Hello Comic Shop Friends! One more week until Valentine’s Day, so come in and pick up a gift for your loved ones or for yourself! (Don’t tell my husband, but I got him a new Junji Ito book.)
We’ve also been adding new back issues, and John did a wall rerack this past Sunday, so there’s new stuff to check out.
(Ben’s face is the reaction to John Shearer mentioning Red Room while I was trying to get a pic.)
We’ll also be doing Late Nite Comics on Thursday the 16th from 8 pm to midnight! DC fans can look forward to 40 new long boxes that have never been through from the 60s to the present! It’s always a good time, so stop by and see what you can find in the $1 boxes!
MARVEL COMICS
Bishop has started a War College on Krakoa to train teams of mutants to defend the island and keep mutant kind safe, but a training exercise with Armor, Surge, Aura Charles, Cam Long, and Amass goes awry when Andrea and Andreas Von Strucker show up. Will Bishop and Tempo be able to protect the War College students and Krakoa? From television writer J. Holtham and artist Sean Damien Hill.
Normie Osborn, Norman Osborn’s grandson, has been given a piece of symbiote by Dylan Brock, son of Eddie Brock. Now Normie and Rascal are the Red Goblin, and they’re out to clean up Pop-pop’s mess and change the Osborn name for the better. But if Norman disbanded the Goblin Nation, who is in charge now? And can Normie and Rascal fully bond and make a difference? Art by Jan Bazaldua, and written by Alex Paknadel.
The Sins of Sinister tie-in Storm and the Brotherhood of Mutants from Al Ewing and Paco Medina start ten years in the future. Mars has been destroyed. Storm wants revenge. Hiding in the rubble of Arakko, she and a handful of survivors are prepared to fight a war against Sinister. And perhaps reset the timeline and save their planet.
DC COMICS
It’s the start of Season Two of Static from Vita Ayala and Nikolas Draper-Ivey. After stopping the government’s prison operations in season one, Virgil and his friends deal with citizen vigilantes and the mysterious Ebon (Comic book debut!), who lurks in the shadows of Dakota City.
DC also has a Collector’s Edition polybagged facsimile of Static #1 from Dwayne McDuffie, Robert L. Washington III, John Paul Leon, and Steve Mitchell. This set has a trading card, an exclusive cover poster, and four panels of a giant 16-panel mural!
SMALL PRESS COMICS
This series premiere from writer Rodney Barnes and artist Alex Lins is Independence Day-esque but with kids! Travon has grown up as an orphan in Compton, avoiding bullies and forming a surrogate family. But today is the day aliens make their first contact with Earth, and everything is about to change for Travon. Will he be able to protect his friends and survive?
Tales From Hawkins is a four-issue anthology of spooky events tied to the more significant events of Stranger Things from writer Jody Houser and artist Caio Filipe. Two friends head into the woods with a couple of six packs for a day of “hunting,” but things quickly turn upside down, and they become the prey.
New four-issue slasher miniseries set at Halloween time? Yes, thank you! Created by Justin Jordan and Brahm Revel, this take on the slasher genre is both familiar and new. The teenagers of Harrow, New York, think the Harrower is just a local legend. But there are those in the town that know the Sinner’s Mark is not just graffiti and that the Harrower always returns to enact vengeance on the unrighteous.
Hi Comic Shop Friends! Happy start of tax season! May the tax fairy bring you a refund, and you get to spend it in the shop!
John Dudas has been working through a few new collections (and is picking up another one in Erie, PA), so there are many new Modern keys on the wall. You all cleaned out half of it at the last Late Nite Comics! He’s been restocking and adding new books as he goes.
John Shearer and Kevin have been trucking through sorting and checking the collections too, and Kyle and I have been pricing and putting out tons of new back issues! The newest stuff is labeled on the boxes on the statue case, so come in and check them out.
MARVEL COMICS
Sinister has been battling the X-Men for over a decade, but now it seems that his secret schemes are paying off, and all his darkest dreams are coming true. Writer Kieron Gillen and artist Lucas Werneck start off the Sins of Sinister X-event that continues in Storm and the Brotherhood of Mutants, Nightcrawlers, and Immoral X-Men.
DC COMICS
From G. Willow Wilson and Jamie McKelvie comes the next One Bad Day. This time Catwoman is planning a heist to reclaim an item from her past, one that is now being auctioned off for way more than it was worth when in her mother’s possession. Batman tries to stop her from impeding his investigation, but she’ll do anything to steal it back, even tangle with the mysterious Forger.
Another Lazarus Planet one-shot! We Once Were Gods has four vignettes featuring Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman, and the Shazam Family as the Lazarus rain continues to affect all beings on Earth, human and extraordinary. Written by Francis Manapul, Dan Watters, Philip Kennedy Johnson, and Josie Campbell, with art by Francis Manapul, Max Dunbar, Jack Herbert, and Caitlin Yarsky, these stories continue the Lazarus Planet epic, and continue on in upcoming issues of Dawn of DC, and Lazarus Planet: Revenge of the Gods.
SMALL PRESS
The follow-up to TMNT: The Last Ronin, Lost Years follows Michelangelo during the years when he only had Master Splinter’s journal and the need for vengeance. Original miniseries writers Kevin Eastman and Tom Waltz team up with artist Ben Bishop to reveal the lost adventures of the Last Ronin. And it’s both a prequel and a sequel! In the present, Casey Marie Jones has become a new master to some adorable baby turtles to train the next generation of Ninja Turtles!
Inferno Girl Red is a new three-part mini set in the Massive-Verse from Erica D’urso and Mat Groom. Cássia Costa is moving to a new place, Apex City, with her mom and starting at a new school, but the big changes don’t end there. They’re just getting settled when an ancient cult rips the city out of the universe and casts it into darkness. Now the stories she heard about Inferno Girl Red are becoming her new reality, and Cássia has to embrace a secret legacy and find the courage to become a light of hope in the dark.
Look, it’s a new Darkwing Duck comic, what else do I need to say? Written by Amanda Deibert with art by Carlo Lauro. He is the terror that flaps in the night.
I haven’t bought an Archie comic since I was a kid, but they got me with the Mad Max: Fury Road (Best action film ever!) description and the most hardcore Josie and the Pussycats! Written by Aubrey Sitterson with art by Jed Dougherty. Pick it up, it’s fun.
“Unfortunately, Inflation has come to the comic book shop. Starting on February 13th, Carol and John’s Comic Book Shop will no longer be offering a 10% discount to file customers. This is not a decision we came to lightly. We are very much a “The Buck Stops Here” type of operation, but we thought we would give some insight about how we came to this conclusion.
This decision is a direct result of the increased cost of shipping as well as the cost of getting comic books from three distributors, as well as a handful of publishers. At the start of 2020, all books came through Diamond Comics Distributors, and our discount reflected that. By the third quarter of 2021, Marvel Comics started coming through Penguin Random House, and DC Comics through Lunar Distributions, while most other products still come from Diamond. We also order directly through numerous other publishers, such as Scholastic and Simon and Schuster.
After reviewing our books for 2022, the cost of goods has gone up 14%; in some cases, such as Diamond, the cost of shipping can be an additional 15%. Diamond’s shipping practices are near criminal, and an unrelated example is a pack of 100 backer boards costing $6.00 just to ship, which is why we use BCW when possible.
In addition to the cost of goods, the cost of processing those shipments has gone up. More staff is needed to check in the books from the three major distributors each week to get them into your file. Publishers do not have a universal ordering and invoicing system. Each week, we must deal with multiple shipments arriving on different (sometimes random) days and format them into our system to prepare them for you on Wednesday. We need to be able to pay our staff competitive wages to make sure they stick around to keep this process operational.
We love our customer base, and we want to continue to provide a full-service comic book shop. Many things we do are not cost-effective, but we do them anyway to get the books you are looking for into your hands whenever we can. We know that this mentality is also healthier for our big picture.
We are waiting a month to make this change so that everyone has time to adjust their file accordingly. They do not need to feel that they ordered a book under the impression it was discounted when it will not be. It also gives everyone time to find a different service elsewhere if they feel they need to financially, and we understand that. We do, however, believe we provide the best service possible and are worth the discount elimination.
We likely should have done this at the beginning of last year, but we tried to make it work for one more year. Healthy back issues sales at the beginning of 2022 helped us to hold off on this decision, but as the market has cooled a bit and we have a clear picture of 2022 in its entirety, it is time to go forward.
To be clear, we are not in any trouble of going out of business; we are, in fact, doing this to keep ahead of this situation. We have been around for over 32 years, and we have gotten good at seeing the writing on the wall. From Marvel’s near bankruptcy in 1996 to the global financial crisis of 2008 to the pandemic of 2020, we have figured out a way to stay viable by responding to the state of the industry and the market.”
And now, onto the fun news!
This Thursday, January 19th, from 8 pm to midnight, it’s Late Nite Comics! We’ll have 50% off back issues (not including wall books) and SEVENTY long boxes of 50-cent comics! Marvel! DC! Small Press and Indie! This is the last chance for these books before they make their way into retirement at Uncle Todd’s farm in PA! Refreshments will be served, and we’ll be spinning vinyl!
And speaking of back issues: John has been putting new wall books out from some new collections, and there are a bunch of new back issue boxes on the table. We’ve added three new dollar boxes to check out, and Ben added even more discount graphic novels!
Just in time for the new trailer drop!
Look at this precious lil baby! He comes with all his choking hazards! So tiny! So cute!
And here’s The Mandalorian Season Three trailer if you haven’t checked it out yet:
MARVEL COMICS
We had Ant-Man; now, from writer Al Ewing and artist Kasia Nie, it’s time for the Wasp! Janet Van Dyne and her stepdaughter and fellow Wasp, Nadia, are threatened by an old enemy who may not be fully in control. Now the two women must confront the ghosts in their shared history to solve this mystery.
Marvel Tales spotlights fan-favorite characters, features timeless stories, and highlights talent from Marvel’s past in each issue. Issue #1 is Avengers Two: Wonder Man and the Beast #1-3, written by Roger Stern with art by Mark Bagley, first published in 2000. A buddy story set in California, as Beast tags along with Wonder Man while he tries to pick up the pieces of his life and make amends. His return to L.A. is not unnoticed by former adversaries, and trouble begins when the Living Colossus attacks the city. Can these two save the city while burying the ghosts of Wonder Man’s past?
DC COMICS
Bane broke the Bat, but he’s also a broken man. Living as a wrestler, he relives his greatest accomplishment every night by defeating someone dressed like Batman, but his past haunts him. When he hears that the drug Venom is back, he will do whatever he needs to shut down the facility for good and make sure that no one else is poisoned by the drug that controlled his life. Joshua Williamson and Howard Porter expand on the regrets and hopes of the legendary villain.
The world of Superman is changed forever in Lazarus Planet: Assault on Krypton. Written by Nicole Maines, C.S. Pacat, Frank Barbiere, and Leah Williams, with art by Skylar Patridge, Scott Godlewski, Sami Basri, and Marguerite Sauvage, this collection of vignettes from in and around Lazarus Planet finds the Earth’s protectors from Krypton hit hard. Dreamer’s visions may guide the heroes to victory. Jonathan Kent is having a bad day with the effects of the Lazarus Volcano. Mercy Graves is transformed and is forced to fight beasts with knife tails. Power Girl must free herself from the out-of-control Omen.
Celebrate with writer Tom Taylor and artists Bruno Redondo, Rick Leonardi, Scott McDaniel, Mikel Janin, and Javier Fernandez as Nightwing hits the milestone issue #100! Take a look back through the decades at what made Nightwing a beloved hero, and then, with Heartless creating a lair in Bludhaven, Nightwing sets up a headquarters of his own, with the help of some friends of course.
SMALL PRESS COMICS
Based on a true story? The Maniac of New York has finally been stopped. As the city celebrates, Detective Zelda Pettione tries to move on, but her life is suddenly so empty she almost wishes the Maniac was back. But be careful what you wish for. Writer Elliott Kalan and artist Andrea Mutti return, bringing with them a new Maniac!
New Image nine-issue mini-series, Immortal Sergeant, from Joe Kelly and Ken Niimura, begins on the eve of Jim Sargent’s unwelcome retirement. Grizzled, hard-drinking detective Sarge catches a break on the murder case that has haunted him, but now he’s forced to drag his son Michael along, or risk losing the lead.
