Every year on the first Saturday of May I make my yearly trip to the comic book store for Free Comic Book Day. My brother and I hit up two stores after seeing the new Spider-man movie, the one he always goes to and the one that’s on my way to work that I never actually visited, also the one where someone apparently got shot. The first one was rather busy but the second only a few people. It was a little creepy how only half the store was lit. All in all I picked up six comics for absolutely nothing.
The Amazing Spider-Man
It’s been weeks since Peter Parker has had the opportunity to don the spidey suit. With new heroes springing up, there seems to be no need for the spidey vigilante. Ready to surprise Aunt May with a birthday cake, Peter willingly partakes in a high speed car chase to end his post-hero blues. Spider-Man captures our short-term villain, a huge Spider-Man fan with spidey bobble heads on his dash, and leaves him to the cops. A short sweet one-shot that was conveniently used to promote Spider-Man 3. 3.5/5
Marvel Adventures: Iron Man & Hulk
Iron Man: A short one shot story of the Invincible Iron Man, Stark International’s head of security. An employee, who is trying to sell his new rejected innovation breaks into headquarters to steal supplies only to be thwarted by Iron Man! 2.5/5
Hulk: On a contruction site, a large spider attacks a little girl. Bruce can feel the Hulk breaking free, “no one can hold Hulk!” What ensues is an eight page battle which culminates in Hulk finally squashing the spider. Haha I’ve never actually read any Hulk comics but this was absolutely ridiculous. “Oh no big spider! I am Hulk! Arghh!!!” So simple but effective. 3/5
Transformers Movie Prequel
Gawww my eyes. Who knew that reading this comic book would be worse than looking at the character designs for the upcoming movie? Nothing much happens in this short prequel to the prequel. It briefly tells of the start of the war between the Autobots and Decepticons. Every couple pages they’ll have a complete panel or panels completely in black and white. I don’t know if they just didn’t have time to finish painting it or if this is some new form of retro art. 2/5
Devil’s Due Publishing: Flipbook
Family Guy: This is a short preview from the recent graphic novel release “Book of crap.” Peter tells what being a good parent is while introducing his kids to internet porn and assigning a fat Mexican to “fill-in” for him at work. 3/5
Hack/Slash: DDP’s second FCBD offering. The introduction to a brutal horror story of a young girl whose mother, the lunch lady, kills all her daughter’s bullies in the kitchen. Rather disgusting and has very foul language. 1.5/5
It’s Sonic!! It’s amazing how many issues this series has under its belt and yet I’ve never felt the need to pick up a copy. Now’s as good a time as any! Eggman has implanted an electronic device in Sonic so that he destroys his friends and allies. Tails and the gang sets out to literally knock the bug off of Sonic. Predictably the day is saved and Eggman retreats with his tail in between his legs. 2/5
Tokyopop: Choose Your Weapon Sampler
First off, it’s important to note that this sampler contains no manga whatsoever. 3 of the series contained are manwha (Korean) and the other 2 American, the whole sampler is read left to right. That being said I don’t understand how this this is called “Choose your weapon” where the only weapon used in 4/5 of the stories is a sword! That being said lets move on:
Archlord: Having read the first volume already at the library, I have concluded this is the best series in this sampler. In this preview, our hero meets an elegant Lady after preparing his freshly butchered pig for dinner. 4/5
Gyakushu: Our American manga stars a nameless man who is bandaged from head to toe. This man takes up his sword to protect a villager in danger in this high action paced preview 3.5/5
Phantom: spends most of its preview in character introduction. K is a mech pilot for the city police whose technology is not up to the par to the terroists that they chase. In the end K is called to pilot his mech whose character designs are almost as terrible and confusing as Gundam Seed Destiny’s 2.5/5
Utopia’s Avenger: “Nonstop martial arts action!” Hong Gil-Dong has created an Utopian land but then disappears. Years later he returns to fight the invaders who has left the land in ruins. Our hero fights a large demonic monster in a rather confusing albeit entertaining battle sequence. 3/5
Warcraft: The Sunwell Trilogy: From the manwha artist of King of Hell and Richard A. Knaak, New York Times best selling author. With such stars behind this I expected to find something more…understandable. Then again I know next to nothing about Warcraft in itself. For the second preview in a row we get our heroes battling some huge king of mythic beast. Artwise the best in this sampler. 2.5/5
Overall another excellent Free Comic Book Day. Even if the comics weren’t all up to par who cares, it was free! Can’t wait till next year. Hopefully more manga publishers will step into the game.
Posted by Andrew 
andrew reads comics 