Doug: Well, what did you get?
Doug: Me? Well, I'm glad you asked! I was the fortunate recipient of the Marvel Team-Up tpb by Chris Claremont and John Byrne. As my bloggin' partner had suggested that we take a look at some of those issues in the new year, it was of great import that I obtain said tome. Do not underestimate the power of Santa Claus. I also received the Mail-Order Mysteries book I'd mentioned last week. Art Spiegelman's Meta-Maus was an exciting "get", as I've used Maus in teaching the Holocaust to our world history students for well over a decade. Not only is the book great-looking and exhaustive in Spiegelman's telling of all-things Maus, but it includes a DVD with a treasure-trove of extras that include the tape recorded interviews Spiegelman made while talking to his father, Vladek. I'm really eager to sit down with this over the next few days. I'm also anxious to see the DVD Batman: Year One which my mother bought for me. Lastly, I got the Hallmark ornaments of Thor and Avengers #4 featuring a relief of Captain America popping right out of the cover. I treated myself today to the Green Lantern ornament at half off. And also falling under the category of "treating oneself", at the behest of our friend david_b I snagged a 16x24 print of the artwork from the 1975 Marvel Comics Convention -- drool over all of that John Buscema goodness below.
Karen: Nice haul, partner! I didn't do badly myself. My husband is way too good to me; he got me three wonderful books: The Hammer Vault, the Star Trek Vault, and the Making of Star Wars. It will take me months to look through them! I also got some sweet Funko monster figures, and a very cool model of the rocketship from the movie When Worlds Collide. My friends got me some great stuff too -boy do they know what I like! I now have a mug with the cover of Giant-Size X-Men #1 on it, a couple of new tiki mugs, an Adventureland t-shirt from Disneyland, and some Disney pins as well. Wow, am I lucky.
15 comments:
I did quite well this year.
From my beloved wife and daughters I got:
Captain America - The First Avenger (DVD)
UFO - The Megaset (TV show DVD collection)
and most precious of all...
Captain Scarlet & The Mysterons (TV show DVD collection).
I'm pretty giddy. I've been wanting Captain Scarlet pretty much forever.
I've gotten myself so many other comic book collections lately, that I think I need to just settle in until the spring and catch up on the reading and the watching.
Great problem to have!
Rip Off
Wonderful tidings, and glad to read the round of haul stories this year, y'all..!
My wife's more of the 'eye-rolling' type when it comes to my nuturing my coveted geekness so I just got an Eddie Bauer Travel mug and two argyle sweaters. I happen to love wool argyle sweaters, maintaining my '80s yuppie wardrobe...
To my wife's chagrin, I wrapped my recent purchase of Avengers Masterworks, Vol 6 (my 1st hardcover), and got my wife a Alterra giftcard for her hot-chocolate fix and the SNL Season 2 boxset with highlights of Bill Murray's 1st year, George Harrison appearance, and their ill-fated Mardi Gras telecast (where nothing funny happened...).
We stayed low-key this year, since we just saved $14K on a new driveway with a cobblestone walk (waited nearly 20yrs for that..), and it looks fantastic.
I did get some $$ from my mom, so I'll be focusing on finishing my few Mego customizing projects. I bought a Mego FF Baxter Building playset from didadisplays.com last year, sorry to say I haven't even taken it out of the box yet.
Doug, GREAT to hear you got that Buscema print. I still couldn't believe my eyes when I first found that site.
Rip, congrats on getting the UFO set. I watched nearly all the eps on Hulu a few years back, such an outstanding show. I still watch my Space:1999 set on Blu-ray on a regular basis.
On the heels of my comment in last week's post, I have to say that my comics haul this year did indeed consist of those two Doc Savage books put out by DC (Man of Bronze and Showcase), which reprint all of Marvel's Bronze Age Man of Bronze goodness. Also - although I actually got it in November - Enki Bilal's Nikopol Trilogy. Picked it up at a local bookfair at a discount. The reason I consider this a Christmas present is that, like with the Doc Savage books, my wife was with me, saw how much I wanted it, saw me hesitating, and just said "we're getting this."
As for the 'gift to myself' - I visited a local comic shop two days before Christmas and stumbled onto a pristine (like brand new and probably unread) copy of the 1986 "Elric of Melnibone" graphic novel by Thomas, Russel & Gilbert for a very, very reasonable price. It was too good an opportunity to pass up.
Rip, I'm with David about UFO - I watched about a dozen episodes; while campy at times, it is a very fascinating series, and a lot of the stories still hold up surprisingly well even now.
I did quite well in receiving lots of "geek" swag this year.
From my parents I got
The Complete Star Wars Saga box set on Blu Ray
"Sherlock" (Season One of the BBC Series) Blu Ray
"Sherlock Holmes" (Downey/Law movie) Blu Ray
Uncharted 3 (video game)
Marvel Team-Up by Claremont and Byrne (trade)
Origin of the Hobgoblin (trade)
Alpha Flight Volume 2 (original Byrne series trade)
A month or so ago my wife and I bought ourselves a new TV as our main Christmas present to each other. But for Christmas itself she got me...
Marvel Firsts: The 1960's (this is a totally awesome book)
Arkham City Robin action figure (Mattel)
I got her SIMS 3 Pets and Outdoor items expansions pack for her PC.
It was a great year to be a classic comic's and sci-fi geek. :)
As I spend so much time on the laptop, my big gift was a negative/slide converter (wading my way through thousands of negatives is a fun yet daunting task). My son gave me Gregory Maguire's "A Lion Among Men", book in his Oz aeries. And my wife is sending me out to select a few graphic novels this week, while she also gets to select a few goodies...
Just an interesting observation based off Edo's Doc Savage comment; I think Karen may have mentioned this when we began our Conan reviews -- just in general, I think it's very interesting with the licensing of various franchises (Tarzan, Conan, Planet of the Apes) how various publishers get the rights to reprint material from their competitors. In regard specifically to The Chronicles of Conan, Dark Horse reprints the interior story pages but no covers -- not even artwork with the Marvel insignias Photoshop-ed out. I wonder if the original publishers get any cut from the reprint revenues?
Again, just an observation.
Doug
Doug, with reference to covers, DC's Doc Savage reprints do indeed include them: in the color reprints, the words "Marvel Comics Group" is just blotted out on the famous 1970s bar on top; meanwhile, rather interestingly, the logo for Marvel's Curtis magazines imprint is actually left as it was on the covers in that Showcase edition.
In fact, I'm actually a bit puzzled by the fact that you say the Dark Horse "Chronicles of Conan" books do not include the covers. When flipping through a few of those longingly in bookstores and comic shops in the past, I distinctly recall seeing the covers (sans the Marvel logo). In fact, I do have Dark Horse's "Chronicles of Solomon Kane" and their phonebook reprint of Marvel's entire John Carter series, and both include the covers as well. Are they leaving the covers out of the newer editions of the Conan books?
Rip / David - It would be hard to explain to anyone why UFO was so cool at the time as it looks a bit creaky now, but it so was. The one where they look everywhere for the downed UFO and it’s hiding at the bottom of the lake? The one where Foster gets turned into one of the aliens? Still remember them from nearly 40 years ago.
Never liked Space 1999: too turgid and slow moving, I thought. Great models though.
Captain Scarlet – now you’re talking. Why does that hold up so much better than any of the other Anderson shows? You’d think at least Thunderbirds would give it a run for its money, but no. It was the best. Gerry really got screwed on that CGI version, which I thought looked great, but which was basically never shown properly.
The haul was good this year: DVD’s of Thor, Green Lantern and Cap (twice). Latest Terry Pratchett and Stephen King’s Kennedy book. Tickets to see Aussie Pink Floyd at the Albert Hall and Springsteen in the Park. The fireworks will be hailing over little Eden that night!
Richard
Edo --
I double-checked the Conan covers. I have two volumes of the Chronicles of Conan tpbs, the first one, and then vol. 5 (?) -- the first one with all-Buscema art. Neither of those trades have the Marvel covers in them. However, in the four volumes of the Savage Sword "Essentials" that I have (vol. 1-4), the Marvel covers to those magazines are indeed included, sans the Marvel Comics Group (or was it Marvel Magazine Group?) in the top left corner of the magazine. That has been blacked out.
I do find it strange that DC included the covers. I should have checked when I was downstairs earlier to see if the Dark Horse "Archives" of the Joe Kubert Tarzan stories contained the DC covers. I don't believe they do. Will update.
Doug
Here's my Dark Horse/DC cover update:
The Dark Horse Archives of the Joe Kubert Tarzans do have the original DC covers, but without the DC logo in the upper lefthand corner of the book. The rest of the cover is intact.
Does anyone know about revenue sharing contracts in these sorts of deals?
Doug
Doug, I'm wondering if any revenue sharing is necessary. I'm not a lawyer or any kind of expert on copyright law, but as I understand cases of properties like these, all of the material and rights thereto revert to the copyright holder - in this case the respective estates of Robert E. Howard and Edgar Rice Burroughs - once a license expires. Someone with a better understanding of these matters can correct me, but I'm pretty sure that includes cover art, minus any aspects subject to a different copyright (i.e., the DC or Marvel logos). Which is why I was surprised to see that DC did not remove Marvel's Curtis magazines logo from the Doc Savage covers in that Showcase edition - I'm assuming it's because Marvel did not bother to renew the copyright to a long defunct imprint...
...and my apologies for derailing this thread...
Edo --
No apologies necessary, friend. I find these peripheral issues fascinating in any discussion of creative/intellectual property rights. By all means, I'm glad your point about the Doc Savage books spurred this side conversation.
Doug
david_b (and everyone) --
The print I ordered from imagekind.com arrived today (see original post), and I couldn't be happier! The packaging was outstanding and FedEx brought it on the day it was promised. As soon as I get a frame it is going up in the comic room. David, thanks so much for the tip!
Best,
Doug
Not to belabor the point, but check out this print -- it may very well be my next purchase!
http://www.imagekind.com/Evening-with-Stan-Lee-at-Carnegie-Hall_art?IMID=c8c4109c-9b4c-4ade-9a3b-7509e536b082
Doug
I got Starman volume 2.
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