It’s time for an iFlashback, a weekly feature in which we take a look at some comics that were on sale nine years ago. So jog down memory lane with me. The date is April 21st, 2004 (it was a leap year in 2004, so we are a day off now) the number one film at the box office is Kill Bill vol. 2 and these are some of the books that are on the stands at your local comic shop.
Ultimate Spider-Man #57
By Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley
Birds of Prey #66
By Gail Simone, Michael Golden
Fantastic Four #512
By Mark Waid, Mike Wieringo, Karl Kesel
Fraction #1
By David Tischman, Timothy Green II
Lucifer #49
By Mike Carey, Peter Gross, Ryan Kelly
Astro City/Arrowsmith #1
By Kurt Busiek, Carlos Pacheco, Brent Anderson, Wendy Broome, Jesus Merino
Captain Marvel #22
By Peter David, Aaron Lopresti, Chris Sotomayor
New Mutants #13
By Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir, Khary Randolph
New X-Men #156
By Chuck Austen, Salvador Larroca, Danny Miki
That was the week that was in comics. Kind of a “light” week as we refer to them here at the iFanboy offices. New Mutants #13 and New X-Men #156 were the final issues for those volumes of New Mutants and New X-Men. So, did you read any of the books that came out this week? If you did make sure you let us know what you thought of them.
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Yes, the start of Golden Years of X-Men by Chuck Austin.
Otherwise known as, “That time I stopped reading X-Men for five years.”
This was the point where he was writing Uncanny and X-Men. Pretty sure Pete Milligan took over on the next issue. Pretty sure we’re nearly at the end of the crapfest that was Austen on iflashback. Milligan was actually quite good in his run. I thought it was very under-rated to be honest. He was just off X-Statix which is one of the best X-Men runs ever so he was at a good place in his career. Particularly remember his Beast and Apocalypse being quite good.
C’mon let us not disrespect Chuck by misspelling his name. It’s Austen, and Worldwatch was a fantastic book! Okay, some of his stuff wasn’t so great – X-Men, Superman – but I don’t think he was as nearly as bad as some angry internet people made him out to be. And his US War Machine was pretty fun.
You’re right. His X-Men stuff wasn’t as bad as some people make it out to be. It was worse. Far, far worse.
Just Mark Waid’s FF (of course) and USM. I sort of miss reading that series, I stopped after the Ultamatum travesty and it’s was losing the magic for me before that anyway.
I think the Ultimate Universe titles were definitely on the way down at the time, but I always felt that Spidey kept up a good standard. Honestly I can’t think of a run better since Quesada started. Bendis, Bagley and Immonen always did great work on this title. That terrible Geldoff arc excepted of course!
Geldof, that was the arc when Spidey meet the X-Men the first time right? I don’t know, after the Clone Saga the drama just seemed to go down and I was disappointed Peter broke up with Kitty when it hadn’t even gone on very long. The Goblins arc or whatever it was called was the last I bought and it wasn’t that great of a place to quit. I’ve never read the entire run 100% so maybe Ill revisit it.
Ultimate Spider-man is still the only Spider-man book that matters.
I used to love Ultimate Spidey. I read it for a long long time. I quit when they upped the price, however.
And Geldof was just awful. WTF was that all about?
That “Hollywood” storyline in Ultimate Spider-Man was a lot of fun. I need to go back and reread that entire series.
I picked up the first omni lately (despite having all the singles) and I had forgotten how incredibly strong this series was. really hoping they get the remaining three omnis that would finish the Peter Parker storyline out in a reasonable timescale.
Ah man, those DC focus books never had a chance… Although, I heard they were all pretty good even outside of “Hard Time”…
The mighty Lucifer & always good to see a bit of Astro City!
Oh god. Arrowsmith! Whatever happened to that series? Busiek promised more! And it never came!
Damn I didn’t realize it had been so long since I had got back into the hobby. This was the week that I walked in to my LCS to say hi to the owner who I hadn’t seen in years. I had stopped buying comics in 2000 when I was deep in studies to graduate from Cal State Fullerton. Fast forward to this flashback week when I walked around the LCS and saw the cover to New X-Men and wondered why the hell Cyclops was holding on to a woman other than Jean Grey. I had to know so I picked up the copy, and have been back in the hobby ever since! I know what you’re thinking, how sad that he got back into X-Men during the Chuck Austen years, but I survived those and am happy I did!
Was that run of New Mutants any good? I loved DeFlilippis and Weir’s arc from the old Batman Confidential run. I’ve loved up at their previous work and it sounds great but I never got a chance to read it yet.
Here are some other big events, births, and deaths to occur on April 21st:
Events
-1934: The most famous photograph of the Loch Ness Monster, The “Surgeon’s Photograph” is showcased. (Revealed to be a hoax in 1999.)
Births
-1926: Queen Elizabeth II
-1951: Tony Danza
-1971: Michael Turner
Deaths
-1910: Mark Twain
I bought all of these books except Captain Marvel and New Mutants. 7 out of 9 ain’t bad.
Brereton cover on Birds of Prey is awesome.
Fraction was a cool 6-issue mini, Tim Green III’s art has changed a lot since then (it’s not as good now).
Lucifer was a great book, and so was Astro City – glad to see it’s finally coming back again. I don’t think I liked Arrowsmith, though.
I was reading the Ultimate Spidey but fell off the Ultimate anything for…ever till now shortly after USM #60 or so,aside from going back and reading The Ultimates which is solid. Current Ultimate X-Men is good & am reading the Venom War then dropping it. I love Peter David’s Captain Marvel run, all four volumes :Nothing to Lose, Coven, Crazy Like a Fox & Odyssey.
Fantastic Four for me, though eventually read most of Ultimate Spidey in collections.
I don’t remember that Astro City/Arrowsmith flipbook, though I did read Arrowsmith in issues.