Mike Mignola, �Hellboy: Weird Tales Volume One�
Ok. Seeing how my computer desk with the pull-out drawer is now bending lower to the ground due to the 20 books waiting to be reviewed, let�s see if I can�t keep this short.
The Girlfriend also reads comics. In fact, she used to work at a comic shop, so she has the insight on who is good or not. She looked at me shelf one day and chided my selection, as it consists pretty much of only Daredevil related titles, and some of the mega-authors of comicdom like Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Warren Ellis and Neil Gaiman. She�s suggested titles and offered to let me borrow some of her issues, but I have so much shit to get through that I�m reluctant to pick up more stuff, the equivalent of bringing sand to a beach.
Then Hellboy came in. I knew a lot of people liked this title. I knew there was a movie forthcoming. And I hadn�t read anything by Mignola before. So I wondered if I should pick it up. But there was another problem: it wasn�t just one issue of Hellboy, it a set of five different books. What if I did like it, but the other copies sold before I got a chance to buy them? My hold shelf at work has too many titles on it already, all consisting of things I am NOT willing to give up.
I called her and asked what she thought of the title. She was non-committal. To prove how non-committal she was, she put her old boyfriend on the phone. He was also non-committal, which should go without saying, as he is the EX-boyfriend. He declared I should pick up the first title in the series and see if I cared enough to get the other ones. I went with that advice.
Only thing is, I found out this title is a tribute by other authors, some serious, but most fairly snarky. Not knowing anything about the character, I didn�t understand the inside references. I also couldn�t figure out whether I liked the character or title.
So I went ahead and bought the other five issues. This is why I�ll never catch up.
