My shopping list for the week:

……………………………..

NOTHING!

Damn. And it’s not even a skip week. So, what is there this week that I COULD buy?

I could get the third Gotham Central trade, if I didn’t already have all the issues of a series that has been cancelled, and was screwed by DC in its turnaround time for trades in the first place.

I could buy Infinite Crisis #7, if I cared about the DC Universe the way some people do, and so I could understand what most of the internet comic book chatter is about these days. (Or make sense of this eloquent post by the returning Jim Roeg.)

I could get Y: The Last Man, if I wasn’t consigned to getting it in the trade format already. Once I start in one format, I can’t make the change, dinosaur that I am.

I could buy the Sam & Twitch trade, collecting the first nine issues of Bendis’s great run on the series, if I didn’t already own the issues in question. Really good stuff, btw.

Marvel has trades I could buy if I didn’t already have the issues: the third collection of Peter David’s Hulk work is out, collecting the strange selection of The Incredible Hulk #349–354, Web of Spider-Man #44 and Fantastic Four #320; also out is The Uncanny X-Men Omnibus, collecting #94–131, Annual #3 and Giant-Size X-Men #1 (phew), which would look good on the bookshelf, if it wasn’t so expensive. The only new collection that interests me is the fifth Punisher trade, The Slavers, but I am still undecided on it.

The only thing I can think of buying is THE big book of the week, Civil War #1. This would be to have something to read, but also the problem of not understanding most of the chatter on the web about comic books this week, as I’m sure it will be the hot button topic. I must confess to a curiosity about it; I guess it is something to do with my being a Marvel kid growing up, and their universe always had more of a rough and ready appeal to it, compared to the airlessness of the DCU.

To keep me entertained this week, I have to turn to my blogging compadres.

Greg has the second instalment in his discussion of magnum opera, which is a wonderful read (and not because there are similar choices to my own) that I would urge you to check out. Great job, Greg.

Kevin posts a scan of a cracking page from Sensational She-Hulk #50 that I would gladly pay money to see, if it was a continuing series by Walt Simonson.

I wanted to mention David’s second Free Comic Book Month, where he gives away free comic books according to what he thinks people might like when they write to him with their list of top five books, even though my living in the UK makes me ineligible for it.

Does anyone know what’s happened to Scott at Polite Dissent? I get through to a search page, rather than the actual blog, which makes me worried for the massive collection of medically related comic book posts by the working doctor and comic book fan.

Finally, I wanted to mention this post [EDIT: blog is now invitation-read only] at Ye Olde Comick Booke Blogge, which dares to speak out loud the contentious view that Jack & Stan’s Fantastic Four isn’t actually that good, something I can agree with based on the limited stuff I’ve tried to trudge through and my singular dislike for Kirby’s art (notwithstanding his dynamism and what it brought to comics, I can’t bear to look at it for very long, and hate all the Kirby ‘homages’ that make my eyes bleed, which means I can’t read Godland).

Jake is also responsible for a charming piece of Photoshop work in this post at 2 Guys Buying Comics, which bought a smile to my face.