If you are interested in reading the first arc of Brian Michael Bendis/Michael Oeming’s Powers, called ‘Who Killed Retro Girl’, and do not have access to a torrent, you can read the whole arc online at newsarama.com. The site, in collaboration with the creators, put up a page a day the last couple of months and have just got done with the storyline. David Mack’s Kabuki: Circle of Blood, Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’s Criminal are the other series being posted there on a daily basis.

The Dark Tower comics are out. Marvel comics did a Harry Potterish midnight release of the first issue in a number of comicbook stores, with writer Peter David (Yeah, Stephen King was just a consultant on the series) and artistJae Lee being in attendance in NY. Comic art dealer Albert Moy has put up the original pencilled pages up for sale on his site, and the full page spreads are already sold out. And they cost a lot too. Bah!

Now that I am on a complete Eduardo Risso trip following my 100 Bullets reread, this bit of news gives me a lot of enthusiasm. Apparently, this comic book called Borderline, one of Risso’s earlier releases in Argentina along with writer Carlos Trillo, is being translated and released in the US. Mmmmmm bueno!

Speaking of 100 Bullets, I got them in a recent hamper of comics that landed at home. One more of Brady’s Bunch ( couldn’t resist) that contained Planetary 1-25 and the three specials, 100 Bullets 1-77, a near-complete run of Hellblazer and Sandman Mystery Theatre, the first 6 trades of Invincible, the first two volumes of Path of the Assassin, another run of Samurai Executioner ( I already had ’em), all issues of Ex Machina until a few months ago. There’s one more package due to come, in three months. Phew!

Of these, I am done with Invincible which I had followed on scans until about issue 12. Dammit, the story just keeps getting better and better. This is the comic to pass on to people who bitch and moan about how bad superhero comics have gotten ( note: people like me, that is ). This was the perfect antidote to the bad taste of books like Batman: Face the Face – I swear the Batman books just keep becoming worse and worse every year.

I reread Planetary as well, just because I felt like it. Done with 70 issues of 100 Bullets, have decided to go slow on the latest ones just for the heck of it. Will not read Hellblazer now, I think, and wait until the complete trades come in. Ditto Sandman Mystery Theatre. Next read will probably be Path of the Assassin. Which happens to be another Kazuo Koike/Goseki Kojima collaboration reprinted by Dark Horse comics. Both Samurai Executioner and Lone Wolf and Cub were about samurai during the Edo period, the time when Tokugawa Ieyasu established the shogunate in Japan. Path of the Assassin deals with Masanari, the youngest of three sons of the chief of the Matsduaira clan – who is entrusted with a responsibility. He has to be shadow guardian to Jiro Motonobu, the future clan leader who is being kept under virtual house-arrest by the reigning emperor. What is known, partly because history tells us so, is that Motonobu goes on to unite Japan and take on the name Ieyasu, while Masanari becomes the famous warrior known as Hattori Hanzo. I am interested in seeing how the fifteen-volume series pans out. Of course I will buy all of them, idjit! It’s Koike-Kojima – whaddya think? The packaging of the book remains the same as the previous two series, with one major change – there is no left-to-right mirroring of the manga, it’s meant to be read in reverse, like the originals.

I didn’t buy the Wounded Man and Crying Freeman books that were on eBay. Not regretting it. Not.