DC Comics - THE NEW 52

Wow! It's been a long time since I first started this blog, and I only ever made three entries, so I guess in that sense my little endeavor was quite a failure, but there is a silver lining to this cloud.

I have been inspired to start this blog back up as a way to pick out the books in the NEW 52 that are really great and worth keeping up with.

So I guess I'd just like to dive right in then...

The following is a list of the 24 books out of the NEW 52 that I felt were worth sticking around for 3-4 issues to see where the story takes us (in order by shipping date each month):

Justice League --> Jim Lee artwork, nuff said! See art below.

Action Comics --> Grant Morrison/Rags Morales take Superman back to his roots. Great concept.

Animal Man --> Creepy setup for a potentially great story.

Batwing --> Stellar art and a great cliffhanger ending in Issue #1.

Detective Comics --> Great Tony Daniel art, over-the-top story, very crazy cliffhanger in Issue #1.

Stormwatch --> Wildstorm characters, nuff said! (I'm a HUGE Wildstorm fan)

Swamp Thing --> Scott Snyder firing on all cylinders, made me care about a character I wouldn't normally think twice about with the creepy atmosphere and cool insights into the character.

Batman and Robin, Vol. 2 --> Solid art and story, interesting inter-play between Batman and Damien.

Batwoman --> Gorgeous art from J.H. Williams III, cool supernatural-type initial storyline.

Demon Knights --> Neat middle-ages setting, it will be fun to see how this fairly eclectic group of characters comes together and plays off each other in the book.

Frankenstein: Agent of Shade --> Who doesn't love the classic monsters (Frankenstein, Wolf-Man, Dracula, The Mummy, Creature From the Black Lagoon)? I'm interested to see if the storyline is engaging enough to keep my interest.

Green Lantern --> Doug Mahnke on art duties! I pretty much will read any book that he draws, but the story in Issue #1 was pretty good as well.

Grifter --> Wildstorm character, nuff said! (Grifter is my favorite comic book character of all time) I do feel like I need to say that the story was engaging and very mysterious. A lot of cool plot threads are being thrown at us and it will be cool to unravel the mystery behind them at the same time as the lead character does. Also, really pretty art by CAFU (for the first 3 issues at least). See art below.

All-Star Western --> This one came out of the blue for me. Amazing story, pacing, and character set-up. I can't wait to read more of this series.

Batman --> Again, Scott Snyder is the bomb! This is a MUST-READ series for any Batman fan! Nice art by Greg Capullo.

Green Lantern Corps --> Artwork was beautiful in Issue #1, but other than that I'm a little on the fence about this title based on the storyline so far.

Nightwing --> Amazing artwork (as you can see, my enjoyment of a book really depends a lot on the quality of the artwork) and nice character work on Dick Grayson.

Red Hood and the Outlaws --> Art was awesome -- Kenneth Rocafort! Story has potential to make the Red Hood (Jason Todd) a much cooler and more likable character which I'm excited for.

Aquaman --> Ivan Reis hit the artwork out of the park. Geoff Johns seems like he will be able to make this character cool again. I love the crazy sea monsters (badass-looking) at the end of Issue #1.

Batman: The Dark Knight --> David Finch artwork, again...nuff said!

The Savage Hawkman --> Very pretty, painted artwork (but it can be a little muddled at times). Story is a bit standard at this point, but the art is keeping me around for a few more issues.

Superman --> OK issue, I love the character so I'll stick around to see where this first story arc or two goes. Art was OK too. This series needs to create a hook for new readers, which it hasn't yet.

Teen Titans --> Brett Booth artwork, again...nuff said!

Voodoo --> Wildstorm character, nuff said! This incarnation of the character is very different from the original, so we are all pretty much seeing Voodoo evolve from the ground floor, which is pretty neat. The art was also glorious to behold in Issue #1.

I will be wittling this list down over the next 2-3 months, so I'll try to post my updates as I drop some of these books and get into a more permanent pull list.