The Price Was Right

Today was what I would characterize as a slow day for new comics. There were only two titles in my pull list this week (Invincible Iron Man and The Walking Dead), and I picked up another I was on the fence about (Daredevil) and one I didn’t know was even coming out (War of the Green Lanterns: Aftermath). Four comics just isn’t enough to satisfy me for a week, so I had to find something else. Unfortunately, most of my options were Fear Itself spin-offs and DC titles that are getting cancelled next month.

There was one other comic that caught my eye though- Thor: Heaven & Earth, written by Paul Jenkins and illustrated by Ariel Olivetti. Thor is usually hit or miss for me, but I’ve been a fan of Jenkins’ stuff in the past (mostly the Spider-Man stuff), and Olivetti’s art is always gorgeous. But being a Marvel mini-series, it was surely priced at $4, right? Wrong.

For some reason, Marvel decided to price this one at $3. Same story length, same paper quality, same everything, but Marvel dropped the price a buck from their usual mini-series pricing. So I gave a book I had absolutely no intention of buying a shot.

And you know what? It was terrible. Like really bad. A total stinker. There was practically no plot, certainly no set-up for the second issue, and since it was set well before the age of superheroes in the Marvel U, all the character designs were a little off. Not good at all.

But since Marvel priced this mini-series lower, they split three dollars with the local comic shop instead of zero. And if it had been good, and I had bought all four issues, they would have split twelve instead of zero. Hopefully Marvel is finally taking after DC and drawing the line at $2.99.

But probably not.