Update: My Marvelous Year has started! You can sign up here, and can join the action and see the reading lists here.
I started Comic Book Herald in late 2012 with naught but a hope, a dream, and a barely functioning grasp on blogging, and here we are three years later and I’m writing my 500th post on the site! Granted, we’ve had some excellent contributors (like my man Matt Lehn on the Marvel reviews this year), and that number doesn’t include the far more extensive reading order guides I’ve labored over… but still… 500 posts!
As I celebrate my likely hall of fame induction among peers such as Micky Mantle and Ron Santo (at least in my heart), I do have some exciting news for the Comic Book Herald faithful, and thankfully, it has nothing to do with childhood baseball fantasies.
Throughout 2015 I’ve been running the Comic Book Herald reading club, where once a week we all read a core selection of Marvel Comics. Over 500 of you have participated throughout the year, and we’ve had some really fun discussions about some of my favorite comics (and some where I just wanted to gauge your reaction).
My Marvelous Year – The 2016 Comic Book Herald Club
Well, in 2016 the CBH Reading Club is going to megamorph into something far less amorphous, and far more ambitious.
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We’re going to read every Marvel Comic ever. Starting from Fantastic Four #1 in 1961, and onward!
Wait… every Marvel Comic… ever?
Every. Marvel. Comic. Ever.
… steps away from computer…
… coffee stars to where off….
…. Oh God, what have I done….
Ok, ok, we’re not going to try and read every issue (at least not officially). That would be some combination of suicide and euthanasia, and yes, it’s very likely those words don’t mean what I think they mean.
We will be reading a carefully selected series of 10 comic book stories each week, all from one year of Marvel Comics, starting straight from the top.
So for the first week of January 2016, we will read 10 Marvel Comics published in 1962 (starting with the final two months of 1961 since that’s when the Marvel U really begins). For the second week of January 2016, we will read 10 Marvel Comics published in 1963. And so on…
I’ll be providing carefully handpicked lists of the most relevant (ideally best) issues from the time period, and in this way we will streamline our way from 1962 to 2014 in the course of one year! It’s totally possible!
During each week, we will vote on the following:
Hero of the Year – What Marvel superhero or superhero team won the year? Who had the best comics? Who had the most meaningful comics? Who did you flat out enjoy reading the most? In this way we will decisively determine a definitive MVP / Oscar Winner / Heavyweight Champ for the entire Marvel Universe dating back to 1961.
Villain of the Year – See above, but celebrate evil.
You can sign up here!
Some answers to anticipated questions graciously provided by the voices in my head:
Is this going to be too many comics? I have a job, Dave. And a family. Jeepers H. Creepers, man!
You will have a lot of flexibility with the reading selections. I will be providing checklists for all the recommended reads, and will limit each year’s reading to 10 stories. Now, I should be clear that as Marvel progresses from single issue stories to stories that span several issues, our total number of weekly comics will expand. I will be trying to keep the total number of issues per week between 10 and 20. Remember, I have to try and read these too.
What if I don’t like old comics? This sounds old. How old are you anyway? What dinosaur was your favorite pet as a kid?
First off… you know what, never mind (kids these days).
If you’re not super psyched about starting from Marvel’s ground floor and prefer modern Marvel comics, well, that’s cool! I do a lot of times, too.
I’ll be providing modern Marvel stories that are influenced or draw from the material we’ll be unearthing in the earlier periods of Marvel history. Plus, the advantage of tackling an entire year in a week, is that by April we’ll be hitting 1975 and the birth of the Uncanny X-Men as we know them today!
So One Year a Week… Is This Going to Take Forever?
Probably not! I’m no mathematician, but if we stick to it for all 52 weeks in the year we should cover Marvel’s birth all the way through Marvel NOW in 2014.
Are There Better Ways To Do This?
Honestly? I don’t think so. Sure, you could put your faith in Marvel Unlimited and sort by publication date and try to read everything. You could do that. But by the time you hit the 8th consecutive issue of Hulk where the army captures him, loses him, and contracts the Leader to capture him again, you may wish for some curation.
Will We Get Anything To Keep Out of This? What If I Fall Behind?
I’ll be sending out detailed checklists for you to keep and follow along with, so it’s no big deal if you miss a week. The lists will also include convenient links to Marvel Unlimited for each issue, so you can customize your library accordingly.
Ok, How Do I Sign Up?
It’s easy! Click here! I’ll just ask for your name, e-mail, and rights to your first born (… that’s a joke, relax).
I look forward to tackling the entire Marvel Universe in one year with you! Happy new year everyone!
View Comments (24)
This is now in my New Year's Resolution! But I have four weeks to catch up @.@
Hey, I know it is too soon to ask this, but will you probably do the same for DC next year?
Oh, and thanks for doing this, you are awesome <3
Awesome, look forward to seeing you in the club!
I really like the dc idea, but it's more of a logistical challenge without a DC unlimited. It's one of the ideas I'm bouncing around.
I subscribed on the second and wasn't sure if i missed the cutoff. Have any emails been sent off yet?
I'm in will cover aload of stuff I haven't read, most of the comics I have read are more modern ones.
I'm up for this. When will it start?
Started yesterday - you can quickly catch up here.
It has. Happy New Year! Check your email.
Oh yeah, so in!
This is great! Actually, I am kind of a novice in the matter of comic reading. I started reading Marvel comics last week because of a friend influence and I was going through your guide.This considered you recommend me to stop reading this way and reading the comics you'll choose for this or I can continue with your Marvel guide?
Good job and happy readings.
If you really want to try and start from the top, going along with the reading club will bring you all the way through Marvel's history. That said, you could definitely continue with the guide as that will give you some more modern comics - we won't hit a lot of those until later in 2016, so hopefully it will give you a sense of what you enjoy!
I look forward to reading along with you!
Maybe you already answered this, but will I need a subscription to Marvel Unlimited in order to participate in your comic book club? I am really looking forward to this event, and don't want to miss a thing.
It's highly recommended, simply because it's the most cost effective way to try and read all these comics. All my picks will be trying to keep to the Marvel Unlimited library. Now's actually a pretty good time to give it a shot - follow this link (use code Comics16) and you'll get a free month of Marvel Unlimited: Click here.
I look forward to reading comics with you!
Wow, this sounds really awesome! :-)
But what do you plan to do when we get around to stuff like Age of Apocalypse?
Will we have to skip like half of it, or do you plan to provide some sort of extra list with more epic comics from the period, beside the regular 10-20 comics?
Or does "10 stories a week" mean 10 full storylines, and not just 10 issues?
The Age of Apocalypse conundrum is tricky. I will likely fast track the event for those trying to keep within the 10 to 20 comics a week range, and share the full reading order for those who ready to take on the whole thing!
This is actually really cool. I've been working on a complete reading list for all the major comics starting from 1961 to the present. I got through to 1970. I had a system for deciding which to read first each month which was pretty simple, and useful since it's kind of hard to figure out specific release dates for early marvel. This should motivate me to complete my list. (which last time I checked was somewhere above 13,000 comics)
That's a pretty beastly list!I look forward to your thoughts as we work our way through.
Yea it is. It's not too bad through the 60's because there's under 15 comics a month for the most part. Halfway through the 70's is when things start to get thick. I just restarted the list because I felt I wasn't being thorough enough. Not writing down first appearances, crossovers, etc. Plus I'm going to add a few I missed. It's tough, but I try to write down a decade every 2-3 days. Not looking forward to catching the list up to now, with 12-18 comics a WEEK.
Yes, having read every Secret Wars tie-in for most of 2015, I definitely hear that :)
I guess you can only drill down so far when replying. So re: Demithyle I'd guess that's Disney's influence. See: Frozen.
I didn't even realize how many there were until I saw your list(since I was interested in doing a SW marathon read). That's ridiculous. Oh yea, I should thank you for your work, since once I get to certain points I actually use CBH to help with event reading. I don't plan on posting it anywhere, it's purely for personal knowledge, although if I ever finish it you're welcome to take a look and put it up here if you want. But that is definitely going to be a while since I work over full-time and usually only get an hour or two in a day.
I'm in.
Thanks, Dave. This is exciting. And I'll spread the word around, see if some of my friends want to join in.
A couple of questions:
1. Are you always going to pick comics available on Marvel Unlimited?
2. Could there maybe be a thread where we chime in on comics which didn't make the cut but which are personal favorites?
Awesome!
Marvel Unlimited will be a requirement for the selected comics, yeah. This way everyone can play along.
A personal favorites thread sounds like a great idea. I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's take on issues I don't focus on.
Excited to get started!
Pretty sure I wouldn't want to be the one that decides the ten - what, best? popular? most relevant? - comics in each year. Leaves a lot of room for missing too much good stuff (c AM/PM). Good luck and I look forward to reading them along with you.
Thanks, Mark.
The list of 10 is a tricky proposition, but I'm pretty happy with the looks of things currently. Sure there's some personal preference in there, but who doesn't want to read every appearance of Stilt-Man along with me!