DC Comics

At least once per year, my local comic shop runs a “newer comics” sale, where books that are still on their shelves that came out at least a month ago are all $1.50. It’s a great sale, and I typically use it to obsessively collect runs I wasn’t pulling in real time, or in some cases to spot up for atypically expensive oversized specials purely based on the savings.

In 2020, I was most excited for the sale as an opportunity to catch up on DC’s Black Label books. For the unfamiliar, “Black Label” is an imprint within DC Comics that launched in 2018 with Batman Hung Damned, and offers standalone, (generally) out of continuity stories from A-list creative talent. While the exact marketing can get muddled, I think of it as something like Vertigo for just DC superheroes and villains, with stories that are targeted for more mature audiences and gunning hard for “must read” long-term status. [Read more…] about DC Black Label Reading List