Taral Books and Comics

A few weeks ago, my wife and I were discussing what we wanted to watch that evening. A bit ambivalent about it, I told her that I had had an idea about watching every movie we owned, alphabetically. There were several movies I owned that I had not watched (some still sealed). It would be a fun way to spend nights rocking the baby to sleep.  My wife liked this idea.  There were some of my movies that she had never seen, too, and some of hers that she hadn't watched in years. The benefits of an alphabetical order include ease of tracking, randomization on ownership, and especially variation in genre (until we get to Star, where we own 13 Star Trek movies, 9 Star Wars, Stargate, and Starship Troopers).  The first five movies on the list are a musical, a Disney cartoon, a dumb (in a good way) comedy, a superhero movie, and a romantic comedy.  This will make most movie nights different, which will be fun. We agreed to do it. Every night we were planning on staying at ...

Despite the ever-growing list of books and comics I want to read, I keep adding new ones to the list, as they enter my radar. A couple of weeks ago, I was looking into Star Trek novels, and especially the novel continuations of TV series after their series finales.  I remember enjoying the continuing stories of Deep Space Nine, as well as the books leading up to the final TNG movie.  I recently began re-watching Enterprise on Netflix and thought about trying the post-finale novels for that series. The first novel was called "The Good That Men Do", by Michael A. Martin and Andy Mangels.  This novel had a good story, but the idea behind it was beyond weird. Cover of the novel in question.  Image from Memory Beta. Story: It is almost universally acknowledged that the series finale of Enterprise, "These Are the Voyages", was bad.  Not even really an episode of Enterprise, it was Commander Riker and Counselor Troi in the middle of an episode of The Next ...

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I make a point to read every comic I buy at least twice, once the week it comes out, and again several months later before I file them away.  The first time I read it, I can appreciate the serial nature of the story, since each issue is released between two and four weeks apart.  The second time, I read entire story arcs in one sitting, so I can enjoy the whole story at once, as if I purchased a graphic novel. I just finished my second reading of the Secret Wars event and many of the tie-in stories. For a bit of context: when Secret Wars came out, almost every single Marvel series ended, and for a few months were replaced with comparable miniseries.  This is because, in the story, the entire Marvel multiverse ends and is replaced with Battleworld, a planet made up of surviving pieces of different universes/dimensions.  I purchased several of these, especially the ones that seemed to replace the comics I was buying anyway (...

Following my read-through of the early years of Laura Kinney, I decided to read about her time at the Xavier Institute, learning alongside other teenage mutants.  I decided  to read the entire New X-Men series (of which Laura joins the cast halfway through), as well as the New Mutants maxi-series that led into it. For this post, I read the following comics: New Mutants 1-13 (by Nunzio DeFilippi s and Christina Weir , 2003-2004) New X-Men 1-46 + Yearbook Special (by Nunzio DeFilippis. Christina Weir, Craig Kyle , and Chris Yost , 2004-2007) New X-Men: Hellions 1-4 (by Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir, 2005) The X-Men: Messiah CompleX crossover event, which in addition to New X-Men 44-46 (above) includes the following issues from 2007-2008: X-Men: Messiah CompleX one-shot (by Ed Brubaker , 2007) Uncanny X-Men 492-494 (by Ed Brubaker, 1963) X-Factor 25-27 (by Peter David , 2005) X-Men 205-207 (by Mike Carey ,  1991) I read all of these...

I interrupted my read-through of Star Wars Legends stories because the library set aside a copy of one of new canon novels, Lost Stars , for me. This was the fifth Star Wars novel I read that's part of the new canon.  When I say new canon, I'm referring to stories published in our after 2014 which are fully consistent with the new stories being told in the new movies  I've read the following new canon novels: Tarkin (by James Luceno , 2014) Heir to the Jedi (by Kevin Hearne , 2015) Lords of the Sith (by Paul S. Kemp , 2015) Aftermath (by Chuck Wendig , 2015) Lost Stars (by Claudia Gray , 2015) I've also read a number of canon comics, which I will discuss in a separate post. Generally I've enjoyed the new canon novels.   Tarkin , Heir to the Jedi , and Lords of the Sith all tell small, targeted stories featuring Grand Moff Tarkin, Luke Skywalker, and Darth Vader, respectively (with Tarkin also presenting a detailed biography, and Lords of t...

The next items on my chronological read-through of Star Wars Legends stories are those associated with Knights of the Old Republic. This is the first time I won't be merely discussing novels or comics, but other media such as video games. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.  Image from Wookieepedia. For this review, I consumed the following material: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 0-50 (comic by John Jackson Miller and various artists, 2006-2010) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Handbook (comic handbook by John Jackson Miller and various artists, 2007) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republc: War 1-5 (comic by John Jackson Miller and Andrea Mutti , 2012) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (video game by BioWare , 2003) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (video game by Obsidian Entertainment , 2005) I read the handbook as a comic issue, but the remain comics were read in my copies of Omnibus: Knights of the Old R...

As I continue writing about my chronological read-through of Star Wars Legends material, I will now discuss the Tales of the Jedi comics.  I actually re-read these first, not as part of a chronological read-through, but because I love these books and occasionally like re-reading them. The first issue of Tales of the Jedi. Image from Wookieepedia.com I'll be discussing a total of eight titles here (in chronological and reading order): Tales of the Jedi: The Golden Age of the Sith 0-5 (comic by Kevin J. Anderson , Christian Gossett , and Dario Carrasco Jr., 1996-1997) Tales of the Jedi: The Fall of the Sith Empire 1-5 (comic by Kevin J. Anderson and  Dario Carrasco Jr. , 1997) Tales of the Jedi: Ulic Qel-Droma and the Beast Wars of Onderon 1-2 (comic by Tom Veitch  and Christian Gossett, 1993) Tales of the Jedi: The Saga of Nomi Sunrider 1-3 (comic by Tom Veitch,  Janine Johnston , and David Roach , 1993-1994) Tales of the Jedi: The Free...