Post by Tony on Sept 19, 2014 2:16:56 GMT -5
How do you guys approach dropping a book or preparing to drop a book, and the epilogue to such decisions? It always seems to be such a tricky, nebulous, neurotic ordeal for me, and after the fact i'm left with anywhere from one to six or so issues of something sitting in one of my shortboxes that I don't particularly ever want to see again and don't know what to do with, reminding me of my failures and wastefulness every time I lift the lid to slide new issues of other, infinitely better books in there.
Example: I loved the idea of 'The Mercenary Sea'. I'd followed the artist on deviantart for several years and fancied his Indiana Jones/Bond-ian works, I picked up the #1, liked it just barely enough to pick up the #2, hoped for the best (but felt like maybe it was all going south) when I picked up #3, thought to myself "I really should drop this right now, 'cause I'm not enjoying it, but the art's good enough to give it one more issue, and also I hate telling Ben, who owns my friendly local shop, to take me off a book" while conceding to picking up #4, and numbers 5 and 6 were bought under ye olde "Well the arc's wrapping up; I should at least finish out the arc, grumble, grumble, maybe it'll get better" line of justification. At six, it was easy enough to dump (though the promise that they'll eventually drop the incredibly boring pre-WWII stuff and get into the mystical monkey island of golden fun-treasure stuff is enough to drive me 'round the bend, as that's why I wanted to read the damned thing in the first place), but it's frustrating to even think about, and I don't imagine i'll ever get the bug to pull it back out again. Wasted dollars, wasted space, wasted anxiety.
I'm currently going through the same thing with Warren Ellis' 'Trees', which is driving me crazy with its (lack of) pace and its outrageous meandering (and the art's not even half-way decent, which kills me dead). Yet, reluctantly, i'll give it one more issue, to get to #6, I know I will. And then i'll jump off, but it will miraculously then start getting to the point, and then i'll have to go grab the issues for the second arc that i'd missed 'cause I jumped off at the wrong time, wishing all along that i'd waited for the trades and/or never tried it out to begin with, and . . well, you can see the inherent frustration with this sort of cycle, i'm sure.
How do you guys deal with this? Can you relate? It's worth noting that this is not the norm in terms of how I feel about the books I pick up, week to week. A good 90% or better of the books i'll grab in a given month are outstanding, and carry with them no particularly vicious existential baggage or doubt; i've generally become appropriately skilled at picking out the stuff that I know i'll like and weeding out the rest, and such. But it seems like there's always going to be that ONE book that stabs me in the back. Thoughts? Should I just never try another new series in singles, and only trade-wait here on out for the rest of my comic-reading life, excepting only for the current series' that would ostensibly be grandfathered-in? That sounds a little sad, to me, and smells of capitulation, if also of prudence.
"Well there's a chance you might be in the wroooong business, Rogers."
Example: I loved the idea of 'The Mercenary Sea'. I'd followed the artist on deviantart for several years and fancied his Indiana Jones/Bond-ian works, I picked up the #1, liked it just barely enough to pick up the #2, hoped for the best (but felt like maybe it was all going south) when I picked up #3, thought to myself "I really should drop this right now, 'cause I'm not enjoying it, but the art's good enough to give it one more issue, and also I hate telling Ben, who owns my friendly local shop, to take me off a book" while conceding to picking up #4, and numbers 5 and 6 were bought under ye olde "Well the arc's wrapping up; I should at least finish out the arc, grumble, grumble, maybe it'll get better" line of justification. At six, it was easy enough to dump (though the promise that they'll eventually drop the incredibly boring pre-WWII stuff and get into the mystical monkey island of golden fun-treasure stuff is enough to drive me 'round the bend, as that's why I wanted to read the damned thing in the first place), but it's frustrating to even think about, and I don't imagine i'll ever get the bug to pull it back out again. Wasted dollars, wasted space, wasted anxiety.
I'm currently going through the same thing with Warren Ellis' 'Trees', which is driving me crazy with its (lack of) pace and its outrageous meandering (and the art's not even half-way decent, which kills me dead). Yet, reluctantly, i'll give it one more issue, to get to #6, I know I will. And then i'll jump off, but it will miraculously then start getting to the point, and then i'll have to go grab the issues for the second arc that i'd missed 'cause I jumped off at the wrong time, wishing all along that i'd waited for the trades and/or never tried it out to begin with, and . . well, you can see the inherent frustration with this sort of cycle, i'm sure.
How do you guys deal with this? Can you relate? It's worth noting that this is not the norm in terms of how I feel about the books I pick up, week to week. A good 90% or better of the books i'll grab in a given month are outstanding, and carry with them no particularly vicious existential baggage or doubt; i've generally become appropriately skilled at picking out the stuff that I know i'll like and weeding out the rest, and such. But it seems like there's always going to be that ONE book that stabs me in the back. Thoughts? Should I just never try another new series in singles, and only trade-wait here on out for the rest of my comic-reading life, excepting only for the current series' that would ostensibly be grandfathered-in? That sounds a little sad, to me, and smells of capitulation, if also of prudence.
"Well there's a chance you might be in the wroooong business, Rogers."