Month: December 2019

Hey, Folks!

 

Well, that’s one holiday down and one to go before everything can get back to normal! Or, in my case, a semblance of normality. When you work in the comic biz everything eventually boils down to a rigorous weekly schedule and just one frakata holiday can throw everything into a tailspin and this time of year I’ve got two that screw everything up. I want to remind everyone that next week’s new comic day will remain Wednesday and that for the first time ever I will haul my hungover @$$ into the store from 12-4 to attend to your comic buying needs. Tired of Quality Family Time by Wednesday? Monarch Comics is the place for you!

 

I hope everyone had a good Christmas this year. It was a pretty good one for me despite my (deserved) reputation as a curmudgeon and a Scrooge. Hill and I visited my good friend Wendy’s grave site in the morning, visited his mom, went to see the car wreck of a movie musical Cats, watched the latest episode of The Great American Baking Show, and had a lovely dinner courtesy of my roommate David. Well, I had a lovely dinner…Hill ate his usual baked sweet potato. I enjoyed the extremely tasty roast leg of lamb…lol.

By the way, if you were tempted to go see Cats in the theater let me just warn you off right now. I am decidedly NOT a fan of the original musical, but I am a dedicated “Swiftie” so I had to go to see Taylor’s movie debut. Also, I am a movie masochist and I needed to see for myself just how bad it could possibly be. I am pleased to report that it exceeded all of my expectations and just might be the worst movie I’ve seen all year and I’ve seen some stinkers. I lost count of the times my gaze swiveled over to Hillman and we shared a shocked What the %^&# glance during some of the more bizarre sequences, including the Rockette-inspired cockroach dance sequence with creepy CGI faces painted onto the roaches while they get randomly eaten by the cat characters. It was a strange experience as I kept feeling a vague sense of embarrassment watching Dame Judi Dench and Sir Ian McKellen stumbling shellshocked through the musical wreckage in display. It felt like watching some pretty advanced elder abuse. The tap dance scene was pretty good though…

I also took my Dad to see the new Star Wars movie. I won’t get into any specifics as I don’t really feel qualified to comment on it from a fan perspective as I’m not really much of a Star Wars fan and my expectations were pretty low going into the theater. That being said, I found it amazingly entertaining…far more so than I had anticipated. It wrapped up 40 years of filmmaking in a somewhat satisfying way and I was never bored, except during the 40 minutes of trailers and commercials before the film started that was the cinematic equivalent of a forced march through 10 miles of knee deep snow. My Dad took me to see the first Star Wars picture back in ’77 and it felt strangely satisfying to watch the final chapter together. I will say that it beat the hell out of The Last Jedi in terms of simple entertainment. I do have ONE question though. Why did the final character (no spoilers) end up back at that $#!%hole of a planet Tatooine? Lol

I’m not expecting to be too busy this week as there are only a handful of new titles this week and most of them are small quantities and are already nearly sold out. One title I apparently under anticipated was Marvel’s Incoming #1, the sequel to Marvel Comics #1000 and 1001. I based my orders on the sales for #1001 and we are already at a sell out. I suspect I might need a few more copies and I do have some in the works, but because of the vagaries of holiday shipping I won’t see them until next week. So if you wanted an Incoming #1 then please let me know and I will do my level best to get a copy of it for you.

 

One final reminder and then I will get to completing my December initial orders. Monarch Comics’ annual Post-Holiday Sale will be begin on January 1^st and will consist of 25% off hard covers/trade paperbacks, 25% off wall display books, and 50% off the back issue boxes. Additionally, the dollar boxes will become 3 for a $1 boxes for the month of January.

 

Oh, wait! One more final thing…the regularly scheduled Monarch Comics…AT NIGHT Facebook Live show will be recorded/broadcasted at 5pm on Tuesday night rather than the usual 7pm time. This is because we close at 5pm on New Year’s Eve and I have dinner reservations for 7pm…lol.

 

Happy New Year’s, Folks!

 

Eddie

Hey, Folks!

 

I’m afraid that I have a short note for you this week as it is time to knuckle under and get ready for that last minute holiday rush of business! This could very well be the biggest ship week of the year and there were a tsunami of you descending down upon us yesterday afternoon to gobble up all of the comic book goodness that shipped in. There are a couple of things I’d like to go over really quickly before I sign off for the year!

 

One thing is going over our holiday hours with you one more time. Our holiday hours really haven’t changed much in over 30 years, but since the New Comics day falls on January 1^st and it is a pretty heavy week I’ve decided to open for limited hours just in case you need an escape from all of that family holiday cheer! So, at the risk of driving the point home too hard, here are the Monarch Comics holiday hours:

 

Tuesday, December 24^th, Christmas Eve: 11AM-5PM

 

Wednesday, December 25^th, Christmas: CLOSED

 

Thursday, December 26^th: 11AM-7PM

 

Tuesday, December 31^st: 11AM-5PM

 

Wednesday, January 1^st: 12PM-4PM

 

Thursday, January 2^nd: 11AM-7PM

 

I guess its also time to make it official that we are changing our Wednesday hours in the first non-holiday week of 2020! I’ve been monitoring customer traffic patterns very closely for the last several months and have decided that we get way more customers before our official opening time of 10AM on Wednesdays than we do between 7PM and 8PM. As a result I decided it was time for a change. Starting with Wednesday, January 8^th, Monarch Comics new Wednesday hours will be 9AM-7PM.

 

And, finally, I’d like to remind everyone that our Annual Post-Holiday Sale begins on January 1^st and we will have the following items on sale for the months of January and February:

 

From Wednesday, January 1^st, until Friday, January 31^st, all hard covers and trade paperbacks will be 25% off price marked. This includes items on our sale table that are already marked down as well as any special orders you place during the month of January.

 

From Wednesday, January 1^st, until Saturday, February 29^th, all comics displayed on the wall will be 25% off the price marked.

 

From Wednesday, January 1^st, until Saturday, February 29^th, all of our back issue boxes will be 50% off price marked.

 

I’d like to now take a moment and thank each and everyone of you for choosing Monarch Comics for all of your comic book needs over the last year. I hope that you know how much I appreciate your patronage and that I realize that I have the best customers in the area. This is Steve’s final year before handing the keys over to me and it is going to be a quiet one promotion-wise, but I will continue to update and refine the website and subscription form in order to serve you better and make sure I make your hoppy experience the best one I can. I am humbled every week by the great group of people that I get to interact with on a regular basis. Truly…you’re THE BEST!

 

Steve and I would like to wish each and everyone of you the merriest Christmas, the happiest holidays, and a smashing (but safe) New Year’s!

 

Eddie

Hey, Folks!

 

Is the holiday season more exhausting than usual this year or is it just me? Those of you who know me know that I am not all that into holidays to begin with and I usually do all that I can to minimize it within my personal life. I do, however, try to capitulate a bit for those of you who are holiday-mad, but it is difficult. And this year it feels like everything has been crammed into too short of a time!

 

For instance, I do love holiday baking and every year I put out a tray of cookie experiments for customers to feast on when they visit the store. I always put the tray out on the Wednesday before the holiday since that is the last time I will see many of you before the actual holiday arrives. This year, however, the holiday is on a Wednesday which means I have to get my cookies done a week earlier than usual. Unfortunately, there is only so much pre-prep you can do in cookie making and I also have holiday parties and the like to attend. As a result, I will be attempting to motor through and baking up a crazy amount of cookies on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. I’m planning on my old standbys, such as the iced pumpkin cookies and the jam-filled shortbread thumbprint cookies and I always have to do a batch of (very) basic chocolate chip cookies for Steve. This year I will be attempting gingerbread men as well as sugar cookies to see if I can master even a basic level of decorating which I traditionally suck at completing. Hopefully Hillman will be able to give me a hand int hat department. And why do I do it? Because I love you guys and I’ve found over the years that my customers are the best when it comes to test subjects with my baked goods…lol. So look for the big tray of cookies on the 18^th!

 

Speaking of the 18^th, can we talk about the insane amount of titles shipping in next week!?! I finished the shipping list for next week and counted something along the lines of 107 titles that have to displayed on a rack that is built for 70 face out titles. I completed the subscription list yesterday afternoon and ended up with just over 200 options on the sub form! It’s goofy how many books are being published! Of course, it IS the final shipping week of the year considering there will only be a handful of titles coming out the week of Christmas, so I suppose we should have expected some sort of deluge.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

On the plus side, there is a whole host of big books due in! The final chapter of Geoff Johns and Gary Frank’s magnum opus, Doomsday Clock, will FINALLY be arriving! Tune in to see the final big grudge match between Superman and Doctor Manhattan! Tom King’s conclusion to the long running “City of Bane” storyline in Batman #85 will be landing to many accolades and Scott Snyder will be wrapping up his long running Year of the Super Villain story in Justice League #38 just in time for the final battle between Apex Lex and the Legion of Doom and the Batman Who Laughs’ twisted Secret Six in the miniseries “Year of the Villain Hell Arisen” by James Tynion IV and Steve Epting. DC’s hit Black Label imprint will also have both Harleen and Joker Killer Smile returning to the new release rack and a new title, Wonder Woman Dead Earth, will also be here!

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Not to be outdone, Marvel Comics will be ending the year on s strong note with the grand finale of their 2099 event with 2099 Omega. Avengers #28 by Jason Aaron will be continuing the current Avengers in space storyline with poor Thor apparently turned into a Brood warrior. The final issues of the hit Guardians of the Galaxy book will be in as well as the final issue of Jason Aaron’s swansong of his Thor run, King Thor. Amazing Spider-Man and Daredevil and Tony Stark Iron Man and the latest round of X-books will also be gracing the new release rack on Wednesday. It is a literal bounty of amazing comics and coming out right before the big holiday weekend!

• 

• 

• 

• 

There will also be a few Funko POP figures making their appearances this week just in time for holiday gift buying! The 80^th Anniversary Wolverine 1^st appearance, Endgame Cap with broken shield and Mjolnir, Endgame Korg w/headphones, and the Thanos Snap 6” PX figure! All of these great POP figures will retail for the standard $10.99 except for the larger and more impressive Thanos figure which will be retailing for $28.99! We will have limited quantities available for all of these figures on Wednesday and those of you who preordered their figures will have them held behind the counter. Check out the other POP super hero figures we have in stock while you’re here.

Frank Miller’s latest entry into the world of Dark Knight Returns dropped this week right on the heels of the completion of his Black Label Superman Year One series. Dark Knight Returns The Golden Child is written by Miller and drawn by the absolutely amazing Rafael Grampa. Seriously, whatever you may think of Miller’s storytelling skills, this is a gorgeous book. Well, at least as gorgeous as any book can be that deals with that flattening of Gotham City by Darkseid and the aftermath of destruction that these things tend to cause. I haven’t been a huge fan of Miller’s writing as of late, but I did enjoy my read through of this one shot. It features Carrie Kelly as Batwoman as well as the brother sister team of Lara and Jonathon, erstwhile children of Superman and Wonder Woman. It’s great stuff and worth a perusal at the rack this week.

 

Just in case you missed the announcement in last week’s EDitorial, our holiday hours for this year are as follows:

 

Tuesday, December 24^th, Christmas Eve: 11am-5pm

 

Wednesday, December 25^th, Christmas: CLOSED

 

Thursday, December 26^th: 11am-7pm

 

Tuesday, December 31^st, New Year’s Eve: 11am-5pm

 

Wednesday, January 1^st, New Year’s Day: 12pm-4pm

 

Thursday, January 2^nd: 11am-7pm

 

I’ve really got to figure out how to post these on the website…

 

I also wanted to say a few words about the subscription form orders this week as well. Since the launch of the new website, I have more people than ever taking advantage of the Subscription Form and I couldn’t be any more thrilled! I do want to let new users know that at this point there is no mechanism available to accommodate orders for multiple copies of individual comic titles. If you are looking to buy more than one copy of any book then please message me through the store’s Facebook Messenger account and if I can spare the copies then I will take care of you. Additionally, I put a lot of comics up on the subscription form, particularly small press titles. Unfortunately, occasionally these titles sell out before I can cover any orders for them. This has been happening with disturbing regularity with BOOM! Studio and IDW titles, with BOOM! apparently selling out of the first two printings before the first has even been published, although I’m not sure exactly how that work.

 

I’ve been trying to figure out how to deal with these kinds of situations in regards to the subscription form. In the past, I have simply stopped offering titles from publishers who have problems publishing enough copies to fill orders. This system, however, is haphazard and stops me from giving you the opportunity to get a hold of the comics you want. So I’m going to try something new. From now on I will include a checkbox at the top of the subscription form that you may opt in to if I try to order a comic that is sold out, but there is a 2^nd (or 3^rd, or 4^th) printing available for order. If you ordered, say “Red Mother #1”, and all the first printings are sold out and you’ve checked off the box then I can automatically put you down for whatever printing is available.  If you aren’t interested in anything but the first printing then you can leave the box unchecked and I will take the title off of your order. It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s all I can think of unless I can find a better platform for the subscription form. Also always remember that I love special orders and if there are any titles that you are worried I either won’t be carrying please let me know before FOC and I will make sure I have those books ordered for you.

 

Okily dokily…that’s it for me this week! I want everyone to know that I will be out of the office on Saturday to attend a Christmas party that I will be supplying some of the food for (slow roasted pulled pork and a dessert to-be-determined later) and I need to take the day off. Also, It will be nice to actually get a chance to sleep in with Hillman on a weekend morning without worrying about opening the store on time. I will be back on Sunday, so if you have any pressing questions please message me on Messenger and I will get back to you as soon as possible!

 

Have a great week, Folks, and I’ll see you next week!

 

Eddie

Hey, Folks!

 

Well, I’m back! It has been a long couple of weeks what with the holidays and all. I mean, I haven’t been this busy socially or professionally in a good long while and I still haven’t caught up with my regular duties. I can’t even get my laundry caught up at home much less get the Shipping List and Subscription Form out quickly! Of course, we are still in early December which means it is going to get way busier before it settles down for the cold, dead month of January.

 

I wanted to start out this week’s EDitorial by once again going over Monarch Comics holiday schedule this year. As you may remember, both Christmas Day and New Year’s Day fall on a Wednesday this year which is creating a mild amount of havok in the back end of our distribution system. Both next week (12/11) and the week after (12/18) are going to be HUGE ship weeks. This is mostly due to the fact that the week of the 25^th will be an extremely small ship week as well as all of the comic companies, both large and small, cramming out as much product before the end of the year as possible. I can’t really look at the data easily at this point, but I suspect the shipment on the 1^st is going to be pretty substantial as well.

 

In any case, while Monarch Comics will remain closed on Christmas, I have decided that there are so many new books due out the week of the 1^st that I will for the first time open the store up on New Year’s Day for limited hours. I figure y’all are going to be needing a break from the family by then and we are here to accommodate you!  We will see how this goes. If it goes well enough then it might become a new thing for us in the future. I also want to assure everyone that I will broadcasting the weekly Monarch Comics AT NIGHT Facebook live show on Tuesdays as per usual, but it will be at 5pm instead of 7pm!

 

MONARCH COMICS HOLIDAY HOURS

 

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 24^TH, CHRISTMAS EVE: 11AM-5PM

 

WEDSNESDAY, DECEMBER 25^TH, CHRISTMAS DAY: CLOSED

 

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 26^TH: 9AM-7PM

 

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 31^ST, NEW YEAR’S EVE: 11AM-5PM

 

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 1^ST, NEW YEAR’S DAY: 12PM-4PM

 

THURSDAY, JANUARY 2^ND: 9AM-7PM

 

I suppose now is as good a time as ever to mention that we are also permanently changing our Wednesday hours starting next year. For the last 30 odd years we have been open 10am-8pm on Wednesdays, but Steve and I have discussed it and we think it is time for a change. You see, I’m always here by 9am on Wednesday morning, mostly to finish getting everything ready for New Comic Day. As a result, I see more than a few folks dropping by for their weekly new comics long before the official 10am opening time. We rarely have more than one or two people who show up after 7pm on Wednesdays, however, and I think we would be better served opening earlier and not staying quite as late. As a result, our new hours on Wednesday will 9am-7pm starting January 8^th!

 

Also, starting January 1^st will be Monarch Comics’ annual post-holiday sale, or, as I like to call it, “The Propping Up The Really Slow Retail Months of January and February Sale”. That doesn’t quite roll off the tongue as well as “Post-Holiday Sale” though. In any case, starting Wednesday, January 1^st, and ending Friday, January 31^st, all hard covers and trade paperbacks will be at 25% off price marked! This will, of course, also include any titles already marked down as well as any special orders that are placed and/or received the month of January, So, for instance, if you special order a hard cover or trade paperback in the month of January you will receive the 25% off no matter when it actually ships in! We will also have 50% off all of our Back Issue Boxes and 25% off Wall Books from Wednesday, January 1^st, through Saturday, February 29^th! That’s right…two whole months you can plunder our back issue boxes on deep discount!

 

Diamond Comic Distributors just released the complete listing of titles that are going to be going on sale December 26^th and it is such a tiny list I figured I could end your suspense and just give it to you now. Never fear though…I will post this information under a proper shipping list that week as well as have a subscription form ready for your orders. The list of titles includes:

 

BETTIE PAGE UNBOUND #8 (DYNAMITE ENTERTAINMENT)

CRIMINAL #11 (IMAGE COMICS)

DIAL H FOR HERO TP V.1 ENTER THE HEROVERSE (DC COMICS)

DR STRANGE #1 (MARVEL COMICS)

EAST OF WEST #45 (IMAGE COMICS)

FAITHLESS TP (BOOM! STUDIOS)

FIGHT CLUB 3 #12 (DARK HORSE)

HOSUE OF SECRETS THE BRONZE AGE OMNIBUS HC V.2 (DC COMICS)

INCOMING #1 (MARVEL COMICS)

KILL LOCK #1 (IDW)

MARKED #3 (IMAGE COMICS)

MASK I PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE TO THE MASK #3 (DARK HORSE)

OUTCAST BY KIRKMAN & AZACETA #13 (IMAGE COMICS)

RED SONJA VAMPIRELLA BETTY VERONICA #7 (DYNAMITE ENTERTAINMENT)

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG #24 (IDW)

SPIDER-HAM #1 (MARVEL COMICS)

SUPERGIRL TP V.2 SINS OF THE CIRCLE (DC COMICS)

VENOM #21 (MARVEL COMICS)

 

I wanted to take a moment and mention the BIG EVENT coming up in next week’s Superman #18! I’m going to assume that everyone has heard the news by now, but if you haven’t then ***SPOILER ALERT***!

• 

• 

Still There? Okay. Superman is going to reveal his identity to the world in issue #18 shipping in next week! This is, of course, the continuation of Brian Michael Bendis’ brilliant run on Action Comics and Superman. After kicking off his Superman run with a magnificent outer space saga and the continuation of the Leviathan storyline in Action Comics I have a feeling this new “reveal” storyline is going to be a doozy! In any case, I ordered extra copies of the new issue in the anticipation of extra interest, but even so, we will be limiting purchases of Superman #18 to one of each cover (regular and variant) to make sure that everyone who wants a copy gets one. I will lift this restriction as soon as I’m satisfied that I’ve sufficiently spread the copies around. The title is already listed as sold out at Diamond so I don’t believe there are any more copies available for reorder.

And finally this week there is one new POP offering from Funko and Diamond this week and it is a doozy! Diamond is taking preorders for the POP Specialty Series DC Golden Age Green Lantern Vinyl Figure! This absolutely gorgeous figure will retail for $10.99 and come packaged like all of the POP figures in its own window box. The Final Order Cut-Off Date for this figure is 12/23/19 with an estimated ship date of 3/25/20! Please let me know ASAP if you’d like to special order one of these figures!

 

I hope everyone has a great weekend despite all the cold and dreary weather and I will be right back here next week to blather on some more about comics and store stuff!

 

Eddie