So, what to pull?

I think that this is the biggest (and most fun) question that a new collector has to ask themselves is what to start pulling.

To “pull” a comic book roughly means to have a subscription. Your local comic book shop will pull an issue and set it aside for you to pick up at your leisure. This protects the patron if there is a sellout and guarantees that the patron will not miss an issue. Plus, depending on how your local comic book shop operates this greatly increases your chances at getting a variable cover. Some shops sprinkle in those more valuable covers randomly into the pulled issues.

The hard part of this arrangement is keeping your pull list from becoming bloated and overly expensive. Especially as a new collector, a part of me wants to subscribe to everything that looks interesting for me. However, I don’t throw too much money into this right from the get go and I don’t want to burn myself out on it. So it was time to get down to some serious decision making.

The first thing I decided to pull for sure was Batman: Black & White. Considering that issue 1 was the first comic that I have ever bought, it is a miniseries that is important for me to collect purely for sentimental reasons. However, since this miniseries is almost over I don’t feel the need to count it when deciding how much I am willing to spend on my pull. Since only issues 5 and 6 are remaining it will only cost me for a couple of months.

The second obvious pull for me was a Batman full Batman. I thought this was going to be simple but

Seriously, the cover art of
Batman: The Dark Knight #26 is sick

there are so many Batman series out right now. Batman, Batman and Robin, Batman: The Dark Knight, Detective Comics, etc. For someone who was just getting into comics I had absolutely no idea what was going on in any of them, which makes it really uninviting for new readers. Originally I wasjust go with plain old Batman which is currently being written by Scott Snyder. But after browsing the web and seeing the cool things they are doing with the Dark Knight like the upcoming Silent issues I lost my willpower and added that too.

After I got my Batman fix taken care of the rest of my pull list was really up in the air. Ultimately I decided to go with Deadpool (Cause he is fucking Deadpool) Harley Quinn (mostly because it appealed to me to be able to start at number 1), The Punisher (the series that takes place in LA and starts in February), The Walking Dead, and Hellboy in Hell. The last two I added because I was familiar with them in other mediums and I wanted something a little different than a regular super hero story to keep things fresh.

Eh

Perhaps more interesting though are the series I didn’t pick up. I am a huge Spiderman fan but none of the current comics interested me. Scarlett Spider looks sick but unfortunately it just wrapped up. Superior Spiderman is an interesting concept and it could be a great story but I don’t want to start reading with Doc Ock as Spiderman. Then The Amazing Spiderman just seemed like its being going on forever and would be confusing to just jump into.

The other big series that are going on right now such as Forever Evil or The Avengers I passed on for much the same reason. I don't feel the need at this time to parse through a story with references and effects than span the entire universes. I just want some stories that can stand on their own.

At least for now...