Wolverine and The X-Men #2 - Marvel

It's good to be back!

Since ending this blog in October 2008, I received a good number of emails from people saying how much they enjoyed it, and miss it now that its gone.

First off, I really appreciate that--its always nice to feel wanted (blog-wise, I mean)--and secondly, I had never intended this blog to be gone forever. So when I noticed I had three or four classic b/w mags that I could write about here, I decided to pick up a couple more and make it a full week of new posts, which will run every day starting today.

No sooner did I end this blog then Marvel started to practically flood the market (was is this, the 1970s?) with magazine-sized releases. Not only did they increase the publication frequency of their Spider-Man Magazine, they started a new title, Wolverine and The X-Men Magazine, undoubtedly to coincide with movie.

They also released several magazine-sized "poster books", starring The Punisher, Wolverine, Marvel Monsters, even an Secret Invasion!-themed one. There might have even been more, it was hard keeping up with them all!

Wolverine and The X-Men (I wonder how the rest of X-Men feel about Wolverine's promotion to Tom Petty-esque billing) follows the same format as Spider-Man Magazine; namely it features two modern reprints, plus one classic story from either the Silver or the Bronze Age.

The first story is "Surprise!" by Fred Van Lente and Andrea Di Vito:

...followed by "The Bird, The Beast, and The Lizard", from the X-Men: First Class series:

After that is a two-page Wolverine pin-up by Joe Quesada, then the classic "Second Genesis" by Len Wein and Dave Cockrum, from Giant-Size X-Men #1:

But that's not all! There's also a fun Min-Marvels segment by Chris Giarusso:

Considering that these magazines are (presumably) aimed at a younger audience, I think its a great touch to have these humor segments in each issue.

I could argue that the price point--$6.99--is a little high, but considering that Marvel is producing more of these magazines (indeed, both this and Spider-Man mags are now listed as monthly publications), they must be turning at least some decent-sized profit. Maybe parents today aren't batting an eye at dropping seven bucks for a magazine for their kids.

It'll be interesting to see if any of Marvel's other future movie stars--Thor, Captain America--earn their own magazines, as well. I know I'd personally love to see a Captain America magazine, reprinting some of the amazing Brubaker/Epting run, mixed with some classic Cap stories.

Oh, one last thing: on the back cover, Marvel is running this ad:

...further solidifying my belief Marvel is aiming for a slightly younger audience, they choose their current Wonderful Wizard of Oz mini-series to promote on the back cover (speaking of different formats, wouldn't a collected edition of this series make an excellent treasury edition?).


Everyone, please come back tomorrow, where we'll take a look at some of classic b/w magazines of the past!