2016 Comic Challenge 187 Sonic Super Digest #14

TITLE-Sonic Super Digest #14
PUBLISHER-Archie Comics

A few times a year I will find and grab one of Archie's digest sized reprints of their long running Sonic the Hedgehog comic. Mostly cause for years I kept hearing how good the comic was.

This issue has a few hundred pages and a stack of stories. With a few of them either being complete in this issue or wrapping up in this issue. But of course to get ya to want to buy the next issue a few of the stories have cliffhangers that got me to try to find the next issue.

The art is good. But no matter the artist the characters have a similar look. But you expect that out of most stuff from Archie. The stories are good. And not just crap written to sell to kids. The writers include enough stuff for an older audience to keep them reading.

Sonic Super Digest #14 gets a borrow.

2016 Comic Challenge 115 DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23

TITLE-DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23
PUBLISHER-DC Comics

It was summer of 82. I was with my parents,oddly enough about 40 minutes east of where I live now,visiting some friends of theirs.The county they lived in was a dry county,so all the guys had drove to the nearest wet county to get beer for the weekend. I have no clue why they brought me with them. All I remember was as soon as we went into the country store I headed straight for the magazine rack. Sat down and started reading the above comic. Someone ended up buying it for me. And  read it at least 3 times over that weekend.

This digest sized collection reprints 10 or so Green Arrow stories. Going back as far as the Jack Kirby and Lee Elias stories from the Golden Age.And going forward with a few classic Neal Adams drawn stories. Then best of all Mike Grell drawing and Denny O'Neil writing The Origin of Green Arrow. Plus a brand new wraparound story. Where Ollie is telling some of his past adventures to Dinah.

I like how who ever chose the stories for this digest managed to work in almost every major version of Green Arrow. From the boring stories but good artwork days of Green Arrow being Batman with a bow.To the much much better Denny O'neil stuff.

After I had totally forgotten about this comic,I lost my original copy decades ago,one night while browsing this online comic shop that was ran by the drummer from System of a Down I found a copy in good shape for a decent price. Sure it was a few bucks over what it cost back when I first got it. But it wasn't like I paid $15 for it.

DC Special Blue Ribbon Digest #23 gets a BUY.

2016 Comic Challenge 097 Archie's Pals n Gals Double Digest #121

TITLE-Archie's Pals n Gals Double Digest #121
PUBLISHER-Archie Comics

One of the few things better than an Archie digest is an Archie Double Digest. At a bit over two times the size the double digests are great deals. Pretty sure all Archie puts out now is Double Digests.

Since Dilton is on the cover I figured he might get the spotlight in this issue. Pals N Gals tended to focus on people outside Archie's big four,who are Archie,Jughead,Veronica and Betty. This issue has a couple of really good Dilton stories. And a few one page gag strips with Riverdale's resident head nerd.Plus you get a handful of stories where Cheryl Blossom is in the lead. First appearing a long time ago,Cheryl was kind of forgotten. Then Archie did their first big storyline "Love Showdown" and brought her back.Then the last third of the digest is all Lil Archie stories. With lots of Lil Reggie stories in this section.

Back when I was buying lots of Archie digests. I was getting them cause my job at the time gave me 7 to 8 hours of down time each shift. And a double digest would help kill a few of those hours.

Archie's Pals N Gals #121 gets a buy.

2016 Comic Challenge 076 Archie Digest Magazine #245

TITLE-Archie Digest Magazine #245
PUBLISHER-Archie Comics

When I moved back to Mississippi for the longest time the only comics I could find was the various Archie digests.This issue came out in the summer of 2008. Which was during a time when I was buying pretty much all the Archie digests.

Even as a kid I usually bought the Archie digests instead of the normal comic sized stuff from Archie. I think part of it was back then the digests were a around the same price as a normal sized comic. But the digest had so many more pages. What I didn't know back then was the digests were a mixture of old stories and brand new stuff.In the current day the normal Archie digests cost about half of what a normal comic does. And you get almost 8 times the amount of comics.

The cover story in this issue is what stands out to me. Archie is given a liquid by Dilton. Which causes all of Archie's hair to not stop growing. So we end up with a very Sasquatch looking Archie running around Riverdale.Since the cover is credited to John D'Agostino and Fernando Ruiz I am guessing either both of them or one of them did the lead story.

The various reprinted stories in here are fun. And from the clothing styles seems they are from as far back as the 40s. With a bunch of them looking like classic Dan Decarlo 80's stuff.

One little neat thing is while reading the digest I noticed that in one of the ads they are talking about how they are having a huge sale on overstock digests. And I have went and circled all the stuff I wanted to order. Which I ended up doing. Got like 30 or so various Archie digests and double digests for less than 20 bucks including shipping.

Archie Digest Magazine #245 gets a buy.