Since getting back into my groove, this is something which I have wanted to talk about here. I'm pretty sure that I've written about this previously and, if I did (I've scanned back and can't find anything myself), it was most likely not on the scale it is now.
However, I didn't have the same incentive as I do now.
This is because I (to the extent that it's actually 'my wife') is expecting our second child!!!
Unfortunately, in this world of dulled expectations, I am now bringing a second mouth to feed into a world where I'm paid less than I need and live in a house which only contains three bedrooms.
The third of which houses my comics.
This is why, several months ago I had started the arduous/fun? task of re-reading my entire collection in order to determine what comics within my collection would stay and what comics would have to go. The thing is, as I've read through series after series of Marvel, DC, Image and the rest, I've had two realisations:
1. The number of comics I could conceivably keep is far less than I first believed.
2. The number of series I can't bear to part myself from is considerably more than the number I can actually keep.
As such, I'm finding that I'm having to seriously brutal in the critique of these comics in order what stays and what goes. For example, Some comics I am finding to be truly epic, or engrossing or enjoyable and so these titles are on my 'keep' list. Meanwhile, series which I dropped part way through or which I re-read and find not to be as enjoyable as I remember them (something I'll get into in greater detail another time) are placed on the 'go' list.
However, I've found that this method has not been without it's problems as no comic series (well, at least very few) are consistently enjoyable and has me questioning how far I need to go to follow the above mandate.
For example; I recently re-read Uncanny X-Force for the first time since it finished six years ago. I found the first 18 issues of this run from Remender, Opena and Ribic to be absolutely gorgeous and fantastic and many other words I'm can't really recite. However, the second half of the run I found to be lacklustre in comparison (although it picked up from issue 24 until the end) and no comparison with it's first half.
Meanwhile, I also re-read Demon Knights by Cornell, Venditti and Neves which, while not as truly epic and mesmerising as X-Force (in my opinion) was more consistently enjoyable over it's 23 issue run.
So, how do I decide what should go here if the choice came down to it? The series which peaked high but fell often, or the series which, while not epic, kept steady throughout?
It only gets more difficult the more I think about it as I could always just sell parts of the series which I didn't get on with. Therefore, with Uncanny I could keep 1-18, sell 19 onwards and keep 24 until the end if I wished. But then, what happens if that missing segment, while not a great read, contains some important bit of narrative which informs the rest of the story. Like ripping the middle 10 pages of a book.
A suggestion which has been made to me (by that fountain of knowledge Matt Garvey) is that, as the comics are already bagged and boarded, they should be protected enough to have them stored in the attic. Now, this is a pretty good suggestion, ruined only by my own concern for my clumsiness. This is because, I'm remarkably clumsy and my attic has no floor. Therefore, I can easily envision my foot going through the ceiling and that is a situation I cannot afford. But also, I love comics too much to place them in the attic where they might (I stress 'might') be destroyed by the elements, especially if they get forgotten about. This then makes me wonder, if I did place them up there then would I ever see them again or would my son find them while cleaning the house after my death and say 'I didn't know Dad had these?'
In the end, I thinking selling them to other people is the best choice (albeit I don't sell them for much) out of all other options as it allows others to give them a good home and enjoy a story I am done with.
But what of the titles I truly enjoy? In truth, I've discovered in these last six months that re-reading a single issue series in full is a rather laborious task and so it does make me wonder whether moving them to trades might be a good plan (another conversation for another time) or possibly even moving fully to digital (again more on that later). This might be the way forward for me, although I would like to find some middle ground so I'm still supporting print.
That said, I've still got six months to decide. More importantly though, I've got to get back to clearing that new nursery.
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