For a beat or two, Keys to the Kingdom might convince readers that Locke and Key is becoming a typical, ongoing comic series. By which I mean, the story could continue indefinitely, allowing Joe Hill, Gabriel Rodriguez, and the Locke children to live in the book’s premise for as long as sales or Hill’s interest allowed.
But believing anything about Locke and Key is typical would be a mistake.
For this year’s Locke and Key re-read, I decided to jump into Vol. 3, Crown of Shadows, without re-reading Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. I expected to spend some time remembering details and getting back up to speed, but was instead surprised by how effortlessly I fell back into the story of the Locke family and the horrible, magical world that surrounds them.
It’s time to continue Matt Reads Comics‘s October tradition: Re-reading the next volume of Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez’s Locke and Key! A series that, at this pace, will take us only six years to finish.
My favorite DC comics show superheroes as friends, people who truly understand one another and work together within an elaborate, established DC Universe. Which is why I like DC Comics Presents No. 58, a book you’ve likely never heard of, so much.
I know I’m not the only reader who swore off Spider-Man comics in 2007. When one of your favorite heroes makes a literal deal with the devil, negating a relationship you’ve been invested in for the last 20 years, it leaves a bad taste in your mouth.
As a result, it was a long time before I read any of the recent Spider-Man titles written by soon-to-depart Spidey author Dan Slott. But over the years, my “outrage” faded. When Brand New Day and Slott-era stories began showing up in my local library and cheap on comiXology, I began picking them up.
One story in particular served as the perfect jumping-on point for Spidey’s new world, smoothing the way from “One More Day” to where we are now. That story also just happened to be Dan Slott’s first big Spidey event, so I thought now would be a perfect time to look back at it.
If you’ve been out of the loop since “One More Day,” and you want to see what Spider-Man’s been up to before June’s upcoming Amazing Spider-Man relaunch, there’s no better place to start than “New Ways to Die.”
