Some of Monitor Duty’s readers may be new and unfamiliar with my standing re: Marvel.

I don’t read Marvel. I’ve never read Marvel. I’m such a NON-Marvel reader that I can list herewith the total, er, list of my Marvel reading from childhood to today.

First off, load up this page in another browser window (or a tab for all you much-cooler Firefox users). It’s the complete list of Marvel comics that I’m selling on my comics-for-sale site. Of these, I’ve only read about half of them, and the rest were just added to my collection when I bought someone else’s longboxes wholesale. So, of this paltry list of 81 comics, I haven’t even read all of these!

The one’s I’ve read are:

The Annie Movie Adaptation.

Yeah, way to start off this list of Marvel comics, I’m sure. In fact, if you remove the movie adaptations and licensed properties like Blade Runner, 2010, Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, Doctor Who, Bill & Ted, Krull, Mighty Mouse, Robocop and Sledge Hammer, this list gets a lot smaller. So, I’ll stick to the Marvel Universe superhero books from here on out.

The Avengers on Late Night With David Letterman, which I bought because I was a Letterman fan at the time. No idea who any of the characters are in the book.

I gently leafed through this Thor issue where some dog guy named Beta Ray Bill becomes Thor. I was told it was a big issue at the time. I didn’t really get it, but it’s the only Thor I’ve ever read, and the real Thor isn’t in it.

The ‘Nam #65 I got just ’cause I wanted to read one of the stories done by Chuck Dixon. I might want to read more of the series. Oh, wait, this isn’t Marvel Universe.

Quasar #17. OK, this one rocked. I got it just because another comic reader told me about it and it sounded good. This one has the race to determine who is the fastest person in the Marvel Universe. The ending is hilarious.

When I was a kid, I read a single Fantastic Four issue. All I remember is a scene where the Human Torch is on a school bus and he lights up his thumb when a kid asks him to, and then they dump water on him. Aside from that, I read this little digest-sized b/w reprint of the first three issues of Fantastic Four earlier this year. No big whoop.

Captain America (2002) #1. Bought it because I was hoping a Captain America comic post-9/11 might actually be interesting. You heard right: I was willing to give a Marvel comic a chance to get on my regular pull list, provided it was compelling. It sucked. Some guy with an eyepatch appears, and he is never named. Great job of introducing your characters in a #1 issue, Marvel! The parts that weren’t confusing were offensive or depressing, especially the bit where a man who lost a loved one in the World Trade Center almost murders a random middle easterner. So, the only superhero action in this War On Terror-oriented Captain America comic is when Cap stops a hate crime committed by a victim of 9/11. No wonder Chuck Dixon wanted to do a comic where a U.S. agent is smacking Osama in the gob; Captain America, who SHOULD be doing that on a comic cover, is nowhere to be found.

I picked up the first few issues of Ultimate Spider-Man and much later bought the first few trades. Every Marvel fan I know hated Ultimate Spidey, which must be because it was so continuity-free and accessible that I could get into it. Not bad.

Two years ago, I finally bought Marvels. It’s Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross, so I knew I wouldn’t hate it. It was OK. There’s a joke at the end about a paperboy saying his name and the main character saying, “Ah, a nice normal kid” and this must be some terrific joke if you recognize who the kid is. I didn’t, but I could tell what Kurt was going for just by laying it on so thick. So…you Marvel readers… who was the kid?
(If you want to buy my copy, it’s in the books section.)

That’s it. That’s all the Marvel I’ve read in my life, except for a book collecting the “Spidey Super-Stories featuring the Electric Company” which I read as a kid (believe it or not, this was a better introduction to Marvel’s characters than anything officially Marvel that I’ve read) and the “Civil War #4” with new dialogue.

So, if you’re a much bigger Marvel fan that I am and you’re upset that Marvel gets such short shrift on Monitor Duty, contact me and I’ll see about making you our official Marvel contributor!