League of Regrettable Superheroes by Jon Morris (LootCrate Edition)

Cover is for the full-sized edition, not the LootCrate version I read.

An insane look at over 80 years of some of the wildest, craziest and more bizarre superheroes to ever grace a comic book!

This is the companion piece to Legion of Regrettable Supervillains. Only it's condensed in order to fit in a LootCrate box. There's now a third book about sidekicks. While I wouldn't mind finding that book for a steep discount like I did this one, I am not planning on actively looking for it (or the larger versions of these books.)

Jon Morris does an amazing job finding these wacky characters. He covers some great depths of comic book history. But his sarcastic view is off-putting. 

God knows I don't take things as serious as I could. I guess what I am saying is that the author, while a great historian, just isn't that funny to me. It's like the professor who is incredibly smart and knowledgeable but only does dad jokes.

There's one more thing to be aware of. This book, though only 4 years old, is already dated.  For example, Morris talks about how the Marvel run of Rom Spaceknight is likely to never be collected and reprinted due to licensing issues. Yet with IDW's recent franchising deal with Hasbro, the publisher has not only revitalized the character  but they've also announced plans to issue a multi-volume collection of those Marvel books starting sometime this fall.

This isn't the author or publishers fault. Anytime you right a book about history of any sort, new developments will cause some of the data to become outdated. So maybe Jon Morris and Quirk Books might want to work on some revised editions. If so, maybe he can update the jokes as well.

Rating: 6 out of 10 stars.

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains (Loot Crate Edition)

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains is a celebration of the most unusual, oddball super-villains to ever be put to 4-color print. Well, almost. This book has been on my wish list for quite some time. I just never got it for myself or as a gift. Then one day at a thrift store, I found this: the Loot Crate Edition.

This edition of only focuses on 50 awfully crafted baddies. (More like 60 if you count a couple of sections that focus on multiple adversaries of similar theme.) The regular edition is much bigger, covering roughly 150 entries.

Despite the size of the book, I couldn't pass it up eitherway. The thrift store price was certainly right at only $1! I finally decided that I would read this digest version in order to decide if I should go for the full Monty.

I'm actually glad I went the way I did. The author Jon Morris, is considered a comic book historian with a long running blog devoted to forgotten comic books and their characters. While I enjoyed his factual narrative, sometimes Morris got just a little too tongue in cheek at times with some very corny jokes.

I also managed to get the Loot Crate Edition of his companion piece, The League of of Regrettable Superheroes, for that sweet price of $1. I'm only a few pages into it. But it reads in a more serious tone that is more delightful to read.

While I doubt that the full edition of The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains is due to become a part of my collection, (unless I find it for a tremendous bargain), I plan on keeping this book. There's a lot of excellent information in here and as a comic book historian myself, this will make a potentially good reference book for future readings, reviews and composition of articles. I just wish that the commentary was a little more dry.

Worth Consuming.

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars.