What stories have improved the most upon re-reading?

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Sometimes a story just doesn't work for you the first time around. Maybe you were distracted by something and weren't in the mood. Maybe you read it too quickly and missed something crucial that dulled its impact. Maybe you just weren't ready to fully appreciate the story or art until you'd gotten older. Whatever the reasons, many comics end up being much, much better the second time around. In some rare cases, a story can get better and better the more you re-read it.

For me, Morrison's Final Crisis and the late great Darwyn Cooke's New Frontier are shining examples of stories that I really enjoyed the first time around, but didn't fully appreciate just how great they were until I read them again and again.

Johns & Frank's Doomsday Clock is another example. I had grown less and less enthusiastic about the book with each issue. I respected the craft, but the story wasn't really connecting to me because I was expecting it to deliver something it wasn't ever trying to be. When I re-read the entire story so far a little while ago, the whole thing was a revelation. While it's entirely possible the final few issues could fumble the ball, I was blown away by how good it was when read without the months long gaps between issues and my preconceptions of what I thought the story should be were removed from the equation.

What about you? What stories have grown better for you upon re-visiting them?

[caj]

Batman - Dark Victory

To me, it was a letdown after The Long Halloween. I wasn't really surprised by who Hangman was and it just wasn't all that interesting.

But I've since read it a few more times. While it's still not in the realm of The Long Halloween, it's much better than I originally thought.

By the way, great idea for a thread.

[jb681131]

Well this applies to all long runs and complicated stories like Geoff Johns on Green Lantern or Grant Morrison on Batman.

[Witchfan]

Jonathan Hickman's Avengers run didn't seem so entertaining if you read the issues monthly, but if you read them all in one sitting they are much better.

[Yoda]

Final Crisis is definitely one that as it was coming out I thought was a convoluted pretentious mess, but with rereading and reading analysis of it, I've come to enjoy and understand quite a bit. Particularly the Superman 3D issues and the statements it makes on Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow.

Similarly, I just reread Morrison's first Action Comics arc recollected and reordered in the Essential Edition: Superman: World Against Superman and have come to appreciate it a lot more. In order, without the Legion fill ins messing it up it reads much better. And isolated from the convoluted stuff that came in the back half of that arc and after that dragged it all down.

[Frontier]

All-Star Superman.

[RBerman]

Watchmen, of course.

All-Star Superman made a lot more sense after I read Morrison's JLA and DC One Million.

For those who now understand Final Crisis: Can you explain it to me? Especially the Batman part at the end. The rest of it made more sense now that I am finally reading the Fourth World.

[BatmanJones]

Watchmen, of course.

All-Star Superman made a lot more sense after I read Morrison's JLA and DC One Million.

For those who now understand Final Crisis: Can you explain it to me? Especially the Batman part at the end. The rest of it made more sense now that I am finally reading the Fourth World.

Rikdad to the rescue. Start here...

https://rikdad.blogspot.com/2018/01/...ew-part-i.html

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Rikdad to the rescue. Start here...

https://rikdad.blogspot.com/2018/01/...ew-part-i.html

YES! You beat me to it BatmanJones!

Besides being one of the most insightful comics commentators I know, rikdad is responsible for decoding Final Crisis for me in a way that made that story work so, so much better than it ever had, to the point that Final Crisis is up there with my favorite stories.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

All-Star Superman.

Absolutely, although this was one of the rare cases, along with New Frontier, where I already knew I was reading an all-time classic during my first reading.

[Yoda]

Rikdad to the rescue. Start here...

https://rikdad.blogspot.com/2018/01/...ew-part-i.html

YES! You beat me to it BatmanJones!

Besides being one of the most insightful comics commentators I know, rikdad is responsible for decoding Final Crisis for me in a way that made that story work so, so much better than it ever had, to the point that Final Crisis is up there with my favorite stories.

Yup. This is what cracked Final Crisis for me as well. They should publish an annotated version with rikdad's analysis.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Yup. This is what cracked Final Crisis for me as well. They should publish an annotated version with rikdad's analysis.

Given how DC seems to have completely given up any pretense towards not trying to piss off Alan Moore, they might as well include rikdad's work in subsequent reprintings of Final Crisis. It's not like Moore would be even more pissed at them for explicitly pointing out how they published a story giving one of his most revered stories the middle-finger that just happened to be written by a guy whose guts Moore hates.

[BohemiaDrinker]

Seven Soldiers for me. Probably my favorite Morrison, but the first time I read out of proper order and got really lost.

Preacher is one I loved in the first read, hated in the second, and loved it in the third for completely different reasons.

[Restingvoice]

Batman Year One. I was too young when I first read it. I still don't like it as much as golden and bronze age Batman stories, but I see why people like it.

[Rod G]

The Justice Maxi series for me.