That’s the point of the entire exercise.

If this is something that you have to read the whole thing for it to be comprehensible, then why is it published as a seven-issue mini-series? Why not publish it as a book? If it’s not divisible into seven readable portions, aren’t you cheating your readers by selling it to them in seven installments? If you’re not intended to start at part six, why make the reader work to find parts one through five if six was the first issue they found?

But, as a first-time comic book reader, Egypt #6 presents some problems.”

This alone makes the review much flawed, like Funkygreenjerusalem said.

It’s like reading one late chapter in a complex book, and not appreciating the characters, the plot elements, or any nuances or build-ups, or even getting lost about the whole thing.

The reviewer would have done a much better, more objective review if the only issue he read was at the first issue instead of the 6th in a 7-issue mini.

I read this miniseries lately, and found it to be pretty good. Fortunately for me, I didn’t hear all the hype beforehand.

Flex Mentallo has always been caught in the Charles Atlas mess that DC got into with the character. Now that they’ve published his origin in trade, I’m hoping they manage to get the mini-series out.

I thought that was collected, though… perhaps it’s out of print? Shocking, considering the people involved. I’m sure I have a few nominations, but one that pops immediately to mind is Scene of the Crime, a Vertigo detective story that Ed Brubabker and Michael Lark did a few years ago. Well worth picking up, even for a dollar (rather than a quarter)!

I’m going to go to the CBR forum and suggest a new top five topic– mini series most deserving of a collection!

Well, those numbers are above the price tag, so I assume the person would have to be pretty absent minded not to notice.
(then again, I brought two copies of American Century #2 once, because #3 had just came out, and I paid no attention at all to what I had in my hand.)

“Surround the words you want to quote with and , just without the x’s. ”

Is that explanation missing somthing?

That said, issue 6 of a 7 issue miniseries probably isn’t the greatest candidate for a “how would it read to a first-time reader?” column.

FGJ – I tried to keep that in mind when I read it. I didn’t really want a two-page recap, which would drag down the story, just a bit more. I didn’t hate the book at all. It didn’t grab me, but I was intrigued by it. The reaction from the comments makes me think I SHOULD go get the rest of it. It’s always going to be flawed, to a certain degree, because, for instance, I LOVE Peter Milligan and know that if I buy one of his books I’ll probably enjoy it. A new comic reader, however, might not notice that it’s a sixth out of seven in a series. They might get drawn in by the cover (that’s what covers are for, after all) and there’s no indication that this is a mini-series beside the small numbers tucked away in the upper left corner of the cover and in the preview section in the back. It’s just tough to get into this if you buy it with no foreknowledge. It’s a fantasy, of course, because Vertigo is sold to a very specialized audience and the casual reader probably won’t pick this up, so you’re right about that. It’s still fun to read this as if you’ve never read a comic before.

In the case of Egypt though, for a bout 3-4 months, when it was coming out, every respectable pro interviewd in Wizard mentioned it when asked what their favourite current books were – and for about a year it was held up as an example of books that fall through the cracks.

Now I know Wizard ain’t a good measure, but there was no CBR back then!

This may sound weird, given how so many comics fans complain about the rampant negativity among comics fans, but I really think over-praising material for being merely competent or different is a more severe problem with comics criticism than it is even with other niche mediums.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.

Heck, that is practically the founding principle of this blog. Only praise the comics that are GOOD.

I love this series alongside his earlier Enigma. At the time, Milligan wasn’t as splashy as his Vertigo peers, but he seemed sincere, and that comes through in his writing at the time.

I think this column is a bit flawed Greg, as I can’t imagine anyone buying #6 of 7, even someone new to comics, and then complaining about it not making sense.
It’s a mini, so it can’t be judged by the same criteria as an ongoing.