Devolution is the Name of My Band...

[sisabet]

I'm planning. I feel better about things when I plan.

Unfortunately, my natural avoidant nature means I can't actually plan any more about my move or current finances beyond what I have already established. Any more thought beyond "This is what I will do...tommorrow" will result in a stomach ache.

So I am planning what order I will tackle "Sandman" in. I don't know when I will have the time or the energy to start it, but I know I will read this and now I am just trying to decide which book goes first.

I know, I could read them in the order published - but if I did things like that, then I would still have to count "The Train Job" as the first episode of Firefly and that is just insane.

Also - I have a difficult time starting with something from the ground up. TV shows typically need 3 years before I start to get fannishly interested. I think this is part of my problem with "Preacher" - I am starting at the beginning when maybe I should have started around book three or with The Saint of All Killers, cause right now we are just getting to know the characters and it is all set up and really - if I jumped in and the shit was hitting the fan and, yeah, I might be kinda confused, but you can typically figure these things out (hence the wide number of people who did not watch Buffy until season 5) and then you look at everything preceding your starting point as "Cool! Back story!"

My attention span is just not what it used to be. Sadly, I am far from alone in this and I have no idea what to do to fix it. Well, I don't know anyway to fix it that would not require active work on my part. I prefer to be lazy and just bemoan. Actually correcting something is difficult, yo.

I have actually gotten to the point where I don't actually distract myself from stress by reading. No, I distract myself from stress by thinking about reading. This is not an improvement. I feel like Anya and it is the bookstore that became a bookstore/coffee house and is now just a coffee house. Evolution in reverse.

On a bright note - I cannot get enough of these Illyria icons.

Comments

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

Sandman was actually published in the order in which issues were written, though. (Well, there's one exception. But it's not really relevant.)

I usually recommend people start with Volume 2, The Doll's House, because it's the first volume that's fully successful, and it tells one story arc, with minimal necessary backstory. Volume 1 is okay but more episodic, and up until the very last issue ("The Sound of Wings"), I was wondering why people were raving about Neil Gaiman, because it was good but not special -- and then in "The Sound of Wings," Gaiman discovers his voice and I got it.

[sisabet.livejournal.com]

My post would make sense if you read graphic novels. Want to read graphic novels?

I know what you mean about the skinny. Illyria always seemed less thin than Fred to me, though. You would like Cordelia. Also - the actress that played her, Charisma Carpenter, just did a Playboy spread.

[undercoverbro.livejournal.com]

Sorry about the deleted post above. I got the LJ name wrong and just HAD to fix it. (Now it's below.)

My post would make sense if you read graphic novels. Want to read graphic novels?

Lord no. I don't even want to watch movies based on graphic novels. Give me boring text any day.

I know what you mean about the skinny. Illyria always seemed less thin than Fred to me, though. You would like Cordelia. Also - the actress that played her, Charisma Carpenter, just did a Playboy spread.

I'm more familiar with Charisma thanks to her recurrence on Miss Match. The bitchiness works for me more than her figure, but then, that's not bad either. You have many scan-friendly folk on your Friends List, so I've pretty much seen the layout.

[undercoverbro.livejournal.com]

The rest of your post made no sense, but:

On a bright note - I cannot get enough of these Illyria icons.

I miss luvsbitch's icon of naked, arms-crossed Illyria. It was from a safe distance, so the viewer could be deceived into believing she wasn't too skinny. It made blue hair sexy, and almost made me want to catch a glimpse of an actual Angel episode.

I said almost.

Dark Knight Returns

[aexia.livejournal.com]

Well, when you're finished with Sandman, Preacher and Watchmen, pick up Dark Knight Returns. Have I said this before already?

Best. Batman. Story. Ever.

Seriously. There's so much stuff about Batman that's taken for granted today that Frank Miller initiated. It's in its own continuity really, but the "official" line picked up many of the elements. I really wish they'd take it to the big screen some day. Sarah Michelle Gellar might make a good Robin. Maybe Kurt Russell as Batman. He's about the right age for the story now, I think. Get Elisabeth "Det Kate" Rohm to be the new commissioner. Superman would be whomever they end up casting in the new movie. He doesn't need to age.

The Dark Knight Strikes Back(the long-delayed sequel) is crap however so you should avoid that.

All this Sandman talk, though, makes me want to dig up my Rose "I hate love" Walker profile pic I had at the WD for a while.

As for the order, the thing about Sandman is that there are a lot of issues that are pretty much just about storytelling. Gaiman got to about three levels of storytelling one issue. (It's a story about a bunch of guys telling each other stories and one tells a story about this one time someone told him a story about the history of a city.)

My two cents

[whoisclothilde.livejournal.com]

When starting people on Sandman, I usually drop them in at World's End - actually number 8 in the series. Gaiman's *so* in control of his world by this point that the whole book's just a delight, and there aren't any spoilers that someone who hasn't read the whole series, like, five times would even be able to understand are spoilers.

Personally, I started with A Game of You, which I wouldn't recommend; I was very confused for a long time. But actually, it was quite nice - that sort of confusion where you think "I know something very clever's going on here. I have no idea what it is, but I really want to know...."

If you just want to have a look round his world without entering Sandman, try Stardust (the illustrated version, for the love of god, not the plain text one...). It's just perfect.