Monday, January 05, 2015

Smallville comics reading order - help a lady out

I am finally catching up on the Smallville comics Chaos and Continuity - these are the final story arcs and I have failed to read them until now.

Halfway through Chaos I got distracted and wanted to understand the reading order of the different issues.  I get my copies from Comixology and they arrange the issues alphabetically then numerically, which is annoying as I'd rather they were listed by date of publication.

Here is a page giving the reading order of the Smallville comics.  I'm still a bit confused, some are listed as parallel stories, some are main, and I can't recall exactly when each arc came out.
Note - the chapters in the first table on that page refer to the digital issue numbers.  There are 63 of these which are then collected into 19 print issues.

That web page summarised the story arcs as follows.  I'm pretty much copying it because it helps me understand if I write things out:

Main arcs with focus characters:
Guardian (Hank Henshaw)
Detective (Batman and Nightwing)
Haunted (Impulse)
Argo (Supergirl, Booster Gold and the Legion of Superheroes)
Olympus (Wonder Woman) - All these are released on comixology under the Season 11 title.
Alien (Rocket Red Brigade and the Monitor)
Lantern (John Stewart, Parallax and the Green Lantern Corps)
Chaos (Eclipso, Darkseid, Booster, the multiverse and the bleed)
Continuity (Justice League, everyone else)

Parallel stories:
Effigy (Martian Manhunter and Batman)
Valkyrie (Lois Lane and Lana Lang)
Hollow (Tess Mercer and Lex Luthor) - These top 3 are released on Comixology under the Season 11 title.
Titans (Jay Garrick and the Teen Titans)
Harbinger (Zatanna and John Constantine)

Now, as to how to read them, if you wanted to read the whole lot in one go, I think you would follow the publishing order and do so as follows:
Guardian
Detective
Haunted, Effigy (parallel)
Argo, Valkyrie (parallel)
Olympus, Hollow (parallel)
Alien, Titans (parallel)
Lantern, Harbinger (parallel)
Chaos
Continuity

What do other fans think?  I can't recall if the parallel stories take place alongside the main story arcs, or if they take place alongside some of the TV episodes.  I want to establish where the arcs sit within the timeline of the Smallville universe.

1 comment:

stefanos said...

Hm.
If im right the order should be like this.
Guardian(Main)
Detective(Main)
Haunted(Main)
Effigy(Parallel)
Argo(Main)
Valkyrie(Parallel)
Olympus(Main)
Hollow(Parallel)
Then
Titans
Alien
Harbinger
Lantern
Chaos
Continuity
Im a totally noob with books but if i understand correctly thats the right order to read depending on release date.
Sorry for late response...just finished the Tv Show [ 2016 yeah :( ].
Looking forward for your answer.