By Zack Quaintance — It’s a week of villainy and crime comics here on our Best comiXology Sales for the weekend of August 28, 2020. It’s also a week in which one of my all-time favorite superhero comics runs is on sale, with Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley’s classic Thunderbolts topping our list. This was a formative set of comics for me, and if you haven’t read it yet, I really recommend you do so now.

You can find the rest of our choices below!

Best comiXology Sales: Weekend of August 28, 2020

PICK OF THE WEEK
Thunderbolts Classic, Vol. 1 - Vol. 3
Writer: Kurt Busiek
Artist: Mark Bagley
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Justice, like lightning! When the world's heroes disappear, a new team rises to take their place! Meet the Thunderbolts: Citizen V! Techno! MACH-1! Songbird! Meteorite! Atlas! But what dark secret are these heroes hiding? Read the stories that changed the way the world looks at redemption!
Why It’s Cool: I read these comics as a kid way back when, and, yes, they hit me just like lightning. These comics just felt like such a fresh and novel concept, and while the Thunderbolts have gone on to become a little less exciting (these days they’re basically just a team of used-to-be bad guys), but this original run had a really novel concept to it — the main heroes of Earth are gone, and a bunch of villains are filling their places, initially as a scam but later because heroism fits them. It’s an amazing throughline to unite a series of incredibly well-done monthly serial comics by the team of Busiek and Bagley, and they still hold up all these years later.
Price: $5.09 each, or $15.27 total
Buy It Here: Thunderbolts Vol. 1; Thunderbolts Vol. 2; and Thunderbolts Vol. 3

Batman: A Death in the Family
Writer: Jim Starlin
Artist: Jim Aparo
Publisher: DC Comics
Batman readers were allowed to vote on the outcome of the story and they decided that Robin should die! As the second person to assume the role of Batman's sidekick, Jason Todd had a completely different personality than the original Robin. Rash and prone to ignore Batman's instructions, Jason was always quick to act without regard to consequences. In this fatal instance, Robin ignores his mentor's warnings when he attempts to take on the Joker by himself and pays the ultimate price. Driven by anger with Superman by his side, Batman seeks his vengeance as he looks to end the Joker's threat forever.
Why It’s Cool: This week saw the publication of Three Jokers, a new big Batman story that plays on some of the Joker’s most violent interactions with the Bat-Family from the past. One of those stories is this one here — Batman: Death in the Family. You don’t really need to read this story in order to understand Three Jokers, but this is just an interesting artifact to begin with, given that it’s the most prominent example in superhero comics history wherein fans have had the agency to decide the fate of the character. Yes, readers of comics got to call in and vote on the fate of Jason Todd…and, spoiler alert, they choose death. This book gives you a chance to see how that played out. It’s fascinating, to say the least.
Price: $5.09
Buy It Here: Batman - Death in the Family

Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery
Writer: Mat Johnson
Artist: Warren Pleece
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics - Berger Books
In the early 20th Century, when lynchings were commonplace throughout the American South, a few courageous reporters from the North risked their lives to expose these atrocities. They were African-American men who, due to their light skin color, could "pass" among the white folks. They called this dangerous assignment going "incognegro." Zane Pinchback, a reporter for the New York-based New Holland Herald, is sent to investigate the arrest of his own brother, charged with the brutal murder of a white woman in Mississippi. With a lynch mob already swarming, Zane must stay "incognegro" long enough to uncover the truth behind the murder in order to save his brother -- and himself. Suspenseful, unsettling and relevant, Incognegro is a tense graphic novel of shifting identities, forbidden passions, and secrets that run far deeper than skin color.
Why It’s Cool: If you’ve been following my first Kickstarter comics project, Next Door, you might not be surprised that this book is 100 percent my type of comic. It’s a noir (of the period too!), with a mystery that’s rooted in the real world, and it’s also topical and smart as all get out. It’s also written by Mat Johnson, whose novels I think are just fantastic. Moreover, this is just a really good comic from start to finish, one that will have you rapt with its mystery the whole time before leaving you with more questions than answers, as it should be.
Price: $5.99
Buy It Here: Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery

Moonshine, Vol. 1
Writer: Brian Azzarello
Artist: Eduardo Risso
Publisher: Image Comics
Set deep in Appalachia during Prohibition, MOONSHINE tells the story of Lou Pirlo, a city-slick “torpedo” sent from New York City to negotiate a deal with the best moonshiner in West Virginia, Hiram Holt. Lou figures it a milk run, but what he doesn’t figure is that Holt’s just as cunning and ruthless as any NYC crime boss. Not only will Holt do anything for his illicit booze operation, he’ll stop at nothing to protect a much darker, bloodier family secret.
Why It’s Cool: I don’t think I really need to give this book that hard of a sell. It’s from the classic Vertigo team of writer Brian Azzarello and artist Eduardo Risso of 100 Bullets fame, and it’s about prohibition era gangsters in Appalachia who are also mixed up with werewolves. That’s one hell of a comics pedigree/pitch, and the first volume of the story was very well done, with an ending that is likely to catapult you eagerly into the next issues of the book.
Price: $4.49
Buy It Here: Moonshine, Vol. 1

My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies
Writer: Ed Brubaker
Artist: Sean Phillips
Publisher: Image Comics
The first original graphic novel from the bestselling creators of CRIMINAL, KILL OR BE KILLED, THE FADE OUT and FATALE. Teenage Ellie has always had romantic ideas about drug addicts, those tragic artistic souls drawn to needles and pills have been an obsession since the death of her junkie mother ten years ago. But when Ellie lands in an upscale rehab clinic where nothing is what it appears to be... she’ll find another more dangerous romance, and find out how easily drugs and murder go hand-in-hand. MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN JUNKIES is a seductive coming-of-age story, a pop and drug culture-fueled tale of a young girl seeking darkness... and what she finds there. A gorgeous must-have hardback from the award-winning team of ED BRUBAKER and SEAN PHILLIPS, with acclaimed color artist ELIZABETH BREITWEISER.
Why It’s Cool: Nobody does gritty and grounded crime comics like the veteran team of writer Ed Brubaker and artist Sean Phillips, and of late the duo has been moving toward going straight to graphic novels, rather than releasing serialized comics. This is the first book in which they’ve done that, and if you missed it when it first came out, now is your time to catch up.
Price: $5.39
Buy It Here: My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies

You can find our picks for the best books on comiXology Unlimited!

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as Comics Bookcase.