X-MEN EPIC COLLECTION (VOL. 6) PROTEUS

$44.99, 440 pages, Marvel

If you want to read silver and bronze age comics on paper, Marvel’s Epic line is your best bet. Even the weird “who knows?” order they’re sprinkling them out in is fun—it’s like going to a spinner rack back in the day before you knew what would be there. Yes, this is Claremont and Byrne X-Men stuff that’s been reprinted a dozen times. But if you didn’t want to shell out $125 each for the omnibus editions (understandable) and the black and white newsprint of the dearly departed Essentials line wasn’t your thing (blasphemy), these are for you. Over 400 pages, twenty issues in published order. Do modern superhero comics stink? The case can be made, but we’ve never lived in a time when the good books of the past were so accessible. And these are iconic late ’70s X stories—Magneto! The Savage Land! The debut of Alpha Flight! The first shadowy glimpses of Wolverine’s mysterious past!

Collects: X-Men #111-128, Annual #3, Marvel Team-Up #89 and Incredible Hulk Annual #7.