We’re back, with more news and reviews and the usual nonsense. We’ve got chat about Archie Comics’ NFT shenanigans, IDW’s Originals line, DC’s Pride special’s lineup, the new Batman and Detective Comics creative teams, Superman: The Space Age, X-Terminators, All-Out Avengers, the relaunch of Shang-Chi and Grant Morrison’s debut novel Luda. We’ve also got reviews of The Wrong Earth: Fame and Fortune and Sandman Universe: Nightmare Country and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe doesn’t have a leg to stand on. All this plus a fictional Scottish king, an unexplained vendetta against Sussex and Fleem Blomfom, the character find of 2022.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page.

And as always, if you want to show off your appreciation of Scotland’s longest-running comics podcast, you can do so with a fab shirt from our Redbubble store.

Lightning strikes eight times! It’s really very dangerous to be out here! Get to shelter!

Paul and Al are back to talk about Thunderbolts #21 and Captain America/Citizen V ’98, with all the extraneous cover blurbs, world-class pauldrons and embarrassing Pritt-Stick accidents that entails. Come on in! The water’s Thunderbolts!

The episode is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. And as always, there are some beautiful shirts over at our Redbubble store. They would look great on you! I mean, obviously everything would look great on you. But these give us a few quid a pop.

We’re back once again with a full slate of comics news, remembering Ian Kennedy and Tom Veitch, and discussing the Hero Initiative’s JLA/Avengers reprint, DC’s upcoming Black Label titles, Marvel’s Wild Cards and Thunderbolts revivals, IDW’s Last Bot Standing and the Amazon/ComiXology disaster. We’ve also got reviews of Iron Fist and Nightwing, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe has a burnin’ love. All this plus an underground car park, trading cards with staples and Carnage, the most well-adjusted man in comics.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or through our Facebook fan page. And if you wanted to buy a t-shirt from our Redbubble store, then well, we wouldn’t say no.

It’s time for another adventure with the Marvel Universe’s most neurotic super… er… heroes? Villains? Something along one of those lines, or possibly both. Anyway! We’ve got Graviton, Charcoal, and the addition of a crucial element of the Tbolts mythos, plus: A pug in a hoodie! Some French! An old lady from Elgin! It’s all go around here.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. And since it’s not yet the done thing to walk around without a shirt on, why not let us help you avoid that scenario by buying one of our great tees?

It’s time for our annual look-back at the comics and creators of 2021, as they give out the gongs in the Homies awards. Will your favourites go home with a glittering prize? Only one way to find out!

Then it’s time for a trip back to Harrogate in November 2021, for the recording of the SILENCE! To Astonish panel from Thought Bubble, featuring Rachael Stott, Becky Cloonan, Al Ewing and Hannah Berry. What larks!

Thanks again for sticking with us for another year, and we hope you’ll join us this year as we keep bringing you the news, reviewing comics, making over low-level loser characters, rereading Thunderbolts, and so on, and so forth.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. And look, what better way is there to prepare for the year to come than by buying a t-shirt that shows your support for this podcast? Other than buying in tinned food and bottled water? Exactly.

I say! You there! You, boy! What day is it?

It’s Homies Eve? Then I haven’t missed it! Go to the content mines, bring me your finest views on comics from the calendar year 2021! The ones as big as you, yes, come on, be quick about it, you children today, you don’t know you’re born, a short spell of National Service would sort you out.

Anyway. It’s time for your nominations for the 2021 House to Astonish Homies awards.

As always, Paul and I will individually be choosing a winner for each category, but there’s the usual proviso – we want YOU to help, so you all name your picks in the comments, and Paul and I each choose our own, and we talk a bit about each of the three on our awards show.

We’re likely to be recording at the beginning of the new year, so we’re giving you until midnight UK time (7pm Eastern, 4pm Pacific) on December 31 2021 to make your choice. When you list your picks, don’t just name names either, because we’ll be reading out the best comments on the show, so let us know your thinking!

BEST NEW SERIES

This one’s pretty self-explanatory – any comic whose first issue was published between 1 January and 31 December 2021 is eligible. What new series got your attention the most this year?

BEST ACTUALLY NEW SERIES

This one’s a little less self-explanatory – what series, again first published during 2021, did you think was best, with the proviso that it has to be something where the property wasn’t in existence prior to the start of 2021. We’re counting re-use of titles as well as concepts, so Eternals or The Swamp Thing wouldn’t be eligible, but (for example) The Good Asian or Primordial would.

BEST CONTINUING SERIES

The counterpart to the categories above, which covers books whose first issue was published in 2020 or before. They’ve been around the block, but they’ve still got what it takes.

BEST MINI, ONE-SHOT OR OGN

These are explaining themselves by this point, right? We’re looking for OGNs, one-shots and minis published in 2021 (or partially in 2021, in the case of minis).

FAVOURITE WRITER

FAVOURITE ARTIST

FAVOURITE COLOURIST

Each of these three is pretty self-explanatory – whose name on the cover or credits box of a book makes you want to pick it up? Whose work do you most look forward to seeing?

MOST WANTED

This is for the comic, series or graphic novel that saw print this year which you’d want to see more of, whether that be a book that was cancelled before its time, a one-shot or mini that just begs for a follow-up, or an OGN that you’d love to see a sequel to.

MOST PLEASANT SURPRISE

It may have seemed unappealing when you read about it online, and those preview pages may have looked unremarkable, but when you finally got the winner of this category in your hands you were ready to eat your words. What comic, series or graphic novel did you find yourself enjoying much more than you thought you would?

OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT

This is exactly what it says – which creator, creative team, publisher or other contributor to the world of comics really knocked it out of the park this year?

Let us have your picks in the comments thread below, along with your thinking on each one – we’ll read out a range of the responses on our big end-of-year show. Happy nominating!

A relatively quiet few weeks of news means a compact and bijou episode, but we still find time to talk about Amazon’s postponed assimilation of Comixology, Gina Gagliano leaving Random House Graphic, the launch of Zestworld, Oni signing with Lunar for distribution and Marvel’s announcement of Secret X-Men. We’ve also got reviews of King of Spies and Justice League Dark Annual, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is an absolute unit. All this plus a cross between luge and Cluedo, a shop selling lemons and the gentrification of Neopets.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or via our Facebook fan page. And as always, remember that you can get our highly stylish t-shirts from our extremely convenient 24-hour shop on Redbubble.

Lightning strikes six times! This is surely a sign of the Biblical apocalypse!

This time round we’re diving into the second year of Thunderbolts, covering issues 13-16. Bug people! Political intrigue! Hulkbots! Guys called Dirkson! Santa Claus the Luchador! Justice League Norwich! It’s all here, and it’s all go!

You can get the podcast here, or here on Mixcloud, or via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or through our Facebook fan page. And hey! There are t-shirts! For sale! And they have our logo on them! This is quite a lot of exclamation marks for one post!

(Also – today is our 13th birthday. House to Astonish Episode 1 was launched on November 8th 2008. Thanks so much for sticking with us – we genuinely appreciate every single person who listens to the show. We’re not stopping any time soon, so get ready to wish us a happy 20th anniversary when Paul and I are both orbiting 50.)

We’ve got a bit of NYCC-dodging news chat for you this time round, as we discuss the Ditko lawsuit, creative changes on the X-books, Kurt Busiek’s new Image slate and Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese coming to Disney Plus. We’ve also got reviews of Amazing Spider-Man, We Have Demons and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is a little dark. All this plus Spidey and the Family Stone, a little girl that swears and the Scott Snyder/John Allison crossover project you didn’t know you needed.

The episode is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the player below. Let us know what you think, either in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. And don’t forget that our fab shirts are available over at our Redbubble store! We will remind you if you do forget, it’s okay.

Lightning is striking again! That’s five times now! This is surely statistically improbable! We’re now up to the finale of the first year of Thunderbolts, and covering issues 10-12. This is where is all starts going off, as secrets are uncovered, plans are revealed and the whole house of cards comes down.

The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. And let us know what you really think by buying one of our lovely t-shirts from our Redbubble store. Yeah, that’ll show us!