Astro City: Metrobook, Vol. 1

Astro City Metrobook #1

by Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson (Artist), Will Blyberg (Artist)

A hero dreams of flight. An alien spy prepares for invasion. A young man is mentored by a hero with dark secrets. A street criminal discovers a hero's identity. And much, much more. Step into a world of heroes and see them from a whole different perspective. These are the multiple-award-winning stories that began the epic series and changed how we think about superheroes.

Collects KURT BUSIEK'S ASTRO CITY, VOL. 1 (#1-6) & VOL. 2 (#1-12, #1/2)

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Comic Book, Fiction, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics

512 pages, Paperback

Published April 5, 2022

About the author

Kurt Busiek is an American comic book writer notable for his work on the Marvels limited series, his own title Astro City, and his four-year run on Avengers.

Busiek did not read comics as a youngster, as his parents disapproved of them. He began to read them regularly around the age of 14, when he picked up a copy of Daredevil #120. This was the first part of a continuity-heavy four-part story arc; Busiek was drawn to the copious history and cross-connections with other series. Throughout high school and college, he and future writer Scott McCloud practiced making comics. During this time, Busiek also had many letters published in comic book letter columns, and originated the theory that the Phoenix was a separate being who had impersonated Jean Grey, and that therefore Grey had not died—a premise which made its way from freelancer to freelancer, and which was eventually used in the comics.

During the last semester of his senior year, Busiek submitted some sample scripts to editor Dick Giordano at DC Comics. None of them sold, but they did get him invitations to pitch other material to DC editors, which led to his first professional work, a back-up story in Green Lantern #162 (Mar. 1983).

Busiek has worked on a number of different titles in his career, including Arrowsmith, The Avengers, Icon, Iron Man, The Liberty Project, Ninjak, The Power Company, Red Tornado, Shockrockets, Superman: Secret Identity, Thunderbolts, Untold Tales of Spider-Man, JLA, and the award-winning Marvels and the Homage Comics title Kurt Busiek's Astro City.

In 1997, Busiek began a stint as writer of Avengers alongside artist George Pérez. Pérez departed from the series in 2000, but Busiek continued as writer for two more years, collaborating with artists Alan Davis, Kieron Dwyer and others. Busiek's tenure culminated with the "Kang Dynasty" storyline. In 2003, Busiek re-teamed with Perez to create the JLA/Avengers limited series.

In 2003, Busiek began a new Conan series for Dark Horse Comics, which he wrote for four years.

In December 2005 Busiek signed a two-year exclusive contract with DC Comics. During DC's Infinite Crisis event, he teamed with Geoff Johns on a "One Year Later" eight-part story arc (called Up, Up and Away) that encompassed both Superman titles. In addition, he began writing the DC title Aquaman: Sword of Atlantis from issues 40-49. Busiek was the writer of Superman for two years, before followed by James Robinson starting from Superman #677. Busiek wrote a 52-issue weekly DC miniseries called Trinity, starring Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman. Each issue (except for issue #1) featured a 12-page main story by Busiek, with art by Mark Bagley, and a ten-page backup story co-written by Busiek and Fabian Nicieza, with art from various artists, including Tom Derenick, Mike Norton and Scott McDaniel.

Busiek's work has won him numerous awards in the comics industry, including the Harvey Award for Best Writer in 1998 and the Eisner Award for Best Writer in 1999. In 1994, with Marvels, he won Best Finite Series/Limited Series Eisner Award and the Best Continuing or Limited Series Harvey Award; as well as the Harvey Award for Best Single Issue or Story (for Marvels #4) in 1995. In 1996, with Astro City, Busiek won both the Eisner and Harvey awards for Best New Series. He won the Best Single Issue/Single Story Eisner three years in a row from 1996–1998, as well as in 2004. Busiek won the Best Continuing Series Eisner Award in 1997–1998, as well as the Best Serialized Story award in 1998. In addition, Astro City was awarded the 1996 Best Single Issue or Story Harvey Award, and the 1998 Harvey Award for Best Continuing or Limited Series.

Busiek was given the 1998 and 1999 Comics Buyer's Guide Awards for Favorite Writer, with additional nominations in 1997 and every year from 2000 to 2004. He has also received numerous Squiddy Awards, having been selected as favorite writer four years in a row from 1995 to 1998,

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A classic.
But as some other reviewers have mentioned, this one does take a minute to warm up.



It starts off with some loosely connected slice-of-life stories from the view of the citizens and superheroes of Astro City. But nothing really grabbed me by the collar and shook the shit out of me right off the bat. Although, I did enjoy seeing Winged Victory & Samaritan go on a date.
That one had more punch than you might think.



I was enjoying myself in a comfortable way, but things heated up with the Alter Boy and Confessor. That whole arc was fantastic and definitely my personal favorite.



You definitely get your money's worth. I wasn't in love with each and every issue, but there are a lot of really good stories in this thing. Jack-In-The-Box's messed up children coming back in time to haunt him, and the little superhero girl who just wants to be a regular kid for a while were both great. Another one of the stories that stuck out to me was the one with the old man who turned into a villain because no one would hire him. I was rooting for him, not gonna lie.



I remember reading some Astro City comics years ago and not being at all impressed, but I really enjoyed myself with this collection. I don't know if was the difference in the collection or the difference in me but these hit me in the feels several times.
Again, this isn't perfect, and some of the characters take a minute to get interesting. Still.
Recommended.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Picked this up because I’ve always heard people talk about it. I had no idea what to expect. An interesting concept that ended up being pretty good. So we have this world and in it we have Astro City. A big metropolis where several super heroes and villains reside. For the first half of the book, each issue takes a certain super hero or a regular resident from the town and tells a story about them. Almost like one shots but they are all part of this city/world. During these issues we slowly learn about the different heroes and villains and learn what it’s like to live on Astro City. Some of these issues were ok and some pretty cool. However, I’ve not been the biggest fan of anthology type books and this was similar to that. But past the halfway mark, we got our first story that went 2 issues. Follows this super hero family and their daughter that goes missing. As the reader, we see what she’s up too but her parents are frantically searching all over for her. Then we roll into another story that goes on for six issues. This was my favorite . It follows a hero called the Confessor and a sidekick, Alter Boy, that he takes under his wing to train. This had a really great story going, a nice reveal and a really nice twist in the end. So it started off kind of ok, but picked up steam and I found myself really getting into it. I have vol 2 coming in the mail. Looking forward to see how the next book fairs.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Astro City Metrobook 1 collects Astro City 1-6, Astro City volume 2 1- 12, and Astro City 1/2.

So I didn't really get Astro City when I was a teenager but I've read a fair bit of it as an adult and dug it. In fact, I've blocked a few people on Twitter who shit talk it. Anyway, I decided to free up some shelf space and trade in my old collections for these big honkin' Metrobooks.

So Astro City seems like an homage to archetypical comics, and it is, but it mostly focuses on the human side of things. Samaritan can fly around the world in minutes but doesn't leave himself time to go one dates. Astra from the Furst Family is a third generation hero that wants to be a normal kid. Jack in the Box wonders how he's going to juggle being a super hero with fatherhood. There are dozens more examples to back up this viewpoint.

The artwork by Brent Anderson is understated but it fits the human tone of the story. You don't need a behemoth with bulging muscles and eye burning coloring to tell human focused stories. The plot of Astro City turning against the super heroes due to a political demagogue is a plot that seems just as fresh today as it did in the 1990s.

That's about all I want to say. I don't want to spoil anything for people who've never read this. This is my third time through Astro City and it just gets better with age. Five out of five stars.

[Algernon · Rating 3 out of 5]

[7/10]

I decided to visit Astro City for the artwork of Alex Ross, one of my favorite graphic artists in the medium. I stayed longer than I expected for the storytelling talent of Kurt Busiek, a new name for me. Alex Ross is only doing the covers, excellent as I expected, but Brent Anderson and the rest of the creative team behind the anthology are more than able to keep up with their most famous team leaders.



Comics about superheroes in spandex, wearing capes and flying effortlessly through the skies of the metropolis are not my usual cup of tea when it comes to comic books. One of the reasons I stay away from them is the franchise approach, with not only hundreds of issues for each iconic superhero, but also with jumbled timelines, reboots, tie-ins and other marketing tricks to sell you more of the stuff. I prefer more focused story lines, with self-contained characters and more adult oriented action and characterization.
I know there are true gems in each franchise [Superman, Spiderman, Batman, etc] that are shorter, better written and sort of stand-alone, but I started relatively late in the Marvel and DC universe, and the research needed in order to choose something good is often too much for me.



The reason Astro City works well in my case is the combination of familiarity and concision. The whole collection consists of cameos, at most double issues, that focus on character building and slice-of-life portraits of heroes, ordinary people on the street and brief conflicts that are used more for background colour than for plot advancement. There is no plot, but that is OK, because Busiek somehow manages to make his character sketches vivid and relatable. Actually, there is one more ambitious five issue story arc that was handled rather well about a teenage boy coming to the big city and learning to become a justiciary, but I was actually glad when the creators returned to the cameo format.
The familiarity comes form the many similarities between the superheroes of Astro City and those from the Marvel and DC universes. There’s a Superman clone [Samaritan], a Wonder Woman clone [Winged Victory], a sort of Batman [The Confessor], the Fantastic Four [The First Family], Silver Surfer, The Flash and others that maybe I could recognize if I was more familiar with the originals. The cast is huge, with golden age and silver age precursors, second tier heroic teams and apprentices, but we don’t need to memorize each one’s origin stories.
There are also several original and unusual heroes, and these were the more interesting ones for me, like Jack-in-the-Box or the Hanged Man. Astro City itself is a big attraction for the visit as the reader slowly explores more neighbourhoods and meets the locals.
I was tempted to draw some parallels with another modern series that tries to reinvent the genre by deconstructing or looking at superheroes from a different angle: The Boys, Volume 1: The Name of the Game by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson, but I am only familiar with it from the television series and, anyway, the focus is completely different on explicit language, graphic violence and collateral damage.

Astro City feels closer to the classic portrait of the whole superhero comic universe, an attempt to make them more human and not the monsters envisioned by Ennis. Busiek is not afraid to ask the tough questions about who they are and what are they doing to society as a whole, but his approach is more laudatory than critical.

I plan to continue with the second Metrobook anthology.

[Corey Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5: Astro City is an anthology type book where the city is filled with superheroes. Every issue (some stories span across multiple issues) takes a different characters point of view and tells a story.
I'll admit I wasn't the biggest fan of this in the beginning. In the beginning, most of the stories were told from a random citizen instead of a superhero. Which made it very very boring. Believe it or not I don't care about the random guy that just moved in and happened to see a superhero fly by. To me, it felt like it was missing a huge opportunity. But then the eighth issue came along and I was hooked. It was finally taking advantage of having this huge city filled with superheroes. My only really compliant from here forward was it was very wordy. I don't know if this is because it is a bit outdated or what. But there is way too much narration in this.

Speaking of outdated, the art was not for me. I felt like it kept getting worse as the book went on. I went into this thinking this was going to be all Alex Ross (like the cover) but nope he only does the individual covers for each issue.

Overall: So it's a bit outdated and takes a while to get started (in my opinion). But once it does get started it is VERY VERY good. I didn't go into much details about the story's mainly because I think it was fun getting to experience all these stories on my own and not knowing how they all might tie into each other. I will have to check the next volume out once I get the chance.
I recommend!

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Life in the Big City (v1 #1-6). Astro City is often praised for its average man's take on a superheroic world, and though this book has some of that (most successfully the story of a woman living on Shadow Hill), its best stories are its looks at the superheroes itself. I mean, this whole book is bookended by two stories of Samaritan, and his eternal hope that he might be able to live a normal life. The trick is that even when these stories are about the heroes and not normal residents of Astro City, it's their human side we're seeing.

Beyond that, it's impressive how much Busiek manages to set up in this first volume, including many of his most interesting heroes and some of the deep mysteries of Astro City that weren't revealed for years. And, we have an alien invasion in the offing.

Astro City was even more spectacular in 1994 when it debuted and offered a truly groundbreaking take on a superhero world. But today these stories are still extremely well-written and ... so very human. [5/5]

Welcome to Astro City (v2 #1). I wasn't that fond of this in the previous TPB collections and I think that might be because it led off the third TPB, after the Confessor arc took up the second. And this is a big intro with many of our heroes and a everyman's view of them in the city. As a follow-up to the Confessor, that's disappointing. As an intro to the new volume of Astro City, that's great. (What a difference a mapping decision makes! I look forward to reading the whole series in proper order in the Metrobooks as opposed to the slicing and dicing of the original volumes [4/5].

Everyday Life (v2 #2-3). The first multipart Astro City story! Honestly, I found it a bit slow when I originally read it: one issues worth of story spread out over two issues. The extra pages are spent on really pulpish adventures, which are a cool analog for the FF, but not really necessary for the storytelling. However the last few pages of this story are so golden that everything else is forgiven. They showus what a wonderful character piece this was! [4/5]

Confession (v2 #4-9). Busiek's first Astro City epic is an intriguing one, because he deftly threads together several major plotlines, then he subverts it all by largely summarizing the ending.If anything,the result feels more epic but simultaneously it allows him to cast a strong spotlight on the characters at the center of the storyline: the Confessor and Altar Boy. And, it's a great character study that had me desperately wanting to see more of the characters for years afterward.

I think that the storyline doesn't hold up to rereading as well as some of the other Astro City volumes because it's so heavy on mystery and revelation, but it's still brilliantly put together for a first-time read. [5/5]

Show 'em All (V2 #10). The Junkman story is fun, but the whole psychology-of-a-villain thing has been done so many times since that it no longer feels very fresh; it was probably moreso when it was published [3+/5].

Father's Day (v2 #11-12). The Jack-in-the-Box two-parter is what always sticks with me from this book because of its inventive use of travelers from the future; the plot line is OK too. [4+/5]

The Nearness of You (.5). The short story that ends the volume, "The Nearness of You", may be one of Busiek's best Astro City stories ever. The last pages always fill my eyes with tears. Very deserving in its Eisner nomination. No One Forgets. No One. Also nice to see The Hanged Man after his importance to the Confession arc.

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

A convenient and concise way to start reading and collecting Astro City! This collects the early, classic stories in the series about the fictional American city filled with costumed heroes, villains, and super powered beings, providing a basis for commenting on the nature of superheroes and how regular people live among them, as well as an homage to Classic age comics.

This collects the stories from:

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's a delight when something you remember with fondness is just as good decades later. The first six issues are perfect short-form stories, and "The Nearness of You" is still one of the best single issues ever.

[Marcelo Soares · Rating 5 out of 5]

Astro City é um dos tesouros dos anos 90.
Não tem pochete, não tem ombreiras, não tem armas gigantes, não tem caveira no pinto. Não tem cara de anos 90 porque consegue encapsular a experiência de ler gibi sem se preocupar com a modinha do momento - o que não é bem assim, porque a mudança de perspectiva que começou na Marvels - do Busiek - é o que corre nas histórias de Astro City e essa coleção pega as primeiras 19 edições do gibi.
Tem um pouco de tudo, momentos filosóficos, encontros românticos, invasão alienígena, coisas do sobrenatural, famílias disfuncionais, viagem no tempo e o que acontece quando alguém cai por uma fresta no meio de uma crise qualquer. É ótimo.
A primeira edição, uma das mais belas edições únicas da história da mídia, conta um dia na vida do Samaritan - o análogo kryptoniano da cidade - e é uma obra de simplicidade, a coleção já vale só por essa edição.
O que mais aparece é a simplicidade do cotidiano do super humano que é muito parecida com a nossa porque, no final, os bons personagens são exatamente esses cheios de falhas, dúvidas, sonhos, medos e ilusões.
Eu acho maravilhoso e não tem nenhum personagem parecido com o Deadpool.

[Cloak88 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A master study in Superhero Comics.

Astro City is a work of art! Written as a deliberate reconstruction of the Superhero genre, this colorful and hopeful book is everything I love about Superheroes. Bushiek and his collaborators manage to invent a world reminiscent of the DC/ Marvel universe, but make it feel lived-in and full of history, but all it's own. From the simple pleasures of a man who dreams about flying, a super-powered child wondering what it is to excel at hopscotch, to a unacknowledged villain who commits the perfect crime and thus can't brag about it.

This massive 496 pages comic book was just a pure joy to read. After years and years of publishing purgatory, health problems and corporate shenanigans, this lovely Metrobook is finally here. And even better.... Book 2 is only a few months away!

Go read this book and rejoice in this absolute gem of a comicbook!

[C. Chambers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfection for all who have been engrossed in the medium and feel the need for more... But... Different. Like Alan Moore's deconstruction of the genre in Watchman, Astro City serves as it's antithesis to reconstruct your belief in these books and the joy they can hold.

It's a masterpiece.

5/5 stars

[Mariano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una gran deuda pendiente.

Muy bueno, cómo su fama lo precede. Una lectura densa, que hay que dosificar, pero con una cantidad de ideas por página descomunal. Hay cierto estilo noventoso bastante fuerte (sobre todo en el color y la tipografía) que no envejeció súper bien, pero que no molesta a la lectura. Realmente transmite la sensación de estar en medio de un universo enorme.

Tiene ocho mil referencias por viñeta, algo que le encantará a algunos los fans de eso (no estoy en ese grupo) y que a veces cansa un poco, PERO otras veces la referencia es parte de la historia y la hace golpear diez veces más fuerte, como la descomunal historia del número 1/2.

Seguiré con los otros cinco librazos a ritmo tranquilo para saborearlo bien.

[Bryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a delight to revisit these stories for the first time in a long time. ASTRO CITY is one of those books that's easy to take for granted how great it is. And maybe at some point, it does start to lose steam, but there's no hint of that in these first 19 issues. This is about as good as it gets in the superhero genre.

[Corey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just as enjoyable as when I first read through it. Now to buy the next one.

[Phishy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first 1/2 was excellent, but the second half I completely lost interest. It is an anthology, so maybe I will give further volumes another try.

[Dair · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this reread. Astro City is at the top of the list of superhero books.

[Cal Brunsdon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’d been wanting to read Buseik’s Metro City for YEARS. Consistently touted as one of the OG creator-owned superhero universes (and heavily influencing Black Hammer, Invincible and countless other modern titles), the title revolves around the literally hundreds of caped crusaders of Astro City - but primarily through the eyes of the working joes who make it their home. Buseik examines social issues through the lens of an irradiated, God-filled Earth: the unending media cycle, western work expectations, divorce, and addiction. It’s very well done, and though that early 90s art isn’t always my jam, I look forward to volume 2.

[John Wright · Rating 3 out of 5]

For the most part, it seems like deft retelling of classic comic stories with nobody characters. I guess I just don’t “get it”.

Some interesting ideas and perspectives, but that’s all.

[kavreb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I did not grow up reading superhero comics. As a child I read the Duck comics and some violent foreign-language noir I found lying around (kudos to my parents). So when I started reading reading them as an adult, I lacked the connection or the nostalgia seemingly needed to enjoy most superhero comics and tended to prefer the weird (e.g. Saga of the Swamp Thing), the deconstructive (Watchmen) or visually distinctive (David Aja's run of the Hawkguy). Plus I've never much liked the art style of most superhero comics (hence also the preference for the alternative).

But Kurt Busiek's Astro City is something different within the norm. Its world of superheroes, humans, aliens, villains, multidimensional elemental power beings etc is very much modeled after more famous superhero mythologies (their Samaritian is unapologetically heavily influenced by Superman) and the art style hews closer to what I usually dislike, but the stories they tell have such sense of verisimilitude and interest in the psychological and everyday aspects of living in a world with superheroes, that I absolutely love it.

And in this Metrobook are the stories that first made me fall in love with Astro City. I felt I was reading something special from the very first story, a day from the life of their Superman, concentrated on what does it mean to be the most powerful superhero with a martyr-like need to protect others while still slave to the ticking of a clock? The work stress this guy has is insane, but the most beautiful thing in the story might be that the guy who can fly dreams of flying - the waking flight is not an offer of ultimate freedom, but a tool that allows him to get anywhere fast (so he feels he also must be everywhere fast); but in dreams he can slow down to actually feel the air massage his soaring form.

That very first chapter is a promise that Astro City rarely breaks. It is first and foremost interested in the psychological aspects of a world with superheroes and other such things, and through that becomes a mirror to ourselves (like the best superhero comics often are). It pursues the perspectives of both superheroes, regular humans and villains alike (there's a good story here about a villain, but an even better storyline in the next Metrobook, one of my absolute favourites). It was apt to choose "beautiful" to describe a moment from the first story, for Busiek often reaches for the emotionally beautiful, and often enough achieves it.

As for the Metrobook version of the Astro City itself, well, if you've already got the old Astro City editions, there's no need for this one. For as a Deluxe edition, it's a disappointment - regular sized, soft-cover, no extras, and the panels are a too close to the spine, cutting off a bit more than the older editions. Unfortunately if you don't already own the old versions, you're out of luck - these are the only way to get the older Astro City books, unless you're willing to pay considerable extra on abebooks or some such (and let me tell you, shipping these books outside America isn't something to not bat your eye at). And for that these books do the jobs. The stories are still great, the psychology still deep, and the art still nice to look at (even for a style I'm not usually a fan off; at least Busiek never twists his female characters in the insane ways superhero comics so often love to do; the worst you get here is female costumes modeled after classic female superhero costumes; but the best is somethike like an outspoken Wonder Woman running self-defense training places for women and Superman commenting on how dumb her detractors are).

Even so, I don't think this will be recommendable to everybody who doesn't usually read superhero comics. I do think you need the ability to accept the inherent absurdity of superheroes. But if you can, oh boy is this a treat. And the only "normal"-looking superhero comic I care to recommend.

[Theediscerning · Rating 2 out of 5]

Right back when I was first plucking graphic novels from library shelves, one of the first I read and enjoyed was Astro City. Even I, way back then, could tell it was doing a quite joyous thing – twisting, quirking and disassembling the superhero story, yet not with an eye to being arch and meta and modern, but to do it all with a knowing approach, with a positivity and optimism the world needed then and still does now. So it's a shame how the series devolved, as this book proves.

What we get here is Volume One (ie the first six issues), Volume Two (the next twelve, taking us to #18) and then Issue #Half. And at the beginning, with linked stand-alones, this is wonderful. Yes, the artwork even then wasn't really current, and certainly isn't now (and the Jewish stereotypes in issue #3's visuals really need shouting down, due to being truly horrendous), but the scripts felt a solid, meaningful, modern take on such old things. Here are Superman equivalents that are so recognisable and yet so new and therefore so likeable. But then...

But then we get a horrendous double-issue concerning a superpowered tweenage daughter going AWOL, and its mish-mash of cod-FF side characters and its rampant cheesiness are embarrassing. It gets worse – an extended (and extended, and extended...) story takes us from a neophyte getting inducted into superhero ways, to the dark side of his mentor, to a whole Marvel Civil War anti-powers strand, to alien invasion. Yes, we've seen all of these superseded, but it's not because of that that we find them ditchwater dull – they were dull to begin with. And after that come stories we struggle to want to finish, said optimism and light mere roadkill a long way back.

You think of missed opportunities as flashes in the pan, an opening issue of wonder and interest that then never hits the same stride again. This was a whole book of joy, followed by bleakness and boredom and naffness. The parallels to everyone else's characters become tedious, the drama more so. As a result these 500pp (and how vanilla are these – just the standard cover and nothing else added to the story pages) end up being hard work. I didn't stop then reading my graphic novels, but I do kind of wish that – catching up with how bad this series got to be after all this time – the creators had stopped in their paths. Two stars as a thanks for the memories, sullied as they are.

[Evan Ransom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Show me a person who doesn’t think this is a five star book and I’ll show you a liar (or one of those people that still insist Zack Snyder is a genius).

This spiritual successor to Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross’s Marvels has been one of my favorite series since I picked up the original Confessions trade over 20 years ago. A humanist superhero anthology series like no other on the market, you can pick it up at any point and never feel lost. But I’ve wanted to read it from the beginning for a long time and I am so happy I finally have the chance.

I’ve already read the six-part story about the Confessor and Wizard special “The Nearness of You” (my favorite story in the series) but reading them both in this collection gave me great new context that I never had before. Like how the main-ish plot was actually set up in a previous issue as well as the setting of Shadow Hill, my new favorite location in Astro City. And it’s great to have better context for characters like the Superman analogue Samaritan, or the not-so-Creeper-like Jack-in-the-Box.

But if you’re completely unfamiliar with the series and thinking I’m vaguely hinting at just standard superhero fare, you couldn’t be more wrong. Sure you get stories like
“Dinner at Eight” about two high-profile superheroes just trying to have a date or “Serpent’s Teeth/Father’s Day” that sees another hero confronted with his legacy both through time travel shenanigans AND his wife’s pregnancy. But you also get tales like “Safeguards” that show why some of the Astro Citizens prefer the hellish Shadow Hill over the shinier parts of town, or “Show ‘em All” where a supervillain tells you why he keeps coming back to fight the heroes even though he’s already won.

In other words, it’s the “Man on the street” approach to superhero storytelling that makes you see the myths as people, the citizens as your neighbors, and tells you the girl of the dreams might be more real than you think even when she’s not real at all.

I don’t know if you’d ever want to live in Astro City, but don’t pretend you don’t want to visit. Just make sure to have your camera ready.

[Blake Jarvis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I approached Astro City with some hesitation. As a first-time reader of Kurt Busiek's highly regarded series, I was worried it might not resonate with me—I've often struggled to connect with beloved comics despite their reputation. At first, my fears seemed justified. The series kicks off with a focus on the Samaritan, a Superman-like hero torn between his desire to truly experience life and his duty to protect the city. While the story was well-structured, it didn't immediately hook me the way many had promised it would.

However, things changed around issue 10. That's when I began to feel the depth of what Astro City offers. The series captures the essence of the best of DC and Marvel, but twists it just enough to feel fresh, with heroes that are familiar yet distinct, all operating within the richly imagined city of Astro City—a vibrant, New York-esque metropolis. I expected the story to center solely on the Samaritan, given his prominence on the cover and in the first issue. But instead, Busiek slowly reveals a layered world through anthology-style storytelling, with each issue introducing new perspectives and filling out the city’s landscape.

Characters might appear for just a panel, remaining unnamed until the moment is right to delve into their story, making the city feel alive and interconnected. And while Astro City is, of course, about superheroes, some of its most compelling stories focus on the everyday citizens and how their lives are touched—both for better and worse—by the heroes and villains that share their world.

By the time I reached the later issues, I fully understood why Astro City is so beloved. It’s a love letter to the superhero genre, but it’s also something entirely its own—rich with nuance, humanity, and a deep respect for storytelling. If you’re willing to be patient as the layers unfold, it’s a series that truly rewards you, offering an immersive world that’s both familiar and refreshingly different. I’m glad I gave it a chance, and I can’t wait to see where the journey through Astro City takes me next.

[Rick Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Busiek, Anderson & Ross' epic series gets a new collected edition format. I've read a lot of Astro City in single issues, but it was nice to get a thick trade of Vol. 1 and about half of Vol. 2 of the series. The early Astro City stories hold up remarkably well, with some rather teasing satire on superhero pastiches. It's not reductive sature in any way - Busiek clearly shows his affection for the genre staple in this medium with classic tropes used in almost loving ways. This is perhaps the biggest appeal to Astro City for many readers who grew up on Marvel/DC - something that isn't just a remaster of old classics, rather a celebration of the old with something fresh.

I could rave about individual stories in Astro City (particularly the phenomal 1/2 issue - "The Nearness In You") endlessly, but I think the body of work speaks for itself. My favorite thing about Astro City has always been the highly discretized storytelling structure - each issue stands on its own without much narrative ties to previous issues. It always made for a perfect dollar bin dive in comic stores - any issue of Astro City recovered from a bin would be the promise of a whole and complete story on its own. This is particularly true of the issues collected in this first Metrobook volume, while in the latter portions of Busiek's seminal run there are definitely longer running arcs.

My only gripe with this book is the scans are not quite as good as they can be. I felt like some of the colors looked a bit washed out and when I dug out old issues from my collection to compare the book to, the difference was quite noticable. It won't break one's reading experience, but I do hope future volumes can have higher quality scans for the reproduction.

[Camilo Guerra · Rating 4 out of 5]

-Pórtate bien, ¿vale?.

Un mundo donde los superhéroes son comunes tanto como los policías y políticos corruptos. Astro city es la ciudad mas grande, mas llamativa, una mezcla de Metrópolis con Gotham y la New York de Marvel. Kurt Busiek escribe lindo y clásico, y Brent Anderson dibuja lindo y clásico.

LO BUENO: Es de esas obras con hype inmenso, que todo el mundo quiere ,recomienda...yo era super fanático de la revista Wizard en la que hablaban del comic y siempre decían Astro city es esto, es aquello, es la panacea, y al leerla pues si, tienen razòn, un mundo muy bien construido, te sueltan un mundo de información pero nunca me sentí avasallado, y si te gusta el comic de superheroes, hay mucho que homenajea y se siente bien, desde Superman, los 04 fantásticos, Batman, Spiderman, por montones y eso es chévere, además, creo que esta en el top 03 de trabajos de Alex Ross, el cuál nunca me encanto como diseñador pero acá se sale, y regala unas portadas
increíbles, y la de Jack-in-the-box con la esposa embarazada es de un nivel tan hermoso !!!.

LO MALO: Muy clásico, se pasa de clásico, y hay momentos en que se siente tan amor a la silver age, y unos números tan sosos ( el del periodista, omg), y cosas que se sienten tan obvias tan de lejos,( el caso del alcalde y la similitud de la infiltraciòn skrull) que aburre.

[Romulus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Piąta gwiazda z wahaniem. Nie wszystko mi podeszło, przede wszystkim w drugiej, bardziej rozbudowanej fabularnie części. Niemniej, te opowieści mają fajny klimat. I chyba stworzenie własnego uniwersum superbohaterskiego daje więcej przestrzeni na kreatywne podejście. Co nie jest odkrywczym stwierdzeniem. Tak czy siak, ujęło mnie podejście do superbohaterów. Szalenie niebezpieczne, bo łatwo wpaść w banał lub schemat błahej historii. Napisanie mrocznej historii jawi się jako łatwiejsze - jest przecież wciąż silny nurt anty-heroicznej opowieści, w której pozytywne postacie skrywają jakieś dramaty lub mroczne tajemnice czy oblicza. Wreszcie, mamy „The Boys”, który to serial (jak i komiks) superbohaterów zamienił w łotrów i durni, z którymi uporać się musi garstka barwnych, czasami mrocznych, ale jednak przyzwoitych, zwykłych ludzi. Kurt Busiek swoich bohaterów napisał z ciepłem i empatią, wprowadzając do ich świata czasami smutne, czasami ujmujące obyczajowe wątki, lub dramaty. I właśnie tu tkwiło wspomniane wcześniej niebezpieczeństwo. Z drugiej strony, może intencją był powrót do korzeni, do poczciwej i mocno staromodnej konwencji „czystych” moralnie superbohaterów - ale we współczesnym wydaniu? Nie wiem, tak samo jak nie wiem, czy się udało. Ale efekt był bardzo zadowalający.

[Seb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Figured out how to put comics onto my phone and wanted to read some series all the way through. This was first on my list, an absolute classic of "picking up a random comic in the anette street library."

Astro City feels to me like comics vet Kurt Busiek writing all the stories that were shot down during is time at Marvel and DC. He uses obvious stand-ins for Superman, Batman etc. to tell off-kilter stories set in his superhero world. As a kid I was immediately struck by the first issue, a day-in-the-life of Busiek's Superman proxy, Samaritan, which focuses more on his mental exhaustion and desire for freedom than his battles with supervillains. Every subsequent issue chooses another unique angle, often centering on regular people who have chance encounters with superpowered characters. Some stories are better than others, and Busiek's 90's liberalism sometimes comes off a little dated, but for the most part I find Astro City extremely charming. I'm a sucker for this type of genre remixing, and this specific era of unbridled optimism. Revisiting these was a total blast, and I'm excited to continue on to volume 2.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

4/5? I think that’s what I want to give it?

I went into to Astro City blind (honestly, I still don’t know much about the author or the series beyond what I read in this volume). All I knew is that it was critically acclaimed.

Astro City is an homage to traditional, tights-wearing superheroes. If it feels like you’re in the worlds of DC or Marvel, that’s intentional. For example, the Samaritan is a cape-wearing, flying, super-strength hero who also happens to be a journalist for a big metropolitan newspaper. Sound familiar?

That being said, Astro City is its own universe with dozens of heroes and villains (almost too many, at times). It took me a while to warm up to this book. The first few issues are almost like one-shots. Midway through, you start to get some character arcs. These are the best parts of the book.

The artwork, like the writing, I think is supposed to look like traditional DC and Marvel heroes. It isn’t mindblowing but fitting for the style.

While I did appreciate the work, at times it did feel a bit like a chore to read. I’ll probably read more in the future, but I won’t rush out to find the next book.

[Justin Partridge · Rating 5 out of 5]

“They need us. Is that not enough?”

Obviously I’m quite a few decades late to this but…whooooooBOY are these good comics. And made immediately better in that, these are just broad riffs on characters we are already familiar with so that way we don’t have to waste basically any time with origins or set ups with powers or anything like that.

It’s just all heart and propulsion and just out and out incredible storytelling. Both on the scripting side and production side. The consistency of the artwork with the dynamism of the lettering and coloring. Just masterful stuff throughout. So masterful in fact, I now realize how and why it won basically every Eisner ever when it debuted and stretched into its first major arcs.

And even sweeter, these are just FUN comics to read! You get everything that makes comics the greatest throughout this whole first volume. It’s silly and preposterous but splashy and funny and heartbreaking and beautiful. It’s all the things you wish Big Two comics could be. Truly cannot wait to get deeper into these.

[Cantopia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Contrary to your everyday superhero stories in the bookstore, Astro City focuses on, you guessed it, the city itself, which is like an altered version of Superman's Metropolis. With a more humanitarian approach, the story takes its time depicting the more "mundane" aspect of superhero writing. A lot of stories are one-shot, slice-of-life ones that can be a bit boring at times, so it really needs time to warm up. But there are still a lot of amazing stories like The Confessor and Altar Boy and Jack-in-the-Box that manage to "humanize" the heroes with the bittersweet depiction of superheroes' lives. The last story in this volume, "The Nearness of You", is probably one of my favorite short stories: the concept of time, the powerlessness of both common people and superheroes in some aspects, and also, the connection we have with others that makes us different with other species. Overall I did enjoy most of the stories, and even tho some less interesting ones did make the reading experience feel like a chore from time to time, I still recommend reading it.

[Crazed8J8 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can definitely see why people line this run/collection, but it just wasn't for me.
The artwork is solid throughout, and consistent. The storytelling, while interesting, followed many tropes. We meet Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman and Robin, even Spider-Man, with different powers, and different names, but the trope remains. The focus is more on the humanity of the characters and is told from a ground-level rather than from the hero's perspective most of the time. I've read Marvels before, and love it, and the tone of this collection is very similar, but again, it just wasn't for me.
Even the Alex Ross covers were somewhat lackluster in their breadth. I love his work, but these ones just didn't speak to me.
A good collection, and I would totally recommend it to someone looking for a different kind of superhero book, but to me, it just didn't resonate.