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Runaways Vol. 1: Pride and Joy Kindle & comiXology
When six friends discover their parents are all secretly super-villains, they run away from home and straight into the adventure of their lives -- vowing to turn the tables on their evil legacy.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherMarvel
- Publication dateApril 14, 2004
- Grade level8 and up
- File size386422 KB
- Due to its large file size, this book may take longer to download
- Read this book on comiXology. Learn more
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
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Product details
- ASIN : B00AAJR2EI
- Publisher : Marvel (April 14, 2004)
- Publication date : April 14, 2004
- Language : English
- File size : 386422 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Not enabled
- Enhanced typesetting : Not Enabled
- X-Ray : Not Enabled
- Word Wise : Not Enabled
- Sticky notes : Not Enabled
- Print length : 145 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,146,096 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #1,443 in Contemporary Women Graphic Novels (Kindle Store)
- #1,801 in Contemporary Women Graphic Novels (Books)
- #7,469 in Marvel Comics & Graphic Novels (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Brian K. Vaughan is the Eisner Award-winning writer of Y: THE LAST MAN, EX MACHINA, RUNAWAYS, and PRIDE OF BAGHDAD. His newest work, with artist/co-creator Fiona Staples, is SAGA, an ongoing sci-fi/fantasy series from Image Comics that The Onion's A.V. Club called, "the emotional epic Hollywood wishes it could make." Vaughan lives in Los Angeles, where he works as a writer and producer on various film and tv projects, including three seasons on the hit series LOST.
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Top reviews from the United States
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I love the concept of Runaways: what would you do if you found that your parents were super-villains and you found out because you watched them (through a one-way mirror from a secret passage that you just discovered) murder an innocent young woman? Well, in Vaughan's Runaways series, six youngsters discover exactly that, as they find that their parents are members of "The Pride," a group of villains bent on domination and in almost complete control of the city of Los Angeles, with powers from magic, science, time travel, mutation, and another world.
As it happens, the kids have a few surprises up their sleeves as well, as they go exploring to find out everything they can about their parents and their activities. And in the course of a single night, they find themselves fighting for their very lives against their own parents. In the world that Vaughan has dreamed up, the only thing the kids can depend on is each other, as their parents use their complete control of the city to frame their own children for a crime they didn't commit, making it clear to the children that there will be no help from any other quarter. But even their allegiance to one another is called into question, as the parents find a note from one of their children...
Once you get past the unbelievability of the main premise (but, after all, is being bitten by a radioactive spider or becoming a God of Thunder really any more believable?), the story rings true, with dialog and situations that follow naturally, as events quickly explode well beyond what the kids would have thought possible just 24 hours earlier, and the kids search for some sort of sanity, some clue that would allow them to make sense of their whole world turning upside down literally overnight.
Vaughan takes his time with this one, not providing too much exposition or too many explanations (i.e., we don't find out how the Pride formed in this volume, nor just what the source or extent of their powers are). The story starts off quite slowly, as the kids meet up when their parents come together for their annual ritual. But once it explodes into action, it really explodes, and doesn't stop until the last page of the book.
The artwork by Adrian Alphona complements the story well. It's a bit cartoony or, as another reviewer put it, "manga-influenced," with very fluid facial expressions, in particular, and with somewhat muted colors throughout, but it really shows the full range of emotions that the youths experience throughout this first set of events.
It's an intriguing concept and Vaughan makes the most of it, creating characters and situations that I really want to know more about. I can't wait to see where he's going with this and I can heartily recommend this series.
Still, it's got a nice pace, action, dark deeds, heroic deeds, and the bickering you'd expect among teens. Plus a pre-teen who adds the added dimension.
In this opening bound volume, we get to meet the families of Villains/Heroes--that is, the parents are villains and the kids will be heroes who decide to break from the familial units and band together to stop the evil plans of their moms and dads. That, in itself, is a huge conflict. Think about it: Would you be willing to fight your parents to the death? Hmmm. I don't know. Sounds tough to me. And that's good. Anything that adds an emotional and conflictive dimension to a story is a dramatic plus.
So, kids find out who parents really are, learn things about themselves they never knew (ie, each one has a power/gift/specialty), and, yes, they become RUNAWAYS. Of course, running away from supervillains isn't easy. They have ways of making you show yourself, ways of tracking you, ways of making running away extremely stressful. And that's good, too.
I like the digest size volume. I am vexed that amazon doesn't have the digest size volume two: Teenage Wasteland. Geesh. Now I have to traipse to the local comic store and scout for it. Or order it. Why is volume 2 so hard to find?
Well, be warned. While volume one is a pleasant graphic novel read, you may have a bit of a headache getting to the next installment in this form.
Mir
****BUT BEWARE; THE PAGES FELL OUT OF MY BINDING ON THE FIRST READ*****
I got Runaways 1-5 and had to return them all. I hate to discourage anyone from purchasing these great books, especially because this doesn't seem to be the universal experience, but buyer beware. It looks like someone else had this problem 15 months ago as well. I just hate to see anyone go through the hassle I went through. If you get them, it's a risk you take. Luckily, Amazon's return policy is excellent, and they were easy to return, but still a bummer, because the story is great. My kids have loved these and were really looking forward to having copies of our own (we read them from the library).
May just end up buying them for the iPad. At least then the pages can't fall out!
The storytelling and art are amazing and should appeal to readers tween to adult. The themes are universal and relatable (teen angst, high expectations parents, being attracted to your goth friend) and the diverse cast teaches young readers a great message without ever being preachy. Most importantly it’s fun, with snarky, MCU-esque dialogue at every turn and loads of great action. One of my all time favorite comics.
Top reviews from other countries
I've been reading many US comics lately and the more I read them, the more I feel the differences between the way I intend a fumetto should be and the way Americans draw their comics. I grew up with Disney comics and I got used to very bright colors and nice, fluffy drawnings. Then I switched to manga and I found out that the more kawaii a drawing is, the more I like it. When it comes to Us comics, you rarely get bright colors and kawaii art.
I don't know why, but colors in Us comics are always dark and brownish. Come on, there are millions nuances that are better than brown... Even in Runaways brown is the most used color. What's wrong with brighter colors? Even the different color shades seems fake in these comics.
What I also don't like in Us comics is... the strokes, but I'm not sure this is the right word. Take this one, for instance, or The Hockey Saint or Alex + Ada, Vol. 1. It seems to me that you can see from a mile away that they're drawn on a screen. And The results... I don't know... It's like drawers can't draw expressive faces anymore. Most of the faces in those comics have always the same expression over and over.
And even Japanes artists used computer nowadays but their strokes are thinner and they are able to show tons of expressions in their characters' eyes. American artists - but also Italian ones - haven't learned to do that yet. And it seems that they will never learn. SIGH!
Apart from the drawning style, Runaways has an interesting story. Six kids find out that their parents belong to a sort of secret society named The Pride and they're all super-villain with distinctive characteristics: you have the ninja-like couple, the witches, the aliens, the mutants... Of course, their kids have inherited some of their traits.
My favorite character in this first issue is... the name-less dinosaur from the future. I wasn't that sure that I would continue reading the series but as soon as I saw the dinosaur I was hooked. I also like Nico very much, while Molly and Chase are my least favorite protagonists so far. Chase because he seems to be the classic brain-less jock. Molly because she's a bit wimpy for the time being.
I also don't like the parents... which aren't that big on parenting apparently.
Let's see what happens next. Fortunately this short series has an ending... I hate comics that are never-ending, sorry!
With its easy to grasp concept and the right amount of action and romance to keep things ticking along until the last page, it's easy to see why kids took to the title and saved it from cancellation (twice) as a monthly series, and as a trade collection, it works well as medium-sized snippets of a larger ongoing story, combining with volumes 2 and 3 to cover the origin of the characters and their first adventure before striking out into the wider Marvel universe in search of a direction.
The size and format isn't really an issue, being more to give the series the look of a manga title (I assume because these are popular with Runaways' intended audience of teens), and the artwork combined with some blunt dialogue helps with the affectation, but the low paper quality might mean buying another copy of the book a few years down the line if this one gets more than one read-through - which it very well might.
A commendable effort on Marvel's part to reach younger readers, and a good start to the series.