The Threshold

Real Talk:  Infinity is not very good.

It's cold, impersonal, and ultimately pretty boring.  Sure, it has some real epic set pieces, but that junk don't make an impact if I don't care about who or what it's impacting.  And don't even get me started on how the whole Thanos thing feels shoehorned into this over-arcing plot about The Builders and the Ex Nilhos;  it's tenuous at best, but mostly it's just terrible.

But, even though I complain and complain, I'm still going to buy the final issue next week.  Why?  Because I have the other five.  And therein lies the rub.

It was about a decade ago now when I made the conscious effort to stop buying books on inertia.  If I  wasn't enjoying the direction of the book, the creative team, or was just generally not excited about reading it anymore then I wasn't going to read it anymore.  It's a solid policy that's harder than you'd think to enforce, but aside from the odd Secret Warriors run, I've been pretty good at staying true.  

Except,  I just can never figure out the right time to stop buying a miniseries.

Take, for example, Infinity:  It's first couple of issues were good enough to warrant the buy, but after issue 4 I found myself increasingly disengaged with the story on a whole.  Culminating on the point I find myself at today:  I have five issues of a six issue miniseries, so I feel I need to see how it concludes, but I'm not really excited by it.  

I passed the point of no return and now am bound by my stupid feelings of completion to finish off the series.  It sucks.

So the question is:  Where is that Threshold?  What's the optimal number of issues to buy of a miniseries before making a true decision whether to continue or not.

Clearly, buying the first issue is a given.  It gives you a good sense of the tone, style, and hopefully has some gripping plot point that keeps you going.  A great first issue goes a long way to getting me to buy at least the next two to three issues and or looking out for the eventual trade.  A good one has me looking out for the next issue, and of course a bad one has me never going back to that well.  Seems simple enough, right?

Second issues is where things start getting dicey.  If it's no good, or just generally doesn't expand on the promise of the first, I'm out.  If it's good enough, I'll give it another go around before I opt for something more re-reading convenient.  And therein lies the dicey.  

Third issues are trouble because typically (at least with the newer 6-issue series) this is where something big happens that makes you (or me at least) feel the need to buy the next issue.  Then suddenly your four issues into a series you weren't sure about that's going to end in another issue and you might as well keep the train moving.

In other words, we end up where I am with Infinity.  Bleh.

I find myself at a loss.  I don't know how to solve this little conundrum.  So, how do you get around this?  How do you decide when to stop buying a middling miniseries?  Or better, when do you decide to stop buying single issues and just switch to trades?  

I'm curious if any of you have any tips for me and my issues with issues.

Also, does anyone really like Infinity?