[mxlm]

Anyone else reading Young Liars? I picked up both trades this past month and I swear it's the most fucked up thing I can remember reading--and I read Ellis' Crooked Little Vein in May.

[polishgenius]

About the JMS thing, it's a bit daft leaving because you can't handle a company doing their own stuff with their own characters, but since the person who currently calls the shots on these characters is Joe Quesada, I am totally with JMS on this one.

[Illuyankas]

I still haven't found anyone who thinks One More Day was a good idea.

[Aptorian]

This One More Day, what was it actually about?

I heard it was mainly just a HUGE fuck you to Civil War and magically retconning Spiderman's secret identity thorugh some demon who then ate Mary Janes love or something like that.

But did they then also remove that story arch about peter dying and becoming some kind of spider avatar, with stabby claws and real web and stuff? Because I really liked the idea of finally changing Spiderman up a bit.

Without the mystical spider thing going on, it's sort of putting Spider-man in the bottom of the list of priorities.

[polishgenius]

Yep, that was removed. It was basically Joe Q taking Spiderman back to the way he was when he was a little lad because he thinks that's the way it should be.

[Illuyankas]

One More Day was Mephisto (the Marvel Satan) saving Aunt May's life (after Kingpin's sniper missed Peter and hit her) by exchanging Peter and MJ's marriage for it. There was some bullshit about it being a perfect love or something but what it boiled down to was Spiderman making a deal with the devil in order to prolong the life of a eleventy-billion year old woman for about six months - a woman who had told him specifically, while in a coma and with Doctor Strange's help, that she was ready to die now and didn't want him to do anything stupid (LIKE MAKING A DEAL WITH THE FUCKING DEVIL) to keep her alive. So, Spiderman went back to being a single incompetent loser, still living with his surrogate mother at 30-something just like the 70's, just like Quesada's childhood. He also has no Other powers, and he's back to using the webshooters - which would be fine, if only he didn't run out of webfluid in pretty much ever single story.

Oh, and no-one knows he's Peter Parker anymore. No-one. Not Wolverine, not the Fantastic Four, not even Norman Osborn.

Oh, did I mention that accepting the deal killed their unborn child that neither he nor MJ knew about?

I miss the married teacher Parker already.

[Yellow]

I stopped reading Spider-man in the mid nineties. Sounds like it went off the rails somewhere

[Illuyankas]

You did miss Spiderman beating the living fuck out of the Kingpin in the middle of a prison for having his aunt shot, though. That was the only good scene to come out of that whole mess.

[wolf_2099]

mxlm, on Jun 28 2009, 04:18 AM, said:

Anyone else reading Young Liars? I picked up both trades this past month and I swear it's the most fucked up thing I can remember reading--and I read Ellis' Crooked Little Vein in May.

Sight, too little to late, it was canned not too long ago. Issue 18 is last. It's sad, great comic.

[wolf_2099]

On Thor: JMS, and the gentlemen who draws the Twelve, both have so much Hollywood work coming there way after writing and story boarding Changling most of their work has been put on hiatus in comics as it is. Considering JMS last story, was, as mentioned, railroaded by OMD, can anyone blame the guy for not wanting to deal with editorial interference? He would have better paying job opportunities waiting for him. It isn't the first time a writer hjas left a book, or been fired. Peter David is a Good example from Marvel, or Dwayne McDuffie, and especially Alan Moore.

On Spidey: Joe Q always hated spider-man being married, has for a long time. So he decided on a ridiculous storyline that made no sense to dissolve the marriage. It made the clone saga look pale in comparison. (Okay, maybe not.)
Also, for this Storyline, Mephesto seems to have gained powers he didn't even come close to having previously in comics.

http://www.comicbook...rticle&id=12230

|It's magic bitches, we don't gotta explain shit."

This post has been edited by wolf_2099: 29 June 2009 - 07:24 PM

[Abyss]

RodeoRanch, on Mar 14 2009, 01:53 PM, said:

I just finished reading the "Justice" series. I sure do like Alex Ross artwork. Pretty cool series.

Seconded. SO MUCH fun, so much eyecrackcandy. Take awesome characters, pitch continuity out the window, have fun. Result is pure awesome, marinated in awesomesauce. With a side of deep fried awesome.

stone monkey, on Jun 5 2009, 09:30 PM, said:

...And the new League of Extraordinary Gentlemen has, after some delay on this side of the Atlantic, got going. ...

Read the first issue. Am... ambivalent. Wil wait til it's done.

wolf_2099, on Jun 29 2009, 03:23 PM, said:

...It's magic bitches, we don't gotta explain shit."

well, that is one way to hit the reset button.

The fact is, mainstream comics buyers are a revolvling door. For every dude who was a fan from when he was twelve until well into his fourties, there are ten that left when they were sixteen and ten more that turned tweleve and just got there. It's the newbs who power the market, not the dinos. Dinos will buy whatever for however long they care to. They are, within a fairly small variance, a smal portion of the market. ten year olds who saw the Spiderman flic and demand that the parental units provide allowance on wednesday weekly so they can charge down to the local comic shop and look at vampirella pron buy new comics, that, THAT is the dollars they want.

Final Crisis fails (more or less) because it plays to the older fans and the minority of newer fans who can be bothered to look a dxecade of information shit up or download it. You can't break it down into something the average reader can wrap their brain around. It opens, not with massive 'splosions and invasions and dudes getting kicked, but with a more or less obscure character being shot and an almost forgotten dead character being chased by an entirely forgotten character.

Skrull Invasion succeeds (more or less) because it's a shapeshifting alien invasion and that's all you need to know.

Similarly, Sinster Corps War was easy... badguy yellow ring dudes attack! Blackest Night wil probably be this with more bigger 'splosions.

Btw, i"m told, and from the bits i've looked at i agree, that CAPTAIN AMERICA has been the best in decades since they offed him (don't worry, he'll get better). Put another way, 'New Cap kicks bad dudes in the heads, things 'splode, cool spy shit happens.'.

I don't think it's a DC or a Marvel thing, i just think 'events' work bettwe when they have a coherent centre.

Oh, and APT: track down the complete 12 ish run of GLOBAL FREQUENCY. It's brilliant good fun and even the weaker issues are more readable than a lot of the stuff you're grabbing.

- Abyss, ...also watches what's happening over in Batman with interest ...

[Illuyankas]

Abyss, Cap's getting better in less than two months.

In fact, spoilers from Avengers/Invaders 12:

Spoiler

Toro, the sidekick of Jim Hammond the original Human Torch (the android one who killed Hitler, not the gargantuan quivering vagina of the Fantastic Four) is alive again, and it looks like they're reviving Hammond soon too. Invaders reunion, anyone?

[Aptorian]

To be fair I also hate the "Married with Mary Jane" Peter Parker. It was cool back in 90s... 80s? but it's oooold and not really that cool any longer, that whole "science nerd gets the cheerleader" schtick.

I wish she'd die in some spectacularly dreadfull way or at least become properly fucked up a la Daredevils first true love, Karen Page. Who they turned into a crazy heroin addict, hooking for dope and eventually selling Murdocks identity for a fix. I believe they off'd her in true "fuck you disney"-style... AIDS, the ultimate comic book death.

Funny, I don't know when I started to feel this way. I think it may actually have been the horrible troll woman they had playing Mary Jane in the Spiderman films that has pushed me over the edge.

But, seriously, the notion of how hard the One More Day angle must suck has now made me put the spiderman comics in the bottom of my "to read" pile of comic books. I really liked the idea of Peter going primal and becoming a darker character (at least once in a while)

Any spider-man fan loves it when he goes crazy. There's only been a few occasions over the years, but when he dons the black suit and goes on a vengeance it's always awesome.

[Illuyankas]

LEAVE SPIDEY ALONE

Seriously, the amount of shit they write Spiderman going through, it's amazing he isn't utterly batfuck crazy by now. Let the man have some good luck for once. Just not the Dirsten Kunst type.

Also, Amazing Spiderman 542 is the issue with the Kingpin bludgeoning with the black costume BEFORE OMD, if you wanted to read it.

[Aptorian]

Abyss, on Jun 29 2009, 10:24 PM, said:

Oh, and APT: track down the complete 12 ish run of GLOBAL FREQUENCY. It's brilliant good fun and even the weaker issues are more readable than a lot of the stuff you're grabbing.

- Abyss, ...also watches what's happening over in Batman with interest ...

I am downloading it as we... uhm... I mean, I have my people looking into wholeheartedly honest and completely legit channels of acquiring said articles.

About continuity.

I'm currently some 1/3 through the whole Uncanny X-men run (supplementing with X-factor), currently I am at the point where the X-men are fighting Sinister and the Marauders, Madeline Pryor turns into the Goblin queen, Genosha is emerging, etc. And the amount of story I've gone through and the change I've witnessed from the 60s up into the end of the 80s is just amazing. It's easily manageable to understand all the plots and everything fits pretty sweetly together over the course of some 20 years of history. Granted a part of this success is because of Chris Claremont but it is still pretty damn impressive story telling.

On a sidenote, X-factor having never been published and large chunks of story being ignored in danish X-men, may I just say that I squealed like a little girl when I finally read the original stories about Sinister and Apocalypse.

[stone monkey]

Abyss' Global Frequency recommendation is seconded here and then some. Again, I have the floppies; but it is available as two TPBs. It's joyous stuff. Brilliant sf ideas carried off with the usual Ellis aplomb.

The issue "Superviolence" is my favourite of the run. It's absolutely fucking mental. It just consists of two badass dudes kicking the everliving shit out of each other for 28 pages; both of them subscribe to some weird biofeedback technique that makes them superhumanly tough... and that's it... There is other plot stuff in there, but it really doesn't matter...

This post has been edited by stone monkey: 29 June 2009 - 09:44 PM

[polishgenius]

Global Frequency is a masterclass in taut storytelling - there isn't a wasted word or panel. It's probably the leanest comic I've ever read.

The parkour one always sticks in my head.

[mxlm]

Go read the Luna brothers' Girls. Why, you ask? This is why: page one, page two, page three

[Illuyankas]

While those pages aren't horrible, I've read part of Girls.

IT'S UTTERLY UTTERLY SHIT.

So I'm going to have to disagree with you there.

[Aptorian]

I agree it looks shit. Enjoyed the bear bítting him, but I find it completely unbelievable that the kid survived.