So it's not going to leave me seething anger at their screw-ups, then?
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Face Front, True Believers! A Marvel Comics Thread
- Thread starter Octopus Prime
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- comics marvel no-prize snikt-thwip
Vince Coletta may be infamous for… umm… wrecking every comic he ever put ink to; but gal dang Tomb of Dracula is a great looking book;
Granted, I don’t know if he inked anything beyond the second issue, but still! That’s a real good looking page! From Vince!
I think Vince Colletta is misunderstood. Yes - he sometimes erased Kirby backgrounds and/or background characters to make his jobs easier. Yes - it's rumored that he sometimes would ink from his swimming pool.
But he also worked in an era where deadlines were more important than quality. And there are FAR worse inkers for Kirby. Coletta may not have been a great talent, but he was a competent inker and far better than Syd Shores, Don Heck, Chic Stone.
Colletta's work on Thor produced some of the best Kirby art. Compare it to the hack inking work on Captain America after Joe Sinnott left the title.
Any other readers of Marvel Epic Collection line? There have been generous collections of Lee, Claremont in color on nice paper. Cheaper and more comprehensive than the Marvel Masterworks line.
They've been holding back on issuing a lot of the premier 80's work from Miller, Byrne, and Simonson, but I think it will eventually come.
They've been holding back on issuing a lot of the premier 80's work from Miller, Byrne, and Simonson, but I think it will eventually come.
My understanding is that the Epic Collections line is focused on collecting issues that aren't already in collections. So a lot of those famous runs which already have collections aren't a priority.
They haven't been shy about bringing classic Stan Lee stuff from the 60's or Todd McFarlane Spider-Man (which have been collected many times) to the Epic Collections.
BUT they do seem to be avoiding 80's - 90's runs that received Marvel Visionaries collections. Are these even still in print? Just my own observation.
Walt Simonson Thor
John Byrne FF
PAD Hulk
Miller DD
I've been trying to re-read Simonson Thor for years
David's Hulk is currently being collected in the Epic Collection series. The rest of those are all in print in their own collections/omnibuses. I don't pay a lot of attention to classic reprints because it's much cheaper and easier to read comics digitally.
So Ryan Norths Fantastic Four started in MU
Perhaps unsurprisingly having my absolute favourite comic writer work on my favourite comic makes for a book that’s really good
Perhaps unsurprisingly having my absolute favourite comic writer work on my favourite comic makes for a book that’s really good
Started reading Nick Spencer’s Astonishing Ant Man run from 2015.
I will, charitably, say that Nick Spencer is a writer I like half of the time; when he’s writing about minor characters being kind of generally scummy, but not outright bad, he’s terrific. And, luckily, this book has that energy in spades. The main thrust of the story is both about Scott trying to get his small business of the ground (superhero security company, where his only employees are guys like The Grizzly and Machinesmith), while trying to secretly reconnect with his daughter and also having to contend with the development of supervillains going to the gig economy.
Made me say “Oh heck, this is fun as hell!”
I will, charitably, say that Nick Spencer is a writer I like half of the time; when he’s writing about minor characters being kind of generally scummy, but not outright bad, he’s terrific. And, luckily, this book has that energy in spades. The main thrust of the story is both about Scott trying to get his small business of the ground (superhero security company, where his only employees are guys like The Grizzly and Machinesmith), while trying to secretly reconnect with his daughter and also having to contend with the development of supervillains going to the gig economy.
Made me say “Oh heck, this is fun as hell!”
With the usual caveat that no one in this era can take blame or credit for the general direction of the line because it's infamously editorially driven, I'm finding the late 90s Alan Davis written era of X-Men and Uncanny X-Men (with a few separate scripters, like Joe Casey and Fabian Nicieza) to be a huge improvement over the Kelly/Seagle in terms of basic storytelling competence. Also, Davis coming on as a writer also means he does art for one of the books, which is a huge plus, and the issues where Davis appears to be getting room to riff instead of going through the paces of editorially mandated events definitely have that Alan Davis whimsy, too—for example, Juggernaut absorbs too much Cyttorak energy and starts punching through barriers between dimensions.
I'm prepared for it to go sour at any moment because this run is not exactly beloved and I've got The Twelve looming ahead, but so far it's just nice to have issues that meet basic standards of readability again. My hope is that with Kelley and Seagle over I'm through the worst of the worst now. (I know Chuck Austen's run is infamously bad, but my understanding is that it often verges on so-bad-it's-good territory.)
I'm prepared for it to go sour at any moment because this run is not exactly beloved and I've got The Twelve looming ahead, but so far it's just nice to have issues that meet basic standards of readability again. My hope is that with Kelley and Seagle over I'm through the worst of the worst now. (I know Chuck Austen's run is infamously bad, but my understanding is that it often verges on so-bad-it's-good territory.)
I know I've already mentioned how funny it is for all Swedish comic book readers that one of Marvel's big villains is named "Knull" (Swedish for "fuck"). But today I learned that Marvel released a number of alternate covers with characters drawn to be under the influence of Knull, described as "Knullified".
I haven't giggled this much about a Marvel comic since I first learned of Giant-Size Man-Thing.
I haven't giggled this much about a Marvel comic since I first learned of Giant-Size Man-Thing.
Nearly caught up on New Mutants (started with Krakoan era) and… I largely really like it but it is hard to peg down. Book categorically refuses to pick a lane. Definitely benefits from reading a whole lot at once rather than month-by-month.
Each arc is *drastically* different from one another, and can’t even seem to pick a central group for the team (Dani, Wolfsbane and Magik seemingly being the closest thing to mainstays), but each of those arcs is largely self contained so you don’t get a lot of, say, Boom Booms bored melancholy being relieved by finding Bad Guys to Explode getting mixed up with Shadow King trying to corrupt Krakoan youths, say.
And those arcs are, individually good, if not necessarily *fun* (sometimes VERY fun, mind), but they don’t hang together great.
Also; as per the issue I read most recently, Magik straight up had a Sailor Moon moment;
Each arc is *drastically* different from one another, and can’t even seem to pick a central group for the team (Dani, Wolfsbane and Magik seemingly being the closest thing to mainstays), but each of those arcs is largely self contained so you don’t get a lot of, say, Boom Booms bored melancholy being relieved by finding Bad Guys to Explode getting mixed up with Shadow King trying to corrupt Krakoan youths, say.
And those arcs are, individually good, if not necessarily *fun* (sometimes VERY fun, mind), but they don’t hang together great.
Also; as per the issue I read most recently, Magik straight up had a Sailor Moon moment;
Yeah it's a weird book. Hickman's initial arc was straight up comedy which I've never seen him do before.
So… started reading the Sabertooth mini from last year (or so)
You know, The super violent comic about the murdering cannibal wolfman. That Sabertooth.
It’s about encouraging prison reform and what it means if you have a penal system in a supposedly utopian society.
I… *really* did not expect that content from a Sabertooth miniseries
You know, The super violent comic about the murdering cannibal wolfman. That Sabertooth.
It’s about encouraging prison reform and what it means if you have a penal system in a supposedly utopian society.
I… *really* did not expect that content from a Sabertooth miniseries
And yet Sabretooth is still Sabretooth. Fun mini
the whole premise of the first issue is that Krakoa does not like or condone his stomach being repurposed as an inescapable hell-prison, so he tries to be accommodating by making sure the prisoners are treated nicely, and living out their hearts desires…
Which for Victor means a 24/7 slaughter of everything he sees.
And yet
You gotta admit that the unstoppable murder-machine has a valid point
Which for Victor means a 24/7 slaughter of everything he sees.
And yet
You gotta admit that the unstoppable murder-machine has a valid point
Ike Perlmutter is gone, part of a campaign to fold the "redundant" Marvel Entertainment into other parts of Disney.
Good riddance to Perlmutter, but wondering what if any implications this has for the comics side of things. Probably a wait and see issue.
Good riddance to Perlmutter, but wondering what if any implications this has for the comics side of things. Probably a wait and see issue.
I guess I would hope for them to leave the comics division or whatever as it is rather than roll the dice on what could happen in a big shakeup, but we'll see.
HA!
HA!!
HA!!
I have complicated feelings.
Whenever I hear an interview with a Marvel author in recent years talking about a story that was well received by readers, there's this constant refrain that mysterious unnamed corporate forces resisted many of their ideas. It's possible it's all or at least partly kayfabe to show how hard they're working for readers and fighting The Man to do so. I primarily pay attention to X-book related news, and they do basically all specify that they're not taking about their direct editor (Jordan White). Maybe that's just the BS excuse White gives them to shoot down ideas (no evidence of this, but it's a pretty common management tactic in general), maybe that means it's just one step removed (C.B. "Akira Yoshida" Cebulski), maybe it really is some Marvel corporate division focused on protecting intellectual property that sometimes does veto stories that might alter longstanding characters who are likely to show up in the movies too much.
But, if it's actually not just White or Cebulski, then it's theoretically possible that a different corporate approach could be good for the comics side of things. On the other hand, I'm skeptical that basically any changeup under Disney ownership is going to free up the creatives in any substantial way, and also somehow Marvel comics are in a relatively good place now (creatively, at least) compared to most of the first two decades of the 2000s, so this moment isn't exactly when I would ask for a big shakeup in how things are run.
The current Amazing Spider-Man storyline by Zeb Wells is the most cynical thing I've seen a comic publisher release in a while. Spoilery explanation below.
I don't like it!
For context, the previous ASM series, which started in 2018, reunited Peter and Mary Jane romantically for the first time since the infamous One More Day story in 2007, where they traded their marriage to Mephisto in exchange for saving Aunt May's life. In issue #93, the last before the current series, also written by Wells, MJ asks Peter to move in with her shortly before a mysterious figure appears and the scene ends. In the first issue of this series, we see Peter sitting horrified in the aftermath of some sort of explosion without explanation, and it cuts to six months later, where we find out his friends are all angry at him over something he did, he's working for Norman Osborn, and he's separated from MJ, who is living with some guy named Paul and two kids.
Rather than explain this mystery box with any sense of urgency, the series goes through other storylines of varying quality for about a year. Peter and Black Cat become attached again, a relationship we know can't actually work in the long term since she's a criminal and he's a crime fighter, so it feels like a waste of time. In the last issue before the current story, written by a fill-in writer, he tells her that he thinks of MJ as a sister or friend now. This sort of comes off as self-delusion since he has reached out to her multiple times this series only for her to push him away, but fans didn't take it well. It turns out that was nothing compared to what's happening now.
The current story is the long-awaited explanation of what happened six months earlier. In the present, the mysterious figure from issue #93 appears again. The story jumps to the past, where we learn that this figure was Rabin, a forgotten villain from a three issue story Wells wrote 15 years ago, who was trying to bring an evil god into this universe. He comes back and marks Peter and MJ, sending them to another universe that the god has already devastated, where surprise, they meet Paul, the guy MJ is living with in the present. He explains that he was also sent here by Rabin, and that the god took over this universe after he killed its Spider-Man. If he kills our Spider-Man, he'll be able to take over his universe as well. Peter repairs a device to send MJ back to their universe to get help, but the god arrives to kill him, and she uses the device to send him back instead. You can probably see where this is going.
It turns out that what Peter did to piss his superhero friends off was act like a child who can't use his words. When he returns to his universe, it causes the explosion we saw him reacting to in the first issue. He goes to the Fantastic Four to get help saving MJ, but they're weirdly suspicious of him and reluctant to help before squaring away the situation caused by his return. He runs away, punches Captain America, and goes to Norman for help. In this week's issue #24, he reportedly continues to burn his bridges with the FF and makes it back to the other universe, where in the cliffhanger MJ reveals to him that she's been living there for years, and started a family with Paul, including the two kids. We know issue #25 will show things from her perspective and be "heartbreaking". We know that issue #26 will resolve the Rabin story in the present and that somebody will die, and it will be "the most shocking issue in 50 years". This is almost exactly 50 years after Gwen Stacy's death, and there are multiple variant covers referencing that issue, so on top of everything they're teasing the possibility of MJ dying. I see two ways it can go from here.
The first option is that she's telling the truth. She moved on from Peter and fell for Paul, a character so underdeveloped that he has no last name, and had essentially no characteristics before the current story revealed him to be a universe-hopping math-magician out of nowhere. This would basically be a huge fuck you to fans of the Peter/MJ relationship, who waited over a decade for the pair to be reunited and finally got their wish, only for it to be ripped away a few years later in an incredibly cruel way. The second option, which I believe is more likely for multiple reasons both in and out of universe, is that she's lying. We know from the start of this story that Peter needs to die for Rabin to succeed, and that Paul and MJ have some sort of plan than anticipated Rabin's return. There are various clues and theories, but the gist is that for some reason this plan requires Peter to believe that MJ left him and be kept in the dark, and the kids aren't what they seem. This option is preferable, but it's still an incredibly cynical story. It has been intentionally written and presented in a way to antagonize fans and prompt a bunch of clickbait articles and angry forum posts like this one. MJ has not had a single moment of interiority or perspective in this series so far. Just a single indication at any point that she still loves Peter but can't be with him would be a vast improvement in terms of telling an actually heartbreaking story, but this is what we've gotten instead.
Rather than explain this mystery box with any sense of urgency, the series goes through other storylines of varying quality for about a year. Peter and Black Cat become attached again, a relationship we know can't actually work in the long term since she's a criminal and he's a crime fighter, so it feels like a waste of time. In the last issue before the current story, written by a fill-in writer, he tells her that he thinks of MJ as a sister or friend now. This sort of comes off as self-delusion since he has reached out to her multiple times this series only for her to push him away, but fans didn't take it well. It turns out that was nothing compared to what's happening now.
The current story is the long-awaited explanation of what happened six months earlier. In the present, the mysterious figure from issue #93 appears again. The story jumps to the past, where we learn that this figure was Rabin, a forgotten villain from a three issue story Wells wrote 15 years ago, who was trying to bring an evil god into this universe. He comes back and marks Peter and MJ, sending them to another universe that the god has already devastated, where surprise, they meet Paul, the guy MJ is living with in the present. He explains that he was also sent here by Rabin, and that the god took over this universe after he killed its Spider-Man. If he kills our Spider-Man, he'll be able to take over his universe as well. Peter repairs a device to send MJ back to their universe to get help, but the god arrives to kill him, and she uses the device to send him back instead. You can probably see where this is going.
It turns out that what Peter did to piss his superhero friends off was act like a child who can't use his words. When he returns to his universe, it causes the explosion we saw him reacting to in the first issue. He goes to the Fantastic Four to get help saving MJ, but they're weirdly suspicious of him and reluctant to help before squaring away the situation caused by his return. He runs away, punches Captain America, and goes to Norman for help. In this week's issue #24, he reportedly continues to burn his bridges with the FF and makes it back to the other universe, where in the cliffhanger MJ reveals to him that she's been living there for years, and started a family with Paul, including the two kids. We know issue #25 will show things from her perspective and be "heartbreaking". We know that issue #26 will resolve the Rabin story in the present and that somebody will die, and it will be "the most shocking issue in 50 years". This is almost exactly 50 years after Gwen Stacy's death, and there are multiple variant covers referencing that issue, so on top of everything they're teasing the possibility of MJ dying. I see two ways it can go from here.
The first option is that she's telling the truth. She moved on from Peter and fell for Paul, a character so underdeveloped that he has no last name, and had essentially no characteristics before the current story revealed him to be a universe-hopping math-magician out of nowhere. This would basically be a huge fuck you to fans of the Peter/MJ relationship, who waited over a decade for the pair to be reunited and finally got their wish, only for it to be ripped away a few years later in an incredibly cruel way. The second option, which I believe is more likely for multiple reasons both in and out of universe, is that she's lying. We know from the start of this story that Peter needs to die for Rabin to succeed, and that Paul and MJ have some sort of plan than anticipated Rabin's return. There are various clues and theories, but the gist is that for some reason this plan requires Peter to believe that MJ left him and be kept in the dark, and the kids aren't what they seem. This option is preferable, but it's still an incredibly cynical story. It has been intentionally written and presented in a way to antagonize fans and prompt a bunch of clickbait articles and angry forum posts like this one. MJ has not had a single moment of interiority or perspective in this series so far. Just a single indication at any point that she still loves Peter but can't be with him would be a vast improvement in terms of telling an actually heartbreaking story, but this is what we've gotten instead.
I don't like it!
As long as one red headed girlfriend is treated well, and one is treated poorly, there is equality in our universe
I mean, not gonna lie, I've been enjoying this part to the fullest extent that I can, even though I know it probably won't last, if only because of "that Parker luck," i.e. their excuse to keep doing shit to Peter.
I like Black Cat as a character a lot, but this feels off when she previously said she didn't want to be a rebound.
Just finished the Matt Fraction Fantastic Four/FF run and, honestly… this might be my all time favourite run on the book(s)? *Definitely* the best implemented “Two Different Series You’re Supposed to Alternate Between” book I’ve read. Both books tell their own completely unrelated stories, however they keep unintentionally coinciding, and because Time Travel is a major part of one of them, they’re also completely out of sync so ignoring one to focus on the other doesn’t impede your understanding at all.
Also you’ve got Mark Bagley as the lead artist for most of one of those runs and Matt and Laura Allred for the whole of the other and you know I’m on board with them.
It’s also the only time I’ve seen Doom written as… just a terrible person. Not in a fun overblown comic book villain who’s convinced he’s a hero way, he’s just a friggin’ asshole, and the entire last issue of FF is an extended speech from Scott Lang (who has more cause than most to hate Doom) pointing out that, no, he’s not a Fun Supervillain Who Brags a Lot, he is a bastard. Which, weirdly is not the direction his characterization tends to take.
Also you’ve got Mark Bagley as the lead artist for most of one of those runs and Matt and Laura Allred for the whole of the other and you know I’m on board with them.
It’s also the only time I’ve seen Doom written as… just a terrible person. Not in a fun overblown comic book villain who’s convinced he’s a hero way, he’s just a friggin’ asshole, and the entire last issue of FF is an extended speech from Scott Lang (who has more cause than most to hate Doom) pointing out that, no, he’s not a Fun Supervillain Who Brags a Lot, he is a bastard. Which, weirdly is not the direction his characterization tends to take.
The "shocking death" in the next issue of Amazing Spider-Man has leaked and it's so stupid that I'm just gonna go ahead and write off this series until there's a new writer
Do I even want to ask, or have I already guessed it?
If you want to know: It's Kamala Khan. Obviously she will be resurrected, probably to make her a mutant in time for her first film appearance. But doing this to her as the climax of a story she had very little to do with and that everyone is already sick of is just incredible.