Amph The Great Soontir's and Glorious Chissman's comic talk shop. (ITT get yelled at by a crazy person)

Well, sure, in-continuity it hasn't been that long, but when you need an Endangered Species event to remind everyone "Hey this is a big deal, honest!" then perhaps there's a problem. Although I read somewhere that Brubaker had originally planned to be on UXM only for twelve issues, so he wisely did a story that wouldn't deal much with the overarching storyline, choosing instead to focus on his space adventure.

 

I have absolutely no interest in Secret Invasion. I hate Bendis when he writes the Avengers and the last two events penned by him have been terrible. And the new avengers issues drawn by Yu have been a fragging nightmare. Also I find it stupid that the Skrulls would bother with Earth when their galaxy has just been ravenged by the Annihilation wave and Annihilus. Man Annihilation was good. Course some people had to be brow beat into buying it.

On the other hand despite that the first half of Countdown was middling, I am really excited for Final Crisis. I wasn't on board at first because I thought it was too soon with IC just happening, but Morrison and Jones? New Gods? Hell yeahs! And it's going to be fairly self contained, which is a lesson I think DC learned from the Sinestro Corp Wars.

Speaking of SCW I know the lanterns have a part to play in FC, but I wonder about the other Corps. Will they make an appearance? And what about Superman Prime in a Geoff Johns book. Whats going on there?

 

I'm tentatively looking forward to Secret Invasion, it has a "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" feel to it that is kinda cool. I'm just afraid it will turn into "Hey guess who is a Skrull?" when it turns out it's mostly B listers that no one cares much about anyway.

 

You tentatively look forward to everything. And I guarantee that everything we thought we knew will still be what we know when it's over. Or it will be changed to something stupid. Like Hawkeye is a Skrull or something. Maybe Jessica Jones. Who sucks anyway.

 

I'm REALLY looking forward to "Blackest Night" thank you.

 

If John Stewart dies does he become a Black Black Lantern?

 

i really enjoyed the 4 part mini-series of annhilation:starlord.
i like how they brought bug back from the pit and also rocket racoon.
cpt. universe is good too, but that's just because they really needed another bill mantlo character.
speaking of bill mantlo, i heard that he busted up his head and that he can't connect with reality anymore. when i found that out, i was like: "woah". i mean, a guy like bill, with that sort of imagination, basically being trapped in his own mind. that's a pretty crazy thought.

i guess you could say that i appreciate a lot of older comics/spin-offs and ideas that nobody likes to talk about anymore. mostly like the maxx, the micronauts, and the varied 2099 serieses.
in the more modern world, i must admit that i am glad peter david is back with x-factor again.
and as far as x-men go, well , i don't even know where to look at the x-men these days. there's about 5 different x-mens out there. i do like what i've read of astonishing x-men though. they seem to be aweful colorful.

 

At least it's better then being Dave Sim. Still in control of your senses, but driven entirely mad by your work and left a misogynistic shell of a man.

 

yeah, it's not all bad.
i hear he still accepts letters from fans.
though fans shouldn't expect anything to be written back.

 

With DC, they haven't forgotten about their long standing plot threads. Everything flows from one into the next, whereas at Marvel, you have some of the complaints we've had here and elsewhere. I give Quesada credit for bringing Marvel up, but sometimes, he and some of his writers miss out on things. Like with "House Of M" and it's fall out, but I think that's attributed to doing "Civil War" taking up everyone's time. It wasn't planned out initially and was put together on the fly. Which would account for the inconsistancies and what not.

The Red Lanterns will be appearing, from what I understand, after Hal's origin story and the Alpha Lanterns arc ends. Johns has said that they're first.

 

January 2008 Sales

Some things I found interesting:

-Marvel utterly crushed DC this month, however those number may be slightly inflated due to many "events" happening at once (start of BND, Hulk #1, end of Messiah Complex, two issues of Mighty Avengers)

-As for BND, sure there was a big drop from #546 to #548, but remember, it's still doing far better than Friendly Neighborhood and Sensational were doing a couple months ago. If they can keep ASM at about the same level it was pre-OMD, then that would have to be considered a success.

-It pains me to see Green Lantern not even crack the top 20. It is by far DC's best book of the moment, and yet friggin' Countdown outsells it (yes yes I know it's an event and the quality has improved lately...)

-As for Countdown, it's been holding steady for months now, with maybe the slightest trend downwards. Still, I'd expect it to rise as we approach Final Crisis.

-Star Wars: Legacy #18 at #75 is the highest I've seen a SW book in some time.

 

I've mentioned it on similar TFN comics threads before, but my REAL big fear about "Secret Invasion", which I probably won't invest money in anyways, is that the storyline will serve as a scapegoat for all the stuff that was switched around in "Civil War". (I remember when rumors were flying at the time of CW's nearing conclusion that it may well end up being a "mind control" conclusion. That was ONE thing I was thankful didn't happen in the conclusion, but it wouldn't shock me to hear that Marvel chalks up some of the CW events to Skrull "intervention". )

What I AM happy about is, according to this thread, the anticipation building for "Final Crisis". The pieces are in place to make for a KILLER story, and I'm eager to see where Morrison takes it. (I admit that "Countdown" has been iffy in spots, but now that it's nearing the end, things actually ARE getting interesting... And for another look at what looks to be a BIG part of FC, I have to throw in a recommendation for "Death of the New Gods". That mini-series has been nothing but enjoyable every issue I've read.)

 

Everyone associated with Marvel and Secret Invasion has said many times that both Iron Man and Captain America are not Skrulls. Granted, they could be lying, but I don't remember any double speak in any of those denials. They even said it in response to the fear that Secret Invasion would be used to cheapen Civil War. I suppose we'll see.

As for Final Crisis, I'm interested, but not nearly as much as I was for Infinite Crisis. Maybe I'm beginning to be "Crisised" out...

 

are the secret defenders going to save us from the secret invasion?



...secrets......

 

How can you cheapen CW even more than it cheapened itself?

And I'm pretty sure you aren't looking forward to FC more because you are a godless sodomite who doesn't love Jack Kirby enough.

 

They didn't save us from the Secret War now did they?

How can you cheapen Civil War even more? "Civil War II: More Registration"

 

civil war II: draft dodgers!

 

Civil War II: Electric Bugaloo

 

I had forgotten how fantastic Ex Machina was, but my volume 1 trade came today and changed that. Everyone always associates Brian K Vaughan with Y-The Last Man, but this is fantastic as well.

 

I've got a bunch of new shelves, very nice shelves really, and I was sorting through my trades to try to decide what would go where on the shelves, and what would even make the new shelves. The pile that made it soon gathered recent runs on Green Lantern, the Ultimates, Y: The Last Man, Ex Machina, Captian America, Wanted, Red Son, Fables, Annihilation, Planet Hulk, Astonishing X-Men, New Frontier, Paul Dini's Batman run, The Losers, and a few others.

I took the time to sit down and try to decide what all my favorite stories had in common, if anything.

What I decided:

A) They all had clear storytelling objectives. Whether in ongoing series or miniseries or otherwise, you could describe the main thrust of things in one or two sentences.

B) They were all self-contained. Even Green Lantern, sometimes crossing over into the wider DCU, still managed to be very self-contained, not relying on guest stars to boost the story. You could pick up the run at the start of the run, read through the run, and everything that you needed to know was there. Dini's Batman run is all one-shot stories, so he could get hit by a bus tomorrow and the series would still feel complete.

C) They all feel like they're going somewhere. Even in the Dini Batman run, there's been a growing relationship between Batman and the Riddler, and Batman and Zatana, and those have been great fun to read.

D) They feel like the writer or a small group of writers is deciding things. It doesn't feel like the editors are deciding things.

E) When it does smack of editorial interference, things aren't nearly so good.


Draw your own conclusions...

 

That's one of the reasons I like Morrison's New X-Men. I'm not generally a fan of Morrison. His work usually doesn't appeal to me. But with the X-Men, I think he's said something along the lines of, "Whatever went before, whatever comes after, I'm writing a book." His run is self-contained, and is one clear, sequential story, beginning to end, that really builds to its conclusion and denouement.

Has anyone read any of Rick Remender's Fear Agent? Fun, but lightweight. Haven't decided whether to continue the series yet or not.

 

You're certainly right about that; it didn't take Marvel long at all to completly unravel everything he established in NXM. In fact, wasn't it within a month of his leaving that they revealed "Just kidding, Magneto wasn't really Xorn, and in fact, he's alive!"?

 

There was no X-Men after morrison. It ended when he left.

 

I didn't like Morrison's X-Men much. I liked some of the concepts, liked some of the individual stories, but as a whole I didn't care for the run at all.