Just read Ultimate FF 14 and I liked it. Sure, it was mostly talk, but come on…it was GOOD talk. Especially Dr Storm’s rant about his kids…that was freaking HILARIOUS!
Batgirl. I like Batgirl and Robin together. They’re good compliment. Now that all of Tim’s other prospects are… well, dead… I’d like to see these two hit it off. 
Ultimate FF. Ditto on the pacing. Lots of great dialogue (and Johnny Storm sure is hot in some of the art, and not in a flame-on sorta way), but this story was them walking down a hall then getting in a shuttle. Wow. I wish I could get paid to write nothing for 22 pages a month.
Superman/Batman Words cannot describe how much I hate this book, but it impacts continuity in major ways, so I keep subjecting myself to it. First they ruin Lex Luthor, then they foist Superslut on us, and now this nonsense storyline. Boring, and terribly written. I mean terribly written. Those dueling narration boxes? Cute the first time, but utterly pathetic now. Stop it. Just stop it. Stop destroying the DCU!
I don’t mean to pick on YOU, spectrum, but this mindset is the reason that the Big Two publishers keep churning out the same tired, turgid crap comics–because people consider themselves “completists” and “collectors” who buy books they don’t even like. Because there are “traditions” and “loyalty” involved in following the adventures of 65-year-old corporate trademarks we all read when we were kids. Because maintaining “continuity” is supposedly more important than storytelling. Why not just drop a comic that no longer blows your proverbial cape up? Vote with your wallet! The Internet is full of unhappy comic book fans, but the biggest complainers are always the ones who spend the most money–and Marvel and DC know it! They will just keep coming out with the same stuff whether people like it or not, because people buy it even if they don’t like it! Can’t miss an issue, gosh no! It might get better!
Try new comics–something risky, like Vertigo or Wildstorm or Oni or something truly “indie” or self-published. Dig through discount bins and find some wonderful cheap back issues from the '80s. Order a new TPB from Amazon.com for 30% off. There is no need for so many cookie-cutter subpar superhero books clogging the shelves, especially those that begin with “X”, “Bat”, “Spider”, “Super”, or “Ultimate.” You won’t die if you end up with holes in your run, or if you miss a key issue that some upstart writer might refer back to ten years later. Just drop it, try something new, or save your money! I’m down to buying just one monthly comic, and I love the feeling.
Wow, you don’t understand the situation at all. First, yes, I like continuity. I want the DCU (don’t really care about Marvel) to have some basic sense of logical history and a tangible something that roots the books into the same universe. But that doesn’t mean I want the same thing over and over again. I drop books all the time. But there are characters I really care about … or did until they ruined them, and that’s the only reason I pick up Superman/Batman.
Continuity doesn’t mean never changing. I want things to change and evolve. Hell, I want the characters to AGE. Nothing pisses me off more than retreading old ground when there’s new stuff still to explore – that’s why I hate the way Superman/Batman has raped the Lex Luthor character and introduced Superwhore. Stop trying to undo Crisis, you jack asses.
I read lots of that stuff. My favorite book is Y: The Last Man.
I sort of understand what you’re saying, Big Bad Voodoo Lou (although I don’t think spectrum actually said any of the things you’re criticizing him for), but spectrum is absolutely right. Superman/Batman is a terrible, terrible book and has been since issue #1. For reasons that are utterly beyond me, I follwed it up until ish #13 or so and now I read it in the store when new issues come out and it continues to be one of the most awful books I’ve ever read. It’s huge popularity utterly baffles me (well, maybe not that much, it does tend to get very pretty artwork).
I read through this week’s, and my opinion remains no different.
Wow! A lotta folks chiming in this week! Fun to read what everyone’s saying. Good deal!
Batman/Danger Girl – grumbles/mutters Dammit, they had TWO different cover variations. Been awhile since I’ve read a Batman x-over one-shot. And I wondered, would the light, T&A fluff stuff blend with the no-nonsense Batman? Luckily, somehow, you get both. Each title character goes after their familiar own villain who are in league with each other. There’s a Catwoman cameo that seems superfluous (and has IMO an implausible moment) though. Still, decently executed. Blink and you’ll miss a “Nader Wins” headline on the Gotham Tribune.
Teen Titans #19 – I know I’m in the minority, but I’ve been enjoying this story all along. I’m a sucker for seeing characters like Bette Kane and Bumblebee. Johns has been oh-so careful and playing close to the vest as to revealing the futuristic fates of some characters while tossing some bones as to what this (possible?) future looks like. I don’t think this issue had a flat ending either, what with the epilogue with the future Superman paying a certain someone a visit in Smallville.
Superman/Batman #16 – Yeah, I usually have a beef with the dueling, off-setting yellow and blue “thought boxes,” too. I didn’t mind or notice that much though here; I thought there was too much action and cameos going on – which made this the most enjoyable chapter for me. I really liked seeing Kamandi and all the old DC western heroes. I thought Batman’s actions at the end of the issue were totally plausible – makes me want to see what happens next (like a good comic book should).
Amazing Spider-Man #515 – (Yay! My run of this title now eclipsed the 500 consecutive issue mark.) Nice cover with a tank-topped n’ shorts MJ giving Spidey a sack lunch before exiting a window. So, Skin Deep part 1 of 4 … sighs Someone from Peter’s high school past is introduced who’s even more of a geek than he was? mmm … I suppose that’s less of a stretch than the whole Gwen/Norman affair. Eh, talky issue too … too much Peter, not enough Spidey.
Batman #635 – Nice Matt Wagner cover. Too bad the depiction of the Red Hood on the cover doesn’t quite match the un-tuxedoed one inside the book. As what seems to be the prerequisite for a current Batman comic, you get the too-talky word boxes with Batman’s thoughts. The current mystery for the reader is to figure out just WHO is behind the Red Hood (I’ve got a hunch), as it obviously doesn’t seem to be the same person who was the original Red Hood. Okay, but this issue seemed to drag a wee little.
Legion of Super-Heroes #1 – I have high hopes for this, but had some mild mixed feelings after reading this – not that I didn’t like it, just too soon to tell. Saw some of my favorite Legionnaires (Ultra Boy, Shadow Lass, and Light Lass), but didn’t see some others (Dream Girl) yet though. Some of the costumes look different (Colossal Boy, Star Boy), one is no longer caucasion (Star Boy), and one seems to be either sex (Chameleon). Kitson seems up to the task doing artwork on a team book with a LOT of characters. I chuckled at the folks making the “L” sign witht thumb/forefinger NOT for “loser,” but for “Legion” – cool. I’ll stick around for a bit.
Batgirl #59 – the conclusion to the “Fresh Blood” story. Well, I didn’t exactly see how they were gonna get from point A to point B in the “cliffhanger,” so I gotta give 'em props there; but the conclusion was a bit predictable. Decent ish, but not great.
Captain Greedy #1 – this was in my hold slot; it looked interesting from the blurb from Previews so I got it, but this likely was a resolicitation. Part b/w comic, part b/w fummetti comic, part ego-stroke, it’s about a guy named Geoffery Patterson ("#1 Comics Fan") who owns a CA comics shop and has his own cable tv show. Some interesting parts, I mighta enjoyed it more if I really knew the guy personally. I would’ve liked some more interesting bits with the fumetti stuff though.
I still have a lotta reading to do. I also got: Elektra Movie Adaptation (Jennifer Garner cover, natch!), Adam Strange #4, Doom Patrol #7, JSA Adventures #5, Superman #212 (some nice Jim Lee Lois scenes here), Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes #4, Iron Man #2, Ultimate Fantastic Four #14, Ultimate Nightmare #4, Tom Strong #30, and all 6 of the Marvel “What If …?”'s
See, this is why I hate continuity with a burning passion. You can have your Superman and Batman that you like in your books, and I can have the versions I like in mine. God knows both guys have enough books to accomodate us both.
I love Superman/Batman. Along with Flash, it’s my favorite title right now. It’s tone is epic and over-the-top, as befitting a book about the two greatest Superhero icons of all time. But I totally understand there’s people who bristle at a Batman (or a Superman, for that matter) that uber. That’s cool. They can read about a darker, more crazy Batman in, say, Batman, and I can get mine in S/B and perhaps JLA (and can I have a less powerful but still not quite crazy Bats in say, 'Tec?).
Is this the same Character? Hell no. Do I care? Hell no. Each book should keep its own tight continuity, and the universe as a whole should keep a looser one.
For example, Lex Luthor is no longer president, and everyone should respect that. But in one book, he can be a more quiet behind the scenes baddie, and in another, crazy powersuit guy. Both are valid and historically supported versions of the character. Trying to keep sixty years of history perfectly straight in thousands of published books by hundreds of authors is just madness.
Don’t like Kara? Don’t read books with her. I don’t care. I kinda like her, and I’ll read the ones with her that interest me.
The interior monologue is getting kinda tiresome. But the plots are still so cool!
Characters should be consistent. Luthor going batshit insane in Superman/Batman DOESN’T FIT THE CHARACTER. At all. The low-talent writer just did that because he wants to undo Crisis.
The same with polluting the DCU with Superwhore. We already have a Supergirl, dammit.
For twenty years, DC has been doing well post-Crisis, putting a new spin on old characters. Now a bunch of retards are running the show and are trying to bring back the bad old days. It makes me seethe.
Nobody picked up Concrete? Man, it’s a dark day in comicdom.
Granted, Concrete isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and it teeters on the precipice of “deep” and “up with people,” but since there aren’t little flowers drawn everywhere I think we can call it deep. The thing I like about it so much is that the situation is set so there could be a real angst-fest, but instead he (both the author and the chracter) try to do something positive with it. Earlier stories focused on how his new body and his new awareness reveal things that he had only dreamed about the natural world and there was always the temptation of whether or not one *should * do something (especially something that they’ve always dreamed of) simply because they can. Pretty heady stuff.
I don’t know how well someone picking up this series alone would do with the story, but it seems fairly accessible.
The included “Island of Unicorns” short was a really bizaare thing to throw in to what was essentially a new jumping-on point for beginners.
The essay on Concrete’s favorite painting was also very unusual and, to be sure, not a terribly interesting painting. Makes me think that maybe there are dragons airbrushed on the side of Chadwick’s van.
Self-referentialism was also evident in Kabuki. I picked up Circle of Blood (or at least the first four issues) at the Chicago ComiCon the year it was released (I was so excited that I bought something from a real comics person) and promptly forgot about it until I saw Mack at a smaller con in Chicago.
This latest series also goes into some odd reflexivity, but it reminds me a lot of *Cerebus *, especially the scene where Kabuki is on the plane, reading a book by Mack while Mack walks up and sits next to her. IIRC, Kabuki is modeled after (or at least the photos taken of) his girlfriend/wife.
Woah.
Of course, creators making a pit stop in their own works is nothing new, but we’ll see what happens here. The theme of making your own story/fate is pretty strong here esp. with the vet but doen’t really get too heavy-handed which makes this a story I think is really worth reading (especially after that awful “Echo” story he did in Daredevil. The story was a nice thought, but wasn’t really a story to speak of. Perhaps I’m not familiar enough with the character. Of course, this Kabuki story is essentially the same theme and the characters are surprisingly similar (at least Echo/the vet)).
Of course, complaints about **UFF’s ** glacial pacing will be compounded here. The action is roughly: Girl gets passport, gets on plane.
I haven’t got this week’s books yet, but I had to jump in on this. Don’t give up on the JSA entirely because of Strange Adventures. That mini is told in a very Golden Age style; the “golly gee” aspect is part of that old-school charm. The current *JSA *series is one of my favorite titles. It takes place in the present-day DCU and there’s very little “golly gee” to it, just characters ith a hell of a lot of history.
For forty years before that DC was doing fine with only a loosely connected shared universe, and it was much, much better.
How do we know? They sold much more comics! Now, competition from TV, video games etc. as well as overlong storylines and high book prices can be blames for some of it, but its undeniable that today’s DCU (and the Marvel universe) is inaccessible to new readers and creators alike.
New readers can barely understand what’s happening, it’s all so self-referential, and writers are either forbidden from changing key concepts, or else can’t use classic characters because someone else already changed them. Screw it, says I. You got a good story idea? Just write it, don’t worry if it doesn’t perfectly jive with what other folks have written before.
Now, I liked the PAD Supergirl. That was a hell of a story, but way too complex to be a teen girl counterpart to Superman. She wasn’t even Kryptonian, for crissakes! Besides, that story was told. Let’s give this one a shot. I’d like to see how Kara works with modern sensibilities.
Now, I’m not saying that there should be no continuity whatsoever. Batman never kills. Superman is a boy scout. They serve together on the JLA. hat sort of thing. But to expect writers to throw out good characters and good stories because of the twice rebooted poorly and artifically constructed shared continuity of the past twenty years (by dozens of authors and in hundreds of books?). Naw.
A new Concrete came out this week?! I didn’t know, or surely I’d have bought it.
I decided to go back and just pick up Legion of Super-Heroes after all and enjoyed it a lot. I’ll definitely be sticking with it for a while. I’ve always been a Kitson fan, and these costume designs are great.
Never read Concrete, actually. I did pick up Invincible, which is a pretty cool series.
spectrum, shy, etc., it seems like your’re paying for a book you don’t like. Without getting into the motives or the wherefores, you shouldn’t do that. It’s a waste of your money and it makes it harder for me to get good comics.
One more thing I’ve read:
Robo-Hunter: Verdus – Another volume from the excellent new DC reprint program from 2000 A.D. This is a b&w volume of material originally printed in the late '70’s by John Wagner and (mostly) Ian Gibson. Sam Slade is the best robo-hunter on earth, so he’s sent to the robot-run Planet Verdus where all the human colonists have disappeared. The art is lovely and it’s an excellently-crafted action comic. Although Slade’s the protagonist, from an objective perspective he’s horrible, killing robots left and right and never considering whether he has a moral right to do so. It’s sometimes unclear whether you’re meant to accept this view uncritically or not; in hindsight it’s plain that Slade is no hero, but the book had a lot of opportunities to make that point which it missed. Does that mean that Wagner is a philosophically unsophisticated writer or does it mean that I’m an unsophisticated reader who needs big “GOOD” and “EVIL” signs to figure out who to root for? Not sure, but the fact that I have to think about it means that my $14.95 sure was justified.
–Cliffy
The Rest:
Supreme Power #14; Invincible #18; Exiles #57; Adam Strange #4; Wildguard : Fire Power #1; Superman #212; Batman/Danger Girl ; Warren Ellis’s Stormwatch TPBs #1 and #2.
Finally gotten my copy of LSH, just finished reading it…
I’ll start with what I didn’t like, because it’s easier to articulate:
I don’t like the fact that they’ve gone back to the X Lass/X Lad/X Girl/X Boy names for everyone (that we’ve seen named) but Chameleon - particularly since the rationale for it suggests that several 21st Century characters - or rather, legacies - have dropped into obscurity - significantly Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow and Robin. Keeping a few of the names created for Legionaires/the rebooted Legion would have at worked better to my mind. Leviathan was one of my favourite renames, but Collosal Boy/Micro Lad’s revised origin and story/jokes surrounding his name make me miss that less. Although, since Vi seems to be there, I assume she’s still called Shrinking Violet, so that’s a minor gripe. (And if they ever talk about the Heroic Age, and call Flash ‘Flashman’, that’ll amuse me enough to make up for it.)
I HATE Cham’s look. The lack of antannae is tolerable, but the eyes…they make Cham look like s/he’s in from a different book. I hope I come to tolerate it.
A couple of the characters looks bother me - like the ‘glow’ sometimes in Sun Boy and Lightning Lad’s insignia. While the glow is neat, conceptually, it doesn’t look good with the colouring techniques used.
What I DID like:
I like the whole concept of the Legion. The rebellious teens as a major political movement is just neat. Not being an arm of the UP and alligned with the SP is an improvement, too.
Aside from the glowies, I like the designs of most of the costumes (even Sun Boy and Cham’s.). Triplicate Girl’s, particularly, looks really good. I think Lightning Lad looked better with more abstracted lightning bolts, though.
The look of the world(s). It looks great.
The look of the Legion clubhouse, both external and internal. The reference to the old rocketship clubhouse, and the Heroic Age decorations inside are both pretty nifty.
It’s basically taking the concept seriously, but the characters goof around.
Yeah…those are definitely teenagers.