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Comments
The New Teen Titans 4: Gah. People. I know you're all good at punching and blasting stuff and whatever, but if you would just learn to communicate with each other, things would not be going to shit right now.
Seriously, it's a good plot, but I get the distinct impression that if Raven had just tried to actually persuade people instead of mind controlling them, this could all be avoided.
Incidentally, the Temple of Azarath is pretty awesome looking. Just thought I'd mention that.
Argh, I want to read the next couple of issues, but it's 3:23 AM. I should sleep.
A big part of the Teen Titans is...well...they are teens.
Well, yeah, but...
I was about to rhetorically ask if most teens would resort to mind control before trying to actually just convince people they're right, but now that I think about it, given the option, the answer is probably "yes."
But yeah, I think that what I liked the most about the teen titans as a concept is that unlike most superteams, they aren't really in sync and make rash decisions. Like, the Justice League are basically gods taking care of earth. Sure they are fallible but those flaws barely show when they are together. But the Titans have a much more real core to them, I think.
And then you have X-men where they are like a family. Which means that when they are in synch they are unstoppable. When they have a falling out though, things tend to get messy though.
I will never not love this:
Wolverine getting hurt to shut him up will never stop being amusing.
New Teen Titans 5-6: Trigon has the least intimidating horns I've ever seen on a demon. Also, Raven's mother's backstory is...well, kinda silly in spots. "I joined a cult and was offered as the bride of Satan. But then it turned out that Satan was evil!" That said, in terms of backstory expansion, multiversal battle and getting the team to finally act as a team, I mostly like this story.
Naturally, the next issue Comixology has is 28. Annoying.
Murder everything there is to murder.
So I caught up with Waid's Daredevil. I think the best part about Waid's run so far is that he actually does the resurrection part of Born Again without it feeling accelerated or brought about by an annoying hyper-manly super soldier failure.
I also read Justice League Dark and I'm sorta annoyed that I hafta read I, Vampire to get the full gist of the Rise of the Vampire arc but fuck da police i'm not even gunna touch that.
Oh, also, I didn't notice Starman was in there, Alk. You should do that cuz it's pretty awesome and I wanna hear your thoughts on it (Especially the ending)
I just skipped the arc, and it didn't really feel like anything was missing.
Me too, actually. Although I just didn't know the scope of the crossover. Oh well. Issue 9 was nice enough for me to forget about it, although I miss Milligan and Shade.
I guess I'll just have to read The Changing Man (Shut your whore mouth Malk)
Justice League Dark is brimming with potential. It's never quite reached it yet but I think it is going to be something great.
I don't think it has been really bad. I mean, it's been exactly what it should be: A merry band of fuck ups and assholes joins together to try and save the world while dealing with magicshit and bickering a lot.
My only real issue so far is that the Vampire arc involved reading another shitty comic but otherwise, it's quite top-notch
My only complaint other than the Vampire thing is that not knowing anything about the characters made it a bit hard to follow for a few issues.
I never really felt like that, but I always felt that basic knowledge, such as their powers or whatever, are the only things you need to know in most histories.
or, basically, all ya need to know is that Shade's vest is made of ALTER-REALITY-NIUM, Zatanna's words are MAGICAL, Constantine is a total dick and that Boston Brand is...well...dead.
man, you know what JLD needs? A nextwave-like theme song.
Well, see, I didn't know any of that going in, and it kinda took awhile before I could figure out stuff.
Though it was 2 AM when I read it the first time, so Idunno if that's normal.
All I knew is that JC is a total dickhead (Which I think is not really that unexplained from the beginning, anyway) and that Zatanna's power came from speaking backwards. In fact, I thought Shade was The Shade from Starman
So as you can imagine, I was confused by that reversal of fate, but not enough to stop reading or understanding it.
So did I! Especially since DC started publishing a Shade-from-Starman comic in October!
So, since not much I'm reading comes out this week:
Action Comics 2: It's interesting to see Lex Luthor not knowing what the hell he's doing. And Superman, for that matter. Also, it's looking like there'll be an alien invasion coming, which is presumably how Superman's going to make people stop hating him for being an alien. Also, why are the Kents dead in this continuity? Was one set of dead parents deemed insufficient?
Wonder Woman 2: Oh, hey, an actual origin story! Which is semicontradicted by the ending cliffhanger, so we'll see how that's reconciled. The revamped Greek gods continue to be interesting. Anyway, though I liked the issue, I do feel the need to point out that this series has now had two nude scenes in two issues. Maybe it is a weird thing for me to pick up on, but I mentioned it yesterday, so I'll mention it today.
Action Comics 3: You know, the backup material in this series really isn't worth the extra dollar at all. I mean, last issue it was actually stuff related to Action Comics, but this time around it's just ads. I paid a dollar for ads. I'm not sure I'm happy about that. Meh, the series itself continues to be pretty good, so whatever. The part of this issue from Superman's perspective mostly deals with life as Clark Kent and Metropolis's reaction to his journalism. And meanwhile, we get development on the alien invasion plot. I really wish this series weren't good so I could buy something cheaper instead.
I guess this is relevant to this thread, since we're speaking of Grant Morrison: The man was recently awarded an MBE, which is basically the lowest rank for knights in Britain.
He'll be coming to cons in chainmail that gives you a contact high now.
I hope so! XD
(this is not a joke because Alan Moore is deathless and eternal and was named "Merlyn" in his younger years)
So, I've been thinking a lot lately about superteam books
See, the thing about superteam books is that, these days, they are about how big can things get. The Avengers fight threats that could destroy the whole earth or at least big populations. The Justice League fights villains who can (and have) decimated reality itself. It's pretty ridiculous, and it's cool, when done right. Under the hand of people like Grant Morrison and Kurt Busiek, all this action has a certain heart to it besides the big explosions. It's a sense of adventure and swashbuckling that stories about people fighting together need in order to be compelling
The issue with the market right now, though, is that the Avengers and Justice League book represent polar opposites of these two concepts, each one tipping the scale on one side. So, The Avengers has become a boringly ruminating book about the nature of the team and how they protect earth, whereas the Justice League has become a boring book where everything's actionactionactionaction and there's no real plot to speak of, motivations or character work
I could get behind Bendis' Avengers were it not because even the character work is rather weak and based too much on the roles they play on the team (Hawkeye is only in sarcastic jerk mode, Spider-Man is the jokey rookey, Luke Cage is the guy with a son, etc) rather than how do they fit the team and how they relate to each other, which would theoretically also let us know each character better via knowing their reactions to certain attitudes.
Johns' Justice League, though, is a disaster, through and through. The Justice League was never much about the things I mentioned about, to be honest (Giffen and De Matteis' run excluded, of course) but the sense of scale and character work within the action was what made it so good to read. Of course, the characters were defined by their roles in the nineties (Batman's the smart one, Flash's the funny one, Wonder Woman's the warrior one, Superman's the punchy one, etc) but there was character work (Especially for Green Lantern and Flash)
On the other hand, this league doesn't really make sense. GL and Batman just hate each other because each represents different concepts and methods of operation. Which in theory, is legit, but the whole point of the JL is that this is a team made of different methods with the same ideology and goals for peace and justice (It's even in the name, jeez)
And I mean, then you get a series like Avenging Spider-Man, where Spidey only joins with some of the Avengers in one-and-one teams and even that book manages to portray better the sense of begrudging alliance turning into everlasting friendship that was basically the founding cornerstone of the Avengers (And yes, even back in the sixties, they were a "time bomb" as Banner puts it in the movie)
So I dunno, I guess what I'm really bitching about is that superteams have lost the touch that made them so exciting. I mean, there was a time when you could have a scene involving Rogers and Stark sharing a six-pack and watching a movie and it wouldn't feel out of place (Not to say there is such a thing, sadly) or Hal, Ollie and Barry discussing their favourite bands. These days, it's such an unthinkable idea. Basically, all you can have is grim-and-gritty examination of the meaning behind a superteam or over the top action. And neither of them examine the people who are involved in these adventures or ruminations, which I think is the single worst flaw that a work of fiction can possess.
you may now continue with your normal life
Yeah, but my concern is more that the big crossover ones (Like the Avengers and the Justice League) that always made me so giddy back when I started reading comics have become gigantic wrestling/punching fests or boring ruminations with no actual character to them
I'm already reading Demon Knights (And Justice League Dark) although I need to catch up with DK.
Is New Mutants as complicated as the X-men?
Generally speaking with the best x-books you only need rough knowledge of earlier stuff to understand it. Like Wolverine & The X-men. You might get more out of having read a couple other titles but it never penalizes you for it.