Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
If you have an email ending in @hotmail.com, @live.com or @outlook.com (or any other Microsoft-related domain), please consider changing it to another email provider; Microsoft decided to instantly block the server's IP, so emails can't be sent to these addresses.
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
Comments
Amazing Spider-Man #662: More cool Avengers Academy stuff. Made me really want to check out Avengers Academy...oh, hey, the first issue is free. That settles it: Comixology is officially a drug dealer. Anyway, two backups in this one. The first is Spider Island lead-in stuff. Interesting, but really short. The second was a really awesome story involving Peter helping a supervillain he stopped once reform.
Avengers Academy #1: This one unfortunately got hit with a triple dose of first-issue-ness. It's having to introduce the main characters because it's a new series, the old characters because it's trying to be a Marvel Universe jumping on point, and establish some status quo stuff because it's part of the transition out of the post-Civil War stuff to a more iconic footing. All of this turns large portions of the issue into infodumps, but it's nevertheless pretty good. If this is its quality level when it's being held back that much, I imagine the rest of the series will be quite good.
Avengers Academy #2: Whose bright idea was it to have the most screwed-up superheroes instructing the most screwed-up potential superheroes? Anyway, that little logical gap aside, I'm definitely enjoying this series. I like the thing it's doing with having each issue focus on one character's perspective.
Amazing Spider-Man #663: Ohai, Anti-Venom. I liked this issue, but I feel like bits would have made more sense if I'd read the stuff between New Ways to Die and Big Time. Oh, well. I was able to follow it anyway.
Avengers Academy #3: Yeah, this is a really obvious early plotline for them to do. They're handling it pretty well, though. The bit with the Juggernaut was hilarious.
Amazing Spider-Man #664: Eddie Brock trying to be a good guy and convince everyone he isn't crazy is pretty fun. Peter telling Carlie he knows Spider-Man offscreen, then lying and using the "I build his tech" excuse was kinda lame though.
I think my credit card company decided Comixology is trying to siphon off all my money or something.
The Green Lantern one was that time Green Lantern and Green Arrow decided to go on a roadtrip to see America and how bad it was right?
Right. It's filled with great ideas but it definetly has aged badly. If anything it represents one of my big complaints about the superhero genre as it is today and it's that stories like that would never get approved because of how daring it is in the first place.
No, you give them people who were born on the edge, who fell in, who jumped in, found their way out, and survived. You give them people who have sinned, turned away from it, and said; "Thus far, and no more."
Oh, hey, it's working again.
Avengers Academy #4: I like how this played out. I knew they weren't going to kill Osborn, because duh, but I like the way it wound up happening, so that it's morally ambiguous. Well-executed.
Avengers Academy #5: Well, I'd definitely nominate Striker for "most likely to go supervillain" based on that. Not that I hate him or want him off the team or anything; he's just kinda an asshole.
Avengers Academy #6: ...Well, that was depressing. Sometimes, the ambiguous backstories are the best ones. Also, more stuff with Quicksilver and Finesse. I can't really picture Finesse going supervillain. She just doesn't seem like the type. I mean, she might wind up as an overly-pragmatic antihero, but the side she'd be on isn't really in question IMO.
Amazing Spider-Man #665: Now that was some good character work. Good to see Peter get his prioritites straight when he's been so busy lately. Also, the backup, while a really transparent excuse to get May out of town before Spider Island starts (which is really too bad), was really good nostalgia stuff.
Amazing Spider-Man #666: "Spider-Man?! No! Not again!" Wow, New York criminals really don't ever learn. Also, the Jackal. Um...wasn't this story supposed to be good? :P Also, Madame Web. She's pretty much trolling 24/7, isn't she?
Amazing Spider-Man #667: The city goes to hell really fast. Though under the circumstances, that's understandable. MJ making fun of the clone saga was hilarious. Spider-Man thinking he could just form up with the Avengers when they were beating up a bunch of people with his powers and costume was kinda stupid.
Anyway, liking Spider Island so far, but I have to wonder who at Marvel had the balls to go "hey, let's take the villain from the worst story we've ever published and have him turn everyone into Spider-Man!
"
Because seriously, if I'd been working at Marvel at the time and someone had pitched that to me, I would probably have just slapped them.
It's debatable if the Clone Saga was worse than the Onslaught Saga really. Both were 90s stupidness at ludicrous extremes. Also:
ITT: ClockworkUniverse gets hit with the branching, entangling, nature of shared universes, hard.
I'm not actually familiar with that one.
It's stupid and complicated and everybody likes to pretend it all never happened.
Ah.
Conductor: Neal Adams, while a fantastic artist, is no storyteller.
ClockworkUniverse: Basically; Professor X and Magneto's...psychic signatures (or something) merged together (or something) into one all powerful bad-ass (or something). It wasn't fun.
Malk: I know, it's rather sad, the concept and even the line up of First X-Men is cool it just falls at the last (and most important) hurdle.
EDIT: I'm not a fan of the minimalist art in Hawkeye, it's like a less sketchy version of the stuff in Winter Soldier and Secret Avengers (Which, to me, make both of those books nigh unreadable).
Also, Higher Earth is really good.
At the time Slott was (And is) a critical darling because of his run on She-Hulk and New Ways To Die.
So there was a point in which he got sort of a carte blanche because of how good he was. And considering that his run as a whole is basically bringing stuff from Spidey's past and making it awesome, it seemed like the best fit.
And really you haven't seen the last thing Slott will bring back from the darkness of horrible 90s past.
Also, am I the only one who thinks that if Rachel Grey and Julia Carpenter ever met they would both accuse the other woman of ruining the red jacket look?
Ah. Sounds...well, sounds like something that would happen in comics in the 90s.
Ah, that would explain it.
Amazing Spider-Man #668: Peter doing some supheroing as Peter was extremely awesome. Also, the stuff about #6 is interesting. It can't be the Jackal, so I'm guessing Doctor Octopus. Oh, and Anti-Venom's whole "let me cure your superpowers" thing is actually a good thing now. Neat.
Avengers Academy #7: This one filled me in on parts of Dr. Pym's backstory. His life really kinda sucks. The ending with him devising a more humane containment method for Absorbing Man was pretty neat.
Spider Island spoilers in this post. Obviously.
Amazing Spider-Man #669: Peter being afraid to tell Carlie he's Spider-Man won't end well. JJJ freaking out about the whole situation is hilarious. Also, there's a new villain. Who is apparently an old villain, but I don't recognize her, so...:/
Amazing Spider-Man #670: And because things just weren't urgent enough, people are turning from Spider-Men into Spider-Spiders. Anyway, there's an infodump on the villain, and her backstory involves...World War 2? She looks no older than 30. The long-running nature of the Marvel universe's timeline has kinda screwed some things up. And the Spider-King turns out to be...Captain America?! Did not see that coming. Anyway, from there, everything pretty much goes insane. I mean that in a good way; there's a lot of story happening very fast here.
Amazing Spider-Man #671: Now that Mary Jane has spider powers, we naturally get a fanservice cover. Also, I was wrong about #6, but he was someone I've never heard of, so I'm okay with that. Small plothole when Kaine gets into Peter's lab: fingerprints are random and independent of genetics, thus a clone would have different ones. I find it hard to believe the hand scanner only checks DNA and not fingerprints. Anyway, aside from that, a whole bunch of awesome stuff happens.
Amazing Spider-Man #672: The Queen is pretty much a JRPG final boss. MJ lectures Peter about how just anyone can't be Spider-Man. Also, Madame Web's greatest weakness is that her powers only work to the extent the writers want them to work. I love the random superhero I don't recognize going "every time this many superheroes show up, someone always dies! Usually a third-guy-from-the-right like me!" MJ whispering "I love you" was either really sweet or really depressing, depending on whether you're thinking in the context of One More Day. And finally, Kaine kicks ass. And I don't even care that he killed someone. That was just awesome.
Amazing Spider-Man #673: "Guys, we live in a world where Hulk grows ten times his size and his pants stay on. Roll with it." And...the dead Jackal was a clone. How the hell did I not see that coming? I feel stupid. Carlie dumping Peter was really depressing, though I knew it was going to happen at some point. The ending fake-out had me fooled for a moment there. That also made me feel stupid. Good ending to a great story arc.
So now I guess I can read that one Avenging Spider-Man issue I missed.
Nope, wrong event.
Oh right, Spider Island was also a crossover with the new Venom series, issues 6-9. That's where the stuff about Spider-King being Captain America was explained. The other tie ins were fun and consistently good for event minis, but the standout was Spider Island: Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, which had Shang Chi beating people up.
For more Kaine being a jerk and beating people up, there is the Scarlet Spider series.
I'll check those out...at some point...
I'm going to need to start keeping a list of things I've said that about.
Hrm, lets see what are the series you've gotten started on since chattering with us.
That about cover it?
Having a kick reading Empowered volume 6 at the moment. I don't think any writer quite swerves between comedy, self aware fanservice and grimdark as fast as Adam Warren does.
That's most of it, though I was thinking more of the list of series where I went "oh, I should check that out at some point in the future." Series I'm already reading are easy to track, since there's a list right on Comixology.
Anyway:
I think now would be a good time to take a break from Amazing Spider-Man for a bit.
First, Kwaku Anansi.
Second; Arachne (the original) finding some light in her lonely life during the whole debacle.
Lastly, "DOES THIS MEAN...THAT WITH GREAT SPIDER-POWER COMES GREAT SPIDER-ANGST?!"
Really Herc(the series) felt like a let down after The Incredible Hercules in general though.
Oh also
The idea is that Hank and the rest are people whose lives have been improved by the Avengers and their membership.
Yeah, I get that now.
Avengers Academy #8: Wow. I might have seen the kids' side in this if they'd arrested the guy, but they just let him go? Seriously? That's insanely stupid, and not even the in-character sort of stupid that a lot of the stuff they do falls under.
Avengers Academy #9: Huh. The Taskmaster was pretty neat, and I'm looking forward to seeing where that plotline goes whenever it shows up again.
Avengers Academy #10: I love how this issue's cover is making a big deal about how Dr. Strange is going to be teaching them about magic, then in the actual issue it's one panel, with him talking about something we already more-or-less knew while the kids talk about the main plot in the background. Fortunately, the actual main plots with Speedball, Veil and Hazmat are all very interesting. And as for the ending...yeah, that's going to end well and make people like you more. Though this is the in-character kind of stupid, so I can accept that.
That said while the Herc series was pretty fun, it just had so much that it could do with a depowered Hercules, no Amadeus, and no Delphyne. So it was a let-down in general.