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Author Topic: Useless comics news, discussions, and recommendations  (Read 202488 times)
palmer_eldritch
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Reply #385 on: April 26, 2015, 09:40:52 AM

Yeah and they've actually done some nice little stories are Northstar and his husband. Off the top of my head I think there was one about the boyfriend (as he was) being nervous about visiting Northstar on Utopia (where the X-Men live) because they might not accept him - because he's not a mutant - but it all worked out ok of course  smiley
HaemishM
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Reply #386 on: April 26, 2015, 10:57:12 AM

Fuck's sake, they had Northstar and his boyfriend get married in a comic. Making an existing character gay isn't shocking anymore, and it certainly isn't worthy of being a news story other than that Iceman is somewhat of a likeable if ill-used character.

But again... Bendis.

Khaldun
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Reply #387 on: April 26, 2015, 12:06:26 PM

Young Avengers was pretty great in this respect--there were multiple gay characters where it was never particularly treated as a defining or unusual trait of the character.
Mattemeo
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Reply #388 on: April 26, 2015, 04:35:44 PM

Fuck's sake, they had Northstar and his boyfriend get married in a comic. Making an existing character gay isn't shocking anymore, and it certainly isn't worthy of being a news story other than that Iceman is somewhat of a likeable if ill-used character.

But again... Bendis.

Again... Bendis-bashing.

Bendis had no intention of making this whole 'Bobby is gay' thing an actual thing. The comic was just supposed to come out; no press, no mention, just be what it was - a minor reveal that ultimately doesn't matter because we should be past making it a thing.
But someone had a bone to pick and leaked some shitty context-less scans and made it a thing.

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Velorath
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Reply #389 on: April 27, 2015, 01:30:11 PM

Well I'm sure we'll see him approach this character development in a respectful manner. You know, in the one month he has before he leaves the X-books and All New X-men wraps up to make way for Secret Wars.
HaemishM
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Reply #390 on: April 27, 2015, 01:31:18 PM

I didn't realize All New X-men was going away. It's been an amazingly decent book despite the absolutely braindead premise and its writer.

Velorath
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Reply #391 on: April 27, 2015, 01:40:44 PM

From the June and July solicitations, the only X-men related book continuing through Secret Wars seems to be Magneto.
HaemishM
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Reply #392 on: April 27, 2015, 02:00:17 PM

So I finally read Original Sin (just the series and the two spin-offs with Iron Man/Hulk and Thor/Loki/Angela). What the fuck was the point of all that? I mean, it wasn't bad (the #0 story with Watcher and Nova by Mark Waid was really good) but in the end, Nick Fury becomes The Unseen which is mostly just like the Watcher only maybe he acts? Angela being Thor's long-lost retconned sister raised as an angel just... why? I haven't read the first of the female Thor so I don't know the explanation behind that or if Angela becomes Thor or what. The whole thing just seemed unnecessary. And who the fuck were those villains? Dr. Midas, the Orb and Exterminatrix? They remind me of Grant Morrison villains from The Invisibles.

Velorath
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Reply #393 on: April 27, 2015, 02:05:23 PM

The Orb is an old Johnny Blaze Ghost Rider villain. The other two are in fact Grant Morrison creations from his Marvel Boy miniseries.
HaemishM
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Reply #394 on: April 27, 2015, 02:15:04 PM

That makes more sense then. They seemed a little too oddball for the level of story being told.

Khaldun
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Reply #395 on: April 27, 2015, 04:24:02 PM

There's apparently some rumor that the reboot of the Marvel Universe will put the X-Men in a separate continuity...
Mattemeo
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Reply #396 on: April 27, 2015, 05:09:14 PM

It's been an amazingly decent book despite the absolutely braindead premise and its writer.

 swamp poop

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Sky
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Reply #397 on: April 27, 2015, 09:40:41 PM

There's apparently some rumor that the reboot of the Marvel Universe will put the X-Men in a separate continuity...

That train started to run off the rails waaay back with the New Mutants in the 80s.
Velorath
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Reply #398 on: April 27, 2015, 10:10:40 PM

Axel Alonso already shot down the rumors of the X-men line splitting off from the rest of the Marvel Universe.

Even though I don't care much about the crossover as a whole, there a number of the tie-in minis look like they'll be good fun. Looking forward to:

- Jason Aaron's Thors and Weirdworld. The former involves a shit-ton of Thors as essentially a police force. The later is a sword and sorcery book staring minor character Arkon, which is said to be one of the more self-contained minis.

- Felipe Smith's Ghost Racers. He's had an interesting run on Ghost Rider. Willing to give this one a look.

- Peter David's Future Imperfect and Secret Wars 2099. It's Peter David doing Hulk and 2099 stuff.

- Noelle Stevenson's Runaways. Lumberjanes writer has a group of teens who become runaways after learning that their school headmaster is a supervillain.

- Kieron Gillen's Siege. A group of superpowered characters at Battleworld's equivalent of the Wall from Game of Thrones preventing zombies, the Annihilation Wave and other terrors from breaking through into the rest of Battleworld. Gillen says “Imagine NextWave as a tragedy”.

- Amazing Spider-man and Spiderverse. Enjoyed Superior Spider-man and Spiderverse, so I'll continue to keep up with these.

- Garth Ennis' Where Monsters Dwell. Ennis, Biplanes and dinosaurs. Alright.



Raguel
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Reply #399 on: April 28, 2015, 09:12:27 PM

Angela being Thor's long-lost retconned sister raised as an angel just... why?

I don't know the reason, besides the fact that Angela isn't original to Marvel and they wanted to give her an origin story. I liked the mini personally, especially the Loki bits. It's unlikely Angela is the new Thor but I won't spoil it for you.

Fordel
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Reply #400 on: May 25, 2015, 11:23:54 PM

I just started reading Black Widow's solo, man Phil Noto is a good artist.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
Mattemeo
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Reply #401 on: May 26, 2015, 07:23:55 AM

I'm really hoping they release an over-size HC of the first two arcs; Noto's art deserves it. Supreme visual storytelling done in a gorgeous style.

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Fordel
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Reply #402 on: May 26, 2015, 01:28:45 PM

Did he sell his soul for artistic talent? He does like cover quality art for entire books.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
Mattemeo
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Reply #403 on: May 27, 2015, 05:43:25 AM

He's similar to Stjepan Sejic in that they're both capable of near-photo realistic faces and proportions but both retain a fluidity and a natural design sense that means they can drop a lot of rougher work into their pages because they intrinsically understand their focal points. It's something I admire greatly and am massively jealous of; I am a horrendous perfectionist and I wish I could allow myself to get away with the short-hand truly great artists like Noto can because they believe so much in their work. His covers are incredible, and those he doesn't do short-hand on at all. He better have an art book out soon.

If you party with the Party Prince you get two complimentary after-dinner mints
pxib
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Reply #404 on: May 30, 2015, 02:22:37 PM

He's similar to Stjepan Sejic in that they're both capable of near-photo realistic faces and proportions but both retain a fluidity and a natural design sense that means they can drop a lot of rougher work into their pages because they intrinsically understand their focal points.
I hang around on Skype with a collection of other artists I originally met on 4chan, and one of them is a fellow who draws like that. He describes it as seeing the image in his head, transposing it onto paper or a tablet, and then only filling in the lines he needs. He'll sometimes draw a line three or four times before he's happy with it, but once he's happy with it then he never needs to move it or draw it again. It's exactly where it needs to be.

There is nothing in the world that he'd rather do than draw. He doesn't take breaks: Drawing is the break from driving or hanging out with his girlfriend or coding java apps for travel agencies and law offices. When he was a kid he drew more than he watched TV or played video games, because art engaged him at a level that other entertainment didn't.

I think that's what selling your soul looks like in real life. It doesn't seem like a bad deal.

His one-panel epilogue to Catwoman #1:
« Last Edit: May 30, 2015, 02:46:18 PM by pxib »

if at last you do succeed, never try again
Khaldun
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Reply #405 on: July 11, 2015, 09:19:24 AM

Bruce Timm is going to make an animated version of The Killing Joke.

I kind of wish he wouldn't. I still admire the story's great idea about the origin of the Joker, and don't care for some of the more recent revisions/alternative ideas about his beginnings in Scott Snyder's Batman work. (Let's leave the show Gotham out of this entirely). But it's almost too perfect a story in that respect, and in others, I think it was actually pretty weak. (Alan Moore thinks so too, now.) Not just the obvious example of mortally injuring a female character in order to produce a dramatic crisis for a male character, but it's also the fact that it helped spur the "can you top that?" aspect of the Joker in later stories, in which he has to commit more and more unpleasant kinds of atrocities just to show that the next writer is even more wretchedly horrific and badass in how he writes the character. (Leading to the wretchedness of the new 52 Joker with his severed face etc.)   
Trippy
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Reply #406 on: July 12, 2015, 11:38:57 AM

Amazon US is having a Gold Box sale today on some assorted Kindle Marvel comics, Calvin & Hobbes and assorted Comic-Con inspired titles.
HaemishM
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Reply #407 on: October 23, 2015, 08:36:47 AM

So Marvel Unlimited finally released the issue of All New X-Men where we find out Iceman is gay.

 Head scratch

It's goddamn terrible. Bendis, for no good reason that I can figure out, just throws in 3 pages of Iceman and Jean Grey talking about how gay he is. It is SO SO SO out of place that it's like whiplash. It doesn't seem to have a goddamn thing to do with the story itself. And I assume the only real nugget of any kind of sense in there is that he clearly states that the present day Iceman is NOT GAY. Which is even more levels of WTF because either Bendis is saying that being gay is a CHOICE (which seems completely and utterly against the whole spirit of how the thing is phrased) or he's basically given himself the out about the whole time travel shitstorm he's created by almost stating as a fact that these young X-Men are NOT from this timeline. Or something. It's just such an awkwardly weird exchange that makes no sense and adds nothing to the story, especially since having characters be gay isn't even a thing to be noted anymore.

palmer_eldritch
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Reply #408 on: November 07, 2015, 02:42:35 AM

I've been making my way through Bendis' Uncanny X-Men on Unlimited and they're pretty good. I think the X-Men suffer from being spread out over so many books but if you just pick one to binge-read and ignore the others then there are some good stories out there.
HaemishM
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Reply #409 on: November 07, 2015, 05:58:53 PM

Most of the Uncanny X-Men by Bendis is decent - it's certainly the best stuff he's done in years (which isn't saying much). But then he comes up with some really really stupid shit, most of the time involving time travel. The X-Men as a whole has been a fucking trainwreck since Schism, though. There are good books out there but continuity is nonexistent with characters appearing all over the place with no rhyme or reason.

Khaldun
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Reply #410 on: February 24, 2016, 04:18:44 AM

Aaaaaaaaaaand DC is going to do a comprehensive reboot again. Oh, sorry, "rebirth". Whatever, guys, whatever.
Velorath
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Reply #411 on: February 24, 2016, 04:33:23 AM

They've fallen on hard times. Not that a reboot, rebirth, relaunch, whatever is going to help.
HaemishM
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Reply #412 on: February 24, 2016, 07:06:42 AM

What is this? The 3rd or 4th relaunch since Infinite Crisis? ... the fuck?

Maybe if they'd come up with a version of the Marvel Unlimited subscription service, they might see some upswing. I'd be all over it. But comics are way too goddamn expensive for me to buy single issues anymore.

jgsugden
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Reply #413 on: February 24, 2016, 10:28:11 AM

Seriously.  1980 - comics cost $0.50 to $0.60.  Now?  $2.99 to $4.99.  According to the inflation index, they should be ~$1.50 to $1.75.  We're probably actually in a world where physical copies should cost $2.00 or so due to shipping cost spikes, but they're still 50% to 150% over expectation.  The amount of comics I bought back in the late 80s would be a $300 a month habit now.  If I have a $300 a month habit, I expect to get high or diseases from it.

 

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Fordel
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Reply #414 on: February 24, 2016, 10:58:52 AM

DC could give their shit away for free and it wouldn't matter.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
Margalis
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Reply #415 on: March 01, 2016, 10:27:15 PM

I suspect that relaunches give you good sales numbers for a few months but also shed long-term fans and end you up worse than where you started. It seems like DC has fallen into a spiral decline of relaunch for instant sales boost, settle in at lower sales numbers, then relaunch again.

How can anyone even care about a DC reboot at this point?

vampirehipi23: I would enjoy a book written by a monkey and turned into a movie rather than this.
Velorath
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Reply #416 on: March 02, 2016, 12:42:19 AM

Certainly there's diminishing returns and I think the sales numbers over the last several years would show that. The format and business model just need to evolve. I'm sure I've said it before but single issues don't need to exist anymore. Graphic novels, and Manga/Digest formats work quite well for telling stories. Nobody really wants to read a story arc 22 pages at a time separated by month gaps over a typically half a year period for one arc.

Also they need to  stop flooding the market. In April, Marvel has just over 80 comics coming out (not counting Star Wars comics, Dark Tower, Haunted Mansion, Miracleman, Mark Millar's new mini).  Spider-man alone has 14 related books coming out that month not counting any team stuff he's in. DC has about 60 books, plus a few licensed things. This is the same kind of shit they were doing in the 90's. There is no way possible to market this many books, or make sure they all have strong creative teams. It's just a matter of tying to gain market share by pushing everything else off the shelf.

Personally I feel like the best business model would be to put together high quality creative teams and put out a few dozen graphic novels a year which can all get their own marketing push and don't have to have their page count and pacing dictated by being broken up into single issues.
HaemishM
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Reply #417 on: March 02, 2016, 07:03:42 AM

You can ask the publishing industry how that "few novels a year" business model is working out. Hint: it's not. Which is the reason eBooks have taken off so much.

I agree creatively about the less books sold as graphic novels thing, I just don't know if it makes financial sense. Pushing paper for profit is just hard as fuck these days. In the past, the big 2 would have relatively captive audiences but these days, not so much. The relaunches and constant crossover bullshit has probably done as much to drive off customers as they have get new ones or get temporary sales bumps. I'd like to think things like Marvel Unlimited are the real future of "monthly" comics but I'm not sure how profitable it is at just $10 a month. Pushing things to apps and digital delivery is the key to their future survival but they have to get better at it and better at marketing it. DC's complete lack of understanding of this market is probably killing them just as much as anything else they are doing.

Velorath
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Reply #418 on: March 02, 2016, 01:00:13 PM

Focusing more on digital is obviously a bit of a no-brainer. I think Marvel Unlimited is a start, but they still need to put some work into improving the reader and it sucks being half a year behind.
Fordel
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Reply #419 on: March 02, 2016, 01:37:56 PM

I'm okay with being a half year behind for the access it grants in the end. If I bought the individual issues for all the books I am currently reading, I would be spending like 80 bucks a month, if not more. Since I bought a full year of unlimited I'm actually paying like, 6 bucks a month or whatever?

That doesn't even factor in all the binge reading I do on older issues.

Like yea, I'm sure Marvel would LOVE it if I was spending that 80 a month on them, but I'm pretty sure they are ok with my 6 a month for unlimited too. Especially since before unlimited they were getting 0 a month from me.  why so serious?

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
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