Civil War

[HaemishM]

1) Thor has just been ressurected in his own book, but Asgard is still dead. He has yet to interact with the rest of the Marvel Universe, though.

2) Hawkeye was alive, and banging the Scarlet Witch in Romania. Now, he's wearing the Ronin costume in New New Avengers. Yes, that's a complete tool thing to do. He's totally given up the bow and arrow and is swinging a sword. Yes, it's retarded as hell.

3) Punisher is really a lame character in the MU anyway, no matter how well written. The Mack Bolan style of writing they've used on him in the last decade or two really clashes with the 4-color MU world.

4) Hawkeye is listed above, Thor was dead during the Civil War and Cap... well, I won't spoil the end for you.

5) The Hulk had been shot into space by the Illuminati, which was Iron Man, Reed Richards, Black Bolt and Doctor Strange. He ended up on a world where he was a gladiator, overthrew the world's oppressive government and took over himself, married a woman and had kids (?), then the capsule that the Illuminati used to shoot him into space exploded, killing almost everyone on the planet including Hulk's wife. Hulk has just returned to Earth in is currently beating the shit out of any hero that will fight him in the World War Hulk crossover event series running right now.

[Tannhauser]

Haem, I saw the CW trade paperbacks today and thought about jumping in do you recommend the series?  Also, any idea where I start?  I'm not sure when trade is the first one.

[Velorath]

Pick up the Planet Hulk HC instead.

[HaemishM]

Haem, I saw the CW trade paperbacks today and thought about jumping in do you recommend the series?  Also, any idea where I start?  I'm not sure when trade is the first one.

No, I couldn't in good conscience recommend them to anyone, unless you just have to know why the Marvel Universe is so fucked lately, or if in 2-5 years, you wonder why the MU is doing a complete Crisis on Infinite Earths/Worldstorm type of reboot. Civil War is a well-drawn nightmare of a shitty story written by a good writer who really didn't give a shit about the story he was writing.

[Ironwood]

Haem, I saw the CW trade paperbacks today and thought about jumping in do you recommend the series?  Also, any idea where I start?  I'm not sure when trade is the first one.

hahahahahahah.

Well played.

[UnSub]

Honestly, go to that Mighty God King blog and read his recaptioned parody of it. That's what I did and I'm a better man geek for it.

[Velorath]

Kind of, but not really Civil War related, the second issue of Thor came out today.  So far the series is decompressed storytelling at it's finest.  Issue #1 should have been some #0 issue promotional give-away or something given that the majority of it was to recap past events in splash pages.  This time around we get a few more pages of Donald Blake socializing the the locals, about 8 pages or so of him turning into Thor and summoning Asgard, and then the rest of the issue is him walking through the empty halls, and buying the land that Asgard is floating over.  These first two issues could have been told in about 11 or 12 pages.  After being gone since Avengers Disassembled, I don't think people wanted to get a Thor series where he sits around drinking coffee in a diner as Donald Blake.  I also realize the locals they seem to be developing as part of the supporting cast may not be the brightest people around, but one would hope they quickly make the connectiion between Blake arriving in town and Thor showing up.

JMS has talent.  Rising Stars and Midnight Nation were both great stories.  Everything he's done since then has been wasted potential, from books that take way too long to get anywhere, like Supreme Power, to the downright horrible work like some of his Spider-man arcs.  I guess the former is the lesser of two evils, but it's still sad to see that a once good writer kind find a way to fit some action into a book about one of Marvel's more powerful characters, the fucking Norse God of Thunder.

Marvel's new series the Order (which came out a week or two ago), was a surprising decent read.  Sure I've seen some of the concepts utilized elsewhere, and I haven't gotten to know any of the characters yet, besides the team leader (although there's somewhat of a reason for that in the story), but it's an enjoyable team book regardless.  Nothing I urge people to run out and buy, given how much competition there is out there for your dollar.  If one wants to buy a Marvel team book, I'd recommend Runaways and X-Factor before I'd recommend The Order.  Solid book though.  Hopefully they'll keep the pace going as fast as it was in this first issue.

[UnSub]

Having not heard about the new Order series until very recently, I'd hoped it was going to be a return to the Order miniseries - where the Hulk, Namor, Dr Strange and the Silver Surfer decide to take over the world - but sadly, no.

I love how Marvel has reduced its mutant population to the magical 199 figure (or whatever) but is then creating a whole host of new characters to fill the 50 teams. That seems sensible.

[Velorath]

Having not heard about the new Order series until very recently, I'd hoped it was going to be a return to the Order miniseries - where the Hulk, Namor, Dr Strange and the Silver Surfer decide to take over the world - but sadly, no.

They were going to reuse the Champions name originally, but had to change it at the last minute for legal reasons.

[Ironwood]

The Spider-Man 'Back in Black' nonsense that's come out of the Civil War is making it really, really clear what a fucking mistake it was to unmask Peter.

That's Spider Man almost completely and utterly ruined.

[HaemishM]

Yep. The latest issue of Spider-Man just really doesn't ring true to me. He's vowed to kill the Kingpin whenever Aunt May dies, which will essentially be the last hurrah for the old Spider-Man. Spider-Man doesn't kill, I don't care how far you push him. Angry Spider-Man just doesn't work.

[Ironwood]

Yup, that's pretty much what I was referring to.

We knew the cop-out was coming, but not what form it would take.  The form it took fucking sucked donkeys.

Indeed, this whole 'I'm Peter Parker and you can deal with me face to face now' thing is fucking retarded.


Before he used anonymity to protect his family and now he's going to use....intimidation and threat of death ?  What an awesome hero.

I eagerly await the waterboarding.

[NowhereMan]

Just wait till the Daily Bugle run with a front page featuring an unmasked Spider-Man, cigarrette in his mouth, smiling and pointing at the genitals of a hooded Doc. Oc.

[Velorath]

Read Thor #3, and figured I'd mention it here since it ties into the whole clone Thor thing from Civil War.  Aside from the by-the-numbers fight between Thor and Iron man that does nothing beyond what's expected, and the "Asgardians in mortal forms" plot point which is recycled from the Journey into Mystery title that replaced Thor after Onslaught, what's the real reason why I wanted to bring this issue up?  JMS' nigh-offensive use of New Orleans and hurricane Katrina, not for any sort of thematic connection to what's going on in the book, nor to make any sort of intelligent political commentary.  No, it's seeming shoehorned into the book in order to try and add false weight and sentiment.  It feels like exploitation plain and simple, using a real life tragedy to try to make a dull comic seem more relevant.

[HaemishM]

As much as I like JMS for B5, you are completely 100% right about Thor #3. New Orleans felt extremely tacked on for all the worst reasons. It almost got preachy and not preachy in the good JMS way but preachy in the bad, didactic way. What's worse is the whole sympathetic to New Orleans' plight stuff goes right out the window when Iron Man comes and and they have to fight. It's such a shame, because the artwork is the best Thor's looked in years. But the fact that Thor DOESN'T kill Tony Stark is just ludicrous. He's a fucking God, and Stark stole body bits to make a Thorling.

Stark should be getting double-stuffed by the Hulk AND Thor, instead of just a "we'll deal with this later."

[Khaldun]

It was definitely the "bad preachy" that JMS is prone to on occasion.

Plus the whole take so far seems to me a slight ripoff of Gaiman's American Gods.

It's never a good idea in a universe full of underwear-on-the-outside superheroes to ask, "Why didn't they stop a real-world disaster/attack from happening?" Because the answer has to be about ten pounds of stupid within those universes. "Well, you see, normally Superman can plug up a volcanic eruption with his superflatulence, but...this time he was on a mission in space. Yeah, that's the ticket."  "Uh, 9/11? All the superheroes were at a picnic and the teleporter tubes and Quinjets just happened to be busted that day. Sorry!" It's almost always a dumb idea to do "real-world relevant", but it's an extra pile of dumb the way JMS chose to do it. Just concentrate on Thor, dude. With a bit of Iron Douchebag ass-whipping on the side.

[Jimbo]

I'm wishing for a pony...so why not:

I want to see Hawk, Cap, and Thor yell Avenger Assemble and beat the fuck out of Iron Man and his cronies, and have Spidey, Punisher, and the others that have been bastardized put back on the right track.

Stan Lee will show up to the office, say WTF and clean house...

And the beagles and the bunnies will play cards with each other...

[SurfD]

You know, I honestly must say I agree with Jimbo on this one.  Stan really needs to go down to the marvel offices and kick some major ass, wolverine style.   Throw in a 'nuff said when he is done, and all will be good.

[Tannhauser]

You can't beat up Iron Man, he's about to have a major motion picture released.  What will Johnny Public think after the movie when he picks up a comic and the Hulk is using IM's helmet as bongo drum?

[rk47]

Cross over movie!

Ironman vs Incredible Hulk 2 !

[HaemishM]

You can't beat up Iron Man, he's about to have a major motion picture released.  What will Johnny Public think after the movie when he picks up a comic and the Hulk is using IM's helmet as bongo drum?

Bongo drum, hell. He should be using it as a chamber pot right now.