the vynsane asylum

At least I was kidding.

Part of me feels like new comics have worn out their welcome. I haven't been making my trips to the store or following the releases NEARLY as closely over the past 6 months or so. Thing like Spider-Man coming out to fast for me to keep up, Thor being SO boring & Red Hulk being irregular (and not very good) haven't helped, but DD and Cap still always get me going. I'd say I should cut back on titles again, but every time I try that it never works out - I miss something good (ie expensive to get after the fact).

Rollo Tomassi wrote:Has Secret Invasion worn out its welcome?

Double post - how's that for a Secret Invasion of your back entrance, Grimdouche?

Secret Invasion should have been a fucking one-shot or a two-parter at the most. It's taking forever.

jjreason wrote:Secret Invasion should have been a fucking one-shot or a two-parter at the most. It's taking forever.

And confusing as fuck.

I still think every page looks like the artist threw a bunch of toys on the ground and drew them and the ones that weren't Marvel toys became Skrulls.

I guess Mark Millar is killing Sue Richards. Because he doesn't have many ideas that don't involve killing people, right?

At the going rate, the only characters alive in a year in either of the main universes will be Bucky Barnes, Jason Todd, Donna Troy, Superman, Colossus, and Cyclops. I realize they're written in such a way that the stakes are supposed to seem higher for idiots running around in their underwear saving people, but, Christ, isn't everyone totally burned out on it yet?

I've got the whole Death of the Invisible Woman storyline sitting up there in my "to read" pile. I'm so excited about it that I haven't touched the title in 4 months.

Whats going on in the Marvel U?

Amazing Spider-Man. ALL OF THESE STORIES COULD BE TOLD WITH A MARRIED SPIDER-MAN. All of them.

Avengers. Avengers continue to rock ass. Even with the perpetual Event-itis, Bendis keeps his books in the air with great dialog and constantly shifting stories.

Black Panther. I guess this book is coming to an end, and theres going to be a chick Black Panther book next year.

Captain America. Continues to rock with Bucky in the costume. Might be the best ongoing series Marvel has right now.

Captain Britain. More of a team book with Pete Wisdom. Black Knight, Blade and a bunch more. This book SHOULD be Excalibur without that fucking hack Claremont writing it. As it it, the writer Paul Cornell is brilliant. Good stuff across the pond.

Daredevil. Continually excellent. looking forward to issue 120 which SHOULD reboot back to issue 500 if Marvel is consistent.

Fantastic Four. Millar/Hitch deliver an underwhelming yearlong story arc. This book is hurting people. Sales numbers are alarmingly low.

Ghost Rider. I hear good things about Jason Aaron's writing, but until they get a new artist, I'm skipping it. Oh yeah, Dan Ketch is back and he's an evil, blue flamed Ghost Rider. I don't know either...

Guardians of the Galaxy. I expect this book will do great things someday. It's not quite there, but I have faith. And Vance Astro is BACK! yahoo!

Hercules. Funnest book from Marvel every month. Greg Pak and Fred VanLente deliver witty tongue in cheek moments for Herc and his pal Amadeus Cho.

Hulk. Jeph Loeb. The new Claremont. DROPPED.

Iron Man. Damn, this is a good read. I suggest you find issue seven for the BEST Iron Man AND BEST Spider-Man story in a long time. Excellent stand alone issue. Highest recommendation.

Ms. Marvel and Moon Knight. No clue. Don't read 'em.

Nova. Surprisingly good. DnA continue to craft the flagship title of the Cosmic Marvel books.

Punisher. In terms of the 616, I think War Journal is going bye bye and a new Punisher title is starting up. Something to do with Dark Reign.

Skaar, son of Hulk. Following whats going down on Planet Hulk ( which 100x better than that new Loeb crap book with the Red Hulk bullshit.) And it has wonderful uninked pencils from Ron Garney. Beautiful.

Thunderbolts. Holy shit. This book is awesome. I swear, watching the worst villains of the Marvel Universe fake being heroes in all their psychopathic glory is so much fun. Green Goblin, Bullseye, Venom, and Moonstone. I am pretty sure this book paves the way for Dark Avengers.

So I just read the Secret Invasion spoilers. Are Emma and Namor villains again?

I haven't read Secret Invasion 8 yet, but my theory is that Norman Osborn wrests control of SHIELD away from Tony Stark and using the premise of the Initiative, he makes all the bad guys authorized "good guys" and all the former good guys are now outlaws. Or something to that effect.

Namor, Emma, Dr. Doom, the Hood, and Osborn are the "new" Illuminati replacing Stark, Xavier, Reed Richards, Black Bolt, and Dr. Strange.

Yeah, that's what I mean. I'm not familiar with The Hood, but he's supposed to be nasty. Dr Doom, when not moderating here, only does evil things. Loki is a fucking evil god. And Norman is one major SOB.

But Emma and Namor... two of these things are not like the others. At least not for several years.

I just read Secret Invasion 8 and I can't even remember who was all at the table with Osborn - the Hood (who is actually someone else we know controlling a human via the hooded cloak as per New Avengers), Namor, Doom, Female Loki.... and was it Emma? I'll have to go look again.

The whole thing was a little silly, especially in light of how AWESOME finding out about Elektra was and how awesome the first issue of this series was.

EDITED: Yep, it's Emma.

EP, please have a loot at this and see how close I am to being up to speed with these "core" characters.

SPOILERS, POSSIBLY, IF YOU'RE NOT UP ON SECRET INVASION
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Old/Light Illuminati vs New/Dark Illuminati:

Tony Stark - ousted now as head of SHIELD, replaced by Thunderbolts chief (and killer of the Spider-Woman Skrull Queen) Norman Osborn.
But what's Tony's status? Is he a fugitive or just back to square one? He has no government contracts, hence his business is going to fall apart presumably. Will he go broke and hit the bottle?

Charles Xavier - ousted now as head of the X-Men but does have his powers (they were lost in House of M but regained when the X-Men went to deal with Gabe Summers in that 12 part limited series) vs. Emma Frost, whom I still believe to be with Scott as joint head of the X-Men program. In Uncanny it appears that she'll be facing off with Madelyn Prior who appears to have been resurrected.

Dr. Strange whom I kind of lost track of during the Secret Invasion. I remember seeing him drawn frequently (Lenil must like him), but I don't recall him being directly involved in the dialogue vs. The Hood whom we now know is some dude being possessed by a hooded robe controlled by The Dread Dormammu.

Reed Richards who was a Skrull plant for who can remember exactly HOW long (anyone? I'm sure it was in there somewhere) vs. Dr. Doom whom I also lost track of during Secret Invasion. How long will Doom sit there playing 2nd fiddle before he makes his move? I hope this is a story focus.

Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner vs himself? Also interesting. His loyalty is always to himself and Atlantis, but which way will he swing in the eventual battle between Reed & Doom? I'm guessing with Doom this time for some reason, especially if this Millar "Death of Sue" storyline is real and Namor blames Reed.

Black Bolt, king of the Inhumans and now deceased (right?) as per Secret Invasion. I still haven't read the SI Inhumans limited yet to see how Medusa is coping, but that's on my slate for today vs. the new Female Loki whom I'm surprised (to the point of finding it silly, let's be honest) that Norman would invite her OR that she'd be willing to attend the meeting for anything other than entertainment value. Weird.

Double post - double penetration for Grimlock.

Finished the Dark Reign one shot, and it was good Alex Maleev wise, though I'm not a real fan of his Sub Mariner looking like a fat English gangster with a bad haircut. Kinda all wrong or something. The story & dialogue popped nicely, and the book does a good job of explaining Secret Invasion and the outcomes on the lead-in page. Doctor Doom is handled masterfully.

I'll get Dark Avengers & continue with the 2 Avengers books, but I'll wait and see about the Nick Fury Secret Warriors title - that's a maybe at best. If Bendis is writing I'll likely be buying.

What's happening in the Marvel Universe: the May 2010 Edition

Amazing Spider-Man. Since they cancelled his other two low selling titles and replaced them with a thrice monthly schedule on Amazing, Spidey made a deal with the Devil, retconned his marriage (STILL STUPID, QUESADA. it will never be NOT a stupid idea) and de-aged a few years, Peter is having all the problems he had in his "heyday" being unemployed, no luck with dating, running out of web fluid constantly etc. And systematically fighting EVERY single one of his foes (in chronological? alphabetical? order). This summer is a sequel to the "One More Day" fiasco called "One Moment In Time" where Quesada and company finally work up the courage to tell the story about how Peter and MJ didn't get married and the unfathomable continuity clusterfuck that entails despite Quephisto insisting otherwise.

Avengers. The whole best selling franchise is getting rebooted with fresh #1 issues after the seven year saga from Disassembled thru Siege. Gone are New Avengers, Dark Avengers, Mighty Avengers, and Avengers:Initiative and replacing them are (adjectiveless) Avengers, Secret Avengers, New Avengers(again) and Avengers Academy. In addition to those ongoings there are literallly a dozen Avengers mini-series scheduled for this year. It's Marvel "Heroic Age"

Black Panther got cancelled in favor of a higher priced mini-series called "Doomwar" wherein Dr. Doom invades Wakanda. This is a trend Marvel has started recently where ongoing books get put on "hiatus" (hiatus meaning cancelled without the negative connotations) and replaced with a more expensive limited series to "test the waters." Iron Fist, Ghost Rider, Hercules, Nova and Guardians of the Galaxy have faced similar "hiatuses" (hiati?) More on them later. In any case, I've not read Black Panther since he got killed or put in a coma or something and his sister is a new female BP.

Captain America. Steve Rogers died and then came back to life (like you do) and in the meantime Bucky (who also came back to life, like you do) is the new Captain America (even though he has the Puerto Rican flag on his uniform). Anyhoo, since we now have two Caps, in the wake of Seige ending and Norman Osborn getting the boot, Steve Rogers is the new head of SHIELD and wearing a costume very similar to the Fighting American (I'm sure that's coincidence) and running the Secret Avengers consisting of Nova, Beast, Moon Knight, Valkyrie, annnd, somebody else. I've forgotten. Because you need a fucking program to keep up with all the rotating Avengers teams rosters.

Cosmic Books. Nova and Guardinas got "hiatused" in favor of a new epic cosmic crossover called Thanos Imperative. Let's see... after War of Kings where Blackbolt, leader of the Inhumans and new ruler of the Kree Empire and Vulcan, brother of Cyclops and Havok and new ruler of the Shi'ar Empire fought mano-amano and blew themselves up (don't worry I'm sure they'll be back) and opened a huge rip in the fabric of reality and some evil alternate universe is invading and all the Cosmic Heroes need to step up, the best chance they have is to ressurrect Thanos whose been dead since Annhilation several years ago. I'm a sucker for anything Thanos so I'm there.

Daredevil. After Bendis and Brubakers epic runs, new writer Andy Diggle has veered the entire series off into left field (in an interesting way, mind you) and made Matt Murdock take over his once fearsome rivals in the Hand ninja Clan. He's using this newfound power to rethink crimefighting in Manhattan and building a large "prison" called Shadowland underneath Hell's Kitchen. Presumably so he can circumvent that annoying due process and legal system this country is founded on. Other "street" heroes like Spidey, Luke Cage, Moon Knight, Punisher etc are going to be involved in a big EVENT this summer/fall called (what else) Shadowland. We'll see.

Fantastic Four. After Millar and Hitch's abyssmal run on the book, Jonathan Hickman has taken over writing duties and made this book one of the funnest titles at Marvel again. Wacky, epic alien and assorted otherdimensional exploration hijinks ensue on a monthly basis. Good fun and a throwback to the Lee/Kirby era where pretty much anything can happen.

Ghost Rider. GR got cancelled last year and replaced with a mini series called Ghost Riders(plural) where BOTH GRs (Johnny Blaze and Dan Ketch) are fighting an evil angel named Zadkiel who took over Heaven. Also, Ghost Riders are actually agents of Heaven and apparently there have been hundreds of them over the years all over the world. So Hindu Ghost Riders, british Mod Ghost Riders. Basically any cliche stereotype you can think of, slap a flaming skull on it and voila, a new Ghost Rider character.

Hulk. Ummmm....honestly there's been some humongous Hulk Epic thats been going on for over two years now, but it's such a flaming pile of shit I couldn't tell you what its about. But there are several Hulk titles now, Incredible Hulk, Hulk, Red Hulk, She-Hulk, Red She-Hulk, Son of Hulk, Red Son of Hulk, etc, etc, etc. Good luck with that.

Iron Man. Matt Fraction has been writing a pretty good Iron Man series since the first movie came out. First he tore down Stark Industries. Then he completely mindwiped Tony Stark. And now he's bringing him back after all the Civil War/ head of SHIELD/"Most Wanted"/Dark Reign chaos. Very impressive. One of Marvel's better reads right now. Anway, since Tony's body and mind are essentially a biogenetic computer, he had to "reboot" himself. But the last time he "backed up" his memory was before Civil War, so he's confronting all this shit he doesn't remember "doing" because he hasn't "done" it yet. Like waking up from a coma to find out you were on autopilot for the past five years making really stupid decisions.

Moon Knight. Moon Knight stopped being crazy from his last series and is trying to stay in the straight and narrow as a hero. Y'know, no killing, tie up the bad guys and not throwing them off roofs or permanently maiming them. He's also going to be a Secret Avenger.

Punisher. @#%^ that noise. @#%^ it right in it's stupid ear.

Secret Warriors. This is Marvel's Spy book. Nick Fury and his Howling Commandos vs Hydra. Jonathan Hickman writes it. Solid fun book.

Thor. After JMS left, theres been the big Siege crossover where Asgard fell down, went boom in Oklahoma. Matt Fraction is taking over writing chores and I don't know where he's taking the book in the wake of Siege.

Thunderbolts. After being a "douchebag villains posing as heroes" (which is different from the original premise of "former villains attempting to redeem themselves as heroes") comic for so long, the series takes another Turn with new leader Luke Cage offering criminal a chance to do good. Sounds like the first two premises sorta meeting in the middle.

X-Men/X-Force/X-Factor/New Mutants are in the middle of a huge EVENT crossover called "Second Coming" where lots of fan favorites (like Nightcrawler) and D-list nobodies (like Ariel. Go ahead. Wiki her. I had to.) are getting killed to hype a lagging franchise. Remember when the X-Books were hot?

I think that's everything. Oh shit! I forgot Deadpool. But that motherfucker is a one-note overhyped parody of a cliche with WAYYYY to many titles and none of them are any damn good.

Rollo Tomassi wrote:Amazing Spider-Man. Since they cancelled his other two low selling titles and replaced them with a thrice monthly schedule on Amazing, Spidey made a deal with the Devil, retconned his marriage (STILL STUPID, QUESADA. it will never be NOT a stupid idea) and de-aged a few years, Peter is having all the problems he had in his "heyday" being unemployed, no luck with dating, running out of web fluid constantly etc. And systematically fighting EVERY single one of his foes (in chronological? alphabetical? order). This summer is a sequel to the "One More Day" fiasco called "One Moment In Time" where Quesada and company finally work up the courage to tell the story about how Peter and MJ didn't get married and the unfathomable continuity clusterfuck that entails despite Quephisto insisting otherwise.

while the way they got there was retarded (OMD) the stories they've told since have been very entertaining. there were better ways of getting out of it, but spidey was backed into a corner story-wise that was just too dark. i wasn't enjoying his civil war stories, the back in black arc, or OMD... but BND and beyond has been FUN with a capital FUN. i don't care about continuity so much... i just care about being entertained for my dollar. also, the fact that i have a 36 issue subscrioption for $50 means anytime an issue comes out at $3.99 i get it for, like, 75% off!

Avengers. The whole best selling franchise is getting rebooted with fresh #1 issues after the seven year saga from Disassembled thru Siege. Gone are New Avengers, Dark Avengers, Mighty Avengers, and Avengers:Initiative and replacing them are (adjectiveless) Avengers, Secret Avengers, New Avengers(again) and Avengers Academy. In addition to those ongoings there are literallly a dozen Avengers mini-series scheduled for this year. It's Marvel "Heroic Age"

i've enjoyed 'new avengers' and am glad they'll continue to publish that book. i may sign up for 'avengers', but i don't think i'll be going for any of the other books.

hiati?

didn't they have a really bad earthquake in hiati?

(even though he has the Puerto Rican flag on his uniform).

no, the PR flag turned portrait-style wouldn't have a perfectly centered star, the top point would be skewed to the right.

Secret Avengers consisting of Nova, Beast, Moon Knight, Valkyrie, annnd, somebody else. I've forgotten.

i REALLY don't understand the inclusion of Nova - everyone else, i get...

Daredevil. After Bendis and Brubakers epic runs, new writer Andy Diggle has veered the entire series off into left field (in an interesting way, mind you) and made Matt Murdock take over his once fearsome rivals in the Hand ninja Clan. He's using this newfound power to rethink crimefighting in Manhattan and building a large "prison" called Shadowland underneath Hell's Kitchen. Presumably so he can circumvent that annoying due process and legal system this country is founded on. Other "street" heroes like Spidey, Luke Cage, Moon Knight, Punisher etc are going to be involved in a big EVENT this summer/fall called (what else) Shadowland. We'll see.

diggle was handed the reigns after the veer - that was the way brubers left it, same as bendis leaving off with DD in jail. DD has become the book where you leave the character in the most impossible predicament possible for the next writer to deal with, which is kinda awesome.

Iron Man. Matt Fraction has been writing a pretty good Iron Man series since the first movie came out. First he tore down Stark Industries. Then he completely mindwiped Tony Stark. And now he's bringing him back after all the Civil War/ head of SHIELD/"Most Wanted"/Dark Reign chaos. Very impressive. One of Marvel's better reads right now. Anway, since Tony's body and mind are essentially a biogenetic computer, he had to "reboot" himself. But the last time he "backed up" his memory was before Civil War, so he's confronting all this shit he doesn't remember "doing" because he hasn't "done" it yet. Like waking up from a coma to find out you were on autopilot for the past five years making really stupid decisions.

it's definitely an interesting way to remove some of the DRAMATAS surrounding the character - a better way of doing it than making a deal with the devil, for sure. fraction is hit-and-miss, but in this instance it's all hit - a lesser writer would've made it seem more hackneyed and contrived. and now he has a new (awesome looking) suit.

vynsane wrote:while the way they got there was retarded (OMD) the stories they've told since have been very entertaining. there were better ways of getting out of it, but spidey was backed into a corner story-wise that was just too dark. i wasn't enjoying his civil war stories, the back in black arc, or OMD... but BND and beyond has been FUN with a capital FUN. i don't care about continuity so much... i just care about being entertained for my dollar. also, the fact that i have a 36 issue subscrioption for $50 means anytime an issue comes out at $3.99 i get it for, like, 75% off!

It's been almost 100 issues since OMD! That's crazy to think about how long a 'monthly' series takes to get to 100 issues. SEVEN years. Some of them have been great, and some have been mediocre or sucked. I can judge an individual issue on its own merits. I agree they wrote themselves into a corner, but honestly I didn't get this fervor they were touting that a married Spider-Man is a downer. That came from the editors/writers not being creative enough, and NOT from the fans, who is who they tried to pin it on. I can't recall ever reading a missive from a fan that says, "man Spider sucks now that he's married. Can you make him a swingin' bachelor again like he was in the 60's?"

i've enjoyed 'new avengers' and am glad they'll continue to publish that book. i may sign up for 'avengers', but i don't think i'll be going for any of the other books.

Brubaker and Deodato are doing Secret. Since is Deodato is my fave artist and Bru is a good writer (aside from the occasional choice he makes that infuriates me, like deciding to make Zemo a straight up villain again. grrr.) I'm in for that one.

didn't they have a really bad earthquake in hiati?

BaDUM Tssss.

no, the PR flag turned portrait-style wouldn't have a perfectly centered star, the top point would be skewed to the right.

Wiseass.

i REALLY don't understand the inclusion of Nova - everyone else, i get...

Nova is currently homeless. His book got cancelled (or hiatus-ized). This is probably some attempt to get him in a bigger book for some more face time and then spin him off into his FIFTH solo series.

diggle was handed the reigns after the veer - that was the way brubers left it, same as bendis leaving off with DD in jail. DD has become the book where you leave the character in the most impossible predicament possible for the next writer to deal with, which is kinda awesome.

I'm enjoying it. Especially when you think about how all the other heroes in this new 'Heroic Age' are interpreting Daredevil as basically a new A-List Supervillain.

it's definitely an interesting way to remove some of the DRAMATAS surrounding the character - a better way of doing it than making a deal with the devil, for sure. fraction is hit-and-miss, but in this instance it's all hit - a lesser writer would've made it seem more hackneyed and contrived. and now he has a new (awesome looking) suit.

Fraction is hit-and-miss. His Punisher was miss, Utopia was miss, and his X-Men have been careening wildly between the two. But on this he's been Hit. And because of that I'm willing to give his Thor a chance for a few issues.

I just read on another website that Red Hulk's identity was finally revealed as Thunderbolt Ross and Red She-Hulk is his daughter Betty.

Also revealed was Jeph Loeb as an assclownshoe Hulk.