Leftovers 10-29-14

Pretty short week for full reviews this week but, like I said yesterday, not too many giant books out there. Let's just blast through this.

All-New X-Men 33

The ANXM search through the Ultimate Universe trying to make sense of their new surroundings. Angel and X-23 find each other, Jean leans on the Ultimate Spider-Man, Iceman gets in some trouble, and Beast is rather trapped in Latveria. It's extremely similar to Bendis' GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY 15, which featured the Guardians all split up in foreign places, some faced with the unknown and some faced with enemies, in little almost-vignettes to show that they're all confused and lost. Like I said with that one, worth a miss. Total Score: 2/5










Death of Wolverine: The Logan Legacy 3
Sabertooth has latched on with an army unit and is brutally killing just a bunch of people, even going so far as to kidnap a shorter one per night, dress him as Wolverine, and murder him. His dreams are filled with Wolverine mocking him, telling him that he'll never be complete without Wolverine and laughing at him for never getting to kill his true rival. It's weird and heavy-handed and the art is interesting but often lost me as to what was actually happening. Full-on crazy Sabertooth is not a Sabertooth I have any interest in, though I'm rather burned out on any Sabretooth after a few years straight of seeing him show up what feels like every week. Total Score: 2/5


Death of Wolverine: Deadpool and Captain America 1

Steve Rogers calls Deadpool in to help him thoroughly clean and destroy Wolverine's stuff, insistent that no one should find his genes and clone him (is this regular procedure when a hero dies?). The last piece is a knife used to stab Wolverine that was sold to AIM not long ago. With the clock ticking, Deadpool and Steve launch an attack on an AIM base and secure the knife again. When they return home, Cap leaves Deadpool to destroy the knife. Deadpool, though, returns to Butler's base and considers cloning Wolverine himself. It's a decent team-up, one we could have expected after their arc together in DEADPOOL. It's got a few laughs and some sweet moments between the unlikely allies, but it's nothing particularly groundbreaking, like I thought their first arc was. Total Score: 3/5






Deathlok 1
Henry Hayes is a Deathlok and has no idea. When he's sent on missions by his handlers, he returns mind-wiped, believing that he was assisting Medics Without Borders in war-torn areas. He also returns home to his life as a single father of a teenage girl named Aria. However, things might get complicated as his last mission had him attacking Black Tarantula, among others, who seemed to survive, unbeknownst to Deathlok, and he's drawn the eye of Maria Hill, who covertly promotes a promising researcher named Andrea Hope to active agent, tasked with finding as much as she can about this new Deathlok. It's an interesting starting point for this new series, though its best attribute this issue is actually how quickly it reads. With so much new information and characters and storylines coming at us all at once, this issue could drag, too exposition-heavy to keep us interested. Instead, it moves well and switches locales and perspective a lot, keeping the reader interested, if not yet invested. Total Score: 4/5


Elektra 7
Matchmaker has been killed by the experimentally juiced up Lady Bullseye who can become intangible as she pleases. Still not a problem for Elektra, who allows herself to take a few hits to force Lady Bullseye to become solid, allowing her to stab her then, as she goes intangible, Elektra breathes her enemy in. It's kinda disturbing. Anyway, she defeats Lady Bullseye and returns to Sidewinder, demanding he take her to the Assassin's Guild leader. He leads her to New Orleans where she's ambushed by other assassins she's defeated but are now similarly juiced up like Lady Bullseye with varying new powers. It's a tough fight but she bests them once more, finally making her way to someone at least pulling some of the strings. The guy says he doesn't lead the Guild but he can make this go away if Elektra lets the weird doctor experiment on her too. She, of course, refuses, kills the pair, and returns to Sidewinder to find out who leads the Guild. He doesn't know but believes Bullseye, currently catatonic and in SHIELD custody, does. Elektra sets off to bust Bullseye out. Elektra continues to be great, handling all of the amped up assassins who come her way and illustrating just how next-level she is in this community. The art isn't my favorite here, which is unfortunate because Del Mundo's really was up there. It's also a bit strange that she destroys so many people this issue that could have been issue-long fights. I'm not that upset about it, nice to see a book move quickly instead of trying to milk every fight out, but it's a tad weird in this community. Also, Matchmaker is dead and I hate this book for that. Total Score: 4/5


Fantastic Four 12
Wyatt and Spider-Man talk to Johnny, who IMMEDIATELY comes to his senses and visits Ben, explaining that someone is clearly pulling the strings here and that Ben needs to get out. In Latveria, Valeria tells Doom she has to go home to try to pull her family back together, leaving Doom, who has devious plans once more. Finally, Reed accuses Mr. Eden, with a great deal of exposition because who would ever want to see him work towards a discovery when we could just have him talk about things he discovered off-panel, of engineering the portal opening in the Baxter Building. Mr. Eden isn't really Mr. Eden though, Reed's lab partner Cully is Mr. Eden and he's doing all this because he hates Reed. WHAT A DUMB ENDING. I'm going to give this the very slightest benefit of the doubt here as we all know FANTASTIC FOUR is ending soon, so it's entirely possible these dumb twists and dumb turns were meant to unfold over multiple issues instead of twenty pages, but STILL. We don't care about the GASP, it's not MR. EDEN, IT'S CULLY thing because we don't care or know about either of those characters. Reed accuses him of engineering everything with a ton of evidence we're just learning about NOW, which is like a detective story where we see a moonlighting detective doing his day job then suddenly, apropos of nothing, solving the whole case on the last page of the book. It's all terrible and I do not like it one bit, my friends. Total Score: 1/5


Guardians of the Galaxy 20

FINALLY, the end of Star-Lord's story reveals that an already dying Nova sacrificed himself to transport Drax and Star-Lord back to their proper universe and that Thanos escaped too. There's also some crap about how Nova was in love with Gamora and he swore Star-Lord to secrecy about all of this, which is why he didn't tell Gamora or the crew earlier. If it is indeed the death of Richard Ryder (doubtful, as that old comic book axiom of "we didn't see the body" certainly comes in to play), it's a pretty stupid death; a standard sacrifice with questionable motivation marred by a prolonged and unnecessary admission of love. It's the worst kind of superhero death, cliche and boring at the same time. Then Gamora goes off and sheds a single tear. Total Score: 1/5






Inhuman 7
Black Bolt is still alive and Maximus is using his telepathic powers to control the missing king, focusing his limited powers entirely on Black Bolt. Medusa knows that her husband is alive and sends a pair of Inhuman investigators, one from the old kingdom named Auran and one NuHuman named (by Auran) Nur, to track him down. They eventually do find Maximus and Black Bolt and Auran, knowing that Maximus likely can't control their minds while he's focused so hard on Black Bolt, somehow doesn't realize that Maximus would be willing to use Black Bolt to attack the investigators, which he does, blowing out a huge part of the penthouse they're staying in overlooking New Attilan. Nur, though, may still be alive, ready for the next move. There are some interesting things in here, particularly between Maximus and Black Bolt, but the whole book is dragged down by a lot of exposition and re-explaining what's going on all over the universe wherever Inhumans are concerned. I also kind of like the idea that Soule is introducing new Inhumans all over the place, moving them into our consciousness slowly so he can eventually bring everyone out at once and we won't be overwhelmed. It's a smart play for a franchise looking to build. Still, the writing will have to get out of its own way and start trusting the reader a little more before the book can really take off. Total Score: 3/5


Marvel 75th Anniversary Celebration 1
It's an extra long (and double-priced) book to commemorate 75 years of Marvel, replete with a story about the start of the universe, an old Stan Lee script illustrated by Bruce Timm, a Bendis Jessica Jones story, a Tom DeFalco Spider-Man story, a Len Wein Wolverine story, and a slew of covers from a slew of illustrators for books that will never exist, all credited to Brian Michael Bendis. Is it worth your money? No, probably not, unless you really love Bendis because this book is just chock full of him. It's always nice to see some of the legends like Lee, DeFalco, and Wein, but their screen-time is limited and the stories are somewhat fun throwbacks, nothing you haven't read a thousand times before. Six bucks though? I'm not gonna tell you to spend that. Total Score: 2/5






Nova 22
Nova talks his way back out of expulsion with a reluctant Principal Philbin then goes trick-or-treating with the X-Kids at the Jean Gray School. It's a bit of a reset issue and it works well enough for that with a couple of nice moments and an easy, generic story. Nothing to write home about but not a complete failure of an issue, as I maintain it's important to rest every few issues and let our hero have a slower day now and again. Total Score: 3/5


Thunderbolts 32

Six months after the fall of the Thunderbolts, Red Leader runs his new compound from Kata Jaya, the spot of the team's very first mission. He's plotted his whole life perfectly and now his only problem is that he has a crush on his biographer and can't seem to win her affection. However, all is not well for Red Leader as the Thunderbolts have been gathering intel about the new compound and have led the Avengers there to help take it apart. Red Leader has plenty of plans in place to pick apart his old team but they all crumble when his biographer turns out to be the SHIELD agent Hawkeye had been working with in disguise. She shoots him from behind and the T-Bolts and Avengers win the day, though it's made clear to Red Hulk that none of them want to join him again. It's a fun ending to a book that has certainly had its ups and downs (though mostly ups, particularly from halfway or so on). Deadpool has a particularly strong issue here, though the rest get a little bogged down by the sheer amount of characters and the focus being on Red Leader. Also, Mephisto sends the spirit of vengeance back to Johnny Blaze, to his dismay, which is a fun moment. Total Score: 4/5


Wolverine and the X-Men 11
Melita interviews Spider-Man, Storm, and Quentin Quire about the passing of Wolverine, though "interview" probably isn't the right word. She talks to each of them and gets more from some than others. The Spider-Man bits are mostly fun and work pretty well and the Storm stuff is more or less what you want out of Storm. To be fair, the Quentin stuff is what you can expect from Quentin too, but I still have to ask if we need this much Quentin Quire in our lives. Anyway, strong "in memoriam" kind of arc and, like last issue, it's nice to see so many artists paying their respects to Wolverine. Total Score: 3/5

Further NYCC announcements

New York Comic-Con has ended, thereby effectively ending convention season for the year with ostensibly the second biggest annual con (though early numbers suggest that it may have brought in more visitors than SDCC). I've already outlined some of the news that came out this weekend (including the announcement of a new Squirrel Girl ongoing, the new Ant-Man ongoing, the creative team change on HAWKEYE, and the cancellation of FANTASTIC FOUR) but there was plenty more that happened (sorry, I had put off reviews so late that I was busy with those all day and didn't get caught up on the news until TOO LATE. I really need someone to pay me for this, okay world?). Let's try and go beat by beat, with our friends from CBR.

Hickman and Ribic launch a new SECRET WARS

Marvel revealed this weekend that there's a long-game in place for Jonathan Hickman's TIME RUNS OUT arc and that it will lead to a brand new SECRET WARS. Readers will remember the original SECRET WARS from the mid-80s as a huge crossover event (one of the biggest, if not the biggest, to that point) from writer and eventual EIC Jim Shooter. It was...you know, kind of cynical at the time? Kind of a big money grab. Also, I do not love it. However, you have to imagine if Marvel is willing to go back to this well, no less with top flight talent like Hickman and Ribic, that they have to have something more planned. By the same token, is anyone else a little event-exhausted? I sure am. And SECRET WARS, if it keeps with its history and even with its Alex Ross cover (at left), will tie everyone up for a little while so don't expect it to be a one-and-done kind of event.

News about Netflix's new Daredevil series

NYCC had the first significant news and images for the upcoming Daredevil series, set to premiere on Netflix in 2015. Included in that news was a first look at Charlie Cox as both Matt Murdock and as Daredevil (donning a JRJR-esque black suit that the producers called "his first suit"), Rosario Dawson's role as Claire Temple (billed as a "nurse who works at night" and critically important to Matt's story, though it also seems like she'd be a good low-key but important character/actress to tie the four upcoming shows together neatly), Joe Quesada's concept art for the show (seen at left), and a nice panel with much of the announced cast (with plenty more announcements made this weekend). All in all, it's our first real news drop since Cox's casting and it sounds like everyone is optimistic about the pace at which this development is happening.





Weekly WOLVERINES book set to hit in January
Following the death of Wolverine and the loss of plenty of his secrets, an unlikely team comprised of heroes and villains such as Sabretooth, Mystique, X-23, and Daken will need to work together to uncover some of those lost secrets. Charles Soule and Ray Fawkes will head up the series, which will be an ongoing weekly series sure to break anyone's wallet who even considers buying it. Though there's been no price point revealed yet, I have to imagine it's minimum $2.99 but more likely $3.99, given Marvel's current release price average, meaning a prospective buyer would be spending about 16 dollars a month on this book. Yipes.

New Marvel Cosmic event set to kick off in February
Did I say I was sick of events? I meant GEEZ, LET'S GET SOME MORE IN HERE. In a move not unlike the changing of AXIS to AVENGERS AND X-MEN: AXIS, short and sweet ominous title THE BLACK VORTEX will actually be named GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY AND X-MEN: THE BLACK VORTEX because somehow Marvel made a name LONGER than AVENGERS AND X-MEN: AXIS (am I just capitalizing book names or am I shouting, no one will know). The event will be bookended by two issues of GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY AND X-MEN: THE BLACK VORTEX with multiple crossovers in-between. The event will move through books like LEGENDARY STAR-LORD, CAPTAIN MARVEL, NOVA, ALL-NEW X-MEN, CYCLOPS, and some other yet-to-be-announced books (money on GAMORA, in the least). Well. On the other hand, I'm happy to see ROCKET RACCOON's not on that list so if Skottie Young stays attached and sticks to his typical issues, I guess I won't be too upset.

New SILK ongoing announced

SILK 1 cover by Dave Johnson

Following the character's recent introduction in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, Cindy Moon, AKA Silk, will be getting a new ongoing written by Robbie Thompson with art from Stacey Lee. Thompson claims that the series will flesh out Silk and follow her "from bite to bunker." The new series is set to begin in February.














New SPIDER-GWEN ongoing announced

SPIDER-GWEN 1 cover by Robbi Rodriguez

A link so nice we used it twice. The hit Spider-Gwen from Jason Latour and Robbi Rodriguez's EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE 2 will be returning for a new ongoing in February. Latour and Rodriguez will return to the book, which is enough to make anyone excited, given the fun and the great look of Gwen's debut issue. Excited to delve more into that universe.













Juggernaut returning to the Marvel Universe in Yost's AMAZING X-MEN
Come January, the X-Men and likely some bad dudes will be racing to find the Ruby of Cyttorak, the gem that transforms anyone into Cyttorak's unstoppable Juggernaut, in Chris Yost's AMAZING X-MEN. The upcoming arc, titled "THE ONCE AND FUTURE JUGGERNAUT" will start in issue 15 of the current run and would at least seem to potentially expand the X-Men villains a little more than just Mystique and Sabretooth.

Limited series OPERATION S.I.N. to premiere in January
A new five-issue limited series exploring the Marvel Universe in WWII days is set to launch in January. Written by Kathryn Immonen with Rich Ellis art, OPERATION S.I.N. will involve characters such as Peggy Carter, Howard Stark, and the recently introduced Woodrow McCord (ORIGINAL SIN) fighting some aliens. I really like Kathryn Immonen and this will at least have a different focal point than most WWII releases from Marvel. Looking forward to Immonen's take on a recently well-spotlit Peggy Carter.

GAMORA ongoing scheduled for Spring 2015
Some news in that link just there about the new GAMORA upcoming, written by Guardians of the Galaxy co-screenwriter Nicole Perlman.

Also, G. Willow Wilson to have a four-issue arc on X-MEN
Same link, different news. MS MARVEL's G.Willow Wilson will have a four-issue arc on X-MEN starting in January with X-MEN 23. The arc will be titled "THE BURNING WORLD" and will kick off at a Burning Man-esque festival.

Women of Marvel variant line set for March 2015

Stephanie Hans' THOR 7 variant

Third time using the same link is purportedly the charm so here goes. Following the announcement of Phil Noto variant month in February (still excited about that), March will find Marvel releasing 20 Women of Marvel variants by such artists as Sara Pichelli, Stephanie Hans, Vanesa Del Rey, Jill Thompson, Stacey Lee, and Faith Erin Hicks. Pretty neat.













There was also a bunch of other news about things like a James Patterson miniseries, some STAR WARS bidness, Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy cartoon, the upcoming animated feature film Big Hero 6 (which I think we can all agree looks great), and probably more, but we here at Marvels are focused on the comics and only occasionally on the peripheral stuff. Like how terrible the new animated shows are and how much we miss shows like Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes and Spectacular Spider-Man. Or how boring we find Marvel's Agents of SHIELD (though this season's debut had more interesting plot points than anything that happened last season). Or how interested in Big Hero 6 we are (pretty interested, you guys). Or those Netflix series that it occurs to me don't fall under the umbrella of comics but still got decent coverage in this here post. Look. Whatever.

Captain Marvel 8, Rocket Raccoon 4

Captain Marvel 8

Chewie has had a number of Flerken babies and Captain Marvel's ship is being attacked by some aliens who want them all dead. Rocket Raccoon, feeling a kinship with Chewie upon learning that she's the last of her kind, helps defend Chewie on the ship from one such alien who has made its way onboard while Tic takes the shuttle off the ship full of Flerken younglings and Carol attacks the invading ship from the outside. Together, they all manage to ward off the aliens and Rocket learns that Chewie is actually pretty alright. They drop the Flerken kittens off at a refugee planet but Tic and Chewie refuse to leave Carol, preferring to stay on as part of her team.

It's not a bad issue and it moves pretty well. Marcio Takara does a pretty great job on the art duties of this one (as does Lee Loughridge on colors). I'm feeling less of an attraction to this series than I did with its predecessor. I'm still not convinced Captain Marvel's place is in space. We've spent so much time with new characters lately that it's taken Carol sort of out of the spotlight and swapped in a handful of characters I don't care so much about. It's a delicate line to walk with a solo book, leaving the focus on your protagonist and building up her support characters. One of the best parts of DeConnick's first volume on CAPTAIN MARVEL was that she seemingly easily navigated that line, creating a whole world in which Carol could comfortably live all while never forgetting that she was the focus of the book. One of the problems, too, with space books at current are that most books have to spend so much time establishing who the threats are that we have less time for the heroes we're ostensibly there to see. DeConnick has certainly built up more than enough good will that I'm still looking forward to seeing where everything is going to go next.

Total Score: 3/5


Rocket Raccoon 4

The other mysterious raccoon has captured Groot and sends away Rocket's backup with a bigger payoff offering than Rocket had. Finally alone, the other raccoon pokes and prods at Rocket, berating him for being alone in the universe before revealing that he himself is not similar to Rocket at all, unzipping his costume and revealing himself to be mercenary Blackjack O'Hare. He tells Rocket that this has been a plan years in the making, concocted after Rocket ruined his chance at assassinating Princess Amalya and making enough money to happily retire on. Rocket's two storylines intersect at just the right moment, though, as Amalya bursts in with her cadre of Rocket's ex-girlfriends to exact their revenge on Rocket, who had a habit of seducing them and stealing their goods. The ensuing fight leaves Rocket the last one standing, though certainly exhausting and worse for wear, before the Guardians show up to pick him up. He celebrates with them but goes to bed early, depressed still that he's the only one out there. HOWEVER, that still may not be true, as we see a raccoon-esque captain leading her ship to find the book Rocket was so desperate to hear more about.

I very nearly didn't include this book as one of the ones I did a longer review for (reverse-spoiler: I'm running really late on reviews this week so this many long ones certainly seems counter-intuitive) because, though the issue was excellent, I wasn't sure I'd have more to say than I've been saying. For those who haven't been paying attention, I've been saying that this book is the most fun book Marvel is putting out right now, with Young really knocking it out of the park in the tone, the story, the art (my god, the art), the dialogue, and really, everything. I'm not sure I have more to add to that but I decided to still shine a light on this book because not having much to add doesn't mean I shouldn't still do a little more to recommend it. For real, it's a great book, you guys. It's the perfect marriage between art and writing, between character and tone. This one even shows that the book can go further than just wild and crazy hijinks, delving here into Rocket's sadness and loneliness. Excellent stuff.

Total Score: 5/5

Leftovers 10-1-14

Alright, let's get right into it because you and I both have some Smash Brothers to play.


Edge of Spider-Verse 4

In an alternate universe, a creepy kid named Patton Parnel gets bitten by a radioactive spider and it begins to turn him into something close to a living spider. Patton begins to eat people, starting with his bully Gene and his Uncle Ted before really just uncorking and going for everyone, including his beloved next-door neighbor Sara Jane. Before he can capture Sara Jane, Morlun shows up and finishes him, though all is not well for Sara Jane, who has a number of spider eggs in her from a bite she sustained. Creepy twist on the Peter Parker origin story here as EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE gets a horror comic entry. It's certainly readable though the connections between this world and the 616 are almost distracting. Writer Clay Chapman clearly chose these names for a reason, he's not shy about telling us that this is meant to be similar, but it does border on over-repetitive, a forced wink and nod. Total Score: 3/5



Fantastic Four Annual 1
Sue goes to Latveria to get Val back but Val wants to stay and Sue freaks out and attacks Doom, who reveals that someone else is in her head and Val stops Sue before she can kill Doom and I still do not care one bit about this book. I really don't like any of these characters and again, the exposition here is just SO HEAVY (and not like Marty McFly's "heavy"). It's unbelievable and clunky and obnoxious. I also like Val in certain scenarios but you really have to balance out the genius with the child thing for me, you can't just have a precocious "spouting exposition" and "using big/formal words" child to illustrate who she is. I know that Sue has something going on in her head right now, but it's still such a terrible rendering of this character, a character that I just don't have any interest in reading, regardless of what's in her head. Total Score: 1/5

Guardians 3000 1
The Guardians of the Galaxy in the year 3000 (or 3014, to be exact) are under attack from the Badoon. The Guardians are Vance Astro, Charlie-27, Martinex, Yondu, and Starhawk and they have a refugee, named Geena Drake, from a Badoon camp in tow. They had met up with other powerful space entities fighting the Badoon in what was supposed to be a safe place, but they were ambushed and everyone died. However, there are issues with time right now and Geena seems to be a key to it. She wakes up 30 minutes before they all die trying to escape and she begins to remember, eventually picking up a gun and fighting back. Groundhog Day (the more popular reference) or Edge of Tomorrow (perhaps the more applicable reference), whatever you want to call it, that's happening. It's mixed in with a ton of exposition as if this is the only issue this creative team is going to get and they have to get everything out now. The only reason to believe maybe they have more time than they're letting on is that they won't stop saying made-up words and I get that we're a thousand years in the future and language changes but COME ON, STOP WITH MADE-UP WORDS. I really do not like them. They're always distracting and clumsy and obnoxious. Seriously, it drags the book down and slows the pacing badly, even when the exposition does that plenty. Total Score: 2/5

Legendary Star-Lord 4
Okay, we gotta speed things up again. Star-Lord tracks Thanos to the moon and wants to kill him, what with his guilt about letting him get back into the universe. The Mandalay Gem gets him to a point where he can kill Thanos but he won't do it because it would possibly blow up the moon and then the Earth would be in some real trouble. Meanwhile, Kitty's mad at him but he wins her over again, SOMEHOW, and Mr. Knife wants to steal a powerful artifact. It's hard to get on board with the cast of this book and this one just serves as another of the multitudinous books where I'm beginning not to like Kitty Pryde, who freaks out when Peter travels near Earth and won't see her (irrational and weirdly needy in their line of work) and then forgives him when he GOES TO EARTH AND LEAVES A MESSAGE FOR HER OUTSIDE OF HER PLACE BUT CONTINUES NOT TO SEE HER. There are things happening in this book but it's hard to really care about them if you don't care about the people involved in said things. And I don't right now. Total Score: 2/5

Moon Knight 8

There's a hostage situation in a building in New York and Moon Knight goes to put an end to it. He alternates between his three personalities, all of whom have a very specific way of dealing with problems, and eventually he ends up killing the hostage-taker, only to learn from the news later that the bomb the purported terrorist had was his company's agricultural accelerant that, though harmful, wouldn't have killed his hostages. Now, thanks to news reports of his brutal dealings, Moon Knight has been revealed and exposed as a brutal vigilante, all according to Knight's doctor's plan. There is a lot of interesting stuff here, particularly the multiple personalities we see and another look at Khonshu, but the overall pacing is a little slow here. It's a different sort of layout, almost meant to read more as a picture book than a comic, with dialogue (occasionally ambiguous as to who said it) and narration printed neatly on the sides of smaller panels. Although it's a kind of neat look, it doesn't quite hide the fact that there's a lot of pace-slowing explanation and prose there. Still pretty strong stuff and it's clear with his second issue on the series that Wood is intent on following Ellis' tone for the strong series. Total Score: 4/5

Silver Surfer 6
After a series of requests that try Surfer's patience, Dawn demands they get the best ice cream in the universe, leading them to Planet Prime, a planet where perfection reigns and everyone is the best there is at what they do and what they do is a very specific task, such as Banker One or Tour Guide One or Street Sweeper One. Their actions on the planet inevitably lead to Warrior One, the most perfect warrior, to attack Surfer. He struggles under the might of the warrior, nearly losing the fight, before Dawn tells him to simply remove the Warrior's badge, promoting Warrior Two to his spot and calming things as the new Warrior One calls for an end to the fight, but leading the new Warrior Zero to swear his revenge. As ever, the book strives to be fun and light and mostly hits, occasionally going a little far in one direction or another. It's hard not to draw certain comparisons to Doctor Who, as we have an extremely powerful and knowledgeable alien leading an Earthgirl around on a series of adventures but these issues are self-contained, typically, small anecdotes from a larger story and with very little ongoing drama. The smartest thing about this book is the inclusion of Michael and Laura Allred, whose art and colors grant this book the energy that they'd probably be lacking with anyone else. It's such a specific tone for this book and the Allreds make sure to convey that tone in everything they do. Total Score: 4/5

Spider-Man 2099 4

Scorpion, with a legion of Spider-Slayers at his disposal, is dead set on killing Spider-Man 2099, who he believes to be regular-type Spider-Man. He's succeeding until Miguel gives them the slip just long enough to have his computer Lyla turn on his regular clothes hologram. With no spiders to target, Scorpion begins to threaten the civilians around, believing Spidey won't let them die. Miguel tosses Lyla on to Scorpion's back with direction to hologram him up to look like Spider-Man. The Spider-Slayers attack him and he only barely survives, destroying them in the process. Meanwhile, Tiberius' captor dies saving him from the collapsing building, causing him to have a change of heart and not sell the Slayers to the warlord dictator, even going so far as to oust him with his own legion of Slayers. It's a very strong issue out of this young book, one that moves pretty well and finds Miguel using his smarts and his skills to win the day in classic Spider-Man fashion. The art is strong and the tone is right where it needs to be. I'll be interested to see if this book can fit in with EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE, where it's headed next. Total Score: 5/5

X-Men 20
The mystery deepens as hunters return to their original ship, forcing Rachel, Monet, and Psylocke to take them all down. They discover security footage in the ship and learn about Sharada Darthri, a being who seems intent on creating and cultivating new life, even if it's at the expense of old life (this may be a little vague and/or wrong because they still haven't actually figured out her intents), which is why she's so interested in the Shi'ar/Kree/mutant child of Deathbird. Under Darthri's command is SWORD's Manifold Tyger, who is directed to kill everyone at the Peak. He attacked Storm already and now aims to take out Cecilia Reyes. It's an interesting story so far, even if it's a little tough to follow, and the writing continues to be pretty strong here, though there are maybe a few too many asides and interjections. I'll be interested to rate this one a little more thoroughly once we've seen it all and once the plot is cleared up a bit more. Pretty strong stuff though otherwise. Total Score: 4/5

Leftovers 9-24-14

Okay. I apologize both for my busy week this week and for the upcoming post. Got a lot of apologies to make. ANYWAY, let's get right into and out of it.

All-New Ghost Rider 7

Robbie is still having trouble making his personal life and Eli come to some sort of understanding and he ends up killing a guy to take the money he was owed before another Ghost Rider shows up to complicate things further. Still strong stuff with Smith spending just the right amount of time characterizing Robbie and the neighborhood, though I'm still wary of Hyde's role in all of this. Total Score: 4/5












All-New Invaders 10
Mars attacks? I don't know, man, this book is pretty terrible. They're helped by the daughter of the original Iron Cross who is an Inhuman now and then Torch goes crazy and she promises to help while Mars attacks London and Roger Aubrey, the Mighty Destroyer, literally has a line of dialogue that goes "I'm an incredibly dashing, older gay gentleman, by virtue of which means I'm incredibly vain" directly after he says to Union Jack and Spitfire "A speedster, a young man with a pistol and a vintage motor bike, and a "flamboyant" octogenarian." DOES ANYONE THINK ANYTHING IN THIS BOOK THEY DON'T SAY? Perhaps James Robinson would like to sit beside us as we read his books and explain bit-by-bit what's happening in case we don't understand? Total Score: 1/5

Amazing Spider-Man 1.5

Spider-Man finally beats Clash and we're all relieved because Clash is not interesting nor likable and looking back to this point in Spidey history means Spidey also isn't terribly interesting and isn't really likable so now we can all move on with our lives. Total Score: 2/5














Amazing X-Men 11
Wendigos! They're everywhere! Wolverine is one! The X-Men travel to the realm of monsters where monster Tanaraq is getting supercharged by the Wendigo presence on Earth and where he plans his attack on Earth, even expanding the Wendigo curse to mean Wendigos can exist outside of Canada! Where goes the Wendigo? EVERYWHERE. Pretty good stuff, drags a little bit despite all of the action, but still a compelling story and Yost brings to this book his uncanny ability to nail the voice of everyone he touches. Total Score: 4/5

Cyclops 5
Cyclops and Corsair have fixed the tracking beacon bounty hunters placed on their ship and therefore successfully lure a group to them, managing to outwit them and steal their ships, though Cyclops overrides his dad's plans a few times to show compassion for the bounty hunters. Good characterization of a young and optimistic Scott and now we can continue our journeys with the interesting father-son duo. Total Score: 4/5











Deadpool 35
MAYBE, just MAYBE, there will some day be a week where nary a single DEADPOOL book will be released. But that's not this week so, onwards. Deadpool spends some quality time with Ellie and has to fight a Spider-Slayer Dracula has put his consciousness into, which he defeats handily. He also brings the refugees from Butler's camps to the Jean Grey School and has Beast run medical tests on them, which could complicate things as Hank quickly calls Deadpool back, needing his liver for a vital operation. Bit of a break from the action here as even the Dracula fight has very little stakes (HA) and mostly plays for laughs, which are certainly there if not enough to carry the issue. Total Score: 3/5

Edge of Spider-Verse 3

Dustin Weaver introduces us to Aaron Aikman, the only Spider-Man who has sought out the Spider, injecting himself with a serum that gave him his powers and using advanced machinery to vigilânt around the city. There's a full story here about his laboratory and the woman he loved risking everything to save her daughter but the real story is the twist ending when Morlun shows up and kills Aikman, meaning that just because we're seeing these dudes on the EDGE of SPIDER-VERSE, they won't necessarily make it to the main showing. Pretty good stuff, drags like any of these have when they've had to really give a lot of backstory for one issue, but it holds together somewhat nicely. Total Score: 3/5






Guardians of the Galaxy 19
Quill continues to tell his story to Gamora and explains that they couldn't die in the Cancerverse so their sacrifice had kind of been for nothing, now they had to play eternal keep-away from Thanos with the Cosmic Cube, made more troublesome by the appearance of the Cancerverse Avengers who are all evil and who want the Cube themselves and, sadly, eventually get it. The issue is all from the memory of Quill so it's basically a big ol' flashback where we don't know the full ending but we kind of know maybe half of it (Drax, Quill, and Thanos, in the very least, survive to return to the 616) so kind of low stakes here for a story that's going to last at LEAST three issues. Total Score: 2/5

Inhuman 6

Dante and his new friends Jason (rock-based powers) and Naja (weird-based powers) find their way back to Attilan, now run by The Unspoken, and manage to, with the help of Vinatos, the medical regent of New Attilan, infiltrate The Unspoken's throne room. He still has the Terrigen crystals he found so he's still insanely powerful but Dante attacks him all the same, getting horribly wounded in the fight for his troubles. While Naja continues the distraction, Jason uses his rock powers to destroy the crystals, effectively ending The Unspoken's new reign and restoring Medusa to the throne. Good issue for the NuHumans as everything is set right once again, though Lineage seems ready to strike a deal with the imprisoned Unspoken. Total Score: 4/5






Loki: Agent of Asgard 6
Thanks to some time-and-space trickery, Doctor Doom finds himself face to face at the end of the universe with the original Loki, who derides and denounces him, causing Doom to go back to his own time and search out the young Loki, pulling him into battle at his castle. He ends up trapping Loki, who doesn't want any part of this fight, and announcing that he's captured a god, effectively weakening him by destroying his story. Though things seem lost for young Loki, he secretly brought Verity Willis (eye roll!) with him and now she's prepared to help her friend. I literally have no idea what's going on and what the point of any of this is. Total Score: 2/5

Magneto 10
Magneto has been captured by the Red Skull and is being tortured by Xavier's brain in the hopes that Skull can break him. Magneto tries to hide in all his worst memories, giving us a full tour of many of them, but finds eventually that he cannot keep Skull at bay. Before he breaks, he's rescued by the similarly captured Havok, Rogue, and Scarlet Witch. Pretty sad issue for Magneto, you guys, as we see the worst of the worst, but it follows the theme Bunn has set up for this series, which often goes back to why Magneto fights. Total Score: 4/5

New Warriors 10
The Celestials are coming! The New Warriors strike again at the High Evolutionary and his Evolutionaries. Speedball makes a great Ghostbusters reference! The Eternals show up! Action, hijinks, comedy, drama, and more! Check out NEW WARRIORS 10! Total Score: 5/5














Savage Wolverine 23
A story from Wolverine's past where someone drugs him, slowing his healing factor and tries to hunt him through the woods of his animal-times. He's protected by the runt of a wolf pack but eventually the wolf sacrifices himself to save Wolverine, drawing Wolverine out to murder everyone in sight. Typical Wolverine-in-the-woods story done with maybe a little less flare and heart and with even more hand-holding than some of the others I've seen. Total Score: 2/5

Storm 3
Storm is called to Kenya by a mysterious benefactor saying that he needs her help to bring rain and water to the people there. Though she's wary it's a trap, it's a cause that matters enough to her to send her there anyway. It's not entirely a trap, but it was Forge, with whom she has a rocky relationship, who sent the letter. He swears he can do it and she chooses to trust him, though one of the Kenyans doesn't and his interference sort of sabotages everything, though Storm does her part to sabotage the machinery, demanding that Forge first spend a year in Kenya working on the tech and working with the people so that they can all have a mutual trust and to ensure that the tech will work and not just be an experiment. It's another good issue to characterize Storm, who wants to trust Forge but knows things aren't that black and white. Instead, she comes up with an interesting plan that roots itself in trust and hope. That's what we want to see out of Storm. Total Score: 4/5

Thunderbolts 31
It's Punisher vs. Red Hulk in the final battle of the T-Bolts. It's a huge fight and the momentum swings back and forth until Hawkeye and the Avengers (though the lesser known ones, like Cannonball, Sunspot, and Shang-Chi) show up to break up the fighting. Red Hulk doesn't believe they're the Avengers but Punisher stands down, unwilling to harm the good guys. Elektra turns up to calm Red Hulk, dropping the Leader's body in between them and showing them that he was an LMD and that, in fact, it was the Leader behind all of this the whole time. Ross announces the Thunderbolts are done, leaving the Red Leader victorious for next time. Plenty of fun in this issue as the fight gets more and more elevated. Also fun to see Hawkeye lead his team of lesser known Avengers into battle and to see the Punisher and Red Hulk struggle to understand that they are, in fact, Avengers. Total Score: 4/5

Hawkeye 20, Captain Marvel 7

Hopefully there aren't many but please forgive any spelling or grammatical errors, particularly today. I wrote a slew of reviews (today's and tomorrow's) on my phone away from the comics and autocorrect REALLY hates comics, I tell you what. Nearly as much as I hate proofreading. So we're all to blame.

Hawkeye 20

Harold H. Harold has been killed and one of Kate's arrows is responsible. She's brought in for questioning but talks her way out of it with Caudle, who still doesn't like her but realizes she couldn't have done it. With the help of her LA friends, the flower shop owner who she helped in her first solo adventure, and the suddenly not-dead Harold, she sneaks into Masque's complex, finding herself suddenly on the losing end of a battle with her henchmen, though not before she manages to steal some really important client files of Masque's, including her father's. She escapes but returns to torch Masque's home as payback for her own torched trailer, which puts her back in the grasp of some more LMD henchmen (for, of course, that is what Masque's business dealing in bodies is and explains the lives of the rich that Harold stumbled on so long ago and Harold's own death and reappearance) and of Masque herself. She manages to walk away from the fight thanks to a timely rescue by SHIELD, who interrogates her but has no ground on which to stand in their interrogation, particularly when Kate questions their involvement, given the LMDs. She settles things up, borrows money from Marcus and Finch (who she refers to as "the best family a girl could have," d'awwwww), and heads home, calling her father and vowing to stop him.

The series is ready to merge into one story once more with Kate headed back east and it leaves me torn. I really love this book and obviously the first 15 or so issues with both Hawkeyes together were excellent but it's a testament to the strength of this series and the strength of Annie Wu that I don't want this to end just as much as I want Kate and Clint reunited. Fraction's Kate, in her first solo arc, has definitely proven she has the ability to stand on her own, showcasing skills and charisma at every turn. It's been tons of fun; credit to Marvel for trusting Fraction with this and for bringing in relative unknown Annie Wu to absolutely kill with a big spotlight on her. This book doesn't land nearly as well, even despite Fraction's writing, with any other artist. As far as this issue goes, fantastic work all around, Kate continues to be one of the most fun characters to read out there and her energy and excitement bursts off the page. There are great long-jokes, great quick-jokes, great references snuck in (the old cranky Hallmark card lady gets referenced! There's a "It's Chinatown" reference too but the cranky old Hallmark card lady is that funny that I'm not even going to mention the Chinatown one), and overall an excellent book.

Total Score: 5/5


Captain Marvel 20

Captain Marvel has returned from her first arc successful, but it hasn't stopped the nightmares she's plagued by, namely a nightmare wherein she cannot protect the people she loves and fails them when they need her most. In perhaps happier news, she's found herself traveling with Tic, who stowed away after their first adventure, and the pair of them return to Carol's ship, currently being grudgingly watched by Rocket Raccoon, who immediately begins fighting with Carol again about the possible alien nature of her cat. Their fight is interrupted by a spaceship latching on to and breaching Carol's. Matters are made worse when Tic finds Chewie the cat sitting on a host of apparent offspring, perhaps confirming Rocket's assessment that a very dangerous Flerkin has made its way onboard.

Despite the nightmare to kick this one off and the tension by the end of the issue, this one is certainly more light-hearted than any of the first arc of this CAPTAIN MARVEL volume. Just about everything both Tic and Rocket say is played for laughs, some hitting well and some missing the mark a bit. It also feels a bit like we're missing a scene here as Carol sees Rocket and IMMEDIATELY tears into him for...watching over her ship and cat for her. Granted, Rocket changes some things on her ship and hates the cat, but there's nothing wrong with Chewie as Carol returns and the changes to the ship aren't cited as problems, which makes Carol just come off as aggressive and ungrateful. As I said, I think there are grounds for a fight present but those grounds never feel like the reason she attacks. It's not an awful issue and certainly guest artist Takara does a very good job filling in, but it never feels fully together the way DeConnick has made us accustomed. Such is the price of repeated success.

Total Score: 3/5

Rocket Raccoon 2, Legendary Star-Lord 2

Rocket Raccoon 2
Young (w and a) and Beaulieu (c) and Eckleberry (l)

After handing himself in, Rocket is put in and subsequently, with the help of the Groot shard he smuggled in, breaks out of one of the highest security prisons available. On the way out, he finds and takes with him fellow inmate Macho Gomez, a criminal he put in prison originally but who will actually have transport available once they get out. Though Macho does not like Rocket, he wants to get out of prison and he wants to see his own boss Funtzel, with whom Rocket wants a meeting, destroy the raccoon. As they escape and set out, to the chagrin of the other raccoon-like life form, they're accosted by the fleet of Rocket's ex-girlfriends.

This book is unrepentantly and unabashedly fun, something you rarely see in mainstream comics these days. I would say that something like SUPERIOR FOES OF SPIDER-MAN is the closest you'll get to this level of humor and excitement and weird plot turns and so on, but even that is a little more entrenched in the giant established Marvel Universe. There's only so much you can do with a group of characters who live in a continuity-based universe and are acting in the one major city on which that universe focuses. Rocket, on the other hand, has a whole unexplored galaxy to play in with completely different rules and freedoms. He's only tied to things insofar as he's a functioning part of this universe (now more than ever) but everything else Young is having him play with is fair game. It's exciting and lawless and fun and Young is taking full advantage.

Total Score: 5/5


Legendary Star-Lord 2
Humphries (w) and Medina (p) and Vlasco (i) and Curiel (c) and Caramagna (l)

Star-Lord has just found out he has a sister (well, half-sister) who works on behalf of the Spartax Empire. Though he's captured by her in an attempt to collect a giant bounty on his head from a Mr. Knife, they manage to come to a middle ground where each can understand where the other comes from. Star-Lord is, you know, Star-Lord, we pretty much know his deal, and half-sister Victoria wants to collect the bounty in order to help the destabilized innocents of the Spartax Empire since Star-Lord threw things into chaos by exposing J-Son's crimes. They work out a plan wherein Victoria turns Star-Lord over to one of Knife's lieutenants but the two end up duping him and cashing in even more credits from all of the accounts Knife holds. Though it paints a bigger target on Star-Lord and Victoria, it gives her the money to really help the Spartax and at least leaves her feeling amicable towards her half-brother. Meanwhile, though, Mr. Knife isn't so pleased.

Boy, it sure was clever of me to review ROCKET RACCOON first, though my typical alphabetical listings skewed the other way at first glance. I'm glad that I did that one first because I almost wish this book, already, was more like that one. This one is embroiling Peter in the same sort of anti-Spartax fight he seems to be constantly fighting in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. Some of that is fine, sure, and he certainly has more personal vendettas than someone like Rocket in his established history already, but I'd love this series to come in with a bang as we see this wild card roguish chaotic good sort of dude tramping around the galaxy and pretty much Han Soloing or Mal Reynoldsing. Instead, we get right into the politics and the daddy issues we've been seeing so much of in GUARDIANS. This seems the perfect place to break away from that a little and, particularly on the coat-tails of Chris Pratt's charming portrayal of the character, give us that sort of character for this universe. That's not to say it's not coming, certainly, but to get so invested in a sort of standard story when you have such a galaxy of opportunity, like in ROCKET RACCOON, seems like a waste. This issue isn't awful by any stretch, I just feel it's a missed chance to really explode with fun and excitement but it ends up feeling a little boilerplate.

Total Score: 3/5

Comics this week

Lot of intriguing books out there this week. On the other hand, I'm probably just going to mostly pick books you're expecting me to pick? So, not so much intriguing here as "predictable." Look, these things happen. Maybe Marvel should release its intriguing books on weeks where fewer sure-thing books are coming out?

Black Widow 9
Great book all the time and it got an added boost of heart last time with Winter Soldier's inclusion. This one will crossover with this week's PUNISHER 9 as well. Expect a pretty fun one, particularly as both books are helmed by writer Nathan Edmondson, who has added life to both series.

Iron Fist: The Living Weapon 5
Guys, do I have to cover why I like this book even more? There's a lot to like here and it's certainly worth a look if you somehow haven't looked yet, if just to see how the book plays. Lots of neat things, though maybe not quite as neat and predictably great as...

Moon Knight 6
Very sadly, this is the final issue for Warren Ellis and Declan Shalvey, who have really killed it on this book, completely redefining Moon Knight and blowing away readers at every turn. They've made this series, in just five issues, one of this best Marvel has in a lineup replete with good books. I don't want to write off the series when Ellis and Shalvey leave as Brian Wood will take over as series writer and I quite like Wood's work, not to mention that colorist Jordie Bellaire will stay on, which is certainly a win. Still, this will be the final issue for Ellis and Shalvey (who, excitingly, will team together again on Image's INJECTION, along with Bellaire) and I insist you read this book.

New Avengers 22
Back-to-back release weeks for NEW AVENGERS and I can't help but choose this book, which I've loved overall and whose last issue I particularly loved. Excellent work last week as we see a depth of character to Black Panther that Hickman had kind of danced around, particularly because Panther is someone who tends to play things close to the vest. How will the Illuminati react to Namor's ability to do what they could not?

Rocket Raccoon 2
Look, this is why having five books on this pre-game list is sometimes tough. SPIDER-VERSE starts this week with the return of SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN, the compelling SHE-HULK is out this week, and the very fun NEW WARRIORS returns this week as well, recently revoking their own Avengers status (well, Justice, as the only Avengers member) to stand for the New Warriors. Instead, though, the pick goes to Skottie Young's already incredibly fun ROCKET RACCOON, which will hopefully get a few more pick-ups in stores this week on the heels of the immensely successful and delightful Guardians of the Galaxy. Not that, if the pre-order numbers were any indication, this book needs a huge pick-up.

Leftovers 7-30-14

Alright all my buddies, here's the deal. I am committed to telling you about every Marvel book EVEN WHEN I have no motivation to do so. So let's play a game wherein I blaze through the last ten books I have to review (TEN, WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH THAT?) in thirty minutes or less. CAN WE MAKE IT HAPPEN? Only time will tell. Worth noting that secretly I'm pushing to knock out ten in ten minutes but that seems improbable, particularly given my propensity for expounding.

100th Anniversary Special Guardians of the Galaxy 1
Lanning and Marz (w) and Duarte (a) and Delgado (c) and Sabino (l)

The ragtag group of Guardians decades from now battle a Silver-Surfer-extra cosmic-power-imbued Galactus dead-set on consuming Knowhere to gain the knowledge and power of the Celestial whose head Knowhere is. The Guardians fight back alongside Galactus' saboteur herald Vance Astro, who is actually Peter Quill in disguise. The universe is saved and check out Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, in theaters now. Total Score: 2/5











All-New Ghost Rider 5
F. Smith (w) and T. Moore (a) and Staples w/Sanz (c) and Caramagna (l)

Robbie Reyes has to decide if he wants to use the spirit of vengeance within him to, as his teacher wants, change his community through positive action or, as the spirit Eli wants, burn it all to the ground. As a gang fight between Zabo and his men and Grumpy and his men breaks out, Robbie is forced into action to save his brother and the other innocents around. Mr. Hyde rips Grumpy in half and begins to beat on Ghost Rider but overdoses on drugs in an attempt to keep Ghost Rider down. Robbie decides to try to be a hero for the community instead of a monster. More good stuff from this book. Total Score: 4/5

Avengers World 10
Spencer (w) and Checchetto (a) and Mossa (c) and Caramagna (l)

All of the storylines we've seen in this book so far converge to begin to feel like some greater force is driving them. China's newly revealed SPEAR helps SHIELD and the Avengers in the fight against the dragon carrying Madripoor while Iron Man tries to "debate" Andrew Forson on live TV to poor results while Morgana Le Fey's army of the dead begins to march on Earth and while Cannonball and Sunspot bring the children of the Avengers back to the present. So much happening, so much still to come. Lots of fun writing and fun moments here and I AM TAKING TOO LONG. Total Score: 4/5

Cyclops 3
Rucka (w) and Dauterman (a) and Sotomayor (c) and Caramagna (l)

Cyclops and his dad end up stranded on a desolate planet as a result of a ship failure and Cyclops accuses his dad of being a drug addict. Corsair reveals that he's not addicted to drugs, per se, he's kept alive by the drugs he's been taking and the amount he has will only last him through 27 or so days so it's either they get off the planet, which seems unlikely, or they spend a nice final month together. Not a bad story and this certainly gets to the heart of the series quickly. Total Score: 4/5










Guardians of the Galaxy 17
Bendis (w) and Bradshaw and Oeming (a) w/Wong (i) and Ponsor (c) and Petit (l)

Captain Marvel has saved Peter Quill and he calls his ship back to him, sending it crashing out of its lock-up, before he takes it to fly straight at his dad in the city, pulling off at the last second. He and Carol need to find the other Guardians. Gamora and Angela call in quickly enough to just be picked up and they fly to a point in space where Drax is getting beaten by Gladiator, rescuing him easily enough. With J-Son's crimes revealed, the Supreme Intelligence wants nothing to do with him and returns Rocket peaceably, also giving their best known location for Groot. With the team re-assembled (except for newbie Venom, who intentionally avoids them on Knowhere), they're ready to enter ORIGINAL SIN. This arc screams of an ad for the movie: some stakes but ultimately a way to introduce each character without too much actual characterization. Total Score: 2/5

Iron Man Special 1
S. Ryan (w) and Handoko (p) and Poggi, Yeung, Livesay, and N. Lee (i) and Redmond (c) and Cowles (l)

So this story is still going then, hm? Total Score: 2/5

Iron Patriot 5
Kot (w) and G. Brown (a) and Charalampidis (c) and Cowles (l)

With Terrence Rhodes in the Iron Patriot suit punching at the villain, Rhodey has to stand around and hope that his dad hits the manual release on the other guy's suit. He finally does, launching Rhodey out of his inert suit and into the fight himself. He punches and punches at the villain, breaking plenty of his own body parts in the fight against metal, but eventually subdues him, though it comes too late to save his father, who took quite a beating in his own fight. Someone was pulling the strings on the villain but Rhodey never did figure out who and the villain himself gets smothered in his hospital bed by another mysterious character. Is this a win for America's new defender? Who knows? Still, pretty fast read and this continues to be easily my favorite book from Kot, who doesn't have the time to get into his writing patterns that tend to annoy me elsewhere. Total Score: 4/5



Original Sin 3.3 - Hulk vs. Iron Man
Gillen and Waid (s) and Waid (w) and Bagley (p) and Hennessy (i) and Keith (c) and Petit (l)

As Extremis-powered Hulk destroys Iron Man's labs in the hopes that the hero will come rushing home, Iron Man continues to investigate his own memories, praying that something is wrong. Iron Man hopes to lay low while he tries to figure things out, heading for Troy in the thought that Hulk won't realize to go there, even if Banner would have. However, he's not accounting for smart-Hulk and he's met by massive resistance when he touches down. The city, though, is built to be defensible and takes the fight to Hulk long enough that Iron Man can sneak away to his armory. On his way he realizes even more about that night that will make him look EVEN MORE VILLAINOUS. Still some interesting stuff, though I'm not a huge fan of Bagley's art here and I'm already a little tired of the "OH NO, I ALSO DID WHAT" endings of these issues. Total Score: 3/5

Secret Avengers 6
Kot (w) and Walsh (a) and Wilson (c) and Cowles (l)

Lady Bullseye is still alive and wants a meeting with Black Widow, enough that she's taken over a bullet train with a dirty bomb on it. Hill sends Widow and Spider-Woman to deal with it but they quickly learn that it's a trap (well, more than the trap they expected) as someone set another sentient bomb like their own new teammate Vladimir on the tracks and it opens a portal out of the world, sending Black Widow and Lady Bullseye through it. Meanwhile, MODOK announces that something had sex with the Fury to cause its pregnancy and Hawkeye tries to find Coulson only to be led to Deadpool hanging out with AIM. Some weird stuff here. I think the tone is starting to settle in on this book, which is an upside, but it still feels weird to have a book that's trying to go almost full-bore humor play with such big pieces of the Marvel Universe, pieces that have distinct personalities already and don't necessarily fit this way (I always dislike the Black Widow-as-bloodthirsty-killer design you occasionally see in books). Still, climbing out from under me really hating this book. Total Score: 3/5


Personal Total Score: 35 minutes or so. SO VERY CLOSE. I had to ramble on and on, didn't I? I just had to give extra summary when no one asked for it.

Guardians of the Galaxy quick review

Hey guys, as ever, no spoilers this close to the release of the movie.

I was nervous about Guardians of the Galaxy right up to the moment the movie started. I tried to get myself excited, tried to remember all the praise I'd heard, tried to just be excited that we were seeing such a crazy Marvel property in a movie, but I couldn't help being a little worried. There are people out there who hear that kind of attitude and say "you're worried that a fictional movie about a fictional universe with fictional characters will let you down?" They're the same people telling me that, as a grown man, I shouldn't care what horrors Michael Bay has bestowed on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. What kind of life must those people have, not caring about stories, about the oral and the aural and the written tradition? Look, I don't have to convince you guys. You're my people. You're comic people. So I can tell you instead that this movie was a ton of fun.

That's what I'd been hearing all along and I can't help but agree. I don't think the film is as deep as a few of the Marvel movies have been. I don't necessarily think it has as much to say as, say, Captain America: Winter Soldier. I don't think it's as ambitious as Avengers. I think it's riskier than both those movies and I think it maybe pulled what it wanted to off as well as either of those movies. It wasn't ever trying to be Cap 2 or Avengers. It was shamelessly and unflinchingly itself the whole way through. It never bogged itself down with grit or a big message. It took a team comprised of a half-human, a pair of alien assassins/killers, a talking raccoon, and a talking tree and said "hey, you know what, maybe this shouldn't be heavy-handed. Maybe this should just be a fun superhero movie." And it absolutely was. There are a lot of genuine laughs to be had, there still manages to be a good amount of heart, and the team itself ends up being a really likable and really fun team. Fun is the keyword, I've certainly used it enough. Go in looking for a fun movie and I don't think you'll be disappointed. It was maybe a little over-expository but you run that risk, as I say in so many comic reviews, when you have a whole team to develop in a limited space and when you set it in space and have to introduce an audience to brand new mythologies that intersect. It's maybe a little long because of that and it's maybe a little weighed down by that, but it manages to keep the dragging to a minimum and keeps the tone and the pace pretty well in check. It also accomplished something that less than a week ago I was doubting, which was to make me like this team and this universe enough to be excited for the sequel. Can't say better than that for a movie like this.

Movies this week

An addendum to my typical comics pre-game on Tuesdays because I didn't even mention it in this week's post. In case you somehow missed it (and you would have to be trying REALLY hard to miss this) Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy comes out THIS VERY FRIDAY (or, most likely, Thursday night). I'm a little mixed on this release, as I rather have been since its announcement, but the reviews have been overwhelmingly positive. Of course, the reviews were overwhelmingly positive for Iron Man 3 and I was not onboard with that one. Anywho, if all goes well, I'll be seeing this Thursday night and give you a quick update on my thoughts, likely to not be succeeded by another post with a full review since CLEARLY I have stopped doing those? Look, what I'm trying to say is that I've had a nearly empty draft post about Captain America: Winter Soldier, a movie I loved, sitting in this blog since April.

Comic-Con Roundup and Reactions

So my having a job that requires me to not be at a computer all day and then being busy to kick the weekend off left me a little late on some SDCC news that may have come out but I wanted to wait, as I did last year, until I had seen most everything I think I'm going to see about Marvel's Comic-Con this year. Still not sure I have and I'm certainly not sure that I actually heard everything that's been announced as is, which leads to my first point. I'm kind of underwhelmed? I don't know, maybe I missed some stuff, but here's what I think we've mostly learned from this year's biggest comic convention.

Gillen and Bennett heading ANGELA: ASGARD'S ASSASSIN
I'm not so enamored with Angela that I can find this the most entrancing news but readers know I do love Kieron Gillen, who will be joined by fellow writer Marguerite Bennett and artists Phil Jimenez and Stephanie Hans (who I quite like) for the new series. (fun fact, by the way, all my links will be from CBR because I'm too lazy to find multiple links, guys. Sorry)

Marvel debuts Ant-Man concept art, announce roles for Lilly and Stoll

With a new director (Peyton Reed) onboard and a 2015 release date still in place, Marvel has finally shown some concept art for the upcoming Ant-Man and announced that Lost's Evangeline Lilly will play Hope Van Dyne, daughter of Hank Pym, and House of Cards' Corey Stoll will play Darren Cross, a version of the villain Yellowjacket. The news comes even as they lose three attached actors. With Edgar Wright's departure from the long-rumored film, I find myself rather uninterested in all of this.

Marvel announces new SHIELD ongoing, written by Mark Waid
Though it seems like this may play a sort of bridge between the TV show (ugh) and the 616 Marvel Universe, writer Mark Waid advertises his new SHIELD ongoing as a sort of "stealth team-up," indicating that any superhero might end up working on SHIELD's behalf in the series. I like Mark Waid, I'm lukewarm AT BEST on SHIELD, and I really don't like that TV show, so we'll see what that all amounts to. Though I will say I'm irked that I indicate a comic title with all-caps and now I have a comic title referring to an organization that I write in all-caps. What is this business?

Guardians of the Galaxy sequel confirmed for 2017, Gunn returns to write and direct
July 28, 2017 is the projected date for the sequel to the still-upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy, which is garnering praise from fans as its release approaches. I can't really make any sort of judgment on this news until I've seen its predecessor but I will say this wasn't a franchise I was really clamoring for. Maybe my mind will be changed but it feels like this just puts off another new potential franchise.

Guardians of the Galaxy cartoon confirmed for Disney XD

The newly confirmed animated series will join Ultimate Spider-Man, Hulk and the Agents of SMASH, and Avengers Assemble on Marvel's animated block on Disney XD. I'd be more interested in this news if I didn't hate every one of those shows (with the exception, perhaps, of the Hulk show, as I've only seen maybe one episode, which, admittedly, I didn't not like). I'd be interested in this if it were teamed with, oh, I don't know, Spectacular Spider-Man and Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, which were both GREAT cartoons (I totally did know when I said I didn't).

Marvel teases new Agents of SHIELD and Agent Carter information
Still don't care about Agents of SHIELD even with the hint that Mockingbird could show up at some point. She'll probably just be crappy, sadly. Agent Carter still excites me, though I'm a little put out by the quality of Agents of SHIELD so I'll have to hold off getting too excited about that.

Marvel announces new line of STAR WARS books, headed by Gillen, Aaron, Waid

As the rights to the STAR WARS comic universe transfer back to Marvel after decades out of their control, Marvel had a slew of SDCC announcements for next year's launch, including Kieron Gillen writing STAR WARS: DARTH VADER with artist Salvador Larroca, Jason Aaron writing STAR WARS with artist John Cassaday, and Mark Waid writing STAR WARS: PRINCESS LEIA with artist Terry Dodson. These are pretty big announcements and feels like a big business move for Marvel, putting three top writers and some big name artists on these properties instead of allowing them to carry their weight with name recognition alone. Gillen on a DARTH VADER book is particularly intriguing (though I don't love Larroca. Helped that the covers will be from Adi Granov). Still, the news isn't huge to me so who really cares?

Other comics kind of announced?
This is a little trickier to talk about since they're not really big announcements. They include an ORIGINAL SIN ANNUAL (why?) from Jason Latour, an ALL-NEW CAPTAIN AMERICA infinite comic from Dennis Hopeless, a few more tie-in books to DEATH OF WOLVERINE, tie-ins to SPIDER-VERSE, and others in that vein. Not huge books by any stretch. In fact, almost undoubtedly books I will roll my eyes at when I go to review them.


So that's the news I encountered. Did you guys see more? Did you, maybe, see more that made you excited instead of, you know, anywhere from mildly interested to completely uncaring? I don't know. Not so into it? The biggest news to me was...

Jordie Bellaire wins Eisner for Best Colorist
Totally well-deserved. She does phenomenal work where ever she is and where ever she is happens to be MOST BOOKS.

Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky win Eisner for Best New Series with SEX CRIMINALS
I really like SEX CRIMINALS and think it's a really fun and interesting book with some real and often surprising pathos. I was surprised to see it on the Best Series list but Best New Series seems apropos, though I haven't read many of the other contenders (I will note, perhaps controversially, that I don't think SAGA deserves as much credit as it gets. Do NOT get me wrong, I think it's a very good book, I just don't think it's the comics-changing epic it's often lauded as).

HAWKEYE 11 wins Eisner for Best Single Issue or One-Shot
Yup, no problems with that.

David Aja wins Eisner for Best Cover Artist
I have no problems with this, though I was personally pulling for Mike Del Mundo on X-MEN LEGACY. My girlfriend and I also talked about the likelihood of seeing Jamie McKelvie's name in this category next year (and winning this category next year). Every cover he draws (and right now particularly, he's got covers on MS. MARVEL, NIGHTCRAWLER, and THE WICKED AND THE DIVINE) is outstanding. Anyway, congratulations to Aja and all the other winners!