Leftovers 9-10-14

Wowwwwww, managed to knock out enough books that I only have SIX ISSUES to quick-review today. Not saying I'm super-duper proud of myself but it'd be okay if you were all super-duper proud of me.

All-New Ultimates 8

The Ultimates meet to figure out their next plan, particularly where they're going to live and how they're going to operate now when Spider-Man tells them that J. Jonah Jameson offered them "whatever they need" to help and maybe he could help with this. Meanwhile, the Femme Fatales, a new villain group with some sort of puppeteer over them, attack Manhattan. The Ultimates dispatch them well enough but constant bickering between Cloak and Dagger comes to a head and the two remove themselves to break up. Oh, and the Future Foundation shows up for some plot device and someone is watching them/researching them on some monitors. You know how it goes. The series continues to drag with exposition and would-be playful dialogue hampering the pacing. The banter during the fight is as constant and as head-shakingly frustrating as it's ever been. Total Score: 2/5




Deadpool 34
In another throwback story, this one tied to ORIGINAL SIN, we learn that Deadpool used to work willingly (sort of) for Butler, giving him his blood and doing jobs for him. His personality is still there but there is an element of coercion to it. Things come to a head when Butler, testing the limits of Deadpool's subservience, sends Deadpool to kill his own parents. After a brief encounter with Alpha Flight, Deadpool burns his childhood home down with his parents sleeping inside. He returns home to find Carmelita on Butler's doorstep with little Ellie. Butler takes a blood sample from Ellie before Deadpool sends them away, shouting about how dangerous he is. He also leaves Butler's employ, leading to Butler to capture him covertly whenever he needs a new sample. Back in the present, Adsit has seen all of this courtesy of the truth bomb but Preston refuses to let Deadpool know about it. It's a pretty strong issue with the expected amounts of '90s comic-book references and homages which tend to be a lot of fun but can also carry on a little long. Instead, here, Duggan and Posehn front-load the issue with such references (making it a little bit of a drag but not giving it enough time to really slow things) and then really put some weight in the back half. Pretty strong stuff. Total Score: 4/5


Fantastic Four 10

Thing learns that She-Thing runs his Ryker's prison wing as dictated by someone higher up on the food chain, Sue steals one of the Fantastic Four transports from under SHIELD's nose, Johnny continues to party, and Reed finds himself alone in a fight in Chicago against the Wizard and the women of the Salem Seven, only surviving the fight with the appearance of Scarlet Witch. It's funny that this book should come after the '90s throwback DEADPOOL issue because that issue made fun of the '90s tradition of long-winded mid-fight exposition, among other things, then here all of that is in a real, non-tongue-in-cheek FANTASTIC FOUR book. Just further highlights why books aren't written that way any more. As ever, this book drags, the dialogue is terrible, and nobody has a thought they don't shout to the world. Total Score: 1/5





Magneto 9
Magneto sets off for Genosha, where he's learned more atrocities are being committed. He recalls times in the concentration camp as he finds mutants and Inhumans imprisoned at Genosha, held by the Red Skull, who Magneto soon learns has old friend Charles Xavier's brain. In his anger and his desire for justice, he goes alone to attack Skull and his S-Men only to be humiliated by the S-Men and captured. It's as dark an issue as that summary would make you expect, but it's a pretty good issue as Magneto fails for pretty much the first time in this series and as we get a little bit of a teaser of what we can expect out of the upcoming AXIS. More strong work out of Bunn, Walta, and Bellaire on this series. Total Score: 4/5


New Warriors 9

Scarlet Spider wants to quit the team and the mountain has brought him "home," which, to his chagrin, means Houston. He and Justice fight about the team and about Scarlet Spider's heroism but the two are interrupted by Choke the Bear, a giant former NBA mascot granted insane powers and size by a meteorite that once crashed through his court and landed on him. As Scarlet Spider tries to leave, hoping that Choke, who is set on fighting a villain in Houston, will follow him, he runs into old friend and police lieutenant Wally Layton who tells him that he was wrong when he blamed Kaine for Houston's problems, that Kaine really was a hero and saved the city and his own life multiple times. Kaine reluctantly goes back and, with the help of Justice, takes Choke down, even more reluctantly agreeing to stick with the team. Meanwhile, Aracely reveals to Speedball that Mictlan is coming and she will die soon. This issue is a lot of fun and Yost again shows off his prowess for taking any character, giving them a unique voice, and making you care about them. Everyone on the team gets at least one line this time out and there's not really a wasted line. Everything is meant to color a character or to advance the plot and it all works really well. Excellent work as ever and the book continues to be a really entertaining read. Really sad this one's ending. Total Score: 5/5


Nightcrawler 6
Nightcrawler and Scorpion-Boy team to fight their way through the Crimson Pirates in their attempt to save mutant genius Ziggy Karst. Together they plow through the pirates with seeming ease and Nightcrawler begins to believe there's more to it than the pirates just killing a bunch of people to get to Karst. Indeed, when they finally rescue Karst (who is immediately taken with Rico), they find that the pirates have been shooting everyone but the guns have been teleporting them to interdimensional slaver Tullamore Voge. Nightcrawler uses the gun on himself and rescues the civilians and Ziggy, returning home triumphant again. The book continues to be really start-and-stop with the dialogue and exposition stepping on the toes of the plot and the character-building. The plot twists, too, seem to come out of nowhere, which is kind of what you want a plot twist to do but a twist doesn't mean anything if there's absolutely no precedence for it, as in this case. This is a new mutant we know nothing about being attacked by pirates we haven't seen in decades for a slaver we haven't seen in decades and it's all over and done with in one issue. What a weird book. Total Score: 2/5

All-New X-Factor 7, New Warriors 4

All-New X-Factor 7
David (w) and Di Giandomenico (a) and Loughridge (c) and Petit (l)

Serval doesn't need X-Factor today so they come up with their own mission, brought to their attention by new team member Cypher. The daughter of anti-mutant author Scott Dakei has broadcast a live stream to the world saying how she's too cooped up and how she wants to experience the world before her stream is stopped by her father having one of his men shoot out the computer. The team agrees (some more willingly than others) to try to secret Georgia away from her father if it's what she really wants. They visit his locked-down home and, after some initial bumps, manage to get a chance to talk with Georgia. She says she doesn't want to run away and that she's happy where she is, happy to wait until she's able to leave. Cypher refuses to accept such an answer, believing that she's being held prisoner by her father, and tries to take her with them regardless. She shows off her own power then, though, as she reaches up and touches Cypher's face, seemingly draining life force from him.

Story
Peter David does have a tendency to take what's in the news of the day and place it into the comics world. I remember, in fact, reading a long section about it in his book on writing comics (I would be more specific but I'm not near the book right now, you guys). There are plenty of examples of this sort of thing happening, a discussion about whether you can separate art from its creator, but the most recent example is Ender's Game creator Orson Scott Card, an outspoken anti-homosexual...uh, bigot (I was trying to go with something classier but nothing came, sorry dudes and dudettes). Scott Dakei (guys, his first name is even Scott!) engenders the same sort of conversation: should Danger be reading his book despite his anti-mutant beliefs? Who does she support when she buys the book? Does she show support for his causes by buying a book unrelated to his beliefs? All sorts of questions and very few answers here because it's a hard question to answer. Beyond that, the attempted rescue of Georgia is a little far-fetched but David (something else he pointed out in his comic-writing book) himself makes sure to point out it's a little far-fetched before we can. Well countered, Peter David, well countered. 4/5

Character
There are some character movements in here, particularly surrounding everyone's motives for saving the girl and how far each is willing to carry on with it. Quicksilver hates Dakei and wants to upset him, Gambit wants to be the sort of hero who doesn't get so muddled up in dealing with supervillains that he forgets the little guy, and Cypher seems particularly attuned to the idea of a depressed girl trapped maybe against her will. Probably some more on that coming later, supposing Cypher isn't dead. There aren't huge revelations here but David is doing a good job to ensure we understand a little more about who these guys are as we push forward. 5/5

Writing
The issue gets a little long-winded and borders very tentatively on preachy well after we understand what the debate is. The order of the day in comics is shorter and quicker interactions but David forgoes that to make sure the specifics of each debate in this issue (whether you can separate an artist from his or her work, why this group of mutants should get involved in Georgia's struggle, the ethics of kidnapping someone who wants to be kidnapped, etc.) are unveiled. It's maybe a slower read than some of the other ones but it doesn't really drag, particularly. If there's a problem with it, it's really that there are too many debates going on and it means we jump from one ethical dilemma to another without any sort of resolution, leaving the reader exhausted by the end. David, though, does a good job to illustrate multiple points and counterpoints to a lot of these questions. 4/5

Art
Di Giandomenico does a pretty good job with the character designs here and works to some of his own strengths by showing faces at very specific angles and often giving the characters somewhat longer, wavier hair to give everyone a solid sense of motion. I don't always love Di Giandomenico's art but it works out pretty well here. 5/5

Miscellaneous
Maybe I should have talked about all that creator/art stuff down here and left "story" to the broader strokes. Whatever.

Total score: 4/5


New Warriors 4
Yost (w) and To (a) and Curiel (c) and Caramagna (l)

Just as Nova has been captured trying to protect his fallen comrades, Justice, Speedball, Sun Girl and Haechi (that's what the splash page calls Mark, the new Inhuman they found) turn up and enter the fight. With the New Warriors assembled, they begin to fight back against the Evolutionary and the High Evolutionary (two different people, you guys, totally unrelated somehow) and manage to send the High Evolutionary fleeing for his machine. Well, maybe it's not totally fleeing because the machine will kill everyone with powers once he starts it up. It immediately knocks out their entire group (save for Nova, who was knocked out at the end of the fight) except for Sun Girl, who is human using tech. The High Evolutionary explains the stakes but Sun Girl refuses to listen and blasts him through the stomach before blasting the machine. With the High Evolutionary wounded and the New Warriors back on their feet, the villains are forced to flee (for reals fleeing this time). Though they regroup in the Savage Land, the High Evolutionary proclaims that there's no time to try again, the Celestials are on their way.

Story
It remains an intriguing story, the idea that the Celestials are ready to wipe out the unclean planet as evolutionary progress has been so...unique up to this point and as the villains of the series are trying to protect the Earth as a whole by killing the majority of the superpowered beings on the planet. It's the ultimate "kill one person to save a hundred" sort of story but ramped up to a much bigger scale (as the High Evolutionary points out). With a pretty neat group of characters representing each of the major evolutionary off-shoots (and a few more at that), this story has set itself up to be an exciting one. Also, bonus points for invoking Ghostbusters with the next issue tease of "Dogs and cats, living together." 5/5

Character
Christopher Yost has been one of my favorite writers recently for picking up just about any character and immediately writing them with a strong voice and a pretty interesting thing to add to a story. No one ever feels like they were just tossed into a story without a reason for being there and that's the case now too as everyone adds something to the issue and as Yost manages to write fun and exciting fight dialogue. It reminds me, in a way, of what Bendis likes to do on just about every page of every book but, instead of it being irritating to me, it's paced in a way that works and that makes sense and flows better. I'd say more but I'm afraid I would just rail against Bendis' back-and-forth dialogue some more and we've all already heard plenty about that. 5/5

Writing
I feel I've rather covered this in the previous two sections, particularly in "character," but Yost's writing continues to be strong and the pacing starts to get pretty hectic right when it needs to here, ramping everything up as the fights start. Solid stuff. 5/5

Art
Marcus To and David Curiel are doing a great job here. There wasn't a lot that really struck me in this book (I'm not great at reviewing art unless it really sticks out to me, positive or negative), but To conveys plenty of emotion and his action sequences work extremely well. Fun and fitting stuff. 5/5

Miscellaneous
I had high hopes for this book when it kicked off and I'm yet to see them disappointed. I also like that cover quite a bit.

Total score: 5/5

Inhuman 1, New Warriors 3

Inhuman 1
Soule (w) and Madureira (a) and Gracia (c)

The Terrigenesis wave has spread across the world and it's brought out Inhumans new and old across the planet. On top of the new Inhumans who experienced Terrigenesis as a result of Black Bolt's bomb, factions of Inhumans have emerged to show off their philosophies. Primarily, that puts Inhuman Lash at odds with Attilan queen Medusa, effectively putting Attilan up against Lash's home of Orollan. Orollan had limited access to Terrigen and thus only evolved people who they thought had earned it and who they believed would help the community with their evolution. As a result, Lash and his Inhumans believe that Terrigenesis is not for everyone, as Black Bolt made it, and he wants to make sure that Inhumans only get stronger with this new wave. He captures one cocoon from Norway and waits for its inhabitant to emerge before deeming it weak and killing it. He then appears at the Des Plaines, Illinois home of a family with some amount of Inhuman DNA in them; the sick and frail mother has enough to trigger Terrigenesis but not enough to survive the process while her son Dante has enough to enter and emerge from the cocoon. Lash believes he's been unchanged and aims to kill him but Dante quickly bursts into flames a la Human Torch and attacks. Though Lash is impressed that he has indeed changed, he believes that Dante (who we may as well just call Inferno at this point) cannot control his transformation and still readies to kill him when Medusa appears to defend Dante and his still-human pregnant sister Gabriela. Medusa forces Lash to leave, though he vows that their paths will cross again, and promises to bring Dante to the remains of the Attilan family.

There are a number of questions to ask about this new series and the aftermath of the Terrigenesis bomb and almost all of them, for me, have to do with process. In this case, is this book going to have enough of an impact to make the Terrigenesis bomb and the new influx of Inhumans worth the wait? The problem with the delay (and I do believe, given what I know of the writer switch and everything, that the delays were worthwhile; you never want a writer who's writing something he doesn't want to be writing as it seems the case had become as the story broke more) is that now we've seen some of the effects of the Terrigenesis wave and, frankly, unless you're a diehard Inhuman fan, I think you're probably mostly over it. Of course, the plan had been to launch this book just after INFINITY and I think it would have had built in impact just with the timing. Now we're rather through the majority of tie-in books to this "event" and we're just starting the core book. While I do believe that the warring Inhuman factions is an interesting story and one well worth watching (hey, I finally mentioned something about this book specifically!), I worry that it may end up being too little too late. Instead of getting a boost from its well-timed release, now Soule and Madureira have to create a better book to actually entice people to pick it up in the first place. Feet to the fire and all that.

New Warriors 3
Yost (w) and To (a) and Curiel (c)

The High Evolutionary explains to Nova that the Celestials had long ago created the Eternals, the Deviants, and the Humans on Earth and that the Eternals and the Deviants fought one another while the Humans grew and evolved, much to their liking. However, all of the mutations and outside effects that have created the Marvel Universe as we know it (mutation, radioactivity, alien experimentation, Atlanteans, etc.) have caused humanity to diverge from the path the Celestials set for it and now they're coming back to erase their mistake. The High Evolutionary, then, is trying to save the world by purging it of the subsets of humanity who differed from the plan. In addition, his Evolutionaries have brought in Scarlet Spider, Hummingbird, and Water Snake (Faira) from Mexico. Meanwhile, Sun Girl and Justice come at odds with one another as they escape cops trying to shoot their new horn-headed pal. Justice believes that they should leave well enough alone and set Mark (horn-headed pal!) up with the Attilans while Sun Girl believes they have to get to the bottom of this. Justice reluctantly agrees to step up and says that their first course of action should be finding Nova. Speaking of Nova, Scarlet Spider manages to summon spiders to the High Evolutionary's machinery, breaking it enough that he can bust out of his holding cell and break everyone else out too. Nova vows to go get help but they're all quickly overrun by the Evolutionaries.

I've been a little iffy as this book has kicked off. I think Yost has done a pretty good job starting to establish his characters and giving us a story that's clearly got pretty big pieces to it but it was going to be a tough tightrope to walk (as opposed to the tightropes that are like, totally simple to walk) building the characters up while also navigating a complicated story. This issue proves that he'll be able to knock it out of the park. Really solid issue, we get a lot of character development with our team and one of the most concise and complete definitions of the Marvel Universe in the High Evolutionary's speech to kick the book off. Phenomenal work to clarify parts of the universe that are admittedly difficult to follow for an audience perhaps unfamiliar with it. Suddenly this series is not just a nice selection of characters melded together by a good writer, it's also a fully functioning story that will very clearly carry itself and which has been really well-defined for such a sweeping story. Check this book out for a great look at some neat and under seen characters and a pretty cool story to boot.

Best Marvel comics of 2013 (part three of five): 11-15

Let's keep it rolling with picks 11-15.

15. Scarlet Spider

One of the real surprises on the list even though it probably shouldn't have been. Writer Chris Yost has an impressive resumé and 2013 saw issues 13-25 of SCARLET SPIDER so it's not like we hadn't had a year's worth of comics to deem this one "good" already. Even still, I think there's a part of me that still believes this book had no right being good. An evil clone version of Peter Parker flees New York to start a new life in Mexico and gets held up doing good in Houston with a whole new cast of characters doesn't really sounds like the best pitch. Yost never gave it up, though, and showed us what a well-written and well-established Kaine can do. The character was great, the writing was fun, the story was engaging, the fights were impressive and unique, and the ending was appropriately brutal for Kaine. After establishing himself as a reluctant hero in Houston, a city that apparently desperately needed one, and finding himself a slew of new friends in the city, Kaine's life was turned upside down by none other than Kraven the Hunter, the man who most recently killed Kaine, and things spiraled out of control quickly from there, culminating in an unhappy ending as Kaine finally reaches Mexico after all. Sad to see the series go, glad that Yost will pick up Kaine's reins again on NEW WARRIORS in the coming year.

14. Venom

This is another one of those books that lasted far longer than I would have predicted going in. This book kicked off a few years ago with Rick Remender at the helm of a Flash-Thompson-is-Venom story where the high school bully of Peter Parker turned war hero turned paraplegic alcoholic is called back into duty as a newly weaponized military-controlled Venom. Solid start to the series back then and Cullen Bunn this year managed to take the helm and still tell a worthwhile story with some worthwhile characters. As everything starts to crash down around Venom from his new home in Philadelphia, Flash is put up against challenges in the form of Toxin, Carnage, and his own demons. That's not a metaphor, he really did get his own personal demon fighting for control of the Venom symbiote somewhere along the line. On top of that, he lost longtime girlfriend Betty Brant and he gained new pseudo-sidekick Mania after he tossed some symbiote to her to protect her from the attack of his kind-of archnemesis Jack O'Lantern. A more angry and wild new symbiote-wielding character, Mania had the demon transferred to her and began fighting like the dickens (if that's what the dickens does) to avenge her father's death while Flash struggled with the morality of allowing this girl to be a symbiote and a killer. Nice book all the way around and one that allowed Cullen Bunn to play around a little in the Spider-Man world and come out of it with a successful book after all was said and done.

13. Red She-Hulk
For as much as I said I couldn't really believe SCARLET SPIDER worked, RED SHE-HULK certainly shouldn't have worked, at least for me. I was never the biggest Hulk fan (though my top-ten books to watch list early this year will describe my turnaround on the character) and I didn't know these characters very well. Jeff Parker, though, did a phenomenal job creating and developing a wonderful friendship between the rather new character Red She-Hulk and the older but not particularly used X-51. The two had really distinct personalities and their team-up came about incredibly naturally as X-51 was tasked with keeping tabs on Red She-Hulk and bringing her down when the Avengers decided she was a hazard. X-51 analyzed his own findings and decided there was something more to her than what the Avengers had seen and chose to intervene on her behalf, eventually siding with her in the fight against the sketchier branches of SHIELD and General Fortean. Really good characterization supported by an intriguing story that took the pair all over the world and eventually into an alternate reality where Betty Ross became the Hulk back at the test site when Banner should have. This series certainly would have ranked higher if it had continued past the summer but what we did get was a really great book that was able to very clearly do what it set out to do and tell a story worth telling with characters that mattered. Very fun book.

12. Superior Spider-Man

The way I went about constructing this list was to first list off every book I thought worthy of consideration for the top (then) ten. When the list got too long, I adjusted it to the top twenty. Then I looked a little deeper into it and started to arrange by "top ten" and "bottom ten," finally beginning after that to sort more directly within those lists. As we near the top ten, only two books have really switched sides, one jumping out of the bottom ten and into the top ten (to be revealed TOMORROW) and the other sinking down to number 11, only to eventually fall to number 12. That was THIS VERY BOOK. I really love the way that SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN started this year, giving us a look at the brand-new Superior Spider-Man, Doc Ock with the powers and (kind of) the responsibilities of Peter Parker. It was a real separation from the Peter Parker Amazing Spider-Man, someone who leapt headfirst into danger to help and save those who needed helping and saving, no matter if he was playing into a villain's hands. The Superior Spider-Man, meanwhile, plotted and planned, rapidly developing his own methods for protecting the city and doing it with such aplomb and vigor that...well, that he was put on probation from the Avengers. Regardless, it was a great new look at a new type of Spider-Man and one that Dan Slott really stuck with despite plenty of hate tweets and death threats (still illegal, you guys). It slipped out of the top ten with the last few months of 2013 as it started to get into weaker arcs (notably one that stranded Spider-Man 2099 in the present) and started to present more of Doc's personality than I think we really needed at this point. Still, the series never became a bad read, necessarily (okay, it got a little tedious in the late months there) and it seems to be coming out of its spin a bit but the first half of this year with the new Spider-Man really solidified its place somewhere in this list; then it just became where it would land.

11. Avengers

Jonathan Hickman has taken over the major part of the Avengers wing of the Marvel Universe and has really done absolutely phenomenal things with it. I said in that very same top ten list at the start of this year that I wasn't really onboard with what Bendis had been doing in Avengers the last few years (as I'm suddenly even more vehemently against the happenings over in the majority of the X-books now) and that I was hoping for a solid change out of Hickman. Well I got it and I couldn't really be happier about it. All three of Hickman's AVENGERS related titles (INFINITY, AVENGERS, and, spoilers, NEW AVENGERS) will have made this list when it's all said and done and everything about that part of the universe seems to be on the upswing. AVENGERS has been a really interesting book, one that hoped you'd be following along but wasn't ultimately too concerned if you missed a beat or two. There were a lot of really cool single issues at the start of the series to establish some of our newer characters (like Smasher and Hyperion) and eventually the whole series got wrapped into INFINITY and told the tale of the story with a focus on the fight against the Builders. It was a pretty masterfully executed event and all of the groundwork was laid here, in AVENGERS. Looking forward to the next movements by Hickman as the Avengers celebrate one of their biggest victories with no doubt larger foes on the horizon.

This week's picks

FOR THE HOLIDAYS, I GOT YOU GUYS AN EXTRA LONG POST WHERE I PICK THREE BOOKS BUT NOT-SO-SECRETLY ACTUALLY PICK SIX.

This was one of those weeks where it was exceedingly difficult to pick the top three for any number of reasons. Unlike most weeks where that's true, I had to actually break down my full list of comics into ones that could make the top three or at least could snag an honorable mention on here. That brought me down to six titles that were all worthy of some amount of higher praise.

The first one I eliminated from those six was INDESTRUCTIBLE HULK 17, which was a solid and fun book that really managed to tell a good story that ties in to current MU events while also giving us a great breakdown of characters.

The second one down, surprisingly, was UNCANNY AVENGERS 15. I honestly thought going into this post that UNCANNY AVENGERS was a lock as a top pick. It's a huge story that manages to actually ramp up tension after an issue where three major Marvel characters died but it still spends enough time with individual characters to show us their personal stakes, like Wolverine's belief that his violence had rubbed off on Rogue too much or like Cap's belief that his splitting up the Unity Squad led to the deaths of two of his friends and two heroes (he hasn't heard about Rogue yet) or like Thor realizing that the Earth might be executed in retribution for events kicked off by his enchanting Jarnbjorn way back when. Really, really good stuff in here but ultimately I pushed it aside to make room for things that may have been better in different ways.

Astute readers (and ones who are still reading this much-longer-than-average picks post - I felt behind on every single post this week except for this one so I'm relishing it and extending it, okay?) will notice that we've eliminated two contenders from the original six in an attempt to pare down to three, leaving ONE MORE on the chopping block. Unfortunately, this week's final cut went to the surprise "wow, that hung on for a while longer than I'd've predicted" book, SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN TEAM-UP 8. Chris Yost has a way with looking at characters and getting right down to the most compelling parts of them. There has been something compelling about Doc Ock in Peter's body from the get-go, which is why the series is doing so well, but there's only so much you can do with "egomaniacal sociopathic genius learns value of responsibility and justice" before it starts to feel a bit stale. Yost took a different angle after the first full arc on SSMTU (don't think that acronym is going to catch on) and showed us an egomaniac whose pride has been bruised and who has to deal with the weight of a massive failure with this newfound sense of responsibility. On top of giving us a great look at that character, we get the character who perfectly represents an egomaniac who will almost undoubtedly never feel the weight of a massive failure like this one because he doesn't see himself as a failure in Namor. Really great issue but one that ultimately just barely falls short of my actual list which may seem inexplicable and judged by whimsy and caprice more than fact but SURPRISE, THAT'S WHAT I'VE BEEN DOING FOR A YEAR NOW.

Daredevil 34
What Mark Waid has done best with DAREDEVIL is hard to say. This is a book led by a character who, since Frank Miller took the reins on him, has been known as an exceedingly dark character. There have been moments of light and he's had a certain playfulness to him but, since Miller, it's been underlined by a distinct rage and violence which had only escalated in the years preceding Waid's run with Brian Michael Bendis and Ed Brubaker before culminating in Andy Diggle's finale, SHADOWLAND, which saw Daredevil snap and live out his darkest moment. Mark Waid then jumped onboard (following Diggle's follow-up DAREDEVIL: REBORN) and turned the character back to a far more light-hearted, happy to put down any connections to Daredevil as Matt Murdock (although everyone knew), happy to interact with others character. He still has his darkness and Waid has still put him through his paces but this is a far different character than the one Matt had evolved into while somehow staying entirely the same. If this series hadn't been so extremely good, it would have been a disaster. Instead, here we are, 34 issues later and Waid is still putting out gold for Matt Murdock. This issue adds to the fun and light-heartedness of the series while still showing Matt at a time that's particularly dark for him as he sees his legal system, the one thing that hasn't truly hurt him in the past, in the hands of horrible racists and corruption. Also, Waid has built Kirsten McDuffie into what is already the best Daredevil female supporting character since Echo (who only appeared in two DAREDEVIL arcs and those were separated by a sea of issues). Great book, great fun. Really long post today, huh?

Scarlet Spider 25

Okay, so SCARLET SPIDER has definitely benefitted this week from the bump I tend to give good books as the series closes but, in truth, that bump needed to do less work than you think it did. If anything, it skipped it over UNCANNY AVENGERS and SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN TEAM-UP. Like with SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN TEAM-UP, it's hard not to point to Christopher Yost's mastery of character as the driving point in all of his books. Yost took a character in Kaine who was only ever a bad guy; even when he worked for the right side, he was still something of a jerk about it. Here's the thing of it: after 25 issues of what turned out to be a really good series, I'm not sure I can definitely say that Kaine isn't still just a jerk. That's not to say that the book has been vague about it or his character hasn't gone deep enough; the opposite, in fact. Yost didn't want the audience to come out of this book saying "Kaine is the most morally upstanding citizen, a true hero, in the Marvel Universe." Yost wanted people to come out of this book saying "gee, how about that Kaine guy?" And I think he did it. The fact that this book doesn't wrap cleanly, that Kaine ends up fleeing Houston without the girl, without the friends, without the esteem, and winds up ignoring a street mugging in his new Mexico home is both such a wonderful choice and such a punch in the gut. Back in the Stan Lee days of comics, the idea was to leave every book the way you came into it; at the end of the month (or, as arcs started to grow, the end of every story) the team or the individual would be right back where he started. That's kind of happened with Kaine but now we have a wealth of knowledge about who he's been and who he's capable of being. It's solid work and truly defining for the character and it's the best promotional work I can imagine for Yost's NEW WARRIORS next year.

Young Avengers 14

I think I'm actually incapable of leaving this book off my recommendation lists. Throughout its 14-issue run (concluding in two weeks, as I will not stop reminding you) YOUNG AVENGERS has done thing that no other superhero comic has ever done, and that's coming in an age where you can say that about a handful of books so it's safe to say the medium is stretching out a bit. The story, the self-awareness, the art, the layouts, everything about this book has offered something new to its readers and I think this is the sort of book that will reverberate in the years to come. This issue even goes so far as to do something that isn't entirely uncommon in ending a series with a number of guest artists on a giant-sized issue (the finale is two issues but I have a feeling it'll read just as well as one) but still does it in what feels like a revolutionary way. This is a series of vignettes about our characters as individuals more than it is a closing chapter for a team book. That's not to say that the next issue out, our true finale, won't bring the team together again to let us look on them as one, but this one has skirted that by separating them into the pieces they were when the book started; Billy and Teddy are together, America is alone, Kate is alone, Noh-Varr is alone, David is alone and slinking off, and the book is a team book that featured a team that was, overall, hugely successful. Again, I'd be very surprised if the series doesn't end on a more team-centric feel (I would not be surprised, then, if it ended around a diner's breakfast options) but this issue has seen to it that we get some sense of our team as individuals first and foremost. In addition to great character work, the art of this book is tremendous. I will forever champion Jamie McKelvie but I can't even say I'm upset that this book isn't entirely made up of his art, which is something I can't say about many books he's not even attached to. Emma Vicielli, Christian Ward, and Annie Wu (good God that woman draws a great Kate, what a steal to have her on HAWKEYE too) supply some of the best art I've seen this year in little five page pieces. Amazing stuff.



CHARACTER OF THE WEEK

I know, this post really should be over. The one time my post-game post actually takes longer than my everyday post and I'm LENGTHENING it, something I almost never do these days? Well I couldn't help it because how do you ignore the fact that Dr. Strange, a favorite character in his own right, appeared in FOUR SEPARATE BOOKS that he had almost NO connection to previously. We got to see Dr. Strange in LONGSHOT SAVES THE MARVEL UNIVERSE (which he did, in fact, have a connection to previously), DAREDEVIL (okay, again, he has some long-standing connections to Matt that make him something less than a series regular but something more than a strange appearance) (HA), DEADPOOL, and THUNDERBOLTS ANNUAL. Guys. Four Dr. Strange appearances despite no ongoing Dr. Strange book and no NEW AVENGERS, the only book he's regularly promised in. WHO'S COMPLAINING? I'm willing to speculate right here and now that we're in line for another attempt at a Dr. Strange ongoing in the near future. Between these four appearances and talk of an upcoming movie (nothing official yet but pretty much as official as unofficial can be) in the works for something like 2016 or something, time seems ripe to get someone on that. Hopefully it's Fraction or Gillen/McKelvie's next gig. Or, you know, someone else.

Superior Spider-Man 24, Scarlet Spider 25, Superior Spider-Man Team-Up 8

Superior Spider-Man 24
Slott and Gage (w) and Ramos and Olazaba (a) and Delgado, Fabela, and Gandini (c)

The Venom symbiote has jumped on to Spider-Man and Flash tries to call it back, hoping he can coax it back to familiar territory before Spider-Man loses control. Doc Ock, though, assures everyone he can control it and attacks anyone who thinks otherwise, namely Cardiac. He points out that, if he couldn't control the symbiote, Cardiac would be dead instead of just seriously wounded. Sound logic. He decides to show the world his control of the symbiote by tracking down some crimes and brutally and efficiently stopping them. In the midst of doing this, Anna Maria calls him and he hurries to her, where she's upset that she's damaged his relationship with Aunt May. He vows to take care of it and storms to May and Jay's, where he immediately begins yelling at her for bombarding Anna Maria with questions. She relents but things get crazier as MJ, trying to obey Carlie's wishes on her voicemail, goes to warn May and Jay to stay away from Peter and also gets screamed at by Peter, who reveals the Venom symbiote and leaves. MJ contacts the Avengers as Carlier, deep underground with the Goblins, gets sprayed with the goblin serum.

There's almost too much happening here. There's not and it actually works pretty well as a coherent storyline and as a good example of Doc teaming with Venom but, for someone trying to summarize, there's almost too much happening here. Still, the majority of this issue is dedicated to showing Doc Ock with the Venom symbiote and the effects it's had on him. Though he swears he can control it and loves the additional power it grants him, it's clear that he's extremely unbalanced with the symbiote. Well, more so than usual. He's at everyone's throat and his rage is bubbling at the slightest provocation. Calling the Avengers in on him is certainly going to shake things up as they'll be tasked with taking down Spider-Man, already a worthy foe, powered up by the symbiote, a worthy foe in its own right. Interesting storyline and one that lets us see a slightly different side of Doc Ock, or perhaps an amplified side of him. I'd like to, before I wrap this review up, thank my incredibly aggressive autocorrect for not trying even once to correct the word "symbiote," even though its repeated use is clearly driving autocorrect nuts.

Scarlet Spider 25
Yost (w) and Baldeon (a) and Sotomayor (c)

The final issue of SCARLET SPIDER fluctuates between showing us the immediate aftermath of the explosion in Kaine's hotel and his new life in Mexico with Aracely. He was forced to flee Houston after saving the lives of everyone in the hotel room and below by webbing them all up and webbing up the falling debris on its way to Earth. When he hit the ground, he was attacked by Shathra, the Spider-Wasp that has had run-ins in the past with Peter but who was posing most recently as Annabelle to get close to Kaine. She's seemingly unstoppable and ready to kill anyone in between her and Kaine, namely Wally who tries to step up and protect him. Kaine refuses to let it happen and unleashes Prey, who dispatches Shathra quickly and extremely brutally. Everyone is horrified and Wally tells Kaine he has to leave, promising to take care of the police in Houston but that he cannot stay. So began Kaine and Aracely's journey into Mexico on the hunt for her parents. Kaine is back to where he started, albeit with the addition of Aracely and a world of now painful memories. He doesn't consider himself a hero and he doesn't believe he can get a happy ending. Fortunately, it's not entirely an ending for him as he'll pop up again in Chris Yost's NEW WARRIORS.

Fitting end to a really surprising series. Yost has really nailed down Kaine's character through the course of this book and has been sure to never stray too far from it. He had given Kaine friends and relationships and grudging amounts of friendship but he'd never allowed the darkness in Kaine to leave him or for him to feel fully comfortable in his new life. There was always the chance that Kaine would pick up and leave Houston at any given second but there was also always the chance that he'd stay forever, making his eventual forced exit all the more painful. Even still, in a somewhat depressing final note for the series, there are fun moments here and there, including a moment where Kaine, in Houston, yells that he's not a superhero before watching his Scarlet Spider costume, still impervious to the flames that are hanging around it, float down to him. There's a lot to really like about this series as a character study for Kaine and the book ends in exactly the sort of fashion it should. You like your superhero books to typically end on an up-note, telling us that the hero has done may worthwhile things and has learned from them and made a better world for everyone else, but this book would have felt a little wrong if it ended that way. The truth is Kaine ended up being pretty right. Maybe he's not a hero. Maybe he can't have a normal life. Maybe the evil clone of Spider-Man was never meant to do more. Good series, solid ending.

Superior Spider-Man Team-Up 8
Yost (w) and Sliney (a) and Fabela (c)

Fresh off the disappointment of losing control of his reformed Sinister Six and the fact that his arrogance nearly caused the death of millions, Spider-Man is in a bit of a more somber mood than we've found him since the death of Peter Parker. After examining himself and being thrust into self-doubt (wondering how Doc thought he could have done any better than Peter, who constantly beat him, among so many others), he's decided he's going to go to the Avengers and hand himself in, explain everything, and hope that they can reverse it still somehow (which would be the absolute cleanest way to get Peter back). On his way to Avengers Tower, he comes across Namor, hunted by invisible-to-the-naked-eye Hatut Zeraze in the war between Atlantis and Wakanda. Despite his negative feelings for Namor, Spider-Man jumps into the fight (able to see the Hatut Zaraze with his lenses) and gets the injured and protesting Namor out of harm's way. They bicker for a bit but eventually sit for a spell under the Brooklyn Bridge where Spider-Man reveals his doubts to Namor and Namor laughs at them, reminding Spider-Man that they are always more important and more powerful than the sheep they protect. The Hatut Zeraze show up there and Spider-Man again dispatches them but quickly learns that these aren't actually Hatut Zeraze, or at least not authorized by T'Challa or Shuri; these ones have been sent by some coward wishing to use the war as a way to attack Namor. These fighters are actually robots with self-destruct options inside, options that will destroy the bridge if they go off. Namor doesn't really care, saying that the perpetrators will face justice at some point, but Spider-Man wills himself to stop the bomb, reminding himself of the promise he made a dying Peter. Namor shares a moment with Spider-Man, telling him that he's shown true bravery and that his display here was superiority. Spider-Man punches him and tells him not to come back to his city, emboldened by his recent victory and even by Namor's words.

Okay, of the three books here, this shouldn't have been the longest summary. I do tend to slip into longer summaries when I'm excited about a book or when I get really interested in a book. This was just such a case as I found just about every beat of this issue to be delightful and a really well-thought out look into Ock's mind. Take Doctor Octopus, a crazy megalomaniac who believes himself to be the smartest person in any room. Now give him morals somewhat based on Peter Parker's unflinchingly good guy mentality. Now make that ego solely responsible for nearly destroying New York City. It wracks Ock with guilt and doubt and it's absolutely a perfect and logical step. However, it also means that Yost may have dug himself a hole because how do you make anyone break out of that? Who out there can both be considered a hero and can support the way the Superior Spider-Man parades himself? Who can have that same sort of ego and talk him out of his perceived inferiority? Well, Namor, of course. It's a great issue with a great premise and near perfect dialogue throughout. It's a much deeper look into this character than we're thus used to and, maybe, than we've had so far. Even the ending, which could very well have just copped out and had Spider-Man swinging away while Namor flies away as grudging allies, is pitch perfect as Spider-Man retakes his pride and punches Namor before demanding that he leave the city. Great issue, solid art and writing and character.

Comics this week!

OKAY GUYS, homestretch of these long release weeks before next week (Christmas Eve is the Wednesday) gives us just TWO NEW BOOKS. AND THEY'LL BOTH BE WORTH READING (prediction: they will both make my pre-game and post-game lists). This week promises a slew of new and interesting options for readers and, for some strange reason, another two AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 700.- issues. That is just a strange thing to be happening, you guys. Easy enough to pick out five most-anticipated though, as is this weekly entry's job. QUICK HITS TIME.

Daredevil 34
Barely making the pre-game this week over pleasant surprise LONGSHOT SAVES THE MARVEL UNIVERSE's conclusion, DAREDEVIL has been a phenomenal series overall and it's inching its way to its conclusion...before being renumbered with the same creative team. Okay, so it's not really a conclusion but PRESUMABLY we'll reach an end to an important storyline to justify the renumber. Matt will be back in New York this issue (I would assume) after snagging the magic needed to go after the Sons of the Serpent. Should be fun, this series always is.

Scarlet Spider 25
You want to talk about pleasant surprises, there's no better place to look than SCARLET SPIDER. A 25 issue run concludes as we see what will become of Kaine and his Houston co-stars as Chris Yost wraps up his extremely fun and always-intriguing tale of the dark Spider-Man clone gone good. Excited to see the end of this one, sad that it will be the end.

Thunderbolts Annual 1
Like with DEADPOOL ANNUAL a couple of weeks ago, this one makes the list thanks to its writing team of the Bens, Acker and Blacker, who write, among other things, the incredible THRILLING ADVENTURE HOUR podcast (and the graphic novel which I still need to check out). Good news: DEADPOOL ANNUAL did not disappoint after I went in with high hopes for this team. Better news: I like THUNDERBOLTS more than I like DEADPOOL right now and I think, as a series, THUNDERBOLTS has portrayed the better Deadpool. Looking forward to it.

Uncanny Avengers 15
I dare you to find a pre-game list that doesn't include this book (don't look anywhere but this site though, in case it's very easy to find and I'm misinterpreting how important this book is). After the shocking conclusion of the last issue, this issue's importance can't be overstated (unless it can, which goes back to the last parenthetical aside). Not only are we racing towards the conclusion of a really long arc, we saw major characters die the last time out and now we'll have to see the effect of that. Don't miss this one.

Young Avengers 14
It pains me to say that we're only two issues away from the end of this series and the final issue will come just two weeks later. So incredibly sad to see this series, which has done so much in so little time, go. These two issues should be a lot of fun, though, as we get the afterparty for the entire series, with a ton of major young characters in the Marvel Universe heading out to the clubs. On top of that, we'll get a ton of big-name artists and colorists jumping in to highlight these final two issues. Very excited that a book that has changed the way stories can be told in comics will end with a two-part non-standard ending. Really love this book. If you haven't read it, pick up the trades when they're all released.

This week's picks

I...I can't. Look, there were too many books and too many good books and too many important books this week. How do you knock it down to three? Well hey, we're officially in the holiday season right now and, in America, this week marked the very worst ritual we have, Black Friday, so, in the spirit of excess, let's categorize what books you should get!

Best books ending this week:
Avengers Arena 18

Really sad to see the series go but glad to see it go on such a fitting last issue. The survivors have some serious darkness to them now, a darkness they'd rather not reveal to the world but one that might come out anyway. It will lead nicely into Hopeless' new AVENGERS UNDERCOVER.








Infinity 6

I have to call this the best major Marvel event in a long time, one that was both satisfying and epic enough without, for a change, pitting heroes vs. heroes. Don't get me wrong, CIVIL WAR is still my favorite event and it was the ultimate example of heroes vs. heroes but when you then have like, 50 straight events that do that, it loses some meaning. Here we had enemies and we had heroes and we had insurmountable odds being surmounted. This will lead nicely into both INHUMANITY and books like AVENGERS WORLD as the Avengers have really never been higher.


Best Avengers books this week:
New Avengers 12

Really phenomenal ending to INFINITY as we see the toll this has taken on the most troubled of the heroes right now. Where the Avengers have never been higher, the Illuminati have never been more out of their depth, facing Earth-shattering problem after Earth-shattering problem and finding themselves at the base of everything. Black Panther has been cast out of Wakanda, Black Bolt has been severely depowered and finds himself in hiding, Dr. Strange has turned to his darkest spells, and the others have to face the people they've teamed with, including Black Swan and, potentially, the frozen Thanos. So much happening, so many, as Namor said, kings without kingdoms.


Uncanny Avengers 14
Huge book for both this series and for the Marvel Universe as a whole as we see two major Marvel characters seemingly die (always have to add "seemingly" in there, though BOY does Rogue seem pretty dead) and one turn into ions, but he's done that before. On top of that, it's kind of all Rogue's fault, as she attacked Scarlet Witch not knowing her plan (and still not trusting her) and then wavered for a moment afterward, allowing Grim Reaper to strike. Whoops! Lots happening here and lots to be anxious about as we move to the next issue.




Most fun books this week:
Hawkeye 14

Matt Fraction has really developed a character for Kate Bishop, who had ever really only appeared in YOUNG AVENGERS before, a book that was both a team book, thus typically taking some amount of individuality out, and a book that required her to step up and take the mature role amongst a bunch of younger people. She was sarcastic and clearly competent there but Fraction has turned that just a bit as she really gets to thrive by herself. She's fun, she's resourceful, she's caring, she's persistent, and she's a star now so she gets to shine here. Annie Wu does absolutely fantastic art for Kate, filled with complexities and emotion. Great issue.


Deadpool Annual 1

Not a ton by way of substance here but, well, honestly kind of more than I tend to expect out of annuals. Still a really fun issue that brings out the sort of Deadpool I tend to like most, one that is funny and probably insane but that is less absurd and less weird than the world he's entered into. The book itself had some nice little moments, including sound-effects and transitions like "TURN-AROUND," "CATCH," and "ATTACH." Also a couple of good Looney Tunes homages in there.

Scarlet Spider 24

This might seem a strange one to put in "most fun," as it mostly features a really fundamentally troubled Kaine and it ends with our hero and his friends being shot with a rocket launcher, but it did have a sense of fun to it. Part of that was in the pacing, which is very strong even as it leads to an extremely chaotic finish. Another part was in the individual moments and dialogue. The most fun part of the book, for me, was the homage to AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 50, the infamous "Spider-Man No More!" story, as Kaine throws his costume in a trash-can and lights it on fire, saying "Scarlet Spider no more!" only to find that the unstable molecules in the costume prevent it from catching fire. There are other fun bits with Aracely here and there and the ramping tone gives everything a frenzied but somewhat fun sense. Good issue.

Books I didn't mention but that, you know, were still pretty good:
Avengers Assemble 21
Spider-lady team!












Indestructible Hulk 16

D'aww, Randall Jessup.












Nova 10

Some neat little moments, including dream sequences and the Watcher!

Superior Spider-Man 22, Scarlet Spider 24, Superior Carnage 5

Superior Spider-Man 22
Slott and Gage (w) and Ramos and Olazaba (a) and Delgado (c)

Flash Thompson is back in New York and on the trail of someone going by the name Crime Master, who he had recently fought in his own series and had rather brought his life to something of a stand-still. Meanwhile, Parker Industries has opened its doors and started work. Peter gives his first speech to the scientists (it's practically got super-villain written all over it) and meets with his Aunt May and Uncle Jay to show them around. He's called away from the offices (and from Anna Maria) by his Spider-Army, who alert him to Venom and Crime Master's fight. Venom has figured out that Crime Master isn't Betty Brant's brother, the most recent Crime Master, but some former Maggia guy who bought the name off of Hobgoblin and currently regrets it. Venom pretty easily takes this new Crime Master down a peg and the villain gives up when Spider-Man appears with a small battalion. But he's not there for Crime Master; he's there for Venom. Venom realizes that Spidey probably doesn't realize Venom's a good guy now and eventually is forced to show his face, revealing himself as Flash and hoping that's enough for Spidey but ultimately, this Spider-Man doesn't have any connection to the man and seems poised to kill anyway.

Pretty smooth issue, moves a little bit more quickly than the last handful of SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN issues have and sets us up in a lot of different ways. We're no longer in the Parker Industries funding stages, nor in the doctorate-earning stages so we're able to move a little more efficiently through Doc Ock's newest plans. There's a nice character-defining line from Anna Maria as she points to Peter as someone who's quick to action, someone who goes out and does what he wants done and who takes what he wants taken. It's hard not to see that in stark contrast to OG Peter Parker who was constantly second-guessing himself and doubting himself on top of the difference in action vs. reaction we've talked about a lot in other reviews. There's also some more plot-building stuff than was highlighted above as Wraith discovers that Carlie's disappeared and her apartment's been ransacked with all of her notes on Peter similarly gone. She blames Spider-Man and vows to play as dirty as she thinks he's playing. Meanwhile, Jameson is sick of being under Spider-Man's thumb and supposedly has a plan to get out from under it. Plenty happening, plenty of groundwork laid for the next set of issues, and plenty of character development through it all. Pretty solid work.

Scarlet Spider 24
Yost and Burnham (w) and Baldeon (a) and Sotomayor (c)

Kaine still blames himself for Donald's injury and all of the guilt and the pressure he's felt from the start has reached its breaking point, leaving him frustrated and angry with himself, ready to throw away the Scarlet Spider persona for good. Both Annabelle and Aracely are firmly on his side but Wally feels differently, particularly after finally looking Kaine up in his police database and finding the laundry list of crimes attributed to him. After a long day of wallowing and being unable to burn his costume (unstable molecules), Kaine returns home to find Annabelle there, ready to make him feel better and taking a different and more sex-filled tact. While Aracely tries to not hear what's happening in the other room, she has another strange vision laced with plenty of ancient Central and South American imagery and claiming that either she has to die or everyone will die and the likes. As those events both wrap up, all hell breaks loose as Wally comes in to arrest Kaine, the real Annabelle shows up alongside a rocket-launcher-toting Zoe Walsh (unstable daughter of a Roxxon CEO who blames Scarlet Spider for his death but also has a thing for him from back in SCARLET SPIDER 7 or so), and the revealed-to-be-fake Annabelle transforms into a horrifying monster thing we've probably seen before but I don't remember off-hand. Amidst the chaos, Zoe fires her rocket, exploding the penthouse.

The final issue of Scarlet Spider, issue 25, is just around the corner and it shows here as the rising action really speeds to a climax here, bringing everyone who might want to have at Kaine together at once and then firing a rocket-launcher into the room. For all of its last-second action, sudden characters, and confusion, the issue does a really good job sticking to the themes of the book and getting right to the core of everything Kaine's been going through, perfectly summed up by the critical injury to Donald (WAIT, if Wally and Donald got married, would Wally become Walter Meland because that just came to me and I'll never be happy again if I don't decide that's what's going to happen). He's been going through a lot of this kind of reformed villain stress from the first moment of this book, where he didn't intend to be a hero or to stop in Houston and he can't help thinking about how much better everyone would be if he had stopped, unable to even consider that that wouldn't be true because Houston would have blown up like, ages ago if he wasn't there. A lot of really good stuff and the book develops in such a way that Yost and Burnham really get to explore that stuff before turning the jets on ramping up the action, which also has the added benefit of making the action seem incredibly chaotic and shocking the audience with how quickly it moves. Good stuff, looking forward to the final issue though also pretty sad that it's about to be over.

Superior Carnage 5
Shinick (w) and Segovia, Crisostomo, Ho, and Mexia (a) and JD Ramos and Lokus (c)

Klaw has been killed but it doesn't stop him from being our narrator for the issue. As a being made of pure sound, his death has transferred his consciousness and his abilities into the sound wall, making him a part of everything but with the knowledge that he'll continue dispersing, soon to lose his consciousness in the sounds. For now, though, he watches as Carnage runs rampant in his friend the Wizard's body. He outmatches Spider-Man and knows his secrets, he bests all of Spider-Man's men, he rips the legs from Malus, and he still demands to see his son. One of Spider-Man's men reveals that he's there and eventually Spider-Man is forced to play his trump card. To the Wizard's surprise, it's not Bentley-23 on-site but rather the "son" of Carnage, Cletus Kasady. Klaw explains that he's realized over time that Carnage feels the sort of betrayal a teenager feels, passed around from host to host, wanting to separate from everyone while maintaining some sort of link to someone. However, he adjusts it to include the fact that it's Carnage who has left his hosts behind, evolving and changing, but that he longs for someone he can fully control, someone designed especially for him, and that perfect host then is Kasady. Carnage rips itself off of Wizard and makes its way to Kasady as Spider-Man and his men use a specially designed gun to try to contain him. They can't get it running in time but Klaw uses his remaining power from the sound wall to project unbridled sound at the reunited Kasady and Carnage, allowing Spider-Man the chance to contain him. The book ends with the reveal that Wizard's dementia has stopped and, for all intents and purposes, he's doing better than before now that Carnage has seemingly fixed his mind to an extent; that Cletus Kasady's mind has been similarly fixed from his short time with Carnage, fixed enough at least to wake him out of his coma if not to make him less crazy; and that Spider-Man has Carnage under his control for now.

Solid ending to what turned out to be a pretty compelling and well executed story. I wasn't terribly optimistic at the start after the first issue didn't exactly win me over but Shinick had a story that was pretty good and clearly wanted to play with a couple of characters in unexpected ways, showing Wizard as a broken man who wants nothing more than to impress his son, showing Klaw as an extremely loyal and very capable villain right up to the end, and showing Carnage in probably the most complex light it's ever been cast in. Instead of a somewhat mindless and blood-thirsty beast, Carnage has a whole range of purported emotions that have left it an efficient and extremely calculating killer. There's a lot of really good stuff to this and the Carnage bent, not entirely unlike the Deadpool-based but rather silly series (like DEADPOOL KILLS THE MARVEL UNIVERSE, DEADPOOL KILLUSTRATED, and DEADPOOL KILLS DEADPOOL), aims to continue, albeit with less of a silly tone than the Deadpool books and more of a "oh dear god why is this happening tone," with the next Carnage-based series (following up CARNAGE, CARNAGE USA, and now SUPERIOR CARNAGE) revealed as CARNAGE HOMECOMING. Get ready for a lot more Cletus Kasady.

This week's picks

Did you guys remember that Infinity and Avengers came out this week? I KNOW, it feels like it was so long ago but it was just this week. Well geez, that might complicate some things, right? Let's mix it up a bit though this week, huh? Like, kind of mix it up. Not mix it up so much from my regular picks that I'm going crazy and picking Battle of the Atom or something like that, I'm still me. But let's leave both Infinity and Avengers off this list. Save 'em up for the finale.

Captain America Living Legend 2

I really like the approach on this book. It's a book about Captain America but it kind of feels like it's only tangentially about Cap. You can go a few ways in a mini-series. Your time is limited so you kind of have to hit your points hard and fast. Is this a story-heavy series? Is it a character-revealing series? You can still absolutely make it both, but it's going to find you pressed for time. I'd say Diggle is doing a fantastic job making it about both character and story without having to push too hard in either direction. Cap has had some major character arcs through his existence but, by and large, Captain America is the most unchanged character in the Marvel Universe through his existence and that's intentional. He's the symbol of all things morally right. As such, there's not a huge need to explain his character here so we're seeing little facets of his personality mixed with the personality of those around him and we're seeing the story in bloom. It's well-approached and everyone really comes off as a full-fledged character because of it.

Scarlet Spider 23

Uhh, spoilers, I guess

Scarlet Spider was in a competition with Superior Spider-Man to make the cut this week (both of them edging out Infinity, Avengers, and Cataclysm) and ultimately won out because of its clear purpose. If Spider-Man had won, it would have been because of the "dear god" factor of his fight with Black Cat. The ideas and the character win the day though with Scarlet Spider as we see Kaine officially in a position where he's done killing people, a pretty recent decision, and immediately being forced to kill or watching his friends die. His decision and his desire to be a hero are respectable but his friends are still torn on it as, at current, it directly impacts them. This issue puts Kaine in a place where making the right decision suddenly feels like the wrong decision and his supporting cast doesn't know what he should have done either, though at least Wally has an idea about it. Really solid issue, just another one to add to the bank.

Ultimate X-Men 33

I continue to really like this series, a series that Marvel editor Tom Brevoort called a "sleeper title" on his rather fascinating Tumblr. As far as I'm concerned (and I've said this before but whatever, I'll keep saying it), this book does pacing better than any book out there. Pacing is so hugely important and, though it's a somewhat intangible thing, such a make-or-break factor of the way a book comes across and it's so easy to drop it. Some of my least favorite issues of books from this past year have been paced ridiculously slowly, to the point where I'd end up feeling exhausted by the book and look to see that I was, somehow, only on page 10 or 12. Ultimate X-Men has never felt that way and, as a series, has never really let an arc overstay its welcome. This is hands-down the best book coming out of the Ultimate Universe right now and probably lands somewhere in the top five, definitely top ten from Marvel as a whole, who is putting out a slew of fantastic books. What's more impressive about that statement is that this series was one of my top ten series of 2012 as well so it's not like this is a new phenomenon, this is just a book that has been churning out great issues throughout its run.

Superior Spider-Man 20, Scarlet Spider 23

Superior Spider-Man 20
Slott (w) and Camuncoli and Dell (a) and Fabela (c)

Doc Spidey has a lot on his plate at present. His time with Horizon Labs is officially ended and its put him on the job hunt once more but, being Otto Octavius and not Peter Parker, he has some big plans for that. He intends to start his own company, Parker Industries, with girlfriend Anna Maria Marconi and former Horizon scientist Sajani Jaffrey at his side. On his way to tell Anna Maria, Spider-Man runs into sometimes-villain, sometimes-hero, sometimes-lover Black Cat and, unlike what the cover would have you believe, swiftly beats her up and webs her for the authorities. Obviously, Black Cat is furious and swears to never forget this. Meanwhile, Carlie Cooper has what she believes is definitive proof of something weird with Spidey now that she's found a paper trail (albeit from suspicious sources) linking Spider-Man to Doc Ock's bank accounts. She calls MJ to warn her to stay away from Peter and that she should tell May and Jay to stay clear too. MJ is busy, though, trying to learn more about the firefighter who saved her life during her nightclub's fire. Finally, Peter goes to present his doctoral thesis, his last step in becoming Dr. Peter Parker. After a seemingly very successful presentation, Dr. Lamaze gleefully jumps up and calls Peter a fraud, saying that he's simply stolen the unpublished work of the late, great Otto Octavius. He swears to have Parker expelled for this and Doc realizes that this could ruin everything he's worked for unless he stops Lamaze somehow.

One of the really interesting things about this series has been Slott's systematic destruction of everything in Peter's life pre-Superior. It's typically come in little waves, with the hero community becoming a little suspicious of him and kind of wavering back and forth on their acceptance of him, followed by his friends getting sick of his new attitude, followed by this and that and so on. This is another great example as Doc absolutely ruins Black Cat. Slott and Camuncoli leave absolutely no room for discussion about it; it's a solid beat-down, remarkably swift and pretty brutal. Honestly, if they hadn't brought Black Cat into it, I probably wouldn't have thought about her as such a staple in his life; she just kind of comes and goes into it as she pleases. Now that it's been brought up and so thoroughly dispatched, though, I realize how important she is to Peter and how jarring this attack is. It's another example of a well-thought out and well-realized story for Slott. I think, as fans, we're all kind of aware that Peter Parker will SOMEHOW, at some point, come back. Of course, it's not a guarantee but it's as close to a guarantee as comics can make. The fact Doc has stuck around this long (ten months now, impressively) has been a remarkable show of restraint. Still, it leaves fans looking at these situations going "gee, that's gonna be tough for Peter to clean up" and the like, but issues like this one make it very clear that Slott knows what he's doing with these characters. Doc Ock isn't treating it like he's a placeholder for Peter; he is Peter now and he intends to stay as Peter forever, hence Parker Industries and his insistence that he become Dr. Peter Parker, even if it means sitting through school again. Really good stuff here and a very complete issue.

Scarlet Spider 23
Yost and Burnham (w) and Baldeon (a) and Sotomayor (c)

It's Kaine vs. Kraven in Kraven's newest hunt that can only be ended by one killing the other. To ensure that Kaine doesn't simply walk away, what with his newfound hero personality, Kraven has tied up all of Kaine's friends and swears to kill them if Kaine doesn't go along. Kraven is still a force to be reckoned with and it proves hard for even Kaine, stronger and faster than Spider-Man, to keep up. He continues to insist that he won't give in, that he won't kill Kraven, but the situation gets more and more dire. Kraven believes that Kaine is the only one who can kill him, as its Kaine's blood that brought him back from the grave in the first place and won't allow Kaine to leave until the deed is done. As they fight, Kraven sends Ana to kill one of Kaine's friends. She chooses Donald Meland and slashes him through the stomach. Furious, Kaine tries to go to him but Kraven holds him back, swearing that Ana will kill all of his friends before this is through. Kaine promptly kills Kraven with a force palm to the chest and rushes to his friends, slashing Ana across the face first. He tries to save Meland and eventually cuts his other friends down so they can help (particularly Meland's husband Officer Wally Layton). Kaine, meanwhile, goes back to Kraven and resuscitates him, bringing him back to life. Now, Kaine reasons, that he's killed him, just like Kraven wanted, and now any connection between them is through. Wally manages to stop the bleeding enough to transport Donald to the hospital but the surgeries are very touch and go and it's hard to say whether he'll live or not. Wally, through with Kaine, researches him for the first time in a superhuman criminal law enforcement database and learns about his past.

Tons happening in this issue and it's really a tremendous book. As much as I was bummed by Venom ending last week, I think I might be more broken up about this book when it comes to its end in the coming months. There's such a solid feel throughout this book and such a nice core to it. Kaine's a very complicated character and this is a great arc for him, as he has to directly face his past as a killer, something he decidedly doesn't want to be any more. It's been a nice transformation for him as the series has progressed, especially considering its start. Kaine was simply leaving New York so he wouldn't be apprehended or anything of that nature; he never intended to stay in Houston, let alone America, and to be dragged into his "brother's" heroic ways. But here he is, doing whatever it takes to try to save his friends and finding out that sometimes it's just not enough. It's a really well-written issue here as there has to be just enough sentimentality placed towards his friends and the way they view him without going too overboard and becoming repetitive. It works well and it creates a good picture of the new Kaine. The fighting is extremely well-paced and we see the pain in Kaine as Kraven works him over for a while before Kaine finally unleashes and immediately defeats Kraven and Ana. There's plenty happening here and it'll be interesting to see where we go from here.