The Marvel Thread

[marhawkman]

As critical as the reviewer is, he's absolutely right. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first 3 issues of Siege but that has to be the worst event conclusion I have ever read in my life.

Haven't almost every Bendis-involved big event ended with a thud?  It seems to me, most of them don't make sense, have huge plot holes, don't pan out and/or leave many readers wondering, "WTF?".

Dana

Pretty much.  What are all the big, Bendis-scripted events so far?  Avengers Disassembled (Didn't read), House of M (kinda funky idea, but totally irrelevant except for the last page), Secret Invasion (dragged on way too long), and Siege?  Am I missing any by Bendis?  The guy just isn't good at big action.

Secret invasion's premise was GREAT!  It was the ending that sucked.  It sooo needed another issue to explain how the Skrulls lost.

[herodad1]

i might have missed the thread but how does siege #4 end?everyone's disappointed with it.dont know if i'll buy the TPB.might since it involves thor and the asgardians.how went the battle between thor and sentry?just read thor 609.i,m rooting for the asgardians!i hate sentry so i hope thor put up a good fight.

[Previsionary]

... If you go back a page or two in this thread, you'll see a lot of our discussion on that issue and some of the tie-ins + a link to a spoiler-heavy review site, buddy.

[crimsonquill]

i might have missed the thread but how does siege #4 end?everyone's disappointed with it.dont know if i'll buy the TPB.might since it involves thor and the asgardians.how went the battle between thor and sentry?just read thor 609.i,m rooting for the asgardians!i hate sentry so i hope thor put up a good fight.

Most of us that read it agree..

Spoiler

that the final issue was a huge build up to something that fizzled out quickly due to a rushed job while already way way behind schedule. (opens the comic) First off, we start off the issue with Loki suddenly having a change of heart about siding with Osborne and Sentry since both turned into such loose cannons and destroyed Asgard as a result. So he yanks away the Rune stones from The Hood and uses their power to "power up" the Avengers to help them take on the remaining bad guys (and Hood's villians suddenly wonder why their magic powers suddenly vanish) and Void (who has now suddenly become a half-spider Angel of Death). Of course Void doesn't approve of this change in gameplay and takes out Loki in a rather deja vu god-killing moment. Of course this swiftly ends the use of the Rune stone power up and the heroes once again have to face Void on just their own powers. Things start looking bad so Iron Man decides to override the controls on the giant HAMMER Helicarrier and ram it right down Void's throat in an epic explosion. When the dust clears the human side of Sentry is revealed in the middle of the crater and begging the heroes to kill him while they have the chance. Thor pauses to tell him that he will be arrested and put on trial for his crimes like Osborne which gives Void all the time he needs to recover and reassume control. Everyone panics and Thor just sighs and brings down a ultimate god-like lightning bolt by hitting the ground with his hammer and (we turn the page of the comic) find a burned out corpse of Sentry and we cut to New York City as Sentry's tower slowly fades away. The heroes try to understand what just happened and Thor wraps up the body and flies toward the sun and lets the body go so it burns up as it drifts into the solar flames. Cut back to the heroes talking with Captian America about what was going to happen next. Then cut to Steve Rogers standing in the Oval Office with the President asking him to step up into taking over the "top cop" spot since everyone else hasn't worked so far and Steve stating that if he did it would be only be "his way". Cut AGAIN to a party on top of Stark Tower with every hero involved with Seige in attentence and Thor along with a few Asgardians appear and use their magic to make a all-new Asgardian designed tower appear (in the place of Sentry's old tower) stating that Earth is now their allies and anyone who attacks one or the other will occur the wrath of both worlds. Thor also states that he is also willing to return to being an Avenger and that's when Steve arrives and announces that he will need everyone for what comes next. End.

That about covers it..

- CQ

[herodad1]

thanks CQ!

[Talavar]

As critical as the reviewer is, he's absolutely right. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first 3 issues of Siege but that has to be the worst event conclusion I have ever read in my life.

Haven't almost every Bendis-involved big event ended with a thud?  It seems to me, most of them don't make sense, have huge plot holes, don't pan out and/or leave many readers wondering, "WTF?".

Dana

Pretty much.  What are all the big, Bendis-scripted events so far?  Avengers Disassembled (Didn't read), House of M (kinda funky idea, but totally irrelevant except for the last page), Secret Invasion (dragged on way too long), and Siege?  Am I missing any by Bendis?  The guy just isn't good at big action.

Secret invasion's premise was GREAT!  It was the ending that sucked.  It sooo needed another issue to explain how the Skrulls lost.

Secret Invasion had its moments, but it dragged on way too long in the middle (8 issues?  Really?) and the ending did suck, though not as badly as Siege.  In Secret Invasion, the skrulls' advantage was secrecy, mistrust and numbers - with the first two gone, them losing a straight-up fight to earth's combined superhuman forces makes sense - losing to superheroes is what skrulls have been doing since the '60s.  The Sentry had been built up and up and up as basically unbeatable ...

Spoiler

only to be beaten by a few punches, a crashing helicarrier and Thor's lightning.  How does any of that trump his ability to self-resurrect, as seen in Dark Avengers?  It didn't make sense.

[BlueBard]

Sentry = Bad concept = Bad end

The equation makes perfect sense to me.

[marhawkman]

Bob basically got klled by Magic.

[Previsionary]

A new era is among us! What book did you all read? I read:

Avengers V4 #1 (3):

It's a new day in the lives of the Avengers, and with Bendis taking it upon himself to do new, and better, stuff (...), it's time we see just how good this book is. I've made no secret that I'm very mixed on Bendis's work (and having read some of his scripts, his repetitive nature is NOT unique to dialoge), but how did this book fare to me?

Spoiler

Well, I'm going to start out with the art because that's immediately what got my attention. I know JRjr. is a legend in the comic industry, just as his father was before him, but his art just doesn't seem appropriate for this book. Some of the characters just look bad to me. I do understand they were going for an "old school," classic style, but it needs more refinement. There are just some characters that look ridiculous like Thor and his big, blocky head, and Spider-woman with her mop top hair do. Also, the cover I have has Wolverine and Spidey on the cover with the classic three. Why? Those are Bendis's pet characters. They don't belong on the cover. Not on this book (or the issue at least).

The first scene opens with a teaser of the NEXT Avengers confronting a deranged Immortus (thanks, AA) before heading into present day with Steve and the Avengers. Steve, as the new head in charge, has asked all the Avengers he could find to join him on his mission. Of course, the majority of them are happy (queue the double page montage of the Avenger just saying, "yes," with their own personal voices. I like to call it page waster.), but one man of the wonder variety thinks they're all insane. This will probably be a source on conflict for Wonder-man and Steve for the next few months (see issue 2).

Later on, Steve gets around to creating his first Avengers team, which consists of Hawkeye (Clint Barton), Spider-man, Wolverine, Ironman, Thor, Spider-woman (the only female), and Captain America (Bucky for those that don't accept him). And who'll lead this wonderful group of heroes? Tony Stark. Ha, no. I kid. Maria Hill. That's right; the person that got under Steve's collar the most (and sometimes Tony's) is the head of the Avengers.

While all this happy happy is going on, Kang decides to make an appearance to warn the The Avengers of upcoming problems. Of course, that's what he would have done if Thor, like any normal hero, didn't rush into action and start a fight. After Kang bounces around the city a few times, the heroes and him face off, only this time, Kang has the advantage as he's carrying a weapon Tony hasn't even made yet (but he immediately recognizes it as his Doom's day device). Now with everyone's attention in his grasp, Kang reveals that the children of the Avengers have defeated the Ultron of their world with a ruthlessness Alexander the Great would wince at, and the Avengers need to jump across time and deal with them as they do not know how to deal with their powers and new position in their timeline. If the Avengers help Kang, then he promises to never cause them suffering again.

The book ends with the Avengers discussing the possibility of going into the future and the mechanics of time travel that I really don't care to discuss. Since Tony doesn't have a time machine, they resolve to find someone who can help them. Coincidentally, Wolverine already has someone in mind. Meanwhile, in the future, Kang is revealed to be working with future Hulk and some female villain I didn't recognize.

After reading this issue, I'm left with a feeling of "meh." We went through Dark Reign and Siege for this? If you're going to relaunch Avengers, then it better be a BIG relaunch. It should be a premise that captivates me and makes me realize this is the team I have been missing. There should be things in motion here that make me feel GLUED to what I am reading. None of that happened. It felt like yet another resolution to Siege/Civil War with everyone just reverting to their classic forms (see: Hawkeye). Overall, I think this is a book that's going to suffer from Bendis-typical decompression, and this first issue made it more than obvious. I give this issue a 3. When you're given 10+ more pages to move your story, please do something with them. It reminded me of Siege #4 all over again... minus the giant monster.

ETA: Anyone wanna explain to me why Bendis keeps writing the Bucky/Thor meeting scene? Didn't they already meet under his pen? Even better, haven't Bucky and Thor met just before Bucky "died" way back when? I clearly remember the two talking in an issue of "The Invaders," which I have.

[AfghanAnt]

It wasn't

Spoiler

Strange

it was

Spoiler

Immortus

.

Damn you for beating me with a review.

[Previsionary]

Ack, my goof. Thanks, AA (though to be honest, that dude looked too much like Strange). You should write your review anyway. It's always good to get more perspectives!

[AfghanAnt]

Ack, my goof. Thanks, AA (though to be honest, that dude looked too much like Strange). You should write your review anyway. It's always good to get more perspectives!

Well I was just going summarize with images and talk about how nothing happened but hey it's a Bendis book. I was surprised by

Spoiler

Next Avengers showing up and being killers. I've never seen the DVD but I'm pretty sure they don't murder in it.

Ah Bendis. Also with the bad characterization.

Oh also!
I hated the art. It really made the story seem slower in my opinion. Which is weird because I loved his work on Kickass.

[Podmark]

Speaking of bad art...Greg Land. It's not like Legacy was great this week anyway, but Land just dragged it straight down.

[AfghanAnt]

Speaking of bad art...Greg Land. It's not like Legacy was great this week anyway, but Land just dragged it straight down.

I only flipped through but yeah... the art seemed particularly bad.

[Previsionary]

I think the preview was more than enough to prove that. . How was the issue over all? The second part of Second Coming has been sloppy to me. I still can't believe a 20+ year old woman got into a fight with a teenaged, red-headed, time-jumping orphan. I... will review something else later. Maybe.

[Podmark]

It mostly meh. I didn't have any specific problems with it other than the art, but nothing has really happened in a few issues. Next issue could very well be great with the setup at the end of Legacy.

Second Coming will probably read pretty well as a whole but this month has dragged. I almost wonder if maybe they should have rolled Hellbound into the main story. It seems a bit like they don't quite have enough material for 3 full months.

[Silver Shocker]

I looked through Avengers at the shop, because I'm curious about Kang (who's one of my favorite villains in comics), and I wanted to see how Bendis handles him. It didn't seem as bad as it could be but there were some lines that kinda annoyed me/seemed off to me. (not surprisingly, this happens a lot with Bendis when he writes mainstream 616 Marvel)

Spoiler

-Bucky ( or Steve, I forget) calls Kang a "time terrorist" and Kang scoffs at that for being short-sighted, since Kang thinks in terms of the grand scheme of things. Yet a little later Kang says if the Avengers help him he would end his feud with them. If Kang thinks in such grand-scheme terms, why does he even consider the Avengers enemies? Admittedly I've not read all of the Kang appearances (though I've read most of the ones in the main Avengers book from the 60s to the 70s and most or all of the stuff since Busiek's run) but I figure Kang would consider the Avengers more of a minor inconvenience than anything. I mean the guy travels to all sorts of eras of time and space, I'm sure he does stuff that doesn't end up involving the Avengers (see: Kang's backstory in Avengers Forever)
-Kang claims that he tried to fight Ultron (or the kids, not 100%) "twenty times", with allies from all of time and space, but failed to stop them every time, and therefore needs the Avengers' help. Really? You realize the kind of high-tech, armies Kang could have access to and has in past stories. In Avengers Forever, seemingly hundreds of Avengers from time and space appeared for the final battle, and that included guys who'd never been Avengers in the regular timeline (including Songbird, for one). Why didn't Kang just get an army like that?
-Kang claims this is the first time he asked the Avengers to help him. I'm pretty sure that's wrong. For one thing, Kang worked with the Avengers during Avengers Forever.

Now I might be nitpicky about these things, but its little things like that in Bendis' writing that bug me. Regardless, I'll keep my eye on the rest of this arc to see how Kang is used (and I'm also curious about the supposed use of Spider-Girl).

[cmdrkoenig67]

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned before, but I've been noticing an awful lot of DC parallels at Marvel lately.  Sentry is a Superman clone and for the past few years, Marvel has been aping DC's Silver Age...I mean, how many of Marvel's heroes and villains have children now (who all pretty much happen to be adults and are either heroes or villains too)?  Three Hulk kids, Wolverine basically has two kids, Galactus even has a kid for criminy's sake!

Dana

[Previsionary]

Hulk has 2 kids unless I'm missing something; Wolverine has 3 + a clone (who would be like his younger sister); and Galactus does not have a child in mainstream marvel (unless they got around to confirming that digital comic + her appearance from '09 is canon). Also, Marvel has not been silver age inspired for the past few years and even the Heroic Age is just going back to what Marvel was before Bendis/Millar began morphing the universe into Ultimate Marvel clone.

I'm not really seeing the Marve/DC Silver age comparison. Marvel wasn't even copying DC's silver age during their own silver age.

[Podmark]

Hulk has 2 kids unless I'm missing something;

Skaar, Hiro-Kala and his sons if I understand correctly. Wasn't Scorpion thought to be his daughter? And isn't the Savage She-Hulk an alternate world daughter?


I think the reason why we're getting a lot of kids lately is for a number of reasons. The biggest one is that creators want to launch new characters and linking them to existing ones gives them the best chance of being successful. Another reason is that most of these characters have 30+ years of continuity behind them so children are often a way to cover new ground.

[Previsionary]

Yes, Lyra is his daughter (not alternate world... alternate time. She does have his actual DNA inside of her). What's the story behind Hiro-kala? The Scorpion/Hulk thing hasn't been touched on anymore. Scorpion is also a character that isn't used very much.

[This somehow reminded me that Echo/Ronin has been missing as well, though I hear Bendis will be using her for a story arc or two]

[Podmark]

Alright dark humour warning:

Spoiler

Preview for X-Force 27
Think Julian can borrow that hand Bastion left in Nightcrawler?

[cmdrkoenig67]

Yes, Lyra is his daughter (not alternate world... alternate time. She does have his actual DNA inside of her). What's the story behind Hiro-kala? The Scorpion/Hulk thing hasn't been touched on anymore. Scorpion is also a character that isn't used very much.

[This somehow reminded me that Echo/Ronin has been missing as well, though I hear Bendis will be using her for a story arc or two]

Have we even seen Echo since Stupid Invasion...Sorry...Secret Invasion, where she was supposedly "killed" by Veranke posing as Spider-Woman?  Not that I really care, Bendis really hasn't even been able to write her correctly as a deaf character.

My DC Silver Age comparison was due to stories featuring the headlining heroes (mostly Superman and Batman) having kids...Even if it's an "imaginary story" like the Galactus' daughter story  (many of DC's "heroes with kids" adventures took place in "Imaginary stories" in the 60s)...Should I bring up Marvel's recent fascination with gorillas/apes (LOL!)?

Sorry, I'm rather peeved that they've put Guardians of the Galaxy on hiatus, effectively killing the book.

Dana

[cmdrkoenig67]

Alright dark humour warning:

Spoiler

Preview for X-Force 27
Think Julian can borrow that hand Bastion left in Nightcrawler?

Um...Do his hands always do that when he uses his powers?  I don't get it. 

Spoiler

The fight against Nimrod/Bastion would be over in less than a second if they'd just use Madison Jeffries to his potential.

Dana

[Podmark]

Sorry, I'm rather peeved that they've put Guardians of the Galaxy on hiatus, effectively killing the book.

No idea what the ultimate fate of Guardians or Nova will be but the Thanos Imperative, essentially the two series put into one book, starts next week.

Um...Do his hands always do that when he uses his powers?  I don't get it. 

No.

Spoiler

One of the Nimrods has blasted off his hands with an attack. This is just the latest in a series of crappy things to happen in Hellion's life. Looking forward to his arc in Legacy. Will he get hooks? Robot hands? Will Josh be around to heal him?

Spoiler

The fight against Nimrod/Bastion would be over in less than a second if they'd just use Madison Jeffries to his potential.

Dana

Spoiler

I guess that's why Bastion already planned for that and has taken Jeffries out of the fight.

[Previsionary]

Yes... Madison isn't even on X-island anymore. Instead, he and the "X-club" are off dealing with their own stuff *see the tie in*

I don't really see how having kids is a DC silver age thing, but KK. A good deal of Marvel's heroes were having kids before this point, and Marvel usually doesn't try to force the headlining character into the background or an early grave as they [slowly] work on the next gen. They mostly share the stage.

And no, let's not talk about Marvel Apes (which people requested and bought) or their excellent use of Gorilla Man (thank heavens for Jeff Parker). We've already had that discussion last year. It's about moving forward now! That's right, FR is entering the Heroic Age. What that means exactly is a mystery... so... stay as you are, I guess?

Spoiler

I'd love to know what's up with superhero comics and their need to dismember characters in some way. What, is this number 4 or 5 in the past few months? Also, can Elixir heal wounds like that? A wall probably fell on him... or a rock... that's why he's missing.

[Podmark]

Spoiler

Also, can Elixir heal wounds like that? A wall probably fell on him... or a rock... that's why he's missing.

Spoiler

Have you seen the damage that Elixir healed Vanisher from? In the second arc Porter was cut to ribbons including losing his jaw and Josh healed him of all of it in a second. In Necrosha Porter lost a limb among other damage and again Josh healed him in a second. When he's not hampered by a random coma or what not Josh can heal pretty much anything. It makes him a bit of a plot headache (hence the comas) so I wouldn't be surprised if he dies in Second Coming.

Elixir's current hindrance is "having trouble staying gold" after fighting Wither and Selene in Necrosha.

[Previsionary]

Elixir isn't really a character I pay attention to. I notice him, but I don't track his feats. The New X-men didn't really connect with me as a whole minus a few. I don't expect to see him at all in this arc though because it's an event... and they need pain, chaos, and death. Though an easy way to deal with Elixir, as I said before, would be to have Bastion aim for teleporters and healers. Josh could also be overwhelmed by using his powers too much. They just needed a bit of creative thinking to deal with him.

[Podmark]

Well the New X-Men are my favorites, so I try to always keep track of them.

I actually fully expect Elixir to be with X-Force again in Second Coming. I'm expecting him to go on the mission into the future with the rest of the team. He seems to be on the cover, unless that's Cypher - who I think the solicits said would be going with X-Force into the future.

[deano_ue]

i lost all interest in the avengers comic when I saw the stupid kids from that crappy cartoon