|
|
Post by fanboystranger on Jan 8, 2015 10:58:32 GMT -5
The scary thing is that in 2021 we will have to consider the Nu52 and Marvel NOW! as classics.  There's some books from both that should legitimately be considered classics:
Soule's Swamp Thing Mieville's Dial H Azzerello's Wonder Woman Lemire's Animal Man Robinson's The Shade Fraction's Hawkeye Waid's Daredevil Wilson's Ms Marvel Ellis' Moon Knight Spencer's Superior Foes of Spider-Man
I get the hate for the continuity shifts and the constant restarts, but all in all, the ratio of good books to mediocre books really hasn't shifted.
|
|
|
|
Post by fanboystranger on Jan 8, 2015 11:03:22 GMT -5
His F4 run, on the other hand, was probably the first run since Byrne's that I've read and enjoyed. He really expanded their world & developed the characters (pretty much all of which has been ignored in the abysmal follow-ups) See, I liked his FF run to begin with, but after following it for a year, I realised that he didn't really know what he was doing. I think Hickman is a writer that throws everything at a story and sees what sticks, but a lot of the sub-plots he introduced in FF were going nowhere. It's weird, but I think superficially he comes across as a good writer, but when you actually stop to think about it, he's not very good at all. I mostly agree with this assessment, and I'd add that he must really hope that readers haven't read the Euro-comics and '80s independent books that he cribs most of his ideas from. I still like his creator-owned work, but even something like Manhattan Projects wears the interwar period of The Secret History on its sleeve. |
|
|
|
Post by badwolf on Jan 8, 2015 11:05:20 GMT -5
Spider-Man is no worse a teamplayer than Hulk, Quicksilver, USAgent or many other wildcard members they had over the years. And Wolverine's methods and philosophy are also not that different from many longtime Avengers. The reasons why some people could join and some people could not always seemed arbitrary to me. The Hulk didn't get along with them and quit after a few issues. Quicksilver is probably the most inconsistently-written character in the MU but when he was stable, he was good. USAgent was government-mandated; they didn't want him! I'm not saying Spidey absolutely can't be an Avenger...but after so many years in solo books it just seems weird. |
|
|
|
Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 8, 2015 11:08:01 GMT -5
His F4 run, on the other hand, was probably the first run since Byrne's that I've read and enjoyed. He really expanded their world & developed the characters (pretty much all of which has been ignored in the abysmal follow-ups) See, I liked his FF run to begin with, but after following it for a year, I realised that he didn't really know what he was doing. I think Hickman is a writer that throws everything at a story and sees what sticks, but a lot of the sub-plots he introduced in FF were going nowhere. It's weird, but I think superficially he comes across as a good writer, but when you actually stop to think about it, he's not very good at all. I agree with this completely. I loved the start of Hickman's run. But with each trade it meandered and meandered into...I don't know. And I don't think Hickman knew where it was going. And it just got boring. |
|
|
|
Post by The Captain on Jan 8, 2015 11:09:44 GMT -5
At the risk of sounding like an Old Crumudgeon, back in the day they could write a good story with a beginning, middle, and end in 12 pages. Now it takes 150 pages, and we rarely get a solid ending, but rather the lead-in to the next massive event. Of course they could do that back in the day, because they weren't writing 6-issue arcs designed to sell TPBs. I miss one-and-done stories, where you could just pick up an issue because it looked interesting, get a good read, and maybe never buy another issue in that series again. A couple of my favorite recent comics are the She-Hulk where Slott has fun with vacationing heroes from another dimension on Earth-616 (and explains "She-Hulk" sleeping with Juggernaut) and the Punisher War Journal (#4, IIRC) where they have the wake for Stilt-Man; those were well-written stories, and I don't have to buy another issue of either series to enjoy them again and again. |
|
Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,202 
|
Post by Confessor on Jan 8, 2015 11:24:49 GMT -5
A couple of my favorite recent comics are the She-Hulk where Slott has fun with vacationing heroes from another dimension on Earth-616 (and explains "She-Hulk" sleeping with Juggernaut) and the Punisher War Journal (#4, IIRC) where they have the wake for Stilt-Man; those were well-written stories, and I don't have to buy another issue of either series to enjoy them again and again. Yeah, that Punisher issue was great. That was in the midst of Civil War, if I recall correctly. |
|
|
|
Post by wildfire2099 on Jan 8, 2015 12:32:50 GMT -5
But ... it was covered in the series. Cap did object to him, but Iron Man wanted him in precisely because he would cross lines they wouldn't go over, in case of another Scarlet Witch-type runaway power. Whether you agree or not, I think the in-story logic was reasonable, and Iron Man's pragmatic view was reasonably consistent with his "cover all the options" futurist planner character. I guess so, but that wasn't much of an objection, considering the past. I mean, the Avengers used to have trials when someone was even implicated in a death... to have Cap just agree after a quick conversation was silly. Plus, what about everyone else? Bendis didn't kill off ALL the old guys... wait... I guess he did. Still, it was too quick and easy to discard a 50 year old policy that was a cornerstone of the group, IMO. |
|
|
|
Post by wildfire2099 on Jan 8, 2015 12:39:30 GMT -5
The scary thing is that in 2021 we will have to consider the Nu52 and Marvel NOW! as classics. There's some books from both that should legitimately be considered classics:
Soule's Swamp Thing Mieville's Dial H Azzerello's Wonder Woman Lemire's Animal Man Robinson's The Shade Fraction's Hawkeye Waid's Daredevil Wilson's Ms Marvel Ellis' Moon Knight Spencer's Superior Foes of Spider-Man
I get the hate for the continuity shifts and the constant restarts, but all in all, the ratio of good books to mediocre books really hasn't shifted.
I'd agree with most of those  You know what they all have in common? None of them are really hooked in to the mainline universe (perhaps with the exception of Wonder Woman... I only read the 1st trade there)... they all sorta happen in their own space... heck, Waid is actually the only guy that made Original Sin (as a concept) work, and he did it by having it be competely self contained. |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 8, 2015 12:43:17 GMT -5
I guess so, but that wasn't much of an objection, considering the past. I mean, the Avengers used to have trials when someone was even implicated in a death... to have Cap just agree after a quick conversation was silly. Plus, what about everyone else? Bendis didn't kill off ALL the old guys... wait... I guess he did. Still, it was too quick and easy to discard a 50 year old policy that was a cornerstone of the group, IMO. Fair point - I remember Trial of Yellowjacket and Trial of Hawkeye, as well. However, I think it's justifiable, in context - the aftermath of "Disassembled" with several Avengers dead or seriously injured and given Stark's pragmatism; I can see that others might have more of a problem swallowing this as a change. I guess in some ways, this was a fairly radical revamp, not just for the personnel, but in pretty much throwing out all the Avenger bureaucracy which used to make up so much of the old stories - changes to charters, roster changes etc, and letting the team be driven much more by the evolving events rather than being in any way in control of them. |
|
|
|
Post by wildfire2099 on Jan 8, 2015 12:48:58 GMT -5
Exactly!! You got a real sense back in the day the Avengers were an elite organization, not just a club house for superheroes. The latter is what it is now, there's no real rules, screening, really there's not even a leader. I know it's a part of the plot point to 'get bigger', but that was never an issue before, they had reserve members, (which did include quite a few people), and they were happy to call Reid Richards or Professor X if they needed help.
Now, due to business factors, the 'Avengers' is more a brand...anyone can be one, as long as you're not an X-Man, it seems. There's no more spotlights on a character that is considering leaving the team, or if so and so is worthy, they just use whoever the writer wants and don't worry about it.
|
|
|
|
Post by fanboystranger on Jan 8, 2015 14:19:26 GMT -5
There's some books from both that should legitimately be considered classics:
Soule's Swamp Thing Mieville's Dial H Azzerello's Wonder Woman Lemire's Animal Man Robinson's The Shade Fraction's Hawkeye Waid's Daredevil Wilson's Ms Marvel Ellis' Moon Knight Spencer's Superior Foes of Spider-Man
I get the hate for the continuity shifts and the constant restarts, but all in all, the ratio of good books to mediocre books really hasn't shifted.
I'd agree with most of those You know what they all have in common? None of them are really hooked in to the mainline universe (perhaps with the exception of Wonder Woman... I only read the 1st trade there)... they all sorta happen in their own space... heck, Waid is actually the only guy that made Original Sin (as a concept) work, and he did it by having it be competely self contained. Which is the way it should be, in my opinion. A book should be strong enough to stand on its own feet before it's made to fit into an overarching puzzle. I think that's a big problem with the bulk of both DC's and Marvel's in-universe output these days-- they think about the universe first, then the individual book. That's a backwards way to approach it. |
|
|
|
Post by wildfire2099 on Jan 8, 2015 18:19:25 GMT -5
I agree 100%. Unfortunately, the mentality these days is that books that are strong on their own but don't fit into a big event don't 'count'. So the get shoehorned into crappy events, people complain, they don't buy them, and they get cancelled.
Then people complain there's not enough diversity.
Man, Comic book fans are a fickle lot.
|
|
|
|
Post by Reptisaurus! on Jan 8, 2015 18:36:09 GMT -5
I will go much stronger - "Spider-man is a loner" is an inherently dumb argument. I know Stan Lee made it - still dumb. Spider-man is, in fact, a social construct. When Spider-man is by himself he's Peter Parker. For proof, allow me to site every Spider-man comic with thought baloons ever published. The Spider-man elements of his personality only emerge when he's (A) in costume, and (B) in a social setting, either amont civilians, friends, or enemies. So Spider-man should always have been in the Avengers, it was a mistake not to put Spider-man in the Avengers in the first place, and I will always be happy that Bendis et. al. fixed this grevious over-sight. (Except for Wolverine, I really like the original New Avengers line-up.) It's not that, it's that they had Spidey try to join... twice... and he failed... twice. Just showing up and being there shouldn't have been a thing without addressing that. IIRC he'd been a reserve Avenger for a while. So those two (awful) stories full of nonsensical reasoning where he didn't join were addressed. |
|
|
|
Post by dupersuper on Jan 8, 2015 20:48:55 GMT -5
Agreed up until he killed Cliff. For some one who seems like such a fan of the Morrison run, he sure seemed to miss 1 of the main points made in the end... |
|
|
|
Post by dupersuper on Jan 8, 2015 20:50:13 GMT -5
Spider-Man is no worse a teamplayer than Hulk, Quicksilver, USAgent or many other wildcard members they had over the years. And Wolverine's methods and philosophy are also not that different from many longtime Avengers. The reasons why some people could join and some people could not always seemed arbitrary to me. The Hulk didn't get along with them and quit after a few issues. Quicksilver is probably the most inconsistently-written character in the MU but when he was stable, he was good. USAgent was government-mandated; they didn't want him! I'm not saying Spidey absolutely can't be an Avenger...but after so many years in solo books it just seems weird. I find it weird he spent that much time in solo books without joining the team. I've never known anything in his character that would keep him from joining: it just comes across as editorial mandate. |
|
You know what they all have in common? None of them are really hooked in to the mainline universe (perhaps with the exception of Wonder Woman... I only read the 1st trade there)... they all sorta happen in their own space... heck, Waid is actually the only guy that made Original Sin (as a concept) work, and he did it by having it be competely self contained.
