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Post by senatortombstone on Feb 7, 2019 20:37:13 GMT -5
Something that I consider a good sign - and an encouraging anecdote that this book is popular - is that when I arrived at my local (and very large) comic shop yesterday afternoon, there were only about a dozen copies of Conan #3/278 remaining and all were of the above variant cover. The variant cover strikes me as odd considering the complete (and thankful) dearth of Skrulls in this issue. It is probably a sign of things to come, as Conan exists in the main Marvel 616 universe along with Skrulls and superheroes and crossovers are inevitable.
Anyways, this issue places a 17 year-old Conan at the wrong end of a rope in a backwater Nemediam mining town - the wages of a failed attempt at brigandry.
Without infringing on spoiler territory, suffice it to say that Conan evades death - twice - more thanks to luck than anything else.
While this was not necessarily a bad issue, I really don't like seeing Conan saved by luck, especially twice in one issue. While the author deserves credit for placing Conan in a setting consistent with the probable outline of his career, this issue did not feel like something that Roy Thomas, let alone REH - would have written. Rather, it feels like the middle of the SSoC run that was not written by Roy Thomas - not necessarily bad, but not always true to the character. There was also a very cringe inducing scene in which a priest of Mitra tries vainly to save Conan's soul.
The series' main offenses thus far:
Issue #1/276 - Conan the gladiator. Issue #2/277 - Conan sings kumbaya with the Picts. Issue #3/278 - Skrulls on the variant cover, two very unlikely and completely lucky saves from death, and an evangelizing priest of Mitra.
Don't get me wrong, I have been enjoying this series and will continue
to purchase it, along with two other monthly titles that will be coming
out soon. However, previous writers have set a very high bar for Conan
and this is simply how I measure it.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2019 0:05:45 GMT -5
Archie 1941#5: this ended exactly how I thought it would. The town is mourning the apparent deaths of Reggie and Archie, however Mrs. Andrews and Betty believe Archie is still alive. Veronica and her dad have it out as she decides to attend nursing school and live with her mother. We do see that Mr Lodge secretly has some good in him. Jughead is the new owner of Pop Tate’s as the story winds down. The ending was very cliched. While I appreciate this story, I didn’t truly enjoy it. Definitely a very different version of the gang with serious subject matter. Still, I can imagine this is similar to what may have happened in small town USA during WWII.
6/10
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Post by hondobrode on Feb 8, 2019 9:48:27 GMT -5
 Really really enjoyed this issue and even laughed in a couple of spots. This flashes back to the earlier days of Granny and her Furies and essentially shows how she and her Furies aren't given the same equal treatment in Apocalyptic culture from Darkseid and the boys. It's insightful and even shows Darkseid putting the moves on Granny back in the day. Seriously, it comes down to Granny and her girls having to break through the misogynistic culture and proving their worth. Discrimination is bad and Darkseid is bad so this makes sense, right ? Keep the women in their places... Interested to hear what anyone else thought of it. Oh, and someone got tired of taking some crap and things take a big turn leading into the next issue. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2019 10:40:47 GMT -5
Archie 1941#5: this ended exactly how I thought it would. The town is mourning the apparent deaths of Reggie and Archie, however Mrs. Andrews and Betty believe Archie is still alive. Veronica and her dad have it out as she decides to attend nursing school and live with her mother. We do see that Mr Lodge secretly has some good in him. Jughead is the new owner of Pop Tate’s as the story winds down. The ending was very cliched. While I appreciate this story, I didn’t truly enjoy it. Definitely a very different version of the gang with serious subject matter. Still, I can imagine this is similar to what may have happened in small town USA during WWII. 6/10 It's a shame because this concept was so good but the execution of it didn't do it justice. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2019 9:18:12 GMT -5
A sincere thank you to thwhtguardian for creating and maintaining these threads every single week! |
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Post by thwhtguardian on Feb 9, 2019 9:21:04 GMT -5
A sincere thank you to thwhtguardian for creating and maintaining these threads every single week! Ain't no trouble at all, it's fun to have a place to talk about the new arrivals and see what everyone else is reading too. |
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Post by thwhtguardian on Feb 9, 2019 9:22:17 GMT -5
Immortal Hulk #13Written by Al Ewing Art by Joe Bennett Summary: The Devil summons all his minions in Hell to take down the Hulk, but long odds aren't the end that's just when you really see why Hulk really is strongest.
Plot: So, action wise this issue comes across as more than a tad anticlimactic. Sure, we get Hulk and zombie A-Bomb fighting demons for a few pages but it didn't seem consequential and then we saw Hulk get his full gamma power from Absorbing man with the line, "I can't beat you, but HE can." but we never really see a show down with the Hulk and Banner's father. The Hulk convinces Banner to rejoin him then he literally claps his hands and it all goes away like it never happened. In the end we get Banner calling Betty in the middle of the night needing a pick up and it's all status quo so even aside from the action it's disappointing emotionally. I always knew it couldn't stay Hulk by night, with undead Banner by day but I was hoping for a better way back to the way things were than was presented here.
Art: Although the story was a let down the art was as solid as always from Bennett. Although he didn't have any really stand out shocking moments like he's had in previous issues it was still really solid visual storytelling.
Grade:5/10
That was definitely a disappointing issue. The book is a bit of a roller coaster. But the highs are high enough to make it worth the ride. True, I've certainly been critical of this books misses but at the end of the day I definitely think this has been one of my favorite runs on Hulk so far. |
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Post by thwhtguardian on Feb 10, 2019 21:33:08 GMT -5
 Young Justice #2. Written by Brian Michael Bendis. Art by Patrick Gleason and Emanuela Lupacchino. Robin (Tim Drake), Wonder Girl, Teen Lantern and Jinny Hex join forces to help Amethyst free Gemworld. We also get more back story on Wonder Girl. No Superboy (Conner) or Impulse this issue. Great art. Bendis is taking his time as he "builds" the team. 7/10. The pace is pretty slow but I'm loving the character moments here so I'm definitely interested in seeing more. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 11, 2019 23:04:54 GMT -5
Young Justice # 2: while not too much happens as far as the plot (I do like the inclusion of Gemworld and Amethyst, although I liked her old look better) this is an ok issue. I liked the spotlight on Wondergirl (I don’t like the look they’ve given her, it’s too much at once). Curious how some recognize her while other characters in the book don’t. Based on this issue, it seems she has a history with Wonder Woman and like they are combining elements from pre 52 and the new 52. I do like her characterization in this issue. Ginny Hex is a standout too. Looking forward to seeing where this all goes.
7/10
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Post by berkley on Feb 12, 2019 19:28:02 GMT -5
Really really enjoyed this issue and even laughed in a couple of spots. This flashes back to the earlier days of Granny and her Furies and essentially shows how she and her Furies aren't given the same equal treatment in Apocalyptic culture from Darkseid and the boys. It's insightful and even shows Darkseid putting the moves on Granny back in the day. Seriously, it comes down to Granny and her girls having to break through the misogynistic culture and proving their worth. Discrimination is bad and Darkseid is bad so this makes sense, right ? Keep the women in their places... Interested to hear what anyone else thought of it. Oh, and someone got tired of taking some crap and things take a big turn leading into the next issue. I thought it was very much off the mark and based on a serious mis-reading of the whole New Gods concept. Darkseid isn't just some vague, all-purpose embodiment of evil in general, he represents a specific kind of evil: the will to power. You might argue that misogyny is derived from a wish to have power over women, but this is putting the cart before the horse: misogyny is fear and hatred of women and the desire to control them is derived from those feelings not an end in itself, whereas with Darkseid, the will to power over everything, indiscriminately, is paramount.
Paradoxically, this meant that the Furies, in Kirby's set-up, are not subject to a special, misogynistic oppression - to do so would have been to undermine Darkseid's control of all Apocalypse, because this would be a form of oppression independent of Darkseid, since based on a male/female hierarchy that would exist with or without him.
It also makes little sense for Darkseid to allow the Furies to be systematically denigrated and bullied by their male counterparts, thus undermining their effectiveness as components of Darkseid's military machine.
I also disliked Barda being subordinated to the new Aurelie character (presumably the mother or forerunner in some other way of Kirby's much younger and very different Aurelie?). This smacks once again of a writer entirely unsympathetic to the original and seeking to "correct" it.
The artwork wasn't much to my taste either. A shoddy effort all round, to my mind.
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Post by chadwilliam on Feb 13, 2019 22:57:47 GMT -5
With issue six, The Wrong Earth just wrapped up for the year. There'll be a Free Comic Book day tie-in in May, but after that, I'll be waiting until 2020 for the series to continue. Although I pick up the occasional new comic here and there, it's been a long time since I anticipated a next issue as much as I did with this series. Though there are still some unanswered questions - and they're big ones - this was a great series. The premise is pretty straightforward - imagine Adam West's Batman finding himself in Frank Miller's world while Miller's Batman finds himself in West's - but the execution is very precisely thought out and reflects a genuine appreciation for both interpretations of each character. When his identity and location of his secret headquarters is revealed to the police, the proto-Adam West DragonFlyMan decides to bribe the cops to keep this information to themselves. The scene isn't played for shock value or to sully the purity of a decent man, but to acknowledge that being a genuinely moral person doesn't make you naïve to the world you live in. When questioned about the bribe by his sidekick, DragonFlyMan explains "Stinger-Two, where I hail from, virtue looks like virtue, and evil like evil. Things are not as plain here. And certainly not as rigid. That part's been quite... difficult for me. But my act of bribery didn't create this corrupt social structure. It was only the least damaging way I saw of operating within it." It's a nice little confirmation that the old style superhero - the type without feet of clay or some moral failing to make them " mature and realistic" in today's day and age - could still fit in nicely in today's world without being a joke or anachronism. Meanwhile, Grim and Gritty DragonFly over in West World has successfully tricked that world's Stinger (DragonFlyMan's sidekick) into thinking that he's the same cheerful guy from his world. That the motivation for this deceit stems from a desire not to see this world's Stinger kill himself the way his partner over in his Universe did, is a nice touch as it wasn't immediately clear at first why he would bother with such a ruse. He kind of seems like the kind of the guy who would trick a kid just so he could roll his eyes at him behind his back. Finding out instead, that he's committing this act of deception to maintain a child's innocence might actually be the noblest act performed in this series so far. Man, I'm really hoping that Titan Comics does another Fighting American series so I'll have something to look forward to this year.  |
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