Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,220 
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Post by Confessor on Nov 15, 2014 6:28:39 GMT -5
The Quality of the art for "Death?" The final issue was just spectacularly incompetent - Screwed up perspective, Plastic-Man-esque anatomy, camera angle choices that just. did. not. work. Working with just full panels splashes - and no establishing shots, cut-away panels and inserts -is HARD. You basically gotta be Walt Simonson to pull it off. On the other hand, it was the first time in my adult reading that I recognized bad art as "bad art" so it taught me a lot. It's been a long time since I read it, but I remember the pacing/momentum of the art being quite powerful. I noticed that more than specific anatomy issues. I can fully appreciate what Reptisaurus! is saying, but like shaxper, I found the pacing/momentum of the big splash pages leading up to the actual death being very powerful when I first read it. Hell, the whole thing was pretty powerful I thought. I has been an awful long time since I read that story though, so please bear that in mind. |
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Post by Dizzy D on Nov 15, 2014 8:13:34 GMT -5
Is Age of Apocalypse that disliked? I always thought it was fairly popular (at least the original event, every time they went back to that well though... *yikes*. In my headcanon it goes from Age of Apocalypse > world basically ends > Blink and Sabretooth get out through Exiles, rest pretty much is done for.)
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Nov 15, 2014 10:39:15 GMT -5
While I didn't care for the Clone Saga then (I haven't read it again cause I sold them all but a handful) I did love Age of Apocalypse, and still count it as one of the best X-Men, if not the best, I have read. And I know I am in a small camp with that too, as most are in liking the Clone Saga. Maybe at some point I'd buy a TPB of it, if it's been collected to read it again. Though I'm not an X-Men reader at all, I've heard talk about how disliked Age of Apocalypse is among the majority of the X-Men fanbase. Good for you for liking it though and sticking to your guns. In addition to liking the Clone Saga, warts and all, I absolutely love the Sins Past storyline, which you may be aware is the chief "whipping boy" storyline among Spider-Man fans (perhaps even more so than the Clone Saga). It's not easy to be a defender of poorly received story lines, but there is a very rewarding sense of being "righteous" and having vision, where others are wearing bifocals (to quote Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid). So, yeah...good for you. Keep on keepin' on, brother. Im the first to admit that my liking may have to do with it being the story I discovered when I first started reading comics. But the fact that I've tried X-Men in many different spots in the publication history and never found 616 interesting enough, I guess I just like the AoA versions of them better. I think what got me with the Clone Saga, unlike AoA was that it had no published plan of telling the story, at least to the readers knowledge. AoA comics advertised the change in the titles for four issues (two for X-Men Unlimited) and outside of five, I think, "bookend" and/or special issues, that was the extent of the AoA story. Whereas the Clone Saga just kept you buying issue after issue with promise after promise of the next big surprise closure but never did. I've never really read the actual comics to the conclusion. I've just read it in on the internet. With publishing the way it is now, I could see reading it in one collection and enjoying it that way. Especially if some thought were out into what key issues would tell the story the best. As a new reader it seemed I had to be in all fouf titles every month because there was hint of what issues were going to contain the stories you needed to read. I like the Scarlet Spider costume though. My second favorite behind the symbiote costume. |
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Nov 15, 2014 10:50:55 GMT -5
Is Age of Apocalypse that disliked? I always thought it was fairly popular (at least the original event, every time they went back to that well though... *yikes*. In my headcanon it goes from Age of Apocalypse > world basically ends > Blink and Sabretooth get out through Exiles, rest pretty much is done for.) Forgive me my generalization/observation but it seems most of the dislike it gets is from old time readers of comics, X-Men in particular. But most of those too don't seem to like much X-Men of 90s either. I think AoA is the "name" for all 90s X-Men, which I think is unfair as the 616 X-Men to me were far worse than AoA. I did like Wolverines title in the 90s. |
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Post by Icctrombone on Nov 15, 2014 10:53:12 GMT -5
Though I'm not an X-Men reader at all, I've heard talk about how disliked Age of Apocalypse is among the majority of the X-Men fanbase. Good for you for liking it though and sticking to your guns. In addition to liking the Clone Saga, warts and all, I absolutely love the Sins Past storyline, which you may be aware is the chief "whipping boy" storyline among Spider-Man fans (perhaps even more so than the Clone Saga). It's not easy to be a defender of poorly received story lines, but there is a very rewarding sense of being "righteous" and having vision, where others are wearing bifocals (to quote Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid). So, yeah...good for you. Keep on keepin' on, brother. Im the first to admit that my liking may have to do with it being the story I discovered when I first started reading comics. But the fact that I've tried X-Men in many different spots in the publication history and never found 616 interesting enough, I guess I just like the AoA versions of them better. I think what got me with the Clone Saga, unlike AoA was that it had no published plan of telling the story, at least to the readers knowledge. AoA comics advertised the change in the titles for four issues (two for X-Men Unlimited) and outside of five, I think, "bookend" and/or special issues, that was the extent of the AoA story. Whereas the Clone Saga just kept you buying issue after issue with promise after promise of the next big surprise closure but never did. I've never really read the actual comics to the conclusion. I've just read it in on the internet. With publishing the way it is now, I could see reading it in one collection and enjoying it that way. Especially if some thought were out into what key issues would tell the story the best. As a new reader it seemed I had to be in all fouf titles every month because there was hint of what issues were going to contain the stories you needed to read. I like the Scarlet Spider costume though. My second favorite behind the symbiote costume. The alternate version of stories always have an appeal. The What If? series was great because you couldn't be sure your hero would win a fight or even live to the end. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2014 12:14:54 GMT -5
Is Age of Apocalypse that disliked? I always thought it was fairly popular (at least the original event, every time they went back to that well though... *yikes*. In my headcanon it goes from Age of Apocalypse > world basically ends > Blink and Sabretooth get out through Exiles, rest pretty much is done for.) I thought it was named as one of the top 50 storylines in comic history or something like that. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2014 12:20:25 GMT -5
Over on the collected editions board at the other place, it was getting bad-mouthed (in reference to another event getting collected), but then some fans have shown up to sing its praises (admitting nostalgia is a factor).
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Post by Dizzy D on Nov 15, 2014 13:43:22 GMT -5
Is Age of Apocalypse that disliked? I always thought it was fairly popular (at least the original event, every time they went back to that well though... *yikes*. In my headcanon it goes from Age of Apocalypse > world basically ends > Blink and Sabretooth get out through Exiles, rest pretty much is done for.) I thought it was named as one of the top 50 storylines in comic history or something like that. That'd be going very far (it's not much of a storyline.), but it was one of the better executed event comics (I know, I know. Low bar). |
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Post by dupersuper on Nov 15, 2014 22:43:38 GMT -5
I should've liked AoA better given how many good writers were involved, but A) the alternate future thing didn't mean much to me as I was familiar with but never a massive fan of the X-Men, and B) though this rarely takes me out of a story, in these books I found the art truly horrible.
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Post by Paradox on Nov 16, 2014 4:11:31 GMT -5
It's been a long time since I read it, but I remember the pacing/momentum of the art being quite powerful. I noticed that more than specific anatomy issues. I can fully appreciate what Reptisaurus! is saying, but like shaxper, I found the pacing/momentum of the big splash pages leading up to the actual death being very powerful when I first read it. Hell, the whole thing was pretty powerful I thought. I has been an awful long time since I read that story though, so please bear that in mind. I found it lazy, and not particularly well-executed. Of course, I also found the whole arc to be mildly stupid and pretty much a bad idea, particularly the lame and undefined deus ex monster, Doomsday. |
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Post by Icctrombone on Nov 16, 2014 14:32:30 GMT -5
I can fully appreciate what Reptisaurus! is saying, but like shaxper, I found the pacing/momentum of the big splash pages leading up to the actual death being very powerful when I first read it. Hell, the whole thing was pretty powerful I thought. I has been an awful long time since I read that story though, so please bear that in mind. I found it lazy, and not particularly well-executed. Of course, I also found the whole arc to be mildly stupid and pretty much a bad idea, particularly the lame and undefined deus ex monster, Doomsday. He was the Hulk without any human compassion. He was awesome. |
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,874
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Post by shaxper on Nov 16, 2014 14:42:02 GMT -5
I do find it interesting that DC chose to have Superman and Batman both taken down by total unknowns instead of a villain who'd earned the privilege.
Maybe they figured fans wouldn't buy any of the established villains suddenly succeeding after fifty years of fruitless attempts.
But yes, I'd say the biggest strength the original Death of Superman had over the '90s version was that Luthor did it, and boy did he earn it.
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Post by Icctrombone on Nov 16, 2014 15:00:15 GMT -5
I do find it interesting that DC chose to have Superman and Batman both taken down by total unknowns instead of a villain who'd earned the privilege. Maybe they figured fans wouldn't buy any of the established villains suddenly succeeding after fifty years of fruitless attempts. But yes, I'd say the biggest strength the original Death of Superman had over the '90s version was that Luthor did it, and boy did he earn it. Doomsday was the Borg of comics. He adapted continually to his opponents. He was awesome. |
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Post by hondobrode on Nov 16, 2014 15:02:15 GMT -5
Yeah I like what they've done with Doomsday.
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,874
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Post by shaxper on Nov 16, 2014 15:04:46 GMT -5
It was a bit of a cheap shot though, introducing a new character and proving how tough he is by taking out an established hero.
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