So, I called them all except Angel, and only because I saw a quote about Angel being “the last person they would want on this team”.  That will teach me to listen to even pretty direct denials. ^.^  Plus, those wings are either horribly drawn, or drawn deliberately like that to make an image like the one on the left more easily confused with someone in a cape.  I’m going to go with a little of both.

So.  Deadpool in an actual X-team.  I don’t like that one bit.  But hey, I’m willing to be convinced.  I’m not sold on the team make-up at all,  but since I don’t pick up any of the Wolverine books (I was getting Origins in trades but… the ending was just so bleh I not pick up the rest) I’ll let this be my Wolverine fix.

Final image found via Bleeding Cool here, where there’s another image which, along with is parts in Second Coming 2, serves to remind me that Greg Land can ruin anything.  I’m not going to link to it because it’s ugly.  Also, Angel with a gun?  Does he really need a gun with the metal wings!?

Also, the new title is going to be “Uncanny X-Force”.  Which makes no sense to me.  Because… really, simple is always better and when you have a title that works and is simple and conveys a pretty clear image about what your title is, like oh, I don’t know, “X-FORCE“, you want to add a pointless adjective because why?!  I could see if they were trying to run two simultaneous X-Force books or something.  Thankfully they aren’t….

So, what else?

Great Ten, although muddled by art I didn’t quite like, was a great story and it’s a shame it didn’t sell more.  Hopefully it will do some business in the trades and we’ll get a return to it eventually.

Second Coming was decent, and contained not one, or even two, but 3 X-deaths.  I know folks may not count Ariel but hey, they at least said her name when she died.  And Karma lost a leg (now bionic), and  Hellion lost both his hands.  Thankfully he’s a telekinetic.  I guess.  I mean at least he’ll be able to wipe his own butt.  No bionic hands yet though, which seems a bit unfair.

Oh!   Second Coming: Hellbound has been the best crossover related mini I have seen in a very long time.  And it’s not even really related to Second Coming in the sense that it advances none of it’s plot points… it just picks up on a random tangent.  BUT.  If you are a Cannonball fan… which I happen to be… it has some of his best scenes in a long time (although he kind of bumbled around a bit in the first two issues, but the third has some good payoffs).

He gets to take down a powered-up Gambit and Northstar, and even uses his blasting powers to “blast” someone – he hasn’t done that on panel that I recall since he figured out he could do it a decade ago.  Has it been a decade already?  I think so… it was either during, or before the Counter-X run.  Speaking of, what happened to Bedlam?  Oh right, he got killed.  Awesome.  Way to go Marvel at developing minority characters then killing them off.

Anyway, yeah, Hellbound was pretty good.  Pixie is played out as hell right now, but her and Magic get some nice motion in their character arcs.

I’m not sold on the X-Men vs. Vampires stuff yet.  I mean, I don’t hate it but… I just don’t get the point of the new “X-Men” book.  The team has too much overlap with Uncanny/Astonishing (swap Colossus for Beast & Pixie for Armor) to be interesting in a team composition sort of way.  The art is at least decent.  Vampire Jubilee is a different/interesting way to re-power her at least, assuming they don’t just cure her in the end.

What’s up with team of X-Men+teenage girl anyway?  Claremont X-Men + Sprite (then Jubilee), Whedon X-Men + Armor, current X-Men+Pixie.  Do the main X-teams have something against teenage male sidekicks?  How about Anole?  Love that kid, he could use some more screen time.  Or Prodigy!  Then again, Prodigy has the distinction of being a young, interesting, black X-Man.  Every year he doesn’t get killed is a surprise to me (see: Synch, Bedlam).  When they depowered him I figured that was it, but they had a somewhat novel way of repowering him (telpathically unlocking the memories of his stolen skills… giving me a static set of abilities – but better than nothing!).

I dropped all the Avengers books, none of them are interesting.  Thunderbolts was the closest to coming home, but the shop sold out of the first issue of the new arc, and I didn’t want to drive all over town trying to chase it down so… no on that too.

I guess that’s enough comic rambling for now.  Enjoy it non-readers!

I can’t say I was expecting one half of what happened in X-Men: Hellbound 02.  Sure, the stuff with Pixie was clearly telegraphed… but who actually expected them to deal with the Gambit/Death thing in the middle of a major event?  I have a feeling it won’t really be “dealt” with so much as just used to fill some pages (“Oh, the demonic nature of Limbo made it like that, temporarily.”), but we’ll see.  Still, one of the more entertaining X-limited series in ages.

What the hell is the point of Deadpool – Wade Wilson’s War?  Is it a What If? Is it dumb (not “dumb as in funny” but “dumb as in pointless”)?  Yes!

I was extremely unimpressed with Avengers Academy 01.  The “twist” is dumb.  I’m sorry but.  Dumb.  Really.  Christos Gage can do better, and has done better in the past on Avengers Initiative.  Other than that the writer was decent, but not great.  I’m not buying angry Speedball – and how did his powers get back like that?  The art was passable but some faces were kinda ugg.  The lack of carryover threads from Initiative is going to kill it for me.  There’s a little from Mighty but.  I just don’t care about these new characters.  Oh no they are all traumatized and arrgghhh blah who cares?  There are a ton of quality characters from Initiative that they could have worked with.  I’m just not convinced a batch of almost completely new (-1) characters was called for.  I would have much rather seen the Initiative cast in a new “Heroic Age” light – hell you can throw these new kids into the mix in a “special class” but don’t make the damn book about them.

Avengers v? 01 was also underwhelming.  Unlike pretty much everyone else in the world, I don’t really like JRJR’s work.  OMG *GASPHEMY* I know.  The only title I ever liked it on was Amazing Spider-Man with JMS.  When I was younger, when he came onto Uncanny X-Men (issue 300?) that was the last straw I needed to quit (I don’t remember what else I was thinking… I think I was trying to quit for misguided religious reasons).  I remember thinking the art so damn ugly that I had a hard time reading it.   The story is interesting.  Maybe with another artist I might actively like it but.  Meh.

Ultimate Avengers 2 03 was exactly as dumb as you would expect.  People are buying this?  Ultimate Nick Fury is a horrible person with no redeeming values (I don’t think patriotism counts as a redeeming character trait in a story)?

Titans 24 (Or “New Angsty Killy Titans”) is pointless.

I dig the art in Heralds 01 but the characters that gathered for Emma’s party make NO EFFING SENSE.  Does she even know any of those characters in continuity?  Umm.  One random I could see but Scott picked 5 RANDOM women to hang out with his wife and none of them were X-women or… I don’t know anyone that would actually know Emma?  Oh woops I forgot the woman from SWORD was there (hey – they didn’t even bother to intro her on the page where they intro’d the others so I have a good excuse for not knowing her name right now).  She actually knows Emma.  OK, that’s 1.  Of course, the more screen time Monica Rambeaux/??codename?? gets, the better.  But still.  Hellcat was there because the writer did a couple of Hellcat minis… yeah, no.

Shield 02… Leonardo.  I dunno. I suspect it will read well in the trades but I’m having a hard time buying it within the 616 universe.  Nice to look at though.  And it had a random page of text in the middle, which I found amusing.

Prince of Power 02 was good.  It did a nice job of ratcheting up the tension and getting some character work in – although this version of Thor is slightly inconsistent IMHO, but it’s all in good fun.  I dig the last page because my favorite super-hero (ex-)girlfriend is back!  Yes, I want them to get together.

Secret Six 22 was also quite good.  Where does Catman go from here?  Wow.  After some seriously brutal putting down of some metas you know it’s going to be even sillier next time Batman beats him up.

[UPDATE/EDIT: Thread over at Bleeding Cool with a list of the fates of various non-white superheroes and discussion.  I didn't realize the Hawk-douches were supposed to be (partially) non-white.  Or Kyle Raynor...]

Oh, right, Marvel just did that too in Amazing Spider-Man 631… the kid killing that is.  Yes, the Lizard ate his own kid… to show that yes, he really is the Lizard now.  And only the Lizard!  Until another writer changes his mind.  Remember kids (and writers!): comics!

Siege 4 was really bad/dumb/BlackestNight8ish.  It’s like both writers thought of the stupidest possible solution with the least satisfying resolution and went with that.  Also, I could have sworn I read in an interview somewhere that the green on Osborne’s face was supposed to be symbolic… yet it was fucking everywhere in this issue, and someone even commented on it??  The whole power-up->1 panel->Loki dies->throwing a ship can hurt the Sentry->now Thor can knock him out->STFU COMIC!

Ugh.  Ugh.  C’mon Bendis, we KNOW IN CAPITAL LETTERS that you can do better than this.  This was like an after noon of engaging foreplay only to prematurely splatter in your partner’s nose while trying to suppress it resulting in an ejaculation with no orgasm:  no one’s satisfied, and at least one party is probably pissed.

Waitamminit!   Did Loeb ghostwrite this?  Shit :  ANSWER!

Speaking of Loeb – the Red Hulk/Red She-Hulk identity reveals should surprise absolutely no one.  Even though they went out of their way to basically break the chain of clues by having the Red Hulk in a scene with his alter-ego at one point (which I think is an incredibly cheap way to throw off suspicion)… still it was fairly obvious I think.  So yeah, that’s out of the way.  Yay.  Now maybe after this latest round of Hulk event stuff pans out we can get some more Pak-driven stuff.  Sure, I know he’s on board for this stuff (and his issues tend to be better written than Loeb’s)… but there is a huge difference in style and quality between this and the wonderful Pak-driven Hulk stuff from 2-3 years ago.

The way the Constrictor/Diamondback thing fell part in the last issue of Avengers:Initiative (35) was so incredibly, depressingly cliche.  I mean, could they not get a break?  Really?  Would it be that hard to leave them together?  It’s not like anyone else is going to use them for the next couple of years…

The bit with Maxwell Lord and the bleeding nose?  Always?  Oh look he’s got a giant bleeding nose in a giant tub of ice… *yawn*

Did they really go to all the trouble with the bottle city and giving Kryptonians a planet again and like two years worth of story arcs in 3-4 books just to KILL THEM ALL?  I mean, is that where this is headed? *yawn*

Dumbest Marvel retcon in recent memory: The Sentry slept with Rogue.  Because yeah, that TOTALLY makes sense.  Although, I guess if she magically “forgot” she slept with him since everyone forgot he existed then yeah, sure maybe decades of X-Men stories about her emotional fragility and inability to have contact with anyone (possibly culminating in finally getting with Gambit during a power loss period?  Hell, I don’t even remember) make sense… but still, it was cheap and stupid imho.  A much longer and more eloquent commentary HERE with follow-up HERE and note from Mike Carey (who has been doing great work with Rogue for the last few years on his X-Men title).

Astonishing X-Men: Xerogenesis was pretty bad too.  Not liking the bizarre art with uber sex-toy Emma (even more than usual, trust me – the artist actually draws in weird, visible, hand-sized circular nipple pad things that stick out from her ludicrously tight top… do real people wear these??) and strangely deformed everyone else (mostly the women, see above).  Also… there really is no place in continuity for this.  Why?  Because a) Beast is still with them (PAST) and Storm has a new haircut (FUTURE).  So yeah, pointless, skippable title.  Yay!  I’m so glad they moved this to limited series because now my inner compulsive will let me happily skip it.

There’s been some good stuff lately too (the current X-men event, Pak’s Amadeus Cho stuff) but I just felt like being negative for this post… maybe getting my “Dark Onefinemess” out of the way so I can move peacefully into the Heroic Age of Pullbox Commentary. (TM).  Or something

X-Force 26

What else happened?  Hope finally makes it to Utopia.  So glad it only took 4 issues for that.  Karma did indeed lose a leg.  Still curious where that is going.  I’m fairly sure I read somewhere that she’s still around post-xover, so I wonder if it’s bionic leg time or… weird power upgrade?

And Hope’s powers still haven’t kicked in yet – but we know that they will, and they’ll probably be the Phoenix force.  *twiddle*

Mighty Avengers 36 : The final issue of the “mighty” title, and a semi-capstone to the long running Pym/Jocasta/Wasp arc.  I can’t say I was pleased, as it really was a little too much of a “classic” style ending for the way things have been going these days.  Scared off with holograms, REALLY?

I will say that I like that Pym’s quest to return his wife is (I think) failed.  I think it’s good to see the heroes put their all into something (especially something fans would expect), and fail.  I’m sure Janet will be back eventually, but I’m glad it’s not yet.

Yes, it should be obvious that I have less than 0 faith in comic deaths now.  5 years seems to be a max lately.  Bucky & Cypher were the longest running ones that I can think of, and they’re both back.

New Avengers 64 : Another issue devoted pretty much entirely to the Hood.  I’m not as annoyed as I should be, as I think it’s a decent way to avoid sitting around on your ass during a crossover you can’t spoil (although there is a little spoiler in Mighty), and Bendis has already invested so much into the Hood… he’s done a good job of making him a villain you can empathize with (to a limited degree, enough for a villain) – taking him far past the generic thug status of many villains these days.  There’s one more issue in the series, and it looks like it will be adding some kind of resolution to the Hood’s story.  Probably just setting him up as whatever his next incarnation will be, since he’s now sans powers.

Thor 609 : Anything with Kelda in it is gold.  For now at least. I’m sure they’ll wear her out too, but Kelda+Bill were the best supporting character couple in memory.  There’s some weird art choices on a few of the pages – one Asgardian looks entirely too much like Thor with a sword – but overall everything was really solid.  I’m really curious what Loki is going for here, especially when paired with the spoiler from Mighty 36.  Is he trying for a glorious death in battle, proving to the other Asgardians that he was always better than them or something?  I thought he wanted to just destroy it all (see Siege: Loki), does that include himself?  Obviously, whatever happens he won’t be gone for long, as the Thor movie is due out next yearish.

Note: The cover has nothing to do with the content of the issue – I think that’s the battle from next issue. ?

Thunderbolts 143 : The final issue of this incarnation and I couldn’t be more happy.  That it’s over, not that it was awesome.  Next issue we’re back to something actually resembling the original theme of the series (I’ve harped on its loss many times), so I’m really looking forward to that.  Especially Juggernaut’s story.  I’m really hoping they keep his continuity in mind.  Seeing him almost reverted back to a cookie cutter villain (as many writers seem to have a soft spot for that, Frank Tieri for one) was really pissing me off.  The recent Spider-Man arc with him was decent and, I think, sets him up quite well for the Thunderbolts.  Ghost & Ant-Man’s change of hearts here were interesting, and Ghost’s quite unexpected.  So I guess I won’t mind him being around in the next incarnation… the ones I’m annoyed about are Swamp Thing (really??) and Crossbones (no chance or reason for redemption here, just execute him).

Wolverine Origins 47 : I guess something happened in this issue.  Maybe it will read better in the trades?  Glacial plotting.

Ultimate Avengers Whatever The Mark Millar One 01 – It’s exactly what you’d expect from Millar.  I think that pretty much covers everything he writes these days.  Nothing particularly annoying beyond his usual levels, nothing less annoying and more interesting than his usual stuff either.

So this arc has the tagline SECOND COMING * REVELATIONS… I get the tie in part – the anti-mutant forces attacking pretty much every mutant left, simultaneously -  that works.  What I don’t get is the REVELATIONS bit.  What is there to reveal?   Peter David is big on long boiling revelations… hmm, let’s check the solicits.

Next month:

The mutant hunter Bastion has sent the Mutant Response Division and the newly resurrected Bolivar Trask after X-Factor with one mission: Kill them all. And it seems thus far that all is going according to plan. Meanwhile in the jungles of South America, Strong Guy has to form an extremely unlikely alliance if he wants to save Monet from the MRD.

June:

At last! All the members of X-Factor are reunited in this climactic, slam-bang X-plosion of a conclusion as Trask decides to take matters into his own hands and personally direct the forces of the Mutant Response Division into a full blown war against everyone’s favorite mutant detective team!

Huh.  No clues at all.  Not even a tease of a giant revelation (which Marvel tends to do, especially for this book… see July‘s solicitation blurb:

Remember when we warned you about the shocking twist involving Madrox’s baby? Remember when the return of Shatterstar wound up making every comics-related website? Well, that was just a warm-up for the shocking end of this issue. X-Factor gets a new client, a tall green-garbed woman with a deadly secret, but that’s just a set-up for the jaw-dropping final page that’s going to reignite the Internet and have fandom going, “Did you BELIEVE what happened at the end of X-Factor #207?!”

Yeah so.  You got me.  Normally, I would guess that the marketing folks just thought it sounded cool… but X-Factor is usually running a different course… soooo.  Something.

X-Men Legacy 235: Second Coming pt 4: The X-event continues!  People die (a d-list character who did actually feature in a favorite, 8 issue, limited series of mine.  From the 80s.), people get shaken around without their leg (Karma! OUCH.  Somewhere I read that she was getting some kind of a big overhaul… so uh, bionic leg I guess?, the X-Men finally get a clue and start fighting back, and Warlock goes uh… Warlockian.

Still no clues as to what the hell is going on with Hope, although I think it should be pretty obvious from, oh, the solicits for the X-MEN PHOENIX FORCE HANDBOOK (A Second Coming tie-in!).  How the hell is one of their stock reference books being billed as a tie-in?  The hell?  There is NO STORY in those things.  Usually?

Oh, and Greg Land, my favorite “artist” pulled “art” duties for this one.  And it was probably the least offensive thing I can remember seeing by him.  Yes, all the women had the same faces (I didn’t realize X-23 was in the issue until I saw Rogue with her powers later on… I thought she was Psylocke the whole time!).  Yes, there was a near-full page spread of Rogue standing with weird tiny-wings and splayed legs, ready to receive it in the backside and yes I swear that every time I saw a male face I could almost recognize which celebrity he was tracing and  yes, yes it did suck.  But it was slightly less sucky than other issues.  Maybe because I read it really fast, in the car?  Going back through it now I’m finding more and more stupidity…  You know what?  When he’s not drawing faces it’s pretty OK.  As soon as the faces come out it’s ARGOEGUHUHBOOM.  There is a great page with Warlock that I swear is actually another artist.  Oh.  Maybe he just traced that… O.O

Note: The cover at left is not the one I got.  For some reason I can’t find an image on the net (yet) of the non-variant cover.  WTF?

Guardians of the Galaxy 25:  Another strong issue – and the art was great too!  Except for a few panels where someone is drawn getting clearly atomized, yet no one gets atomized?  All the bystanders are dead… so?

So yeah.  Thanos is back.  And he’s pissed.  The one guy that actually wants to stay dead, and Magus had to go and be a dick and bring him back…  We get to see Thanos unloading physically like we haven’t in quite a while, but Quill has one trick up his sleeve… and it’s a hell of a trick.

I think the title is going on hiatus for a few months now.  Or something?  While the next cosmic event – I think it’s the Cancerverse (think a Marvel U where Cthulu-esque things won) vs. 616 – called THE THANOS IMPERATIVE (which doesn’t have the word “cancer” in it) – runs.  Which is kind of a bummer and kind of cool at the same time, because I won’t be spending any extra money to pick up the event.  I guess.

Oh, and I’ll leave you with a cover that I found particularly amusing.  Because, seriously, what the hell is going on with her belt?  Skirt?  Weird underwear?

X-Force to end and relaunch.  Sounds like “Wolverine’s X-Men” meets Secret Warriors.  Teaser image below.

The guy on the right looks clearly to be Fantomex, it’s suggested in the article that Wolverine is the only returning member (and also, that Angel might be one of the last people they would want on the team), so the “winged” person is NOT Angel so… Cloak maybe?  I’m thinking it’s a cloak specifically drawn to look like wings to mess with us.  I mean, in an ideal world it would be Mimic….   And two people with swords. So, Psylocke for sure I’d say – probably the figure in the front.  It looks like bottom left has two swords… which leaves us with Deadpool. UGH. UGH. UGH.  Please no.  What other X-Men have the sword-ninja thing going on?  Honestly I can’t even remember.

X-23 gets her own book.  The artists for the interiors of last month’s one shot was terrible.  If it’s someone who can actually draw something that will interest me, I’ll pick up the first issue – but that will probably be the only Wolverine-”mini-universe” book I touch.  And only because I like Liu’s take on her.

Wolverine’s “real” kid also gets his own book.  Oh, what?  He already had his own book?  Indeed.  It’s just a relaunch for the #1 sales boostCalled Daken: Dark Wolverine or something.  Horrible title, but they had to keep the Wolverine in there to make people care enough to pick it up I guess.  Don’t get me wrong, Liu has done a good job writing Dark Wolverine so far… I just couldn’t care less for the character.

There will be a 3rd (4th? 5th?) “core” X-Men book,  called plain old “X-men” again.  Is that volume 3?  The first arc is billed as “mutants vs. vampires“. Before and after O.O:

Gambit and Rogue together again huh? BLEH.  Interesting to see Rogue in two titles…or will Legacy be forced to shift focus again?  That would be a shame, as Carey has really done a great job of making Rogue actually interesting and not lame anymore.  Oh, and Nate grey looks like an old ass Elvis in the above! Plus… Nate has too much power for a team.  Just sayin.

PS: Mark Millar is, in addition to his other redeeming characteristics, a big whiner.  Oh no!   Someone else at Marvel is using vampires in their books!  The sky is falling!   Nevermind that whole long running MI13 vampire arc… obviously everyone is out to steal Mr. Millar’s high quality “work”.

New ongoing X-Men series scorecard:

Uncanny: 0
Legacy: 0
New Mutants: 0
X-Force: -1
Cable: -1
Wolverine: Origins: -1
Wolverine: Weapon X: -1

“New” X-Force: +1
X-Men v3: +1
Daken: +1
X-23: +1
Wolverine: +1

Grand total: 8 ongoing x-books, including 3 Wolverine-related books, for a gain of +1.  I’m much more pleased with 3 Wolverine-related books than I would be if it were 3 actual Wolverine books (also, he’s still appearing in New Avengers too, so it’s not like he’ll be in less than 4 books a month).  They HAVE to make these books all about the characters… because really we’re just looking at 3 people with the same powers (although different #s of claws o.o).  It’s a challenging situation and I fully expect either Daken or X-23 to fold by issue 13.

Oh, and it looks like Cable is dead. Or at least off the table again.  And I’m not seeing Nightcrawler anywhere…  It’s a shame that’s probably not him (back to his old, two swords “swashbuckling” gear) in the X-Force teaser up there.  BUT WOULDN’T THAT BE AWESOME IF IT WAS? That squiggly thing that I thought was a random ninja ribbon (ninja frequently have random ribbons on their costumes so they can trail in the wind when they hop around) could be his tail.   That would certainly be a stellar follow-up on the seeds planted in last couple weeks.  Not to mention Nightcrawler as the team’s conscience.  Wow.  That would actually be really cool.  So cool that I hope they’ve already thought of it.

Which would mean who dies…. Iceman?  Well, at least he has a built in resurrection clause.

Since I wasn’t buying Cable or any of the Wolverine books (I have was getting Origins in trade due to the whole intentionally finite length of the story but man it’s just kinda bleh, so I may not get them all unless it wraps up smartly) this means I’ll be adding a book to my list.  Oh, wait – almost forgot, I’m dropping X-Men Forever.  Sweet.  The first volume is ending next month or so, and I don’t think I’ll get the second.    It was entertaining but… meh.  Maybe if the art were better.

I may just drop the entire Avengers line though… not that I don’t enjoy them, but picking up two entire lines is just a bit much.  Still, there is some interesting stuff coming up in the Avengers line.  Nova will be in the spyvengers.  Funky, I know.  That same title has Black Widow though, and she’s always annoyed me so.  Oh, it also has Beast!  Tempting.

And, the much expected Avengers Academy will finally arrive… with Justice,  Speedball (no longer Penance), Wasp, Tigra & Quicksilver as instructors.  Looks like it will get the carry over plots from both Mighty & Initiative.  Mighty was running out of steam, so hopefully this will be what those arcs needed.  Then there’s Amadeus Cho’s solo (!) book.  Pak’s Hercules run was fucking brilliant, and I love Cho as a character sooo…. yeah, there’s another one I’ll be getting.

It looks like it will be a good year for Marvel books.

I mean, it’s not like their suddenly going to kill a little girl for shock-effect right?  Yes, I AM looking at you Justice League: Cry for a Longer Title and better writing.

Hulked-Out Heroes 1: This one gets the “There was no reason to print this” award for the year (so far).  A Deadpool-hulk hopping around in time with a brain-addled Thing-pirate (from an archaic FF storyline)? I mean… I GUESS if 7 year olds still read comics then maybe this would be cool?  Probably too wordy for them.  Dumb.

Secret Six 20: Simone continues to knock the ball out of the fucking park.  Once again veering from comedic to gut churning… pretty much the best thing DC is putting out.

New Mutants 12: Part 3 of the return of Hope thing.  Cable’s behavior continues to be stupid.  I get that he hasn’t seen the X-Men in 20 years, but he returned to just about the same point he left.  Soooo dumb.  So obviously an inserted plot device for dragging this crossover out at least 30% longer than it needs to be.  That being said, if you can ignore that it’s a good read and I’m curious to see where it’s going.  Also, the fact that we know someone is supposed to die… with what’s going on they seem to be really pointing to Nightcrawler.  Which is.. bleh.  Couldn’t they get rid of Wolverine or something?

Also, still not seeing a reason to send a depowered Dani out against stuff like this.  She should have been way dead this issue.  I was hoping the Valkyrie stuff would stick – she needs *something*, especially with the way things are going for the x-folks these days.  I mean, they realized how stupid angel was with just the feathery wings (esp. once they took away the healing factor again),  hey maybe Dani can borrow Angel’s spare Soulsword?  I suspect we’ll NEVER see that again.  Hah.

Variant cover  looks nice but the women are bit much, as usual, and EVERYONE looks really constipated.  Seriously.  Look at the posture and faces.  OK, maybe not Warlock – but that’s only because he a) doesn’t have a human face and b) doesn’t poop.

The Flash 1 : About as interesting as watching molasses sit in a jar.  Art is nice though.

Daredevil 506: It looks like Marvel is building the next mini-event around DD.   That should be interesting.  If nothing else, the current direction is at least different.  Also, it’s nice to see that the Hand at least have a motive for letting DD run things because, really, that was a bit of a stretch.

It was a pretty big week for comics.  Several books that I was/am really looking forward too.  Basically everything except the X-Men Forever issue – which I expect to be decent, as usual, but not stunning.  I don’t think I’ll be picking up the second volume of that one, we’ll see.

Blackest Night 8 - Deciding which book to read first this week was tough, but I figured the “big” event book should go first.  Oi.  Lots of stuff here.  The resurrections are obviously the big thing folks will be talking about.  I’ll just say that I think they are all stupid.  I mean, we knew they weren’t going to leave big guns like Aquaman, Hawkpeople & Manhunter dead.  Bringing back Maxwell Lord just seems stupid – maybe as a way to semi-retcon Wonder Woman’s killing him?

And bringing back the original, boring, burnt out Captain Boomerang? ARGH.  His son was at least kind of interesting – until they filled him full of stupid recently and killed him.  I could care less about the Hawkpeople, their memories, blah.  Bringing back the original Firestorm: DUMB DUMB DUMB.  Leaving new Firestorm’s girlfriend dead?  DUMB AND CRUEL.   The whole thing is going to leave a nasty taste in my mouth – especially if they shuffle the new, non-white, Firestorm off to be replaced by the old school white Firestorm.  It looks like they will be sharing a body though… that actually has some potential.

Bringing back Jade… BLEH.  I liked Kyle + Sinestro’s Daughter.  Did we really need to complicated his life even more? I mean, I know this shit is all about drama but really?  Ugh.  Am I the only one who wants characters to be happy once in a while?  I admit, I have a soft spot for Kyle.  Oh, the art looked really good – especially the surprise fold-out splash page.

Oh, and someone actually says “I think from now on, dead is dead.”  AHAHAHHAH.  AHAHAHAHAH.   Ahhhhh hahahaha.  Yeah, right.

Oh.  This issue was bad.  Just in case my rambling wasn’t clear.  It was pretty, and somewhat entertaining, but just bad in pretty much every way.  Villain was hugeass phantom menace, tons of zombified heroes were completely ignored (for pretty much the whole series), tons of zombified enemies were ignored.  I guess, maybe the whole series was supposed to take place in like, 20 minutes or something? I dunno.  Bleh.  Bummed.

X-Force 25: The other big one this week I was waiting for.  And by “other big one” I mean “the end of the other crossover event that involves a bunch of dead people coming back and tormenting their old friends and people fighting a “dark god of death”"  ANnnnnndbreath.  How crazy that Necrosha & Blackest Night both ended on the same DAY?  Zombie zeitgeistnsnarfin.  So.  It was ok.  A little too easy I thought, actually.  Oh and evil Blink is still out there (but armless?) along with Lois London (Dazzler’s sister, to be in the upcoming Dazzler ltd).  I suppose she might make an interesting villain.  At least it will be something different, as we already have a “real” Blink out there with the Exiles who just may make it over to 616 someday.  Might as well bring “good” Sabretooth with her.  Oh right.  This issue.  Elixer, Wolfsbane, Warpath and X-23 are out of X-Force.  Leaving us with Crazyangel, Wolverine, Domino & Vanisher.  A decent issue.  Better than average.  Art was hard to follow, but that’s always been the way of this.  Compared to Blackest Night, I think this one came out on top – mostly because it avoided stupidtactular resurrections.  For the most part.  And killed a few villains.  Yay!   And one hero turned villain.  Yay.  Done with.  I hope!

X-Men Forever 20: Uhh.  Re: the reveal at the end: Umm?  This is still sort of set in 616… sort of.  So I don’t get this.  Alternate build-up to the Civil War maybe?  The issue was competent, if lackluster, as expected.  Still a bit much exposition, even for Claremont.

New Mutants 11:  Art: ugly.  Characters: horribly written.  Quite obviously not the normal writer.  Worst issue of this volume, hands down.  There were some decent ideas, but very poorly executed.

and in closing…. the beginning of another event:

X-Men: Second Coming -  A good start.  I’m not sure why Cable couldn’t just have stopped when he saw the X-Men taking out his attackers.  I mean… the panel seemed pretty clearly drawn to indicate that he saw the X-Men.  So that was dumb.  Resurrecting pretty much EVERY dead “human” villain in X-Force was dumb.  Using them here is still dumb and lazy, but the story is well written so.    Art was good, although the coloring was a bit too dark for my tastes.  Lots of wasted space in those shadows.  Seriously, resurrecting Hodge, Creed, Leper chick, and other dead annoying dudes was lame.  Hopefully they die somewhere along the way and we’re done done doooone with resurrections for a while.

Spider-Man 625 – Who didn’t see that coming?  Seriously.  It was well written but predictable and had the blatantly dubious honor of ending pretty much exactly where you thought things were already ended.  Oh, except that now it’s personal for Rhino.  Maybe the point was to get another “failure” into Spidey’s belt?  I dunno, compared to everything else he has not failed at, this was just dumb.

Cinderella – From Fabletown with Love – Finally checked in on this series.  Good fun.  I’ll pick it up in trades.

Dark Avengers 15 – Finally, Bullseye kills someone?  No?  He always does that?  Oh.  Well, uh, I dunno, stuff happens.  More stuff to make the Sentry more dangerous.  Why would Osborn get rid of Lindy when he knew she was one of the only things keeping the Sentry in check?  Back up plans are always a good idea.

Green Arrow 31 – Dumb.  Green Arrow, as a concept, has always seemed stupid.  Guy using bow & arrow in the days of fully automatic laser blasto guns?  Dumb.  Guy using arrows NOT to kill people?  Dumber.  So nothing that happens here, dumb as it may be, changes my opinion of the character.

SWORD 5 – Shame this series had to end, it was really quite good.

Green Lantern Corps 46 - Not sure how wise bringing the fridge into this was.  It seems kind of insensitive in general, given how generally offensive the original act was.  The Star Trek references and the rings working together was fun though.  But then in the end they killed the Anti-Monitor in half an issue?  I mean, I GET how powerful a gathering of lanterns that size would be BUT umm.  It’s the Anti-Monitor guys.

Siege 03 – Performs as expected, with no real surprises. I suppose next issue will have all those.  I have to wonder if Bendis is going to clear the playing field of the Sentry too, removing the only two characters from Dark Avengers that managed to become more interesting than they were before he picked them up. What I mean to say is, he did some interesting things with them and it would be a shame to see all that thrown out.  Not that I’d miss the Sentry spectacularly, but Ares in particular has become a nice three dimensional character as of late.  Art was great.

Titans 23 - This series is still going.  I think it might finally be over though.

X-23 One Shot – Wow was the art horrible here.  The story was quite decent, with some potentially interesting additions to continuity, and the mental sequences I could buy but damn was the rest ugly, especially given the great cover.  It was good to see the NYX gang again, but a shame they looked so horrible.  OH AND WHY DIDN’T X BRING THEM BACK TO UTOPIA?? WTF?!??  Her old friends are living on rooftops eating trash and she’s not even going to invite them for some food??  Yeah.  Because look, we know editorial wants to keep those kids homeless for story reasons, but it makes NO GODDAMN SENSE.

Incredible Hulk 608 – Yeah, I don’t know what’s going on anymore, and I’m not sure that I care.  I feel like I missed a thing or three.  I’m blaming this all on Loeb and hope we come out Loeb-less on the other side of World War Hulks.

Mighty Avengers 34

Wolverine – Weapon X 11: The art was decent, but I really wasn’t feeling Wolverine’s characterization here.  And I think there was some really irresponsible writing at one point.  Wolverine basically picks a fight with a completely normal dude.  The guy is not a bad guy in the least, and Wolverine picks a fight over music, then punches the guy clean through a window. Probably killing him.  Seriously.  Adamantium fists + your face = crushed skull.  Super “hero” writing fail.

Ultimate Avengers 5: Ugh.  They are still printing this.  It just seems gratuitous and gross to me.  Not gross in the sense of something disgusting – no wait, look at the origin of the Wasp in this issue… that was disgusting and unnecessary – but gross in the sense of too much.  Overkill on the “we are so badass and teh awesome and we rock and oh god look we are ultimate Captain America is an asshole and you love him for it right.  You love him!!!  Right?”  ARGH. Stop now.

Ultimate Other Avengers 1: [I forgot the exact title].  Also horribly written, but better than the above Ultimate book in the way only a Jeph Loeb book can be better than a Mark Millar book. No, I don’t know what that way is, but evidently it exists.  Generally I expect them to be equally terribly written. I suppose the Millar title was better written in the sense that it was completely understandable… I just judge it worse because its more offensive.  Both books were visually interesting but the “meh” is strong in their writing.  Also, ultimate Mjollnir continues to come off silly and weak.

Justice League – Cry for Justice 7: I read this one because of all the stuff it supposedly sets up but wow, was it ever lame.  The biggest kick in the balls (not the heart, where it’s supposed to hit) was the death of a child – made even worse by the fact that her dad wasn’t even around to fight for her.  Also maybe made even worse because her babysitter left her alone during a disaster to go save other people?  This was just plain stupid. I mean, don’t get me wrong, the writing in this series has been weak the whole way through, so there aren’t any surprises.  Also, the way in which the villain was finally dealt with rang doubly weak because a) you build him up to be this crazy badass, you have him kill hundreds of thousands of people (include a freaking child, one of the few child supporting characters in DC canon right now (the only  one?), then he’s done in by a simple arrow?  REALLY?  Super uber genius is lax in his own lair?  Or something.  The whole series was terrible.  The plotting had some potential – I mean the IDEAS here are interesting, but the execution is one of the worst event (because really, it was an event, albeit a surprisingly self contained one) fails that I can remember.  Reading this helps to understand why the last few issues of Justice League have been so oddly written & paced (same writer).

First Wave 1: This was actually an interesting read.  I’m thinking it will do better in trades, as lots of pieces were missing.  But still, any DC trade I think about picking up can’t be that bad.

Iron Man 24: The dreamscape thing didn’t work for me.  Not enough of it matched up with how I would think Tony actually feels.  Still, it was beautifully drawn, and now that part is finally over and we can move back to business.  Having him forget the Civil War though?  WEAK.  I hope it comes back to him, because “I don’t remember that but I’m really sorry” would be a horrible way to do the coming interaction between Tony & everyone else.  Oh, also having Steve Rogers Cap in uniform is really confusing, as he isn’t actually wearing the uniform anywhere else yet.  I mean, he put it on to visit Tony in the hospital but not to hang out with the Avengers and plan the Siege stuff??

The cover is nice though.

Broken Trinity: Pandora’s Box 1: I don’t usually read Top Cow stuff, but I’ll skim the events sometimes.  This one has some promise.  The “13 artifacts” is an interesting take on the genesis, function and role of superpowers in that world and I’m curious to see where it will go.