On the State of Superhero Comics

I realized during my most recent child-related break from comics that I didn't really miss the superhero comics.  I was worried that I'd accidentally read spoilers about "The Realm" or "The Weatherman," but I was only moderately concerned that I'd find out Kindred's identity from Bleeding Cool or Wikipedia.  Given my almost 40 years reading superhero comics, I wondered what the problem was.

Looking at Marvel's current line-up, it isn't hard to identify.  As of this post, Miles Morales is the newest character with an ongoing solo title (he debuted in 2011) followed by Cable (1993) and Eddie Brock as Venom (1988).  (The fact that the Cable of the current title is Kid Cable doesn't really feel like a creative win to me.)  The team comics are a little fresher, particularly after Jonathan Hickman's ingenious rebooting of the X-Men line.  That said, Savage Avengers is the only new team per se.  We've seen many iterations of the Avengers, Champions, Excalibur, Fantastic Four, Guardians of the Galaxy, Hellions, Marauders, New Mutants, Runaways, S.W.O.R.D., X-Factor, X-Force, and X-Men over the years.  With the exception of Champions, all these teams currently feature characters that we've seen on some team or another for the last 30-40 years.  ("Strange Academy" is new but also essentially "Wolverine and the X-Men.")

In other words, same old, same old.  "Champions" has become Marvel's dumping ground for teen superheroes, and they're on their fourth volume in five years.  The Young Avengers pop up every once in a while, but even Kelly Thompson's amazing "West Coast Avengers" couldn't find its footing in the market despite the fact that she provided a real vision of what the Avengers could be after the "Big Three."  Marvel's attempt to add young character doesn't necessarily mean introducing new ones, as they're now trotting out 20- or 30-year-old characters via Power Pack (1984), New Warriors (1989), and Runaways (2003).  Marvel famously attempted to make things younger and/or more diverse a few years ago when it replaced some of its marquee characters with different versions, but they wound up stumbling into the culture wars in so doing.

Even looking at the established characters, Marvel has largely wiped the slate clean of decades' worth of changes.  I'll admit that I've applauded some of those developments.  Nick Spencer has basically undone the excesses of the Joe Quesada and Dan Slott eras of Spider-Man, bringing back a much more familiar version of Peter Parker.  Ta'Nehisi Coates returned Steve Rogers to something reminiscent of the Nomad/Captain era, an appropriate response to the current political and social environment.  And Jonathan Hickman's reboot of the X-Men saved the line for me, as he wisely undid the endless cycle of death and rebirth by simply declaring no one can die now.

But, returning established characters to familiar version of themselves means that the line is all the less fresh.  It means that Marvel has had to sacrifice some of the best new characters of the last few years, such as Rick Remender's Ian Rogers and Jet Black.  (The members of the various "Wolverine and X-Men" lineups are now little more than bit players in the larger X-Men reboot.)  It also means new uses for established characters that reinvigorated them were also out the door, such as Nick Spencer turning Misty Knight and D-Man into Sam Wilson's support staff.  Bucky went from the Man on the Wall to Cap's sidekick yet again in "Invaders."

You'll notice that I haven't even mentioned DC.  I don't even know what to say there.  The only compelling character left in my book is Dick Grayson, and even then it's hard to call him "a" character.  He's been at least five different characters over the last few years, from circus owner to international spy to deadbeat amnesiac.  His amazing ass is basically the only way we're able to recognize him.  DC couldn't even commit to its own reboot, shunting "Doomsday Clock" outside continuity (even if they claim otherwise) before Johns had even finished it.

I understand that the editors and creators are working with the market they have not the market they want, as Marvel's attempts at diversity prove.  (Though, we also have enough evidence of inside resistance that you have to wonder how much support these efforts got.)  You got the sense that they really, really wanted "West Coast Avengers" to work.  But, it's also hard to believe that they're not trolling us at times.  As I've previously mentioned in one of these missives, the aborted marriages of Bruce and Selina and Kitty and Piotr took our hopes for change and dashed them on the rocks.  Yes, Gambit and Rogue got married and even managed a spin-off series, only to be reabsorbed into the X-Borg where they're yet again playing second fiddle to Jean and Scott.

In other words?  I'm not sure how long for the spandex set I am.  Even events like Annihilation - Scourge and Marvel 2099, which should've been right up my alley given my love for the characters, have left me cold.  How many reboots of 2099 can we have?  Also, is Marvel at some point going to trot out an octagenarian Annihilus just so his name can be in "Annihilation Wave - Scourge of the Conquestors:  Amplitude of Doom!"?  I'm giving Empyre a chance but I'm not sure why.

As such, I've decided as I face a year backlog of comics to prioritize non-superhero comics.  I'm bailing on "Batman:  Curse of the White Knight," "The Batman's Grave," and "Detective Comics," leaving "The Last God" as my only DC comic.  I'm down to six superhero comics at Marvel:  "Amazing Spider-Man," "Captain America," "Guardians of the Galaxy," "Marauders," "New Mutants," and "X-Men."  I'll give some limited series a try, but they'll mostly be related to these other series, like "Falcon and Winter Soldier" or "U.S.Agent."  Hopefully, it'll give Marvel sometime to figure out a path to a future that looks different from 1989.

On the Past Not Being the Future

I am obviously a fan of comic books as an art form.  This blog is a testament to the copious amount of time I spend on them:  reading about them, obsessing over them, writing about them.  Comics often tell tales that move me deeply, in ways even the best works of literature can't do.  At the end of the day, someone reading all seven volumes of "Remembrance of Things Past" will still spend a finite amount of time with its characters.  Conversely, someone who purchased "Action Comics" #1 in 1938 could still be reading about Superman 80 years later.  (I hope someone is!)  In other words, the serial nature of comics allows these characters to work their way into your life in a way Proust's characters cannot.

It's why what Marvel did to Kitty and Piotr in "X-Men Gold" #30 and DC did to Bruce and Selina in "Batman" #50 are unforgivable sins.  It's why Marvel turning its back on some of its most innovative new series (and DC not even trying to innovate) makes me wonder why I'm still reading comics.  Lately, DC and Marvel are telling us nothing will ever change.  In so doing, they're telling me I know what stories I'm going to be reading five to ten years from now:  "Civil War III," "Infinity Wars and BEYOND," "Maximum Cloneage Redux," etc.  If comics are going to survive, they need to stop desperately trying to stay in 1968 at worst and 1992 at best.

The Problem with the Weddings
I feel like the only conclusion you can draw from "Batman" #50 and "X-Men Gold" #30 is that DC and Marvel believe their writers to be talentless hacks who can only tell the same stories over and over again and their readers to be mindless drones who can only read the same stories over and over again.  I can't see any other conclusion, as sharply worded as that might be.  The editors just don't believe their writers are sufficiently creative to let their characters evolve.  In dumping Bruce, Selina says that Batman can't be happy and fight crime, so she's sacrificing her happiness for Gotham's.  In dumping Peter, Kitty argues she can't marry him given it took them so long to get to the altar. 

These positions are incredibly cynical.  Simply because Batman has always been miserable while fighting crime doesn't mean he has to be miserable to fight crime.  Does DC think police officers should be monks?  In marrying Selina, Bruce could easily have found new motivation to make the world a better place.  He could fight for a world where he, his wife, his son, and his surrogate sons don't have to put on spandex and fight crime every night.  It's just as heroic of a motivation (if not more of one) as his misery-born need to ensure another child doesn't suffer the loss he suffered.  In fact, Selina herself says Bruce hasn't matured at all since that day in Crime Alley.  It's just hard to believe the editors at DC really believe that.  All these experiences and he's still the boy he was?  On the Marvel side, you have to wonder how long the editors feel is an appropriate amount of time to wait before getting married.  My husband and I were together for seven years before the Supreme Court ruled same-sex marriage constitutional.  Does Marvel believe we should've just called it quits because it took us so long to get to the altar?

To make matters worse, both women are portrayed as making impulsive decisions as a result of input from their best friends.  Holly tells Selina she thinks Bruce can only be Batman if he's miserable, and Illyana raises her doubts with Kitty when pressed.  Selina and Kitty then respond as if these doubts never occurred to them.  To believe the events of these issues, you have to believe Selina and Kitty aren't the capable, confident, and insightful women they clearly are.  It's a lot to ask. 

These colossal failures of imaginations are bad enough, but my disappointment with these issues goes beyond that.  DC and Marvel hyped both events for weeks, building up the excitement by offering a number tie-in issues.  The "Prelude to the Wedding" books DC published were some of the best Batman stories ever told.  (The Marvel ones...not so much.)  Nothing in either set of prelude issues implied either member of the happy couples had any doubts.  Why would Kitty propose to Piotr if she worried about their long path to the altar?  Why tell Damian she had his back if Selina worried she couldn't marry his father?  Why risk hurting Dick's feelings by selecting Clark as his best man if Bruce didn't think the wedding would happen?  If I remember correctly, "Batman Annual" #2 showed Selina with Bruce in his final days.  In other words, King never even slipped in a moment of doubt there.  Sure, he had some cockamamie excuse for why Batman and Catwoman, and not Bruce and Selina, were getting married.  But, otherwise, it was (allegedly) the real deal.  It again advocates this belief that both Selina and Kitty made impulsive decisions to agree to get married in the first place and equally impulsive ones to end their engagements.  It's like DC and Marvel are the embarrassed parents of the bride who called off her wedding apologizing to everyone who spent money to travel to the wedding.  Except, they knew the bride was going to cancel the wedding before the tickets were bought.

But, it's not just my disappointment in the stories that drives my anger.  Between the "Prelude to the Wedding" mini-series and the X-Men's "Wedding Special," I spent $24.95 on related issues.  My sister asked me to buy her two copies of "Batman" #50 so she could frame one.  At some point, it's hard not to feel like DC and Marvel are taking advantage of me, turning my enthusiasm for their product against me.  It's moments like these where I feel a little silly reading comic books as a grown man.  I start to wonder why I'm reading these stories if the characters aren't allowed to progress beyond adolescence.  To make matters worse, DC and Marvel aren't even allowing us to be a 2018 adolescent; they're forcing us to be 1968 adolescents.  

The Fading of Diversity
With the cancellation of "Generation X," "Hawkeye," and "Iceman" (to name a few), Marvel has virtually turned its back on any story that doesn't involve single, white men taking out their rage with their fists.  (DC never even tried to tell these stories, so at least Marvel deserves some credit for the effort.)  By my count of the relevant Wikipedia page, Marvel is currently running 29 solo series featuring men, 14 series featuring teams, nine series focused on events, seven series featuring a duo, and six solo series featuring women.  As far as I'm aware, only five of the solo series feature non-white characters:  "Black Panther," "Rise of the Black Panther," "Lando:  Double or Nothing," "Ms. Marvel," and "Star Wars:  Dr. Aphra."  (It's notable two of the diverse series are "Star Wars" ones.)  I believe Aphra is the only non-straight character with a solo series.  If I'm feeling generous, we can look at the duos and add in Cloak from "Cloak and Dagger" and Moon Girl from "Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur."  But then we also have to add in Ant-Man and the Wasp (twice), Dagger, Ben Grimm and Johnny Storm, Devil Dinosaur, Gambit and Rogue, and Deadpool and Spider-Man.  As I said, it's mostly straight, white men taking out their rage with their fists.  

For me, canceling "Hawkeye" in particular felt like Marvel abandoning an innovative title whose creative team obviously put great care into the story it was telling.  It was easy to see a future where Kate split her time between superhero-related adventures and regular-person cases, giving Marvel a rare title that didn't focus entirely on the good guys punching the bad guys into submission.  Instead, they canceled "Hawkeye" and gave us "The Sentry."

"Generation X" and "Iceman" trod more familiar ground when it came to the punching, but they were groundbreaking because they focused on LGBTQIA+ themes.  "Generation X" was a cornucopia of queer kids, from Benjamin and Nathaniel's burgeoning romance to Quentin's undefined orientation.  In fact, Nathaniel's powers --being able to see the inner-most thoughts of any person he touches -- were a made-to-order nightmare for a teenager.  They reminded me of Miles Morales once expressing concern over Jean Grey reading his mind because she'd see a lot of "teenage-boy stuff."  Christina Strain gave Benjamin and Nathaniel a happy ending because Benjamin's feelings for Nathaniel were so all-consuming (as teenagers' feelings tend to be) they eliminated any possibility of Nathaniel seeing something he couldn't handle.  But, how interesting would it be to see where they found themselves in 40, 50 issues?  That would be some fertile ground for storytelling.  One of the best stories I've read in the last few years is when Gillen introduced doubt into Billy's relationship with Teddy in "Young Avengers."  Strain had a lot of places to go with that.  Combined with Bobby Drake's journey in "Iceman," "Generation X" allowed my middle-aged self some sense of wish fulfillment, as I got to see people like me represented in a way I hadn't seen before.  But, then Marvel lowered the boom.

This situation got worse from there.  Jane Foster gave up the hammer.  Sam Wilson passed on the shield and couldn't even maintain a solo title.  Bruce Banner, Logan, and Tony Stark have all returned from the dead, replacing their Asian-American, African-American, and female analogues.  Everything is "normal" again.

I raise the diversity issue in the same post as the marriage discussion as I think they both stem from the same problem, a preference on the part of editors to tell the same stories they were telling in 1992 and, in some cases, 1968.  Bruce Wayne can have sex with every socialite in Gotham, but he can't be married to the woman he loves.  Sam Wilson can support Captain America in his crusade for freedom, but he can't carry that burden himself.  Thor Odinson, Steve Rogers, and Tony Stark have to lead the Avengers.  Dick Grayson has returned to Blüdhaven.  It's not only that I increasingly don't recognizing the world I see in the DC and Marvel comics I read; it's that DC and Marvel seem so committed to keeping it that way.

An Argument for Change
I read this excellent piece (yes, I know it's a year old) that really got me thinking about the comics I was reading and buying:  http://www.comicsbeat.com/titling-at-windmillls-259-what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-marvel-comics-anyway/.  As someone says in the comment section, John Walker was a great Captain America exactly because he was a terrible Captain America.  Mark Greenwood was able to tell stories we didn't expect, because John reacted in ways Steve wouldn't.  I still remember -- 32 years later! -- the expression on John Walker's face as he left Left-Winger and Right-Winger to burn to death in an oil fire.  (In retrospect, that might not have been the most appropriate comic for a ten-year-old.)  In other words, good stories come from shaking up the status quo.

Marvel seemed to have learned that lesson, but then blamed sagging sales on its diverse roster and not its inane events.  At this stage, I'm hard pressed to think of a character who's gone through some sort of fundamental change that seems to stick.  Right now, all I've got is Sharon Carter, Groot, Iceman, and Thor.  Sharon is still old.  Groot's metamorphosis was an event-related change, so we'll see if that sticks.  Bobby is still gay.  Odinson is Thor again, but he's having to make do without his hammer.  Otherwise, it's all pretty much the same.  Dan Slott even undid all the changes he made to Peter Parker's status quo over the course of his 100+ run; Peter's life right now is hardly distinguishable from "Amazing Spider-Man" #546, when "Brand New Day" began (with one exception I'll discuss in the next paragraph).

I get the double-edged sword of continuity.  I can only appreciate "Batman:  White Knight" as an innovative take on Batman because I've got the security blanket of "Batman" and "Detective Comics" advancing a 79-year-old story.  I'm loving series like "Oblivion Song," "The Realm," and "The Weatherman" because they're so fresh and new; eighty years from now, they probably wouldn't feel as fresh.  But, some authors have introduced change in a way that worked.  Chip Zdarksy let JJJ, Jr. know Spider-Man's identity a few issues ago, and it totally jolted the Spider-Man franchise to life.  It's not all about replacing one character with another one.  Sometimes, it can just be changing a relationship.  It's what I was hoping to see with Batman, Kitty, Piotr, and Selina.  But, DC and Marvel have decided even that minimum amount of change isn't possible.

Where Do We Go from Here?
I stopped reading comics the last time because Marvel had gotten so greedy with "The Clone Saga" that I couldn't stand it anymore.  The unwieldiness of "The Clone Saga" alone wasn't enough for me to cancel all my subscriptions.  It was the unprecedented money grab that pushed me over the edge.  For over two years, Marvel asked every Spider-Man fan to buy a comic a week just to understand the story.  As a teenager during that era, I didn't have that sort of cash on hand.  I acknowledge, as a comics fan, that everyone once in a while I'm going to have to suffer through a summer cross-over event.  In those moments, I can choose either to dive into the deep end and buy books I wouldn't normally buy or stay in the shallow end and accept the fact I might be a little confused by the events in the issues I would normally buy.  Marvel robbed us of any decision during this era.  For two years, I was getting only 25 percent of the story at any given point in time.  It was just too much.

I haven't given up all hope.  The flipside to Kitty and Piotr breaking their engagement is Gambit and Rogue getting married, giving Kelly Thompson the ability to continue to excellent story she started in "Rogue & Gambit."  Bobby is apparently getting back his solo title.  But, if DC and Marvel continue to embrace a world where few of their characters can change in this way, I can see the percentage of my pull list comprising their issues growing smaller and smaller.  It's time to be brave.

On Remaining Questions from Scott Snyder's Run on "Batman"

Based on Snyder's comments about the upcoming "Dark Days:  Metal" event, we're lead to believe many of the questions I (and other people) had about Snyder's run on "Batman" were actually Easter eggs he intentionally left for this event.  I'm not entirely sure I buy that, but I'm also happy to have some of them answered, even if it's retroactively.  One of the advantages of keeping a blog on comics is it helps you remember what you've read.  Given my obsessive need to remember questions from previous stories, I went through my reviews of Snyder's 50-issue run and included the major questions here.  I skipped some issue-specific questions (notably, the ones I had in issue #34), focusing mostly on the most obvious plot holes (and thus most likely to be retroactive Easter eggs).  Notably, I couldn't force myself to re-read my reviews of "Batman Eternal" or (with less hesitation) "Batman and Robin Eternal."  If Easter eggs are there, I'm just going to have to go without noticing them.

1) from "the Court of Owls" arc:  How did the Court of Owls elude Bruce's notice for all that time?  In "Death of the Family," Joker claims the Court of Owls gave Bruce so much trouble because he was distracted by the Bat-family.  It's worth mentioning because Snyder is specifically acknowledging Bruce was off his game.  But, he never gives us an alternate explanation, so, at this point, I guess we have to believe he agrees with Joker.  Continuing on the theme, why did the Court emerge from the shadows for the Night of the Owls?  How did it successfully return to said shadows (if it did)?  Why did the Court turn against Lincoln March just as he was on the cusp of realizing the Court's investment in him by becoming Mayor?  Most pressingly, how did it turn crippled Thomas Wayne, Jr. into strapping Lincoln March?  (Dionesium definitely seems to play a role here, and I wouldn't be surprised if Owlman didn't appear in "Dark Days:  Metal.")  Why did the Court freeze former Talons, particularly since it didn't have the means of resurrecting them at the time?  Did the Court know Bruce's identity?

2) from "the Death of the Family" arc:  Why did Joker cut off his face?  Did Joker know the Bat-families' identities?  I don't want to rehash this argument too much, because it was already explored ad nauseum at the time.  But, as a reminder, the tie-in issues in "Death of the Family" made it pretty clear Joker knew their identities (particularly the back-up story in "Red Hood and the Outlaws" #0).  Joker kidnapped Barbara's mother, he destroyed Haly's circus, he knows what brand of soap Dick uses, he knew Jason's father was a deadbeat dad, etc.  But, Bruce insisted Joker didn't know, because he once revealed his identity to him and Joker refused to acknowledge it.  Snyder never has Bruce acknowledge the most plausible explanation for that:  Joker might've conveniently forgot that information at the time but "remembered" it now.  After all, at the start of the arc, Joker is shown as unhinged over the Bat-family dragging down Bruce.  It makes sense he'd allow himself to "remember" their identities if he was so upset.  (Issue #37 seems to confirm this point when Joker calls Batman "Bruce.")  Conversely, does Bruce really know Joker's identity, as implied at the end of issue #17?  Finally, what did Joker tell the members of the Bat-family when it came to what Bruce "really thought about them."  This part was particularly ridiculous, since Sndyer established Joker didn't find some sort of super-secret dossier on the Bat-family he could share with them.  But, in addition to the Bat-family's believing Joker did really know their identities, it's this information that helps drive the wedge between them and Bruce.  As such, it's obviously relevant. 

3) from the "Zero Year" arc:  In issue #21, Riddler had some sort of card arrangement with phrases that I predicted would return one day as significant.  Is that day now?  In issue #23, Bruce opens a gem his father willed him that turns rooms seemingly into caves.  It's so random, I have to assume it's one of the Easter eggs Snyder left on the way to "Dark Days."  How did Riddler meet Dr. Death?  Why was he using him to distract Batman?  So he could plan Zero Year?  In issue #29, Bruce tells Gordon he should've taken "the call" to avoid all the death that comes, but I wasn't sure what he meant; I didn't recall some call that could've avoided Riddler turning back the clock on Gotham or Dr. Death from doing whatever it was he was doing.  Also, it was never clear to me how Riddler got access to the Red Hood Gang's files; it's an important point, because he uses them to build the army that patrols Gotham.

4) from issue #35:  Bruce confronts the Justice League with a suit he built specifically for the occasion.  During his conflict with the Flash, Capullo very carefully shows us a lightning bolt striking a Batarang.  However, it doesn't have any impact on the battle; Batman wins by creating a frictionless surface to neutralize Barry.  But, given the events of "The Button" cross-over event in "Batman" and "The Flash," it seems retroactively significant.

5) from the "Endgame" arc:  We've never explicitly been told why Joker wanted to destroy the pool of dionesium under the Batcave.  At the time, I hypothesized it was because he wanted to be the only one with access to dionesium (given the amount of it in his spine), but Snyder never spells out that part explicitly.  Also, it's not entirely clear how Joker goes from battling Dick at the parade to arriving at the pool so quickly.  In terms of the final conflict, I noted at the time Bruce seemed to have plenty of other options beyond dying and taking Joker with him.  Snyder never really explained why he chose that route.  Moreover, Alfred's explanation of the note Bruce left for him after he died -- reading only "HA!" -- didn't really make sense.  He claims it was because Batman's story could've only ended in tragedy for people to believe in him (because he had to be mortal), but that doesn't seem to have anything to do with the word, "HA!"

6) from the "Superheavy" arc:  Snyder never states how the dionesium that seeped through Bruce's cracked cranium changed the pathways in his brain.  At the time, I just accepted it did.  But, given the importance of dionesium to "Dark Days," it's probably worth noting here.  Snyder also never explains how Peter Duggio survived the four gunshot wounds he received when the cop fired on him as he fled his burning bodega.  At the time, I figured whatever Mr. Bloom gave him to grow wings retroactively healed the wounds, but Snyder never actually said that.  After all, Peter went to his cousin Dylan before Dylan created Bloom, so I think we're supposed to believe Dylan also provided some sort of medical assistance.  It's also never really clear how Duke gets clued into Bloom's existence.  Gordon seems to learn of Bloom in issue #42 due to the Devil Pigs' connection to him, and Batman learns of him in issue #44 when he's investigating Peter's death.  Duke knows enough about him to bring the seed Gordon gave Bruce to Dylan to investigate, but we don't know how he recognizes seed as coming from Bloom.  Finally, almost everything about Geri Powers remains a mystery.  For example, it seemed like Geri Powers might've given the thief who confronted Gordon in issue #41 the technology he used to do so, but we never get that confirmed.  We also never learn why she was on her quest for an "island of stability" in the elements in the 200s.  What was the point of creating Batmanium?  Simply for science?  I'm also not entirely sure why she and the Powers That Be never wanted Gordon looking into the Bloom case.  After all, she never wound up having any connection to Bloom; in the end, he was just a homeless man who stole Dylan's seeds.  Wouldn't she want Gordon stopping the villain destroying the city she now functionally controls?  We're also not really sure what her plan was if Jim resigned as Batman as she wanted him to do, after he went rogue to investigate Bloom.  Moving to other questions, Julia uses the Bat-signal to save Gordon because the Bat-signal apparently "holds" Rookie with an "electro-magnet" and such a magnet could counter Bloom's seeds, which are also "electro-magnetic."  I never really understood why the robo suit was attached to the Bat-signal, but maybe Snyder had a reason.  Finally, is it meaningful we learn Julie Madison is covered with tattoos, including an owl one?

On Being Even More Untimely than Usual

I named this blog "Untimely Comics" partly due to the fact that my reviews were always destined to be late.  I live overseas, often in places without English-language comic-book shops, so I get my comics through a combination of shipping arrangements (thanks, Midtown Comics!) and digital subscriptions (hello, Comixology!).  But, sometimes my inherent untimeliness is combined with a particularly busy period of my life, and I get seriously behind.  Like, October 21 behind.

I'm now powering through the backlog; I've managed to get to November 11.  Only 87 comics to go to be current!  I've got about 20 reviews in the can that I'll spread out a bit over the next few days, hopefully enabling me to resume a normal publishing schedule.  For those of you out there still reading, thanks!

On Ezekiel and Morlun

Since it's pretty clear that at least Morlun is going to play an important role in the "Spider-Verse" event, I tracked down all the appearances of Ezekiel and Morlun that I originally missed.  These issues appeared after my post-"Clone Saga" departure from collecting, and I'll admit that I was excited about reading them, since I had always meant to fill in that gap someday.

After finishing them -- published 8-13 years ago -- I have to say that I'm surprised by how bad they are, given how much Spider-Fans seem to love Straczynski's run.  I understand that Straczynski came after "Amazing Spider-Man" had hit its nadir, with the "Gathering" following up the Clone Saga.  Straczynski was certainly an improvement on those stories and a reason to be excited.  Moreover, the issues are mostly OK (with some notable exceptions) in terms of standing on their own individually.  My main problem with them is that the dialogue can get clunky, with the hyper-literate criminals in "Amazing Spider-Man" #56 serving as the best example of that.  But, I'll give Straczynski credit for breathing some life into Aunt May, allowing her to be the feisty oldster that she is today rather than the near invalid that she had always been.  Moreover, he does a great job of organically bringing Mary Jane and Peter back together, even if the moment itself relies on some luck to happen.

My real problem with these issues is that Straczynski is telling a grand tale, but falls far short of fleshing out the high concepts that he introduces.  He bases his stories around the idea that Peter is connected to a spider-totem, but fails to really explain this connection or its connotations in full.  You get the sense that he didn't have enough time, given his hasty departure from the series as a result "One More Day."  But, it would be too convenient of an excuse.  Certain parts of both Ezekiel and Morlun's back stories and appearances just frankly make little sense.  Given that they're the vehicles for this changed origin, the failure to explain them dooms the entire enterprise.

Let's start with Ezekiel.  On the face of it, he's a cheap version of Spider-Man.  He got his powers through manipulation, bribing a Peruvian shaman into giving them to him in exchange for saving the shaman's village.  Straczynski introduces the idea here that someone -- presumably either Anansi the West African spider-god or the Great Weaver that we see in "Spider-Man:  The Other" -- chose Peter to become a member of Team Spider.  But, some demi-god didn't choose Ezekiel to join; he chose to be part of it.  But, we never learn why Ezekiel wanted to be a spider or, for that matter, why he wanted to be part of any totem.  We don't even learn how he learned of the totems' existence in the first place.  Given that Peter knew nothing about them, it's pretty clear that they don't exactly advertise in the back of Scientific American.  We just know that Ezekiel appeared in a Peruvian village one day and demanded powers.  Moreover, why does Anansi have an outpost in Peru?  Isn't he a West African god?  Straczynski hints throughout his run that the temples that we see in Ghana, Peru, and Wakanda are all connected, but (again) he never actually clarifies that connection.

We do learn that Ezekiel eventually uses his powers to become a millionaire industrialist.  I can't for the life of me see how spider powers would make one a successful entrepreneur, but, whatever.  I'll just go with it.  Moreover, his colleagues at the company seem to know about his powers, but we never really learn anything about them or the company to draw some sort of conclusion from this revelation.  Outside the revelation that he hired the aforementioned hyper-literate ex-cons for some sort of project in "Amazing Spider-Man" #56, we don't really learn anything else about Ezekiel.  He exists only so far as he serves as a device to move the plot from Point A to Point B.

The problem is that said plot itself doesn't make a lot of sense.  We learn in "Amazing Spider-Man" #507 that Ezekiel is trying to get three Powers connected to the spider-totem -- Morlun, Shathra, and the Gatekeeper -- to take Peter instead of him.  The Powers are apparently mad at Ezekiel for stealing his powers, but he figures that they'd be sated by devouring Peter.  Honestly, that part makes sense in and of itself.  The problem, of course, is that it makes no sense compared to the way that we're introduced to Ezekiel.  In issue #32, he's trying to convince Peter to hide in a bunker so that Morlun can't find him.  In fact, in issue #34, he sacrifices himself to save Peter from Morlun, not sacrifice him to Morlun.  When we later learn that Ezekiel's goal was to sacrifice Peter to the Powers, Straczynski makes no attempt to explain why he initially saved Peter in the first place.  Moreover, we never learn how he survived.  The fact that he survived Morlun's touch seems pretty significant, given how bad-ass we're supposed to believe Morlun to be.  But, Ezekiel just appears in issue #47, no worse for wear.

Speaking of mysterious returns from the dead, let's talk about Morlun now.  On some level, you could argue that Ezekiel made sense if you ignore that first arc where he's trying to save Peter.  If you look at just his later appearance, you could cobble together a coherent story.  Straczynski could've eventually fleshed out his back story a bit, telling us how he learned of the totem, why he wanted the powers, and how his company worked.  In other words, Ezekiel as a concept could've worked at some point, and we could've gotten a better sense of the spider-totem along the way.

Morlun?

Yeah, I just don't get Morlun.

First, Straczynski puts no effort into giving us any background on him.  He is essentially the Marvel version of Doomsday, ripping through a series of issues to defeat the hero, a heretofore unknown villain that just so happens to have our guy's number.  I assumed that he was connected to the spider-totem, since he devours the life essences of Spider-Men, but Straczynski doesn't really spell out this connection.  He really just appears, announces that Peter's mojo is so strong that it could sustain him for 100 years (sexy), and tries to devour him.  Does the Great Weaver know?  Shouldn't he be, like, pissed?

Beyond his unclear back story, Morlun's characterization is just bizarre.  In "Amazing Spider-Man" #32, he asks Dex if an outfit makes his butt look fat (no joke) and, in "Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man" #1, he exclaims, "Snake eyes" to announce Peter's imminent death.  It's like he's a cross between Liberace and Dean Martin who just happens to be a vampire that feeds off the energy of people attached to a spider-totem.  Sure.  But, these sorts of pop cultural references make even less sense when you consider that he appears in "Amazing Spider-Man" #4 on a different planet and clearly travels through the multiverse with ease.  Does he get Netflix out there?  What cable provider does he use?  Also, he has a personal assistant named Dex that he's employing against his will, given that Dex asks Morlun to kill him in issue #31 and Morlun refuses.  But, we never learn anything about Dex.  He simply shoots Morlun, appears to lose his mind a little, and then disappears.  Everything about him is just a jumbled mess.

Finally, I have no idea what his powers are.  As I mentioned, he appears indestructible when we first see him; among other things, he survives blowing up a building on top of himself in "Amazing Spider-Man" #33.  However, Dex eventually kills him with a simple bullet; sure, Morlun's weakened from the radiation that he's absorbed from Peter, but it still seems a pretty simple end for a guy that blows up buildings on top of himself.  Of course, he does survive that, though we're never given any explanation for how he survives getting shot in the heart.  Furthermore, when he's ready to feed on Peter in "Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man" #3, he has to abandon his plans because of the police descending on the scene.  Straczynski has him say that he's strong, not indestructible, but it just makes no sense, given what we've seen him do.  Moreover, also in issue #33, he's able to move so quickly that he's covers the same ground that Peter did while web-swinging.  If so, why couldn't he have just grabbed Peter's body and escaped somewhere more private?

Spider-totems, vampires, West African gods, Peruvian temples:  they're not stories that you associate with Spider-Man.  Straczynski had a tall order in selling them as such, but he could've made it happen.  But, to do so, he needed stronger messengers than half-drawn characters like Ezekiel and Morlun.  We seem to have an opportunity here for Dan Slott to fill in the gaps, and, if "Spider-Verse" is anything like "Spider-Island," then I think that it's possible that Morlun might emerge a fully formed character and villain.  But, as it stands, I can see why neither character was used after Straczynski left the title.  With so many questions left unanswered, Straczynski didn't seal the deal on recreating Spidey's origin, and the time stream re-asserted itself to give us the origin that we've always known.  Of course, then Spidey makes a deal with the Devil to erase his past, but that's a story for another time.

On Collections and Converting to Digital Comics (Maybe)

A History of Collecting
I've been collecting comics since I was roughly six years old.  I'm not sure when I started using bags and boards, but it was definitely by the time that I entered high school.  In the years before I had a computer, I spent at least a few days every summer carefully writing out the inventory of my collection on legal pads.  My adolsenct self only happily went to the grocery store with my mother because my LCS was in the strip mall next to it.  I met one of my best friends when we both checked out "Incredible Hulk" graphic novels from our middle-school library.

When I left for college, I was separated from my collection, even as it took up an increasingly large part of my (former) room in my parents' attic.  By the time I finished college, I had stopped collecting comics, thanks to the late 1990s era of comics driving me over the edge and a increasing embarrassment in those years before nerd culture became acceptable.  Within a few years, I was moving frequently and my collection stayed in my parents' attic, even though it no longer had any active meaning to me.  My parents have always happily stored the collection, but my distance from it started to call into question why I still had it.  What value did comics in an attic on the other side of the world have to me, particularly since I wasn't even bothering to stay current with the characters?

I resumed collecting a few years ago, and it's been a real joy to discover that the writing and the art in comics have improved dramatically since the last time that I was collecting.  But, it meant that I entered a particularly ridiculous phase of collecting:  a predominantly large percentage of my collection remained in my parents' attic, but an increasingly large percentage now resided with me, wherever it was that I was.  I had a great deal of anxiety over reunifying that resident collection with the attic collection, going so far as taking suitcase full of comics home with me on visits as if I were smuggling drugs.  (I would actually frequently be paged in the airport to open up the suitcase, since a bundle of 200 comics wrapped in plastic bags apparently looks "odd" on x-rays.)

I returned to the U.S. in 2012 and spent a year in graduate school, and I was excited about the potential to reunify my two collections at long loast.  I moved it the attic collection with me to my new apartment, and it was the first time since I was 18 years old that I was in the same place as it.  I spent hours and hours (and hours) going through the collection letter by letter.  I made sure every issue had a decent bag and a board, I weeded out second and third printings that had snuck into the main collection.  (It's this part that honestly took hours.)  I updated my increasingly sophisticated database.  It was stressful and enjoyable all at once.  By the time I left in the summer of 2013, my collection was a thing of organizational beauty.  And, into my parents' attic it would again go.

Insomnia Inspires an Epiphany
I'm once again overseas, and so I once again find myself with a resident collection separate from my larger one.  I started considering getting insurance on both collections, particularly as I passed the 5,000-comic mark.  When I had nothing else worrying me, I'd wonder how I would store my collection when I eventually returned to the U.S.  At some point, I would have to take possession of the attic collection again.  I mean, I couldn't exactly have 50+ boxes of comics in the retirement home with me.  What would I do?  I figured that I'd have to build the sort of specially equipped room like you'd see on some sort of TLC show about organizational challenges.  Then, I'd have to, I don't know, die there, cursing the "Clone Saga" with my last breath.  In other words, I'd dedicated a lot of energy, money, and time into ammassing 5,000+ comics over the last 32 years and I'd begun to wonder what the future held if current trends continued.

Despite this angst, I never really considered digital comics.  To be fair, they weren't really available for most of the three decades that I've collected comics.  But, a few weeks ago, I was suffering from a bout of insomnia and realized that I should probably get "Batman Eternal" -- a series that I'm not really enjoying but feel obligated to get -- digitally.  I could still read the story, but I didn't really care if I had the comic physically.  Given that it's going to generate over four years of a monthly series' issues over the course of its run, it seemed a good place to cut back a bit on storage.

But, this realization begged another question:  if I was going to get "Batman Eternal" digitally, why not another upcoming weekly series, "Earth 2:  World's End?"  I was marginally more excited about that series than I am about "Batman Eternal," but it again seemed a good way to mitigate the problem that weekly comics presented.  Suddenly, the floodgates opened.  Why not get everything digitally?  If I really only cared about the story, did it matter if I had the issues physically?  In my gut, I felt like I might want to get "Amazing Spider-Man," since I felt like the physical connection mattered to me.  I wanted to be able to read that in the retirement home.  But, right now, I have to wait weeks and weeks to get my comics from the Midtown Comics shipping service.  Wouldn't it make more sense to go entirely digital?

Where I Am Now?
I've decided to do a trial run on the digital front, getting the weekly comics and comics that I'm thinking about dropping -- like "New Warriors" and "Secret Avengers" -- since I obviously don't care if I have them for posterity.  But, I feel like it's all going to fall quickly.  I'm not only considering why I'm accruing comics, but I suddenly find myself seeing my collection as a burden.  If I were to lose my comics, it would be devastating...but I would be able to pay $9.99 a month for Marvel Unlimited and have access to probably 80 percent of the issues that I lost.  It's this sudden inversion of the model -- where back issues had more value than current issues -- that's changed the game.  If I no longer have to pay more than a minimal monthly fee to have decades' worth of comics at my fingerprints, why worry about the comics sitting in my parents' attic that I can't read anyway?

On some level, I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulder.  Digital comics aren't perfect, obviously, though the DRM issues feel like the sort of thing that'll be unlikely to be with us in 20 years, if not ten.  (That said, I linked my Comixology account to DC and Marvel, since, if it eventually closes shop, I wanted at least some sort of claim on the comics that I bought.)  I will say, though, that I do find myself reeling a bit.  If I'm not a collector -- in a physical sense -- what am I?  A reader?  Do I cound these issues in my spreadsheet?  Do they go into a separate spreadsheet?  The times, they are a-changin'.

On Superior Spider-Man

It's been a long and turbulent journey, but, in the end, I'm not really sure how I feel about the "Superior Spider-Man."  After thinking about it, I realized that I'm not sure how I feel because I'm not sure that Slott knows how he wants me to feel.

I'm going to go into an obsessive amount of detail here, but, to bottom-line it, I think the main problem with "Superior Spider-Man" is that Slott was never really clear on what motivated Otto.  We never really get a definitive sense if Otto is the guy who tried to kill 99.92 percent of the Earth's population or the guy who got angry when the Vulture made him strike a child.  Slott tries to stake out a position that they're the same person, but we're never really sure if that bridge is because of Peter's inherited memories or Slott's wishful thinking.

The Original Sin
Spider-Man attracts his fair share of die-hard fans, and, as someone who's read, according to Comic Collector, 27+ years of "Amazing Spider-Man" comics, I clearly fall into that camp.  It's hard for me to think of a more divisive plot twist during that time than this one, except the "Clone Saga."  For me, the switch felt like a cheap stunt, given the rushed feeling of the last few issues of "Amazing Spider-Man" that set the stage for it.  Maybe if Slott had taken more than three issues to tell that story, I would've bought the transfer of Otto's consciousness into Peter's body.  It would've felt more organic.  Or, Slott could've done a better job of conveying Peter's shock over losing control of his body; as it was, these issues focused almost exclusively on Peter's mad scramble to undo the procedure.  This rush to introduce Spider-Otto became "Superior Spider-Man's" original sin, resulting in some readers, like me, never really accepting the premise.  Like "A Christmas Carol," nothing wonderful could come from the story that Slott was going to relate if you didn't accept that Peter Parker was dead like a doornail.  Most of us -- correctly -- did not.  (In fact, Peter himself didn't even "die" until issue #9 of the new series.)

This sense of unease wasn't made any better by the carpet-bombing that Stephen Wacker (and, to a lesser extent, Dan Slott) did to anyone who didn't immediately accept this change as OMG YOU GUYS ARE AMAZING GENIUSES!  I mean, it's a clever, if disingenuous, move to paint anyone opposing a BOLD NEW DIRECTION as simply a mindless defender of the status quo.  But, claiming yourselves as the sole stewards of Spider-Man is always a dangerous road for creators to go.  It's doubly true of editors, given their long history of screwing up everything, as the "Life of Reilly" blog that I have in my links section details through the behind-the-scenes story of the "Clone Saga."  Reluctant though I was, after the questionable premise and aggressive attacks, I eventually decided that Wacker and Slott were clearly lying to us and that Peter would return.  Although it might mean that nothing would be wonderful, I was at least prepared to grit my teeth and bear it.  In my most optimistic moments, I hoped for another "Big Time!"

The Four Laments
Re-reading my reviews, my complaints about this series fell into four categories:

1) Throughout the series, it was difficult to tell where Peter ended and where Otto started.  At the start, Ghost Peter made this confusion worse.  Otto didn't erase his presence until issue #9; as such, for almost a third of this series, Otto was directly competing with Peter for our attention.  In issue #3, Otto is furious at the Vulture for forcing him to strike a child, despite the fact that he was trying to eliminate most of the Earth's population a few issues earlier in the "Ends of the Earth" arc.  One could point to Peter's influence for inspiring this change of heart, but it's clear that it's Otto himself -- and his experience as an abused child -- that feels this anger.  In issue #8, Slott is even more direct, bringing Otto face-to-face with a girl injured during his aforementioned attempt to burn the Earth.  He feels remorse, but, again, it's unclear why he didn't feel such remorse when he originally tried to pull off that plan.  Are we supposed to pin this kindness on Peter?  It makes more sense than the Vulture example, but it's still unclear.  The issue is somewhat mooted after Otto erases Peter's memories, but, on some level, it made the problem even worse:  if Otto is no longer haunted (literally) by Peter, why stay a good guy?  If I had to tease out an argument, I'd say that Slott is saying that Otto cares more about being superior (as either a hero or a villain) than he does about the actions themselves (heroic or villainous).  To Otto, burning down the Earth and making New York safe are one in the same.  But, Slott never clearly makes that argument, making you question Otto's motivations for the entire series.

2) Slott relied way too frequently on overly convenient devices to resolve problems.  Alistair Smythe's "Slayer-Bots" miraculously create cybernetic implants on the spot to get Boomerang, the Scorpion, and the Vulture into the game in issue #11.  In issue #21, Stunner conveniently awakens from her coma, allowing Otto use of her virtual-reality technology to convince Dr. Lamaze (as Otto) that Peter didn't steal his research.  More unbelievably, the entire Goblin Nation arc is based on the premise that Otto missed the Goblin King building his army as a result of the Goblin Protocols blinding his lenses to the Goblin Army's presence.  In other words, we're supposed to believe that Peter lived in New York City and never noticed, outside his costume, that the Green Goblin and his men were wrecking havoc on the city for a few weeks.  Moreover, it's not just technical innovations that created these convenient moments.  Max decides to fire Sajani -- but not Grady -- in issue #19 as a result of the destruction of Horizon Labs, despite both of them engaging in activities that he had banned.  Slott clearly has Max fire Sajani so that Peter could hire her and she could use her expertise to perfect the cure for the Goblin Serum.  Had Max fired both Grady and Sajani, I'd be singing Slott's praises.  But, by firing only Sajani without explaining why Grady got to stay, Slott once again sacrifices characterization (of Max as a caring and understanding boss) for expediency.

3) Slott spent most of the time juggling an excessive number of sub-plots.  Four of my favorite issues were #17-#18, #25, and #30, where Otto's battles with Miguel, the Avengers, and the Goblin King, respectively, were almost the sole focus of the issues.  Similarly, in issue #7, I note with glee that Slott focuses on Spidey's fight with Cardiac and not the three sub-plots that he had on the back burner at that point.  Unfortunately, most of the time, it was almost impossible to identify the primary story that Slott was telling.  In issue #16, I lament that we're not given a chance to see how Phil responds to his life falling to pieces around him as Otto launches a full-out assault on the Hobgoblin, because Slott is too busy focusing on other sub-plots.  The best example of this phenomenon comes from my review of issue #23:  "It's not enough that Peter has to deal with Aunt May and her reaction to Anna Maria in this issue or that the Venom symbiote took over Spider-Man.  We also have him deciding to 'cure' Flash of the Venom symbiote, Yuri deciding that Peter kidnapped Carlie after a visit to MJ, JJJ, Jr. commissioning Alchemax to build more Spider-Slayers, and the Green Goblin deciding that Carlie must know Spider-Man's identity if she knows that Otto is controlling his mind."  'Nuff said.

4) Slott appropriated main characteristics of other comic-book characters, turning Spider-Man into an amalgam character (and, therefore, diluting the focus of the story on Otto's experience as Spider-Man).  At some point, it stopped feeling like "Spider-Man" and more like "Iron Man:"  Spider-Island, the Arach-naughts, the Spiderlings, etc.  In terms of Peter's estrangement from his supporting-cast members, it actually became "Batman," with Slott having to create an emotional distance between them (as I mention in my review of issue #15) to explain why they didn't realize that they were no longer dealing with Peter.  As I said in issue #29, we're supposed to believe that Mary Jane can't figure out that Peter isn't Peter, but Miguel could?  Moreover, you could actually say that Otto's more aggressive version of Spider-Man was really Batman-esque.  This series provides any number of examples of Otto's brutality, though "Superior Spider-Man" Annual #1 and "Superior Foes of Spider-Man" #11 probably do the best job of showing us the fear that he's inspired in the villains that he faces, similar to Batman.

Trying to find a theme to these four complaints, I would say that Slott was trying to cram 60 issues of stories into 30 issues and didn't have a clear vision of the story that he was telling.  Would Otto be redeemed?  Would Otto be superior?  Would Otto return to villainy?  Slott didn't seem to have an answer from the start, taking us on a winding road with no clear map.  I've read that he and Wacker never intended Otto-Spidey to last as long as he did, making you wonder which plots Slott just threw at us to stall for time.  But, it makes it clear why the series felt so poorly plotted from the start.  If Slott and Wacker had really trusted the concept and given themselves the time to develop all these plots and thoughts, I would've enjoyed this series more.  Instead, at the end, it feels like a pastiche of situations leaving us with no clear sense of who Otto was.

The Successful Foreshadowing
Retroactively, we do see some hints of where Otto will find himself in issue #31.  In "Superior Spider-Man" #6AU, Otto blames his inability to stop Ultron from taking over the Earth on his need to "act" like Peter, finding yet another excuse for why he was struggling to be "superior" to Peter.  In the end, Otto ditched the excuses and simply realized that he wasn't superior.  Moreover, he feels Peter's impulse to feel bad for Max Modell, but dismisses it; later, he'll tell Peter to dismiss this sentiment -- of feeling bad about his superiority -- so that he could, in fact, be superior.  Moreover, in issue #10, it was clear to the reader that an over-confident Otto would be so convinced of his ability to be superior to Peter and defeat the Goblin that he would underestimate "Norman" and get his ass handed him in the early rounds of their battle.  Similarly, in issue #14, he essentially reveals his identity to Alistair Smythe before he kills him, showing how overconfident he was, never imaging that he wouldn't be able to deliver the coup de grâce.

Slott also foreshadowed where other characters would be.  In issue #12, it's clear that JJJ, Jr.'s fast and loose relationship with the law was going to have consequences down the line.  Similarly, it was clear by issue #24 that the main challenge for Peter after his return was that he was going to have to choose between redeeming Peter's reputation or Spider-Man's, but it was going to be hard to do both without revealing his secret identity.

On some level, these moments almost imply that Slott did have a map and I'm just being excessively critical.  The problem is that you also have counter-examples that could explain a triumphant Otto crowing over his superiority in this issue.  After all, he did successfully take down Shadowland.  Maybe he could've successfully been a hybrid Batman/Iron Man; after all he does manage to launch Parker Industries and finish his Ph.D. thesis.  Maybe he was a superior Peter Parker; he is dating a brilliant, nice girl who clearly loves him.  I think Slott would argue that he was keeping us guessing.  But, I know when we're dealing with someone keeping us guessing on purpose (see anything Rick Remender has ever written) and someone keeping us guessing because they don't know the answer.  All this contradictory foreshadowing leads me to believe that Slott falls into the latter category.

The Final Assessment
Was it worth it?  Sure.

I'm not entirely sure how history is going to remember it.  We all seem to be getting nostalgic about the "Clone Saga," and I think even the most die-hard critics of this story would agree that it was better than that mess.  Do I think that it's going to be on the same level as Peter failing to save Gwen Stacy or the struggling to identify the Hobgoblin?  Probably not.  In the end, Slott tried to do too much.  He missed the chance to give us an amazing think-piece on heroism, exploring why someone like Otto Octavius would be inspired to change his stripes and become a hero, even after Peter's memories were expunged from his consciousness.  Instead, he decided to make Otto's main justification for his heroism the fulfillment of his ego, leaving us a narrow story, despite the 31 issues dedicated to it.  I would've preferred to see Otto move past his need to be superior and decide if he really wanted to be a hero.  It might've been fun to see Spidey become a bad guy, after Otto decides that he no longer wants to be a hero.  Moreover, he only concedes that Peter is superior for the tritest reason ever:  love.  It still strikes me as more of a move of desperation than one of truth.

I leave this series with a sense that we had so many other places that we could have gone had Slott really kept this core question in focus:  what motivates Otto?  In the end, my only answer is ego, and it feels unsatisfying.  The preceding paragraph is my rejoinder to Wacker's argument that anyone criticizing this series was opposed to new ideas.  I actually wanted Slott to go further than he did.  But, I will certainly applaud him for being bold.  Every time I was ready to drop this series, Slott managed to pull an amazing story from his hat and I hung in there, as other books fell off my pull list.  If he had managed to sell it to me, I'd be excited about the upcoming issues dealing with the aftermath of Otto's "possession" of Peter.  As it is, I'm just glad that he's home.  Onwards and upwards.

On "Villains Month"

Going into "Villains Month," I had pretty low expectations.  They were raised after reading "Forever Evil" #1, because I figured that, in addition to being the obvious money grab that they are, we at least now had a reason for it, exploring what the various super-villains of the DCnU would do with the superheroes gone.

However, of the several issues I read, only the Riddler, Penguin, and Bane stories actually did that (to varying degrees of effect).  The others -- Joker, Desaad, Solomon Grundy, and Doomsday -- issues decided instead to focus on those characters' origins.  I was theoretically OK with that, so long as they didn't wreck the same sort of havok to the villains' origins as the #0 issues did the Bat-family's.

In the end, DC didn't really deliver on the promise of either premise.  The Penguin issue was the best of the "absence" issues, if you will, in that it felt like a normal issue of "Detective Comics" (despite appearing in "Batman").  The Bane issue most directly addressed the absence of the heroes, with Bane deciding to take on Gotham, but Tomasi diverted attention that he should've paid on that story to Bane's origin, in the end leaving the reader unsatisfied with both stories.  The Joker origin story was the best of the "origin" issue, but, in the end, I probably was more interested in seeing what Joker was doing in the absence of the superheroes, particularly since, as the other villains discussed in "Forever Evil" #1, he'd probably be displeased at being convoked by the Crime Syndicate.

Moreover, beyond the gimmick covers, which I didn't buy, every issue suffered from some form of pet peeve #2, showing the villains defeating characters who they never actually combat during the issue.

So, yeah, in the end?  Money grab, plain and simple.

On Dropping Some Titles, or Why DC Can go F&%^ Itself with "Villains Month"

I had a moment of clarity at some point during the last few weeks and found myself dropping a number of titles over the last few days:  "Batman and Robin," "Justice League," "Justice League of America," "New Avengers," "Nova," "Red Hood and the Outlaws," and "Venom."

I had been considering dropping "Nova" and "Venom" for a while and finally just reached the point where I felt like I legitimately didn't want to read another issue.  The authors were telling solid stories, but I just didn't really care about the characters enough to keep reading.  I also tried hanging in there as long as I could with "New Avengers," but Hickman finally just lost me.  In all three cases, I feel like it was a pretty informed decision, made after giving each series a few issues to convince me to stay.

DC, on the other hand, really forced my hand.

I'll be honest that my patience with DC has been limited after the disastrous #0 issues of the Bat-family titles, with the histories of the various Robins getting horribly butchered.  But, the upcoming "Villains Month" is such an obvious money grab that I found myself disgusted.

I've been disappointed with most of the DC titles on this list for a long time, but asking me to buy four extra issues each of "Batman and Robin," "Justice League," and "Justice League of America" goes beyond the pale, even for a comic publisher.  After all, looking at the titles participating in the event that I still plan on collecting  ("Batman," "Batman/Superman," "Detective Comics," and "Earth 2"), I have to buy 11 extra issues, if I want to stay current.  (I've actually decided to take a pass on the "Detective Comics" ones since they're not written by Layman.)

But, it goes beyond even that.  I'm clearly also supposed to be buying the "Forever Ever" mini-series and probably the three related mini-series.  It also seems, based on what I've read about "Forever Evil" on the Internet, that my failure to buy the mini-series at least means that the issues I do buy of the titles I'm getting will make little sense to me.  It takes some real chutzpah to ask me to cough up $40+ for issues of titles that I normally collect but now won't understand.

I, of course, get why DC is doing what it's doing.  Another version of me would've studiously collected as many of the issues as I could.  But, it runs the risk of doing (and, frankly, will likely do) what "Fear Itself" did to me, where my need to collect as many issues as I could left me reading a lot of terrible comics.  You could tell Marvel phoned in a lot of the tie-in issues as it hustled to make as much money off the idea as possible.  Given what I know about DC, I'm going to doubt that the authors of the various .1 issues had enough time (or experience with the characters) to craft a good story.  With "Fear Itself," I felt horribly and terribly disappointed.  It was like having a mugger decide not only to take your wallet but your watch at the last minute.  I can't imagine "Forever Evil" won't leave me feeling the same way, if not worse.

But, Marvel had at least been telling good stories at that point and continued to do so after it.  DC is an entirely different story.  My stable of DC titles has been getting progressively smaller since the "New 52!" began.  I'm down to six and, after what I hear happens to Dick in "Forever Evil," I wonder if that number if going to drop to five soon.  Of the six, "Batgirl," "Detective Comics," and "Earth 2" are the only ones that I'm really excited to get.  ("Batman/Superman" has been great, but it's too new to know how long it's going to last.)

How did a company that gave us Scott Snyder's amazing work in "Detective Comics" or Grant Morrison's trippy tales in "Batman" fall so far so quickly?  Remember the amazing "House of Hush" story in "Batman:  Streets of Gotham?"  How did we end up here?  It's pretty clear that the answer is editorial interference and I have to wonder, with Robinson leaving "Earth 2" and Simone's seemingly tenuous grasp on "Batgirl," if I'll be getting any DC titles a year from now.  [Sigh.]

On "Age of Ultron" at This Point (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

The idea for this story came from the first arc of the previously relaunched  "Avengers" series, where future Tony Stark and Kang recruit the present-day Avengers to convince Ultron to throw the final battle of the Ultron War, since it's Kang's repeated attempts to win said battle that break the time stream.  (Did you follow all that?  Trust me, just take my word for it.)  However, at this stage, it's unclear the extent to which this original story is actually the same as the present one.  In fact, all signs point to the fact that they're going to wind up having little connection to each other.

First, in the present story, Ultron engaged in a blitzkrieg attack that would essentially preclude this final battle that we saw in "Avengers" #4.  The heroes never actually got a chance to face Ultron, because he took over the world so quickly.  Moreover, even if they had faced him, the splash page their final battle with Ultron depicts a number of heroes in ways that they shouldn't be depicted based on the present story.  For example, Vision is seem as completely assembled and Captain Marvel is still alive.  As such, even if the final battle were to have happened in the present story and Bendis hasn't shown it to us yet, it wouldn't happen in the way that it was present in the original story.

So, the question at this point is whether Bendis is going to change the time stream again in the last two issues of the present story in a way that sets the stage for this final battle or if he's discarding this original story as a timeline that never happened thanks to future Tony and Kang's intervention.  If Bendis is going the first route, he has to change the present story entirely, since the resolution that seems the most likely at this point -- Logan getting Hank Pym to insert some sort of time-released bomb inside Ultron's brain that would activate when he tries to take over the world -- would still result in his blitzkrieg approach and not the final battle.  Whatever happens, for the original story to hold, it has to lead to this moment.

However, one thing bothering me throughout this storyline could actually be the deus ex machina that Bendis needs.  In "Avengers" #6, future Tony hands present Tony some sort of device that he believes will help stop Ultron.  We never really get details about this device, though I'm pretty sure it's mentioned again (possibly in issue #7).  Through the "Age of Ultron," I've wondered why Tony hasn't used it.  Other than Bendis forgetting about it (always a possibility), the only thing that I've been able to suppose is that the blitzkrieg attack made the device useless.  Perhaps it had to be used on Ultron directly and, since he's not in the present, Tony never had a chance to use it.  One way, then, to combine these two stories is for Logan to alter the past in a way that allows Tony to use the device, blocking the blitzkrieg attack and setting up the final battle depicted in issue #4.

(One entry point seems to be "Avengers" #12.1, where the Avengers witness the return of Ultron.  If Logan could travel to that point and explain to Tony what Ultron is going to do, then it seems to set the stage for him to blunt the future attack with the device.)

I know I'm probably the only person who cares about this level of detail, but I can already feel that I'm going to feel betrayed by this mini-series if it doesn't somehow connect to the original story.  It's already starting to feel like "X-Men:  Prelude to Schism," which wound up showing a series of events that had nothing to do with the story that the authors actually told in "X-Men:  Schism."  Connecting the present story to the original story would be a pretty cool feat, rewarding long-time readers for their patience.  Not connecting it to the original story by dismissing the original story as a timeline that never happened would leave you wondering what the point of setting up this story so early was, particularly if it ends with no actual consequences (as it seems like it's going to do).  The latter possibility would just make my event fatigue all the more profound and make me wonder why I even bother forking over the money that I do for these storylines.  The former possibility would at least give me some sense of accomplishment, though I think the likelihood of it happening is remote.  We'll see, I guess.  In the end, after so much build-up, it's hard not to feel disappointed.

On Bendis

As I was writing my reviews of "Avengers" and "New Avengers" #34, I decided that I couldn't let the end of Bendis' run on those series pass without commenting on it.

I've made it pretty obvious over the years that I haven't been a fan of Bendis's run on the Avengers titles.  I actually loved "Siege," the first work of Bendis' that I ever read.  But, his tenure on the Avengers titles focused too much on the grand battles that made "Siege" work and and too little on the character development and team dynamics that make "Avengers" work.  Bendis frequently played fast and loose with continuities, changing characters' histories and personalities to make them match whatever story he was telling at the time.  Partly as such, it seems unlikely that any he told in his run is going to have a lasting impact.  Wonder Man suddenly hated the Avengers, the Scarlet Witch suddenly went crazy (again), Iron Man believed in big government.  All of a sudden it seemed possible that Cap would start praising the virtue of the Nazis or Namor would start waxing poetic about humans.

Of course, the impact of these fluctuations in characterization was at least muted by the fact that Bendis was often juggling at least a dozen characters in each issue, so you didn't have time to linger over your confusion.  "Why is Hawkeye encouraging everyone to file their taxes on tim...wait, is Spider-Man killing someone?"  In fact, Bendis cycled so many characters through "Avengers" and "New Avengers," with so much overlap, that I'm actually hard pressed to tell you the actual roster of each team.  

In his farewell letter, Bendis admits that his goal was to basically tell slug-fest stories.  He tells us that he just wanted to tell the stories that he wanted to read.  Basically, he admits that it was all about him.  He was less concerned about telling a story that developed the characters and more concerned about seeing how many superheroes he could cram onto a page at a time.  I get fun.  I do.  But, I feel bad for Bendis that he thinks the Avengers are just a pale imitation of the Justice League.

One of the Avengers runs that I remember most is Bob Harras' in the mid-300s.  It involved the Black Knight/Crystal/Sersi love triangle and the mysterious Proctor and the Gatherers.  I actually remember feeling frustrated with it at the time, in part because I was an impatient teenager who didn't understand why Harras couldn't just tell us Proctor's identity.  But, after all these years, I remember those comics so vividly because Harras didn't rush those stories.  He let them develop at a natural pace.  He'd go and tell other stories, and other authors would come and tell other stories, and then he'd return to the story to thicken the plot.

It wasn't really an A-list roster.  Sure, you had Cap, but everyone else was pretty B-list:  Black Knight, Black Widow, Crystal, Giant Man, Hercules, Sersi, and Vision.  But, Harras did a great job of playing up the affections and tensions between them.  I remember feeling devastated for Crystal when Dane took Sersi's hand and stepped through that portal.  We had gone through so much by that point that it seemed cruel that they didn't get a chance to have their happy ending.  But, the fact that I felt that way showed how much I cared.  It reminds me now of the great scene at the end of "Avengers" #230 when Hank finally leaves and Captain Marvel and She-Hulk comfort a crying Jan.  The Avengers have never been the Justice League.  They've always been a family.

Bendis never got that.  He never got that I think most of us rarely remember battle sequences from comics. But, I do remember Cap holding up the Cosmic Cube and telling Bucky to remember who he is and I remember Beast making a witty remark while grabbing Jean right before Cyclops obliterated Mr. Sinister.  I remember Jean using her telekinesis to dance with Professor X at her wedding and I remember the pancake breakfast the X-Men had after defeating Onslaught.  I remember a woman giving Spidey a box of macaroons after he stopped a thief from stealing her purse right before Christmas and I remember Spidey crying next to Harry Osborn's body.  I remember Jason Todd dying and I remember Tim Drake reminding Batman why he needs a Robin.  I remember realizing what a man Nova had become and Mary Jane reminding Peter that he'll always find a way to save the day.  I remember those moments because I care about those characters and the authors knew that.

I can't recall a single moment from Bendis' run that rises to that level.  I've read his run on Avengers for three years and nothing comes to mind.  The only moment that comes close is Tony Stark telling Steve Rogers that he's not nearly as good at doing something as he is when he's doing it with Steve from "Avengers Prime" #5.  But, Bendis decided that story couldn't get told in the main series.  He made it pretty clear that character development had no business in "Avengers."

Bendis is writing the X-Men now.  He's writing about a team with even deeper emotional connections to each other.  I hope he remembers that.  I hope he takes the time to really ponder what Scott's fall means for Beast or Iceman or Storm.  I mean, don't get me wrong:  I really would love to see Bobby kick Scott's ass.  But, maybe he could actually reflect on it afterwards.

So, ciao, Bendis.  I wish I had something better to say.  I probably would've avoiding saying anything at all, but I couldn't just let you claim that the Avengers are a pale imitation of the Justice League and not defend them.  At least now I can read the Avengers without feeling bad about myself for paying money to do so.

On a Format Change

I just thought that I'd post a quick self-indulgent note about a change that I'm making to the format of to the blog.  When I first started blogging, I was living overseas and received my comics via mail.  As such, I was usually a few weeks behind the curve (hence the title of this blog).  At the same time, I was moving my way through 100+ back issues of "Amazing Spider-Man" that I had bought when I decided that I couldn't resume collecting comics and not read Spidey.  But, I realized that I needed to understand "Brand New Day," so I dropped some bank and started reading.  Both factors lent themselves to posts covering multiple issues, as I made my way through various arcs in "Amazing Spider-Man" and bundles of comics that arrived in the mail.

Happily, I now live in the U.S. and am able to get my comics every Wednesday like everyone else.  As such, waiting to post until I read enough issues to make up an "edition" (Avengers, Cap, X-Men, etc.) no longer makes sense.  Instead, I'm going to start posting review one by one, which should also mean more frequent posts.  I'm still going to include longer summaries and reviews for "Amazing Spider-Man" with shorter reviews only for every other series.  At least, if homework doesn't get in the way...