Marvel Comics blabbery

("Unstoppable Wasp" seems like another potentially good new one along those lines; I've only read #1 so far tho.)

I've been meaning to catch up on the present Thors, although I've only really read a few issues of the Simonson "Thor" and Ewing's "Loki, Agent of Asgard," so I'm not sure where to start.

Maybe start with Straczynski's Thor (although I recall the arc fizzles out near the end, when Kieron Gillen takes over briefly), the onto Jason Aaron's. Aaron's run is widely praised and brings you up pretty much to current day, I think.

Kieron Gillen's run on Journey into Mystery is worth trying after that. It might make Agent of Asgard make more sense.

I'd agree that's a good start, if only to give the excellent Gillen run context. Aaron's run which later turns into Goddess of Thunder is also pretty dang good. I've been reading the Aaron run over the last year and haven't been disappointed. Need to catch up on all things Loki.
An unnecessary (though good) detour might be the pre-"Avengers Assembled" Thor "Ragnarok" run setting him up to die prior to Civil War, I liked that story. The JMS run takes place on his return following Civil War. But ultimately, everyone forgets that it happened.

Aaron's run and Journey Into Mystery are contained enough that you shouldn't have to read anything before them. Is the Straczynski run any good? He sounds like a berk, which has put me off reading it, although I guess I've read enough Comics By Berks by now that it really shouldn't matter.

I'm reading less Marvel stuff than I have in years - just Black Widow and the Thors - and Black Widow is ending soon I think. Wish Dr Strange had a different artist. Wish Waid was capable of writing more than one good book at a time - his other books right now are *awful*. I think they need to steal Tom King from DC and get him on some Hickman-style epic Avengers run for the next 5 years.

I think Daredevil is bringing back Waid's cast next month, presumably to shit over/retcon it.

Straczynski's Thor run is pretty good, certainly better than any other comic by him that I've read... It sorta fizzles towards the end, as for whatever he quit in the middle of a story arc, but the Gillen took the reins and made the book even better during his short run, which set the stage for his incredible Journey into Mystery run, which is pretty much the best Marvel run of the last 5 or so years. So yeah, it's all worth reading.

Unfortunately the main Thor book wasn't very good during Gillen's JiM run, as Matt Fraction had no idea how to write these characters... But thankfully JiM's crossovers with the main book don't really require you to know what's going on there to get what Gillen's doing. He pretty much took the liberty he had with writing such a fringe book, and made it into the Animal Man of the '10s. And Ewing's Agent of Asgard, which is almost as good, continues those themes with Loki.

"as for whatever reason he quit in the middle of a story arc, but then Gillen took the reins"

Agreed that Thor was the best mainstream Marvel book Straczynski did (never read his Supreme Power stuff).

!

http://marvel.com/games/play/34/create_your_own_comic

The Straczynski Thor seemed almost as good as could be when it started, a great mesh of Thor finding his new place in the Marvel universe - having Asgård hover over Oklahoma was a pretty great idea - and Loki plotting to nefarious means. But once the plotting all became clear, it didn't really add up to anything... Gillen couldn't really save the ending, but JiM is as good as everyone says it is.

i feel like i woulda killed whole weeks with that "make your own comic" thing as a kid.

Here's some random blabbery -- what do y'all think of the way Marvel uses S.H.I.E.L.D. these days? I feel like they get too "deus ex machina" with it -- S.H.I.E.L.D. can see anything, go anywhere, pop up at the climax of any issue to "tie things down," etc. I sort of roll my eyes at the scenes where Nick Fury Jr. and Agent Hill stand there looming sternly above our heroes, their arms crossed, talking about "protocol" and "need-to-know basis". I also feel like once you've seen one (anti-)hero fight her way out of the Helicarrier and jump into thin air, it's been done (yet even that, I've seen twice).

I know S.H.I.E.L.D. has always been around, but they didn't figure much into the comics I read in the '80s... now they seem to loom so large. I'm sure the popularity of the movies and TV show has something to do with it.

i feel like i woulda killed whole weeks with that "make your own comic" thing as a kid.

― A big shout out goes to the lamb chops, thos lamb chops (ulysses)

when i was a kid those were called "colorforms"

well yeah!

or presto magix really

what do y'all think of the way Marvel uses S.H.I.E.L.D. these days?

idk about their role in terms of storylines since I tend not to read/watch much with direct SHIELD involvement, but more generally: I find SHIELD irritating because its arrangement/set-up doesn't fit contemporary global politics. It seems to go back and forth (or is entirely vague) about whether it's a body of/related to the American government or the UN. If the former: it's a completely outdated cold-war concept that an American organisation would be responsible for global affairs, and that other countries would be happy with that arrangement. If the latter: it's highly unbelievable that so many SHIELD agents would be American and its heroes would be dominated by Americans. Different cultural perspectives would be nice. It's not like Marvel doesn't have markets outside the US.

I think Daredevil is bringing back Waid's cast next month, presumably to shit over/retcon it.

― Chuck_Tatum, Wednesday, February 8, 2017 7:46 AM (four days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I only read the first part of Waid's run, but got back on Daredevil with the current volume. It's a pretty good read I think, much more 'classic' Marvel than the other stuff I see on the shelves. Charles Soule is writing the book right now and Ron Garney has done some nice artwork on the book.

The only other Marvel books I have been reading is The Punisher, Star Wars and now Doctor Aphra since Dr. Doom ended. Gillen's Star Wars comics are really good. He's paired up with Kev Walker on the Doctor Aphra book and he is really good.

<i>It seems to go back and forth (or is entirely vague) about whether it's a body of/related to the American government or the UN.</i>

I thought SHIELD reported to some shadowy cabal of world leaders (and not necessarily "elected" ones), with no other oversight -- which may account for why the org has had to be reformed and rebuilt "from the ground up" so many times, due to corruption/infiltration/etc -- but I'm not too familiar with the whole deal. My impression was that SHIELD originally functioned as sort of a stand-in for the CIA, but later grew beyond that (and the CIA now even "exists" in the Marvel Universe?). I recently read the "Mockingbird: Bobbi Morse, Agent of SHIELD" TPB -- highly recommended, btw -- and in one of the stories from the '70s, SHIELD was funneling $$ appropriated by Congress to a Latin American strongman who went rogue... so yeah, basically the CIA.

(sorry, forgot to do the "convert HTML" thang)

SHIELD has been retconned significantly over recent years to have a greater historical depth, but in a way that links it to past organizations without making them essential to the American-focused, post-WW2 SHIELD.

In its original incarnation it basically cast Nick Fury as the american James Bond, complete with other field agents, a love interest, one-off costumed villains like Scorpio, and Hydra as a Spectre-esque villainous organization. There's not a real analogue because it's a take off of the Bond movies, not the Bond books, so it's all too fantastic and larger than life to be an analogue of real American organization

Interesting... Well, James Bond has ended up faring better than his American counterpart, seeing as Nick Fury is now an all-seeing wraith chained to the moon. (The worst indignity that Bond has suffered is being played by Pierce Brosnan.)

And having his testicles battered with a carpet-beater

http://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/galleries/x701/74426.jpg

Oh cool, they finally made an Obnoxio the Clown movie

https://uncannyxmen.net/sites/default/files/images/covers/oneshots/obnoxiovsxmen1.jpg

three month marvel unlimited code if anyone wants it:
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ooh thanks

I like the Sfar and Trondheim ones:

http://www.huffingtonpost.fr/jean-samuel-kriegk/8-auteurs-de-bd-francais-se-reapproprient-lunivers-marvel/

i would read an entire marvel universe drawn from trondheim

tbf, i would read anything by trondheim

Tarot the Black Witch by Lewis Trondheim

another three months of marvel unlimited for anyone who wants it - gotta be used today tho

OUOB6QJZEXK

looks like it's too late :(

wait, i think i misread the email - try this: FFHPYPI1YHJ1

nope

:(

I'm currently making my way thru ESSENTIAL SPIDER-WOMAN, VOL. 1. Jessica Drew's origin/background are pretty weird and funky, even by the standards of the typical "superhero with a tortured past." FUN FACT: Jess originally had short, light-brown hair; and her famed long dark locks were a wig that she sewed into the costume(!)

I was rereading some old Wolverine the other day and had forgotten she makes an appearance in Madripoor when he's lying low as Patch

That reminds me, Marvel is running a sale on digital editions of X-23 (Laura Kinney) collections; it ends tomorrow night: https://comicstore.marvel.com/X-23-Collections-Sale/page/14082.

I assume they did this to tie into the upcoming "Logan" movie (which features a young Laura); tho you'd think they'd run the sale *after* the movie comes out...

Also, I didn't realize how deep Jessica's roots were with the X-Men... Vol. 2 of that collection has a run of Chris Claremont stories (with Tom Orz lettering) that basically look & feel like X-Men books, and feature some of that crew.

Yeah, Claremont tended to weave whatever titles he was writing at the time into one another. Jessica Drew and Misty Knight were like secondary/tertiary characters in Uncanny in the late '70s-ish.

A properly expansive collection of UXM from that era would also have to include relevant issues of Ms. Marvel, Marvel Team-Up, etc. You're missing bits of the story if you only read the main title. Nothing crucial, but still.

Yeah...that is one big classic Uncanny X-men compilation that Marvel has not yet done. You could make big book with all those stories.

Sabertooth also starts in Iron Fist, I think originally it might have been thought to make him Rand's arch villain at some point and later they did all the stuff with Wolverine.

Another one never compiled with either classic 80s X-men nor Spider-man is the Marvel Fanfare story-line where both of them end up in the Savage Land.

Nightcrawler had a story in Amazing Spider-man too that I don't think Claremont wrote. Stern wrote the Avengers/X-Men miniseries, but it looks like that one is going to get reprinted in the Epic Collection series.

It would be better if those were printed in order with the X-men books, but I would imagine if ever compiled - they will be in a separate book.

There's prob stuff missing still, but sorting Claremont into date order on Marvel Unlimited works quite well (thanks again ulysees).

Just started reading the Ditko Spider-Man's for the first time - they're amazing (obviously) - I've had the telephone book in my house for 10 years but never opened it till now. The cliche is true - every issue is basically millions of $$$ in future IP. Also Stan's scripting is relatively subdued and fun (and actual good jokes - I'm assuming these aren't Ditko's).

And Peter is a surprisingly bitter, sad fellow.

and actual good jokes - I'm assuming these aren't Ditko's

perhaps the safest assumption in history

I always thought that Lee's Spiderman scripts were his best claim to be something more than just someone who got famous by putting his name on other people's work (there *are* jokes in some of Ditko's solo work imo, funny jokes even, but they tend to be somewhat odd and very different in tone to Spiderman). kind of feel like Spiderman without Lee would have been all bitter, sad stuff though, without enough light or irreverence.

i always thought that the care that those early spider-man books took to establish the two sides of peter's character, the nebbish and the wisecracking hero, felt a bit like stan was throwing in some autobiography

Stern wrote the Avengers/X-Men miniseries, but it looks like that one is going to get reprinted in the Epic Collection series.

This was already collected in the Avengers Epic Collection titled "Judgment Day", which came out a couple of year ago. It's a pretty weird mini, apparently Stern wanted it to end with Magneto becoming a villain again, but someone (probably Claremont?) didn't like that resolution, so Stern was asked to change the ending... He refused and walked out, and DeFalco was brought in to write the last issue, where the plot kinda fizzles out and the question of Magneto's villainy is sidestepped in a disappointing way.

Given how protective Claremont was of his pet characters, it seems like the Marvel editorial made a mistake in giving the whole mini to Stern in the first place. Even if he'd gotten to write his preffered ending, I'm sure Claremont would've found a way to retcon it.

If Stern had gotten his way, we would've missed out on Claremont's much more narratively-satisfying explanation that Moira MacTaggert had somehow scienced a temporarily baby-fied Magneto into a more beneficent being.

hahaha what?