Best Marvel Hero of 2007?
Bucky Barnes. With Cap's death, Bucky's become something of the main star among an ensemble cast in Cap's book, and Brubaker's put him to great use, making him conflicted and charismatic in all the right ways. I was admittedly one of the people who hated the idea of his coming back, but Brubaker's made it work so well that I can't really fault him for anything now. This whole death of Cap thing wouldn't have been nearly as good without Bucky around to give it its intensely personal, almost fanboyish perspective.
Worst Marvel Hero of 2007?
Colossus. He had a lackluster resurrection a while ago, which most of us excused because we were just glad to have him back, but he's done absolutely nothing but suck in 2007. He honestly might as well still be dead for all the impact he's had on anything this year.
Best Marvel Heroine of 2007?
I know I'm probably alone on this, but I'm gonna go with Talisman from Omega Flight. I took a real liking to her thanks to Oeming's characterization of her as a tough, no-nonsense woman with...
issues... regarding the Canadian government and its treatment of her father. I only wish the series had continued so I could see more of her apprehensive beginnings of a bond with Michael Pointer.
Worst Marvel Heroine of 2007?
Tigra. Granted, it's not her fault. People have just been using her in really terrible ways. First she becomes something of a sexpot, trophy girlfriend to Hank Pym, which makes both Hank and her seem kind of sleazy since they've known each other for years, including while Hank and Jan were married. Then she's just used as an easy victim to make the wussy Hood look better in New Avengers. She's just pathetic now.
Best Marvel Event of 2007?
Messiah Complex. I've stayed away from a lot of the crossovers lately. Burnt out, I guess. But Messiah Complex is easily the most engaging and narratively sound of the bunch. The story flows well from issue to issue and, although parts of it have been boring (Jamie and Layla, I'm looking at you), the majority of it has been logical in concept and great in execution.
Worst Marvel Event of 2007?
The Return of Captain Marvel. Didn't need to happen in any way, shape, or form, but the shape and form it
did take turned out to be downright insulting.
Best Team Book of 2007?
The Order. Matt Fraction and Barry Kitson have taken a team I had zero interest in going in and forged them into a compelling, dynamic bunch of living, breathing human beings. They have their faults and failings, but unlike a lot of other comics, Fraction knows when to rein it in and also make them genuinely heroic rather than just miring them further and further in failings. I also love the dickwad playboy persona he gives Tony; it seemed odd and disjointed given his portrayals elsewhere at first, but after I put it in context and realized that this is Tony letting his hair down among friends like Henry and Pepper, it made sense--
perfect sense, in fact, in one of those head-slapping moments.
Worst Team Book of 2007?
Exiles. Poor, poor Exiles. I used to love the team, but then Chris Claremont hopped on board and derailed that b**** in no time flat. Judd Winick had kept the Exiles themselves very X-centric but allowed the worlds they explored to branch out and encompass neat What If versions of virtually every Marvel character, and then Tony Bedard extended that and broadened the Exiles' membership horizons to include such favorites as Spider-Man 2099 and Princess Power of the Squadron Supreme. Then Claremont came along, slapped Psylocke and, later, Sage on, and made it more myopic in its X-centrism (ha, pun) than ever. Talk about regression.
Best Relaunch of 2007?
Thor, obviously. JMS took an already fantastic character that people were too dumb to appreciate and made him appealing to the masses. I'm not sure how impressive that really is, given that most people seemed to hate Thor simply for the way he spoke, but the end result--a Thor comic consistently sitting in the top 10 for its entire run so far--is pretty damn gratifying to a huge Thor fan like myself.
Worst Relaunch of 2007?
Don't know. I don't think there were that many relaunches in the first place this year, but I generally enjoyed the ones we did get. At least, as far as I remember.
Best Fight of 2007?
Nova vs. Annihilus in the final issue of Annihilation--oh yes, Annihilation #6 came out in January '07, so it still counts.
What a badass fight. Everything about it owned and, unlike many of the other big "event fights" in recent memory, it
totally delivered on its promise as a fulfilling climax to its story. It was incredible.
Worst Fight of 2007?
The Hulk vs. Black Bolt. Ostensibly supposed to be a huge battle in a huge event, we only saw about five panels of it. Uber-lame.
Best Moment of 2007?
Thor vs. Iron Man, Thor vol. 3 #3. You'll notice this isn't listed as the best fight, and the reason for that is simple: this wasn't a fight, it was a slaughter. Thor took everything Iron Man had to throw at him, waxed righteous for a bit, and then
beat the ungodly living crap out of Tony, showing simultaneously that he was back and better than ever power-wise, and that he wasn't going to roll over and take any crap from lowly mortals now that he was alive to object to it again. And the best part of all was that it was absolutely, 100% justified. Tony spat on their friendship and tarnished Thor's good name. He is Thor's Judas at the moment and Thor calling him on it made for one hell of an issue.
Worst Moment of 2007?
The ending of One More Day. Self-explanatory, really, and being discussed in about 3 or 4 other threads for the last several days, to boot.
Best Mini of 2007?
Annihilation Conquest: Star-Lord. Giffen really needs to just be let loose on a space-based ongoing. Starting with Annihilation: Nova through Annihilation and finally into Star-Lord, he's made Marvel's cosmos wondrous, dangerous, and fun again. The dirty dozen-style antics of Star-Lord and his crew easily made for one of the most entertaining minis I've
ever read, let alone in 2007.
Worst Mini of 2007?
Mystic Arcana/The Marvel Tarot. I count The Marvel Tarot because, although it's not officially associated with Mystic Arcana, it's obviously a Mystic Arcana Official Handbook of sorts. While touted as Marvel's magical answer to Annihilation, Mystic Arcana was anything but. Rather, it was just a series of barely connected, hugely mediocre one-shots about random magic characters that had nothing to do with each other and only the tiniest bit to do with the framing story featuring Ian McNee. Even the Black Knight issue, while enjoyable for its Grummett art, was just pointless and unnecessary. Didn't even follow the right Black Knight, for my tastes. Just lame from start to finish.
Best Ongoing of 2007?
Captain America. Consistently my favorite series from Marvel, which is saying a lot. (Thor may give it a run for its money in '08, but it only started more than halfway through the year.) If you don't know why, you're probably not reading it, and if you're not reading it, I don't really care to talk to you so I won't bother explaining.
Worst Ongoing of 2007?
This one's tough for me, since I generally don't read comics I don't enjoy long enough to have them settle in my mind as the "worst of" anything, but I'm gonna go with Fantastic Four. Whether it was bumbling through Civil War as an incoherent mess under JMS, with his terrible, ill-conceived 'justifications' for characters' actions, or just generally bumbling about in mediocrity under Dwayne McDuffie, the title has had a very bad year. I'm not surprised it's still selling well because it's the Fantastic Four, but I doubt anyone would really give you more than an "ehhh... it's the Fantastic Four!" as justification for reading it. It's been horrible for a while now, and with Millar and Hitch taking over, it only looks like it'll get worse.
Best Writer & Artist of 2007?
Ed Brubaker and the team of Steve Epting and Mike Perkins on Captain America. Not only is the comic my favorite Marvel publication every month, it looks and reads better than most mainstream comics. All three creators are top-notch talents and operating at the top of their game every month on the series. Few other artists can match the subtle emotion in Epting's expressions, and few artist teams can manage to keep such a distinct and consistent visual style regardless of which artist is drawing a given issue. Perkins and Epting are different artists, but they complement each other so well that I rarely ever think of them as "Epting issues" or "Perkins issues" anymore; they're Captain America issues and they
always look like it. They've built an amazingly convincing and consistent visual world for Brubaker's stories to take place in.
Worst Writer & Artist of 2007?
This one's not a team. Chris Claremont gets my vote for worst writer of 2007 for trotting his same, tired, boring, overwrought style from title to title. Seriously, he's not even writing distinct comics at this point; he's been writing Random Comic with Sage, Psylocke, and Various Other X-characters
every single time. Worst artist goes to Humberto Ramos. It'd be easier to justify an artist who just flat-out sucks, but Ramos genuinely annoys me because he
doesn't suck. The man has talent, but he refuses to use it in anything resembling a coherent visual style. His figures are all kinds of ******ed, his narratives are muddled and hard to follow, and his art is just generally very unpleasant to look at.
Best Marvel Villain of 2007?
Iron Man. Sure, you and I know he's not really a villain, he's just a hero with pretty extreme, ends-justify-the-means methods, but a lot of the superheroes in Marvel's cast certainly think of him as a villain. And it's been making for some very good stories. Way to take a character who was never really all that interesting to me and instantly turning him into one of the most polarizing figures of the year. He's certainly interesting now.
Worst Marvel Villain of 2007?
The Hood. I gave him a shot, but if kicking Tigra's ass is supposed to be his idea of a "major move" in the superhuman underworld, he's not fit to be the kingpin of a bowling league, let alone of Marvel's supervillains. The guy's a crappy villain who's only getting to look this good at the expense of other characters, who are being written well below their usual standard.
Best New Marvel character of 2007?
Orson Randall. All right, so I'm not entirely certain his first appearance was in 2006 or 2007, but seriously, who else could top Danny Rand's predecessor to the Iron Fist mantle? The guy was badass from start to finish and, although his death was pretty telegraphed, it was no less meaningful and poignant. I look forward to more flashback tales from his prime in the months and years to come.
(Honorable mention to Cloud 9, whom I really liked because of Slott's ability to make her both a metaphor for the juggernaut-like Initiative's effect on the average, down-to-earth (figuratively) superhuman and a genuinely interesting character in her own right.)
Worst New Marvel character of 2007?
I can't really think of anyone. The Gauntlet's not really a new character of '07, since he was mentioned in She-Hulk before this year, but he does annoy me. Dude's just profoundly unlikable. By design, sure, but unlikable nonetheless.
