Bought/Thought 12/24

[Blader5489]

Hey, I didn't say I disliked it. I agree, Sharon probably had the most reason to be the one to take down Skull after all he did. But, still, it's like if you watched a TV series for 5 seasons and then the villain simply goes down with a single bullet.

But, Skull will be back so it is alright.

It is personal pet peeve of mine when a build-up to a conflict with a villain goes on for 12-40 issues and then they are beaten in a page. It makes it almost worthless, like, "No one could have figured out, 'Just shoot him' a year ago". Let's see a longer sequence. But I guess that's the action movie buff in me. Hence why I usually enjoyed all three times Bucky took on Crossbones. Now THOSE were fights.

Yeah, CAPTAIN AMERICA was able to pull off that one slow build plot for about 3-4 years and pull it off brilliantly from beginning to end. Yeah, I probably would have liked a longer showdown with Skull, but at least he went down and all that.

That said, I will feel very cheated if Thor simply beats Loki with one move. C'mon man, he's the God of Thunder. It should be an actual fight.

3-4 years? The Death of Cap arc started around the beginning of '07.

 

[Dread]

3-4 years? The Death of Cap arc started around the beginning of '07.

I know, but the LARGER plot with all the affairs with Lukin/Red Skull and the plot to take over America and whatnot started when Brubaker launched the CA title. Cap's death was just a part of that larger story.

 

[Blader5489]

I know, but the LARGER plot with all the affairs with Lukin/Red Skull and the plot to take over America and whatnot started when Brubaker launched the CA title. Cap's death was just a part of that larger story.

But even that plot to take over America didn't really start until #25. The Lukin/Skull dynamic might have been around since the beginning of the book, but #1-24 were all separate arcs (Winter Soldier, Red Menace, etc.) that were more about establishing characters than anything else.

 

[DBM]

Thanks DBM,I snatched up the first trade then #7-22.

How is the older stuff like Savage Sword and Chronicles?

I haven't been buying the Chronicles, but I've bought all of the Savage Sword reprints and even preordered all that are available currently. I love the Savage Sword stuff. The "Essentials"-like volumes are perfect for it since the stories were originally in black and white anyway. Most of the art is great and the stories are good too.

 

[DBM]

He did other stuff, too. He killed Bor and masqueraded as Bor to tell Odin that adopting Loki would make them even after Odin allowed Bor to die. Given that Bor's coming back into the series pretty soon, that'll probably end up being significant.

But for the most part, yes, it's a predestination paradox. Loki knew to go back in time and do all this because he'd told his younger self to go back in time to tell his younger self to go back in time, etc.

I just read Thor and at first I didn't like the time travel/paradox idea but the more I thought about it, the more I've become OK with it. They've been living a never-ending cycle of life and rebirth anyway, so a little time travel isn't that big a deal to me.

 

[Dread]

But even that plot to take over America didn't really start until #25. The Lukin/Skull dynamic might have been around since the beginning of the book, but #1-24 were all separate arcs (Winter Soldier, Red Menace, etc.) that were more about establishing characters than anything else.

I don't know. I read it as all one long conflict, just it took a dramatic turn when Skull actually succeeded in killing Steve Rogers and Bucky had to take over against all odds. The Skull had been doing all sorts of schemes.

Still, in the end it reminded me of a line from a movie, and I forget which one (HAROLD & KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE) : "Bullets! My only weakness! How'd you know!?"

 

[fifthfiend]

but Donna and Cass need to nut-up (or egg-up, I guess) and get a ****ing grip.

**** up.

The women's version should be **** up.

 

[BrianWilly]

Oooh yeah. ****.

That.

Insanity isn't the plot motivation in Fight Club.

...I mean it's a major plot device sure, but if you're talking motivation then that'd be like, some kind of existentialist 'yearning to escape the crushing sameness of modernity' thing crossed with his being all hella in love with Marla.

I thought that the plot device greatly nullified the plot motivation in this case. At first it felt like what Tyler and, uh, Edward Norton were pulling off was really significant as a social metaphor and had all of that countercultural pathos that really good social metaphors tend to have, and then by the end we find out that, well, no, they're both just crazy. And I'm not talking about the crazy that the movie explicitly reveals, I'm talking about how even within that reveal, Edward is still just individually crazy and Tyler is even more just individually crazy. There's no greater picture here. There's no grand social message. There's just a ****ed up guy...eh, some ****ed up guys who have lost it. All the interesting stuff that has gone on for the hour and a half before is just because of two ****ed up guys who have lost it, and everyone who followed them thought they were a part of something deep and meaningful but, no, they end up all just being weak, gullible idiot scum who couldn't think for themselves and fell under the sway of stronger men.

'Cause I'll tell you what, I liked that message. I liked the fight club and all of the psychological and social undertones it brought balls-out. I liked that it wasn't sugarcoating the **** of life. I thought the movie pulled that off damned well. But then the movie pulls out the rug from under its own feet 'cause, hey guess what, everyone is just a crazy, pathetic loser. The end, thanks for coming, haha got you there.

I'm thinking you got a bad/partially faded copy. I'm looking at #27 right now, at two pages that show Vixen, Firestorm, and John Stewart. She's colored slightly lighter than John and Jason, but I think she almost always is. The moment I start to confuse her with a white character, however, is the day I get pissed.

I'm looking at the page where Vixen is shouting at Canary to snap out of it, and Vixen's colored more or less the same as Canary and even lighter than Diana is at the bottom of that page, much less John Stewart who appeared a page earlier. And you have to consider that Mari is a first-generation native African immigrant. She's not Halle Berry or Alicia Keys, it doesn't make sense for her to be even a little white, and she should actually be noticeably darker-skinned than John. And she was, when she first appeared and in her recent mini. In her JLA appearances, on the other hand...

This is actually one of Gail Simone's "remember a while back when this thing happened? Well, it led to this, but I forgot to tell you" things. A few issues back, Nemesis went to Agent Prince's condo, where he ran into Diana's loyal troupe of white gorillas. The gorillas kept referring to Diana as "the princess," and Donna Troy even came by and referred to Agent Prince as her sister.

I think we're just supposed to assume that Tom put 2+2 together.

But I mean, even during that confrontation, Nemesis seemed to already know something, or else it was incredibly vague as to what the hell exactly he does know, and even at the time no one seemed to actually bother to tell the readers anything. Like I said in my review of that issue, "Donna asks him what he's doing at Diana Prince's apartment, he says he thinks she's an Amazon spy, and then Donna says well okay my sister will tell you what you need to know in her own time. All the while no explanation is actually ever given to Tom as to why there would be freaking monkeys at Diana Prince's apartment and he's just like oh, okay whatever. Just what exactly is going on here?" It just feels like we've been getting half a story with each issue for a long time now. I did manage to ask Simone herself about it once, and she says that what I'm feeling is completely intentional which is really the only reason I'm holding on to hope that it's all going to make brilliant, shining sense eventually...right? Right??

 

[GNR]

I haven't been buying the Chronicles, but I've bought all of the Savage Sword reprints and even preordered all that are available currently. I love the Savage Sword stuff. The "Essentials"-like volumes are perfect for it since the stories were originally in black and white anyway. Most of the art is great and the stories are good too.

Is the Savage Sword series written well?I can't enjoy most comics from back then with all the thought balloons and overload on dialog.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

That said, I will feel very cheated if Thor simply beats Loki with one move. C'mon man, he's the God of Thunder. It should be an actual fight.

Correction: it's the god of thunder against probably the most powerful sorcerer in Asgard at this point, so yeah, it should definitely be a huge battle.

I just read Thor and at first I didn't like the time travel/paradox idea but the more I thought about it, the more I've become OK with it. They've been living a never-ending cycle of life and rebirth anyway, so a little time travel isn't that big a deal to me.

If the gods can't bend time to mess with their own lives, who can?

 

[fifthfiend]

Doc Brown.

 

[SouLeSS]

Where we're going, we don't need roads.

 

[GNR]

Conan #24-44

Snatched up the rest of the Dark Horse series by Busiek and Truman.Very impressed by the first 3 volumes.Nord's inkless pencils matched with Stewart's colors look awesome.

I went into this series wanting nothing but Conan chopping people's heads off and killing monsters.I always thought there wasn't more to the character than what I saw in the Arnold movies.This series proved me wrong in every way.Busiek and Truman succeed at unraveling Conan's character.He's a conniving thief,lover and tactician,never in the series do they get lazy and turn him into a sword swinging brute which so many have him labeled as.

 

[Anubis]

Told you so.

 

[DBM]

Is the Savage Sword series written well?I can't enjoy most comics from back then with all the thought balloons and overload on dialog.

I think they are written well. The stick to the characterization of Conan that comes from the books pretty closely. You have to remember too that the Savage Sword was a b&w magazine written for a mature audience, and not a comic book written for kids at that time, so the writing is at a higher level than you would have gotten out of superhero comics of the same era.

There's not a lot of thought balloons and stuff, but there is a fair amount of narration. This comes straight from Robert E. Howard's original story style so it's not intrusive in any way.

If you like the comics, I highly recommend reading the original stories. They're pretty frickin' great. You can read a lot of them on Wikisource. I recommend Red Nails, its consider one of the best.

 

[Blader5489]

Oooh yeah. ****.

That.I thought that the plot device greatly nullified the plot motivation in this case. At first it felt like what Tyler and, uh, Edward Norton were pulling off was really significant as a social metaphor and had all of that countercultural pathos that really good social metaphors tend to have, and then by the end we find out that, well, no, they're both just crazy. And I'm not talking about the crazy that the movie explicitly reveals, I'm talking about how even within that reveal, Edward is still just individually crazy and Tyler is even more just individually crazy. There's no greater picture here. There's no grand social message. There's just a ****ed up guy...eh, some ****ed up guys who have lost it. All the interesting stuff that has gone on for the hour and a half before is just because of two ****ed up guys who have lost it, and everyone who followed them thought they were a part of something deep and meaningful but, no, they end up all just being weak, gullible idiot scum who couldn't think for themselves and fell under the sway of stronger men.

'Cause I'll tell you what, I liked that message. I liked the fight club and all of the psychological and social undertones it brought balls-out. I liked that it wasn't sugarcoating the **** of life. I thought the movie pulled that off damned well. But then the movie pulls out the rug from under its own feet 'cause, hey guess what, everyone is just a crazy, pathetic loser. The end, thanks for coming, haha got you there.

There is something pretty damned insane about wanting to blow up buildings with piles of soap. It doesn't make the social commentary any less effective. If anything, [blackout]Tyler having to create a separate personality to deal with what's happening is the most telling aspect of the film's message: that people have become so inundated by our own materialistic excesses, then when we try to get back to the roots of our humanity, our own minds reject it. In other words, we're so ****ed up, we can't even save ourselves from being ****ed up.[/blackout]

 

[Dread]

Correction: it's the god of thunder against probably the most powerful sorcerer in Asgard at this point, so yeah, it should definitely be a huge battle.

Written by JMS. My faith in him has been shattered. He's got to earn it back.

But, yeah, hopefully 2009 seems some climax for this situation.

 

[Blaktin America]

IMO the whole Bor Flux-Capacitor storyline will clear the path for the return of Odin. Odin right now is in the netherworld thinking he's repairing a debt to his father. Once Loki's deception is revealed. Thor gets his dad back and he gets to freelance and join New Avengers.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

It's possible, but I'm really not keen on Odin coming back. I think getting Thor out from under his shadow has been nothing but positive.

 

[Texas]

IMO the whole Bor Flux-Capacitor storyline will clear the path for the return of Odin. Odin right now is in the netherworld thinking he's repairing a debt to his father. Once Loki's deception is revealed. Thor gets his dad back and he gets to freelance and join New Avengers.

Actually that was already covered (issues 7 & 8)and Odins' debt was paid by Thor asking Odin if Thor could bring him back. Odin declined and stated that he would prevent Surtor from escaping the Netherworld. Of course that may not keep Odin away forever barring other events.