(Bought - Thought) 6+6=12

[JewishHobbit]

Five comics this week, all Marvel. Non-AvX first.

Defenders 7 - This was a decent issue. I dropped this title once due to how boring and uninteresting it was at first but it's picking up. Having the Prince of Orphans as the villain is an interesting direction and I'm curious where the title goes. I'm glad that it's tieing into the Immortal Iron Fist stuff that I've loved. I'm hoping that when this is over John Aman will somehow still be a hero, or at least an anti-hero. Also, since the remains found were fairly unrecognizable, I'm hoping that Bride of Nine Spiders also survives.

I've never been a big fan of Black Cat but she's an interesting addition to the title to say the least. I liked her in this issue and am curious what role she will play now.

So how are sales on this title and how long are we expecting it to last?

X-Factor 237 - I actually LOVED this issue. Very seldomly is religion, and specifically Christianity, portrayed well in comics. With everything that Rahne's been through she's been a pretty poor example of her faith and that's always bugged me. It all comes to a head here and she's brought (forcefully) to John Madrox (Jamie's preacher dupe). I think Peter David handled their coversation very well to a fantastic conclusion. He captured the faith well through John and in one issue made me like Rahne again. I also want to see more of John Madrox, who I've always liked. I hope he has some sort of role in this upcoming storyline, though I expect that if that happens he'll end up dead. Also, he'd become the 13th cast member not including the villains whoever they'll end up being. There's no room for him.

Avengers Academy - I should have read this one before Uncanny X-Men this week because it leads into Uncanny, which ruines the ending of Academy. That said, it was a decent issue. Gage did not take the obvious route with Shaw, which makes me happy. I liked how it all played out and Hercules had me in stitches. The students were enjoyable, though again I wish Penance played some part. And it seems like Loa is sticking around for a while, though whether that's just for the rest of the tie-in or permenantly is unclear.

I was buying this title for the X-students. Being that their role is finished I'm not sure if I'll be back for the rest of the AvsX tie-ins. I'm not as interested in Emma in the next issue but I'll at least skim it.

Uncanny X-Men 13 - This issue takes place directly after Avengers Academy. The kids have escaped and arrive on Utopia again. The Generation Hope kids take the spotlight as they go to see Unit per Hope's hidden message slipped to them after she attacked them. Unit explains some stuff, which is interesting, but then reveals that he betrayed Hope in order to appease his curiosity. Unit, by the way, is such a fantastic character Unit uses Danger to take out the Gen Hope kids and then erases their minds and leaves them on the beach.

Simoultaneously Storm, Magneto, and Psylocke have a softer storyline where, having been left behind, share some thoughtful moments while wondering what to do next. I actually liked these little scenes a lot. This event has been all hit and fight and fast pace but this issue takes a second to slow down and it's a nice breath of fresh air. Not the most influential tie-in in the world but definately a good issue. Gillen's putting at one of the best tie-ins to this event.

Avengers vs. X-Men 5 - I actualy enjoyed this issue until near the end. Every time Cyclops spouts crap about Captain America trying to do away with mutants it makes me cringe. That is SO far away from what he would think that it's painful. So that took me out of the story, then the surprise twist just made me roll my eyes. When the Phoenix came and it was said that it chose not to embed Hope I was expecting it to do what I've been expecting all along... go find Wanda. Turns out it just took over the X-Men (Cyclops, Emma, Magik, Colossus, and Namor). If it took over only Cyclops that could have been interesting, or to a lesser degree Emma, but all 5 of them just cheapens it. So the next round of AvsX books will probably now be everyone versus these 5 until Wanda gets the Phoenix in a few issues, or something silly like that.

I mean, this could go somewhere interesting but I don't really see where that would be. I'll keep my mind open though.

I guess the question of "where is Xavier?" is answered here. He's apparently on vacation with his son, Legion, in Spain... which I actualy find to be very cool. I wish we would have had more to that story somewhere instead of just one panel of AvsX. Oh well.


Best and Worst of the Week

Best: X-Factor -I'm biased but when someone at Marvel manages not to screw up the Christian faith I get excited. I get even more excited when they actually put it in a good light.

Worst: Avengers vs. X-Men - The issue itself wasn't horrible but the ending just took me out of it, as I've already stated.

 

[RockSP]

Also, since the remains found were fairly unrecognizable, I'm hoping that Bride of Nine Spiders also survives.

Wouldn't she just be replaced with a new one, being an Immortal Weapon of one the 7 Cities and all...?

 

[Harlekin]

X-Factor #237 was great. Love punny Alex and Lorna.

 

[JewishHobbit]

Wouldn't she just be replaced with a new one, being an Immortal Weapon of one the 7 Cities and all...?

They'll all be replaced but not necessarilly with someone like the ones who've passed. I like the Bride a lot and feel she has a lot of potential. To bring in another one would just cheapen her since she's still a relatively new character.

 

[Dread]

Big week to start the month, as usual. Spoilers abound!

DREAD'S BOUGHT/THOUGHT FOR 6/6/12:

ACTION COMICS #10: Grant Morrison re-teams with regular artist Rags Morales (who has needed some breaks for some issues) for a return to his traditional Metropolis after last issue's side-story about an alternate reality's Superman. This issue sees a new villain emerge to stalk Superman, and to make a long story short he is very close to Kraven The Hunter for Spider-Man. His mantle is "Nimrod The Hunter" and he has tracked down Superman's origins to Smallville and the Kent farm in his attempt to find bigger game to kill. Meanwhile, Clark Kent tracks down a child-killer and starts to experience frustration with the judicial system and his superhero allies' unwillingness to do more besides assemble to fight "space monsters". This issue ties into Morrison's long term plot of an army of villains assembling from across time and space to battle Superman. The twist of the issue is that the identity of Clark Kent seems to be killed off, and we see the character through the eyes of others as they mourn. The dilemma of this is that we've seen little of Kent or his cast between all the crazy battles with aliens or the Legion of Super-Heroes in previous issues, although Morrison as well as Sholly Fisch in the back-up strip execute the mourning well enough to make it work. Since this book is set in the past and SUPERMAN is in the present, one knows this "identity crisis" can't last, but in the short term could be a fine arc.

JUSTICE LEAGUE INTERNATIONAL #10: A dead book walking, as this series has been canceled with issue #12, although it will get an annual so that'll be 13 issues of material. This is a little odd as while it was selling at the bottom of the Top 70, sales weren't at cancellation range and were actually not far below JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK. Of course, JLD is also critically acclaimed. I have head word that JLI would be relaunched with a fresh issue #1 or #0, and if so than that New 52 thing really IS a mindless imitation of 1990's fads. Dan Jurgens continues on his run with regular artist Aaron Lopresti, and this book continues to hit that middle of the road level of being neither terrible nor great. OMAC and Batwing, characters whose books were axed sooner, have become new members of the team to replace the members who were hospitalized or killed (who were mostly their female characters of color). They've tracked down their enemies "The Burners", who are basically a gang of metahuman Libertarian extremists who want to destroy the entire world because it oppresses the masses, and anyone who dies in the middle is just an acceptable loss. We get a bit of action and a predictable "are the heroes dead" sort of cliffhanger. It is somewhat odd that a franchise best known for "BWAHAHAHA" has been relaunched as something grim, and that DC seems to have a grudge against Vixen. She's been crippled here in her first mission and in BATMAN BEYOND UNLIMITED she's been killed off. At any rate, the decompression means that this series will have only seen two adventures before cancellation, and both against new creations who seem about a decade out of date. Oh, and apparently there was some crossover with FIRESTORM that I forgot about even trying to get and to be honest the characters themselves dismiss as a waste of time at the start of this issue, so I'm not inspired to bother with it anyway. Jurgens is someone I liked on BOOSTER GOLD but with hindsight perhaps the cast needed to be a little smaller or at least there needed to be a creator more willing to do different things besides kill off characters and mangle women and create generic villains circa 1997. I wasn't thrilled with the standard JUSTICE LEAGUE when I flipped through the first issue and I hoped for different things out of this one, but so far I've been underwhelmed.

SUPER DINOSAUR #11: Robert Kirkman and Jason Howard continue their creator owned "all ages" series which in all seriousness would make for a far better cartoon series for a cable network than "ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN" is. The Exile escapes and kidnaps Derek Dynamo to his home, which is the secret world at the center of the earth where dinosaurs still live. Meanwhile, the rest of the supporting cast save Super-Dino from a battle against villains and Dr. Dynamo is nearly killed after being totally played by his nemesis Max Maximus in a false quest to save his wife. There is one bit where you could see that there would be far more gore if Kirkman weren't being mindful of kids, although even modest burns could spook a few. Then again, most parents have rarely heard their "sweet innocent cherubs" curse worse than WWII sailors on mics playing "CALL OF DUTY" games. I still miss ASTOUNDING WOLF-MAN but this has certainly gotten more complicated and engaging as it has gone along. As I say, if it was a TV cartoon, it would manage to do all the obligatory toy selling bits as well as telling a decent story of it. Not the best thing Kirkman has done but something which rarely disappoints me.

AVENGERS VS. X-MEN #5: With five writers credited with the overall story, this week the bottle spins towards Matt Fraction to handle the script with John Romita Jr. still handling the artwork. At the end of last issue, the X-Men and the Avengers fought over Hope a bit until winding up on the moon. In this issue, while on the moon, the Avengers and the X-Men fight for a bit over Hope. Shocked yet? Other non-surprising events are Iron Man's attempt to build yet another suit of armor which he assumes will totally save the day but which probably won't, much like he did in WORLD WAR HULK, and that Wolverine looks for any excuse to try to kill Cyclops. Lowlights include Captain America issuing a fairly condescending statement to Cyclops such as "time to a leader, son" as if the past 40 years of the X-Men didn't count as well as the Phoenix Force deciding to possess five X-Men, with only one of them being a psychic. At the very least, it will provide new character costumes for action figures and video games. The notion of the Phoenix wanting to re-start the evolution of earth by reviving the mutant gene is decent, but it is lost in the mess of aimless fighting and awkward cliffhangers. The bottom line is this isn't exactly a better story than last year's FEAR ITSELF, but it's less bad than that was.

AVENGERS ACADEMY #31: This seminal run by writer Christos Gage on this property starring second tier and original characters has fallen from its way a bit with the editorially mandated crossover with AVENGERS VS. X-MEN. Gage is a writer whose smaller Avengers books often are ones which always roll off the waves of crossovers; it occurred during the years he both wrote and co-wrote AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE and it has happened with his run on AVENGERS ACADEMY. While Gage has often made lemonade with the lemons he was tossed by crossover obligations, the past few issues of this run have suffered from an increase in characters vying for space. This is actually the third part of the AVX crossover featuring the cast from the canceled GENERATION HOPE as well as other spare young X-Men characters, but it has also been the best for two reasons. The adult characters act like sane adults instead of crossover barbarians, and the obligatory team battle is treated as exactly that, which makes this issue hilarious.

The gist of the arc is that the Avengers Academy has been tasked by Wolverine and his Avengers allies as a place to detain the teenage X-Men who were left behind during the current battle between Cyclops' X-Men and the Avengers over Hope (who is set to become the latest host of the Phoenix Force). While the academy is stated to not be a detainment camp, Capt. America insists that none of these teenage X-Men are to leave, because they might enter the fray and get hurt (or hurt others). This naturally sparks debate not only among those young X-Men themselves - especially Hope's former teammates - but among the Academy cadets themselves who have often straddled the gray line of morality. One of the newest cadet is X-23, a former X-Woman herself who actually gets a lot to do this arc in finding a friend in Finesse, who is another female killing machine who struggles to understand emotions. Along with the students are Madison Jefferies/Box and Dr. Rao as their caretakers as well as Sebastian Shaw, the former evil leader of the Hellfire Club who got amnesia but now remembers the facts of his past. It only sounds complicated because it is.

At any rate, these issue sees everyone get into a fight, the X-Men versus the Avengers versus Shaw, at least until the points of whether it is right to detain someone simply for what they MAY do is right at all. One of the problems of AVX is it features a lot of adults on both sides of the battle acting crudely and this issue at the very least introduce some serious discussion about whether it is right to stifle youth from making their own choices. The highlight of the issue is that a battle between the sides is something which MUST be staged for the sake of legalities, so both sides do that. The fact that characters within the Marvel Universe realize how obligatory a fight in a crossover story is and literally go through the motions is awesome; Hercules' terrible (or outdated) acting is probably the gem of the issue. The art is done by Tom Grummett and as usual the action caters to his strengths, although after a while many of his characters' faces look the same. The color work by Chris Sotomayor and ink by Cory Hamscher backs up Grummet's work well, which overall manages to have a classic, almost DC Universe feel to it.

Gage on Avengers Academy managed to wrest some solid stories from crossovers such as FEAR ITSELF, although until now AVX seemed to prove to be a bigger challenge. This issue was a welcome return to form for one of Marvel's best Avengers titles.

DARK AVENGERS #175: When reviewing this book, it is irresistible to avoid talking like the Riddler: when is a relaunch NOT a relaunch? The answer is when it is something like this. DARK AVENGERS was the title of yet another Avengers spin off written by Brian Bendis which ran for 16 issues from 2009-2010, so one could see this as a relaunch of that. Yet it has the numbering of THUNDERBOLTS (which is even on the cover), and it has the regular creative team of THUNDERBOLTS for the last few years of writer Jeff Parker and rotating art from Declan Shalvey and Kev Walker. Marvel has had some new launches "take over" the numbering of old ongoing titles, such as INCREDIBLE HERCULES (taking over for INCREDIBLE HULK) and BLACK PANTHER: MAN WITHOUT FEAR (who took over DAREDEVIL), although those came with new creative teams. Bluntly, sales for THUNDERBOLTS had fallen to cancellation levels during an awkward time when Marvel was celebrating how long it had been in publication, so this is a re-title in a desperate attempt to sell better. Regardless, the issue changes the cast roster drastically but remains a strong issue. The previous squad of Thunderbolts have literally escaped through time itself, leaving their handlers Luke Cage, Songbird, and Mach-V greatly frustrated with the entire "leading a team of cons for black ops missions" job. Unfortunately, their government higher-ups have Norman Osborn's latest team of evil "Dark Avengers" captured from recent issues of NEW AVENGERS and want them put to work with the latest in cellular control collars. These include Hawkeye's evil brother Barney Barton/Trick Shot, the cyborg clone of Thor, Ragnarok (from CIVIL WAR), and two characters from Kelly Sue DeConnick's OSBORN. While Cage initially refuses to lead them, he eventually reconsiders when recruits the final member - Hulk's son Skaar. The art is by Shalvey with colors by Frank Martin Jr. and as usual matches the atmosphere of the work well. Parker's team books seem to consist of "team of oddballs fight bizarre threats" and this looks to continue that, but at the very least the shift in team roster is a useful gimmick. It is a last roll of the dice for the title formerly known as THUNDERBOLTS, but this opening issue is quite entertaining.

DEFENDERS #7: Matt Fraction and Terry Dodson reunite for the last time on this series they launched together; of them I believe Dodson (and his wife) have handled the art for I believe 4 of the last 7 issues, which is apparently enough to be have been considered the regular artist for a run of a book these days. At any rate, the storyarc seems to be coming together with the Defenders and John Amon both chasing after the same Maguffin which is the "chaos engine" which apparently makes wishes come true and has some effect on reality itself. The cover gives away that Black Cat appears, but we also see a trip to Wakanda and an appearance by Black Panther as well. Black Cat is hired by some mysteriously eccentric rich people to steal a Satan's Claw (Baron Strucker's old weapon) and when she succeeds at that despite their undermining of that theft (for their own amusement), they task her to steal the Chaos Engine for them. This naturally seems similar to the bit in DAREDEVIL when Black Spectre hired Felicia to steal something for them and she refused because she realized they were baddies; this time she doesn't know and honestly they could not be baddies, just eccentric. Amon, however, is bad as he seems intent on murdering anyone who gets near the Chaos Engine, which in this issue includes T'Challa himself. Now, while I was willing to accept that Fraction did really kill off the Immortal Weapons he co-created in this series, I do not for a minute believe Marvel would allow him to kill off Black Panther in this series, especially since sales are slipping to the point that making it past issue twelve will be a feat. There are some fun bits here, especially Panther's "soul juice" and what it does to Silver Surfer. The Surfer in particular has become very weird and while I'm not sure if it is out of character, it is probably the most fun I have had with him in years. James McKelvie will take over on art next issue, and as usual the text at the bottom of the pages is fun. Fraction remains hit-or-miss in general, which has included this book, but for the moment things are coming together enough that I'm interested in the conclusion. It's certainly weird enough to be worthy of the name DEFENDERS, which was always about the strange stuff.

WINTER SOLDIER #6: Steve Epting returns for cover art while Brubaker and Lark continue on their latest arc, which picks up from the last. Bucky just thwarted a plot by Red Ghost and Lucia Von Bardas to use some Soviet sleeper soldiers that Barnes trained as the Winter Soldier to try to start a third world war by setting up Dr. Doom. The problem was that there were only two sleepers and Barnes knows there were three. We learn that the third was awoken from an earthquake in San Francisco decades ago and wandered as a vagrant for years before being finally summoned by his handler. However, the agent kills the handler and has decided to become his own man and get revenge on Barnes himself. This is a good set up issue with the sort of dark espionage stuff that Brubaker is usually good at. We get into the head of his villain and it sets things up simply but effectively.

 

[JewishHobbit]

DEFENDERS #7: ... especially since sales are slipping to the point that making it past issue twelve will be a feat.

So you think it's winding down?

That'd be good for me. Trying to cut my buy list this is one title that I don't necessarilly want to keep buying (especially with that price) but I'm interested in seeing what happens with Iron Fist and the Prince of Orphans. It getting canceled would be a blessing for me.

 

[hippie_hunter]

I have head word that JLI would be relaunched with a fresh issue #1 or #0

Probably not going to be for a while though, DC has announced their Third Wave titles already (Talon, Phantom Stranger, Team 7, and Sword of Sorcery). And they're going to cancel three more titles along with Justice League International (my bets are on Captain Atom, Legion Lost, and Voodoo).

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Winter Soldier #6: Brubaker's pretty good about continuing balancing plot threads over long periods. This is technically just a continuation of the same story, since it's still about the sleeper agents Bucky trained as the Winter Soldier, but Brubaker managed to make the first two agents' deal feel very satisfyingly concluded and this third agent's part very much its own new thing. This arc seems like it'll be more interesting than the previous one, too; the Doom/Von Bardas thing was fun, but the third agent has ratcheted things up to a far more personal level with Bucky here. That makes it a bit more exciting to watch. A few things trouble me about this series in general, not least of which is Bucky's total abandonment of his preference for non-lethal action as Captain America; I guess he really was doing that solely because he didn't want to tarnish the Cap name in Steve's absence, not because killing people on a whim if you've clearly got other means at your disposal is kind of, like, totally wrong. But I remind myself this is a spy comic and not a superhero one, so it's not really that bad. The other thing that bugs me is the somewhat disheartening realization that this series will almost certainly follow Brubaker's MO with Cap, only it'll substitute Bucky's Cold War history for Cap's WWII history. Brubaker's not shy about setting a strong trend for the stories' featuring Cold War leftovers that pop up in the present to haunt Bucky. It got really tiresome with Cap in his series, and I could see it getting pretty tiresome with Bucky here. It may take a bit longer, though, given that we haven't actually seen much of Bucky's Cold War antics, whereas I believe Cap's WWII history has been covered in more comic issues than there were actual days he could've possibly been active during WWII at this point. But for now it's still pretty good.

Swamp Thing #10: Snyder nailed the tone of Alan Moore's old Vertigo run perfectly in this issue. The reintroduction of Anton Arcane is chilling and creepy and vaguely uncomfortable even though I'm used to reading about all kinds of weird stuff in comics. The art by Francesco Francavilla complements Snyder's writing beautifully. I still find it a little offputting that Alec and Abigail are suddenly in love with each other when Abigail was formerly married to an entirely different being and Alec technically only met Abigail like a day or two ago, yet no one's actually brought any of those facts up in the comic yet. But otherwise, great issue all around.

Animal Man #10: Also great. Buddy continues his journey through the Red, which is apparently changing and reshaping itself to fit his daughter's preconceived notions. Also, the Red is apparently a physical place, which is nice to know; it always seemed odd to me that the nexus of fleshy life could be purely ethereal. Justice League Dark shows up to be as cryptic and useless as they always are in their crossovers, but at least Madame Xanadu isn't a giant b**** this time. The ending has some interesting implications. Steve Pugh's art is pretty good; I haven't missed Foreman much at all. Pugh's art actually feels heavier, like there's genuine mass to things, which actually suits the tone of the series a bit better.

X-Factor #237: Good issue, although it might mean more to me if I cared at all about Rahne's time with X-Force. But, as I try to tune out any and all things related to the X-Men's murder-squad, the latter half of the issue just sort of bored me. The first half was fun, though, with all the banter between the ladies. It was nice to see a non-cynical portrayal of the Christian faith, too. Granted, I'm a Catholic who lapsed into atheism myself, but it's novel to see religion portrayed as something other than the basis for perfidy just because it's so rare at this point in most non-fundamentalist media.


Hulk #53: Having laid Doc Samson's (or evil Hulk Doc Samson, I guess, since that's a thing now) soul to rest to make him stop haunting him, Ross jumps right into a new arc following up on Rick Jones' backups featuring some kind of Mayan gods (I think). I don't remember those Rick stories especially well, but this issue fills you in on the broad strokes. Either way, this issue is mostly setup introducing the major players (including Alpha Flight because it takes place in Canada, which is kind of cool). It's nice to see Machine Man back, after basically ditching him for like 3 issues. Not really much else to say about this issue; it's good but uneventful. The ending indicates some interesting times ahead for the Hulk family, though.

Dark Avengers #175: Not bad. I think I will be sticking with this for a while, after all. Basically, this series is still Thunderbolts in everything but name. The Dark Avengers are essentially a new team of T-bolts, recruited due primarily to the fact that they were just out in the field testing themselves against the New Avengers, as opposed to Luke Cage's previous team, who have been time-jumping for two months and still haven't been recovered. The T-bolts' oversight committee basically tells Luke that they're the new team whether he likes it or not, and they appreciate his service but he won't be needed anymore. Luke, however, senses something's not right with this whole situation and puts himself back in charge because, having been appointed by Steve Rogers himself, he can basically pull rank on anyone in the T-bolts system. So he joins Ragnarok, Ai Apiac, Trickshot, and Toxie Doxie on their first mission with Skaar, the double-agent who busted the Dark Avengers, as insurance if the DA try to turn on him. Solid premise that introduces the new characters but fits with the existing direction of the series, so I'm cool with it. Having read up on what I missed with these new Dark Avengers, I'm also a bit more open to the idea knowing that Skaar had never actually gone bad; I was thinking the whole time that Bendis had undone all of Pak's development with Skaar just to have a quick, easy "evil Hulk" character on the Dark Avengers. I'm actually looking forward to future issues now.

 

[Dread]

So you think it's winding down?

That'd be good for me. Trying to cut my buy list this is one title that I don't necessarilly want to keep buying (especially with that price) but I'm interested in seeing what happens with Iron Fist and the Prince of Orphans. It getting canceled would be a blessing for me.

Sales figures for DEFENDERS are not pretty. Marvel promoted the heck out of the first issue by double-shipping it; retailers got 2 issues for every one they ordered. Thus, issue #1 technically sold at almost 86k. Yet as of April, issue five was selling below 28k. For perspective, DEFENDERS is selling worse after 5 months than VENOM is after a year (or less than DEADPOOL is after almost 5 years). Even SCARLET SPIDER after four issues is outselling it; April's SCARLET SPIDER #4 actually saw an INCREASE of orders over 1% for no reason. Combine that with the reprints and SS may be stable. Books that are still seeing sales drops of over 5% an issue past the third or fourth issue rarely last long. So, yeah, I imagine DEFENDERS could squeak by until a 10th or 12th issue but I will be stunned if it lasts longer unless it double-ships a few times. I imagine Matt Fraction has some pull but the downside of high salaries for certain creators is their books usually have to sell better (unless the creator or creators agree to a pay cut I imagine). MOON KNIGHT was announced as canceled once sales hit below 25k or so likely because the creative team commands a higher salary than, say, Christos Gage and Tom Grummet do. The $3.99 price tag means DEFENDERS is technically bringing in more cash than a $2.99 book selling better, but unless sales get steady fast I doubt it will still be in publication by this time next year...or maybe even December of THIS year.

This shouldn't be a surprise; DEFENDERS has been a tough sell for Marvel since the early to mid 80's when the first volume ended. I suppose it should actually be a pleasant surprise that in 2012 a DEFENDERS series could actually last 10-12 issues in a world where some other titles sure didn't.

Probably not going to be for a while though, DC has announced their Third Wave titles already (Talon, Phantom Stranger, Team 7, and Sword of Sorcery). And they're going to cancel three more titles along with Justice League International (my bets are on Captain Atom, Legion Lost, and Voodoo).

I see. I do think JLI could have been a better book. It isn't that Jurgens is a bad writer, I think he's just too thuddingly average a writer sometimes. That and I didn't think literally taking out 3 out of the cast's 4 female characters who were all more well known than Lady Godiva was a wise decision. Not that I think THAT is why sales are underwhelming; I just didn't care for it. Maybe if it'd attempted to have some sort of higher profile or even KNOWN villain - much like the first arc of JUSTICE LEAGUE had Darkseid - maybe that would've helped too. Instead the team is fighting forgettable original characters who barely would have made an impression back in 1996, much less 2012.

Frankly, the most satisfying DC book I am getting now is BATMAN BEYOND UNLIMITED, and THAT's mostly (if not ENTIRELY) a reprint of digital content.

I still think Vixen is cursed. Two New 52 books where she's either crippled or killed off. You'd think she was, oh, the entire Amazon society or something.

 

[WOLVERINE25TH]

JLI suffered for the simple fact that people were expecting the fun throwback to the old JLI days that Booster Gold and JL:GL gave readers. Instead, we got a somber book whose teammates were constantly at odds and virtually ineffective in everything they've done. The dark tint of the new DCU had ruined what was a highly anticipated book.

 

[hippie_hunter]

I see. I do think JLI could have been a better book. It isn't that Jurgens is a bad writer, I think he's just too thuddingly average a writer sometimes. That and I didn't think literally taking out 3 out of the cast's 4 female characters who were all more well known than Lady Godiva was a wise decision. Not that I think THAT is why sales are underwhelming; I just didn't care for it. Maybe if it'd attempted to have some sort of higher profile or even KNOWN villain - much like the first arc of JUSTICE LEAGUE had Darkseid - maybe that would've helped too. Instead the team is fighting forgettable original characters who barely would have made an impression back in 1996, much less 2012.

I completely agree. Justice League International had a great start but it totally went downhill with losing the U.N.'s support, knocking out, killing, and disabling several cast members, and a plot that was just becoming more and more dull.

And after reading issue #10, I still feel the same way. This book should have been much better. Also, the bad guys aren't extreme libertarians, they're anarchists which fall on the opposite side of the political spectrum.

Frankly, the most satisfying DC book I am getting now is BATMAN BEYOND UNLIMITED, and THAT's mostly (if not ENTIRELY) a reprint of digital content.

Batman Beyond Unlimited is flat out confusing. We have Batman Beyond which seems to be set in a pre-Flashpoint continuity, Superman Beyond which feels like it's set in both the DCU and DCAU, and Justice League Unlimited where it feels like it's set in the DCAU, and yet all three stories are set in the same continuity. It's kind of a mess in that it doesn't know what it wants to do, especially in the post-Flashpoint DC line-up.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

JLI suffered for the simple fact that people were expecting the fun throwback to the old JLI days that Booster Gold and JL:GL gave readers. Instead, we got a somber book whose teammates were constantly at odds and virtually ineffective in everything they've done. The dark tint of the new DCU had ruined what was a highly anticipated book.

That's why I ditched it after one issue. Same reason I didn't even bother trying Earth 2 after I read some articles about what Robinson was gonna do with it. I don't understand why DC's so against having anything in its repertoire that's just straight-up fun. Everything's gotta have some dark, depressing elements to it or reinvent things in a way that does a total 180 from what made them successful. Odd. But I guess they're saving me money, so...

 

[WOLVERINE25TH]

DC is 20 years behind the times. They're just NOW entering their grim 'n' gritty 90s phase.

 

[Dread]

JLI suffered for the simple fact that people were expecting the fun throwback to the old JLI days that Booster Gold and JL:GL gave readers. Instead, we got a somber book whose teammates were constantly at odds and virtually ineffective in everything they've done. The dark tint of the new DCU had ruined what was a highly anticipated book.

BOOSTER GOLD started out fun but gradually became more traditional and even grim at times once Geoff Johns left the book and especially when Jurgens took over full time. I liked it, but after the first maybe 3-5 issues I wouldn't have called it "fun".

The thing is, I'd have been fine if it was a straight superhero comic without JUST being a comedy. The issue is it quickly became a grim decompressed affair.

I completely agree. Justice League International had a great start but it totally went downhill with losing the U.N.'s support, knocking out, killing, and disabling several cast members, and a plot that was just becoming more and more dull.

And after reading issue #10, I still feel the same way. This book should have been much better. Also, the bad guys aren't extreme libertarians, they're anarchists which fall on the opposite side of the political spectrum.

Yeah, the book really should have been better. It's sort of a shame it is being canceled, but I won't mourn it too much.

Batman Beyond Unlimited is flat out confusing. We have Batman Beyond which seems to be set in a pre-Flashpoint continuity, Superman Beyond which feels like it's set in both the DCU and DCAU, and Justice League Unlimited where it feels like it's set in the DCAU, and yet all three stories are set in the same continuity. It's kind of a mess in that it doesn't know what it wants to do, especially in the post-Flashpoint DC line-up.

For me the BATMAN BEYOND strips and the JLU strips usually go together very well. It's the SUPERMAN BEYOND strip which sticks out like a sore thumb, but it isn't horrible at least. The bottom line is I enjoy BATMAN BEYOND UNLIMITED on a monthly basis more than ACTION COMICS or JLI on average.

DC is 20 years behind the times. They're just NOW entering their grim 'n' gritty 90s phase.

Throw in that DC is seeming to realize minority groups exist outside of Pam Grier films.

 

[WOLVERINE25TH]

Isn't it funny, though, that the title character's strip seems to be second fiddle in BBU?

 

[Dread]

Isn't it funny, though, that the title character's strip seems to be second fiddle in BBU?

Really no different than calling a superhero team show "YOUNG JUSTICE" in which every character bends over backwards to never call the team that. In fact, it's just "the team".

In fairness, Batman himself technically appears in two strips; his own and the JLU one, so he's still always in 2/3rds of the issue. Or at least half now that there's a Warhawk Origin strip there. Given that the overall package is consistently entertaining for me and I feel I get my money's worth, I don't mind.