BOUGHT/THOUGHT for June 13, 2007

[Upset Spideyfan]

You're not much one for the critical reading, are you? Here's a start for you - sometimes, people say things that are false because it suits their purposes to have other people believe that these things are true. Example: Iron Man claiming to be "protecting" the people of New York from a threat, that we as readers are fully aware wasn't threatening anybody other than Tony Stark & Company.

Hah! You're just seeing what you want to see.

In Tony's speech as it refers to the Hulk there was NOT a single statement he made that was not true. Let's look at a few key parts.

He starts off by accepting responsibility upfront.

"Blame me"

He follows up with

"Everything I've done"

Bendis stated, in the first of the Illuminati issues, that the Hulk HAS in fact killed people in his rampages (even if unintentionally). I think something like 23 kids died in his Las Vegas rampage.

Taking that into account, the heroes of Earth were COMPLETELY justified in sending the Hulk away. They had made numerous attempts to cure him and it wasn't taking and his last rampage was nearly unstoppable.

Tony and co. made a decision in that instance to SAVE lives. And guess what? He didn't decide to send the Hulk's shuttle into the sun or into a black hole. He was sent to a planet devoid of sentient life in order to live out his life in peace (it wasn't their fault a wormhole whisked the shuttle away to an entirely different planet).

So thus far he's telling the truth.

"Everything I'll do to day"

You say the Hulk was only a threat to Iron Man. I guess you didn't read the part where he threatened to tear the Earth apart like he did to Black Bolt if the Illuminati didn't face him.

And you know what, he met every one of the Hulk's conditions.

He evacuated the populace of Manhattan and laid down arms against the unregistered heroes to help in that endeavor.

And finally Iron Man faced off against the Hulk. He didn't throw every superhero in the country at him, and hid in the back to save his own hide, he threw himself into the fire first because that was the Hulk's demands.

Sounds to me like Tony was doing everything he could to protect the people of Earth from the Hulk's wrath.

There were two elements of your original post that irked me. First of all you complain he fired missiles at the Hulk.

How the hell was he supposed to beat him? Punch him to death? Iron Man was fighting to win and when he saw he had the Hulk on the ropes he took the initiative.

Finally, you bring up Bruce. But Banner's seen the Hulk as a monster for years. There is no way in Hell that he would support the Hulk's destruction of the planet.

You're trying to portray it as if Iron Man is in this for himself, primarily concerned with himself, but when you look at the facts that's just not the picture that's being painted.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I get the impression some don't like the civil war? I thought it was a great storyline...

It was a decent idea, but I didn't think it was executed very well.

 

[Dread]

Nova #3: I know there were just a bunch of people jumping on the Nova bandwagon before issue #1 even came out. They should be really disappointed that this Annihilation spin-off totally sold out by the second issue; and issue 3 really made that more apparent than ever. In order to try to up sales, Nova tries to tie into the Civil War spin-off, The Initiative, and fails miserably. You get a battle that goes nowhere, you get the "Tony Stark appeal" that we've seen in too many books nowadays (amazing how he can appear at a moments notice in every single book Marvel puts out; he's like Wolverine now), and we get the same old "my parents and friends don't understand me" issues. At least we get the next Annihilation saga starting next month. Hopefully the writers can do better than they did with this very predictable issue. 4/10

So they "sold out" by having Nova deal with the issues of having the situation on earth change COMPLETELY since he's last been there? That's not something that the writers can just simply leave alone. And it's not like he can come back and deal with this without having to deal with the Initiative BS.

I'm with IFryKids here; what might have seemed predictable in your eyes was Abnett & Lanning pretty much delivering what the fans wanted. As someone who was reading ANNIHILATION, when CW started and got about midway, people were begging to see Nova's reaction to it, some of his friends dying and the stuff back home, especially as the New Warriors got vilified, or when Speedball becomes a masochist freak and joined the Thunderbolts to "attone", and gets to be allies with ruthless, remourseless killers like Norman Osborn, Venom, and Bullseye.

So, yes, in terms of business, it was a obligatory INITIATIVE tie-in to try to keep sales steady until ANNIHILATION: CONQUEST, especially since every volume of a NOVA ongoing has failed (and most quickly). But in terms of story, Abnett & Lanning were giving fans what they wanted and having Nova react appropriately. It was "predictable" because Nova was acting in character. I'd rather a story that makes competant sense and is predictable, than a story that sacrifices any sort of coherant sense or development in an attempt to throw me, as CIVIL WAR often did (had the writers not been so eager to make the Pro SHRA forces undeniably nasty in order to fool the readers, the story would have been MUCH better off; that point is nearly unanimous). Besides, who really expected Nova to put the Thunderbolts into a coma while they're up and at 'em in their ongoing? That's like expecting Spider-Man to lose his powers in AVENGERS: INITIATIVE #3. I thought it was handled alright. The only bit that may have disappointed some was that Nova & "Tony" were friendlier with each other than the covers and solicts suggested, but that was because Iron Man chose to be more diplomatic with Nova since he was now much more powerful than when he left (when he sometimes needed assistance to take down the Rhino, circa MTU), and because the war was over so Iron Man could tone down his hard-arse a little.

I found the NOVA tie-in a rare case of professional writers delivering what fans pleaded and wanting without trying to disappoint them. Some people claim "no good writer ever sought to give the audience what they wanted because it always is boring" in defense of controversial stories, but I usually disagree. Even Shakespeare sought to please the "groundlings" (re: starving peasants seated on the floor) with lots of sword-fighting. That's how I see it, though, and that will differ from some. I hope CONQUEST rocks too.

 

[Dread]

It was a decent idea, but I didn't think it was executed very well.

The execution in CW was shot mainly for Five reasons (IMO, of course):

1). The story was selected with certain characters playing key roles, regardless of whether said roles were counter to what the character stood for or acted like. Character personality didn't matter. What mattered was getting things on a checklist.

2). The majority of the key writers, Millar, JMS, Jenkins, Hudlin, and Bendis, sought to distract the reader from the ending by presenting the Pro-SHRA side as unmistakenly dishonorable and underhanded, via hiring supervillains, cloning allies, locking up friend and foe alike in Gulugs without any trial or hope of release, and acting suspicious towards anyone whose "gung ho" spirit wasn't up to snuff enough. The fact that the Pro-SHRA had a very reasonable arguement didn't matter when the agents employing it were made to seem as nasty as possible; Magneto always had a worthwhile arguement, but he was a villain for employing nasty means to get there. Same principle. The "Cap realizes he is in error and surrenders" might have been less shocking, or at least made more sense, had it not seemed like he was going, "The Civil Rights violaters have a point".

3). The key point of the story, which was presenting the SHRA, the side that resisted it, and then the end when the resistance faulters when Cap caves to American public opinion, had notable distractions; the biggest of which was Spider-Man Unmasking, and Clor, who was basically in the story because Millar wanted to use Thor's image, but was told at the last second by the editors that Thor would not be used in CW, despite a 2 issue FF tie in promising as much. Some could argue it was a cynical bait-and-switch.

4). As mentioned by the FF PRELUDE TO CW issues, the story bore signs of several re-writes and occasional miscommunication between writers. JMS' Iron Man in ASM says, "They are locked up, forever, if they resist because they are too dangerous to release", and Millar's, in the same scene, in CW goes, "C'mon, Spidey, it won't be forever". That is only one of many. These sorts of errors always happen in mega-crossovers, but it gets no less annoying. To paraphrase Millar in CW #2, "Yeah, crossover screw-ups have always been with us, but so has smallpox. Get with the 21st century".

5). CW was a story that needed a somewhat more analytical and subtle writer at the helm to make it work without making both sides seem like video game characters who exist only to fight. That writer is not Millar, who at best is a popcorn action writer, a Micheal Bay if you will. You'd never trust Micheal Bay with a GONE WITH THE WIND venture. You trust him for shameless popcorn fluff with explosions and a pop culture soundtrack.

The aftermath, the launched titles and status quo afterwards, has been better than I expected, though. It just is a shame that the events that cause these sorts of "new growth from burnt earth" moments couldn't be better. Will WWH be the 3rd one that has the charm?

 

[GNR]

Every week I swear,the BOUGHT/THOUGHT thread turns into paragraphs and paragraphs of arguments.I don't understand.

 

[Not Jake]

It's the "/THOUGHT" part.

 

[Max Shrek]

Every week I swear,the BOUGHT/THOUGHT thread turns into paragraphs and paragraphs of arguments.I don't understand.

Keyword: "Thought."

 

[Darthphere]

I get the impression some don't like the civil war? I thought it was a great storyline...

I get the impression you like to state the obvious.

 

[Darthphere]

Every week I swear,the BOUGHT/THOUGHT thread turns into paragraphs and paragraphs of arguments.I don't understand.

It's the "/THOUGHT" part.

Keyword: "Thought."

Next week: Bought/Thought: 2 sentence maximum edition

 

[Dread]

Next week: Bought/Thought: 2 sentence maximum edition

D'oh. Hell, that 20,000 character limit on posts is a weekly source of frustration for me.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

D'oh. Hell, that 20,000 character limit on posts is a weekly source of frustration for me.

Dread, just take a step back, remember that you review like 2 or 3 comics per post, and drink in the sheer absurdity of that statement. From one verbose mother****er to another: goddamn, man!

 

[Dread]

Dread, just take a step back, remember that you review like 2 or 3 comics per post, and drink in the sheer absurdity of that statement. From one verbose mother****er to another: goddamn, man!

What?

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Nothing. That's a lot of characters, is all.

 

[venom892]

I don't read new avengers so I'd like to know how long are we suppose to assume

Spoiler

]Elektra was a skrull?Is the real one still out there or is she dead?killed by a skrull or has the skrull been assuming that identity since bullseye killed her?

 

[Not Jake]

who cares, the real one can just be brought back by the deus ex handica

 

[TheCorpulent1]

You gotta love the Hand. They'll resurrect anyone. They brought Doctor Octopus back from the dead. Doctor ****ing Octopus. A guy with no connection to the Hand, whose only martial arts experience is the frantic gyrating he does to reach for that last twinkie. But they're like, "You want him back? Eh, all right. Gimme $3.50."

I don't read new avengers so I'd like to know how long are we suppose to assume

Spoiler

]Elektra was a skrull?Is the real one still out there or is she dead?killed by a skrull or has the skrull been assuming that identity since bullseye killed her?

We don't know how long. We don't know what happened to the real one. We don't know if the real Elektra and Skrullektra have even met. We don't know if the real Elektra is still dead from when Bullseye killed her and it's been a Skrull all these years, although that seems pretty unlikely.

So, in short, we don't know jack.

 

[Not Jake]

I'm going to assume that she was real for the entirety of Bendis' DD run, because, you know. She was totally real. I can tell.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

But was she spectacular?

 

[Upset Spideyfan]

I'm guessing the Skrull replaced Elektra after she became leader of the Hand. For two reasons.

Simply, she wouldn't have been a person of interest to them prior to her taking control of the group.

Secondly, Elektra showed up in the later parts of Bendis' run on Daredevil (while in control of the Hand), and her appearance in New Avengers was considerably more villainous.

So taking all of that into account, I think its quite reasonable to assume that Elektra was replaced shortly after Daredevil was locked up in prison.

 

[Darthphere]

But was she spectacular?

No, Incredible.

 

[Not Jake]

Seinfeld.

 

[Phaedrus45]

how on earth can you give a book 6/10 (by definition above average) and then remark that it's cancellation is a good thing??

We all have our views on our ratings, and those who know me will figure an average rating is a 7 or 8 out of 10. This review really takes into fact that it was much better than the previous nine issues. I don't think a previous issue received above 4/10.

Anyway, let me ask you this? If 5/10 is average, and you're going to date a woman, would you date a woman who is 5/10 or 6/10? Not me. They have to at least rank a 7/10.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

But you just said your average is 7 or 8 of 10. So what you're really saying is you'd only date 9s and up. Conceited much?

Seinfeld.

Right in one.

 

[Darthphere]

We all have our views on our ratings, and those who know me will figure an average rating is a 7 or 8 out of 10. This review really takes into fact that it was much better than the previous nine issues. I don't think a previous issue received above 4/10.

Anyway, let me ask you this? If 5/10 is average, and you're going to date a woman, would you date a woman who is 5/10 or 6/10? Not me. They have to at least rank a 7/10.

Ranking systems are ******ed. I go by the "Would I hit it?" method. It's either a yes or a no. In extreme cases, a yes if I was drunk.

 

[Not Jake]

A girl has to be a 7 but a guy has to be a 10. Or a 9 but really cool. Like David Boreanaz.