Didn't I read that you were going to buy multiple copies? Here's a better idea: If you do buy multiple copies, give them to friends to read, so they'll start buying it. If you don't have any comic-reading friends, give them back to you LCBS and tell them to give it to someone who might like it.
I try not to employ sarcasm on the internet. It just doesn't come through the screen, and people always seem to get bent out of shape. (I start to wonder how they get through the day without seeing smilies when people talk to them.)
I'm pretty sure I explained this in this thread or elsewhere before but it's just that rarely anything good comes out from them.
Far too often writers use time travel stories as an opportunity to butcher beloved characters because they can just hit the reset button later. And if they actually use time travelling to change things, then it's often a lazy way to "fix" something (the same goes for alternate reality stories like "House of M", which I hated).
I'm pretty sure I explained this in this thread or elsewhere before but it's just that rarely anything good comes out from them.
Far too often writers use time travel stories as an opportunity to butcher beloved characters because they can just hit the reset button later. And if they actually use time travelling to change things, then it's often a lazy way to "fix" something (the same goes for alternate reality stories like "House of M", which I hated).
I'm pretty sure I explained this in this thread or elsewhere before but it's just that rarely anything good comes out from them.
Far too often writers use time travel stories as an opportunity to butcher beloved characters because they can just hit the reset button later. And if they actually use time travelling to change things, then it's often a lazy way to "fix" something (the same goes for alternate reality stories like "House of M", which I hated).
A great issue overall, a little predictable, but not in a bad way, and thankfully was more upbeat than many of us were predicting. Here is my review, with heavy spoilers:
MARVEL TEAM-UP #18: The best Marvel Adventure title no one is reading, and probably my highlight of the week if I did that sort of thing. It is Paco Medina's second book this month and the second, ironically, that stars Speedball as well. "LEAGUE OF LOSERS" reaches its conclusion as the team has their showdown with Chronok, desperate to keep him from ravaging their own time. For some reason Medina insists on having characters swing at unseen minions off panel with only a sound effect alluding to the blow; he's no Perez when it comes to group fights (but then again, who is?).
Despite time-travel stories being used as an excuse to slaughter longtime heroes, and despite many of our predictions, none of the "LOL" die in this conflict; they hold their own (with the air of Reed in his Thing-robot suit of course and a really big canon) against the army and Darkhawk takes down Chronok as he was trying to slip into a time-portal, effectively chopping him in half. Speedball titles the team "The Avengers", and I say, why not? No one else has the title in MK 2099. Reed, however, explains the wonky world of Marvel's Alternate timelines/dimensions, as noted in their Handbook; the "LOL" can't return "home" because their home is now a divergent timeline, where Chronok succeeded, and all they did was create a new timeline (or at least stablize the 616 timeline), where there was no Chronok invasion, essentially leaving them stuck where they are in MK 2099. Heck, maybe Chronok's invasion sort of led to MK 2099's reality; Kirkman created that reality and so why couldn't it? It's his book. The downside, of course, is that some of them were looking foward to going home for various reasons (Sleepwalker misses having a host and accessing the Dreamscape, Dagger misses Cloak, Speedball wanted to gloat), but end up adjusting themselves to their alternate timeline. X-23 and Gravity are still an item, Terror and Sleepwalker are unlikely friends, Dagger gets on the rebound with Darkhawk, and Speedball gets a lesson that the fact that they DID save thousands of people without any fanfare or reward is what makes them heroes.
If MTU sold as well as ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR, you can bet your arse that quicker than Joe Q can say "ka-ching", this team would see a mini like the pointless MARVEL ZOMBIES did, but it sadly doesn't. Overall, between MTU and MASKED INTENTIONS, Speedball's had a pretty good month. Considering the preview of this summer's CIVIL WAR #1 as shown in WIZARD #174, though, he'd better enjoy it while it lasts. Anyway, a solid finale to a solid Marvel Universe title. We need more like it, and we need Kirkman on more higher profile work.
Can't wait for the next arc, which after a "1991" one shot with Wolverine and Cable, will introduce a new hero called Freedom Ring. I wonder if it'll tie into that cosmic ring that Ringmaster had from many issues ago.
So far I'm not sure what to think with MTU. It's just about 50/50 whether i like any given issue so far on this run but i'm gonna stick it out for another arc or two at least. Wasnt much of a fan of this league of losers arc though. Time travel is a tricky storyline device to work with and I didnt like the way it turned out this time. I also didnt like the way absolutely everyone died at the beginning. Element of surprise or not I would expect a better fight from most of the characters they showed. I did however enjoy Terror. He was an interesting character i've never seen before. What else is he in/has he been in?
and was it just me or was X-23 acting a little out of character? All the girl has ever known is death and violence and yet she was acting like an average flirty high school girl.
I have stated in previous months that X-23 is out-of-character when Kirkman writes her here. Alas, it is a shame when you can claim that character who is acting more like a normal girl and not an emotionless, robotic, "killing machine" is now out of character. Yes, I know X-23 has a vital reason to act that way. I knew that back when she was on X-MEN EVOLUTION. It still makes her boring to me.
And Terror is cool. He had his own series in the 90's called TERROR, INC. I didn't read it, but some back issue bin somewhere has to have it.
I reread the issue and I think I can better explain the "time loop" that kept the League of Losers (or the Marvel Knights Avengers 2099, as I want to call them) stuck there. Basically, the only reason they were able to stop Chronok's time-travel attack in their present was because they stole his Chronometer and went into the future. Basically, in order for them to have stopped Chronok in MK2099, his attack on their friends and family in the past had to occur. So therefore, once they stopped Chronok, as Reed said, they simply created an alternate timeline where his attack never existed, and their timeline, where it did, still exists (as Earth-666 or whatever; note that "canon" Marvel is Earth-616, according to Roma).
Think of it like THE TIME MACHINE, a movie from 2002 (which was a remake of the movie version of the classic book). Alexander Hartdegen in the 19th century is working on a time machine when his lover is killed by a robber. The death motivates him to actually finish the machine and travel back in time to save her; however, no matter what he does in the past, she always dies. So he basically travels into the future to ask someone why he can't save her. Long story short, he gets his answer 80,000 years into the future: if she never had died, Alexander Hartdegen never would have constructed the time machine in the first place. And so therefore that whole meeting could not have existed without her death being the trigger.
The fate of the MK Avengers 2099 is simular. The attack on their friends and family HAD to occur to basically be the trigger for them travelling into Chronok's time period and stopping him before he was too powerful. And of course it allowed for the team's growth and comradery to have not been for naught as they are stuck in that time period, making lemonade with the new lemons life has dealt them. And as Chris Powell told Speedball, it's the fact that they did all that and got no reward or fanfare that makes them heroes.
This is easily my favorite arc of MTU so far. Kirkman will not have an easy time topping himself. But at least he has a whole Marvel Universe to play with to try.
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usually works to convey Sarcasm, but it almost always pisses people off. It's the most evil Smiley after all.
