What would ruin,.. or what HAS ruined a hero for You?

[Kirk Langstrom]

To be fair, Longshot didn't suck in his own mini. Dazzler on the other hand, well I never read her book, so I guess I don't know for sure.

Yeah, it was ok. They're decent characters and all..i was just angry when they replaced some of my favorite X-Men...that was also around the time the book got real "grim and gritty", with punk-rock Storm and the like...

 

[The Question]

Yeah, it was ok. They're decent characters and all..i was just angry when they replaced some of my favorite X-Men...that was also around the time the book got real "grim and gritty", with punk-rock Storm and the like...

Part of me really wants to see that era be referenced with Storm, all gussied up in her new royal robes, sitting in the throne room of Wakanda listening to "Anarchy in the UK."

 

[TheCorpulent1]

...that was also around the time the book got real "grim and gritty", with punk-rock Storm and the like...

The '80s, you mean?

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

Part of me really wants to see that era be referenced with Storm, all gussied up in her new royal robes, sitting in the throne room of Wakanda listening to "Anarchy in the UK."

Lol..t:

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

The '80s, you mean?

Yup. '85 or '86...

 

[ShadowBoxing]

Yeah, it was ok. They're decent characters and all..i was just angry when they replaced some of my favorite X-Men...that was also around the time the book got real "grim and gritty", with punk-rock Storm and the like...

Blame Frank Miller's DareDevil. It, and DKR, had such a major impact that in the eighties everything had to be "dark" and "gritty". I'm actually a huge fan of Silverstri's run with Pierce and the Reavers, however much like every other period in comics...the overuse of dark got very old very fast.

 

[K.B.]

Hmmm...getting back on topic....

Things that ruined characters/books from marvel for me would be ..

Bruce Jones Hulk run- started off really good and strong but then it got all x-files and confuzzeled and became crap. I stoped reading after the betty ross reveal.

Clone saga- was crap...just crap.

X-men mid 90's- even in the mid-late 80's it was starting to become a twisted wreck (thanks Clearmont ) but at least it had artists to keep you coming back. By the mid 90's it just got so bad it was unreadable.

Stazynski's spider-man- I loved the book and but thought it was losing it's great build of steam when he got Pete and MJ back and the whole Ezekial turns bad but stuck it out. I was there through the Stacey/Osborn kids (which I liked the idea that Norman stole her cherry before Pete but HATED the kids angle) and I finally had enough halfway through the moving into avengers tower arc.

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

Hmmm...getting back on topic....

Things that ruined characters/books from marvel for me would be ..

Bruce Jones Hulk run- started off really good and strong but then it got all x-files and confuzzeled and became crap. I stoped reading after the betty ross reveal.

Did you stick around for the Abomination arc? That was probably the high point of Jone's entire run. Phenomenal art by Mike Deodato.

 

[KangConquers]

Yes, but I just don't see what that has to do wtih what I said.

I was saying a lot of villains start as canon fodder. Then they're given purposes later. Think about how many Stan Lee villains just started out with a goal to rule the world, and nothing else.

 

[ShadowBoxing]

I was saying a lot of villains start as canon fodder. Then they're given purposes later. Think about how many Stan Lee villains just started out with a goal to rule the world, and nothing else.

Green Goblin, The Enforcers, The Fogman, Mr Hyde, Cobra, Beetle, Sandman (ironically), Kraven, Mysterio, Masked Marauder, Owl, Molten Man, Purple Man, Trapster, Kang, Magneto, J.Jonah.Jameson (Spider-Slayer), Smyth, Gladiator (Melvin Potter), etc...

 

[K.B.]

I just went up and actually looked (lol it was bigging me) and I left Hulk at exactly issue # 70 of the Bruce Jones run. I thought the Absorbing man arch was meh..had it's moments but really seemed forced (love the artist though) and the Abomination one started well but then it became way too mcuh with everybody banging everybody else...c'mon lol.

Also I HATE deaodato's art...well ok let me clear it up...I hate his covers they are 99% of the time complete crap but he can produce some really good interior art (mostly when he isnt rushed to put the book out)

 

[Spade]

Bruce Jones was so bad that (as a tepid comic buyer at the time) I stopped buying comics altogether. Yes, the stupidity was THAT bad. On the other hand, I love Deodato's art. I think his Hulk and Spidey are awesome, though he can do without drawing other characters like Venom.

Meh.

 

[KangConquers]

Green Goblin, The Enforcers, The Fogman, Mr Hyde, Cobra, Beetle, Sandman (ironically), Kraven, Mysterio, Masked Marauder, Owl, Molten Man, Purple Man, Trapster, Kang, Magneto, J.Jonah.Jameson (Spider-Slayer), Smyth, Gladiator (Melvin Potter), etc...

exactly. I mean...some characters still have barely been given any characterization.

Not agreeing on the Goblin so much because he got something of a motive within two years of his first appearance. Compared to Kang not getting a motive outside of "I love combat and conquest" until the late 80s, and Magneto remaining a mustache twirling villain till the mid-80s...well Gobby comes out looking pretty good.

When you think about it, Kang and Magneto are pretty damn big name villains to have started out as flat characters, but they did.

 

[Spade]

In Magneto's case, I think Stan was just too lazy to change the recurring villain.

 

[ShadowBoxing]

exactly. I mean...some characters still have barely been given any characterization.

Not agreeing on the Goblin so much because he got something of a motive within two years of his first appearance.

Well you did say "started out with no motivation".

Compared to Kang not getting a motive outside of "I love combat and conquest" until the late 80s, and Magneto remaining a mustache twirling villain till the mid-80s...well Gobby comes out looking pretty good.

When you think about it, Kang and Magneto are pretty damn big name villains to have started out as flat characters, but they did.

Magneto was basically Dr.Doom part II. Everyone loves X-Men and thinks Stan was oh-so-brillant coming up with allegories to racism...when in truth Stan created yet another book about angsty teenagers fighting power hungry tyrants. Racism and philosophies were null and void in his X-Men.

 

[Spade]

Ouch. Not a big fan of the original X-Men?

 

[ShadowBoxing]

Ouch. Not a big fan of the original X-Men?

Stan wrote four great comics in the Sixties. Fantastic Four, Amazing Spider-Man, Thor and Silver Surfer. Everything else is some sort of variation of those books, and his heart usually wasn't in the others. X-Men is fun, it has it's moments, but it gets hard to read pretty fast.

 

[KangConquers]

Stan wrote four great comics in the Sixties. Fantastic Four, Amazing Spider-Man, Thor and Silver Surfer. Everything else is some sort of variation of those books, and his heart usually wasn't in the others. X-Men is fun, it has it's moments, but it gets hard to read pretty fast.

Avengers?

I also love the original Hulk comic. It was always a favorite of mine.

 

[ShadowBoxing]

I didn't think Avengers really hit it's stride until the late sixties/early seventies.

 

[KangConquers]

I didn't think Avengers really hit it's stride until the late sixties/early seventies.

fair enough...though I'd argue Spidey didn't hit his stride until "If This Be My Destiny".

FF was great from the get go though.

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

Bruce Jones was so bad that (as a tepid comic buyer at the time) I stopped buying comics altogether. Yes, the stupidity was THAT bad. On the other hand, I love Deodato's art. I think his Hulk and Spidey are awesome, though he can do without drawing other characters like Venom.

Meh.

Yeah, his Venom looks about ten feet tall...

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

I didn't think Avengers really hit it's stride until the late sixties/early seventies.

Oh, no way man. I think Stan really got comfortable with the book by issue #16, all the way up until he turned it over to Roy Thomas...he wrote the second stingers much more naturally than he wrote the big guns, imo...

 

[ShadowBoxing]

Oh, no way man. I think Stan really got comfortable with the book by issue #16, all the way up until he turned it over to Roy Thomas...he wrote the second stingers much more naturally than he wrote the big guns, imo...

I much prefer Roy Thomas' Avengers to Lee's.

 

[3dman27]

civil war messed up iron man and the marvel universe for me .
i just hope i.m the movie can blow away some of the stench

 

[Ockham]

For me,

1) Wolverine trading his nifty fighting skills for an insane regeneration and immortality has been a big step backward for the character.

2) Storm was already pretty well ruined by the X-treme X-men arc, but the final nail to her coffin was the retcon that reduced her into Black Panther's side-kick concubine.

3) Rachel Summers ---> Rachel Grey. Having experienced the days of the future past, being the Phoenix avatar, being trapped in the Mojoworld for several years, fighting against the Apocalypse for dozens of years in the Askani timeline I would have expected more than her devolving into an easily manipulated teenage bimbo.