Ye ol' Bought-n'-Thought Hoedown, October 26, 2011 - SPOILERS

[chamber-music]

I never really liked Cloak & Dagger in X-Men either.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Me either. Never really saw them as more than third-stringers.

 

[JewishHobbit]

That said, reviving Reilly would have been complicated. Firstly, many of the higher-up's vowed to never do it, and to go back on that would merely be the latest in a series of examples of what Marvel brass say don't mean ****, which would defeat the purpose of doing promotional interviews. Now, a lot of what Joe Q or Tom Brevoort say don't mean **** now anyway, but this would make it worse. But the big second is reviving Reilly from a story perspective would have been a pain. The guy was killed on panel, and turned to dust on panel. Unless you're Dracula or use magic, that's pretty much resurrection proof. Magic was used in OMD/OMIT and it's always awkward in Spider-Man stories. The only option would have been to claim back in '96 Reilly was swapped out with a "defective clone" in time for Osborn to run him through, but that's a major retcon as well as asks people to remember a story I imagine most of Marvel's brass would rather they forgot. Thus, the option of "curing" Kaine so he'd act more like Reilly was seen as the best option. If you see Scarlet Spider as an actual character and not Spider-Man B, then it's a dilemma. I never did, so I suppose I don't mind as much.

You always say this but I fail to see how it's difficult (from the plot perspective anyway). Reilly's death was such a plot loop hole that people yelled about it the very moment it happened and has been ever since. Reilly was a perfected clone and couldn't degenerate. The clone who died degenerated. Therefore, it could not have possibly been Ben according to the whole point of him being the perfect clone. He was defeated by Osborn and out of the picture before Osborn brought a beat up and warn out Ben before Peter and we all know Osborn had an abundance of clones and liked playing mind games. Within the plot of the Spidey mythos Ben's return would be extremely simple... he was switched prior to being brought before Peter.

And is bate and swtich a hard thing? Of course not! It's already been done tons in marvel (Colossus, Multiple Man, Jean Grey). And Reilly's bate and switch would actually make sense straight from the issue he died in... unlike any of those other three I just mentioned (well, maybe Madrox). And to bring fans back to the "horrible" days of the Clone Saga... did they not just bring back Jackal and Kaine... two of the main characters of that time period?

So yeah... you always lay out this novel of excuses as to why it would be so insanely difficult to see a return of Ben Reilly and it really isn't difficult at all. Heck, they said Ben was pretty much winked out of existence and would never be heard from again, and yet, he showed up in the story from BND that shifted back to Ben and Kaine, and then Ben was in a new story in Spider-Man & the X-Men, and then there's all the trades they've been releasing of the Clone Saga of late. It seems to me they don't have so much of an issue letting the Clone Saga era out of the bag these days.

So that said... why change Kaine and go against all character traits and alter him physically off panel and emotionally over several arcs to just get him to a point of being a darker Ben Reilly? Just freakin' bring back Ben Reilly, make him a little more bitter like Bucky or something and move on. It can be done in a single issue and the plot can move forward.

 

[WOLVERINE25TH]

JH pretty much nailed it. I mean, look at Jean Grey...died after Dark Phoenix, only to end up being a cosmic entity that replicated Jean and put her body below the frikken bay. Colossus I still don't even understand.

 

[moraldeficiency]

Let's just leave reilly dead, his purpose isn't there anymore. I like the idea of Kaine as a hero type but not as the new reilly.

 

[JewishHobbit]

Sure he does... Peter's brother. That was a fantastic thing they had going and their dynamic was beautiful. Kaine can't realy fill that like Ben did and that's always a role that can be brought back and done well. His role as the potential "real" Peter is done and I wouldn't want to see it back, but to bring him back as Pete's brother and then move him away from the Clone stuff and let him grow his own legs would be fantastic. Have him do something different from Peter. He could move out west and teach at the Avengers Academy for example. Take the good aspects of Ben Reilly and mix in some of the missed stuff pre-OMD like Peter's role as a teacher. There's things you could do with him.

 

[moraldeficiency]

Sure he does... Peter's brother. That was a fantastic thing they had going and their dynamic was beautiful. Kaine can't realy fill that like Ben did and that's always a role that can be brought back and done well. His role as the potential "real" Peter is done and I wouldn't want to see it back, but to bring him back as Pete's brother and then move him away from the Clone stuff and let him grow his own legs would be fantastic. Have him do something different from Peter. He could move out west and teach at the Avengers Academy for example. Take the good aspects of Ben Reilly and mix in some of the missed stuff pre-OMD like Peter's role as a teacher. There's things you could do with him.

That would actually be acceptable. Actually one of the things I really wanted before OMD was peter to be both a teacher to regular high schoolers and to run something like AA as a teacher.

 

[runawayboulder]

JH pretty much nailed it. I mean, look at Jean Grey...died after Dark Phoenix, only to end up being a cosmic entity that replicated Jean and put her body below the frikken bay. Colossus I still don't even understand.

What's there to get? He was secretly kept alive so bad guys could experiment on him.

 

[Dread]

I remember reading an earlier interview with Spencer where he said he really wanted to do a cloak and dagger series. I'm betting this mini was just a good testing ground for such things. Also a way to cement them in the Spider-verse wing of the MU since they mainly use and had their start with Spider-Man villains and Mr. Negative would be a pretty perfect antagonist for them in the long term. They fit better here than they ever could with the X-Men, so hopefully it'll stick cause I've always liked them. I would like to see the dagger power be more than just daggers cause it always seemed like cloak had powers that just dwarfed hers, but that's a minor compliant.

Cloak & Dagger have never worked well with the X-Men. Marvel tried to claim them as mutants in the 90's to boost their sales, and it didn't help then, either. But, 2009-2010 are the best years to re-try ideas that didn't work in the 90's, right? I did like their stints guest starring in RUNAWAYS, though.

Mr. Negative suits the two for a few reasons. Firstly, his color scheme. But second and most importantly, because Mr. Negative is a drug dealer (among other enterprises) and back in the 80's, C&D used to have a lot of anti-drug stories. Their entire origin was one, after all - they were LITERALLY force fed drugs by criminals. The fact that it ties into their roots as a Spider-Man spin off franchise is just the icing on the cake. The Punisher remains the most successful ASM spin off's. Venom, at times, is a close second.

You always say this but I fail to see how it's difficult (from the plot perspective anyway). Reilly's death was such a plot loop hole that people yelled about it the very moment it happened and has been ever since. Reilly was a perfected clone and couldn't degenerate. The clone who died degenerated. Therefore, it could not have possibly been Ben according to the whole point of him being the perfect clone. He was defeated by Osborn and out of the picture before Osborn brought a beat up and warn out Ben before Peter and we all know Osborn had an abundance of clones and liked playing mind games. Within the plot of the Spidey mythos Ben's return would be extremely simple... he was switched prior to being brought before Peter.

The reason Reilly degenerated back then was fairly simple. REVELATIONS was supposed to finally end the Clone Saga after ASM's sales had been destroyed due to that meandering and complicated mess of a story - at least by the end. Marvel claimed they used to get hundreds, if not thousands, of letters begging to kill Reilly off for the better part of a year by '96. Thus, if Reilly had simply died and laid there, there would have been no conclusive evidence that he wasn't "the real" Spider-Man and the tale would have solved nothing. The story sought to end the Clone Saga and get Osborn back into circulation after 20 years, under the theory of two wrongs making a right. REVELATIONS, if anything, HAD to "reveal" that Peter was real and Reilly was the clone.

Norman Osborn being involved in the clone mess was a bit of hack work by Mackie at the time to justify him as a big bad again. It would have been problematic to remind people there was a link between Osborn and Jackal now that Osborn is in prison and after DARK REIGN, nobody wants to see Norman Osborn for some time.

And is bate and swtich a hard thing? Of course not! It's already been done tons in marvel (Colossus, Multiple Man, Jean Grey). And Reilly's bate and switch would actually make sense straight from the issue he died in... unlike any of those other three I just mentioned (well, maybe Madrox). And to bring fans back to the "horrible" days of the Clone Saga... did they not just bring back Jackal and Kaine... two of the main characters of that time period?

Jackal and Kaine weren't killed off in as dramatic a fashion. Kaine has sort of just fell off into obscurity while Jackal is akin to Mr. Sinister and can always revive himself with a new body.

Marvel is in an awkward position in which DC's New 52 is a genuine, if not awkward, attempt to hook in new, lapsed, or curious readers with mostly new continuity, while anything Marvel publishes is almost impossible to penetrate unless you've been reading it a while. The X-Men are perhaps the most impossible to penetrate, but they're not alone. Thus, hinging an entire summer crossover based upon a retcon of something from 15 years prior would have been fairly ropey. Sure, SPIDER-ISLAND asked people to remember Kaine and Jackal, but nothing specific - just general ideas. Queen was amped up, but she's from 2004 so it's just a matter of repeating some exposition that's fairly recent.

Your Colossus example is the most recent, and even he was only dead about 3-5 years. And even that was already AGES ago.

So yeah... you always lay out this novel of excuses as to why it would be so insanely difficult to see a return of Ben Reilly and it really isn't difficult at all. Heck, they said Ben was pretty much winked out of existence and would never be heard from again, and yet, he showed up in the story from BND that shifted back to Ben and Kaine, and then Ben was in a new story in Spider-Man & the X-Men, and then there's all the trades they've been releasing of the Clone Saga of late. It seems to me they don't have so much of an issue letting the Clone Saga era out of the bag these days.

Reilly was featured in flashback stories. There's nothing wrong with a flashback story so long as it adds nothing constructive to continuity. I adored Gage's SPIDER-MAN AND THE X-MEN/FANTASTIC FOUR mini series, but absolutely nothing from it will ever be utilized again. Jon Hickman immediately ignored everything Kristoff did in that, for instance; the fact that Epting stuck with the new armor from that was likely a happy accident. The BND story with the Reilly flashback was just to introduce a new villain named Raptor.

So that said... why change Kaine and go against all character traits and alter him physically off panel and emotionally over several arcs to just get him to a point of being a darker Ben Reilly? Just freakin' bring back Ben Reilly, make him a little more bitter like Bucky or something and move on. It can be done in a single issue and the plot can move forward.

So, you don't like Kaine being made more like Ben Reilly, but you want Ben Reilly to act more like Brubaker's version of Bucky. Right-o.

I imagine the option was that Kaine was chosen because it didn't involve a resurrection and a retcon. He was just wandering around and then he was utilized last year and whatnot into GAUNTLET and GRIM HUNT.

Admittedly, Slott had his chance to bring Reilly back at the start of SPIDER-ISLAND when that "perfect specimen" for Jackal and Queen to mutate into Spider-King. It turned out to have been Steve Rogers, who was captured and mutated mostly off panel and via flashback pages, which admittedly was fairly awkward. Perhaps no more awkward than retconning some minor plot detail from 1996 may have been. Then, of course, we'd have Reilly and Kaine back at once and that's compound the dilemma unless one of them is killed off.

To me, it really doesn't matter who they use. They could have dusted off that last MVP clone if they wanted. The problem is that regardless of who it is, it still amounts to Spider-Man Lite or Spider-Man B, and I don't think anyone is really looking for that. Those that are, are already on VENOM, and I don't think they want another. Especially since they haven't flocked to Arana/Spider-Girl and she's been sold to audiences twice within the last 7 years. I don't think there is a place for that regardless of who it is.

JH pretty much nailed it. I mean, look at Jean Grey...died after Dark Phoenix, only to end up being a cosmic entity that replicated Jean and put her body below the frikken bay. Colossus I still don't even understand.

That was in the 80's. It's a different market and the same things won't fly.

As for Colossus, Joss Whedon claimed aliens swapped out his corpse with a copy that was cremated while they revived the original and experimented.

Sure he does... Peter's brother. That was a fantastic thing they had going and their dynamic was beautiful. Kaine can't realy fill that like Ben did and that's always a role that can be brought back and done well. His role as the potential "real" Peter is done and I wouldn't want to see it back, but to bring him back as Pete's brother and then move him away from the Clone stuff and let him grow his own legs would be fantastic. Have him do something different from Peter. He could move out west and teach at the Avengers Academy for example. Take the good aspects of Ben Reilly and mix in some of the missed stuff pre-OMD like Peter's role as a teacher. There's things you could do with him.

I can't imagine Kaine or Reilly could have taught at Avengers Academy because the cadets had already met the actual Spider-Man. It would have seen as a false Spider-Man copy who can't cut it and decided to teach. That's actually kind of pathetic. He's better off in Texas.

I don't think Peter needs a "brother". He has various supporting characters to talk to as Peter as well as MJ and no end of superheroes to talk to as Spider-Man, or both. I do agree that Kaine is awkward in that role since he was an adversary before, although wasn't the 90's retcon was that Kaine was made BEFORE Reilly, just Reilly turned out better? Thus, without Reilly or the clone degeneration, he would fill Reilly's role. Frankly, it is all a bit awkward. I'll try SCARLET SPIDER but I don't think it will last long. I don't think there is an audience for Spider-Man B. I don't think Spider-Man is a franchise that needs a half dozen useless clones of the title character or some other character like the Batman books have or the Green Lantern books have. Making everyone a Hulk didn't make it sell better, has it? It needed a relaunch with Marc Silvestri dusted off for it.

 

[JewishHobbit]

The reason Reilly degenerated back then was fairly simple. REVELATIONS was supposed to finally end the Clone Saga after ASM's sales had been destroyed due to that meandering and complicated mess of a story - at least by the end. Marvel claimed they used to get hundreds, if not thousands, of letters begging to kill Reilly off for the better part of a year by '96. Thus, if Reilly had simply died and laid there, there would have been no conclusive evidence that he wasn't "the real" Spider-Man and the tale would have solved nothing. The story sought to end the Clone Saga and get Osborn back into circulation after 20 years, under the theory of two wrongs making a right. REVELATIONS, if anything, HAD to "reveal" that Peter was real and Reilly was the clone.

Yes, but that was all behind the scenes. Marvel essentially said screw continuity to just have a moment that can "prove" that it Ben wasn't the real Peter. The problem with it was that their moment made zero sense with established continuity of the character. They wanted to prove that ben wasn't real and so they made him degenerate when Ben couldn't degenerate. It's like if Cyclops accidently killed Havoc by blasting him too hard and we were told to accept it because editorial wanted to make a point. Their powers don't work on each other but now it does just because. Just because editorial makes something happen doesn't mean it makes sense within the confines of the page and it leaves a gap wide open. That is the case with Ben Reilly.

His death proving something has absolultely nothing to do with whether or not it was a legit death. Sure, he's not the real Peter... whatever... but that doesn't mean his death made sense or was conclusive by any stretch of the imagination.

Norman Osborn being involved in the clone mess was a bit of hack work by Mackie at the time to justify him as a big bad again. It would have been problematic to remind people there was a link between Osborn and Jackal now that Osborn is in prison and after DARK REIGN, nobody wants to see Norman Osborn for some time.

I actually am very excited to see Norman back in the Avenger books. He's a great foil for them and I like that Bendis plans on playing up his feud with Spider-Man in this plot. That said, I actually never liked his return in Revelations. I've come to accept it though.

Jackal and Kaine weren't killed off in as dramatic a fashion. Kaine has sort of just fell off into obscurity while Jackal is akin to Mr. Sinister and can always revive himself with a new body.

Not as graphic but definately more final. Jackal, unmistakably Jackal, was shown falling to his death and there was a body and he was pronounced dead. Kaine had a large beam shoved through his heart. Both came back like it was nothing. As was said before, Ben could easily just be out wondering again building evidense that he is the actual clone or with amnesia or something.

Your Colossus example is the most recent, and even he was only dead about 3-5 years. And even that was already AGES ago.

What does that matter?

Reilly was featured in flashback stories. There's nothing wrong with a flashback story so long as it adds nothing constructive to continuity. I adored Gage's SPIDER-MAN AND THE X-MEN/FANTASTIC FOUR mini series, but absolutely nothing from it will ever be utilized again. Jon Hickman immediately ignored everything Kristoff did in that, for instance; the fact that Epting stuck with the new armor from that was likely a happy accident. The BND story with the Reilly flashback was just to introduce a new villain named Raptor.

Yes, but the point is that Marvel tried so hard to make people forget the Clone Saga ever existed. Now they're reintroducing people to Ben Reilly through flashbacks. Readers starting with BND know who Ben Reilly is already because of the arc with Raptor. To bring him back wouldn't be near as difficult. It would take one issue and that's it.

2 page flashback to reintroduce Ben's old relationship with Peter and his degeneration death. Other stuff with Peter going on. Ben shows up and Peter is happy to see him but ticked off that he's never told him he's alive. Ben explains that after he was switched with a clone by Osborn he had to discover the truth about it all. Give some page or two explanation as to how he did this and prove that he is certainly a clone and that Peter is real, and then explain why he was away for so long... imprisoned or something. Maybe enlisted in the Iraq war or something, who knows? Peter is glad to see him alive, give some brotherly punch for freaking him out for so long, and call it done. Less than an issue right there, all plot points are resolved, all the crappy "clone or the real one" stuff is taken care of, and they can move forward. That's it.

So, you don't like Kaine being made more like Ben Reilly, but you want Ben Reilly to act more like Brubaker's version of Bucky. Right-o.

I don't WANT Ben to be darker but if that's what Marvel wanted it would have been easier and more believable to do it with Ben than to make Kaine suddenly chatty and chipper.

I imagine the option was that Kaine was chosen because it didn't involve a resurrection and a retcon. He was just wandering around and then he was utilized last year and whatnot into GAUNTLET and GRIM HUNT.

Which is fine, but then make him Kaine... not Ben Reilly wannabe.

Admittedly, Slott had his chance to bring Reilly back at the start of SPIDER-ISLAND when that "perfect specimen" for Jackal and Queen to mutate into Spider-King. It turned out to have been Steve Rogers, who was captured and mutated mostly off panel and via flashback pages, which admittedly was fairly awkward. Perhaps no more awkward than retconning some minor plot detail from 1996 may have been. Then, of course, we'd have Reilly and Kaine back at once and that's compound the dilemma unless one of them is killed off.

I didn't read SI so I have no idea who the Spider-King is. I heard rumor that Ben might have returned but knew it likely wasn't true so I didn't pay attention and it never came back up again.

And having both Ben and Kaine back would be fine. They were such distinctively different characters from Peter and each other that they could always have survived in a shared universe together... and the same with Spidercide. That was the good thing about the Clone Saga and these clones are that the creators fleshed them out enough to be individual, not just cheap copies.

To me, it really doesn't matter who they use. They could have dusted off that last MVP clone if they wanted. The problem is that regardless of who it is, it still amounts to Spider-Man Lite or Spider-Man B, and I don't think anyone is really looking for that. Those that are, are already on VENOM, and I don't think they want another. Especially since they haven't flocked to Arana/Spider-Girl and she's been sold to audiences twice within the last 7 years. I don't think there is a place for that regardless of who it is.

This is the only part where I semi-agree with you. It would be hard to find a role for Ben in the Marvel Universe today but his brotherly connection with Peter is a start. I mentioned the Academy role as a thought. Hey, maybe he can marry MJ and have baby May! It's not like Peter's using her at the moment

That was in the 80's. It's a different market and the same things won't fly.

But it flew wonderfully when it happened with Colossus in the 00's. It's heralded as one of the best modern runs of the X-Men and no one blinks an eye.

As for Colossus, Joss Whedon claimed aliens swapped out his corpse with a copy that was cremated while they revived the original and experimented.

Which is ten times more difficult and confusing than Ben's return could be, and yet it was accepted just fine.

I can't imagine Kaine or Reilly could have taught at Avengers Academy because the cadets had already met the actual Spider-Man. It would have seen as a false Spider-Man copy who can't cut it and decided to teach. That's actually kind of pathetic. He's better off in Texas.

Kaine wouldn't make sense but Reilly would be fine. He's just as intelligent as Peter but with more world travels. Him getting out of NY to LA is in character and him trying to find a life for himself outside of Peter's would also make sense. Also, they are really trying to build up LA as a legit place in Marvel like New York is with Moon Knight, Runaways, Daken, and the Avengers Academy (plus half the X-Men off the shore of San Fransisco). It can only help sales to have a Spider-Man out there too. And you act like Teaching is a hack profession... it's a fantastic profession. Plus, you have students who are a risk to themselves and Ben knows what that's about being a "fake" of the successful Peter.

I don't think Peter needs a "brother". He has various supporting characters to talk to as Peter as well as MJ and no end of superheroes to talk to as Spider-Man, or both.

But you have to admit... none of those bounce off Peter as well as Ben did in his day. Only MJ could compare but that was tainted with OMD. Does he need a brother, not necessarilly, but would he benefit from having one again, absolutely.

I do agree that Kaine is awkward in that role since he was an adversary before, although wasn't the 90's retcon was that Kaine was made BEFORE Reilly, just Reilly turned out better? Thus, without Reilly or the clone degeneration, he would fill Reilly's role. Frankly, it is all a bit awkward.

But he doesn't fill the role like Ben did. Ben and Peter were true 'brothers' but Kaine is being shoehorned in at that role. It's much more awkward and Ben could have been a simple one issue plot and it'd be back in full force. Plus, Kaine was such a great badguy that shoehorning him into Ben's role removes that. Building Kaine as an anti-hero on his own is a great idea but then putting him in Ben's shoes as the Scarlet Spider takes away from his individuality and makes him less interesting. So for me, in theory, they're hurting Kaine in this trade as well.

 

[THANOSRULES]

I think a hook to revive Reilly would be to have him be drafted to Exiles, whose last MO was to snatch their members from death ALA the Mick Jagger /Emilio Estevez masterpiece Freejack. (Anthony Hopkins too!)

Really I do think more or equally difficult resurrection bits have been done.

Dread,

As for your thoughts on Bandit, I now don't really have complaints about the swap, or feel the need to see Dwayne come back "now", I think grievioux did a good job. While dynamics may have changed and their may be more story potential, he's essentially the same character. Knowing Marvel, 2 ears from now NT will be back and mysteriously be Dwayne, for all their continuity respect among writers now. Many people will critizize that last NW book for not being the New Warriors book we fans wanted, but i thought it was a pretty quality book on it's own..especially a good Night Thrasher story.

I'll probably check out this new SS book despite my gripes, it's up my alley and worth a shot. Spider Island was very good IMO, so I'm willing to check it out.

 

[JewishHobbit]

I really did enjoy the newest New Warriors book. Yeah, it wasn't really New Warriors but it was still a really good book on its own. I loved the arc with Machinesmith (I think that was his name). And I forget his new name but I honestly LOVED Redneck in that book and hated when he died. I'd like to see him return and since Stacey X mysteriously lived through the explosion that killed them both, there's a chance.

Well, honestly there's little to no chance anyone cares enough to bring him back... but one can hope.

 

[THANOSRULES]

Machinesmith is also involved right now in Captain America Corps FYI

 

[fifthfiend]

Spider-Man: still only good to the extent that you can pretend Pete and MJ are just married like any sane human being would have them be.

 

[fifthfiend]

My favorite thing about the ending of Spider-Island is how the ending only actually works if you allow that Slott wrote it pre-OMD then dug it out of a shoebox somewhere, scratched out "wife" and filled in "ex-girlfriend".

 

[KingMob]

Sad.

 

[Themanofbat]

Yep... it sure is sad when people hang on to stuff years later.... makes it even more sad when it's about comic books...

 

[moraldeficiency]

Yep... it sure is sad when people hang on to stuff years later.... makes it even more sad when it's about comic books...

Yes because you don't ever consider stuff that's happened years ago in the past, right? In fact Spider-Man should get retconned every year and those whiny *****es should just flow with it.

 

[Themanofbat]

Yes because you don't ever consider stuff that's happened years ago in the past, right? In fact Spider-Man should get retconned every year and those whiny *****es should just flow with it.

Yo md... your eyes are turning brown again...

 

[Spider-Nerd]

I don't buy the "continuity is too complicated for new readers" argument. Until 3 years ago I hadn't read an x-men comic since the mid 90's. All it took was an afternoon on wikipedia to catch up on things. Xaiver gone, jean dead, scott is as paranoid as bruce wayne, emma's a hero, x-men live in sf, nightcrawler dead, mutants not being born, hope born, mutants born again....Bam

 

[JewishHobbit]

Yep... it sure is sad when people hang on to stuff years later.... makes it even more sad when it's about comic books...

Well, you know, when we spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on the things I think we're entitled to a little disappointment in bad choices by Marvel executives.

 

[moraldeficiency]

Yo md... your eyes are turning brown again...

Just make your complaints better in the future and we won't have these problems.

You are a major continuity guy with Spider-Man to the point where you enter into daily contests all the time for trivia. So maybe saying it's sad when people hang on to things from the past could have been rephrased in a way that's well...better I guess is the word I'm looking for.

 

[WOLVERINE25TH]

I'll do you one better, Nerd...I came on all the books BEFORE there was Wikipedia and the web was as expansive as it is today. It took a little while, but I eventually got all caught up as much as anyone can be without losing any enjoyment in the stories I started with. And so had many others I know.

 

[Themanofbat]

Just make your complaints better in the future and we won't have these problems.

You are a major continuity guy with Spider-Man to the point where you enter into daily contests all the time for trivia. So maybe saying it's sad when people hang on to things from the past could have been rephrased in a way that's well...better I guess is the word I'm looking for.

See? This is what I'm confused about....

You claim that I'm a big continuity guy... and I AM a BIG continuity guy, but then you initially make some inane comment about how I don't care about what happened before... hence, why your eyes are turning brown.

When OMD first came out, I was pissed at the potential screw ups with continuity... but I gave them 12 to 18 months to explain themselves... and guess what? They did.

Were the answers perfect? Not really... but it works.

Yes... they were married... we have the books that state so... but then Marvel went back in time and undid that in a very mediocre (ok... piss-poor) stroy... but it works.

It's not perfect... but it works.

So no, I don't have to go back and replace the word "wife" with "girlfriend", and when pathetic posters make that claim, I think it's sad.

I beleive that's a quick recap over what happened above.

I don't want anymore retcons... and if a retcon happens, I hope to **** that it makes sene in regards to continuity.

Just make your complaints better in the future and we won't have these problems.

You are a major continuity guy with Spider-Man to the point where you enter into daily contests all the time for trivia. So maybe saying it's sad when people hang on to things from the past could have been rephrased in a way that's well...better I guess is the word I'm looking for.

So I'm not sure what your comment was about... probably nothing important. But I'm not so hot with the printed word when it comes to expressing myself.

Have a great day.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

So anyway, back to reviews...

Gladstone's School for World Conquerors: For a series with only a so-so beginning, this has become a surprising favorite every month for me. This issue features a common trope among comics featuring young characters: the f***-up. The kids take on Shakurankai, this Japanese hero with tornado powers, over the comics they recently discovered that besmirch their villainous parents' names. Unbeknownst to all but two of the kids, the comics and all of the fights they've seen between heroes and villains are part of an armistice--the real fighting's long since stopped and everything since then has been an act. The kids who don't know go after Shakurankai full-force, while the two kids who do know try to stop Shakurankai from spilling the beans. Ultimately, one thing leads to another and Martian Jones inadvertently ends up killing (apparently) Shakurankai. Hence, "the f***-up." Some other stuff happens to imply that all is not as it seems, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone who might be interested in trying the series out. Suffice it to say that it's all quite good. This series has developed from an uneven bunch of interesting characters dealing with uninteresting clichés into a fresh and engaging spin on the relatively common "children of superheroes/villains" trope. Half a year after its somewhat inauspicious start, I'm very glad I decided to try it and even more glad I decided to stick with it.