Tpull's Weekly Marvel Comics Review

March 6, 2010 8:48 PM | Comments:

The Amazing Spider-Man 623

by Mark Waid and Paul Azaceta

Electro breaks the new Vulture out of the Raft and lets him fly loose; all of the rogues are working for Miss Kraven. The one thing that’s been missing from all of this is why they would agree to follow her lead. Electro just got a power-up, and he’s been reveling in it. Now he acts more like a hired flunky. None of this is working for me. Acazeta’s art does not fit this title. The new Vulture makes me miss Toomes. The vomiting acid trick is more up the alley of someone like Venom or Carnage. The bland mob story can’t spark my interest in this guy at all.

The Vulture believes a desperate mob guy and falls for the frame job that JJJ hired someone to turn him into his current monstrous form. The art is so lazy, they give us four news screens alternated by white space. For those of us who sometimes count panels to see how many panels we get for our entertainment dollar, this is an insult. Waid also has reverted to using modern political pablum, thinly disguised for our comics. I don’t even watch those television panels where they have four people debating politics and interrupting each other, but I’ve seen a few seconds of them here and there over the years. I don’t like watching them, and I don’t care for them here. Just about all of Mark Waid’s recent writing for Spidey has had these political references, ostensibly because JJJ is currently the mayor, but it really reads as if he has lost his original thought, and is just pulling things off the TV. If there is not a shift soon, this title will go on the chopping block for me.

Invincible Iron Man 24

by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca

Yay, it’s over! The Ghost tries to kill Stark, but Doctor Strange comes to the rescue. He has the upper hand, too, until Ghost shoves his hand into the doc’s chest, doing a Vision-type phasing attack. Inside Tony’s head, he is confronting victims of his weapons, and stepping in the spilled blood from his history as an arms dealer. Unfortunately, Tony’s arms deal past is just that: far in the past. There was no modern reference for the reader to grab onto and relate to these kinds of issues Tony has, and Fraction doesn’t bother using any framework to try to explain why this would be the biggest deal regarding piecing him back together. More relevant and current might have been issues involving the apparent death of Steve Rogers, Bill Foster, and other train wrecks associated with the Civil War and his other recent failures.

In the real world, the Ghost is conveniently interrupted again by Maria Hill, stalled just enough for pepper to get out her phone and call HAMMER to rat out the Ghost. Tony finally wakes up and grabs the phone off of ghost that lets him teleport via technology, and dials a number for the Seoul branch of his old company. It’s okay, but there’s nothing really exciting in any of this. They took two years to do a more individualized “disassemble” story, boring us to tears when they could have done it in two or three issues.

After all of the nonsense is finally out of the way, they give him memory gaps, due to the “backup hard drive of his mind.” It’s an old copy, see. You remember the last five years, when every writer spent a lot of time explaining how Tony is a futurist, and he can predict what’s going to happen, and his brilliance and knowledge of technology made him the best to lead us all? Well, Tony the genius doesn’t know the old rule of backup early and backup often. So we get a repeat of Hank Pym, as Tony has to be brought up to speed on the events of the latest few months. All I can hope is that we can finally move on and get to something that resembles an interesting comic. In the meantime, notice that the headlines that Tony reviews show Cap getting shot, but no mention of Black Goliath. Because, you know, he was just Black Goliath...

The Mighty Avengers 34

by Dan Slott, Christos N. Gage and Khoi Pham

This issue actually has a classic feel to it, one that reminds me of John Buscema for some reason. Pym finally reveals to Quicksilver that Loki is the one disguised as his sister, the Scarlet Witch. The team tracks Loki down and traps him, and begins torturing him a little, figuring he knows where Wanda really is. For all we know, she’s still hidden in her little villa, last seen having a quick fling with Clint Barton.

Loki sends a distress call to Thor, who arrives to see an awkward situation. He actually takes Loki’s side for a moment, and knocks Quicksilver on his butt, which is always fun to see. Pym asks a different question of Loki: will he join the team?!?

This issue has a lot of great moments to it. The art fits very well, but the true star is the characterization. Pietro is classically arrogant, the Vision lets slip some words that hint he still cares for Wanda, which Cassie picks up on with light speed, and we learn that the whole “Scientist Supreme” thing was a joke set up by Loki (or so he claims). I’m going to side with Loki on this one, since it was so ridiculous. That doesn’t phase Pym one bit. Still acting totally confident of himself, and falling back into “scientist” mode, he refers to his Mighty team as an experiment, and mentions that Loki is an element injected into the mix that seems to be responsible in part for the assemblage of these powerful teams in the first place.

The entire team immediately concludes he is a lunatic, to include Loki, and it looks like the team instantly disintegrates. In the meantime, Ultron has co-opted most of Jocasta’s bodies at the mansion. It’s all fun until your android-based-on-your-dead-wife’s-memory, whose name you have taken, gets possessed by your robotic child.

I’ve been deliberately staying away form news about the new Avengers line-up as much as I can, but I seem to remember seeing ads for a New Avengers, a Secret Avengers, and I think a title just called Avengers. I wish they had room to keep Mighty around.

Ultimate Avengers 5

by Mark Millar and Carlos Pacheco

Is it just me, or is this title a little late? The Red Skull’s history of rebellion shows that he was responsible for President Kennedy’s assassination. By the time the team tracks him down, he already has a functional cosmic cube. Did we mention this is supposed to be the Ultimate universe, where they try new things? Even for all of their “brilliant” changes here, making the Red Skull the son of Steve Rogers, he doesn’t do anything besides what the regular Skull has done a dozen times: try to get a cube.

Cap escapes custody and heads out, because naturally the Skull will use his cube to take out the team, and only Steve will somehow be able to triumph in the end. Pacheco does what he can for the art, giving us a few dramatic scenes here and there. Still, the predictable nature of the story is something of a let-down, especially for $3.99.

Ultimate New Ultimates 1

by Jeph Loeb and Frank Cho

I kid you not, the indicia calls this title the “Ultimate New Ultimates.” I’m not sure how to avoid using this word, because I know some people find it offensive nowadays, but this title is retarded. I’m guessing it is supposed to be the next story after the Ultimate Avengers story wraps up, but for some reason they didn’t want to hold it for the sixth and final issue of that series. The cover is a six-page fold-out, and kind of cool, but also about one page short of good imagination.

The plot is a little lame, with the Defenders showing up on the rooftop to immediately ambush Hawkeye and Iron Man. Cap, Zarda, and Valkyrie show up to help out, but the bad guys capture Thor’s hammer and run off with it, magically disappearing. We cut to a scene that shows Thor in Hel, and asking to return to life and his love. Hela takes off her clothes and tells him to give her a baby. I’m not sure if the following panel really does well to help us know what Thor is thinking about her offer, but you have to give Cho props for this, he does know how to draw a sexy woman.

Loki and Enchantress show up in front of Kazar and Shanna, and we end with Tony sleeping with Carol Danvers. The plot is not the best in the world, but considering it’s Jeph Loeb, it’s actually one of the most coherent stories I’ve seen from him in years. One of the big problems with this title is that they do not spend much time developing the characters, working too much off of the archetypes form Marvel Proper. It’s hard to work up the interest for these characters when it seems like we’re just visiting an alternate universe, and that’s it. We need more time to learn how different these people are, if they are to be relevant to us. As it is, we’re still basically getting the same stories with mostly the same cast. Is that sustainable?

Tpull is Travis Pullen. He started reading comics at 5 years old, and he can't seem to stop.

The Amazing Spider-Man 623 \n\n by Mark Waid and Paul Azaceta \n\nElectro breaks the new Vulture out of the Raft and lets him fly loose; all of the rogues are working for Miss Kraven. The one thing that’s been missing from all of this is why they would agree to follow her lead. Electro just got a power-up, and he’s been reveling in it. Now he acts more like a hired flunky. None of this is working for me. Acazeta’s art does not fit this title. The new Vulture makes me miss Toomes. The vomiting acid trick is more up the alley of someone like Venom or Carnage. The bland mob story can’t spark my interest in this guy at all. \n\nThe Vulture believes a desperate mob guy and falls for the frame job that JJJ hired someone to turn him into his current monstrous form. The art is so lazy, they give us four news screens alternated by white space. For those of us who sometimes count panels to see how many panels we get for our entertainment dollar, this is an insult. Waid also has reverted to using modern political pablum, thinly disguised for our comics. I don’t even watch those television panels where they have four people debating politics and interrupting each other, but I’ve seen a few seconds of them here and there over the years. I don’t like watching them, and I don’t care for them here. Just about all of Mark Waid’s recent writing for Spidey has had these political references, ostensibly because JJJ is currently the mayor, but it really reads as if he has lost his original thought, and is just pulling things off the TV. If there is not a shift soon, this title will go on the chopping block for me.\n\n\n Invincible Iron Man 24 \n\n by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca \n\nYay, it’s over! The Ghost tries to kill Stark, but Doctor Strange comes to the rescue. He has the upper hand, too, until Ghost shoves his hand into the doc’s chest, doing a Vision-type phasing attack. Inside Tony’s head, he is confronting victims of his weapons, and stepping in the spilled blood from his history as an arms dealer. Unfortunately, Tony’s arms deal past is just that: far in the past. There was no modern reference for the reader to grab onto and relate to these kinds of issues Tony has, and Fraction doesn’t bother using any framework to try to explain why this would be the biggest deal regarding piecing him back together. More relevant and current might have been issues involving the apparent death of Steve Rogers, Bill Foster, and other train wrecks associated with the Civil War and his other recent failures.\n\nIn the real world, the Ghost is conveniently interrupted again by Maria Hill, stalled just enough for pepper to get out her phone and call HAMMER to rat out the Ghost. Tony finally wakes up and grabs the phone off of ghost that lets him teleport via technology, and dials a number for the Seoul branch of his old company. It’s okay, but there’s nothing really exciting in any of this. They took two years to do a more individualized “disassemble” story, boring us to tears when they could have done it in two or three issues.\n\nAfter all of the nonsense is finally out of the way, they give him memory gaps, due to the “backup hard drive of his mind.” It’s an old copy, see. You remember the last five years, when every writer spent a lot of time explaining how Tony is a futurist, and he can predict what’s going to happen, and his brilliance and knowledge of technology made him the best to lead us all? Well, Tony the genius doesn’t know the old rule of backup early and backup often. So we get a repeat of Hank Pym, as Tony has to be brought up to speed on the events of the latest few months. All I can hope is that we can finally move on and get to something that resembles an interesting comic. In the meantime, notice that the headlines that Tony reviews show Cap getting shot, but no mention of Black Goliath. Because, you know, he was just Black Goliath...\n\n\n The Mighty Avengers 34 \n\n by Dan Slott, Christos N. Gage and Khoi Pham \n\nThis issue actually has a classic feel to it, one that reminds me of John Buscema for some reason. Pym finally reveals to Quicksilver that Loki is the one disguised as his sister, the Scarlet Witch. The team tracks Loki down and traps him, and begins torturing him a little, figuring he knows where Wanda really is. For all we know, she’s still hidden in her little villa, last seen having a quick fling with Clint Barton.\n\nLoki sends a distress call to Thor, who arrives to see an awkward situation. He actually takes Loki’s side for a moment, and knocks Quicksilver on his butt, which is always fun to see. Pym asks a different question of Loki: will he join the team?!?\n\nThis issue has a lot of great moments to it. The art fits very well, but the true star is the characterization. Pietro is classically arrogant, the Vision lets slip some words that hint he still cares for Wanda, which Cassie picks up on with light speed, and we learn that the whole “Scientist Supreme” thing was a joke set up by Loki (or so he claims). I’m going to side with Loki on this one, since it was so ridiculous. That doesn’t phase Pym one bit. Still acting totally confident of himself, and falling back into “scientist” mode, he refers to his Mighty team as an experiment, and mentions that Loki is an element injected into the mix that seems to be responsible in part for the assemblage of these powerful teams in the first place.\n\nThe entire team immediately concludes he is a lunatic, to include Loki, and it looks like the team instantly disintegrates. In the meantime, Ultron has co-opted most of Jocasta’s bodies at the mansion. It’s all fun until your android-based-on-your-dead-wife’s-memory, whose name you have taken, gets possessed by your robotic child.\n\nI’ve been deliberately staying away form news about the new Avengers line-up as much as I can, but I seem to remember seeing ads for a New Avengers, a Secret Avengers, and I think a title just called Avengers. I wish they had room to keep Mighty around.\n\n\n Ultimate Avengers 5 \n\n by Mark Millar and Carlos Pacheco \n\nIs it just me, or is this title a little late? The Red Skull’s history of rebellion shows that he was responsible for President Kennedy’s assassination. By the time the team tracks him down, he already has a functional cosmic cube. Did we mention this is supposed to be the Ultimate universe, where they try new things? Even for all of their “brilliant” changes here, making the Red Skull the son of Steve Rogers, he doesn’t do anything besides what the regular Skull has done a dozen times: try to get a cube.\n\nCap escapes custody and heads out, because naturally the Skull will use his cube to take out the team, and only Steve will somehow be able to triumph in the end. Pacheco does what he can for the art, giving us a few dramatic scenes here and there. Still, the predictable nature of the story is something of a let-down, especially for \$3.99.\n\n\n Ultimate New Ultimates 1 \n\n by Jeph Loeb and Frank Cho \n\nI kid you not, the indicia calls this title the “Ultimate New Ultimates.” I’m not sure how to avoid using this word, because I know some people find it offensive nowadays, but this title is retarded. I’m guessing it is supposed to be the next story after the Ultimate Avengers story wraps up, but for some reason they didn’t want to hold it for the sixth and final issue of that series. The cover is a six-page fold-out, and kind of cool, but also about one page short of good imagination.\n\nThe plot is a little lame, with the Defenders showing up on the rooftop to immediately ambush Hawkeye and Iron Man. Cap, Zarda, and Valkyrie show up to help out, but the bad guys capture Thor’s hammer and run off with it, magically disappearing. We cut to a scene that shows Thor in Hel, and asking to return to life and his love. Hela takes off her clothes and tells him to give her a baby. I’m not sure if the following panel really does well to help us know what Thor is thinking about her offer, but you have to give Cho props for this, he does know how to draw a sexy woman.\n\nLoki and Enchantress show up in front of Kazar and Shanna, and we end with Tony sleeping with Carol Danvers. The plot is not the best in the world, but considering it’s Jeph Loeb, it’s actually one of the most coherent stories I’ve seen from him in years. One of the big problems with this title is that they do not spend much time developing the characters, working too much off of the archetypes form Marvel Proper. It’s hard to work up the interest for these characters when it seems like we’re just visiting an alternate universe, and that’s it. We need more time to learn how different these people are, if they are to be relevant to us. As it is, we’re still basically getting the same stories with mostly the same cast. Is that sustainable?\n\nTpull is Travis Pullen. He started reading comics at 5 years old, and he can't seem to stop.

Tpull's Weekly Marvel Comics Review

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