Make Mine Marvel... No More!

I spent the better part of an hour trying to articulate my thoughts on why, effective immediately, I will not being supporting any product made by Marvel Comics including comic books, novels, merchandise or movies.

I've read a number of convincing arguments from other people as to why they can no longer support the company in the wake of Secret Empire #0.  From the Veteran who was inspired to serve his country because of Captain America to the Jewish and LGBT comic shop owners who balked at being asked to dress as Nazis in order to promote the comic, there are a lot of people who have legitimate, personal reasons to be upset by this comic.

I sympathize completely. I was similarly torn by One More Day and the idea that Peter Parker - who lived and breathed the idea that With Great Power, There Must Also Always Be Great Responsibility - would sacrifice his marriage in a Faustian Pact rather than work past the guilt of having indirectly caused the death of his Aunt May.

I boycotted all things Marvel from that point on until I was convinced to lift the ban so that I could see The Avengers movie. The argument from a fellow Browncoat that I shouldn't deny myself a new Joss Whedon movie over some comic that would be changed back to normal sooner or later swayed me. I still abstained from all things Spider-Man, but I would read titles written by writers I enjoyed under the Marvel banner.

The problem I face now is that any rallying cry I make for a boycott will ring hollow. Until recently I'd only been reading two Marvel Comics on a monthly basis and I'd already dropped one of them since it looked like it was going to start requiring me to read other titles. I lack the words to make up for my lack of gravitas.

Thankfully, I have an image that captures my feelings perfectly.

The Irony of Mockingbird #8 & The Stupidity of Anti-Feminists

I've never thought much of Mockingbird. What thoughts I've had about Bobbi Morse have not progressed much beyond "Black Canary rip-off".

While that's a little unfair to the character - who existed for nearly a decade in a variety of roles before she became Mockingbird - the historical record is clear on this point. Mockingbird was paired up with Hawkeye for the first time in his 1983 solo mini-series. This occurred several months after Green Arrow (famously paired with Black Canary for over a decade at that point) appeared in his own 1983 solo mini-series. And Mark Gruenwald - who wrote the Hawkeye mini-series - was known for taking inspiration from the Distinguished Competition. (There's a reason comic critics call the original Squadron Supreme one of the best JLA Elseworlds stories ever.)

The sad truth is that Mockingbird's writers did little to distinguish her as a unique character. Her most notable story-line before her death involved her being drugged, brainwashed and raped by The Phantom Rider and Hawkeye divorcing her for allowing her rapist to fall to his death, but really because he felt that she'd cheated on him. This is because Clint Barton is the worst, but I digress.

Take that general sense that there's no real character there apart from Mrs. Hawkeye. Throw in my general antipathy towards Marvel Comics at present as well as anything tied into Civil War II (The Search For More Money!) and the odds of my ever picking up an issue of Mockingbird were slim to none.

Then this cover came out and all Holy Hell broke loose.


Faster than you could say "two tubby Tribbles in trilbies", a certain contingent of fandom arrived to take back comics from The Feminist Menace. These attacks drove Mockingbird writer Chelsea Cain from Twitter once she got sick of dealing with sorting through hate speech to get to important messages. Why they went after the writer of this book rather than the artist who drew this cover I have no idea. Then again, this contingent of fandom - well-represented by this one fellow who claimed that "comics are the last safe space for men" - are not noted for their reasoning skills.

Thankfully, their efforts at harassment have backfired horribly. Because if there's one thing the majority of comic readers can't stand regardless of political credo, socioeconomic status or religious affiliation, it's bullies. As a result, the first TP collection of the the Mockingbird series is topping the Amazon sales charts, with the print book at #1 and the Kindle edition at #2. Vol. 2 of the series is at #8 on the charts, despite not being due out until April 2017.

In all this hullabaloo over a cover, I hadn't heard anyone say anything about the content of the book. I sought out a copy of Mockingbird #8 to see how the book's interior compared to the exterior. It turns out you can judge a book by its cover and had any of the people going after Chelsea Cain bothered to read this book before complaining about it, they would have been pissed off royally.


The basic plot of Mockingbird #8 is that Bobbi is on a Comic Convention cruise and is being harassed by the ghost of her aforementioned rapist, The Phantom Rider. He's trying to torment her with news that Clint Barton is on trial for murdering Bruce Banner and trying to win her back with "sweet talk" that will sound familiar to any woman who ever rejected a "nice guy". Thankfully, Bobbi is not without friends and everyone on the cruise - from the superstar nerds to the most humble of cosplayers - are united in fighting "The Phantom" menace.

Let us pause to consider that for a moment. A bunch of anti-Feminists lost their minds over the cover of a book - not knowing the story inside the book is about fandom standing up against harassment - and wound up inspiring a mass uprising of fandom against harassment. The irony is so thick you could slap a trilby on it and call it a Men's Rights Activist.



Ignoring all irony and my instant attraction to anything involving a cameo by The Doubleclicks, Mockingbird #8 is a damn fine comic. The script by Chelsea Cain is full of wit and humor. The artwork by Kate Niemczyk, Rachelle Rosenberg and Joëlle Jones looks fantastic. In fact, I was so impressed by this issue, I went and bought the rest of the series to date on Comixology.

So do I still think Mockingbird still a Black Canary rip-off?  Yeah, I do. But I enjoyed reading this book a lot more than I did the last Black Canary book. And if a dyed-in-the-wool Dinah Lance fan like me can say that with a straight face, there's no reason for you not to pick up Mockingbird Vol. 1 yourself.

Howard The Duck #11 - A Review

Howard The Duck is dead but the chaos he attracted lives on. Now, as a group of intergalactic content-creators who manipulate the heroes of the universe for their own ends attempt to take control of the situation, Howard moves on to his final rest.

Oh, if only it were that simple...



There is little I can say about this series at this point beyond this: Chip Zdarsky and Joe Quinones have done the legacy of Steve Gerber and Val Mayerik proud.

This Howard the Duck run - too good for one volume - did not try to ape the style of the classic series but it did what the original series did in the 1970's - examine the comic industry and the world at large through the lens of The Marvel Universe and everything that makes them all so gloriously insane. This was no small thing in a year in which Howard The Duck running for President might be seen as the best of all possible options even to those who only know him for "that crappy George Lucas movie" and Marvel Comics became hopelessly devoted to promoting special event after special event.

Yet this book remained free and true to its vision to the very end. More, it proved what wonders can be created when writers and artists are free to create and not beholden to the whims of an editorial team devoted to crafting the next big spectacle, so that they may build audience interest for the next big spectacle to follow.  It is a lesson that will surely be lost upon The House of Ideas but, for a time, at least, the sanity of the everyduck prevailed.

Rediscovering The Magic: Special Edition! Marvel Cinematic: We Don't Need Your Civil War!

Back at All-Con 2016, Rick Gutierrez of United States of Geekdom & Rediscovering The Magic and I did a panel on the original Civil War comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe in general.

Here now is the audio of that panel: Rediscovering The Magic: We Don't Need Your Civil War!

A Plethora of Comic Book TV Show News

SOURCE: Warner Bros. Is Creating A TV Show For DC Comics’ Hourman

SOURCE: Marvel Teams With Netflix For Jessica Jones, Daredevil, Luke Cage, Iron Fist Original Series Leading To Team Mini-Series 

SOURCE: The CW Sets Drama Based On DC Comics’ ‘iZombie’ With Rob Thomas, Diane Ruggiero



Let me say all of this in order.

1. As a fan of Hourman, I'm actually glad to see that a lesser-known hero is being given a chance to headline a major show - particularly one who, as of right now, has yet to show up in The New 52 Universe.

2. I think the logic behind Warner Bros.choosing Hourman is entirely due to two concerns.  First, that a superhero show based around a hero whose powers are precognition and super-strength will not break the bank in terms of special effects and second, that there is far less baggage to deal with in adapting a superhero without a major following.

3. I do like the idea of a Daredevil TV series.  Legal drama.  Superhero stories.  Inspiring stories of overcoming a handicap.  Lots of angles to work with.  If they can get a Black Widow team-up for one episode, so much the better.

4. Yes, your jokes about Marvel getting a Jessica Jones series made before Wonder Woman got a new TV show are very funny.  Too bad the average American has no idea who Jessica Jones is and any attempts to explain Alias to them will probably result in confusion regarding Jennifer Garner and Elektra.

5. Also, as a feminist, I'm bothered that out of all the female characters Marvel could build a series around, they chose one whose background is dependent on a rape and who is best known as another superhero's wife.

6. Luke Cage and Iron Fist should have a show together.  They've always been more interesting as a team.

7. Granting that it's almost certainly born entirely of the current craze for zombies and procedural dramas, I'm still the most excited and hopeful about iZombie out of all of these simply because the creative team behind Veronica Mars is attached to it. 

8. For that matter, the fact that iZombie is the only one of these shows to have a definitive creative team attached to it speaks volumes.  Everything else is just hearsay at this point.

9. Regardless of whether you are a Marvel Zombie or prefer the Distinguished Competition, we should all agree that anything that encourages interest in the reading of comics - and indeed reading in general - benefits us all.

John Carter: The Gods Of Mars - A No Flying No Tights Review

SOURCE: John Carter- The Gods of Mars

I stand as one of the few who seems to have appreciated the 2012 movie John Carter. I firmly believe it to be a good film that was destroyed by bad marketing. Originally titled A Princess of Mars after the pulp novel that inspired it, the film that became known as John Carter had its title changed repeatedly.  Reportedly, various executives worried that fathers and sons wouldn’t pay to see an action movie with the word “Princess” in the title. Never mind that the plot of the story focuses on a soldier traveling to another planet and gaining superpowers! Then they demanded all reference to Mars be removed from the title and the advertising in the belief that – since no movie with the word Mars in the title had ever been a blockbuster hit – people hated Mars.
 
Throw in an ad campaign that emphasized generic CGI desert landscapes over any of the truly alien wonders of Edgar Rice Burrough’s Barsoom and you can see why John Carter may have been doomed from the start, cinematically. To my mind this is a crying shame, because it had the potential to be so much more. The script had a perfect blend of action, comedy, drama, and romance. You had a strong, likeable hero. You had an equally powerful heroine. Heck, you even had the boy and his dog angle in the form of John Carter’s loyal companion Woola the calot! What more could a franchise ask for?

I mention all this because John Carter: The Gods of Mars is a direct sequel to said film, presented in comic book form. I also mention this because this graphic novel is similarly troubled in its presentation. The artwork on the front and back cover bears no resemblance to the interior artwork by artist Ramon Perez. Perez’s artwork is competent enough, though his panel-flow is confusing at times and his character designs leave much to be desired. Far too many characters resemble one another and it is fortunate that the story keeps John Carter’s true love – the warrior princess Dejah Thoris – out of the action for most of the book, as there is no way of distinguishing her from Thuvia, another Red Martian warrior woman, who teams with John Carter for most of the story.

A larger problem is the book’s coloring which, according to the credits page, was handled by no less than four individual colorists/coloring companies! The palette changes wildly from chapter to chapter, with the coloring used for John Carter’s skin changing frequently. Why is this a problem? Because coupled with so many characters looking alike, it is hard to keep some of the characters straight when Carter’s skin is as red as the Red Martians in some panels or as white as the White Martians in others. Things become even stranger in the flashback sequences, where Green Martians are yellow and the Earthman is the same shade of blue as the Black Martians.

The story, at least, is action packed and a fair adaptation of the original Gods of Mars story by Edgar Rice Burroughs. In fact, I dare say it’s a good enough adaptation that anyone who hadn’t read the original A Princess of Mars or seen the film John Carter will be completely lost as to who is fighting whom, and why. Sam Humphries’s script could have benefited from a recap at the start.

Another eyebrow raiser is this book’s all ages rating. Considering that the John Carter film was rated PG-13 and the language used in this adaptation is at a higher level than what I’d consider fitting for the “under 8” audience Marvel’s all ages works are aimed at, I’d recommend this book for Young Adult collections if I were inclined to recommend it at all… which I’m not. Give this a miss and consider the excellent Warlord of Mars series published by Dynamite Entertainment instead.

John Carter: The Gods Of Mars
by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Sam Humphries
Art by Ramon Perez
ISBN: 9780785165132
Marvel Comics, 2012
Publisher Age Rating: All Ages

X-Men: Schism - A No Flying, No Tights Review

SOURCE: X-Men: Schism



Mutants – those beings born with natural super powers – once represented the future of humanity. But as a wise man once said, “the future isn’t what it used to be,” and various circumstances have reduced the number of mutants world-wide to just about 200. Most of them now live on an artificial island dubbed Utopia, located just off the coast of San Francisco. With Mutantkind in such dire straits, their de facto leader, Scott Summers (a.k.a. the X-Men leader Cyclops), intends to go before the United Nations and ask for the recognition of Utopia as a peaceful nation. More, he plans to ask for the destruction of any weapons technology that specifically targets mutants.

An attack on the UN by a telepathic mutant terrorist leaves the rest of the world largely unsympathetic and leads to a run on the sale of Sentinels, the robotic assassins built exclusively to hunt and kill mutants. This is all according to the machinations of Kade Kilgore, a young munitions magnate and owner of most of the world’s remaining Sentinels. As Kilgore’s plans develop, the X-Men find themselves stretched increasingly thin trying to protect a world that hates and fears them from an army of malfunctioning Sentinels. And as the threat of total destruction builds and Cyclops forces more and more young mutants into battle, Wolverine will find himself taking a stand against his leader and starting a fight for the future of Mutantkind.

I’ve never been a big X-Men fan. In fact, it would be fair to say that I believe that X-Men comics in general are the epitome of everything that is wrong with American superhero comics. The storylines are dominated by characters who had far more thought put into their powers than their personalities. You need to read more than a doctoral student working on her thesis to have even a basic grasp of the continuity. And on the rare occasions a creator tries to do something unusual or thoughtful with the concept (I’m thinking Grant Morrison’s New X-Men or Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men), the fandom revolts and demands more of the same epic storylines where Everything Changes Forever.

X-Men: Schism is guilty of all of these generalizations. And yet, I found myself enjoying it anyway. The story Jason Aaron tells here is remarkably accessible, despite being mired in some complex continuity. While most of the supporting cast doesn’t get much definition and there are a few bits where only long-time X-Fans will get the joke, the action flows well and Aaron takes the time to show off the hidden paternal side of the team badass, Wolverine. Indeed, some of the best scenes in this story involve Wolverine and his efforts to try and give some sense of normalcy to the life of a 14-year-old girl who considers herself a monster because of her powers.

While the script flows well enough, the art doesn’t always aid the story. Each of the five chapters of X-Men: Schism is drawn by a different artist, each of them possessing a completely different style. They are all good artists, but the differences seem jarring at times as the story transitions from one scene to another.

Kieron Gillen, who wrote the final issue in this TP collection, fares somewhat better in his story, detailing how the two factions of mutants are formed in the wake of the titular schism. There are a lot of effective character moments here and some good humor. Sadly, the artistic metaphor of the B-story of this chapter – an odd sequence depicting the various X-Men as a tribe of cavemen rallying around two of their fellows battling for supremacy – seems to be less about tribalism as a metaphor for the current state of the Mutant population taking sides with either Cyclops or Wolverine and more about giving artist Billy Tan a chance to draw the X-Men as fur-clad barbarians.

Despite this tiny bit of fan service and the general sense that we’ve seen a lot of this story before in various pieces (Wolverine bonds with a troubled teenage girl, Wolverine fighting Cyclops, the return of The Sentinels, etc.), I’d still recommend this book. It isn’t the greatest X-Men story ever written, but it is a must-read for those who wish to know the current status quo of the team. It is good for what it is, a well-paced action flick on paper.

X-Men: Schism
by Jason Aaron and Kieron Gillen
Art by Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel Acuna, Alan Davis, Adam Kubert and Billy Tan
ISBN: 9780785156680
Marvel Comics, 2012
Publisher Age Rating: T (13 and Up)

Comic Readers Shocked To Learn Professor X Still Alive

Comics readers were stunned this Wednesday morning as Marvel Comics revealed the latest shocking twist in the Avengers vs. X-Men storyline as Professor Charles Xavier - founder of the X-Men - was killed by his star pupil Scott Summers (a.k.a. Cyclops). However, the most shocking thing about this storyline may be that readers were not stunned by the death itself but by the fact that Professor X was still alive in the first place.

"I thought he died a while ago," said Jamie Alexander, a self-described casual comics reader. "I mostly just read the Wolverine book but I started flipping through AvX in the the store and I was all - woah, Wolverine is running a school now? Where is Professor X? And then I found out that Cyclops was on an island with Magneto and Namor. So I kinda figured Charles was dead. Again."

"Even the guys who read all the X-Men books were stunned," claims comic shop owner Buzz Winthrop. "I haven't read any X-Men books regularly since Joss Whedon was still on Astonishing X-Men and back then Xavier was off in Genosha or something. I did read X-Men Schism when the trade came out and Xavier wasn't in that at all! I just figured he'd died in somewhere and I'd missed it.

"I think this just shows how Marvel Comics is the most thrill-packed comics company in the world," boasted Marvel Comics Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada. "Those other guys? They might kill a beloved character to try and boost their sales. But us? Only we'd have the guts to kill a guy who everyone thought was dead to try and boost sales! It's a gamble but that's the way we roll, baby!"

Marvel Comics Editor In Chief Axel Alonso has promised a full investigation into whether or not Charles Xavier was already dead and promised a refund of all AvX #11 issues if that should be the case along with the release of a new six-issue Avengers vs. X-Men: X-Humed mini-series detailing Professor X's not-dying.

My thoughts on Marvel Now, for those who wondered...

SOURCE: Marvel NOW! refreshes creativity and characters

Avengers: The Movie - A Review

  
I'm going to keep this short and to the point.

Joss Whedon has not created the greatest comic book movie ever made.  Avengers: The Movie goes far beyond that.  It is so much more than we have seen in any comic book movie before now.  Avengers: The Movie captures the essence of everything that makes good comic books enjoyable and conveys it in the form of an amazing movie.

There is action, yes, and it is well-played and well-paced with only a few moments where the CGI is obvious and intrusive.  But what really sells this movie is the characters and the relationships between them.  Whedon's script is full of these little moments - bits where the characters stop being characters and start being people.  Bruce Banner and Tony Stark geeking out in a lab.  Black Widow's silent vigil over Hawkeye's sickbed as she worries over the man who saw something good worth saving in her that she never saw in herself.  Thor's pleading with Loki to put aside his anger for the good of their family.  All these little moments that are nailed by a wonderful ensemble cast. 

This is a good movie.  It is a good comic book movie but more than that it is a good movie.  You don't have to have seen any of the other Marvel Comics movies leading into it - everything will be explained for those who are new to these characters.  The characters are new to one another, so there are plenty of natural introductions as the film progresses. 

My one bit of advice?  Stick around through the all the credits.  There are two extras for those with the patience to wait.

Coming Soon - My Review of The Avengers Movie

 

Regular readers know about my personal boycott of Marvel Comics and the reasons for it.  So it might surprise you all that I've decided to lift my ban, this one time, so that I can review The Avengers movie.

Is it because I'm a big fan off Joss Whedon and don't want to miss the project that - if early reports are accurate - may finally give him the mainstream success and recognition he deserves?  No.

Is it because I don't want to miss out on what may be the biggest cultural event for geeks all year?  No.

No, it's because I realized that I have a unique opportunity that I don't think any other film critic or comics blogger has at this point. 

Having not seen Iron Man 2, Thor or Captain America, I have the ability to view the film objectively as an independent work rather than a continuation of these other films.  And given that the first negative review of The Avengers made great play of the fact that the story would be largely inaccessible to those who hadn't seen all the other Marvel movies... well, I feel a need to test that. 

So sometime towards the end of this weekend... I will be seeing The Avengers.  And for good or ill, I'll be reviewing it here.  Mark your calendars.  Tell your friends.  And be sure to support your local comic book store this Saturday when you're getting your free comics.  

THIS JUST IN: Marvel And Disney Possibly Run By Total Maroons!

SOURCE: Marvel cancelling Avengers Earth Mightiest Heroes in favor a new show inline with Ultimate Spider-man






So here's the basic situation. 

1. Disney has a cartoon, Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, which airs on their Disney XD channel.  I've only seen a few episodes myself but I agree with the accessment of my friend Rob Bricken that it is the best cartoon based on a Marvel Comic in recent memory, if not ever.  It has lots of action for the kids but at the same time is smart enough that adults can enjoy it too.

2. Jeph Loeb, whom you might remember as the man who had a hand in making the show HEROES utterly unwatchable after its' second season, has been placed in charge of Marvel's TV properties.  He's elected - due to Disney not being thrilled about the relatively low ratings of A: EMH and a desire to make an Avengers cartoon more in line with their new Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon - to cancel the series.

3. This move is coming just weeks before a big Avengers movie is due out, at which point demand for kid-friendly properties involving The Avengers is probably going to soar.

4. Nobody has apparently thought to try moving the new episodes of A: EMH to a more adventageous time-slot (the new episodes currently air on Sunday mornings at a time most Americans are in church or sleeping in) or moving the show onto the main Disney Channel,which is available in more households, in order to improve the ratings.

So... yeah.  Can anyone give me any compelling evidence that Disney or Marvel wouldn't be better off being run by a pack of feral chimps at this point?

Advertising Fail: Avengers Role-Play Accessories

SOURCE: Avengers, Assem-- Wait, Why Are You Rapping?

*sighs* Just roll it.

My Thoughts....

1. Rap music to promote a line of toys based on an all-white superhero team, modeled by a group of all-white boys?  1991 called.  They want their ad-man back.

2. Those "kids" look a little old to be playing superheroes.  Just saying.

3. No Black Widow props?  Of course not!  Because girls don't want to pretend to be superheroes!  They want to play dress up and look pretty!  (Don't worry ladies - there will be a faux-leather catsuit for you all in time for Halloween!)

Help Ghost Rider Creator Gary Friedrich!

SOURCE: Donate to Gary Friedrich

30 Days Of Night scribe Steven Niles has gotten in touch with Ghost Rider creator Gary Friedrich and has organized a PayPal drive on his behalf.

If you can give, do so. If you can't, spread the word.

One More Good Reason Not To See Ghost Rider 2 And/Or Boycott Marvel Entirely

SOURCE: MARVEL COMICS DEMANDS $17,000 from BROKE CREATOR of GHOST RIDER!

Read it and weep at how a company that has millions of dollars, backed by another company that has billions of dollars is still trying to stiff it to an ex-employee who currently has no job, no savings and no chance of paying what is chump change to The Powers That Be.

I've heard word of a movement to start a legal defense fund for Gary Friedrich. As soon as it is confirmed and legitimized, I will be posting a link.

I'm already boycotting all things Marvel so all I can do is encourage some of you to join me and to tell Marvel why you won't be supporting them anymore.

Daredevil: Reborn - A No Flying No Tights Review

SOURCE: Daredevil: Reborn
 
   

Blinded as a child by an accident that exposed him to radioactive chemicals, Matt Murdock was empowered by those same chemicals and gifted with enhancements to his other four senses that more than made up for the loss of his sight. Obsessed with justice after his father’s death at the hands of gangsters, Matt would grow up to become a lawyer and fight crime as the vigilante Daredevil. But all that is behind him.

Having abandoned New York City following the latest in a long line of difficulties, Matt Murdock is a man on the run. From the law. From his enemies. From his own past. When his wanderings lead him to a small town in the American Southwest, it doesn’t take a blind man to see that the sheriff is crooked and the local land baron/gang leader Calavera is the real law in town. With his own life and liberty threatened, Matt would be content to move on and leave the town behind. But when he learns that innocents are endangered, including the blind son of the former sheriff, Matt will have to choose between the peaceful life he longs for and the heroic destiny he’s long denied.

Author Andy Diggle is an old hand at this kind of high-action story with low-powered superheroes and his Green Arrow: Year One is a personal favorite of mine. One thing I must note is that this volume is a wonderful jumping-on point. Unlike many recent Marvel Comics, this volume is easily accessible to new readers who might not have read a Daredevil story before. This was something of a relief to me, as I hadn’t read Daredevil for several years myself and wasn’t up to speed on current events.

The plot is fairly standard stuff but Diggle makes it seem fresh and new. With the Southwestern background, a boy in need of a hero, and a story based around Murdock’s internal conflict between a desire for normalcy and his personal sense of justice, comparisons to the classic western Shane are inevitable. But Diggle’s tale avoids any cliché romance with the blind boy’s mother. And Matt’s final battle against the corrupt forces running the town come down to the battle of one man against many rather than a war between two factions.

Many Daredevil artists drown their artwork in ink, trying to physically convey the literal and figurative darkness of Matt Murdock’s world. This style is one of the hallmarks of long-time Andy Diggle collaborator Jock, who produced the cover art that separates each chapter of this volume. The cover of this trade paperback is particularly noteworthy – a glorious piece which depicts the slums of Manhattan in black and grey, the darkness broken only by white-hot lightning strikes. Above it all, traced with Daredevil’s famous custom nunchucks, lies the outline of a dead man.

While Jock’s style would be effective for a story set in the alleys of Hell’s Kitchen, it might be ill-suited toward a story set in the American desert and interior artist Davide Gianfelice is wise enough to limit his own inks accordingly. With the character-design skills of John Romita Jr. and a style that evokes Michael Lark without being quite so muddy, Gianfelice was a good choice to handle the pencils and inks of this book. Colorist Matt Hollingsworth also deserves praise for his choice of palette.

One content note – this book earns it’s T (13 and Up) rating. There’s a goodly bit of ultra-violence, bloodshed, and some subtle language indicating that the former sheriff’s widow has turned to prostitution to make ends meet. Still, there’s nothing that I believe would mark this volume as unsuitable for most teen graphic novel collections.

Daredevil: Reborn
by Andy Diggle
Art by Davide Gianfelice, Matt Hollingsworth
ISBN: 978078515133
Marvel Comics, 2011
Publisher Age Rating: T (13 and Up)

Marvel Announces Big Crossover Shocker - Heroes Fighting Heroes!

SOURCE: Marvel Comics pits 'Avengers vs. X-Men' in 2012

Anybody else miss the days when superheroes fought crime instead of each other?

The (not so) Amazing Spider-Man Trailer and Why This Movie Will Suck.

Is it just me, or does this movie look really depressing?

Now, I know what you're thinking - isn't Peter Parker sort of a depressing character, defined by tragedy? After all, let's consider his past. His parents were killed, leaving him to be raised by his elderly aunt and uncle. He's directly responsible, through inaction, for the death of his beloved Uncle Ben. He's indirectly responsible, through association, for the deaths and injuries of at least a dozen loved ones because his vigilante lifestyle has put so many people in danger.

The answer is yes - Peter Parker is defined by tragedy. But - and this is the important thing - he should not be consumed by it. Because at his core, Peter is someone who refuses to let the bad things beat him down or make him stop trying to make things better.

I don't see any sign of that in this trailer. All I see is lots of angst and emo behavior on the part of Peter. There's none of the sense of fun that Spider-Man should convey, particularly in the lifeless CGI swinging scenes.

So yeah... despite my love of Spider-Man and Emma Stone being far easier on my eyes than Kirsten Dunst, I don't think I'll be lifting my ban on all things Marvel to see this one.

House Of Bad Ideas Continues To Throw Money Away

SOURCE: Jon Favreau Won’t Direct Iron Man 3.

One informed source hears that [Favreau] was frustrated with Marvel’s urge to stuff more of their in-house heroes into the next film in the wake of The Avengers. In a recent interview with MTV News, Favreau explained that based on his conversations with Marvel Studios executives, he had no clarity as to what a third Iron Man film would even be about. “In theory, Iron Man 3 is going to be a sequel or continuation of Thor, Hulk, Captain America and Avengers,” said Favreau at the time, “This whole world … I have no idea what it is. I don’t think they do either, from conversations I’ve had with those guys.”

This comes as no surprise. Critics who liked the first Iron Man movie for offering a sophisticated morality play about a flawed man's efforts to change himself for the better and do good in an increasingly hostile world tore apart the second movie, which sacrificed a lot of the Tony Stark character moments for totally unrelated (and, in some cases, confusing) scenes meant to set up the next batch of Marvel Comics movies.

The problem is that while we now have technology that allows us to make live-action movies that look just like comic books, the people calling the shots at Marvel don't seem to realize that you can't write a movie like a comic book.

Comics are built on the cliff-hanger. The "And so the world is safe for now... but for how long?" moment at the end. Movies, by contrast, have to have some degree of closure. You cannot make a multi-million dollar film that is made up of sneak-peaks of "Next Year's Storyline" and expect it to please anyone other than the action movie fans who are more concerned with cool visuals and Scarlet Johansson's perfect butt-cheeks encased in black leather.

Which, now that I think of it, is the stereotype of the average male comic reader.

My point in all of this is that it seems remarkably short-sighted on Marvel's part to give the axe to a talented director who is a fan of the material simply because he feels having a coherent story is more important than promoting The Next Big Thing. And I ain't talking Ben Grimm.

The sad thing is... we've seen this story before. And we already know how this drama is going to play out.

It happened in Spider-Man 3, when Marvel forced Sam Raimi to shoe-horn Venom into the movie when he didn't want to. To Rami's credit, I think he rebelled and all the stuff the Venom fans complained about (i.e. the symbiote awakening Peter's love of dance and piano playing, muscleman Eddie Brock being played by skinny Topher Grace, dying like a punk) was done specifically to highlight just what a ridiculous character Venom is.

It happened with X-3: The Last Stand when Bryan Singer left and Marvel got a director who was willing to cram in more mutants and put Halle Berry front and center. And what did we wind up with? A sprawling mess with lots of characters we hardly knew and didn't care about, doing things that were barely understood and the realization that Monsters Ball was the fluke, not Catwoman.

And I don't want to say that Marvel Comics tends to encourage the employment of sycophants who will toe the company line over creative and talented artists with a proven track record of creating quality material... but how else can you explain that their habit of letting talented directors like Singer, Raimi and Favreau go free while putting someone like Jeph Loeb in charge of the development of all of their TV properties.

Jeph Loeb who, in case you needed reminding, was responsible for most of the storyline of Season 3 of Heroes and was fired because of "execs' frustration with the creative direction of the show" and "hefty budget overruns... that are going well beyond its already sizable $4 million per-seg pricetag".

Which, given how cheap Marvel is apparently becoming, can't end well for Loeb.

THIS JUST IN: Marvel Puts The Screws To Cash-Tight Readers Again!

SOURCE: Marvel Point One Aims to Give New Readers a Jumping On Point With '.1' Issues

Do you all remember how shortly after DC Comics announced that they were dropping the price on their $3.99 books to $2.99, Marvel announced they were doing the exact same thing?

The bad (if unsurprising) news is that Marvel was lying. It turns out that they were referring to a new series of ".1" books, aimed at new readers who have no idea what is going on in the current storyline of Marvel's most popular titles.

Now, I know what you're thinking - that's actually a pretty good idea and it would throw a life preserver to all the would-be comics readers adrift on the sea of continuity. And I'll admit that if you ignore the lies and the countless on-line resources that allow a casual fan to get into the swing of things in a hurry, that is a good idea...

... except for the VERY Bad News.

The very bad news is that these .1 issues will also be used to premiere new material and information. Indeed, Marvel is going to introduce a new Venom in the first Amazing Spider-Man .1 issue.

So really... not only is Marvel NOT lowering the price of their comics - they are introducing yet another gimmick book that the die-hard fans MUST have in order to know what is going on in their favorite titles.