Sperg about comic books here

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Stab You in the Back said:
I read a couple of "funny" superhero books recently, and I want to sperg about what works and what doesn't.

What doesn't work: Deadpool.

Deadpool sucks. No, really, he's just the worst. He's not funny. He's not clever. His books don't have any stakes because he's invincible. There's no reason to read his stories unless you like to see brutal murder being trivilized, but then, the books I read didn't even have that.
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I've also never really liked Deadpool, especially what's been done with him the past 20 or so years.
I think you'd really like Ambush Bug. He's basically the antithesis to Deadpool, and was created earlier actually. What's great is that he was created by someone who actually knows how to make comics fun and funny. (Keith Giffen, compared to Rob Liefeld, who, while overhated, is about as far from the words "clever" and "subtle" as the Grand Canyon is deep) Keith's also the guy that created Lobo, so he knows how to parody capeshit and do it in an interesting and fun way.
Why Ambush Bug works for me and why Deadpool doesn't is I think it comes down to how they're fundamentally treated by their writers. Ambush Bug's only been written by Giffen, so he's incredibly consistent for an obscure DC character from the 80s. Ambush Bug is an idiot. Nobody takes him seriously. Anytime he schleps his way into the Watchtower to be a member of the Justice League, he's fired within a day for being incompetent. He's basically a manchild with an overactive imagination who's watched too much TV and read too many comics. His "power" is that he's self-aware about being a comic book character, so he teleports between panels at will. Why this works compared to Deadpool's Fourth Wall breaking is because it's always in the service of telling jokes. But unlike Deadpool, who's also an idiot, he's not a murderous le silly Reddit sociopath. The jokes in Ambush Bug are never "violence=funny". Ambush Bug's always trying to talk himself out of situations, and he rarely if ever gets in a fight. And how are fights resolved? Through jokes, both visual and written.
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So give the 'Bug a try. It also helps that he never overstays his welcome. You can knockout literally every single comic he's ever appeared in up to this point within a couple hours, and while the jokes are heavily based on poking fun at inside baseball industry stuff, DC comics, and just the general silliness of having this green retard running around teleporting constantly, it never gets old.
 
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Can someone explain to me the X-Men Red omnibus? Its not the Jean Grey one. It looks like its Storm and Abigail Brand and Magneto?
 
Scarlett Johansson said:
Can someone explain to me the X-Men Red omnibus? Its not the Jean Grey one. It looks like its Storm and Abigail Brand and Magneto?
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It's the continuation of the SWORD title. In the first Hellfire Gala, they terraform Mars and give it to the Arakko mutants. The X-Men Red book (because Red like Mars) is about Storm and Magneto getting spots in the ruling council of Arakko and trying to curb their warlike ways, while Brand tries to play 4D chess to gain more political power for SWORD and herself in the galatic stage.

strumpets exeunt said:
So, basically, Joss made a mistake and set Brand up with a wholesome romance with Beast back in the day. And Marvel is dead set on undoing everything even remotely hetero.
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Beast and Brand actually get a psychopathically romantic scene during the book, though they don't get back together.
 
I imagine it'll all be included in future omnibuses. So I can wait.

Messiah Trilogy finally being collected is great. Now.....if they could just include Necrosha? (Or better yet Necrosha and several Selene stories from UXN, New Mutants, etc). I can't even remember where it fell chronologically. She is alive and well in current timeline right?

Secret Six's second omnibus is absolutely insane?! From From Waller attacking with the Suicide Squad to Catman ripping off a guy's face with his teeth to get to his kid, to the wild west episode and the Most Dangerous Game parody where they're on an island fighting against neckbeards who use presidents as codenames. I'm not even halfway through.

I'm glad Thomas Blake isn't in the DCEU. I can't imagine anyone who could do him justice in the live action. Maybe Lee Pace but aside from him....nobody. That and the Six in general. (Tell me Faruiza Balk wasn't the inspiration for Black Alice though).
 
Nick Obre said:
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That's the problem with so many of these replacements, they come in dismissing the replaced, because their writers have no respect and they think they're better than the pale male & stale and that they're leaving their mark.
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Honestly, this is why I genuinely loved this comic. It was crucial not only to have Jamie mentored by his predecessor's old team members but also to have them genuinely understand and share with him how they viewed Ted. It's a truly respectful insight into Ted, and a passing of the torch in its own way. Jamie might have been the newer and better model in the Blue Beetle legacy, but he was actually someone who was taught by the right people at the right time. They could have dumped him on the main leaguers as a background character, but the creators actually gave a damn about telling an actual story after a bullshit end to Ted.

Ted's death could have easily been a Barbra Gordon situation. A shock value plot point that pretty much ended the character's existence for a time. The only reason they'd come back in a meaningful way is because someone who cared about the character had to dig them out of the trash and put them back together somehow. We just got lucky that the right people were there at the right time.

Anyways, enough of my bullshit. I just had to drag this back up because no one hardly acknowledges that replacement syndrome. We need more of this, and plots like Vic Sage preparing Montoya to become The Question.
 
Lain The Tranny Beater said:
Honestly, this is why I genuinely loved this comic. It was crucial not only to have Jamie mentored by his predecessor's old team members but also to have them genuinely understand and share with him how they viewed Ted. It's a truly respectful insight into Ted, and a passing of the torch in its own way. Jamie might have been the newer and better model in the Blue Beetle legacy, but he was actually someone who was taught by the right people at the right time. They could have dumped him on the main leaguers as a background character, but the creators actually gave a damn about telling an actual story after a bullshit end to Ted.

Ted's death could have easily been a Barbra Gordon situation. A shock value plot point that pretty much ended the character's existence for a time. The only reason they'd come back in a meaningful way is because someone who cared about the character had to dig them out of the trash and put them back together somehow. We just got lucky that the right people were there at the right time.

Anyways, enough of my bullshit. I just had to drag this back up because no one hardly acknowledges that replacement syndrome. We need more of this, and plots like Vic Sage preparing Montoya to become The Question.
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I think it also helps that Jaime just has a really good costume. Like I think it looked really good in live action though I profess I haven't actually seen the film.

DC usually is pretty good about doing legacy characters
 
Currently started the new Spider-Man Noir run. It's only 2 Issues in but im praying to god Gwen Stacy isnt going to be sticking around long.I am also not a big fan of the way they changed Noir Peter's entire personality to more closely align with 616 when the thing that stuck out about this version was the LACK of quips and the more grounded tone outside of Spider God bullshit. It's so fucking frustrating.
 
I just read the DC Compact edition of Batman: The Court of Owls. Modern DC tends to be better than modern Marvel, but I still was mostly meh on the whole affair. The story fell into a couple of my personal pet peeves:

-an attempt to turn the story into a metatextual treatise on Batman
-a new writer retconning Bruce's history in order to establish a new villain
-Batman relying on technology--essentially magic--instead of detective work to investigate leads
-Batman relying on technology--essentially turning him into Iron Man--instead of training and experience to win fights
-a painfully obvious twist
-nonsensical writing in order to get Batman out of corners the writer painted himself in

The art wasn't bad (wasn't great either, imo), but the pacing, plot and writing were god awful. It reminds me a lot of the shit Jeph Loeb would write, specifically Hush. To his credit, unlike Loeb, Snyder doesn't rely on established villains to push sales.

Here's a tip for writers: If you're going to introduce ONE new character, its not going to be a twist when he turns out to be the villain. Either introduce several new characters or tell that character's story throughout the narrative so there's some significance to him being the bad guy.

The compact format itself is great. I like to read when I walk, so, like a novel or a manga, its the perfect size because it fits in one hand. Its just the selection of stories they choose to print in compacts that sucks.

I know this review is a little short and goes into no detail, but I wasn't even planning on reading the story until yesterday. I am reading the first three Batman DC's Finest and I will write a very long review of those when I finish.

In the meantime, here's a recent cover I picked up at auction. Typically I rail about how the colorist fucks up a good piece of art. Here, I think the artist does a good job of enhancing the ethereal nature of the piece.

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AGPinochet said:
I am a chud, I am not offended by this, I just thought it was funny

I don't usually read comic books but I mindlessly clicked a YouTube video on the Punisher Max Moldovan sex traffickers arc and decided to read the entirety of Punisher Max for no other reason than I felt inspired to do so.

And my main takeaway is that Barracuda is one of the most unintentionally racist depictions of a nigga I have ever seen, violent, hypersexual, amoral murdering rapist with gaudy gold teeth who will do anything for a dollar. It's almost comedic. Funnily enough he's not transphobic

I mean seriously look at this bullshit
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Man, i simply love 'Cuda. Long, Cold Dark is maybe my favorite Punisher MAX arc, though they are all pretty good, don't care for Kitchen Irish though. If you haven't read them yet definitely check out Punisher: Born and Cell, both are outstanding. 'Cuda's own comic i found to be average at the most but worth it for Parlov's artwork.
 
Some discussion of titles that parodied aspects of superhero books, reminded me of one short-lived, nearly forgotten title from DC that was printed in the 90s, Young Heroes In Love. It was promoted as having soap opera-ish elements, and did indeed lean towards soap (though more Melrose Place than daytime soap) but it has some decent satire about superhero teams. In this case, it was about a loose grouping of young twenty-something who form a sort of super team that's more thrown together like a garage band. Though they do so with the dream of hitting the big time, one day in between dealing with villains like the Birthday Boy (a deranged manchild who kidnaps people to "attend" the parties he holds for himself), finding out shocking secrets, occasionally running into a DC heavy hitter like Blue Electric Costume-era Superman and goofing around (and/or getting caught at it).

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So Guggenheim omnibus and Bendis omnibus are a no buy. Apparently the latter's run is boring and he did whatever the fuck with Rachel Summers. The latter I've heard is mixed opinions. Tbh I don't really care about that lineup. Are they ever going to release a Red omnibus (the first series where Jean led the team)

Apparently the x-men comics are objectively ass post krakoa. Except I am probably getting Alyssa Wong's Psylocke solo because I've heard good things. Not sure why they're giving Betsy a new solo because from what I've seen, everyone prefers Kwannon. I find her better written.

Lol at the artist they fired from x-men gold for slipping in Islamic content.
 
ChampFantana said:
Of all the MAX artists, I think Parlov is a lesser artist than Leandro Fernandez.

He's better than Chaykin though, so at least he has that going for him.
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I used to dislike Parlov's style immensely but over time that Euro shit really grew on me. I think i sperged about Chaykin and his work on Punisher MAX #50 before ITT, i have no idea what the fuck he was thinking. His artwork is beyond shitty in that, offensively so. I read American Flagg!, i know he can do much better.
 
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