Siege Books for 3-24

Thunderbolts 142

Good god, this is what everyone needs to look at over at Marvel and DC if they need to know how to do a tie-in to a crossover book. My god, Jeff Parker tells a fantastic story. Let us count why this is awesome:

1) It is a tie-in that advances a plot and seems as if it has some importance to the main title. I know the Spear of Odin is not going to show up in Siege 4, but that doesn't mean the books can't act like they're some important piece to the over-all story, and this plot about the Thunderbolts getting the Spear of Odin to Osborn to help him defeat the Asgardians is exactly that. You have some real tangible proof that if something bad happens in this book, then people in the main story could be in serious trouble.

2) It has The Mighty Avengers

2.5) U.S.Agent vs Scourge. you never knew you would want this fight to happen until it actually happened.

3) "You've blown my cover. That's another demerit." God bless you, Nuke.

New Avengers 63

This, thankfully, is one of the better Bendis written tie-ins to Siege. It is not ALL flashback. In fact, the only thing the flashback sequences accomplish is to provide characterization of Cage, Jessica, Hawkeye, and Mocking Bird. I don't mind knowing how each of these respective characters feel about the Siege of Asgard and it's aftermath. Do I wish that, perhaps, there were no flashbacks? Sure. Hakeye and Mockingbird's little story could have taken place inside Asgard, but I'm just too happy over the fact this entire issue isn't ALL flashback.

Mighty Avengers 35

OK. First the bad. As much as I bang on Bendis for his tie ins to Siege, at least his boks help, a bit, in characterizing the major players of the event. Dan Slott's first of a 2 part tie-in doesn't really matter much in the grand scheme of Siege. Its not right to call this a tie-in and probably anyone just lookign to pick up all Siege books will be disappointed in this book.

Now, for the good. this is a book written by Dan Slott. That's instant credibility in my eyes and a sure fire guarantee of "having a hoot." As a person who started reading Avengers books with New Avengers, and neve rpicked up Mighty Avengers until Dan Slott's run, I'm happy to be reading my first Ultron story, now. The book features its daily requirements of Pym science and does enough to tangentially tie itself into the Siege event.

Now, just some general reactions to things in the book:

1) Hank Pym is straight up getting creepy with his real(er) doll mods he keeps doing to Jocasta.

2) I forgot about G.R.A.N.D.P.A.

3) Hank Pym is kinda a dick.

4) I HATE speculating on the future, but hear me out on this because I think this whole train of thought has a special pay off of insanity. So, The Wasp looks kind of like Eternity in the Underspace. I can only surmise that when Thor teleported the Wasp to underspace so she could blow up at the end of Secret Invasion, she was the new Big Bang of Underspace, and she became the Eternity of Underspace.

Now, Eternity in the Marvel U is the personification of the Universe. To recap-The Universe is actually a living biped. Now, Eternity must have been born in the big bang. There was a universe that existed before the Big Bang in the Marvel U. Galactus is its last survivor. So, Eternity, the personification of space, has a tiny Galactus floating aroud inside him eating planets. Its like a virus in the bloodstream, or a hook worm.

So, If Eternity, the embodiment of the Marvel U, has Galactus, the last survivor of the universe before the big bang, foating around inside him, then does Janet Van Dyne, the Eternity of Underspace, has a tiny Galactus floating around inside her, too, from the universe she destroyed when she blew up?

Avengers: The Initiative 34

Christos Gage keeps doing what many people find to be amazing: Give adequate page time to about several different plot threads and stories in a 22 page book. We have the New Warriors, Taskmaster, Constrictor, Diamondback, Penance, and The Hood as the books main characters and Gage utilizes what little page time each character can have to their maximum efficiency. Night Thrasher decides whose side he will be fighting on by the 2nd page. Tigra gets her chance to tear into the Hood for about 3 pages. Justice worries as only a leader can worry for about 2 pages. Penance comes around within 3 pages, Taskmaster gets his chance to shine for about 6 pages, Constrictor and Diamondback get all emotional for another 3 pages, the remainder is tied into timing the events of Siege 3: The appearance of The Hood, The Avengers attacking Osborn, and the Sentry's destruction of Asgard. There's is a LOT going on in this book and Gage deftly handles it all.

You know what this means? Its a comic that doesn't slow down. God Bless Jorge Molina for keeping the action going on the page, too. Outstanding work.

This book is a tie-in with plot hreads that are independent of main story, yet have real repercussions to the over-all tale. We're back to why I liked Thunderbolts so much and this book is another example of point 1 from that review.

Red Hulk 3

I know squat about Rick Jones. It makes it kind of hard, initially, to get into this book, then. However, Jeff Parker does enough to fill you in on the history of Marvel's greatest-support-character-other-than-Jarvis. My only thoughts on this book, as a whole, is wondering where it is going. Issues 1 and 2 did a good enough job filling in some gaps in stories from the Hulk book and how Red Hulk and Banner get together to attempt to take down the Intelligencia. This story really doesn't do much other than fill in the origin of A-Bomb and extrapolate 22 pages of story from it as A-Bomb was created to be a manchurian candidate by the Intelligencia against Bruce Banner.

The book is mostly characterization of Rick Jones as A-Bomb, which is sad since the title of the comic is "Red Hulk". Yet, Parker's analysis of Jones' psychology is pretty nifty. The big question about how Rick should actually be feeling about being a Hulk-thing, and why he should feel that way was a nice bit of drama injected into Rick's character. Sadly, I liked Rick as the guy that was enjoying being a Hulk-thing more than most people. I suppose it is because I felt more like Rick was a representative of the readers. I don't think i'm going on a limb to say the readers would think it was pretty awesome to be a Hulk-thing. Rick has his A-Bomb form. He can change back into Rick. H eis still kind of the same guy in either form. Now, because of Parker's characterization of Rick, that analogue is gone, but it doesn't make Rick a worse character for it.

Amazing Spider-Man 625 and 626

Joe Kelly wraps up his contributions to Gauntlet so far by bringing the Rhino story to a further close than I feel it really needed. I'm glad, I guess, that status quo is upheld and old Rhino is back to being Rhino, but I don't see the reason why outside of retaining status quo. I was fine with a new Rhino as much as I was fine that old Rhino was completely emasculated by his wife. So, instead, readers get a rather predictable story where Old Rhino's wife dies because of new Rhino and Old Rhino becomes Rhino again because he can't properly channel the tragedy of death towards positive improvement. Also, the story is narrated by what seems to be a teenage girl, and Peter Parker gets kinda emo.

One of the better things that I am noticing in these books is that writers haven't dwelled on Peter's emotional state, most of the time. Specifically, the reader knows Peter's having a rough time, but I am not reading the thoughts Pity Party Peter Parker. Kelly gives us a helpful helping of that, though.

Look, on the whole, it is not a bad story. However, as part of the genre of graphic serialized ficition this chapter highlights what a lot of people complain about regarding the medium and what some fans complain about Spider-Man. We had a good character progression moment for old Rhino and perhaps some potential for stories about the new Rhino before he shuffled off this mortal coil. Instead those possabilities for new stories were taken off the table for a plot that has been told enough in just Spider-Man books themselves. Additionally, one of the harder things to do in comics is probably making Spider-Man entertaining without the character of Peter Parker being a whiny shell of a man the whole book. I always figure one of the defining traits of the character was his ability to continue to bounce back from adversity and in this installment, it seems more like he's letting adversity defeat him. That's not a character I want to read about.

Being an ex-teacher, the events between Michele and Lucas make me think of too many bad memories from emtionally investing myself in the wrong kids from that time in my life. So, on a personal level, Fred van Lente grabs me and hooks me into this story, which I'm sure is something all writers want to have happen to their readers.

High level of engagement aside, FVL tells a great Spider-man story that has the tale of Michele and Lucas as one of many threads running through it. What's most important is that it is a Spider-man story and not a tale that also features Spider-Man, which I could say is very different than what I read in 625. This is a story that forces Peter to have to use his resourcefulness instead of his spider powers, which was an enjoyment to read given Peter's humility and pragmatacism. The reader gets a self deprecating Spider-Man without me getting the impression he was going to have to cut himself once he got home.

I, sadly, did not read World War Hulk. I have no prior knowledge of who the new Scorpion is. I suppose I wish for more conflict between her and Spider-Man, but c'est la vie. I'll take a Tombstone appearance, though. Now, if only the comics could build him up the way the Spectacular Spider-Man TV show did.

X-Books

Uncanny X-Men 522

Nation X comes to a close and Matt Fraction leaves the story on about as good a note as you can for the X-Men. This month's book leaves a sugary sweet feeling within the reader in the end, if you discount the fact Kitty pryde is perpetually intangible for the moment. If the concept behind "Nation X" was that it was to be the place for all the mutants in the world to gather, Fraction pulled in the last piece he could, with Kitty Pryde being the final mutant to call Utopia home.

Perhaps the only knock on the story was that it seems there is much more that could be told about living on Asteroid M than what Fraction covered given the page and monthly limitations. Now, if Nation X becomes more of a setting change than just a storyline, the possabilities are still there, but until the end of Second Coming we'll have to wait to read more about the 200 some-odd mutants living on a rock in the middle of San Francisco Bay.

The only other negatives generally are with charcaterization, specifically how much of a dick Reed Richards comes off as. But, c'est la vie.

The backup story was pretty good. The plot goes, "What if you knew when your world was going to die, and there was an appreciable amount of time. Could society keep itself together in the face of that knowledge?" Its always an interesting story because it is almost akin the the zombie movie genre in that if you focus on just a few characters it turns into them trying to maintain their ethics and a sensible morality in the face of the world going mad. The story adds a layer of irony because we know Kitty is in the giant space bullet and the aliens will actually survive the coming apocalypse just fine. I am actually pleasantly surprised with the ending to the story, too, as it maintains the sugary sweet feelings the whole book coaxes from the reader.

X-Factor 203

Sometimes I wonder if I should stick with X-Factor, given how niche it is within the X-Books. Then Peter David reminds me why I'm such a moron for thinking these things. We got Baron Mordo up in this book, man! Plus, there's some mindless ones, too.

Now, time for vaguely critiquing the writing of the book. Peter David probably uses a bit too many pages to get across the story he wants to here. The opening scene could probably have been done in 1 page. Readers can all see that something weird is going on with Monet by the end of that page. Guido's assault of the drug cartel could have been lessened by a few pages, and generally I seem to be frustrated with scenes I feel are going a bit too long than they need to be. I just get the impression that David had the idea of where he wanted to end the book and just kinda drug out scenes as much as he can until he had enough pages for a whole comic.

Now, one final note. Is it wrong that I can totally relate to Guido and the advice he got from "Legs"? 'Cause that's totally why I asked out my current paramour. Just another comic from this week that is enhanced by me having an emotional resonance with the characters.

Nation X 4

With this issue, the anthology comes to a close. Nothing truly advanced, nothing truly altered, but, over-all, some good stories and a chance for some talent to shine in a limited space.

In the frist story Michael Allred turns in some fabulous art for a story written by Peter Milligan that features Doop. WTF is a Doop?

Harvey Tolibad turns in som nice art for a good story about the Stepford Cuckoos and they give teaching a better name than it deserves by claiming how much it fulfilled Emma's life and can fulfill the lives of the three mischevious minxes.

Best story, bar none, was "Ice Cream Alamo". Though I question the sanity of kids willing to stab people just for Ice Cream. Not cool Loa. You lost, suck it up and learn from it.

"The King and Queen of Utopia" was a fine story, but Niko Henrichon's art is just a bit off for me. Check the chin on Namor. He's ready for Late Night. However, a good little wrap up of what was a very obvious theme between most of the stories in Nation X, the problem of food. Plus it spotlights Namor, who just doesn't get enough nods in Uncanny.

Green Lantern 52

I'm going to put it out there: this book really didn't do much for me.

Now, it has some nice extras in it for those that want a complete story. The threat of Xanshi is resolved. We get a peek at all the different embodiments of the colored corps. Geoff Johns also gets to provide his take on the whole creation of the DC Universe.

One problem I have with this is that, given that Johns has to write this book so that it is completely unnecessary for a reader to pick up if they are only buying the Blackest night event book, the book kinda moves in a circle. Where the book started is about the point the books ends.

A second problem I feel the book has is that its kinda falling beneath its own weight. I can buy complete darkness and silence in the world before the white being showed up. I get that. Then the reader is told that the white being made Earth. Then the reader finds out all the different colored entities of the corps: ion, parallax, etc, are all mutated animals from earth themselves. That doesnt quite jive, I guess, with some things. Is a flying bug really the first thing to feel fear? No protozoic sea bugs or fish? And while I find the attempt at using the serpent from The Garden of Eden cute for the being of avarice, do we have to throw in some biblical creation stories as well into this? Plus, I'm sure the serpent didn't eat the apple, and I'm an avowed Atheist. Is Johns simply hinting at the serpent's part in getting Adam and Eve to eat the apple, without showing the two? Having that question just leads me into what I'm seeing with all of these references. Johns has just made a muddled mess of various creaton tales and what it does is make inconsistencies that I have to spend time deciphering how all the pieces fit together and that really takes me out of the story.

The wrestling equivalent of this is the show before a Pay per view. That's known as the "going home" show. Well, this is the going home book and while it sets up Blackest Night 8 to be, possibly, a slobber knocking fight book, this book does more to set up future arcs than truly resolve anything in the Blackest Night event.

The DC books from me 3-17

Green Lantern Corps 46

No picture for this one because of difficulties getting one :(


The end of Blackest Night, part 1. All of the various multi colored lantern corps begin converging onto Earth and the black lantern Anti-Monitor makes an appearance, as well as black lantern Ice, for the first time. Things then start to get really wacky as a black lantern refrigerator full of Kyle Raynor's first girlfriend appears in space and we get to relive Major Force's now reviled act of aggression against sensability in comics. It is probably sad to say I am de-sensitized enough to violence to not be ashamed of my favorite medium for allowing such a scene to be put into ink back in the 90s, or be reminded of it, again, today.


Its nice to see Dove continue to make appearances, though. Blackest Night: Titans is continuing to show its one of the few tie-ins people honestly should have bought into for story purposes

Fables 93

I love Fables to death. Month after month Bll Willingham knocks it out of the park. However, given that his main narrative is the ever-present doom of Mr. Dark in the mundy world, I find it annoying that we get these 2-5 month side tales every once in a while. With the Adversary as the antagonist, the threat of danger against the protagonists and suspense raised because of that was lower due to the relative proximity of the two. It was fine to have these arcs spread across the tales of the Fables war against the Adversary because there was no great sense of urgency to resolve the conflicts in story. However, I find that, in story, there is a greater sense of urgency to resolve the issue of Mr. Dark and, thus, these side trips to Bufkin's fights against Baba Yaga and Fly's kingdom, while entertaining, become frustrating.

That aside, this story was pretty good. John's idea of using the story of a fable to help him locate his only witness for the trial ahead was an inventive, meta, use of the characters' nature. I do not think I've seen this use of the fact that the character's are fictional beings, before, in such a way by the character's themselves. It was quite inventive and helped in telling a larger story of nature vs. law and to what degree society should provide leeway and excuse the actions of people due to their customs. In the end, Willingham sets up a future story to tell that will center on the possible decline of Fly's kingdom.

Doomwar 2

Issue 1 was a hoot for me and issue 2 of Marvel's comic book adaptation to Kissinger's idea of Realpolitik keeps on trucking along just fine.

I am thoroughly enjoying this type of Doctor Doom than some of the others. This is one that is not driven by revenge or slights agaisnt his personage. This Doom is a political thinker and Machiavellian manipulator. The only thing off putting about him is his use of a gun, which seems suplerfuous given the number of lasers his armor houses. So, really, the only gripe I have about Doom is that he's misuing his armor. Personality wise, this flavor of Doom is the best one I have tasted yet. The ending is a bit confusing but given the rest of the story, that's a small complaint since I am aware that the ending will be better hashed out come issue 3. Something tells me it will be along the lines of Doom proving his purity by being merciful.

The only thing I wish differently, now, is if the book just did not have the Dora Milaje story. I figured that once the Desturi leader was killed in issue 1 that the X-Men-T'Challa-Shuri forces would defeat the Wakandan-Desturi and Doombot army. Instead of the panels and pages devoted to the Dora Milaje, more of a spolight could have been placed on T'Challa.