What's new with the big two: Marvel and DC Comics discussion thread.

[Ares]

So the Champions and West Coast Avengers are more or less a dumping ground for Marvel's bad ideas. The Champions recently confronted Thanos himself, and Riri Williams tried her usual schtick on him. Now, in her own book, this resulted in things like Riri conquering Latveria, receiving constant emotional validation from SHIELD and other superheroes, and more or less acting like an entitled narcissist.

Here?


She gets smacked upside the head with the Reality Stick and finds out that movie success and being a legacy character still matters to some people.

*sigh* It's a good day.

What's better is that after this nice reality check, Riri actually decides to start making her armor more of her own thing instead of something she basically stole from Iron Man. So hey, maybe we'll get actual character development and Riri will become a character worth reading about.

I was actually going to bring that up to you in this very thread. As soon as I read that I was all "Ares is going to love this shit."

While I'd like to think that speaks more to the type of character Riri is, I'm sure it says just as much (if not more) about me.

[L-Space]

A Shatterstar solo series is being released. Did anyone actually ask for this?

[Batgirl III]

A Shatterstar solo series is being released. Did anyone actually ask for this?

I did. When I was eleven...

[Jabroniville]

Flipped through the X-Men issue where Kitty runs away at the altar.

It's maddening. In part because the actual WRITING and DIALOGUE are good. The art is fantastic- absolutely what they should be doing more of- strong-jawed, handsome men and beautiful women. Very lovely- not like a lot of the "Indie Comics means everyone is deformed, right?" stuff you see these days.

But the IDEA is stupid. Kitty proposes to Colossus, they build this up for MONTHS, and then she just quits the idea, fearing they'll just screw it up later? Because a drunk Illyana puts some doubt into her mind? WHAT THE HELL IS THAT? So there's all this great writing and art, and it's all in service of an IDEA that sucks. It's like having the best inker in the world work over Rob Liefeld's pencils. A bad idea and story means the whole thing is rotten.

And now Gambit & Rogue, the most tired couple in X-History, are suddenly back together after more than a decade (I think) apart, when she's had two or three love interests in the interim. Gambit- a character with so many failed book runs that even the WRITERS were joking about it.

huh- apparently it wasn't the writer's idea- Guggenheim basically went "it was my job to steer the ship, so I did it to the best of my ability". Probably explains the "good writing; terrible idea" dichotomy I described.

[greycrusader]

Kind of like Doomsday Clock; impressive creative talent, really, really bad concept being executed.

[Ares]

A bit of old news, but apparently a few months back, Hal Jordan and General Zod had a fight.

https://comicnewbies.com/2018/03/28/gre ... d-rebirth/

The end result?



Hal WINS. No real extenuating circumstances either, Hal just straight up outfights Zod and kicks his ass. It isn't a "I wrote the book on willpower" scene where just outright overwhelms Zod with raw power, but Hal is able to fight Zod evenly and take him out with superior tactics.

I mean, HOLY SHIT. DC actually allowed someone other than Superman to beat someone who is equal to Superman in terms of power. Hal even mentions that Zod is the most dangerous Kryptonian alive. No weakness useage either, the planet orbits 2 yellow suns, so Zod was at full power.

Maybe this got retconned in the next issue or something, but wow. They actually let an elite Green Lantern beat an elite Kryptonian. Alert the media.

[Ares]

Actually, this makes me wonder: What in the Hell has Kyle Rayner been up to since Re-Birth? Ever since Johns brought Hal back, it seems like poor Kyle has gotten the shaft. Which is a shame since he was a very solid "everyman superhero" and he frequently displayed a level of creativity and willpower few other Green Lanterns had. His time on the Justice League gave him a lot of epic tier good showings, and now he gets almost no use.

I kind of wish they'd kept the dynamic that Green Lantern: Rebirth implied for the Lanterns.

Hal is guy most likely to use his powers in a tactical, military fashion, and prefers simple constructs to complex ones for their utility. His fighting style is boring, but practical and effective.

Guy is like the "Raphael" of the Lanterns, the guy who prefers to brawl with a lot of raw energy and less focus in his constructs. He's like an unrelenting tidal wave that just hammers his opponents relentlessly.

John Stewart is engineer, and while his constructs sometimes take longer to build, they tend to be the most durable and functional due to having actual moving parts and reinforced structures. He's the one most effective at using his ring for non-combat purposes and making things that last.

Kyle Rayner is the guy with the crazy imagination. Generally speaking, he's the most versatile one, the one who constantly changes up what he's doing and coming up with creative solutions to problems. Hal will hit you with big green fists or use GL constructs resembling military vehicles. Guy will hit you simple objects and raw energy. John will hit you with precision. Kyle will hit you with anything and everything. He'll engage you with a giant mecha robot, then create a kung fu expert that deflects your attacks, then create Indiana Jones to wrap you up in his bullwhip.

While all of them should be impressive in their own ways, Kyle should be the most entertaining of the bunch to watch in a fight.

[Ares]

So I'd heard the latest issues of Domino featured Shang Chi, so I decided to flip through it. I mean, hey, it was Gail Simone writing it, maybe it would be worth picking up to support the Master of Kung Fu.

And . . . well . . . how to put this delicately . . . . did Gail Simone have a stroke? Because I remember her writing being a lot better than this. She's basically writing Domino as if she were Deadpool. And writes the Southern character as if she were Yosemite Sam. And writes basically none of them good.

It feels like Gail has gone full on Peter David / Warren Ellis where every character she writes is basically just an idealized version of herself: hot, snarky and obsessed with food.

And Shang Chi . . . well, I realize this isn't Simone's fault, but the current outfit they've stuck him in looks painfully generic. They stick Domino in his classic outfit for the purpose of humor, but all it does is make me thing it'd be a lot easier to update his old look and retain some of the iconic-ness about it than the uninspired set he's walking around in.

Anyway, Simone shows a lot of respect for Shang's skill, but has him and Domino kissing by the end of the issue . . . the first full issue in which they've interacted. Jab talked about these instant hook ups before, but WOW. Really Gail? In an issue where Domino has been acting like nothing like but an ass clown for the only issue they've known each other and Shang is tonguing her tonsils before the book is over?

And the whole set up is just bizarre. Domino's powers are acting inconsistently because of something a villain did to her. She realizes that because of her Luck powers, her actually ability to be aware of danger and fight has eroded, making her vulnerable. That's actually a pretty good hook for a Domino mini-series.

So she goes to Shang Chi to receive training to help compensate for her loss (jeez, first Spider-Man, now Domino. Is that Shang's thing now?). Only at one point during the training, and without having really learned anything, she challenges Shang that if she can land a hit on him, they'll take a break at the location of her choice. Shang tells her she doesn't really have a chance, but accepts. And while he's in the middle of accepting, her luck power kicks in and she hits him while he's blinking. So instead of them just taking a break, she actually makes him dress up in a tuxedo and go out dancing with her, when the kiss happens.

I just . . . what? Let's forget that this assumes that Shang has never been attacked while blinking, that Domino managed to hit him in the space of a blink, etc. She goes to Shang Chi for training because her powers are failing her . . . and then uses her powers to get out of training?

Needless to say, I did not pick up the books.

[BriarThrone]

Gail Simone, at a certain point in her career, appears to have decided that her job is not comics writer, but comics celebrity. Writing comics appears to be something she considers a tedious chore between convention appearances and interviews.

Her female characters are all basically the same character - an obnoxious slut, obsessed with food, other women, and one-night-stands with men. Her male characters are THE textbook example of what Sarkeesian is talking about - existing to serve and be conquered by the opposite sex - only gender reversed and actually being a thing.

It's bad enough to actually look back on her previous work and wonder if we were being overly generous to Ms Simone all along.

[Batgirl III]

Simone has developed a bad case “Frank Miller Syndrome,” when a comic book writer becomes more concerned with their celebrity status than the quality of their work; where contemporary works seem like a shallow parody of their own previous works; and the quality of contemporary works are so poor they begin to retroactively make older works seem worse.

[RUSCHE]

A bit of old news, but apparently a few months back, Hal Jordan and General Zod had a fight.

https://comicnewbies.com/2018/03/28/gre ... d-rebirth/

The end result?



Hal WINS. No real extenuating circumstances either, Hal just straight up outfights Zod and kicks his ass. It isn't a "I wrote the book on willpower" scene where just outright overwhelms Zod with raw power, but Hal is able to fight Zod evenly and take him out with superior tactics.

I mean, HOLY SHIT. DC actually allowed someone other than Superman to beat someone who is equal to Superman in terms of power. Hal even mentions that Zod is the most dangerous Kryptonian alive. No weakness useage either, the planet orbits 2 yellow suns, so Zod was at full power.

Maybe this got retconned in the next issue or something, but wow. They actually let an elite Green Lantern beat an elite Kryptonian. Alert the media.

It was implied in the end of the issue that Zod took that beating to further his long term goals . In the previous issues Zod and his family beat up Kyle,Hal and company pretty bad. I myself like the idea of Hal having a legit win over Zod though.

[Ares]

Simone has developed a bad case “Frank Miller Syndrome,” when a comic book writer becomes more concerned with their celebrity status than the quality of their work; where contemporary works seem like a shallow parody of their own previous works; and the quality of contemporary works are so poor they begin to retroactively make older works seem worse.

I don't think anyone will be able to take away Birds of Prey and Secret Six from Gail, but yeah, her recent stuff has been shit.

Mark Waid has suffered a similar fate, which is heartbreaking. The man wrote some of my favorite stories, but he's not only suffered "Frank Miller Syndrome" with his recent Capt. America and Champions work, if what's being said about him is true, he's gone completely off the deep end. The feud between him and Zack of Diversity & Comics has only really made Mark look like an extremely bad person that needs help.

And we can tell his writing has suffered because the instant Mark left the Champions . . the Champions became kind of readable. It's not fantastic, but Amadeus Cho and Riri Williams got re-designs that (while a bit generic for Cho) actually look okay and give them their own identity. The characters are actually given some pathos, some real emotions, and while Riri still doesn't human very well, she's the least annoying she's ever been. They've introduced a new character named Snowguard, who is basically an Inuit version of Snowbird, and I actually appreciate that they didn't just have Snowbird killed off and replaced with her, though having another animal shifter when you could have given her almost any powers seems kind of uninspired. Overall tho, the moment Mark left the book, the team became a lot more bearable as people and the book has almost become what I'd want from an average Marvel comic.

[Ares]

Also, I'm going to need someone to help me with Kamala Khan. From everything I've read about her, the new Ms. Marvel is someone on paper I should like. My understanding is that she's the daughter of Muslim immigrants, and is suppose to be kind of a "Fun Personified" superhero geek girl, dealing with being a Muslim girl in America, being a new superhero, etc. All of which sounds interesting.

The problem is I apparently need someone to point me towards good portrayals of the character, because my exposure to her thus far were:

- Avengers Assemble (admittedly a pretty sub-par Marvel animated series), where she was annoying.
- LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2, where she was annoying.
- Unstoppable Wasp, where she was okay-ish. Then again, it was Unstoppable Wasp, something I wasn't a fan of.*
- Champions, where she was utterly unlikable until Mark Waid left the book.
- The Civil War 2 stuff (which was a very crap event), where she was basically a massive hypocrite who got her friend maimed and has apparently never apologized to him about it.

So based on that, I'm not very inclined to give her solo series a read. I've seen a few of D&C's reviews of her books, but I find D&C has an obvious slant with certain characters and I basically only agree with him half of the time. So I'm curious if Kamala has any fans here who could point me towards some good issues with her so I can find out for myself what kind of character she is and whether I've been seeing bad portrayals of her or just average portrayals of her.





*I actually rather like Natalie Pym's personality, and another science superheroine in Marvel to be an example to young girls is never a bad thing. She's a much more likeable person than Riri Williams, but suffers from similar issues of being a replacement character for an existing hero. It wasn't helped that Jan was a pretty major Marvel heroine, former Avengers leader, founding member and one of the last bastions of femininity there, and was replaced by a character who existed basically to say "More girls need to get into STEM". And based an entire book around someone who doesn't know how acronyms work (her group should either be GARL or Girls Inaction Research Labs, which would actually make sense given the ladies never really did anything in their book). If they had basically given Natalia Pym's personality to any new character with a science background, I probably would have liked her. But as a new Wasp when the old one was just fine? In the series we got her in? No thanks.

[Yojimbo]

So based on that, I'm not very inclined to give her solo series a read. I've seen a few of D&C's reviews of her books, but I find D&C has an obvious slant with certain characters and I basically only agree with him half of the time. So I'm curious if Kamala has any fans here who could point me towards some good issues with her so I can find out for myself what kind of character she is and whether I've been seeing bad portrayals of her or just average portrayals of her.

I've read seven of the eight available trades and enjoyed them a lot. I'm not much interested in current Marvel, but Ms. Marvel is a fun book. Light-hearted, fun, low stakes (lives and fortunes are imperiled, but not the world) superheroics. Kamala juggles school, friendships, superheroing, and learning about her Inhuman heritage. Its the Inhuman stuff that feels the most tacked on. The Muslim community is presented as any other religious community, and the gentleman who leads the mosque is as worthy as any Catholic priest that ever appeared in a Daredevil story. Kamala's immediate family are great characters, especially her brother and her mother, and she's got a good group of supporting characters at school as well. The actual adventures are not as engaging as one might hope - her archenemy is a clone of Thomas Edison with a chicken head, and she fights the evils of a Hydra-led attempt to gentrify Jersey City, for example - but I for one am fairly sick of momentous story arcs and the frequency of life changing events in the average superhero's career. Ms. Marvel's adventures are breezy and occasionally silly (one arc involves an evil AI taking over an MMORPG), but she always manages to pull off some impressive heroics. It really did remind me of the early Lee/Ditko Spider-Man stuff, in general tone if not details, and I think Kamala Khan is easily the best character to come out of the big two in at least a decade. I've seen the Avengers all turn into assholes, Spider-Man replaced by Doctor Octopus, and supposed heroes put killing at the top of their list of ways to deal with bad guys, but Ms. Marvel remains decidedly old school and genuinely positive.

She's not perfect, she makes mistakes regularly (as any rookie should), but she keeps trying. I'd say at least get the first trade at the library and give it a decent read-through before writing the character off completely. G. Willow Wilson has a pretty good handle on Kamala, and I'm actually excited to see Wilson take over Wonder Woman in December. Kamala does feel "off" to me under other writers, for what its worth.

[Batgirl III]

Imagine a mix of Dikto-Lee era The Amazing Spider-Man or early volumes of Kirkman's Invincible, with a dash of My Big Fat Greek Wedding or maybe Bend It Like Beckham. Only substituting Pakistani-American experience for the Greek-American Orthodox or British-Punjabi Sikh experience as the source of the main character's outsider status.

Kamala Khan is a fun character, which is something that is missing in an awful lot of modern mainline comics. Her adventures focus on her fighting crime, rescuing people, and protecting her hometown from danger, a real refreshing change of pace from the constat drumbeat of hero versus hero angst-angst-angst we see in way too many other titles these days.

I'd definitely recommend giving her first couple trades a read. They're a fun romp.