Getting It Together

It's been awhile since I posted regularly and that needs to change. And there's no better way for me to get in the game than to mouth off about what I didn't like. Then switch it up and to keep you on your toes.

Anyone else confused about what the hell McKeever's Titans of Tomorrow Today storyline was about? That ending made no sense and it invalidated how the future Titans were defeated in the first place. A lot of things blew up and feelings were hurt but the whole story seemed lacking.

Leave it Marvel to make the world's coolest bionic arm. If there's any world that should have the best mechanical prosthesis, it's the one with the 70's ex-patrol cop with a cybernetic arm.

Anyone else realize that if you take the backup stories out of Countdown to Adventure and Countdown to Mystery, they would have nothing to do with Countdown to Final Crisis? And that eight issues seems like a way to squeeze an extra $6 out of you than actually being needed to tell the story?

Dan Slott is very subversive. Avengers:The Initiative, while showing heroes being trained to handle volatile situations also gives readers the reasons why Captain America was so adamant against registration. Marvel government can't be trusted, at all. With Gyrich, government douche extraordinaire scheming every panel he shows up in and Hank Pym to overwhelmed to put his foot down, you can tell it's only a matter of time before it all blows up in their face. And not just by gun arm MVP.

And the MVP clones in Iron Spider costumes called Scarlet Spiders? Awesome and ironic.

One More Day? Rather than talk about the story itself, which every comic blogger on the internet is probably doing, I want to talk about what the story feels like to me. It feels like a DC story. Not to say being a DC type of story is a bad thing, but a history rewrite to "set things right"? DC does that every ten years, and it's usually fun. One More Day was not "fun" at all, and Marvel is not the place continuity rewrites, at least not story ones.

Marvel has passive rewrites all the time, usually to keep their heroes from being forty years old. DC has their being continuity fix and then sets about reworking old stories into new continuity. That's their thing. Now Spider-Man has his classic supporting cast back, and what do you think Harry Osborn being back is going to entail? More "your father keeps trying to kill me-no, he's innocent" stories. Marvel moves forward, DC looks back. That's how it works and One More Day seems to be one for the "keep the formula" column.

Well, that should work for now. I will post more often from now on.

Big Monkey No More

It's been six years since I started going to Beyond Comics 2, the comic book store now renamed Big Monkey Comics, the first comic community experience I've ever known in my twenty-three years of reading comics. I loved going there on Wednesdays for new comics, Thursdays to record a podcast and Saturdays to play HeroClix. Mostly, I went so often to see my friends who worked and/or shopped there.

It's over now.

Devon Sanders, the manager of the store for many years and owners, has been let go, due to financial mismanaging by the owners and the douchebaggery of one person in particular. With him goes many of the customers who became loyal customers due to the environment Devon encouraged. We became real friends, who talk about our lives, as well as the lives of our favorite superheroes and villains. In good conscience, we cannot support people who would treat Devon so unfairly, when he can basically run the store himself and devotes much of his time to making Big Monkey a great store.

This is my goodbye to the time I spent in that store. I don't regret any of it and only wish the store could remain as the clubhouse we've come to enjoy. But it can't. Not for me. For the foreseeable future, Fantom Comics in Union Station will be my comic book store of choice.

TV Has Made Me Happy

It has occurred to me that this generation of TV writers are comic book readers. But it's not from "Heroes", "Bionic Woman", or any Sci Fi show that has me coming to this conclusion. I know those guys are geeks.

On "Numb3rs", a rare ashcan comic is stolen during a comic book convention. Not only is one of the agents an avid collector with "long boxes"(his words), but Charlie Eppes(played by David Krumholtz) gets into a discussion about comics with his friend Larry Fleinhardt(played by Peter MacNicol). Fleinhardt says that some of the characters he liked were Daredevil and the Fantastic Four, but his favorite was Galactus. When Charlie points out Galactus's diet, Fleinhardt comes back with Galactus is one of the three fundamental forces of the universe along with Death and Eternity. Not only is that the Marvel explanation for Galactus's purpose, but to even for someone to even think of Eternity requires a deep interest in Marvel comics a casual reader is likely to miss.

Last week's episode of "NCIS" began with Agent Timothy McGee(played by Sean Murray) reading an issue of the original Iron Fist series before Agent Tony DiNozzo(played by Michael Weatherly) tries to snatch it out of his hand. McGee tells Tony to "watch it. This is Iron Fist #14, the first appearance of Sabretooth." The issue shown was indeed Iron Fist #14, and not a crappy reprint. You can see the yellowed pages of the book as McGee is reading it.

On "Dexter", the serial killer drama on Showtime, Dexter was called to examine the blood spray for a murder at a comic book store. There were Heroclix all along the counters and in glass cases. It doesn't take a deep understanding of comics to display Heroclix but they are awesome. So, hooray.