NOTE: The individual opinions of each Roundtable contributor is their own, and is not representative of anybody but that contributor.
RUMOR: Simon Kinberg named writer of X3, may curtail Joss Whedon’s involvement (credit: All The Rage)
“Starman” Matt Morrison (Writer of Looking To The Stars): Since Whedon writing the thing was about the only point that gave me hope for the movie being halfway decent (even without Berry mugging her way through it), I can only shrug my shoulders and say “meh.”
Jamie Hatton (Writer of Diner Talk & Nexus reviewer): Direct from IMDB —-
-Killer’s Game, The (2004) (pre-production)
-Fantastic Four (2005) (filming)
-XXX: State of the Union (2005) (filming) (written by)
-Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005) (post-production)
That’s who is going to get X-3…. oh, well now I’m 100% more supportive of it. *rolls eyes* GIVE US WHEDON!!!! PLEAAASSEEEEEE!
RUMOR: Rob Liefeld says Marvel will release Shatterstar mini-series in February, 2005 (credit: All The Rage)
Matt Morrison: Yes. Cause the public has SO been clamoring for this.
Ben Morse (Writer of The Watchtower & Co-Editor-In-Chief of The Nexus): Ironically, Shatterstar is a character who really could have used a mini-series about eight years ago after writers like Fabian Nicieza, Jeph Loeb & John Francis Moore made him interesting and in need of having his backstory explore, but Liefeld has already returned him to the joke of a “character” that represented everything bad about the 90s back when he first created him.
Jason Berek-Lewis (Coming soon”¦): Well, it’s another promise…will he keep it? I hope so, because there is an undeniable energy and hype about Rob’s work. BUT Rob is not actually working on this one (Maybe he will do covers?). The art chores go to Marat Mychaels, a Extreme Studios alumni who has also had limited success with his series Demonslayer at Image and Avatar. I believe his work is good and he deserves wider exposure – which he will hopefully get with this Marvel work. PLUS, I met him at Wizard World LA – he’s a great guy!
Jamie Hatton: I agree, many years ago, Shatterstar could have had an excellent mini-series – and possibly could have supported his own book if it was done well. Give
him a fun action adventure book running through Mojoverse…but being that Mister Ankles & Wrists announced it, he’s obviously going to be drawing it”¦and.”¦please lord no…possibly writing it.
So, to save everyone the 12-15 for a Shatterstar miniseries, here is what you do:
1) Go to your comic store that has a fine selection of dollar books
2) Buy the first 5 issues of X-Force (OR 5 issues of X-Force #1)
3) Cut out all the pictures of Shatterstar
4) Make your own comic
You have now officially created a Rob Liefeld ™ comic book for the new millennia.
Jesse Baker (Angrier Than a Pimp on Pay-Day Who’s Been
Told That His
is involved it will be
Paul Sebert (I give up): BECAUSE YOU DEMANDED IT!!!!
But seriously, the current Youngblood title is one of the most hilariously inept sources of entertainment I’ve ever seen in print. It’s the comic book equivalent of House of the Dead, and I for one commend Marvel for providing us with more comedy.
RUMOR: Chris Bachalo will produce an Age of Apocalypse series for the tenth anniversary of the original event (credit: Lying In The Gutters)
Matt Morrison: It’s official. It really is 1994 again at Marvel.
Jamie Hatton: So I read all of the Kirkman 2099 stories, and overall they were fun little 1-shot reads, the Daredevil one being the coolest. Now, one of my favorite
artists is going to attack one of my favorite crossover arcs… eVAH! I don’t care how retro and silly this is, I’m loving it.
In connection to this, they’re going to put out an Age of Apocalypse TPB?! (not to say I don’t have them all anyway) I doth proclaim a mighty HUZZAH!
Paul Sebert: For more information, please visit www.butseriouslywhogivesacrap.com
I forget, which one of the AoA books was the one with Blink? Degeneration X? Gobo and the X-Fraggles? XFL?…
RUMOR: The Scarlet Witch is the villain behind “Avengers Disassembled” (credit: Lying In The Gutters)
Matt Morrison: Not a big surprise, really. We were all wondering where the heck she was and Doc Strange showing up at the end of the last issue pretty much confirmed it.
Ben Morse: Even worse than if it was Yellowjacket; a great character ruined and an ending EVERYBODY saw coming two miles away. As always, I will give Brian Michael Bendis the opportunity to prove me wrong.
Ben Nagy (Nexus reviewer): If she is, then I demand an explanation. Namely why in the heck were the Kree she conjured attacking Quicksilver, her brother? Look in #502. I think it’s page 3 or 5 – Quicksilver is running for his damn life from the invasion. I want an explanation, Mr. Bendis.
John Babos (Co-Writer of Near Mint Memories): First they callously kill Hawkeye now this? Is the so-called House of Ideas on fire?
[Insert Hawkeye-centric rant here]
I mean, we KNOW Hawkeye will be back. If not in this horrible arc then by better writers like Kurt Busiek perhaps in the pages of Thunderbolts. If Hawkeye’s death turns out to be “fake” and resolved by the end of Disassembled then Marvel did it just for cheap guaranteed fan reaction. There’s no “win-win” in killing a character of Hawkeye’s stature. None whatsoever.
[End of Hawkeye rant]
Scarlet Witch as the villain? Hmm. Predictable “Guaranteed to irritate readers with a decent IQ” = The Bendis formula. I hope this is not true, but it feels on par with the train wreck that is Disassembled. Marvel’s reliance on Mutants and Spider-Man over the years clearly shows that when it comes to any other Marvel property they have NO IDEA what to do with them. Sad. Very sad. House of No / Poor Ideas is more like it.
Jamie Hatton: I thought Nightwi… sorry, that’s somebody else’s joke.
Jesse Baker: And even worse, Bendis will hack it up like he always does and give us a one-dimensional, tepid “Wanda is evil because she’s on magical chaos crack high from doing too much magic crack” BS motivation that makes one want to scratch your head and yell “That’s It? That’s it?”.
As for the cameo, it’s either going to be Wolverine (announcing he’s joining the team) or Sentry. Though if they REALLY want to shock people they should end the comic with Hank Pym walking into a room in the hospital where Janet’s at and find Kid Miracleman
publish/reprint Miracleman again….
Paul Sebert: Please keep in mind this is the same column that’s told us on separate occasions that Nightwing and Kyle Rayner were definitely the Identity
Crisis killer.
I’ll believe it if I see it.
Morse: To be fair, he never said anybody was definitely anything, such is the nature of a rumor column.
Marvel provides Newsarama with first six pages of Uncanny X-Men #451
Jamie Hatton: 2 words: fed and up. Let me bust loose on this one a little – assuming that this is the official debut in an mainline X-Book by ‘X-23’ are they going to even bother explaining anything that happened in NYX? The fact that she was a hot little goth girl and now looks like she was dressed by Sabretooth in 1991. Apparently this is the ‘FANG’ costume from an old Byrne run – huh?!
The Alan Davis art is, as always – pretty damn fine – and I do like that they are trying to slowly match up the costumes from other titles so they look a little similar, but can’t Claremont learn that he is not writing in his own little X-Bubble and that there are hundreds of pages a month being pushed into the X-World – his not being the only, or definitive, ones anymore. Then again, they might have just decided to ignore NYX altogether – in which case it makes me sad, but it’s a bit more tolerable.
“Troy” writer David Benioff tapped to write Wolverine solo movie
John Babos: I am torn here. I love Hugh Jackman, and I think that this could be a very good movie. But, on the other hand, what makes Wolverine so good (to me at least) has been his relationship with the X-Men. I am not sure how good a solo Wolverine movie could be.
Ben Morse: Loved Troy, love Jackman as Wolverine; I’ll take it!
Preview of Avengers #503 released to The Pulse
Mike Maillaro: Quoted from the article: “The last page cameo will have the comic world talking for years! Guest starring every Avenger … ever!”
What BS. Unless Superman shows up and declares his love for Captain America, I sincerely doubt we’ll be talking about this book even next week, much less for years. This story arc just wasn’t that good.
Riddler being revealed as the mastermind behind Hush? Hal Jordan going nuts? Colossus being alive again?
Sure those things are worth talking about. Not this crud.
Ben Morse: The solicitation talks about a traitor”¦Wonder Man is being shown a lot”¦yep, looks like Wanda is the villain.
Cameos by every Avenger EVER? Not impressed; Busiek already did that and actually found stuff for them to do. Glad Beast is in this one though”¦
I still predict the last page cameo is just the Young Avengers.
Penguin to releases graphic novel line based on classic books
Jamie Hatton: Good. I’m not sure of the commercial viability of it, but this along with the Smith – Bone book thing goin on, and kids are going to have comics forcefed down their throats”¦they don’t buy em on their own”¦WE’LL MAKE EM!
In all seriousness though, I applaud them for trying something different and new to make kids read and to bring awareness to comics.
Ben Morse: Applause. To me, the most important function comics serve is to get kids both reading and appreciating art”¦if only this had existed while I was in high school or college so I could have actually read the books I was supposed to for class.
Tim Stevens (Writer of DC News & Views & Nexus reviewer): Hey, any and all exposure is good. I also like Jamie’s idea of force-feeding children comics. Maybe we can link them to terrorism in some way: “Read comics instead of (insert activity here). By doing (aforementioned activity) you only fund the terrorists that want to come to America and kill your pets. You don’t want Fluffy to die, do you? DO YOU?!
Cal Publishing Inc., an indirect Disney subsidiary, wins the auction for CrossGen’s assets with a $1,000,000 bid
Jamie Hatton: What a double edged blade THAT is. It’s great that those properties have a home, but that home happens to be underneath the biggest commercial crackpots in the world. At least with Time Warner they would have been given a proper home and then a crappy movie.
If they mess up Abadazad, what would have been my book of the year, I will cry. Seriously. Hard.
John Babos: As long whoever the accepted purchaser will actually publish the properties and / or bring them to other media like movies, tv and the like, I’m ok with this. With Disney behind it, you know the resources are there to make a go of a new universe for the CGE properties.
There are many lessons to be learned from the CGE experience particularly that a new publisher should grow their universe / monthly titles slowly.
Properties are bought and sold comics. It happens. DC bought Fawcett, Quality and Charlton properties. Acclaim bought Valiant. Marvel bought Malibu. Sadly, of all these only DC continues to actually use the characters they bought. Acclaim tried and failed. Marvel bought and buried Malibu for its coloring technique.
I just want to see Ruse and Sojourn on the stands. (Well I also want to see Valiant / Acclaim properties like Eternal Warrior[s] and Bloodshot too, but alas that’s far off or in the “never” category.) Hopefully, a Disney-backed company will make regular Ruse and
Sojourn offerings a reality.
Fantastic Four cartoon to be produced to bridge the gap between movies ala Spider-Man
Jamie Hatton: Cart before the horse on this one eh? What happens if FF tanks? We shall see.
Ben Morse: Didn’t the Spidey cartoon not do so well? Are the DVDs really moving? Anybody? Jamie? Bueller?
Jesse Baker: Disney owns the rights to the 94 Spiderman animated series and they sell pretty good, given how Disney keeps churning out themed disks (most notably the upcoming release of the Venom Saga at the end of the year)…
Tim Stevens: What if it tanks, creatively or box office wise? Can’t say yet, but Batman: TAS succeeded independent of the movies’ ability to achieve either and was, arguably, more interesting and better made. Will that happen? Again, who knows? But isn’t it nice to dream?
Morse: However, Tim, unlike Batman: TAS, this is being specifically marketed to the movie fans”¦so no movie fans, no show.
Tim Sheridan (Nexus reviewer): How wasn’t the Batman one targeted to the movie fans. It started production only a few months after the 89 flick, and then was released 3 months after Batman Returns.
Morse: Yeah, but the recent Spider-Man one and this potential FF one are actually set in movie continuity, literally telling what takes place between movies, the Batman series had its own self-contained continuity.
Hatton: That might not be the case specifically, if they gear it ‘VAGUELY’
towards the movie – but I sadly feel that FF is just one of those groups that only seem to work in comics. They just don’t work in any other media form.
It’s not like they were the Bionic 6…now THAT was a superfamily.
Stevens: The theme song RULED. The only cartoon song better was Digimon.
“Digimon, digital monsters, Digimon are the champ-IONS!”
Whoever wrote that ditty was writing art.
Baker: As corny as the Digimon music was, it was a THOUSAND TIMES better than the crap being churned out for Pokemon. The theme song to Pokemon still makes
me cringe in horror when I hear it…
Paul Sebert: I hate to admit it, but I have a copy of the Digimon Movie Soundtrack, and I keep it in semi-frequent rotation getting my groove on to Hey Digimon
while I’m driving. Actually the Americanized cartoon had some really nice-emo
pop music to it in the second season.
Stevens: I can see why you’d hate to admit that.
Sheridan: Do you all remember the FF cartoon from the 90s? Wow was that an awful thing. “Call the 4….Fan-tas-tic Four!” Let’s hope this is better. And for that matter, let’s hope the film is good too.
Sebert: Yah know… I was a really big fan of that mid-90s Fantastic Four cartoon which got saddled with the much inferior Iron Man toon as the Marvel Action
Hour. It had pretty good voice acting, and was pretty loyal to the Lee/Kirby stories.
One minor quip though… it had the WORST cartoon theme song bar none ever.
Bonus points to anyone here who can find the lyrics to it.
Morse: The mid-90s Marvel Action Hour Fantastic Four may have sucked, but it did have two things going for it: Brian Austin Green as the Human Torch and the greatest cheesy theme song ever. It also didn’t hurt it that it ran as a package with friggin’ Force Works the animated series, which would make an animated version of Gunfire look like Watchmen done by Steven Spielberg, Alfred Hitchcock & that dude who did 2001.
Stevens: And a thousand film students screamed out in agony. “That dude” is Stanley Kubrick.
Sheridan: The Marvel Hour was pretty awful in every way. What is with this weird obsession you have with Brian Austin Green? He can’t bring back Young Justice either.
Morse: Clearly you have never heard Mr. Austin Green rapping “Flame On””¦
Stevens: Oh and, bad news for Ben:
“Brian Austin Green leaves the show after Season 1 and is replaced by Quinton Flynn, who took over the role of the Human Torch.”
Morse: And it was no coincidence that they were cancelled after the second season”¦
Sheridan: I hear that in later years, Flynn was an avid Young Justice follower.
Morse: How’s Sleepwalker doing these days, Tim?
Stevens: As for the Spider-Man cartoon…no, it is not moving off the shelves. However, that movie was highly successful, so the point is…
Sheridan: I bought a copy of the Spidey DVD, and then lent it to fellow Nexus-er Tim Stevens, but he never gave it back. He says he did, but I know he still has it.
Stevens: Dude…I gave it back and you know it. Not my fault you are too chuckle headed to keep track of your things.
Hatton: For the record, this is the longest we’ve discussed a topic since
Marvel continuity breaches”¦and it’s over the flippin FF cartoon”¦wow – is EVERYONE bored at work?
And Kudos to use of the term ‘Chuckleheaded.’
Matt Morrison: I would just like it noted that you are all geeks.
Now, back to my life of loose women and wild adventure.
