Pulse Glazer
Grey! Marvel! NOW!
We have announcements to talk about.
Grey Scherl
We really do, Marvel went ahead and did for real what we did last week. The creativity can be argued.
Glazer
Let’s talk announcements first, then we can speculate.
Grey
Works for me, speculation just tends to lead to wild tangents when it comes to us.
Glazer
Jonathan Hickman is taking over the Avengers line. Well, the pure, non X-y avengers line. He’s with Jerome Opena on Avengers and Steve Epting on New Avengers. Thoughts?
Grey
From what I’ve heard, he’s going to have a different artist every arc on Avengers and will be bringing the same sort of story telling he’s been utilizing in Fantastic Four over the past few years…so really, this is the best move Marvel could have made. The Avengers line needed a new voice to replace [Brian] Bendis, and Hickman definitely can be that.
Glazer
I love the idea of Hickman on Avengers. I’ll finally care about the franchise again. He’s one of my two favorite Marvel writers. I have to ask though – why does New exist now?
Grey
I imagine that he’ll find some way to make it work, like keeping FF going after Fantastic Four came back, and it could just as easily just be two totally unique rosters doing independent actions.
Glazer
That’d work – Can we keep Logan and Spidey there and off main Avengers? Please? The movie showed we don’t need them there to sell.
Grey
I’m all for that. I want Avengers to have a roster of people that I think of and say “That’s an Avenger”, despite the last decade I still don’t look at either of them like that.
Glazer
I’d more guess Avengers is the movie roster.
Grey
Nah, Avengers Assemble is apparently not getting relaunched, and that’s already the movie roster.
Glazer
Oh, no writer yet, though, right?
Know what’s weird? I can’t wait to see what Hickman does with Scarlet Witch.
Grey
My gut is telling me it’ll be Bendis, even though he swears he’s leaving Avengers, he still has to set up Ultron War somewhere.
Glazer
Wow, I utterly forgot Ultron War. That makes sense.
Grey
Ultron War is weird, dude, we’ve known about it for how many years now? And yet all that’s been done on panel is Ultron returning in a point one issue, the bogus future that opened the current Avengers book, and that overpriced Point One book that showed Hitch drawing Spidey and Hawkeye right before he left Marvel for good.
Bendis teases it and does nothing with it. It’s the vaporware of crossover events despite that we know it’ll come eventually.
Glazer
I’m okay with the wait, but wish there were a more coherent build.
Grey
I wish there was a build period.
At least Secret Invasion had Quesada and Bendis hyping up that some big Skrull event was coming during their weekly interviews with the big name comic blogs.
Glazer
Fair- but screw Bendis. Thumbs up for Hickman on two Avengers books?
Grey
Way way way WAY up. Hickman is one of three guys that Marvel has that could get me back on Avengers.
Glazer
There’s more than that for me, but Hickman is clearly choice A. Next we have the All New X-Men. That’s Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen having a time displaced original 5 X-Men join the present roster.
Grey
The fact that the book is going to be hitting stands every other week is the only reason I’m going to give it a shot. I love the premise, but the longevity baffles me.
Glazer
I’m not touching it. Bendis on X-Men holds zero interest to me and the original five aren’t a selling point. They were the worst of Lee’s early Marvel stuff and never sold.
Stan, obviously, not Jim.
Grey
It’s the opposite end of some of the most classic of classic X-Men stories, instead of future X-Men going back in time to warn the past to change the future, we have the past coming to the future to be like “Holy crap, this isn’t what I signed on for”.
Man, Marvel’s two famous Lee’s both cut their teeth with the mutants, didn’t they?
Glazer
Stan “cut his teeth” with Spidey and Avengers. X-Men was canceled. Well, Days of Future past is getting a movie so this makes some thematic sense.
Grey
There was some really good stuff in the early days of X-Men, it was just….the premise was before its time. And just like “Nobody knows what a Mutant is” nobody knew what an X-Man was either. Really, I just wanted to bring up that Jim Lee became the biggest artist in the industry after drawing X-Men.
Glazer
Fair, but screw that guy and the horse he rode in on. Most inconsistent creative voice of the past 30-years.
Grey
Jim? He has the same problem that most of the Image founders did; fantastic artists with great ideas that they wanted to write themselves despite that none of them really knew how to write.
Erik and Whilce learned how to write, Rob to an extent, but Jim and Todd? Fail.
Glazer
Right… and he was wildly inconsistent in choosing writers. Hush.. really?
Grey
I will actually support that decision. Hush’s biggest problem was ending with no sort of follow up, the rest of it was just a fun and mainly irrelevant Batman story. It was Long Halloween with blockbuster art.
Glazer
It was fun crap. Lee is supposed to “matter.” Whatever. I’m not touching original X-Men in present day.
Grey
Also that most of the arc saw giant retcons and rewrites to it’s big moments, with only Catwoman finally finding out that Bruce Wayne is Batman sticking around long enough to be erased by the New 52.
Riddler knowing his identity? Taken out by a mace shot to the head.
Hush as a villain? Got abused in Gotham Knights by a horrible creative team before Paul Dini finally made him scary again in Tec.
Glazer
Hush was a terrible idea.
The character, I mean.
Grey
Or my least favorite, Harvey Dent is finally cured of being Two Face only to go back to being Two Face the very next time we saw him.
Glazer
Ha that was absurd.
Grey
If Jeph had actually done a followup arc to Hush I imagine things would have been so much different. Instead his leaving DC for Marvel wound up getting his work crapped on like when Grant left Marvel for DC.
Glazer
Except Jeph’s work was 1/100th as good and just fan service.
Grey
Valid, but the situation was more or less the same. He introduced new elements into the mythos and altered ones we had grown accustomed to, and for the most part all were gone within a year of him leaving the book.
Glazer
I wasn’t complaining when Loeb’s were gone.
So you’re getting All New X-Men. I am not. A split decision.
Time for Rick Remender and John Cassaday’s Uncanny Avengers! You’re getting it, I’m getting it, but why is it such a great idea?
Grey
Well, for one, it’s Rick Remender being elevated to “marquee book of the entire company” status.
And for two…Marvel is finally answering the age old issue of “Why the hell do the X-Men and Avengers operate in the same city and never work together on anything”
Glazer
Well, they aren’t exactly in the same city, but it does make a ton of sense to combine the franchises in some way.
Historically one seems to sell a ton at a time. This is a good way to make them both utterly marquee.
Besides, Havok!
Grey
HAVOK!
I may love Cyclops, but Alex is my favorite Summers.
Glazer
Cyclops is my favorite X-Character, but I’m happy to see Alex return to prominence after … sheez… X-Factor’s first heyday? Starjammers stuff sucked.
Grant [Morrison] and Gillen wrote an amazing Cyclops.
Grey
Fraction wasn’t half bad at writing him either.
Alex had minor prominence after X-Factor, I mean, I read the Howard Mackie written Mutant X where he couldn’t even keep his own “I created all of this” continuity straight. That book was awesome.
Glazer
Never read it but heard good things.
I have a concern with Uncanny Avengers though – Cassaday isn’t exactly timely.
Grey
It was as bad as it was awesome, he would retcon himself every six issues or so.
I imagine that Cassaday has the first arc already in the can, with the way the industry has shifted in the past few years delays longer than two weeks require a Batman Incorporated #3 level of issue.
Glazer
I got that – great issue.
Grey
I did not get that, my store either didn’t get it or respected DC’s “Don’t sell it” wishes.
Glazer
My store apparently did not care. It’s excellent.
So, we’re in on Uncanny Avengers. How about Rick Remender’s other book. He’s writing Captain America with John Romita Jr. on art.
Grey
I was all about Gage on Captain America, but Rick Remender may be perfect to bring a modern voice to Cap.
I’ll also say that when he’s written Cap in his other books for whatever reason…he does a pretty good Steve Rogers.
Glazer
I’m willing to give it a shot. Remender has never written anyone similar to Cap with any frequency, so I’m curious.
Romita, however, has been bad.
Grey
I would argue that, he looked really good in AVX, so I’m going to blame his recent artistic issues on his inkers.
Because he had a different inker for his AVX issues than he did for his horrific Avengers issues.
Glazer
AVX has been super inconsistent. Between Romita being shaky and me not being sold on Remender’s Cap voice, this is a book I’m getting, but it has a short leash.
Grey
Let’s be fair about one thing, this is Marvel, expect no artist to last longer than six issues.
Glazer
They put their best foot forward early. And, honestly, I’ll be getting Steve in Avengers. His solo book always has a short-ish leash.
Grey
Not true, did you ever read a Mark Waid written run? Man Without A Country had no leash.
Glazer
It had a short leash at first. It was fantastic so I read the whole thing.
I read half-ish of Brubaker’s.
I generally prefer Cap on a team.
Grey
I do as well, but you get some good stuff sometimes. Really it just takes a writer with the balls to not lock him in the team element.
Glazer
Well, let’s see how Remender does.
Next we have Iron Man with Kieron Gillen and Greg Land!
I’m there. Land does nothing for me, but Gillen has yet to write a book I don’t like
Grey
Greg Land is awful, but Gillen sells me books.
Plus, I always want to like Iron Man.
Glazer
I doubt Gillen can touch the best run ever on the title, but the dropoff won’t be steep.
Do you think Gillen can match Fraction?
Grey
If he doesn’t ever write a book like Fear Itself, then yes. Fraction didn’t sell me on his Iron Man until he did the Dark Reign arc of Tony on the run, that made the book must read to me.
Glazer
Stark: Dissassembled is where I jumped on and I’ve loved it since besides the FI detour.
Grey
FI just left a bad taste in my mouth across most of Marvel’s ‘heroes’ line. Thor, Cap, and Iron Man all wound up toxic to me.
Glazer
The series sucked. You paid too much attention to it.
Grey
I just read the core mini so I could do reviews for every issue.
Well, and the books I was already reading.
Glazer
You’re editor. Assign them shits out.
If I don’t like the direction of the tie in issues, I just use it as an excuse to save money.
Grey
Man, have you seen our staff? I could assign four books to everyone and the only review I’d definitely get is my weekly Wednesday one.
Glazer
Burn! Let’s move on. You into Jason Aaron and Esad Ribic’s Hulk Thor?
Grey
Thor and Captain America didn’t have tie ins, or at least ones that I read. I just hated the directions coming out of FI. Iron Man I was reading all along and FI killed it for me.
They aren’t on Hulk!
Glazer
I meant Thor!
Sorry!
Grey
You and confusing Thor, that’s twice in a week!
Glazer
Thor had FI tie ins that sucked. We just didn’t care for Frac’s Thor. Journey into Mystery, AKA Marvel’s best book, was launched out of FI though.
Grey
I was so burned on FI that I ignored JitM, but I’ll trade it.
Glazer
The first two are out, I believe.
Grey
I expect an oversized collection to be released digitally soon at a discount price.
Glazer
That’d be awesome. I might get it and I have the issues.
Grey
Jason Aaron could bring me back to Thor. He made me like Hulk, so I mean, he can’t realistically ruin Thor.
Though I said the same thing about Fraction with Iron Man, and his Thor was terrible.
Glazer
I’m in as well. I like Aaron, but I like his madness more on teams. Thor’s Asgardian family operates enough like a team that this should work out.
Grey
Wolverine and the X-Men, when it’s good, is just so insanely fun.
Glazer
Agreed totally. I want an Aaron Black Panther.
Grey
I keep thinking of people I want to see him write but I keep pulling out books he has written well. He really has turned the corner for me, because this time last year I couldn’t last more than six issues on a book with him.
Glazer
His Secret Invasion Black Panther was one of the 3 best Panther takes I’ve come across. Guess the other 2!
Grey
Priest for sure.
Glazer
That’s #1.
Grey
If Priest isn’t somebodys favorite Black Panther then they either haven’t read it or have horrible taste.
Glazer
Agreed.
Grey
What’s the other one? I’m not uber versed in those who have written the Panther. Animated?
Glazer
Nope, nice and easy – Jonathan Hickman.
Well, looks like we’re in on Jason Aaron’s Thor. Now for a book Aaron’s leaving – Hulk by Mark Waid and Leinil Francis Yu.
Grey
I’ve actually enjoyed Jason Aaron’s Incredible Hulk, save for Planet Hulk it’s my longest time reading a Hulk book. However, Mark Waid is going to make the book must read.
Glazer
I’ll officially read anything Waid writes. He’s got stellar runs on everything he touched except X-Men.
Grey
When did he write X-Men?
Glazer
Onslaught. Editorial killed him.
Grey
He was writing X-Men then? I thought he was on Avengers and Captain America getting killed by editorial. I know his Heroes Return Captain America run was Marvel saying “Sorry we screwed with your run”.
Glazer
He definitely wrote X-Men around them. I should look into it.
Grey
I just pulled up his bibliography and it looks like he was writing along with [Scott] Lobdell during that time. Which means someone else got goaded into writing The Crossing.
Glazer
See? There we go. I remember being wildly excited by it.
Grey
My first real entry into Marvel was the end of Onslaught, so writers hadn’t really begun to click for me yet. I just know I have a complete collection of X-Men and Uncanny X-Men from that time period. JOSEPH!
Glazer
He’s one of the top 5 writers of the 90s. I’d go Mark Waid, Neil Gaiman, Warren Ellis, James Robinson, and Garth Ennis.
In no order, obviously.
Grey
He’s one of those rare guys who wrote super heroes in the 90’s and is still doing amazing with them today. His styles have evolved with the times, not unlike the most renowned of Hulk writers, Peter David.
Glazer
He co-wrote a bunch of Age of Apocalypse.
Grey
He wrote Avengers after The Crossing and ended it with Onslaught, that’s what I was thinking of.
Glazer
He’s written everyone major at Marvel except Hulk and Thor it seems.
Grey
He and Hickman are competing for my top Fantastic Four writer of all time.
Glazer
I like Hickman’s run better, but it’s close. Waid still has the best Cap run ever… and the best Flash run… and the best Elseworlds.
Grey
Not to mention that Mark wrote, in my opinion, the best ever superhero Captain America book. Ed Brubaker did some amazing stuff before bringing Steve back, but he never really did superhero stuff.
He also wrote some great JLA after Grant Morrison left.
Glazer
Waid’s run as a whole has fewer weakpoints than did Bru.
His run is nowhere near Morrison’s, as much as I enjoyed it. It didn’t collapse until after Waid, though, and then it fell hard.
Grey
Waid was also the first writer to break the shield and do an arc about replacing it and another about fixing it, which is something we’ve seen in the cartoon recently. Not to mention all the shock shield breaking moments we’ve seen over the past few years.
Joe Kelly tried his best but he was only an issue to issue go on that book, he’d do a good issue or arc and then follow it up with something mediocre.
Glazer
True there. Kelly’s better on smaller, more character driven stuff.
Grey
He did an issue about the potential Batman/Wonder Woman romance that was just awesome.
Glazer
That overlapped with, I think, Hush making Bruce and Selina serious. It was strange editing.
Grey
Especially when you consider that a few years later the book was completely editorial controlled.
Glazer
And worse than Kelly ever made it.
It was a weird time. The Authority had begun kicking the shit out of everything and created a paradigm shift.
Grey
I’d say the Byrne/Claremont reunion was the absolute worst.
Everyone wanted to make their superheroes cool and edge and modern, and only Mark Millar could do it in Ultimates.
Glazer
Ultimates was just government controlled The Authority. As much as I love it, Millar was better on The Authority.
And nowhere near as good as Warren Ellis on the same title.
Grey
Agreed, I’m just saying that the pro-active hero approach with superheroes going after realistic things and trying to save the world from non-supervillains never worked in the mainstream Marvel or DC.
Glazer
Realistic here being wildly relative.
Grey
Wildly is still an understatement, but the point is there. The Authority weren’t running around beating the crap out of supervillains so much as they were making broad strokes to change the world.
Glazer
Not really at first – the first arc they kill god.
But this is a crazy tangent, even for us. We’re in on Waid Hulk. Let’s talk about the character Waid swore to never write again – Deadpool!
Grey
That was the last arc, the first arc they had the suicide bombers from Gamorra.
Ooooh, Deadpool! He with the video game that makes Rob Liefeld the happiest man alive!
Glazer
Wow, Gamorra. Man, I loved that run. Stormwatch’s Not Dead Yet remains one of my favorite arcs ever. A team of villains turns up trying to change the world by utterly freeing it. The heroes mindlessly destroy them, but the “villains” were right.
It was fantastic. And yes, finally, Daniel Way is gone!
Thank god they didn’t give him Hulk.
Grey
Way carried the torch way too long and it hurts my memories of a book that wasn’t that bad for the first two years.
Glazer
Deadpool goes to Brian Posehn, Gerry Duggan and Tony Moore.
Grey
During those two years I would have called it good, now it’s “wasn’t that bad”.
Glazer
Way’s book utterly lacked a heart. It was just slapstick.
Grey
Which was fine in the first couple of years because at least he was getting reigned into events that kept him on a set course. Once they let him on his own the book just drifted.
Deadpool vs Bullseye as Hawkeye was great.
Glazer
It was just fun. You getting the Posehn book?
Grey
Yes I am. Comedians writing comedy? What a novel concept!
Grey
I actually have been a fan of Posehn’s for years, I watched Just Shoot Me when I was younger and he was always memorable when he showed up. Kinda etched him into my memory.
Glazer
He’s never written anything I really like, but he has all the right comedic influences.
Grey
It’s inspired, I’m excited for it.
Though you know who else I’d read a Deadpool book by?
Glazer
Louis CK!
Grey
Hahahaha, that would be really interesting!
Glazer
Weird is the word you’re looking for.
Grey
I was going to say Cullen Bunn, actually. I read the first issue of Deadpool Kills The Marvel Universe the other day and was blown away. This is the Deadpool I remember seeing in X-Force and Wolverine.
Glazer
That works. I’ll check that out. I’m skipping Posehn’s run. Can’t buy everything and, well, I’m worried it’ll be slapstick again. Good enough reviews and I’m there.
Grey
I’ll give it an arc and cross my fingers. I hope for the best and expect nothing.
Glazer
We’re down to our last three books! And one’s a two-fer. Matt Fraction takes FF and Fantastic Four… with Mike Allred and Mark Bagley respectively.
I couldn’t be more excited. Frac is choice #1 to follow Hickman.
Grey
I’m wary, but given the things that Frac has done the past few years to raise my ire…I’ll be damned if my problem with his Thor run isn’t that the first arc was a Fantastic Four story.
That didn’t star the Fantastic Four.
Glazer
Ha, I think he got stuck with Thor when JMS threw everyone off. Frac’s FF will be amazing. He’s really good at long term planning and Sci Fi.
Grey
What killed me about his Thor was that he did minis and one shots that were awesome, but then he got the book and made it sci-fi for no apparent reason.
At the end of the day though…I read Fantastic Four, good or bad, and this will be no exception.
Glazer
I’m all but convinced he didn’t want it.
He’s my favorite Iron Man run ever. His Uncanny X-Men was good. His Thor mini’s were great. And Casanova? That is trippy, amazing shit.
Grey
You know what book cemented him to me initially?
Glazer
What?
Grey
The Order.
Glazer
I’ve heard good things. I should have bought it. It’s like your Agents of Atlas.
Grey
It was a fun concept that really had a lot of ideas I’d love to see revisited. They were the California Initiative team and they were bigger than rockstars.
Glazer
X-Statix?
Grey
With a more serious tone. One girl was a pop star who put out a Paris Hilton tape in hopes of boosting her image. The main guy was a recovering alcoholic that played Tony Stark in a movie or TV show about him, and is actually friends with Tony and one of them is the others sponsor. He’s shown up a few times in Invincible Iron Man, I know that much.
Glazer
Wow, interesting. One day I’ll trade it.
But you won’t regret Fraction’s Fantastic books. Calling it now.
Grey
He’s got Mark Bagley and Mike Allred, at the very worst I can just stare at the really pretty pictures.
Glazer
The FF work with his sci fi sensibilities.
Grey
I want to see him go high concept, because he can’t do mythical.
Glazer
He will. Watch and see.
Grey
I’m looking forward to it, I want to be a fan of his again.
Glazer
I still am, obviously.
Grey
I openly completely checked out after Fear Itself.
At the same time, I also read no Bendis.
Glazer
I read one Bendis book… will be two, but we’ll get to that.
The last book is one I didn’t expect to exist: X-Men Legacy with Simon Spurrier and Tan Eng Huat.
Grey
I expected them to do a sister title, because the X-Men really have gotten to be too big for one main title, but Spurrier is an inspired choice. His X-Club work has been fun.
Glazer
I haven’t loved it. That mini was mediocre.
And I love those characters.
Grey
He’s going to be using them still, just wait and see.
Fraction’s best addition to the X-Men, the X-Club.
Glazer
Agreed totally, but I’m not in on Spurrier. Never liked Judge Dread, didn’t like his X-Club… nothing for me.
Grey
I imagine someone gave him the nod, and that Christos Gage is moving on to something bigger.
Glazer
He paid his dues, whatever that means, but I haven’t liked his smaller work, so not bothering with the bigger work.
Grey
I’ll give him an arc, that’s all I was going to give Mike Carey before I wound up giving him every single issue of his six year run.
Glazer
Annnnd we’re spent! Enjoy everybody! Check back later as we match the .1 creative teams up with their books!
Grey
Have a good one!
