It's No Secret: the Latest Event Series is Lame

Back in the 80s, I read the Secret Wars limited series and freakin' loved it.  It was so exciting and so many exciting things came out of it:  Spider-Man got his black symbiote costume, The Thing stayed behind on Battleworld and got his own series, She-Hulk joined the Fantastic Four, etc.  Not only was the series unique and interesting, but Secret Wars action figures came out of it.  There were characters I had never had or seen before to play with!  Yes, they were pretty cheaply made with no points of articulation, but still it felt revolutionary.

A couple of years later came Secret Wars II, which was just plain farcical with the Beyonder in his white Miami Vice leisure suit. 

After the most recent shitty Marvel event series, AXIS, I was really looking forward to the new Secret Wars series.  I finally read Secret Wars #1 (2015) and all I have to say is, "Huh?"  What the fuck was that?  Seriously.  What the fuck was that?  I don't even know what the hell happened.  It felt like I was picked up and plopped down in the middle of something going on -- a battle of some sorts on Earth -- and I'm supposed to enjoy that and follow along?   Did I miss the introduction?  This was the first issue, correct?  

I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  It was written by Jonathan Hickman after all, who has previously turned me away from his storytelling on Fantastic Four and the Avengers.  There's no character development.  No character interaction.  No enjoyable/followable plot.  It's just battle after battle after pointless battle, like watching Man of Steel on repeat.  And while his comics always have more word balloons than most comics, they don't really say anything.  The dialogue doesn't feel real or seem to come naturally to the characters speaking it.  The characters are always telling what is happening, when the pages should naturally just "show" it without explanation and the extraneous wording. 

After reading the latest Secret Wars #1, I can only guess that the rest of the series will be equally boring and pointless, much like every Marvel event series that has recently preceded it.  Wake me when the Marvel Universe is over. 

The Better-Than-Average Spider-Man

I started reading Amazing Spider-Man again with #583, the comic that grabbed all of the headlines because it featured President Obama on its variant covers.  I had stopped reading just before #400, when I quit comics all together.  I had never been as satisfied with ASM anyway, after the fantastic storylines of Spidey's black costume, the first appearances of Venom, and Todd McFarlane's art chores.  The stories were just kind of so-so.  

Amazing Spider-Man #698

Jump to #583 and beyond.  The stories still were just kind of average, but I still kept buying them.  I've put up with Mary Jane and Peter Parker splitting up as if they've never been married, Spider Island with a bazillion Spider-Man rip-offs running around NYC, the introduction of the annoying Alpha, and all of the extra "Point One" issues.  I even put up with ridiculous three issues per month stint with various writers and artists, making the series so incoherent and inconsistent.  Finally, Marvel signed on Dan Slott and went to a twice monthly publication (at a heftier $3.99 price tag), giving the series at least some consistency and regularity.  I truly admire Dan Slott for being able to put out so many stories of Spidey every month.  It's quite a feat.  Unfortunately, to me, the stories, again, have just been so-so (with the exception of the poignant issues, #655 and #657). That is, until issue #698 when it was revealed that -- SPOILER ALERT!! -- Doctor Octopus had mysteriously switched bodies with Spider-Man, leaving our web-headed friend in a dying body.  Even the cover is one of the best I've seen since picking up ASM again.  At first you think Doc Ock has discovered Spider-Man's secret identity and is calling him out on his deathbed.  Only inside do you discover that that's actually Peter saying his own name to try to get people to help him.  Now, that's AMAZING.  

There are a lot of angry readers out there, disgusted by the thought of a "Superior Spider-Man."  I, for one, am actually looking forward to where Slott is going to take us with Doc Ock as the new Spider-Man, since this is one of the best storylines I've seen for Spider-Man in YEARS.  I also wonder when Peter Parker will "come back to life" and take back control of his own body.  And...will the series still be called Superior Spider-Man?  Or will we see the dawn of another Amazing Spider-Man title?  Will the sequencing start over again with #1?  Or will it return to the 700s? 

Meet: the Venisher

 

Dear Marvel Comics,

Seriously?  The new Venom?  A cross between Venom and the Punisher?  The Venisher?  I think I'll pass.

Regards,

Former Fan of Venom 

Here Comes the "Reign" Again

Continuing with the "Dark Reign" storyline that Marvel Comics has basically spread throughout all of their series, I've picked up a few of the series that focus on the individuals within Norman Osborn's "Dark Avengers." You know the ones: they vaguely resemble and dress up like actual Marvel superheroes, so everyone thinks that they're the real deal, despite the obvious differences (like swearing, maiming, killing, destroying property) and the fact that the real superheroes are...actually still doing their thing. Anyway, once you suspend your disbelief at this ridiculous notion, there are some pretty decent stories going on...and some rather horrible ones.

The GOOD:
The Wolverine series has become a playground for "Dark Wolverine" instead of the normal, lovable (?), fuzzy, one-of-a-kind Wolverine. Dark Wolverine (blecch! I can't stand the "Dark" titles in every name and/or group) is actually Wolverine's son. Wolverine was apparently married long ago to a Japanese woman (but not the famous Mariko from his first limited series back in the 1980s) and had a child that he thought long since dead. Daken (Dark Wolverine) is all grown up now and sports a mohawk and tattoos underneath his mask and costume. He has similar mutant powers to Wolverine, plus a unique pheromone manipulation ability, which I find very intriguing. It's something unique that I haven't seen in comic books before. He is also struggling with his own identity, and between good and evil. Lastly, Daken seems pretty comfortable in his sexuality...whatever it may be. He made a couple of joking sexual innuendos to "Sinister Spider-Man" and The Thing to f**k with their heads, using his pheromone ability. For all of these reasons, he is a very interesting character and not just the child of a superhero with the same abilities. I hope Wolverine gets his own series back and Daken goes on to new adventures in his own series. I'd definitely invest my reading time in finding out more about him.

The BAD:
In the tradition of the new "Dark" Hawkeye limited series comes Sinister Spider-Man. Why "sinister" instead of "dark" like everyone else? Other than for alliteration purposes, who knows!? Anywho, this new Sinister Spider-Man posing as Spider-Man is actually...Venom. I know, I know. It's pretty hard to believe considering he's actually wearing the black and white Venom symbiote costume while posing as Spider-Man. It would be like me walking into work wearing a rubber Obama mask, toting myself as our President. Deceptive, right?

Apparently there have been some changes to Venom over the years. He's no longer Eddie Brock. He's now Mac Gargan, formerly the Scorpion. This in itself is kind of sad, because I always liked the idea of the Scorpion as a villain. Maybe another one is in the works. But I digress...

I read Sinister Spider-Man and all I can say is {YAWN}. It's a four-issue limited series by writer Brian Reed and artist Chris Bachalo. Reed says, "the whole Marvel Universe thinks Spider-Man is living in Avengers Tower, when it's really Mac Gargan, who has a long history as a sociopath." Venom...er, Sinister Spider-Man...er, "Spider-Man" is a womanizer, a killer, and an all-around a-hole. He's the male equivalent of a Black Widow spider. He bites the heads off the women he f**ks. And it's all on the news. So, you can see why people would naturally believe him to be the real Spider-Man. Especially with the real Spider-Man out there swinging around in his red and blue tights. After the first issue, I didn't want to read the rest (and had wished I hadn't already purchased them), but I did anyway. The story of Sinister Spider-Man felt rushed and randomly thrown together, unlike Dark Wolverine or Dark Reign: Hawkeye (previously reviewed), just to sell comics.

The UGLY:

The artwork on Sinister Spider-Man. With all the talented, unused artists out there looking for employment, why settle for mediocre?

Dork Reign

In case you're unaware, Marvel Comics has this ongoing theme/story running called "Dark Reign" throughout most of their comic books: Norman Osborn (formerly the Green Goblin) has a government job running the agency called H.A.M.M.E.R., which replaced S.H.I.E.L.D. As the director of this new "law-enforcing" agency, Osborn creates his own Avengers and X-Men team, made up of villains posing as superheroes. And nobody notices.

I know, I know. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking WTF? And you'd be right.

Maybe I'm not on the same trippy substance as the current Marvel writers and executives, but seriously...WTF? From the few different series and issues I've read or browsed, I just have to wonder how it is that not a single person has questioned that the "heroes" look a little different than their counterparts...and are killing people. Case in point: the new "Spider-Man" looks like Venom. And IS Venom. The new "Hawkeye" sticks a pen in the eye of a "fan" asking for his autograph. Norman Osborn is a hybrid of Iron Man and Captain America called Iron Patriot, but I guess people just see him as Iron Man or Captain America, depending on who they want to see? Kinda like one of those Magic Eye puzzles? But wait...doesn't everyone know that Norman Osborn is/was the Green Goblin? And everyone is...okay with all this? I feel like I'm in the middle of an I Love Lucy episode where Lucy is trying to deceive Ricky by wearing a fake mustache and...it works! He has no idea who she is!

Anyway, onto one single (but long) story of the thoroughly confusing (and dull) Dark Reign storyline: the Dark X-Men / Dark Avengers crossover "Utopia," which runs through a series of one-shots and the Dark Avengers and Uncanny X-Men series. I read most of the storyline, avoiding the Dark Avengers series since I don't currently collect or read them. However, after reading the first one-shot about "Utopia," I was regretting purchasing the rest, including Uncanny X-Men, which I regularly buy. Again...WTF? There was no coherent thought process throughout and I didn't care about anyone or anything I read. To top it off, the Dark Avengers/Uncanny X-Men: Utopia #1 one-shot was drawn by Marc Silvestri, an artist who became big in the 1990s when the women of the X-Men became a lot more bustier, a lot more Asian, and the stories took second (or third) place to all of this. Is it any wonder that's when I stopped reading comics after 15 years of nonstop dedication? Ugh.

I forced myself through all of the issues of "Utopia" I had purchased...and I still have no idea what happened. And, honestly, don't really care to know. All Marvel needs to know is that it's time to drop the lame Dark Reign storylines throughout its titles before it begins to lose readers. DC is currently doing a "MARVELous" job with their "Blackest Night" storyline. It's one of their best ever. Why is Marvel trying to compete with the poorly assembled Dark Reign? Forget Dark X-Men, Dark Avengers, Dark Wolverine, Dark This, Dark That. If I ever hear the word "dark" again, it'll be too soon. There's such a thing as overkill, Marvel.