it was like an episode of Are You Being Served, all misunderstandings and foolishness leading to shenanigans.

i HATED this book.

don't ever make me read it again.

Sorta like heroics in a terrorist sorta way right? Just because you believe that you are doing the right thing, you shouldn't use any means nessecary. Thats what separates a hero from ordinary people. Thats why we root for them. They do what we can't. Classic example. When Capt. America he realized that he was endangering the very people he was fighting to protect. He stopped and turned himself in even though he knew he didn't have to probably realizing that he might be striped of his rank and status, and possibly sent to jail. You will be missed. At least for a year or two then your clone comes into town, and everyone realizes that thats the real Capt.

Then you look at Stark and the mentality of Your either with me or against me. (Kind of reminds me of a currrent president.) Sign up or get thrown in jail without trial even though most of you have saved the world ten times over. But thats not important. What? You have family thats not superhuman and could possibly get harmed if your enemies know who you are? Tough cookies for them. Maybe we can setup a SuperWitness Protection Program. But then again, city reconstruction costs are pretty high on the budget list imo...

1. We have to stop taking the words of every character as gospel. It might be Spidey's opinion that Blackbolt is one of the two strongest guys in the galaxy, but would his character actually be qualified to make that assessment?

2. For those that lament the loss of super-heroics in Marvel comics, i disagree. I view Tony Stark as more of a hero now than ever. I despise him for the things that hes done and for his arrogance, but its become blatantly obvious that regardless of his personal failings he is willing to sacrifice himself and all of those he loves if he believes it to be in the best interest of the majority. You can make arguments for or against him, but you have to admire his courage and his willingness to act on his beliefs.

3. Quote: "Marvel has no Watchmen. Hell, Marvel doesnt even have a 300 for God’s sake. Why are we still reading this crap. Lets all unclench our spidey under-roos and try some adult fiction for a change. Just a thought."

Im so sick of that pompous attitude. Why is it that when we dislike something, we feel the need to make it somehow inferior to the things that we admire? For you supposed literary elitists out there, its time to get over yourselves. Personally, ive read the Watchmen, and I enjoyed it. And ive also read a truckload of other books (actual books!), including some 'classics' that critically dwarf the Watchmen. 'Waiting for Godot', 'The Old Man and the Sea', 'Animal Farm', 'Wuthering Heights', etc etc. And honestly, I thought a lot of them sucked. Does that imply that they were poorly written or that their underlying themes werent important? Nope. It means that I personally thought that they sucked....that at the end of the reading experience they failed to manifest the qualities in literature that entertain me. And at the end of the day, regardless of any critics posturing and grandstanding, the only valid measure for each of us as to the quality of a work of fiction is how much we personally enjoyed it. If you want to, im sure you can continue to lock yourself in your ivory tower and hurl out insults about our soft minds, while continually praising the brilliance of your preferred literature. But regardless of what your opinion might be, the fact is that what you read has no bearing on (nor does it by necessity reflect) your intelligence....reading critically acclaimed books or watching critically acclaimed movies does not make you 'better'. In fact, it seems to me that coming to a WWH site and posting an anti-marvel tirade seems a little idiotic.

4. For those who dislike the maturation of comic books in recent years, take a good look at these forums. There seem to be few, if any children posting here. I dont think its wrong for Marvel to gear comics towards young adults....we have showed loyalty for years, afterall. Although honestly, I see no evidence that Marvel has tried to do this at all. Marvels comics always had a degree of complexity and maturity, at least some of them. Does anyone remember Harry Osborn being a drug addict? If you take realism and maturity out of comics altogether, what are you left with? Power Rangers? Pokemon? Those mediums might remain popular for a time, but eventually their popularity dwindles as their audience matures. As young fans mature, they are going to grow out of 'Spiderman Adventures' and want to follow the more 'real' stories of 'Amazing Spiderman', if only because their older siblings/relatives are reading them. I resent the idea that enjoying comic books and expecting them to be portrayed somewhat realistically means possessing a delayed adolesence. I prefer the superhero medium and the stories it permits to many forms of fiction, and thats a matter of preference not maturity. More to the point, we demand that certain rules of logic be followed in all works of fiction. How many times have critics blasted a movie or book for failing to abide by the rules that its universe sets in place, regardless of that movie involving aliens/ghosts/demons or fictional secret agents? I stopped reading Marvel comics in the 90's because of their blatant disregard for their own continuity on numerous occasions, and the general lack of consequences for anything that occurred. And Civil War brought me back.

5. For those that think that Civil War wasnt a drastic departure from the status quo, I have to disagree. Prior to Civil War, Marvel failed to really give their characters political or ideological viewpoints (in most cases). It may have been hinted at, but it was never explored fully. With Civil War, our heroes finally came to life. Not to mention it ushered in the first major change to happen in the life of Spiderman since Harry Osborn's death (with his unmasking). In fact, the status quo has been turned on its head. Captain America is dead. Spidey's aunt is probably going to die, and he has been unmasked to the world. Old friendships have been destroyed, and we will never look at IronMan, Dr. Strange, Professor X or the others the same way again. Sure, heroes and villains will still slug it out in massive battles that level cities. But the heroes roles in those battles, as well as their lives outside of them, have changed forever (at least I hope so). Marvel is ultimately a business, and as such, their primary motivation is profit. Profit for Marvel means making comics that we, the readers want to read. If there was no demand for 'world altering events' like WWH, than they simply wouldnt exist.

And thats that. This tirade wasnt really based on anything on these pages....its just a vent about a few attitudes that have been bothering me lately about peoples attitudes towards comic books and the superhero medium, and general pessimism. Make mine Marvel!

Well then if you feel this way, why are you in a forum about World War Hulk

I Think Hulk should battle Juggernaut in a long good fight. The fight he had with Hulk was too quick and cheesy.

As some have speculated, it may turn out to be sabotage by some of the Warbound, but it has never been implied by the writers (in any meaningful way) that the Illuminati meant to blow up the Hulk. If that DOES arise - that the Illuminati DID intend for the ship to blow up - it would be news to the reader and go aganist the way the "shoot Hulk into space" plan was originally presented.

Only the Hulk and his loyal followers hold the Illuminati responsible for the explosion at this stage of the game.

That makes no sense.

No matter what you think of Reed and Tony, there is no way that a Marvel writer is going to have that be the case.

Really, the ONLY thing that is keeping it from being Miek or the Brood or Morg is the simple fact that it is SOO obvious, you figure they wouldn't do something THAT obvious.

But since it works so well, plot-wise (it gives them an ending that doesn't make Hulk or the Illuminati appear THAT evil), then that is most likely going to be what happens.

I think also that the fact that Iron Man No. 20 handles that loose end. When I say handles, I really mean "handles," because the general tone of the writing feels rushed here, especially considering how Hulk's return tramped big green bare feet all over the re-emergence of The Mandarin (itself seeming forced for the 2008 release of the movie). Stark's been preparing for Hulk's return since he discovered Hulk never made it to where he was supposed to go. Since the decision was made without Banner's input, we can only assume, in Hulk's words "I've come to smash."

I also think the off-screen battle with Bolt works, because, let's face it, actual witnesses to Bolt's full power are pretty scarce (Of course, there's that whole part where Galactus is scared of him).

In all, the whole set-up requires some pretty serious suspension of disbelief. Yeah, the line they have to walk is pretty thin. I come down on the side of registration, not really logically, but more sentimentally (I'm a big Iron Man fan), but I'm not militant about it, and I think having the two-sided coin of secret superheroes vs. public superheroes could be a workable and entertaining dynamic. If nothing else, all the back-and-forthing reminds me of the scene from "Top Ten" where the superhero mice are battling the superhero cats and the exterminator is trying to explain the plotline to someone who doesn't know what's going on.

But, as actually implemented, registration was far more indefensible than this. Apparently, registration requires anyone with superhuman powers not only to register, but also to do whatever Tony Stark says, on penalty of being imprisoned in the Negative Zone without trial. There may be some justification for registering superhumans; there is no justification for enslaving them to the whims of an eccentric billionaire with political connections. This makes the pro-registration side nearly impossible to sympathise with.

You might be able to argue for registration on real-world logical grounds (if there really were people who could destroy cities with a whisper, control magnetic forces, or read minds, we'd want to know who they were and what they could do). But you can't then switch back into comic-book logic and say that Reed and Tony can't really have killed millions of innocent people on Planet Hulk, because they're heroes and heroes don't do things like that. In the real world, many of the most horrid atrocities have been committed by people who were absolutely certain that what they were doing was the right thing.

What shock value? Anyone here thought the Hulk was goin to lose. The shock would only be to the Illumati, so there was no need for an off panel battle. This is what happens when writers and artist try to get too cute.

That was what I went into this issue thinking, but doesn't it seem weird that nobody took the time to deny it? I know if somebody came out publicly and said "You are responsible for the deaths of millions of people, including my wife, because of that bomb you set up," I'd say, "What bomb?" not "Okay, let's evacuate the City, because we all knew this was gonna come up sooner or later."

Playing devil's advocate, the bomb does seem like the only logical way to deal with Namor's very-obvious objection, "Don't send him into space, because he will come back angry and kill you." Uber-futurists like Richards and Stark have been portrayed lately wouldn't just put Hulk somewhere far away, they'd *have* to (try to) kill him.

I've got to agree they pretty much telegraphed that if you read Planet Hulk. Meik and Brood are pissed that Hulk is peaceful now, because they still want revenge, then they discover his ship...seems pretty obvious to me.