Comments on: Comic Book Legends Revealed #182

By: Frank

Frank — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 04:25:24 +0000

I figure the Paul Smith era was Claremont taking a breather after many cosmic shake ups. There was a lot of warmth no doubt. But the love for these characters started during the Byrne era. A lot of touching moments. (Just different). I did not enjoy Cockrum coming after Byrne so much because it felt like a regression. Only the Magneto/Charles vs the Brood stood out really. But I disagree with the put down on the Romita Jr. and Silvestri era by Paul up there. It's not because it was different from Paul Smith that it was bad. It did take a nasty turn around the Mutant Massacre but even amidst it all it gave powerful stuff. I love the introduction of Rachel in the present time and how she reacted to everything..leading to Wolverine stabbing her out of necessity. And from the Silvestri time I appreciate the dream-like quaity that it offered. Chris and Marc seemed to like the mystical/magical part of stories and it showed. Their best story I think was the X-Men face-off with the Adversary(a mystical creature) leading to their "death". It had such a feeling of innevitability that they would meet their end that these two issues were as powerful as any stuff from the Byrne era.

By: Paul Ware

Paul Ware — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 19:31:09 +0000

I came across the Madelyne Pryor storyline in odd lumps long after it had got started - same for the Brood storyline. Given that at that time Jean Grey was dead, I was pleased that Scott - always one of my favourite characters back in the Stan Lee/Roy Thomas days - got some of the happiness he deserved. Plus, the story was all about second chances, a good message in my opinion. The Claremont/Smith period (and like another poster on here I consider this to have started with "Beyond the Farthest Star" even though that was a Cockrum story) was magical. The clutch of two-parters including Wolverine's wedding and Scott's first meeting with Maddie, followed by "Romances", were some of the best comics I have ever read. Byrne's tenure on the series remains classic, and possibly technically better than Smith's, but Smith's has something that Byrne's lacks: warmth. Not love or affection, just simple warmth. Romita Jr, after a very promising start, was just pants. And Silvestri (apols for spelling) was just another scratchy panel filler who had neither warmth, love, nor any feel for character. Claremont seemed to lose his way with the series after the resurrection of Jean, something that for me was one of the low points in comics history and marked very nearly the point at which I stopped reading X-Men on a regular basis. I loved Claremont's stories when he was allowed to tell them his own way; one of the great problems with companies like Marvel in the 1980s and 90s was that too many writers were allowed to tamper with other writers' creations. The last truly great X-Men ish, for me, was "He'll Never Make Me Cry" - another story that I am convinced was foisted on Chris by a meddling writer/editor (yes, Tall Man, I do mean you) - but one that he pulled all the stops out on and made into a little classic. After that, "Two Girls Out to Have Fun" is the last ish that I would ever read again for pleasure. After that it just went down hill like a greased toboggan. But for all the wonderful issues up to then, Chris Claremont (who has the same agent as me - how's that for name dropping!) has my eternal thanks for some of the best stories since Stan Lee.

By: Frank

Frank — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:55:24 +0000

They could have done X-Factor without Jean in my opinion. It's not like they were reforming the X-Men anyway, they were starting something new.

By: Gabriel Rocha

Gabriel Rocha — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 04:13:49 +0000

The current comics added the two values, the structure by McFarlane + "realistic" academic training.

By: Comics Bronze Age | Review: The Avengers Annual #10

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:28:46 +0000

[...] Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide also lists this as the first appearance of Madelyne Pryor, though this fact remains in dispute. (It’s interesting to note that The Official Marvel Wiki also lists Avengers Annual #10 as the [...]

By: JimZipCode

JimZipCode — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 05:11:08 +0000

The Claremont/Smith run is my favorite X-run, even a little moreso than the Claremont/Byrne run; it's one of my favorite runs on any book. (Unfairly I count it as starting a few issues early, with Cockrum's issue with Wolverine alone on the Brood world.) Great moments like "Professor Xavier's a jerk!" and the Wolverine wedding two-parter. One of the neat elements of Joss Whedon's X-run was how he seemed to be nostalgic for the same stuff I was -- very enjoyable. When it happened, I thought the terrible thing about Jean Grey's resurrection and the X-Factor series was that there was NO "right" thing for Scott to do. And the stuff that happened after: a terrible thing to do to a great character. I liked Madelyne Pryor a lot. Don't see how anyone could call her whiny or wimpy, at least in the original Claremont stories. She stood up for herself. The resurrected Jean was worthless, basically until Morrison's X-run. But it was great to see Famke Janssen in tight leather pants.

By: Frank

Frank — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 09:45:02 +0000

alright, yes she should never have been ressurected

By: Walid Koussa

Walid Koussa — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 07:23:17 +0000

I think Bobby is referring to Jeans first resurrection for X-factor, Frank, and not her actual death during the Dark Phoenix Saga.

By: Frank

Frank — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:08:27 +0000

I have no idea you meant by that comment, Bobby about marketing of the X-Men books. They reached their conclusion because they felt it would serve their story or their Universe better. Shooter wanted Jean tortured; Chris and John felt was her losing her power was enough. The compromise was Jean dying a tragic death while saving the cosmos from herself.

By: Bobby Drake

Bobby Drake — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 02:36:13 +0000

McFarlane? At his best, his people looked liney and distorted: His Spidey looked pretty cool that way, his human beings looked uninked. His work was ok, but is an example of elevated mediocrity!

Marshall Rogers? At his worst, could outdraw McFarlane, and at his best, made history as one the best artists in Batman history.

Who would you rather be?

By: Bobby

Bobby — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 02:20:08 +0000

....and therein lies the stagnation and damnation of the Xmen line: another cut and paste fix-it job to help marketing to sell more X-Books. Its why I quit reading the crap: lets undo every good story by every good writer, cause in the real world everyone dies, and no one comes back.....

By: Frank

Frank — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:05:07 +0000

Thanks Micheal! I wonder if the best idea would have been to have Jean with the mind of an infant yet still possessing the Phoenix force(to come out at any times) or Jean powerless and Magneto tempting her to in giving her back her powers. Nevertheless it would have been something seeing a Phoenix vs Magneto showdown for 150. Who to root for?

By: Walid Koussa

Walid Koussa — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 14:42:07 +0000

Mcfarlane's characters do express better emotions, but Rogers did a better job on pacing and story. They should have just let Mcfarlane finish Roger's layouts.

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:37:52 +0000

Byrne Robotics has a nice summary of Claremont's,Byrne's and Austin's ideas about what would have been done had Jean not been killed. Here's the link:
http://byrnerobotics.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=13985&TPN=7

By: Stevicus

Stevicus — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:43:26 +0000

On the G.I. Joe story, I was collecting comics back then, and McFarlane's style was so much like John Byrne when he was inking himself, and most people did NOT like it. Sloppy and round, very uncomicy, little did anyone know that would be the wave of the future. Mcfarlane, Bagley, Arthur Adams, damn Arthur Adams' X-Men annuals and Longshot were freakin' awesome. In the ironic department, whoever started on the Special Missions book, had a very John Byrne take too, only much cleaner, but it still did not look like standard comic fare.

By: Frank

Frank — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 08:02:10 +0000

The thing is, Jean returning and Scott dumping Madelyne for her is an old daytime soap opera staple. Madelyne will return somebody. And then Jean will return to!

Lawrence: the idea was for either Jean returned with the mind of a 5(or 10) years old forgetting everything that happened since she was that age while you would have the Phoenix force always looming in the horizon like a threat. Or that Jean was depowered completly while keeping her mind. And yes at some point Magneto offers to give her powers back. All I know was on one or these two instances, Phoenix and Magneto would have duked it out for all the marbles.

By: salamurai

salamurai — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 04:46:45 +0000

I find the McFarlane pages to have more dynamic staging, but the anatomy is horrid.

By: Brian J.

Brian J. — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 04:54:13 +0000

I just had to remind everyone that Alex Summers looked pretty hot in his Goblin King (Prince?) outfit during Inferno. I'm sure everyone would remember this, too, if it weren't for the fact that his brother was busy being a giant dick.

By: Basara

Basara — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 04:24:45 +0000

I think part of the issue with the GI Joe comic by McFarlane was that you had Joes visably shooting people that while working for "an" enemy, weren't the pretty much faceless minions of Cobra, but uniformed soldiers of another nation. If you look at the comparison pages of the combat scene, the casualties are inferred (no bullet traces) in the second version- not actually shown being shot by the Joes by the visible bullet traces.

By: Desert Son

Desert Son — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 21:06:35 +0000

Why did Rogers draw Jinx wearing a Klan hood?