Comic Book Resources

We’re very much in agreement with the term “fan-service.” And it’s also why I’m not a huge fan of Johns. He writes great “fan-service,” but I really feel like he’s lacking for people who aren’t interested in that type of fan-service. I mean Blackest Night is custom fit for that type of writing. Dead characters confront live ones? All other heroes get lantern rings? “What will dead-character X say to character Y? What type of lantern ring will character Y get? Will he get ring Z?” The types of chatter that filled message boards even before Blackest Night came out.

Isn’t that gonna be the title for DC’s crossover event of 2012?
Crisis? What Crisis?

I agree that Ellis depicted the Lois and Clark relationship really well (the whole JLA in fact) but New Maps of Hell wasn’t very good, in my opinion. It seemed like Ellis was phoning it in.

Speaking of Ellis, I liked the newest issue of Anna Mercury much more than Gravel.

You did sound a bit Canadian, but not as Canadian as I would’ve thought.

Comics bloggers never sound like how I’d imagine them to when I hear their voices. This is why I ignore podcasts.

I, like (many/some/few?) people, have been getting rather annoyed by Deadpool’s appearing everywhere. But even I’m LOVING these variant covers. And unlike the “Wolverine Art Appreciation” covers from last year, his presence isn’t bumping off the characters who are actually in the book.

Happy birthweek, Chad! And since we’re on the topic: Sure, Gretzky might sound cooler, but you could do a lot worse than to share your actual day of birth with Ms. Winfrey. There’s plenty to slag on when it comes to the big O (as there would be for anybody that rich and famous), but she’s a good Aquarian. I mock her, sometimes, for her über-consumerist show (convincing people to buy her “favorite things”!), but I also remember that she’s done some good. The book club is an example: She got a bunch of non-readers to start reading. And not just page-turner best-sellers, but literary works by the likes of Toni Morrison, Isabel Allende, John Steinbeck and Elie Wisel.

My favorite good-Oprah story is the one where the Texas cattlemen sued her for all sorts of damages after she remarked on her show that she might not eat another burger (because of the threat of mad cow disease). She could’ve caved to their bullying and settled out of court, but she moved her entire show from Chicago to Cattle Country, Texas, for months so she could fight the lawsuit. And she won. That’s an example of her putting her money where her mouth is, to defend the principle of free speech.

In three days, I turn 27, but my due date was actually January 26th..

Happy B’day, youngster!

(If you’d been born on your due date, you would’ve been born on Australia day, which meant if you lived here, you’d get a public holiday every b’day. And you’d only be two days younger than me as opposed to five).

it’s meant to be a fun little question that’s really an excuse to promote The Unwritten, but I still don’t like the implications.

Comics have had questions like that since… well, ages. Who would you like to see Spidey team up with etc.

I kind of hope that Daken did kill Norman Osborn in the pages of Dark Wolverine.

Wouldn’t it have been even better if they both died?

Ellis writes Lois and Clark banter better than everyone else.

Shame about the actual plot – the JLA try to save the day, but can’t until the girl with the computer jumps in.

How can the book be called Die Hard: Year One when the first story takes place on July 4, 1976 and the second takes place on July 13, 1977… more than a year apart?

I’m not familiar with it, but how can he had an adventure before the first film, when part of the promotion for the second was ‘How can the same thing happen to the same guy twice’?
Surely that implies that the airport hostage situation was the second big adventure he had… and thus anything before the first one wasn’t really that out there or dramatic?

NO! Not until you have an “eh?” in your dialogue, will you EVER sound Canadian!!!!

How many new directions does Outsiders need to go through before DC realizes that nobody gives a fuck?

“Random Thought! No teases about any of this week’s books that I’ve gotten to read for review purposes. Regarding Dark Avengers #13: what did people think? I didn’t learn anything that I didn’t already know and the weird Biblical connection looks like it could be a rather lacklustre twist. Disappointing.”

I almost feel like Bendis was thinking “let’s see, how much can I get the internet to believe this time? hahahahaha”

The Biblical thing looks like a joke, the Galactus thing was obviously a joke, and yet the internet still freaked out.

My complaint with Dark Avengers 13 isn’t the Biblical nonsense so much as the implication that Bob isn’t a hero struggling with severe mental illness who found a ( seeming ) friend in Norman, but a junkie with no willpower who’s hooking up with the Gobliny guy for a new stash. I’m familiar that crazy and evil are almost always synonyms in pop culture, but applying that to crazy and weak bothers me.

Sharing a birthday with Oprah doesn’t sound so bad. I share a birthday with Jesus so it always get ignored.

I’ve seen a lot references to Deadpool appearances lately, but I haven’t seen any of these appearances anywhere, aside from one issue of Spider-Man and a single page in X-Factor. Have I just been reading the wrong Marvels? (I assume Deadpool’s own series don’t count.)

Also, on the podcast tip: Nobody sounds particularly Canadian, but one of you sounds mad nerdy. I wasn’t paying enough attention at the beginning to figure out who’s who.

Supertramp? What’s a supertramp? What is this, a fool’s overture? Explain yourself. Don’t hide in your shell. Come on, give a little bit.

Here’s a “Random Thought”: Apparently for the last 4 issues of Terry Moore’s ECHO, whenever the week that DIAMOND announces that ECHO appears, I get that issue the following week.

Has this happened anywhere else? Does anyone know why this happens? So far, this is the only one book that this keeps on happening and not even my comic book retailer knows why.

Shit, one of us sounds nerdy on a comic book podcast.

How are we gonna live THAT down?

I don’t know, Tim. One of us clearly wasn’t doing his job right and sounded normal. We’ll have to fix that.

Tom Fitzpatrick asked:

“…whenever the week that DIAMOND announces that ECHO appears, I get that issue the following week.”

It happens all the time with various books. I have seen it happen with Alter Ego. Many times it gets delivered to my LCS a week or two after Midtown Comics gets it. Sometimes it is the same week. It has happened with Tiny Titans a few times in the last year.

Mary..there’s a lot of Deadpool series, specials, and comics out. Apparantly Marvel sends interns to stores who threaten to shoot people who don’t buy them.

I know he has three series, but some of the stuff I’ve seen on here implies that he’s been appearing all over Marvel in other books, and I just haven’t seen that (aside from the two I mentioned).

I bought X-Force #2 long ago and it had Deadpool in it, but I couldn’t see anything great about him in that. So I never bought anything else with him until the recent Spider-Man. He seems a lot more entertaining now. Just because of that one guest-appearance I actually went and bought a recent Deadpool issue, and that was good enough for me to buy another one. So I guess guest appearances do work.
I don’t know if he’s funny enough to buy on a regular basis, though.

haven’t heard the podcast yet, but as a fellow Canadian,I’m happy to hear you threw some Hawksley Workman in there. Everyone should download (legally) his “Delicious Wolves” album.

Mary,

He’s also been in Hulk lately, Marvel just wrapped up the limited series Suicide Kings, Thunderbolts not too long ago and I think he was in Wolverine lately, although I could be confusing it with a Wolverine appearance in Cable & Deadpool. The Skottie Young cover sticks in my brain. In a good way. I could be missing some appearances.

I don’t care that he’s showing up all over the place, really. It’s the declining quality of books that he’s in that bothers me. Deadpool was good, Merc with a Mouth was a neat concept for a limited series which has quickly gotten monotonous, and Team-ups was another neat concept that’s been churning out totally forgettable pablum. I only preorder Deadpool now.

Deadpool actually does work fairly well with a writerwho makes his violent insanity either an eventual problem for the character (Fabian Nicieza on Cable and Deadpool), o the candy coating on some disturbing and more realistic issues (Joe Kelly’s solo run).

Used as he is these days, as basically Marvel’s version of Itchy Mouse, the overexposure is becoming grating and fast. And as with Wolverine, turning a character into a shallow spectacle of a formerly decent idea will, of course, succeed in the direct market.

Oh, and on the Sentry thing…as I keep saying, elsewhere, I’m pretty sure it’s either a joke or, more likely, Bendis hasn’t read what he’s referencing in a very long time. I’m not annoyed by this week’s Sentry reveal so much as by the fact that the comic gets a very easy reference to a figure as well-known as Moses completely wrong.

In my opinion it really depends who writes Deadpool. He’s a popular character for untalented writers, because he’s good for sales and he’s got the 90s dark-and-all-messed-up-in-the-head aesthetic going for him. But that Deadpool appearance you read in Amazing Spider-Man was written by Joe Kelly, who just happened to be the one who transformed Deadpool from 90s overkill into a rich and compelling character back in the late 90s. If you’re liking the regular series I highly recommend you check out the Deadpool Classic TPBs – vol. 2 and on are all Joe Kelly. (volume 1, unfortunately, is not on par with the rest but its final chapter was Kelly’s first, the first issue of the original Deadpool ongoing series).

ummmm, about the Jimmy Page comment you left? let me tell you something, alright?? #1, from what I’ve read about you, you’re only how old? I will take that into consideration while culturing you on THEE finest guitar player/engineer/musician alive today or any other day/year/life….

Mr.Page, more than likely, will NOT be “publishing or distributing” anything close to what you want. BUT-FYI-there are hundreds, if not thousands, of bootleg Zep that’s right up there with some of the stuff Page releases/has released……..Blueberry Hill, for example, even Page has said it is probably the best of the bootlegs out there. Wanna really know more? READ “HEAVEN AND HELL” it IS the best you’ll ever read about what’s Zeppelin in this lifetime-unreal photos by Neal Preston, never published until he put them into this book. the #1 interview with Jimmy Page to date, which is January 30, 2010. other than that? have a nice day. rock out. zeppelin rules. communicationbreakdown. trampled underfoot. peace