TF Views

Sparky Prime wrote:I just wanted to comment on an oddity with DC's shipping schedule this month...
Today, Green Lantern Corps #20 was released. And it's the epilogue to the Wrath of the First Lantern storyline. But the final issue of Wrath of the First Lantern story, Green Lantern #20, was supposed to be out last week and has been delayed until the 22nd. So they went ahead and released the epilogue 3 weeks before the issue ending the storyline. Why wouldn't they delay GLC until the 22nd along with GL #20 to avoid this mess?

If I had to guess, it's probably because more delays looks worse and sells less books on time than less delays, storyline flow be damned. If nothing else, this sort of situation serves to show why storylines across multiple titles can be a bad idea. Of course, it also makes me wonder how hard getting a 22-page comic book out on time is.

BWprowl wrote:Of course, it also makes me wonder how hard getting a 22-page comic book out on time is.

To be fair, Green Lantern #20 is going to be around 64-pages, and will have art from 10 different artists for Geoff Johns final issue on Green Lantern. So I can understand why it has been delayed because there is a a lot more to it than your average 22-page comic. I just don't see the logic in releasing an epilogue before the finale of the storyline. I've never seen a company release a story out of order like this before. And every other Green Lantern title is scheduled for release on the 22nd. Seems odd GLC would be out earlier.

I've never seen a company release a story out of order like this before.

And you've been reading comics 'how' long?

Stuff like this used to be commonplace in the 90s.

The 90's was a terrible time for comics overall, so I'm not surprised they'd have problems like that. But I only got TPB's back then. It wasn't until the 2000's I started getting individual issues to follow the storylines as they were released so for more than a decade, I've never seen them do this. Anytime they've had to delay a comic they just delayed the tie-ins so as not to spoil the issue that was delayed.

BWprowl wrote:The original cut of Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker (fantastic flick, by the way) featured some pretty hefty violence, including characters getting shot and impaled on-screen, and a rather blunt death for the Joker shown in flashback, among other things. Then Columbine happened and there was a big backlash against violence in media, so the movie was hastily edited to cut down on the violence (in particular, the Joker's death was completely re-worked to be more...Disney-ish). Warner did eventually release an 'uncut' version of the film.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman_Bey ... Re-editing
For me, the worst was editing out the knife to the knee for Batman from the Joker, thus explaining Bruce's creation of a batsuit to help with mobility, and the use of a cane later in life. That and having

Spoiler

Tim

kill the Joker in a direct way.



So, I burned through Dark Avengers 9-16 plus the ancillary included comics. I hated this material though. As a run, it failed in epic style, the amount of information not properly conveyed, action that took place in books not included, decompressed story that took place in these books that didn't matter or didn't convey what it wanted, it overwhelmed the whole thing.

Issue 9 with Ares and his son was interesting, except I didn't know why Fury gave a crap about the son or who these characters he was training and hanging out with were. Bob catching it in the face at this point was clearly meaningless.

Issue 10, all setup but no followthrough and the big reveal at the end missed the landing.

Issue 11 is even more setup and very little followthrough, but also a disappointing lack of payoff to the premise of Norman facing his demons.

Issue 12, finally some payoff but it's unrewarding and the machinations aren't really working, Norman is less than the sum of his broken parts, and Bob's story tumbles into obvious territory.

I couldn't figure out where the Annual went in all this, so I read it after that and it didn't really fit there either, but it was the lone good story - even then it's still bare bones and not great on the followthrough, the big reveal being Noh-Varr becoming something new and Steve Rogers being less dead than advertised; there's also the new guy from Asgard screwing things up, setup that doesn't get a payoff right.

Siege: Loki seemed to come next, that wasn't so interesting because it felt very disconnected just talking about things in abstract without connection to them, but at least Loki seemed interesting and his machinations actually had followthrough unlike Norman's.

Avengers: The Initiative 31 was the next piece of the puzzle, this was interesting as it connected to the material I had read and Taskmaster had a different take on things, it was introspective yet active, I just would have liked to have bought Taskmaster's inclusion in the Cabal v2 better.

Issue 13, yes finally we get back to the series, and this was "All About Bob", only as I wasn't terribly invested in Bob, his tale and how it was told (as obvious setup for this run's finale, I might add) really didn't feel like it mattered enough to fill a whole floppy. Also, at this point I realize that the Dark Avengers have fought 2 actual battles and aren't involved with the "Siege" that their title seems to be trying to anchor.

Issue 14 shows Norman's plan was flawed from the beginning because it relied on out of control elements to be in control. This feels like something that should have come up WAY later in a run, like 3 years in or something. Nobody's DONE anything, nobody's really DOING anything, there's a lot of sitting around and arguing and pretending there's big Machiavellian moves playing out, but there's really not. Bob plays out Watchmen's worst fears thinking he's a god, and gets talked down with a very missed mark.

Issue 15 feels like it's commenting on DC's Kingdom Come, substituting Captain Marvel with The Sentry. Norman's big move is lazy, uninspired, and fails. The story also fails in a big way, it fails to convey where the robot insects attacking the tower came from, and it fails to explain why following Bullseye's chopper out to sea evaporated. Bullseye turns in an interesting performance at least, but this one really doesn't feel like it's gone anywhere.

Avengers: The Initiative 33 makes little sense without having read the previous issue, I assume, because I was unfamiliar with almost everything going on here. There's stuff going on from the previous issue that is unclear, there's stuff going on from Siege which is utterly off-tempo from what I just read in DA 15, and none of it is a real STORY, it's just crossed bridges from places I haven't been to places I'm not going. This one was the beginning of massive frustration.

Issue 16, the end. This book warns me that I have to have read Siege #4 first, since I don't have that issue and I don't want to buy it and I'm already annoyed with this run, I just jump in anyway. Imagine you're buying into this "Dark Avengers Vol 1" title, issues 1 through 16 is a complete story, the Annual and Secret Invasion: Dark Reign being directly tied into the series as well, and you get to issue 15, everyone's sitting around Avengers Tower, Norman's in another Cabal meeting using The Void as his big threat, the big event is the tower comes down and Bullseye uses the confusion to kill Bob's wife claiming it was suicide (on orders from Norman, despite Bob already being dangerously unstable), Bob buys the story and flies off. Now imagine reading the next issue, the final issue, where it starts with Norman being put in prison by IM and Cap and Thor, then flashing back to an already-captured Dark Avengers with Norman wearing greenface, Ares is already dead, Asgard has fallen, the world has instantly turned on the Dark Avengers and Norman Osborn for nothing shown here, etc.. A mountain of things have transpired off-panel, none of which have resonated in the DA title itself until now, a giant battle has been planned, executed, and failed off-panel; loyalties have been swapped, Bob is entirely missing, and Norman makes his big speech at the end only to be tormented by his inner Goblin as they remain locked away. This could not have been a more frustrating failure of an issue, this could not have let this series down worse. Some of it plays out interestingly, Hand gets a turnabout, but ultimately there's nothing here. If Norman is right, then his methods are right and the world works on his "shades of gray" mentality; but since they're not right, since the world isn't shades of gray again with the resurgence of the real Avengers and heroes, and our Dark Avengers "heroes" are instantly played as villains again with nothing to say for that, then nothing here made a difference, it was an exercise in a twist, an idea, and dragged its feet at actually following through with that idea, exploring it in any real way. It's got big ideas that get swallowed up in decompression on top of large-story compression which undermines the value of it, at the end everything is relatively back to status quo and a bunch of stuff that should have mattered happened outside the title.

Can you imagine someone spending $20 on the Dark Avengers TPBs, culminating with Dark Avengers:Siege TPB (issues 13-16, 2009 annual)? How robbed would they feel? Dom gave me these books to read, they were donation, an experiment in a way, and I felt cheated of my time, imagine working hard for twenty bucks cash only to come out with these. If I had stopped at the annual and left issues 13-16 and ancillary titles by the wayside, I would have been WAY happier with Dark Avengers. Instead there's a mountain of crossovers that ruin the run and are incomprehensible to follow, and then it pumps the brakes way too early.

I just wanted to comment on an oddity with DC's shipping schedule this month...
Today, Green Lantern Corps #20 was released. And it's the epilogue to the Wrath of the First Lantern storyline. But the final issue of Wrath of the First Lantern story, Green Lantern #20, was supposed to be out last week and has been delayed until the 22nd. So they went ahead and released the epilogue 3 weeks before the issue ending the storyline. Why wouldn't they delay GLC until the 22nd along with GL #20 to avoid this mess?

At least your comic is getting finished. All you have to do is wait for the delayed issue to ship and you can read your comics happily.

"Team 7" is never getting finished. A major plot thread is *never* getting resolved. (I guess Majestic is not coming back despite all that lead up?) I gave that book an "A" because the rug was clearly pulled out from under the writer and editor. But, damn....I am more than a little sore about it being cancelled so hard.

I would be willing to bet that "Team 7" will end up going the way of "Hawkworld" and will not be counted at all. *grumble*

Issue 9 with Ares and his son was interesting, except I didn't know why Fury gave a crap about the son or who these characters he was training and hanging out with were. Bob catching it in the face at this point was clearly meaningless.

Bendis was writing more than one book. Stuff bled through. (And, it is not unreasonable to expect a reader to follow more than one book when those books are written by the same guy and are made to fit together.)

Issue 10, all setup but no followthrough and the big reveal at the end missed the landing.

Issue 11 is even more setup and very little followthrough, but also a disappointing lack of payoff to the premise of Norman facing his demons.

Comics are serialized. Why is it so wrong for one issue to set up a later issue?

Avengers: The Initiative 31 was the next piece of the puzzle, this was interesting as it connected to the material I had read and Taskmaster had a different take on things, it was introspective yet active, I just would have liked to have bought Taskmaster's inclusion in the Cabal v2 better.

Taskmaster's promotion was a damned good read.

ssue 13, yes finally we get back to the series, and this was "All About Bob", only as I wasn't terribly invested in Bob, his tale and how it was told (as obvious setup for this run's finale, I might add) really didn't feel like it mattered enough to fill a whole floppy. Also, at this point I realize that the Dark Avengers have fought 2 actual battles and aren't involved with the "Siege" that their title seems to be trying to anchor.

Issue 14 shows Norman's plan was flawed from the beginning because it relied on out of control elements to be in control. This feels like something that should have come up WAY later in a run, like 3 years in or something. Nobody's DONE anything, nobody's really DOING anything, there's a lot of sitting around and arguing and pretending there's big Machiavellian moves playing out, but there's really not. Bob plays out Watchmen's worst fears thinking he's a god, and gets talked down with a very missed mark.

Issue 15 feels like it's commenting on DC's Kingdom Come, substituting Captain Marvel with The Sentry. Norman's big move is lazy, uninspired, and fails. The story also fails in a big way, it fails to convey where the robot insects attacking the tower came from, and it fails to explain why following Bullseye's chopper out to sea evaporated. Bullseye turns in an interesting performance at least, but this one really doesn't feel like it's gone anywhere.

All of those issues lead in to "the Siege". You did not read it, that is on you. Bob is basically a physical manifestation of Osborn's lunacy. Osborn wants the Sentry's wife killed because (as far as he knows) she is the only other person who can control/influence Bob. Bob is a punk who blundered in to great power.....and lacks the intelligence and mental stability to do anything with it. Osborn is only marginally better in that he can actually plan more than a few moves ahead.

The whole point of issue 15 is that in a way, Osborn was right when he told Bob that "there is no Void". There really is not a clear and magical line between the Sentry and the Void. They are *both* figments of Bob's super-empowered imagination. (When Bob reacts to his wife's death, he manifests as the Void. Think about that.)

A mountain of things have transpired off-panel, none of which have resonated in the DA title itself until now, a giant battle has been planned, executed, and failed off-panel; loyalties have been swapped, Bob is entirely missing, and Norman makes his big speech at the end only to be tormented by his inner Goblin as they remain locked away. This could not have been a more frustrating failure of an issue, this could not have let this series down worse.

Uh, what is the problem with "hey, remember to go read this thematically and event-relevant book that is written by the same guy who wrote the book you have been following for a bit more than a year now"?

Nothing happened "off-panel". It happened in that book you knew about did not read.

Issue 16 was presented as an epilogue to the story that ran through and ended in "the Siege".


Yeah, "Dark Avengers" was decompressed. But, at least Bendis can write an individual scene using sentences and style that do not come across as being written by a backwards ass kid, unlike say "Iron Man: Rise of the Melter". That was self-contained.....and untterly pointless.

Bob is important to "Dark Avengers" as the visible manifestation of the corruption and power themes. The whole point is that Osborn and his team were going to fail. (They call that much out in the first issue or two.) The most stable and upstanding members of the team were the God of War and a frustrated bureaucrat. And, Bendis conveyed all of that.

I did not even get in to "Dark Avengers" looking for layered story-telling. And, I still picked up on this. Bendis included relevant scenes. And, "the Seige" was part of "Dark Avengers". It was less a different book than it was "additional issues of the same book". That is how Bendis writes.


Dom
-more than a bit sore about "Team 7" getting axed so quickly.

Dominic wrote:Bendis was writing more than one book. Stuff bled through. (And, it is not unreasonable to expect a reader to follow more than one book when those books are written by the same guy and are made to fit together.)

I think it's funny that you're the only one who champions this as completely acceptable and expected while all the rest of us are like, "No, that's bullshit, they shouldn't do that." If I go out and spend my money on a comic book, I don't want them hustling me going, "Ha, now you have to spend MORE money on this other comic you didn't even care about before if you want to make sense of the story!"

Uh, this is how comics are published, and how they have been for some time now.

If two or more comics are written by the same guy and cover similar subject matter, it is not unreasonable for them to cross-over, nor is it unreasonable to expect people to buy both. There is a significant difference between assuming people will read two related titles and obligating them to buy otherwise unrelated titles.

I read "Cobra". I do not bother with "GI Joe", even when there is a cross-over. I just assume some shit happened that I did not bother to read about and move on. But, when I was reading "Dark Avengers", I did not complain when Bendis crossed it over with other "Avengers" books, including those that he was writing.

Dominic wrote:Uh, this is how comics are published, and how they have been for some time now.

If two or more comics are written by the same guy and cover similar subject matter, it is not unreasonable for them to cross-over, nor is it unreasonable to expect people to buy both. There is a significant difference between assuming people will read two related titles and obligating them to buy otherwise unrelated titles.

I read "Cobra". I do not bother with "GI Joe", even when there is a cross-over. I just assume some shit happened that I did not bother to read about and move on. But, when I was reading "Dark Avengers", I did not complain when Bendis crossed it over with other "Avengers" books, including those that he was writing.

The problem here is that it's essentially the comic book version of how Playmates fucked up the 2009 Star Trek toy line. "We're going to release this but to get the whole thing you have to buy everything". It's an obvious money grab and it's a shitty thing to do to consumers and fans.

Dominic wrote:At least your comic is getting finished. All you have to do is wait for the delayed issue to ship and you can read your comics happily.

"Team 7" is never getting finished. A major plot thread is *never* getting resolved.

I think it's a bit too early to say it's never going to be resolved. The title might be canceled, but that doesn't mean DC can't pick up the plot threads in another title. I've seen them do that with other titles that have been canceled.

Shockwave wrote:The problem here is that it's essentially the comic book version of how Playmates fucked up the 2009 Star Trek toy line. "We're going to release this but to get the whole thing you have to buy everything". It's an obvious money grab and it's a shitty thing to do to consumers and fans.

Yeah. Although I do kind of like it when a writer might use more than one book to enhance the over all story, I don't like it when they make it so you have to buy all of their titles to get the overall story. The individual titles should be able to stand on their own.