Comics are awesome.

[138 Scourge]

Hey, I'm all for innovation in comic stories. And there's a lot of it going on in various comics these days, if you look in the right places. Hell, even in this story Sparky's talking about, there's some clever things going on...the Protector of Earth thing, f'rinstance.

The only reason I mentioned precedent for the thing with J'onn was because Sparky called it a bit of a stretch. Initially I agreed in the original version of my post, but then I remembered about the "One Million" thing. The only similarity in the two stories is J'onn having dirt-related powers, and even then there's a world of difference between the two situations.

[Sparky Prime]

Yeah, it's not that there needs to be precedent, it's just that when you look at the others, it's obvious why they were selected to be those Elementals. But for J'onn? None of his powers are 'dirt' related. Just seems odd he really has nothing to do with his element when the others are so obviously tied to theirs.

And I really wouldn't call this an example of comics being cyclical. As 138 Scourge said, the only similarity between the two stories is just J'onn having an ability to control the ground/dirt. The stories themselves couldn't be more different though. In "One Million" J'onn is shown to really never have given up hope on restoring life to Mars, making it a final wish that merges him with the planet itself. In Brightest Day however, he's forced to choose between saving Earth or restoring Mars, and by choosing Earth he was accepted by Earth to become the Earth Elemental. It also suggests that perhaps J'onn has accepted Mars' fate by choosing Earth as his home over Mars.

[Dominic]

You can generally read comics for about 5 years and avoid redundancy. Then, leave for close to 10. Over that time, changing norms and industry standards will kind of make things seem newer when you get back into the hobby.

Dom
-actually coming up on that 5 year mark.....

[Shockwave]

As far as events sure, but what about constantly getting characters "back to the way they were". I here Dom complain about that all the time. How is that not cyclical? We even see it in Transformers. I mean you can read TF for about 3-4 years (sometimes not even that) and then bam, everything's back to the '84 lineup. IDW so far has seemed to avoid this trap but I'm willing to bet it'll be back with enough time.

[Dominic]

It is not just a question of huge events resetting comics. It can just happen over time. When this tendency is mixed in with stories that imply/require the passage of time, it gets messy.

Oddly, IDW has avoided falling into that trap, even with a few reboots in ~5 years. In theory, one could pick up "Infiltration #1 and the current ongoing, and logically guess about what happened in the time between the 2. The guess would be wrong in details, but idiomatically right.

Capes and tights are filler for me right now.


Dom
-of course, this sort of thing is not a problem is wresting...where the characters have to age.

[Sparky Prime]

As far as events sure, but what about constantly getting characters "back to the way they were". I here Dom complain about that all the time. How is that not cyclical?

Honestly, I think Dom over-exaggerates on this topic. I really don't see that they constantly make characters "back to the way they were" because that totally negates the characters development. The way I see it, they generally find other ways to manipulate the story into working the direction they want to take into it rather than just going back to the way it was.

[Onslaught Six]

Anyone else see that IDW got the TMNT license now? Wheee! They say they'll be reprinting the old stuff again, which makes me happy in my pants.

[Dominic]

When Steve Rogers puts on the Captain America mask again, things will be just like they was.

Okay, last week's comics:


Avengers #11:
Bendis does a solid job of building an "event" style story and running it through one title. We knew he could do solid dialogue and characterization. And, he has flexed muscles in terms of writing out of sequence. But, this arc is the first time I can recall Bendis writing a straightforward "epic" style story. The pacing and build-up are solid. However, Bendis still has a clear weakness when writing cosmic characters such as the Watcher. This flaw is compounded by the apparent rule Marvel has about writing Thanos as a bad guy whenever Jim Starlin is not in the room. The "Oral History of the Avengers" back-up continues in truncated form this issue, (making room for "Fear Itself" promos). Bendis, through Captain America, continues the trend of the last few issues of taking shots at previous runs of "the Avengers" that some old-time readers may take umbrage over. (I think the references this issue are to the Thomas/Buscema run, but I am not sure and do not much feel like checking this.) Over all, this book is solid filler, and worth picking up if you are going to the comic shop anyway.
Grade: C


Irredeemable #24:
There really is no excuse for this. By that I mean that I have no excuse for picking up this book, as it is not even a guilty pleasure, and there is really no excuse for it to exist beyond Mark Waid's ongoing fit of picquie. Yes, Mark, we know you can write dark comics. This issue touches on thematically redundant bits from the Plutonian's origin and delves into the creepy motivations of the Lex Luthor analogue whose name I cannot be troubled to remember. (Get this, the obsession is vaguely sexualized, meaning we get we are getting some oh so cutting edge homo-eroticism. Wowzers. This is some good comics right here kids.) I actually prefer Morrison's recent Silver-Age fetishization to this.
Grade: D


Dom
-eagerly counting the hours until "Transformers" #18 on Wednesday.

[Sparky Prime]

When Steve Rogers puts on the Captain America mask again, things will be just like they was.

All that means is Steve will be Captain America again, just in time for the release of the new Cap movie. That doesn't mean the story is automatically going to be 'just like it was'.

[Shockwave]

When Steve Rogers puts on the Captain America mask again, things will be just like they was.

All that means is Steve will be Captain America again, just in time for the release of the new Cap movie. That doesn't mean the story is automatically going to be 'just like it was'.

Is Steve Rogers already back? Or did he actually manage to somehow stay dead? But, yeah I'm sorry, I gotta side with Dom on this one, if Rogers comes back as Cap, it's pretty much just like it was. This is why I didn't get all flipped out when they announced that they were killing off the character. The attitude from marvel at the time was that he would stay dead and I think at least Dom and I both knew damn well that wasn't gonna stick for very long.