TF Views

I dunno, O6. I'd really like to read the Hulk books because I really like the character. But what can I do? They're in full crossover mode right now, and while half the crossover is done by an extremely talented and enjoyable writer (Greg Pak, who also co-writes "The Incredible Herc") the other half is Jeph Loeb. Now, I clearly can't go around reading Jeph Loeb comics, now can I? It's a shame, too, because Incredible Hulk (not the red one, the one with Banner running around with his Space Barbarian son) was REALLY cool before "Fall of the Hulks" started.

EDIT: I'm not a bit shocked about Betty. Actually, my guess was that Betty would be Red Hulk. Somehow. Look, with that many muscles, who could tell if Red Hulk was male or female. Thunderbolt Ross feels a little predictable, somehow, but whatever.

I got some comics!:

Siege #4: The most fun I've had with an event comic in almost too long to remember. However, the art was pretty good, but this really needed, like, Walt Simonson or somebody to really up the "KRAKATHOOOM!" Still, a great ride.

Dark Avengers #16: This is Dom's fault, he pretty much made me start reading this book. And since the end of it ties into Siege, well...

Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers #3: Super-pets!

Prince of Power: Amadeus Cho's solo series until Herc returns? C'mon, you know I'm gonna buy that. Loads of fun.

Ahahahaha! I flipped to the end of that Hulk comic in the shop this morning, after hearing O6 mention the thing about learning Rulk's identity. I haven't been following this story at all, and I hardly read any Marvel, let alone Hulk, and yet I still thought to myself when I heard about this "Red Hulk is probably that General guy". Ahahaha! Quite pleased with myself, I was.

Okay, you guys talking about Siege, and hearing in other places that it's actually pretty good, has me intrigued. What do I have to read to get this story? Am I fine with just the main Siege book, or what all of the myriad tie-ins do I need to read?

Anyway, I'm a little upset with DC this week for releasing ALL the Brightest Day tie-ins TODAY! Plus a good chunk of the Batman titles, including Return of Bruce Wayne. And on THAT subject...

Forgive me, Father Dominic, for I must confess: I think I'm starting to LIKE Grant Morrison! It started when I was chatting with some people on /co/, and I had an epiphany and finally understood Final Crisis! So I wanted to re-read through that story, plus all of Morrison's Batman stuff leading up to it. Well just in time, someone Storytimed Morrison's run on Batman starting with 'The Black Glove', and after that I whipped out my copy of 'Batman R.I.P.', only to realize that not only did I actually get what Morrison was DOING with that story, but I approved of it and enjoyed it! So now I'm actually EXCITED to start reading Return of Bruce Wayne. I'm kinda scared.

What other Morrison stuff should I check out, now that I've acquired this taste? I know I need to read All-Star Superman, and I've heard good things about his Animal Man run. Scourge? I'm looking to you here, since you're the big Morrison fan around here.

Really, he's totally insane, but in the same enjoyable way that Hideo Kojima is.

So Rulk, instead of being an interesting new character, turns out to just be that same bad guy who's been against Hulk since about day one. Ugh. Oh, and also, the General Ross that Rulk interacted with? It's some crazyass Tony Stark clone or some bullshit.

This is like if Venom turned out to be Norman Osborn, right after there's been an entire arc where Venom was fighting the Green Goblin.

Comics are retarded.

Red Hulk is buggerin' who now?

Who is the Red Hulk? No, really, save me from a trip to wikipedia...please.

I picked up a goodly sized pile of comics. I read "Dark Avengers" #16...and felt compelled to write Bendis on Facebook to thank him. Damn. Wow. I mean....wow. That book was powerful. It had the power of 1,001 exploding suns.

Prowl, all you need for "Siege" is "Dark Avengers" and "Siege" proper. "Embedded" is a bit polemic, complete with a Limbaugh/Beck type character to be the foil for Urich. (I am *really* tired of conservatives being the bad guy strawmen.) There are a few good one-shots, all clearly marked. And, some of the tie-ins are actually pretty good as well. I want to say "Avengers: the Initiative" has some good moments, making the Task Master one of the most sympathetic and interesting guys in Osborn's Cabal. (And, no, Bendis does not make Task Master a good guy. He just flexes his "common man among great powers" muscles.) Be wary of some of the non-Bendis appearances of the Dark Avengers though, as some writers cannot write them well.

Look at "Dark Avengers" as a Greek tragedy told with Norse Gods and super heroes.

Bendis also manages to write Osborn as a bigot...and keep him sympathetic. "Heroic Age" be damned, any mature adult living in 616 Marvel would have to concede Osborn was closer to being right on that last page than one might hope.

In other news, I was right about which member of the team will be joining the post "Dark Reign" Avengers.

The only other book I picked up was "GI Joe: Operation HISS" #4. It is better than your average Furman book, but still really just filler.

Dom
-will post better reviews later.

Dominic wrote:Red Hulk is buggerin' who now?

Who is the Red Hulk? No, really, save me from a trip to wikipedia...please.

General Ross, I guess. Yeah, really.

I'm kind of interested in the upcoming Shadowland storyline for Daredevil.

Onslaught Six wrote:Comics are retarded.

Well this is a Loeb story we're talking about here, which for the past several years have been pretty stupid.

BWprowl wrote:
Okay, you guys talking about Siege, and hearing in other places that it's actually pretty good, has me intrigued. What do I have to read to get this story? Am I fine with just the main Siege book, or what all of the myriad tie-ins do I need to read?

Like Dom said, all you really need is the four-issue thing and maybe some "Dark Avengers". Really, though, I'd say that the story's pretty self-contained and that the DA stuff is just useful background. Except for "Dark Avengers" #16, which concludes the whole thing.

I really wish I had more time about now, I'd totally write up a post on why I loved "Siege" so much. It reminded me of being in eighth grade and reading the Simonson/Simonson X-Factor sections of "Fall of the Mutants". Just awesome superhero beatdown epicness.

What other Morrison stuff should I check out, now that I've acquired this taste? I know I need to read All-Star Superman, and I've heard good things about his Animal Man run. Scourge? I'm looking to you here, since you're the big Morrison fan around here.

One of us! One of us!

Okay, good Morrison stuff to get into. First off, you're on the right track with "Animal Man" and "All-Star Supes". That's quality right there. With "Animal Man", you'll need at least the first couple of volumes, it starts out focusing on the family life of a forgotten superhero aspect, but by volume two it gets into the full Morrison crazy.

My man's run on "X-Men" is pretty much the high point of that series in my own opinion, but you gotta remember that I hated 90's X-Men with a passion, and people don't appear to be able to like both versions.

"Seven Soldiers of Victory" is one that I just started on, but it leaves me with a little bit of a buzz after reading each volume. It's full of a lot of sheer batshit crazy fun.

If you ever run across "Flex Mentallo" then buy the shit out of that, not only is it an awesome story about why superheroes are rad, but it's an early collaboration with Frank Quitely, so that's a win. However, you won't find it...it's crazy rare and thanks to Charles Atlas' estate, it won't be reprinted. God damn my old landlord that made off with my copies.

If you love some animals, check out "We3" for escaped laboratory super-pets. I keep trying to get Dom to read this one, too.

And finally, if you're gonna read some Morrison, you may as well read "The Invisibles"

Really, he's totally insane, but in the same enjoyable way that Hideo Kojima is.

Okay, now you gotta tell me about this guy.

I have to disagree about "Dark Avengers". The whole series is important to "The Siege". There is excellent thematic and character based interaction between Osborn, the Sentry and Hand throughout the series. Bendis did an excellent job of writing Osborn as flawed, but possessed of great virtue. Like I said above, it is impossible to read the last few pages of "The Siege" without seeing how a reasonable person living in 616 Marvel would not at least partially agree with Osborn's world-view, even before Stamford and the Civil War.

"Dark X-Men", (trust me), also has some important bits about Osborn.

If you love some animals, check out "We3" for escaped laboratory super-pets. I keep trying to get Dom to read this one, too.

PETA supportes like Morrison have zero credibility with me when it comes to writing about animals.


Dom
-is pretty sure Morrison is afraid of dogs. You can just tell.

Dominic wrote:

If you love some animals, check out "We3" for escaped laboratory super-pets. I keep trying to get Dom to read this one, too.

PETA supportes like Morrison have zero credibility with me when it comes to writing about animals.

Hm. Well, I could have phrased that better, but I was in a hurry. But regardless of Morrison's support of PETA or anybody, it gets down to the question "Would I like to see superintelligent pets in robot murder suits turn on their creators"? If the answer is "Good lord, yes!" then We3's where to go. It's Morrison and Quitely, that's good stuff right there.

138 Scourge wrote:

Really, he's totally insane, but in the same enjoyable way that Hideo Kojima is.

Okay, now you gotta tell me about this guy.

Hideo Kojima is the director of the Metal Gear Solid series. If you've got a PS1/PS2, grab yourself a copy of the first game and go from there, they're not that long of games, honestly. And the story is rife with stuff like Cyborg Ninjas and the hero's clone brother who possesses a Russian gunslinger by grafting his arm onto him and a girl who's power is supernatural luck and swordfighting in cyberspace with the President of the United States who turned out to be another evil clone and is wielding an army of amphibious walking tanks and there's a guy in the 60's who controls bees who's part of a group of supersoldiers that also includes a ghost and then it goes into the future and there's chicks with tragic pasts who are also robots and there's computers named after presidents that control the nanomachines in everyone and ooooh chriiiiiiist. Just play it.