Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Comic Books >

Marvel's 'Civil War'.

Page: 1 ... 12 13 14 15 16(17)18 19 20 21

10:11 / 09.01.07

I haved to admit that I'm also pro Civil War, but only in theory. I like the idea, I think the books ahead have potential, and I totally agree that this stuff is pure Marvel, but I'm not so keen on the execution, at least I'm not so keen on anything Millar's written for the crossover. That's partially because I'm suffering from Millar fatigue (detailed elsewhere), and partly because the central title hasn't been up to much. Seriously, that last issue was utter crap, all build and very little content. And, I ask again, what was the Punisher doing in that book other than advertising War Journal? I mean, who would trust to do that job, Frank Castle or a techie guy with super agility and a spider sense?

12:15 / 09.01.07

Anyway, I could give a shit about Speedball. He 'was a fun character'? Look, he's been a dried up punchline (e.g. see 'The Underneath' arc in Alias) for at least twelve years, about whom very few writers cared to write and very few fans cared.

Here's my problem.

Yes, Speedball was a C-list (if not lower) hero. Yes, he's a goofy throwback character. And yes, he hasn't been more than a supporting character in years.

So what? Is Marvel's future so dependent on Speedball selling top 20 numbers that they HAVE to change him? Was his very existence somehow disruptive to the future of Marvel Comics? In days of yore, if a character didn't work, they simply shuffled him off to Limbo until someone felt like using him. Totally rewriting a character simply wasn't necessary.

I mean, seriously. New name, new powers, new costume, new attitude. There's a simple term for that: "New character".

12:27 / 09.01.07

It does seem a bit stupid not to have gone for a new character, especially in light of the fact that the recent storyline has utterly failed to set up Speedball for his transformation into a masochistic self-loather. In fact I'm not sure an attempt was even made.

That said, the character may still have potential, even if the concept is absurdly heavy-handed.

Essential Dazzler

13:46 / 09.01.07

especially in light of the fact that the recent storyline has utterly failed to set up Speedball for his transformation into a masochistic self-loather

I haven't been following the series particularly closey, not having bought it and all, but did it seem to you that Speedball made the decision to become penance while he was in a coma? I'm probably wrong.

Civil War #7 pushed back till February 21st

14:16 / 09.01.07

If that is the case, I think having him decide to become Penance when he's in a coma, as opposed to reaching that decision as the natural resolution of a well told story, is rather rubbish. Not that the speedbal story in Front Line has been awful, mind, just that it seems to have little to do with the direction in which Marvel editorial seem to want to take the character.

14:48 / 09.01.07

I hope Penance spends his down time sitting nude in a bottomless chair getting rope-whipped in the groin.

Why save it for down time? Apparently pain enhances his powers, so he'll need to do that sort of thing on the battlefield.

"Damn! My hot wax tank's on empty and Kid Terrax is still coming! But if I spread my legs at just the right moment, I can catch his next blast on my balls and supercharge myself! It's risky...but it just might work!"

15:54 / 09.01.07

I'm certainly hopeful that's the avenue down which Thunderbolts - a title, incidentally, that I personally had never remotely once considered purchasing before this week - will pass.

Is Marvel's future so dependent on Speedball selling top 20 numbers that they HAVE to change him? Was his very existence somehow disruptive to the future of Marvel Comics? In days of yore, if a character didn't work, they simply shuffled him off to Limbo until someone felt like using him. Totally rewriting a character simply wasn't necessary.

I mean, seriously. New name, new powers, new costume, new attitude. There's a simple term for that: "New character".

Well, gross overstatement aside - of course it's not going to alter Marvel's fiscal future in any noticeable way, but then few comics are - it has generated some further heat for the title in which the character is to appear. Last week or month if you'd told me (or been told, I'd think) that Speedball was to be the most discussed character on the comics internet by some distance, it'd have been dismissed that as the ravings of a one-off man mental. So, there's some form of alchemy there that certainly wouldn't have been generated in the creation of a new character (which the notably conservative mainstream audience would have almost exactly no interest in.) So, yeah, 'shoulda been a new character' - ever the cry of people who want nothing changed to their ineffable idols, some of whom they don't even care for or about (cf: Speedball) - would not have had the same effect at all, and a legion of complainers - in lieu of some new Transformers stills this week - would be denied a lightning rod also.

Look on the upside.

In terms of the character arc I've not read Front Line so I can't really comment on that, but there is a distinct line to redemption from the central event he's largely responsible for in Civil War #1; the alternatives were imprisonment or death (I think this may have been the original plan, given he's quoted as dead in CW#2 or so, and the rest of his team are actually in the ground at this moment) pretty much, and the continuation of the character as a daft, bouncy jerk about whom no-one cared would have rung false.

16:53 / 09.01.07

I agree that a new character wouldn't have really sold it. And the idea of a C-list hero screwing up and then trying to find redemption in a new guise as an A-list hero is classic Marvel angst and fertile story territory (although this is quite possible what Supernova's deal is in 52).

The main problem is that the generic early-90s-X-Men name, spikey costume and pain=power are trite and cheap. All they've really done is flip a switch and turn a one-note lighthearted character into a one-note gritty character.

Honestly, I didn't have any interest in Speedball before and I don't have any now, but at least the old one had a great Ditko design...

17:31 / 09.01.07

I agree that there should have been a redemptive storyline that logically led to Penance, but unfortunately we didn't get it. Bit weird, if you ask me.

17:39 / 09.01.07

Falke:

I have no problem with characters changing. I just want it to be the logical outgrowth of events, not something pounded in with a crowbar (Hence, for example, why I've never complained about Spidey or Supes being married)

18:03 / 09.01.07

Well, my point is Penance is the redemption arc, not yet begun. As I say, I know not the details of Frontline (I used to think Jenkins was halfway decent, right up until his first Sentry series concluded,) but given the beginning of Civil War (which, it might be argued, is not a logical outgrowing of Nicieza/Bagley's New Warriors, c.1994 or whenever, sure but apparently the Wells/Young series had the team as reality teevee stars before CW's onset) I don't especially feel the need to, to apprehend narrative motion to this point.

(In any case, if you read all the tie-ins, especially Strajimski's, all you are supposedly left with is a mess of contradictions. It's quite probably better in my head.)

I literally cannot believe how much time I've devoted to discussing Speedball, of all characters, you know?

18:15 / 09.01.07

Just so we're doubly clear, as I'm not particularly interested in continuity and even less precious about Speedball, I'm happy enough to see what's done with Penance post Front Line. My point is merely that Marvel's failure to set Penance up properly is slightly baffling - they've just devoted an entire series to Speedball, for Christsake. I imagine their intentions for the character must've changed at some point over the last few months.

18:15 / 09.01.07

Oh, and the redemptive arc so should've begun. Penance is just an important stop on the way.

19:43 / 09.01.07

As far as I'm concerned, Penance is this season's Electric Superman.

Regrettable Juvenilia

10:15 / 20.01.07

Has there been a worse-kept ending to a series in the last five years than the fact that the Pro-Registration side wins? And that, in other words, Millar's appallingly-paced main 'Civil War' series basically doesn't even tell an actual story?

Anyway... somebody important dies next issue, and Captain America is not on either of the two Avengers teams coming out as a result. Unless he's the person who's in the Ronin costume but is not Echo. It's got to be him or Mary-Jane, I think, and the latter would be even more irritating than the rest of this series.

14:14 / 20.01.07

B-but, wouldn't that derail the storyline in Captain America's own series a bit? I mean the Red Skull's going to be gutted ...

Presumably one of the new Thunderbolts will do the evil deed (It's not hard to picture the brainstorming session -

A large bearded man shambles into the room

OOR WULLIE: Hey, Warren, while you were at the gents just now we put Norman Osborn in charge! Cool, yeah?

ELLIS: I see. Why did you do that?

OOR WULLIE: It'll really mess with the fanboys' heads!

ELLIS: Mm ... It's just that it doesn't really make any sense. Still, not my problem, I suppose. So who are going to get to write it? (laughs) That new bug Kirkman, right?

OOR WULLIE: No, Warren. You see, you're confusing me with the old Mark Millar. The new Mark Millar does not allow anyone to go to the toilet while the ideas are in full flow!

ELLIS: Right ... Oh god, hang on ...

OOR WULLIE: So you're writing it, Warren. You.

ELLIS: But, but I can't. I can't possibly make that scenario work ...

OOR WULLIE: Course you can, mate. Got a wife and kids to support, yeah?

ELLIS: Don't drag them into this, please.

OOR WULLIE: Mark Millar will drag what he sodding well likes into the discussion! You bloody hairfarmer! Just think of it as a challenge ... It's all right if you drink a lot while you're writing it. You can even (laughs do an 'E' if you like ... You lot, my supposed peers, were all fannying about the planet smoking crack in the bloody rain forests and being clever in interviews while I was there working at the bloody coalface! And now I'm in charge. So you, Warren, will do what you're told!

ELLIS: Let this burden pass from me.

OOR WULLIE: Not in this liftime, ye doss f****** c***)

Spyder Todd 2008

15:13 / 20.01.07

...

Granny, I pray to the comic book gods that Marvel editorial meetings go exactly like that. Please let it be so...

Aha! I am Klarion

03:35 / 21.01.07

didn't somebody get into trouble the last they wrote mark millar's voice

08:09 / 21.01.07

We all got our ASS spanked.

ONLY NICE THINGS

11:15 / 21.01.07

SHOCK NEWS

S

P

O

I

L

E

R

S

Good news - the Skrull Kill Krew is back. I had to pull some strings, break some heads, but we're fucking on, baby. FUCKING... ON.

You see that radge Ronin? That's fun-loving Neo-Nazi white supremacist skinhead good guy Moonstomp - perhaps the best idea Marvel editorial ever didn't read with quite enough attention!

C'moan!

C'MOAN!

Fuckin' Moonstomp, man!

12:04 / 21.01.07

Fly, it is quite astonishingly badly kept, isn't it?

While I agree that having Norman Osbourne in charge of the Thunderbolts does make absolutely no sense - except, I suppose, that it has dramatic potential - I didn't actually dislike Thunderbolts. I lenjoyed the Thunderbirds riff (something, incredibly, that I managed not to see coming) and the overall feeling of complete and utter wrongness that permeated proceedings. I don't imagine I'll be buying the book with any regularity however as I imagine it'll be as slow as any work by the man Ellis.

14:28 / 21.01.07

Perhaps the best idea Marvel editorial ever didn't read with quite enough attention!

Indeed.

They didn't see the potential then, but they're bloody well going to now! The wee shites.

15:23 / 22.01.07

I liked Thunderbolts for the same reason, Boboss. Warren Ellis seems to see what an astonishingly bad idea it is to give Norman Osborn SHIELD clearance and a meaty chunk of the U.S.'s defense budget, but he just runs with it without trying to justify it, and Condition Indigo! fun ensues.

Also, unlike most of the Civil War writers--who seem pretty clearly anti-registration but hem and haw to give the pro-reg side some sort of halfhearted justification for cutting Bullseye a paycheck and throwing the Slingers in the Negative Zone--Ellis isn't trying (and failing) to be balanced at all. Jack Flag is going to DIE and pro-registration is WRONG and Tony Stark is a BASTARD. This is the lesson of Thunderbolts.

I'll wait for the trade, which will be chock full of Tommy Lee Jones-as-Osborn goodness.

17:13 / 22.01.07

I might wait for the trade too.

I seem to be waiting for an awful lot of 'em at the moment

11:24 / 22.02.07

The ending of all this hubbub is the famous comic book cliche 'one of the two parties fighting suddenly says 'whoa, look at all the property we're destroying....all the innocent lives disrupted....let's just stop fighting, give peace a chance, etc.'??!?! Plus, that party is Captain America, who I doubt would lose sight of his environment for long anyway given his extensive combat experience.

The new status quo is interesting, tho'.

11:39 / 22.02.07

Any major deaths?

11:42 / 22.02.07

I should note that (X-Factor tie-ins and Thunderbolts aside) I'm not reading Civil War.

But...question.

I get that the X-teams are bascially not getting involved in the War (except Wolverine who's contractually obliged to be in any and all cross-overs) but why exactly are none of them running about the place screaming "Oh my God! It's Days of Future Past minus the Sentinels!"?

I mean, they've seen how wrong a registration act can go. It doesn't make sense that the X-Men would sit this one out.

12:05 / 22.02.07

The only "death" was Clor, the Thor clone/cyborg/android, who literally got his face smashed in.

And the reason the X-Men are sitting this one out is that they cut a deal, basically.

12:26 / 22.02.07

And the reason the X-Men are sitting this one out is that they cut a deal, basically.

Are the remaining mutants registered though?

Thinking about it, this would tie in quite nastily with the possibility of X-Factor causing global destruction by bringing back the mutants.

One insta-cure later and 200 controllable mutants become a significant portion of the American population. Suddenly mutants have to be registered and Friends of Humanity re-unite.

Send in the Sentinels!

Phex: Dorset Doom

13:02 / 22.02.07

Well the Mutants would all be anti-reg (except Bishop for some reason), meaning the whole civil war would be over in all of three seconds. It would have been cool if in the next panel after Spidey and Reed's whole 'Amazing'/'Spectacular' exchange the X-men turned up with the battle-cry 'Uncanny!'.

13:34 / 22.02.07

All remaining mutants were registered by default after the whole 198 thing. Most of them have taken refuge at Xavier's.

13:36 / 22.02.07

All remaining mutants were registered by default after the whole 198 thing.

I bet Rachel Summers was overjoyed about that.

rabideyemovement

14:16 / 22.02.07

HERE THERE BE SPOILERS:

I really enjoyed the final issue of this title. The fight went down exactly how I expected it to, and the art was top notch. I'm glad Herc got to be the one to disassemble Clor's face. And I like how their only route free from the Negative Zone was stragiht into the streets of NYC.
I do feel this should have been a double-sized issue. There are many fun moments missing from the battle. The Sentry is pretty much absent form the whole thing, other than when we see him being tagteameded by Hulkling and Hercules. And Namor seems to vanish immediately after his flashy entrance.And It's hardto believe that the Atlanteans would stop their fight on the whim of Cap America.
I also hope that they explain Mar-Vell's presence. It's hard to believe that he would so readily fight his friends so early after his return. That should be addressed in his own book.
The epilogue was great too. The Punisher salvaging Cap's mask? I'd like to see him use it, maybe swap out the giant white chest skull with a star for a few months.
Cap sits in 42, just as Zemo predicted, though we know he was given the means to escape when the time comes.USAgent defects to Canada, as does ?BetaRayBill??
And its now painfulyl obvious that Miriam Sharpe is not who she claims to be. Did Stark really give her all the heroes secret identities?

I see alot of disgruntled talk on the message boards about an anticlimactic ending, but its really not the ending to this story.
Civil War is the biggest, longest Marvel Team-Up ever, and what do heroes always do before they team up?
They fight each other.
Then they team up and fight the villains.
The same villain is obviously behind the Raft break, the Stamford incident, and the Registration Act. A villain that can even trump the psychohistory equations of Reed Richards. A manipulator... perhaps Loki?

14:35 / 22.02.07

has the raft villian never been found?

14:51 / 22.02.07

Not yet.

Page: 1 ... 12 13 14 15 16(17)18 19 20 21