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Underground > Comic Books >

Jeph loeb

16:05 / 25.10.09

you all complain about him but you all buy his comics

Essential Dazzler

03:22 / 26.10.09

Comic Book Piracy exists and is amazing you Bleach Dubbing piece of Poo.

20:56 / 26.10.09

I secretly AM Jeph Loeb, and I hate myself.

03:24 / 27.10.09

If we're going to discuss the Loeb phenomenon seriously, I have to say that I don't understand it either.

What possessed me to not just read, but actually buy, all five issues of 'Ultimatum'? Perhaps the answer is that if a farm bloody cat had been set loose on the writing chores, I might, just as easily, have followed its antics to the bitter end. That Loeb ought to be put on 'Moon Knight' or something, as a test of his mettle.

Though it's hard to escape the awful suspicion that if he was, sales would go through the roof.

ONLY NICE THINGS

21:27 / 27.10.09

I don't read his work or buy it, so I might not be the target audience, but it does seem like a lot of people are unhappy with some of the directions he's taken things in. That said, maybe we should give him a break? He's had some very difficult time, and unfortunately whereas most of us can probably just let things slide a bit at work if we're having a bad time, comic book writers have to be visible and available for criticism if they're going to keep earning money.

That said, the Ultimate universe is pretty much broken at this point, yes?

Maybe we could remember our favourite Jeph Loeb work from the past? I haven't read it, but I understand Batman: The Long Halloween gets good notices...

23:59 / 27.10.09

All right. Target audience or otherwise, I would not invest in Jeph Loeb as a business, because, as a family man, as a father of what is it now, about eight, I would have concerns about what exactly Loeb's Red Hulk is supposed to represent? Is Red Hulk a disguised metaphor for ... something, let's face it, that might be quite bleak?

Either way, I'm out.

02:34 / 29.10.09

Imagine my suprise when, having read Batman: Hush, I realized that the story formula was essentially the same as Batman: The Long Halloween.

12:19 / 29.10.09

Imagine my suprise when, having read Batman: Hush, I realized that the story formula was essentially the same as Batman: The Long Halloween.

You think? How so?

I quite liked Hush and some of his Batman/Superman stuff was readable.

Ultimates 3 was truly awful given how much potential the Ultimates had at the start. There are so many flaws in it that it's really not even worth laying into here.

Ultimatum was just more of the same. A big world-changing event could have been just the ticket to turn the Ultimate brand into something a bit more unique, but Loeb dropped the ball big time and turned it into a boring character cull.

Regrettable Juvenilia

16:47 / 29.10.09

Thursday morning. I wake up and I hide beneath the covers. I can hear my kids playing in the garden. I can hear my wife making breakfast. But I don't want any. Not today. Not Thursday.

I get up and I put on my best suit. I walk through the kitchen and I eat a piece of toast. "Off to the Android's Dungeon, luv?", asks my wife. I smile at her. But I can see she's worried. "Can we come with you, Dad?" asks my eldest. But I tell him no. Not today. Not when the new issue of Hulk is out.

I walk out of the house and I get in my car. I pull out onto my street and I drive to the junction. I get on the motorway and drive into Derby.

I park on the street and I walk towards the shop. The dirty, dirty, dirty shop. Hateful place. Spiteful place.

They hate him and they love him. Old Jeph. With his lists and his schemes. His little black books. Books full of ideas. Hateful ideas. Books full of lists. Characters to kill. Characters to ruin. All his plans and schemes.

It is his Hulk, not mine. Never mine. I will never write the Hulk. He does. Not me. Never me.

23:27 / 29.10.09

Dude! You wanna visit Loeb's house and take a leak in his bathroom, right?

'How's this for an Ultimatum?' I guess you might find yourself muttering, as you flooded his john, an Ultimate spider of sorts being lost in the turmoil. 'Reverse the magnetic poles now, you frikkin' weirdo.'

Well if so, just come out and say it, brother! You're with friends here!

10:03 / 30.10.09

Eviiil scientist:

For a detective story built around a classical whodunnit, I found the main antagonist for both storylines to have been singled out and pushed aside far too tacklessly.

"Holiday" supposedly dies but we're almost deliberately never shown any conclusive evidence, while "Hush", introduced as a new character, is also removed in such a way that I remember thinking, "I saw that," and expected the character's return at say about the end of the book, right after we've made our way through the bling bling rogue gallery and oh, Jason Todd.

Somehow Batman in Morrison's "Gothic" was much better, but I haven't read that many Batman stories to know really.

10:42 / 30.10.09

I can see your point, although "killing" villains in such a way as to allow their return is par for the course in cape-books.

I found Hush to be an entertaining romp through Batman's history. I'd recommend it to someone who hasn't actually read Batman and wanted get a bit of his backstory.

In some ways I felt it paralleled Muzzlgum's New X-Men arc in that it covered the dominant themes of many of the Batman stories (the Bat/Cat flirtation, the Superman/Batman team-up, the new enemy obessessing about the Bat, Batman's eternal problem deciding if it would be a good thing to snap Joker's neck).

Maybe it's just me that sees that though.

Somehow Batman in Morrison's "Gothic" was much better, but I haven't read that many Batman stories to know really.

I'd say it was once he re-charged Batman as the Justice League's "deadliest man on the planet" that he really got a handle on Batman.