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Underground > Comic Books >

‘Ultimate War’ #1

15:27 / 05.12.02

Feeling extra geeky today, for some reason. Did anyone get the first issue of this?

So, is it nice to see Millar destroying discernible NYC landmarks again? As mentioned in yawn's excellent Grant Morrison interview. Still going back and forth on how I feel about this.

Bachalo’s art. Some of it was great (that shot of Captain America catching his shield after taking out Hard-wire or Hard-drive or whatever her name is, the one where you see him 3 times in the same panel, like Spartacus Hughes in ‘The Filth’ #1. The multiple mulitscreen shots, the footage of the exploding bridge being shown over and over). But then that shot of Cap crashing through the window into the Brotherhood hideout looked like something out of early 1990's ‘Youngblood’. Interested in comparing/contrasting Bachalo's work here w/ that 1st 'Shade' trade when it comes out.

And I have questions. Is that Spider-Man laying in the snowbank? Why is he doing that? Looks like he gets crushed by Iron Man, or a bus being dragged by Iron Man, or something. Not entirely clear what's happening here. Is there a crossover w/ 'Ult Spider-Man'? When does this take place, w/in each series? Didn’t see Giant Man anywhere. Didn’t see the X-Men, either, for that matter (aside from vague shots of Wolverine and Cyclops early on). And fucking Hawkeye. Why is this guy still using a bow and arrow? Wouldn’t it have been more realistic to make him a sniper or a weapons expert or something?

Always nice to see Telford Porter working though.

Or: 'It's as if Millar's in a race with himself to make the most embarassing (sic) comic of all time'?

Nice foil cover. Reminded me of ice cream sandwich wrappers.

"See me for what I am, OK?"

17:30 / 05.12.02

Yeah, some of the art was great and some was...well, at least none of it was as bad as his Ultimate X-Men fill-ins.

I didn't see and Spidey, I'll check that later, and I really doubt Giant-Man would be there, since I believe Captain USA is gonna beath the unholy crap out of him in Ultimates 8...confirmed somewhat by the fact that Wasp has gone back to her maiden name in Ultimate Spider-Man...whatever issue was out a fortnight ago. I forget.

The no X-Men is that most ancient of trash writing traditions - a slow buildup of tension before all hell breaks loose...

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

18:23 / 05.12.02

That's the toy Spidey head from one of the cars on the bridge. You can see it bounce off the dashboard in the panel with the cassette weilding (and soon to be toast) mom. I thought it was Bachie's best work in a while. Much more discrenable than his Steampunk work and even a big improvement over his UXM issues. His Dr. Zaius, or whatever his name is, was pretty bad tho.

Those new covers are eye catching, yes, but flimsy as hell. They've never felt more disposable, and I don't know if that's good or bad.

18:34 / 05.12.02

I dunno... I really didn't like the new covers. Something to do with the texture I think. For me, it just added to the feeling that this was a dirty wee book... made it feel like cheap'n'nasty porn!

Art was hit and miss. Not up to his Shade, the Changing Man standards, but a bit more cohesive than some of his other stuff recently.

Writing bounced of me. Didn't take it in at all.
*Shrug*

00:29 / 06.12.02

That's a good way of putting it - "bounced off you." I've already forgotten what it was about and I only read it 20 minutes ago.

10:20 / 06.12.02

Oh, c'mon Cam, its THE Event, cantya' see that?. Who wouldn't like to see again Cap crashing through a window & teamed up with a guy shooting arrows???

The Natural Way

11:18 / 06.12.02

Well I enjoyed it. And (altho' yr right abou the 'Youngblood' thing, damn you - I hadn't thought about it like that) I lurved the Captain America-launching-through-the-window shot. Scary. As he should be. I love the way Millar plays Cap - he's so threatening. And there's this feeling that setting him loose on civilians (terrorists or not) is just plain wrong. Also really dug Mag's speech intercut w/ shots of the Ulti-gang getting their duds on. Straight down to business. Hugely cinematic.

Will enjoy rereading this after finishing 'Oranges are not the Only Fruit' on the train tonight. Not insanely good, but still the best superhero action this side of super action town.

ONLY NICE THINGS

12:44 / 06.12.02

I'm not sure that lesbianism is techncially speaking a superpower...

Oh.

I see.

Sorry.

13:23 / 06.12.02

Having been a great fan of Bachalo's Shade work I was disappointed by the art here. Many of the panels I couldn't figure out what they were supposed to be representing. I felt I was having to decode Bachalo's increasingly stylised artwork, this affected the flow of the comic for me. I was increadibly hung over at the time though, I'll read it again later.

The Natural Way

13:27 / 06.12.02

Yeah, I agree. A bit. I think a big ol' super-romp SHOULD be easy to decode. But, still, when you do get the panels the flow does kinda...happen.

Imaginary Mongoose Solutions

15:27 / 06.12.02

I'm just wondering if it was Millar or Bachelo's decision to have the Ultimates' support teams looking like sexy fascist stormtroopers.

And I'll second people's thoughts on Millar's Captain America being cool in that "Oh my god, he's a war machine" sort of way.

That said, this book fell really flat for me.

17:10 / 06.12.02

Also - check the cover.

Wolverine is FAT.

17:11 / 06.12.02

Also, on a book called ULTIMATE WAR - THE ULTIMATES VERSUS ULTIMATE X-MEN....why are the two cover characters standing side by side? shouldn't they be, you know, kind of fighting each other?

Knodge - YOUR nemesis!

17:33 / 06.12.02

It had a few decent moments, but I really couldn't make sense of the art. There were a lot of areas where I had to look over the page three/four times to figure out what was going on.

Murray Hamhandler

14:13 / 07.12.02

Right. Bachalo was at the top of his form (and a huge influence on me) towards the end of his run on Shade, but I think he's been slowly going downhill since. He's lost his storytelling chops to a good extent. Or purposely obscured them for whatever reason. His highly-stylized art isn't well-suited to comics stories anymore.

15:11 / 11.12.02

yeah. i read it again and tried to be really kind, but a couple of !ACTION! panels aside the art on this issue was barely-comprehensible sloppy shit-slops slopping in a slop-bucket.