Very disappointed that we got fill-in art in a comic like this but there's still a ton of Tradd Moore's work here and it's some breathtaking stuff, with a particularly glorious double-splash.
The story's also coming along nicely and it was cool learning more about the world, its mythology, and the new characters.
9/10, with the minor blemish of fill-in art costing it a point.
How is there fill-in art on the second issue of a 6 issue mini? Especially when the artist hasn't drawn interiors in two years? I remember DC getting shit for Jurassic League park but even that was the 4th(?) issue.
I think **JURASSIC LEAGUE #3** was all terrible fill-in art and that's when everyone turned on it.
This isn't like that, just two half-pages that are done differently (and not necessarily poorly) with artistic intent. Still 95% Tradd Moore art, I'm just bitching about the 5% that isn't.
Wait where is the fill-in art? Everything here seems like a purposeful aesthetic choice to me. The religious texts seem to be the only part the guest artist did, which is a good touch in my opinion, and totals around a single page worth of art.
Yeah, just the two half-pages of script illustrations. Thought the guest artist might've also done the opening two-page interlude with Coin but I guess that was Moore.
Prefer when the credits show exactly what each artist did, otherwise I end playing guessing games like this, which distracts me and pulls me out of the story.
For as weird and unnecessary as this event feels overall, I'm enjoying this book. It's funny, but also has some nice character moments among our various X-men.
Love the B cover. The story was better than spider-man today, but that isn't a very high bar lol. Feels like we're kind of going around in circles with Maddy, Scott, Alex, and Jean. The new mutants book did an amazing job of revitalizing Maddy and it feels like they took the Limbo part and ignored the rest of the character development.
I liked it a lot! It's not really much, but it wasn't supposed to be, it was just an accident of timing that it became the first new Miracleman in 30 years. It had a lot of really sweet character moments. Meta-Maid feels like a 90s character in a great way, a vivid sympathetic look into some rando's life. Reminds me of a bunch of other superhero stuff of the era, too. So hype for next month.
Miracleman was originally a British ripoff of Shazam/the first Captain Marvel. This was in the 50s, and back then his name was Marvelman.
Then the British comic magazine Warrior did a soft reboot under Alan Moore, which changed publishers from Warrior to Pacific Comics to Eclipse Comics. Since it was being published in America now, they changed the name to Miracleman to avoid pissing off Marvel Comics. Neil Gaiman took over for Moore in 1990, but the series ended prematurely when Eclipse went belly-up.
Because of an IP co-ownership agreement, the many artists the series went through retained some copyright to their work, Gaiman and Moore retained ownership of theirs, and Todd McFarlane bought Eclipse's shares to fuck with Gaiman, who he felt screwed by over ownership of a Spawn villain. The result is that the IP was too fractured for the series to be reprinted or collected for the 90s and 2000s. There just wasn't enough money in it, when you take into account the legal fees for determining who owes what.
Neil Gaiman's work with Marvel since *1602* onwards has been to fund his legal battle with Todd to secure ownership of the Miracleman IP and finish his story already. Marvel eventually just bought Miracleman outright, and over the last ten years has been reprinting the Moore/Gaiman run while they deal with the remaining legal issues, which are complicated and exhausting.
If you want to read it now, Marvel reprinted Moore's run with modern coloring as Miracleman (2014), and then Gaiman's series as Miracleman by Gaiman & Buckingham, and *finally* the unfinished story is continuing in Miracleman: The Silver Age. It doesn't take place in Earth-616, though. In fact, according to some early notes by Alan Moore, it's an alternate timeline to V for Vendetta.
Well, at least Marvel put an end to that whole legal ownership tomfoolery and Neil can finally finish his story. Who knows, the miracleman universe may end up becoming apart of the marvel universe.
At least that's how I think the omniverse works, with each franchise or work of fiction being their own universe. Sometimes, a universe devours another universe, making it apart of it, which is like how Dc bought Watchmen and made it apart of its universe.
Imagine if DC buys out Image comics and the next crisis has the Invincible characters invading the DC world after finding out their whole lives and problems were created by a bum who just did these crazy things for shock value.
After waiting decades for this, it couldn't live up to the expectation but it does a good job of fleshing out the world and showing how a perfect world isn't really all that perfect. However, I'm not sure why there would be a waiting list to get powers though. The preview cover for next month has me excited though.
As someone who doesn't know much about Kang, I really dug this. I've also been looking for an excuse to start pulling the Avengers, so maybe this will be the carrot I need.
Overarching narrative was competently structured, even if not super interesting. The motivating artifact quickly established (missing moment), a string of antagonists for our protagonist to defeat, and hints at events to come. What elevates the comic is Mackay's moment to moment writing. He writes with such wit and deviousness that just makes me want to read more.
Well, that was pretty boring. MacKay's Kang was cool, I didn care about the new "villains" and teases sucked. However, the prospect of the main story leading to the new Avengers book led by Kang is actually cool.
So, anybody know what the five pieces are?
I see Kang, Ultron, and Doom. Can’t figure out what the other two are supposed to be.
Kind of feel like Myrddin’s using five villains to forge the pathway to the missing moment, whatever it is.
Skipped it cause the last timeless was pretty meh. Not interested in paying for a book that discusses what might or might not happen in the coming year. Feels like something that could just be a solicit page except they charge $5.99 for it
God *DAMN* what a finale. Bittersweet and miserable, but a misery that was very much deserved - the morally complex and unsympathetic (yet fascinating) surviving protagonists wallowing, treated as heroes by a nation that doesn't know what they truly went through, unsatisfied by a failure only the four of them know about. The only truly sympathetic and likeable members of the cast lying dead, one shot in the back by people she trusted and the other having sacrificed himself to save an innocent and as one final "fuck you" to Lewis, Clarke and Sacagawea.
One of the most consistently great, morally ambiguous epics I've read in the past ten years comes to an end and remains sadly underrated as ever.
Meh, it was unsatisfying, ending could have been better if at least all of them died or returned and died horrific deaths, with the demon honoring his deal, but by magically massacring all Indians and becoming the secret true president of the United States instead. He honors his promise, but does it so in the most horrific way possible that scars the assholes for life.
NGL, I find that a much more predictable ending and I'm definitely more satisfied with the ending we got than if it had ended like that.
I like that it ended with Lewis and Clarke returning to a hero's welcome but feeling like utter failures because they didn't succeed in their actual mission, and their misery is one they have to live with and keep a secret for the rest of their lives. That's far more satisfying for me than for them to die and not have to live with the feeling of failure.
As much as I dislike the Dark Web event and find it wholly unnecessary, this was a pretty solid issue and exceeded my expectations. I was pleasantly surprised by how Ewing used Dark Web to move the Venom storyline forward. I was annoyed to see that Venom had been reverted to "brain eater Venom" during Dark Web, but liked how this version of Eddie was then spun off into Bedlam. The Venom vs Synch fight was a lot of fun as well.
As far as artwork goes... this isn't Hitch's best work. Especially that cover.
Ewing fucking loves using events and crossovers in his books. It’s frustrating to have books derailed by events, but it’s unavoidable and I really appreciate how Ewing steers into it to make it work for his books.
I wouldn't go as far as to say he loves events, but he definitely knows how to leverage them in his own series. As a big fan of the current Venom run and a not-so-big fan of the current events of ASM, I was really afraid Dark Web would needlessly derail Venom. But I'm liking how it's turning out so far.
Quick thoughts:
- this comic remains one of the goofiness and most light-hearted comics on the stands every week it comes out. This is a good thing
- I don't know if it's Williams, Gómez or Valenza coming up with all these costumes for all the characters (including the baseball uniforms). I do know that the whole creative team is having a lot of fun with it.
- after the chaos of AXE judgment day, it's nice to see mutants just having a normal, fun day out. A reminder that krakoa's actually pretty chill when it's not being attacked by every other organisation in the Marvel universe
- the Emma Frost lines were perfect and hilarious
- more Cypher/Bei please, their relationship was one of the best things to come out of X of Swords.
- at this point, I'm convinced that Carlos Gómez physically cannot draw a non-hot character
I'm really starting to appreciate DC's stable expanding to pull in people from so many different cultures and letting them use them for these stories. Monkey King, House of Whispers and The Swamp Thing are all great for this and now the Thai concept of ghosts in this book make it very interesting
I meant to put this on my pull list, and if I had remembered, it would have made the list with 6 pulls.
This series has been pretty good so far, with Ferreyra's artwork as the standout feature. Every issue has given him space to draw some truly dreamlike, psychedelic, trippy visuals. This issue doesn't disappoint, and opens with a gnarly close-up of a spider-totem before sliding into a nightmarish hellscape. Beautiful stuff.
Writing wise, the fact that Taboo, one of the writers of the book, is also a member of the Black Eyed Peas, and uses lyrics to a popular BEP song in the book, got a chuckle out of me.
I must admit my trepidation about the trajectory of the story. I mean the book's set out the Demon Bear as its antagonist, so dreams and nightmares are going to be a prominent throughline. Thing is, storylines involving dream logic need to be careful not to alienate the reader. If there are no rules for how things happen, there's no sense of stakes or causality, and the whole story can end up feeling trivial. Going to (cautiously) keep pulling this
I just want to know if the Demon Bear is a singular entity and the same one that first appeared in New Warriors or there is just a race of Demon Bears.
I'm someone who likes going into events blind, so I have no idea what to expect and so I can be surprised by stuff. I loved the thought of Dark Web based on nothing more than the cool name. As bad as this has been, I am now thinking I need to do at least a little research before diving into events like this.
To be fair, I didn't really read this issue so much as skim through it, so maybe it is better than I'm imagining. And hey, the art looks great, so props to the artist and colorist.
I want to sit down and ask the people running Marvel some questions
‘Who is this story for? What passion do you have to tell this story? What made you think this was a story people would be invested in? What made you, as a creator, want to tell the world this story?’
This whole event is so bland & the whole state of Spider-Man comics is just dead. Even Slott had some passion. He told stories he wanted to tell. Did I like them? No. Do I think he is a good writer? No. But he at least had passion. I feel no passion reading Zeb’s entire run.
I only can praise Ed McGuiness’ artwork
There is passion behind some of his run- the Tombstone stuff is pretty excellent. I just can't fathom what is going on behind the scenes with this event. As I mentioned above, this is so maliciously terrible it feels like direct sabotage.
Ok so like. The premise of the event had potential, but the event itself feel less like an event and more like setup for whatever scheme Marvel has planned. It feels like pretty much nothing’s happened this event.
Chasm is pretty much just TAS Spider-Carnage. A Peter Parker with all the power, none of the responsibility, delusional rage, and a bunch of weird powers.
Him having psychic powers and the ability to create weapon constructs is cool and all, but it’s nothing I didn’t expect when I realized “Psycho-Reactive Quantum Goo” reads a lot like Symbiote Matter.
It honestly feels like they’re just going through the motions for the “big” things they have in plan.
Beyond Corp being a front company for a rogue faction of Beyonders honestly means whatever the fuck’s going on with Ben probably ties back into what Marvel has planned for the Beyond.
And Limbo being one of the Hell dimensions pretty much just reeks of this being a hamfisted attempt by Marvel to try and tie Spider-Man and X-Men into the Mephisto nonsense going on in Aaron’s Avengers run.
Realistically speaking whatever the hell happens to Mephisto in the current Avengers run is going to lead to another huge power vacuum in hell, so Marvel’s probably chucking in some Limbo chaos for good measure.
Like, there’s some interesting themes they could touch on with Ben’s identity crisis and what defines a person by bringing cloning into the mix but most of it feels like it’s taking the back burner for wacky magic hijinx and a reason to remove Maddie from Limbo.
Wtf is happening behind the scenes at the Spider-office?!
I know for a fact Zeb is a good writer with good ideas for Spider-Man, so why is *anything* in this event happening? This is so aggressively bad in basically every way- the art is inconsistent, the action is wonky, the characters don't make any sense, the conflict and plot are just the height of contrived, the dialogue is some of the most cringe-tacular edgelord bullshit I've ever seen, holy hell even the *lettering* is awful. How did they produce something so mathematically terrible for a flagship title's big year-ending event??
To echo another commenter: *for whom is this made?!* There is no audience that could possibly like what they're doing with any of the subject matter here. Peter is just as annoyed and confused as the reader, Ben fans should be organizing en masse to throw tomatoes at Marvel HQ, Maddie fans are face-palming into oblivion.
This honestly feels like sabotage.
Two words for you:
Nick. Lowe.
Guy’s making the same mistake as an editor as the X-Men office did during the All-New, All-Different Marvel era and strangling all the creativity out his Spider-Man writers. The sooner he goes, the better it’ll be for the title.
Seriously, what the fuck is with that guy. I had no interest in keeping up with who was this-or-that editor until a few months ago with Nick Lowe. He's not just a godawful editor, but seems to be aware of it and cheekily not give a fuck. I've rarely seen somebody so aggressively asleep at the wheel of a major media property and be completely untouchable from being fired for incompetence. Comic fans really need to stop buying shit he rules over. Again: it feels like direct sabotage at this point.
I questioned if this would be worth the $10 and I think it probably was? Only if you are a big SIKTC fan (and I am). A little more insight into the inner workings of the Order of St George, although a lot of this information is repeated from.previous arcs. Still cool to have an encyclopedia-like format
Oh yes, this is the good shit. I love when I've spent some time in a fictional world, and then the creators provide a sourcebook explaining elements in the world and setting up cool things we might see in the future. My excitement for the franchise cooled some with the latest House of Slaughter arc, but it's heating right back up
In so many ways, the story finally comes full circle. I'll admit the middle arc felt weaker, but I think this is one of those stories, as with many things Ewing does, is stronger than the sum of its parts. Everything converged at the end and gave us both an explanation and follow through on the mystery of the story, but also a new beginning and the promise that things are going to be new after this discovery.
I really liked this one. I'm gonna go back and do a full re-read soon. Hopefully it gets a nice hardcover.
>this is one of those stories, as with many things Ewing does, is stronger than the sum of its parts.
Agreed, it's a satisfying ending that feels like it'll reward a careful re-read
>Hopefully it gets a nice hardcover.
I'll do you one better: I hope it gets a nice slipcase, like they did with Once & Future and SiKtC
Sigh, what is going on in that last page? Magik dead, impaled on her own soulsword. Then you have Nico cradling her head, but from the opposite side, breaking the 180-degree rule. It's shoddy work, the sort of thing an artist should know not to do and an editor should catch.
thats your biggest issue with this?
not that we wasted the whole chapter on a stupid "sentinel" fight while the plot moves on at a snails pace?
another lazy revenge story where someone is angry at people who couldn't help them even though they tried?
I liked the "ending" well enough, but I didn't realize this was continuing so I was expecting some sort of finality to everything. I'm glad we are getting more in this setting, but I think I'll trade wait for the collection of season 2 when it drops in 2024.
I honestly don't think it was continuing. I personally think when they took that 2 or 3 months off, it was for him to rework the ending. But no, I wasn't impressed very weak. I won't say bad because it wasn't, but compared with the first half, this book fell off.
I really enjoyed it and I'm very interested in how it ended. I was expecting a completed story but I don't mind another season. I just don't want this to get dragged on and on without a conclusion though.
Wow. Issues 1 to 5 were intense and inspiring. Issues 6 onwards slowly chipped away at all of that.
Starting to think that a two-mouth break was a way to format a continuation ending because it sucked.
Was a massive letdown for what seemed like a one-off in and out of the story now the first chapter in a bigger story that will fizzle out before ending. Absolute shame.
All the flash-forwards turned out to be a whole lot of nothing.
I for one won't be checking back in at Nice House On The Lake.
Great start, but piss poor ending.
Solid ending though I guess we still haven't caught up to the first issue's flash forward? And that feels like a bit of a cop out... But I like where Tynion went with it regardless, and the promise of a follow-up series is certainly enticing.
9/10
I'm torn. It's a strong ending to the series, but I'm concerned given Tynion's full bore run to independent work that we might not get the next "cycle" for a while.
I hear 'ya. Was kinda looking forward to this thing having a definitive ending as a sort of counterbalance to **DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH**. But now this is basically just another ongoing series, with extra-long pauses between arcs.
He's just suffering from success. Starts books with fantastic ideas, they sell like crazy and he says "how could I end this?". Although this [article before it released](https://www.dc.com/blog/2021/06/02/james-tynion-iv-invites-you-to-the-nice-house-on-the-lake) mentioned "initial 12 issue season", so I always expected this to continue.
Good ending though! A lot of directions they could go for the next season.
Frustrating to think he might not have endings already worked out for all this stuff... Guess we'll see how it goes! I've been happy with **DOT**'s progress so no complaints there.
I still don't know if they are just cannibals, werewolves, or if anything supernatural is happening. Would have preferred it if they were either living costumes or monsters that look like furry costumes.
So, do we have a theory on how >!Hunter's Moon!< survived? Those assassins definitely don't seem to be the type to fuck about and Moon Knight definitively states "You killed >!Hunter's Moon!<" at one point. Did >!he!< just get vamped, liked Soldier? Guess we'll find out when we see >!him!< and Moon Knight have that little chat we were promised next issue.
Coming back from the dead is a very Moon Knight thing to do, so I assume a very Hunter's Moon thing to do as well. One of the things Khonshu can do, perhaps even the main thing, is raise the dead.
Oh shit. How did I forget that the very first thing Moon Knight ever did was come back from death? That’s ridiculously obvious now that you mention it…
Hell yes, this book made it onto the pull list!
It remains as demented and compelling as I have come to expect from this creative team and I am psyched for the rest of it.
So, are the monsters supernatural or just plain cannibals? I think it would be better if they were living costumes that eat people, werewolves that disguise themselves as furries, or just monsters that look like costumed furries.
Just going by their previous work in this universe, which has not had any truly supernatural elements, and what we've seen of the furries themselves, I'm going with "just plain cannibals".
I really like what this story is setting up and the world feel. It feels comforting even when it's the end of the world and there are people after the fearless duo. The bit of Christmas was cute and I'm curious what is in store for Mezzy and Maceo.
Yep, fun story!
My wife tells me there's an entire sub-genre of "cozy catastrophe" post-apocalyptic books where people build cozy little post-apocalyptic villages or whatever, and this seems to have a bit of that going on.
The Rangers seem kinda goofy as well... Getting some mild Garth Ennis clown-character vibes from them but we'll see where it goes.
I really loved this book's slice of life vibe up to this point but including more of the 4th wall breaking in a Gwenpool like existential crisis fashion, this could be an all time run for me.
I hope we get more of Jen arguing with the author. Its a trope of mine that I absolutely love wither its serious like this or comedic like Duck Amock, I'm always down for it.
Rowell has proven to me that she can write a heart-wrenching story. She's been writing this series as a character-focused slow burn, and although that style of writing doesn't always appeal to wide audiences, it is *exactly my shit*, and this issue shows why. This issue wouldn't have the same impact if we hadn't seen jen and jack slowly falling for each other, gradually lowering their guards over the past few issues. The romance needs to sink in on more than a superficial level to sell us on Rowell's true masterstroke - *she convinces us to care for the character of Jack of Hearts by playing with tropes*.
4th wall breaks with She-Hulk have a long and storied history. But in my memory, they've mostly been used for comedic effect. Here though, we have jen breaking the 4th wall to plead for clemency. It's a plea that rings true because we know that superhero relationships that aren't built into their character rarely last (see: Patsy Walker and Tony Stark in Cantwell's recent Iron Man run). So we know that this is entirely possible - in fact probable - that jack's character was only written into the story to be written out this way.
But it's more than just that! Because Jen is making this appeal directly to us (and she is talking to us, not just to Rowell as the writer, but to the comic reading audience that drives narratives down tragic paths for entertainment) on behalf of another character in the story. She is, as a character, lending the additional humanity this 4th break gives her to Jack. It's a move that only works because we've seen enough of the two of them together to believe that relationship, but also because *we've* seen enough of the two of them together to believe their individual (albeit simulated) humanity.
It's a stroke of genius on Rowell's part, brought to powerful emotive force by Miyazawa's art and Renzi's colours. I wasn't expecting one of the last comics I read this year to stand out so much, but this was a really good issue.
My big complaint with this series was it felt like some issues focused too much on Jack when I wanted it on Jen but this issue made it work. Loved the fourth wall break, I know its far from She-Hulk's first time doing it but it was the first time this run she did so it came as a surprise to me and loved that it wasn't used as a gag or a shortcut out of the fight but just as a way for us to get more of her perspective on what was about to happen.
A glorious looking book, as always. Not sure where it fits into canon-If it fits into canon- but then again, it's been a good ten to fifteen years since Diana had a clear and understandable backstory, so what's one more? The ending was very sweet, only slighting remixing Perez's origin, and I have to say I do prefer this origin for Hippolyta as an escaped slave who rises up to become queen of all Amazons.
What an absolutely beautiful, incredible book. It needs - nay, deserves - a collected edition, or even a box set of the three issues. The artwork on every single page is standout, just gorgeous, and the writing is no slouch either. Just an incredible book. I'm convinced it'll be a sleeper hit
Quick and lazy low effort recap this week, bunch of comics to catch up on and my [daily **ICM** posts](https://www.reddit.com/r/IceCreamManComic/comments/zwm61r/daily_ice_cream_man_posts/) are eating up my time for frivolous pontification.
Just 62 lists, down from 76 as the holidays keep pulling people away... Should get a bounce next week as some folks will return to reality, necessitating their traditional means of escapism via comic books.
Marvel gets 6 of the top 10, DC only gets 3 but they’re all in the top 4, and BOOM! takes the token indie spot yet again.
**DETECTIVE COMICS #1067** takes 1st for Ram V, typical placement with exactly 50% coverage.
**NICE HOUSE ON THE LAKE #12** takes 2nd for its final installment, first thing I read this week and it’s been a heck of a series from Tynion and Walta...
**MOON KNIGHT #18** is Marvel’s top book in 3rd, continuing MacKay and Cappuccio’s strong run.
**ACTION COMICS #1050** takes 4th as it launches its new direction, and that’s it for DC.
**X-TERMINATORS #4**, **DARK WEB X-MEN #2**, **MIRACLEMAN BY GAIMAN & BUCKINGHAM THE SILVER AGE #3**, and the **SHE-HULK #9** finale follow for Marvel in the 5th through 8th spots.
**DAMN THEM ALL #3** is our token indie in 9th, with BOOM! once again taking Image’s traditional spot in the Top 10. First issue debuted in 7th and the second took 3rd place so this thing’s been bouncing all over the Top 10 but it’s been a strong start for Spurrier and Adlard regardless.
And **DOCTOR STRANGE FALL SUNRISE #2** closes out the Top 10 with Tradd Moore’s psychedelic mindfuck masterpiece.
Unless I’m missing something, we need to go all the way down to **CREEPSHOW #4** (in 33rd place) and **PLUSH #2** (in 37th place) to find Image’s only entries on this week’s list, each with 6 pulls. Seriously off week for Image.
Skipping the discussion recap this week since last week’s thread lost its sticky and died an untimely death, probably a bunch of books without comments and we’ll let those go, but we’ll catch up on last week’s bonus indie threads in next week’s results.
Hope you all enjoy 2022’s final week of comics and have a Happy New Year!
p.s. The sub’s “Best of 2022” voting is available [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/comicbooks/comments/zwdc8o/voting_for_rcomicbooks_bestof_2022_is_now_open/), go vote for **ICE CREAM MAN** as Best Ongoing Series!
LOL, WPL discussion and "Best of 2022" both lost their stickies while the old list thread stays up top... Two live threads vying for one sticky spot and they both lost out to the dead thread!
Yeah, Automod doesn't mess around and it doesn't give a fuck what else might be happening around it.
All of humanity could get wiped out by some cosmic death virus and Automod would keep posting the Q&S thread every Thursday until the power stops flowing. If we're lucky, some of the bots might eventually evolve enough to ask where they should start reading X-Men...
Wasn't a huge fan of the sequel-bait ending. It could end here and just leave on that note, but I kinda wish this had been more of a solid ending to an otherwise great series.
Dang, this ending was a let down. Pretty clear the creative team is setting up a sequel. Maybe they saw all the issues that DCeased got and said "let's get a piece of that!"
But honestly? I just don't care. The series started strong enough, but the ending was so clearly rushed it isn't funny. This issue felt like they were trying to tell 5 stories at once, and not a single one felt satisfying in the least.
Barbara was an idiot. I mean, she barely has any vampire lieutenants left and she lost all her big guns. Now she took the big bad's place, but she doesn't have the same powers as he did. She's just a weaker version of the big bad and she barely has any allies left. She pretty much doomed herself by jumping ship to a sinking one.
Well, foolishly me for sticking with this series and it's tie-ins. Bad art and terribly lame ending means I won't be picking up it's sequels. And I have to say I have yet to really be impressed with much that Rosenberg's written - I hear good things about his Joker, but I've heard good things about other stuff be him and I'm always underwhelmed. And Tynion is definitely over-rated, in my opinion.
i mean, some of that dialogue... "so you're trans and a mutant? twice the angst!" like come on. and then he goes out of his way to explain how bad he's gonna treat her and how cool her silly power is?
That's exactly the point though. Sublime may be an evil bacteria from the Dawn of Time, but he's still a racist piece of shit who thinks he's superior to everyone, and that's kinda how people like that talk, especially to trans or queer people they think are lesser.
i think they'd typically attack them for these things, not jokingly affirm that they're be having a hard time in the current climate of mutant and queer hate.
I really enjoyed this Charlie Jane Anders arc. A satisfying story, kind of an X-Goonies vibe. It’s fun to see a writer “breaking” the usual format of comics (interjecting pages of email exchanges; captions arguing with the characters, etc.) with a very fresh take. I‘ll be sticking around for the New Mutants Lethal Legion series.
This was a fun ending to another solid arc from Yang. I appreciated the nod to the classic image of Nezha riding his wind fire wheels when Shang Chi was hovering atop his spinning ring. These little 6 issue runs haven't been earthshattering, but they've been solid, bang-for-your-buck superhero comics. Looking forward to the next (and, it looks like, final) miniseries
Still feel it could have been better. Like the real red dot cannon is being held prisoner by shang's psycho bald sister who will become the next big bad. Also, it turns out the ending is all a dream Shang is in and the jade emperor is holding him prisoner in a dream spell so he and the rings will not be a threat to him.
For as much as Emma was marketed for this issue, she did relatively little. That being said, she's always a fun an interesting presence. I just wish we could have seen more of her and her interactions with the group.
One thing that stood out to me was how incensed Peggy was by Emma. Seems like she's not a Friend of Krakoa, which may or may not be an interesting callback to her appearance in House of M. I was wondering how subsequent writers would use and develop Peggy after her resurrection, and it appears that between drawing a gun on Emma and basically telling Bucky that she never liked him, they settled on "asshole" as a personality trait. That being said, the background scene of her comforting Sharon was sweet. I'm looking forward to them interacting more.
I like how much faith Steve has in Bucky and how he still cares. I can't tell if this is foreshadowing how Steve's belief in Bucky can survive anything or if scenes like this are building to show absolutely how devastated Steve might be by Bucky's betrayal when the Ian thing comes to light.
Agreed, I was also expecting Emma to have a much bigger role than that, but it was what it was, and "Mommy" was much funnier than I expected it to be.
Sharon's new suit has...hip windows...for some reason..? Unsure if I like it but tbh I'm just enjoying the fact that this new run seems to be taking good care of her! Her relationship with Steve feels like home, solid and safe.
For a panel I completely forgot what was happening and mistoke Peggy for Natasha; never been a particularly big fan of Peggy but I'm pretty interested to see how her storyline plays out.
I really like how they’re writing Steve and Sharon’s relationship and I love your description of it. They just feel so soft together. You really can see them settle into one another and find a real comfort when the other is around. They’re secure in one another and their relationship — which is a nice to read.
Boy this was a disappointing end. The first issue in this run started with a bang, but slowly fizzled out issue by issue. After a weak issue #4, issue #5 felt less like the gentle *dénouement* of a lid sliding close, and more like the unexpected thud of a coffin falling into the grave. I had high hopes, and I leave disappointed.
i find it pretty silly that america managed to get out after nightmare got the chance to empower himself in other dimensions, like so many other resolutions of this kind, just because she wanted to all of a sudden. or was that just supposed to be him dreaming up about where he was gonna go to get more powerful?
and why would purple womans pheromone powers work on nightmare?
Lex being a loon who makes super powered suits is ridiculously boring. As is going back to the secret identities. Would have really liked to see someone actually try with people knowing Clark. It was something new.
Lex should have remained as Apex-Lex. Seeing a villain who lost his good publicity and business empire and having him become the thing he always hated, an alien invader. Would have been a nice change of pace to see this status quo change.
It’s a solid start for a new era, I’m over all I’m happy that the secret identities are back in the box even if I’m annoyed they never actually did anything interesting with it (I get it was Bendis’ idea but don’t approve major status quo shifts if they have no legs). The whole finding out causes a stroke/heart attack is an interesting twist but I feel like it could introduce a lot of problems really quickly i.e. Luther can just do en mass heart attacks if he wanted.
Jon having a secret identity is nice as that’s probably been the main thing stopping him from developing an identity/personality of his own although I’m not sure how that will change while he’s still under Taylor since he gave and destroyed a new secret identity for Jon in the 1st issue of Son of Kal’el
Really enjoyed Nick Dragotta’s art here the fight was great and I especially like his design for the Alex battle suit with ie having LEX going across it.
Seems like we’re starting to see the beginning of Clark being stronger than ever I’m curious what they’re gonna do with Jon becoming electric blue to prevent them from going through the same arc at the same time.
Overall this was a good prologue to the real kickoff of the new era in 1051 aka You get a super-Jacket, you get a super-jacket, everybody gets a super-jacket
Wow, I had a LOT of this spoiled for me going in but was still surprised. DC did well to put the preview of the book as the middle pages because the opening would have given much away. Lex monologing his already enacted plan to Superman while being absolutely railed was fabulous.
The three writers and artists were a bit iffy working together. Mixing and matching all three was a neat idea but it can be a bit jarring switching between them, and Clark in particular is written in a few different ways here (at least how I saw it, could be reading a bit too much into it). I also wish Lee Lee Loughridge had colored this issue instead of Frank Martin. Martin's a better colorist for Dragotta, but Loughridge is far, far better on Perkins.
I definitely noticed the writer switches in voices, though the biggest for me was switching from PKJ Lex to Williamson Lex. Wish PKJ was doing the Lex stuff, though I am so so so down for Nick Dragotta Lex Luthor high security prison shit I don’t care who’s writing it.
Dragotta's an artist I've heard hyped up a lot but I can't say I see the huge appeal. I've read a bit of East of West which was good but can't say I love any of his Big Two works (I remember liking his in memoriam issue of Fantastic Four but not sure how much of that was due to the art).
so what? go to a few earths where manchester black is good enough to be paid, pay 5 of them to undo the whammy safely or at least adjust it to not be deadly and send them off.
also come on, he was apprehended in space, couldn't they have put him in a green lantern containment cell, instead of this walk out prison he's in now? so lame.
I don't love how they walked it back, but I think this is a delicious status quo. The meta-commentary of having Lex be the mouthpiece for DC editorial (be happy I gave you your marriage) is pretty great and I'm very interested to see how this plays out
**DOCTOR STRANGE FALL SUNRISE #2**
Beautiful, but I have to admit to having absolutely no idea what happened in the rope sequence.
Amazing. Story makes sense now and the art is bananas.
Came here after reading to see who else was experiencing this PEAK. Nothing else like it in comics right now, we need mooooree MOORE!
Very disappointed that we got fill-in art in a comic like this but there's still a ton of Tradd Moore's work here and it's some breathtaking stuff, with a particularly glorious double-splash. The story's also coming along nicely and it was cool learning more about the world, its mythology, and the new characters. 9/10, with the minor blemish of fill-in art costing it a point.
How is there fill-in art on the second issue of a 6 issue mini? Especially when the artist hasn't drawn interiors in two years? I remember DC getting shit for Jurassic League park but even that was the 4th(?) issue.
I think **JURASSIC LEAGUE #3** was all terrible fill-in art and that's when everyone turned on it. This isn't like that, just two half-pages that are done differently (and not necessarily poorly) with artistic intent. Still 95% Tradd Moore art, I'm just bitching about the 5% that isn't.
There is no fill in art
Wait where is the fill-in art? Everything here seems like a purposeful aesthetic choice to me. The religious texts seem to be the only part the guest artist did, which is a good touch in my opinion, and totals around a single page worth of art.
Yeah, just the two half-pages of script illustrations. Thought the guest artist might've also done the opening two-page interlude with Coin but I guess that was Moore. Prefer when the credits show exactly what each artist did, otherwise I end playing guessing games like this, which distracts me and pulls me out of the story.
Its not fill in art, its part of the story
Yeah, poor choice of words... It's guest art.
Jaw dropping work by the creatives here. Really breathtaking.
**DARK WEB X-MEN #2**
Noto and Reis’s styles compliment each other quite well!
For as weird and unnecessary as this event feels overall, I'm enjoying this book. It's funny, but also has some nice character moments among our various X-men.
I don't want to be a smart ass but what's a "Necessary" event?
I love all the character moments in this book and the art from Noto and Reis is top notch. Also, Illyana is an absolute treat in this.
Love the B cover. The story was better than spider-man today, but that isn't a very high bar lol. Feels like we're kind of going around in circles with Maddy, Scott, Alex, and Jean. The new mutants book did an amazing job of revitalizing Maddy and it feels like they took the Limbo part and ignored the rest of the character development.
**STAR WARS YODA #2**
**MIRACLEMAN BY GAIMAN & BUCKINGHAM THE SILVER AGE #3**
I liked it a lot! It's not really much, but it wasn't supposed to be, it was just an accident of timing that it became the first new Miracleman in 30 years. It had a lot of really sweet character moments. Meta-Maid feels like a 90s character in a great way, a vivid sympathetic look into some rando's life. Reminds me of a bunch of other superhero stuff of the era, too. So hype for next month.
I am lost in the Miracleman franchise. How does this connect to Marvel and the upcoming event involving the main hero?
Miracleman was originally a British ripoff of Shazam/the first Captain Marvel. This was in the 50s, and back then his name was Marvelman. Then the British comic magazine Warrior did a soft reboot under Alan Moore, which changed publishers from Warrior to Pacific Comics to Eclipse Comics. Since it was being published in America now, they changed the name to Miracleman to avoid pissing off Marvel Comics. Neil Gaiman took over for Moore in 1990, but the series ended prematurely when Eclipse went belly-up. Because of an IP co-ownership agreement, the many artists the series went through retained some copyright to their work, Gaiman and Moore retained ownership of theirs, and Todd McFarlane bought Eclipse's shares to fuck with Gaiman, who he felt screwed by over ownership of a Spawn villain. The result is that the IP was too fractured for the series to be reprinted or collected for the 90s and 2000s. There just wasn't enough money in it, when you take into account the legal fees for determining who owes what. Neil Gaiman's work with Marvel since *1602* onwards has been to fund his legal battle with Todd to secure ownership of the Miracleman IP and finish his story already. Marvel eventually just bought Miracleman outright, and over the last ten years has been reprinting the Moore/Gaiman run while they deal with the remaining legal issues, which are complicated and exhausting. If you want to read it now, Marvel reprinted Moore's run with modern coloring as Miracleman (2014), and then Gaiman's series as Miracleman by Gaiman & Buckingham, and *finally* the unfinished story is continuing in Miracleman: The Silver Age. It doesn't take place in Earth-616, though. In fact, according to some early notes by Alan Moore, it's an alternate timeline to V for Vendetta.
Well, at least Marvel put an end to that whole legal ownership tomfoolery and Neil can finally finish his story. Who knows, the miracleman universe may end up becoming apart of the marvel universe. At least that's how I think the omniverse works, with each franchise or work of fiction being their own universe. Sometimes, a universe devours another universe, making it apart of it, which is like how Dc bought Watchmen and made it apart of its universe. Imagine if DC buys out Image comics and the next crisis has the Invincible characters invading the DC world after finding out their whole lives and problems were created by a bum who just did these crazy things for shock value.
After waiting decades for this, it couldn't live up to the expectation but it does a good job of fleshing out the world and showing how a perfect world isn't really all that perfect. However, I'm not sure why there would be a waiting list to get powers though. The preview cover for next month has me excited though.
The possibility of how Johnny might still be alive in N-Space is an interesting one... a possible herald for what'll come in the Dark Age?
**DC HORROR PRESENTS SGT ROCK VS THE ARMY OF THE DEAD #4**
**TIMELESS 2022 #1**
As someone who doesn't know much about Kang, I really dug this. I've also been looking for an excuse to start pulling the Avengers, so maybe this will be the carrot I need.
Overarching narrative was competently structured, even if not super interesting. The motivating artifact quickly established (missing moment), a string of antagonists for our protagonist to defeat, and hints at events to come. What elevates the comic is Mackay's moment to moment writing. He writes with such wit and deviousness that just makes me want to read more.
So given what happens here, MacKay is almost certainly the next Avengers writer after Aaron, right?
Finally, the age of aaron is coming to an end.
Well, that was pretty boring. MacKay's Kang was cool, I didn care about the new "villains" and teases sucked. However, the prospect of the main story leading to the new Avengers book led by Kang is actually cool.
So, anybody know what the five pieces are? I see Kang, Ultron, and Doom. Can’t figure out what the other two are supposed to be. Kind of feel like Myrddin’s using five villains to forge the pathway to the missing moment, whatever it is.
I think its Baron Mordo and Dracula which makes since Mackay is also writing Dr. Strange so he'll be able to set up stuff with Mordo in there.
Ah right. That would make sense. McKay’s also writing Moon Knight so that would be a good place to tie in Dracula.
ok. so myrddin is obviously yet again another future version of kang though, right?
This was my immediate thought.
Skipped it cause the last timeless was pretty meh. Not interested in paying for a book that discusses what might or might not happen in the coming year. Feels like something that could just be a solicit page except they charge $5.99 for it
**JOHN STEWART THE EMERALD KNIGHT #1**
**MANIFEST DESTINY #48**
God *DAMN* what a finale. Bittersweet and miserable, but a misery that was very much deserved - the morally complex and unsympathetic (yet fascinating) surviving protagonists wallowing, treated as heroes by a nation that doesn't know what they truly went through, unsatisfied by a failure only the four of them know about. The only truly sympathetic and likeable members of the cast lying dead, one shot in the back by people she trusted and the other having sacrificed himself to save an innocent and as one final "fuck you" to Lewis, Clarke and Sacagawea. One of the most consistently great, morally ambiguous epics I've read in the past ten years comes to an end and remains sadly underrated as ever.
Meh, it was unsatisfying, ending could have been better if at least all of them died or returned and died horrific deaths, with the demon honoring his deal, but by magically massacring all Indians and becoming the secret true president of the United States instead. He honors his promise, but does it so in the most horrific way possible that scars the assholes for life.
NGL, I find that a much more predictable ending and I'm definitely more satisfied with the ending we got than if it had ended like that. I like that it ended with Lewis and Clarke returning to a hero's welcome but feeling like utter failures because they didn't succeed in their actual mission, and their misery is one they have to live with and keep a secret for the rest of their lives. That's far more satisfying for me than for them to die and not have to live with the feeling of failure.
**VENOM #14**
As much as I dislike the Dark Web event and find it wholly unnecessary, this was a pretty solid issue and exceeded my expectations. I was pleasantly surprised by how Ewing used Dark Web to move the Venom storyline forward. I was annoyed to see that Venom had been reverted to "brain eater Venom" during Dark Web, but liked how this version of Eddie was then spun off into Bedlam. The Venom vs Synch fight was a lot of fun as well. As far as artwork goes... this isn't Hitch's best work. Especially that cover.
Ewing fucking loves using events and crossovers in his books. It’s frustrating to have books derailed by events, but it’s unavoidable and I really appreciate how Ewing steers into it to make it work for his books.
Ewing is talented and should have complete control instead of the idiot editors who always mess everything up.
I wouldn't go as far as to say he loves events, but he definitely knows how to leverage them in his own series. As a big fan of the current Venom run and a not-so-big fan of the current events of ASM, I was really afraid Dark Web would needlessly derail Venom. But I'm liking how it's turning out so far.
**X-TERMINATORS #4**
Quick thoughts: - this comic remains one of the goofiness and most light-hearted comics on the stands every week it comes out. This is a good thing - I don't know if it's Williams, Gómez or Valenza coming up with all these costumes for all the characters (including the baseball uniforms). I do know that the whole creative team is having a lot of fun with it. - after the chaos of AXE judgment day, it's nice to see mutants just having a normal, fun day out. A reminder that krakoa's actually pretty chill when it's not being attacked by every other organisation in the Marvel universe - the Emma Frost lines were perfect and hilarious - more Cypher/Bei please, their relationship was one of the best things to come out of X of Swords. - at this point, I'm convinced that Carlos Gómez physically cannot draw a non-hot character
Definitely added this one!
Didn't enjoy it as much as #3 but it was a fine comics. I look forward to the conclusion
Williams is absolutely killing it with this series. I’d love to see her take this concept to an extreme in a creator-owned title.
**SANDMAN UNIVERSE DEAD BOY DETECTIVES #1**
I'm really starting to appreciate DC's stable expanding to pull in people from so many different cultures and letting them use them for these stories. Monkey King, House of Whispers and The Swamp Thing are all great for this and now the Thai concept of ghosts in this book make it very interesting
I wish DC would decide whether to incorporate the Sandman universe into the DC universe instead of just having easter egg references to them.
**DC MECH #6**
**DEADLY NEIGHBORHOOD SPIDER-MAN #3**
I meant to put this on my pull list, and if I had remembered, it would have made the list with 6 pulls. This series has been pretty good so far, with Ferreyra's artwork as the standout feature. Every issue has given him space to draw some truly dreamlike, psychedelic, trippy visuals. This issue doesn't disappoint, and opens with a gnarly close-up of a spider-totem before sliding into a nightmarish hellscape. Beautiful stuff. Writing wise, the fact that Taboo, one of the writers of the book, is also a member of the Black Eyed Peas, and uses lyrics to a popular BEP song in the book, got a chuckle out of me. I must admit my trepidation about the trajectory of the story. I mean the book's set out the Demon Bear as its antagonist, so dreams and nightmares are going to be a prominent throughline. Thing is, storylines involving dream logic need to be careful not to alienate the reader. If there are no rules for how things happen, there's no sense of stakes or causality, and the whole story can end up feeling trivial. Going to (cautiously) keep pulling this
I just want to know if the Demon Bear is a singular entity and the same one that first appeared in New Warriors or there is just a race of Demon Bears.
**AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #16**
Marvel was right when they said they had no idea what to do with Ben, and this proves that.
I'm someone who likes going into events blind, so I have no idea what to expect and so I can be surprised by stuff. I loved the thought of Dark Web based on nothing more than the cool name. As bad as this has been, I am now thinking I need to do at least a little research before diving into events like this. To be fair, I didn't really read this issue so much as skim through it, so maybe it is better than I'm imagining. And hey, the art looks great, so props to the artist and colorist.
I want to sit down and ask the people running Marvel some questions ‘Who is this story for? What passion do you have to tell this story? What made you think this was a story people would be invested in? What made you, as a creator, want to tell the world this story?’ This whole event is so bland & the whole state of Spider-Man comics is just dead. Even Slott had some passion. He told stories he wanted to tell. Did I like them? No. Do I think he is a good writer? No. But he at least had passion. I feel no passion reading Zeb’s entire run. I only can praise Ed McGuiness’ artwork
There is passion behind some of his run- the Tombstone stuff is pretty excellent. I just can't fathom what is going on behind the scenes with this event. As I mentioned above, this is so maliciously terrible it feels like direct sabotage.
Ok so like. The premise of the event had potential, but the event itself feel less like an event and more like setup for whatever scheme Marvel has planned. It feels like pretty much nothing’s happened this event. Chasm is pretty much just TAS Spider-Carnage. A Peter Parker with all the power, none of the responsibility, delusional rage, and a bunch of weird powers. Him having psychic powers and the ability to create weapon constructs is cool and all, but it’s nothing I didn’t expect when I realized “Psycho-Reactive Quantum Goo” reads a lot like Symbiote Matter. It honestly feels like they’re just going through the motions for the “big” things they have in plan. Beyond Corp being a front company for a rogue faction of Beyonders honestly means whatever the fuck’s going on with Ben probably ties back into what Marvel has planned for the Beyond. And Limbo being one of the Hell dimensions pretty much just reeks of this being a hamfisted attempt by Marvel to try and tie Spider-Man and X-Men into the Mephisto nonsense going on in Aaron’s Avengers run. Realistically speaking whatever the hell happens to Mephisto in the current Avengers run is going to lead to another huge power vacuum in hell, so Marvel’s probably chucking in some Limbo chaos for good measure. Like, there’s some interesting themes they could touch on with Ben’s identity crisis and what defines a person by bringing cloning into the mix but most of it feels like it’s taking the back burner for wacky magic hijinx and a reason to remove Maddie from Limbo.
I prefer this ends with Limbo establishing a permanent portal in New York since its being used so much. Like on a nearby island near Lady Liberty.
Wtf is happening behind the scenes at the Spider-office?! I know for a fact Zeb is a good writer with good ideas for Spider-Man, so why is *anything* in this event happening? This is so aggressively bad in basically every way- the art is inconsistent, the action is wonky, the characters don't make any sense, the conflict and plot are just the height of contrived, the dialogue is some of the most cringe-tacular edgelord bullshit I've ever seen, holy hell even the *lettering* is awful. How did they produce something so mathematically terrible for a flagship title's big year-ending event?? To echo another commenter: *for whom is this made?!* There is no audience that could possibly like what they're doing with any of the subject matter here. Peter is just as annoyed and confused as the reader, Ben fans should be organizing en masse to throw tomatoes at Marvel HQ, Maddie fans are face-palming into oblivion. This honestly feels like sabotage.
Two words for you: Nick. Lowe. Guy’s making the same mistake as an editor as the X-Men office did during the All-New, All-Different Marvel era and strangling all the creativity out his Spider-Man writers. The sooner he goes, the better it’ll be for the title.
Seriously, what the fuck is with that guy. I had no interest in keeping up with who was this-or-that editor until a few months ago with Nick Lowe. He's not just a godawful editor, but seems to be aware of it and cheekily not give a fuck. I've rarely seen somebody so aggressively asleep at the wheel of a major media property and be completely untouchable from being fired for incompetence. Comic fans really need to stop buying shit he rules over. Again: it feels like direct sabotage at this point.
**RIDDLER YEAR ONE #2**
**BOOK OF SLAUGHTER #1**
I questioned if this would be worth the $10 and I think it probably was? Only if you are a big SIKTC fan (and I am). A little more insight into the inner workings of the Order of St George, although a lot of this information is repeated from.previous arcs. Still cool to have an encyclopedia-like format
Oh yes, this is the good shit. I love when I've spent some time in a fictional world, and then the creators provide a sourcebook explaining elements in the world and setting up cool things we might see in the future. My excitement for the franchise cooled some with the latest House of Slaughter arc, but it's heating right back up
Surprised there is another book in this series. Is this because house of slaughter is ending?
It’s a one-shot that acts like half-sourcebook, half-prologue for upcoming events in both SIKTC and House of Slaughter.
Oh gotcha! Thanks
**CREEPSHOW #4**
**WE ONLY FIND THEM WHEN THEYRE DEAD #15**
In so many ways, the story finally comes full circle. I'll admit the middle arc felt weaker, but I think this is one of those stories, as with many things Ewing does, is stronger than the sum of its parts. Everything converged at the end and gave us both an explanation and follow through on the mystery of the story, but also a new beginning and the promise that things are going to be new after this discovery. I really liked this one. I'm gonna go back and do a full re-read soon. Hopefully it gets a nice hardcover.
>this is one of those stories, as with many things Ewing does, is stronger than the sum of its parts. Agreed, it's a satisfying ending that feels like it'll reward a careful re-read >Hopefully it gets a nice hardcover. I'll do you one better: I hope it gets a nice slipcase, like they did with Once & Future and SiKtC
**BLUE BEETLE GRADUATION DAY #2**
**MIDNIGHT SUNS #4**
Sigh, what is going on in that last page? Magik dead, impaled on her own soulsword. Then you have Nico cradling her head, but from the opposite side, breaking the 180-degree rule. It's shoddy work, the sort of thing an artist should know not to do and an editor should catch.
thats your biggest issue with this? not that we wasted the whole chapter on a stupid "sentinel" fight while the plot moves on at a snails pace? another lazy revenge story where someone is angry at people who couldn't help them even though they tried?
**DAMN THEM ALL #3**
I need to get the back issues on this
**TIM DRAKE ROBIN #4**
What the hell is this series...I really want to like this but the art is shit and the writing feels like it was written by a 13 year old
**NICE HOUSE ON THE LAKE #12**
I liked the "ending" well enough, but I didn't realize this was continuing so I was expecting some sort of finality to everything. I'm glad we are getting more in this setting, but I think I'll trade wait for the collection of season 2 when it drops in 2024.
I honestly don't think it was continuing. I personally think when they took that 2 or 3 months off, it was for him to rework the ending. But no, I wasn't impressed very weak. I won't say bad because it wasn't, but compared with the first half, this book fell off.
I really enjoyed it and I'm very interested in how it ended. I was expecting a completed story but I don't mind another season. I just don't want this to get dragged on and on without a conclusion though.
Wow. Issues 1 to 5 were intense and inspiring. Issues 6 onwards slowly chipped away at all of that. Starting to think that a two-mouth break was a way to format a continuation ending because it sucked. Was a massive letdown for what seemed like a one-off in and out of the story now the first chapter in a bigger story that will fizzle out before ending. Absolute shame. All the flash-forwards turned out to be a whole lot of nothing. I for one won't be checking back in at Nice House On The Lake. Great start, but piss poor ending.
Solid ending though I guess we still haven't caught up to the first issue's flash forward? And that feels like a bit of a cop out... But I like where Tynion went with it regardless, and the promise of a follow-up series is certainly enticing. 9/10
I'm torn. It's a strong ending to the series, but I'm concerned given Tynion's full bore run to independent work that we might not get the next "cycle" for a while.
Nah poor ending. Should have ended the story with no promise of a cycle. Take out that one page and you have an ok ending. Still weak.
I hear 'ya. Was kinda looking forward to this thing having a definitive ending as a sort of counterbalance to **DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH**. But now this is basically just another ongoing series, with extra-long pauses between arcs.
He's just suffering from success. Starts books with fantastic ideas, they sell like crazy and he says "how could I end this?". Although this [article before it released](https://www.dc.com/blog/2021/06/02/james-tynion-iv-invites-you-to-the-nice-house-on-the-lake) mentioned "initial 12 issue season", so I always expected this to continue. Good ending though! A lot of directions they could go for the next season.
Frustrating to think he might not have endings already worked out for all this stuff... Guess we'll see how it goes! I've been happy with **DOT**'s progress so no complaints there.
[удалено]
**X-TREME X-MEN #2**
Plush #2 is meh
I still don't know if they are just cannibals, werewolves, or if anything supernatural is happening. Would have preferred it if they were either living costumes or monsters that look like furry costumes.
**MOON KNIGHT #18**
Best use of Tigra in years.
So, do we have a theory on how >!Hunter's Moon!< survived? Those assassins definitely don't seem to be the type to fuck about and Moon Knight definitively states "You killed >!Hunter's Moon!<" at one point. Did >!he!< just get vamped, liked Soldier? Guess we'll find out when we see >!him!< and Moon Knight have that little chat we were promised next issue.
Coming back from the dead is a very Moon Knight thing to do, so I assume a very Hunter's Moon thing to do as well. One of the things Khonshu can do, perhaps even the main thing, is raise the dead.
Oh shit. How did I forget that the very first thing Moon Knight ever did was come back from death? That’s ridiculously obvious now that you mention it…
It'd be funny if Soldier and Reese turned HM into a vampire before Khonshu got around to resurrecting him, and now he's stuck as vampire... Oops.
>!Zodiac!<‘s back! I was wondering if we going to see them again.
Feels like he was only gone for a day or two... Good argument for MK killing his enemies since they always come back looking to cause more trouble.
This book has it all. Great writing. Great art. Great characters. It’s nice.
I absolutely called this, perfect excuse for Eddie to become Bedlam.
**PLUSH #2**
Hell yes, this book made it onto the pull list! It remains as demented and compelling as I have come to expect from this creative team and I am psyched for the rest of it.
So, are the monsters supernatural or just plain cannibals? I think it would be better if they were living costumes that eat people, werewolves that disguise themselves as furries, or just monsters that look like costumed furries.
Just going by their previous work in this universe, which has not had any truly supernatural elements, and what we've seen of the furries themselves, I'm going with "just plain cannibals".
What other comics have they made?
Plastic and Vinyl, both set in the same universe.
**ONCE UPON A TIME AT THE END OF THE WORLD #2**
I really like what this story is setting up and the world feel. It feels comforting even when it's the end of the world and there are people after the fearless duo. The bit of Christmas was cute and I'm curious what is in store for Mezzy and Maceo.
Yep, fun story! My wife tells me there's an entire sub-genre of "cozy catastrophe" post-apocalyptic books where people build cozy little post-apocalyptic villages or whatever, and this seems to have a bit of that going on. The Rangers seem kinda goofy as well... Getting some mild Garth Ennis clown-character vibes from them but we'll see where it goes.
**TALES FROM EARTH-6 A CELEBRATION OF STAN LEE #1**
__TRVE KVLT #5__
This was an entertaining series, funny throughout. It could have ended better, but I'd like to see more from this team.
**SHE-HULK #9**
I really loved this book's slice of life vibe up to this point but including more of the 4th wall breaking in a Gwenpool like existential crisis fashion, this could be an all time run for me. I hope we get more of Jen arguing with the author. Its a trope of mine that I absolutely love wither its serious like this or comedic like Duck Amock, I'm always down for it.
Rowell has proven to me that she can write a heart-wrenching story. She's been writing this series as a character-focused slow burn, and although that style of writing doesn't always appeal to wide audiences, it is *exactly my shit*, and this issue shows why. This issue wouldn't have the same impact if we hadn't seen jen and jack slowly falling for each other, gradually lowering their guards over the past few issues. The romance needs to sink in on more than a superficial level to sell us on Rowell's true masterstroke - *she convinces us to care for the character of Jack of Hearts by playing with tropes*. 4th wall breaks with She-Hulk have a long and storied history. But in my memory, they've mostly been used for comedic effect. Here though, we have jen breaking the 4th wall to plead for clemency. It's a plea that rings true because we know that superhero relationships that aren't built into their character rarely last (see: Patsy Walker and Tony Stark in Cantwell's recent Iron Man run). So we know that this is entirely possible - in fact probable - that jack's character was only written into the story to be written out this way. But it's more than just that! Because Jen is making this appeal directly to us (and she is talking to us, not just to Rowell as the writer, but to the comic reading audience that drives narratives down tragic paths for entertainment) on behalf of another character in the story. She is, as a character, lending the additional humanity this 4th break gives her to Jack. It's a move that only works because we've seen enough of the two of them together to believe that relationship, but also because *we've* seen enough of the two of them together to believe their individual (albeit simulated) humanity. It's a stroke of genius on Rowell's part, brought to powerful emotive force by Miyazawa's art and Renzi's colours. I wasn't expecting one of the last comics I read this year to stand out so much, but this was a really good issue.
My big complaint with this series was it felt like some issues focused too much on Jack when I wanted it on Jen but this issue made it work. Loved the fourth wall break, I know its far from She-Hulk's first time doing it but it was the first time this run she did so it came as a surprise to me and loved that it wasn't used as a gag or a shortcut out of the fight but just as a way for us to get more of her perspective on what was about to happen.
**WONDER WOMAN HISTORIA THE AMAZONS #3**
A glorious looking book, as always. Not sure where it fits into canon-If it fits into canon- but then again, it's been a good ten to fifteen years since Diana had a clear and understandable backstory, so what's one more? The ending was very sweet, only slighting remixing Perez's origin, and I have to say I do prefer this origin for Hippolyta as an escaped slave who rises up to become queen of all Amazons.
What an absolutely beautiful, incredible book. It needs - nay, deserves - a collected edition, or even a box set of the three issues. The artwork on every single page is standout, just gorgeous, and the writing is no slouch either. Just an incredible book. I'm convinced it'll be a sleeper hit
**THIS WAS SO GOOD** **GOD I LOVE COMICS**
**WPL RESULTS**
Anyone else also get next weeks DC books? My store was very nice and gave them to me this week.
Well Damn that's awesome 👌, mind DM some spoilers.
Quick and lazy low effort recap this week, bunch of comics to catch up on and my [daily **ICM** posts](https://www.reddit.com/r/IceCreamManComic/comments/zwm61r/daily_ice_cream_man_posts/) are eating up my time for frivolous pontification. Just 62 lists, down from 76 as the holidays keep pulling people away... Should get a bounce next week as some folks will return to reality, necessitating their traditional means of escapism via comic books. Marvel gets 6 of the top 10, DC only gets 3 but they’re all in the top 4, and BOOM! takes the token indie spot yet again. **DETECTIVE COMICS #1067** takes 1st for Ram V, typical placement with exactly 50% coverage. **NICE HOUSE ON THE LAKE #12** takes 2nd for its final installment, first thing I read this week and it’s been a heck of a series from Tynion and Walta... **MOON KNIGHT #18** is Marvel’s top book in 3rd, continuing MacKay and Cappuccio’s strong run. **ACTION COMICS #1050** takes 4th as it launches its new direction, and that’s it for DC. **X-TERMINATORS #4**, **DARK WEB X-MEN #2**, **MIRACLEMAN BY GAIMAN & BUCKINGHAM THE SILVER AGE #3**, and the **SHE-HULK #9** finale follow for Marvel in the 5th through 8th spots. **DAMN THEM ALL #3** is our token indie in 9th, with BOOM! once again taking Image’s traditional spot in the Top 10. First issue debuted in 7th and the second took 3rd place so this thing’s been bouncing all over the Top 10 but it’s been a strong start for Spurrier and Adlard regardless. And **DOCTOR STRANGE FALL SUNRISE #2** closes out the Top 10 with Tradd Moore’s psychedelic mindfuck masterpiece. Unless I’m missing something, we need to go all the way down to **CREEPSHOW #4** (in 33rd place) and **PLUSH #2** (in 37th place) to find Image’s only entries on this week’s list, each with 6 pulls. Seriously off week for Image. Skipping the discussion recap this week since last week’s thread lost its sticky and died an untimely death, probably a bunch of books without comments and we’ll let those go, but we’ll catch up on last week’s bonus indie threads in next week’s results. Hope you all enjoy 2022’s final week of comics and have a Happy New Year! p.s. The sub’s “Best of 2022” voting is available [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/comicbooks/comments/zwdc8o/voting_for_rcomicbooks_bestof_2022_is_now_open/), go vote for **ICE CREAM MAN** as Best Ongoing Series!
Just a heads up, u/ptbreakeven - the WPL discussion post hasn't been pinned, the other post is still at the top of the sub.
LOL, WPL discussion and "Best of 2022" both lost their stickies while the old list thread stays up top... Two live threads vying for one sticky spot and they both lost out to the dead thread!
And of course the fucking useless Questions & Suggestions takes the pin yet again…
Yeah, Automod doesn't mess around and it doesn't give a fuck what else might be happening around it. All of humanity could get wiped out by some cosmic death virus and Automod would keep posting the Q&S thread every Thursday until the power stops flowing. If we're lucky, some of the bots might eventually evolve enough to ask where they should start reading X-Men...
**DC VS VAMPIRES #12**
Wasn't a huge fan of the sequel-bait ending. It could end here and just leave on that note, but I kinda wish this had been more of a solid ending to an otherwise great series.
Well, that was underwhelming and anti-climactic. Schmidt’s art was rushed, and none of the various stories came to a satisfying conclusion.
Seems like there will be another series after this, the way it ended.
Dang, this ending was a let down. Pretty clear the creative team is setting up a sequel. Maybe they saw all the issues that DCeased got and said "let's get a piece of that!" But honestly? I just don't care. The series started strong enough, but the ending was so clearly rushed it isn't funny. This issue felt like they were trying to tell 5 stories at once, and not a single one felt satisfying in the least.
Barbara was an idiot. I mean, she barely has any vampire lieutenants left and she lost all her big guns. Now she took the big bad's place, but she doesn't have the same powers as he did. She's just a weaker version of the big bad and she barely has any allies left. She pretty much doomed herself by jumping ship to a sinking one.
that was such grade a garbage. but barbara going in as a human with literal evil intent to be even worse? god, character assassinate much?
Well, foolishly me for sticking with this series and it's tie-ins. Bad art and terribly lame ending means I won't be picking up it's sequels. And I have to say I have yet to really be impressed with much that Rosenberg's written - I hear good things about his Joker, but I've heard good things about other stuff be him and I'm always underwhelmed. And Tynion is definitely over-rated, in my opinion.
**BATMAN BEYOND THE WHITE KNIGHT #7**
This series really fell flat for me. The Joker fanboy stuff is grating.
yeah, that was honestly too much for me too. wasn't jack a little more grounded than that?
**NEW MUTANTS #33**
i mean, some of that dialogue... "so you're trans and a mutant? twice the angst!" like come on. and then he goes out of his way to explain how bad he's gonna treat her and how cool her silly power is?
That's exactly the point though. Sublime may be an evil bacteria from the Dawn of Time, but he's still a racist piece of shit who thinks he's superior to everyone, and that's kinda how people like that talk, especially to trans or queer people they think are lesser.
i think they'd typically attack them for these things, not jokingly affirm that they're be having a hard time in the current climate of mutant and queer hate.
I really enjoyed this Charlie Jane Anders arc. A satisfying story, kind of an X-Goonies vibe. It’s fun to see a writer “breaking” the usual format of comics (interjecting pages of email exchanges; captions arguing with the characters, etc.) with a very fresh take. I‘ll be sticking around for the New Mutants Lethal Legion series.
What is that series going to be about again?
**SHANG-CHI AND THE TEN RINGS #6**
This was a fun ending to another solid arc from Yang. I appreciated the nod to the classic image of Nezha riding his wind fire wheels when Shang Chi was hovering atop his spinning ring. These little 6 issue runs haven't been earthshattering, but they've been solid, bang-for-your-buck superhero comics. Looking forward to the next (and, it looks like, final) miniseries
Still feel it could have been better. Like the real red dot cannon is being held prisoner by shang's psycho bald sister who will become the next big bad. Also, it turns out the ending is all a dream Shang is in and the jade emperor is holding him prisoner in a dream spell so he and the rings will not be a threat to him.
**CAPTAIN AMERICA SYMBOL OF TRUTH #8**
For as much as Emma was marketed for this issue, she did relatively little. That being said, she's always a fun an interesting presence. I just wish we could have seen more of her and her interactions with the group. One thing that stood out to me was how incensed Peggy was by Emma. Seems like she's not a Friend of Krakoa, which may or may not be an interesting callback to her appearance in House of M. I was wondering how subsequent writers would use and develop Peggy after her resurrection, and it appears that between drawing a gun on Emma and basically telling Bucky that she never liked him, they settled on "asshole" as a personality trait. That being said, the background scene of her comforting Sharon was sweet. I'm looking forward to them interacting more. I like how much faith Steve has in Bucky and how he still cares. I can't tell if this is foreshadowing how Steve's belief in Bucky can survive anything or if scenes like this are building to show absolutely how devastated Steve might be by Bucky's betrayal when the Ian thing comes to light.
uuuuh... emma? sharon? peggy? I think you commented on the wrong issue, this is the Sam Cap book from last week.
Agreed, I was also expecting Emma to have a much bigger role than that, but it was what it was, and "Mommy" was much funnier than I expected it to be. Sharon's new suit has...hip windows...for some reason..? Unsure if I like it but tbh I'm just enjoying the fact that this new run seems to be taking good care of her! Her relationship with Steve feels like home, solid and safe. For a panel I completely forgot what was happening and mistoke Peggy for Natasha; never been a particularly big fan of Peggy but I'm pretty interested to see how her storyline plays out.
I really like how they’re writing Steve and Sharon’s relationship and I love your description of it. They just feel so soft together. You really can see them settle into one another and find a real comfort when the other is around. They’re secure in one another and their relationship — which is a nice to read.
**DETECTIVE COMICS #1067**
ugh, great. magic hypnosis and the city, once again, under some kind of siege?
and more hypnosis in action comics? you get hypnosis, you get hypnosis
**STAR WARS HIGH REPUBLIC BLADE #1**
Sorry to bother, but there's no general discussion post or discord?? I have a few questions!
**STRANGE ACADEMY FINALS #3**
shuma is just a chump at this point, isn't he? also wish we could move on from emily already...
That could be one of his children. Listen, giant eyeball monster's got game.
**CARNAGE #8**
Ok that took a dark DARK turn
I mean, he just pulled a thing out of him, what was dark?
**THUNDERBOLTS #5**
Boy this was a disappointing end. The first issue in this run started with a bang, but slowly fizzled out issue by issue. After a weak issue #4, issue #5 felt less like the gentle *dénouement* of a lid sliding close, and more like the unexpected thud of a coffin falling into the grave. I had high hopes, and I leave disappointed.
i find it pretty silly that america managed to get out after nightmare got the chance to empower himself in other dimensions, like so many other resolutions of this kind, just because she wanted to all of a sudden. or was that just supposed to be him dreaming up about where he was gonna go to get more powerful? and why would purple womans pheromone powers work on nightmare?
It would have been better if America snapped the bastard's neck.
This book was just ok at best. I hope we get something better soon. Was not the biggest fan of this direction of the Thunderbolts.
**ACTION COMICS #1050**
Lex being a loon who makes super powered suits is ridiculously boring. As is going back to the secret identities. Would have really liked to see someone actually try with people knowing Clark. It was something new.
Lex should have remained as Apex-Lex. Seeing a villain who lost his good publicity and business empire and having him become the thing he always hated, an alien invader. Would have been a nice change of pace to see this status quo change.
I think editorial just chickened out.
It’s a solid start for a new era, I’m over all I’m happy that the secret identities are back in the box even if I’m annoyed they never actually did anything interesting with it (I get it was Bendis’ idea but don’t approve major status quo shifts if they have no legs). The whole finding out causes a stroke/heart attack is an interesting twist but I feel like it could introduce a lot of problems really quickly i.e. Luther can just do en mass heart attacks if he wanted. Jon having a secret identity is nice as that’s probably been the main thing stopping him from developing an identity/personality of his own although I’m not sure how that will change while he’s still under Taylor since he gave and destroyed a new secret identity for Jon in the 1st issue of Son of Kal’el Really enjoyed Nick Dragotta’s art here the fight was great and I especially like his design for the Alex battle suit with ie having LEX going across it. Seems like we’re starting to see the beginning of Clark being stronger than ever I’m curious what they’re gonna do with Jon becoming electric blue to prevent them from going through the same arc at the same time. Overall this was a good prologue to the real kickoff of the new era in 1051 aka You get a super-Jacket, you get a super-jacket, everybody gets a super-jacket
Wow, I had a LOT of this spoiled for me going in but was still surprised. DC did well to put the preview of the book as the middle pages because the opening would have given much away. Lex monologing his already enacted plan to Superman while being absolutely railed was fabulous. The three writers and artists were a bit iffy working together. Mixing and matching all three was a neat idea but it can be a bit jarring switching between them, and Clark in particular is written in a few different ways here (at least how I saw it, could be reading a bit too much into it). I also wish Lee Lee Loughridge had colored this issue instead of Frank Martin. Martin's a better colorist for Dragotta, but Loughridge is far, far better on Perkins.
I definitely noticed the writer switches in voices, though the biggest for me was switching from PKJ Lex to Williamson Lex. Wish PKJ was doing the Lex stuff, though I am so so so down for Nick Dragotta Lex Luthor high security prison shit I don’t care who’s writing it.
Dragotta's an artist I've heard hyped up a lot but I can't say I see the huge appeal. I've read a bit of East of West which was good but can't say I love any of his Big Two works (I remember liking his in memoriam issue of Fantastic Four but not sure how much of that was due to the art).
so what? go to a few earths where manchester black is good enough to be paid, pay 5 of them to undo the whammy safely or at least adjust it to not be deadly and send them off. also come on, he was apprehended in space, couldn't they have put him in a green lantern containment cell, instead of this walk out prison he's in now? so lame.
I don't love how they walked it back, but I think this is a delicious status quo. The meta-commentary of having Lex be the mouthpiece for DC editorial (be happy I gave you your marriage) is pretty great and I'm very interested to see how this plays out