Civil War - I read it because it is supposed to change things and I would really like to understand what it is going on in the books I read.  But it's just not that good.  Shock value.  Not story.  I expressed my opinion of shock value earlier.  The character of Tony Stark I can believe this from.  Reed Richards, well I'm glad I've read 500 Fantastic Four books that mean nothing for this character. 

Which leads to FF.  Great looking book these days.  Well written for Sue and Ben.  Apparently Johnny isn't needed.  And Reed isn't Reed.  Who wrote that HUAC story Reed tells.  What weare supposed to understand from that is so wrong.  Were we realy not supposed to understand which side to choose.  If anyone got from Macarthyism and HUAC that resisting the committe and operating withing the system in situations like that fixes things then they need to go re-read history.  If this is how you write the world's smartest man I'm thinking you need to do some research.

52 - Pacing is hurting ut I like most the main stories.  Only think I don't like is Supernova and the LEx Luthor stuff.  But I have high hopes for the Luthor story towards the end of 52.  Could care less who SuperNova is.  But Ralph is good.  Evil Skeets and Rip Hunter is good.  Wish we would have touched on the group lost in space the last 2 weeks.  Always like when someone decides that Ekron might have had two eyes. And apparently a head this time.   Ralph's descent is fun.  

Legion - Give us the next main story out front already.  Other than that a true fun read.  This isn't my Legion yet but we're getting close.  I don't mean characters either (although Mon-El is coming and Wildfire can't be far behind) but the fun of the book and the interaction of the characters.  Character driven.  Story driven.  And they were right up front this was a reboot so although youcan think this isn't how you remember this book from when you were a kid at least your not supposed to believe it's the same character (sorry, still taking a cheap shot at Marvel and Civil War characterizations).

X-Men - I'm tossed.  There's good stuff in there, but there are also insults to the reader's intelligence in there.  Note I don't say which X title Uncanny or X-Men.  Because it is the same sh*t.  The X-Men travelling through space are good, everything with the Shiar is jsut stupid, made up, laziness.  The... heck, I can't even remember what the enemy is supposed to be called... but their origin is stupid, made up crap.  Marvel can't just pull a random group of Mutants out of the hat for laziness anymore so they bring in random evolved humans.  Which somehow does not make them mutants?  100 % human.  Huh?  It's lazy, they need to pull out a group, establish how infinitely tougher than the X-Men they are, beat the X-Men around and then have the X-Men pull out something in the end and take them down.  Ho-hum.  But Chris Bachalo's art looks great.

Detective Comics - One and done on Batman stories.  What a great idea.  Who would have thought it.  Wow, who would have thought?  Not the best Detective stories but fun.  And I'm not into Detective Stories.

Batman - WTF?!?!?  No, really, wtf?!?!?  Wat just happened there.

The Boys - Is anything going to happen in this book.  Pure shock value atempts but again nothing new here.  Just a slow paced book designed to startle newbies.  Guess I'm done with this book.

Done for now.

I'm really not a Marvel and DC Zombie, really I'm not.  So wy can't I read more independants.  And how do you know a good indie based on the crappy descriptions in Previews.  Sorry, I love to read comics and I think I'm padding my reading with garbage for the sake of completeness and the lack of something to read.  So if any of the handful of people who actually read the randomness I jot down want to recommned a good superhero comic away from the big 2 I'm game. Here's what I currently read from Independants.  And I list Wildstorm as an independant becasue that is where my comic shop puts most of them and it helps assure things are not missed from my pull list:

Battle Angel Alita

A Princess of Mars

Fallen Angel

Four Constables

Hero Squared

Invincible

King of Fighters 2003

Noble Causes

Planetary (yes, a joke to have this on a monthly pull list)

Powers

Ranma 1/2

Sidekick

Star Wars (All of them)

SVC Chaos

Yes, I read a lot of superheroes and Martial Arts Comics.  Good Manhua is pretty much just a costumed superhero book.  So someone throw me a suggestion.  And no books designed for the sole purpose of shock value.  Those books just show weak writing.  Sustain a story through story or through action, not through seeing what boundary you can push.  I'm old, I'm jaded, I've seen someone do it before and probably do it better so write a darn comic book that more than 3000 rabid internet fans will read and nobody else.

Wow, I'm swerving off into half the writers out there write for the worship of whining fanboys on the net.  Hasn't that been covered enough by others.  This isn't supposed to be more forum to gripe, I thought I was going to be constructive.  So I'llj ust say whining internet prima donnas and end there.  But I will give them credit that they probably spell and type better than me.

Too much in this entry.  I'm going to post now and then go discuss something I just read.

 

Wow, has it really been 3 months since I wrote here.   Hard to believe since there have been some really good and really bad books out this summer and I do so love to rant. 

And football has started.  How have I not posted anything about football.  As my alum the Wolverines are crushing Notre Dame right now it is a fine football afternoon.  And the Jets actually won there opener.  Ans somehow I have not blogged in  months.

And Civil War pulls one of the worst scheduling blunders and worst professional moves and I have not blogged.  Where is the bitter man that is me?

Must rectify this soon.  Tonight even.  But first must watch Michigan because it ain't over til it's over.  And then dinner.  Then sorting comics.  Then blog.

I hate when work forces me to a skip a week getting to the comic shop.  But it still beats waiting for a once a month shipment from a mail order outlet.  But no new books, no new blog entries.  Not that I need to blog but I would like someplace to vent on a couple of books.  And praise a couple of items.  But mostly right now I want to complain about part o New Avengers.

Understand, I am a huge Avengers fan from way back.  I've got an almost complete run of all Avengers series.  One of my grail piece hunts right now is an Avengers 1 in fine or better.  I've got a 2 and 3.  Can only afford a 1 or 4, would rather have the 1.  So understand I am not giving up on Avengers.  But New Avengers is killing me.  The concepts are high, the execution right now is not.  I harped on the last issue and I'm going to whine again here.  I think my biggest gripe is the whole "Hose of M" mutants thing.  Why is it only in Avengers they call it House of M mutants.  What the heck does that mean.  I saw the list, it's not mutants who belonged to Magneto's family, it's depowered mutants.  In the rest of the Marvel Universe it's M day, Spiderman has to call it House of M in front of SHIELD why?  Oh yeah, to advance the government is evil story that is editorial direction apparently at Marvel these days.  But really, Bendis needs to make up his mind if Spiderman is a veteran hero or an amateur in this storyline.  And can anyone tell me why Michael walked from Alaska, across Canada and in to the continental US if he was trying to get to Genosha?  Isn't Genosha in the Pacific.  I'm confused.

Hmm, netwrok issues.  Better save and post.  More on this rant later. 

I know it's a comic book.  Science fiction if you will.  But I've always been bothered by how superspeed is written in comics.  And no place worse than Marvel.  DC with the Flash's over the years ludicrous speed is the norm.  And maybe it actually gets under utilized.  But here I want to think or put on papre if ou will some thoughts on superspeed at Marvel/  Was reading Captain America 18 with Spitfire and it triggered this. 

Side not on Captain America first.  I skipped this series when it first came out but kept hearing people raving about Brubaker and Captain America.  I've been a long time Cap fan but was dissapointed with the previous series and was not sure things were going to get any beter.  But I read it.  And although I don't like bringing Bucky back I think the series itself has been written well with art appropriate to the story telling.  Might diagree with the concept of Bucky alive after all these years and thought it would have worked better if it was a fake.  BUt can't complain with the quality of the book.  And 15 was good if a little slow.  Yes that complaint again.  I'm an addict, I wish I could stop reading comics in protest of decompressed stories but I can't stop reading comics so they will have to absorb my complaints with my money.

But superspeed.  How fast are the speedsters in the Marvel Universe?   I think Quicksilver is supposed to be our baseline.  At least considered in the top 3 for land speed.  I seem to recall once seeing he had a top speed of 200-300 mph.  Let's say I am wrong though and he is faster than that.  We can all agree he is sub sonic.  And we'll say spitfire is slower.  Much slower, maybe a 100mph speedster.  So why are we supposed to believe these people move to fast to see?  Ever watched Formula 1.  Top speeds around 250mph or so.  One of those cars become invisible on the straightaway when you were looking from any angle.  How about a speeding car at 100mph.  Had any touble following that moving by you.  At 250mph it takes you a second to cross a football field.  A person can see that. 

Now let's fire a missile at a Marvel speedster.  Sub sonic speedsters here.  A missile is going to be supersonic.  Figure Mach 3 or so.  Speedser at 200 MPH, missile at 2000 mph.  Missile 10 times your speed.  Not outrunning it.  Not running with it.  Most assuredly not going to dismantle it.

Let's see a Marvel speedster trying to dodge  bullet after the un is fired.  We'll put the speedster in the same room as the gun.  So close range.  Non-suppressed round.  Supersonic muzzle velocity.  Say 800 mph on the bullet.  That's 1173 ft/sec.  Let's go into a decent size living room, say 25 feet away.  To travel that far it would take a bullet 2/100th of a second to travel that distance.  Say I'm a pretty good shot and I decide to shoot center chest.  So Quicksilver has to move 1 foot to the left or right to get out of he way.  He has .02 seconds to do this.  Quicksilver moves at 250 mph or 366 feet per second.  Can I dodge that bullet?   Yes.  I can actually move about 7.5 feet in .02 seconds.  The math actually surprised me, I didn't think Quicksilver was going to make it.  Even Spitfire makes it at 100 mph.  Lives by a foot and a half.  Cap dies.  Spidey dies.  But wait, you say.... that is instantaneous acceleration and instantaneous reaction time. so true.  Let's say we allow them to hit peak speed in .1 seconds though.  That's 5 times lnger than we have.  If we are say running at 1/5th speed at this point (seems as good an acceleration rate as anything).  Now I'm assuming max 50mph in that .02 seconds.  Shoot, I moved 1.5 feet.  better not have abs or your hit.

I guess this whole thing is deigned to say Marvel needs o establish their characters are faster than they say.  I have no problem with superspeed in comics.  Just do some basic math and establish your characters are faster than you say.

Later we'll address the supersonic speed of DC cahracters and why if Superman has superspeed and is even half as fast as the Flash he should be able to beat anyone in the DC universe with ease.     

Slow week for me for the stuff that I read. Not much out and not much time to read this evening so I only got through three books. Did read Fallen Angel, Ultimate X-Men and Annihilation Nova. Normally I prioritze the pile but today all I did was sort 1 year later stuff from everything else and just randomly started reading from the everything else pile. THus the randomness of what I read. I'm enjoying Fallen Angel at IDW. Just a great looking book with a fun story. Glad Peter David's exclusive contract with Marvel llows him to complete this book. Although not sure I like them changing the magistrate for Bette Noir. He was a good foil for Lee, don't know how much we're going to get out of her own son, especially as there seems to be an adjustment period. Ultimate X-Men. I like Krikman on Invinvible. Not enthused by his Ultimate X-Men run. Or maybe it's just the rushed feel of the art. Or Nightcrawler's homophobia. Or the fact that Jean seemed to be purple in my issue. But manly I think it is week story and art. And if you are reading comics and the story is week and te art is week odds are you're not going to like the book. I'll let the Phoenix storyline play out and decide from there. Annihilation Nova 1 was really good. Much better than Issue 1. PRetty sure that was for the Drax stuff. For a minute there I thought it was Giffen doing the book not Abet and Lanning (had to check the cover credits). Very surprised, expected Nova to be the weakest of the Annihilation books. Right now that title belongs to Surfer.

OK, if you have been wondering about reading Superman recently please jump on the 1 year later bandwagon.  Superman is well written fun again.  I'm really enjoying this arc.  The powering down to 1940 power levels for this issue was pretty fun for an old-time fanboy like myself.  Arts good.  Lois is written correctly and the writers seem to understand the Clark, Lois, Superman dynamic.  Read Superman and Action.  Now is a good access point, jump on board.  Just think, in the last two Superman/Action issues he's been faster than a speeding bullet, more poerful than a locomotive and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.  How fun is that.  OK, the choice of villians leaved a little to be desired (not really powerful enough for Superman) but still some good battle scenes.

OK, just finished Deadly Genesis 6 and The 198 5.  And didn't like either one.  Thought Deadly Genesis ended weak with no surprises.  Thought the explanation for Prof. X changing how Krakoa was heard and that the Island wasn't intelligent was junk.  Accelerated aging was stupid.  Apparently Brubaker is going to take over Uncanny.  Mae tat's a good opportunity to drop Uncanny.  Ad if that happens I might as well drop plain X-Men because I only carried that book for continuity.  Tough decision though, hate to drop something I've read for years.  Did it once beore with X-Men back in 1994 but found my way back.  Don't know about what to do here.

198 ended dumb.  Ended weak.  The O.N.E. is still a racist organization.  X-Men are still being mis-written and for some strange reason are sitting and taking it from the government.  I hope Civil War: X-Men is written as the X-Men just laughing at the non-mutants and calling them hypocrits for 4 issues. 

But 198 and Deadly Genesis piled on top of House of M is at least going to save me $20.00 per month as I drop all X-related titles.  I can use that funding for back issues.

Well, I guess the evil government of the United States is still alive and well in the DC Universe.  This series is nto good.  Not recommended.  I'm glad the Titans show up in this book so we can see someone who is not familiar with the caracters write them poorly.  Well, specifically Wonder Girl and Robin.  Since when is Wonder Girl Ms. Establishment.  Why even throw them in the book if they are going to do nothing but sit around and act out a bad scene from Civil War.  Painful.

Yes, my vow to be positive didn't last a day.  But I hadn't read this piece of garbage yet.

Liked Outsiders though.  This was good because I was iffy on the first couple of 1 year later issues and was thinking of dropping.  But then they throw in Jay Garrick at the end and peak my curiosity.  Plus I think any decent speedster would have done this to the outsiders.  Except if you punch Grace in the face 25,000 times and there is no Speed Force for healing and protection shouldn't your hand turn to hamburger before Graces face?  Other than that fun little fight. 

So, who exactly s reading this thing?  I have linked, posted or tied this in to nothing, how has it been viewed 35 times?