A Little Light Reading...

[lydamorehouse]

My holiday reading included lots of comic books, bought at HPB. Of course, as usual, I seem to collect many of these with issues missing, so my reading of them is full of gaps. Here’s what I’ve read so far:

The Amazing Spider-Man: Grim Hunt, Part 1 (#634) – Kelly /Lark & Gaudiano
The Amazing Spider-Man: Grim Hunt, Part 2 (#635) – Kelly/Lark & Gaudiano
The Amazing Spider-Man: Grim Hunt, Part 3 (#636) – Kelly & Wells/Checchetto, Lark & Gaudiano

Since I don’t really know how all this ends, all I can say was that my lack of Spider-Man history messed me up a bit in this series. I, for instance, had no idea Peter Parker had a failed clone, named after the Biblical first murderer [K]aine, no less. I think the writer(s) understood that a lot of readers might not know much about Kaine, thus there was this utterly depressing back story/mini-story of Kaine’s life previous, complete with a pathetic version of Aunt May, with whom Kaine has a detestable non-relationship with and discovers dead on the stairway. Gah! Since the entire of bit of the arc of “Grim Hunt” seemed to be about redeeming Kaine, I wonder at the wisdom of the wholly unlikeable mini-story, which simply served to make me happy he sacrificed the way he did. *

*New, later addition to this thought. At some point, Kaine calls himself a "soulless" creature because he's a clone, a mere shell of a man, etc., etc. Can I just say how much I hate this trope? Clones certainly have souls. Or maybe this is where I show my Unitarian upbringing, because I believe if you do good work that's close enough. So, live well, clone, and you shall be a real boy and have a soul!


Thor (#1): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#2): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#3): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#4): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#5): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#6): Straczynski/Coipel
Thor (#7): Straczynski/Djurdjevic
Thor (#8): Straczynski/Djurdjevic

People have been recommending these to me for a while, and I found this bundle on sale together at HPB. I have NEVER been a Thor fan. Straczynski, IMHO, had the sense to bring back Thor’s human counterpart Dr. Donald Blake, which helped one of my underlining problem with the title previously – relating to a Norse god isn’t easy for a mortal like me. Spider-Man deals with the kinds of things I do: mortgage/rent, keeping a job, getting along with a spouse/lover; Thor, not so much. I don’t really worry about Ragnarok much, frankly. So, bringing Blake back as the human side of Thor helped tremendously.
As with much of Straczynski’s comic work, I appreciated a lot of the little touches. I liked that Straczynski updated Blake to be a “Doctors without Borders” member. His relationship with his old lover was also wonderfully complicated by the reincarnation story and the fact that Blake is Thor to the point of obsession about Thor’s lover, rather than thinking about his own.

Speaking of the reincarnation storyline, I ALWAYS appreciate reincarnation stories that allow for gender shifts. (One of my favorites, a DC title: Camelot 3000.) I totally happen to buy into the choice Straczynski made, too.


Amazing Spider-Man Presents: American Son (1 of 4), Reed/Briones
Amazing Spider-Man Presents: American Son (3 of 4), Reed/Briones
Amazing Spider-Man Presents: American Son (4 of 4), Reed/Briones

This series follows Norman Osbourne’s son(s) after the elder’s fall from grace as the former head of the Avengers/S.H.I.E.L.D. I’ve always enjoyed a good villain, though Green Goblin was never a favorite, not like say Magneto or Dr. Doom. I think it’s the crazy, honestly. Though kudos to Reed for taking on the whole complexity of being a villain’s kid. I found some of the relationships confusing, since I own, but have not yet read “One Last Day.” MJ with Osbourne, Jr.? Srsly?

Then, though these aren’t precisely a grouping, I also read:

The Heroic Age Steve Rogers: Super-Soldier (#1), Brubaker/Eaglesham

The Heroic Age Captain America (#606), “No Escape, Part 1,” Brubaker/Guice
The Heroic Age Captain America (#608), “No Escape, Part 3,” Brubaker/Guice

I have to admit to not knowing why these titles fall under this new “The Heroic Age” banner -- perhaps to distinguish them from the popular “Ultimates”? I have no idea. Okay, never mind. I just Googled “Heroic Age + Marvel,” because I can from home now and I’m disappointed to see that Marvel has plans to make the future bright and shiny and pull away from strife like the Civil War, Secret Invasion, the Death of Captain America and other fantastically awesome writing. Oh, wait, they didn’t say that last part, but it was pretty much implied. This is sad to me. I like dark and real.

Anyway, in Super-Soldier we find Steve Rogers trying to be a superhero without being Captain America. He doesn’t have much of a problem. ‘Nuff said.

Meanwhile, James “Bucky” Buchannan is having a MUCH harder time figuring out how to be Captain America, especially when Baron Zemo, Jr. exposes his past as Soviet era assassin to the press. Yikes! (Side note: is it true? Did Bucky also get the super-soldier formula? I thought only Steve did. In fact, one of the things I like about the new Cap is that he really doesn’t have superpowers outside of the one Soviet cybernetic arm.)

Of the two, I’m actually more interested in Bucky’s storyline, which makes me wonder. Am I really a Captain America fan, or did I really only like Winter Soldier?????

*gasp!*

Comments

[seawasp]

WHOSE Spider-Man history? In MY history of Spidey he didn't have a buttload of clones, failed and otherwise.

Did you read Walt Simonson's run on Thor? To me, that's the defining stories of the character in Marvel's universe.

[seawasp]

You LIKED "Civil War"? Urg. That's sorta the inverse of anything I'd read a comic for. Especially because of the Ultimate Fail in some of the major characters. Okay, Tony Stark has always been something of a dweeb, but even he ought to recognize that he has a foolproof way of figuring out if he's Doin It RONG.

[lydamorehouse]

"Civil War" is what brought me back to comic books having given up on them in the early 90s. So, yeah, I *liked* it.

I'm actually pretty certain that I could make your head explode by telling you I often like the things Bendis has done, including blowing up the Avengers, re-forming them, and everything pretty much up to Secret Invasion -- which I found kind of far-fetched and dorky.

[seawasp]

"Civil War" had logical holes in it large enough to swallow up the logical holes in OTHER comic books. The single largest still being the simple fact that Tony Stark didn't realize he was wrong from the get-go.

No, I know people who even like Lord of the Flies, so you can't make my head explode. Hell, I've even met people who thought the Star Wars Holiday Special "wasn't that bad".

Interesting that you bailed in the early 90s and came back with something like Civil War, because stuff like Civil War is what was heading for a peak in the 90s, the "Iron Age". The beginning of that trend was what drove ME out, with "Inferno" being the straw that broke the camel's back, though the Mutant Massacre really got the ball rolling.

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