X Marks the Spot!

Well, it's been a while since I've said this... Hello X-Maniacs!!! That is if there are any of you left... It's my understanding that you have all been brainwashed and converted to the Todd Squad... Whatever THAT is... Seriously though, before anything, a HUGE kudos to JT for keeping things running smoothly while I was doing the whole Vampire X, sleep all day and work all night thing... Good times that. And by “good times” I mean awful times. However, that has come to an end and I no longer work the dread overnight shift meaning that I can try to dip my toe back into the blog waters. It's been a while, and I'm probably kind of rusty(I haven't done a post since early JUNE!), but I'm sure blogging is much like riding a bike. Just with a bruised ego instead of scraped knees. And anyway, it's not like I can suck much worse now than I did then, right!? Let's see, where to begin... I know, let's start with something positive!

Kissing ass and taking names!
First and foremost, I once again want to give JT a massive thanks for stepping in and doing a fantastic job here at the blog. I never felt like I had to come back because JT was doing as good, if not better, than I could have possibly done. JT, I bow down to you. I also promise to pay you back someday for this... Really, I do!

The world according to Alpha.
By far, the best single issue I've read during my blogging absence(as well as so far this year) was Amazing Spider-Man #692. Yes it cost a horrifying $6(!!!), but you know what? It was actually worth it. The primary story rocked big time(Alpha is already climbing the ranks of my favorite characters... After ONE appearance!), and the back-up story by Joshua Hale Fialkov(he of I, Vampire fame) was also enjoyable. But back to the main story... Dan Slott wrote Alpha amazingly(get it?) and then there was Humberto Ramos' art... It was fantastic!!! I've been a fan of Ramos' since reading the Impulse series, as it was his artwork that basically shaped the Bart Allen character and helped turn me into a huge fan of Bart to this day(well, that and Mark Waid's writing of course). Alpha's look reminds me of Impulse SO damn much... And any time I'm reminded of Impulse I'm happy. So yeah, needless to say, I'm really hoping Alpha sticks around for a good long while after this one.

XvAvX
But enough of that nice stuff. I'm X, and I don't do nice. So hows about we talk about the disappointment that is AvX... There's so much wrong with this event that I don't even know where to begin... You have the X-Men being corrupted by the Phoenix Force, you know, like EVERYBODY said was going to happen. You have the Phoenix powered X-Men doing NOTHING for mutantkind, even though that was supposedly why the X-Men wanted Hope to gain the Phoenix Force, to restart mutantkind. You have Cable, who was the main character in the AvX prelude, X-Sanction, doing nothing. I guess he's still in a coma, which, once again, makes no sense since his father has a portion of the Phoenix Force! Couldn't Cyclops, oh, I don't know, take a few seconds away from planting flowers and burning Avengers to either fix Cable, or at the very least have Emma do it? And who can forget the whole Iron Fist angle... Because I know when I think, “Phoenix Force,” my mind immediately thinks, “Danny Rand!” I mean did Bendis(or whichever writer thought adding the Iron Fist aspect was a good idea) just pull a character's name out of a hat at random? Ugh... So yeah, big surprise, yet again we have a Marvel event that started out with such promise devolving into... Well, this. On the bright side though, this IS better than Secret Invasion...

Marvel Soon!
Next up? How about we talk about Marvel Now!? As of right now I plan on getting EVERY one of the announced Marvel Now! books that are dropping starting in October. Yes, there are some things that frighten me(Bendis on X-Men?!? Hickman on Avengers?!? X-Men Legacy starring Legion?!), but overall I am relatively excited for this. But then I was also excited for DC's reboot and the new comics they ended up putting out... And now I'm picking up less than half the number of DC books I was picking up when they did the reboot... However, I do have more confidence that I won't be dropping the Marvel Now! books nearly as dramatically as I dropped the New 52 books. I mean at least Dan Didio isn't a part of the Marvel Now! launch. That's a huge advantage right there!

Alright, now for a few quick thumbs up/thumbs down concerning a few comic related things from the past few months...
-Ed Brubaker leaving Marvel? Thumbs down.
-Avengers Academy being canceled(and thus far) not announced for Marvel Now!? Thumbs down.
-DC doing a Team 7 book? Thumbs up.
-Dan Way off Deadpool? Thumbs down.
-Mark Waid on Hulk? Thumbs up.
-Hawkeye having a solo series? Thumbs WAY up.
-Christos Gage not announced on any Marvel Now! books(so far)? Thumbs down.
-The idea of DC's Zero Month? Thumbs down(prove me wrong, DC.).
-The Scarlet Witch apparently back on an Avengers team post AvX? Thumbs up.
-Alpha? Thumbs up.
-Hawkeye #1 getting a second printing? Thumbs up.
-The conclusion to the Court of Owls stuff? Thumbs down.
-'Everything Burns' thus far? Thumbs up.
-The current direction of Ultimate X-Men and the Ultimates? Thumbs up.
-Any time Dan Didio opens his mouth? Thumbs way down.

Now, back to the blog... I still haven't decided just how active a blogger I'm going to be this time around... I mean there were weeks where I was reviewing 20+ books over the course of 7 days. That's a bit crazy. After talking with JT, we're probably going to do some sort of rotating schedule, where we both do three reviews a week, posting them on alternating days. That way there's a post a day, with neither one of us being overwhelmed with blogging... Or at least that's the plan... But then I suck at plans, so who knows how long that'll last! I mean hell, I may feel like doing 7 reviews in one night. Or suddenly want to do a retro-review or something... Who knows! But on the plus side, there WILL be reviews, and they WILL be done by both JT and myself, meaning there will always be something to read here, regardless of the day. So huzzah for that. Now, tomorrow IS New Comic Day, and as such there will be a NCD post up, either by JT or myself. Whoever does it, we'll both list which books we're getting for the week, as well as a tentative idea for who will be reviewing what. Or at least that's the plan, and I've already stated how well I do with plans... With that taken care of, for the first time in about three months I get to say the line... What line? X out.