Story- We see Clint and Logan crossing the seemly lawless country in the old Spider Buggie, as they continue their trek eastward to New Babylon with Clint's mysterious merchandise. Upon arriving in what was San Francisco, they discover Mole Man's old Moloids, who have apparently begun to eat people to thin out the human race.
While investigating the Moloid situation, and looking for survivors, they are attacked by "Ghost Riders", a bunch of punks riding flaming motorcycles. The Riders take out Clint quickly figuring he's no threat being blind and all, and focus their attack on Logan. They tear into Wolvie with chains and bats, but Logan clings to his pacifist views and refuses to fight back. Even blind, Clint is still the world's greatest archer and kills all 4 Ghost Riders in a hail of arrows, by following the sounds of their voices.
Clint admits to Logan that he is pissed that he didn't defend himself, but Logan explains that whatever happened those 50 years ago completely broke him and he could never fight again. The duo next arrive in what was Las Vegas, the site of where Magneto and the Absorbing Man killed Thor. Thor's hammer still sits ominously on the ground where the God of Thunder fell. Las Vegas is a big tourist attraction and falls under the jurisdiction of the Kingpin.
While passing through, Clint is stopped by Ultron 8(!), who informs him he should go speak with his ex-wife and that it is urgent. Clint meets ex-wife #3, who turns out to be Peter Parker's youngest daughter. She informs Clint that their daughter, along with three others, attempted to rebel against the Kingpin, but were caught and were to be executed the following day, leaving Clint and Logan with the problem of what to do...
Overall- So far, I like this story. We are slowly getting bits and pieces as to what happened to the heroes all those years ago, and now Logan is faced with the prospect of breaking his pacifist vows in order to help spring Clint's daughter.
There is still a lot of information that is lacking, but I think that Mark Millar is deliberately holding back this info, so everything can be revealed during the big climax at the end of the storyline, which is fine by me.
It was interesting to watch the crazed berserker Logan lay there and get pummeled by the Ghost Rider's, while Clint, who was always a strict backer of the Avengers no killing policy, had no qualms with killing everyone of the Riders.
One very minor complaint though, Clint should be about 75-80 years old here, but he looks to be the same age as Logan. I thought Logan's healing factor was supposed to keep him looking younger, so Logan should look much younger then Clint. Other then that, I am seriously looking forward to watching the rest of this story unfold.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Wolverine 66
What?!?! A Marvel comic that isn't in some way, shape or form related to "Secret Invasion"???? I refuse to believe that!
Story- OK. This looks to be interesting. This story opens 50 years in the future. Apparently, the villains of the Marvel Universe wound up banding together, and killed practically all of the super heroes, conquering at least the U.S.A., as well as presumably the world. Wolverine survived the massacre, and became a pacifist, never again popping the claws.
He married and had two children. The Logan family live out on the West Coast of the U.S. The country has been divided up into 4 sections, with the Hulk, Kingpin, Doom and "the President" controlling each one. Wolvie and family are living on land controlled by the Hulk and his grandchildren. The Logan clan live a simple farming life, but wind up having trouble making ends meet, and can't make rent one month. This sends out three of the Hulk's grandchildren to collect.
Since Logan can't pay, they beat the tar out of him and tell him they expect their money next month. Logan awakens in his house where he is visited by a blind Clint Barton(!) who says that he needs Wolvie to help guide him to the East Coast, where Clint needs to deliver a package. Clint promises enough money to solve Wolvie's money troubles, so Logan reluctantly decides to leave his family and go with Clint on the cross country trip.
Overall- Interesting so far... I'm kind of a sucker for alternate dimension storylines, I LOVED the old What if... comics, so I'm more then willing to give this comic a fair shake. First off, before I say anything else, let me just scream one thing, WHY DOES CLINT BARTON ALWAYS END UP BLIND IN EVERY TALE ABOUT THE FUTURE!!!! Whew... Sorry I just had to get that out of my system... By my estimation, this is at least the third future story where Clint turns up blind(Last Avengers Story, Fantastic Four:Big Town, and Avengers Forever off the top of my head).
Anyway, let it be stated here that Hawkeye(Clint Barton) is one of my all time favorite comic book characters, and I'm happy to see him anywhere(even if he's blind again...). I got a kick hearing Clint mention his "ex-wives". I think Mockingbird was the only woman with the patience and ability to knock him on his a$$ when necessary to stick with Clint, so I could easily see him going through a mess of other wives after her death.
Mark Millar is the writer and Steve McNiven is the artist. I mention this because I really like Steve's pencils, and I usually like Mark's stuff, although, I'll always be a little pissed off about how he ended "Civil War"...
I think we all know Logan won't be a pacifist for long, especially in a world dominated by super villains and it should be interesting to see how and why he became a man of peace.
During the comic, they showed a map of the U.S., where many cities were renamed after various villains. I cracked up when I saw the city of Paste Pot Creek. How the hell did Paste Pot Pete manage to get a city named after him!!! One last thing, Logan's children are named Scotty and Jade. Would Logan really name his son after Cyclops???!!! I guess time really does heal all wounds...
Story- OK. This looks to be interesting. This story opens 50 years in the future. Apparently, the villains of the Marvel Universe wound up banding together, and killed practically all of the super heroes, conquering at least the U.S.A., as well as presumably the world. Wolverine survived the massacre, and became a pacifist, never again popping the claws.
He married and had two children. The Logan family live out on the West Coast of the U.S. The country has been divided up into 4 sections, with the Hulk, Kingpin, Doom and "the President" controlling each one. Wolvie and family are living on land controlled by the Hulk and his grandchildren. The Logan clan live a simple farming life, but wind up having trouble making ends meet, and can't make rent one month. This sends out three of the Hulk's grandchildren to collect.
Since Logan can't pay, they beat the tar out of him and tell him they expect their money next month. Logan awakens in his house where he is visited by a blind Clint Barton(!) who says that he needs Wolvie to help guide him to the East Coast, where Clint needs to deliver a package. Clint promises enough money to solve Wolvie's money troubles, so Logan reluctantly decides to leave his family and go with Clint on the cross country trip.
Overall- Interesting so far... I'm kind of a sucker for alternate dimension storylines, I LOVED the old What if... comics, so I'm more then willing to give this comic a fair shake. First off, before I say anything else, let me just scream one thing, WHY DOES CLINT BARTON ALWAYS END UP BLIND IN EVERY TALE ABOUT THE FUTURE!!!! Whew... Sorry I just had to get that out of my system... By my estimation, this is at least the third future story where Clint turns up blind(Last Avengers Story, Fantastic Four:Big Town, and Avengers Forever off the top of my head).
Anyway, let it be stated here that Hawkeye(Clint Barton) is one of my all time favorite comic book characters, and I'm happy to see him anywhere(even if he's blind again...). I got a kick hearing Clint mention his "ex-wives". I think Mockingbird was the only woman with the patience and ability to knock him on his a$$ when necessary to stick with Clint, so I could easily see him going through a mess of other wives after her death.
Mark Millar is the writer and Steve McNiven is the artist. I mention this because I really like Steve's pencils, and I usually like Mark's stuff, although, I'll always be a little pissed off about how he ended "Civil War"...
I think we all know Logan won't be a pacifist for long, especially in a world dominated by super villains and it should be interesting to see how and why he became a man of peace.
During the comic, they showed a map of the U.S., where many cities were renamed after various villains. I cracked up when I saw the city of Paste Pot Creek. How the hell did Paste Pot Pete manage to get a city named after him!!! One last thing, Logan's children are named Scotty and Jade. Would Logan really name his son after Cyclops???!!! I guess time really does heal all wounds...
X-Man75=blog posting machine???
Man, I've really posted a lot of junk since I started this blog up... I think that this should serve as a shining example that I truly have no life!
Does anybody remember New Mutants->New X-Men?
A lot of times, I like to read a nice inoffensive comic book. You know, a comic that tells a good story, without the characters always facing life or death situations. One of my favorite comic books from about 5 years ago was New Mutants, which transformed into New X-Men:Academy X. The writers were Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir. They wrote the book as a I think a book concerning a group of teenagers should be written, in a light hearted, fun manner. The stories dealt more with what it was like to be a teenage mutant, the various relationships they made, and other light hearted affairs.
For me, this book was a nice breath of fresh air. Since I also read all the other X-team books, who were constantly fighting for their lives, the stories in New Mutants were more about taking a step back and being able to still read about mutants, but not constantly worry about the well fair of one of your favorite characters. Now, that's not to say these kids sat around the mansion all day and did nothing, there were plenty of times that they would disobey the X-men and go out and battle some various super-villain, be it Donald Pierce or the Blob.
However, the tone of the book was more uplifting, and with the student body approaching about 100 or so, there was almost limitless story potential. This changed a little with the re-titling of the series to New X-men, and it became obvious that Marvel had larger plans in store for the students at the Academy. Some things changed a little, the students were given practice time in the danger room, etc, but the overall feel of the book remained the same. These were kids first and foremost, and being such, dealt with more petty things, which like I said earlier was a welcome change from the dangerous world of the X-Men. As a matter of fact, a good deal of students attending the school had little to no interest in even becoming X-Men, they were just there to gain an education.
This all changed when the new creative team of Christopher Yost and Craig Kyle took the reigns of the comic book after the House of M/Decimation event. No longer was New X-Men a fun lighthearted read, it was now a darker comic then the other X-titles which is almost incomprehensible, considering the fact that the book dealt with teenagers! Yost and Kyle killed about 25 of the students on the grounds of the school(even though the school was supposed to be under 24 hour protection by Sentinels...). The characters who were killed off, weren't exactly what you would call main characters, but it was unfortunate to see those lives snuffed out none the less.
What they did next was as far as I am concerned completely unforgivable. First they killed of the character of Jay Guthrie. This move made little sense, since the Guthrie family was so entrenched with the X-Men, two of Jay's siblings actually served as X-Men(Cannonball and Husk). To make matter even worse, Jay possessed a HEALING FACTOR! Now, I can't claim to be an expert on healing factors, but aren't they supposed to, I don't know, HEAL YOU FROM INJURY! Anyway, the killing of Jay was an asinine move on so many levels, because it disregards his history, as well as the fact that his siblings now had to work at a place where their younger brother was murdered.
However, I still continued to read this comic, because of the fact that it WAS one of my favorites, and ever the optimist, I continued to hope that things would turn around and the comic would return to it's more lighthearted roots. Boy was I wrong... For me the final straw was the killing of Laurie Collins. Laurie had been one of the first characters introduced back in the New Mutant days, and was to me the heart and soul of the team. She was a shy girl, who had tremendous powers, the ability to control the pheromones of others around her, and was usually unsure about herself and her powers. I loved her character, because of the fact that she was the most "real" character in the book. Laurie wasn't going to be running around in skin tight spandex, or leaping into battle guns blazing, she was a deep character with TONS of potential. Laurie meets her fate while talking to her on again off again boyfriend Josh Foley on the school grounds. While they are discussing their relationship, a sniper shoots Laurie through the back of the head killing her instantly. Now, remember, the school grounds were under the protection of O.N.E. and their many manned Sentinels. So I ask, where the #### were the Sentinels? How did a sniper get close enough to pick off a student with all the security the school was supposed to have? Most importantly though, is why would you kill off a character as interesting and dynamic as Laurie? Couldn't she just have been written out of the series a number of different ways? To this day, I still don't understand what the death's of all of these students served... Each character in the hands of a better writer could have become something greater, but by taking the easy way, Yost and Kyle Threw all those potentially great characters away.
Why did they do it? The only reason I can think is to add X-23 to the mix. X-23, whose only claim to fame is being a teenage female version of Wolverine. Well, that's just what the world needed, yet ANOTHER version of Wolverine. Don't get me wrong, I like Wolvie, but I think that lately he has become a little over exposed. He's everywhere! Now, we have the female version of him running around in New X-Men/X-Force. Oh yeah, just to twist the knife a little more, X-23's first appearance was during the X-Men Evolution cartoon, and guess who was responsible for her creation their? That's right, Christopher Yost and Craig Kyle. To them, all New X-Men was, was a way to bring their creation into the Marvel Universe at the expense of all of the other characters in that series. I to this day could never read a comic with X-23 in it, because all she reminds me of is the selfishness of Yost and Kyle. Needless to say whenever I see either the name Yost or Kyle on a comic book, I avoid it like the plague. New X-Men went from being one of my favorite comic books every month, to the first comic book that I ever stopped collecting mid-series. For that, I will never forget or forgive the pathetic "writers" who ruined this book, Yost and Kyle. I would love to hear from anyone who may have also been fans of this under appreciated series.
For me, this book was a nice breath of fresh air. Since I also read all the other X-team books, who were constantly fighting for their lives, the stories in New Mutants were more about taking a step back and being able to still read about mutants, but not constantly worry about the well fair of one of your favorite characters. Now, that's not to say these kids sat around the mansion all day and did nothing, there were plenty of times that they would disobey the X-men and go out and battle some various super-villain, be it Donald Pierce or the Blob.
However, the tone of the book was more uplifting, and with the student body approaching about 100 or so, there was almost limitless story potential. This changed a little with the re-titling of the series to New X-men, and it became obvious that Marvel had larger plans in store for the students at the Academy. Some things changed a little, the students were given practice time in the danger room, etc, but the overall feel of the book remained the same. These were kids first and foremost, and being such, dealt with more petty things, which like I said earlier was a welcome change from the dangerous world of the X-Men. As a matter of fact, a good deal of students attending the school had little to no interest in even becoming X-Men, they were just there to gain an education.
This all changed when the new creative team of Christopher Yost and Craig Kyle took the reigns of the comic book after the House of M/Decimation event. No longer was New X-Men a fun lighthearted read, it was now a darker comic then the other X-titles which is almost incomprehensible, considering the fact that the book dealt with teenagers! Yost and Kyle killed about 25 of the students on the grounds of the school(even though the school was supposed to be under 24 hour protection by Sentinels...). The characters who were killed off, weren't exactly what you would call main characters, but it was unfortunate to see those lives snuffed out none the less.
What they did next was as far as I am concerned completely unforgivable. First they killed of the character of Jay Guthrie. This move made little sense, since the Guthrie family was so entrenched with the X-Men, two of Jay's siblings actually served as X-Men(Cannonball and Husk). To make matter even worse, Jay possessed a HEALING FACTOR! Now, I can't claim to be an expert on healing factors, but aren't they supposed to, I don't know, HEAL YOU FROM INJURY! Anyway, the killing of Jay was an asinine move on so many levels, because it disregards his history, as well as the fact that his siblings now had to work at a place where their younger brother was murdered.
However, I still continued to read this comic, because of the fact that it WAS one of my favorites, and ever the optimist, I continued to hope that things would turn around and the comic would return to it's more lighthearted roots. Boy was I wrong... For me the final straw was the killing of Laurie Collins. Laurie had been one of the first characters introduced back in the New Mutant days, and was to me the heart and soul of the team. She was a shy girl, who had tremendous powers, the ability to control the pheromones of others around her, and was usually unsure about herself and her powers. I loved her character, because of the fact that she was the most "real" character in the book. Laurie wasn't going to be running around in skin tight spandex, or leaping into battle guns blazing, she was a deep character with TONS of potential. Laurie meets her fate while talking to her on again off again boyfriend Josh Foley on the school grounds. While they are discussing their relationship, a sniper shoots Laurie through the back of the head killing her instantly. Now, remember, the school grounds were under the protection of O.N.E. and their many manned Sentinels. So I ask, where the #### were the Sentinels? How did a sniper get close enough to pick off a student with all the security the school was supposed to have? Most importantly though, is why would you kill off a character as interesting and dynamic as Laurie? Couldn't she just have been written out of the series a number of different ways? To this day, I still don't understand what the death's of all of these students served... Each character in the hands of a better writer could have become something greater, but by taking the easy way, Yost and Kyle Threw all those potentially great characters away.
Why did they do it? The only reason I can think is to add X-23 to the mix. X-23, whose only claim to fame is being a teenage female version of Wolverine. Well, that's just what the world needed, yet ANOTHER version of Wolverine. Don't get me wrong, I like Wolvie, but I think that lately he has become a little over exposed. He's everywhere! Now, we have the female version of him running around in New X-Men/X-Force. Oh yeah, just to twist the knife a little more, X-23's first appearance was during the X-Men Evolution cartoon, and guess who was responsible for her creation their? That's right, Christopher Yost and Craig Kyle. To them, all New X-Men was, was a way to bring their creation into the Marvel Universe at the expense of all of the other characters in that series. I to this day could never read a comic with X-23 in it, because all she reminds me of is the selfishness of Yost and Kyle. Needless to say whenever I see either the name Yost or Kyle on a comic book, I avoid it like the plague. New X-Men went from being one of my favorite comic books every month, to the first comic book that I ever stopped collecting mid-series. For that, I will never forget or forgive the pathetic "writers" who ruined this book, Yost and Kyle. I would love to hear from anyone who may have also been fans of this under appreciated series.
That blasted junkie Speedy!
This is one of my all time favorite images in comic book history, only because of the reactions of Hal and Ollie. Ollie is in obvious shock, because since it's Ollie we're talking about, he misses all the signs of Roy's ongoing drug abuse. Hal on the other hand is just one mean SOB here! Hal just seems totally unfazed by Roy shooting up and rips into Ollie. Remind me to never piss off Mr. Jordan... 
Ollie being the kind hearted and forgiving individual he is(Yeah right!!)deals with this revelation by trying to knock the drugs out of Roy... Sorry Ollie, that's not quite how it works...
Finally, Ollie has enough of physically abusing Roy and throws him out to live on the streets with the rest of the "sniveling punks" . Speaking of a mean, cold-hearted SOB...
Anyway, Hal, feeling badly for Speedy, tracks him down living in an alley near a dumpster and takes him to Black Canary, since as Hal puts it, "I don't have any experience in helping someone with your problem." Why would Hal think that Dinah has experience in helping recovering junkies??!! That's really typical of Ollie and Hal back in the day, when they didn't want to deal with something, they'd dump it in Dinah's lap!
Thanks to Dinah's efforts and care, Roy is able to cure his addiction cold turkey, putting poor Dinah through hell in the process. Ollie, ever the idiot, decides that since Roy isn't an addict anymore, everything is fine again, even though he abandoned Roy, and forced him to LIVE ON THE STREETS! Roy, understandably doesn't forgive Ollie and gives him a well deserved shot to the face. It would take many years for the wounds between Ollie and his ward, Roy to heal. To this day, Roy is still much closer to "Uncle" Hal and Dinah thanks to them helping him through his most trying period.Wow, this story was pretty heavy stuff for comic books back in the early 70's! I can't believe that the Comic Code Authority would even allow a story like this to see the light of day. Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams really put together a great story, and everyone should definitely try to get their hands on these issues(I wound up picking them up in a TPB)if they haven't already. It was really fascinating to see the way each character interacted with each other and themselves, concerning Roy's addiction.
Punisher War Journal 24
Not another "Secret Invasion" crossover...
Story- Stuart Clarke was the super villain formerly known as Rampage, but reformed and had been assisting the Punisher up until Frank's incarceration. However, Clarke finally discovers that the Punisher murdered his girlfriend in Mexico during a mission a while back. Of course, what Clarke doesn't know is that Frank was brainwashed at the time and didn't have a choice when it came to the murder. Clarke decides that now he has to hunt Frank down and kill him in retribution. He remakes his old Rampage armor, and wades through the streets of New York, killing Skrulls as he goes, figuring he'll find Frank where ever the largest explosions are.
When the Skrulls invade and destroy all of Tony Stark's technology, Frank's prison shuts down and he walks out, since the jail was fully automated. Seeing the Skrull ships filling the skies, Frank realizes that it is time for the Punisher to return to punish the Skrulls.
While this is occurring, SHIELD tells GW Bridge that since he is the resident expert on Frank Castle, they need him to recapture Frank, before he causes anymore deaths. Bridge catches up to Frank, by following his trail of destruction, but the two are forced to fight side by side against the Skrull legions. Just as things are looking bleak for Frank and Bridge, Rampage arrives to destroy the Skrulls who were about to kill Frank and Bridge. Rampage then demands to know what Frank did to his girlfriend in Mexico.
Overall- AAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!! Not Skrulls in this comic too!!!!! I just can't seem to escape this damn "Secret Invasion"! To make things even funnier, the cover of this comic didn't even have the "Secret Invasion" banner on top, so I didn't even realize it was a tie-in until I started reading it! The story was good, except for the needless appearance of the Skrulls, and I was glad to see the writer, Matt Fraction, finally allow Clarke to discover exactly what Frank did to his girl in Mexico. I actually have the old Champions trade paperbacks, so it was cool to see Clarke don his circa 1970's Rampage armor. I always liked GW Bridge and enjoy his interaction with Frank, so I was happy to see them fighting together again.
One complaint(besides the Skrulls!)is the artwork. Howard Chaykin's artwork just hasn't grown on me like I kept hoping it would. I guess he's going for a gritty look, since the Punisher's world is a gritty, dirty place, but I just don't like the scratchy way the artwork looks here.
Other than that, I liked this issue, and I look forward to Rampage's confrontation with Frank next issue.
Story- Stuart Clarke was the super villain formerly known as Rampage, but reformed and had been assisting the Punisher up until Frank's incarceration. However, Clarke finally discovers that the Punisher murdered his girlfriend in Mexico during a mission a while back. Of course, what Clarke doesn't know is that Frank was brainwashed at the time and didn't have a choice when it came to the murder. Clarke decides that now he has to hunt Frank down and kill him in retribution. He remakes his old Rampage armor, and wades through the streets of New York, killing Skrulls as he goes, figuring he'll find Frank where ever the largest explosions are.
When the Skrulls invade and destroy all of Tony Stark's technology, Frank's prison shuts down and he walks out, since the jail was fully automated. Seeing the Skrull ships filling the skies, Frank realizes that it is time for the Punisher to return to punish the Skrulls.
While this is occurring, SHIELD tells GW Bridge that since he is the resident expert on Frank Castle, they need him to recapture Frank, before he causes anymore deaths. Bridge catches up to Frank, by following his trail of destruction, but the two are forced to fight side by side against the Skrull legions. Just as things are looking bleak for Frank and Bridge, Rampage arrives to destroy the Skrulls who were about to kill Frank and Bridge. Rampage then demands to know what Frank did to his girlfriend in Mexico.
Overall- AAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!! Not Skrulls in this comic too!!!!! I just can't seem to escape this damn "Secret Invasion"! To make things even funnier, the cover of this comic didn't even have the "Secret Invasion" banner on top, so I didn't even realize it was a tie-in until I started reading it! The story was good, except for the needless appearance of the Skrulls, and I was glad to see the writer, Matt Fraction, finally allow Clarke to discover exactly what Frank did to his girl in Mexico. I actually have the old Champions trade paperbacks, so it was cool to see Clarke don his circa 1970's Rampage armor. I always liked GW Bridge and enjoy his interaction with Frank, so I was happy to see them fighting together again.
One complaint(besides the Skrulls!)is the artwork. Howard Chaykin's artwork just hasn't grown on me like I kept hoping it would. I guess he's going for a gritty look, since the Punisher's world is a gritty, dirty place, but I just don't like the scratchy way the artwork looks here.
Other than that, I liked this issue, and I look forward to Rampage's confrontation with Frank next issue.
Captain America 43
Story- This issue starts a brand new story arc, with the Red Skull finally being out of the way and Sharon Carter finally out of his clutches.
Half this issue told a story from WW2 involving Steve Rogers, Bucky and the original Human Torch, in China searching for a young Chinese scientist before the Japanese could catch him. The three heroes manage to find the child genius, but it isn't revealed who he is or what his importance is to the Allies.
In the present, Bucky is still not altogether comfortable with his new role as Cap, even though just about everybody else seems to accept him as the new Captain America. We also see that Bucky is now romantically involved with the Black Widow. Bucky leaves his "best friend" as he calls her, to clear his head, and runs into trouble in the form of Batroc the Leaper. Batroc and some mercenaries had just broken into a U.N. research facility and stolen some top secret information and Bucky, in civilian guise attempts to stop them. Unfortunately for Bucky, while fighting Batroc, he is blasted in the back by one of the mercs, allowing Batroc to escape with his information, but not before Batroc notices Captain America's shield attached to Bucky's back through his destroyed clothing.
Batroc meets his mysterious contact to turn over the stolen information and shows the man some pictures of the unmasked Bucky, taken from nearby security cameras. The mystery man recognizes Bucky as the Winter Soldier, and says to himself that his leader will be pleased to know that the Winter Soldier is the new Captain America.
Overall- God, do I love Ed Brubaker's writing... Once again(as always), he manages to turn out another great story, while most of the rest of the Marvel Universe goes to hell in a hand basket. I was pleasantly surprised to see Batroc the Leaper, who was a favorite villain of mine from way back when Mark Gruenwald wrote Cap's adventures... I really miss Mark Gruenwald. He was one hell of a writer and editor. I can't even begin to imagine how much better the quality of work coming out of Marvel today would be if he were still alive and editing...
Back to the story though. I'm not really sure how I feel about Bucky shacking up with Natasha(or Natalia if you prefer)... With how ####ed up Marvel is right now, I keep expecting her to be a ####ing Skrull, so I just can't invest too much into their relationship right now. Most of what is going on in this issue is shrouded in mystery, since this is the start of a new storyline, but Brubaker could write the Manhattan phone book, and tell an interesting, compelling tale, so I'll definitely be awaiting next month's installment of Cap with great anticipation.
Half this issue told a story from WW2 involving Steve Rogers, Bucky and the original Human Torch, in China searching for a young Chinese scientist before the Japanese could catch him. The three heroes manage to find the child genius, but it isn't revealed who he is or what his importance is to the Allies.
In the present, Bucky is still not altogether comfortable with his new role as Cap, even though just about everybody else seems to accept him as the new Captain America. We also see that Bucky is now romantically involved with the Black Widow. Bucky leaves his "best friend" as he calls her, to clear his head, and runs into trouble in the form of Batroc the Leaper. Batroc and some mercenaries had just broken into a U.N. research facility and stolen some top secret information and Bucky, in civilian guise attempts to stop them. Unfortunately for Bucky, while fighting Batroc, he is blasted in the back by one of the mercs, allowing Batroc to escape with his information, but not before Batroc notices Captain America's shield attached to Bucky's back through his destroyed clothing.
Batroc meets his mysterious contact to turn over the stolen information and shows the man some pictures of the unmasked Bucky, taken from nearby security cameras. The mystery man recognizes Bucky as the Winter Soldier, and says to himself that his leader will be pleased to know that the Winter Soldier is the new Captain America.
Overall- God, do I love Ed Brubaker's writing... Once again(as always), he manages to turn out another great story, while most of the rest of the Marvel Universe goes to hell in a hand basket. I was pleasantly surprised to see Batroc the Leaper, who was a favorite villain of mine from way back when Mark Gruenwald wrote Cap's adventures... I really miss Mark Gruenwald. He was one hell of a writer and editor. I can't even begin to imagine how much better the quality of work coming out of Marvel today would be if he were still alive and editing...
Back to the story though. I'm not really sure how I feel about Bucky shacking up with Natasha(or Natalia if you prefer)... With how ####ed up Marvel is right now, I keep expecting her to be a ####ing Skrull, so I just can't invest too much into their relationship right now. Most of what is going on in this issue is shrouded in mystery, since this is the start of a new storyline, but Brubaker could write the Manhattan phone book, and tell an interesting, compelling tale, so I'll definitely be awaiting next month's installment of Cap with great anticipation.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Enjoy...
Here is a picture of Huntress and Bruce Wayne. I don't think there is anything I can write that would do this picture justice... Just what exactly is going on there???
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