Category: Marvel
The Death Of Wolverine #2: The Best There Is? Hardly…
The Death of Wolverine #2 is a comic book I’ve really been looking forward to for the last week! I was super impressed with the first issue even though it was five bucks and had a bunch of useless filler, it felt in part like the old Wolverine stories I used to love! So issue two continues the story in the classic setting of Madripoor- One of my favorite places in the Marvel Universe! There we meet a disguised Logan (“hipster Logan”, I personally would have preferred “Patch”instead) who’s been hanging out there for weeks looking for Viper, with some valuable merchandise for sale. This leads Logan to an odd encounter with several villains from his past. Sounds cool huh?
Well I don’t wanna spoil anything but it all seems a bit too forced. We’ve got important characters that disappear from the pages of the story as fast as they appear. Maybe this series needed to be a six or eight parter instead of four? It already is feeling a bit rushed, issue #2 feels quite a bit different from the first. I would have liked to have seen at least two issues of Madripoor and now it appears at the end of this issue we are off to yet another “classic” locale.
The story at issue two has lost it’s flow and lost my interest substantially. I get it now, they’re trying to cram as many classic characters into this four part series as possible and it seems issue three is likely to continue doing the same. Considering that how large the panels per page are in this series so far (a lot of panels simply divide up on single drawing into multiples) it’s likely that we’re not going to get the quality story telling we’d thought we were promised with issue number one. I’m on board for the last two though, I could easily be proven wrong and might be simply dazzled by the last two.
However, with issue number two and it’s rather paper thin plot, uninspired and unnecessary fight sequences and mish mash of random classic characters coming and going I’m starting to think it’s hard to make Wolverine interesting anymore for more than a single issue. At least McNiven’s art is still beautifully rendered. Oh yeah this issue is also 5 bucks and jam packed with a bunch of dull extras that somehow Marvel thinks justify the high cover price. What I predict we’re in store for is a rushed storyline that could have been amazing. If they don’t pull this off correctly I doubt anyone will be be anticipating Wolverine’s return from the dead anytime soon…
Comic Book Cover of the Week: Beware of The Vermin!!!
Everyone knows that Kraven’s Last Hunt is a simply incredible Spider-man tale but what I love about it also is the the role The Vermin plays in it all! Let’s face it-the Vermin is a totally freaky and awesome villain who never gets the respect he truly deserves! Maybe it’s because he chooses to spend all of his time the schleppin’ around sewers with his rat minions! This cover from 1987 also drawn by Mike Zeck really does justice to this creepy ass character. Just the atmosphere of the filthy corroded sewer, the dripping pipes and of course the brilliant image of Spidey in his classic black costume just adds to the horror of it all. Just posting this is making realize I need to dig this series out of my comic box and read it again!! One of the best ever…this cover kinda makes me wonder if Neil Marshall got some inspiration for “The Descent” the spelunking horror masterpiece from this here cover?!
The Vermin in all of his disgusting glory!
Erista: The Last Mysterious Thing About Wolverine!!
With all of this talk about the death of Wolverine lately it’s got many people debating the true motivations behind Marvel’s decision to “off” him. Some people think it’s a dick move by Marvel to screw over Fox for having the rights to the character theatrically. Others think more to the obvious, that Wolverine has been turned into a boring, over exploited, cash-cow character by Marvel. As I said yesterday, he was once the most mysterious character perhaps in comic book history. There’s not much left to the imagination anymore regarding Logan, not many interesting stones left unturned in his past. However I’d like to bring to light something that we touched upon a few years back here that’s quite interesting. Logan’s other son “Erista”! Nope we’re not talking about that brat Daken. We’re talking about another kid that “dead beat dad” Logan has running around the Savage Land! Many people forget about a one shot by Mike Mignola called “The Jungle Adventure” from 1989.
This saw Wolverine escaping his troubles in the Savage Land, because back in the 1980’s when Wolverine was interesting he’d do cool shit like this. There he met an amazonian woman named Ghack and they got busy right there in the Jungle, of course this happened when Wolverine was still a rad dude before he started hanging out at the Avengers mansion with Tony Stark drinking cocktails. So Ghack has a child named Erista, son of Wolverine. Of course Wolverine splits and never checks back to see if he got Ghack pregnant, maybe not such a cool move, but well I guess that’s how he rolled back then.
Strangely we have never seen or heard from Erista or Ghack since! Nope just this one issue ever addresses the issue. It’s hard to believe that Marvel hasn’t exploited the living shit outta his long lost son by now! I say with Wolverine soon to kick the bucket we finally get the scoop on this guy! What the hell has he been up to? Is he still roaming around the Savage Land? Perhaps he’s a character we’ve already met-who’s simply unaware that Logan is his father? Shouldn’t he meet his douchey brother Daken one of these days? I think this is a missed opportunity Marvel-you could cash in big time with Erista! At the very least it’s something that legitimately remains one of the last truly mysterious things about Wolverine’s past…
So that baby is Wolverine’s son Erista, we’ve never seen or heard anything about him since 1989-what the hell happened to this guy?!!
The Death of Wolverine #1: Review
The deaths of major comic book characters have been a big trend for a long time. It usually happens when a major character becomes boring. We all know that boring most likely means that the character has been over exploited, to make money and finally because we’ve seen them so often every month in multiple titles that they just get stale. They become a weak, pale version of what used to make them so cool. Usually sales decline and comic companies start trying to figure out new ways to make the character popular again, one of the ways to generate some excitement again is to “kill” the character. This will get news online, in papers and probably on tv and generate interest and interest means dollars. This is what has happened to our once mysterious, mean mutant berzerker, Wolverine.
Let me first say, Wolverine used to be the coolest damn character ever. He was mysterious, he was a loner, he hung out at bars and got wasted, he killed people and he didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought about him. His past was a mystery and we all so desperately wanted to know who he was. Over the years his popularity grew, he was in movies, a ton of cartoons and was in dozens of comic books every month. His past was over explained, and what we all found out about him didn’t quite measure up to what we had hoped for. He was no longer a loner, he became headmaster at Xavier’s school, he appeared in dozens of X-titles. He even joined the god damn Avengers! Wolverine was officially corporate in every way. He started hanging out with Captain America for crying out loud-taking orders from SHIELD etc, ect! Everyone’s fav mutant was no longer mysterious, he was drawn more as a handsome, dashing superhero instead of a mean little hairy runt with fucked up weird ass hair. Wolverine was officially boring. A tough thing to accomplish honestly.
So now here we are, Marvel is trying the whole “Death” stunt with Logan. Let’s face it people, you have nothing to fear. Wolverine is not really dead. He’s worth too much money. Marvel does want us to miss the guy though. So I figure he’ll be gone for about a year and we’ll see him pop back up in some really ridiculous way(this will again maybe make some more money-the return of Wolverine!). But for the moment let’s just let ourselves be shocked-okay? So issue number one is actually quite impressive I must say. It’s a pretty neat little story here that’s bound to get incredibly brutal and bloody by it’s finish. Steve McNiven is easily one of my favorite current comic book artists and his work shines here.
The story is quite simple. Wolverine has lost his healing factor, he’s hiding out and there’s a bounty on his head. It seems that super powered killers are hot on his trail and the first real threat to arrive is Nuke, the star spangled psycho, who’s dead set on collecting some big time money. What we get here is a no holds barred classic Wolverine story, much like the ones I used to love as a teenager. There’s a pretty amazingly brutal sequence when Nuke and Wolverine go head to head, and I mean that literally that you’re not likely to forget any time soon. I’m on board with this one as it looks and feels much like the stories that they should have been telling all along.
I’m also looking forward to his return to Madripoor(hinted at the end of the issue), as well as seeing who else shows up to take out Wolverine. Razorfist? Wildchild? Bloodscream? Lady Deathstrike? Omega Red? I only hope it’s not Sabretooth. That guy should have stayed dead, having him kill Wolverine might be a little to cliche, though it’s certainly a strong possibility after reading issue number one. Let’s hope when they do bring Logan back from the dead, and they will, they give him one solo and one X-men book to star in. Use Logan wisely and make him more of what he used to be before. A lone wolf.
Lastly my complaints!! Okay this issue is $4.99, infact the other Marvel title I bought today was $4.99 as well, if this becomes the going rate of new weekly comic books I’m fucking outta here. This issue, though quite enjoyable was pretty thin on story. The panels keep getting bigger most pages only contain four panels, some three, some two and several full pagers. It’s got a two page splash as well.
This issue took me about five minutes to read. It looks thick, but it’s full of “Extras” a ton of random panel sketches, the “directors cut” which narrates what McNiven is supposed to draw each panel and five page interview with Co-creator Len Wein. Basically a bunch of stuff that should have been put online for free. For $4.99 an issue these comic book companies better bring MORE to the table. More story, bigger page count, and maybe smaller panels. This should have been a double sized issue. I think it’s time for the big two to pony up and give us readers more bang for our buck! I can’t afford FIVE dollar comic books every week nor do I want to spend that on any new comic book. What do you think?
Comic Book Cover of the Week! More of Mike Zeck’s Amazing Cap Cover Art!
I personally think that the best Captain America artist of all time is hands down Mike Zeck! Pretty much his whole run on the title in the 80’s features some of the coolest Cap covers of all time, issue #276 is a great example of a great comic book cover! The perspective, the colors are all equally impressive and the comic book itself is a ton of fun! This classic cover features Cap battling some of Baron Zemo’s androids! Is there any way we can get Zeck on board for some current Cap stuff?!
Cinematic Captain America: The Greatest American……..Virgin?!
I’ve been thinking about this since I saw Captain America: The Winter Soldier in theaters, it’s like a big elephant in the room at this point! We just have to address this, the movie Captain America is most definitely still a gosh darn virgin!! Am I wrong?! Nope! Movie Cap was born in 1918 so technically he’s a 96 year old virgin-It’s been three movies that this Cap portrayed by Chris Evans has been in, one being The Avengers and thus far Cap, though quite popular with the ladies since he got his muscles, has gotten ZERO action, aside from a few random smooches! Daaang!
So I think a great plot point of the next Captain America movie must be him finally losing his damn virginity already! I could see this being an incredibly funny moment being discussed by him and his fellow Avengers at a bar over a few beers and I can already imagine a ton of jokes involving Tony Stark, Banner and Thor about this. Now though the bigger question is who’s going to be his first?! Let’s face it Cap is quite the goody two shoes, so he may benefit from a more edgy lady like The Black Widow, or could go old school with Agent Carter (well that might be a bit weird), or maybe he’ll hook up with that SHIELD agent he was talking about?
The Avengers are in serious need of some options for the guy, Black Widow is hot and all but let’s face it she’d tear this momma’s boy’s heart to shreds! Or maybe Cap hasn’t come out of the closet yet?! Maybe he and Bucky will hook up?!! Either way it’s been too many decades for the guy, he’s gotta be feeling some serious sexual frustration at this point with all that super soldier serum pumping him up too, whatever the case he better make sure the big moment is worth the wait….
“Uggh…I can’t focus on a word Fury is saying with this raging boner I’ve had since we made out in that mall earlier!!”
Guardians of the Galaxy: No Need for a Cinematic Avengers Crossover!
The verdict is in! The Guardians of the Galaxy have moved from C to D list superheroes to A list superstars literally overnight! I had my doubts about it, I mean who wouldn’t considering their previous popularity or should I say unpopularity in the comic books. But the movie was a ton of fun, it had great effects, a neat-o story, excellently executed characters and a ton of laughs! It also had another thing going for it-it stood on its own with out needing to constantly reference The Avengers!! It was honestly a breath of fresh air to see a Marvel flick that wasn’t (at this point) trying to tie in or crossover into The Avengers. I like the whole crossover cinematic movie universe that Marvel has created but does everything always need to tie into something else? The answer is no even though it seems now everyone is getting the idea that they want to crossover and create one big movie universe for their separate franchises.
Don’t get me wrong I love The Avengers-it was awesome. But I can’t tell you how happy I was that this had nothing to do really with Thor, Captain America & Iron Man! I hear the plan is to have the Guardians meet The Avengers. When I think about that, it really doesn’t excite as much as I thought it might. maybe because I simply enjoyed The Guardians so much that I’d just love to see them hit space on their own, Avenger free so to say. I think they should tie in a little bit with Thanos but do we really need a movie jam packed with ten plus superheroes crammed into space? I don’t think so! Right now I’m just excited to this movie again and I’m this close to saying I like the Guardians movie even more than The Avengers! Nice work Mr. Gunn!!!
This was one of my favorite comics as a kid! And it is a crossover…so well, maybe Marvel will once again prove me wrong?!*-
Top 5 Obscure Marvel Superhero Teams Who Deserve Their Own Movies Too!!
So Guardians of the Galaxy is all the rage suddenly! The movie is on it’s way to being a HUGE hit for Marvel. Well I’m sure that’s got all the big wigs in Hollywood and at Marvel thinking about what the next big thing is gonna be. It seems that the characters in these movies really don’t have to be A-list characters to hit it big time. Maybe you Avengers aren’t quite as special as you thought you were huh?! Well listen up Marvel and Hollywood, fear not, because I’ve got the 5 superhero teams who who got the muscle to score you another blockbuster! Forget about the X-men, forget about the Justice League, The Avengers? Ha! old fucking news! There’s really only so much of Captain America, Thor and Iron Man that we can take! Here are five lesser known teams that could be the next big thing on the big screen!
5. The Defenders: This is Marvel’s safest bet, The Defenders are the B-list Avengers and always have been. But through time they’ve embarked on some of the most downright bizarre adventures in comic book history. This is because of one character in particular, at the core of the group is Doctor Strange, who Marvel is already getting ready to cast into his own feature film. Also in the group is The Hulk, an Avenger who people now are demanding more of on the big screen, ad on The Silver Surfer, who’s one of the coolest characters ever and lastly Namor, the first Marvel Mutant and you’ve got the perfect team to head into truly Strange territory in the movies.
This movie I have no doubt will at some point be made and if you have any doubt that this could be a great big screen adventure take a moment to read The Defenders mini series from 2005 it’s the perfect reference point to success! It’s jam packed with action and some really great comedy, mostly revolving around the Hulk’s sex life!
4. The Exiles: This was a great series that was designed as a “What If?” comic for X-men fans, it involved the team traveling to different dimensions, times and alternate realities. It was kinda like Quantum Leap with superheroes. We have already seen that the alternate timeline stuff works quite well for movie fanatics lately so why not give this team a shot at some big screen glory? You get some weird mashed up versions of popular characters that would sure to quite interesting as well. The Exiles were hired to fix broken realities and the team originally consisted of Blink (Clarice Ferguson, from the Age of Apocalypse), Mimic (Calvin Rankin), Magnus Lensherr (son of Magneto and Rogue),Thunderbird (John Proudstar), Nocturne (Talia Josephine “T.J.” Wagner, daughter of Nightcrawler and Scarlet Witch), and Morph. How’s that for a stellar line up?
3. The Invaders: Ok, how cool was it that the first Captain America movie took place in the 1940’s? Let’s face it this is an awesome era to tell comic book stories-and with the backdrop of WWII it’s the perfect place to kick some Nazi ass-something people never get tired of seeing! We already got a tease of a loose version of the team in the first Captain America movie, but sadly the team didn’t sport costumes or get much development. JJ Field was even cast in the movie as Montgomery Falsworth, who becomes “Union jack” one the most prominent and awesome members of the team.
The movie version could be a mix of The Howling Commandos who had some of it’s members in the Cap movie as well(Dum Dum Dugan!). The movie could take place after Cap’s death and maybe even be developed in the “Agent Carter” Tv series before it hit the big screen. This one would be huge and could take them on an Indiana Jones-esque type of adventure battling the likes of, Baron Zemo, The Hate Monger, Baron Wolfgang Von Strucker, The Master Man & Baron Blood!
2. Alpha Flight: I’m not sure how many times I have to say it-Alpha Flight is just begging to be a big screen smash!! These guys have been a fave of mine since I was a little kid. They’re the Canadian X-men for cryin’ out loud! The movie could have strong ties with the X-films, heck Hugh Jackman could even be in it when Wolverine was a member of the team! The finale of the flick could be when Wolverine goes a-wall and the Flight chases him down ultimately clashing with our very favorite movie X-men! How awesome would that be?
Also visually seeing Sasquatch in action alone would be worth it! Plus Marvel could be the first to introduce the most bad ass first full-on gay superhero to the silver screen-Northstar! This one has success written all over it and the team is always filled with a ton of drama-just read the first 12 issues of the original 1980’s John Byrne run, it’s golden…
1. The Great Lakes Avengers: This one is the one. The Great Lakes Avengers has all the ingredients of big time hit. It’s got heart, drama, a ton of comedy and one other thing going for it the word “AVENGERS” in it’s title. So who are these guys you might ask? Well they are a midwest superhero team that forms in Milwaukee Wisconsin!! They’re huge fans of the Avengers and decide they want to give the superhero stuff a shot themselves. The only problem is that this team is band of regular joe type people with weird superpowers who’ve got zero cred and really zero experience in costumed crimefighting. Think of the movie as a cross between Kick-Ass and Mystery Men. This would be a great one for Edgar Wright or someone who could write something truly hilarious with some well cast comedic actors.
We could get a few cameos from the other real Avengers as well, unintentionally blowing these guys off on the street. Then, the team who we follow from the beginning, as leader Mister Immortal (who no matter how badly he’s injured, can’t die) assembles them all from ads on telephone poles and Craig’s List . He eventually gets them all in to deep with a major Marvel villain, this is where things get serious. This could be one of the most funny superhero movies ever and at the same time have some good serious drama and action as well. Plus it seems that one of it’s members Squirrel Girl already has quite a cult following-To not jump on this now would be a crime Marvel-make it happen!!! Still don’t believe me check out The Great Lakes Avengers trade “Misassembled” from 2005 it’s proof of my claims!
Deadpool Test Footage: Does it Warrant a Full on Feature Flick?!
We all got to see the leaked footage of the test footage that was made with Ryan Reynolds voicing the character and it seems like it’s generating a lot of hype for a big screen solo adventure! I’m intrigued by this footage, as it came directly off a wretched portrayal of the character from probably the worst superhero flick of recent times, X-Men Origins: Wolverine. But with that said the test footage was actually better than I expected. Fans all over are hoping that this idea will turn into a full fledged “R Rated” feature film, with a ton of gore and the typical Deadpool smart ass humor we all have come to expect from the character. However, today it’s been said that if it happens it WONT be rated R, it will be PG-13. It will generate far more money if they make it more kid friendly, that’s the motivation behind the rating.
So it really seems, with no surprise, that everything in Hollywood is indeed about money. The times are past when Hollywood just wanted to make an amazing movie and take any real risks. Today any superhero flick apparently needs to make an obscene amount of cash for it to be even considered. To me this is sad. I know it’s the world we live in today, but it’s too bad that it all revolves around making a big big buck. A movie like Blade which was rated R was made for 45 Million dollars, it made 131 million worldwide, but today those numbers just aren’t good enough. Today Hollywood is looking for four to five times that, as Iron Man made 582 million buckaroos. There’s a lot of cool movies being passed on these days (Hellboy 3 anyone?) because Hollywood doesn’t think they can make the money. But how much money is enough?!
Well in this case I’m certain that Deadpool will be made, and it just might be a damn good flick. However I miss the days when they might have made an awesome Deadpool flick without trying to market it to thirteen year olds. How many thirteen year olds do you know that read Deadpool anyway? Now let’s move on to the footage we all saw, I think it looked decent but why did we get a CG motion capture version of Deadpool?! This isn’t Roger Rabbit dammit! What’s wrong with having Reynolds in an actual costume? Is that too complex now? Designing an awesome costume that the actor actually has to put on? It seems to me that the whole motion capture thing is getting a bit out of hand, I fear that there will soon be no actual wardrobe or costuming for fantastic characters on the big screen. How about Ultron in the upcoming Avengers “Age of Ultron” did he really need to be motion capture? Have you ever seen C3PO? Or now what about Thanos? They couldn’t transform Brolin into the character with make up? I mean what if Ron Perlman didn’t get the make up for Hellboy-would he have been as convincing?
Lastly I really do hope we see a good Deadpool movie, I hope it’s wild and funny. That means that we need some good writers who know how to blend comedy with the genre. I’d take Edgar Wright on a project like that. In order to make Deadpool a success they need a lot more than him cracking wise ass jokes that simply aren’t funny. So this will all be interesting to see what comes to be with this one, they are on the right track I think, but they need to go a far distance from the movie he first appeared in to make it everything the fans love about the character…
The Incredible Hulk’s Sexual Frustration!
I had to share this rad little clip from College Humor being a huge Hulk fan i totally dug this one-Great little comedy on Bruce Banner’s frustrating sex life!! Check it out!!!
Universal Dork 