Flash Review - 3/14/12

Age of Apocalypse #1 – When it was first created, the Age of Apocalypse was new, exciting, and incredibly innovative, and it even warranted 2 one-shot issues to fill in some background on these incredible new takes on classic characters. Then for the 10 year anniversary of the storyline (yes storyline, as in it had a beginning and an ending) we got another one-shot plus a 5 issue limited series to catch us up on what had happened to these character, all of this is still good.  I was skeptical to say the least when I heard about the crossover with X-Force, and more than a little leery about AOA Nightcrawler, but please someone tell me how they strip Jean Grey and Sabretooth of their powers, have them join up with B-class human villains and then call it a new series?!  This is honestly just a huge mistake, and it will undoubtedly ruin the legacy of this incredible storyline.  I suspect it will not have more than 12 issues or less so I will buy them, but this is just an insult to the original concept.

Avengers Academy #27 – Eh…not as great as I would have expected it to be.  First of all, I am not as into the Runaways as I am Young Avengers or even the defunct Young Allies so this issue was already at a disadvantage.  I find the entire Runaway crew to be kinda lame and mostly just knock-offs of the Young Avengers so when they came here and started acting like their bratty superior selves it was even more of a turn off then I had anticipated.  Why do they keep associating the Academy with these cheesy “Next-Gen” teen teams?  Why don’t they every actually meet the Young Avengers?  Or the New X-men/Generation Hope?  Instead we get the Young Allies (which was an slap in the face to Firestar since she used to be an honest to goodness Avenger) and the Runaways?  This book has come such a long way so we can definitely bury one or two bad issues but let’s get it together people!!

Avengers Prelude: Fury’s Big Week #1 – On the other hand, this issue was significantly better than I would have expected!  When watching the various Marvel movies, it seemed like it was one story after another with no connection and Nick Fury showing up at the very end of all of them, but this series is showing us that that wasn’t the case.  According to this book, not only was Fury involved behind the scenes of all of the scenarios from the beginning but in some cases, they were happening practically simultaneously!  I thought that was a really cool twist to the stories.  Other than that, this doesn’t really add too much new information to the mix, it more just added continuity to the separate stories in an effort to bring them all together for the big showdown.  Nothing terribly exciting but still worth a read.

Defenders #4 – I’ll be honest, I am not really clear on whats going on with this Prester Omega character and the giant squiggle but I loved this peak into the past of Stephen Strange.  I mean we know all about his life as a vain surgeon before learning magic and we know about his long time love with Mistress Clea of the Dark Dimension, but this seems to be from even before any of that.  Before his time as a world class surgeon he dated a woman names Martha who left him and began her own life and family, and now she had returned to him by some untold magical means (probably to do with the squiggle).  Unfortunately this is not to last and she once again left him to discover the meaning of her new life, but she did lead Stephen on the path to let someone new into his life, his grad student Molly…who he already slept with.  Ignoring the clear ethical violations involved, she’s nothing like what you would expect him to go for and yet might be exactly what he needs.

Fear Itself: The Fearless #10 – It’s really at the point now where my eyes and ears bleed every time I have to type the words “Fear Itself”, but yes this series is still happening.  On the bright side, this issue is finally making the series exciting!  I’m bored to death of Valkyrie moaning and whining across the globe and I’m tired of Sin’s maniacal posturing too, but the idea of the Serpent having it’s own Destroyer is a pretty cool concept.  I also found it intriguing that Crossbones doesn’t seem to be as on board with her grand schemes as he once was.  The big battle scene at the end was truly epic though.  I mean you have ALL the Avengers (not to mention the Fantastic Four and the Thunderbolts) present at once and every demonic supervillain that Marvel has churned out in the last 25 years like (Master Pandemonium, Witchfire and Blackout just to name a few).  Maybe after 4 months of boring drawn out nonsense, we will actually get an exciting ending to this endless epilogue.

Uncanny X-men #8 – Great ending to a bit of a strange story.  It started out as a mission to save the inhabitants of Tabula Rasa from what amounts to rampant lethal skin cancer, but what really made this issue was some of the finer character moments that were seen.  Namor putting his harpoon to good use with the Tapeworm Queen while Hope develops more than a small crush on him.  Cyclops putting the needs of an entire species first (and they WEREN’T even mutants).  And my personal favorite:  Illyana and Peter fighting for their lives in the underground caverns of Tabula Rasa.  It is truly amazing to see how far these two siblings have come.  Colossus becomes more of a powerhouse on the verge of losing control with every issue while Magik has gone from demonic princess to powerful voice of reason.  Watching him lose control of his very form from tapping into the power of the Juggernaut was one of his more intense moments ever since Illyana died back in 1993.  Of course we can’t forget the foreboding scene between Psylocke and Magneto at the end.  What side are they really on?  Was that just tough guy talk from Magneto or is something more sinister going on that we don’t know about yet?  Or even worse, is he just implying that they are both killers and therefore alike…

Venom #14 – And Circle of Four comes to a close…and what a close it is!  First let me get it out of the way and say I HATE ALEJANDRA!  This incarnation of the Ghost Rider has one horrific issue after another.  I honestly just don’t know what the writers are even thinking at this point.  Watching her flat out push Flash from a moving taxi in the middle of a firefight in Hell was just the absolute last straw!  I mean really, who the hell does that?!  I’m just glad her own title is ending.  On the bright side, we got to see when Venom officially joined the Avengers (or Secret Avengers)…the only annoying thing is that we knew that was coming weeks ago if you’ve been reading that title.

Wolverine & the X-men: Alpha & Omega #3 – It’s…interesting.  I am not sufre I love it or that it was a necessary storyline but it’s definitely interesting.  I love the whole idea of Quire’s construct, it’s like a huge video game that Wolverine and Armor can’t find the end of, and I like even more that he loses control of it when he goes to sleep.  One thing I am not really into is that Wolverine’s body wakes up as the “Berserker” when his mind isn’t in residence.  I am not going to dig through my back issues to find out where, but I am sure at some time in the past his mind has been removed from his body by some force and I am pretty certain that this didn’t happen.  Either way I still maintain that this could have been a one-shot instead of a 5 part series, but whatever.

X-Club #4 – I love this series.  It started out a little strange…and now it’s just completely out there weird!  Is it me or did we find out that not only is Danger somehow pregnant but she and Madison Jefferies are in love?  What the hell are these people doing over there on that island!?  The best part of this is entire story however is the telepathic starfish stuck on top of Nemesis’ head.  He’s just such a douche all the time it’s nice to hear the ridiculousness that goes on in his head.  I’m looking forward to the conclusion of this story, but also just for the series to be over.

X-men #26 – AGH!!  I AM SO BORED OF VAMPIRES!  If I wanted to read about vampires I would pick up some old Chillers or Tomb of Dracula issues.  This is X-men…X-MEN…I want mutants, and world saving.  Not undead vegetarians.  I have said it before I am bored of Raizo Kodo and his band of creeps and I am even over Jubilee’s storyline.  They need to get her under control or just get rid of her but either way they need to be done with the vampire storylines.

Flash Review - 2/29/12

Angel & Faith #7 – Call me crazy but I’m just not that into Faith’s father showing up.  And not just that I don’t trust him (that much is pretty much a given) but that I am just not that intrigued by him even showing up.  I always got the impression that he was a big douche but that he was out of the picture for whatever reason.  Now a still-sane Druscilla on the other hand…THAT I can read ALL DAY.  It’s almost even creepier seeing her with all her scruples because now there’s no rational excuse for her strange behavior (or in this case her strange lack of strange behavior I guess).  In both cases I am at least curious enough that I can’t wait for next issue.

Avengers #23 – Eh…once again another lackluster installment of this over reaching story arc.  I am getting so sick of Norman Osborn at this point, I don’t care what powers or whatever that he has acquired, Viper is a much more interesting adversary during this entire scenario.  The Hulk-like creatures they’ve created are already getting overused and boring, and once again we spent an entire issue without seeing Storm take any sort of feature role.  What was even the point of bringing her on if they were just going to lock her up?  I get that they are focusing one by one on the different members (with Red Hulk, Quake and now Vision all getting some feature time) but when may I ask is Ororo’s turn?

Astonishing X-men #47 – YAY! It’s over!  This is quite honestly the dumbest storyline that I have seen in an X-book in quite some time.  What was even the purpose of it?  They made a big deal over Scott and Storm kissing a few issues ago and then it turned into this entire weird ass other dimension nonsense (like we don’t already have enough of that).  And it really just seemed like they were trying too hard to make the whole thing so damn deep, with Scott wearing Magneto’s helmet, the evil Xavier named Savior, and Scott cracking a beer to Logan’s honor at the end.  It was just all too forced and reeked of “they don’t know what to do with this book” in my opinion.

FF #15 – I am so over this title.  I gave it more than a fair chance I think and I was even excited to see the whole Power Pack reunite.  But to be honest, it just seems like a continuation of the Fantastic Four title I dropped months ago and promises to be even more closely tied in the coming months.  I think I’ll give it a few more issues (I’ll have some spare cash since a few of my other titles are getting cancelled) but I don’t really have a lot of high hopes for this one.

Venom #13.4 – OK they may have jumped the shark on this one folks.  I’ve really been enjoying this storyline so far.  Red Hulk has really grown on me, I’m always a Ghost Rider fan (no matter how ridiculous the writer’s choice of host is), and I even like the Flash Thompson version of Venom, but I feel like they went a little overboard with that last page monstrosity that melded the 3 together in a fashion.  I wonder what sort of condition Alejandra will be in at the end of this whole ordeal since her own title has but one issue left before cancellation.

Flash Review - 2/22/12

Avengers Solo #5 – Well the good news is that the series is over.  And it finished up just how it started:  Hawkeye’s story sucks and the Academy back-up carried the book.  All we learned from thids book is that the top Avengers all still barely trust each other and are willing to do shady things behind each other’s backs.  On the other hand, I am really curious to see how this “test” that Finesse and Striker were put through affects their relationship with their professors in the future.  Here’s to more West Coast Avengers fun in the coming months.

Magneto: Not a Hero #4 – It’s not that I didn’t like this series per say, it’s just that it seemed like the entire thing could have been told in a one-shot rather than drag it out for several issues.  I was sort of expecting Astra to be a bit more important and maybe even see more of the deformed Brotherhood clones.  And Joseph was such a great character back in the 90’s and now they kind dumbed him down to “Well you’re good now, Magneto, so I’m going to be bad.  And not just bad…badder then you ever were”.  I am never really a fan of just bringing characters back from the dead only to throw them away again.  Like why couldn’t Joseph return and ACTUALLY become the evil Magneto while Max (the real Magneto) continued on as an X-man?  Good story, but the length made it boring.

New Mutants #38 – You know, I was JUST talking about this with a friend of mine recently.  “Why did they bother bringing Doug back and then do nothing with him?  And what ever happened to Bird-Brain and the Animator’s other creations?”  I swear I was just talking about it like last month, and there they are!  Many comic creations from the 80’s were a bit cheesy and cartoony but that was the style back then so now the challenge presented to writers is how do you bring these corny characters back in a way that keeps to their origin but also updates them  for more modern readers?  HERE’S THE ISSUE WITH THAT ANSWER.  When Bird-Brain last hung around the New Mutants, he was a clunky awkward caricature but now in his dramatic return, we see an updated Bird-Brain who is strongly reminiscent of his original drawing but even a seasoned reader couldn’t help but be startled but his fearsome look as he attacked Dani and the rest of the team.  More importantly then Bird-Brain’s new style is Warlock’s sudden shift at the end and refusal to let any of them leave the island.  One can’t help but wonder how far he will take that ultimatum when his friends don’t back down.

Secret Avengers #23 – I love the team, and the new direction of the book.  I think Captain Britain is at his most snarky in this title, much more so than we have seen in the last few years.  What I don’t like is when they give us stories of characters that spoils the ending of another storyline.  Like when Valkyrie joined this new line-up for example, clearly that means that she lives through the end of Fear Itself: the Fearless with at least some measure of strength and power to her so it almost defeats the purpose of us reading the end of Fearless.  Well they did it again, this issue with Venom.  I am all for Venom joining this team, I think it will be nice to have a Venom around that a little less Lethal and a little more Protector, but they already stated flat out in this issue that he recently saved Las Vegas from being sucked into Hell.  Now obviously the chances of the Marvel writers actually sucking Las Vegas into Hell are remote at best, but, for the sake of storytelling, maybe they should not have mentioned that until the final issue of Circle of Four?  Just a though here guys, work with us!

Uncanny X-Force #22 – Some real high and low points in this issue.  High points include Besty still rocking the Lady Britain outfit (which is a nice welcome change from her normal unitard and AOA Kurt starting to loosen up a bit around his new comrades in the midst of this insane Otherworld War.  Now on the other hand, some bad or just weird parts of the issue were creepy muscle-controlling guy and his grow ass power, the nonstop barrage of Otherworld battling and creatures (almost as if they were trying to squeeze an entire huge war into just 2 or 3 issues), and last but DEFINITELY not least is Weapon III slicing Fantomex’s face right off his head (which is just as bad as Deadpool’s entire head being severed while he continued bantering).  The entire storyline is just turning into out to be a bit much and poorly handled I think.

Venom #13.3 – Eh…I dunno.  This storyline started out really strong and I was into it, but now it’s starting to peter out a little bit.  Part of the reason for my lagging interest could be because we already know that this ends with everyone being fine.  Red Hulk is over in Avengers.  X-23 is with Avengers Academy.  Venom just joined Secret Avengers.  And Ghost Rider is presumably still alive and being a bitch, but who really cares at this point about her.  It’s also worth mentioning that I hated Mephisto in this issue because I just saw and LOVED him over in New Mutants a few weeks earlier.  I’m going to of course get the last few issues of the story but my hopes aren’t as high as they once were.

Wolverine & the X-men #6 – I LOVE a good Brood story!  I do, it almost doesn’t matter what else is going on because I just love reading about Sleazoids.  And not a person on this Earth hates Brood aliens more than Kitty Pryde so it’s MORE than fitting that her entire body would be being invaded by them.  I love seeing how Broo reacted to his brethren being so close by (and even more glad that he chose to protect Kitty from them).  I’m a little less into the whole gambling story but I get it, they are trying to keep a large portion of this book light and happy so that fine, I just hope they don’t put so much emphasis on “fuzzy warm feeling” that we lose the quality of the story and the character development.  Oh and who’s this creepy alien coming after Broo?  How many people even know he’s there?

X-men #25 – Sigh…I just…don’t care.  Yeah, I don’t care about this anymore.  I am getting really tired of Raizo Kodo and his band of miscreants, and to be honest, I’m not really that invested in Jubilee anymore.  They’ve ruined a classic character to the point where I just don’t even care anymore.  It was bad enough when they took her powers but this vampire deal has really run its course.  The best part of this issue is that they finally dealt with Storm and her history with vampires.  Maybe with Deadpool showing up next issue, this whole thing will get a bit more interesting.

X-men: Legacy #262 – BIIIIIIIG Let Down.  I was expecting this issue to be about the two sides of X-men meeting up for the first time to take down Exodus and then go their separate ways maybe a little less angry.  No instead the entire issue was a cross country chase with him and a brief and over-before-it-started disagreement between Logan and Rogue.  And the only ones of Cyclops’ X-men that even appeared was Generation Hope (which mean this is either before Kenji’s mutiny or after and it didn’t go very well) which was a completely let down.  I don’t really understand why Hope showing up is worse than Cyclops since as far as I can tell she is the one person he won’t kill but I guess that something we will get into last issue since they only showed up for the last page.

Flash Review - 2/8/12

Battle Scars #4 - FINALLY!  It took 4 issues of boring battling between everyone in the world and Marcus Johnson.  We saw some creepy aging guy at the very beginning and Nick Fury (sort of) at the very end…and that was interesting!  Other than that everything in the middle was still boring as hell.  I love Deadpool and Taskmaster but every panel that didn't have them on it seemed like a complete waste of time to me.  And the big shock ending that he was Fury’s son…wasn’t such a big deal to be honest, I kind had that suspicion a while ago.  Here’s the twist though.  He’s not Nick Fury, he’s the living LMD that we saw over in Secret Avengers…oooooo!  With only 2 issues left, there’s no point in stopping the series now but what a wait of 6 issues. 

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 9 #6 – I love a good Nikki Wood as much as the next Buffy fan but to be honest that was the only good part of this issue…oh that and the return of Spike!  The story of Spike going on a police ride-along was a great secondary story but the whole issue in general was a little flat.  Also, it was also really great to see Principle Wood again (especially since the last time we saw him was with Faith in the show’s finale and now she’s off on her own with no explanation of why they split), maybe we will get to see more of him but I doubt it.  I know the show was big on having a few quiet episodes in-between the huge events but someone should tell the writers that that doesn’t always fly with printed stories.  We didn’t even get a cliffhanger ending…

Carnage USA #3 – SUCH…a disappointment!  I keep saying it but this series has just left me completely unfulfilled with each issue.  The team of Avengers they threw together for this is boring, the storyline was weak as hell, and the best part of the issue was the appearance of Venom (the worst and least of the Venoms ever) at the very end.  The symbiote weapons that the soldiers are using are lame, the use of Scorn/Tania Nieves is lame, and Carnage’s entire plane to subjugate the town and make them pull out their own teeth is the worst.  The preceding Carnage limited has Shriek, Doppelganger, and all sorts of craziness so we were led to believe that this sequel was going to be bigger and better than ever.  NOT SO MUCH.

Journey into Mystery #634 – First and foremost I loved the Buffy reference at the very beginning!  If anymore remembers season 4 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, there was a Halloween episode that involved an impending God of Fear being summoned and we find out at the end that the words next to his miniscule picture mean “Actual Size” so I loved the opening splash page of this issue.  After it was a bit of a downhill slide though.  I love a good Nightmare story but I prefer him corny and campy not actually evil and sinister.  Last issue was better and hopefully next issue will be great, but this one was a little weird.  But Journey has been great lately so we can ignore one slow issue.

Secret Avengers #22 – First issue of a brand new era!  Love the new line-up.  Hawkeye will be a great leader for this new team…if he can get Brian Braddock under control that it.  I have seen Captain Britain and his uppity attitude in the past (mostly in old issues of Excalibur) but he seemed like he mostly got that under control until now.  I think it will be great to see the dynamic between two leaders (who usually would never have even crossed paths) as this new team progresses.  I am surprised to see Giant Man joining the team since “covert ops” never really seemed like his thing but Hank Pym is a great character no matter where he is so it should be fun to watch.  Thrilled to see Black Widow and Beast are still around, but I somewhat question the presence of Valkyrie.  I already think that The Fearless series is a complete waste of time and money but by having her show up here we already know she lives through that story (with her sword and some measure of her powers) and joins this team…so why are we supposed to even bother with Fearless??

Venom #13.1 – SO much better than the first part!  The art is better, the villains were more interesting, and the storyline was pretty good.  Watching the Antitheses take apart their “good” counterparts was exciting to say the least.  I mean who would have thought that X-23 would get taken down by a cheerleader??  I have loved Blackheart ever since Hearts of Darkness back in the 90’s so it’s great to see him coming back with some devious plots that don’t involve taking down Mephisto.  I’m not sure how I feel about Daimon Hellstrom and Dr. Strange suddenly being everywhere in the Marvel Universe at once I’ll reserve judgment on them until later.

Wolverine and the X-men #6 – What the hell!?  That skank Kitty Pryde woke up at the end of last issue all preggers and we’re all left wondering “Who’s the father?”  The answer this issue was creepier then we could have ever expected: Kitty is pregnant with millions of Brood designed to kill just her.  Again I ask “What the hell!?”  And as if it wasn’t bad enough to hear about her inhaling brood, we got to watch her inhale a mini Kid Gladiator…ewww.  And as much I love the Brood and their stories…didn’t we just have TWO Brood related stories over in Astonishing X-men within the last year??  I wish they wouldn’t over use such a great X-villain so much.  And way does Wolverine insist on making Kid Omega so heavily involved in everything?  It’s one thing to keep him under watchful eye at the school but another all together to make him an integral part of important missions.  Which leads me to…

Wolverine and the X-men: Alpha and Omega #2 – This is why he shouldn’t trusted or forced to participate because even if they pressure him into helping they have no guarantee that they can control him or trust him not to betray them.  And since he is a telepath able to create and control something as elaborate as his mental prison for Wolverine and Armor, who could really stop him without Jean, Emma, or Charles around?  I’m sorry but I just don’t see Rachel (sorry…”Ms. Grey”) being up to the task without the help of the Phoenix Force or its echo.  And one last thing…does this mean that Armor is now longer going to be in Astonishing and is here now?

X-men #24 – I’m not really feeling Raizo Kodo and his band of vegetarian vampire followers (especially since they are popping up everywhere now) but in a way this story did need to happen.  I mean, unless they were going to make Jubilee go crazy and evil, they needed to have some way of getting her under control.  Unfortunately it may end up meaning that she leaves the X-men AGAIN to go join his group, which would be a big shame since she JUST got back with the team.  On the bright side…wait there is no bright side, here’s to Jubes staying for more than just a few issues.