salinea | Entries tagged with medium: comics

Someone on failfandomanon asked for comics recs to learn about Magneto at his morally ambiguous best, and I spent a half an hour typing a huge ass long answer and was late to meet a friend >_>. Anyway, I’ve cleaned it up and clarified some stuff and decided I might as well share it here:

In order of chronology of the character

Magneto - Testament by Greg Pak: Magneto’s youth during the Shoah. Very good and heartbreaking. Highly Reccomended.
Classic X-Men #12 (A Fire in the Night) by Claremont: After the war Magneto tries to settle in Ukraine with his wife & child. It does not go well. Essential reading.
Uncanny X-Men #161 by Claremont: Magneto meets Charles Xavier in a hospital in Israel. It goes well until it doesn’t. Essential reading.
Classic X-Men #19 (I, Magneto) by Claremont: Magneto goes Nazi hunting for the CIA. It does not go well. Highly recommended.

Uncanny X-Men #150 by Claremont: Magneto tries to stop nuclear proliferation by threatening the world’s governments with his power. The first issue in which Claremont gave Magneto’s depth and recreated him as a Holocaust survivor.

God Loves, Man Kills by Claremont: Somebody is targeting mutants. Magneto seeks the X-Men to help. Highly recommended and fairly standalone.

Secret Wars by Shooter: An overly powerful entity decided to summon a bunch of villains and heroes and have them fight against one another for his entertainment. Magneto was summoned among the heroes, to everybody’s shock. Not absolutely necessary but takes place in the lapse of time when Magneto was getting more nuanced and Xavier was using the chance to try to convince his friend to amend his way. Lots of other cool stuff in it otherwise (Doom is the star of this show tho).

Uncanny X-Men #196 by Claremont: Magneto chats with Rachel, who came from the future in which Magneto’s worst nightmares happened.

Uncanny X-Men #199 by Claremont: Kitty takes Magneto to a Holocaust survivors reunion.
Uncanny X-Men #200 by Claremont: Magneto is put on trial. It does not go well. Both of those are highly recommended.

New Mutants v1 #21-75: Charles left Magneto in charge of the kids at his school. It does not go well. In particular issues #35, 38-40, 50-52 by Claremont are highly recommended. #60-61, 64, 73-75 by Louise Simonson for how it goes to hell, but I don’t much like Simonson’s take on the character.

X-Men vs Avengers by Stern & Shooter: The Avengers question Xavier’s choice of substitute teacher. It does not go well.

X-Men vs the Fantastic Four by Claremont - Magneto tries to save Kitty Pryde’s life.

Uncanny X-Men 274-275 by Claremont - Magneto and Rogue in the Savage Land and old ghosts. Highly recommended.

X-Men 1-3 by Jim Lee and Claremont - Magneto’s descent into heartbreaking crazy villainy again and Claremont’s farewell to the X-Men for a while.

IGNORE SHITTY 90S EVENTS

Well, except for:

Legion Quest (Uncanny X-Men #320- X-Men #40- UXM 321 & XM-41) by Nicieza, Lobdell and Waid - Xavier’s crazy and crazy powerful son goes back in the past to Xavier and Magneto’s first meeting in Israel to try to kill Magneto before he becomes a supervillain. It does not go well.

X-Men Unlimited #2 by Nicieza – A story of vengeance and grief.

ANYWAY ON TO THE 00S

Excalibur v3 #1-14 by Claremont - Xavier and Magneto hang out in the ruins of Genosha. Not very good but very, very slashy.

House of M (main series) by Bendis - Magneto’s dream has been made true and replaced reality. His family is the stuff of Greek tragedy.

House of M - Civil War by Gage - How Magneto’s dream came true in the House of M alternate reality.

X-Men Legacy #208-210 by Carey - Xavier was shot in the head during the Messiah Complex events. A depowered Magneto helps him finding himself again.

Magneto gets repowered and then joins the X-Men who are living on an artificial island made of the ruins of Asteroid M off the coast of San Francisco and has declared themselves to be their own nation. Because if they’re copying him he might as well join them, ya know.

(This is Uncanny X-Men #516, but I don’t much like how this issue is written so it’s not highly recommended. OTOH I’m pretty fond of UXM #518-522, in which Magneto does his best to show his use to the X-Men).

Nation X #1 (The Ghost of Asteroid M) by Spurrier - Short story about Magneto settling in with the X-Men and especially their students

Uncanny X-Men #534.1 by Gillen - The X-Men ask their PR agent to deal with Magneto’s joining their team. Hilarity ensues.

X-Men Legacy #231-259 by Carey - Magneto as a member of Rogue’s team. Not always very Magneto focussed, but Carey writes one of the best Magneto outside of Claremont so… Also the Magneto/Rogue romance, if that rocks your boat.

Uncanny X-Men v2 #1-3 by Gillen – Magneto as a member of Cyclops new Extinction team, which he boasts as the world’s mightiest heroes, vs Sinister. Not essential, but has a couple of great Mags moments and is a great mood setting for that point of time in the X-Men.

Magneto: Not a Hero by Skottie Young - A mini about Magneto’s clone re-appearing and starting to kill people in his name. Highly recommended.

Uncanny X-Men v2 #13, #15-20 by Gillen - the Avengers and the X-Men went to war and a few of X-Men became the host of the Phoenix Force. Oh, also Sinister is attacking. What does Mags do?

Avengers vs X-Men – Consequences by Gillen - The Avengers won and the X-Men are on the run. What does Mags do?

All New X-Men #1-5 + Uncanny X-Men v3 #1-3, #8, #16, 21-22 by Bendis – Cyclops’ group of hunted X-Men try to a be a radical force for good for mutants and train new recruits. Magneto plays a dangerous game with SHIELD trying to uncover who is resurrected the Sentinel program.

Magneto v1 1-on going by Bunn - Magneto left Cyclops to go and hunt the enemies of mutantkind by himself. Very good and very dark.

No More Humans by Carey - Humans have mysteriously disappeared from earth, leaving only mutants. What does Mags do? Carey still writes the best Magneto outside of Claremont.

Outside of continuity:

X-Men – Mythos: A rewriting of the first mission of X-Men against the mutant terrorist Magneto.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/440766.html

( looooong )

Which brings my reading list to:
Enjoying:
ANXM
UXM
C&XF
Avengers Assemble
New Avengers
Captain Marvel
Journey into Mystery
Thor: God of Thunder
FF
X-Men Legacy
Young Avengers
Uncanny X-Force
Fearless Defenders

So far so good:
F4
Secret Avengers
Age of Ultron
Guardians of the Galaxy

Dropped:
Avengers
Thunderbolts
Ironman
Deadpool

I'm not sure why I keep reading this but I am?:
Uncanny Avengers

Looking forward to:
X-Men
Thanos Rising

Onward!

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/437960.html

Basically it's an update on my previous post: Recs to newcomers to X-Men comics for the First Class fans but more generic about it.

So you want to read X-Men?

X-Men is one of the hugest and often most confusing corner of the Marvel Universe. Therefore despite its popularity it can be hard to get into. I’m hardly the most well read X-Men fan ever – yet – but I’ll try my best to give some pointers.

( looooooooooooooooooooooooooong )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/437573.html

First! Did I ever got around to plugging

comics_reviews_etc and

comicsmod? Comics_reviews_etc, modded by the lovely

bethbethbeth is a community for discussions and reviews of comics issues for people craving meta and discussions (where has all the meta gone?); and comicsmod is a comics anon meme. They both look pretty neat!!

Second, short meta/rant I wrote on tumblr about the events regarding Daken at the end of Remender's Uncanny X-Force
( spoilers for UXF's final )

And third, I wrote a review for the first six issues of All New X-Men over on

comics_reviews_etc

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/436098.html

( slight/vague spoilers )

Which gives:

I'm in:
ANXM (has been solidly entertaining despite flaws of voice & characterisation (and continuity))
C&XF
Avengers Assemble
New Avengers
Captain Marvel
Journey into Mystery
Thor: God of Thunder
FF

So far so good:
Deadpool
X-Men Legacy
F4

Nevermind then:
Avengers
Thunderbolts
Ironman

Looking forward to:
Young Avengers
Uncanny X-Force
Fearless Defenders
X-Men
Uncanny X-Men
Thanos Rising

Onward!

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/435871.html

I caught up with volume 6 of Ooku, and while it continues being very good; it does feel like the big edge and quality of the manga faded out after the first two or three volumes. The point of the gender reversal in the setting is less prominent and it becomes a lot of political & some romantic intrigues with too many characters that it is hard to keep track of.

I've also caught up with vol 4-6 of Black Rose Alice, and while I love, it is very very id ficcy.

I also read the second volume of Brides Story, and it's still ridiculously good and gorgeous. Lots of wonderful silent panels that are so expressive and they went and OMG the scenes about the embroidery motives transmitted through generation *GUSH* I kind of love that the author sort of apologises in the annex about fan service. Oh, Kaoru Mori, here, you have my express permission to put in as many female naked bodies in anything you do as you want. Srsly she draws the best naked female bodies ever.

Inanna's Tears
It's a decent story (though the person who decided on the font of the first few pages should be shot), but not as good as what I was hoping. It lacks something, I dunno, some sort of twist to truly make it a story. It's all too predictable.

So I did go a read Stumptown (it's shorter than Q&G), at least the first one (is the second a mini too? I think I'll wait for it to be over to read it); and it's brilliant. Don't have much to say beyond that ^^

Did I mention reading the recently finished run of New Mutants yet? I don't see it in this thread so I assume not. I remember the first time I tried it, while I was starting to get into Marvel, and I was confused and had a hard time getting into it. Man, it is so much better when you already know and like the characters!! Wells' run overall is excellent, very strong and focussed and epic. DnA's has a much more hazier sense of plot and characterisation although it does also have good moments (at least they did try to develop Cypher past bringing him back even if some of those development were weird and still lacking the answer to the question "did anybody bother telling his parents he's not longer dead?"). Some very random shipping though.

Also I read the first volume of Peter Madsens' Valhalla which is... hmm, less good than I was expecting? A bit too much of the sort of humour I don't care much for; but still good and funny.

Iron Man - Armor Wars
Solid enough story, but not very engaging. I think I might just have to give up on Iron Man and stick to fanfics when it comes to him.

Himitsu: the Revelation v5-9
So long since I'm catching up with this one. As always the stories are very good in all their dark & morbid glories (and the storytelling so much more understated than the animated adaptation, what a relief!), with some very fine tension and horror. I'm struck by how much more slashy than I remembered it is though. And somewhat surprised that I don't remember any of the stories from the anime, I guess they made up quite a few.

Also Captain America & Black Widow which was pretty good, if a little bit... quick? I dunno, not everything was, but sometimes it skipped forward in time in a way that felt a bit off. Anyway good characterizations and good use of alternate universe and alternate characters.
I think I ended up shipping evil!Natasha with the person she was working for ^^

Emperor Doom, brilliant in a tragi-comic way and loads of fun.

Super Villain team-up 1-4 (The one with Namor & Doom)
Loads of fun! Those two are so cute together.

Doctor Strange & Doctor Doom: Triumph & Torment
Holy shit that was good. Gorgeous art, gorgeous storytelling, brilliant characterisation. A beautiful bittersweet tragedy lacking the usual comedic tone that Doom's usually got but without trading them for lack of clarity.
The only thing I disliked was the way all the multicultural magicians were made to look like fools and then fawning all over Strange.
Anyway I ended up posting some scans & commentary of this one on tumblr if anyone's interested: http://demoiselledefortune.tumblr.co...ph-and-torment

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/435372.html

( vague spoilers )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/434587.html

Another meta on tumblr I'm reblogging, about the ending of Journey into Mystery from a meta perspective:

( spoilers, duh. )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/433419.html

Where were we?

Ah yes, first, Alan Davies' run on Excalibur wrapped up. It was cute, it had some great Nightcrawler and Rachel moments and Phoenix lore that would be utterly ignored in future crossover events, but it was also high on a wacky, and to be perfectly honest, I retain, at most, a very fuzzy memories of it. Oh, and suddenly Brian wasn't an ass anymore. I guess there was that.

I actually read the first handful issues of Lobdell's run too. Because, that other arc he wrote, with Doom, that was actually good. But then he tried to be grimdark, with Excalibur, and well, that didn't work out so much.

Judging by the fact he wasn't awful on X-Factor either; I think that's an on going issue with Lobell. He's good when he allows himself to be fun and light, but if he tries to be serious, he this subtlety problem in which that he has none. 'Tis very sad. So yeah.

Which brings us to Fatal Attractions. The thing is, it isn't awful. By which I mean there's a bunch of good scenes in it. All the stuff with Kitty, for one. Quite a few with Storm. Some of the scenes of pathos in general - around Illyana's death - are pretty good for all that they are awfully forced and "subtle". And there's even some interesting things with Xavier's characterisation and his discussion with Magneto - except most of it didn't make sense in the end -- but between that and a few other things, I do actually rather like Lobdell's Xavier. At least when he isn't trying too hard to be edgy and nineties. And the summary of Magneto's backstory is actually pretty damn good which makes the absolute breakdown in characterisation later on all the more baffling and frustrating.

The story structurally is quite weak because both in terms of actions following from actions and from the characters acting out their motivation, it makes no damn sense. Stuff just happen because the writers thought it'd be cool for them, I guess? The overall result is a handful of gems amid a confused mess of crap. Sad.

Bloodties is at least better structurally; although it of course also suffers from the SUBTLETY problem, and apparently decided that after going through the troubles of showcasing Pietro and Crystal all along and bringing them in the centre of it, they were now going to stop allowing them any agency and let everyone else resolve the story. I dunno.

Anyway, to answer Yo!'s liveblogging '90's question; I have actually for some time done something similar to that on tumblr; and since I have recently fixed a tag problem I've had; I can now even link you right away to those stuff: http://demoiselledefortune.tumblr.co.../reading-x-men. If you want to see me flail a lot about Magneto & relatives, that's the place!

Moving on!

Black Widow: the Things they say about her suffer from the same problems as Homecoming except worse.

Black Widow: Deadly Origin also suffers from similar problems except it's also not as good a story and rather on the confusing side. Just - most flashback scenes are cool.

Ironman: Doomquest and Legacy of Doom are wonderfully hilarious and fun stories.

I also liked the Doom miniseries (2000) and its contingent F4 issues (by Claremont - I didn't know Claremont had done a F4 run!!) also loads of fun.

I also tries reading Spider-Woman: Origin and Spider-woman: Agent of SWORD which I found both pretty boring. The Bendis idiosyncrasies were getting on my nerve, I guess, and on their own do not sell me on the character (I guess if I had already liked her, I could have enjoyed them much more).

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/433088.html

Well, that was horrible.

( spoilers )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/432773.html

Miscellaneous stuff I picked up at random at the library / borrowed from friends, etc. :

Avengers Kree - Skrull War
Rather weak. The storytelling is just wayyyyy confusing and muddled. (And I don't think it's just the Silver age aspect). I think the most amusement I got from that was seeing the parents of Teddy and Billy on the same panel... >_>

Korvac Saga
Also pretty weak, this time more because there's just too many characters for it to go anywhere. Has a couple of good moments though.

World War Hulk - Damage Control
Sheer brilliance.

Gaiman's The Eternals
I'm too much of a Zelazny fangirl to love part of this; buuuuuut I do resent how it's all premise, very little concrete payoff. I believe there was another series that did follow from there but that seems a bit little (also not exactly something I've seen recced around). And I'm not certain it works very well with the Marvel Universe.

Enigma
A bit aged. Lots of cool stuff though. Mostly enjoyed it.

Back on point:

The first 12 issues of Priest's Black Panther
Funny story: that book at my public library? Started in a very confusing way with a story called "The End". After some puzzling around, I figured it skipped the first 12 issues for some reason. I guess it's nice to know that not only does DC and Marvel hate us, so does Paninin! Anyway, I managed to procure myself those 12 issues by other means, and that was much less confusing, despite the anachronological storytelling. Also it was pretty awesome. Except for the way the narrator talks about the under age bodyguards/bethrothed girls in a disgustingly leering tone that is

Let's see if the story called "The End" makes more sense now

Black Widow - Web of Intrigue
Decent enough story. Didn't exactly blow my mind though.

Black Widow - Homecoming
You know when I said that from past experience I didn't think I liked Richard Morgan's handle of gender issues? I think I should have kept it at that. He makes Sheri Tepper look subtle, and manages to be more dis-empowering at the same time. It's not a bad story otherwise, there are so good bit, but huh, yeah, whatever.

Black Widow - Itsy Bitsy Spider & Breakdown
Now that's something else; pretty brilliant story and characterisation. Loved it.

Black Widow - Pale Little Spider
A bit more on the nose, but a very solid story still.

PAD's original run on X-Factor
Loved it. Excellent mix of humour and a sharp take on X-Men themes. Great gallery of characters. I never really warmed up to Guido in the current run of X-Factor but this totally did the work. Also Maddox to a lesser extent. Quicksilver's brilliant, I fell in love with Lorna in two seconds (they have the best bickering sibling relationships even if they weren't supposed to be siblings yet or were they? I suspect PAD had plans), & so on. Then it ends abruptly, which is a shame.

X-Cutionner Song
Kind of liked this more than I expect, actually. Not that it is good exactly, and it has a few bits that totally made me facepalm; however I mostly enjoyed it. Overblown soap opera family melodrama - my one big weakness.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/431049.html

I don't think i'd posted yet on Black Widow (2010)

So, the Black Widow run by Liu was, like, really, really good. Hmm, why was it so ridiculously short? Great art too, and a great balance of atmosphere and badassness.

Then Swierczynski did a story too, which was okay, I guess.

Then I tried reading Widowmaker but I got bored so I gave up.

And I've finally concluded my reading of the Claremont era of X-Men.

The whole Outback - Siege Perilous era was mostly very weak, messy and aimless, with some highlights like the introduction of Jubilee and Gambit and it does get better by the ending though, when the team start gathering again. (although to my disappointment they never really acknowledge how douchy it was to play dead for such a long time)

Louise Simonson's X-Factor is overall mostly very solid, with a few weaker issues here and there, but I found myself surprisingly interested in those characters (given that I'm hardly a fan of the O5 as a team), also great art

Wish I could say the same of her New Mutants, but she's obviously more interested in her own characters (the X-Terminators one) than any of the previous ones. I do love Boom Boom and Rictor, though, so there's that. And the return to Asgard arc at least was okay.

Excalibur, I kind of love the character dynamics and characters period (well except for Brian), but I usually found it pretty hard following the plots and as a result caring for the stories. Lots of great art though.

Days of Future Present was very good.

I also read Vision Quest and Darker than Scarlet while I was at it, which were okay as stories if... wince worthy at times.

If anyone's still reading and has suggestion for 90's X-Men stuff that are worth bothering with, I'm all ears. Obviously, i'll try PAD's original X-Factor run, I'll continue Alan Davies' Excalibur and will try the Warren Ellis one, there's Lobdell's Generation X and the whole Age of Apocalypse I'll check out. And someone on tumblr persuaded me to try Nicieza's X-Force (I think they have psychic power). Beyond that...

Oh, and for something completely different, I've started reading Starman, which is very good.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/429995.html

Teaser:

Black Widow (Name of the Rose) x17
Loki (kid Loki, quotes) x16
X-Men (Mystique/Destiny, Kitty, Emma Frost, Hope) x4
Magnus family (Magneto, Children's Crusade, House of M - Civil War) x10
Demon Knights (Xanadu) x1

( under the cut )

If you want, please, comment & credit ♥

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/427717.html

Essays & meta:

coffeeandink on Avengers (especially liked the bits on Thor and Loki):

Loki is both Thor's brother and an alien, a friend and a traditional enemy, every strangeness and every unfitting (unfit) aspect now an answer instead of a puzzle. So long as Thor can only comprehend the Asgardian narrative, the Allfather's narrative, he cannot acknowledge that Loki the Liesmith has been lied to all his life; Loki the usurper has been kidnapped from his home, Loki the ambitious has always been treated as innately not-quite-right.

brownbetty on Loki in fandom

The thing is, I have the idea that what Loki is suffering is among other things, a crisis of morality. The Asgardian moral decision making flowchart seems to look more or less like this:

Should I do $thing?

Is it something Odin would do?
if yes: Goto 2.
if no: Goto 3.

Are you Odin?
if yes: You're Odin! Do what the hell you want!
if no: No way, man, that shit ain't right.

Will it make you sound awesome when it is immortalized in epic verse?
if yes: Do it! Definitely the ethical course.
if no: Don't do it. Unless it's punching a Jotunn. That's always ~~hilarious~~ right.

experimentalmadness on Magneto and the Frankenstein's Monster in XMFC:

The thing that all these stories have in common is whether it’s a Monster, a Golem, or Magneto, you are dealing with the pure unadulterated result of what happens when you ostracize a minority to the breaking point and then instead of realizing that you created this destructive force to begin with, you turn around and blame the very creature itself and call it the monster.

I think everyone's seen this one already but just in case,

cluegirl On Sentiment:

When I saw The Avengers the first time, Loki's scornful "Sentiment" as he shanks Thor, (accompanied by the tear he will deny until the last breath is wrung out of him,) is the one I remembered. It was a beautiful line, and it was a beautiful, breathtaking moment, and it was meant to shine.

However upon second watching, I noticed an even more beautiful pattern to Joss's use of that word in other places. Sentiment. It's not a two dollar word, really, is it? You don't lay even odds on getting to hear it on any given day, because it's not an everyday word, or notion -- unless you own or work in a gift shop that specializes in engraving.

But that word is used in the Avengers four times. And each time it's spoken with scorn about something the speaker is trying to disprove -- and each time, the speaker fails to disprove anything at all, and in fact that point goes on to be staggeringly proven later on. It is, if I may say so, a beautiful evidence of Joss Whedon's actual skill as a writer well beyond snappy dialogue.

minnaway on the Avengers movie. I especially loved her observations about the way food/drinking was used in the movie and a few other things like:

9. If Loki/Bruce/Tony are one triangle, Bruce/Tony/Steve are another. Coulson tells Steve that Bruce isn't just the "thing" but a very smart person; Tony tells Steve that even without the suit he's a genius etc. etc. etc.; Bruce was trying to be Steve; Tony says everything special in Steve came from a bottle.

10. And Odin/Thor/Loki are mirrored by Fury/Steve/Tony. Loki notes that Odin had to summon...dark energy? dark matter? something or other? whatever, the point is, expend a shitlot of energy to get Thor to Midgard without the Bifrost; Fury has to call in cards and negotiate with the powers above him to get the Avengers Initiative in process. Odin traded his eye for ravens; Fury has a zillion electronic eyes keeping the earth under surveillance. Fury and Steve and Tony post Coulson's death, marking out the points of a triangle, and Tony with his chair half swiveled away.

(And Loki and Clint steal an eye specifically.)

Greg Rucka on writing women. (I have such an admiration crush on Greg Rucka)

Gender isn't simply a biological trait; it's a societal one. The female experience is different from that of the male, and if, as a male writer, you cannot accept that basic premise, then you will never, ever, be able to write women well. A man walking alone through Midtown Manhattan at three in the morning may have concerns for his safety, but I promise you, it's a very different experience for a woman taking the same walk, and it's different again for a man wearing a dress. Think about it. That's a societal factor, and it's a gendered one, and this is not and can not be subject to debate. If you're looking to argue that sexism is a thing of the past, that the world is gender-blind, you're not only wrong, you're lying to yourself.

rexluscus's page of Loki fanfics recs.

And some fics recs of mine own:

Móðir (2559 words) by

what_alchemy
Summary:

When Odin places his Jötunn foundling in Frigga's arms, she knows what is to come.

Beautiful story about Frigga and her relationship with Loki.

When I Say Jump (12539 words) by

lc2l

AVENGERS SPOILERS!!!

One minute Clint's reaching for his gun to stop Loki stealing the Tesseract, the next he's shooting Fury and taking it. Easy as switching sides.

mindcontrolled!Hawkeye/Loki. Wonderfully twisted and yet very honest.

and get him to swap our places (28734 words) by

Mici
Fandom: Young Avengers
Relationships: Billy Kaplan/Teddy Altman, Billy Kaplan/Other (sort of), Teddy Altman/Other (sort of)
Characters: Billy Kaplan, William Lensherr, Tommy Shepherd, Thomas Lensherr, Teddy Altman, Kate Bishop, Cassie Lang, Eli Bradley, Jonas (Young Avengers), Julio Rictor
Summary:

Billy casts the most dubious of spells and gets into a shitload of trouble when he switches places with William Lensherr, Prince of Genosha, member of the House of M.

Great exploration of the House of M reality, and especially what it would mean for Billy and Tommy (if, you know, they had been in it as anything more than shadows). I just love characterisation here, they have a lot of subtlety. The only criticism I'd make against it is that it has no real plot and it gets resolved too easily. I especially love how, while not appearing in this story, Magneto casts a large shadow.

Zhashtar (3095 words) by

epistolic
Fandom: The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Relationships: Loki/Thor
Characters: Loki (Marvel), Thor (Marvel), Clint Barton
Summary:

Love is for children.

I just love the writing/atmosphere in here. Very evocative and sort of... sword & sorcery in a way that feels almost poetic. You know, Tanith Lee-like. Very & short insta portrait.

Family Ties (84560 words) by

skiesovergideon
Fandom: Thor (2011)
Characters: Loki (Marvel), Thor (Marvel), Iron Man, Captain America - Character, various and sundry OCs
Summary:

After his fall from the Bifrost, Loki finds himself taken in by a suburban family and lacking most of his magic. He resolves to escape them as soon as possible. This does not go the way he planned.

Pre-Avengers movie Loki redemption (mostly) epic fic. Lots of OCs, very ingenuous plottig with a kickass finale and it mostly works well in term of characterisation without cheating (too much, and what cheating there is has intra-story justification).

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/426497.html

Read Freak Angels, which was very good. Gorgeous art and the story is entrancing start from finish. Reminded me a bit of la nuit des enfants rois.

The Immortal Iron-First

Aka the last chance for me to find out if Fraction actually can write or if everything he does is crappy. And, errr, yes, actually this was pretty damn good. Very solid storytelling, atmosphere, action and characterisation. Some of the one shot stories, especially, were really brilliant. Of course perhaps it was only due to Brubaker's co-writing XD The plot was a bit more so-so, with some strange skips here and there.

The follow up by Swierczynski was also solid, though a bit more aimless.

Immortal Weapons
Dog Brother #1 was good. The rest were mediocre. (Although Prince of the Orphan has some nice art of half naked Danny).

The first Robin miniseries

Well anything with Shiva is automatically good as far as I'm concerned.

Overall a nice little story.

The second Robin miniseries

Cute stuff, especially the very 80's concept of computer virus OMG and what not. XD a solid story anyway.

But do I really want to read those 100 issues of the Robin on going by Dixon? Err, they're probably not bad and I'm sure it'll be somewhat entertaining, but I'm not sure I have the motivation, no.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/414858.html

It's so frustrating seeing reactions to the Huntress in DCnU is Helena Wayne thing, because so many people are excited and enthusiastic by it, and it's not like they're wrong for being excited and enthusiastic about it, they have very legitimate reasons for it!!! but each time I read it it feels like they're gloating about me losing one of my favorite DC character - yet another of my favorite DC characters.

And at this point I just. I cannot anymore, DC. Congrat. After Renée being so deep in limbo nobody even know what's up with her to tell the writers of Batwoman when they wanted to know, after Cass Cain and Steph Brown having their past as Batgirls and Robin so heavily erased and insulted and being in limbo and oh yeah at some point they'll show up in Leviathan and we have such a good habit of keeping our words so you can have faith in it, and the Birds of Prey history being erased, and Oracle being demoted to Batgirl and her disability offensively removed, and Secret Six disappearing, and Catwoman, Voodoo and Red Hood and the Outlaws being written in such a panderingly objectified way, this one is the last straw. I give up.

I love Batwoman and Demon Knights so I'm reading those as long as I keep on liking them; and if Cass and Steph ever do show up in another Bat book, I'll check it; but other than that it's going to take a hell of an interesting premise to make me bother to check out anything you do.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/414660.html

Like with other issues of sexism in comics, the problematic narratives revolving around female characters becoming dangerous and insane / evil (the insane=evil thing in itself would be very much worth the examination and could be easily seen as worse than gender issues, but I’m not sure I’m up to it) as a result of their power was something I’d heard of before I started reading comics; mostly revolving around Jean Grey, and a little bit around the Scarlet Witch with Disassembled and Decimation. Now that I’ve just read the X-Men storyline Inferno, I found it interesting to see how many characters are present in it which plays in various ways along those lines, and how really fucking bad it looks.

Now most of the characters in Inferno have more to do with a theme of corruption by evil than by insanity (though again, the two are too often seen as nearly equivalent), but power, though in not an obvious way, definitely plays a role in each one of those.

Those characters are Madelyne / Goblin Queen, Illyana / Magik, Lorna / Polaris & Warren / Angel. Two of those, Madelyne & Illyana, are placed right in the center of the story; whereas Polaris and Warren are more peripheral but still make an interesting counterpoint.

( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/406852.html

Miller's run on Daredevil, including Born Again

Okay, this was very good. Damnit, now I have to praise Miller

but yeah, great storytelling, very fluid, sometimes very powerful, and often quite clever in plotting. Great villains, Kingpin as Magnificent Bastard is a great figure, and I always find Bullseye to be a blast. Elektra is a good... promise of a character. And yeah, this is all despite the creeping misogyny, which, to my surprise, was hardly the worst on Elektra, despite the fridging, but more on everyone else with a female body. (I read Miller's first run in translation - this one was good for a change

- and they put a couple of O'Neil penned issues written with advices from Miller or something, and I don't think I can find it in myself to forgive what the narrative does to Heather. Also there was Daredevil - Love & War which was just bad.)

and, err, I have more to post on X-Men stuff, but I think I'm going to make a separate post for it, considering, sorry for the spamming factor ^^

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/406597.html

So I really was planning on reading Immortal Iron Fist next, but then I was at my public library and I couldn't find anything of much interest, and there Alias was, so I took it. Turn out that might have not been such a good idea, because the French translation is horrible. Like sometimes the translator left some English words (like "Man" or "shit") untranslated because they think they're Manga scanlators or something, or maybe it was just to try to make it fit the bubbles, which still look really fucking unprofessional - and silly. Since at the best of time I find Bendis dialogues to be oscillating between amusing and aggravating, this is not doing it any favour.

Despite this, it's a pretty good story. Jessica is a strong lead, I love the whole outlook on a universe with superheroes from a more grounded and outsider PoV, and the storytelling is very good. The plots are a bit mediocre though.

The Pulse

Bendis dialogues work so much better in the original English! I liked this, it's fun and the story are interesting. It's too bad it hasn't a very strong direction - either the whole newspaper focus or Jessica Jones vehicule would have been great, but by trying to split between both it loses some steam. Jessica and Jameson in "discussions" will never get old, though.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/403464.html

X-Men related stuff I've read since the last:

The Longshot miniseries: Good but not as good as it wants to be. Still very neat ideas thrown in the lot, and it's always fun to have a Fool archetype as protagonist - we don't have enough of those.

Finished reading the Claremont penned New Mutants story, which ended on a pretty high note.

Up to the Fall of the Mutants with UXM, the art has greatly improved but the writing has been a bit uneven.

Started reading X-Factor branching from the Mutant Massacre crossover - I like it. Nice art. A bit too soap opera-ish with Scott & Jean, but very solid overall.

X-Men vs F4 was pretty good.

X-Men vs Avengers was... kinda weird.

I'm kind of wondering if I should keep up posing my on going impressions, both here and on rpg.net, so tell me if you're still interested.

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/401634.html

So I ended up posting those favourite lists of comics series & characters on rpg.net, so I might as well post them here too.

( Read more... )

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/399352.html

Daredevil - Man without Fearminiseries by Miller

This is all-right; but man is it wordy. Srsly, slow down with the narration boxes here!
Not sure if I have much else to say; it works well as an introduction to the character via origin story.

Chase

Very nice series. The art is awesome, Williams III oblige, and I really love Chase's character as much as I thought I would. Badass, world weary, sarcastic and non nonsense <3 Can't say I was all that interested into the plots though, and often found them a bit confusing as a result.

And it's very nice knowing who the kickass lady is just as she shows up in Batwoman, so thanks for the rec

Also, for massive irony points:
( big pics )

Also, I asked this on rpg.net to general indifference, but I should ask here too: So ya know, this makes it a year since I started reading the X-23 comics on advice of Yo!. Maybe I should do some sort of synthesis or something of the stuff I've read and liked best, some top [numbers] or something? What would you guys like (if you care at all)?

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/398449.html

Checkmate (Rucka)

Solid stories, and as always with Rucka, lots of badass women; but - well I think the big problem is I'm not that interested in spy stories (think I mentioned that while talking about Secret Warriors) especially in a superhero comic context when they're going to fight against ridiculous organisations - so I can't say I was gripped. Also I thought the ensemble cast dynamics failed to properly coalesced. Too many characters, perhaps, and too much on the jobs most of the time.

Not that I disliked it either, it's a good series. I just didn't think it was great.

Hickman's run on Fantastic Four (including Dark Reign: Fantastic Four & FF up to now)

Hickman has a way with long term storytelling that is very entertaining. I wasn't entirely sold on the story at first (note that the FF are probably, of Marvel's biggest franchises, the one I was the least familiar with or interesting in, so that doesn't help), but seeing plotlines converge and start having pay off is a thing of beauty.
On the other hand, I still hate sitcom family dynamics; the art is frequently crappy - especially on characters' face; Hickman sounds like a smug assholes in the letters in the back; and the poor Inhumans really are getting dragged right & left willy nilly depending on what authors from various corners of the marvel universe want to do with them, aren't they? Sad.

Current Mood: depressed
Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/397980.html

I'm due an update I think. I haven't been reading much lately, but I just started reading Checkmate; and mostly, I've been continuing reading Claremont era X-Men stuff.

Liked a lot of the X-Men stuff - I'm up to issue #200 - though the art is starting to get very uneven. Let's not even mention the hairstyles. I kind of really liked the meeting between Storm and Forge.

I find the New Mutants stuff a bit more uneven; some stories are great (the Legion one, the whole Asgardian stuff, some of the standalone stories) others less so (the Nova Roma arc especially, that whole fatphobic thing with Karma was disturbing, and the introduction of the Hellions was a bit weak though not without potential). I especially like Dani and Illyana.

Read Secret Wars which is extremely dorky, mostly in fun ways but also in awkward ways. Gotta love the Aliens Made Them Do It premise.

Read the Kitty Pryde & Wolverine miniseries which was pretty good.

That's all for now; you can continue reccing me stuff

Crossposts: http://etrangere.livejournal.com/395437.html

21 x Loki & co (kid!Loki, fem!Loki, regular!Loki, Ikol, Thor, Odin, Sif, Jormungand)
7 x Loki quotes icons
13 x Miscellaneous Marvel icons (Scarlet Witch, Wiccan, Speed, Nightcrawler, Gamora, Deadpool, Monet, Wolverine, Shadowcat, Adam Warlock quote, Rocket Raccoon quote, Kenji & Hope quote)
9 x Miscellaneous DC icons (Cass Cain, Lady Shiva, Steph Brown, Barbara Gordon)

teaser: