Diary of an up and coming sociopath

A couple of busy weeks coupled with some slow weeks for comics has left me playing catchup a little. 2 weeks after reading a comic it’s already well on its way into fading memory so a few of these might start getting vague, but I feel obliged to do them for completeness’ sake.

New Thunderbolts #11 - I’m currently failing to see how this fits in the ongoing story especially well. As a House of M tie-in, it’s trying its best but it doesn’t seem to have even a peripheral connection to the main plot of HoM, and its connection to the main plot of Thunderbolts seems a bit laboured. It was a brave choice, to try and make the HoM issue read seamlessly but there’s so much information flying about here I’m failing to be engaged by it on a plot level. I’ve only manged to read it once, and I usually read through things a few times before consigning them to the comic box for archiving. Art is as good as ever, but this month the plot and script have left me dead cold. New Thunderbolts is comissioned through issue #24, but i’m feeling that Nicieza’s writing on this has been ncreasingly patchy, and no matter how much I love the characters and concept I don’t see it surviving much beyond #24. A shame, but Thunderbolts has been quite badly treated by Marvel in the past and I don’t see any likelihood of that changing in the future. But then, when it’s getting them work like this, you can kind of see their point. D+.

Ultimate Spider-Man Annual #1 - This is such a great comic. Ultimate Spider-Man and Ultimate Kitty Pryd go on a date, and stuff affecting continuity actually happens. Much like Peter, I’m both surprised and glad of this plot development, even if it does mean MJ is getting well and truly chucked as a result. Rationally, I know it can’t last, but this is great territory for the Ultimate titles to break into away from the 616 universe. Thematically, it also makes a lot of sense because Peter’s problems with MJ are entirely about how she’s just going to get herself hurt. Kitty, on the other hand, can’t get hurt because of her powers. The Art isn’t from Bagley which is incredibly strange for an Ultimate spider-man title. Not unprecendented, but strange. Entirely welcome though, because Mark Brooks’ art is a welcome change. It’s slightly manga-influenced, but retains a lot of american flavour, and I’ve been quite interested in seeing some of his work ever since I saw some samples of it. If Bagley ever left, I can think of no-one better to keep drawing Ultimate Spider-Man. A+

X-Men #174: Bizarre Love Triangle, Part 4 - An incredibly disappointing end to a storyline that looked like it was about to explode. Turns out that it’s little more than a trailer for future storylines, complete with shadowy benefactor epilogue. It was quie cool to see Mystique and Nightcrawler interact given how they’re related, and having the rest of the X-Men actually around was an all-too-rare acknowledgement of the other books. The big problem I’ve got with this is that the reader doesn’t find out the truth about what’s been going on, even thought Rogue does. I’m not a fan of ambiguous endings. Or, at least, I’m not a fan of ambiguous endings when the driving force of the story is a whodunnit-style mystery. The colouring I’ve bene complaining about a lot actually seems to have improved a little this issue, but it’s hardly a saving grace. C for the issue, C+ for the storyline as a whole. Iit’s had some good material but the quality has been uneven. Milligan’s better than Austen, but only because he’s actually writing competently. I expected something a little more bizarre and quirky, really, rather than the relatively tame material we’ve had so far.

House of M #5 - Again, brilliant stuff. Choosing not to “awaken” Captain America was a wonderful moment though it’s ambiguous as to whether she does or not. The good ambiguous, this time. Spider-Man’s realisation was played quite well as he comes to terms with how badly he’s been screwed over this time, and of all the stories his might have some truly lasting repurcussions. The revelation of Xavier’s death didn’t really get me all that worked up, because it’s happened before, and I know the MU isn’t stuck as the HoM universe, so he can’t be their “only” hope. If the rumours about the X-Men 3 movie plot are true then it’ll be interesting to see whether they do actually keep Xavier dead. I don’t count on it, personally. It’s a bit strange to see the wheels of the story are only just about turning 5 issues in, but I can’t complain too much about character-writing this great. A+ again.

Incredible Hulk #85 - 3rd and final (?) HoM tie-in and I just can’t bring myself to care. Definitely something that should’ve been a House of M miniseries. I wish i’d been buying the Hulk/Abomination miniseries instead of this. PAD’s not doing his best Hulk work ever and i think I’m done with it, actually. I’ll give the next issue a flick through on the shelf, but once this story is complete (if it isn’t already) I might just quit for now. think I saw mention of a big Hulk story to come next year so maybe post-HoM there’ll be a good change. Right now it’s skating on pretty thin ice. A pity PAD’s return to Hulk has stalled for me like this, but it can’t have done a huge amount for PAD himself because he’s leaving soon, to be replaced by Daniel Way. C-.