Sunday, February 2, 2014

Elsewhere (and also bitching about Cataclysm)

Two weeks ago, I had a post on PopMatters comparing Scott Snyder's run of Detective Comics to his current work on Batman and arguing that the former is far superior. I've written before about my disappointment with Snyder's interpretation of Bruce Wayne in the New 52, and I also just think his Dick Grayson Detective stories were more in his wheelhouse, conceptually. This week, I talked about Unity's original take on familiar superhero comicbook ideas. My hopes for that book are high, even though it looks like Doug Braithwaite may not stick around...? That'd be too bad, unless he either a) comes back eventually, maintaining a semi-regular schedule as artist, and/or b) is leaving to work on more Storm Dogs. Also, my newest piece went up Friday at The Chemical Box about the truly godawful Kobier and Oso. It is truly godawful.

Something I Failed to Mention
Often when I'm writing, I have moments where I have to cut an idea I originally thought I might include, for space or clarity or both. And when I'm working on something for a site other than this one, I try to remember those abandoned thoughts so I can use them here. But in the case of the three above-mentioned columns, nothing in particular springs to mind as being left unsaid. I mean, I'm sure I could think of any number of things that I didn't comment on directly, but none that feel important enough to spend any real time on now. Instead, I'm going to complain about a completely different comicbook I read today, Cataclysm: The Ultimates Last Stand #4.

Now, there is a LOT wrong with this comic on all fronts, but I don't really want to get into a full-on review of it. I haven't been following Cataclysm or any of the tie-in books, except for Ultimate Spider-Man because I was reading it anyway. The last issue of that series said it was going to be continued in this specific issue of Cataclsym, and because I want to know what happens to Miles Morales and his new friends between this event and their upcoming All-New Ultimates series, I went ahead and spent the four dollars to read this stupid thing. What pisses me off about that is, according to the recap page, a whole bunch of important shit involving Miles that I have not seen went down in previous issues of this series, but neither he nor anyone else from Ultimate Spider-Man plays any kind of role here. You see Miles a few times and he maybe has some lines...? But he doesn't matter to anything that happens. I get that this is not his book and I can't expect Cataclysm to read like an issue of Ultimate Spider-Man just because the one was supposed to "continue" in the other. But it'd be nice if, when I followed Marvel's suggested reading order, there weren't huge gaps in my knowledge of what the star of a book I follow has been doing. And it'd be fantastic if, when he was on the cover of a series that his own series told me to buy, I got to see him matter in the slightest. Now I can't decide if I go back and get the first three issues of Cataclysm so I can get filled in, or just not bother buying the next one and keep myself in the dark, forced to figure out what happened when Ultimate Spider-Man reboots and All-New Ultimates begins in a few months. Stupid event comics. I shake my fist at thee with vigor!

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