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Rhyno posted:Claremontium Claremont is the comic book equivalent of Eckhart's line in The Dark Knight "You eiither die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain." Also, shouldn't it be "Claremontian" if it's an adjective? Claremontium sounds like it's one of the missing spots from the periodic table.
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Aug 6, 2014 06:17
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Skwirl posted:Claremontium sounds like it's one of the missing spots from the periodic table. That was what I was going for. Maybe "Claremontinite" and "Byrnium."
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Aug 6, 2014 06:54
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PaybackJack posted:Other than X-Factor I'm done reading X-Men books. I started to run with Cyclops then saw that Rucka is leaving the book so no thanks. None of Bendis stuff is any good, and the other books are meandering aimless crap. Update the thread title if Bendis actually decides to write something good or if another writer of talent starts writing something good. Oh I'm still on Cable & X-Force because while it's not great, it's interesting and different.  ) It's probably the best X-book since, well, X-Men Legacy. I'm actually on the verge of dropping X-Factor because, while it's not bad, I'm just really not digging it all that much.
irlZaphod fucked around with this message at 13:18 on Aug 6, 2014 |
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Aug 6, 2014 12:18
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HorseRenoir posted:I used to really like Bianchi's pencils; my only issue is that the colorists he would use would always cover the art in this awful, dark airbrushing technique. Nowadays, I think his art has gotten even worse (especially for his issues of New Avengers). I think he nails the weird, otherwordly aspect which is why I liked him in NA. But pretty much drawing normal characters having a conversation isn't really his forte.
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Aug 6, 2014 13:06
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irlZaphod posted:Have you been reading X-Force? You do realize you just quoted him saying that he is indeed reading X-Force. And I can't remember a time in the last eight years when only two outlier books were worth a read across the entire X line, but here we are.
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Aug 6, 2014 13:06
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Oh, whoops. I just read the start where he said X-Factor was the only book he was reading. 
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Aug 6, 2014 13:15
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irlZaphod posted:Oh, whoops. I just read the start where he said X-Factor was the only book he was reading. Yeah, I can't blame anyone on dropping X-Factor either. Peter David is the only writer I know that can take a team that's really interesting on paper, write excellent interactions between them, and then toss them into the most boring and bland overarcing stories ever. I love the dynamic between the characters and I love that he's flirting with advancing the "evil Doug" storyline but he really needs more interesting central plots to his arcs.
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Aug 6, 2014 15:13
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Saoshyant posted:You do realize you just quoted him saying that he is indeed reading X-Force. The current storyline in Amazing is pretty good and makes more sense then the main two books.
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Aug 6, 2014 15:17
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PaybackJack posted:Yeah, I can't blame anyone on dropping X-Factor either. Peter David is the only writer I know that can take a team that's really interesting on paper, write excellent interactions between them, and then toss them into the most boring and bland overarcing stories ever. I love the dynamic between the characters and I love that he's flirting with advancing the "evil Doug" storyline but he really needs more interesting central plots to his arcs. I imagine, like most Peter David stories, it'll be really interesting a year or so into it. The best and worst thing about the guy is that his runs end up being really, really long.
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Aug 7, 2014 13:15
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So, I was a huge x-men fan in the 90's but stopped collecting somewhere in the late 90's/early aughts. After watching the latest movie I decided to get back into it and see what my X buddies were up to! I knew that I would be lost in the beginning and it would take some time to figure out who the new characters are and what's happened to the character's that I knew. I had no idea that things would be this confusing! After reading a couple of months of all the X titles here are some thoughts. 1. I'm surprised at how schizophrenic the world as a whole feels. The continuity between the different books is hazy which is making this whole thing even harder to understand. 2. I'm used to Wolverine showing up in a few different books a month but it seems like the writers are going crazy moving character's around. For instance, Storm is apparently in Canada fighting Wendigo (Amazing X-Men), in the Adirondacks on an amber alert (X-Men), and back at the mansion listening to Prof. X's will (Uncanny X-Men) while stopping baby Phoenix and baby Apocalypse (Wolverine and the X-Men). I don't have a problem with different characters showing up in different books but I don't get the feeling that Wendigo Storm knows what Uncanny Storm is up to and it makes me wonder if it's even the same character in the same universe. 3. Why is the Women focused book called X-Men? I'm not saying that it should be called X-Girls or X-ladies but there's gotta be a better name for a female focused book. 4. It's strange to me that with this many titles there are weeks when not a single X book is released. 5. The Barrier to entry for this universe is huge. If I didn't promise to give it at least 6 months I would stop buying these titles now. 6. X-Factor and X-Force feel like the most complete titles and the ones that I enjoy reading the most (even though I hate Cable due to Liefeld PTSD). These also seem to have the least crossover with the X universe which probably isn't a coincidence. I really wish I could enjoy the X-men like I did 15 years ago. I'm not saying the writing or art were better then but I think that the titles were a little more autonomous which fostered continuity.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:27
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Knucklebear posted:3. Why is the Women focused book called X-Men? I'm not saying that it should be called X-Girls or X-ladies but there's gotta be a better name for a female focused book. Because they're trying to make a statement. quote:5. The Barrier to entry for this universe is huge. If I didn't promise to give it at least 6 months I would stop buying these titles now. That's Marvel's long standing issue. DC overdoes resets but Marvel sucks at new reader entry.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:35
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Knucklebear posted:6. X-Factor and X-Force feel like the most complete titles and the ones that I enjoy reading the most (even though I hate Cable due to Liefeld PTSD). These also seem to have the least crossover with the X universe which probably isn't a coincidence. This is how you do it. These are the two good books. Just read them. As far as continuity, each book happens in it's own Microcosm as it's own story until they fit or don't. Stop thinking too hard about it, it ruins the fun.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:44
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Knucklebear posted:2. I'm used to Wolverine showing up in a few different books a month but it seems like the writers are going crazy moving character's around. For instance, Storm is apparently in Canada fighting Wendigo (Amazing X-Men), in the Adirondacks on an amber alert (X-Men), and back at the mansion listening to Prof. X's will (Uncanny X-Men) while stopping baby Phoenix and baby Apocalypse (Wolverine and the X-Men). I don't have a problem with different characters showing up in different books but I don't get the feeling that Wendigo Storm knows what Uncanny Storm is up to and it makes me wonder if it's even the same character in the same universe. You'd say something similar if you were reading Captain America, Uncanny Avengers, and Avengers. And the answer is the stories are happening at different times, not All Right Now. When you consider that it is very common for 6 months worth of a title to cover one or two days in the life of said hero, this is pretty easy to deal with.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:46
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Diet Poison posted:You'd say something similar if you were reading Captain America, Uncanny Avengers, and Avengers. And the answer is the stories are happening at different times, not All Right Now. When you consider that it is very common for 6 months worth of a title to cover one or two days in the life of said hero, this is pretty easy to deal with. Also, Marvel in general made a very conscious decision about fourteen years ago to give zero fucks about continuity unless it would make the story better. If Writer A wants to have Wolverine trapped a hundred years in the past and Writer B has him punching aliens on a space station, the editors will tell them to go right ahead and not worry about having to make their stories fit each other.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:49
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Aphrodite posted:That's Marvel's long standing issue. DC overdoes resets but Marvel sucks at new reader entry. redbackground fucked around with this message at 01:53 on Aug 8, 2014 |
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Aug 8, 2014 01:50
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Aphrodite posted:That's Marvel's long standing issue. DC overdoes resets but Marvel sucks at new reader entry. That's more the X-books issue. With Marvel at large stuff just goes away but the X-books seem to cling to everything that's happened and it certainly doesn't help that they can't let a month go by without time travel popping up so half the cast has time travel stuff crammed in their origin.
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Aug 8, 2014 02:16
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SirDan3k posted:That's more the X-books issue. With Marvel at large stuff just goes away but the X-books seem to cling to everything that's happened and it certainly doesn't help that they can't let a month go by without time travel popping up so half the cast has time travel stuff crammed in their origin. This is it exactly. I'm a pretty recent comics fan, and of all the titles I've been picking up and backreading and whatever, the X-books are the most confusing. I wouldn't have bothered with them, but I saw a rec for Gillen's run on Uncanny, and then I ended up actually enjoying aspects of AvX. Then I decided to read All-New and Uncanny and ... I sort of like them? But holy poo poo, they can be disjointed and confusing. Like a month or two ago, I had no idea who the gently caress Dark Beast was, or why there was yet another Beast around. I'm still not sure what the gently caress. And I think it's partly disjointed and confusing storytelling and partly wanting to do callbacks without feeling the need to explain them even in the slightest. X-Men continuity feels wayyyy more weighed down by its own bullshit than just about anything else. It's weird.
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Aug 8, 2014 18:06
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I'm glad that it's not just me. I really think that the storytelling would be better served separating the story-lines between books or reducing the amount of books (I know that it'll never happen because  ). Reducing the location and character overlap and saving these interactions for large story arcs would go a long way.
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Aug 8, 2014 18:17
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Uncanny and All-New both handle it well, and it's because Bendis writes them both and will reference events in each. You also don't need to read them both to keep up with the other, but will still see glimpses of what's happening in each.
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Aug 8, 2014 18:29
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Codependent Poster posted:Uncanny and All-New both handle it well, and it's because Bendis writes them both and will reference events in each. You also don't need to read them both to keep up with the other, but will still see glimpses of what's happening in each. I dunno, I started out trying to read only Uncanny and quickly ended up confused, and a lot of that did clear up when I started reading All-New as well. v  v At least early on it confused me. They do work pretty well together when you follow both though.
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Aug 8, 2014 18:40
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Blimey, if I could get one single commandment etched in stone at Marvel to be obeyed for the next 30 years, it would be no more hosed up reality future people travelling back to the present to do *whatever*. Rachel can stay, everyone else can GTFO. Bishop, Cable, the Apocalypse Twins, the new Brotherhood, the Phoenix Corporation, and everything else in-between. It's become a horrible, overused crutch that every jerk and his sister who gets an X gig seems to be obsessed with using instead of just dealing with the characters here in the present and telling decent stories with them. Another decade of this poo poo and I'll probably spend what remains of my life trying to build a time machine to go back and stop Claremont from writing Days of Future Past in the first place..!
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Aug 8, 2014 19:25
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My commandment would be that people age at a reasonable rate and when they die, they stay dead forever. This fixes the cluttered rosters of hundreds of barely used characters. It also fixes the problem of all the future babies if characters can actually have kids that age.
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Aug 8, 2014 23:16
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I don't think the aging, or lack thereof (really at this point, most of the aging seems to be magic than anything else), is the problem. American superhero comics are hardly the only serial media that takes a slowed down passage of time stance. Lots of animated series and even some live action television and movies do as well.
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Aug 8, 2014 23:26
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I think you're right, but the X-Men books in particular seem to have a huge focus on the future and new generations. They also hamstring it by keeping a lot of old characters around who haven't had an interesting personal story arc in 30 years.
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Aug 8, 2014 23:39
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Well I understand people's frustration with the time traveling teams of the past/future/alternate reality etc..., I really do. But I don't think they're inherently bad. Bendis could've chosen not to have the "original" X-Men show up and he'd still be phoning it the gently caress in, regardless of whatever bullshit plot he was writing. The problem isn't time travel. The problem is Bendis it phoning it in. I thought Cable's solo series where he raised Hope, after an initial bumpy intro story, was really good. And that almost entirely consisted of alternate, hosed up futures. Remender's take on the Age of Apocalypse was also really good (but I didn't give a gently caress about the mini series that followed up on that era). I also really don't think the focus is on the "new" generation. There's dozens of teenage/young 20s mutants who were main characters in a team or a specific young x-men book who are now windowdressing. gently caress, Hope was a core X-Men member, was a major player in two X-Men events, and now is completely in the background save for whatever is going on with X-Force. The same can be said of most of the Generation Hope characters. And the New X-Men. Every now and then someone that was introduced ages ago will come back to the spotlight but they'll be shoved aside pretty soon.
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Aug 9, 2014 01:36
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Hope is an active main character in x-force, she's just in the body of another character. Idie was a big character in Jason Aaron's WatX has she been dropped since LaTour took over?
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Aug 9, 2014 02:41
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No Idie and Quire are sort of parallel main characters to Storm and Wolverine in WATAX last I checked. Then again I haven't read the last issue or so, so maybe she took the bus while I wasn't paying attention. Wouldn't be surprised.
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Aug 9, 2014 02:56
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That you can pick out a handful of young x-men currently being used is kind of my point. A few get focus, and the few that get focused rotate out every few years. Most of them sit in the back doing nothing until they need some cannon fodder for the next event.
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Aug 9, 2014 03:08
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MY ABACUS! posted:I think you're right, but the X-Men books in particular seem to have a huge focus on the future and new generations. They also hamstring it by keeping a lot of old characters around who haven't had an interesting personal story arc in 30 years. This is actually the part that's difficult for me. I can keep track of the old characters, they don't change that much. But the fact we've had two whole new generations in the recent history and we're working on a third. And a brand new future. And a Classic X-Men team. It's a lot.
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Aug 9, 2014 03:08
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And they just brought a random group of "All the Avengers hosed, here are their kids" children from the future in Avengers world. Because we needed ANOTHER future/alternate timeline child of the couple that just broke up.
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Aug 9, 2014 03:14
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And a future Quire showed up in the Avengers Union in Hickman's current Avengers arc.
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Aug 9, 2014 03:21
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Nevvy Z posted:And they just brought a random group of "All the Avengers hosed, here are their kids" children from the future in Avengers world. Because we needed ANOTHER future/alternate timeline child of the couple that just broke up. Yeah but there's no indication they're ever gonna be A Thing outside Avengers World. Yet, anyway. I'm like a broken record with this but frig, let's pull back from the Quentin and Evan and Idie show and have a drat book that focuses on the student body at large. Turn WatX into a anthology book with school stories, make X-Dudes a recurring one, and there will be no time travel allowed at all. For real. I need a job. Let's pull Bendis off the X-books and I'll take 'em over.
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Aug 9, 2014 05:50
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Quentin makes me a little sad, because I don't think he's ever going to be the phoenix. There will continue to be a bazillion issues where some future version of Quentin is the phoenix, but there isn't going to be a book where he becomes the phoenix and that is now the new status quo.
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Aug 9, 2014 06:01
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Skwirl posted:Quentin makes me a little sad, because I don't think he's ever going to be the phoenix. There will continue to be a bazillion issues where some future version of Quentin is the phoenix, but there isn't going to be a book where he becomes the phoenix and that is now the new status quo. This is what I said about the first future X-Men tease with him finding Deathlok's body, but everyone said nooo, that's totally gonna happen for real.
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Aug 9, 2014 06:15
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Skwirl posted:Quentin makes me a little sad, because I don't think he's ever going to be the phoenix. There will continue to be a bazillion issues where some future version of Quentin is the phoenix, but there isn't going to be a book where he becomes the phoenix and that is now the new status quo. He's kind of a one note character, and I don't think there's anything they can do to meaningfully kick him up from B-list. And hell, WatX is keeping him hanging on to B-list by a thread.
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Aug 9, 2014 06:17
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Diet Poison posted:For real. I need a job. Let's pull Bendis off the X-books and I'll take 'em over. It's funny that you're complaining about students not getting featured, then complaining about Bendis. He's been featuring the new characters he's written in Uncanny as much as the teachers. Tempus is going to have the annual be all about her.
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Aug 9, 2014 06:47
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Boogaleeboo posted:He's kind of a one note character, and I don't think there's anything they can do to meaningfully kick him up from B-list. And hell, WatX is keeping him hanging on to B-list by a thread. He's like the main character of the book. He's solid B-list, and only time will decide if he can endure long enough to make it to the A-list.
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Aug 9, 2014 14:49
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Codependent Poster posted:It's funny that you're complaining about students not getting featured, then complaining about Bendis. He's been featuring the new characters he's written in Uncanny as much as the teachers. Tempus is going to have the annual be all about her. Only cause I don't know the X-office editor by name. Whoever's in charge of X-structure. I actually quite like Bendis' Uncanny and would probably rank it 2nd after X-Force in terms my enjoyment. He can't end a story to save his life (the recent Dark Beast bullshit) but I love the stories while I'm reading them. I didn't know the annual was gonna be all about Tempus. Presumably what happened to her during her lost years. I'm excited for that!
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Aug 9, 2014 17:08
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Diet Poison posted:I actually quite like Bendis' Uncanny and would probably rank it 2nd after X-Force in terms my enjoyment. That's cool to hear, I haven't seen a single person say that. Maybe I'll jump back on that train. I've only read about three issues (not counting the Battle of the Atom stuff).
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Aug 9, 2014 17:35
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Diet Poison posted:Only cause I don't know the X-office editor by name. Whoever's in charge of X-structure. I actually quite like Bendis' Uncanny and would probably rank it 2nd after X-Force in terms my enjoyment. He can't end a story to save his life (the recent Dark Beast bullshit) but I love the stories while I'm reading them. I just really hate the whole thing where they're artificially aging Tempus up so putting her in a relationship with Cyclops will be slightly less creepy.
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