Shopping List

Another heavy week, another scan of my grubby shopping list. You'll note that I've added an exciting new star rating to the single issues. This is to show you how much I'm looking forward to reading each comic - See, always thinking outside the box!

Ahem...

 

I've also added a handy list of stuff I won't be buying this week. Obviously there's a lot of stuff I won't be buying, but this is the notable stuff I won't be buying. Here's why...

Back Issue + Alter Ego: I've done a lot of money on these expensive mags over the last couple of years. Occasionally I've enjoyed them, but more often than not (and this is especially true of Back Issue) I find myself wondering why I've shelled out my hard earned to read a series of articles where the author usually does little more than recount the plot of his favourite run of comics. If I want the "In issue 9 of Amethyst Princess of Gem World, Amethyst fought the Troll Women of Labiya. In issue 10 of Amethyst Princess of Gem World, Amethyst destroyed the wicked wizard of Kok-Suk" sort of article, I can go to Wikipedia. 

To be fair, there are some good interviews and rare pieces of art interspersed with the bilge, and the fact that this issue features interviews with Alan Davis and Jim Shooter means that I might buy Back Issue after all. Alter Ego is a definite no though.

Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers #1: I'm not buying this because I don't need to. It's not that I don't think I'd enjoy it, because I most likely would, it's just that I have to take a stand against these silly mini-series which seem to be clogging up my life at the moment and this seems a good place to start.

The Ultimates Vol 3 TP: Issue one of Loeb and Madureira's Ultimates run was so fucking bad that I vowed never to look at another issue. Now this is out, and I'm sort of tempted to buy it just to see how bad it is as a whole. But no, I've reread why I hated issue #1 so much and that's enough to jolt me back to my senses.

Secret Wars II Omnibus: Ridiculous! Secret Wars II was so terrible that Secret Invasion looks like The Watchmen in comparison. For the life of me I can't understand why this is getting the Omnibus treatment, let alone fathom who in the world is going to pay the £75 RRP! I fully expect this to be the first Omnibus to end up in the 50p boxes at Orbital.

WTF?

From this week's comic solicitations...

Ultimates Vol: 3 #1 2nd Printing Wraparound Variant, $2.99

People are also fighting over the 1 in 100 (or whatever it was) variant covers on e-bay.

Meanwhile The Exterminators is facing cancellation.

'tis a depressing situation.

L L C recommends Ultimate Human, the last true Ultimate Universe title!

The Ultimate Universe is going down the pan. Ultimate Fantastic Four and Ultimate X-Men have both been turgid non-events for some time, Ultimate Spidey has a great new penciller in Stuart Immonen, but Bendis isn't hitting the high notes that he used too and the book is no longer guaranteed to be fun. Worst of all, The flagship titleThe Ultimates has been ruined by an unwelcome change in direction and a creative team who clearly can't hold a candle to Millar and Hitch.

Sad. But there is some good news to be had with the release of issue #1 of the Warren Ellis/Cary Nord four part mini Ultimate Human. With its a sharp sense of cynicism, great dialogue and beautiful drawings this is a book that feels like the rightful sequel to The Ultimates.

It works where the other Ultimate titles are currently failing because Ellis doesn't try and knock down the foundations that Millar laid in the Ultimates. Instead he builds on Millar's knowing interpretations of both the Hulk and Iron Man by playing up the fallibility and foibles of Tony Stark and Bruce Banner. He respects the tone set in the first two volumes of the Ultimates and as a result Ultimate Human doesn't jar in the way that Jeph Loeb's reworking of the Utimates does. It feels like it belongs in the same universe as Millar's work.

The art is also right. I loved Cary Nord's work on the Dark Horse Conan series, so was delighted to see him get this book. His drawing is careful and detailed, a world away from the stylised neon and shrunken heads of Joe Mad's art.

It's a really good superhero book which reminded me just how good the Ultimate Universe is when done well. The characters all nod respectfully towards the past, but are free of the 40+ years of baggage that sometimes weighs down their regular Marvel counterparts.

These stripped down, modernised versions of Marvel's big toys deserve to be handled by writers and artists capable of maintaining a consistent feel for the Ultimate Universe across the various books. Sadly that consistency is lacking in nearly all the Ultimate titles right now. I've gone from reading all of them to the point where I've dropped everything but Ultimate Spider-Man - and my interest in that book is on the wane.

Unless changes are made across the board, I fear that Ultimate Human may be the last hurrah for a line which has lost direction, cohesion and believability.

The Ultimates Vol 3 Issue #1

For all the delays that blighted it, there's little doubt that Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch's The Ultimates was sharp, good looking and enjoyable. The characters were well written and believable, the action was always spectacular but never muddled and the political edge to the book made it feel relevant in a way that Marvel comics should but rarely ever do.

It's clear that the book has become one of the jewels in Marvel's crown, so it's a shame that the powers that be have seen fit to hand it to a team who look like taking it off in a new and frankly unwelcome direction.

Jeph Loeb made no bones about the fact that he was going to ditch the politics and turn the Ultimates into an action comic. That made me wary straight away, but while I don't think the tone needed to be changed I have nothing against straight up action per se, so I was willing to give the book a chance. I wish I hadn't bothered.

Loeb and Joe Madureira's first issue is a confused blur of a comic. The keenly observed dialogue of the first two volumes has been replaced by hackneyed old trash talk and a slew of in your face sound effects. There's little in the way of a plot, and the characters so carefully fleshed out by Millar have been rendered two dimensional by Loeb.

The art is horrible. The pages look like a strange hybrid of graffiti art and manga overlayed with neon pastels. Where Hitch's drawing was clean and well proportioned, Madureira gives us a set of anatomically muddled michelin men. Captain America is a blob, Wasp who was (as far I can recall) asian in the Millar Hitch run now seems to be, well...W.A.S.P.! and Hawkeye, who was stripped down to his basics and done as a dead eyed hitman has now acquired a distinctly 90's looking leather number complete with unnecessary pockets and rubber mask. Taken as a whole it's a distracting, ill proportioned mess that makes the story even more of a chore to follow.

In all I spent approximately five minutes on the comic. That's all it's worth. There's nothing that makes me want to go back and look at it again, and it's highly unlikely that I'll be back for issue #2.

The Ultimates RIP.

Millar time

That Mark Millar gets a lot of stick doesn't he?

Shame really. I mean I didn't particularly enjoy Civil War, but the lad's produced a lot of top quality action comics over the last two or three years, including two bona fide Marvel classics in Wolverine: Enemy of the State and The Ultimates Volume #1.

That Wolverine story, (drawn by Romita Jnr) is just amazing. Wolverine v the Marvel Universe on board a shield helicarrier. Nuff said.

As for the first volume of the Ultimates, well, I've read it three or four times and really, I think it's one of the finest Marvel comics ever to see print. It ticks all the right boxes: Alcoholic Tony Stark. World War Two Cap. A Hulk who smashes. Nazis. Aliens. Alien Nazis. All done with a black sense of humour and all drawn by the brilliant Bryan Hitch who nails every single jawdropping panel.

Honestly everything about it is beyond awesome. If I had to pick just one reason to read it though, I'd go for this fight scene. It looks like it's taking place in hell, and ends when Captain America cuts a naked Nazi/alien in half with his shield before delivering one of THE greatest lines ever uttered in a Marvel comic...






You'll have to supersize the final panel to enjoy it properly...


That my friends is as good as superhero comics get.

Hard to believe

Its been a laughably long seven months since issue #12, but Millar and Hitch are finally set to wrap up their run on The Ultimates.

Not long to go now...


The delays have totally ruined any plans I had to read this comic, but the day it hits the shops I plan to sit down and plough through the whole run.