Comic Book Discussion

[Kong Wen]

I'm not sure just how confirmed/rumoured this is, but IGN is reporting that RDJ is signing on to play Iron Man in 2016's Captain America 3, with the implication that they're going to try to film the Civil War storyline for the Marvel Cinematic Universe after they finish with this whole Ultron/Thanos/Infinity Gauntlet saga with Avengers 3.

That would be pretty nuts, but I guess they do need a major "event" storyline once they finish up the Infinity stuff. I remain hesitant about it, though. I wasn't a huge fan of the Civil War stuff, which pretty much stood alone and required some retconning to get things back to "normal" again (not sure how willing they're going to be to do that in the movies—but maybe they're thinking they'll be done by the time the Civil War wraps up, since that'll be like 5-10 years from now). I'm also not sure how they'll be able to manage the characters, pitting protagonists against each other while keeping them likeable and relatable.

[Kiwi the Tortoise]

Making first contact with the Marvel universe in Comic form by buying this tome (~1200 pages)



The Infinity Gauntlet Omnibus

[Jelly]

In honour of this comic club, I bought my first serious comic. I've heard it mentioned many times. It's called Saga by Brian K Vaughan, and the first issue was released in 2012.

I literally know nothing about it, but it was cheap enough to give it a try.

I did get this comic, but I never read it until today!

And well, it was awesome. A gorgeously illustrated quirky fantasy space world where an intriguing story about forbidden love and parenthood takes place.

Buy it.

[Bades]

I'm not sure just how confirmed/rumoured this is, but IGN is reporting that RDJ is signing on to play Iron Man in 2016's Captain America 3, with the implication that they're going to try to film the Civil War storyline for the Marvel Cinematic Universe after they finish with this whole Ultron/Thanos/Infinity Gauntlet saga with Avengers 3.

That would be pretty nuts, but I guess they do need a major "event" storyline once they finish up the Infinity stuff. I remain hesitant about it, though. I wasn't a huge fan of the Civil War stuff, which pretty much stood alone and required some retconning to get things back to "normal" again (not sure how willing they're going to be to do that in the movies—but maybe they're thinking they'll be done by the time the Civil War wraps up, since that'll be like 5-10 years from now). I'm also not sure how they'll be able to manage the characters, pitting protagonists against each other while keeping them likeable and relatable.

So this was I guess this just ended up becoming Captain America: Civil War. Unlike Kong, I sort of enjoyed that storyline. It's one of the only Marvel "events" that I've read and I thought it was one of the few books that actually gave a convincing reason for heroes to be at odds with each other. Undeniably there was some cannon confusion tossed in, as happens with many "event" stories, and I believed they would be able to clean it up a bit for a potential film. That being said, I don't really like how it's become a Captain America sequel. Going into the movie everyone's going to be on Captain America's side as the film is basically a sequel in his series. The comics felt like the road the line a little bit more, but perhaps it wasn't quite like that as it has been awhile since I've read them. I also quite liked where they were going with the Captain America movies until this point and had a much different idea of where to take the third movie.

So yeah, sort of conflicted on that. I also liked how we got a WWII/action superhero movie and a ColdWar-esque/thriller superhero movie out of the series and I was looking forward to seeing what sort of "out of the box" idea they might have in store for another Captain America film. Perhaps I'm arguing semantics here but making Civil War into a Captain America sequel sounds like a poor move.

[Kong Wen]

So this was I guess this just ended up becoming Captain America: Civil War. Unlike Kong, I sort of enjoyed that storyline. It's one of the only Marvel "events" that I've read and I thought it was one of the few books that actually gave a convincing reason for heroes to be at odds with each other. Undeniably there was some cannon confusion tossed in, as happens with many "event" stories, and I believed they would be able to clean it up a bit for a potential film. That being said, I don't really like how it's become a Captain America sequel. Going into the movie everyone's going to be on Captain America's side as the film is basically a sequel in his series. The comics felt like the road the line a little bit more, but perhaps it wasn't quite like that as it has been awhile since I've read them. I also quite liked where they were going with the Captain America movies until this point and had a much different idea of where to take the third movie.

So yeah, sort of conflicted on that. I also liked how we got a WWII/action superhero movie and a ColdWar-esque/thriller superhero movie out of the series and I was looking forward to seeing what sort of "out of the box" idea they might have in store for another Captain America film. Perhaps I'm arguing semantics here but making Civil War into a Captain America sequel sounds like a poor move.

I don't know, I think there's a lot of room there to explore some of the stuff they started hinting at in Cap 2—overextension of government powers, surveillance, privacy, rights, etc. The Civil War storyline has that kind of stuff at its core, which is, I think, why Captain America gets cast as the protagonist, both in the comic and in the upcoming movie. I think it makes sense. That doesn't make me any more excited about the film, though.

One of the reasons I'm highly dubious about the movie is... do any of the Avengers have secret identities? Everyone knows who Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Black Widow, War Machine, Thor, etc. are. It would be different if this were happening in the same universe as the X-Men and Spider-Man movies (Spidey is a key player in the Civil War story in the comics), but in the MCU it's not really a compelling issue. I guess they could just change the issue.

[Kiwi the Tortoise]

At this point, I may just dump in my impressions of +1200 ISO 216 pages of Marvel.

The first half of the tome is filled with the Infinity Gauntlet story, starting out with Silver Surfer and leading up to the main ark.
This half is pretty good actually, though as a non-Superhero comic guy I am not really capable to compare it. However it was consitent in it's comic nuttiness and I kinda like that the problem of 'Fillers' is also present in the western comic culture. However there is quite a lot of wasted potential e.g. Iron Man barley has two lines in the entire thing before his head gets ripped off, essentially most characters don't really fulfill any purpose aside from 'being here'.

The second half of the tome is filled with tie-in stories that are connected to the Thanos plot, but don't drive it. These feel often disconnected, since they are usually fragments of other plot-arcs. Some of them are REALLY bad though e.g. the Quasar comics. Ugh... the writing and characters were horrible.

In total, I am happy with it. Lots of cheesy goodness.

[Bades]

I don't know, I think there's a lot of room there to explore some of the stuff they started hinting at in Cap 2—overextension of government powers, surveillance, privacy, rights, etc. The Civil War storyline has that kind of stuff at its core, which is, I think, why Captain America gets cast as the protagonist, both in the comic and in the upcoming movie. I think it makes sense. That doesn't make me any more excited about the film, though.

One of the reasons I'm highly dubious about the movie is... do any of the Avengers have secret identities? Everyone knows who Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Black Widow, War Machine, Thor, etc. are. It would be different if this were happening in the same universe as the X-Men and Spider-Man movies (Spidey is a key player in the Civil War story in the comics), but in the MCU it's not really a compelling issue. I guess they could just change the issue.

Yeah, that's actually a great point. Not only is Spider-Man key to that story but they really don't have secret identities. Civil War as a whole works better if there's a lot more heroes. In less they change what they'll be fighting for. Personally I feel the over-extension of government powers was handled well-enough in Winter Solider, which feeds my one of my complaints that we'll be treading the same ground.

[PoisonRamune]

Recently I've read the classic Star Wars graphic novels which are a collection of the original Star Wars comics published in the paper back in the 80s... It's a pretty good telling of what happened between New Hope and Empire and each graphic novel is like a Star Wars movie in itself. The only weird thing is Luke and Leia don't know they're siblings yet and have this weird sexual tension through the whole series.

[Kiwi the Tortoise]

I just picked up a few comic books.

The first is Ms. Marvel Vol. 1 since it was recommended to me.
Starring Kamala Kahn, a Muslim girl in NY, getting super powers. I just read it and quite liked it. It almost doesn't matter where her powers come from or what they even are, since it's all the stuff involving e.g. her life and family steal the show. While one could argue that some of the characters are stereotypes in their own way (not really uncommon in comics), it works quite well.

I also picked up a Guardian of the Galaxy comic (Vol.1 Cosmic Avengers), which was released to generate hype for the movie and supposedly is a good starting point. Finally, I picked up a Captain Marvel issue, since the cover looks really badass. Still have to read those two.

[pdSlooper]

I spent some time at the bookstore the other day, and I saw they had Superman: Red Son. S:RS is a What if...? scenario where Superman lands in the Soviet Union instead of America. It's got some amazing cover art.