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Every character has a shtick, or some kind of identifying piece to let you know that he is not the same person that another is, and that he is his own person. Marvel, for all of the things I don’t like about it, is a great example this sort of thing– especially Stan Lee’s creations. Each character is expressly unique and represents itself in such a way that you know who this character is. You know who Spider-Man is, you know Daredevil, The Hulk, The Fantastic Four, all of the powerhouse characters that Kirby and Lee and Ditko and all of the others worked to create, ushering in an Age in comics that has yet to be passed, really.

For all of my bitching of the Silver Age, Stan Lee and his co-workers were brilliant and deserve my respect.

But, not everyone is Stan Lee, or Jack Kirby.
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So, a couple of months ago I ran across a series called “Doktor Sleepless” by Warren Ellis, who, as everyone knows, has written Transmetropolitan, as well as Nextwave: Agents of H.A.T.E. and is current writing Astonishing X-Men after Whedon left the roll.

I was intrigued by this series because Ellis tends to have a very distinctive style in what he does. When he isn’t explicitly writing superhero stories, most of the stuff I’ve come across by him tends to be in the vein of cyberpunk and post-cyberpunk. I’m sure that’s not all he’s ever written, but it seems to be the easiest to come into contact with, and it’s really some of my favorite stuff. Especially Transmetropolitan and, now, this book, Doktor Sleepless.
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I’ve decided to change the theme to the website, for no other reason than that I wanted to.

Also, you may notice that there hasn’t been a link to a forum for some time. That’s because I deleted it. Another forum is in the works with a few other people I know. By “in the works” I mean “we’ve talked about it, but too many other things are up in the air.”

I know I’ve been neglecting this place, but I intend to actually have content very shortly. Just bear with me.

Following a discussion about the current Batman story arc, as well as a few other things that were related to it (mostly just what the hell is going to happen to Batman following this arc and Final Crisis) the discussion turned into that of character legacy. That is to say, which characters could easily be replaced by others in the future, if events required such a thing. I’ve been thinking about this for a while now, trying to figure out which characters are best suited for some kind of bequeathing of their throne to another character.

Since the topic was originally on Batman, we’ll start with him.
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I was going to have a long series of articles that detailed my general feeling on the Ultimate Marvel universe, and it’s correlation between the 616 universe, as well as the differences between the two and how Ultimate Marvel is, truly, a wholly unique take on the Marvel franchises and generally an enjoyable piece of work. Then I read Ultimates 3 and I wish I had rather read something much better, or much worse, or stopped reading it back at the first issue. Before I go through and spend the entire time complaining, I’ll give you a brief rundown on just what “Ultimates” is and why this newest series is a travesty of justice or something along those lines.

With the creation of Ultimate Marvel, they decided they needed to create an Avengers team. Instead of calling it “The Ultimate Avengers”, in keeping with the idea that they just tack on “Ultimate” to everything for differences, they decided to call this “The Ultimates”. The Ultimates are a team of people working for Colonel Samuel L. Jackson Nick Fury, of S.H.I.E.L.D. and going about blowing shit up and being generally tough bastards like they do.

The team has had, more or less: Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Wasp, Hank Pym, Hawkeye, and maybe a few others I don’t remember because it’s been a while since I’ve read the comic– oh yeah, Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch. These people have all been a part of it since about Ultimates 2 which was, obviously, the second book that was involving this superhero team. Mark Millar had been the previous writer of this series, (that is to say the previous two Ultimates books) and was generally pretty good at what he was doing. Miller managed to capture the general aspects of the characters, while at the same time elaborating on them and keeping them separate enough from their 616 counterparts to genuinely make a difference.

Jeph Loeb, however, who I normally like¹ apparently was operating under the impression that what The Ultimates needed was a trip back to the 1990s with all of the worst aspects amplified to the point that I can’t really even understand why they kept him on it. Also, the art was bad. Not just the pencils, but the colors seemed washed out and generally lacking. This felt more like a Ultimate Ultimate Marvel book, as opposed to a regular one.

But anyway, onto the book itself.
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1. After all, Batman: The Long Halloween is one of my favorites [↩]

So I’ve been reading Final Crisis and some of it’s tie-ins, in an effort to have a better understanding of the modern comic book scene. All I can say is… wow. Morrison is really going all out, and so are the other writers. Three issues in on the main book and this is already astoundingly better than Infinite Crisis. There’s a certain kind of emotional impact that the previous Crisis lacked, and that this one seems to capture perfectly.

Some of the tie-ins are pretty great, too. They don’t have the same feel, but the writers definitely know what they’re doing. This Crisis is… darker. The overall theme has been “The Day Evil Wins” and you really get that feel. It’s impressive, really, the lengths everything is going to tie it all together. One of the biggest problems with an event like a Crisis, or something similar, is that there’s always umpteen-million tie-ins for people to follow. You have the tie-ins on the main comics, the named tie-ins (like the one-shot Final Crisis: Requiem) and sometimes just the passing-by tie-ins like all of the “Hey, the sky is turning red” comics from Crisis on Infinite Earths.

I’m still not sure what a lot of the things are in some of these books, because it’s been so long since I’ve read a current comic book. I don’t know who these Alpha Lanterns are, but I get an idea.

And they really brought Barry Allen back. I’m still not sure how I feel about that. It was done well enough. I don’t think, really, that it could have been done better. DC Universe #0 was a beautiful comic, and the subsequent re-introduction of the character in Final Crisis #2 was also perfect.

I’m actually optimistic about this Crisis. But maybe I’m a little crazy.

On that note, I want to talk a little bit about the tie-in Final Crisis: Requiem. In Final Crisis #1, something rather interesting happened; The Martian Manhunter was killed. I’m not well-versed in that character, because he’s a bit harder to come across. I’ve only seen him in the Justice League books, and the occasional cameo in related titles, but I’ve not read his solo books. And this is despite being a huge fan of John Ostrander. My point to this ramble was that I can’t be sure, but I’m fairly certain that this is actually J’onn’s first death in the modern canon, if not the entirety of the books. If this website were more popular, I’m sure I could get someone to correct me, but I don’t know if I have that luxury.
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Following a rather lengthy absence, Marvel has decided to revive their kind of teeny-bopper Spider-Man comic, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, which is the follow up to Mary Jane and Mary Jane: Homecoming. These stories are set in, obviously, a slightly different Marvel universe from 616, and focus a bit more on the high school drama and traditional stuff of being in high school that most people really only like looking at when it doesn’t concern them.

Issue #1 came out not-too-terribly-long ago, and I decided to give it a looksy. It’s got a different writer than the previous volume, so I’m a little curious as to how this is going to translate in the long run, but the first issue seems to give the same kind of feel from the previous ones. We start off with a nice, kind of silly dream by Mary Jane, as she then later tries to desperately prove she doesn’t have any feelings for Spider-Man.

I’m curious to see where this series is gonna go now, and if it continues in a similar silly direction that the previous “season” went. One of the draws of this series was that it humanized everyone on a different level than the other versions of the comics. In this version, they’re written to feel more like the people you hung out with at high school, or, if you still go, the people who you would talk about behind their back. Harry Osborn and Mary Jane have their conflicts and drama, and Peter is struggling to juggle his social life and being Spider-Man through a variety of lame excuses that everyone seems to buy.

Considering that the previous series was a nice hit with people, I have faith that this one will do the same. Though, as always, I’m a little skeptical as to what it’s going to do.

Check out Marvel’s piece on the comic at their website.

So, as everyone is probably aware by now. The Dark Knight came out, and, seeing as my website is devoted to comic book nerdery, it only makes sense that I’ll be commenting on it. Every positive thing you could ever hear about this movie will not do it justice. It is an experience. Everything about it happens in a way that I can only describe as somewhere between “epic” and “completely fucking insane.”

But let’s get started.
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I don’t exactly know how new this is, as I’m not designed to be on the up-and-up, but there’s a trailer for the upcoming Watchmen movie out.

And every bit of excitement I’ve had about learning that the movie exists came flooding back. One of my main worries, that they would crew up how Dr. Manhattan looks, has been removed.

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these, so I thought I would bring it back up, and have a little fun. Today’s review is Showplace Cinemas North, located at 4200 North Third Avenue in Evansville, Indiana.
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