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wave 75


mav-man

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18 minutes ago, Mirymate said:

Okay... now that we've all had a nice ride on the modern comics suck bandwagon. (always remember, the good old days weren't always good. in fact they regularly sucked too)

Thanks for the hints, Zach.

I don't think all modern comics are bad but I do think that they are overpriced in most instances. In the old days when I bought a crap issue I'd just say meh it was a dollar now if it's a bad issue it's almost 5 bucks and that's a drink at happy hour.

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On 7/7/2017 at 11:30 AM, Mirymate said:

I'm still looking for a Hydro-Man I won't have to take out a second mortgage for so I feel your pain, Buff.

But you know what I want to see here in 75? (Filtered through the reality of what I could reasonable expect of course) At least a few of the unmade choices from the Series 50 vote.

As you can see here, besides the winners many of the others on that list have gotten made in the 5 years since.  But others remain.

Hydro Armor Iron Man, Mutated Thing (Extra-Rocky), Team X Wolverine, Werewolf Captain America, Gladiator (Shi'ar), Abomination, Vengeance, the Wrecker

And for Army Builders - The Dire Wraiths, HAMMER Agents, Madrox the Multiple Man (Classic), the Mindless Ones, the Stepford Cuckoos, and the Warwolves

If just one of those gets made in this series, I'll be a happy man.

(P.S. the vote totals shown on the linked page only represent MMMVeres vote on the forums companion poll, not the actual Marvel website votes which vastly outnumbered our own)

WARWOLVES!!!!!! WARWOLVES!!!!!!! WARWOLVES!!!!!!

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12 hours ago, thereasonsy said:

I don't think all modern comics are bad but I do think that they are overpriced in most instances. In the old days when I bought a crap issue I'd just say meh it was a dollar now if it's a bad issue it's almost 5 bucks and that's a drink at happy hour.

I totally get that some modern comics are good and some old comics are not, and that everybody will have their own opinions and enjoy different things.  However, the biggest thing that strikes me about modern comics (and admittedly I only currently read 3 or 4 titles) is that they seem to take so much less time to read than older ones if we are talking value for money.  I've recently been reading a bit of old West Coast Avengers and they take me soooo much longer to read than anything published recently.  However where modern ones do score over old ones is by having the "previously in..." page at the start as the older stuff just has to keep on clumsily inserting thought/speech bubbles to remind us where the story is at in the main body of the comic which gets pretty repetitive.

Back on topic for the thread, yes great to have some clues again Zach.  Is the line up still the same as it was in the clues you gave right at the start of the thread?  And are TRU 24 and 25 for that matter too?  Thanks.

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If you are saddened by not being able to afford every new title, I highly recommend checking your regional library system for books you're willing to wait on. I can use my library's site to request GNs from 40-50 libraries in the Hudson Valley area, and they are constantly getting in new Marvel books. They don't have EVERYTHING, but they have a lot. I just requested Infamous Iron Man!

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2 hours ago, DSTZach said:

If you are saddened by not being able to afford every new title, I highly recommend checking your regional library system for books you're willing to wait on. I can use my library's site to request GNs from 40-50 libraries in the Hudson Valley area, and they are constantly getting in new Marvel books. They don't have EVERYTHING, but they have a lot. I just requested Infamous Iron Man!

Yeah, same here.  My local library has A LOT of newer stuff from both Marvel and DC. 

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Lots of good stuff to talk about in this thread, where to start?

Old comics vs New comics:

Some good points have been made about price point ($10 Spidey issue anyone?) and how quick of a read they are. Moon Knight had a few recent issues that took less than 5 min to read. I personally miss the thought balloons and editors notes, I thought they helped with characterization when the art perhaps couldn't convey the point being made.

A sore spot for me is continuity. I loved how tightly the Marvel universe was wound from the 60's through the 80's. Now not so much. Waids DD had that great Ikari storyline where Bullseye was reduced to a prisoner of his own body. Now in the new series he showed up healthy and back in the game with no explanation, and they even touched on some of the elements from Waids story while ignoring others?!

Too much exposure is another issue with me. Having the same character appear in 5 monthly titles (don't even get me started on Wolverine) isn't helping with story quality. It feels like the industry as a whole is rushing to their own demise by completely over-saturating the market. And this has been happening for a while. It's hard to stay committed when decades worth of stories are being packed into years. Nothing seems new or fresh.

Another point is the believability factor. Sure the suspension of disbelief is a major factor (a man can fly?) but how far can you push it? What made some of these characters so endearing is the impossibility of their existence. Banner into the Hulk was a million to one fluke. Sure, they dabbled in it by creating the Leader, Abomination and even She-Hulk. But now how many gamma powered entities are running around the Marvel universe? It seems like every member of the classic Hulk supporting cast has been gamma powered at some point. Where's my gamma powered Gaffer?! You could use the same argument with Spidey, Iron Man or Thor. They just keep pushing the boundaries of believability to the point of ridiculousness. Even in comic book reality how many Hulks could the world support, much less survive?

"Major" events are another thing that has pushed me away as a reader. Too much and far too often. It feels like every titles story gets derailed for three months at a time so they can tie in to a big event. Lately i've been seeking out lesser titles that can avoid this and even that doesn't work most times. And nothing ever changes it seems. DC's Infinite Crisis is the event that jumped the shark for me. You watched Superboy and Anti-Monitor "die" and then pages later, in the same issue, they were brought back... to set up the next event. No thanks.

Unmade characters from wave 50

For me personally I'd be happy if some of those character variations never happen. A new character like Gladiator or Wrecker is what i'm after and to be honest i'd rather see a Melvin Potter Gladiator before the Shiar version. I'd still love to see Warwolves, Mindless Ones or Dire Wraiths as army builders. Oddly enough, if they made a classic Multiple Man i'd only want one for my X-Men display. Go figure. 

Libraries 

Interesting suggestions for trade reading. I live in a small town and I don't believe my local library offers the networking between institutions that Zach mentioned. It's certainly worth looking into though, perhaps I could get that option from one of the bigger city libraries. Sounds like a great idea.

This thread

I think we, as a group, have found a way to make this thread interesting. But for wave 75 guesses I gotta agree with Zach, too early. We know almost nothing about this wave. I'm still curious to see how the wave 74 guesses and "sure locks" turn out before moving to another. My two cents. I am glad the current comics discussion broke out, it feels like that was a long overdue one.

* The viewpoints represented in this post are meant to represent the opinion of poster Ronan the Accuser only. Thanks.

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I got a Marvel Unlimited subscription as a gift several years ago. I have to wait a while to read anything super new, but considering what I'm getting for the money, it's been worth it to keep it up. And they've added more and more old stuff as it's rolled along, so I re-read all of the Byrne Fantastic Four a while back. And between spoiler loaded sites and the handful of spots you can still find comics in the wild, I can keep current enough.

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I've never been too hung up on old comics vs. new comics... 

I like X-Men. I read indiscriminately, regardless of era, and judge the stories as I like/hate them individually.

I read the first couple years. Your Blob and Unus and Vanisher type encounters. I've read classic stuff like Giant-Sized... Phoenix, Dark Phoenix, Proteus... some newer classics like Age of Apocalypse or Phalanx Covenant. But I've read many modern X-Men stories too.

One run that stands out to me as one that I hated was Grant Morrison's New X-Men. For all his rockstar accolades... I found most of it boring, and when it wasn't boring, it still annoyed me. A bit pretentious. I initially hated the Scott/Emma/Jean love triangle... because it was messing with a classic Marvel couple. But I've gotten used to Scott & Emma in the years since. It's easier to swallow with Jean dead than it was when she was in the picture. Hated John Sublime. Hated Here comes Tomorrow. Hated Fantomex (he's grown on me through other writers, at the time he just felt like Morrison was trying too hard to make him cool). Hated Angel (the bug girl) she was one of the most obnoxious characters ever created. Loved Xorn... which was the cruel Irony, because he wasn't real. Initially liked the reveal he was Magneto just because it genuinely shocked me at the time, but hated the way he subsequently butchered Magneto. Hated the mess Marvel made of cleaning it up (admittedly not all his fault, but still). The mess that is Xorn still sticks in my craw. They've never adequately explained him, just given several inadequate half-explanations. ANYWAY... the whole run felt like he was just coming in and trying to shake things up, and screw any established X-Men norms, and then he left the book in a shambles that other writers cleaned up poorly.

I loved Casey's concurrent run on Uncanny. No heavy shakeups... That just felt like the Kurt, Warren & Bobby I loved, having interesting adventures... breaking Chamber into the main team... and frankly I liked Stacy-X under him, when she was a serious character. Then Austin took over and she got more annoying. His run I was love hate with. I hated that he made Lorna a raving crazy ex-girlfriend. I hated Azazel. I loved what he did with Juggernaut though... his Juggernaut hero/redemption stories were some of my favorites for the character, and why I continue to resist him as a villain to this day, lol.

But I'm off on a tangent...

I love all comics. I regret reading none of them. There are ups and downs. But I still love seeing the soap opera of my favorite mutants continue to unfold.

I will say I often find old comics far too wordy. You get pages full of those large square bubbles of exposition that take an hour to read. Then again, the opposite problem is often no better... you sometimes get a modern comic you finish in 2 minutes flat because it's 7 word bubbles dispersed amongst wall to wall action panels (and if the art sucks you can't even follow those action panels). There's a give and take, haha.

This post has kind of inspired me to dig into Marvel Unlimited and find something old I haven't read. I never read Mutant Massacre... maybe I'll give that a whirl tonight.

Edited by Gillbob316
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i miss when it took an hour to read a comic. i've been reading uncanny x-men again from giant size forward and those old books were packed with action and character development. there've been times i thought "wow this single issue would be a 4 part arc these days" and that is sad. especially since the prices have sky rocketed. i'm only picking up a few titles now (mostly just the 2 Caps and Secret Wars) and waiting for the Memorial/Labor Day sales at Excalibur here in Portland to pick up everything else. i used to be able to pick up a box of 5-10 comics and get a couple hours read time out of them. now the same would take me about 45 minutes. and i miss word bubbles too! really let you dive into the character and get to know them. now it's just dialogue that half the time could be said by any character. or 1 sentence is passed along thru three different characters... "oh no-- " "--she--" "--didn't!" so annoying.

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On 09/07/2017 at 8:56 PM, Mirymate said:

I got a Marvel Unlimited subscription as a gift several years ago. I have to wait a while to read anything super new, but considering what I'm getting for the money, it's been worth it to keep it up. And they've added more and more old stuff as it's rolled along, so I re-read all of the Byrne Fantastic Four a while back. And between spoiler loaded sites and the handful of spots you can still find comics in the wild, I can keep current enough.

I love my Marvel Unlimited subscription! I hate that it doesn't work on Kindle though since that's what I bought to replace my iPad when it broke. Also Comixology Unlimited is cool.

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@ Mnemosis

No, I haven't read either. Though X-Cutioner's Song was another one I was eyeballing. I tried reading it as a kid (in its original multi-issue comic form) but it was admittedly over my head for my age at the time, so I didn't ever fully dive into it. And then the issues got destroyed somewhere along the line, as all childhood comic books do, haha...

RE: Marvel Unlimited

I was hesitant as heck to sign up for it beforehand, because A. You're paying money and ultimately own nothing. When the subscription ends, you have nothing to show for it but memories. B. I couldn't see the catalog before I signed up, so I was worried I'd pay for it, then find nothing worthwhile to read.

BUT... I pulled the trigger. I figured if I can pay a monthly fee for Netflix and enjoy it, why can't I do the same for comics right? Did so. Loved it. Haven't regretted it since. Both my fears were quickly put to bed after I actually signed up. Sure I'll ultimately own nothing, but it's a WAY more convenient way to read comics and old stories than chasing issues or trades down 1 by 1. I'm getting through actual stories much more quickly, and much more easily than I ever did reading paper comics (hauling around stacks and stacks... and paying as much in a single week as I do for a whole year of Unlimited). Just like Netflix is way easier than popping in a DVD or renting a redbox movie.

As for the catalog, it was more than fine. That fear was completely unfounded. I don't think I had trouble finding a single comic I wanted to read until about my third year of subscription, haha. Absolutely everything I wanted to read was available for about the first 2 1/2 years. Then one day there was some obscure... limited... one-shot tie-in to an event I wanted to read (I don't even remember what it was, maybe an Old Man Logan tie-in?) which wasn't available. That's the single time that's ever happened, in my entire 3ish years since I signed up, haha. Anything mainstream, anything big ticket, anything you've ever heard of basically, is on there. And PLENTY of smaller stuff too. Just because that one one-shot wasn't there doesn't mean there aren't hundreds of other limiteds and one-shorts available. Except for the newest books from the past 6 months or so, virtually the entire Marvel Catalogue is out there. But I'm not caught up with present day comics anyway, so that's never been an issue for me. I just read a few years behind the curve and it suits me fine. I like it better that way frankly, because there's no gut-busting cliffhangers, you can start and end a story on the spot if you find it engaging.

Edited by Gillbob316
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Good distillation of what's wrong with Marvel from a respected retailer:
http://www.comicsbeat.com/titling-at-windmillls-259-what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-marvel-comics-anyway/

Personally, I think that Marvel has doubled down on so many gimmicks over the years (events, relaunches, spinoffs) that people are desensitized to their tricks. They had a hit out of the gate with Black Panther, for example, and then they immediately diluted that book by launching several ill-advised spinoffs. And I agree with you guys that too many of their newer characters have the same "precocious genius" personality.  I remember reading a description for one of their new books- I think it was for the Wasp- and the description for the character sounded like it was cribbed from the copy for Totally Awesome Hulk, or Kate Bishop Hawkeye, or America Chavez, or any one of the other characters they've tried to make happen in the last five years.

The overlooked factor in all this is that Marvel is desperately trying to create a newer set of characters to replace the old ones so that fans are already used to them when it's time to do the same in the Marvel movies. But they've done such a bad job of it that, when it's time for them to cast Riri Williams to replace Robert Downey Jr, I suspect they are looking at a significant backlash.

Anyway, as for the comics, sometimes they are good, sometimes they aren't... though I do think Marvel has been in a creative lull since Secret Wars.

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20 minutes ago, hellpop said:

Good distillation of what's wrong with Marvel from a respected retailer:
http://www.comicsbeat.com/titling-at-windmillls-259-what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-marvel-comics-anyway/

I have read that before and agree with them.

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Also one thing that bugs me about most of the recent Marvel comics I've read: they all seem to have one of two tones, ultra-serious or light and frivolous. Villains are either universe-level threats or no threat at all. Some of these comics are good, some of them are not, but they still kind of all read the same. One of the reasons I still stick with Slott's Spider-Man (even though I don't really feel like the current status quo works for the character) is that it's the one Marvel book that feels like a classic Marvel book. In this environment that counts as different and unique.

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Or that annoying "just treading water till the next event" feel half the books have once this quarters "This Changes Everything" crossover is over.
But things are cyclical. Marvel and DC have been down this road before. It reminds me a lot of the 90's, minus the chromium hologram embossed covers.

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3 hours ago, BuffaloDelorean said:

Personally, I think $4 would still be too much, even with fancy covers and trading cards. IMO those kinds of gimmicks are like action features in toys, they raise the price without actually improving the product. It's the same thing with fancy packaging.

I loathe action features on toys a lot more than a holographic cover or overpower card. It can ruin the articulation. I think some holographic covers are cool but I wouldn't want every one of them to be. Also I'd count the cover as part of the comic as packaging usually is just throwaway material to me. Plus cards are cool to collect. I do agree it's still too much though. 

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1 hour ago, The Scarlet Spider said:

I loathe action features on toys a lot more than a holographic cover or overpower card. It can ruin the articulation. I think some holographic covers are cool but I wouldn't want every one of them to be. Also I'd count the cover as part of the comic as packaging usually is just throwaway material to me. Plus cards are cool to collect. I do agree it's still too much though. 

Action features can ruin definitely ruin a toy. I was thinking more along the lines of the Toybiz Water Wars or recent Hasbro Marvel movie action features.

I guess for those it's the accessory that has the feature, rather than the toy itself.

I can definitely see how that sort of thing would add value for some people, but I don't think it should be a necessary part of the product for the people (like me) who just want the comic, or if they have to be included, that they shouldn't jack up the price.

Maybe special issues could have "standard" and "deluxe" versions?

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