Marvel Comics General

Admittedly, Valhallen the Viking God of Ragnarock n' Roll is a concept so ridiculous it loops back into cool.

The political barbs were funny, but my favorite gag was actually CHAD HAMMER musing about how he’s caught in a complicated love quadrangle between himself, Amora, Skurge, and “Norwegian supermodel Val Kyrie” (whom he’s beginning to suspect is really his Avengers teammate Valkyrie!) and how it will never be resolved because it’s such an interesting story!

Edited by HamburgerTime on Apr 17th 2024 at 10:04:07 AM

Oh my god

I mean, Chad Hammer is clearly not that bright, but...

The run's shaping up into a really interesting look at the power of stories, who owns them, and art vs. business. But woven into an epic Thor saga with much hammer throwing.

Which still fits neatly with the theme.

Is Ewing now the definitive Agger writer, do you think? Using him in both Hulk and Thor is an interesting choice.

He's pretty much the only writer I've seen so far who manages to make the satire with Agger tolerable and not obnoxious... and even than, I frankly think Agger is one of the weaker parts of both Immortal Hulk and this. Like, as funny as the whole idea of Chad Hammer is, the joke wears thin pretty quick and increasingly relies on the reader sharing a very precise set of political opinions common online. It's mostly saved by the legitimately intelligent way it ties into the run's wider themes of the power of stories and how people use them, as well as the knowledge that Agger is clearly just a Starter Villain to be dealt with before getting into the real meat of the run, trying to thwart the apocalypse that Those Who Sit Above In Shadow are threatening to bring about.

In Immortal Hulk he was a Big Bad Wannabe who got chewed up by Xemnu and scared off by the Leader. I don't expect this plan to end any better.

Interesting that the Hulk plan involved rewriting the story as well, though...

Edited by Mrph1 on Apr 17th 2024 at 4:34:53 PM

Ok, having now read the new Marvel's Voices... Anthony Oliveira and artist Cara McGee are on form. Definite Tear Jerker moments.

This is the third part of the "Unlike Any Other" arc, this time starring Escapade, who previously appeared in New Mutants.

And she's in a restaurant with Emma Frost, but doesn't quite remember how she got there. Because she's not there. She foiled a Hydra plane hijacking, but one of the passengers was thrown from the plane when Hydra forced the door open. Shela/Escapade used her powers to switch places with the woman who fell. Escapade's still falling, pushing herself to the limits to prevent her power swapping them back. Escapade can't fly, and isn't invulnerable. The fall is only going to end one way.

Emma's conversation in the telepathic illusion of the restaurant is to comfort her while she falls, and to say goodbye if the mutants she's contacted can't rescue her in time. They do, of course, but...

So, that's Bloodline, Escapade and the Aaron Fischer Captain America. Interesting group of characters. This is definitely looking like recruitment for a new Young Avengers team.

It's been too long since we had a Young Avengers run. I wouldn't object to it at all, as long as they get a writer similar to Gillen who gets what the series is about.

Makes me think that Kamala being on NYX is Marvel admitting the Champions didn't do as well as they wanted and are abandoning the team.

Earth X time.

Issue 10

Issue 11

Captain America gathers allies from all over the world to stop the Skull… only to hilariously fail because he didn’t bother coming up with a strategy to counter the guy who can mind control people.

Peter Parker puts on a Halloween costume that’s several sizes too small. It’s unclear why but several of his old friends mock how he’s fat.

Black Bolt makes the biggest screm. Then he blows up.

Cap uses Alicia Master’s living clay sculptures for a third swing at the Skull.

This time his strategy is to sneak up on the kid and break his neck. Surprisingly, this makes things worse. Without the Skull to keep the population under control, the Celestials decide to wipe out all life on Earth with only Tony Stark in a giant robot to try and hold them off. Yeah, he’s been living in a giant robot the whole time. That’s the most plausible thing you could tell me about a Future Tony.

Not just any giant robot, it's Red Ronin.

While I have plenty of criticisms for Earth X, one thing I did love about it was how it wasn't afraid to dig up really obscure characters like Red Ronin, Texas Jack, Jude the Entropic Man, and others of that sort and treat them as just as important as the big names.

The Anti-Godzilla mech Red Ronin, yum

It is a fun deep cut.

×4

I think that's over thinking it. Kamala being in NYX has nothing to do with that.

We haven't gotten a Champion title in a way and the past ones all kept quickly getting cancelled to make anything of note.

I feel them emphasizing Kamala as an X-Men is partly cause they want to associate Kamala with a new team to see if it works.

So, thinking back on Tony's run with the X-Men during the finale of the Krakoa arc has got me wondering if there have been any other encounters between Tony and the X-Men?

Best I can think of is that one comic series where some dude brought plucked a Jean right as she became Dark Phoenix out of the Timestream and Tony went through time meeting other heroes (Power Man and Iron Fist, Johnny Storm, etc) at earlier points in their timeline, before ending up meeting Cyclops just before he meets Jean on the roof after she mind nukes Mastermind, and pushes him to talk to her and not give up (possibly knowing how things are supposed to go). He eventually returns to the present, but brings the others forward with him to stop Dark Phoenix, which they do, and then everyone ends up back in their proper timeline, but afterwards, he goes to a restaurant where everyone (sans Johnny, who was dead at the time) is, as they've been meeting there since that time when they could, with more joining as they catch up in their own timelines.

There's also The 8th Day, which was a Iron-Man, Spider-Man, Thor crossover with the Exemplars, other deities empowered by rivals of cyttorak similarly to how the latter empowered the Juggernaut. It's not really a full on X-men Crossover, because besides Juggy, only Xavier shows up, but it's close.

For some reason, I find the idea of Tony working with X-people fascinating so I'm wondering if it's happened more before.

Judgment Day forces him to work with Sinister to end the war, then allies him with the X-Men to defeat a mad Celestial. Jean and Tony are two of the three key characters in the finale.

Ah yes. Judgement Day. I'd forgotten about that.

I even managed to read that one. Tony got judged and managed to pass, which lead to him being sure Jean would as well (because he's Tony Stark and nobody's fucked up more than him, so if he passes, there's no way Jean fails), then gives a loud god dammit when Jean does in fact fail.

And way back in Gillen's Iron Man run, after Avengers vs X-Men, the alien Voldi place Tony on trial for deicide, for his role in seemingly killing the Phoenix.

Like most Marvel characters, Iron Man has had plenty of mutual crossovers in X-Men stuff. Most are just little cameos and such, but a few had him in bigger or more notable roles like X-Men Forever featuring him as a major character. Krakoa was the first time he played a role so big and important in the X-Men, to the point he's arguably got some claim on being one now (and actually was one in the Stasis timeline in Rise).

Honestly, Iron Man has joined the ranks of Spider-Man, the FF, and Hulk in being a major franchise of Marvel's that avoids the Superman Stays Out of Gotham crap where the Avengers feel like they belong in a different universe from the X-Men. If this run has proven anything, it's that Tony actually slots really well into the X-Men, and his series' big emphasis on technology and futurism fits really with X-Men's cyberpunk/biopunk vibes.

With the Duggan's run I'd say the problem is similar to his X-Men, incredibly serialized that its only on this one plotline with the Feilong conflict.

Which is a problem in general with Fall of X, it feels like the conflict with Orchis is incredibly dragged out and there isn't much to explore there despite last over a year as a status quo.

But that has more to do with her being a mutant now.

Yeah its a multiple advantage thing. The character has been languishing (cause of their mishandling of her), and so they see the X connection as a new route for her.

Read Ultimate Black Panther #3, okay the real time gimmick is harming the book. Not much happens, its mostly T'Challa being lead to the place by Killmonger and Storm that Moon Knight are after and we don't get much idea what it is other than it being a floating green orb.

Not much being done with T'Challa who is a bit too reactive, mostly him being told by the 2 there is so much about the rest of the country he doesn't know. The most action in the book is the start where Shuri fights a training robot and gets into a sparring match with Okoye.

Edited by slimcoder on Apr 17th 2024 at 5:02:26 AM

Tell that to Ricochet and Justice!

Hey, how much time does Whirlwind spend with his fellow mutants?

Between Fall of X, Trial of Magneto, and Judgement Day the Avengers feel less like they’re in a different world from the X-Men and more that they’re next door neighbors and the domestic drama keeps spilling over the fence

Good. They're all in the same world. They've shared characters at times.

To be honest, it should seem that way. Avengers shit should affect the X-men and vice versa.

....

That's not to say it can't sometimes backfire.