Reviews ComicBook / Civil War 2006

'If there was something wrong with it, it was that Marvel eventually backed off and returned to the standard superhero genre'

If there was something wrong with it, it's that they made the New Warriors into total twits for the purpose of the story, turned Tony Stark into Fuhrer Stark, and in general made everyone act completely out of character. And I'm not the only one who believes this. And on top of that, outside of the main series, no-one in any of the ongoings or tie-ins could figure out just how the Registration Act was supposed to work. Speaking broadly, some writers actually made it not sound so bad, while others played it up like the plague while simultaneously reinforcing 'Fuhrer Stark.' (Someone even photoshopped Iron Man with a Hitler mustache; that's how bad the general depiction of Iron Man at the time was, as well as up until Dark Reign occurred.) And even when Civil War was all said and done, many of the writers clearly didn't like the resolution. As I said, Tony was still portrayed as a dictator by many of them, with the new post-Civil War regime being incredibly strict and dictatorial in-universe.

But above all, it just didn't work. Let me rephrase that; this idea could work if used in a completely original universe, but it doesn't work in a long established Superhero universe. For one, the major OCC moments. But more importantly, that the rules that govern a standard Superhero universe, especially an ongoing serial one with no end in sight, just don't mesh with the ideas of Civil War. Marvel had been doing it's thing for years, and both the fans and writers liked it. Then, some guy (Mark Millar,) comes along and tries to shake it all up, all the while treating some long established characters completely out of character. The fans didn't like that, and neither did many of the other writers. Dark Reign showed just how the ideas presented in Civil War could horribly backfire, and when that was done, things largely went back to normal, and the writers and fans were happy once more. And I could go on, but you can check the Headscratchers page; I didn't put anything on there, but a lot of people there have addressed points similar to my own, and then some; I just stretched the surface. I also wrote a review on This Very Wiki, if you'd like to check that out.

(Also, Watchmen is acknowledged as 'one of the best comic books ever', certainly, but a lot of people only like or, in some cases, HATE Dark Knight Returns. I don't mean to come across as rude or anything like that, but I really think you should do more research on these sorts of things in the future before you go praising something so controversial to the heavens.)

Just because something is a change from the status quo, doesn't automatically make it good. More often than not it's taking the thing people liked in the past and replacing it with something crappy (see Superior Spider-man, Death of Superman).

Same principal with Civil War. Yes things changed, but in really crappy ways. As Kkhohoho above said, turning Iron Man into a dictator and tarnishing his character for years, not to mention how it made Reed Richards even worse than Doom. Oh and let's not forget turning Speedball into Bleedball. Because god forbid we allow a single colourful and fun character to exist in modern comics.

I agree with everything except for the comment on The Dark Knight Returns. A huge number of people enjoy it and it is universally considered one of the most groundbreaking and influential comics. Not sure where Kkhohoho was coming from.

'Not sure where Kkhohoho was coming from.'

First, let me say that I enjoy DKR, though I don't consider it a masterpiece like some people do. That said, here's a comment from a troper on This Very Wiki, Ambar Son Of Deshar.

God forbid, other people who don't think TDKR was the most brilliant comic book ever. I think the first section, with Two-Face, is decent enough, but the rest of it? The Camp Gay Joker with the transsexual Nazi boyfriend (way to not understand who the Nazis hated, Miller)? The "psychiatry is bad and we should just lock up/kill the criminals" message? The idolization of fascistic figures? And of course, Superman, the stooge of the government? Christ Almighty it's a bad book.

So yes, not everyone enjoys DKR.

I never said that literally everyone enjoyed that book. But it is well'liked, I'd say on the same level as Watchmen.

Sorry; I misunderstood. That said, I'd be lying if I thought the book was a masterpiece. I actually think the first half is the better part, and probably why people like it so much; the quality of the second half is what tends to cause comments like the one I quoted. Mainly, it's really stuck in the 80's, and on top of that has Superman as the government's lackey. Because of that, you've got people saying that while it was revolutionary at the time, it hasn't aged well. And because of that, every now and then, you get complaints.

Yeah, one complaint about Watchmen is that it's stuck in the Cold War. Back then, nuclear holocaust seemed plausible, if not certain. But now... well, I think it's still plausible, but most people don't. This makes the villains motives far more ridiculous than they were intended. Among other things, relating to the general paranoia of the era.

@doctrainAUM, I have to disagree with you on Watchmen. I thought the nuclear angle worked very well, and I was born far too late to know what happened in the eighties. I think you have to go in with an understanding of the political system from the time it was published. It's like The Great Gatsby, while the culture of the time may be long gone, the characters and the author's message remain important. As for Civil War, honestly, I had a hard time following it. I do think that JMS Spider-Man comics at the time were good, but I've got no clue beyond that.

@Picard: If you really want to better understand Civil War, (and God help you if you do,) then just read the main 7-issue miniseries. While it doesn't demonstrate the fact that nobody had actually bothered to sit down and decide just what exactly the SHRA was, it does perfectly demonstrate everything else, including the infamous 'Fuhrer Stark.' (The whole thing was so ill-received that they wiped away Tony's memories of the entire event. Oh, what he did still happened; it's just that he no longer remembers what he did.)

They could've fixed the whole issue if they just reconned CW-era Stark into a Skrull imposter. Now Tony will likely be forever remembered as 'That douche who jammed his own friends into a Negative Zone-auschwitzz and tried to start a war with Atlantis.'

Among people who don't just watch the movies anyway.

Of course that most fans would get scared of real changes in the genre itself, and would prefer it to stay as a medium where nothing ever changes at all, except for Spider-Man's suit. That doesn't mean that Civil War was bad, just that it had an Audience-Alienating Premise. A populated headscratchers page does not mean anything either, Watchmen has an even bigger one, and their plot is a perfect self-consistent plot with clockwise detail.

As for Watchmen and the Dark Knight, when I said that they are "widely acknowledged" as the Magnum Opus of the genre, I was thinking only in comic book magazines and other comments made by professionals.

Again, just because something is different doesn't make it good. Not that that's instantly what makes Civil War bad.

What makes Civil War bad is a plot that makes no sense and functions entirely on backwards nonsensical logic. 'What's that? A supervillain killed a bunch of people?! Well clearly superheroes are to blame! Let's try to kill and imprison the guys who are the only ones who keep our planet from being devoured by space monsters!'

The SHRA itself is never defined, the supposed 'good guys' of the story are shown to be more monstrous than anyone else in the entire story, the politics are bullshit (You don't use MySpace or watch NASCAR? Then clearly you don't know shit Captain America!) and several characters were ruined for years to come, from Reed to Tony to Bleedball.

A nonsensical logic is not a logic that leads to outcomes you don't like. In the plot, the NW are blamed for the Stamford incident because A) They were filming a reality show when they attacked the villains, and B) if they didn't attack the villains in such a reckless way, Nitro would have continued playing with the X-Box, and the city would still be there. Second, nobody ever said that heroes can't go and fight space monsters, only that they must be held accountable for their actions when they do that. The act is, in fact, much more defined than other superhuman registration acts. As for the "good guys", which side are you on? The plot has no good or bad guys. As for politics, I have seen in the real world real guerrillas killing people and blowing places in the name of left-wing nonsenses about "the people", an idealized type of "people" that only exist in their imagination and has little in common with the real people; so I got the intended message perfectly well. Most of the times that superheroes say something political it will be something completely obvious, such as "nazism is bad" or "winners don't use drugs"; so I highly appretiate it when they acknowledge something a bit more advanced, specially when it defies the "superheroes are always right!" dogma.

Well, my problem with Civil War was that it stuffed several characters into the Fridge (Most of the New Warriors, Namora in particular) made the New Warriors into idiots for the sake of plot (They were NEVER that reckless before) and turned Iron Man into an asshole who throws his own friends into the Negative Zone without trial, and then start a war with Atlantis.

Oh, and you said the story doesn't immediately take the side of the Anti Regs? What about when the Pro Regs tried to arrest Captain America for being against the Act, BEFORE IT PASSED.

And Mister Fantastic being on the Pro Reg side? In an earlier story, he outlined every reason he didn't believe such a law would work. One of those reasons was something like "How do you expect to force THOR to play along?"

Then, they offed Black Goliath using that annoying as hell Thor clone. And then they're like "Hey, Norman Osborn, man most famous for murdering a teenage girl to spite some guy for beating him up, want a job?"

Another reason it's impossible to actually side with the Pro Reg side is when they confront Luke Cage and he says he plans on staying out of the whole thing. So what do they do? Threaten his fucking daughter.

Civil war had an interesting premise that was terribly executed, with writers not even being told the Pro Reg side was supposed right until the final issue of the main series was being scripted. They took a premise that originally started with "How do we get to have some punch ups between our big heroes?" Into a preachy (On both sides with some of the Anti Regs basically being under the impression that the Government knowing who they are is akin to living under Hitler) political mess that didn't even know what it was trying to say until it was over.

Also, I apologize for my poorly constructed arguments. I probably ly shouldn't try to argue the merits of a story when I'm half asleep.

'Of course that most fans would get scared of real changes in the genre itself, and would prefer it to stay as a medium where nothing ever changes at all, except for Spider-Man's suit.'

You're certainly right; nothing ever changes expect for Spider-man's suit. The Avengers still consist of their original five members. Iron Man never had a drinking problem, and never lost his company as a result. Captain America never saw Nixon kill himself and then proceed to go through a HBSD. Gwen Stacy never died.

It's true that, at least these days, big changes either don't happen, or when they do, they usually eventually go away, but all that proves is that change did happen before Civil War ever came around. It also proves that whatever changes Civil War brought about were going to be null and void in time.

'The act is, in fact, much more defined than other superhuman registration acts.'

Maybe. But it's also still far less defined then actual real-life acts. Marvel never bothered to sit down and write out one detailed, consistent act to use in all of it's books, and it showed. And on top of that, all of the heroes were fighting over a law that had yet to be passed. Let that sink in for a moment. It had yet to pass. There was still the possibility that the law could be vetoed. And yet, everyone started fighting and over-reacting anyway.

But above all, I've never seen you really touch on what myself and other people are citing as one of the by-far biggest failings of Civil War; the characters, or more specifically, how the characters are written in Civil War. If you'd been reading comics for nearly 20 years prior to Civil War, surely you'd get these characters; how they generally act, how they tend to be written. As I said in my review, prior to Civil War, while Cap and Tony always had their disagreements, they would always work them out in time, and it would be unlikely that they would go to war over each other. Then there's the New Warriors. As Little Wiggle pointed out, they were never that reckless. If written by anyone other than Mark Millar, they would never have just barged in to Nitro's place like they did. Then there's Spiderman. Some heroes can get away with not having a SID, or at least not placing much importance on it, but not Spiderman. He has a quite the personal life, and a buttload of enemies that would gladly take their grievances out on that personal life if they knew who he was. In fact, one of them already had. And so many other heroes and villains were acting OOC as well, with hardly any later attempts (such as Secret Invasion,) to excuse their behavior; Hank Pym's the only notable example I can think of.

And that's not all, either. So, a a group of OOC heroes accidentally cause a supervillain to blow up and destroy a town of 600 people. Okay, but it's not like that was the only time massive amounts of people, if not more, had died. Furthermore, heroes had been operating in this universe for decades; they had been around ever since 1939 with the debut of the original Human Torch. You'd figure something like this would have happened before at some point, but the public never really treated anything like that like they did in this story. But even regardless of all that, it doesn't excuse the biggest offender; Iron Man, and his actions. He rounded up all of his friends, and put them in an extra-dimensional camp, with the intent presumably being to lock them in there for life; all for a bill that had yet to pass. And that wasn't even all he did. No matter how you slice it, Iron Man committed war crimes, and as a result, his character was tarnished for years to the point where, as I stated in my very first comment, people photoshopped him with a Hitler mustache.

I'm not asking you to completely change your opinion on Civil War, but at least seriously consider and take into account that which is being laid before you. If you like the general idea, fine. In fact, I like the general idea too; it is a good concept that could work if done right. But it wasn't done right. It was done horribly. If you want to see an idea somewhat similar to Civil War's done right, go watch JLU if you haven't already done so; you'll thank me later. But this, as is, was far from being done right.

Sorry I didn't notice this reply the last time around, those things do not show up in the watchlist.

The changes you listed are not enough. None of them was a change that redefined the whole superhero genre at large, as in this case. That was the kind of change I had been expecting for long, and which finally came to pass in this story.

The "it had yet to be passed" is simply wrong, read the story again. The law came into force, on-screen, during the 2º issue. All the fights between super heroes take place after that point. We may discuss if Hill made something illegal, or if Cap overreacted in the helicarrier, but "all of the heroes were fighting over a law that had yet to be passed" is plain wrong. There was another comic detailing how Iron Man makes his first arrest enforcing the law: he detains Prodigy, who openly defies the law after the point it came into force (the hour has passed, and the law was in force by then, so Iron Man was doing the legal thing).

As for the characters, it was not the first time that Captain America and Iron Man had a crisis (see, for example, Operation Galactic Storm). And the idea of two big heroes and friends taking their differences to open hostilities is not so strange or unexpected, Superman and Batman have been doing that for decades, Cap with a hacking tool in his gaunlet is not so different from Batman with a piece of Kryptonite in his belt. I disagree on the New Warriors: they are reckless, but they simply had Plot Armor, which prevented them from making disasters like this one. Spider-Man's unmasking might have actually worked, if he stayed on the government's side. May and Mary Jane were well protected in the tower. He ruined it and got May shot when he changed sides, and lost the protection of the law.

The people had never been concerned about it before? They should never be concerned about it, then? That sounds like a very conservative thought. Societies do in fact change their general ideas in a short time or even almost immediately, if the right buttons are pressed. Would the Patriot Act have been accepted previously to 9/11? That's not much of a Genius Bonus, anyone can notice that. Specifically within comic books, Civil War does not happen from out of the blue, and there was already a set up of increasingly public concern about superheroes.

"I particularly enjoyed the meeting of Sally Floyd and Captain America."

You may as well have just said 'My favourite cartoon character is Scrappy-Doo.'

You're completely entitled to your opinion of course and I don't even think Civil War was that bad, but it was executed terribly. It sounds like you're reviewing a version of Civil War that you want to exist but doesn't - a version where both of the sides are balanced and have good points and people find it difficult to choose which one to root for. That would've been an excellent comic, and I hope the movie is more along those lines.

Instead, we got Iron Man acting exactly like a supervillain along with most-nearly everyone who supported him, while the folks rallying behind Captain America were mostly fighting for the right to simply EXIST without being indefinitely imprisoned in another dimension for the crime of... having powers.

The MCU? Have you seen Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.? Because there doesn't seem much difference between the way that comics deal with unregistered heroes, and the way that the MCU deals with the people in "the index".

As for Sally Floyd, let me ask you something: do you live in a country that faced an urban guerrilla in its contemporary history, a bunch of fools killing people and blowing up buildings in the name of left-wing nonsenses about "the people", a concept of "people" that is far removed from the actual people? Because I do. And because of that, I fully understand the point that Sally Floyd was making (or, more precisely, writer Paul Jenkins). I'm not interested in discussing the overly fictional aspect of "who else will fight against Galactus", that scene was a good artistic metaphor of the relation between guerrilla's slogans and the real people, and I appreciate it.

Never seen Agents of Shield.

Doesn't change the fact that in the comics Iron Man was throwing anyone with powers who didn't agree with him into Interdimensionary Prisoner-of-War Camp.

Um, ok. First off, Christ almighty, stop with the flame bait. This is a comic book. 'People blowing up buildings in the name of left-wing nonsenses' is like wearing a T-Shirt saying 'I bring up wildly inappropriate political feelings during the discussion of comic books.'

Also, just a flat no in regards to 'I know what I'm talking about more than you do because I live in a place and you don't live in the same place so take that!'

Secondly, and again, entitled to your own opinion, but I do believe you are assigning meanings based off of your own pre-existing opinions to a work that does not display those meanings. Sally Floyd complained that Captain America didn't use Myspace. To you, this is 'a good artistic metaphor between guerrila's slogans and the real people'. To - not literally everyone else but close enough that using 'literally' would be acceptable - it's some whiny reporter saying that Captain America is a bad superhero because he's out of touch with pop culture.

Yes, he did. That was the law. Do you think it was up to him to refuse, and things would be the usual anarchy? No. If he refused to do this, the government would put someone else in charge of all this, and put Stark in prison as well. Someone like Peter Gyrich, or Thunderbolt Ross, perhaps.

So the moral of the story is 'If the government asks you to do something wrong, do it or they'll throw you in prison and replace you with someone who will'?

Wasn't it brought up in the Spider-Man comic that the whole interdimensional prison camp essentially entirely ignored due process of law, and just locked people up and threw away the key without trial or... anything that's part of the American legal system?

It's not the moral of the story. It's just the way things are. Try to be a cop outside of Hollywood, refuse to obey orders to detain outlaws claiming that they are your friends, and tell me what happens.

As for the Sally Floyd metaphor, As the Good Book Says, "A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. Whoever has ears, let them hear."

I hate to say this because of the implication that I'm too stupid to understand what you're saying (I probably hate to say it because it's true, but there you go,) but I have absolutely no idea what point you are trying to make.

I mean I don't want to be mean or anything but I feel like that should go down as a fault on your part for the complete lack of any explanation in regards to why an out of context series of bible verses explains why your interpretation of dialogue from an Marvel Comics crossover event is correct.

That parable essentially means "if you don't get it, you're not going to get it."

In the context, the metaphor is the seed, those who do not get the point are the shallow soil, and those who do are the good soil. The first ones are confused, and complain, and have a bad time reading the comic. The others are fine, praise the good work and enjoy reading the comic, and have a good time with it. Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.

Wait a minute. You're that guy who keeps doing reviews that rip off of Youtube shows.

Oh. So this review is another attempt at humor.

I don't want to jump to the conclusion that you're trolling, but that seed metaphor was 'The people who don't share my opinion on this comic are too stupid to understand what it REALLY means, and that's why they get angry and complain. But because I'm smarter than them, I recognize it as objectively good because I understand the real meaning that they're missing.'

Either you need to rethink your metaphor so as not to imply that the only reason people don't like the comic is that they're not as intelligent as you, or you're just trolling quite politely.

So you're equating this comic with "the word of God" and that anyone who hates it can never be convinced (which isn't what the parable means). That's quite an overblown comparison if I've ever heard one.

As much as I'm alright with differing opinions and all, I'm much more inclined to take your point with a grain of salt when you're following up a year-old review with bible verses out of nowhere and a degree of "these events concur with my own thoughts on political movements/events and are thus objectively valid". Like seriously, I thought kkhohoho was just as rude in the earlier comments, but reviving your own review so long after its death to refute a point from over a year ago before acting just as thickheaded is a bit of a red flag regarding the accuracy of your claim.

Not that I have an issue with religion, I have a slight interest in bible stuff as well. I just think it's pompous and self-righteous to dismiss your detractors by calling them shallow in comparison to your own mental richness. Just out of curiosity, what represents the thorns in that quote? If shallow dirt represents simple, dismissive minds and good dirt represents rich, well-balanced minds, then what mind is represented by the thorns?

Let's start from a basic premise. A writer will write something expecting people to like it. A write will write something that, from his own perspective, makes sense. And if the writer is writing a character that he created himself, then doubly so. Your interpretation of Sally Floyd's comment suits your dislike for the story, but fails to acknowledge why would have Paul Jenkins write it in the first place. Note that understanding the idea does not equal liking or agreeing with it. I do not agree with existencial nihilism, but I understand how does Watchmen makes a point about it, and I don't reject the story because of advancing an idea I personally reject.

As for the thorns, there is people who reads Civil War and likes it, but then finds the huge Internet Backdraft, and changes his mind to fit with the other guys. In this case, the Internet Backdraft are the thorns of the parable.

That's a very polite way of saying 'If you don't like the comic, it's because you already made up your mind not to like the comic and you're subconsciously refusing to see things the 'correct' way, which happens to be mine.'

I flat out refuse to acknowledge that a number of people greater than 3 have changed their opinions of comics in order to fit in with anonymous internet communities. You're essentially saying that people who don't like this comic are lying to themselves.

You know, in your overblown (and quite frankly, insulting) defense of the story, you've failed to acknowledge a number of criticisms, such as the one about how everyone is wildly out of character, or how the portrayals are incredibly inconsistent across titles.

Yes, I did. It was said that the New Warriors are competent heroes. They are not, they simply had Plot Armor that prevented their antics from making too much trouble. This story simply turned the plot armor off, and Reality Ensues.

Spider-Man reveals his identity on live television, and we know what happened after all of that. Yes, it was a monumental mistake. But, was it really so out of character? Although not in the level of the New Warriors, Spider-Man already has a history of monumental mistakes that seemed like good ideas in the moment. Wearing a suit with many practical advantages that he got in an alien world is one of them. Thinking that Norman Osbourne's Easy Amnesia would stay after he discovered his secret identity is another. And of course, his overrepeated origin story...

As for Iron Man and Captain America, their views towards the whole thing and how did they fit with older stories is fully explored in "Civil War: War Crimes". I find that story to be perfectly fine.

Your argument for Spider-Man revealing his identity, something he vowed to never, ever do because it would put the people he cared about in harm's way, is simply 'Well, it's not like he hasn't made mistakes before!'

Couldn't you say that about... well, not to exaggerate, but, literally anyone ever? Certainly anyone fictional.

Perhaps. But making a monumental mistake and fill some months or years with Wangst about it is almost a Spider-Man trademark.