And Joe Q marks the end of December with the worse possible outcome of ONE MORE DAY ever.

FUCK YOU JOE Q. FUCK YOU IN THE ASS!



Way to flush 20 years down the fuck'n drain.

I didn't read your spoiler but based on the events of last issue and the rumors I had heard attributed to Joe "fuck you in the ass" Quesadilla, I'm honestly dreading picking this up later today because I think I know how it's gonna go. I'll post my comments about it after I read it. *sigh*

On the plus-side, Dan Slott is taking over Amazing, and he has yet to let me down - but with the wacky editorial decisions going on at Marvel, who knows what will happen...

Finally read Avengers: The Initiative, collecting the first six issues. I was surprised that it actually crossed over with WW Hulk, which means that they rushed this thing out the door. I'm a sucker for team books, so I liked it, even though I hate this trend that all superheroes seem to be jerks (I mean really, was Rhodes/War Machine always this bad?).

It's a lot worse than what we were looking at with the whole deal with the devil.

I gave practically no interest in Spider-man, but I have found this whole One More Day situation fascinating. I often think comic fans act like reactionary babies when it comes to "changes" made to their favorite character (I'm probably guilty of this myself), but this OMD stuff just seems...wow. Long time Spidey fans are totally justified in being angry.

I'm really curious to see this play out over time. How long before changes are changed back to cancel changes that were changed to change the changes back to the changes they originally changed for changes to be changed to the old changes again that were the original changes made to change the character for change?

I got to say you're talking through your ass here. Or at the very least not understanding what you're statement means.

Fans have no problem with change. If we did, Peter would still be a teenager who gets into trouble because he plans a date with two women on the same night while trying to fight Doc Ock, all the while having to get home in time to taste Aunt May's meatloaf.

Peter's stories over the past 20 years have changed him. From being married to moving on with his life from career to career to eventually unmasking. Him and MJ have been split a couple of different times and have worked it out through the story. Not just some magic wand of a fix.

Harry was dead. His death had meaning. Side characters die. Gwen died, there's change right there and the fans are fine with it. It's not Changes that we hate. It's STUPID changes without any real point to it that pisses us off.

This is that stupid change for the simple matter of change. There's no point to break up MJ and Peter and send him back to the status quo of 20 years ago. Especially not with the whole skrull crossover next year. This really fucks things up for that.

As stupid as his unmasking was, they dealt with it and it has a very strong base in the New Avengers story so taking that away with the magic flip of the wrist also destroys positive change that was made.

Look at Captain America. Prime example of fans accepting GOOD change. The main character of the comic, Cap himself, IS DEAD. He's been dead for a good number of issues now and everyone is fine with it because there's a good progression in the story and it's actually something that is worth reading and was brought about for a point. Not just cause they felt he needed to die. It all serves a purpose that is story driven and not just to send it back to how it was when Joe Q was a kid and the character was so much more like the readers..

I have to admit, I teared up during the comic. It was sad to see Pete and MJ go through that. Even worse because it was all for nothing. This voids 20 years worth of comics. I see no reason why to bother with Brand New Day. Cause it's more than likely they'll just take it back to the status quo of what we had before One More Day anyway. So the stories we'll be seeing will be void anyway.

Either way, Fuck this shit.

Oh, don't worry Jack. This week gets worse.

Apparently, Green Lantern has started sucking again. Really soon too. I was almost naive to think that The Sinestro Corps storyline could possibly carry on the same level of creative energy. Instead we get 1/8 of a book. There are so many plot threads going on in the latest issue it's impossible to even fathom how all these loose ends are even going to be tied up. Or even if they will at all. Or even, why it's necessary to show all these threads at once instead of tackling them on an issue-by-issue basis like during Marz's run. It's more focused and easier for the readership to follow. Instead we have unnecessarily decompressed storylines that have no rhythm whatsoever with major pacing problems.

Legion Of Superheroes went from being my favorite book that I thirsted for every week, with a streamlined line up, post-modern take on superpowers, clean timeline, and more cohesive storytelling to being an utter clusterfuck again. This week alone we get THREE visions of the Legion's future. Once in Teen Titans, again in Superman, and again in Legion of Superheroes. If DC is really intent on trashing this book, they might as well include Supergirl in the title. Oh, wait.

I don't disagree and I see you point.

I think you might not be understanding me or maybe I didn't make myself clear. I said I "often think" because there are plenty of cases when fans get up in arms about insignificant shit --the Flash isn't the right Flash, a costume isn't the right one, stuff like that. That happens, you can't tell me it doesn't (remember the bitching and moaning about the Morrison X-Men wearing leather? That was more than a few people). With quite a regular frequency too. Now maybe it's just a minority of fans, that are screaming loudest, but you've seen those posts on boards or heard those conversations at comic shops. Haven't you?

Whatever the reason for the reboot of Spidey, it is going to be really interesting to follow it from the outside looking in. I feel for Joe this con season, at least early on. He's going to get trashed.

But in this case, it's not even the changes themselves that are necessarily the problem. The truly egregious thing here is that, moreso than what actually happened in the book, is that the direction of the Spider-Man franchise is all Joe's idea.

HE wanted Spider-Man a certain way, because that's how HE likes his Spider-Man (he's gone on record criticizing the marriage, saying Spider-Man is better single - and I'm sure everything else that got retconned is his preference for the character). So as EIC, he's essentially God at Marvel.

That's the big problem here.

There should be a system of checks and balances for stuff like this, ESPECIALLY when the writer asks that his name be taken off the book!

JOE.. the books aren't written for YOU. They're written for the FANS.

Flipping through the older issues of Green Lantern before One Year Later, you get a whole new experience out of those small loose ends that never amounted for much. Black Hand spouting off about how his power is this and that and even has him stating that there would be a Blackest night made no sense at the time. But now it makes perfect sense.

Just consider this the build up time for the next big event. Hell, the secret origins book itself was amazing to read. Yeah, the threads that the new lantern book started are all over the place, doesn't mean that they wont make sense or lead to somewhere great in the months to come.

During Marz's run, it was a book that only had to deal with Kyle. Johns new book has to deal with the ever expanding Lantern universe. So much that both Corps and the main title have to share duties on telling the tales. Just think of it as two books telling the rich history of DC Space and be fine with it covering a lot of ground.

I realize that a lot of those "hints" do add up to something in the future, but they were such tertiary parts of the story that they weren't distracting. Another problem with a plot structure like this - that plagued the X-men for years - is that by the time the story is finally resolved, it's anti-climactic and no one cares anymore.

In other comic news, I'm not ready to say it's good again, but the last issue of Batman/Superman was really enjoyable. The new writer writes Bats and Supes like friends in a way I like, and this new storyline has my interest peaked. I used to love this book, and I really would like to again as I am a TOTAL whore for the Superman/Batman dynamic. Can't get enough.

I just finished the Return of Rhas storyline and it was pretty decent. I loved how at one point Batman took charge of Damien and ordered him to fight for his life; and when Talia objected, Batman told her that he wasn't asking Damien to do anything he wouldn't ask of Nightwing and Robin and that "any son of his could do no less". I thought that was pretty cool. Damien of course was ready to stand proud and fight with his Father/Batman.

Thewhowhatnow? Please fill me in, as I haven't been keeping up with news.

JMS:

Wow... and it shows just how clueless Joe is. Someone needs to walk up to Quesada and hit him in the fucking head over and over while screaming "you are not here to make the character the way YOU like him, you are here to make the character the way the FANS like him!"

Seriously, how many people wanted this to happen? Who really thought that Peter and MJ should never have been together? As far as I've seen, as soon as Quesada first brought up his desire to eventually split Pete & MJ up, the majority of fans hated the idea.