I had the same thoughts about Final Crisis, although I felt it wasn't as pretentious as the first issue of Infinite Crisis, although definitely not as good as the original Crisis.

Giant Size Astonishing X-men was a confusing mish-mash of good and bad ideas. The art was solid, I'd begun to see Cassaday slipping in previous issues. However, many of the problems in this issue simply stem from how late it is to the party, and where exactly this story fits into Marvel continuity at the moment. The first pages were Spider-man in classic form, which means it probably takes place before Civil War (which is when this storyline began, remember, almost 2 years ago), but there are numerous indications that this takes place afterwards. But that still doesn't work, because of where the X-men are right now. So in an effort to reach the current audience, Whedon has alienated the original audience for this story. It's not particularly important to me though.

Continuity aside, this issue sums up everything that was good and bad with Astonishing X-men. Great character moments, excellent dialogue, stunning art, and some great sci-fi concepts; on the flipside of that coin, muddled continuity, flat moments, and a mediocre and predictable ending bring this story down.

Usually, the first issues of "event" books always get me excited for what's to come. House of M, Civil War, Infinite and Identity Crisis, and the rest (regardless of how they play out) had exciting and captivating first issues. Final Crisis however left me completely cold. Here's hoping the next issue or two manage to capture my interest.

I felt like the book really had a lot of "meat" to it though, and that's something i've come to expect from Grant Morrison. He's not a "cliffhanger" writer either so that's probably why the ending felt so flat, although it was still exciting.

That's fair. Grant is a writer who tends to build a foundation early that pays off later, and that's why I'm not just writing the series off, but to be honest even the "meat" in this issue wasn't that interesting to me. Which makes sense when you consider I've never really been into the New Gods (outside Darkseid and the New God's portrayal in the Superman and Justice League cartoons) or the monitors (I've never read the original crisis).

Thank GOD i'm not the only one that thinks so...

Also, lemme get this straight...Kitty's "bonded" to a metal ship that's aimlessly flying around the galaxy...right?

Ok, so got my last month's batch of comics and trades... yay, no more Supergirl! Teen Titans still bites, though.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #21: decent issue, though the arrogance of the "Big 3" kinda surprises me... having them be the masterminds behind the league made sense maybe in pre-Crisis days, but post-Crisis, aren't all three about the same, experience-wise, as a lot of the other heroes on the roster?

TEEN TITANS #59: I guess Morrison's version of the New Gods is now canon. Other than that... meh.

I'm about halfway through COUNTDOWN TO FINAL CRISIS TP VOL 01. They priced it pretty reasonably. The cover has some blurb from a review about how it's amazing the kind of talent they put together for the book... the writers, maybe, but the art is hit and very, very miss at times. I realize it's a weekly book, but geez. Like 52, it's like a condensed version of the "important stuff" happening in the rest of the DC Universe, with some side stories about relatively minor characters sprinkled in. I don't think it works as well as 52, mainly because it's happening in real time, and if someone were to just read this book and not the other DC series, they'd feel lost and/or like they missed out on the best parts. Which may be by design, as I'm sure it helps sell books. But it just does not work when read by itself, sequentially, because you have these big gaps in continuity that are briefly touched upon. For instance, if not for reading JLA and JSA, there's no way I'd be able to make heads or tails of why Karate Kid fought Batman, then got put behind bars, then got released.

Still have yet to read:
LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #42
JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA #15: always the last monthly I read, because it's always my favorite
STARMAN OMNIBUS HC VOL 01: Looking forward to this, even though I collected these issues when they first came out... it's been a while since I revisited the series.

edited to add:
oops, wrong thread...