Category Archives: Comics
Change Has Finally Come for The Magnificent Ms. Marvel
Dread it. Run from it. Creative changes still arrive. The day we all feared has come: G. Willow Wilson will be leaving Ms. Marvel. She’s written the character she helped create for five years now, at around 60 issues, but word came down today that she’s leaving. I have long feared this day.
Wilson’s run will end soon, and then the new year will kick off with The Magnificent Ms. Marvel #1, written by Saladin Ahmed, with art from Minkyu Jung. More on them in a minute.
I am saddened to see Wilson leaving the title because Ms. Marvel is a fantastic comic. Kamala Khan is arguably the greatest new comic book character of the 21st century, in large part to Wilson’s pen — with help from editor Sana Amanat, and the various awesome artists. Together, they created a freshly original superhero character who is both instantly charming and deeply complex. Kamala’s journey from fangirl to legit hero has been wonderful to read over the past five years.
Personally, I’ve always been a little disappointed at how quickly Marvel spread the Ms. Marvel love. Kamala succeeded in large part because of her grounded humanity. For me personally, Wilson and Amanat welcomed me into the world of Muslim households and places of worship, giving me greater insight into a culture I have never been exposed to. But then Marvel had to go and make her an Avenger almost immediately, and now she’s joined and left and re-joined so many major superhero teams that the very act has no meaning.
Thankfully, Wilson kept the main series grounded. I really am going to miss her work on this comic.
Meanwhile, Wilson wrote an open letter today at Marvel.com. Fun read!
I don’t know what to expect from Ahmed. Word of mouth around the internet on him is great. But I didn’t care for his Exiles comic at all, and I still haven’t read his Black Bolt series (though I have the first tpb sitting on my “to read” pile). I didn’t much care at the time for the short story he wrote in Ms. Marvel #31, but I suppose it was fine. I guess we’ll have to wait and see!
And then we can all get hyped for the Ms. Marvel movie! It’s gotta happen eventually, right?!
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My 6 Favorite Alternate Spider-People
This week sees the release of the movie Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and I am super excited! All word of mouth and reviews paint this as a possible masterpiece! The trailers are excellent. The cast is top notch. We could be looking at a game-changer here!
And if that’s not enough hype, how about a listicle of my favorite alternate Spider-Men?
So many good Spider-things
There have been a bajillion different Spider-Men and Spider-Women over the years, many of whom show up in the new movie. There have even been two very recent comic book crossover stories about Spider-Man teaming up with an untold number of alternate reality versions of him. And there are movie, video game and cartoon versions on top of that. There are so many different Spider-People in comics!
And these six are my favorite! They’re not all alternate reality versions of Peter Parker. Nor are they all Spider-Man. This is just a list of all the knock-off, clone, alternate and sometimes completely unrelated additional Spider-People that I love in comics!
Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 12/8/18
Have you seen the trailer yet for Captain Marvel? What about Avengers: Endgame? Or the new Spider-Man: Far From Home trailer? Is that not out yet? This week was crazy with Marvel movie trailers! Almost like it’s Christmas!
We’ve got some solid Marvel comics this week, too! Like Uncanny X-Men and West Coast Avengers! But DC wins Comic Book of the Week with the second issue of Grant Morrison’s The Green Lantern!
He doesn’t do things by the book!
Meanwhile, take a second to go watch those trailers again. They’re pretty great! Then come back here and read the rest of my reviews.
Comic Reviews: Batman #60, The Green Lantern #2, Uncanny X-Men #4, and West Coast Avengers #5.
Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 12/1/18
Both Aquaman and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse are getting great word-of-mouth ahead of their upcoming releases. That is both crazy and awesome! I’m really excited for these movies now!
But we’re not here to talk movies! That’s just my way of opening up this article with some general superhero chatter. We’re here to talk comics, and this week is a doozy! We’ve got Superman, Spider-Man, X-Men, Wonder Woman, Booster Gold and more! Comic Book of the Week goes to Fantastic Four #4, for an issue that I hope is a solid example of what we’re going to see going forward.
There are now two flat, stretchy superheroes in the Marvel Universe
Meanwhile, I got a request to review the finale to the Drowned Earth storyline in Justice League. I dropped the main comic awhile ago, so I had a lot of catching up to do. I liked the first couple of issues, but big team-focused comics aren’t my cup of tea these days, so I faded from the series. But I take my review requests seriously, so you best believe I have reviewed the Drowned Earth finale below!
Comic Reviews: Action Comics #1005, Amazing Spider-Man #10, Aquaman/Justice League – Drowned Earth #1, Fantastic Four #4, Heroes in Crisis #3, Uncanny X-Men #3 and Wonder Woman #59.
My 6 Favorite “Sixth” Members
The Green Ranger is the best Power Ranger. It’s indisputable. He was the coolest, had the best costume and was just plain awesome. And ever since I saw him karate kick his way onto my weekday afternoon television screen, I have loved the “Sixth” Member of teams. On TV Tropes, this trope is actually called the “Sixth Ranger” specifically because of the Green Ranger, but I didn’t want anybody to think this was a list only about sixth Power Rangers.
I know this is the Gold Ranger, but he’s a strong runner-up
The trope is that you take an established group or team of characters, and then some time later, you add an extra member to the roster. Sometimes it’s a bad guy turned good. Sometimes it’s a new member. Sometimes it’s just a hanger-on. But whatever the case, this is one of my favorite character tropes and I wanted to share!
So join me after the jump for some of my favorite fictional characters, almost entirely because they’re the “Sixth” member of an established group. It’s a pretty reliable thing for me.
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