I still think the Ultimates should have been treated like the Dark Knight/ Tangent universe, and only be written when a great new story comes a long. Putting someone on book just to keep it as an Ongoing is probably the biggest problem the industry. I mean look at Ellis on X-men. Joe Q knew that Warren Ellis name attached to any ongoing was going to put it in the top 20, look at T.Bolts. But its clear that Ellis hasn't wanted to write the stories he's been made to write. T.Bolts and New Universal were Ok, but very poor by his standards (Planetary, Global Frequency, Transmetroploitan, Storm watch, The Authority, in mind). When I saw he was on the X-men in the spring, i had a joy gasm in my pants. I thought that Ellis was finally given work he recognised he could thrive in. Political/moral dilemmas, bad-ass characters, sexual chemistry, and crazy sci-fi scenarios, it was going to be like the fat kid in Willy Wonkas chocolate factory. However, universally bad reviews, its clear that Ellis has been made to do his 'chores' for Marvel again. Joe Q has really raped Ellis schedule, and its massively effecting his high standards. I mean even his indie work at the moment is tepid.
My point is, Holly wood names shouldn't be attached to ongoings just for the sake of sales.
Actually the only thing that has really ****ed up Final Crisis (the other criticisms its had generally amount to; 'i can't be arsed to read the wiki article about the new Gods, so the story is too hardcore for me'.) is Dan Didio. He chose to create another weekly linked to Grants pet project, without giving Dini and co an idea about Grants plans. He chose to name the story, "Final Crisis" when its actually just another "crisis" in a long line of past, present, and future Crisis's. He's the one who fooled everyone into believing that this had been planned since 2006.
to be fair, that kind of is his job. He is D.C.'s front man, revolving around P.R. and propaganda. Like any salesman, he's a lound to bullshit ... a little. Its our fault for believing him. We still have the right to hate him for it, though.
Totally agree with you in theory but I'd imagine that Ultimates would come out even more infrequently than it does now if that were the case and that's not what I want. I'm choosing well shipped bad stories over good ones that never make it to the shelf.....
Partially agreed, but a story doesn't have to be confusing to be complex. That's mostly Morrison's fault for making one seem synonymous with the other. It's possible to write a normal, coherent story that still works on many levels. Some of the more-lauded work I've been mentioning fits the bill for this description quite well.
That's the thing, neither Final Crisis nor Batman: RIP are confusing or incoherent. Those are relativly straight-forward, mystery stories, that leave people guessing until the end. Like I said, one of the main problems seems to be readers wanting to know everything front-up. Everybody was 'Why the hell has Batman gone crazy ? Who is the Batman of Zur-en-arhh ? What the hell is happening to him ?' when if you have patience and let the story develop it will all come together, and you should just enjoy the ride. The same with Final Crisis, and people who were confused on why it doesn't seem to make sense in context with Countdown and Death of the New Gods, which again, isn't neither Morrison or the main-series's fault, seeing as how Morrison explicitly told them not to include New Gods and such in those stories, and had the overall story and script for the first issue prepared even before Countdow started. Even more, Final Crisis: Secret Origins is out in which Morrison 'fixes' the discrepancies between the series.
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Last edited by Philosophía on Dec 31st, 2008 at 05:22 PM
Over the years, I've found that I enjoy stories far more that have little to no tie-ins. Hell, I'm even fine with a story having a sizable amount of tie-ins, so long as I don't have to read them in order to get the gist of what's going on.
It makes the story far less enjoyable for me as a reader to have to keep up with a shitload of tie-ins, just so I can figure out what the hell is going on with the 'main' story. In most cases, I simply lose interest [ie. Civil War.]
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Last edited by Galan007 on Dec 31st, 2008 at 05:23 PM
A better example is the Secret Invasion event, where most of the action was going on in the tie-ins and where you pretty much were forced to get the Avengers tie-ins to get the whole picture.
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You seem adamant on talking about FC and RIP. I only tried to use those as examples when the conversation seemed to steer that direction. My original point had nothing to do with them, but was a more general statement about the potential for success, both commercial and critical, of more nuanced stories. You're more than entitled to your opinion of those particular arcs. But for whatever reason, they aren't being received well. But that's not true of every, or even the majority, of "complex" stories, which will never appeal to as many people as the flagship characters (due to the age of comic readers) but still have a large and dedicated fanbase.
I only used RIP and Final Crisis because those are the most recent examples to prove my point. Once more sophisticated stories appear in one of the big 2 companies, they aren't recived well compared to more simpler stories, which is like you said due to the age of the average comic reader. It's true, there are a number of people who read and enjoy complex stories, but those are not even close to the numbers on sales charts where I would call them succesfull. Thus why I said that the medium isn't really ready for sophisticated stories, and the action-packed ones will (sadly) top them for the forseeable future.
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I suppose we're just defining success differently. One need not top sales charts to be successful. The same could be said of indie movies, for example. They can make money and find an audience without ever competing with big-studio productions.
I'm constantly bringing up the sales charts because it relates to my main point about the average comic reader's preference, and how simple stories are much more appealing compared to more complex ones, due to factors such as age. Anyway, we obviously know the other's views and what he wants to say so .. yeah.
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wow ultimatum is just a giant pile of bodies, so many freaking characters just kicking the bucket with no regard to anything lol.
i mean come on, look at the list of casualties!
Dazzler,Beast,Nightcrawler, emma frost, sunspot, cannonball, polaris, +whole academy of tomorrow, longshot, forge, detonator, hardrive, charles xavier, wasp, blob, thor, giantman, daredevil
this just seems like one of those events that ends with everything reverting to how it was, like IG. of course it might not be handled like that but what does everyone else think of the body count? and did i miss anyone?
can add multiple man and that chick from the brotherhood to the deathlist. its killing alot of potential.. yeah ultimates3 also butchered my fav mutant pyro. hero to rapist..sad sad.
really my point is its pretty sad that all this book can do is kill ppl to be interesting, why cant anyone who can.. you know.. write a interesting and maybe epic arc be put on the ultimates?!
i just hope for a interesting ending. or atleast something passingly entertaining.
This is quite possibly the worst comic series I've ever read with the possible exception of Ultimates vol 3 which is surreal in itself considering the Ultimates vol 1 and 2 were two incredible series.......
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Dec 30th, 2008 11:35 PM
