Boulder

Yes, agreed on Magneto Testament. The whole series was top notch.

I'm digging Old Man Logan. I can go either way with Millar's work- a lot of the time I find it too overdone and "big screen" for my tastes, but when McNiven's the artist, I don't mind letting the pictures do the talking. The idea is pretty cool and so far the execution has been strong. I can't say if I'll feel the same way when this wraps up, but I'm enjoying it more than any of his other recent work, even Kick-Ass.

Final Crisis #7 lived up to the previous six installments and then some. I loved how most of the major players got their chance to shine- Superman (and the other Supermen), the Green Lanterns, Wonder Woman/Supergirl, the Flashes (though you could argue they got a bit short-changed)- and a lot of minor ones played key roles- The Question, Frankenstein, even Luthor in his own way. The time-travel stuff really came to a head here, specifically with Darkseid's radion bullet. It really wrapped up brilliantly, and my favorite part, the very last page, was beautifully haunting. Great stuff.

so, what about that Final Crisis, guys?

Didn't get to read #7 yet, but if it's anything like the past six, I'm sure I'll have nothing but praise for it. I'll let you know what I thought (probably) this weekend.

On another note, has anyone read this week's issue of Nova yet? As great as the series is, this was one of the very best issues.

1. Peter Parker

2. Steve Rogers

3. Magneto

4. Ben Grimm

5. Dr. Doom

6. Rich Rider

7. Jen Walters

8. Mary Jane Watson-Parker-Watson

9. Reed Richards

10. Galactus

Well, I will definitely be dropping Batman. I was willing to stick it out a bit if Morrison stayed on as the writer, but apparently Frank Quitely will be doing the artwork after Battle For The Cowl, and Quitely is my least favorite artist after Rob Liefeld. Bleech.

So I guess I'll drop it and add Detective, maybe. Depends on who is Batman after Battle For The Cowl (although, I suspect it's all going to be a massive swerve and it will still be Bruce).

Though I don't understand your Quitely hate, just wanted to remind you to get the Gaiman two-parter before Battle for the Cowl.

Personally, apart from Gaiman's, I'm leaning towards not buying any Batman until Morrison gets back. Not like I have a particular affinity for the character.

Once again, I could use some help. I'm looking to get into X-Men before X-Men #200 and the Endangered Species stuff. I've already got the first three issues of Brubaker's run on Uncanny and I'm going to pick up the rest, but beyond that, where do I go? Also, has anybody been reading the First Class miniseries? How is it?

I think there was some time between Avengers Disassembled (the end of Avengers and beginning of the New Avengers) and House of M, as Wanda was held in Genosha for a while after flipping out.

Apparently, there's going to be a new Captain America:

http://www.newsarama.com/movies/Hellboy/Iron/889new_storyimage3793928_full.jpg

<-----look at this

Yes, that is the Punisher in a new costume, and over at Marvel.com they hint he may take on the Captain America name. *pass the barf bag, please*

<----then read this

Can't imagine this lasting long. According to something (I think) I read at Newsarama, Punisher's involvement with the Cap mask is an arc from issues 6-10 of War Journal. I'd much sooner believe Bucky to be a longer term replacement until Steve Rogers returns.

Yes, Buffy starts on Wednesday. I think Joss Whedon is writing the first four issues, then handing it off.

Also mark March 31st down on your calendars, because that's when the first issue of Tek Jansen comes out.

I want more information on this "Trail of Tears" Ghost Rider.

Well, there's not much to tell, yet. The series is at #2, and basically the story is kinda like this, ATM:

A soldier from the American civil war is injured, and rescued by a former slave who had bought his freedom and some land. That soldier befriends the slave and his family, working with them for about 2 years. Finally, he goes away, and eventually racist fellows slaughter the family. When the soldier comes back, he goes on to avenge the family, but when he gets to the property of 3 of the killers, they have been horribly slaughtered, with one of them walking while he was dead, before imploding. We then see a hooded figure watching from far away, on a horse, red eyes glowing on an otherwise shadowed face. Probably Ghost Rider. Maybe he's the former slave who was killed after being forced to watch his wife raped by about 12 men, and his children crucified? It's a good series so far, at least I'm liking it, written by Garth Ennis and drawn by Clayton Crain.

on the final few pages, was that spider man ina black suit and underground??

Yes.

It's part of the "Back In Black" storyline, which is already running on the Spider-Man titles; on Amazing Spider-Man, which is the title most related to the Civil War and where the "main" storylines occur, Aunt May has been shot by a sniper (bullet intended for Spidey, who ducked, saving MJ in the process, but not being able to save aunt May). It's unclear whether she survives or not; however, we know the reason he donned the black suit is because "he's not the same man". Take it for what it's worth.

According to last week's Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, she's currently in a coma. I can't imagine they'll get rid of her.

I went into Forbidden Planet yesterday and they had one issue of the variant cover left, so I got that. It was done fairly well I thought.

I also got the first two issues of the Garth Ennis written Ghost Rider: Trail of Tears comic, both issues were very good. Oh, and last week was the last issue of Doctor Strange: The Oath, which was fantastic.

Speaking of Ghost Rider.....I have a question:

I haven't been keeping up lately, but I know there's Trail of Tears and....another GR, series, I think? I've heard Johnny Blaze is Ghost Rider again apparently, but....

Is he bonded with Noble Kale (who was bonded to Danny Ketch and is his and Blaze's ancestor), Zarathos again, or is it essentially just Blaze with the Ghost Rider powers?

The new series is up to issue 8. They haven't really explored too much yet, but it seems to just be Blaze on his own (dressed as Ketch, as in the movie). I never read any of the old Ghost Rider stuff, but I've found the new series to be quite good.

There was never any reference, direct or subtle, to Eric using drugs. He was just pretty lazy in the earlier seasons, and really stupid in the later ones.

I've been reading a shitload of comics these past 6-7 months, but only Marvel. Is there a good jump-on point for DC? Is it worth it? I was planning on picking up Superman and Batman versus Alien and Predator out of sheer curiosity, but apart from that, I'm really not sure. I heard this week's Batman is good, so I might pick that up. Help!

I enjoy Elvis quite a bit. I'm not as big of fan of his as I am of, say, Johnny Cash, but I still appreciate the man's work (chiefly "Suspicious Minds," "Burning Love," and "You Were Always On My Mind"). As for my favorite tidbit, it is a known fact that Elvis's favorite Elvis impersonator was Andy Kaufman.

Bless this thread.

Since July, I've been an absolute comic junkie. Or Marvel junkie, more accurately. I've been getting into a lot of the Civil War stuff, plus Annihilation and Planet Hulk. I've really been going crazy with the back issues of Amazing Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, and Wolverine.

As far as favorite writers go, I think I'd have to put Peter David towards the top of the list. I haven't read a whole lot of his stuff, but his part in The Other was great. I'm not sure which title it was, but the issue where Tracer pretended to be an Avenger and met with Aunt May was just brilliant. They had this awesome discussion/minor argument about theology that really caught my attention. I enjoy JMS as well, and though it may be questionable at times, I respect his penchant for putting his own spin on the long-running histories of his characters. Fabian Nicieza is great, but I can't pick up Cable and Deadpool anymore because I loathe the character of Cable.

A friend of mine recently mentioned that he spends all his money on weed and comic books. Basically it's the same thing for me, minus the marijuana.

Two seasons of Rock Star prove that Dave Navarro owns nothing except makeup, a wardrobe, and a throne that make him look like the love child of Satan and a Greenwich Village drag queen.

Frasier, Cheers, King of the Hill, Futurama, 3rd Rock from the Sun, South Park

The Omen (original)

The Ring

In The Mouth of Madness

The Thing

Hellraiser

The Relic

The Mothman Prophecies

Rosemary's Baby

Prince of Darkness

The Wicker Man (original)

Spider-man 2 was great. At the time I saw it, I wasn't into comic books at all and I hadn't even seen the first one. I expected to strongly dislike it, but I ended up enjoying it immensely.

What a terrible show. Jericho was unbelievably bad. If he would rather be doing this than wrestling, more power to him, I guess, but I guess it also shows that he was really, really tired of wrestling. Even Smokey Robinson, one of the greatest singers of all time, couldn't save this.

I'll be watching Rock Star now. It may suck, but at least Ultimo Dragon's not making an ass out of himself on it.

Fry, Frasier and Niles Crane, Ernie Pantusso, Blackadder, Dick Solomon, Jerome "Chef" MacElroy, Hank Hill, Ted Baxter, Al Bundy, Dwayne Wayne

if it happened then you'd just be complaining about that

Please don't jump to tell me what I would be doing in hypothetical situations.

Of course, all the characters have taken the turn now in the way that the show can now parody itself, but that just opens up all new platforms of comedy, that sadly not all fans let themselves enjoy.

Once again, you're jumping to conclusions about me, assuming I don't "let" myself enjoy the show. The Simpsons was my favorite show pretty much from its inception until 1999. I can't state exactly how big a part the show played in my childhood, but suffice to say that I've spent more hours watching The Simpsons than I have any single show, be it Futurama, Raw, or Nitro. The point is, I never took it upon myself to decide that I no longer wanted to enjoy the show. It simply lost me as the plots became exceedingly repetitive and incoherent, and the humor turned from subversive satire into blatant one-liners.

The initial characters in The Simpsons were fairly one-sided, and over 350 episodes, there's very little comedy you can extract from that.

What you're describing as one-sidedness was, if anything, a consistency. A TV show is, at its core, about its main characters, and peripheral characters like Barney, Moe, and Flanders worked primarily in how they interacted with Homer. If they were one-sided, at least they served as representations of classic behavior we all generally encounter at some point. The one-sidedness that they show today is, again, a product of punchline after punchline being fed out from any available source.

And on another note, as far as I'm concerned, the writers extracted more comedy from their "one-sided" characters in the first 100 episodes than they have in the subsequent 275.

If the characters had remained the same all this time, the show would have got far more dull a long time ago, and we'd be complaining even more about it.

Please speak for yourself, because to me, the show didn't become dull until the change began. And while we're on the subject of dull, even changing the characters hasn't stopped the writers from repeating plots (Let's see what The Simpsons do 10 years in the future... no, 15 years in the future... no, 30 years in the future!).

I would never deny that it must be hard to create new episodes of a show that already has several hundred in the can- but the truth is, there are a few options that are always present:

1) Keep writing funny, original episodes. Sure, as I said, it's hard, but it's possible. There are always writers to be found and ideas to be heard that involve real world situations transposed into an episode. You know, stuff that doesn't involve Groundskeeper Willie getting a makeover.

2) Age the characters. It opens up a whole new world of possibilities in terms of both dealing with familial situations and relationships, and interactions with peripheral characters. It's not ideal, I'll admit, but it beats what we're getting.

Of course, the problems with 1 and 2 are that the plots are only a portion of the problem. My only hope is that more centered plots will help the show rediscover its realness and heart.

3) End it. Remember Seinfeld? I'm really not trying to sound condescending here, but I'm not sure if you guys are old enough/familiar enough with U.S. pop culture to remember the fanfare when the show ended. Personally, I was never a fan, but I respect the originality of both the show and its tactics. NO show was hotter from 1994-1998 (TV Guide named it the best show ever. Literally. EVER), but after only eight seasons, Jerry Seinfeld decided that he wanted to go out on top. Of course, it's hard to turn down more juicy paychecks, but hey, we're talking was to preserve quality. Speaking as a fan, I wish the show went off the air after season 8.

Does anybody else really hate the first few seasons of the simpsons?

I don't think it was until about season 5 that I loved every episode of the Simpsons. The earlier seasons just had alot of fluf, if you ask me. I either liked an episode or really hated it with the first few seasons.

I couldn't disagree with you more. The Simpsons from seasons 2-5 was, IMO, possibly the single best written TV show of all time. That "fluff" you dismissed was the heart that's missing from the show today, and takes a show from being a bunch of jokes to being a great piece of art. Of course, I think I'm in the minority these days; otherwise, I doubt Family Guy would have been brought back. But when you think about Futurama, for instance, and some of the stellar, most beloved episodes ("Luck of the Fryrish," "The Sting," "Jurassic Bark") you can see that there's still an appreciation for shows with heart.

As for The Simpsons, the heart was zapped around season 6-7, when Homer forgot he used to be a loving father and caring husband (albeit an oafish one with many poor qualities), and became a proto-Peter Griffin. Through season 8 the writing was still sharp, but season 9 represented a decent drop-off. Since then, it's been getting progressively worse and worse, lazier and lazier. NO show should have five clip shows, I don't care if it lasts 1000 years. And it seems as though every once in a while, the writers will give the audience a little wink as if to say "Yup, we've been around forever. We may not be as great as we once were, but by acknowledging it, we make that okay."- just check the end credits for "Behind the Laughter."

Characters who once served as brilliant examples of satire have been destroyed for the sake of cheap jokes . Take Skinner, who was the archetypal disciplinarian (with even his name being a reference to that). The Armand Tamzarian episode (which wasn't that funny any way you slice it) rewrote his past, and then retconned it at the end- all to provide a mediocre 22 minutes. The same is being done with Ned Flanders, though more gradually. When the show started, Flanders and his family were perfect. That was it, no real puzzle. They only served to show how dysfunctional The Simpsons were, and more importantly, to show what a jerk Homer was for hating him. These days, Ned has turned up the bible thumping to the point where he's a tool for the writers to get their own political jokes across ("I finished first in the race for the cure... for homosexuality!").

The show has become cheap joke after cheap joke, like Family Guy. To be honest, I don't think it's horrible, nor do I think FG is horrible. I just think that they're both really, really unmemorable, which is sad considering what The Simpsons used to be.

http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=80636

Personally, I'm not too pissed, simply because this gives me a chance to catch up on some stuff from the past few months. But for the majority of readers (who aren't new to Marvel), this has got to be a bummer. Not to mention the stores which stock the books.

On the plus side, I guess this gives Captain America and his crew extra time to evade S.H.I.E.L.D.

Was On The Line that freaking movie where he played the guy who met the girl on the train and didn't get her name so he had to take out ads? Whether it is or not, they used to advertise that movie on the screens at the Hollywood Video near my house far too frequently.