The Ol' Switcheroo

Those that know me know that when I started reading comics, I read exclusively Marvel. I loved the stories, characters and powers. Marvel's world felt like a possibility, unlike DC, which had to threaten the entirety of creation to create tension (unless your Batman & company). I kept on for a few years starting right after Civil War was wrapping up. Then things went nuts. Marvel became cross over crazy and to get even a fraction of what was happening with the characters you had to get at least 3 books with that character in it. My interest dropped heavily in many books and only stuck with a few like Ultimate Spider-man, She-Hulk and Spider-Girl. That is until the later two books were canceled. I was pissed! But I kept on until the price hike came in the fall of last year. I dropped more books again but was ecstatic to find out that X-23 (female clone of my favorite Canadian, Wolverine) was not only getting a new ongoing series but her book was one of the few that were staying at $2.99. Now since Marvel only had a few books on my pull list I started to pick up Wonder Woman with her revamp at issue 600. I liked it and so put it on my pull list permanently.

Now with this new DC reboot I've been thinking (a dangerous thing I know). I love me some super-heroes of any gender, but being a young female comic reader I do prefer to read a great heroine over a gruff hero. Marvel has a much better track record with a wide verity of female characters. Storm, Rouge, Kitty Pride (even if she can't stick to a super name), Invisible Woman, Black Widow, She-Hulk just to name a few heroes, not to mention other non-powered supporting characters like Mary Jane Watson. The thing is, Marvel has only 3 ongoing series with woman as the titular character and one, Generation Hope, I am not entirely sure if its angle is Hope or Hope and a bunch of other characters. DC with its new 52 has 7 titles with women stars (8 if you include Birds of Prey)! So it seems not only in accessibility but in interest level (for me at least) and over all quality DC has, sadly, gotten better. The only reason that Marvel has as many women characters is because of team books and mainly because of X-men and its many incarnations. Yes DC may have retconned marriages but did they have their heroes make a deal with the devil to do it? They may have only one woman, Gail Simone, under contract, but do their star women mainly appear in team books?

I have to wonder if these differences stem from the two companies current goals. In the 70's and 80's DC had much more media coming out of it with TV and blockbuster movies all really successful for their markets. Comic wise they had the multiverse with tons and tons of story lines steaming from each one. This made the comics relatively unfriendly to new readers. Marvel had a great amount of trouble at this time getting quality media out with horrible schlock like the Captain America movies and the live action Spider-Man TV show. Their comics however were self contained, versatile, and very human with the problems and issues brought up in them. That role has now seemed to be reversed. Marvel has been releasing great movies based off their characters since 1999's X-Men (unless you count Blade from 98) Marvel, with its comics being burdened by so many crossover event comics and new material (characters, back story etc), is almost impossible to keep up with them.

Take the Hulk family of characters. A few years ago Hulk had a son with a super powered alien. Great story idea right? Well, that is dropped for awhile with the son on the distant planet of his birth, Hulk has no idea that he is alive, believing he died along with his mother. Then we get introduced to the Red Hulk who we find out is General Ross. Then Red She-Hulk pops up who turns out to be Betty Ross, Bruce Banners supposedly dead wife and daughter of General Ross. It is also revealed that a female super hero from a future were there is a literal gender war stole Banners DNA and used it to impregnate herself. That daughter then comes to the present and  then Bruce's/Hulk's son shows up on earth and their is a huge Hulk vs Hulk vs Hulk vs Hulk fight. This is all great stuff but it is so freaking compacted being revealed over the last 4 years. Marvel cannot seem to take its time to let new stuff sink in and be explored then release new ideas or characters. This is a key problem because it makes it hard for Marvel fans to keep up with multiple characters, all their money goes into all the appearances of the new and old characters from one section of their company.

Now DC has shown recently that they know how to make their comics accessible. Not only do they not have huge cross over events every year they have a variety of stars in their solo books. Granted it's a little white washed but I believe they are making strides in that area. Now they have this relaunch which has been marketed very well to get new readers. DC has shown they know how to get people in and with their self contained stories seem to know how to keep them. Heck, even with this relaunch DC has implied that all the stories from the last 25 years still happened exactly as they remembered them, just in a different time line, pacifying the long time readers while allowing to hook new readers.

Why has this switch in quality happened? Well it could be in the overall concentration areas of the companies. Marvel is making tons of money off of the Marvel Studio movies, much more than the comics. Now, yes, I know that they are entirely different sections of the company with different heads who have different goals and managing styles but even they have bosses. I think that the boss of the bosses is concentrating quality control on the movies since they are THE cash cow right now. Since comic sales are still dropping from the comic boom of the 90's they don't see any reason to try and expand readership or make sure to keep the comic readers they already have.

DC, on the other hand, seems to be having some trouble making any profitable movie outside of Batman and recognizes that comics can still be profitable. What opened my mind to DC comic books was Blackest Night from Green Lantern (the comics, that movie DIDN'T happen!). It was freaking amazing. It had great art, ideas, characters. Now granted this was defiantly the huge crossover, multi-title, end of all things story that I complained about earlier in this post, but somehow it did not feel like you were missing out if you didn't read one small section of the story. It kept what was needed in the main area and the other parts were just icing on the cake. Also it showed me that the type of stories DC has to do to challenge their heroes can be interesting. The heroes didn't feel over powered like I thought they would. Coupled with this story and the new 52 and what it promises to bring it seems that Marvel is on the back shelf, at least for me. I'll still pick up the books I'm reading now which are really good (and self-contained for the moment) but the bulk of my pulls will definitely come from DC. Sorry Marvel, I love you, I'll keep going to see your movies, but my respect for your comics has gone down the tubes.

Firsts

Wellp first week back at old Radford University is almost done. Another interesting first is the new DC universe with all their number ones. Now over the summer, thanks to the Color War that went on in Green Lantern, I have seemed to become much much more of a DC fan (don’t tell Stan “the man” Lee or he’ll sick the Marry Marching Marvel Society on me). I don’t fully know how it happened but it did. My peaked interest came at a great time since DC is doing one of the biggest universe relaunches ever. 52 number ones in one month? That’s just nuts! So I’ll be picking up the titles that peak my interest like Batgirl, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, All Star Western, Justice League (I'll probably pick others up well just have to wait and see). I hope to bring an outsiders perspective on the new DC universe since I didn't keep up with the old one.


I gotta say I hope they keep to the idea of streamlined books open to entirely new readers because even being the Marvel Zombie that I was until recently, I’ve gotton out of Marvel a little bit because of their status quo changing each year with a new event. People may complain when DC shakes things up but at least they do it every decade (if even that short of time span) and not every 5 GD minutes. Anyway I’m starting to ramble. I'll either do short pic video reviews of the books or text reviews, it may be a mixture of both we’ll all have to wait and see. Until then stay nerdy world!

Captain America Vlog

This is taking place of the Green Lantern review. Once the dvd comes out i will review, until then enjoy the first Nerk video! (also forgive the pauses, I didn't edit it and wanted to get it up. My first vlog so hope you give me some leeway!)

(P.S. ugg I wish I had sat up more. Still getting used to set up. Will be better shot next time)

Up coming videos

Here is a list for up coming reviews

Green Lantern (2011 movie)
Doctor Who sonic screwdrivers (toy)
Kirby: King of Comics (book)
Secret Invasion (comic mini-series)

I didn't put dates because I'm still new to editing videos but all will be done by the end of the summer and the Green Lantern review is shot and in post production so that will be out in a few days so come back soon.

Need some opinions....

OK so I have my iconic outfit all picked out and looking awesome but what do you all think? I've gotten some feedback which has been positive but what do you think of the awesomeness? Let me know if you can think of anything to add or loose. On another note the first video is coming soon so keep checking back!

X-men: First Class/Franchise

WARNING SPOILERS
By: Stiz

So, this Saturday I had the great pleasure of watching X-Men First Class in theaters with a couple of friends. It had a good ensemble cast, great story that moved at an incredible pace, and directed by someone who understands how to make an engaging movie. However, rather than talking about how great First Class was, I want to talk about one comment made by one Bob "Moviebob" Chipman, saying that due to events happening or characters appearing in First Class now X-Men The Last Stand and X-Men Origins Wolverine are no longer in continuity with the rest of the films. As a fan of the films, I must point out that retconning just doesn't work that way. You can't say that the bad (or in Last Stand's case, the adequate) films are no longer in canon with the rest of the franchise. If you do go that route, then you have to go that route with the good films as well. Fans can say that The Last Stand isn't canon anymore as scenes like Xavier and Magneto visiting Jean Grey in the first scene of the film never happened as in this scene Xavier is still walking and Mangeto still goes by Erik. Fair enough, but I can say the same regarding X-Men, seeing that Xavier and Magneto didn't meet when they were 17 and they did not build the first Cerebro together. Hell, if I want to be really technical I could say X2 isn't canon either given how Magneto also mentions how he helped Charles build Cerebro and we saw a cameo of Hank McCoy NOT in Beast form in that film. I heard that apparently Beast shed his skin at the end of First Class, but if you didn't put it in the movie, THEN IT'S NOT CANONICAL.

I actually watched my aunt's copy of Wolverine (so as to avoid having to spend my own money to see it) and I do understand people's wanting to forget Wolverine. It lacked the intelligence that made the first two films great, it wasn't a very engaging story and it felt like Fox could just slap Wolverine's name on something and people would go buy it. On top of that, it felt very insulting to Wolverine's character, given how he couldn't smell out that his girlfriend's supposedly dead body was fake and she had no wounds, and they play Wolverine's metal claws for laughs IMMEDIATELY after he had the experiment, not to mention the continuity error of him getting shot in the head with a normal bullet and shaking it off but in X2 when that happened Wolvie was knocked out for a good minute!

However, I would not wish the same fate on X-Men The Last Stand. Obviously, there are things I don't like about it, such as Magneto discarding Mystique the moment she turns human, turning Rouge into a human, Bobby and Kitty's ice skating scene slowing the film down AND providing a bad motivation to try and be normal in the first place, Colossus was a non-character, Angel's pointless sub-plot, and Mystique's dialogue regarding humans. What do you mean by "slave name", Mystique? Were you treated like a slave with your old family? This is especially odd when you put First Class into perspective. So, apparently your "slave name" is the name you were perfectly fine with when you were around your best friend for 20 years, Mystique?! It just makes her come off as a woman whose "eyes have been opened" by a cult leader. While it clearly isn't as smart as Bryan Singer's films, I can appreciate the good parts of the movie. Kelsey Grammer as Beast was fantastic, I liked how they introduced the mutant cure and brought up how some mutants are more accepted amongst the community. Juggernaut was great to see as was Kitty Pryde taking him down. Magneto had a good moment of respecting Xavier after his death, and speaking of Xavier, someone calls him out on tampering with Jean's mind, even if it was for the right reasons. Seeing Bobby actually TURN into Iceman was another fun moment. The action is some of the best I've seen in all of the X-Men movies, and if I may backtrack a bit, some of my favorite scenes regard Beast's reaction to the cure, like saying that it's not a bad thing for some people to want the cure (especially since he can't blend in like everyone else), and seeing his hand turn normal when he meets Leech is a beautiful piece of acting on Grammer's part. In fact, I'd actually say that Beast's wanting a cure in First Class adds a bit of sadness to his character in scenes like that. Also, there were some deleted scenes I wish were in the movie, like seeing the cure being mass produced, Storm pulling off some lightning fu on Maya from Heroes while using Wolverine's claws to electrocute Juggernaut, and some scenes with Jean indicating that the only reason Magneto is leading his rebellion is because Jean LET'S him. Yes, Cyclops and Xavier died, and while Cyclops death was annoying, he honestly didn't have much of a presence in X2, so if the films stopped at X3, I'd tolerate his death. Regarding Xavier, however, to be honest I appreciated the risk of killing him off. I like the idea of the X-Men having to continue on without their mentor.

So yeah, I didn't care for Wolverine, but I think Last Stand has potential. However, if you really want the film to be non-canon, retcon it the RIGHT way. Have Bishop or Cable or someone from the X-Men's future travel back in time to the point where Scott discovers Jean. Say that Apocalypse rules the world in the future and they need a class 5 mutant to stop him, but Apocalypse finds her and makes The Phoenix his servant (and I mean the fire-bird phoenix we saw in X2). Now, Cyclops is alive and the X-Men have to save the future. You get a good movie and you get to retcon the film that "ruined the franchise."

 Here's how you can retcon X-Men canon properly. There's a website called fanedit.org that has a three hour edit of the first 3 movies called X-Men Requiem War which I suggest you check because throughout the edit they're building up the Phoenix and the Last Stand parts of those films work really well, and the edit is at least honest about the unfortunate unimportance of Cyclops.

So to wrap up, First Class has the intelligence and sophistication of the the first 2 films, but the good action of the third and if you want to retcon do it properly

Starting up

Ok so we have a bunch of great ideas in the works but bear with us. Its a hectic time with exams and projects up the ying yang. Expect an introduction video explaining who we are and more about what we do. So check back soon suckers or horrible things will happen to you. I know, the voices told me so.
p.s. also a list of ideas and a tentative schedule will be posted too.