I won a years subscription to Popworld Pulp last week off XFM Scotland. How useful!
Regarding Champions, with all the will and talent in the world it's not going to last more than a year, is it? So if Marvel do bulldoze into this legal battle, what'll be the point?
Who's writing the main titles of World War Hulk? I think it's got a main title, a Front Line (why?) and then the Hulk's own book; that's going to be a mess unless it's all one writer, and I'm not sure it is. I'm sure Marvel think this is all a great idea because Civil War did so well for them, but I can't help but feel that CW might in fact trip them up; the second half wasn't nearly as well received as the first, and it's not even been six months since it ended, so surely it's too soon to launch straight into another one? I'll be very surprised if WWH does as well as CW, although I suspect it'll actually be a better story; Hulk Smash is a simplistic concept, but they did a horrible job of doing anything with the more complicated Registration Act concept...
Plus, there's the thing which 90% of readers seem to be looking forward to in WWH, which is Iron Man getting crushed by the Hulk. Although given that Marvel maintain he was the good guy in CW, they may be clueless enough to try and play such a crushing as a tragedy.
So.....call it the New Mighty Astonishing Champions and be done with it.....
Front Line is By The People Who Brought You Penance (which is also the writer who brought you Civil War: The Return). Disaster waiting to happen.
World War Hulk & Incredible Hulk are both by the guy [Greg Pak] who's been writing Planet Hulk (and Phoenix Warsong, but we'll put that to one side...). It seems the plan is to make WWH the Hulk title, and for IH to, in effect, have the kid from the IH100 backup effectively become the main character while Hulk's busy in WWH. Buy WWH if you want, the IH issues sound eminently skippable.
Other than that:
*Ghost Rider sounds like one of the most Gratiuitous Tie-Ins that isn't an outright Green Skies thing. GR vs. Hulk, no particular rhyme or reason.
*Initiative & Iron Man are tying in because they really kind of have to - the first because of the premise of its' series, Iron Man because the whole mess (in-continuity) is kinda his fault and so his series can't entirely ignore it - but how much they care is shown by the fact that its' tie-ins happens to also be fill-ins.
*Ant-Man's out for a sales boost as well, but it seems to be playing around the margins in a way that makes sense for its' lead character, rather than actually putting him up against the Hulk...
*Ditto Heroes for Hire - although, four issues sounds a BIT desperate for a series that launched with a three/four-issue CW tie-in less than a year ago. Still, playing around the margins with the sentient insect Planet Hulk characters and the insect-obsessive HfH member.
*WWH:Gamma Corps... who knows?
*WWH:X-Men... stretching it. Especially when Xavier wasn't in the "%^&% YOU HULK" video.
The kooky thing about the approach 52 ended up taking versus the approach it was supposed to take is... well, who says it couldn't have done both?
Really, I don't think 52's new approach is in and of itself a problem -- if the book had tied together its various disparate stories to tell one big story (and there were plenty of unfulfilled hints that that was indeed what was happening) I think things would have been fine. And it did represent a cool opportunity to tour the DC Universe, which in some cases has been made good on, and other places not, but was a smart direction to go in, at any rate.
Really, as fun as it's been to follow, it all just fell apart. Stephen Wacker's departure probably didn't help things. It sounds like they're fixing a lot of the format problems with Countdown, but losing out on 52's unique charm in the process.
Ten bucks says Champions winds up as West Coast Avengers.
" So.....call it the New Mighty Astonishing Champions and be done with it....."
If you just stick an adjective in front of the word "Champions" then it would probably still be a trademark infringement. I'm not sure of the exact test they use in America, but over here, you'd argue that it was either confusingly similar, or likely to dilute Heroic's prior trademark.
"Ghost Rider sounds like one of the most Gratiuitous Tie-Ins that isn't an outright Green Skies thing."
You should see the current Civil War tie-in arc in that book. The tie-in is that Lucifer, who possesses the bodies of dead people in every single story, is possessing the body of Jack O'Lantern, who died in CIVIL WAR. Seriously, that's it.
World War III annoyed me. Not only did they say it began in 52 #50 (when it ended in that issue), but it pointlessly devoted page after page to explaining plot gaps for Firestorm (cancelled) and Martian Manhunter (mini-series that ended months ago). When it was supposed to be about the resolution of Black Adam vs everyone.
"World War III" annoyed *me* because DC had the audacity to attach the title "World War III" to a story about:
1. An angry magical man who is trying to attack China for revenge,
2. Who gets into skirmishes with other heroes all around the World (oh, I see...) on the way there,
3. Despite starting his journey at an island off the coast of South Korea.
Setting aside the fact that not a single country was at war with another one, how do you justify, even with comic-book-logic graciousness, that Black Adam could end up fighting in Pisa and Sydney before reaching Beijing? And how was this navigationally-challenged supervillain in any way conducting something worthy of building up as "World War III"?
That's lousy, even by the standards of comic marketing. >=/
Is there any in-story explaination as to why he went the wrong way around the globe or is it expected that people will assume that Sydney's on the way to China? I'm sure the Aussie audience would love that.
Well, and there's the small matter of Grant Morrison having produced a far better World War III seven years ago. One that actually featured an international conflict.
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Didn't Quesada say a while ago that he really hated the name Champions and that's why he wasn't okaying a title by that name? Where they just covering for the fact that they didn't own the name? Cheeky beggars.
Marvel and DC are going from event to event to event these days. The regular monthly comics never get any breathing room. I'm amazed they ever get to tell a story at all. No wonder they have to stretch their plotlines out over years. That is exactly why I gave up on the X-Books years ago.
Given that 52 is one of the few DC titles that sells decently. It doesn't work all that well as a story, but it still shifts something like 90,000 to 100,000 copies a week, managing to do four times a month what books like Frontline are doing once a month (well, in theory).
The failure was in designing the series so that it effectively couldn't tie in very directly to anything else in the line, as it's all meant to be taking palce a year earlier...while simultaneously keeping the DCU writers from being able to capitalize on Infinite Crisis on the grounds that those revelations were meant for 52.
It's as if DC have missed the marketing idea behind crossovers, event tie-ins, and crossover spin-offs.
I said it before, and I'll say it again, the 90's are back (and NOT in a good way). Marvel and DC are both repeating the same stupid mistakes they made durring the 90's. They are using "gimicks" to temporarely boost sales on their books. This is why Marvel is slapping a HUGE CW or INITIATIVE banner on the covers of most of their books. Quesada once said that we should'nt compare the huge sales of the 90's with todays sales, since the sales in the 90's were artificially inflated or was a product of a false market (due to stunts/gimicks. And yet, Marvel (and DC) are using those same stunts to artificially increase sales.
From this week's X-Axis:
NXM40
[...]
This story uses different styles to distinguish between the present day and flashback sequences, and you wouldn't guess it was the same artist.
Isn't that because it isn't, with Niko Henrichon (Pride of Baghdad) doing the flashbacks?
BTW, and did you not get X-Factor #18?
Wraith, you forgot to mention that these big Initiative banners on the books tend to have no connection with the contents too. Red Sky Crossovers all over again.
Indeed. Thunderbolts #112-113 have the banner and there's no mention of it in the story at all.
Well, the Initiative isn't a crossover. It's a generic label that they're putting on any book featuring a pro-registration character whose status quo was altered by the Superhuman Registration Act, and the Thunderbolts certainly qualify for that. I don't have a problem with their inclusion - the Thunderbolts are an Initiative team.
The Initiative isn't technically a crossover, but it's using the sort of trade dress used for crossovers and events, and not coincidentally having the sales effects usually seen with event tie-ins.
The problem DC is having is partially that they haven't twigged to this sales effect, or at least not to the possibility that their neglect of this sales effect is some of what's hurting them in the direct market.
Yes, technically The Initiative isn't a crossover, and as Paul points out, merely donates the appearance of an Initiative team. The problem is that that appearance can be very tenuous; as in New New Avengers, where they're fighting against the Initiative, but it's still counted.
The INITIATIVE banner gives the illusion to fans and dealers, that CW is continuing in those books that have the banner on the cover.
Commenting by HaloScan
