OKAY, SERIOUSLY... 52'S GETTING ON MY NERVES

*SPOILER AHEAD*

So Everyman falls to his death without turning into some kind of, oh, I don't know... BIRD?

And as his dead body's lying on the ground, blood running from his head, Gar Logan - witty as ever - walks up to his corpse and says something like, "Looks like there's only room for one shape-shifter, huh?"

Remember when superheroes used to take people to the hospital... even villains?

Also, not sure why team-52 found if necessary to have Luthor tell us that John Henry's intestine was torn and that he had "fecal matter leaking into his bloodstream."

Welcome to the kinder, gentler DCU.

CIVIL WRAP

When I set out to do this issue-by-issue rundown of Civil War 1 -6, it was only supposed to be a Six Day Event, but as you can see, it’s become more like a six week event… but I, uh, hurt my hand and contracted a bacterial infection. Oh, and, uh, we had snow -- yeah, snow, that's it -- here in South Carolina, so, of course, that slowed things down a bit too. See, I can't really be blamed for not staying on schedule, can I?

Let's look at Civil War 5 and 6.

#5

Page 1 - We kick off with one of those famous Mark Millar splash pages of Johnny Storm and Susan Richards running from S.H.I.E.L.D. Team Four.

We can only guess why Steve McNiven chose this particular pose, but knowing that J-Torch and Susie are siblings doesn’t make it any easier to look at. A minor thing, but it had to be said.

Also, really, why are two members of the FF being chased?

If we ignore the fact that the Fantastic Four are considered an emergency response team by the city of New York and their powers and abilities are probably amongst the most well-documented in the world, wasn’t Johnny layed-out in the hospital at the time the Superhero Registration Act became a law?

So, I guess he wakes up, gets the “you’re all good” from his family physician, and as he’s walking to his car, nobody stops him and makes him register?

They sent an army of cape-killers to Luke Cage’s house at 12:01, but Maria Hill can't put somebody with a clipboard in front of the Human Torch on his way out of a state hospital?

And while we're on the subject of cape-killers… what’s up with that name? “Cape-killers?”

In what I think is the best CW tie-in issue to hit the racks, Captain America # 22 sees Sharon Carter talking to Dum Dum Dugan over his trashed suit of cape-killer armor, the result of a failed attempt to take down the good Captain.

This is what gets said:

DUGAN: Ah… it looks worse’n it feels… cape-killer here took most’a the brunt. Like I’m bettin’ Cap knew it would.

SHARON: Yeah. That’s a safe bet. Still, what a name… cape-killer.

Adam at Monkey Punch Dinosaur and a few other readers have mentioned how silly it is to call these guys cape-killers since there’s only, like, two guys with capes in the Marvel U.

Still, maybe Justice is a lot more popular than we thought.

Page 4 - The Iron Man and Spider-man scene that spins directly out of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN # 535.

A little aside here: I keep thinking about that poor kid in the Midwest who gets a subscription to Spider-man every year from his sweet Aunt Bonnie. And then one day, in 2006, his Spidey comics start having these weird, half-image covers, suddenly Iron Man’s more of a supporting character than Aunt May, and the stories inside don’t really make sense one issue to the next - each reads like something’s missing, and they never pick up where the one before left off.

Poor kid…

Anyway, It would’ve been nice to have seen something here letting the uninitiated reader know where this started. Especially since the last time we saw Iron Man and Spidery together in CW they were best pals. I understand if Marvel thinks footnotes pull people out of the story, but would it hurt to have a single page in the back of each issue detailing how the tie-ins play a role in what we just read?

Pages 5 thru 7 - This Iron Man/Spidey break-up's been building for months, and it ends with the web-slinger running out on the Pro-Reg side… but not before he crashes into a reinforced glass window and gets attacked by a squad of cape-killers.

I keep wondering why his spider-sense didn't warn him about the glass, the cape-killers, etc…but, oh, well.

And what’s up with Tony’s smartass line about the reinforced glass?

"Avengers Headquarters.

Reinforced glass."

“Reinforced glass?” Ah, presumably to keep bad guys out and to protect those inside… but not reinforced enough to hold up against the cape-killers’ weapons? Maybe Spidey weakened it when he hit it. Lots and lots of maybes.

Page 8 - Maria Hill releases the dogs.

Also, here we get another reference to some “Final Battle” that's coming.


Seems S.H.I.E.L.D.’s holding onto the Thunderbolts for Civil War # 7 because… um, the script says they have to, I guess.

Page 9 thru 11 - Spidey On The Loose! Running for his life in the Manhattan sewer, Spidey's stopped and eventually brutalized by Jack O’Lantern and the Jester, all while wearing his nigh-indestructible Deus ex Machina suit which just weeks before could fly, turn invisible, and deflect bullets.

Page 12 - An off panel assassin takes out both Jack O’Lantern and Jester.

No surprise, but it's the Punisher, or as Spidey calls him, “skull face guy…”

What gives, Peter? You’ve teamed up with this guy more than anybody (well, maybe not Wolverine, but…) - I think he’s cool with you calling him the Punisher by now... might even be able to get away with Frank.

Ignoring Spidey’s dazed acknowledgement of the Big Apple’s # 1 vigilante, why does Jack O’Lantern’s head explode like, well, a big ol’ jack O’lantern?

Isn’t that supposed to be a mask? Artistic license, Mr. McNiven? Sorry, pal - LICENSE REVOKED!

Page 13 - This installment's Poorly Thought Out No Prize goes to Christopher “ISB” Sims who wonders, "Why does the INVISIBLE WOMAN need a disguise?"

Great question, Chris!

So, Johnny and Sue join the Underground Avengers, and their entrance announced by the Serpent Society’s (or more recently, B.A.D. Girls') Black Mamba who’s apparently on a first name basis with both of 'em.

Black Mamba, huh?

Page 15 - The Punisher arrives with Spider-man in an homage to the sorely missed Dale Keown.

Page 16, panel 5 - The Punisher's response to Falcon’s question, “Since when are you on this team?”

Punisher: "Since the other guys started enlisting known thieves and multiple killers."

Black Mamba and Diamondback still in the room?

Page 17 - Best (by that, I mean worst) poorly thought out statement of the issue.

“Who do you figure’s been running around in a
ski mask and covering your backs these past few weeks?

Okay, I gotta call bullshit on this one.

Since none of the characters had even mentioned it, I was under the impression that we, the readers, were the only ones that knew there was a mystery man in a ski mask running around “covering [their] backs.” Introducing ski mask guy last issue was nothing but a red herring meant to add another layer of unnecessary to this whole mess, and that kind of makes me mad.

Think about it for a minute - why would the Punisher need to wear a ski mask? Who’s he got to hide from?

And finally, pages 19 thru 22 - Devil-Fist’s been captured and taken to Area 42 On The Negative Zone Strip.

Seems that he hasn’t said a thing since they caught him, and found a silver dollar hidden under his tongue (?).

Stark asks him about it, and he tosses out this bit of weirdness:


"Guess that’s thirty-one pieces of silver you’ve got now, huh? Sleep well, Judas."

Am I crazy to think this is just plain ridiculus?

We last saw Devil-Fist messing around with that coin in CW # 1... so we're supposed to believe he’s been holding on to it this whole time just so he can get captured, and maybe -MAYBE- get personally escorted to Area 42 by Tony Stark so he could give it to him.

Damn, but that’s weak.

There’s a SPOILER ahead, so if you don’t know that it’s Iron Fist in the Daredevil suit, don’t read… oops.

I know I'm over thinking this (but someone's gotta), but I guess Millar uses "DareDEVIL" here since this is such a "nice" Biblical reference? The wonderful Ann Nocenti did stuff like that all the time when she was on DAREDEVIL, and it was beutifully subtle… but not so much here.

Would Danny Rand - a guy raised in the extra-dimensional realm of K’hun L’un where they most certainly don’t worship Christ - really think this kind of thing up all on his own?

# 6

Pages 1 thru 3 - Hank Pym and Maria Hill check out the new Champions, or whatever. Go get 'em, losers!

Page 4 - The Punisher breaks into the Baxter Building. Wait - The Punisher... breaks into... the Baxter Building?

Okay, don’t get me wrong - I love the Punisher, and would never underestimate his abilities as one man paramilitary strike force, but c’mon, guys...

That's Reed Richards' joint - Galactus would have trouble B&Eing into that place.

Pages 6 & 7 - Sue goes to Atlantis to recruit Namor and gets shutdown. Namor wonders why Captain America didn't come to ask for his help in person, instead of sending some chick he used to crush on. I've avoided playing the "what they should've done" thing in these reviews, but in this scene, what they should've done (couldn't help it), was send Cap down to Namor, and still have Subby refuse to help, but totally come clean about the whole Illuminati stuff, thus sending Cap back to the surface madder than ever.

Page 10 - Back at Underground Avenger HQ, Diamondback brings in Goldbug and the Plunderer. The two d-list villains explain that "heroes ain’t the only ones scared [that they’re] heading for a police state.”

If you’ve read it, you know what happens next.

No BUDDA-BUDDA-BUDDA-BUDDA-BUDDA-BUDDA sound FX, but the point’s well made.

Villains in his soup? Big Frank don’t truck with that.

I'll admit it, I loved the hell out of this scene - that's classic.

But if you remember, these guys were invited in by Diamondback and Black Mamba played doorman to Johnny and Sue in the issue before.

I guess you can make a case for Diamondback since she's kind of reformed, and I’d probably give you that. But unless I missed it somewhere, Black Mamba’s still a card carrying serpent, and Frank's got plenty of bullets left, so what gives?

I don't really like that Cap beats up Frank in the scenes that follow - Cap's a little to reactionary, especially considering he brought Frank in. What's his responsibility in all this?

Things move pretty fast from there.

The Underground Avengers throw their stuff in a bag, and get on over to Area 42, while I'm left wondering, did anybody bother and take the Punisher - a man who's just had the stew beat out of him for being a murder - to prison? Isn't what you do with the Punisher? (For the answer to this question, look no further than Punisher: War Journal # 3)

Anyway...

Cap's team gets inside with a little help, and quickly find themselves face-to-face with Iron Man's Pro-Reg team, and an army of super-criminals.

Tony does his best Rick Flair impression and calls Cap into the square circle.

The mole turns out to be Tigra, but who didn't know that?

But Cap throws a wrench into Tony's plans by revealing that the underground has their own spy in Iron Man's ranks... and he's just let all the prisoners out, and both teams are now pretty much evenly matched.

Good thing Tony knew what was going to happen in the Final Battle, huh?

And now here we are - three weeks away (and I'll believe it when I read it) from the conclusion of Civil War.

From now until then, I plan to look at as many of the different CW tie-in books that I can, and try to see which ones fit... and which ones don't.

CIVIL WAR ROOM

Four nights later and I’m back.

No apologies (Chris) and no explanations (Mom). Tonight we jump right back in with Civil War # 4. And we’re off…

CIVIL WAR # 4

This issue picks up with the Pro-Regs setting lose a bio-mechanical version of Thor on Cap and his Underground Avengers (isn’t that better than “Secret Avengers?).

I’m tempted to go on a long tirade about how stupid the whole Thor-clone/cyborg thing is, but there’s really nothing I can say that hasn’t already been said, y’know?

Honestly, I’ve tried to imagine exactly what Millar and Co. might’ve been thinking with this one, and I can’t really come up with a thing… I mean, if it were, like, the early 90s and we were still in the age of cybernetic right arms and clone superheroes, I might even give ‘em this one, but post-00s, they really oughta be able to give us something better.

So I’m going to just skip over the illogical nature of the Thor clone, I mean, the Thor Cyborg, I mean, the Thor Bionicle… or whatever, and get to the good stuff.

Page 4 – Cap and Iron Man are still talking/fighting, when Cap throws out this piece of dialogue gold…

“You really think I’m going down –
--to some pampered punk like you?

Seems that Cap has lot of animosity for the upper class that he's been holding in all these years – how Judd Nelson of you, buddy.

But you tell 'em, man… fuckin’ preps.

FACT: Mark Millar totally gets Captain America.

OH, NO - BLACK GIANT MAN???

Page 8 - Anybody remember when Joe Quesada and Tom Brevoort were doing press for CW # 4 and they kept hinting that we'd see the death of a “big” character? Huh, guess they got us with that one, didn’t they?

Honestly, I’m a Bill Foster fan – yeah, I’m THE one. But his death didn’t really bother me so much as what happens afterwards.

Pages 9 - Bigass Bill takes a hit from fake Mjolnir and dies, Dagger goes into shock or whatever, Thorborg attempts some badass dialogue (“You are all going down.”) and calls down some clone-lightening(?) to fry Cap and crew.

Page 10 - But don’t worry, the Invisible Woman steps in and puts up a forcefield to protect them.

Page 11 - Cable apparently taps into Cloak’s power and transports the “rebels” out.

Here’s what I’ve got a problem with.

Reed steps in after the smokes cleared with this…


“Shutdown code Richard Wagner
eighteen-thirteen to eighteen eighty-three”

What the hell? Why didn’t he do this before?

Thorborg is going nuts and is out of control from the get-go – clearly not “…just like the old Thor!” as Yellowjacket later says he should’ve been.

At one point (page 5, I think) Reed gives him a stand down order, but that doesn’t do the trick.

I know, for a lot of people, CW # 4 was the one where it broke. Up to this point, we’d all been kind of hoping Millar and McNiven could pull it out, and turn this thing into something spectacular, but alas… it was not to be. And most of the breaking happens in the course of this battle.

Page 12 – In the aftermath of the fight, I was happy to see Hank Pym at least acknowledge that Bill Foster was “…one of [his] oldest friends.” Still, while I don’t think they were ever best friends, it might’ve been nice to see Hank dealing with this a little differently. Maybe I’m just looking for too much, I don’t know…

Page 13 – Hank tells us that Tony Stark’s had a strand of Thor’s hair since the first Avengers meeting, and I’m okay with that, I suppose.


But Thor’s gone missing several times before, so why’d the Marvel U braintrust wait so long to clone ol’ goldilocks?

Page 14 – Stature, Nighthawk, and Cable (?) walkout on the Underground Avengers, and as they leave, we notice they’re being watched by a mysterious masked figure on a fire escape. This is important for later.


Page 15 – This is the worst thing I’ve seen in comics in a long time, and terribly hard for anybody to defend, if we're all being honest.

BLACK GIANT MAN – R.I.P.


Jesus - they wrap the poor bastard in some tarps and through his big ol’, dead ass in the ground.

Happy Hogan says…

“Just a shame they couldn’t shrink him down.”

Yeah, it sure is, but Pym particles work both ways, you dumbass!

Why couldn't they have used ‘em to increase the size of nice suit, or heaven forbid, a coffin for the guy. What in the world were they thinking?

Page 16 – Leaving Foster Canyon, Stark and Happy are stopped by Mrs. Sharpe – dead Stamford kid’s mom from CW # 1. She’s come to give Tony something… something that will remind him why he’s doing this.

It’s an Iron Man action figure, her son Damien’s favorite toy since he was three years old.

It’s almost a nice moment, except for the fact that the toy is modern Iron Man, and, assuming that her soon was in elementary school (probably about 7 or 8 years old) when Stamford happened, an Iron Man toy from when he was 3 would probably not look like this.

Of course, Stark could have been so inspired by a toy prototype from a couple of years in the past, that he modeled his current armor off of it, but I kind of doubt it.

Page 17 – Sue’s letter to Reed isn’t bad. It’s got some good parts.

But it’s the ending of # 4 that really gets to me.

Maybe I’m alone here, but there’s no way I can believe, that just a few days after the senseless death of “their friend” Bill Foster, the Pro-Regs think it’s a good idea to call in reinforcements in the form of this bunch:

WHAT THE..?

Civil War # 5 review tomorrow… hopefully.

CIVIL WAR AGAIN...

So, now, after nearly a two week hiatus, here’s what I have to say about Civil War, #s 2 and 3, with 4 – 6, and Civil War: The Return coming tomorrow.

#2

>Civil War # 2 starts off kind of rough, with its opening shot of the Vulture and the Grim Reaper chained to some pillar somewhere underground.

Two things bother me about this: 1 – Vulture was wearing a different costume the last time we saw him in the Marvel Knights Spider-man title, right? What happened to it? Of course, I might be getting a little nit-picky on this, but the new costume did appear in a book written by the same guy (Mark Millar) that writes his appearance here, and even though I know HE didn’t draw it, it would have been nice if the costume’s matched.
I’m sure Marvel might make the argument that they “chose” to have the Vulture in his original costume because it was more recognizable, and I’d almost buy it if not for my point number two…

2 – Where’s the Grim Reaper’s scythe? We’re clearly shown his right hand, but I was always under the impression that when Eric Williams upgraded his Reaper equipment, he sacrificed his hand (if that’s not true, please somebody correct me).

>One of the things that we’ve seen throughout Civil War has been what I’ve taken to calling “the repeat” – a shot or scene that shows up in the MAIN Civil War title and is also shown in a tie-in book focusing specifically on one character’s point-of-view.

So far, it’s happened in Iron Man, Fantastic Four, Amazing Spidey, and most recently She-Hulk.

In CW#2 we see Iron Man’s team after they’ve just taken down a “doombot”.

Same scene is shown in She-Hulk, but this time with a greater focus on ol’ Shulkie’s take on the situation.

Some have worked out well, others… not so much.

The problem I’ve noticed with these repeats, is that sometimes the events don’t match up one-to-one - a bit of dialogue will be off by a few words, but enough to sort of change the way the scene works. We’ll see a pretty good example of this in something shown in CW#6, and then shown that same week in Punisher: War Journal # 2, but I’m jumping the gun a little.

>Page 8 sees the Super Hero Registration Act becoming a law, and those S.H.I.E.L.D. guys waste no time getting to work, as we see on page 9 where they’re seen violently attacking Patriot of the Young Avengers. Also, in New Avengers # ___ , we see S.H.I.E.L.D. take a small army into the heart of Harlem to take down the hardest man in town, Luke “Power Man” Cage. They hit him up at 12:01AM, just minutes after the Registration Act’s taken effect. Jesus Christ guys, give these guys some time… damn.

>Page 13 – Undercover Cap rescues the Young Avengers after they’ve been captured by S.H.I.E.L.D.

Don’t mind him helping out the kids, but check out panel 5 – Cap kicks that SHIELD guy right out of the carrier!!! Holy shit, Cap – you’re on the F***ing interstate, man. What were you thinking? Isn’t that a little uncalled for? I mean, sure, everything the guy’s saying in the scene makes him a creep, but still… kicking him out on the freeway?

>Obviously, the biggest thing to happen in CW#2 is Spider-man’s revelation to the world that he’s really Peter Parker under the mask.

I told Chris, Tug, and Phil when I first heard this might happen, that I’d quit reading comics if it was true, but I honestly kind of like how it was done, and wanted to stick around to see how it played out. No lie.

But the more I’ve thought about it, and after reading it a second time, what struck me as kind of funny was the age Peter says he was when he became Spider-man.

“My name is Peter Parker, and I’ve been
Spider-man since I was fifteen years old.”

I rarely like it when a story locks something in a definite age, year, time, place, etc…

Fifteen seems a little young here for 616 Spider-man.

Think about it – Peter graduates from Midtown High in Amazing Spider-man # 28. Assuming he was bitten by the spider at age 15, that mean Amazing Spidey #s 1 – 28 cover 3 years of Peter Parker’s life, and to me, that just seems like too much, especially when you consider that the next 100 issues only cover a few years of college.

Again, probably me being too nit-picky, but it gets back to something I mentioned in my first Civil War post about Marvel and Mark Millar having a tough time separating the core Marvel U from the Ultimates.

# 3

>CW#3 opens in the media aftermath of Pete’s big reveal from #2, and quickly shifts to a pretty interesting scene of Reed Richards talking with T’Challa in Wakanda, and we see just how disconnected Reed seems from the events going on around him.

>Page 4 has Tony Stark meeting with Emma Frost of the X-men to discuss the mutant stand on the Registration Act.

Apparently the X-men don’t have to play, cause Emma pretty much just tells Stark they won’t be registering and they won’t be getting involved – period. She says they’ll just stay on their “reservation” or whatever, and be good little mutants.

Earlier in their meeting Stark says this:

“[Emma] This must be the first time you and
I have been alone since Marrakesh.

Tell me, does Cyclops know about that
little arrangement we used to have when neither
of us were dating?”

So, Tony and Emma were once F-buddies? To quote my friend Scott, “If that’s the case, then Marvel’s been showing us the wrong stuff.”

Again, another great example of something Ultimate Tony Stark might say, but not what I’d expect to hear coming out of the mouth of a character as nuanced 616 Tony.

And is that Tony Stark... or Tony Montana?

>Page 7 - I thought the secret Avengers secret identity thing was kind of funny.

>Page 11 – Cap’s team gets ambushed by the Pro-Regs, resulting in several pages of Stark and his boys trying to talk them down.

>Page 15 – Needless to say, it doesn’t work.

>Page 16 – Yellowjacket with Big Ass Bill in a headlock, says:

“I thought you were
supposed to be smart, Bill.”

Damn, Hank – that's cold!

>Page 19 – Cap and Iron Man fight. Iron Man knows Cap’s moves before he makes him, huh? Boo.

>Page 20 – Iron Man knocks Cap’s teeth out. Too much. They’ll never be friends again.

And while I’m on the subject, I know it’s just an artistic choice, but having a tooth fly out of Cap’s mouth here, and then have him show up several issues later or in another book with a full, beautiful mouth full of teeth means, that in the midst of this whole Civil War fiasco, Cap found some time to go to the dentist and get his teeth fixed.

TOOTH CAM

Like I said, too much.

>Page 22 – CLOR? CY-Thor? We’ll see next issue…or will we?

THIS GUY IS SO WRONG!

I'll be finishing up my Civil War run down sometime this week... I promise.

But until then, take a look at this crazy review of Fantastic Four # 542.

Favorite line out of the whole thing:

"I hope that Editor Tom Brevoort and Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada [also] shed a tear. Well they must have, because the Fantastic Four title is pretty much down the drain.

This is one of the worst issues of our four heroes I have ever read. Even the Heroes Reborn event wasn’t as bad as Fantastic Four has become."

This guy's off his rocker.

CIVIL W... OH, CRAP.

So, I'd totally worked up an awesome post on Civil War # 2 and Blogger crashed and zapped it.

I'll work on it again tomorrow... maybe I'll even do # 2 and # 3.

CIVIL WAR SILLINESS... BY THE NUMBERS

If you're a friend of mine that reads comics, chances are you've heard me say most of the things I'm about to mention, but oh well...

Unless you live under a rock (or have recently had a very large one dropped on you by Iron Man, maybe?) you're probably familiar with the Marvel Comics Event... CIVIL WAR - a 7 issue mini-series that's taken nearly a year to complete that chronicles the "war" between Marvel's heroes after the United States implements a somewhat unnecessary Super Hero Registration Act.

I say unnecessary, because last time I checked, it was already illegal to be a vigilante.

So, tonight I'd like to do a quick run through of some of the mistakes, inconsistancies, and just plain stupid ideas that I recently found in a quick rereading of the mini-series' first six issues, focusing specifically tonight on Civil War # 1. But before I begin, keep in mind that # 7 hasn't made it to the stores yet, and if indeed the Asgardian god of mischeif is behind this fiasco, like so many peolple seem to think (me not being one of 'em), then this could all prove irrelevent.

Anyway...

Civil War # 1

Page 11, Panel 4 - So Sentinel Squad One come to the site of the Stamford tragedy and just stand around and watch all of the other heroes work? Man, I glad I didn't even give these guys' mini-series a second thought.

Check out ol' what's his name on page 12, panel 2. Glad he's comfortable. Geez.... I mean, what a dick.

Also, take note of what Bigass Bill Foster, AKA Black Giant Man, says in the panel above, there.

"It won't just be mutants they're watching after this one, Ms. Marvel.

This is the straw that broke the camel's back. You mark my words."

Page 18, Panel 2 - Reed Richards mentions to Dr. Strange that he's "one of the post-humans" [the government] hopes to seek a compromise with. What's that all about. This things not even a law yet, so what's the deal here?

Page 19, Panel 5 - Glad to see good ol' SENATOR Sam "Snap" Wilson's so dedicated to the tradition of masks. Better call up them constituants, Snap - you still got some pull, right?

Page 20, Panel 3 - Now, pay close attention to that little bit of dialogue spoken by Devil-Fist.

"No, this has been building up for a long time, Nighthawk.

Stamford's just the straw that broke the camel's back."

Bill... s'that you in the red?

Then there's the 10 pages of obligatory action where Maria Hill attacks Captain America for essentially saying he's not going to help her inforce a piece of legislation that hasn't even been voted into law yet.

Then there's the Watcher's appearance, and Dr. Strange's pronouncement that "...his presence does not bode well."

Now, this is the same guy that showed up to the Black Panther's wedding right? And this is also the guy that helped the Fantastic Four scare off Galactus. I mean, I realize that it's all for dramatic effect, but Ben GRimm of the FF is standing right there in the same room as the guy. I don't think it'd be hard to imagine hims saying something like, "Ah, I don't know, Doc... maybe ol' baldy's here to throw us a clue or two, huh?"

Then there's some silly politically-steeped dialogue that basically works its way through the next several pages leading us up to the very last shot of Iron Man, Reed, and Yellowjacket standing in a politician-filled room, posturing all badass like, and threatening to bring in Captain America.

If you've read a lot of Mark Millar's Marvel work, you probably know what I'm talking about when I refer to the last page jaw-dropper, then. He does it with pretty much every issue of The Ultimates (a book that I truly enjoy0, so it's no surprise that every issue of Civil War pretty much ends with one of these.

And there-in, I think lies the biggest problem with the whole story.

I genuinely think Millar has a tough time seperating the two - the Ultimate versions from the "616" versions.

I want to look at this a little closer tomorrow night, but Millar's version of Cap acts much more like the guy in the Ultimates than the Captain America that was revived in Avengers # 4 back in '63.

And as we'll see tomorrow night, his Tony Stark works pretty much the exact same way.

BACK IN THE NEW POST GROOVE...

Yeah, I know I haven't really posted anything in a few days.

Chalk it up to lots of work, lots of comics, and lots of unnecessary TV watching (BBCs Spaced, Peep Show, Hardware, Doctor Who (again), Torchwood, and I just jumped on 24).

Tomorrow, I plan on getting back into the swing of things, and I'm kicking it off with my tally of everything I've found wrong with CIVIL WAR 1 - 6, which I just reread last night.

'Til then, here's a badass picture of Marvel Legends Hawkeye about to throw down with Marvel Legends Taskmaster.

And now... American Idol's on.

Later, teens.

Additional reading...

Marvel's April 2007 solicitations... notice a certain star-spangled Avenger's title is missing for the month. Hmmmm...

"WELCOME TO TH'PARTY, PAL!"

Is Die Hard the greatest movie of all time?

I think it might be.

I swung by the Dragon tonight to pick up comics and ended up listening to Chris Sims explain to Rob Lindsey why he didn't like PREDATOR (which he'd recently just watched). And I'll give him this - for Predetor to have been a movie about a group of commandos storming the South American jungle in an all-American death-raid only to end up fighting for their lives against a viscious poacher from outer space, Sims made a pretty convincing argument that it was kinda boring.

Still, it's one of my favorites and it's hard for me to look at that movie with anything other than the eyes of an 8 year old.

As you might've guessed, another movie I have the same weakness for is DIE HARD.

But it makes me pretty happy to know that I'm not alone on this one.

Tonight, I don't really remember how exactly, but in talking about 80s action movies, somebody brought up Die Hard, and the same thing happened that always does when it gets mentioned... we stopped, cocked our head's slightly aside, looked up and sighed just a little.


Ah, Die Hard.



Man, what is it about that movie?


I actually didn't own it until just this Christmas, but I've seen it more times than I could ever count.


Is it the one-liners, maybe?

• "Welcome to th'party, pal!"

• "9 million terrorists in th'world and I kill one with feet smaller than my sister."

• "Come out to the coast, we'll get together, have a few laughs.

• "You ask for a miracle, I give you the FBI."

• "I'm Agent Johnson, this's my partner, Special Agent Johnson... no relation."

• "No bullets! Y'thinkI'mfuckin'stoopid, Hans?"

And of course...

• "Yippie-kay-yay, muthatfucker."

Maybe it's the taglines?

• "40 Stories Of Sheer Adventure!"
  


• "Twelve terrorists. One cop. The odds are against John McClane... That's just the way he likes it."
  


• "It will blow you through the back wall of the theater!" (Damn, that's awesome!)

Maybe it's this guy?

I didn't know this 'til recently, but Die Hard is based on the novel Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Mayne Thorp - the main character in the book is named Joe Leland and the villain is Tony Gruber.

Now, in my estimation, the body count for Die Hard comes in somewhere around 19.

• All 12 terrorists (Hans, Karl, Tony, Fritz, Theo, Eddie, etc...)
• Joseph Takagi (Holly's boss)
• Nakatomi building guard
• Harry Ellis ("Hey, Johnny-boy... it's me, Harry!" / idiot California guy caught snorting coke in Takagi's office)
• Both FBI agents (Johnson & Johnson)
• Helicopter pilot and crewman

Not as many as some blockbusters, but when you take into account that nearly all twelve terrorists were pretty much taken out by, like, one guy... well that's saying something.

And finally, one other little tid-bit I didn't know about until tonight...

Die Hard was originally pitched to Arnold Schwarzenegger as a sequel to Commando.

Unlike so many other big-budget action pictures, Die Hard holds up remarkebly well. The script is solid, the acting perfect, the characters are great, and the explosions can't be beat.

Additional Reading:

Die Hard trivia...

Die Hard corrections and mistakes...

Die HArd on IMDB...

John McTiernan on IMDB...

Live Free or Die Hard (Die Hard 4) Trailer...

THE FAMILY DYNAMIC

Here're the first two pages of THE FAMILY DYNAMIC.

Pencils and Inks by Ricardo Cabrera.

More to come later...