House to Astonish Episode 119
Hot on the heels of our special episode on CHIKARA Pro, we’re back with a regular hour-and-a-bit of comics chat. We’re talking about Mike Marts and Nick Lowe’s editorial moves, the new creative team on Superman, the Chew/Revival crossover, the Preacher TV show and various bits of comics movie casting. We’ve also got reviews of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, Ms Marvel and Batman: Joker’s Daughter, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is for kids, silly rabbit. All this plus your grandfather’s superheroes, Deathmate: Taupe and the reshuffling of a plate.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or through our Facebook fan page.
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I don’t know if the timing works out and we don’t know the scope of the netflix series yet but Scott Lang did have a relationship with Jessica Jones.
I only read Chew in trade and I’m glad this news happened because I’d totally forgotten. Thanks to this I just bought volume 7.
Uh… wasn’t Mike Marts the editor of the X-Books during the Chuck Austen era, with the whole Xorn mishap and all? That doesn’t strike me as something we should want to revisit… 🙁
Even leaving Austen’s work aside, I thought Marts was a lousy editor. There were a number of things that he should have caught (errors, inconsistencies between books he was editing and so forth) that he never did.
I even recall wondering to myself just what the hell Marts actually did. Because it didn’t seem like he was reading anything he was supposedly editing.
Ms Marvel was indeed gorgeous and a really good opening issue. It was definitely the right choice to focus more on the character over the plot. As this is one of the increasingly few $2.99 books, I’ll give it another few goes yet.
I hope John Romita’s move to Superman allows him to reinvent his art style a little. I haven’t really been all that impressed with his work over the last couple of years. It hasn’t been awful or anything, but a lot of the times it has looked really rushed, and compared to the styles from likes of a David Aja or Paolo Rivera or Valerio Schiti it has been a bit plain and generic. I know JRjr is as ‘house style’ as you can get, but trying something different wouldn’t hurt. Oh and if he finally figured out how to draw children too.
Good point on Avengers 2 getting rather bloated. They’re obviously going to have to delicately balance giving the new characters enough for people to care about them for the future films, but not at the expense of the more established actors. They’re into double-digits which is pushing it quite a bit. Even Spider-Man 2 looks like it’ll be a mess and that only has to juggle about half that amount.
I just don’t get those Guardians of the Galaxy sequel rumours, even before the first one has been in cinemas. Okay so Marvel Studios has probably earned the benefit of the doubt…but I’m personally still sceptical on the GotG film.
To continue the chikara references, if Dreadmund Druid is going to have a food-based MO, he needs to fight Ultimo Breakfast, which was Dasher Hatfield’s previous gimmick in Chikara.
These guys are way too down on Capwolf. It was a really solid story arc.
I suspect if Bettany is the Vision in Avengers 2, it’ll be a very brief thing (perhaps even post-credits). Some kind of surprise happy ending after Jarvis is destroyed by Ultron earlier on, perhaps, or a twist with Stark uploading Jarvis into the Ultron-made Vision body waiting to be activated as used as a weapon, maybe. (Apologies for spoilers if any of that turns out miraculously turns out to be true).
If Captain Marvel is in it, it’ll surely be in a small cameo like Hawkeye’s in Thor.
Mike Marts & Axel Alonso are what brought us to where we are with the X-books today. I’m a few years behind on reading. With this news, I don’t think I’m even going to bother any more. Buying, downlading, or reading.
I was really pleased with Ms Marvel. It reminded me a lot of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, both superficially (stories about teenage girls with super heroics in the background) and in terms of putting the characters and their relations to each other at the forefront. I imagine that Ms Marvel will be focusing more on the super hero stuff going forward, but it’s really nice to Marvel putting a book with that tone and subject matter into the MU proper.
I wonder if its more likely that it’ll be Carol Danvers rather than Captain Marvel in AVENGERS 2 in some small S.H.I.E.L.D. role (akin to Maria Hill’s in the first?), perhaps involved in the fight versus Hydra/von Strucker, to introduce her before powering her up (via the Kree, being introduced in GOTG) in her own separate plot line in a different movie, thus creating — as you say — in Phases 2 & 3 a new hero who can be used in later movies after losing earlier actors/characters.
As for Evangeline Lily, I wonder if she could still be the Wasp AND Pym’s daughter. The original talk was of Pym having an earlier career as the original Ant-Man (or Aunt-Man?) in his youth before the tech was shelved. Could he have worked with an estranged daughter in some fashion (who has her mother’s name — classic “scientist married to his work”) before giving it up? That would allow for some of the Pym/Van Dyne team-ups to have occurred WITHOUT any problematic relationship issues coming up in the narrative — they can just hook her up with Lang (who, as noted, lacks a usual love interest) for the romance instead. Sure, it *seems* weird, but Stark/Potts wasn’t a thing in the comics until the movies either.
I started listening to some of this and fell into one of those sleeps so deep you wake up and swear no time has passed. Now I have no idea what bit I was up to. But on the upside, at lest I wasn’t listening to it on the car stereo.
Batman: Joker’s Daughter
Wasn’t that the big twist in Flashpoint?
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So I know pretty much nothing about any Nova ever, but as vaguely derogatory names go though, NINO isn’t that bad. I mean while a clunky phrase when spelled out, it’s not quite an insult to refer to the less experienced kid replacement of the character as a child.
Unless they just stumbled into that Spanish by pure luck– I honestly don’t know.
“I started listening to some of this and fell into one of those sleeps so deep”
^This would be a great blurb to promote House to Astonish.
With regards to the Ant-Man casting, it’s worth remembering that Janet Van Dyne was actually originally introduced as the daughter of an older scientist interested in Pym’s work. She had Pym give her powers and became the Wasp after her father was murdered in order to help catch her father’s killer. If Lang’s the original Ant-Man and Pym’s his mentor, then having Janet be Pym’s daughter could actually be reasonably close to her original story. Hell, if they wanted to, then they could have it both ways and have the Wasp be “Janet Pym” Hank Pym’s and Janet van Dyne’s daughter.
Are ther Nova fans?
tons!
hundreds!
dozens!
ok maybe just me.
I’ll always treasure the first New warriors series. they were a bunch of irresponsible grunge teenagers when i was a grunge teen. they started to grow up and take responsibility around the time i was doing likewise.
heck my email is thehumanrocket@
and all this despite his name being Dick Rider (of course he goes by Rich, wouldn’t you?)
Ms. Marvel really reminded me of a good Jemas-era teen book.Like the aforementioned Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Sentinel, or Runaways (not just because it shares an artist). I mean that as a compliment. A lost Tsunami book in its style and pacing.Since that’s not something we see much now it was refreshing and really suits the book.
Were the buyers of the previous Nova books mostly Rich Rider fans, or were they Abnett and Lanning Cosmic Book fans who would have bought a Groot ongoing as long as DnA were writing it?
As a Superman fan, my first thought on hearing about the new creative team was that I was super excited about the new writer, Not Scott Lobdell. I’m a huge fan of Not Scott Lobdell, and am looking forward to his eventual run on Titans as well.
My familiarity with Turok mostly comes from the TV Tropes page, which says his being a Native American is from the original version – specifically “a Pre-Columbian Navajo Warrior”. The Valiant version apparently claimed the dinos came from another dimension where Time Has No Meaning and added demons and aliens, so I suppose Crusaders would fit into that take.
I think the idea of the Joker’s Daughter being sane is meant to be that she doesn’t have the psychiatric disorder she seems to be acting upon. She instead has an entirely different psychiatric disorder that leads her to believe she’s supposed to have the first kind. So the Anchorite is talking nonsense, but nonsense with a basis in what JD’s about.
I noticed something in a couple of recent comics that kind of bugged me, and since this is about the only comics discussion that I read, I figured I’d see what you good folks think about it, even though it has nothing to do with this week’s podcast…
What I’m talking about is ridiculously overblown “title sequences” in comics. Last week’s Uncanny Avengers was the one that kind of set me off, but it’s been popping up a lot. That Uncanny Avengers issue, which I think was $4, had a 2-page spread with nothing but the title of the issue in 120 point type across a black background, with the creator credits at the bottom. Then the next page was a recap text page. That’s 3 pages in a row of the book given over to useless, space-eating content. Why not put 2.5 more pages of COMICS in my $4 comic?
Anybody else kind of irritated by this?
I enjoyed the Valiant Turok, written by Fabian.
IIRC, he was a college baseball player who learned he was the latest in a heritary group of dino hunters and had to take up the mantle when his father/uncle/brother died.
I seem to recall the tittle pages are “freebies” for the creative team and do not subtract from story pages.
So Kamala Khan’s whole family is apt to be Terrigenesis-reactive, right? At least her siblings and/or one of her parents, in any case. Could be a way to get a new, more literal Marvel Family going.
Have siblings or family groups been caught up in the Great Terrigen Guff? Or is that not random enough?
I should say that (thanks to an anonymous, kind soul) I read and enjoyed Ms. Marvel 1. There’s enough loose, expressive style in the art (esp. the colouring!) to make the very familiar teenage milieu seem fresh. The family structure is very real, the conflict between the immigrant and American-born sides of the family rings true.
Not so keen on all the fan stuff, though. It seems like too unsubtle a nod to the social media crowd. The Hero Who Could Be You (As Long As You Have Superhusband Feels)! Can you imagine if they’d done that for Usenet, back in the days of Alisha’s Attic. For the Alvaro boards? For Delphi?! (ahem)
It provides context for the metamorphosis sequence, though, and that’s the main thing.
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PS: There’s a Space Punisher sale on at The ‘Ology right now. Four issues, 99c/69p each. Holy Moley, this is the greatest Punisher story ever invented.
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Some creators dont do that recap page.
I asked Kieron about a gag in a YA issue recap page and he said he didnt write it.
Yes – most text pages are free. Issues have a budget, and mainstream comics are traditionally paid on a page rate. Adding a page of comic art is always the most expensive thing you could do.
The intro pages are almost aways by editorial staff.
Pages without art are normally called by the writer and handled by the in house design team.
Or, to put it another way – if those pages weren’t used on a title page or something you feel is padding, they’d have been used as an advert. They were never going to be story pages.
They’re actually normally an attempt to add more value to the book, or using that space as a creative flourish.
Matthew Craig: In the Iron Man Inhumans crossover issue, the villain of the piece was transformed by the mists, and the rest of his family was transformed a little later (because they got differing amounts of exposure). But except for him, they all died in the course of his origin story.
And I realize somewhat belatedly that it is odd to be posting about that story directly below the person who wrote it. Good work, Mr Gillen; I liked the resonance between Kohl’s and Tony’s issues with family and alcohol. He works well as a foil. Yes, that’s some mighty… fine… foiling… See, it’s fine phrasing like that which explains why I don’t often talk to creators at conventions…
Thanks for the clarification, Kieron. If they were never going to be story pages, then it’s no big deal. I actually enjoy when those sorts of things have a bit of flair to them (as opposed to a one-word title spread across two pages), but if they’re not bumping story pages, it’s all good.
The review of Ms Marvel makes it sound quite boring to my taste of superhero comics. Like if Spider-man had started with an issue of Peter’s life that just featured the spider-bite in the middle and maybe one instance of his spider-sense going off before Flash beat on him.
I guess it’s just a case of writing for trade, and/or another case, relating to the #1s subject, of how it’s the first arc that counts rather than the first issue.
I think that’s a fair assessment, Dave. The cliffhanger’s an interesting one, rather than a dramatic one, but yeah. There’s something to be said for a little bit of in medias res. On the strength of this ish, I’d definitely recommend the trade.
Remember how Raimi’s first Spider-Man felt like two TV shows bolted together around that post-funeral montage? Bit clunky, but I liked it.
(hahaha, that photo of Peter with his wrestler costume where they tried to photoshop the real one over the top)
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PoC – it was actually the other way round – the villain’s family got Inhumanned first. This was a plot point in itself.
Given the dispersal of Inhuman genes among the earth’s populace, shouldn’t some established heroes, villains and supporting characters be affected by the mists too?
Great podcast as usual, but the only thing putting me off Rogen doing Preacher: Green Hornet
Iron Man villain Blizzard got turned into an Inhuman.
In The tradition of Aunt Man, might I put in a request for Matt MODOK?
By the way, in regards to Ms Marvel, I don’t eat bacon and to me it smells like old wee.
AJT–Right. Thanks for the clarification. Serves me right for not going back to the issue properly before I posted.
Red Son and Kingdom Come of course both trade heavily on that distance of Superman. For all its flaws I remember KC fondly for making Bad, Dumb Superman a genuinely terrifying presence.
It is really hard to write a Superman story where he’s both interesting and inspirational, I think for the same reason that writers try to avoid including on-page supposed works of genius. As far as I can tell the answer is less cosmos and more Clark Kent; the creators originated the “secret identity” for a reason. I saw one in passing recently – Action Comics? – with Clark ‘being rescued by’ Lex Luthor from a burning building while welding burst Danger Pipes, blowing out fire and nipping off to shore up walls. It was two stories at once and it was great! I’m sure Secret Superman would get old like anything with too much exposure, but it sure hasn’t for me any of the fleeting times it’s been revived. To be perceived as meek, bumbling and friendly while helping and deciding when to flash a symbol are much more interesting challenges than lifting a very large rock. Handwave it how you like – Chelyabinsk showed us what happens when you fly too fast in atmosphere, for example – take him back down to Metropolis for a while, and see what happens. That’s my totally informed take!
Equally informed is my puzzlement over the continued notion that because his villains are largely mass-murderers, Batman is or should be a horror franchise. It’s in the pornographic torture of Killing Joke, it’s in the body-mod and literal Prisoner’s Dilemma of Dark Knight, and from your discussion it’s endemic to the current books – and I just don’t think it needs to be. There’s a world of difference between a mass murderer and a serial killer, a Stalin and a Manson, and the latter tends to make for writing that exploits and fetishises the suffering of its fictional victims. Burton’s and Miller’s Jokers essentially brand their victims with their own deformity, but they do so because of a simply defined psychopathic compulsion rather than a personal or political basis, which somehow makes them safer and prevents a pornographic eye on their targets.
A couple years ago I saw some preview articles and panels of Batman and Robin. Sneaking! Batarangs! A buddy-cop dynamic! Leaping from the Batplane onto a car! Double-punching an anthropomorphic toad with a big old SOK! sound effect! It looked wonderful, and I bought the first trade to check it out. Inside I found that the motivating force throughout all this was a bunch of detailed mind-break surgerape fiction. In a word, Welp. Never going back to that. What if instead of horror, this vigilante action detective were to focus on action and detective work? I mean, it’d probably go bust; you need only look at film and TV to see that people hate action stories and crime procedurals.
I’ve said for ages that a way to do a compelling Superman story would be to take the point of view away from Superman himself. So show the reaction of the people Superman saves. Hang around for the aftermath of a visit from Superman, long after he’s gone. This is not at all removing Superman from the story, it’s removing the reader from Superman’s shoulder as he looks at the world, and putting the reader on Jimmy’s shoulder as he looks at Superman. And while Superman can’t be hurt by bullets and bombs, Jimmy sure can. So it doesn’t matter how overpowered the title character is.
Compare if you like to the Bible. It’s not all “Hi, I’m Jesus, this is what I did today”, it’s all about the apostles and Herod and the whores and lepers and those poor pigs that Legion got put into. What was Jesus thinking about when he walked on the water? It doesn’t matter, what matters is the reaction of the mere mortals when they saw their messiah get pissed off and show them how it’s done.