Marvel Previews Picks: March 2012
Don’t ask why it took three-and-a-half years for this to occur to me. It probably won’t surprise anyone that I regularly peruse the solicitations from the “big four” as they’re published each month over at Comic Book Resources. Naturally I’m looking to see what collections are being released, along with what format they’re in, their price and page count to see whether or not I’ll buy it when it comes out, wait until the softcover version hits, or until Comic-Con rolls around. Originally, I was going to go through everything that Marvel, DC, Image and Dark Horse had to offer, but this wound up being a much bigger proposition than I initially anticipated. So I’ll start off with Marvel and hope that they don’t find new and interesting ways to aggravate me this month.
Uncanny X-Men by Kieron Gillen vol. 1 Premiere Hardcover: Oh god damn it! I was afraid this was going to happen. With the latest relaunch, Marvel has now decided to start putting out collections for the main X-titles in hardcover rather than going straight to paperback. I’m going to buy this eventually, but $20 for 112 pages is steep unless Amazon’s discount is in the +40% range (which is really just wishful thinking). While I’ve heard good things about Gillen’s first two issues, they aren’t in the “Nextwave Good” range that would get me to pick this up without taking those other factors into account. That brings us to the next item on the list…
Secret Avengers vol. 3: Run the Mission. Don’t Get Caught. Save the World. Premiere Hardcover: Warren Ellis takes over “Secret Avengers.” Channelling the vibe he had with “Global Frequency.” Working with six excellent artists. Sign me up! Even if the cover price is $25 for the six issues collected here.
Ultimate Comics Avengers vs. New Ultimates: Death of Spider-Man: After the last two volumes of “Ultimate Avengers” I’m not expecting much. However, it’s Mark Millar’s final volume and I’m planning to use this as my jumping off point for reading anything else that he writes in the future. Part of me knows that it’s foolish to write off any creator but even if some of his upcoming works sound interesting, they’ll still be drenched in the tone-deaf dialogue and pointless attitude that has dragged down all of his recent work in my eyes. If “Kick-Ass” has shown us anything, it’s that we’ll be better off waiting for the inevitable movie versions of his works rather than reading the comics themselves.
Marvel: Season One Premiere Hardcovers: These are the new original graphic novels representing Marvel’s latest stab at cracking the bookstore market. The hook for the stories this time is that we’re getting yet another take on the origins of these characters. Kind of like a new version of the Ultimate universe for the new decade. Obviously the plan is to bring the likes of “Spider-Man,” “Daredevil,” and “X-Men,” to an audience that doesn’t frequent comic shops and thereby get some of the sales love afforded to titles like “The Walking Dead.” It won’t happen, and it won’t be just because of the price/page count ratio. You see, by including the latest first issue of each respective series, it gives the impression that Marvel also wants these new readers to start reading the in-continuity versions of these characters as well. This ends up giving these volumes the feeling of being a very expensive advertisement rather than good starting points for people unfamiliar with these characters. Regardless of how good the stories are (and respectable creators like Jamie McKelvie and Wellinton Alves are involved) any new readers are likely to be puzzled by the inclusion of the issue and wonder how it relates to what they just read. I can understand why Marvel is doing this, but I don’t think it’s going to work in the way they intend.
Journey Into Mystery: Fear Itself Fallout, Wolverine: Goodbye Chinatown Premiere Hardcovers: Two collections I’ll be picking up once they hit softcover. It’s as simple as that.
Secret Warriors vol. 6: Wheels Within Wheels: If I haven’t bought vols. 4 & 5 by the time this arrives, I’ll probably just get them all at once when it does. The first half of this series turned out to be densely constructed and thoroughly entertaining read. I just wish that they had compressed the back half into two, or even one collection because some of these are a little thin for the cover price.
Annihilators: Earthfall: After all these years, Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning finally get to do a series where their cosmic heroes interact with their counterparts back on Earth. Specifically, the Avengers in this case. Now I want to be excited about this, but I’m having trouble doing so for a few reasons. First off is that the buzz on this series has been very quiet. To the effect that instead of a major event, it feels like “The next major cosmic Marvel story. Woo.” Then there’s the fact that I can’t help but think that it would’ve been more interesting for the Avengers to head out into space for the team-up. That would’ve helped drive home the scale of the conflicts the cosmic characters have faced over the years as the Avengers find themselves the small fish in a very large pond. Plus they could’ve done a scene where they have Wolverine try out various alien foods to see if they’re safe to eat or if they’ll dissolve your digestive tract on contact. It’s something that I would’ve liked to have seen, but the fact that I’m throwing out ideas for how I think the story should’ve gone doesn’t really bode well for this collection either. We’ll see what happens in March.