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2 hours ago, Matt D said:

Mark Waid's way too dismissive of Doom's nobility. 

He misses a big point from fiction writing 101: The villain does not think of himself as the villain, Victor Von Doom has always possessed a high degree of ethics, courage and numerous other "good guy" traits. The fact that he is opposed to 99% of the world is irrelevant, Doom thinks he's right, and in his way, he's right.

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It's similar to Morrison wanting to knock all the shades of grey off Magneto. That, regardless of his reasons, Eric is a terrorist and a murderer.

He used Kick to justify it, and it still pissed off a whole lot of people.

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22 minutes ago, Brian Fowler said:

It's similar to Morrison wanting to knock all the shades of grey off Magneto. That, regardless of his reasons, Eric is a terrorist and a murderer.

He used Kick to justify it, and it still pissed off a whole lot of people.

Another character that is much the better for the shades of gray. In fact, were we to look at the whole roster of Marvel super villains, I think that about the only one that you could come up with as having no redeeming qualities whatsoever would be the Red Skull. Even both Zemo I & II had relatively legit reasons to hate Cap, granted Zemo I was a Nazi, but II was all about family honor over everything else. Yeah, he was a psycho, but like all good villains he saw himself as being in the right. Red Skull I don't think you can make a very good case for thinking he was in the right, just pretty much a sociopathic POS hiding behind a long-defunct Nazi Germany for the sake of convenience.

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1 hour ago, OSJ said:

Another character that is much the better for the shades of gray. In fact, were we to look at the whole roster of Marvel super villains, I think that about the only one that you could come up with as having no redeeming qualities whatsoever would be the Red Skull. Even both Zemo I & II had relatively legit reasons to hate Cap, granted Zemo I was a Nazi, but II was all about family honor over everything else. Yeah, he was a psycho, but like all good villains he saw himself as being in the right. Red Skull I don't think you can make a very good case for thinking he was in the right, just pretty much a sociopathic POS hiding behind a long-defunct Nazi Germany for the sake of convenience.

There are very few stories where Norman Osborn is presented in a positive light. You actually get a little more of that in Dafoe's performance than most of the comics. Some of that was because he was off the board for so long relatively. 

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13 minutes ago, Matt D said:

There are very few stories where Norman Osborn is presented in a positive light. You actually get a little more of that in Dafoe's performance than most of the comics. Some of that was because he was off the board for so long relatively. 

Yeah, ol' Norm would be up there as pretty much batshit crazy sociopath. Dafoe's performance is far more nuanced than what we get in the comics. I've not followed Spiderman in decades, but I seem to recall Norm biting the big one pretty definitively, how did they retcon that?

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On 1/22/2019 at 2:18 PM, Bustronaut said:

Maybe Clint takes the moniker "The Swordsman" instead-of the racist/terrible "Ronin" name.

I have never figured out what the fascination is with having archers as superheroes. Going back the Golden Age, your first character was cleverly called "The Arrow" and appeared to be a guy with a bag over his head. How on earth he saw to shoot anything accurately was never explained as there didn't appear to be any eyeholes in the bag... But whatever, then of course we got the Green Arrow, who I guess by himself is okay, but on a team with Superman, the Martian Manhunter, the Flash and Green Lantern he seems downright absurd. Hawkeye is perhaps notable in being the first of many Marvel characters to start off as villain only to become a hero. Granted, he wasn't truly villainous, just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and have the hots for the Black Widow. But on a team with Thor, Iron Man, etc. it doesn't really seem that he's bringing much to the table. When you're the least powerful guy on a team that includes Quicksilver, the Scarlet Witch and Captain America there's a serious problem there. You would think that in the some fifty years he's been around that Clint just might've thought it a good idea to master another weapon or two. Yeah, I know they have Bullseye and what'shisname from MOKF, Zartan? But still, having a good guy that can do more than just shoot arrows wouldn't seem to be a bad advancement of the character. There's all sorts of less than lethal weapons he could use so you don't fall into the Black Knight trap (which was totally avoidable BTW), of having to hit people with the flat of his sword or risk killing them. What has always bugged me about the handling of the Black Knight (other than the blatant ripping off of the Elric character) was that prior to getting the black sword, Dane Whitman had all sorts of mediaeval-themed weapons that he used to great effect. What happened to all that shit, did he have a garage sale or something? I mean, yeah I get that the black sword is his go-to weapon in extreme cases, but what about the lance that fired off all sorts of goodies, what about the mace? Why not use some of that stuff, not every situation calls for a deadly weapon or worse, a deadly weapon that you can't really use without killing someone. Flat of the blade my Irish ass; you hit someone with the flat of a ten lb. broadsword you will at the very least break some bones if not the spinal column. Might as well use the blade and just get it over with. By ignoring his pre-black sword arsenal they effectively ruined the character. His uncle, the late lamented Nathan Garrett was interesting simply because of the variety of weapons at his disposal, they really missed the boat on what to do with the Dane Whitman character, so much so that I couldn't even tell you if he's active or not in the Marvel Universe.

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13 hours ago, OSJ said:

Yeah, ol' Norm would be up there as pretty much batshit crazy sociopath. Dafoe's performance is far more nuanced than what we get in the comics. I've not followed Spiderman in decades, but I seem to recall Norm biting the big one pretty definitively, how did they retcon that?

Turned out the Goblin Formula also gave him a Wolverine-style healing factor, which allowed him to survive being impaled by his own glider. He escaped from the morgue after killing someone with a similar physique to switch for himself, fled to Europe, and spent the next however-long-it-was in comics time orchestrating basically every shitty thing that happened to Peter in the ensuing years, including being the mastermind behind the Clone Saga nonsense.

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3 hours ago, sdinma said:

Turned out the Goblin Formula also gave him a Wolverine-style healing factor, which allowed him to survive being impaled by his own glider. He escaped from the morgue after killing someone with a similar physique to switch for himself, fled to Europe, and spent the next however-long-it-was in comics time orchestrating basically every shitty thing that happened to Peter in the ensuing years, including being the mastermind behind the Clone Saga nonsense.

Hell, he was even the Mastermind behind things he specifically claimed in his private journals to have had nothing to do with.

I started reading comics after Norman died, and hit that "teenager too old for comics" stage right around the time he came back, so I have literally zero attachment to the concept that Osborne is Spidey's biggest villain. It's Otto goddammit

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9 minutes ago, Brian Fowler said:

I started reading comics after Norman died, and hit that "teenager too old for comics" stage right around the time he came back, so I have literally zero attachment to the concept that Osborne is Spidey's biggest villain. It's Otto goddammit

I wasn't even born when Osborn died, and had given up on monthly pamphlet-style comics too when he came back. And I considered that an incredibly stupid move (still do). But it still strikes me as completely obvious that the Goblin - whichever Goblin it happens to be at the time - has always been Spider-Man's enemy #1. Marvel themselves acknowledged that when they did a count-down of Spidey's greatest foes in an annual in, I don't know, the late '80s I think. They cheated a bit and gave the #1 spot to "the Goblin brothers, Hob and Green", but the only question in my mind when I started reading it was which Goblin would get the top spot.

I've seen Octavius boosters claim that Gobby's position at the top of the villain food chain was invented after and somehow dependent on his ill-conceived return, but that's ridiculous revisionist history.

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1 hour ago, tbarrie said:

I wasn't even born when Osborn died, and had given up on monthly pamphlet-style comics too when he came back. And I considered that an incredibly stupid move (still do). But it still strikes me as completely obvious that the Goblin - whichever Goblin it happens to be at the time - has always been Spider-Man's enemy #1. Marvel themselves acknowledged that when they did a count-down of Spidey's greatest foes in an annual in, I don't know, the late '80s I think. They cheated a bit and gave the #1 spot to "the Goblin brothers, Hob and Green", but the only question in my mind when I started reading it was which Goblin would get the top spot.

I've seen Octavius boosters claim that Gobby's position at the top of the villain food chain was invented after and somehow dependent on his ill-conceived return, but that's ridiculous revisionist history.

You're absolutely correct, prior to say Spidey ish #100, you could make a very good case for Doc Ock being the numero uno badguy. After #100 there is absolutely no question but that the torch got passed to the Green Goblin. That's a hell of a long time in comic book years and in real  years. I have fond memories of the early days of Spidey being drawn by the incomparable Steve Ditko and featuring Marvel's version of the Flash's Rogues Gallery with the "Sinister Six" of Doc Ock, Sandman, Mysterio, Vulture. Kraven and Electro; to say that these guys with the exception of Doc Ock were complete lightweights is an understatement at best. From day one the Green Goblin had all these guys beat in every conceivable way. 

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Spiderman became a thing too me due to the 90s cartoon. Green Goblin as his no. 1 villain always made sense to me. I was actually surprised to see how many felt Otto should have the position when I started reading 8-9 years ago.

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Its kind of neck and neck between Otto and Norman. There is the problem of there have been 2 other Green Goblins during the time Norman was suppoed to be dead and far too many people taking up the Hobgoblin mantle. At least Otto is always Otto, even when people try to become the new Doc Ock, Otto always creeps back in there to retain the title. I remember the big reveal of Norman being the mastermind of the clone saga ledto me throwing a fistful of darts at the issue in question.

No comic has made me that angry, not even Nazi Cap

James

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8 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

It was definitely Otto in the Stan and Steve era, 

I won't give you "definitely", but there's certainly an argument to be made. Getting to be the Master Planner and the leader of the Sinister Six shows Octopus was pretty high on the villain totem pole. On the other hand, the Goblin back then had the distinction of being the only villain Spider-Man never actually caught.

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Once they "killed" Norman though i nth 70s, Otto was given the major stories, like trying to marry Aunt May. When Spidey wasn't fighting second stringers like Mind-Worm and Hypno-Hustler it was usually Doc Ock was always at the forefront of ASM and Tarantula showing a bit too frequently in PPSM (though the latter just might be foggy childhood memories)

James

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On 3/7/2019 at 3:09 PM, OSJ said:

He misses a big point from fiction writing 101: The villain does not think of himself as the villain, Victor Von Doom has always possessed a high degree of ethics, courage and numerous other "good guy" traits. The fact that he is opposed to 99% of the world is irrelevant, Doom thinks he's right, and in his way, he's right.

Bingo.

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On 2/7/2019 at 10:15 AM, The Natural said:

I've read the following Ultimate Spider-Man with Peter Parker as Spider-Man by Brian Michael Bendis/Mark Bagley.

Ultimate Spider-Man: Ultimate Collection Vol. 1. USM #1-13.

Ultimate Spider-Man Super Special #1.

Ultimate Spider-Man: Venom. USM #33-38.

Ultimate Spider-Man: Death of Spider-Man. Ultimate Comics: USM #156-160.

Which other books/stories do you recommend? I'll either do that or may read to #111, the last issue with the BMB/Bagley creative team.

Thank you.

 

On 2/8/2019 at 5:30 AM, Brian Fowler said:

Definitely read the entire Bagley run.

 

Ultimate Spider-Man #14-21 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. Before I begin, I haven’t read #1-13 in years. I’m reading what I’ve not from this run. Otto Octavius has truly become Doctor Octopus out for Justin Hammer. Word gets to the press there’s a cover up over Otto Octavius, he’s alive. Meanwhile Kraven the Hunter has Spider-Man as his next hunt. I right enjoyed this as we get a sassy Gwen Stacy quick with a barb, the aforementioned cover up involving S.H.I.E.L.D., the reinvention of Kraven as a trophy hunter type who has his own TV show. There’s the assembled reporters applauding Spider-Man for his actions versus Doc Ock and Kraven followed by Kraven’s words to the media.

Ultimate Spider-Man #22-27 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. Brief recap, Norman Osborn came up with the Oz formula and the spider with it bit Peter Parker giving him spider powers. Norman turns into a large Green Goblin from it. Spider-Man fights the Green Goblin at school and the Brooklyn Bridge where Goblin falls presumed dead.

Now Norman Osborn is back threatening Peter Parker to do his bidding or he’ll kill his loved ones. I really enjoyed this. Norman Osborn is evil from those threats to using Dr. Miles Warren to insert hypnotic suggestions into his own son, Harry Osborn’s therapy. There’s an intriguing talk between Peter Parker and Nick Fury who commands SHIELD with reveals about Oz, SHIELD and Oscorp. Parker rightly is annoyed because SHIELD will be there after something happens due to technicalities. There’s the nod to The Night Gwen Stacy Died and the fight between Spidey and the Goblin was aggressive as it needed to be.

Ultimate Spider-Man #28 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. Peter Parker’s at school and his girlfriend Mary Jane Watson tells him the Rhino’s breaking into a bank. A good single issue story for Parker trying to get there as Spider-Man but is delayed by things, most noticeably an upset Gwen Stacy dropping her tough exterior with what’s happening at home. Liked the ending.

Ultimate Spider-Man #29-32 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. A fake Spider-Man is robbing banks drawing the ire of the real Spider-Man. I liked this more on the second go through. There’s developments for Peter Parker who almost kills the imposter, Gwen Stacy as her father, Captain John Stacy is murdered and the Parker/Mary Jane conversation about her fears though I wasn’t keen on one part from it.

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Ultimate Spider-Man #39 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. I’ve not read the Venom arc in ages, I’ve gone onto issues I haven’t read before and fancied reading. I should note that I liked the Venom story but don’t rate it as much as most do. #39 is about the aftermath. It’s a good follow up – Peter Parker wants Nick Fury to take away his powers, Fury refuses and Pete’s not sure if Eddie Brock is dead or not.

Ultimate Spider-Man #40-45 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. Spider-Man wants to help Geldoff learn right from wrong, he protests he’s not a mutant. X-Men fittingly guest star. My least favourite story from the book so far. Only good thing is the last issue as Aunt May ponders what’s happening in her life from Peter to Gwen. Oh, Peter and MJ back together goes under the good too.

Ultimate Spider-Man #46-53 written by Brian Michael Bendis, on art is Mark Bagley. There are three storylines at play here: Daily Bugle newspaper supporting someone campaigning on a anti Spider-Man agenda, Black Cat steals from the Kingpin getting the attention of him, Spidey and Elektra and MJ’s Father reads her diary forbidding her from Peter. This was a great story for these story strands.

#43 was the first USM issue I ever read, nice to revisist it: I liked the referral back to Spider-Man vs. Doctor Octopus in #20 with an addition to it, turns out Spidey also fought the Sandman. Praise to Peter Parker and MJ’s talks here. Aunt May and J Jonah Jameson get their moments as Aunt May lets rip at JJJ for firing Peter. JJJ reporting the DA’s connections to Wilson Fisk and JJJ talk with Peter about his son and Spider-Man. Glad the book picked up on the amount of people knowing Peter Parker is Spider-Man, a criticism I have of the title.

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Finished reading Infinity Wars a day or two ago. I really enjoyed the beginning only to feel it lost a bit of something when Gamora merged the souls of the universe. Something about that move just didn't work too well, especially when talking about the need to save the merged characters w/o any specific stories for them in the main book. The main crew used by Loki to save everyone also feel a bit off. I like Emma fine, but the woman has been a crazed villain for 2-3 years now. It was kind of annoying to see it all gone so randomly. Kang just going along with everything also felt off. Still even with my complaints I liked the actual ending and post event stuff that sets the next stage. Not a bad read but still a bit disappointing after the build Duggan did with GotG and Infinity Countdown.

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