froggulper

November 17, 2011 12:37 am This was okay, but I think Snyder's tale is made up of very stale elements that seem kinda lifeless to me. I like the Owl cult, but all of the scenes around that final one seem like scenes I've seen too many times before, and Snyder is doing nothing to make them interesting. The mayoral candidate is so bland I doubt anyone who gave this book 5 stars even remembers his name off the top of their head. I like the series overall, mostly due to Capullo (who is ROCKING it), but Snyder doesn't impress me that much. He sure knows how to put a lot of unnecessary exposition and tedious anecdotes in EVERY issue he writes, though. For some reason every character he writes, no matter who they are, always seem poised to turn into a lecturer on random scientific facts, or to divulge a wistful childhood memory of theirs. If Snyder could refrain from indulging himself in that kind of writing so very often, I would like his comics a LOT more, because aside from his annoying tics, I think he's good.

November 16, 2011 9:44 pm I was wondering when Joe Mad would need a break. It sucks that they're getting a different artist so soon. I didn't hop on board because I don't like the Red Hulk and wasn't excited about the series' initial storyline. But I'm always interested in seeing Joe Mad draw different characters. Hopefully he's back on board for issue #7. It'd be cool to see him draw the FF, for example. But I'm not holding my breath.

November 16, 2011 8:46 pm I wonder what the sales have been like? Does Deadpool MAX outsell this? Because Deadpool MAX just got greenlit for another 12 issues and a Holiday Special. I never really liked this Punisher series, though. It all seemed been-there-done-that. Good creators, but the mood of the book felt stale and predictable to me. If they cancel Deadpool MAX, though, then I'm going ape. None of you internet comics sites have helped that title out. And it is fantastic. Everyone should love it. And I'm not even much of a Deadpool fan. But Deadpool MAX >>>> Punisher MAX.

November 16, 2011 8:43 pm I've read a few of the Alec volumes. They're good. His style is just so "pencilly", though, I think it kind of screams "Own this in paper form!" He's like one of the artist whose style seems least suited to looking at it through a sleek computer screen. It just feels wrong. And all of the Alec books feel like physical art because of their design dimensions, if that makes sense. Hard to convey.

November 16, 2011 8:39 pm Liu is a good writer. Marvel will definitely continue to give her assignments. She was actually writing/co-writing Daken as recently as his summer. She's written other things in the past. It'd be cool for there to be more women creators in comics, but I just don't think the numbers are there. There just isn't a big critical mass of women wanting to write comics. There are a lot of them and personally I think there should be more women who get work from the Big Two. But I don't really see this as sexism. The way the industry is set up, to market to the audience that actually buys comics, it's mostly a boys club. That's changing some (thank god), but the facts are the facts. If there were a number of female creators as good as the male creators would they NOT get work? I think they would. I think they do. I don't know of any female creators who we can clearly point to and say "The only reason they're not working for Marvel or DC is because they have two X chromosomes." I mean, for example, I just picked up the new issues of Batman and Wolverine. If there was a female who drew like Capullo or Garney, would that female NOT get work? I think she'd get work. Same if there was a female writer who wrote like Snyder or Aaron. It's a talent thing, not a sexist thing. If there were MORE female creators aspiring to work in comics, then the law of averages would suggest that there would be a higher number of female creators working at the big companies. But as it is there are unfortunately very few. This is just a fact based on culture and demographics, I think, not any conspiracy against women or any sexism against women creators from fans or from the suits at Marvel and DC. That said, I think Marvel and DC should go out of their way to hire a few more women creators, just to hold out hope that doing so will inspire more girls to read comics and want to create them.

November 14, 2011 6:33 pm So this IS coming out this week? Earlier today there was some confusion. Diamond didn't have it listed and Comixology had a disclaimer that they weren't sure if it was actually coming out. IFanboy didn't add it to the list until just now, so... I guess you guys have gotten confirmation that it is being released on Wednesday? Awesome. It looks hilarious. I love the interactions with the MAX version of Cable.

November 14, 2011 5:16 pm This series and Batwoman are vying for my favorite of the New 52. WW has slightly better writing. Batwoman has slightly better art. Batwoman by a nose, but that could change if the mythology gets a little bit more awesome in WW #3.

November 14, 2011 5:15 pm I'd buy a Jim Lee WW ongoing. And I'm not even a big fan of Jim Lee. Or of Wonder Woman. But his renditions of WW have always done it for me.

November 14, 2011 3:00 pm "Even a $1.99 price-point for a brand new digital comic is probably too much." ^I meant to say that it's "probably too LITTLE, given the continuing decline of the U.S. dollar."

November 14, 2011 2:58 pm Great article. Yeah, there are some exceptions. Marvel in particular really tries to gouge the readers as much as possible. But if the comic is really something you like, then paying an extra buck for it shouldn't matter. Is $3.99 too much for 20 pages of a comic? Not for Uncanny X-Force it isn't. Hell no. Not in my opinion. If someone really feels the sting of paying an extra buck for a comic, then maybe they just don't like that comic as much as they're pretending to. It kills me every time someone gives a random comic series 5 stars every month, only to then take some incredibly touchy stand regarding a possible price-hike of $1, or double-shipping each month. They claim to LOVE the series, but they don't want to get to buy it twice as often? They give issues of the series the same star-rating they would give issues of '80s Alan Moore work, but all of their accolades about the series being a great representation of our cultural peak are apparently not enough to warrant an additional three quarters, two dimes, a nickel, and four pennies. The other side of this whole debate is something you alluded to, Jim: the work that the creators put into this. Whether it's always great work or not, it is work. The creators would have to take a cut in pay for digital comics to be 99 cents. No way around that. It is completely naive to think that 99 cents for new digital comics is at all possible. The only way that could work out would be for Marvel and DC to farm out their creative positions to poor people in eastern Asia. (Of course, many of the digital utopians don't seem to care that all of their Apple toys come from quasi-slave labor, so maybe they wouldn't care if their digital comics were made that way also.) Even a $1.99 price-point for a brand new digital comic is probably too much. Many people don't realize all of the extra labor that has to go into formatting the digital files so that they can be read (panel-to-panel or page-at-once) across various platforms. The bottom line is, if you really like comics, you shouldn't care SO much about whether something is costing you $3 or $4. If $4 is too expensive for you, maybe you're just buying too many comics. You may think that all of the comics you buy are 5-star comics, but they're really not. If they were really 5-star comics, then you'd find a way to drum up an extra, what, $10 a month. Like Jim says, all you really have to do is forsake a few overpriced cups of coffee and you're all set. And when I hear people who have at this point bought MULTIPLE eReaders, tablets, laptops, blackberries, etc, just over the last few years alone, complaining about whether a digital comic is one buck or two bucks, I just can't take them seriously. There's the pretense of caring about a budget, but even holding back on ONE of your electronic gizmo purchases even for a few weeks, until the price went down, would have equaled all of the imaginary savings you would have been getting from your 99-cent digital comics.