Maybe We Don't Have to Be THAT Hard On Marvel

So, the story lately in the comic world has been how The Big Two's sales are down lately and everyone has their various opinions on why that is because fanboys. It's pretty much standard operating procedure to howl endless platitudes about how mainstream comics are coming to an end as we know it or whatever. The main complaint is that DC is changing their characters too much, and "he doesn't look like MY Batman" and basically everything change averse readers over 40 would whine about no matter what. And honestly, things over there aren't as bad as comic retailers would have you believe. I mean, Batman is still going strong, Superman is shaky but Superman has been shaky since before the New 52 reboot and Green Lantern has a strong premise going but Robert Venditti is just no Geoff Johns. Also, Justice League, Midnighter, Doctor Fate and Black Canary are all really strong titles that are just not getting enough press because it's cool to hate DC.

The complaint that bothers me the most actually comes from Marvel readers, though. Now, granted...it's only fair to say that Marvel DID kinda shit the bed by launching their rebooted universe before finishing the event that causes the the universe to be rebooted in the first place. And it was a bit annoying that Secret Wars was an 8 issue event that started in early Spring 2015 and didn't end until early 2016, but this All New All Different Marvel isn't as gagworthy as people are making it out to be. The main gripe seems to be that the House of Ideas seems to be throwing way too many titles at the wall to see what sticks. But the truth is THAT'S WHAT THEY'RE SUPPOSED TO BE DOING. A year ago, the complaint was that they were so busy gender/race bending old characters, they weren't focusing on pushing existing non binary characters. Now, we have them trying out books like "Silk" (which is, in fairness, bad....last time I checked, anyway), The Ultimates, an almost completely non binary team of Avengers, David Walker writing a Power Man/Iron Fist team up book to get readers acquainted with the former Heroes for Hire before their respective Netflix shows debut. These are things that deserve mention. G. Willow Wilson's writing on Ms. Marvel has easily been some of the best in the business, redefining the superhero genre for young millenials. All New Hawkeye, though aiming a little higher than Matt Fraction's strictly everyman approach, has maintained its status as a fun, sometimes heartwarming character study of a guy who's good at being a hero and not as great at being a person. Bendis is doing compelling work on Invincible Iron Man, depicting a less morose Tony Stark trying his hand at having a normal life while facing abnormal problems. And I shouldn't even have to explain the importance of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur.

It's easy to get caught up in the problems, but it's important to mark the interesting things happening over at Marvel right now because there's a reawakening of the confidence in the industry to try some different things that run the risk of sucking. Or we can just go back to have ten X-Men titles and five Wolverine books. I know we all love that shit. Just thinking out loud. 

My comic review of David Walker's Cyborg is up and available on Black Nerd Problems for your viewing enjoyment.

The Week In Geek 2/10/26: Live From Gamer Prom

So, This Week In Games I'm Obsessed With....As a follow up to my article on the closed beta for The Division, I feel compelled to tell you that the rumors of an open beta have finally been confirmed. XBox One jumped the gun and announced it last week and now Ubisoft confirmed it this week. The open beta is supposedly going to include additional content as well as address some of the issues people complained about in the first beta. For one thing, there's going to be more non-player enemies in the Dark Zone for the people that complained there weren't enough challenges unless you went down certain streets or in certain buildings. In fairness, I don't think the developers wanted to overwhelm noobs like myself with Death waiting for you around every corner, but I completely understand that you have to demonstrate that there's going to be enough content to keep the hardcore gamers entertained. After all, the first thing The Overachievers Who Apparently Don't Have Jobs complained about was tearing through all the available content in a matter of hours. Honestly, I think complaining about not getting the whole game in a BETA is the equivalent of watching a movie trailer and being upset you didn't get the whole film, but I realize that this is Ubisoft's core audience and that they have a hard time keeping them happy without being problematic, so with that in mind, the side eyes are reasonable. All in all, I'm looking forward to going back into the Dark Zone to shoot trolls in the face and steal their shit next week. 

The various updates are as follows:  

This Week In Destiny.....The much debated MMOFPS had its first Valentine's Day event, Crimson Days (I affectionately refer to it as Shooter Prom Night). If you're one of these people I'm meeting lately who doesn't play as much as you used to, you're probably wondering if it's worth getting into before it ends Tuesday. In that instance, the primary question to ask in this case is "Did it satiate players who have been salivating for new content?"

Answer: Eh.

Well, if you're exclusively a PvE player (which, apparently, is a thing), you're essentially fucked until Bungie gives us this big expansion which is slated for "eventually" in 2016. For you PvP folks, you get the 2v2 deathmatch known as Crimson Doubles. Well, first off, it's actually sort of fucking hard and I don't even mean that from a noob's perspective because I feel like I've gotten pretty goddamned good at this game. I mean that, given the nature of Destiny's PvP and the overall pacing that comes with this level of shooter, it's conceptually difficult. It's a lot like the 3 on 3 Trials of Osiris except you don't have an extra person there to revive fallen Guardians while you shoot opponents. If your teammate is dead, it's essentially 2 on 1 and you're possibly fucked. Fortunately, my Shooter Prom date is effectively a "tank" and has no problems with taking one shotgun against two +300 light Guardians, thirsty for good drops. As far as drops go, you're pretty likely to get either some Year One/Early Year Two items or some Valentine themed ghost shells that carry some pretty "meh" light numbers. The hot commodity is some ghost shell that 320 light, but if Twitter is any indication, you have to log an assload of hours to get it. As someone who has clocked a LOT of time in the Crucible, I'm here to tell you that's a lot of time to spend in some "sweaty" hardcore matches for possibly one Holy Grail item and some items that are just nice to have. And this is what Destiny becomes when Bungie goes a bizarre amount of time without new content or communicating when you will have new content available: the accumulation of stuff. It's Farmville meets Halo. But I'm okay with that because I like Farmville and I like Halo.

Does it solve the content problem? Not really. Is it an assload of fun? Yeah. Does it add to the world building, mythology aspect of the game universe? Absolutely....and I think that counts for something. So, there's that.

My comic review this week for Batman is available on Black Nerd Problems for your viewing enjoyment. Feel free to like, share and comment as you see fit as usual.