I don't understand people...

[WiseGuyX]

I walked out without the latest Pulse yesterday, and any other Bendis title will not get my money either. Frickin, frackin, Avenger killin slop hack...

 

I kinda like the Pulse series from Marvel. I want comment on the latest issue but it's got me hooked

[Kevin Boyd]

I think Marvel's scared of having to cancel some of their main staples, like Cap, and they try to do whatever they can. And I, for one, think it would be sad to not have a monthly Captain America title our there.

 

I don't think they are scared at all. If they were, they'd cut their publishing output from 65 titles a month to a reasonable 25-30. With so many titles on the rack something has to suffer - instead of publishing TWO mediocre Captain America books a month, publish one GOOD one. Instead of 30 X-books a month publish 10. They might find that those people who would have bought the 20 meaningless x-men minis (and feel crappy about doing it because they have an addiction problem) might turn around and invest their time reading the mainstream marvel universe characters like Cap, Iron Man, Thor, the Avengers, and so on.

 

What's really dying on the vine here is the Marvel Universe. As a whole, the x-men line is quite strong (even though half of those 30 books sell less than 30,000 copies an issue), and Spider-Man is holding his weight... but characters from the mainstream titles that aren't tied into those popular concepts (bolstered by movie p.r.) can't hold people's interest unless they are handled by the best in the business. And to think that their only option to draw people's interest to them is to kill a bunch of the characters, to add Wolverine and Spider-Man to the Avengers, and to relaunch the titles again?

 

As for the new launches, Brubaker and Epting's Captain Americe #1 was excellent (but I liked Neiber and Cassaday's Captain America, which seems to be the bash relaunch du jour). It was a exactly what I would want with a comic, strong story-telling and enough action and conversation completed in a single issue to satisfy me, with a cliff-hanger ending that makes me want more. Ellis and Granov's Iron Man #1 was beautiful to look at, and interesting to read, but wasn't as "filling" because nothing really happens. But both of these books could have easily been the NEXT issue of the previous volume.

[BradleyX2]

I think it has a lot to do with habit (being a completist) and tradition (a new series effectively severs new readers from the need to explore or collect previous numbers in the series) more than content.

 

Plus, people seem to really dislike the idea that someone might be trying to make money publishing these things and judge harshly any profit minded motives (which you have to admit relaunching a series is on the cash grab side of the fence).

 

 

 

 

(or , but it's so dang small...)

[tilleycs]

I got back into comics last year and had to start over from scratch, so I'm not one of those people who currently subscribes to moderns, I'm a person who refuses to start. To me, it's just a matter of priority. I'd rather spend my money buying back issues, which I can get MUCH cheaper since I only want reading copies.

 

A couple of weeks ago, I won an ebay auction for 45 issues of Captain America (ranging from #'s 141-304) for $10.50. How many modern issues of Cap can I get for $10.50? Two and a half?

 

I have gotten moderns through trading and buying them cheap at local used bookstores, but it's just not worth it to me to pay close to cover price EVERY month. I'd rather get full runs of the SA versions first, and there are plenty of modern TPBs that I can check out from the library and read for free.

 

I was working on trading for full runs of Iron Man vol. 2 and 3, and then I heard about them relaunching with vol. 4 with a new "modern" origin. So I read the issues I had of vol. 2 and 3, put them in a box, and shipped them off to Comics4Kids. Why should I bother trying to complete them if the history is going to be erased with vol. 4? I'd rather go back to the SA/BA title and ignore the relaunch than get the relaunch and have to ignore the Iron Man I grew up with.

 

As I posted in the "Iron Man #1" topic, I hate the paradigm shift of "O.k, with this volume, 'x' didn't become 'y' by 'z' happening, he now became 'y' by 'b' happening. Forget everything we've told you and built on for 30+ years, that's all out the window so he can be...modern." And we're not supposed to bat an eye? Screw "modern", give me the character and origin I know and have become emotionally invested in over the past God-knows how many years and issues.

 

It may not be the "manly" thing to admit, but people emotionally invested in these characters, and they get to know them. Quit jerking it away just because you want to keep up with the microwave generation. That'd be like me deciding that I didn't grow up in NC, I grew up in CA instead (and had all new stories about growing up) because I like the sound of that better. It'd be fine for the people who didn't know me, but what about the people I'm close to, who know me and my history???

 

The relaunches, to me, are their way of saying, "This is heading nowhere, and we don't want to do the work it takes to fix it, so we're just going to quit, wash our hands of it, start over, and hope we can get it right this time." I'm supposed to pay $2.99 per comic (or more) to companies who do this? Not worth it to me. What's going to stop them from throwing in the towel on THIS attempt?

 

Sorry for the long response, but that's my reasoning.

[lou_fine]

Oh, I absolutely agree that it's on the cash grab side of the fence. But hey, if that's going to give me another 6 months of a title, so be it, I'll take it.

Companies (except for probably DC) need sales for survival and they'll have to do whatever it takes to make that money. Variants and #1s don't bother me, if that allows companies to stay afloat, so be it.

While Marvel is making questionable moves (they are putting up way too many titles right now, a lot of which are [#@$%!!!]), and I think the variants are getting annoying, I personally think relaunches are fine, but that's just my opinion.

 

I will honestly be pissed if Captain America is cancelled in the middle of a good run just because people dropped it due to the fact it was a relaunch...

 

Alberto;

 

You seem to be contradicting yourself a bit here by saying that you would be upset if Cap is cancelled in the middle of a run. This is just a part of the relaunch game by Marvel which you are fine with and willing to accept since it is needed to keep the titles going for another 6 months.

 

So I don't really understand your statement as to why you would be upset with a cancellation of the title.

[Alberto1975]

You seem to be contradicting yourself a bit here by saying that you would be upset if Cap is cancelled in the middle of a run. This is just a part of the relaunch game by Marvel which you are fine with and willing to accept since it is needed to keep the titles going for another 6 months.

 

So I don't really understand your statement as to why you would be upset with a cancellation of the title.

 

I think you misunderstood, or maybe I wasn't clear. What I meant to say is that I would be personally upset if a title was cancelled in the middle of a good run (by good run I mean quality reading/stories, not an actual run of numeric issues) because people didn't buy it out of spite because they didn't want the series to start with a new number 1. If the reading is good, like in this case Brubaker's Cap seems to be (which I guess remains to be seen, tough to judge after just 1 issue), I wouldn't want that to be cancelled because people got pissed off at the number 1, because I would have to miss on actually a quality comic.

 

Obviously, however, even if I enjoy reading something, I might be the only one, in which case the title might get cancelled. In that case, I would be upset, but I would rather know that a title got cancelled because everyone in the world except for me thought that it sucked artistically/storywise, than because of it was released with a new number 1.

 

In this case, Cap didn't seem to be selling, and I found that the stories were lagging in interest. Relaunching allowed me to keep reading Cap stories, and actually in this case, improved stories, so I am more than happy. Now, if everyone decides Brubaker sucks, and noone buys it, and they cancel the title, I'll have to deal with it, seek therapy, and get over it

 

Who knows, maybe Marvel should cancel all monthly comics and come out with their new material in TPB format, then there will really be no numbering issues Just buy books that contain particular stories that appeal to you, and people won't be upset because of relaunches.

[WiseGuyX]

I got back into comics last year and had to start over from scratch, so I'm not one of those people who currently subscribes to moderns, I'm a person who refuses to start. To me, it's just a matter of priority. I'd rather spend my money buying back issues, which I can get MUCH cheaper since I only want reading copies.

 

A couple of weeks ago, I won an ebay auction for 45 issues of Captain America (ranging from #'s 141-304) for $10.50. How many modern issues of Cap can I get for $10.50? Two and a half?

 

I have gotten moderns through trading and buying them cheap at local used bookstores, but it's just not worth it to me to pay close to cover price EVERY month. I'd rather get full runs of the SA versions first, and there are plenty of modern TPBs that I can check out from the library and read for free.

 

I was working on trading for full runs of Iron Man vol. 2 and 3, and then I heard about them relaunching with vol. 4 with a new "modern" origin. So I read the issues I had of vol. 2 and 3, put them in a box, and shipped them off to Comics4Kids. Why should I bother trying to complete them if the history is going to be erased with vol. 4? I'd rather go back to the SA/BA title and ignore the relaunch than get the relaunch and have to ignore the Iron Man I grew up with.

 

As I posted in the "Iron Man #1" topic, I hate the paradigm shift of "O.k, with this volume, 'x' didn't become 'y' by 'z' happening, he now became 'y' by 'b' happening. Forget everything we've told you and built on for 30+ years, that's all out the window so he can be...modern." And we're not supposed to bat an eye? Screw "modern", give me the character and origin I know and have become emotionally invested in over the past God-knows how many years and issues.

 

It may not be the "manly" thing to admit, but people emotionally invested in these characters, and they get to know them. Quit jerking it away just because you want to keep up with the microwave generation. That'd be like me deciding that I didn't grow up in NC, I grew up in CA instead (and had all new stories about growing up) because I like the sound of that better. It'd be fine for the people who didn't know me, but what about the people I'm close to, who know me and my history???

 

The relaunches, to me, are their way of saying, "This is heading nowhere, and we don't want to do the work it takes to fix it, so we're just going to quit, wash our hands of it, start over, and hope we can get it right this time." I'm supposed to pay $2.99 per comic (or more) to companies who do this? Not worth it to me. What's going to stop them from throwing in the towel on THIS attempt?

 

Sorry for the long response, but that's my reasoning.

 

It seems like a lot of pain inside of this post I agree that we get emotionaly connected to our heroes we grew up with. Well some of us never grew up This was one of my biggest complaints about the IC series. Here was my heroes taking the law into there hands and becoming their own Judge/Jury etc. Then I found out Batman wasn't in on it so I don't feel to bad Now how in the hell Zatanna was talked into doing a brain wash on Batman in beyond me. Anyways this was not the JL I grew up with nor is most of the other modern comics. I still buy a lot of moderns but I'm switching more and more over to new titles. I just cann't handle some of the changes they've done like you mentioned on Iron man. One that really sticks in my mind is Spider-man. Spider-man and his now organtic web shooters...come on, him running out of webing always made it more interrest at times This allowed us to see him use his brain to help think his way out of a tight spot. They also re did Punisher I think, since eveerone says the new movie is based off the Born series. I'm so use to the original where his family was killed in New York central park doing a gang dispute. I'm going by his first full series and not the limited mini. I think it's the same way but don't quote me on it. Either way I stoped collecting Punisher along with the rest in the mid 90's.

[DiceX]

I stopped buying new comics when they announced Ultimates would be relaunched with a new #1.

I figured my money was better spent by buying the comics I read when I was a kid.

Some of the new titles were good, but they just don't have the spark my old comics have.

 

The only "new" title I've bought in the last year is Secret War, and I will stop when that series is over.