A Really Bottom of the Barrel Kind of List

Media Outlet Comic Book Forum
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[FONT=arial]http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=37814[/FONT]
[FONT=helvetica]Dan DiDio’s top ten comics of his tenure at DC. He’s really scraping the bottom of the barrel here. He’s got Hush, 52, Infinite Crisis, Identity Crisis, the New 52, Countdown to Infinite Crisis, the Loeb/Turner Supergirl… It’s all pretty bad, but I actually got a laugh out of reading this because he seems so proud of them all. He doesn’t have Gotham Central, Catwoman, Seven Soldiers, Final Crisis, The New Frontier, the Rucka/Williams III Batwoman, or All-Star Superman.[/FONT]

No wonder DC sucks so hard.

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Ha before I clicked on the link I thought he meant the actual Countdown series and not the single issue ‘Countdown to Infinite Crisis.’

Countdown, the series was so bad the first issue of Final Crisis retconned it out of existence after ONE WEEK! That’s the fastest retcon since the second story of creation in the Bible! :rofl:

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Jesus, those are the worst things DC’s done in the last ten years, no wonder they are in the position they’re in.

Identity Crisis, are you serious?

And how can anyone be proud of the clusterfuck that was Infinite Crisis or 52 or the New 52? I point to those as the absolute worst age of comics that I’ve ever sat through, nothing even in the horrible mid 90’s touches this exploitative nonsense. How can you possibly be proud of these continuity circle jerks that just serve to alienate anyone that’s not a 45 year-old comic book nerd?

Hush is kind of like the ultimate manifestation of the new empty direction of DC, selling everything on style and hype, absolutely zero in the substance department. Just throw a mishmash of talent and characters in there, forget anything about actually telling a good story, people love it. Actually the reason fans bought into Hush so much is why DC’s where it is today - fans clearly responded with style over substance, that’s why we have absolutely no substance anymore.

Every time someone lists Hush in the top 10 list of Batman books you gotta read, I die just a little bit more inside.

The absolute funniest thing is that stuff like All-Star Superman and New Frontier - stuff that DC did that was actually really good, almost by accident - not up there.

This list reads EXACTLY like what were the 10 worst ways DC fucked up in the last decade. So I guess it’s really Didio’s fault.

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What do you think would be on a Marvel “Top Ten” list of the past ten-twelve years? Ultimatum for sure. Uncanny X-Men: The Draco. What else?

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All the Spider-Man stories you’ve been recommending and One More Day is obviously Marvel’s version of a mini Infinite Crisis localized within Spider-Man books, which actually makes it stupider.

I thought the spider totem thing was admirable just for the ambition behind it, like at least they tried to put a new neat spin on things without completely fucking everything up, but the execution was really bad…some of that might have been editorial fault though, Civil War kind of stepped all over their toes. Like remember how for like a month, Spidey had the new suit and was able to like shoot biological stingers and was able to control spiders or something too?

Reminds me of Azzarello’s run on Superman with Jim Lee, and how even though the actual story was insane and confusing, I at least respected the sentiment behind it, how he wanted to tell a different Superman story, different from what they did with just reblending everything together again with Hush.

Didn’t work though.

The whole thing with Norman Osborn somehow taking over everything was straight retarded, but Civil War was pretty good.

Avengers Disassembled and all of House of M and No More Mutants was all kind of stupid, but I don’t think it was bad enough to really rank up there.

Chuck Austen’s X-Men stuff obviously, and the tail end of Morrison’s stuff (Here Comes Tomorrow, Magneto as a junkie, and then the whole Xorn thing, really) was insane even though the start of it were some of the best X-Men stories ever. I’ve completely lost track with all the different X Messiah’s Song: Age of Jizzum X crossovers and just largely ignore X-books now so I can’t really say.

Origin is at the top of the list obviously, because fuck you, that’s why.

To be honest Marvel’s missteps don’t jump out at me as much, I think I’ve been more bored and apathetic towards all their big stories versus actively hating stuff DC’s done. So good for Marvel. I can actually think of books or runs I’ve really enjoyed on the Marvel side in the last couple of years too, which is harder to do on the DC non-Vertigo side.

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Just to add two more Spider-Man stories you might want to check out Spider-Man Fever. It’s Brendan McCarthy’s tribute to the second ASM annual where Spider-Man hangs out with Doctor Strange. The artwork is extremely trippy and I guarantee you’ll never see another Spider-Man comic. It’s a fun psychodelic trip if you want something different.

http://www.amazon.com/Spider-Man-Fever-Marvel-Brendan-McCarthy/dp/0785141251/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342127506&sr=1-1&keywords=spider-man+fever

If you have nothing against prose books (all words, no pictures) than you might want to check out Darkest Hours by Jim Butcher of the Dresden files. One of the best Spider-Man stories I’ve read in the last decade or so. It flows out of events from JMS’ ASM run, but what you need to know is in the story so no need to back track if you don’t want to. Spider-Man narrates the entire story himself and Jim nails his voice down. A lot of fun.

http://www.amazon.com/Spider-Man-Darkest-Hours-Jim-Butcher/dp/1416510680/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342127336&sr=1-1&keywords=spider-man+darkest+hours

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Haha, somehow I forgot all about Origin, where Marvel chopped the balls off the fiercest Canadian superhero of all time. Does everyone in Canada hate Origin? Fine, I’ll put that in the Marvel “Top Ten” for you.

We can probably lump all of Austen’s work together, otherwise the entire list would be like a list of Chuck Austen’s Greatest Hits.

Come to think of it, Daniel Way’s comics are terrible. I think he’s on the same tier as Austen. They’ve never written a good comic. At least Austen can draw a little… Didn’t he do an issue of Marvelman/Miracleman for Alan Moore back in the day?

Wow, Clinty, I never knew you had so much vitriol against how Morrison’s New X-Men ended. I really don’t know what to say about that. Really, it’s a shock to me. I feel like my mean bastard half-brother just sliced open my cute puppy. In the pouring rain. While I watched helplessly. And cried like a little sissy.

I actually enjoy House of M. Out of all of Marvel’s crossover events, that’s probably my favorite one. It’s the only one that doesn’t really purport to be anything beyond just an entertaining, alternate reality superhero slam-bang actionfest.

Sano, Spider-Man: Fever doesn’t belong on Marvel’s “Top Ten” List. It’s way too excellent of a comic. It’s probably the best Spidey comic since Jenkins and Bucky’s final issue together. What an incredible love letter to Steve Ditko. Brendan McCarthy needs to do more comics.

Here’s my tentative Marvel “Top Ten” List thus far.

  1. Chuck Austen’s Complete Works
  2. Daniel Way’s Complete Works
  3. Ultimatum
  4. The Other
  5. One More Day
  6. Dan Jurgens’ Thor
  7. Claremont’s New Excalibur
  8. Ultimates 3
  9. Wow, I really am having trouble thinking of Marvels that I hate with the same passion I hate those DC comics in DiDio’s Top Ten. Take away Austen and Way and Loeb and I honestly have very little to hate. That’s kind of disturbing. I always thought I hated more comics than this. I… I may have to reanalyze my life.
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Um yeah, my post really belonged in the Marvel thread and not here. SRK is a little buggy at the PC at my job. Really wish they’d let us upgrade…

So yeah Spider-Man Fever is a top ten book as in ‘go read it NOW’ but not a “top ten” book as in ‘it’s on Didio’s list so avoid it like the plague.’ :smiley:

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What happened in Dan Jurgen’s Thor? I have zero memory of that entire run. Was that with Romita? Couldn’t have been that bad, right?

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Oh, it was bad.

JRjr did draw the early chunk of Jurgens’ Thor. I don’t care how good his art was. The stories were really weak. Jurgens just writes in a typical mediocre fashion, with cliche after cliche. You could play a drinking game by counting how many times throughout his run he has characters say, “I’ve never seen Thor this angry before!” or “I’ve never seen Thor hit someone so hard before!” Some of his stories began with interesting premises, but he never could resolve them. Every problem Thor faced was solved by Thor hitting someone with his hammer. There was even a flashback where Thor and Loki were little kids, and Loki made Thor cry by slitting the throat of Thor’s pet puppy. All Thor could do was watch. And cry. In the rain.

It was all bad, Clinty.

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To be fair, that’s how all those early 90’s guys write - “Step back Wolverine, I will use my OPTIC BLASTS!” Did you forget that a comic book has illustrations in it that can convey this information visually as well? Back then it wasn’t cool to show, it was better to tell.

The only extended Thor run I’ve ever read was Walt Simonson’s stuff, but I feel like that’s an unfair standard to hold guys up to today. I didn’t like JMS’ recent bit on Thor either (though Olivier Coipel on Thor is pretty boss), I hate all those “Thor’s just a normal dude, look at him interact with lowly mortals - HILARIOUS!” type stories…dude is a cosmic character with an insanely rich mythical history to pull from, why does everyone want to write him like Spider-Man who has to worry about his job and relationships and elderly relatives?

Another thing I thought was really dumb on the Marvel side in the last few years was Bendis bringing back the thought bubble. What the fuck is that. Honestly. That is some pretentious nonsense, and I remember going through Mighty Avengers or whatever issues and just being shocked that someone would let him do this. Another reason for him to cram more dialogue on the page? Those are some irresponsible editors.

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I think Walt Simonson’s Thor run is one of the high points of the entire Marvel canon. I read the omnibus a few months back and even though some bits of writing are dated (kind of like how even some bits of Miller’s Daredevil hasn’t aged too gracefully), it’s just one of those epics that’s full of imagination, wonder, character development, and long-gestating plot points (without getting bogged down by much Claremontesque melodrama and teenage angst).

I’m with you on JMS’ Thor. Totally overrated and even worse than it actually is because, you know, Joseph Michael Straczynski got bored of his own story and quit before he even came up with an ending. Seems like JMS does that a lot, actually. He did that on Squadron Supreme, Superman, Wonder Woman, probably Fantastic Four (that one I was the one who got bored and quit reading after a few issues), and some others most likely. Not sure if his Thor belongs on the Marvel “Top Ten” list but it’s got to be in the “Top Twenty” at the very least.

Actually, now that I’m reminded of it, I think Ultimate Power was an atrocity. That probably belongs in the Marvel “Top Ten.”

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final crisis was horrible