Marvel Comics blabbery

A properly expansive collection of UXM from that era would also have to include relevant issues of Ms. Marvel, Marvel Team-Up, etc. You're missing bits of the story if you only read the main title. Nothing crucial, but still.

Yeah...that is one big classic Uncanny X-men compilation that Marvel has not yet done. You could make big book with all those stories.

Sabertooth also starts in Iron Fist, I think originally it might have been thought to make him Rand's arch villain at some point and later they did all the stuff with Wolverine.

Another one never compiled with either classic 80s X-men nor Spider-man is the Marvel Fanfare story-line where both of them end up in the Savage Land.

Nightcrawler had a story in Amazing Spider-man too that I don't think Claremont wrote. Stern wrote the Avengers/X-Men miniseries, but it looks like that one is going to get reprinted in the Epic Collection series.

It would be better if those were printed in order with the X-men books, but I would imagine if ever compiled - they will be in a separate book.

There's prob stuff missing still, but sorting Claremont into date order on Marvel Unlimited works quite well (thanks again ulysees).

Just started reading the Ditko Spider-Man's for the first time - they're amazing (obviously) - I've had the telephone book in my house for 10 years but never opened it till now. The cliche is true - every issue is basically millions of $$$ in future IP. Also Stan's scripting is relatively subdued and fun (and actual good jokes - I'm assuming these aren't Ditko's).

And Peter is a surprisingly bitter, sad fellow.

and actual good jokes - I'm assuming these aren't Ditko's

perhaps the safest assumption in history

I always thought that Lee's Spiderman scripts were his best claim to be something more than just someone who got famous by putting his name on other people's work (there *are* jokes in some of Ditko's solo work imo, funny jokes even, but they tend to be somewhat odd and very different in tone to Spiderman). kind of feel like Spiderman without Lee would have been all bitter, sad stuff though, without enough light or irreverence.

i always thought that the care that those early spider-man books took to establish the two sides of peter's character, the nebbish and the wisecracking hero, felt a bit like stan was throwing in some autobiography

Stern wrote the Avengers/X-Men miniseries, but it looks like that one is going to get reprinted in the Epic Collection series.

This was already collected in the Avengers Epic Collection titled "Judgment Day", which came out a couple of year ago. It's a pretty weird mini, apparently Stern wanted it to end with Magneto becoming a villain again, but someone (probably Claremont?) didn't like that resolution, so Stern was asked to change the ending... He refused and walked out, and DeFalco was brought in to write the last issue, where the plot kinda fizzles out and the question of Magneto's villainy is sidestepped in a disappointing way.

Given how protective Claremont was of his pet characters, it seems like the Marvel editorial made a mistake in giving the whole mini to Stern in the first place. Even if he'd gotten to write his preffered ending, I'm sure Claremont would've found a way to retcon it.

If Stern had gotten his way, we would've missed out on Claremont's much more narratively-satisfying explanation that Moira MacTaggert had somehow scienced a temporarily baby-fied Magneto into a more beneficent being.

hahaha what?

All was revealed in the final story from Claremont's initial run (the first three issues of the new '90s X-Men series). Yes, this is how he chose to go out.

oh god really? i bought those issues. i must've just blocked it out in my memory

yeah that was revealed during the "magneto reappears and he's aaaangry" storyline. fatal attractions, maybe?

He came back aaaaaaangry in Fatal Attractions because of the revelations from that final Claremont story, IIRC.

I did the preorder for whatever related thing gave you a copy of "Magneto #0" (zero issues were still an amazing novelty) that was a reprint of an old Magneto story plus some more info from whatever agency was tracking him -- I think it was the first time they revealed his name was Eric Lensherr and everything else was an alias

(sorry, I mean the first time they revealed THAT alias)

He'l always be Xorn to me.

He'll, even.

so he went through a ton of comics and years as Magneto with "Magnus" as a supposed given name
then eventually we find out he's "Erik Magnus Lehnsherr" but it turns out that's what he was calling himself when he met Xavier and Gabrielle Haller
then they finally revealed post-2000 that his name is Max

I miss Mr. Xorn

Magneto the tweaker who is so jacked up on mutant meth he keeps hearing Xorn was great

wait how did I miss that Magneto is now named Max

How did you not know he was the kid in Where The Wild Things Are?

His name is actually Max Neato.

Magneto becoming a 'good guy' was around when the X-Men kinda moved into the background for me. It's kind of the beginning of the loss of moral center for the whole title and like when I came back you got Professor X being really pretty damn evil when you add it up and then Cyclops finally losing his mind and becoming pretty much Magneto Jr. Of course, at this point after that last Marvel Crisis on infinite red worlds whatever - there is no moral center to about ANY of the characters. They are all pretty much jerks and just as terrible as whatever is on our Earth 2761 or whatever it actually might be called.

I had forgot about the whole Stern thing on that title, that must have been about the time DeFalco also gave him the boot on ASM and he eventually migrated to DC. Roger Stern is one of the better Marvel writers of that era, although all of them even the dudes like Mantlo who did WAY too many comics did some cools issues at one point or another.

Mantlo micronauts was frequently cool as shit.

<i>Of course, at this point after that last Marvel Crisis on infinite red worlds whatever - there is no moral center to about ANY of the characters. They are all pretty much jerks and just as terrible as whatever is on our Earth 2761 or whatever it actually might be called.</i>

This is one of my big problems with the whole Civil War business. Marvel heroes have always been "flawed" and complex (that's part of why they're so compelling), but they're supposed to remain heroes. In fact, their struggles and achievements in the face of their "flawed" humanity make them all the more heroic. (It's "easy" to be a hero when you're Superman; less so when you're Peter Parker.) But the characters in CWII crossovers that I read aren't heroic; they have no (as you say) moral center. And I'm talking about heavy-hitters like Steve Rogers and ("Old Man") Logan. The whole thing feels like a series of cynical plot devices to sell comics.

someday I will remember to convert those html tags

xpost

I think Roger Stern was a much better Marvel Comics writer than Bill Mantlo, Micronauts maybe excepted (and it sure didn't hurt having the first twelve issues of that drawn by Michael Golden). Just for starters, Stern's Captain America run with John Byrne and his run on Avengers with Buscema/Palmer are excellent, and far less slapdash than Mantlo in superhero hack mode.

Made the mistake of buying "X23: The Complete Collection" during that recent digital sale (I know & enjoy the current incarnation of the character in "All-New Wolverine," but not the backstory). It is so, so bad. Totally cliched writing; bad (and inappropriately "sexy" art); graphic violence and tons of gore; child abuse used as a cheap plot device. Marvel in the 2000s was so bad! I'm sure there are exceptions (and I've come across a few), but geez. Seeing how low they sunk, when I was largely looking the other way, makes the "renaissance"/turnaround that started with Marvel Now! look all the more remarkable.

i wouldn't defend nyx and the x-23 series as great comics, but i liked them, especially the sadness of the runaway stories
actually i just looked up the collection and realized nyx 1/2 aren't even in there so :(

They recently put out three of those collections, one for the complete NYX and two for the remainder of the solo X-23 stuff.

Yeah the NYX material isn't in the one I bought -- it's a few "origin" miniseries (which are what I'm primarily referring to in my rant above), and then some random stuff from way later, after she's been hanging with the X-Men a while.

Al E has a great list of comics up on the "Discover" tab on MU right now

LOL @ these pics: http://ew.com/movies/thor-ragnarok-exclusive-first-look-photos/thor-chris-hemsworth/

(Both current "Thor" series are so good, btw. "THE UNWORTHY THOR" wraps up next ish... supposedly it will be revealed what was whispered to Odinson that made him unworthy!)

from all the way back in Original Sin? geez that's a long payoff that will inevitably disappoint

Definitely a long tail on that mystery. (The whispered secret: "MOST COMICS WILL NOT INCREASE IN VALUE")

"No more mutants."

Probably something shameful about how he could have saved lives, or secret Asgard shame

"You caused Jane's cancer."

why is hemsworth doing thor as god of war now?

nah it's thor as maximus

IIRC, the next Thor movie is supposed to be a gloss on Planet Hulk. He probably got a style upgrade against his will.

I took Fury's whisper to Thor in Original Sin as some sort of Asgardian cheat code. So it was probably just something like 'up down up down left right right left A B start, and poof you can no longer lift your hammer but now you have infinite health and ammo, you're welcome.'

It reminds me of "Hitchhiker's Guide" -- that machine which reveals the true scope and complexity of the universe, and each individual's utterly insignificant place within it; and anyone who goes in emerges a crumpled, gibbering heap... except Zaphod, who walks out whistling and asks, "When's lunch?" [b/c he was in a replica/pocket universe created just for him]. ...Anyway, whatever this "secret" that caused Odinson to lose his mojo, probably shouldn't have had that effect on a *true* Thunder God. I bet Odin would have just laughed in Fury's face!

WmC on to something

Missed this story a while back:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/3/11853862/marvel-thanos-infinity-gauntlet-oven-mitt-recall

I would've totally burned the shit out of my own hand if I'd known that existed.

fuckin' lootcrate

I don't understand the point of it. Hey, here's a box of completely random garbage with maybe one thing in it you think is maybe kinda okay but wouldn't actually purchase on its own, give us your money, thank you.