Bonus odds-and-ends for June 2023
Been awhile since I've done a 'whatever's on my mind' post, but the last couple weeks truly merited some space to breathe; rest assured that as promised, the next planned non-Whowatch post will indeed be about swords.
Big week for bugs saving the world! I caught Shin Kamen Rider 5/31 and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse 6/3, and even if the remainder of the year wasn't as stunningly dire as it is I'd have to assume we'd reached the peak of superhero movie entertainment for 2023. Unlike the previous Shin Ultraman I walked into this with some Kamen Rider experience - I gotta get back to Build, probably when we get to the Chibnall years in Whowatch and I need some light in my life - and I was happy with this, felt tighter than Ultraman while still maintaining the episodic vibe and I enjoyed the wrenchingly overemotive climax. The showing I was at played a little clipshow afterwards of all the shots from the original 70s show that were homaged in this, which is how every DC and Marvel movie for characters with prior adaptations should end.
As for Across the Spider-Verse, a dark and long-brewing confession: I didn't love Into as much as everyone else at the time. I think it was largely because (especially sandwiched between a bunch of mass-media Spider-Man stuff) a lot of how Miles was meant to evoke the classic beats made him feel like a traditionalistic contrast to doing new things narratively with Peter B., and it left it sort of hard for me to fully engage with even as it was operating at a previously-unseen level for what it was doing. Here though Miles and Gwen are the unambiguous central POV figures going through the big wrenching archetypal Spider-Folks problems, and even if I've seen some take issue with this one as having weaknesses its predecessor didn't and can even agree with one or two (if nothing else, yeah, this has nothing on the original's soundtrack) that critical difference made it WAY easier for me to get sucked in and feel what everyone else did the first time. And way behind obvious signifiers like "Hey, that's Benedict Cumberbatch floating in the Dark Dimension!", Miles' final swing really stood out to me amidst even all the rest of the visual bombast as the closest we've seen to Ditko's visual language as realized on-screen. All-timer cape movie with the greatest of ease.
METROPOLIS 'CAT SAVIOR' STRIKES AGAIN. No remaining hot takes. Just fingers crossed.
Meanwhile though we've got word that The Authority are going to be debuting in Superman: Legacy prior to their own movie, and I really gotta believe Gunn isn't the dork who's gonna do a live-action What's So Funny About Truth, Justice, and the American Way? as his Superman reboot. It'd be such an easy hack move so have your new take demonstrate his conceptual superiority to the DCEU/the MCU/The Boys/etc. by having him beat them up and tell them they're meanies, but even besides not thinking that's the kind of perspective Gunn would take, that'd be a pretty wildly bad way to lead into their actual movie. I'd imagine this'll be a minor appearance helping show how far along the superhuman track this world is and potentially setting up some kind of Superman and The Authority-type thing for way down the line, and with a movie apparently about reconciling his emotional baggage the way Gunn has alluded to, putting some faces to 'this super hero thing I've started has gone WAY past what I had in mind' could work.
Also the night before I post this it turns out Superman and Lois has been renewed for what I imagine is the finale of what was always a four-year plan as the kids go through high school, so I guess they'll see their dumb little vision through to the end. I will watch the final episode to see if the little incel Kylo Ren fuck gets to be Superman Secundus while Jon gets to be, idk, his Jimmy Olsen, and I'll be happy when Hoechlin shows up in a Superman Beyond movie in 10 years and gets his Andrew Garfield in No Way Home "holy shit wait he's AMAZING what the hell were they DOING with him" moment, except this time it'll be for a character take that actually has anything to apologize for.
Ridiculous as it seems, it somehow barely occurred to me Ultimate Invasion could actually, properly lead to the return of the Ultimate universe, rebooted or otherwise; I guess I sorta figured it'd reshuffle a bit where the Ultimate toys landed in 616 in line with potential other non-G.O.D.S. plans of his. Or, y'know, Marvel asked him really nicely to. But it looks like maybe he'll have room to build with this in a way Dawn of X could only ever offer so much room for with how many masters that had to serve, even if given this is apparently a pretty full reboot ("the genesis of Super Heroes in a brand new world") I'm expecting a coherent reason for this to be Ultimate from Hickman even if it's obvious why on the corporate end. Some rapid-fire shoot-from-the-hip guesses about this:
Avengers is the property that'll get the least TLC. Fantastic Four and X-Men they're banking on being their next big movie things (and what on Earth will a Hickman-overseen version of Ultimate X-Men look like?), Spider-Man they're perpetually scrambling to figure out, Avengers meanwhile are kings of the world and have zero comics heat right now and were already the big conceptual winners the first time around. They're the entryway as made clear by the cover, but I doubt they're intended as the primary beneficiaries.
I feel like the new Ultimate Spider-Man is either going to be something totally out of left field and brilliant or total phoned-in gutter trash with virtually no option for anything in-between. Or possibly Hickman himself as the dark horse pick for his own book, since it was the original Ultimate title and he's handled the other three 'pillars' extensively, but I wouldn't bet on it. Or I guess maybe Al Ewing. Alternatively...
Ewing doing Ultimate Fantastic Four feels like the so-easy-it's-almost-boring pick, right? More on him again shortly.
My 30% serious theory for 'okay, the core four are a given, what's the total freak additional title no one's gonna see coming' is a Squadron Supreme revamp when their own Ultimateization in Supreme Power crossed over with Ultimate proper in that capacity. Consider: could there possibly be a more seismic power move than Hickman launching Ultimate Justice League at Marvel. Alternatively maybe something with the New Universe stuff, Johnny certainly does love all that.
In any case I know it's become somewhat du jour to hate on Ultimate, but screw it, USM was seminal comics for me and Ultimates proper was so good and so important it absolutely makes sense one of those guys has been able to largely coast ever since, and Hickman's Hickman. I pled on Twitter the other day that I'm allowed to be uncomplicatedly excited for one dorky throwback thing in The Last Days of Lex Luthor; this I make no such apologies for.
Just a couple days ago I finally gave public voice to my regular musings of 'Al Ewing, why on Earth are you so determined to slaughter your post-Hulk career momentum and reassert yourself as primarily a guy on Z-list books he's too good for' with the announcement of Avengers inc. But after everything that's come out of #comicsbrokeme, now I think I'm just in awe of the folks in the field who DO have the nerve, savvy, and sheer luck along with their talent to be able to self-advocate themselves into the big leagues with how horrifically and cavalierly the industry grinds down its talent even among those who've seemingly 'made it'. My own lens for this: I, Some Dude with a newsletter, paid $100 per page for my comic with David Lee Ingersoll, and that's what the artist for my next short comic and I have agreed on for the time being as well. I was and am grateful they were so generous. And it turns out even that's more than what BOOM! Studios was paying for the art on one of its most beloved titles in Lumberjanes, and not much less than it sounds like the big two tend to dole out.
Comics have always been collapsing, so 'comics are collapsing!' doesn't hold much weight. But DMing with some friends on this, I realized there's a pretty clear comparison as things stand to the death of the midbudget blockbuster - we've got indy folks doing this on the side for the love of the craft, the few who've gotten onto major big two ongoings (and the criteria for that particular selection is only becoming more disconcerting with time, at least by my own sensibilities), and a bunch of people who're starving out there. I want to at least stay in that first category in whatever capacity I can, but especially not being able to draw myself, seems like a decent chance 'ongoing title' isn't something that's ever going to materialize for me barring some wild good fortune. And right alongside THAT collapse is my writing port of call Comic Book Herald closing its doors to new submissions; I was really proud of what I did there and loved what other people were doing, it's a godawful shame it wasn't feasible for Dave to keep it going. I had a piece I was working on to pitch to him and a series planned for later that'll end up here instead, and I have some broader thoughts on what the future holds for my online writing you'll all probably hear about sooner rather than later.
That's about it for the time being; right now along with continuing to chip away at Hellblazer I'm in the midst of a big Tillie Walden readthrough, having recently grabbed On A Sunbeam for fairly cheap after having previously read the webcomic, and checking out the rest of her major work out of the library. Besides that my favorite so far would probably be I Love This Part, doing really satisfying things with the ingrained assumptions of comics storytelling to convey the subjective significance of memory. Always but especially with everything lately, take care of yourselves folks, and thanks for following.