Ultimate Spider-Man #66
by Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley & Scott Hanna
Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Bendis and company take one of the oldest plots in the history of storytelling--two protagonists switch bodies--and pull it off. Because when those two protagonists are Ultimate Spidey & Ultimate Wolverine, hilarity just naturally ensues. After the severe moroseness of the past several issues, this is a welcome respite.
Rating: 3.5 (of 5)
Wolverine #20
by Mark Millar, John Romita, Jr. & Klaus Janson
I ended up liking this a lot more than I thought I would. After seeing the ugly cover by Jr. I was worried, but the interior art is quite good, with much of the credit going to Janson's inks setting the right mood. Millar packs a lot of story into this first issue of his inaugeral arc, as Logan is called in to recue the kidnapped son of his cousin-in-law in Japan, leading to a story that involves Kitty Pryde, Nick Fury & SHIELD, Elektra, Hydra and The Hand, but it doesn't feel the least bit crowded. Plus, it ends on an actually, honest-to-golly cliffhanger.
Rating: 3 (of 5)
Majestic #3
by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, & Karl Kerschl
If this issue feels slight it's because, well, it is. Giving a page count, we discover that, as opposed to the regular 21-22 pages of story, we only have 15 (not counting the 6-page advertising insert). I don't recall the rest of the issues being short. Previews lists this as being a standard 32-page comic, so unless they're counting the ad insert (and I sure as heck am not), we're being ripped off. Within the short page count, there's about one and a half plot points covered. That's just too little happening and this all comes off as filler. Look, if you've only got three issues of story, don't pad it out to four. It's a shame, because up to this point I was really enjoying this mini.
Rating: 2 (of 5)
7 comments:
Not sure how you are counting the Majestic pages... I get 22 when I count. Are you missing pages from your copy? I LOVED the final splash page though. Just beautiful.
I'm glad to see someone else enjoyed this issue of USM as well... the sequence where Logan recognizes that Peter had cut off a finger was priceless.
Skywise
I counted the pages in my copy of Majestic three times over for my latest post. The copy I bought comes out to 22.
I counted again: 15 pages. Let's see here; the pages and their starting dialogue are:
1) Hey! Hey! Up Here!
2) Nah, I'm Perfectly Safe!
3) ...Mr. McArest is a Superhero!
4) ...I've Got You
5) Sorry. I was a world away.
6) Ellen! It's Ellen!
7) I don't know what that means.
8) I am close.
9) Come on...
10) Ring any bells?
11) To world peace, at one point.
12) I told you it would take your breath away
13) Ahhh!
14) Get Elijah Out.
15) The Intruder is
No place in the story did it feel like there was a big gap of 7 missing pages...
From the list you made it seems you're missing a few pages between page 4 and page 5 of your copy, as well as a few pages between page 12 and page 13 of your copy.
I think you might have picked up a defective copy. I've had the same thing happened to me a few times. Hopefully the place you bought it from can get you another copy for no extra (or at least reduced) charge.
Thanks Ian. Looks like a signature was letf out of my copy. I've had comics on occasion where they've duplicated a signature (most recently X-Men #161--in which case I think it actually improved the comic...) but never one where a chunk was left out entirely. My LCS is good about such things, so unless their entire shipment was botched (which was the case with X-Men...) I'll be able to swap for a good copy.
The sad thing is, I couldn't tell that any pages were noticably missing, which doesn't speak well of the decompression that these pages weren't necessary for the story!
Also, I'm sad to have wasted perfectly good snark on a defective comic.
wow...that's too weird!
Most of the pages you are missing are part of the flashback sequence, that it looks like you only got one page of. (The one you list as page 13) So it could have very easily been lifted out of the story with no real effect to the main storyline. Still... very odd.
Skywise
Post a Comment