Seriously. It makes sense.

Ennis's Punisher is basically a near-psychotic Batman mixed with MacGuyver. With Guns. And Explosives. And a complete lack of Empathy for Villains.

It's a debate as old as the internet itself almost. Who'd win in a fight? Goku or Superman?

For some strange reason this seems to always end up (debate/fanart-wise) as a battle where both characters would be actively trying to kill each other. Because that's what Goku and Superman are just simply KNOWN for, wanton murder of their opponents. </sarcasm>

The infamous Death Battle video has some amazing points about both characters, and brings up perhaps the best example as to how the two would end up fighting (outside of being forced)... but even then it eventually becomes a match that lives up to the series' title.

I'm sorry... but both characters aren't active killers. Sure they've done such deeds before, but it was usually as a means of an absolute last resort. They didn't WANT to kill their opponents, it's just that their enemies took that option completely out of their hands.

Goku would rather spar with his opponents, the sheer act of fighting being what he'd rather do. His constant quest to train and become better and all that. Hell half of his friends were at one point sworn enemies, who actively tried to kill him and/or his friends. He was even angry at Vegeta for murdering members of the Ginyu Force, guys who almost killed HIS SON for laughs.

And Superman has this ingrained moral compass that prevents him from killing simply on principle. Heck, in the biggest example of him having to resort to that level (Zod and his cronies) ended up with him EXILING himself from Earth for a year or two out of fear that he'd gone too far.

So the idea that these two heroes would go into a match with the sole intent on killing the other is, to me, quite ludicrous. Even on the classic grounds of 'Heroic Misunderstanding Leads To Fighting', they'd eventually figure it out and stop. Hell Goku would probably be shocked to find Superman (via in-fight bantering) as like the ONE opponent who'd actually agree to stop fighting.

I just don't see such a fight lasting long, not on the grounds of one being infinitely better than the other, but because they're not the type of characters who'd go THAT far. Maybe Goku would like to spar with Supes a bit more after the realization that neither are superpowered thugs, but that's really the logical in-character extent of it. Said sparring (if Superman agreed to it) would maybe get a little tense and heated... but nothing that'd leave a corpse.

*shrugs* Just got to thinking of this when I heard about that Marvel/Attack on Titan crossover that's in the works.

Warning: Salty Language and Massive Amounts of Venomous Vitriol.

It's official, Brian Bendis can kiss my ass. And probably Disney too while we're at it.

One of my favorite Marvel events of the last decade or so was the stellar 'Annihilation' story. It re-ignited interest in the cosmic/galactic portion of the Marvel Universe. It had been kinda/seemingly largely forgotten after the 90's. Until Annihilation, all the cosmic areas of the Marvel universe at that point were good for was temporary plot inconveniences. Skrulls... Kree... maybe Galactus for the 10,000th time... generally weaker stuff like that. Nothing that encompassing, nothing space opera-esque. Annihilation made that stuff important again. SERIOUS.

And for me, at the forefront was Nova. Richard Rider. A guy who really hadn't amounted to much in his long history before then. I mean besides occasional membership into whatever temporary roster of New Warriors Marvel was trying to push at various given times. We had last seen him during ANOTHER attempt to revive the New Warriors, as a dorky commentary on Reality TV where they went around picking fights with Supervillains who were hiding out in the parts of Marvel's USA that WEREN'T New York or California. Luckily for him, he left before the group screwed up and accidentally left Stamford a crater.

Well thanks to this event he was suddenly cool, suddenly badass, and most of all... made into a very interesting character over the course of the epic story. He was one of the reasons I bought comics again for about four-to-five years afterwards. Seeing his transformation from C-List Scrub to A-List Awesome was a joy to behold. And it seemed as though it wouldn't stop, almost every story was very damn cool and interesting as he tried to find his place in a now drastically different Marvel Cosmos.

Then came the Thanos Imperative, another cool story dealing with the THEN return of Thanos to aid (against his will) the galactic heroes of Marvel in combating an alternate dimension that was taken over by fiendish Eldritch Abominations. Sadly things didn't go quite as planned for the heroes in the course of saving reality. This left Nova and Star-Lord having to make a difficult choice to protect their home dimension from a freshly-scorned and incredibly PISSED Thanos with a serious mad-on for another cosmic rampage. They sacrificed themselves to buy their friends time to escape back home. While I didn't like it, this felt kinda fitting for such a hero.

Then suddenly Marvel NOW! happened and not only was Star-Lord and Thanos BACK in their home dimension... but Richard Rider wasn't anywhere to be seen. Oh but FEAR NOT, for we had a NEW Nova in the form of Sam Alexander! The character created for Disney's 'Ultimate Spiderman' show was now officially apart of the Marvel U! It'd be cool if one could forget that all of the Nova Corps were virtually wiped out during Annihilation. Let's also forget that the only person who HAD the entirety of the powerful Nova Force was Richard Rider. Thus any and all Novas whom Richard had tried to bring into his own short-lived Corps were basically DE-POWERED when they were cut off from the Nova Force.

But wait! This was a Nova from an entirely seperate 'Secret Branch' of the Nova Corps that just NOW chose to come forward. Again... let's ignore the fact that this premise is like 90% of peoples' early Fan Fiction ideas ('apart of a super secret thing/group/land that nobody knew about till now' makes up for alotta middle schooler's fan character backgrounds), this basically means that while the original Nova Corps was being mercilessly exterminated during Annihilation, while Richard Rider was left alone to shoulder an incredible BURDEN that he was barely able to handle, and while the galaxy as a whole was falling into irreparable chaos... these chumps were apparently sitting on their asses. WHY?!

And suddenly everyone was not only aware of this fact, but totally cool with this 'Black Ops' Nova Corps... in the tried and true tradition of many an elementary schooler's Fan Fiction plot. Not only that, but Rocket Raccoon and Gamora (who was in a relationship with Richard Rider BTW) personally appeared to give Sam his Nova helmet because he's just THAT cool apparently. Seriously, this IS someone's fan fiction story. Try to think of one that doesn't at least START out like this same premise.

Except without self-insertion author persona.

Like many Nova fans, I wondered what had happened to the original Nova. Where was he? Was he even still alive? While I didn't collect comic issues anymore (opting instead for trade paperback collections), I kept watch for the return of Rider.

In many ways... I'm still waiting.

Because now, thanks to Brian Michael Bendis, we've learned the final fate (as it stands now) of Richard Rider... a story that was HEAVILY promoted for like a frikkin' year. They were pimpin' this story like it was gonna be so damn awesome. I had a gut feeling then that this wasn't going to end well for one of my favorite characters. But for some strange reason held out hope that it wasn't going to come true.

Sometimes I'm a frikkin' yutz.

Trapped in this Eldritch 'Cancerverse', where Death used to be meaningless (till the end of Thanos Imperative, which was also apparently ignored during this), Nova and Star-Lord and DRAX (because why the hell not? Keep ignoring continuity there Bendis! You bald idiot) are fighting to keep Thanos from returning to the main Marvel Universe. It's a VERY steep situation, as this is frikkin' THANOS we're talkin' about, a guy who goes toe-to-toe with the likes of Galactus like it's just Sunday Brunch.

And apparently DEATH still doesn't matter in this 'Cancerverse'... again totally making all the craziness shown during "Thanos Imperative" look completely utterly pointless as "Big Purple and Surly" grievously/fatally wounds both Drax and Star-Lord during the course of this fight... yet they 'get better' shortly thereafter ('even death may die' and all that bollocks). Oh and despite the fact that ALL of the Cancerverse was seemingly imploding and collapsing in on itself last time we saw it (again, due to the concept of DEATH being freshly brought back and all thanks to Thanos and his perennial friend-zoned obsession Death), the evil Eldritch-subservient Avengers show up too. Because apparently continuity can go take a flying leap.

During all this madness, somehow a Cosmic Cube gets brought in... (all blurring together at this point, and I really don't care anymore. If Bendis clearly doesn't care about this, why should I?) and it THEN becomes a game of 'Keep the Reality-Warping McGuffin Out of the Genocidal Space Madman's Hands'. And then Nova decides to use the Nova Force in conjunction with the Cosmic Cube to open a portal... and apparently send EVERYONE but himself back... even the dickbag they had sacrificed themselves to keep from returning in the first place. Continuity? Character Drama? Development?! Eh heh... Bendis clearly doesn't care for these things!

And why didn't Nova return? He got his arm cut off during the battle with the evil Cthulhu-vengers and despite the fact that his comrades came back WITHIN THIS SAME UNIVERSE from worse injuries (Thanos had punched Star-Lord's guts out... and he came back from that.) he doesn't want to risk coming back to his home dimension and maybe... possibly... bleed out? I'm sure the Nova Force/Worldmind would have ya covered there Ricky mah boy. But okay... suddenly everyone's taken a step backwards in intelligence. Including the author.

So if you were hoping that this would be a satisfactory ending to this particular mystery... then us older Nova fans can apparently just go pound sand! Richard Rider's probably dead... or due to meddling with a cosmic cube in such a way... becoming some NEW cosmic entity so plucky young Sam Alexander can keep to his own little plot-hole inducing, Disney-certified Status Quo alive.

THE HELL WITH THAT.

I feel god-damned insulted. And ripped off. But mostly insulted. Kept having this feeling that Bendis was having a laugh at my expense. Like he was reverting back to his old tired 'kill off characters i have no interest in/writing for' cliche. Like he was just trolling, pissed that people probably kept asking a question he clearly had ZERO interest in answering. Well mission accomplished, asshat. To hell with him! And add to that any interest I might've had in future Guardians stories! Screw Disney's stupid little cartoon too while we're at it! And screw Sam Alexander too! He's NOT Nova, and will NEVER be Nova to me. He's not even Kyle Rayner-light. He was mainly brought into this world to help promote the cartoon he was created for, regardless of the continuity headaches it'd create.

Like Neal Adams said of Hal Jordan before him... RICHARD RIDER IS NOVA!

They promise to show everyone who's been related to the Friendly Neighborhood Wall-Crawler across the vast multiverse. Let's put that to the test. SINCE There aren't many entries for these characters in profiles... putting my list here.

-"The Spider" (Exiles): Basically Peter Parker got possessed by the Carnage symbiote (or something that resembles it). The version shown in Exiles met a pretty fitting end, but who's to say that THAT is the only version of the character? Hell there's multiple versions of Spider-man 2099 running around the Marvel Multiverse, so why not bring in one of the more twisted versions of Spidey? If they're hoping to fight against Morlun, you might need to fight monsters with monsters in the end.

-Betty Brant, Spider-girl (What-If?, Vol.1 #7): Oh lord, just to see how some of the other Spideys would react to seeing her really hilarious costume design would be worth the "price of admission". Though she'd probably end up being one of those 'fodder characters' to feed to Morlun.

-Mary Jane, Spider-Woman (Earth-8545): The lesbian spider-woman from a Phalanx-ravaged world. Would be nice to see how she's holding up since her dealings with the Exiles. That or see what became of her world once the Exiles pretty much saved it.

-"The Webslinger" (Avataars: Covenant of the Shield): A cursed Spider-man who's basically become a monstrous part-man, part-spider who's still heroic and well-meaning at heart would be fun to see appear. Just to really freak out the other Spideys.

-Spider-man Unlimited: They played with the version of Spidey from the "Amazing Friends" TV show, why not take a short trip back to the world of this late-90's cartoon? At the very least use it as an opportunity to answer what the hell happened after the cliffhanger finale that was never answered.

Just bring Ulysses Bloodstone back already. Seriously. You CLEARLY have ideas still for the guy, and you CLEARLY like using him still... so... WHY NOT BRING HIM BACK? The 50's 'Secret Avengers', this latest 'Covenant' concept that's brewing under the surface with Wolverine, his latest rash of appearances in stuff like Captain America Corps, his having travelled with Fat Cobra, that deal with that Sphinx character in the aftermath of the 'War of the Kings' and so on.

Just bring him back already.

At his core, the son of Charles Xavier is a very cool and interesting character. His abilities, fractured mind, etc. etc. can (if handled well) make him one of the more intriguing characters to have come out of the 80/90's.

But can we PLEASE change his frikkin' hair??? It was considered cool back when he first appeared, but it just looks STUPID now. It just comes across to me like some kind of in-joke the creators originally made so you (and those doing the coloring) could tell him apart from his dad. That or so you could tell how REALLY unlike his dad he was, with a CRAPLOAD of hair. Like two feet worth of it.

Am I the only one who has a hang-up over this?? XD

Well... this was generally true for the most part up TILL the end of the 90's, but the title would've been too huge.

Sure the 90's were an embarrassing era for comics (I'd chalk it up to a sorta "awkward puberty stage"), with all the fads it kept chasing, and trying it's damned hardest to be "dark and edgy" and "XTREME" (or perhaps "Rad" would be a better term). But there is one thing I miss about that era (and the ones before it too).

Villains tended to stay down after each conflict.

Seriously, think about it. Up till about the end of the 90's, villains (even the big names) tended to go on the shelf after big events or significant beatings. Wounds received from battle seemed to matter. If Batman broke your face, (and most of your body) you'd tend to be on the sidelines for a few months (or even a year or two) before coming back. It'd make your return appearance mean something, ("oh shit it's that one guy... he's back!!!") as well as give the illusion that the hero/heroes were still effective. I mean for chrissake, the Riddler sported a broken arm for some time in the 90's. Nowadays?? He'd have that shit mended within a seeming week and be back to bother Batman once again before the memory had a chance to fade. Don't get me started on the Joker. e____e

Some fights just seemed to MEAN something still back then. Spider-man could beat up a villain and he'd not show up again for a while, sometimes years (the only seeming exceptions seemed to be Venom and Carnage), but now it's like they're barely in the hospital long enough for it to really matter before showing up again two issues or two stories later. Granted some of this can be chalked up the concept of "Status Quo is God", but can also be chalked up to the fact that many new writers enter these jobs with certain stories in mind to share about their favorite villains. So you get the seemingly repeat appearances by guys like Joker, Riddler, Green Goblin, Red Skull, etc.

That and they're bankable names, characters with weight behind them. If you get the right author and an iconic villain or two... that has the possibility to sell REALLY well. At least alot more of a possibility than "Batman vs. The Doormouse". :P

Why doesn't Marvel just bring this guy back??? They keep giving him cameos in various comics (Capt Britain and MI13, S.W.O.R.D.) and even gave him a cameo in Stryder's end in frikkin' Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. WHY NOT BRING HIM BACK?!?! Shit I'm sure Simon Furman would be more than happy to write for his iconic creation once more... he doesn't seem to be doing much at the moment. So why not???

And if they ever do, for the love of all that is holy.... bring back the original version!!! Death's Head 2 has his 90's cheese charm, and while I enjoy the Death's Heads shown during Planet Hulk and beyond... nothing tops the original version. He had such a fun personality and usually a pretty awesome look as well.

Would just be nice to see him back.

Become very enthralled with the world of pulp heroes of old. Always have been a big fan of stuff like Indiana Jones, Sherlock Holmes, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and the Golden Age of Comics... so it's no surprise that I've become a big fan of such characters like Doc Savage, the Shadow, and others. Have also recently discovered the world of French Pulp Heroes thanks to cool stuff like "Tales of the Shadowmen".

By extension, I'm becoming more and more knowledgeable of the "Wold Newton Family" concept.

I guess with the new DCU, the higher ups have decided that all their female characters need to look like top-heavy supermodels. Which means the Flashpoint gave Amanda some serious liposuction. That or one could blame this on movies and TV. OR maybe Jim Lee can't draw fat people. :P
 
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Just hits me as... odd... that they've decided to go this route. It just rings to me as a really pointless decision. XD