Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Wednesday Comics: Original Sin Finale and Multiversity #1

ORIGINAL SIN #8

Last week gave us the finale of the big Marvel crossover Original Sin.

The story centered around the murder of Uatu the Watcher.  The final issue resolves that mystery.

Was it worth the wait?

The issue would have had a much stronger emotional impact if it hadn't been obvious who the murder was since issue #3.  The flashback seen right before Uatu's death is the best part of the entire mini-series.  It is a sad and gut-wrenching, but not as powerful as since, as I wrote earlier, the killer was obvious.  If there had been a twist or a bigger surprise, my heart would have broken.

Jason Aaron's story was fine, but a bit anti-climactic.  There are super villains, but like Civil War, the main fight is between the "heroes."  And like most Marvel stories, it feels like this is just a set up to another story.  The events here will lead to the new female Thor, a new Winter Soldier series, and new cosmic character called the Unseen.  In fact, I didn't understand at all the last 3 pages.  It was only later when I accidentally came across a wiki article about it that I finally got it.  For that reason, too, the story didn't have as much of an impact.  Artist Mike Deodato does capture the dark and moody nature of the story and I look forward to seeing more of his work.


MUTLIVERSITY #1

DC has been hyping the new Grant Morrison mini-series for a little while.  They've been billing it as a big, epic cosmic story that will rattle the different corners of the DC Multiverse.  The implication has been by giving Morrison a giant creative sandbox to play in, it will accentuate his eccentric strengths as a writer and bring out his best.

The result?

Absolute, total, and irredeemable crap.

I know that I am just a blogger on the inter web and we stereotypically vent venom onto anything that doesn't please our peculiar artistic pallets.  Yet I have tried very hard to be measured in my criticism and tried to find what is good and excellent even in those things that did not delight me.

But not with this.  With this, all the restraints are off.

As I wrote a while ago regarding Morrison's work, the thing that drives me nuts is that critics still rave about his work as if it was the greatest thing since sliced bread.  Critics trip over themselves boasting about his genius.  But his stories are awful.

Like Batman RIP, Multiversity feels like Morrison is just showing off.  Its starts off with a Monitor-type character being pulled from reading a comic book into a destroyed Marvel-like universe.  This, I guess, is Morrison trying to be meta, saying that the reader is the hero by reading the comic but then has to deal with the consequences or something.

The story then cuts to Obama-Superman, on of Morrison's previous creations, as he is pulled from his parallel Earth into the bleed (the place between universes).  Here he teams up with other heroes like Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew along with other oddballs from the different dimensions.  He seems to like taking obscure parts of DC lore and putting his special spin on it, because we really need to have a dark and gritty reboot of Captain Carrot.  If I'm not explaining the story very clearly its because there isn't a very clear story to tell.   Evan Ivan Reis art, which is always top-notch, cannot save this festering, pretentious mess.

I hated it.

If you like Morrison, then you should like this.

If you like storytelling that isn't awful, then you won't like this.

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