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Post by Shiryu on Feb 10, 2014 21:24:46 GMT -5
I was wondering where you were hiding, Shir! I'm all over the other topic. Come and join the book club!
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Post by Shiryu on Feb 9, 2014 15:25:10 GMT -5
I have been reading most new stuff, in one form or another, so I can shed some light here.
It's not very good, IMO. Having Hank and the Vision around is great, and the Doombot is hilarious, but the plot has been quite slow so far. Vision also has new powers, result of an upgrade following the recent Ultron event, and, despite being logical and modern (for example, he can split his body into millions of nanobots now), they take some of his charm away. Also, Hank Pym is revealed to be bipolar.
It seems promising and I liked issues 1 and 2... but it's by Hickman, so plot develops at snail pace.
To my knowledge, it has indeed been cancelled.
This is an interesting one. It was indeed doing really well in terms of response and sales, and there was outrage on the web at the prospect of Waid leaving. Apparently the restart follows Matt admitting his secret ID publicly and relocate to Los Angeles, possibly following the death of Foggy Nelson (who has been diagnosed with cancer a few months ago). I think Marvel just decided to piggyback the whole new #1 thing to give it some more publicity. It's still a really good book to read though, probably the best thing Marvel is publishing at the moment (even better than Uncanny Avengers, it's more lighthearted).
I'm not sure on what happened to Carol Danvers, but this is a new Ms Marvel. She has an interesting backstory, being a Pakistani immigrant in the US. Reviews for #1 were good, but she's not a character I'm interested in.
I believe it's Loki Agent of Asgard. I did read #1 and it was pretty good, but it requires a knowledge of some recent backstory. As you probably know, the original Loki died a few years ago, during the Siege of Asgard. Thor eventually resurrected him as a child, free of the experiences and the inherent evil that had made him the Loki we know, but still with the innate potential to become so again. Despising his older self, this young Loki has been through a few adventures, first with Thor, then with Volstagg and then with the Young Avengers (for a while, he was accompanied by a raven with the memories and personality of the old Loki). He did show a tendency to scheme, trick, double cross and use others, but usually in order to save the day or achieve some selfish but not threatening end. In short, he is quite the tormented character. Very recently, he has tricked Billy of the Young Avengers to age him to a young adult look, so he has gained more magical powers (but still far less than he held originally). He is also drawn and written in a manner very reminiscent of Tom Huddleston from the Thor films. In the meanwhile, Asgard has been split into Asgard itself, moved to the depths of space and where an embittered Odin lives alone, and Asgardia, a place on Earth built with Stark technology and ruled by Idunn, Gaea and Frigga as the "All Mother" triumvirate.
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Post by Shiryu on Feb 9, 2014 11:49:49 GMT -5
I concur, the last few issues in particular have been great (albeit a bit heavy on the casualties side for my taste... I hope at least some of them get reversed soon). In terms of friendship between characters, there is a nice exchange between Wasp and Cap a few issues ago, when she reminds him they are not just comrades, but old and trusted friends. Much better than Steve or Thor calling Iron Man "Stark" and Bruce "Banner" in some other books.
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Post by Shiryu on Feb 9, 2014 11:46:31 GMT -5
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Post by Shiryu on Feb 5, 2014 18:58:11 GMT -5
Although it's kind of not fashionable to say so anymore, I LOVED Byrne's run on FF. It had it's flaws, sure-- some of which were brought to mind with this reading-- but it never, ever failed to keep me engaged and looking forward to the next issue. Byrne is a great, great visual story-teller-- adhering to the oldsters' rule of thumb that you should be able to follow a comic clearly even if the words aren't there. I'm also very, very fond of his clean, expressive style-- even with it's quirky flaws (like the inability to draw more than one kind of woman's face-- a long-standing, justified criticism). As a writer, he generally did a terrific job of balancing the long arc(s) against the short one(s), which gave his run a nice, cohesive, saga-like sweep. His dialog was at times uneven-- but he generally had a strong feel for characterization even when the words themselves might be a bit suspect (Reed using the word "whilst" in a pressure situation??). And finally, he's also one heck of a good cover artist. I'm on the fence on Byrne's run on the FF. Up until a couple of months ago, I had very good memories of it as he was there when I started reading the FFs and the X-Men. Then over Christmas I purchased the X-Men and FF by John Byrne Omnibuses, and found the second rather disappointing. There are some really great stories there, but they all revolve around Doc Doom - of whom Byrne had an excellent grasp - and Galactus or related characters. Thrown in the mix there were a lot of rather meaningless filler issues (anyone remembers the native "shadow creatures" that made people die of fear?). What I do like about him is that he is great at conveying the sense of someone's power. Iron Man easily carries two cars by the side windows (kind of impossible, but who cares), Wasp gets inside Galactus' eye slits, Terrax lifts an entire portion of the city and so on. He doesn't need to describe it, he just shows it. IIRC it was from Thor. The Thunderer did meet Galactus twice in his early years, during the search for Ego the Living Planet (there was a time when Thor went into space almost as often as the FF) and learned his origin. Byrne then reworked it in the aforementioned special and in the Galactus/Darkseid crossover "The Hunger", showing Big G's attack on Apokolips (has anyone read that? One of the best crossovers IMO).
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Post by Shiryu on Feb 3, 2014 12:21:28 GMT -5
To me, in this story there's a lot of what was good - and some of what was bad - in comics in the 80s. Like SW said, it's the kind of story that, today, would be decompressed in a 8-issue arc, involving a lot of soul searching and arguint, but that originally was probably a little too compressed in essentially 2 and half issues. The decision to save Galactus is massive for the whole universe - he was dying of "natural causes", was responsible for the death of billions and had threaned Earth several times, and yet only Iron Man argues against saving him, only to be quickly overruled by Cap and Reed. Then, in mere minutes, Reed finds "at least 4 planets" he could feed on without killing anyone, and off Galactus goes. A few issues later, he will be destroying the throne world of the Skrull empire, so either those 4 planets weren't that good, or Galactus now needs a planet per month. Couldn't Reed have left him the machine he used? In fact, to revive him he feeds Galactus artificial energies, and the process does work, so there is a potential for alternative food sources for the big G, but it's never really elaborated upon. It's a pity, considering the second half of the last issue is basically devoted to something else completely and could have been used better.
Still, there is also a lot I like. The battle with Terrax is short but cool, especially the Thing punching him through several buildings, and the appearance of various other heroes reinforces the sense of shared world that's too often ignored because "so and so is away on a mission". My favourite scene is Iron Man's reaction to Thor creating an underwater storm to keep the sea away. Doctor Strange also came across really well, to make Galactus scream like that. He can be a big deus-ex character, but here it worked I think. However, I found DD and Spidey disappointing... there's no way they would have stayed out of the fight like that. To make matters worse, next panel we actually see Wasp contributing. Talking of disappointments, why is Susan breaking down like that?
On the plus side, the art is top notch. I'm not the biggest fun of JB's work (his Torch is too skinny for example), but everyone looks very expressive and there are some great power displays (Thor's storm, Terrax lifting a portion of NY, the Thing's punch).
I also liked the attempt to make Galactus feel genuinely sorry for all the people he has killed, just to remind readers he is not evil per se, but simply trying to survive, making in turn the decision to save him more understandable. On the other hand, Frankie's decision is indeed out of the blue. Previous stories had hinted that she was quite self-righteous, not as soft hearted as the FFs, but to leave everyone behind almost on a whim is a tad much... you can really feel for Jonnhy here. IIRC, Frankie as a character predated Byrne's tenure on the book, so it's possible he just wanted to get rid of her. I had a look on Wiki and she will be around for a while, before eventually dying off in space.
IIRC that hadn't happened yet. Spidey fights Firelord wearing his (homemade) black costume and Hercules and Starfox are Avengers, so it was after the Secret Wars, during Stern's stint as Avengers writer. This story takes place be a few years earlier (readers time).
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 30, 2014 8:13:20 GMT -5
This is pretty cool, Shir. Both of our first offerings have a definite Avengers connection w/out actually being Avengers books. We're a clever lot-! One can take the Avengers away from the readers, but not the readers away from the Avengers PS: I did track down and read Hulk #128 btw. Thunderation!
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 29, 2014 15:35:15 GMT -5
Happy birthday to our favourite killing machine! I hope birthdays don't start passing unnoticed now that you have to click to reveal them. I've just made a couple of changes, hopefully they should be fully visible again now.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 28, 2014 17:40:03 GMT -5
Okay, snow day here in NC today and could possibly be the same tomorrow. It would be a perfect day for the next installment. What should I go back and read? We're heading towards the end of the first two weeks of the BC and I'm up next in the choosing list... I can definitely relate to HB now, have been thinking about this for several days and there are so many options. But in the end, after some painful choices (X-Men God Loves Man Kills above all) I'm going for Fantastic Four #242-244 co-starring the Avengers. Like before, anyone who doesn't have the issues in question, drop me a pm.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 24, 2014 16:35:20 GMT -5
From a quick look, here are the main changes - the email account has to be verified on first entrance, so make sure you enter a current one - karma is gone - we can now "like" and share posts. Looks like there is better integration with facebook, twitter and the likes - a new "participated" button at the top right of the screen, to follow threads you have been posting in. It also conveniently tells you if there are new posts - a different icon for boards with new posts, although I'm not sure it's working at the moment - different set of smiles Personally I need to get use to it... I like some new functions, but not the main graphics. Didn't we have a personalized forumhead before? I'll update here if I come across anything else of relevance.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 24, 2014 16:13:55 GMT -5
It looks like even Proboards was impressed by the book club, the forum is all new So a quick question: which group do you find more interesting or compelling: the Squadron Sinister or the Squadron Supreme? Supreme for me, mostly because their status is such that anything can happen to them, including permanent deaths. Their LS is one of my favourite stories ever. I like the S. Sinister too, but because they are villains, you kind of know how things will turn out.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 21, 2014 20:46:27 GMT -5
Oh, what a hoot to rediscover this title at this particular point in its run. Here's the thing-- up until this point, the Defenders had been an extremely off-beat group who tended to go up against mystical, magical, metaphysical-type threats. Including demonic forces and the odd Asgardians. And Xemnu the Titan who kind of defies a category (Is he an alien? Is he a magical hypnotic troll? Is he a plush toy?). The Avengers/Defenders War right before this sort of crossed them over into a more mainstream role. . . and this story put them up against a much more "traditional" bronze-age type of foe (or foes). And with the subsequent addition of Team-Guy Nighthawk (and the exit of scowling, prickly, resentful, arrogant Namor), this "non"-team of course became, for all intents and purposes, another regular ol' superteam--- just w/out the formal Roberts Rules of Order and parliamentary procedure and all that. Ook, I had totally missed shift. I remember several less powerful heroes like Beast, Daredevil and so on eventually became part of the Defenders for short stints, but it hadn't occurred to me that it had all begun with Nightwing. Any speculation for the reason behind this change? Poor sales? Creative decisions? A need to depower the team? It must have been difficult to regularly find foes for a group sporting Silver Surfer, Hulk, Dr. Strange and Namor. I suppose it makes sense, a bit like Thor's human identity occasionally being forgotten for months at the time. Was Bruce Banner ever particularly popular? He is kind of the cheerleader desperately dancing to keep the public entertained before the real game begins... Thank you, Shar. I did indeed wondered who had designed his new look, although it's also interesting to learn the in-story creator had been Reed. Your pic is from the Golden Age I assume? So bizarre to see him in a suit, and talking like a regular guy ("Betty, honey,..."). Just a coincidence she looks a bit like Sue Richards with all that blonde hair? The "old sea-dog" is consistent ;D
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 20, 2014 19:29:29 GMT -5
Like Ultron, I've also made the best of my weekend and read this story for what could have been the first time ever. I remember seeing Nebulon elsewhere, but everything else felt new, making it all the more enjoyable. So, the Defenders. I must admit that, as far as groups go, I've never really been into them. I like most of them as individuals, co-stars, villains even, but as a group of heroes they don't seem to mix. Then again, this is probably the point. BTW, does anyone (HB, I'm looking at you ) know why it's always Hulk and never Banner with them? They are still one and the same, right? And yet Hulk is rather calm at the beginning of the book, but hasn't reverted back to BB The opening sequence is rather goofy... someone comes in asking for help and two of the strongest beings on the planet try to smash him. And of course Nighthaws mops the floor with them, just to show how good a Defender he will be. Kind of reminds me of Mantis' first appearance, KOing Thor with her leg hold or something. *shudder* And the failsafe "get near an Avenger and you turn into a ghost" is even goofier. The rest is good fun, though. I've always liked the Squadron Sinister or the Squadron Supreme, so I enjoyed seeing them in action, shortlived as it was. These are the same guys who will eventually show up in Avengers Annual 8, right? Nebulon himself has a great look and interesting powers. Not the most memorable of villains, but not too cliched either. Speaking of visuals, I'm not Sal Buscema's biggest fan - and indeed at times his Hyperion looks overweight rather than muscular - but he surely knows how to draw a crazy Hulk better than many others. I also like his Strange and Namor, but Val seems somewhat off... perhaps her lips are a bit too full? Speaking of Val, she was kind of superflous in this story, wasn't she. Didn't even have a member of the Squadron to clobber. I agree on both accounts. Atlanteans usually wear long dresses, so having their prince parade around naked never made too much sense. I don't know who's the creator of this costume, but it's simple enough to look elegant. I also like the shape of Nightwings' cape, makes it different enough from all the others. But the beak is nearly as bad as Iron Man's armor with a nose.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 17, 2014 16:31:12 GMT -5
Welcome in, guys!
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 16, 2014 12:24:32 GMT -5
Sounds like fun! Count me in too. And Shiryu, yeah, I know I mentioned to you I did not have the time to contribute on a regular basis... but what the heck, I can still be--er, irregular! ;D That's the spirit!
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 15, 2014 22:23:32 GMT -5
D'oh! Shir, you crafty devil, you caught me flat-footed-- well (as they say) played, sir-! ;D Hulk #128 is indeed quite hard to find, but I do have Defenders #13 & #14 available digitally, so that's a green light as far as I'm concerned. Unless there are objections, Defenders 13 & 14 it is. Anyone who needs them, drop me a private message and I'll send them over via Dropbox or something else.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 15, 2014 20:01:00 GMT -5
And here we go, words barely manage to crawl their way out of one's mouth that new projects are born. Let's give the new AA board book club a round of applause. Book club? As in book club? How... how does it work? Each week, we take turns at indicating a classic story to read, be it either standalone or part of a bigger saga or an annual. We read it and then the following week we all come back here and comment/discuss it, to go wherever the conversation takes us. At the end of the discussion week, we repeat with another story, and so on. This means we would have about 14 days to read, comment and discuss, hopefully enough time to give everyone a chance to throw their 2 cents in. Obviously, reading times are just indicative and aren't meant to be taken too strictly, but two stories per month should be manageable by most of us. But... but I don't have the special story printed on the 2nd edition of the 3rd annual of All Winners Squad! How can I take part? Worry not, we'll try not to go too obscure, so that we hopefully all have the story in one format of another. Still, if there is any problem, drop me a private message and I'll do something, as I have nearly (nearly) everything in digital format by now. Is it Avengers only? I soo want to discuss Lockjaw's Amazing Adventures #16! Not too obscure!! But, other than that, not really. I think we should stick to Marvel, and obviously this is an Avengers board, but the sky is the limit (as long as Galactus doesn't place any barrier there). It's 2030, this book club has been incredibly succesfull for over 15 years... when you founded it I wasn't born yet! Can I still take part? Of course you can, the more the merrier. I'm in! I'm in! Who else is there? At the moment, in order of "registration", you have Humanbelly Yours truly Wundagoreborn Ultron69 Dr Bong in one of his several identities Spiderwasp Sharkar Marvel Boy Pym (anyone else who wants to join, just drop a line here. Starfoxxx, Spiderwasp, Woodside, Bobc... I'm looking at you ) Of course the list above doesn't make anything mandatory, this is all just for fun. I put it there because it's as good a way as any to decide in what order we are going to suggest stories to read so that no one gets left out. When do we start?? Right now. It's the 16th of January and I'll hand things over to HB to propose our first read.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 15, 2014 16:27:50 GMT -5
I'll don my Dragon Cloth (this reference makes sense only if you know the guy in my avatar ) and set things up. It's gonna be in the Nostalgia section. Ready? steady? let's go.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 13, 2014 17:37:15 GMT -5
I stopped reading the other Avengers title a while back so I don't know if any explanation has been given regarding Hyperion being on the team. I love the Squadron Supreme and would love to know what happened to them and to their world that led to this. Can anyone fill me in? As far as I know, it's a different Hyperion altogether. Apparently, there are several According to Hickman: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_(comics)#Marvel_NOW.21
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 13, 2014 16:11:59 GMT -5
Anyways, Shiryu, the Marvel's Finest Kree-Skrull War above is the one I have. I found the pages to be very glossy. Bizarre, mine... isn't. What gives?
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 13, 2014 16:10:53 GMT -5
They do always look tempting, but when I have bought the bigger collections I always regret it. They have fantastic contents but to me they are awkward to read. I bought the New Teen Titans Omnibus, and while it looks gorgeous, one of the reasons I haven't gotten around to reading it yet is that it's freakin' huge. If I try to read it while laying in bed, it may very well crush my chest. This one is ok, I bought it a few days ago and it's not that difficult to hold and read, unlike the FF by Byrne omnibus, which is a freaking 1200+ pages long.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 23:09:50 GMT -5
Not sure if this is the same edition my AA cohorts are referring to, but here's the cover of the trade I have (which I bought it about 6 years ago). It's a softcover version that has glossy pages, but the colors are not overly-saturated. This is the same one I have, but it's not printed on glossy paper. At least not glossy as in omnibuses, handbooks or more recent trades. It feels pretty porous to me EDIT: oook, apparently there are two trades with nearly identical covers: This is the one I have (note the Marvel Finest logo and the slightly different font in the title compared to Shar's) Possibly they are printed on different quality paper?
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 22:03:14 GMT -5
I think I got my copy in 2001 or 2002 (back when trade paperbacks were just starting to become a more regular thing). It was billed as "Marvel's Finest" and had pretty good, glossy paper quality. Anyone else remember when trade paperbacks were big deal and would often come with commentaries and introductions and special features? I mean, I like having TPBs (especially for harder to find or recent stories), but I do miss the special-ness of TPB. I have that very same Marvel Finest edition right next to me now. Paper quality is very good, but it's not glossy like in the more recent books. Perhaps the masterworks?
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 18:18:38 GMT -5
Perhaps we should attempt a "book club" sort of thing where everyone in turn suggests a classic issue to read and, a week later, we all comment on it? I really like this suggestion a heck of a lot, Shir. There's certainly a precedent for it on other boards. A bit of satisfaction for us oldsters that yearn for the days of yore, and perhaps some fresh exposure to younger folks that are less familiar with the past. In spite of the quiet level of commentary, it does look like this board is getting a couple of hundred (or so) visitors a day. While that's a small community in the blogosphere, it's certainly enough to sustain some friendly & interesting discussion, I bet. HB If there is enough interest, I'd be happy to give it a go. Most of us have access to older issues either as originals or reprints, and I could always set something up for the odd time this isn't the case. Anyone else on board for this?
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 18:16:31 GMT -5
There's also Avengers Arena, A+X, Avengers Undercover, and Young Avengers, right? Unless some of these got cancelled. Arena ended about a month ago, Undercover will be its sequel. Young Avengers ended with issue #15 and A+X is slated to end next month.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 14:03:33 GMT -5
I'm too new around here to assess anything specific to this board, but I can say that specifics to any particular board may be secondary to bigger change. I'm seeing traditional discussion board traffic dry up on various forums across widely differing subjects. The banter is migrating to newer forms of social media, I think. I'd echo this statement, blogs and social networks are replacing forums, just like forums replaced old-style websites. But they are so many that everything gets diluted. Thanks to the web, I'm still reading most of what comes out every week, but there is so little interest around here that I sometimes lack the motivations to open comment threads. I'm also investing in omnibuses or in the new Epic Collection volumes. Perhaps we should attempt a "book club" sort of thing where everyone in turn suggests a classic issue to read and, a week later, we all comment on it?
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 13:53:16 GMT -5
I agree he would be a valuable asset for the team, after all a magician / sorcerer is always handy and his powers are different enough from Wanda's to make him new and original.
The problem, as it often happened during Bendis' run, was with the execution. Strange was depowered for most of his time with the Avengers, he had lost the title of Sorcerer Supreme to Dr Voodoo and didn't regain it until the very final Bendis issue, following which he seems to have left the group. So all he did provide was the odd illusion / means of escape and little more. Currently he is still part of the Illuminati, but that doesn't mean much as all they do is talking.
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Post by Shiryu on Jan 12, 2014 13:46:07 GMT -5
I may well be mistaken, but I was under the impression that Avengers World #1 is in fact simply a renumbering of the Avengers title, so it's actually Avengers #21 or something? They are separate books, future solicitations list both Avengers World and Avengers, as well as New Avengers, Secret Avengers, Avengers AI, Avengers Assemble, Mighty Avengers and Uncanny Avengers (and some of these are bi-weekly). The only thing that changed is that Avengers is going from bi-weekly to monthly, so Avengers World is basically replacing the second issue, and that Young Avengers is over, for the time being. I'm not particularly bothered by the high number of Avengers titles, but Hickman's storytelling is still unnecessarily involuted and complicated.
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Post by Shiryu on Nov 15, 2013 15:55:52 GMT -5
Yes to all the questions, I liked the first film, but this is a big improvement in terms of action and scope. Except for an hilarious scene with Jane at the restaurant, the first 15 minutes are not very inspired, but then there is what you could call a watershed moment pretty soon and everything improves drastically.
In terms of characters, expect a lot from Thor, Loki, Jane and Frigga. Some nice moments from Heimdall, Sif, Fandral and Volstagg too, not too much from Odin and nothing at all from Hogun. Loki in particular really steals the movie, making up for Malekith being a rather generic villain. There are some good laughs, too, especially in the second half.
Oh, and do stay until the very end of the credits. As you may already know, there are two scenes at the end. The first is by far the more interesting, but the second provides closure nicely.
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Post by Shiryu on Nov 15, 2013 7:03:20 GMT -5
It's been awfully quiet here in these past few weeks, soo has anyone seen the latest Thor film? Comments?
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