snap judgments

Ever just wanted to pick up a book with the people on the cover on the inside of the book?  I mean, you pick up a book called ‘New Avengers’ and sort expect to see… well, AVENGERS.

Not so this issue.

I will say this, Jim CHeung’s artwork is really great.  Every Skrull he draws has a unique personality and appearance that stays within the bounds of how we’ve seen our little green men in the past and some of the bigger space epic shots have a great layout and sense of scope.  Like the Mighty Avengers issue that came before it, the artwork can not be denied.

The story isn’t that bad either: the reason why the Skrull are still able to muster up this big invasion after the events of Annihilation are due in part to New Avengers: Illuminati #1, as the Skrulls obtained some genetic samples from the most powerful men in the Marvel Universe and reverse engineer their powers and genetics.  Okay, this gets them a big boost in the Super Skrull program that allows them to xerox any combo of powers that the Skrulls can find a genetic sample of, not to mention bypass all the previous forms of Skrull detection by essentially becoming human in mind and body.

The other part of the equation is some sort of prophecy war, which a very pretty young royal woman takes her followers before the Skrull King and pleads for him to listen to the ancient foretelling of a great wave that will totally kick their ass in an six-issue mini-series.  The King says ‘Bah!’, exiles her prettiness to some place far away so that she avoids Annihilation and comes back and better than ever now to finish the prophecy by conquering Earth.

Ehn.  Now, there’s a reason I have a problem with this.  It seems kind of silly that there’s a character who knew about the Annihilation wave that was conveniently dismissed and exiled and still lives and now totally kicks ass and has the biggest advantage right now and who wants to personally infiltrate the Marvel Universe and lead her people in this really… well, Mary-Sue like fashion.  I don’t see her flaws, I don’t see her viscious conquest, it’s all done out of this sense of destiny and … yeah.  It irks me.

And yes, she decides that the best form to infiltrate Earth in is MY PERSONAL HERO, Spider-Woman.

So maybe it’s my vicious reverse-Bendis Spider-Woman distaste.

All you need to know?  The Skrulls can’t lose.  But you know they will.

And Spider-Woman needs to be a secret counter-agent for the Kree and she may just Yahtzee.

Da-na, da-na-na, da-nanananana, da-na-na.

This afternoon, when I came into work, I created this sign out of a used back board:

I created this sign because I could pretty much call how my day was going to go:

Customer: Have you seen Iron Man yet?
Me: Yes!
Customer: Is… is it any good?

I’ve had to go through this with every single comic movie that’s hit the screen, throwing in Star Wars prequels to boot. That hesitant fear of a bad movie of four-color caliber causes customers to cower at the counter and now I’m just alliterating for the heck of it. But no, this is serious, as serious as I have had to answer the question before people even saw the sign.

This fear is not unfounded. We remember the Schumaker Batman flicks with guilt and remorse. The Hulk movie had me in denial for years until an intervention was staged to show me the truth, that the movie is darned well near unwatchable. So looking to others to see if it’s safe is a perfectly rational reaction, especially for Metro considering the store manager is a film studies major.

I also think we look to sources of authority to ensure that the film is true, people who know comics who can call a spade a spade, if you will. If the comic fans don’t like it, well then. Tear up your tickets! This morning on the radio the three disc jockies, self-admittedly out of the loop when it comes to the funnybooks, had to ask their regular movie reviewer if the ‘nerds’ would approve of how close Iron Man stuck to the source material. Even non-comic fans know our word is law on these kinds of things.

So I understand your reticence. I understand the fears and anxieties. But for the love of new super-computer Jarvis:

Please stop asking me.

Conquer your fears. See the movie for yourself and ride the rollercoaster of comic movie acceptance.

For the record? The Iron Man movie just so happens to be THE best comic movie I have had the pleasure of seeing. Mind you, I’m saying this still riding the incredible high of seeing it for the first time, so my snap judgment is just that: WHEE! Tonight, I see it again (this time getting the full effect as I had to cut out before the end (AND YES I KNOW ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS AT THE END OF THE CREDITS!) to go hand out flyers for Free Comic Book Day at Metro, so we’ll see what viewing #2 does to the ol’ brain pan.

Maybe I’ll be more objective. Maybe I’ll still want to declare it a modern masterpiece that thrills me to no end that Marvel has their own studios now. We shall see.

And so should you.