Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Lardy's Roundtable (Gym'll's Ed.): Grant Morrison

Agreed on Silver Age JLA!

I will add that what I've read of early X-Men stories feels like Stan blatantly ripping off his own FF vibe with a few new concepts thrown in. Mostly, it was pretty "blah!" and flat by comparison. I think Stan may even have admitted this at some point.

I consider Neal Adams DC to be the 'Transition Period' and Neal Adams Marvel to be Bronze Age.

Neal was so talented that I generally like everything he's ever done. I just reread his very brief Thor run between Kirby & Buscema last summer--FREAKING FANTASTIC!

Neal & Roy on the X-Men is good stuff, and the intro of Lorna and Havok gave the series a shot in the arm, but to be honest, it's never really blown me away as its done many others (namely John Byrne and some other creators). What is incredible is the artwork & layouts, much like the Kirby X-Men issues. The larger storylines and character beats were good (certainly not bad) but nothing mind-blowing and definitely not as good as Roy's Avengers with Buscema or Neal.

Also noteworthy is how short the Neal Adams stuff is. It's only like a few issues. Lorna was actually introduced by Steranko, though Neal helped establish here after. I always expected it to be like a 20 issue run but Adams only did brief stints at Marvel. There is no Neal Adams Marvel equivalent of Deadman.

Kirby's stories are pretty incredible but you can see Stan was kind of getting around to X-Men at the end of the day when deadlines were closing in. The dialogue is never more ridiculous than in the X-Men. Once Jack left, then forget about it: the tension was lessened quite a bit and Stan's dialogue became even more noticeable so it almost felt like Stan's Comedy Hour.

But if you want a really great Silver Age exploration / adventure story, check out the Ka-Zar intro in X-Men #10. It's classic Kirby.

I have to agree as well.

I was very happy when DC published all the Earth-1/Earth-2 crossover stuff in a separate trade series. It meant I didn't have to get the JLA archives.

Yeah, that run wasn't very long, but the stories with Sauron and the Savage Land and Magneto were the very best pre-New X-Men stuff out there.

I think Byrne did a good job following up on those 'lost' stories after Thomas' run and before Claremont's in X-Men: The Hidden Years, IMO. That was the last time I thoroughly enjoyed an X-book. I wish Quesada had let Byrne finish it out.

Reminds me, I know there's tons of Byrne-haters out there, but there was a time when the man could put out a damn fine comic!

Agree on Byrne. His FF remains a high point of the 1980's; his X-Men stuff is legendary for a reason and his Alpha Flight was terrific. Anything he touched for a long time turned to gold: Marvel Two-in-One, Marvel Team-Up, Captain America, etc.

I really liked the Hidden Years as well and that actually would be a great reread: the Adams issues right into the Hidden Years. Canceling that was hugely stupid. I think that was a Bill Jemas decision instead of a Joe Q one. Stupid no matter who signed off on it.

I'm pleased that you enjoyed THY--there's hope for you yet! That was probably about the last good thing Byrne wrote and drew. I also feel he did a good job on the first volume or two of Superman/Batman: Generations. The third edition (IIRC about there bring a third) was too much. Artwise, it was nice to see him drawing Supes again for awhile with Gail Simone writing on Action Comics.

I haven't read his more recent stuff at IDW doing writing and art on Star Trek and Angel titles, so I've no idea if he's resurging or not.

As we mention the 90s on the "Any Recommendations", I'm reminded of how much I enjoyed his work on Next Men. That was some A+ stuff! Dunno whether it ages well or not, as I haven't reread anytime this past decade, but I enjoyed the hell out've that one when it was published!

What I have read of Byrne's IDW Star Trek work has been surprisingly decent - mostly done-in-one straight up sci-fi action stories. Getting away from the Big Two seems to have done him some good.

I've never read any Next Men stuff. Sounds like another thing for me to check out.

I remember liking his Wonder Woman run at times but then it really kind of got into some storylines that just weren't working. This was prior to THY IIRC.

I liked the first two Generations quite a bit.

I also really liked the Stern/Byrne 'First Line' maxi-series for Marvel. I definitely hated the Spider-Man stuff Byrne did at the same time, but the First Line was a pretty groovy series.

I actually liked his run on WW a good bit. Not perfect, and maybe too obsessed with tying up continuity (and confusing it more in the process), but overall fairly entertaining. His and Perez's WW stuff are the only times I've collected a title. May give JMS a shot.

Byrne helped re-establish Artemis as a part of Diana's cast and introduced Cassie. Two major things IMO that have helped Wonder Woman immensely.

This is something that I had a lot of patience for (or just flat out didn't notice as a kid), but that just pisses me off as an adult, characters acting stupid, and, worse, characters acting stupid *and being rewarded for it by having their asses saved anyway by a plot contrivance.*

TV show, movie, novel or comic book, when a protagonist does something just flat-out idiotic, it bugs me. When it's *all they ever do,* and yet they always seem to get miraculously through it, like some modern Inspector Clouseau, bumbling their way into success, I lose interest and walk away.

It's hard to admire a hero when they are written as such imbeciles, sometimes.

(TV is much worse about this. Sylar was probably the only regular cast member on Heroes who wasn't too dumb to live.)

I think you refer to Marvel: The Lost Generation. That one certainly had its moments, but I find it pretty forgettable in the end. It's backwards storytelling and numbering was kinda gimmicky. It didn't suck or anything, just didn't leave any kind of lasting impression. Plus, I doubt Marvel ever referenced anything about it ever again in its continuity.

Yeah, that was it. I'm pretty sure it's never been referenced again and likely won't be for a long time (unless Roger does it himself).

Byrne's major problem artwise is his stuff always looks better when he has an inker embellishing for him like Terry Austin.

Looking it up, I see "First Line" was the name of the super-team featured in M:TLG. See? I couldn't even remember that about it!

Whomever's inking definitely makes a difference on Byrne (really, as it does for anyone). What I feel is that a heavier line is my preference for properly showcasing Byrne's art. To that effect, of course, Austin does that well, but I've seen many examples of Byrne inking himself that have looked terrific. IIRC, good examples of this are Next Men and Generations. A light, thin line doesn't really make his stuff look as attractive as the thicker line. (I'm no art critic, so I hope that makes sense.)

Never read Byrne's WW, but I have read Phil Jimenez's WW, and I like it a whole bunch. The campiness and the heavy ornamentation actually worked very well for WW in my opinion, and he went a long way towards re-establishing my beloved Donna Troy as a serious contender. I will agree with the criticisms that Jimenez was a bit verbose, but so was Chris Claremont, even in his prime! What do you guys think of Jimenez's WW?

P.S. If anyone hasn't yet read Jimenez's 1996 Tempest mini-series, I urge you to. It's powerful and heartbreaking, and at the time it was an oasis of goodness in a mostly terrible year for superhero comics.

I've long been a big fan of Jimenez and his Perez-like style. I can't really recall the first time I stood up and took notice of his work, but it may have been the really cool issue of Guy Gardner where he opens Warriors and just about every DC hero guest-stars.

The Tempest mini was indeed incredible, and I know PAD had a big hand in it. I consider it the defining moment of turning corny Aqualad into the force that was Tempest, with awesome magical based powers, a great costume (such a simple solution to take Aquaman's 80's costume and add Aqualad's colors--classic Phil), and provide a really great connection to Atlan and Arthur's larger mythos. High recommendation and a must-read for fans of the Atlantis Chronicles and PAD's Aquaman mythos.

I also liked his WW run--probably a little less than I did Byrne's run, but still a solid read and worth collecting. There were many criticisms against it and some I understood but most I felt were nit-picking. One of the things Phil did with WW is he made it a point to amp up WW's rogues gallery which is something that has been needed since the 1950's. He brought back a few classic Golden Age villains as well as some more recent ones and it just added a sense of awesome.

Wonder Woman is kind of funny: three solid runs in the past 15 years were Byrne, Jimenez and Rucka. None of the three IMO were ground-breaking and knock-you-on-the-floor incredible, but all three were really good in their own right and I think certainly worth buying.

Who was the artist on Phil's WW? I remember loving the artwork.

Wow. I never knew that PAD had a big hand in Jimenez's Tempest mini-series. No wonder it was so good (ah, for the days when PAD could do no wrong.) Thanks for that bit of info, Cobie.

Agree about Jimenez amping up WW's rogues gallery. He did the best Circe ever (even remniscent a bit of my beloved MU's Sersi.)

The artist on Jimenez's WW run was Jimenez himself, except for a couple issues drawn by Roy Allan Martinez IIRC.

Bevis, Jerry, and other hardcore WW fans, if you're reading this, I'd love to know your thoughts on Jimenez's WW.

Letdowns- Anything with the word 'Defenders' on it after the original series ended.

- The Black Orchid series (a happy note-- apparently all the DCU characters once said to be unavailable to new story usage due to their Vertigo ties are now free for regular DCU writers to use them... that means Swamp Thing, Orchid, Shade, etc. will likely be appearing in issues of ACTION, JUSTICE LEAGUE, BRAVE AND BOLD, etc. soon)

- COUNTDOWN... aside from general crappiness (though there were a couple of good issues in there), that series took several characters I loved and just wasted them. Aside from Donna and Jason Todd, are any of the characters currently being used? No. They're in toxic fume fadeout limbo.

- TEEN TITANS... letdown should be part of the title there's been so many disappointments with this series. And I'm just thinking of the current run. Ever since Johns left, it's been one letdown after another.

Wow. The Vertigo characters have finally been set free? Awesome. Dare I hope that Hector and Lyta might come back?

IMO, Teen Titans' decline started even before Johns left. The time travel arc was the last one I liked (tellingly, it was after that one that Mike McKone left.)

I can see that, but at least there was a general direction still in place then.

That's true. Teen Titans has definitely been a book in search of an identity since the point where Johns left.

I have been re-reading Next Men with the IDW Hardcovers and would say that by and large the story has aged pretty well. The art however looked very good in the first book that was A4 size but the second collection is in Absolute size which is imo an enlargement too far especially as the story progresses and Byrne draws fewer and fewer backgrounds. Still a darn good read though.

Would also agree that The Hidden Years was a fine series ended before its time as was, from my recollection, his Spider Woman series of the same time.

Nice to hear, stew! Byrne was my favorite creator in comics for a long time and the first creator whose art and style I first noticed and recognized. Next Men was such good stuff and Byrne's profile so high that I find it hard to believe he couldn't continue it with such a rock-solid company like Dark Horse. Maybe the reality is that he either lost interest or, more likely, wanted the bigger paychecks the Big Two could give him.

I know Byrne's a much-loathed creator, but I'll never discount all the terrific comics he wrote and drew that helped make me the comic fan I am today.If he's got a comeback in him, I for one would welcome it.