Lament of the Comic Nerd

This is probably the angriest I've ever been after coming home from my weekly trip to the comic shop.

Normally I come home looking forward to diving into one of my favorite books, but not so much this week. I'm home empty handed. There was not a single thing out this week that was worth my time and money. Why?

Let's start with Captain America: The Chosen #1. This is the story about the last days of Captain America and is supposed to be like the Spider-man: Reign mini-series which was supposed to be like The Dark Knight Returns. There's a huge flaw with this book and that happens to be its timing. It comes out months after Captain America was killed off in a way that is nothing like this book. "Captain America is dead! But here's another way it could have happened..." No thanks. Any weight the story may have had is gone thanks to the whole 'killing off a dead character' angle.

Next we have the beginning of the end of J. Micheal Straczynski's way too long run on Amazing Spider-Man with Amazing Spider-Man #544. Sure his run started out good and for a while featured the awesome art of John Romita Jr. but fell off pretty quickly due to his seemly stubborn refusal to use classic Spider-Man villains in a way that didn't involve them sleeping with the long dead Gwen Stacy. Now we have poor old Aunt May on her death bed since Civil War and Peter Parker's been crying ever since. Her death has been dragged on for months and any impact it may have had was scraped off miles back up the road. Not only that but this whole "One More Day" story has been hyped for so long I feel like I've already read the damn thing. Guess what? Apparently Peter and Mary Jane won't be a couple anymore or whatever. Marvel chose to use the ends this "event" is supposed to accomplish as a way of promoting it thus removing the point of telling the story. I'm just looking forward to the next arc which will be JMS-free and may actually feature some of the witty banter and awesome villains that makes reading Spidey worth while. Oh and one more thing. Joe Quesada is a douche-bag. He's the one drawing "One More Day" and while he is a great artist and decent Editor-in-Chief of Marvel Comics, that little "Still Only $3.99!" tag he slapped on his cover is not in the least bit funny. "This issue is over-priced! Isn't that a stitch?" Must be hilarious to the folks collecting the dough but it's a slap in the face to those on the other side of the equation.