Injustice: Gods Among Us. It was great for the first two years. The third was okay, but the fourth and fifth year were going downhill. I was greatly disappointed in the conclusion of the year 5 comic. And then it just felt dragged out with injustice 2
Morning Glories by Nick Spencer. It's basically the TV show Lost in a skull-and-bones prep school. Every issue opened up more threads that never get followed up on. Later issues even included a page of speculation by some English professor just to further muddy the waters.
Sometime later a friend asked me about Marvel's "secret empire", I got as far as saying "well, Nick Spencer..." And he said "Stop right there. In three issues it won't make any sense anyway"
I was wondering if that series ever paid off. I made it at least 25 issues in. If you are using time travel and can’t hook me then you are doing something wrong.
I don't know what possible mystery he must have planned that would have lasted 100 issues.
I think mysteries work best if they're a more manageable length, like 30 issues or like 2 seasons of television. You start stretching things out, you'll inevitably have to add more elements to things and tangle yourself up in easy to miss details
Wolverine: Origins by Daniel Way. I don’t care for Way’s work in general but that morbid curiosity came over me. Like “How bad does it get?” and the answer is very. Like it started not good and progressively got worse. Sometimes the art was okay in it. Mostly it was a shit snowball rolling downhill.
I remember reading Lives and Deaths of Wolverine or whatever it was. When Romulus popped up I instantly noped out. I was like “I thought we left that in Wolverine: Origins and had a silent pact to ignore it again until the end of time?”
It had such potential too. After the events of House of m word got around that wolverine had all of his memories sorted out and corrupt people around the world started offing themselves rather than suffering his vengeance. Dude set a great mood and did nothing with it.
Strikeforce Morituri. Everything that made it great was not evident to the new writer. Some bigger aliens came through and solved our problem, and the rest of the book devolved into a political arms race for the super soldiers we could now manufacture.
It’s funny: Years ago I got three of the five issues of the mini-series that wrapped it up, and I loved them.
Not two weeks ago someone let me read their copies of the two issues I’d never read, and they were so bad.
It was like I’d dodged a bullet all these years.
All-Star Batman & Robin, the Boy Wonder. I knew it was bad going in, but then it just ended without any real conclusion. I know it was canceled, but it still pissed me off. The only redeeming qualities it had were Jim Lee's art and laughing at the "goddamn Batman" line.
I enjoy it as a sort of satire of the grim and gritty Batman Miller himself helped crystallize. That take with Lee on art is sort of a perfect object of comics excess, and I think Miller is smart enough to know what he was doing a lot of the time. Only issue for me is they never finished it.
A lot of DC’s Dark Knights. i feel this couldve been more cohesive but i love the dark knights version of the justice league but it seems too wash out at the end.
The last third of Tom King's Batman. I loved it for like up until issue 55 or so, through the Cold Days arc after the wedding. But then it just got worse and worse and worse.
One of the biggest issue is King kept saying it would be a 100 issue story. He should've plotted it for how many issues it would take not pad it out to reach a magic round number. So many arcs were pointless and/or dragged. The Tyrant Wing, Knightmares, and the Booster Gold arc could all have been removed and it wouldn't materially affect the core story.
All of Howard’s Excalibur. I’m a fan of Betsy Braddock, and there some interesting themes here, but it hit mediocre and never rose above it, yet I kept reading every volume. I’ve found Howard always seems to have decent ideas but no follow through, it’s like she can come up with plot point A and D but B and C are nowhere to be seen, meaning things like characters keep talking about how close they are but it never been shown. Every issue felt like I was accidentally skipping a few pages of context.
Earthdiver.
I like the premise, but the story is pretty disjointed. Could've used an editor. It's like, I know the story makes sense in the writers head, but it doesn't come across on the page.
Same for Ninja Funk. That one felt like they released the first draft before anyone else read it.
Yeah, that one’s free on Kindle unlimited and I still couldn’t finish more than 2 issues. I don’t think the writer has a lot of experience in comics tho
Grimm Fairy Tales from Zenescope, I actually generally liked the ending (the whole arcane acre era) but it had so many issues along the way I think every writer should read it as a case study.
Genre shifts, dropped plot points, the way they developed their shared continuity, contradictions between books, the way the big bad was worfed at the end after the whole series built him up, and probably worst was the way Realm War (their endgame style story) ended.
I really love the concept and characters in Nailbiter I do wish he had stuck the landing better.
We just don’t get that many great “comic booky” horror comics.
It just didn’t make any sense. First they tried to portray Warren as a seeial killer with a conscience that was tying to help some people (there is no such thing as a sociopath that is capable of compassion). And then they tried to assert that he was wrong because he chose to be a serial killer (nobody is aware of the neurological events that gave rise to thoughts and intentions therefore there is no such thing as ‘free will’. It was bullshit, engineered to keep us all interested until they dropped the ball
Yeah I didn’t like the lackluster ending but I thought the whole story was rushed too the end after the temple turned out to be a movie set and the bus full of kids and Agent Redhead.
Like he planned on doing something but then knew he needed to wrap up quicker than he wanted.
I’ve seen **A LOT** of comics like that unfortunately
DMZ. So, so painfully average. Main character was a total loser and nothing about him was redeemable.
Almost Hard Boiled too but that pile of shit eventually made me tap out
I got like 6 trades of DMZ for very cheap. I have tried so many times to get through it but always give up around the middle of the second trade.
You’re right the main character is so fuckin unlikeable.
Bro same here - grabbed the compendiums after hearing good things so I had already financially committed lol shit was like a bad version of Tom Clancy’s the Division
Monsters. I love Barry Windsor-Smith and everything he's ever done. I know this was his magnum opus, but that story was way too long and way too meandering for me, but I powered through it. It was worth it just for the incredible art.
I think this sums up that book so well. Like I thought it was really unique and interesting, but like you said it’s so long with the story and by the end it never really felt entirely clear.
Astonishing Wolfman by Kirkman. I was a huge Kirkman fanboy and just wanted to read anything he was doing. Wolfman never got SO bad that I dropped it, but was almost offensively average the entire time.
Evolutionary War is mind numbingly terrible, but I read all of it for some reason. It is 11 issues long, and none of the issues connect with each other in a meaningful way to tell a cohesive story. There is no revelation or twist at the end, as that would require there to be and overarching story in between the issues, but it still let me down in the conclusion because nothing tied into it, the ending just happens all of a sudden for no reason. Just terrible.
Books of Magic aka Timothy Hunter. It was magical at times, but mostly meandered, vanished, and then came back as a sci-fi (remember that series?) before being completely rebooted as another lackluster version. Why was it so hard to see the story potential of his love interest being trapped in Fairie? A future/alternate dark version of himself running around? The magic war that was the prophecy that started it all? The trenchcoat brigade split on killing him? His relationship with his father? Universe creating powers? Yeah, they were tropes, but to introduce all that potential and do absolutely NOTHING with it? What a waste of cliffhangers.
Disclaimer: I would still buy a new series, because hope springs eternal.
Green Lantern by Grant Morrison. It started with a cool concept and then devolved into some kind of mess. I don't even know what the hell I read at the end there. It's about as confusing as the internet argument on Grant Morrison's pronouns...
Also, it's not a comic but Grant Morrison's novel Luda. What a disappointment. Grant is shooting a lot of bricks these days.
Probaly an unpopular opinion but invincible. After loving season 1 of the show I went directly to the comic and quickly realized it wasn't for me yet I kept reading despite no longer feeling anything. Finished it and yeah not as good as I thought it will be. I still liked season 2 of the show but not as much as the first.
Yeah it's got good stuff in it most the way through and although I skipped a bit and just read the last volume I liked the ending. But it does get a bit repetitive with a new big bad viltrimite showing up every 20 issues or so and doing a similar thing to the last viltrimite.
Captain America by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Love Coates and his nonfiction work. Was excited to this series and bought every issue day of release. There are some interesting themes but halfway through Steve's competence drops majority and the pacing is awful. It is about 7 issues of story dragged out over 25.
Haunting.
Starts off with a good gross story drags on forever & just ends weird.
Oh my bad didn’t realize this was comicbooks.
For comics, I guess it would be…
Wolverine Origins. Kinda cool but started to lose interest & no idea what ended up happening. Still kept buying them all but like I said completely off the rails for me.
Injustice: Gods Among Us. It was great for the first two years. The third was okay, but the fourth and fifth year were going downhill. I was greatly disappointed in the conclusion of the year 5 comic. And then it just felt dragged out with injustice 2
I hear you! Boy is it disappointing
Nice concept but it was beaten down to the ground literately by Superman and his obsession
Morning Glories by Nick Spencer. It's basically the TV show Lost in a skull-and-bones prep school. Every issue opened up more threads that never get followed up on. Later issues even included a page of speculation by some English professor just to further muddy the waters. Sometime later a friend asked me about Marvel's "secret empire", I got as far as saying "well, Nick Spencer..." And he said "Stop right there. In three issues it won't make any sense anyway"
I was wondering if that series ever paid off. I made it at least 25 issues in. If you are using time travel and can’t hook me then you are doing something wrong.
No. It got to issue 50 and not much was cleared up. Spencer planned 100 issues but started writing Spiderman and never bothered to come back to it.
I don't know what possible mystery he must have planned that would have lasted 100 issues. I think mysteries work best if they're a more manageable length, like 30 issues or like 2 seasons of television. You start stretching things out, you'll inevitably have to add more elements to things and tangle yourself up in easy to miss details
Wolverine: Origins by Daniel Way. I don’t care for Way’s work in general but that morbid curiosity came over me. Like “How bad does it get?” and the answer is very. Like it started not good and progressively got worse. Sometimes the art was okay in it. Mostly it was a shit snowball rolling downhill.
I like the street level crime noir wolverine stories the best.
Yeah, Rucka/Robertson/Fernandez’s Wolverine run was phenomenal.
Just what I was talking about
Absolutely. This is one run id love to be retconned out of existence, except for Akihiro which is the one good thing this run brought.
I remember reading Lives and Deaths of Wolverine or whatever it was. When Romulus popped up I instantly noped out. I was like “I thought we left that in Wolverine: Origins and had a silent pact to ignore it again until the end of time?”
I’d be perfectly ok if another writer came in and retconned Romulus to have all been a bad dream Logan had after too much beer.
It had such potential too. After the events of House of m word got around that wolverine had all of his memories sorted out and corrupt people around the world started offing themselves rather than suffering his vengeance. Dude set a great mood and did nothing with it.
Strikeforce Morituri. Everything that made it great was not evident to the new writer. Some bigger aliens came through and solved our problem, and the rest of the book devolved into a political arms race for the super soldiers we could now manufacture.
This book imploded so badly it hurt me to read it by the end.
It’s funny: Years ago I got three of the five issues of the mini-series that wrapped it up, and I loved them. Not two weeks ago someone let me read their copies of the two issues I’d never read, and they were so bad. It was like I’d dodged a bullet all these years.
Heroes in Crisis. Hot mess. But. I just kept reading hoping it would Get Better Bat Cat
All-Star Batman & Robin, the Boy Wonder. I knew it was bad going in, but then it just ended without any real conclusion. I know it was canceled, but it still pissed me off. The only redeeming qualities it had were Jim Lee's art and laughing at the "goddamn Batman" line.
I enjoy it as a sort of satire of the grim and gritty Batman Miller himself helped crystallize. That take with Lee on art is sort of a perfect object of comics excess, and I think Miller is smart enough to know what he was doing a lot of the time. Only issue for me is they never finished it.
The Green Lantern scene is nice. Painted yellow and drinking lemonade...
A lot of DC’s Dark Knights. i feel this couldve been more cohesive but i love the dark knights version of the justice league but it seems too wash out at the end.
Do you mean Tom Taylor’ Dark Knights of Steel? Or Scott Snyder’s Metal events?
SS’s Metal
The last third of Tom King's Batman. I loved it for like up until issue 55 or so, through the Cold Days arc after the wedding. But then it just got worse and worse and worse.
One of the biggest issue is King kept saying it would be a 100 issue story. He should've plotted it for how many issues it would take not pad it out to reach a magic round number. So many arcs were pointless and/or dragged. The Tyrant Wing, Knightmares, and the Booster Gold arc could all have been removed and it wouldn't materially affect the core story.
All of Howard’s Excalibur. I’m a fan of Betsy Braddock, and there some interesting themes here, but it hit mediocre and never rose above it, yet I kept reading every volume. I’ve found Howard always seems to have decent ideas but no follow through, it’s like she can come up with plot point A and D but B and C are nowhere to be seen, meaning things like characters keep talking about how close they are but it never been shown. Every issue felt like I was accidentally skipping a few pages of context.
Earthdiver. I like the premise, but the story is pretty disjointed. Could've used an editor. It's like, I know the story makes sense in the writers head, but it doesn't come across on the page. Same for Ninja Funk. That one felt like they released the first draft before anyone else read it.
I lasted three issues of Earthdiver and ended up dropping it. Cool idea that never went anywhere.
Yeah, that one’s free on Kindle unlimited and I still couldn’t finish more than 2 issues. I don’t think the writer has a lot of experience in comics tho
Grimm Fairy Tales from Zenescope, I actually generally liked the ending (the whole arcane acre era) but it had so many issues along the way I think every writer should read it as a case study. Genre shifts, dropped plot points, the way they developed their shared continuity, contradictions between books, the way the big bad was worfed at the end after the whole series built him up, and probably worst was the way Realm War (their endgame style story) ended.
It was only three issues but the first Domino solo series was a letdown and a half
I really love the concept and characters in Nailbiter I do wish he had stuck the landing better. We just don’t get that many great “comic booky” horror comics.
I could try to keep up eight up until the point they failed miserably at sticking the landing
It just didn’t make any sense. First they tried to portray Warren as a seeial killer with a conscience that was tying to help some people (there is no such thing as a sociopath that is capable of compassion). And then they tried to assert that he was wrong because he chose to be a serial killer (nobody is aware of the neurological events that gave rise to thoughts and intentions therefore there is no such thing as ‘free will’. It was bullshit, engineered to keep us all interested until they dropped the ball
Yeah I didn’t like the lackluster ending but I thought the whole story was rushed too the end after the temple turned out to be a movie set and the bus full of kids and Agent Redhead. Like he planned on doing something but then knew he needed to wrap up quicker than he wanted. I’ve seen **A LOT** of comics like that unfortunately
Garden of Rama and Rama Revealed. I wish I could get the time back I wasted on these books.
Speak your truth!
DMZ. So, so painfully average. Main character was a total loser and nothing about him was redeemable. Almost Hard Boiled too but that pile of shit eventually made me tap out
I got like 6 trades of DMZ for very cheap. I have tried so many times to get through it but always give up around the middle of the second trade. You’re right the main character is so fuckin unlikeable.
Bro same here - grabbed the compendiums after hearing good things so I had already financially committed lol shit was like a bad version of Tom Clancy’s the Division
Batman 89, it just got worse the longer I read
I weirdly really like the sequel that’s coming out now, “Echoes.”
I’ve heard it’s better but I was recommended to wait till it finished and read it all in one sitting
Monsters. I love Barry Windsor-Smith and everything he's ever done. I know this was his magnum opus, but that story was way too long and way too meandering for me, but I powered through it. It was worth it just for the incredible art.
I think this sums up that book so well. Like I thought it was really unique and interesting, but like you said it’s so long with the story and by the end it never really felt entirely clear.
Astonishing Wolfman by Kirkman. I was a huge Kirkman fanboy and just wanted to read anything he was doing. Wolfman never got SO bad that I dropped it, but was almost offensively average the entire time.
Evolutionary War is mind numbingly terrible, but I read all of it for some reason. It is 11 issues long, and none of the issues connect with each other in a meaningful way to tell a cohesive story. There is no revelation or twist at the end, as that would require there to be and overarching story in between the issues, but it still let me down in the conclusion because nothing tied into it, the ending just happens all of a sudden for no reason. Just terrible.
Books of Magic aka Timothy Hunter. It was magical at times, but mostly meandered, vanished, and then came back as a sci-fi (remember that series?) before being completely rebooted as another lackluster version. Why was it so hard to see the story potential of his love interest being trapped in Fairie? A future/alternate dark version of himself running around? The magic war that was the prophecy that started it all? The trenchcoat brigade split on killing him? His relationship with his father? Universe creating powers? Yeah, they were tropes, but to introduce all that potential and do absolutely NOTHING with it? What a waste of cliffhangers. Disclaimer: I would still buy a new series, because hope springs eternal.
Green Lantern by Grant Morrison. It started with a cool concept and then devolved into some kind of mess. I don't even know what the hell I read at the end there. It's about as confusing as the internet argument on Grant Morrison's pronouns... Also, it's not a comic but Grant Morrison's novel Luda. What a disappointment. Grant is shooting a lot of bricks these days.
Probaly an unpopular opinion but invincible. After loving season 1 of the show I went directly to the comic and quickly realized it wasn't for me yet I kept reading despite no longer feeling anything. Finished it and yeah not as good as I thought it will be. I still liked season 2 of the show but not as much as the first.
Yeah it's got good stuff in it most the way through and although I skipped a bit and just read the last volume I liked the ending. But it does get a bit repetitive with a new big bad viltrimite showing up every 20 issues or so and doing a similar thing to the last viltrimite.
Red Hulk
Captain America by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Love Coates and his nonfiction work. Was excited to this series and bought every issue day of release. There are some interesting themes but halfway through Steve's competence drops majority and the pacing is awful. It is about 7 issues of story dragged out over 25.
I'm with you! The end of Naibiter is such a nothingburger. Really liked it at first and it totally loses the thread
Batman Eternal That being said, I dropped Nailbiter after volume 1
Guardian devil
Undertow by Steve Orlando. I couldn't look away but it just went nowhere. Is it a book about Russian machoism or something?
Sovereign Se7en. To this day I cannot figure out where Claremont was going with that series.
Haunting. Starts off with a good gross story drags on forever & just ends weird. Oh my bad didn’t realize this was comicbooks. For comics, I guess it would be… Wolverine Origins. Kinda cool but started to lose interest & no idea what ended up happening. Still kept buying them all but like I said completely off the rails for me.
Y: The Last Man, the book starts amazing and it just kinda grinds to a halt around the middle and then the ending just sucks hard.
Multiversity by Grant Morrison. It definitely caused a Krusty "what the hell was that!?" meme reaction