Dan Grylls

I'm holding off for now. The series doesn't begin airing here until November, so I've yet to see it for myself. I was going to buy a Batman, but the Zippy-whatsit Batman's right arm with permanent accessory and no elbow bugs me. If/when a suitably on-model basic suit (I hear that unlike previous neon variants, he'll apparently actually wear some of this stuff on the show) Batman pops up, I'll probably get one.

Cable "repaired" Graymalkin and with events that took place in the series, Deadpool also has access to the teleporting device. How could you stop reading the series? It is amazing. Another question. What is the deal with the stats on the back of the Xmen Legends figure set? Since when have Beast and Magneto been stronger then Rogue? I assume they are refearing to physical strength on the stats. Crazy The book just wasn't doing it for me. Not a big Cable fan. Big Deadpool fan, sure, but Nicieza's 'Pool isn't quite up to the standards it would have to be to compensate for the Cable factor. That's just me though. I'm in a distinct minority among 'Pool fans in that I thought Gail Simone's run wasn't all that great, and that the best post-Dead Reckoning stuff was by Priest. ---- I never pay much attention to the stats. The writers of the books certainly don't. I think it was Peter David who once took issue with even the much vaunted Official Handbook strength class system, particularly with how people interpreted Spider-Man's rating (he felt that 10 tons was meant to represent the absolute limit of Spider-Man's feats of strength, the classic "trapped under rubble" scene, where pushing himself to the point where he was doing himself harm, he could just barely lift it enough to get out from under it. Others have since used the figure to justify him lifting such weights routinely). The stuff on the backs of the cards doesn't come from Marvel writers, and there's no guarantee that whoever came up with it has even the slightest clue what they're doing. There's also the fact that the source material tends to be inconsistent about such things, as various writers have different ideas about how to rank characters, and various artists interpret scripts in different ways -- for instance, when told to show a character accomplishing some feat of strength, they might choose to exaggerate it more than the writer intended. If a script says a character lifts a car, one artist might choose to show them straining to lift a Mini, while another might show them casually picking up a big ol' Caddy with one hand. Once that's published, subsequent writers might see that scene as demonstrative of the character's normal strength, and thus write scenes with that in mind. Along comes an artist who then exaggerates that writer's script... Anyways, if I were to rank those three in terms of physical power, then clearly a Rogue with Ms. Marvel strength (which is where she'd be in the Jim Lee era costume the figure uses) is clearly tops, with Beast a distant second (though still significantly stronger than your normal fit human male), and Magneto placing well behind in third. If you include the other two characters in the set, then Wolverine takes third, and Gambit likely fourth, though a case could be made for some versions of Magneto ranking ahead of Gambit.

No, Wade had his own personal teleporter, developed by his pal/tech support/victim, Weasel. The system was in his face-logo belt buckle, and was usually activated with a double tap of the buckle. The energy signature was pink. The range was quite impressive, as he used to routinely teleport between San Francisco and Chicago in what was apparently a single hop (Nightcrawler certainly has nowhere near that range). Once, when accidentally activated within another teleportation portal (aka Doorman), it also acted as a time travel device. Some time ago, however, during the run of his own book, the device was irreparably damaged. Given that Weasel was out of the picture at the time, 'Pool has largely had to make do without teleportation for the past few years (our time, not comic time). I've stopped reading Cable/Deadpool, but skimming an issue today I did note that he now seems to have access of a sort to Cable's old system, and now calls out for a "bodyslide", as Cable did back in the day. --- Wade met Theresa in one of Deadpool's miniseries (not The Circle Chase, the other one, with art by a pre-Uncanny Ian Churchill). Wade fell for her immediately, and they've had a rocky on and off relationship ever since. She appeared sporadically in Deadpool, but never stuck around for more than a two issue stretch. She attended his funeral (he got better), and when she had lost her powers, it was Deadpool who eventually arranged a cure for her (he had to kidnap Wolverine in exchange).

The solicitations for the reoffered wave 1 figures are identical to the original solicitations. That most likely means that, as with the original offering, the info is inaccurate, and only Batman has an interchangeable hand. To the best of my knowledge, all prior rereleases have been identical to the original offering unless it was specifically mentioned that some detail would be altered (various figures have been reoffered in different packaging than prior releases, for instance). A reoffering is just that: the same thing as last time, offered again. --- Alfred is only available in inner and master case assortments. That means most places, you're going to have to get all five figures if you want Alfred. --- They said they wanted to do a parachute with Batman, but I'd judge from the solicitation info that it didn't work out, and he'll be chute-less.

Other than Amiko (a Japanese girl he adopted years back who he then proceeded to ignore except for the occasional guest appearance), I can't think of any. I should note that X-23's origin in the comics has yet to be revealed, and that we've been told that it will not be the same as the cartoon origin. It's possible that the comics version is a daughter, not an altered clone. For those not up to date on X-23, she was created for the X-Men: Evolution cartoon, and is basically Wolverine as a 15 year old girl. Scary, eh? She first appeared in comics in NYX, where she was working as a sort-of prostitute (she apparently didn't have sex with the guys, she just cut them while wearing lingerie... kinky). It looked like more backstory would be forthcoming... but there hasn't been an issue of the book in quite some time, as Quesada was writing it himself and is way behind schedule (the artist, Josh Middleton, got tired of the wait and being blamed for it by fans, and is now DC exclusive). However, Marvel editorial is apparently quite attached to the character, as she'll be appearing in an upcoming arc of Uncanny X-Men (set after her NYX appearances, including those yet unpublished), in Claremont's X-Men: The End, and in her own miniseries early next year.

Invisible Kid and Colossal Boy were scheduled for this week, but to the best of my knowledge aren't yet out. Sept - Contemporary Teen Titans 1 - Robin, Wonder Girl, Deathstroke, Blackfire October - Batman Hush 2 - Catwoman, Harley Quinn, Nightwing, Riddler, Superman November - First Appearance 2 - Green Lantern, Hawkman, Robin, Superman - JLA 2 - Adam Strange, Atom, Elongated Man, Firestorm - JLA 1 rerelease. JLA Superman replaced by the earlier Superman series 1 version, repackaged on a JLA card. December - No figures solicited. With delays, however, I expect that either FA2 or JLA2 will actually end up shipping in December. Also, the Batman Microman figures were solicted this month for a December 8 ship date. --- January - Contemporary Teen Titans 2 - Brother Blood, Kid Flash, Ravager, Superboy February - Justice League Alex Ross 1 - Bizarro, Cheetah, Flash, Sinestro, Superman March - Green Lantern 1 (they call it series 1, despite there being previous GL waves) - Black Hand, Ganthet & Guardian, Hal Jordan, Kilowog, Parallax --- Hush 3 will feature Alfred, Commissioner Gordon, Parachute Batman, Ras Al'Ghul, and Scarecrow. Not yet solicited, but most are guessing at an April release, as the sculpt for Scarecrow has been shown, as well as a partial sculpt of Alfred. First Appearance 3 will be Composite Superman, Contemporary Batgirl, Nightwing, and Riddler. No date announced AFAIK. Possibly May. Crisis on Infinite Earths 1, featuring Earth 2 Robin, Harbinger, Monitor, Psycho Pirate, and Supergirl, is apparently scheduled for June. There will be three JSA waves, at least one of them coming in 2005. The waves will feature 4 Contemporary JSA figs, and one Golden Age JSA fig. My understanding is that the GA figs have been pretty much confirmed as Mr. Terrific, the Atom, and Johnny Thunder and his Thunderbolt. First wave is generally predicted to hit in July. A second Alex Ross wave tentatively includes Batman and Black Canary. If it follows the pattern of the first wave, the other three figures would be villains. Apparently scheduled for October. A second Crisis wave is tentatively set to include Lex Luthor in armour, robot Braniac, Earth 2 Superman, Anti-Monitor, and Flash. ---- Julius Marx has said that there's at least one more new series of as yet unrevealed figures that will be launched in 2005. Nothing's known yet. If it's kept secret like the GL figs were, it could even be the April release, the next one to be solicited (late September).

To the best of my knowledge, the actual attacks of September 11th were never depicted in Marvel comics. The aftermath, with the collapsed towers, was depicted in Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 2, #36 (#477 under volume 1 numbering, which the title has since returned to), as well as in early issues of Captain America, vol. 4 (the current volume, which launched as a Marvel Knights title, and recently shifted back to being a Marvel title. A fifth volume launches in November). No other title dealt with the actual attacks, to the best of my knowledge. For more than a year after the attacks, all Marvel covers bore a small logo depicting the silhouettes of the towers, along with a red, white and blue ribbon. Osama bin Laden, to the best of my knowledge, was never mentioned in any Marvel title. I think Cap did show up in Afghanistan briefly in the MK title, but as I didn't collect the book, I can't check if my memory is correct. Guantánamo has appeared in both Captain America and Captain America & The Falcon. No mention of the current Iraq war comes to mind. There have been references in the past to the previous conflict, with Ultimate X-Men showing that Weapon X was used as an American secret weapon in that conflict, while more recently Supreme Power revealed that Hyperion had a similar role in the conflict. --- In the DC universe, the attacks didn't happen. In part, this may be because the major crossover Our Worlds at War had just come to an end. In that crossover, there was devestation on a much larger scale than in reality. Against such a background, including the attacks would probably have trivialized them. --- SPOILERS FOR THE EXCELLENT WILDSTORM BOOK EX MACHINA AHEAD! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . WildStorm's Signature Line title Ex Machina, written by Brian K. Vaughan (Y: The Last Man, Runaways, Ultimate X-Men) with art by Tony Harris (Starman, Iron Man covers) is about the mayoral term of Mitchell Hundred, mayor of New York, and retired superhero (the first and only superhero of his reality). The stories often flashback to his time as "The Great Machine". The first issue opened with an image of the Great Machine with a jetliner, and closed with Hundred visiting the clean-up at Ground Zero, finally pulling back to reveal that in that reality, the actions of Hundred had prevented the second crash, so that one tower still stands.

How/ when was this revealed? Thanks. Rich Johnston had the real story up possibly before the first issue even shipped. Other people caught on because they remembered the era, or checked their facts, and found that the backstory simply wasn't real. The supposed comic in which Sentry debuted, Startling Stories #1, simply didn't exist. Neither did the artist credited with cocreating the character with Stan Lee (Johnston reported that an earlier version of the idea was to claim the character was a Lee/Kirby creation. That would have been a potentially messy situation, so I can see why they made up an artist instead), Artie Rosen, was an amalgamation of the names of two old Marvel letterers, Artie Simek and Sam Rosen. Wizard played along with Marvel. I'm not sure whether they simply fell for Marvel's story, or if they were in on it, but they did a big article about the history of the character. The Quesada/Lee "conversations" that ran in the back of the issues were a major clue. The first went with the story that Lee had simply forgotten the character (plausible, given that his fuzzy memory is well known, and that he created/co-created so many characters, many of whom only appeared once). Later ones played into elements of the story, where as the Sentry came closer to fully returning, people gradually caught on to the mysterious gaps in records, with Lee claiming to have encountered mysterious and seemingly deliberate gaps in his own records, and so on.

I'll take a look next time I'm in at the shop, and see if they have a copy left.

Strictly speaking, Hound's a different vehicle too: the original was a Mitsubishi jeep, not a Jeep jeep. Still, yes, not as big a departure as a two-door sportscar to a four-door compact sedan.

There's a pretty good chance that it's either undecided yet, the rep doesn't have the info, or both.

There's a decent Legends-scale Carnage from the Spider-Man line already out. A Vulture is a must for a future Spidey wave as well. With Sandman on the way, only he and Mysterio are needed to complete the original Sinister Six (Doc Ock, Kraven, Electro, Sandman, Mysterio, Vulture).

If it was posed it would not be a maquette. Maquettes are supposed to like artists models or something ( I could be wrong). No, you're right. Maquettes are supposed to be 3-d renditions of characters that animators use as references. Don't expect to see cool poses or props (like Cap's flag there on the Cap statue) in a maquette folks, that's not what they're for. There's plenty of Spidey statues around, but only the one maquette so far.

In the first or second issue of Austen's ReLoad run on X-Men (not his run on Uncanny, but the current run on X-Men, formerly New X-Men). I don't have the issue, but if I recall correctly, his powers were interfered with during a fight, causing his eyes to get burned by his glowy pink energy signature. Judging from solicitations, Gambit will continue to be blind in X-Men and Rogue for the next few months at least. However, there's no indication that he'll be blind in his upcoming solo series, in which he wears the current costume (which tells us it's set in the same era, and would seem to indicate they do plan on having him recover eventually).

Huh. Well, we can only speculate. As far as I know, there hasn't been anything saying the adamantium was gone, so we have to assume it's still there. Perhaps they didn't do as good a job as the original Weapon X program or Apocalypse, and left some gaps. Or, and I haven't seen the panel in question so can't tell for myself, perhaps Wolvie aimed really well and shot a claw up through the opening in the base of the skull.

The terms comic, comics, comicbook/comic book, graphic novel, trade paperback (TP, TPB), will get different definitions depending on who you ask, but here's the basics. Comicbooks tend to be relatively short (most monthly books weigh in at around 20-something pages, some of which will be ads. I think most books these days contain 22 pages of story), stapled along the spine, and are published as periodicals (new issues come out at a scheduled interval). Graphic novels are longer works of sequential art (one way of defining comics). They tend to be perfect bound (square bound), and can range greatly in length (200+ pages is not unusual). The term is often used to describe stories collected from a series of comicbooks, but purists prefer to use the term only for original works in long form. Some describe those works as Original Graphic Novels, or OGNs. GNs are generally not published as periodicals. Trade paperback is a publishing industry term for a softbound book that's larger than the pocket-sized mass market paperback that one usually assosciates with the term paperback. The comics industry has adopted the term to refer to softcover collections of stories originally published in comicbook form. TPBs are usually published in the same dimensions as the original comicbooks, but sometimes they're reduced in dimensions. These reduced TPBs are often called digests. The terms TPB, TP, trade paperback, trade, GN, and graphic novel tend to be used interchangeably. --- So basically, the main differences between trades/GNs and comicbooks is length, and that trades and GNs are not periodicals. A wide variety of genres appear in both forms, though in bookstores it's often easier to find the non-superhero stuff than it is in comic shops. Some trade collections will also be altered in content from the original publication, either featuring improvements (recoloured, relettered, etc.) or content alterations (depending on the market, some things are judged to be inappropriate, and thus edited). Some also include extra bonuses, like special features on DVDs, such as samples of sketchbooks, scripts, character designs, etc.

I think I've gone over the topic in general (not specifically dealing with Warren) before in this thread, so you might want to read through to see if it's there. At the time, Warren had his feathered wings back. I don't think he actually appeared at all during that arc, so I can't say for sure what happened to him. However, judging from the effects on Nightcrawler, who turned into a normal looking human (no tail, normal hands and feet, no fangs, no pointy ears), I expect that his wings disappeared for the duration (even though it makes no sense, of course). They probably didn't just physically drop off ("Mr. Worthington, sir, I believe you've dropped something..."), but got reabsorbed into his body. His hollow bones probably filled in as well. Beast also turned into a normal human, but I hesitate to use him as an example for anything, because he's a special case. "Uglies", such as the Morlocks, probably became normal looking humans as well.

I couldn't answer this earlier, as I hadn't gotten around to reading it yet. Now I have, and I'd say that yes, it's post-Ultimates 13. I expect Ultimate Nightmare (Warren Ellis Ultimate mini, featuring characters from Ultimates and Ultimate X-Men) will also be set in a post-13, pre Volume 2 timeframe. Volume 2 I expect will begin in November or December.

The Storm costume IS the Jim Lee look (though, come to think of it, Portacio might actually have designed it). The costume in the books wasn't white, it was either a very glossy black, or possibly a dark metallic look. If you look at Uncanny 281 and X-Men 1, there are several places where it's clearly shown as being darker than things that ARE white, such as Iceman, White Queen's outfit, Storm's hair, etc. The idea that it's white is just another one of those things that results from the limitations of colouring of the era. Other than quibbles about the colour, if you actually look at the other details of the costume, you'll note that it's not merely the X's from the Lee costume, but almost all of the other details as well, though they've chosen to paint gold what was depicted as yellow (though I think that in the comics, yellow actually meant yellow for once there, and not gold, as no attempt was made through inking or colouring to make it look metallic).

Green Goblin, not Hobgoblin. Hobgoblin is pale yellow, and wears orange and blue. Green Goblin is green (shocking!), and wears purple.

Comic and specialty shops.

He didn't use either. The figure, as far as I can tell, is made from an Ultimate MUSCLE fig, with parts from a Mattel Zipline Batman. Both hands are the UM fig's, as are the legs, arms, and torso. It's a cool piece, Spidey, but I wouldn't call it a Year One Batman. There's a few things off-model for a Y1 Batman, the most noticeable being that Y1 Batman didn't have the oval. Good work, anyway.

They haven't announced any further lines following up on the 2 Superman branded waves and the Return of Superman branded wave. They might return to such house-style modern Superman-theme waves at some point, but there doesn't seem to be anything on the radar. It's yet to be announced, but it's pretty certain that there'll be at least one, and possibly two, waves of Jim Lee style Superman figures. It's as yet unknown who'd be in them, but they'd be based on the current Azzarello/Lee arc, which somewhat limits the choices (for instance, Luthor, Lois, Jimmy, Perry and the rest of the usual supporting cast have not appeared and might not appear at all... though I think they'll pop up before the story ends). It's a safe bet that new foe Equus would be in there, as well as Superman himself. Wonder Woman is also set to play a prominent role, so I'd be surprised if they didn't make her. As far as wants for future house-style modern Superman stuff, I'd like to see: 90's Supergirl (Matrix/Linda, as opposed to the Linda figure that they did in the second wave) new Supergirl (Turner designed costume, but not styled after his art) Lois Lane (before they gave her black hair) Lex Luthor (business suit) Superboy (2nd costume) Parasite Electric Superman

DCD cases don't work like, say, Marvel Legends cases. In an ML case, you get 12 figures, with varying numbers of each (usually 4 of one, 3 of one, 2 each of two others, and 1 of the last). In a DC inner case, you get one each of all of the 4 or 5 figures in the wave. A master case is simply two inner cases (thus, two of each). Most retailers aren't going to have a lot of spare Cheetahs to go around (none of the shops around here, for instance, would be likely to order more than a master and an inner, plus whatever individual orders the shop regulars place, which would leave them with at most three to go around, at least one of which they'd make into a package deal for a set. Most of them will probably only end up getting 2 Cheetahs, leaving only one for anyone who doesn't want all of the figures). That Cheetah would otherwise likely be a shelfwarmer is probably the very reason they made her available in case orders only. If you want a Cheetah, your best bet is to order a set, either through your shop via Previews, or online.

I'll be ordering an inner case (one of each fig, including Cheetah, who is only available in inner and master cases: you can't order her individually). My understanding is that the designs are simply Ross's personal interpretations of the characters. No basis in actual storylines, either from old stories or Ross stories. PJ, I expect that Batman and/or Green Lantern will make the cut for the second wave.