Bottom of the Pile: Apr. 1, 2015

If I'd known this week would be so short, I would've done it ages ago.   This isn't being done out of necessity to catch up--I looked and this was just a really, really light week for me.   Ah well.  Onwards!

Amazing Spider-Man

As much as I love Spider-Gwen and Silk, Anna Maria might be the best female character from this Dan Slott-era of Spider-Man.   I mean, the woman manages to be the heart for SpOck and a great foil for the real Peter?    It's great, and I hope she continues to have a presence in AMS, at least until Slott finally calls it quits.

Avengers

Though I knew it was always headed that way, I do hate how they've gone back to the same Civil War well of needing a scapegoat.  And I hate even more that it has to be my boy Tony Stark, who just recovered from the silliness of CW only a few years ago.

And, more importantly...I notice Tony's still wearing the Superior armor, and that's cool, but...did anyone ever fix what happened to him during Axis, or was he still an Inverted jerk-slash-crappy business man.

Batman Eternal

Welp.  It took fifty-two issues, during which time we ran the gamut for possible masterminds behind the threat in this book, saw the introduction of the most Mary Sue Bat-person yet in Harper Row, and had one of the corniest endings to a Bat-comic since the Silver Age ended...but it was all worth it for these two panels.  The first* meeting of Tim Drake (Red Robin) and Stephanie Brown (Spoiler), my favorite comic book couple.

*Yes, the "first".  The next editor/writer who tells you that the "New 52 era" isn't a reboot?  Kick them in the junk for lying so overtly to your face like that. 

Convergence

If nothing else good comes of DC's latest little mini-event Convergence, we'll at least have these gorgeous Ethan van Sciver M.C. Escher-esque multiversal mash-ups.   Obviously I can't show it at full size, but I'm pretty sure right-click solves that?

Spider-Gwen

Nope, she certainly isn't a crminal, Gwen.  Though she seems to have caught the same "can't keep my secret identity a secret" virus that Miles Morales has.  Someone should really see to that.

Also as a sidenote.  Now that Vulture is done, I think it might behoove the writers if they were to create some other actual heroes for this universe.  Matt Murdock's a villain, the Punisher's a dick--there have to be SOME good people here, though?

New 52: Futures End

Wait, no fucking....dude, no way.    This is the last page?!   Who the fuck thought that was a good idea?!  So we spent 48 issues to go in a fucking circle?!   I was so excited to read Batman Beyond when I thought Tim Drake would be in the future, underneath the mask.   But now you're telling me it's not in the typical Beyond future, but another nightmarish universe where the vastly overused Brother Eye is in control?    No.  No fucking thank you.   I followed Future's End along even when I dropped World's End, because it felt like a (far weaker) version of 52, and that felt nice.   Almost comforting, after the ridiculous changes made to my favorite fictional universe over the past four years.

But then they decided to rip a year's worth of storytelling to pieces in order to satisfy an easily changed story idea?   I reiterate: No fucking thank you.

Author's Note: Bottom of the Pile is a weekly column (or at least, my attempt at said) in which I cover the comics that found their way to the bottom of my reading stack, thus being the "best".   Since bog standard reviews can be found literally anywhere, coverage here can range from mini-reviews to funny comments to commentary on a creator's run or comics as a whole, depending on a wide range of factors including the comic itself, the amount of time I have, and my general mood.