Cancelled Comics Commentary for 2012
January 2012
Dungeons & Dragons #16 (IDW):
the famous RPG on boards, rolling dice and paper notes co-created by
Gary Gygax in 1974, it went on to spawn various spinoff board games
(most notably Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms),
novels, toys, video games, and even comics, beginning in 1988 with
DC's adaptations that were even titled Advanced D&D, after the
special edition they'd launched at the time. Those adaptations ended
in 1991, and it took until the late 2000s before anybody thought of
seriously trying it again in comicdom. But when they did, it was
pretty successful, and didn't actually end with this volume, as
there's been a few more miniseries coming after this, including a
few drawing from the novelizations author R.A. Salvatore's known
for. Mostly depicting a group of adventurers trying to defeat all
sorts of evil warmongers threatening the kingdoms they live in. And
let me note that, if written and illustrated well, that's why these
are among the products I'm willing to read these days, given how
terrible DC/Marvel have become.
February-April 2012
Nothing I know of just now to speak of. And in this dire age, that
shouldn't be surprising.
May 2012
Daken: Dark Wolverine #23 (Marvel): a perfect example of how
Marvel was grossly overdoing it with villains, this starred a
crooked son of Logan named Daken, who was also a member of Dark
Avengers (a grave misuse of the Avengers franchise), which in turn
spun out of the Dark Reign "event". As if that weren't bad enough,
he was even portrayed as bisexual, as if that was truly necessary,
even for a purported baddie. His real name was Akihiro, in yet
another example of just giving a character a single name not unlike
Logan for Wolverine. And the premise did nothing to ensure this
character would ever find popularity with a still dwindling
audience.
X-23 #21 (Marvel): a series starring a girl who may or may
not have been established as Wolverine's daughter, subject of an
adamantium experiment similar to what he underwent. And all in a
series which went nowhere. Her name was Laura Kinney, and she had
pop-up claws just like Logan's. She had originally been created in
2000 for the X-Men: Evolution cartoon series (by Craig Kyle
and Christopher Yost) before being incorporated into the MCU proper,
not unlike Firestar/Angelica Jones, who originally appeared in Spider-Man
and his Amazing Friends in 1981 before being merged into the
MCU 4 years later. Lack of good writing only ensured that X-23 would
not last long as a solo book.
June 2012
Mister Terrific #8 (DC): an early mess from the "New 52",
which DC spent at least 4 years labeling on their covers, it starred
the new Mister Terrific, Michael Holt, changed considerably from the
previous continuity (which, lest we forget, fell apart pretty
quickly). And what scuttled this series soon after it debuted was a
storyline where Republicans are attacked as anti-science. As if
Democrats couldn't be the same. That's the New Left-wing 52 for you,
I guess.
All that aside, I sometimes wonder if Holt was ever handled well to
begin with since his debut in the late 1990s. I've long concluded
the JSA series was overrated, and another product of a mindset that
relies on far too much nostalgia coupled with phony character drama.
July 2012
Thunderbolts #174 (Marvel): not quite cancelled, as the title
would be changed to Dark Avengers, and the numbering would continue
from there for another year. But I do want to say that whatever the
writers here were coming up with, it was truly awful slop, mired in
company wide crossovers like Civil War, and don't be surprised if
the Thunderbolts, whether reformed or not, came off looking better
than the official heroes for all the wrong reasons.
And thinking back, I'd argue that the Thunderbolts really ended when
Kurt Busiek left the title after scripting at least 30 issues in the
early 2000s.
August-December 2012
Nothing special here either. This era is a truly dismal affair.
Copyright Avi Green. All rights reserved.