Comics Wrap-Up - A Little Bit of Everything, All of the Time

 

It's Thursday, Comics Wrap-Up is back, this is Dora Reads, let's get an absolutely huge helping of comics-y superhero-y goodness!

Film Trailers

The official Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer is here!

It kind of had to be, because it got leaked, and for once it wasn't Tom Holland who leaked the thing (...probably.)

Anyway, this trailer is proof that Dr Strange is only sensible in comparison to the other Marvel heroes *face palms* - how hard is it to not do the thing Stephen?!

(Warning: flashing images, SPOILERS for previous MCU movies)

In Spidey-adjacent news, there's a new Venom: Let There Be Carnage trailer!

You all know that I love Venom so very, very, much. 😍

(Warning: flashing images, violence and gore (GRAPHIC), cannibalism, executions, prison, serial killers)

There's a new Eternals trailer!

And Kit Harington's character asks the question we all had: where the hell were you before now?!

Also, there are way too many attractive people in this trailer. Angelina Jolie as a an actual goddess = perfect casting *fans self*

(Warning: flashing images, SPOILERS for the MCU, general violence)

The marketing machine for Shang-Chi and the Ten Rings has really stepped up, so there are circa 6 million new trailers.

So I figured I'd give ya just the one as a taster...

(This movie looks freaking awesome, fair play!)

(Warning: mild flashing images, general violence)

TV Shows

So Marvel's What If...? animated series is a few episodes in now.

Here's a few thoughts, and paraphrased/incorrect quotes summaries, from yours truly, on the first 3 episodes, there are SPOILERS here - because I just couldn't seem to avoid them.

I guess if the main theme of a show is that it's different from the continuity you're used to, you need to be able to, y'know, talk about it.

SPOILERS, OK? SPOILERS!!!!!

What If… Captain Carter Were The First Avenger?

Via Giphy

Summary Part 1:

Army guy: Rogers get in there!

Peggy: Dude, he’s bleeding out, chill

Army guy: OK! Howard Stark, you’re up!

Howard: Aw hell no! Risking other people’s lives? Fine. Risking my life? Ain’t gonna happen.

Army guy: Get in there you b***h!

Howard: Yeah, not gonna happen

Peggy: For God’s sake, I’ll do it myself!

Howard: Hell yeah!

Army guy: But… but you’re a girl! Stark, you can’t make a girl a super-soldier!

Howard: Uh-huh, yeah. But I can, tho.

General Thoughts:

*coughs* So… it’s canon that the super-soldier serum makes you hotter. 

Scientifically proven.

No question. And she was fairly damn attractive to begin with, tbh.




Bucky’s ‘oh f**k what did you do now Steve?’ face is the same across mediums and alternate realities.

It is the consistancy of a man who has had to put up with this sh** for too long.

Also, more than once, Bucky's clearly just there like, ‘How is this my life again? Someone please tell me.’

And clearly Bucky and Howard require more supervision than this when left to their own devices.

Howard legit said ‘do science stuff’ and I’m here for it

Also, you will always get extra points from me, Howard Stark, for a Hedy LeMarr reference

Fandom will do things with a tentacle monster Marvel. Unspeakable things.

You do not know what you've done. Or worse... maybe you do...

Summary Part 2:

(aka how the episode would have gone if Marvel weren't cowards)


Steve: Uh, Peggy can you can rescue my… uh… friend?

Peggy: Friend, yeah, sure Steve. Friend. I’ll go get your man candy, no problem.

What If… T’Challa Became A Star Lord?

(Warning: this section discusses child abduction)

Via Giphy

Summary:

Yandu: Listen I’m sorry about-

T’Challa: S’all good. You just did what I asked you to.

Yandu: Yeah but you were a small child which I abducted from its home planet, and then I told you your parents, family, and entire country were dead and destroyed.

T’Challa: See? Nothing to be sorry for.

Yandu: I feel like I dodged a bullet, so I’ma point out how pretty the stars are now.

T’Challa: Ooh! Pretty!

General Thoughts:

I liked this episode - if only because it was the last time we'll get T'Challa in the MCU, certainly with Chadwick Boseman, and I honestly can't see anyone else as T'Challa at this point - but I also found that it was not really believable.

Like, unless the differences between the Alternate Universes (AUs) is a lot deeper than ‘T’Challa was picked up instead of Peter,’ I’ma need less Out Of Character (OOC) moments, k?

I mean, you could even pull it off if you showed us all the little moments that brought us here. But as we stand, it’s just too many people OOC.

It’s not that these eventualities couldn’t happen, it’s that they need more explanation, given what we know about these characters.

I'm not buying Yandu being all peace and love over profit

And I am not buying that T'Challa talked Thanos around - fairly easily by the looks of things. It makes no sense given what we know about Thanos, it just doesn't.

But then, the main continuity has a talking raccoon in Guardians of The Galaxy so maybe believability isn't the be-all and end-all.

And maybe I'm just sore that Rocket wasn't in this.

You know I love that raccoon, dearest nerdlets! 😅

Also:

I’m sorry… did Nebula just use the word ‘kink’ to describe the Collector’s collecting? It’s official, this is ripped from someone’s fanfic.

And Yandu just forgot that they were supposed to go get Peter Quill or…?

What If… The World Lost Its Mightiest Heroes?

(Warning: this section discusses murder, injury, blood, and corpses)

Summary Part 1:

Natasha: Y’know these cuffs are pointless, right?

Fury: B***h, you know I know – the pantomime’s for the guard and the driver, k? Then find out who took out Stark

Natasha: You’re lucky that I’m actually loyal, or I’d be half-way to Moscow by now

Fury: That’s my girl!

General Thoughts:

 

Poop, this is fan – have you two met?

Black Widow’s on the warpath, and Loki is pi**ed. Duck and cover people!




He's pi**ed because no-one kills Thor but him dammit! 

...Wait, does this count as a Loki variant?

...*gasps* ...is this where President Loki comes from?!

I feel like the murder methods in this episode were selected to cut down on the amount of blood they’d otherwise have to use.

Like... first off, it's not easy to animate blood. It's like water - which is notoriously difficult to animate - but red and thicker.

And also, it really wouldn't surprise me if they have levels of gore that they have to avoid - especially if they wanna keep to certain age ratings.

Clint and Phil going all fanboy over Thor’s hair made me think -

 – is this a crack fic? 

(Crack fics are fanfiction which is especially random/bizarre/batsh**)

Cos, in places at least, it feels like a crack fic. And I'm here for that, obviously 😅

And after the whole 'kink' line in the previous episode, I highly suspect that the writers are consuming copious amounts of fanfiction.

Summary Part 2:

Nick Fury: nope, no, nah – I’m calling Carol, sh**’s got too weird. Although…

Phil Coulson: So you’re not calling her

Nick: Nope

Coulson: Even though she could literally defend us from an alien army single-handedly?

Nick: Yup

Coulson: Your criteria for calling your friends is weird

Nick: B***h, you sniff corpses in this universe, don’t talk to me about weird

*Five minutes later*

Nick: ...Oh sh**, that backfired. Yeah, I'm definitely calling Carol.

Coulson: Oh so now you call her

Nick: You mean now that the alien prince has taken over earth? Yeah, now I'm gonna call her

Coulson: I'm just saying... you could've called her before

Nick: And I'm just saying STFU

Coulson: OK, but you know it's true

Graphic Novels

I recently read graphic non-fiction Iranian Love Stories by Jane Deuxard and Deloupy.

This is a book about the stories of young people living in Iran, and navigating life and love under a strict regime, as told to two Western journalists.

It's interesting, and the artwork is strong, but I did have some concerns, which I'm sure you'll hear all about when I write my review - which I plan on doing soon (she said, hoping that she was telling the truth.)

Other Stuff

Tim Drake, aka one of Batman's many Robins (...comics shenanigans,) has Come Out as Queer, and dating a boy.

Yup, Tim is attracted to dudes. Which is cool af obv.!

But... a lot of people were assuming he's Bisexual, with a few assuming he's Pansexual. Despite the writer of this storyline specifically saying that he was still figuring himself out, and didn't have a label yet. 

And I can understand it, but... I have some issues with people labelling Tim according to what they want.

I spoke about this in a Tweet thread, which you can see here, or you can read it on Medium in 'Robin’s Queer! …But Not Necessarily Bi'

Meanwhile, Sam Stone @ CBR explored the Tim Drake storyline in the context of the turbulent history of the Bat-Family (Batman and Pals) and ongoing Homophobia.

TikTokker/YouTuber Nicque Marina made this awesome vid imagining Marvel's reaction to the Spider-Man trailer leak. I love it!

(Warning: jump cuts that may create a flashing-type affect)

A little while back, I wrote some thoughts on You Look Like Death: Tales From The Umbrella Academy, Volume 1 (you can see the original post here,) which I've now adapted to a Medium post, because I am a shameless opportunist, so check out: Klaus Being Klaus Puts the 'Graphic' in Graphic Novel

Scarlett Johansson is suing Disney for breach-of-contract over their release strategy for the Black Widow film.

I don't know, honestly, how I feel about this.

Like, on the one hand, she's hardly short of money. She's well paid, and privileged - she doesn't need this money.

But on the other? She had a contract. And there's an element of sexist pay policies hovering under the surface here.

This is her movie - like it or not, she is the headliner, and she got the kind of contract you would expect for a blockbuster's leading star.

And I can't help but feel that if this was an Iron Man film, for example, Disney wouldn't've acted in this way. But maybe I'm wrong *shrugs* - who knows?

(Warning: references to a fictional pandemic and mass deaths)

FX is doing an adaptation of comics series Y: The Last Man

I'm not all that familiar with this series, but the basic premise is that every animal and human with a Y chromosome has been wiped out by a plague - except for one dude and his monkey.

What is absolutely awesome is that, as Noah Dominguez @ Comic Book Resources explains in detail here, the behind-the-scenes people are working hard to make it Trans inclusive and respectful of gender ID.

The plague also wiped out any Trans women, Intersex people, and Non-Binary people with Y chromosomes. 

So the show takes the stance that its main character, Yorick, is the last person alive with a Y chromosome, and also the last Cis (non-Trans) man - not the last man over all.

There are still men in the world of this adaptation - they are Trans men. One of whom, Sam, is played by Trans actor Elliot Fletcher - always good to see Trans characters played by Trans actors. 

Yorick apparently moves through this world with people assuming that he's Trans - which is an interesting and simply incredible way of adapting this. I hope it turns out as awesome as it sounds!

All of my Friday Fics Fix fanfiction posts for August were superhero-related, so you can check these out if you're interested:

• Loki, Gender, and the TVA (Fandom Is Here For It) - exploring Loki's Gender-Fluid ID

• A SamBucky Rec List - in this house, Bucky Barnes is Queer af

• Road Trip With Steve Rogers - A random Marvel fic with awesome vibes

• An Umbrella Novella - going back to The Umbrella Academy with Five-focussed fanfiction

And to end on yet another note of shameless self-promo, my Medium post 'The Brilliant and Highly Disturbing Tale of Gotham's Jonathan Crane' - talking about the Batman villain, Scarecrow, as depicted in the Gotham TV series - can be seen here.

Or you can see the original post it was adapted from right here on Dora Reads, here.

Have you been watching Marvel's What If...?

What do you think of the new superhero trailers?

What's your take on Scarlett Johansson suing Disney?

Talk to me! 😊💬

You can follow me on Twitter @CeeDoraReads, on Pinterest, and on Dora Reads @ BlogLovin. For more ways to support me, check out the Support Me page

Previous Comics Wrap-Up Posts:

• Comics Wrap-Up - I Said That Lie Already

• Comics Wrap-Up - For Every Time That They Want To Count You Out

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'A little bit of everything, all of the time' is from Welcome To The Internet* by Bo Burnham

* = commission link

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