Godzilla: King of the Monsters
An actual justified purchase of a movie ticket. It looks pretty good with some really gnarly shots and set pieces. The monsters get much more screen time than in the previous film and the humans are put in their place as just serving to give the audience exposition and some comic relief. All in all a pretty cool GODZILLA film and that’s all everyone wanted.
COMPLAINTS: Too many scenes set in the dark or dark and snowy and dark and rainy. Too many cut away edits from the monster action. One scene especially was infuriating when the action is cockblocked by the obnoxious rear end of the whatever hellacarrier the humans were using to monitor the creatures.

X-Men:Dark Phoenix
This was my facebook post immediately after seeing the movie –

Saw Dark Phoenix. It was meh. It was okay. The actors were okay and some of the set pieces were cool. But, it could’ve went darker, could’ve been R rated, the drama would have been effective if the the things that just happen in the film were developed in previous films instead of just being thrown together in two hours. Overall Nice try but too little n too late. I still found some enjoyment but it’s forgettable. One of the better films in the FOX studio X-Men franchise that has been majority pieces of horseshit; so the bar was set low. I liked Sophie Turner as Jean Grey and McAvoy & Fassbender are always great. It just felt like it was all too late. You can sense Jennifer Lawrence’s loathing being on set in this film n frankly who cared if she died. You started the movie not invested save for a $14 bucket of buttered popcorn between your legs just hoping for it to be passable. The writers couldn’t even remember how the last movie ended (remember the Phoenix scene). And that’s been the problem with Fox n a lot of Hollywood supe movies; a bunch of producers paying actors to pretend to be fans of the books that the film’s loosely adapt just to get your money. That’s life. So what? It’s done. It’s over. Goodbye.

And that’s that. Rewind me and throw me to the authorities.

We last left the strangest teens of all in the wake of a crash in Jamaica Bay that kind-of-sort-of-but-not-really-because-comic-books claimed the life of Jean Grey before she emerged as Phoenix, life incarnate. This is a Big Deal. Seriously, this one event winds up being more influential to its series and the Marvel Universe as a whole than Gwen Stacy’s death. In one page, X-Men architect Chris Claremont sets into motion events that affect entire story arcs for decades to come. Most comic books stories have to go through an entire company-wide crossover event to make that happen. Granted, there is more to the story of Phoenix, and it is likely that the conclusion of the Dark Phoenix Saga has just as much of a ripple throughout the continuity, but it all traces back to the end of Marvel Girl.

Naturally then, our uncanny heroes spend the next few issues taking a bit of a detour from the major story arc that Claremont is slowly and famously piecing together. This is the late 70’s – we weren’t sectioning arcs off into neatly sliced 6-issue paperbacks. This retrospective covers Uncanny X-Men #101 – 108 and the first three issues only feature Jean Grey / Phoenix on the peripheral if at all, and have our core group of new X-Men off in Ireland visiting Banshee’s family castle, picking up a blink-and-you-miss-it plot point a few issues ago where a panicked man sent Banshee a letter. These three issues aren’t bad by any stretch, but they have some uninspiring villains in Black Tom Cassidy and Juggernaut, and the team is saved in #103 by leprechauns. It’s goofy and I’m not going to write anything else about it.

On the plus side, we get some great depth added to Storm. Up until now, Ororo Munroe has been largely the most powerful and capable mutant out of the new batch. Honestly, Storm is the best. To have such a prominent, powerful, and unique black female at this time is impressive. Ororo doesn’t get reduced to stereotypes, and her backstory being fleshed out more with attention given to her recurring claustrophobia is a really strong storytelling beat. We also see that the dastardly Eric the Red from a few issues earlier has been not only orchestrating these events, but also working for a greater evil. He also reveals to the reader that there is another, more deadly foe waiting for them. AND HIS NAME IS JOHN CENA!

Just kidding, it’s Magneto. In non-X-Men comics, the master of magnetism was turned into a baby before Eric the Red aged him back up to adulthood. In #104, he engages our mutant heroes in the first of a series of conflicts where the metal-boned Wolverine and metal-skinned Colossus inexplicably throw themselves into a fight with a man whose entire deal is that he controls metal things. But hey, it’s going to make for some gruesome stuff about a decade down the line. This conflict also continues the trend of the new X-Men being absolutely stomped by their opponent and being compared to the original five. Also, Chris Claremont does his usual plant-a-seed-that-takes-forever-to-grow plotting when he reveals a glowing door labeled “Mutant X”. This won’t pay off until literally YEARS later. The frequency and effectiveness with which he makes this feel like an incredibly serialized epic is astounding. This issue also introduces the space pirate Corsair and his ragtag crew of Starjammers.

Enter, a legend… 

#105 is a pretty big deal. It gives closure to the strange, cosmic visions that Professor Xavier has been having and introduces an interesting and unusual character in the humanoid-but-kind-of-bird-like-alien Lilandra. She explains her plight as the wayward empress of the Shi’Ar Empire, which has fullen under the rule of the Mad Emperor D’Ken. D’Ken has disguised a lacky as Eric the Red and has been tormenting the X-Men for the past several months. Most recently, he has tricked Firelord, a former Herald of Galactus, to attack the heroes. Jean Grey, as Phoenix, wipes the floor with him. To clarify and add context: he is bestowed with a portion of Galactus’ godlike cosmic power and loses to Jean Grey. He is far and away the most powerful foe that the X-Men have faced up to this point, and one of them manages to defeat him alone. Also, Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum have a funny and self-referential cameo.

The story takes a bit of a detour before the next major step. Instead of progressing to the space drama of the Shi’Ar Empire, #106 is largely a flashback to a time that Xavier subconsciously attacked the new X-Men with psychic incarnations of the old X-Men. It’s largely forgettable and inconsequential, but it is one of the first times that Charles Xavier as a force of ultimate good is questioned. There is a dark side to the man, and that is something that the series will explore more than once, and with varying degrees of success. Where were we? Right, the M’Kraan Crystal. So the M’Kraan Crystal is a mysterious source of limitless power at the nexus of the universe. Also, Chris Claremont thinks apostrophes make something alien. The X-Men, who are still pretty new to the super hero game sans Cyclops and Banshee, are outmatched against D’Ken’s warriors. The Starjammers, led by Corsair, who is actually and secretly Cyclops’ father, arrive and turn the tide. X-Men is really at its best when it’s a soap opera. For the final issue of the saga, the heroes are taken inside the M’Kraan Crystal, where Jean uses her awesome and tremendous powers, with the aid of her comrades’ life forces, to prevent it the crystal from destroying and rewriting the universe. This issue is particularly notable for having some beautiful and surreal art courtesy of John Byrne. One interesting way that Claremont really builds up the stakes of the issue is by showing other heroes from the Marvel Universe noticing how something major is going on and its on a cosmic scale.

That’s more or less the Phoenix Saga in a nutshell. It isn’t the end of Phoenix by a long shot, and we still have a largely overlooked arc in the space between these issues and the monumentally famous Dark Phoenix Saga. It’s a wild ride, and definitely one worth picking up a subscription to Marvel Unlimited for. Over the course of the next decade, things just get better. 

We last left the strangest teens of all in the wake of a crash in Jamaica Bay that kind-of-sort-of-but-not-really-because-comic-books claimed the life of Jean Grey before she emerged as Phoenix, life incarnate. This is a Big Deal. Seriously, this one event winds up being more influential to its series and the Marvel Universe as a whole than Gwen Stacy’s death. In one page, X-Men architect Chris Claremont sets into motion events that affect entire story arcs for decades to come. Most comic books stories have to go through an entire company-wide crossover event to make that happen. Granted, there is more to the story of Phoenix, and it is likely that the conclusion of the Dark Phoenix Saga has just as much of a ripple throughout the continuity, but it all traces back to the end of Marvel Girl.

Naturally then, our uncanny heroes spend the next few issues taking a bit of a detour from the major story arc that Claremont is slowly and famously piecing together. This is the late 70’s – we weren’t sectioning arcs off into neatly sliced 6-issue paperbacks. This retrospective covers Uncanny X-Men #101 – 108 and the first three issues only feature Jean Grey / Phoenix on the peripheral if at all, and have our core group of new X-Men off in Ireland visiting Banshee’s family castle, picking up a blink-and-you-miss-it plot point a few issues ago where a panicked man sent Banshee a letter. These three issues aren’t bad by any stretch, but they have some uninspiring villains in Black Tom Cassidy and Juggernaut, and the team is saved in #103 by leprechauns. It’s goofy and I’m not going to write anything else about it.

On the plus side, we get some great depth added to Storm. Up until now, Ororo Munroe has been largely the most powerful and capable mutant out of the new batch. Honestly, Storm is the best. To have such a prominent, powerful, and unique black female at this time is impressive. Ororo doesn’t get reduced to stereotypes, and her backstory being fleshed out more with attention given to her recurring claustrophobia is a really strong storytelling beat. We also see that the dastardly Eric the Red from a few issues earlier has been not only orchestrating these events, but also working for a greater evil. He also reveals to the reader that there is another, more deadly foe waiting for them. AND HIS NAME IS JOHN CENA!

Just kidding, it’s Magneto. In non-X-Men comics, the master of magnetism was turned into a baby before Eric the Red aged him back up to adulthood. In #104, he engages our mutant heroes in the first of a series of conflicts where the metal-boned Wolverine and metal-skinned Colossus inexplicably throw themselves into a fight with a man whose entire deal is that he controls metal things. But hey, it’s going to make for some gruesome stuff about a decade down the line. This conflict also continues the trend of the new X-Men being absolutely stomped by their opponent and being compared to the original five. Also, Chris Claremont does his usual plant-a-seed-that-takes-forever-to-grow plotting when he reveals a glowing door labeled “Mutant X”. This won’t pay off until literally YEARS later. The frequency and effectiveness with which he makes this feel like an incredibly serialized epic is astounding. This issue also introduces the space pirate Corsair and his ragtag crew of Starjammers.

Enter, a legend… 

#105 is a pretty big deal. It gives closure to the strange, cosmic visions that Professor Xavier has been having and introduces an interesting and unusual character in the humanoid-but-kind-of-bird-like-alien Lilandra. She explains her plight as the wayward empress of the Shi’Ar Empire, which has fullen under the rule of the Mad Emperor D’Ken. D’Ken has disguised a lacky as Eric the Red and has been tormenting the X-Men for the past several months. Most recently, he has tricked Firelord, a former Herald of Galactus, to attack the heroes. Jean Grey, as Phoenix, wipes the floor with him. To clarify and add context: he is bestowed with a portion of Galactus’ godlike cosmic power and loses to Jean Grey. He is far and away the most powerful foe that the X-Men have faced up to this point, and one of them manages to defeat him alone. Also, Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum have a funny and self-referential cameo.

The story takes a bit of a detour before the next major step. Instead of progressing to the space drama of the Shi’Ar Empire, #106 is largely a flashback to a time that Xavier subconsciously attacked the new X-Men with psychic incarnations of the old X-Men. It’s largely forgettable and inconsequential, but it is one of the first times that Charles Xavier as a force of ultimate good is questioned. There is a dark side to the man, and that is something that the series will explore more than once, and with varying degrees of success. Where were we? Right, the M’Kraan Crystal. So the M’Kraan Crystal is a mysterious source of limitless power at the nexus of the universe. Also, Chris Claremont thinks apostrophes make something alien. The X-Men, who are still pretty new to the super hero game sans Cyclops and Banshee, are outmatched against D’Ken’s warriors. The Starjammers, led by Corsair, who is actually and secretly Cyclops’ father, arrive and turn the tide. X-Men is really at its best when it’s a soap opera. For the final issue of the saga, the heroes are taken inside the M’Kraan Crystal, where Jean uses her awesome and tremendous powers, with the aid of her comrades’ life forces, to prevent it the crystal from destroying and rewriting the universe. This issue is particularly notable for having some beautiful and surreal art courtesy of John Byrne. One interesting way that Claremont really builds up the stakes of the issue is by showing other heroes from the Marvel Universe noticing how something major is going on and its on a cosmic scale.

That’s more or less the Phoenix Saga in a nutshell. It isn’t the end of Phoenix by a long shot, and we still have a largely overlooked arc in the space between these issues and the monumentally famous Dark Phoenix Saga. It’s a wild ride, and definitely one worth picking up a subscription to Marvel Unlimited for. Over the course of the next decade, things just get better. 

The most immediately noticeable aspect of the Bronze Age is the proliferation of traditional superheroes introduced decades before. The recently revived X-Men were extremely popular, as were The Hulk, Green Lantern, and The Amazing Spider-Man (coming off of the extremely successful and famous arc of Gwen Stacy’s death). Other comic characters / heroes that were financially a failure in the past were revived to much greater success. In addition to the aforementioned X-Men, The New Teen Titans were a large success at the end of 1980.  A number of Bronze Age heroes began to suffer from serious real world emotional issues. Grief due to the loss of a loved one was most common, but suffering from abuse and drug addition became ailments of a few superheroes of the time.

As the Graphic Novel Editor of NewRetroWave, I’m going to be covering comics from a variety of countries and publishers. That being said, the trends of comics largely concerns Marvel and DC, the Fender and Gibson of the comic book world. The majority of the 1980’s  saw Marvel as the more successful of the two. Following the success of the Superman film franchise, DC began running more stories each month with more pages and a higher retail price. The results of that business move crippled DC comics and allowed Marvel to see the success that they did. In 1984, toward the end of the Bronze Age, Marvel released the immensely popular Secret Wars. This spawned a trend of epic events in comic book continuities that we still see today (Civil War, anyone?) In 1985, DC began reviving their brand with the extremely well received Crisis on Infinite Earths, which continued the trend started by Marvel and simplified the overly convoluted multiverse that DC had created. The twelve issue run helped bring DC back to the forefront of the comic book world.

The ending of the Bronze Age is amorphous and debatable, but several events are widely considered to be the catalyst for the shift to the Modern Age of Comic Books. 1986 saw the publication of Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. I don’t want to get into too much detail about that masterpiece, as it will definitely come up again in a more dedicated article. The grim tone of that miniseries has affected the depiction of Batman ever since, barring a few unspeakable exceptions. Alan Moore (arguably the most famous comic book writer) also delivered a 1-2 punch of comics at the end of the Bronze Age. The first was Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?, a story that recaps the life and tragedies of Superman, with an aesthetic reminiscent of the idealism held by the Silver Age. This is in direct contrast to the almost oppressively pessimistic and cynical Watchmen story that Moore would release the following year. You will also see both of these stories appear in future articles.

The face of modern comic books

Moore and Miller’s influence is the root of the Modern Age of Comic Books. Post-modern deconstructions of superhero tropes and playing with the medium became the new norm as modern superheroes had to contend with real world implications of their powers. The days of escapism are long gone. Fantasy elements in comics made a return with characters like John Constantine, Swamp Thing, and Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. Antiheroes became the standard of superhero as morally ambiguous characters flooded the market. This is something we still see in modern superhero films. How often does the word “gritty” pop up when describing a modern superhero movie?

I will be going over individual comics / graphic novels in detail soon, starting with Hellblazer. What are some comics you would be interested in reading about? Let us know in the comments!