y'all remember that thing about posting links to news instead of just typing one sentence?
Anyways Checkmate mini by Bendis and Maleev
On the one hand, I'm super into it, but on the other hand, Oliver was like one character that I really didn't like Bendis' voice for. He sounded really immature and dickish and unintelligent. Him, Barry, and Ray Palmer are two characters that Bendis has written that don't sound right.
The longer I read comics the less I have a favorite period. My least favorite is definitely the mid 2000's--that period from 2004 or so to 2007 was really meh. Civil War and Identity Crisis and One Year Later and it's just a ton of misses. My second least favorite, actually, is probably right now.
Make no mistake, there's a ton of GREAT comics that come out. But the diversity makes it so that every comic isn't for me. Now that's a GOOD thing, because it means there are more comics for other people. But for me personally there are just in general, fewer comics to read. There was a time when my list of favorite writers were everywhere: Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Mark Waid, Gail Simone, Kurt Busiek, Peter David, more. The 90's and 2000's saw those people all over the place.
But these days most of those writers have a diminished presence in comics as they work on other things. There's a handful of people there who could take their place: Al Ewing, James Tynion, Kieron Gillen...and that's about it. It's a lot more empty. Occasionally I'll find something really solid like Gwenpool or New Super-Man, but they'll do that one book then they're off writing mini-series or something.
In the end, this is probably fine. I've wanted time to read more old comics. I made my way through a number of seminal 90's comics, but there's stuff from the 70's and 80's I still need to finish. Wrap up the rest of the Legion. Finish all of Iron Man volume 1. Finish Claremont's X-Men, Byrne's Fantastic Four, and PAD's Incredible Hulk. I love Wonder Woman so I wanna finish the second volume--at least get through the beginning. I should probably figure out what in DC was worth reading in the 70's and 80's, lol.
I certainly don't think comics aren't for me now just because there's more women, queer people, and people of color--especially since I'm two of those things (or like, one and a half?)--I just think right now comics are going through a phase that doesn't align with my interests. That doesn't last long. For all I know 5G is smarter than I think and it winds up being awesome, or Marvel will suddenly bring up a ton of amazing series and then I'm only reading modern comics again.
I think if I had a favorite era, it'd be the 00s through the early 10s. A lot of my favorite stuff seems to come from there, especially DC. All of Simone's stuff, for example, but I think I'm mostly with you in that I don't have a favorite era, but being that I really got into comics as a hobby and not just passively so recently, I've definitely read a lot more recent stuff (even as back log) than really old stuff.
That said I can understand burn out and lack of interest as of now. Rebirth really grabbed me on a ton of stuff, and when Marvel did there whole "Fresh Start" bit that grabbed me, too. I mean, I'm still reading a Hulk book. But I really agree on talent, too. I think a lot of it feels like Marvel and DC don't let writers do "passion projects" anymore out of their runs, if there was ever a time where they had more freedom, and that makes a lot of sense. Or at least more creative freedom. I wasn't a fan of Ben Percy's Nightwing even before it got cancelled, but I will always wish that we would've gotten his pitch for Tim Drake taking the mantle with Dick in a coma as opposed to this Ric Grayson bullshit, for example. On the other hand the fact that Joshua Williamson will almost 100% guaranteed make it to 100 issues and maybe past that on Flash is really something new these days.
I would sayd though, as far as names, I think we do have some but they really need to be put on bigger titles to get their pop. Tynion and Ewing are absolutely the cream of the crop right now. Kelly Thompson and Joshua Williamson are also really good, and Williamson is proving himself on both Flash and Batman/Superman with the former's biggest drawback being that Barry sucks and nothing will ever salvage how fucking boring that character is and you can't prove me otherwise. Zdarsky, Duggan, and Cates can throw their names in the hat as well, though I know the latter is more controversial.
So I just read House of X/Powers of X and I loved it. But there's a lot of X-men comics right now. Which ones are worth reading or do I have to read all of them to follow the story?
Marauders
New Mutants
X-Men
X-Force and Excalibur are "your mileage may vary" kind of books. X-Force has been getting better, but it's a book I would describe as "messy." It's very brutal at times, but in a very over the top action movie kind of way, but yet still pushes political commentary and existential dialogue regarding things like murder, torture, and that sort of thing. I enjoy it so far, Excalibur is an X-Men book that tries to be a fantasy book, or the other way around. I'm not sure. The plotting also feels off, but maybe it doesn't because maybe it's well plotted and I just don't like it. I have no idea. It's at one more issue for me.
Fallen Angels is horrible and almost done anyways.
This is really well said. I don't know that I have a singular favorite era of comics either, but I do have favorite runs from all across the spectrum. Like I have pretty much zero interest in Barry Allen Flash comics outside of the sheer ridiculousness of the Silver Age (the way Barry discovers Earth 2 in the Flash of Two Worlds issue is hilarious). The only era I really don't get into is the Golden Age, otherwise I can read and enjoy comics from any era.
Because he sucks. Barry is singlehandedly my least favorite comic book character of all time, and I stand firm in that regard.
I'd like to believe it's more Jessica Jones. NEW Jessica Jones, but who knows. We've already gotten enough X book announcements.