All I want in 2010 is for the Dumb Shit to Cease

Hello America!

For many years, two companies have ruled the comics landscape, DC and Marvel Comics and many of you already know this. For many years these two companies have tried to one up each other in the great game of how to hunt the dollars that we geeks hold onto, almost dearly. At one point the level of competition sort of dropped off but Joe Quesada and Brian Michael Bendis over at Marvel have worked pretty damn hard to bring that spirit back.

I don't mind this spirit of competition. If DC puts out a great series involving Batman, Marvel should really look at Captain American and see what it can do to step it's game up. There is one thing I don't like though I hate when that competition starts looking like something you'd see in high school talent show shenanigans.

Here's the issue at hand:

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=24406

Essentially Marvel is offering we retailers a copy of Siege #3 with a special variant Deadpool cover for ever stripped off cover of certain DC comics.

Stripped Covers To Be Sent:
Adventure Comics #4
Booster Gold #26
Doom Patrol #4

Justice League of America #39

Outsiders #24
R.E.B.E.L.S #10

SO if we happen to have a bunch of extra DC comics (related to DC's awesome selling Blackest Night event) we can destroy them and Marvel will do us the service of getting a copy of the 3rd issue of it's next big event but with a Deadpool cover as opposed to it's normal cover.

My problem with this is pretty much everything. Marvel should not worry so much about how many copies of a DC event we ordered and concentrate on making Dark Reign and Siege something that we give a damn about.

Blackest Night is about the emotional connection between our heroes and loved ones or enemies of theirs who have passed on and since come back to life as undead zombie Black Lanterns (like a Green Lantern, only cannibalistic and chatty). The key here is the emotional connection.

Dark Reign is about how a madman has gotten a cushy government job and hired a bunch of his crooked friends (all villains) to commit crimes and act like dicks (like villains). Generally this means many of them even get to dress up like heroes (kinda like evil transvestites).

It works in some cases but there is no actual emotional connection with anyone involved. Spiderman should care big time because Norman Osborn (Green Goblin) is the aforementioned madman and after that Tony Stark should care but he's off in a coma or something. Captain America should care because Osborn is stamping all over our freedoms, but Cap is all lost in the time stream. I guess super secret agent Nick Fury and his pals in the Avengers could just get film of Osborn being a crazy person but then this story would have been over after like 3 issues so that hasn't happened yet either.

Well something did happen when Luke Cage, Leader of the Avengers, had a heart problem, the Avengers had to go to Osborn's people to get a good cardiologist.

yeah...

So anyway, Marvel wants me to take my DC Comics relating to the good series and send them to Marvel in exchange for Siege #3 (with Deadpool cover).

Deadpool....yeah...

I hate Deadpool too.

He's a gun toting, smartass who seems to be immortal or something and as near as I can tell he just talks shit and winks at the reader a lot. Personally I'm not sure how he appeals to anyone over the age of 30 but then again, if I were a company with a wealth of characters like Marvel Comics and I asked the masses which characters they wanted more of:

The Nerdy Heroic Everyman

The Jekyll and Hyde Complex

The Man Out of Time

The Norse God with Classic Daddy Issues

The Cool Exec with a Heart of Steel

The Family of Misfits Looking for Acceptance in a World That Can only Fear Them

The Family of Misfits who have Found Acceptance but can't Find Normality

The shit talking Mercenary ripped off from a really good DC Villain and who Breaks the Fourth Wall all the time

I have an idea, based on history, which one would get the vote of the masses. The masses have been taught to look past all the stuff that could actually create and emotional connection and to instead go for the thrill of the shit talking little weirdo. Whatever.

Marvel is so confident that enough fans are into shit talking little weirdos that they have offered up...A VARIANT COVER!!!!!!!!!!

OMFG!!! I wonder if I have 150 unsold DC comics around so I can get my hands on THREE of these copies of this 3rd issue of Siege (a comic where that madman with a government job, decides to pull a "9-11" and trick an Asgardian dude into destroying Soldier Field in Chicago, in order to allow the US to invade Asgard.

Yep.

So you can have the 3rd issue of the "Heavy Handed Allegory Follies" complete with "Manic Psycho Killer" cover for issue #3.

Another reason why this is insulting is the timing of it.

Marvel is offering a Variant cover for issue #3 as opposed to the more relevant and appropriate issue #1 but that would have put them firmly up against the point in time when DC's books in question were hitting the shelves. Siege #1 JUST came out so they would have had to ask us to reduce our order of those books (which DC was hoping we'd order more of for reasons such as us getting colored power ring toys to give to customers).

This only really works for rabid collectors of variant covers, which in my opinion, our industry could use a shit ton less of. I'd rather a rabid fanboy who reads the shit out of the books than a rabid fanboy who just wants more damn covers.

Any rabid fanboy who wants more covers would love an issue of Siege #3 with that shit talking Monkey cover but I'm not going to ruin perfectly good copies of comics about what comics are supposed to be about (emotional connections with and between characters) for what comics are not supposed to be about (jealous companies trying to squeeze other comics off the shelves without providing quality content).

Now one could argue that it's just business but I'd argue that my business is my business. I'll be the one to determine if I've got a few extra copies of something and when I determine that I do, I'll do something about it. I sure as hell don't need to trade good comics for speculative bullshit.

Marve is basically acting like the "dumb jock" shouting "look, a nerd" and then running up and trying to convince us retailers to give DC a wedgie in order to get a copy of the Michael Bay Transformers movie.

Screw you Marvel. Just make good comics.