Comics lost all value for me with the invention of essential collections. I mean, 400 dollars to buy the first 30 Wolverines, or $29.95 for an essential edition. Actual honest real Scarcity was now an illusion. I never got essential Wolverine even though I sold all my Wolverines because I knew that I could always and forever buy essential Wolverine whenever I wanted to. Now? Now I could download every Wolverine ever made in about 5 minutes for free. But I don't. Because Wolverine is a sad comic.
And hell for the price of one TPB you could buy a year's worth of Marvel Digital Unlimited and read thousands of comics. I seriously think that once they fix the Beta reader for tablets/phones - unless you're REALLY anxious to read a story - there'd be very little reason to buy back catalog digital comics - or even print - when you can read entire runs online. Even at 9.95 a month it's still a bargain - 9.95 barely buys you 2-3 issues. (Or even at the best 9 -.99cent digital comics) I thought I was pretty much over buying print comics when I got my iPod Touch and started reading digital comics on it - but now that I have a tablet, buying print seems almost "meh". Unless I can get it super cheap in a back issue bin or on one of the apps or on the MCDU service, I don't really buy print anymore. And as someone who's print collection is probably a couple thousand over the past 20 some odd years I've been collecting, for the first time I've actually been considering selling some of the better looking comics in my collection - something that I NEVER would have considered in a million years before.
"Yeah, but they're so wrapped up in whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should." [LEFT]- Ian Malcolm [/LEFT] (Kidding - I don't actually care either way, so long as they keep such mind-punishing insanity out of the movies. I can deal with the occasional mirror universe or transporter double, but, while it's fun to have fun, one should also know when to stop. )
I have no cause to complain. When I heard the premise of "Avengers Arena", basically killing off young teenage heroes (including some of my favorite new characters in recent years) in a Murderworld scenario, my reaction was to say, "If Marvel really wants to impress me, they should kill off Spider-Man, Wolverine or Deadpool." Maybe I should've said, Spider-Man, Wolverine and Deadpool.
Avengers arena is obvious. Arcade has the superman powers of a god. Since when did Arcade have the superman powers of a god? Did he acquire the superman powers of a god through some adventure wrought with struggle and insight? Or is the entire thing virtual reality? And he just merely as usual has the same god mode powers as any other moderator/admin? But forgetting that... It's not a bad read. All these stupid kids shitting themselves in fear huddling around campfires waiting to be murdered.
Hmmm. Alternately. What if it's not Arcade? Superman powers of a god? That's Count Nefariia. I could see the Count beginning a Children's Crusade.
If I didn't have a copy of ASM #700 already, I'd be tempted to get the second printing because of Humberto Ramos' Todd McFarlane tribute cover.
I just think if they can even explain how something could be Superior to Ultimate, that would be pretty Amazing.
And ItsJustSomeRandomGuy who does the I'm a DC and I'm a Marvel videos on youtube has gotten some new material out of this [yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPxrm_ie76c[/yt] and to a lesser extent here [yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JigYgQVzRs[/yt]
Hahahahaha Love that JustSomeRandomGuy - (shame he broke up with JustSomeRandomGal a while ago - she was cute)