Back from the hiatus: 2 memes, and what you can expect to see in this journal soon

[boot_the_grime]

Wow  it's been a while since the last time I posted anything on Livejournal or Dreamwidth. (The last thing I posted was in April.) But  I had a really good reason for this hiatus, due to having been extremely busy these last 3 months with work - I had a huge translation job with strict deadlines, so lots of things got put on hold (frak, I didn't

Comments

[itsnotmymind]

Welcome back!

I would like a letter.

Figuring out comic book continuity is pretty much a full time job. The most famous run on X-Men was the creative team of write Chris Claremont and artist John Byrne from the mid-seventies into the eighties (at some point, Claremont went downhill as a writer). Claremont started writing with Giant-Size X-Men #1 in 1975. Giant-Size X-Men #1 was a special issue, and the storyline starting that continues in Uncanny X-Men #94. As the 94 implies, there were lots of issues prior to that, but they were a different team lineup, and most of them were extremely bad (the first ten or fifteen issues were okay, and then they went rapidly downhill and the title was eventually temporarily cancelled).

Giant-Size X-Men #1 features the introduction of Storm and Nightcrawler and a few other characters, and it also is the first time the Wolverine is on an X-Men team (although he first appeared as a character in an issue of Hulk).

Parts of Claremont and Byrne's run is available in trade paperbacks, things like The

[boot_the_grime]

Thanks

[likeadeuce]

Hey, selenak referred me over here re: your X-Men question.

Probably the best things to read as background for Joss's Astonishing run are the print collections Proteus, The Dark Phoenix Saga, and Days of Future Past from the Chris Claremont era. Claremont wrote lots of other stuff but that's probably the core of what Joss draws on. (And a lot of people would just say to start with Dark Phoenix, but Proteus comes right before it and lays some background.) I also really like the God Loves Man Kills graphic novel by Claremont (just make sure to get the one from the 80s drawn by Brent Anderson, not the more recent collection with, confusingly, the same title).

Recs after the 80s are harder! The Grant Morrison series starting with e is for extinction is the immediate prequel to Joss's run, and it has some great stuff AND some terrible stuff. I don't have a lot of recs AFTER Joss because unfortunately I don't think the X-books have really lived up to the potential set in those volumes. Though if you can find S.W.O.R.D. by Kieron Gillen, it stars

[selenak]

*points*

What she said. Also if you want meta, I reviewed Joss' run, the Warren Ellis run afterwards for a while until I stopped reading because, what she said, and all of S.W.O.R.D. which I loved both for the humour and because Beast/Brand (whom Joss created, thank you, Joss) are one of my very few romantic OTPs.

And as I never will stop boasting: near the end or Joss' run, Likeadeuce, Resolute and I wrote meta for all of AXM. It was linked at Whedonesque. The man himself commented. Kitty Pryde, upon seeing multiple Emmas, that was us then.:)

[likeadeuce]

Yes, and I should never forget that I started reading X-Men comics in the first place b/c of Selena's meta. What a monster she created!

(Also, re: the recs above, I should add that I especially rec God Loves, Man Kills if you're a fan of the Erik/Charles relationship, as I assume you are if XMFC was your gateway!)

[boot_the_grime]

(Also, re: the recs above, I should add that I especially rec God Loves, Man Kills if you're a fan of the Erik/Charles relationship, as I assume you are if XMFC was your gateway!)Yeah - and I already thought Magneto/Professor were at the very least among the best/most interesting things about the first 2 X-Men movies. XMFC made me want to know more about Erik, Charles and Raven - who also happen to be, in that order, the three characters that XMFC focuses on/fleshes out the most. However, I didn't like Hank that much in XMFC, and he's just lovable in AXM. I also had no idea Emma was that interesting until I read AXM. I hope they give her better material in the next movie. Kitty Pryde and Colossus were completely new to me, all I knew was that Kitty is Joss' favorite and was an inspiration for Buffy. And Scott was surprisingly complex in Joss' writing - I don't know what the writing is for him in other comics, but I just knew him from the movies where he's basically just some bland guy that stands in the way of Jean/Logan

[ever_neutral]

Yes x39842932 to all your Faith thoughts.

lol, you are the only person besides me who does not care for Jane Austen. \o/ Solidarity. Also word on a lot of other books. Especially Jane Eyre, Great Expectations, and Lolita.