Here we are in the latter half of 2009. Finally, the five issue series they were hyping in 2007 — when they first started soliciting Ultimate Power #8 — is coming to a close. Through Ultimatum, we see the Ultimate line giving birth to the Ultimate Comics line, only it’s the kind of childbirth that horrifically kills the mother and gives us a baby caked in blood.

But where were we? Magneto attacked the entire world and now the surviving heroes are out to stop him. With one arm left, he stands defiantly before those who would slay him.

Thanks to ManiacClown for coming up with whatever it is Wolverine is ranting about. We’ll be back tomorrow to see Magneto’s rebuttal.

Day Two!
Day Three!
Day Four!
Day Five!
Day Six!
Day Seven!

I dug the first issue of New Mutants, but #2 hit one of my few nitpicky pet peeves. This bit right here:

Naw, son. In addition to being browner back in the day (what’s up with the coloring in this book? everything is set to “superbright”), Bobby is Brazilian. They don’t speak Spanish down there. It’s Portuguese. In fact, here’s a bit from a letters page I found in an X-Force comic I was reading about a month back. It’s from somewhere between issue 80 and 82, I think. The page it was on had reactions for X-Force #76, so you do the math.

Listen to Giancarlo Lima, fellas! I’d have emailed this directly to whoever’s editing the book, but New Mutants doesn’t have a lettercol email setup, near as I can tell. And leaving Zeb Wells a Youtube comment just seems… weird.

Yesterday’s installment of Ultimatum Edit brought our remaining heroes to Magneto’s lair. Magneto showed that he has balls of steel (which he can manipulate) by not blowing their planes out of the sky. Then Angel died gratuitous Loeb death #529 and Sabretooth got shot in the eye, which is as much of an inconvenience as Superman’s cellophane S was to Non.

Let’s take it home.

And there we go. Funny how Cap and Valkyrie are more of a threat to Magneto than Thor after all. ManiacClown insisted I didn’t make any jokes about how it looks like Valkyrie has the runs during that silhouette panel where Magneto cuts her, so good on him.

And if you’re rightfully wondering about that sound effect that I inserted into that scene, well, I couldn’t help myself. You see, it’s a ridiculous piece from a ridiculous sequence in a ridiculous comic that I will be reviewing in the coming days. Want a peek? Knock yourself out. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Phew. Only one more issue of this left.

Week 5!

(from marvel’s x-men #8, words by scott lobdell, art by jim lee)

This is one of those scenes that stuck out to me when I was a kid. Going from a picnic to a fight to a pie in the face to a plot twist is classic X-Men. This was the beginning of a downtime issue, which is another X-Men staple. The team would play baseball, go to a bar, or sit around doing nothing after the end of a big arc. This issue ended the drama of Bishop joining the team and a Wolverine-centric story in Germany, and led into an X-Men/Ghost Rider crossover set in New Orleans, where they all went up against the Brood in the NOLA underground. In hindsight, it’s pretty ridiculous, but still fairly funny. Gambit tended to get all of the best lines and scenes in old X-Men books.

This was also back when the book had a strange tone. There was a lot of droll and self-conscious humor throughout the book, verging on actual meta-commentary. It’s nice to see and gave the book a fun, off-kilter kind of feel. I’m not even going to mention the “Gotta be da shoes” Gambit/Jubilee bit.

Well, maybe I will later. But not right now.

Yesterday had Kitty Pryde find the torn mask of Spider-Man and then Dr. Strange and Dormammu started doing one of their magic fighting skits. And Dormammu’s in the middle of a song. Don’t forget about that.

“THEY CALL HULK THE STREAK! HULK STRONGEST ONE THERE IS ON TWO FEET!”

You know what’s even stupider about this? We’re not going to get to the climactic battle with Dormammu. Chances are, that’s going to be left for Ultimate Fantastic Four: Requiem and left out of the main book.

Hulk’s rampage will continue next time. Come on back tomorrow. ManiacClown and I will be waiting for you.

Day Four!
Day Five!
Day Six!
Day Seven!

We took the plunge and recorded the inaugural 4thletter! Fourcast! this weekend. Esther and I sat down in my apartment and talked about comics for a while, and our gift to you is thirty-four minutes and five seconds of good stuff. I’m not 100% happy with the mix, as there are a few audio peaks spread throughout, but we can work those out as we go along.

We’re looking at a biweekly schedule for now, and bringing in a few surprise guest stars down the line. We also need to rope Gavin into the mix, but that’s a problem for another day.

We begin the first of many Fourcasts with a talk about Batman: Battle for the Cowl, Final Crisis Aftermath: Dance starring the Super Young Team, and what character really hooked us into comics.

If you want to subscribe, hit up the podcast-specific RSS feed or grab the normal one. Tell your friends, give us an iTunes review or three, and drop us some comments. If you want to subscribe on iTunes, click here! If you have suggestions or want to donate some music… drop me an email.

I don’t have history with the New Mutants. I never read their original book, and by the time I’d tried the satellite X-books, they were X-Force. I know a lot of X-Men fans hold the New Mutants in high esteem, but for my money, X-Force was way more interesting. I reread that old X-Force stuff a few months back and didn’t regret it, exactly, but it wasn’t very good, either. The idea of a second generation of X-Men who decided that Xavier’s way wasn’t perfect is a good one, and one that Grant Morrison revisited to great success in New X-Men: Riot at Xavier’s.

That was years ago at this point, though, and those times are long gone. The members of X-Force have given up, regressed, grown up again, and joined the actual X-Men. New Mutants #1 was written by Zeb Wells, pencilled by Diogenes Neves, inked by Cam Smith and Ed Tadeo, and colored by John Rauch. I checked it out mainly off the strength of Zeb Wells. He wrote the awesome New Warriors: Reality Check, starring Marvel’s other second generation of heroes, which was quickly thrown under the bus by Mark Millar’s Civil War. After reading it, the name New Mutants is basically a nostalgia grab. It stars Sam Guthrie, Roberto Da Costa, Amara Aquilla, Illyana Rasputin, Xi’an Coy Manh, and Dani Moonstar, and I found it a pretty solid first issue.

I’m really only familiar with Sam and Bobby as far as the cast goes, in addition to the surprise villain at the end. Even still, Wells does a pretty good job of selling me on the characters I don’t know, two of whom are blonde females of about the same height. I like that Illyana, who I’d previously seen when she died and maybe in some old X-Men reprints, is back and not exactly a good guy. She’s actually pretty sinister, and not in a “rough edge on a smooth team”-Wolverine sort of way.

The fact that the young students hate her is also a good touch, and a good example of something Wells does that I enjoy. He references a lot of backstory pretty seamlessly, but I never felt like I needed to know exactly what went down in, say, X-Infernus, which was a worthless story with solid art. The references are just used to build history, and to give Wells a bit of short-hand when sketching out the characters for new readers. I feel like Wells gets these characters. Sam and Bobby come across as best friends from jump, and Sam’s loyalty to his friends in particular is very clear. I also didn’t mind the suiting up scene, which usually comes across as corny.

I’m not as keen on the art. John Rauch’s coloring is working in that same style Pete Pantazis has been doing over on JLA– where each character is so brightly light that they look washed out and lightened. To be frank, it’s offputting and ugly. There’s not really any mood to the coloring, other than Outside, In A Basement, and Red Because She Might Be Evil. The color should enhance the art, rather than detract from it. It also sucks that Bobby Da Costa looks about as Brazilian as Bobby Drake.

At the same time, Neves’s art is solid, but unspectacular. He’s pretty solid at drawing kids, though his adults tend to skew a little too much toward the overmuscled superhero stereotype, rather than the early 20s mutants they should be, but that’s just comics as usual. Neves pulls some great facial expressions out of his hat, and though the issue doesn’t have a traditional fight scene, it seems like he’d be perfectly fine at choreographing and staging a solid fight scene.

New Mutants #1 was a solid, if a little unimpressive, read. I’ll give it another issue or so based on my past enjoyment of Zeb Wells and the fact that I like Bobby, Sam, and the surprise villain at the end. For it to be truly good, though, it’s going to need better coloring to even up the art. As-is, it’s a good start, enough to keep me interested, and a pretty decent mid-tier Marvel book. I like seeing these old characters turned into adults, and hopefully it’ll stick this time.

Welp. Thirty more to go. Let’s do this!

30) Submissive Blind Al
Deadpool #15-17 (1998)
Writer: Joe Kelly

Deadpool’s relationship with Blind Al is completely weird, but it goes from being wacky on the outside to disturbing on the inside. Despite being Deadpool’s prisoner and a victim of plenty of abuse, we see the Wade/Al dynamic as little more than slapstick. It’s shown to be so cartoony that we aren’t even supposed to care that Deadpool – for whatever impaired reason – has an old woman held in his house against her will.

The seriousness doesn’t truly show itself until Deadpool’s breakdown, which as some of you can figure, is going to be popping up later on the list. The short of it is that Deadpool did some horrible stuff to Blind Al and we got a better scope of the dark history of their relationship. After a couple issues, Deadpool gets over what he’s done and tries to sweep it under the rug, much like he handles many of his mistakes, but Blind Al won’t let him.

Deadpool comes home from his latest meeting with LL&L, high off of his good guy potential, only to find that Al has cooked and cleaned. She closes the door to her room, saying nothing more than, “Good night… master.” Deadpool remembers how much of a tool he’s been.

He tries what he can to get a rise out of her and maybe get her to joke around like they used to, but all she does is act completely submissive to everything he says. She acts like his servant and refers to him as the master and herself as the prisoner. He knows he has to apologize, but like the Fonz, he just can’t bring himself to saying he was wrong.

Jayce Russel also loved this whole bit.

The entire situation with Blind Al is just full of awesome bits, but issue #17, the scene that starts with, “Will you shut up and talk back to me already?!,” and the two pages that follow of Blind Al beginning her elaborate plan to attack Deadpool with kindness kills my ass. The neatly hung Deadpool outfits, the alphabetized ammunition, the grating way she drops “master” in constantly, they’re all the slap in the face that Pool spent the whole series working his way towards. I honestly might prefer Al to DP, and this is one of those moments that explain it. The way an old blind lady gets under the skin of one of the world’s best mercenaries is well-written, amusing and, maybe most of all, kinda tugs at the heart. She obviously thinks somewhat fondly of Deadpool, or she’d not bother with trying to save him, and watching him stubbornly trudge past all hope for redemption until almost the bitter end? Now that’s a motherfucker.

When Deadpool receives Montgomery’s predictions on the future, he’s seemingly inspired to do the right thing. Al hears Deadpool hammering on a wall and finds that he’s been boarding up the Box – the room he’d use to torture Al – and that he genuinely is sorry for what he’s put her through lately. She snaps out of her ruse and embraces him, saying that this is a good start towards forgiveness. Deadpool tries to grant her freedom from this life he’s forced her into, but he’s cut off when Ajax teleports him away.

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Based on one of the comments in an earlier article, I should probably mention that despite Deadpool being awesome in other forms of media (some of them, at least), I’m only counting comic book stuff for this countdown.

Sorry, no inclusions of the time in Ultimate Alliance where he talks to Weasel about the time he stabbed him in the leg for taking the last cheese puff. Or the conversation where he tries to convince Black Bolt to say “spatula”.

This also means no inclusions of animated Deadpool shooting Hulk and Wolverine with a crapload of tranquilizer darts before saying, “Hey, Logan! It’s me, Deadpool! I shot youuuuu!” Which is a shame in of itself because Hulk vs. Wolverine is such a brilliant depiction of the mouthed merc.

50) Rock ‘n’ Roll!
Identity Disc #2 (2004)
Writer: Rob Rodi

For those who haven’t heard of it, Identity Disc is a miniseries from a few years back that is essentially what happened when a writer decided to take The Usual Suspects and rewrite it with six supervillains. Five of the villains are interesting characters and help sell the series, but the other one sucks and is somehow the main character. Hint: I’m talking about Vulture.

Deadpool is part of this group in search for the Identity Disc, which has the identities of every superhero. In one scene, he hangs out with Bullseye, waiting to strike a facility and steal a skeleton key device. The two talk about what the Kaiser Soze knockoff of a villain has on them to make them play ball. For Deadpool, he’ll get information on where his ex-wife is. I don’t even think they meant Mercedes from the Kelly run, which makes it more of a continuity clusterfuck. For Bullseye, he’s tried working both sides of a gang war and it’s blown up in his face. If he does his job here, the slate will be wiped clean.

Finally, it hits nightfall and after all that waiting, they can finally get to business. Bullseye says, “Time to rock ‘n’ roll,” as the two sneak around the building. After all the lead-up, all that happens is Bulleye knocks a security guard out by flicking a piece of gravel onto his forehead and then finds the safe and gets the prize. Deadpool is angry over the complete lack of action and the fact that he wasn’t even needed to begin with.

To make up for it…

And there it is. The only scene from Identity Disc you’ll see on the list.

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(I should probably first mention RIP Bea Arthur because… well, you know. It’s on-topic)

Wade Wilson. Deadpool. The Merc with a Mouth. The Deathstroke the Terminator knockoff. Cable’s reluctant sidekick. The would-be mutant. The febrile-minded man who has to deal with outrageous moral quandaries. The man who shot Liberty Valance. The… you get the point. These days are pretty lucrative for the yellow-bubbled anti-hero of Marvel. The character, who as of this writing has been around for 19 years, has gone through many twist and turns in his fictional existence. Enough that I can write up 70 of his best moments. Why 70? Because it’s a week-long series and ten per day is a round enough number on its own.

First appearing in New Mutants #98, created by the team of Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld, Deadpool would follow the cast as the series became X-Force. There, his character, though with attempts at humor, was mostly pretty bland. His appearances usually involved him talking about how great the mysterious Mr. Tolliver was paying him followed by Wade beating the crap out of his girlfriend Copycat. So yeah, not very fun.

Then he got his own miniseries. It wasn’t all that great, though the ending showed that he wasn’t a total piece of shit. Then he got another miniseries and it was better. Then he finally got his own on-going series, which had a great run by Joe Kelly. Once he left, it went for about two and a half years of different writers that made the whole thing seem like a big step down. Luckily, prior to being cancelled at #69, Deadpool’s final issues were a huge breath of fresh air and put some life back into the character… except for the fact that they killed him off.

But then his Japanese Ben Reilly self got an on-going series, which ruled until the original creative team was kicked off. Then it eventually turned lousy and got itself cancelled. Thankfully, Marvel brought the original team back for three issues to both explain the mystery of the main character’s identity and bring Deadpool back from the dead. Hurray!

From there, Deadpool shared a comic with his blood enemy Cable. In a series that played the two off of each other brilliantly, it went on for a respectable run. Unfortunately, Cable joined the X-Men at one point and the series, though still very readable, had jumped the shark. Even worse, Cable “died”, thus making it all about just Deadpool again and robbing the magic of what made the series fun. But hey, 50 issues isn’t bad.

After a memorable stint in Wolverine Origins, Deadpool has returned to form in yet another solo series. Plus a recent one-shot. And a new miniseries. And a role in Messiah War. And a spot in the animated movie Hulk vs. Wolverine. And a Thunderbolts crossover. And a SECOND on-going series coming up in a few months.

Oh, and Ryan Reynolds is playing Wade Wilson in a movie that’s coming out, but apparently has little to do with what made people like the character in the first place. Like Movie Deadpool’s lack of mouth for one.

Now, then. Let’s get this countdown underway.

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