Tuesday gave us the long-awaited videogame sequel Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds and you bet your ass I picked it up. Not only that, but I picked up the special edition. In addition to the game, the package includes a tin case, free access to the downloadable characters Jill Valentine and Shuma Gorath, free Marvel Unlimited for a month and a booklet that features lots of sweet art and a prologue comic.

Now, I know what a lot of you are saying.

“Who gives a shit about a fighting game’s story, let alone a stupid crossover story like this?”

Me. That’s who. I love fighting game storylines… at least until the 4th or 5th game when they run out of ideas and go through the motions. I love cheesy crossovers. I guess I just love plots where the basic idea is, “Here are a bunch of interesting individuals out to beat each other up. There can be only one winner. Who’s it going to be?” I guess this is part of why I love the Royal Rumble so much.

I was going to scan the 12-page Frank Tieri/Kevin Sharpe comic, but that would be too easy. I thought it would be better for everyone to simply transcribe it for all of you who picked up the regular copy of the game. So it back and enjoy Fate of Two Worlds.

SCENE 1
(Zombie-filled laboratory)

Jill Valentine: Wesker has to be here somewhere. Boy, we really have our work cut out for us.
Chris Redfield: You said it. All sorts of zombie types here. Oh, crap! It’s an Executioner boss!
Jill: We don’t have enough ammo for this!
Chris: Why the hell not?! We haven’t shot our guns once yet! We’ve just pointed our guns at zombies and acted like it was good enough! But you’re right about us being screwed. We’re going to need a miracle here.
(a green hand appears through a portal, grabs the Executioner by the hood and slams his face into the wall repeatedly)
Hulk: HULK SMASH ENDBOSS!
Jill: That green monster just saved us.
Chris: You’re right. LET’S GET HIM!

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This week we have entries from the usual crew in Space Jawa and Was Taters, but also an addition by Luis, who gave me something from Amazing Spider-Man. When I discovered who that’s supposed to be holding the decapitated head, I let out one hell of a sigh.

Amazing Spider-Man #649
Dan Slott and Humberto Ramos

Avengers & The Infinity Gauntlet #4
Brian Clevinger, Lee Black and Brian Churilla

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This week brought the end to one of the more enjoyable Marvel miniseries of the year in Avengers & the Infinity Gauntlet. Written by Brian Clevinger (of Atomic Robo and 8-Bit Theater fame) and Lee Black with art by Brian Churilla (the Anchor), it’s a very fun and all-ages reimagining of the Infinity Gauntlet storyline. Rather than have a bunch of heroes run headfirst into a gruesome death by Starlin’s second favorite character, only so that Starlin’s first favorite character can be the one to stop him, Clevinger goes a different route. The group of heroes sent to figure out what’s wiped out half the universe is made up of Spider-Man, Ms. Marvel, Hulk, Wolverine, Doctor Doom and US Ace. Yes, that space trucker from the awful US-1 comics of yesteryear.

The real star of the comic is Dr. Doom, mainly because of his dynamics with the rest of the cast. He hates Spider-Man for his lack of respect and penchant for annoying humor. He hates Ms. Marvel for daring to give Doom orders. He hates Hulk for being an imbecile. He hates Thanos for being one level above him in the megalomaniac game. He hates US Ace for being a ridiculous space hick. He hates Wolver… actually, he sort of almost seems to respect Wolverine just because they see eye-to-eye as the straight men of the group.

It’s a fun four issues and I can’t wait to check out Clevinger’s Captain America: The Fighting Avenger in January. But that’s not what this post is about. You see, Avengers & the Infinity Gauntlet has this subplot about the Skrulls and Kree joining forces to destroy Earth (long story). There’s a sequence that shows the people of Marvel Earth from all over the globe responding to this. Nick Fury, Mole Man, civilians trying to stay alive, etc. One panel shows the Punisher trying to fight back against the alien invasion. He’s surrounded by flame and… er… the bad choice of coloring hit me by surprise.

Hey, now! Hm… Then again, the guy’s already killing people on the streets. It’s not like public indecency is going to add that many years to his 329 back-to-back life sentences. Still, be warned: if you mention “Micro” around Frank Castle, you BETTER make sure he knows you mean his hacker sidekick.

I jabbed Clevinger about this and this is what he had to say about the Punisher’s Naked Kill:

😀 Lee and I never got to see a color proof for issue 4, so this panel came as quite a surprise. Looking at it now, I’m not sure if we’d have said anything or not. I mean, we got to include the phrase “meanest mother trucker” and show Wolverine killing a guy on panel in an all ages book. Why not go balls out and have Punisher, uh, go balls out?

It’s nice to see him taking it in stride like this. Since he’s been so cool about me poking fun at Frank’s exposed shotgun and grenades, I thought I’d do him a solid. Right here, right now, you’re getting a 4thletter! exclusive. Cross your fingers, but I’m hoping Marvel could use this for the cover for the Avengers & the Infinity Gauntlet trade.

What courage. I would never allow that thing anywhere near Wolverine’s claws!

…what? I meant the beach ball.

First off, Halloween happened. That led to this.

Thankfully, I didn’t come across anyone dressed as Lawrence Taylor or Major Payne.

Now to panels. This week I’m joined by Space Jawa. There are other kinds of Jawas?

Action Comics #894
Paul Cornell, Pete Woods, Nick Spencer and RB Silva

Avengers #6
Brian Michael Bendis and John Romita Jr.

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A year ago I talked to David Brothers about an idea I had for the site. I had tried writing reviews of weekly releases before, but I never got into it. There were a couple reasons and they’re both about redundancies. I can tell you about how great the latest issue of Captain America is, but so will every other site. There are so many other comic sites that will give better reviews of new stuff that I don’t know why anyone would give a damn what I have to say among all that. Then there’s the fact that comic quality doesn’t change so often within the series’ run. If I tell you that Captain America is great one month, chances are it’s going to be just as good the next. Why waste my breath? If I want to give you my opinions, I want it to at least be interesting and hopefully unique.

I thought back to the first issue of the Agents of Atlas miniseries from several years back. The general response of people who read it and tried to push it was to point out that there’s a scene where a 1950’s robot runs down a hallway while carrying a talking gorilla and that gorilla is firing four uzis with his hands and feet. I figured that maybe that could be the unique way to cover the comics of the week. I’d settle on one panel that really pushes what the comic is about, more than often more than the cover does. It’s no longer so much a review as it is giving you a gist on what we all read. At the same time, I would make sure not to have any major spoilers. If the comic has Wolverine beat up Daken in the climax, then I won’t show it. I will, on the other hand, show them about to fight it out.

If anything, it was also an excuse to keep me from straying from doing anything for the site too long at a time. I’d have a deadline of some point every Sunday and I’ve been pretty good on that. I’ve only delayed two weeks and those were because of a lengthy power outage and the loss of my computer.

I didn’t know if it would work, but David said to go for it. Now it’s been a year and I thought it would be fun to do an extra installment in a retrospective form. The idea was to pick one of my favorite panels from the previous 52 weeks, but with the challenge of not double-dipping from the same title at any point. Here we go!

Adventure Comics #4
Geoff Johns, Sterling Gates and Jerry Ordway

Amazing Spider-Man #617
Joe Kelly, Max Fiumara and Javier Pulido

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Goddamn. It’s been an entire year of this. I hope you folks have been actually enjoying these. I mean, I do it regardless because it’s fun, but if you’re digging it too, sweet.

It’s just me and Was Taters this time around. Shockingly, we’ve BOTH read Azrael this week, making me wonder if we’re in fact the only two who are keeping up with the series. And yet Azrael is still going to last at least 14 issues. I’m not complaining, but it is rather strange to me. Maybe Didio really likes the guy.

Astonishing Spider-Man & Wolverine #3
Jason Aaron and Adam Kubert

Avengers & The Infinity Gauntlet #2
Brian Clevinger, Lee Black and Brian Churilla

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Due to extenuating circumstances, I wasn’t able to do ThWiP last week, so it’s been accumulated into this week’s update. For last week’s picks, I’m disappointed in David for choosing that specific Avengers Academy panel when the true honors should have gone to Reptil asking a disgruntled Cain Marko if he can say, “Nothing can stop the Juggernaut!” for his amusement. Was Taters rejoins the show once again, unable to choose between panels for Superman/Batman, so we went with both.

Warning: there is something really fucked up going on with Hal Jordan’s hands in the Legacies image and you won’t be able to stop yourself from staring at it.

Action Comics #892
Paul Cornell, Pete Woods, Pere Perez, Jeff Lemire and Pier Gallo

Age of Heroes #4
Elliott Kalan, Brendan McCarthy and others

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Welcome to a very special Too Much Goddamn Deadpool Edition of ThWiP. Why too much? Even though I didn’t even read Wade Wilson’s War this time around? Simply put, Deadpool #1000 has way too much going for it for me to choose a single panel, so I figured I’d give a spot to all eleven of its stories. Adding that to an already stacked week and we have a hefty set.

Avengers Prime #2
Brian Michael Bendis and Alan Davis

Avengers: The Origin #5
Joe Casey and Phil Noto

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Just got back from CHIKARA’s King of Trios and I’m completely exhausted. I’ll do a little trip report of sorts later. For now, it’s panel time.

Amazing Spider-Man #628
Roger Stern, Lee Weeks, Mark Waid, Tom Peyer and Todd Nauck

American Vampire #2
Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque, Stephen King and Rafael Albuquerque

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For those who haven’t noticed or forgot, a nasty storm caused me to lose my cable connection last week and rather than wait a day to post TWiP, I made the dumbass decision to add it onto the next week. Apparently I was too busy to notice that this week was a huge one regardless, making this a gigantic update. Welp, let’s get moving.

The A-Team: Shotgun Wedding #1
Joe Carnahan, Tom Waltz, Stephen Mooney

Amazing Spider-Man #624
Mark Waid, Tom Peyer, Paul Azaceta and Javier Rodriguez

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