Thursday, September 23, 2010

He IS Rising (And Advancing)!!

This week's Avengers #5, aside from being a fundamental lesson in how to pad out a 2-3 issue storyline to trade length, also sees Marvel doing more explicit ripping off of DC.

Specifically, they steal the idea of Rip Hunter's blackboard containing mysterious hints of future events upcoming in the DC universe. Except here, it's future Tony Stark laying out upcoming events on a big old sheet of butcher paper (don't worry, there are no spoilers for the actual Avengers story here):

Click to embiggen enough to actually read...or wait for one of the news sites to run a big ol' high-res readable version.

Anyway, DC rip-off or not, the important part comes when we zoom in a bit:

Yup, you saw it:

Now, earlier I was experiencing paroxysms of joy because Shang-Chi is returning for a least one storyline in Ed Brubaker's Secret Avengers, and they've been dropping hints that Fu Manchu might be coming back, too.

But this...surely one little guest-arc wouldn't be enough to justify it's own entry on Rip Hunter's blackboard Tony's wholly original timeline from the future, would it??

Is Master Of Kung Fu coming back, as its own title??

Could it be? Dare I hope??

Or is this going to be like when Bendis gave us Nick Fury's Bulletin Board Of Skrulls, which was scrutinized to death by fans and ultimately turned out to be completely meaningless and worthless??

Don't disappoint me, Marvel...

6 comments:

Abe Lucas said...

"Don't disappoint me, Marvel..."

That's like saying, "Don't burn me, fire" You know it's gonna happen.

Abe Lucas said...

BTW, today marks the twenty-eighth anniversary of Gene Day's death. :(

Anonymous said...

only if doug moench is writing it.remember how out of character Shang was in Heroes for Hire? I'd rather see no Master at all than see him written as an oversexed psychopath.

snell said...

Anon, while no one would welcome Meonch back more than I would, I think it would be wrong to say that no one else could write it, even if we were burned by Palmiotti & Gray. Brubaker, who is handling the Secret Avengers arc, has proven himself very capable of writing wonderful non-superhero stuff (see Criminal), as well as the secret agent type stuff MOKF was known for.

There are any number of Marvel writers who could do an intriguing job, methinks, as long as we keep Bendis, Millar, Loeb and Claremont far away.

Martin Gray said...

28 years! Oh my word.

Which reminds me, what is Dan Day doing these days? Or might Mike Zeck pop back for a storyline? I'd love to see Chi's gang back together ... the last I heard of anyone was Clive Reston in an MI-13 story.

And has Fu Manchu not entered the public domain yet? It'd be nice if our boy could say his dear old dad's name once more.

But MoKF must have his red pyjamas!

La Belle Esplanade said...

Hope springs eternal but I think we all know how this is going to turn out:
"Or is this going to be like when Bendis gave us Nick Fury's Bulletin Board Of Skrulls, which was scrutinized to death by fans and ultimately turned out to be completely meaningless and worthless??"

I'll bet money on meaningless and worthless.