Siege

I've kept my mouth shut about Siege for a little while and, while its been hard, I kind of wanted to see what the solicits looked like before I said anything and...

Well, I don't know.

I mean, it could be very good. It could be. It could be the culmination to the Bendis macro-story we've been dealing with since what feels like forever and it could end it and could be done and we could move on.

It could be all of those things. It probably won't be, but it could be. And for the moment, I'm going to continue to have hope.

I'm less interested in Siege, though, than I am in the repercussions Reborn is going to have for the event. I've made no secret of the fact that I think that Steve should have stayed dead. There was a lot to go on with Bucky, a lot of new territory to cover and a lot of new things to do- in many ways, Steve's death was the most authentic and original thing to happen in mainstream comics in a very long time. There was a lot of interesting things going on in the book and I'll be sad to see that period of experimentation end.

Still, it is Brubaker we're talking about here. Reborn (so far) might have been something of a misstep (the story isn't perfect, but it's really the art that makes it painful) but I still have faith; the man had to be due for an imperfect story at some point, right? I'm think he's too smart to undo everything that he's done, and it's unclear to me that Steve is going to be the same Steve- he'll be the same figure, sure, but will he be the same sort of hero? More interestingly, what's going to happen with Buck? The solicits make it clear that he isn't going away and, again, Brubaker is too smart to turn him into Steve's sidekick- will they both be "wielding the shield"? It's not as if he can put on the Nomad uniform, and making him the second "Captain" would be, well, dumb.

Furthermore, what role is he going to play in Siege? Where does Bucky fit in the downfall of Norman Osborn?

I'm going to buy Siege- I don't always dig Bendis, but I generally dig Copiel- mostly because I want to see how Marvel is going to put the band back together, so to speak. I've become interested in Thor as well as Cap, and I'm going to buy a couple of issues of Iron Man starting next month, just to see if my dislike for the character might be misguided (looking back on the way that Brubaker wrote him in Captain America, I think I've been a little mean-spirited in the past; I suspect he's just a tough character to write, so, unlike, say, the X-Men who are often compelling on their own merits, the writer needs to be top notch to make it work. I think Fraction just might be that guy), and this appears to be the culmination of the stories about all three- so I'm interested to see where this leads.

Say what you will about the editorial choices at Marvel in the last few years, but let's put it in perspective- last week, in my Planetary review, I talked about Warren Ellis warning against stale comics and Marvel has done everything they can to move themselves forward, really since Disassembled. It's made for some really good comics, and I'm curious to see what happens. I've got faith.

I guess thats what makes me keep coming back.