I don’t recall how, when, or why it came about, but Spider-Man has always been my superhero of choice. I assume it’s thanks to the syndicated episodes of the 60s animated Spider-Man cartoon, that were often mixed in with episodes of Rocket Robin Hood and The Mighty Hercules throughout the 70s and 80s on Saturday mornings. My brother, my older brother, of course chose the arguably cooler DC superhero, Batman.

Being a fan of Spidey, you’d probably assume I’m a fan of all things Marvel. While it is true I like Spider-Man, I actually pretty much hate everything about Marvel and the Marvel Universe. I also like the Hulk, and to some degree Iron Man, but everything else is utter crap. I hate the other Marvel superheroes, and their villains are completely ridiculous. Okay, that’s fine. I don’t have to follow any of those other characters, and I can choose to completely ignore if I so desire.

More so than its licenses, what I really hate about Marvel are their business decisions in relation to those licenses (as opposed to, for example, what DC does). To illustrate my point, I’ll use the aforementioned Hulk as my example. And forgive me if I’m slightly inaccurate with the details, as I don’t really care.

The Hulk first entered the scene with his own series, The Incredible Hulk, in 1962. This was a short-lived series which only lasted 6 issues. But Hulk didn’t go away. During the next couple of years, he made several appearances in other already established titles such as Fantastic Four, The Avengers, and The Amazing Spider-Man. It wasn’t until he became a feature character in another title, Tales to Astonish, at issue #60, that he started to find a home. This continued until issue #102, when the series was re-titled The Incredible Hulk (volume 2), but kept the same numbering. Thus, the stage was set for Marvel to continue f**king about with one of its flagship characters for all eternity.

Hulk actually maintained some stability for the next three decades, having been written/penciled by some of the biggest names at Marvel of then and now. Though, it probably wasn’t until Peter David took over the writing chore in ’87, and stayed with the comic for 12 years, that it arguably achieved its greatest success. Alas, all things come to an end, and David left the series over disagreements, and the last issue in the series was #474.

Not long after, a new team took over the reigns, but perhaps in an attempt to bring in new readers, this new series was simply titled Hulk and was renumbered starting at issue #1. Unfortunately, the chemistry of this new team was short-lived, as it only lasted for 11 issues. Another new team took it over, and it was re-titled yet again, back to The Incredible Hulk (volume 3), but starting at issue #12. It gets worse…

This third volume of Incredible Hulk has some success and lasts for several years. We now find ourselves in a period where both DC and Marvel have decided that massive sweeping crossovers are the equivalent of the summer blockbuster movie, and for this particular summer, Marvel has decided that Hulk will be the central character. In a bizarre storyline, Hulk is jettisoned from Earth, and to reflect this, The Incredible Hulk series is re-titled yet again to, of all things, The Incredible Hercules, but maintains the numbering, this time starting at issue #113.

So where’s Hulk now? Well, after a stint of crossover-related mini-series, which I’ll get to in a minute, he now finds himself with another new creative crew in another new series, also entitled Hulk (volume 3, I think), which starts back at issue #1… again!

Having said all that, I’ll say one thing good about Marvel. It sounds like they may be trying to restore some order to this mess. After issue #12 of this new Hulk series, they’re coming out with an issue #600 of The Incredible Hulk, and continuing from there. Though, strangely, according to Wikipedia, they’ll still be continuing with Hulk #13 and on, as well. Hopefully, they’ll just drop Hulk, and continue on solely with the Incredible Hulk series. That sounds like what people want anyway.

As an aside, as promised, here are some of the titles I’ve most recently had to put up with as a collector, just with a piece of this little summer event:

• World War Hulk
• World War Hulk Prologue
• World War Hulk: Front Line
• World War Hulk: Gamma Corps
• World War Hulk: Aftersmash
• World War Hulk Aftersmash: Warbound
• World War Hulk Aftersmash: Damage Control

If that’s not a cash-cow, then I don’t know the definition.

Marvel’s done this time and time again with pretty much all their titles (Avengers, Iron Man, even my beloved Spider-Man). I’ve completely ignored X-Men, as I don’t even know where to begin.

Don’t even get me started on the whole clone saga, retcon debacle of the 90s with Spider-Man.

I should also mention that DC isn’t without its own troubles. Whereas Stan Lee essentially tried to establish some semblance of order and consistency with his creations, DC on the other hand (a victim of its own success) has attempted several times to bring together the many disparate story lines in its titles/licenses, to the point now where its stuck having to deal with time travel and parallel universes, any time it tries to do so. Not exactly light reading…

Fuck it. Let’s just all read Sandman over and over…

But here’s a few for the books:

• Punk-ass teenagers who think they own the sidewalk and won’t squeeze to one side, especially when there are banks of snow on either side. One of these times I’m gonna knock one of those ass-clowns down on their bitch-ass and then laugh my ass off. And I wrote “ass” way too many times there. See what I mean? Riled up…
• Cyclists who think they own the sidewalk. I don’t care how treacherous the street is; it’s called a sidewalk for a reason, you jackholes! And then to yell, “Excuse me,” like you have any rights whatsoever. All that does is make me move to the middle and slow down.
• Drivers that don’t signal. Those little levers on your steering column and those little lights on the corners of your vehicle aren’t just for other drivers, you know. You people make me late getting to places, waiting for your dumb-ass selves to make your move.
• Drivers that don’t look for pedestrians when turning on a red light.
• Drivers that stop in the middle of a crosswalk. You ass-monkeys force me to either walk dangerously close to oncoming traffic (which is probably chock full of more idiots like you), or behind you where I run the chance of getting crushed at the knees by a tailgater or smoked off by someone who didn’t see me because of you. Stopped at an intersection is not the time you should be using to finish your pudding! (Yes, this actually happened.)
• Places that close before their posted hours. Whether I want to come in at 8:05AM or 9:55PM, I’m still a damn customer. If you don’t want me coming in 5 minutes before closing then don’t say you’re open that late.

I’ll add more if I think of them.

I start a new job Monday. It’s still computer related, still programming related, but it’s a slightly different approach to working that I haven’t done before. It’s only guaranteed for about 6 months or so, but it’ll give my a better idea of what I want to do.

I’ve got a back-log of videos on YouTube to post about, but I likely won’t be “scooping” anyone, plus I finally figured out how to automatically post my del.icio.us bookmarks on a daily basis, so the blog might turn into a link log for a little while until I settle down again.

Just thought I’d warn all y’all.

My first prolonged visit at an IKEA store. I don’t remember the arrows on the floor from when I was at the one in the West Edmonton Mall as a teenager. I definitely don’t remember the child day case centre. Or the Swedish food market, for that matter. Or the restaurant and cafe. Or the gigantic elevator with the max capacity of 74 people. But I think I now know the Swedish word for a fly swatter.