Avengers Arena #12 The big reveal
Jul. 10th, 2013 06:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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scans_daily2 pages...
Ok so Nico is back and some kinda crazy powerful blood-mage, Chase is un-Darkhawked, Juston's poor Sentinel has been scrapped again, Ryker lost her arm cannon, and both Apex and DeathLockette have been swept underground by Nico.
But that's not what everyone's talking about...
Looks like Arcade's got some sort of crazy Frankenstein crap going on.
Ok so Nico is back and some kinda crazy powerful blood-mage, Chase is un-Darkhawked, Juston's poor Sentinel has been scrapped again, Ryker lost her arm cannon, and both Apex and DeathLockette have been swept underground by Nico.
But that's not what everyone's talking about...
Looks like Arcade's got some sort of crazy Frankenstein crap going on.
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:01 pm (UTC)Am I the only one who thinks Arcade (or maybe not!) looks like he has a pine cone for a head in that panel in the shadows? Because he totally looks like he has a pine cone for a head.
Is that supposed to Mettle's corpse though? It looks robotic, so I'm thinking it's some sort of duplicate, since I thought Mettle has just make of vague living metal, not mechanical in nature.
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:04 pm (UTC)And yeah, Mettle's not a robot at all, so the implication here may be that none of the deaths are happening at all.
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:08 pm (UTC)i think it was pretty obvious that the deaths were suspect....
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-10 11:07 pm (UTC)Anyway there's two running theories...
1. Everyone on the island is an android being mentally controlled by captured kids ala "Surrogates."
2. Arcade is somehow raising the fallen teens from the dead for some underhanded reason. Either he plans to bring everyone back at the end of the "season" and start again, or the maybe surviving kids are going to have to fight their teammates.
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-10 11:14 pm (UTC)The author backed away from it in the second book, but I wouldn't be surprised if that wasn't where this was going.
I really dislike this book.
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Date: 2013-07-10 11:22 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2013-07-11 04:24 am (UTC)That might be pushing it. None of the other kids on that last page seem to be robots.
I'm going with what theflames said, Arcade is making a Mettledroid and using his skin as a shell
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Date: 2013-07-11 02:38 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2013-07-11 02:02 am (UTC)Jack: "Daaaad, WHY can't we buy this orbital laser??"
James Power: "Jack! I told you that's not our AIM catalogue, now do as I said and take it down the hall to Professor Power right now young man!"
Hilarity ensues, etc ;)
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Date: 2013-07-11 06:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-11 08:56 am (UTC):)
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Date: 2013-07-11 12:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-11 12:20 am (UTC)Then I noticed Kid Briton's head still being dismembered, so now I think Mettle's body has been put back together, scoped from the inside out into a robot, using his hard skin as the perfect shell.
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Date: 2013-07-11 12:51 am (UTC)One: This seems like an ill-conceived pseudo-Westworld where Arcade is just testing new robots of the assorted victims, he does after all have robots of the X-men and various others.
Two: This REALLY seems like the writers trying to cover their own asses over killing these characters.
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Date: 2013-07-12 02:56 am (UTC)And it may seem that way, but I remain fully skeptical that they'll backtrack over the deaths. The writer seems to be of a mindset that the deaths need to be 'real' to have impact.
Frankly, they haven't had impact beyond shallow shock value, and what remorse and lamentation we have had has been laughably short or simply laughable.
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Date: 2013-07-11 12:57 am (UTC)His name is Arcade after all. Who is over in the tank?
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Date: 2013-07-11 07:08 am (UTC)I feel the hunger games didn't push it far enough by bringing back the dead contestants as 'mutts', since it was more of Katniss just reacting with it.
Here it seems if they're brought back, it'll be some real body horror (Mettle seems to have been skinned and repurposed) so it'd be nice to see where that runs. Imagine Apex gaining control of this Mettle bot, Hazmat would go nuclear...
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Date: 2013-07-11 08:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-11 01:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-12 02:54 am (UTC)Why? Well, Nico's arc for instnace is basically a retread of her arc under Joss Whedon (power at a price, trauma making her darker, etc), and frankly, we have yet to get a good dramatic death scene that isn't undermined or marred in some way.
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Date: 2013-07-12 01:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-12 07:04 pm (UTC)We can totally agree that Kev Walker's art is all around awesome. :)
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Date: 2013-07-12 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-12 11:48 am (UTC)And we don't know the full details of this. They may not be coming back, in which case, the meat grinder label still applies. And I'm sorry, Red Raven's death was still cheap and insulting to the character, even if she does come back. Not to mention, if they're turned into 'mutts', then they're still dead, only now their corpses have be reanimated to kill their friends. Because killing them off isn't good enough, they need to take a dump on their graves, too.
Besides, if they do come back, then this entire plotline will have been entirely pointless, because it's been panned so much and sales have been sliding (not to mention that charming 'you're terrible for reading this'-why do writers put that stuff in? Do they not want people to read the story they wrote?) that I think pretty much everyone will pretend it never happened.
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Date: 2013-07-12 01:54 pm (UTC)Insulting to the character? ... I take it you were a fan of Red Raven before this series started?
I don't have that emotional resonance with them comings back as 'mutts' in story the characters will validly see it that way, but that's not offensive to me.
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Date: 2013-07-16 04:33 pm (UTC)And no, I'm not a prior fan of Red Raven. I still thought it was an insulting way to treat the character. I don't know why you think I'd have to be a fan to think that, considering it was an incredibly dumb and pointless death for 'comedy'.
Tell me, what did you think of the issue telling the reader that they're terrible people for liking this stuff?
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Date: 2013-07-16 05:05 pm (UTC)I think i'm being pretty fair with the meat grinder considerations. So far, only one character has 'dropped like a fly' and she was a huge stock character that no one truly cared for or knew of before coming back in this book, she didn't even register as a background character before this. Which makes it awkward when they complain about her. There will be other winged characters in the Marvel universe, trust me! And I argue that it wasn't comedy for us - It was completely in character for Arcade to make such a lame joke on a poor girls death-by-panic.
The only full-proof-death-complaint I've read so far are the ones in regards to Mettle. Which has been the only low point (and lowest) of this series, for myself, of course.
I didn't immediately interpret it as Apex talking directly to the reader, and then when I did, I remembered whose mouth it was coming from. The only one whose playing the game and is clearly out her mind isn't to be taken as the be all and end all of moral righteousness. Even when author tracts (which this isn't) are in play, the character whose mouth it's coming from doesn't suddenly loose their context and characterisation. (unless its done in the most painful way ever)
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Back to something you mentioned. It's presumptuous to think that these characters are all being tied up here and can't be used in other stories now. Hopeless was *denied* characters before, so if these where the ones he got, that means no one was planning anything for them anytime soon. So I'm happy they're being put on play in an actual story, I don't mind if they do bite the dust, at the moment they're getting the chance to shine (here's looking at you Cammi).
I feel I can assure you that, after this, if some writer really DOES want to use any of these characters, he/she won't be stopped simply because that character happens to be 'dead'. If someone wants them, they'll be back.
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Date: 2013-07-17 07:31 pm (UTC)And I'd argue that killing off Red Raven was meant as black comedy-because why the hell else is she there, if not to die for the cheap gag? Like you said, she was a tertiary character (although I'm sure she has fans out there) with zero impact on the overall story except another corpse on the mound.
No, Apex wasn't *technically* talking to/about the reader, since I'm pretty sure she's not fourth-wall aware. But it's an interesting choice of words by Hopeless.
And yes, certain characters have been prevented from appearing in other stories. There's at least one interview about the Infinity: The Hunt miniseries where the writer's said 'A lot of the characters I couldn't get to, because they're gone because of "Avengers Arena."'. I'm not being presumptuous.
And as far as I can tell, the only characters Hopeless was barred from using were the JGS kids (because they're pretty central to Wolverine and the X-Men) and Molly Hayes (because even Marvel won't shove a 13-year-old into a book marketed as a teen deathmatch).
As to the 'if they want to bring them back, they'll come back'...Holy Making Death in Comics Even Less Meaningful, Batman! They could have left them in limbo and brought them back that way, you know that, right? You don't have to make up an excuse for resurrection, even! Or do you not see the problem with killing off characters for cheap gain. Maybe if you want to bring a character back from the dead, killing them off in the first place was a bad idea (although there are obviously exceptions to this rule, such as Barry Allen, a great death who was resurrected because...reasons)! it'd just render this whole exercise even more pointless. So I guess I'm all for it, but I don't see why they could have let them 'hibernate' a little longer for another, better book. Like, saw, the one that's coming out in the near future, which the writer was planning some of these characters for?
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Date: 2013-07-17 08:24 pm (UTC)With Red raven, who to me feels like such a non issue, I viewed it as a fodder killing and straight up way of answering 'why don't they just fly away?'. Realistically, in a situation like this, someone with wings would attempt to do just that and 9 times out of ten it would work. Her Red Raven wasn't so lucky, and they gave Arcade a few chuckles.
With Apex, I liked to further point out that with her little speech to the audience she was talking about an audience who *enjoys* seeing kids kill eachother, Hopeless has been very aware that no one in his audience is here for that, despite Marvels promotional tactics. Hopeless knows the fans of his series enjoy the survival/story/character aspects and are not here just to see good guys kill each other. He knows that the detractors of this series aren't interested in seeing kids kill each other. He's calling out a *very* niche group of people who are only here to see good guys kill each other. So I have very little need to be offended, since I know I'm not here for that, I know Dennis Hopeless isn't either. If he's calling out anyone, it's the 'misaimed fandom'.
Infinity: The Hunt - is the other Avengers Arena series. Do with that information what you will. But that writer was prevented from using c-list characters for *his* death match story because they were in another death match story already. None of these other characters have been picked up for other concepts as far as we know, they were given to Hopeless because others were not using them or had little desire too. Which is why he was denied all of the X-kids other than X-23, who we know is coming out alive in this.
+ Molly Hayes, future her anyway, is showing up in the upcoming X-men Battle of the Atom storyline, so that would create a forgone conclusion for her if she showed up in Avengers Arena as a contender, which is most likely why he was denied.
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Comic death have always been a revolving door. We as fans know, or should know that much. It's only permanent for the truly unpopular characters. I understand this a shared universe we are talking about, a universe that has no conclusion - this isn't Harry Potter where there is an end in sight! This is Marvel. I've made my peace with that fact and take stories in as they happen, despite the fact that a sliding timescale and rigid status quo will affect the meaningfulness of said storyline later on, its just the cost of shared universe and sliding timescale.
I'd rather sees these characters be put to an actual story, I can;t enjoy them in Limbo, what use are they to anyone there? Safety in Limbo or death in story, I'll take the latter if it means seeing them in a story. I'm not saying Dennis Hopeless is going to bring them back, I hope he doesn't - I'm saying that if Brian Michael Bendis wanted Juston back, he'd get him.
Letting them hibernate for a better book that might not happen isn't something I'm interested. Some of these characters were hibernating for a long time with no stories for a while till Arena came a long, and I'm happy to see them here. Yes I like to see my favourite characters alive, but wether or not they die isn't proof of a bad concept or story for me. I like seeing my favourite characters faced with challenges and situations, even if those new challenges have death as a consequence.
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Date: 2013-07-12 07:09 pm (UTC)Mettle's was the closest to really working, but was botched by the buildup and the morning period was an utter failure with the line "My Boyfriend exploded all over me!"
Nico's is second, but it really doesn't read well. A motherly character not thinking of her family as she dies? That just doesn't work. It doesn't matter that she's back, her death scene sucked. The art was ugly and the dull colors really hurt. How does "Blood on snow" not call for a vibrant pallet?
Kid Briton is third. He got a burial. And not a word afterwards.
Juston: thrown away. Red Raven: A Joke.
So, out of 5 death scenes, we have 1.5 that work in total (giving half a point ot each one that sort of works, but fails). That's a 30% rate. That's a failure.
And that's why people call it a meat grinder. The deaths really don't matter for the most part, or the ones that 'do' are done so poorly they might as well not matter.