The Four Color Media Monitor

Here's a list on Yahoo Entertainment, originally from Nerdist, ranking what they consider the top 10 Hornhead runs, and once again, we have a most predictable citation of post-2000 runs at hand, no matter how pretentious they became at that point. The examples I'll highlight of this farce include, for instance, Joe Quesada, Kevin Smith and Jimmy Palmiotti's Marvel Knights run:

The 1990s were a rough time for Daredevil. It wasn’t until Kevin Smith, Joe Quesada, and Jimmy Palmiotti assembled in 1998 that the Man Without Fear hit his stride again. Under the new Marvel Knights imprint, Daredevil began anew. With Smith’s lyrical narration and Quesada and Palmiotti’s lush art, Daredevil came out swinging and never let up. Smith, Quesada, and Palmiotti kicked off a new era of Daredevil marked by creative experimentation that continued through the early 2000s. In just eight issues, Smith, Quesada, and Palmiotti reminded comics fans why Daredevil is a top-tier Marvel character. And yes, this is the same Kevin Smith who made Clerks!

Yup, sugarcoating the mediocre portfolio of Quesada's art, and no mention of how, at the time, their whole notion of how to script this volume and "motivate" Hornhead was to kill off Karen Page. Palmiotti doesn't impress me either, based on his involvement in these kind of projects. I don't consider anything coming after DD's original 1964-98 volume ended a valid take on the character. And the 90s were rough for DD? Tell us about it. "Creative experimentation" actually explains what went wrong. Next up is Mark Waid's run:

Mark Waid, Paolo Rivera, and Chris Samnee’s Daredevil departed from the dark and crime-heavy tone that the character had become synonymous with. Instead, Waid’s Daredevil had no private identity. He lived publicly as Matt Murdock, vigilante and lawyer, in San Francisco. Waid and Rivera introduced a fan-favorite girlfriend of Matt Murdock’s, Kirsten McDuffie, a fellow lawyer. Rivera and Samnee’s playful artwork combined with Waid’s adventurous tone reestablished Daredevil as a character who made you smile as much as he made you think. In this sense, this run was a better version of Daredevil’s earliest comics by Bill Everett, Stan Lee, Wallace Wood, John Romita Sr., and Gene Colan. Waid, Rivera, and Samnee proved just how versatile Daredevil is as a character.

This run was noteworthy for containing apologia for Islam, in additiona to other forms of leftism. That sure is some way to make one think, based on the kind of direction it went from a modern, post-2000 perspective. And if memory serves, Brian Bendis was the one who set up the whole Matt Murdock sans-secret ID premise, and not for the better. But it can't be any surprise they'd imply Waid's run - or anything coming post-2000 - would be far better than Lee's run, or even Colan's. Here's also what they say about Chip Zdarsky's run:

If Waid, Rivera, and Samnee’s Daredevil was the Beach Boys’ Surfer Girl album, Chip Zdarsky and Marco Checchetto’s Daredevil was Rage Against the Machine’s debut. Zdarsky wrote Daredevil with righteous fury and emotional complexity, brought to life by Marco Checchetto’s art. Matt Murdock became more and more disillusioned with the justice system as well as his Catholic beliefs. This culminated in him going to prison after killing a man early on in the run. The focus on Daredevil’s rage brought out a terrifying but relatable dimension to his character. With Zdarsky’s attention to both the failings of the justice system and Catholic schools of thought, Daredevil never felt more salient to today’s world. If you’ve ever experienced even a smidge of Catholic guilt, you’ll find yourself at home in Zdarsky and Checchetto’s Daredevil.

Something tells me any criticism this run has for Catholicism or Christianity in general doesn't extend to terrible cases like these. No doubt, Zdarsky's run is just panning Christianity - and probably Judaism by extension - based on what positivities it could have from a conservative perspective. Or, Zdarsky's just slamming Christianity along the lines of far-leftism. No surprise, of course. There may have once been a time where storylines in which Hornhead killed criminals would've been acceptable. But not the way they're writing it here. And just how is the justice system perceived as failing? Not in the way it is in New York today, to be sure. And then, lo and behold, Brian Bendis' run makes the numero uno rank on the list:

Daredevil by Brian Michael Bendis, David Mack, and Alex Maleev is a rare book that fearlessly rewrites what a superhero story can do. The run begins with a story about a child obsessed with Daredevil. David Mack’s gorgeous watercolors defy conventional page layouts. It elevated existing Daredevil characters like journalist Ben Urich in a wholly original way. Bendis brought a sense of soulfulness to Daredevil’s familiar crime dramas, bringing readers into the dizzying sights, smells, and sounds of New York City. Daredevil has a tendency to wall himself off when he feels vulnerable, but Bendis brought us into his headspace like never before. Likewise, Alex Maleev’s vision of New York City is arguably the blueprint for the city moving forward, bringing a palpable sense of grit to the page. Bendis, Mack, and Maleev made a whole new generation of comics readers fall in love with Daredevil.

Sorry, but this run, much like Smith's, was the beginning of the end. And bringing the audience into DD's "headspace" sounds reminiscent of J. Michael Straczynski's claims he wanted to get into Spider-Man's head, when Peter Parker's just as fictional a character as DD. If memory serves, this run saw Matt Murdock have his secret identity revealed, and not for the better. It's no more impressive than Superman getting his revealed.

This list also fails to mention anything prior to Frank Miller's run - not even Lee's storytelling - which is quite appalling. Miller's run is mentioned, along with Denny O'Neil's from around 1984, and Ann Nocenti's later one from 1989, but that's about the only good stuff to be cited in this otherwise pretentious puff piece. Ed Brubaker and Charles Soule's runs are post-2000 as well, just like Bendis', and I wouldn't be fooled into wasting time on them today either.

Besides the above, Yahoo Entertainment also ran an article originally from Total Film, about the new Madame Web movie, based on some of the characters from Spidey's world, and one in particular from the aforementioned JMS' pretentious 2001-07 run, who's turning up in the cast:

Sony's Madame Web movie is shaping up to be the most Spider-y of the studio's Spider-Man spin-off films with three Spider-Women appearing in the first trailer, and even an evil Spider-Man as its apparent villain who is seemingly identified as Ezekiel Sims, an important figure from Spider-Man comics with a connection to the Spider-Verse.

But is all as it seems with Ezekiel Sims in the Madame Web movie? And is that him in the dark spider-suit?

In Marvel Comics, Ezekiel plays a very different role as more of a mentor and ally to Peter Parker, with secret, mystical knowledge about the nature of Spider-Man that calls into question everything Peter knows about his place in the Marvel Universe - and even the so-called Spider-Verse.

Introduced back in 2001's Amazing Spider-Man #30 by writer J. Michael Straczynski and artist John Romita, Jr., Ezekiel is a mysterious older man who discovers Spider-Man's true identity by hiring numerous private investigators to track him. After revealing himself to Peter, Ezekiel also reveals that, like Peter, he too has spider-powers.

Unlike Peter, however, Ezekiel gained his powers on purpose through a magical ritual, tying himself into the power of the so-called Spider-Totem, a mystical spider-entity who, according to Ezekiel, empowers all Spider-heroes across the Multiverse.

Ezekiel reveals this connection to Peter Parker, raising the question of whether the spider that bit Peter gave him powers because it was irradiated, or if it was attempting to pass spider-powers on to Peter before it died of radiation.

Whichever it is, the result is the same: Peter is now tied into all the other Spider-Totems, and with this new awareness also comes the danger of those who hunt Totems, specifically a particularly malevolent energy vampire named Morlun.

The issue Spider-fans had with this take is that it diminishes Spidey's uniqueness - this isn't the DC universe, where the legacy concept was written well enough with at least a few characters like the Flash, up until the turn of the century anyway. Say, and what's this about a so-called Spider-verse? Such a thing didn't really come along until about a decade ago, when Marvel started injecting a busload of other characters into spider-themed roles, again, at the expense of Spidey's uniqueness. The only other character we really need in a heroic spider-role is Jessica Drew. Yet simultaneously, I get the feeling the columnist's putting down Spidey's world rather than praising the best of it (pre-2000, of course).

With Morlun hunting Peter, he must turn to Ezekiel for help. Ezekiel eventually gives his life to defeat the villain - although both Ezekiel and Morlun would eventually return, though Ezekiel would also die again (apparently permanently this time). And in between, Peter would discover one of Ezekiel's darkest secrets.

As it turns out, Peter isn't the only Spider-Totem who gained powers on the day he was bitten as a teenager. As revealed in 2014's Amazing Spider-Man #1 by writer Dan Slott and artist Humberto Ramos, Peter's classmate Cindy Moon was also imbued with spider-powers on that day. But unlike Peter, she was locked away in a vault by Ezekiel, who kept her there for years for fear that Morlun would sense the power of the connection between Peter and Cindy.

Here we go again with that pathetic "revealed" nonsense, instead of "established". And the way Morlun was written was so cardboard, right down to how Spidey initially defeated him.

Sci-Fi Now noted that JMS commented on the Ezekiel issue himself, as the first he's hearing about the use of his poorly scripted character in the film:

“And well, this just happened,” Straczynski said on Twitter. “It’s definitely the character I created for Spidey, but it feels like they may have merged it with Morlun a bit. (Don’t ask for any details because this is the first I’m hearing of it, so my guess is as good as yours.)”

When met with a slew of questions, including whether he can sue for the use of his creation he replied: “No, because comic writers don’t own what we write on a work-for-hire basis, which is how comics work for the most part (creator-owned stuff aside)” and then when asked on clarification on whether he’ll get paid for the use of the character he stated: “No, nothing.”

Oh well. I could honestly care less. JMS' run is largely irrelevant today as it is poor, and predictably, nobody mentions how embarrassingly bad the ending of his run was, what with Peter and Mary Jane making a deal with Mephisto at the cost of their marriage. Today, Marvel continues to dangle the carrot in front of the audience, when in the end, it's not even worth eating to begin with. And JMS has never admitted how cheap he was being to concoct story and plotlines at the expense of the Silver Age origins, that weren't consistent with how Lee first established them. Exactly why he deserves no royalties. He was part and parcel to the devastation of all that's Spidey, did no better with what he wrote for DC either, and if he's left the comics medium, that'll be a blessing. I'll admit though, it is surprising the moviemakers of Madame Web want to put the Ezekiel character in a villainous role. As low an opinion as I have of JMS' past work since 2000, that doesn't mean they should've taken the direction they did. Though what it does indicate is that this is another case of filmmakers going for some of the easiest choices for what to draw from comics, with no consideration that what's come about since the turn of the century is worthless.

Labels: bad editors, Daredevil, dreadful writers, golden calf of death, islam and jihad, marvel comics, misogyny and racism, moonbat artists, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, politics, Spider-Man, women of marvel