A Hulk special edition, featuring–among other things–a Champions story and a long-clamored-for reprint of “Hulk: The End,” and the first of a “Fallen Angel” two parter featuring her first experiences after having fallen to earth. Whad’ja think?
PAD
A Hulk special edition, featuring–among other things–a Champions story and a long-clamored-for reprint of “Hulk: The End,” and the first of a “Fallen Angel” two parter featuring her first experiences after having fallen to earth. Whad’ja think?
PAD
• 
Thrilled that I’ve finally gotten one of my two favorite Hulk stories. If we can get a reprint of Future Imperfect, I’ll be in good shape.
The Hulk stuff was fun. I’m interested to see how Lee first learned to operate as a physical being on Earth… still wondering if the new Fallen Angel series will be able to keep the awesome momentum it had in its first arc, now that it’s an ongoing instead of a limited series.
Given the blurb in Previews and the tone that appears here on socio-political issues, I expected that Fallen Angel would get the same reaction as Orsen Scott Card on Iron Man.
But that’s not the case. Although theology is front and center it’s not down with one and up with another.
A more important point is Lee’s view of God. Is she telling the truth or has past events coloured her views? One could argue that she was cast out there to seek justice for her hosts.
Just a thought..
David
I really enjoyed all three stories in the Giant-Sized Hulk. I appreciated how they connected, thematically. Your “Champions” story tied into Pak’s story over how the Hulk resents his treatment on Earth, and the Pak story tied into the “Hulk: The End” story, with the conflict between the Hulk and Banner–albeit, from two radically different perspectives. My question for PAD: was there some communication between you and Pak for this thematic harmony, or is it just a happy coincidence?
To be honest, I haven’t gotten either yet; I get comics through monthly mailorder. But I did want to give you a heads-up on your writing for comics book. Bud Plant just sent out his weekly newsletter, and your book was the featured item. Here’s the quote, which I thought was tremendously flattering:
“Instantly accessible, Writing for Comics with Peter David is one of the finest books we’ve ever seen on the subject. Not only is it a superbly entertaining read, but it’s replete with exercises to get your creative juices flowing and has tons of full-color comic panels to back up the lessons. Fascinating for comic fans and aspiring writers alike.”
How come Hulk: The End was added to the book? The end is simply one of the finest comics I’ve bought in my 20 years of collecting but I didn’t buy the Annual because it was attached. Why not just reprint it as a stand alone?
Geez, so that’s the third time “The End” has been printed. It started out life as a prose story in The Ultimate Hulk anthology in 1998, was adapted into comics form in The Hulk: The End, and now here it is again. I love it. *grin*
—KRAD
Hmmmm. Well, the Hulk story did not really thrill me. I have seen better from you in the past and it seemed to be a little bit too predictable.
On the otherhand, I really enjoyed FALLEN ANGEL. Great story. Great art.
Loved the Hulk story. Cool to see you writing a story with the classic Savage Hulk version.
Fallen Angel just gets better and better. I loved it.
Eric
Loved Fallen Angel. Whatever he’s doing different with the art (not painting it) I like it. Maybe I just like my comics pen and inked, not brushed?
Either way, I’m liking it. And I finally have gotten over the “not sure I like it since the switch to IDW” hump. I just need time to adjust to change. I’m a wreck when it comes to changing time zones, too.
Mr. David
Just saw on the Heroes Convention web site that you have cancelled your appearance next weekend..just wondering what happened?
The way you phrased the post, for about ten econds i thought you had said that the “Fallen Angel” story was in the “Hulk” book…
Too bad you won’t be at Heroes Convention. I was thinking about going to that to see mainly you and Perez. I live in Indianapolis and I hope to catch you in the Mid-West. I found out about the St Louis convention too late.
I liked how you played with Marvel Time in the Champions story, with the Clinton/Carter thing. Ever think about doing a Herc mini-series? I loved Bob Layton’s mini’s and I’d like to see you do something with that same feel.
Various family concerns presented conflicts I couldn’t really overcome. However, Shelton’s got a guest list of something like 300 people; I think it’s crazy to pass it up simply because I’m not there.
PAD
Loved the “Carter, Clinton, you mortals are all the same” thing in the opening Hulk story. 🙂
Sadly, Diamond didn’t deign to ship any Fallen Angel #6 to my store.
I loved Fallen Angel. After all the upheaval in last issue (Juris’ death, Jude’s ascension, Lee’s deal with God), a flashback issue was just what was needed to let us catch our breath.
Plus, now we know the origin of her ‘costume’.
Keep up the great work!
The Hulk was great – but that’s a given.
I honestly thought Fallen Angel was a mini-series. I am so glad to see it’s not. Good idea telling the story of when she first fell, and excellent story. But I have to tell you, I saw “what’s in the box” coming from a mile away. Didn’t stop me from enjoying it twice in one sitting.
As always, excellent job.
Read the Hulk annual and it just makes me the real Hulk stories and not the Planet Hulk thing they are doing right now.If I wanted Conan or John Carter warlord of mars I would read them…..
This is not the Hulk….Sorry Marvel.
Anyways I enjoyed The End a lot,any chance of Peter doing an Ultimates Hulk series???
Meant to say “miss the real hulk stories”
I’m sure it was editorial decision and not yours. But I already have the Hulk;The End. And I don’t need to spend $5 for 10 or 12 pages of what was probably an entertaining story by you. I mean what is The End, 5 years old? did it need to be reprinted. It just seemed like a big rip-off to me.
Sorry.
This was my first read of ‘The End’ and it was a great read. I really can’t say enough good things about it.
Wow, I’m impressed. I’ve been really enjoying the Hulk’s new milieu (regardless of whatever others say, make no mistake, this IS the Hulk–perhaps moreso than has been in 20 years), and the Giant-Size special is no different. PAD, regardless of your stated dislike of the savage Hulk, I don’t think anyone writes him better than you do right now. The Hulk who fought the Champions here was a more fully realized character than the savage one’s portrayal in other books where he’s appeared with the “caveman speak” over the last few years. I nearly wept with joy. Greg P.’s take was equally good, although with a different incarnation (had to give him credit for Banner taking Psyklop’s place in the Hulk’s dream…if you don’t know what I’m talking about, everyone get out your Hulk #140’s).
I’m stymied by those decrying the reprinting of Hulk: The End, a fine addition in its own right. Remember, the book was underordered by retailers back in the day, making copies go for upwards of $50 on eBay and elsewhere. If reprinting it here gives it a new audience (although from the looks of my comic shop, this book, too, was underordered), then I’m all for its inclusion.
Oh, and there were 28 new pages of story in this volume…not 10-12! Some meaty stuff, besides.
If not for this book, Fallen Angel would have been book of the week. Good stuff and a refreshing change of pace from J.K. Woodward. Fun, fun, fun.
~G.
Not sure where Marvel’s going with these Annuals and various other “one-shot” types of books, but this was well worth the money! Not only did I get to read a couple of new Hulk stories (Carter/Clinton was a great little joke, although I still like my comic book Presidents nameless), but I got to re-read one of the best Hulk stories EVER published: The End.
Hulk: The End certainly needed to be reprinted, as there are many Hulk fans who missed it upon release and can’t or won’t pay $25 for a copy on eBay. The print run on it was, what, 35,000 or so? C’mon, people!
I just read Fallen Angel today, Peter. I liked it. Nice story, really nice art, and nice revelation on the last page.
I neglected to get the Hulk annual on Wednesday because I forgot that you wrote it, but I’ll rectify that tomorrow. 🙂
Hey PAD, this is not a slam at your writing, which I love, but a question/comment on style of writing.
To be honest, so far the individual isses of Fallen Angel have left me somewhat cold. My main/only problem is with the pacing. Read as single issues number 1 through five of FA left me feeling sort of “Ehhh” Going back and reading the all in one sitting made me feel “Wow, what an incredible story.” Same thing with your recent Hulk story arc.
I do love Fallen Angel and fully intend to keep buying it, but I don’t think I’m going to actually crack the cover for another 4 or 5 months until the new story arc is complete and I can read it all at once.
I guess the question would be; is this a delibrrate change in your writing style, something that just naturally evolved over time or something I’m just imaging (my perceived percetion of the shift in your writing from stand alone single issues that can be enjoyed by themselves to story arcs in their entirety to be fully appericated)
I understand that there were those who missed Hulk-The End. Fine, so reprint Hulk-The End, alone. For those of us who did buy it the first time (and remember this was just 4 years ago, not from the Silver Age) it is a complete waste of our precious comics’ dollars to pay $5 for a 10 page Hulk story, even one by PAD.
I may be the only lost sale this book had because of this. But I kinda doubt it.
“I’m sure it was editorial decision and not yours. But I already have the Hulk;The End. And I don’t need to spend $5 for 10 or 12 pages of what was probably an entertaining story by you. I mean what is The End, 5 years old? did it need to be reprinted. It just seemed like a big rip-off to me.”
Considering the original edition was woefully underordered, that people have been asking me for years when/if Marvel’s going to make it available again, that copies are going for serious bucks on ebay, that most comic stores don’t have it, that the cover price for the Giant Size Hulk is cheaper than “The End” was plus it has something like 28 pages of new material…I can see how you may feel it’s not something you want to purchase, but “rip off”? I don’t think that’s especially fair or accurate.
PAD
Ah yes, the old standby. “I didn’t buy it because of this, so other people didn’t buy it because of this, so you lost a lot of money because of this.”
Ed, it wasn’t $5 for 10 pages. There was another story in there too. If you only want the brand new PAD part, then that’s a decision you have to make on your own. Since the reprint added significantly less to the cost of the magazine than the other original story, you’re really complaining about the wrong thing.
Basically, what you’re saying amounts to “How can they possibly expect me to pay $10 for just an orange” and pointing to an elaborate gift basket. Yes, other people won’t buy it for the same reasons, but plenty of other people *will* buy it because they *do* want a gift basket that’s a great value for the sum of its parts.
Guys,
I totally agree with Ed. This annual feels like a cruel version of force feeding. I bought the original printing of the “The End” when it first came out and it was either more expensive or just about the same price as this annual. I think the main problem is that for hardcore Peter David fans, the urge is to buy the book for new PAD Hulk material BUT the reprinting of “The End” could have been done as a stand-alone ish. This way the annual would have been priced cheaper AND the reprint would be more affordable to those have didn’t pick it up the first time as well. Marvel does this kind of thing all the time. We, as consumers don’t really get a choice. Either buy the expensive issue or miss out. And why? So they can milk us comic readers dry. Comics are sooo expensive these days. We need all the breaks we can get.
Paul
I’m another one of those individuals who decided not to buy the Hulk Annual, because half of the book was a reprint of Hulk: The End. This week I already spent 30 bucks on issues plus one Trade Paperback. It was an expensive week.
However, after hearing that Hulk: The End sells for some good bucks, maybe I’ll sell my Hulk: The End and buy the Annual.
KIP
Ugh. Sorry to hear about the HULK annual. I think I might buy it, but only because I don’t have Hulk The End already. I was excited that Marvel said their annuals were returning. I hope this isn’t the modely they’re following though. I was already mad about the complete rip-off that was “Fantastic Four: Death in The Family” which is sad because the lead story is actually kind of a nice, simple FF story that would have been a great fill-in issue.
Onto Fallen Angel – It’s still hard to believe that its still going! I’m really glad we get to read Lee’s further adventures. When I first heard that the book wasn’t going to be painted, I was a bit dissapointed. Until I saw the book. Now, I like the painted look a lot… but I think this might have been even better.
There are times when the painted work seemed every so slightly stiff and at times perhaps a bit too undefined/murky. The linework was wonderfully expressive and I think a lot more personality came out of it.
That’s not to say if we go back to the painted stuff I’d be sad. It’s one of the things that makes the book distinctive. But if for deadline reasons it was decided that this look was preferable, I’d be okay with it.
As for the story – I enjoyed it more then I thought I would as well. Flashback stories can be either hit or miss. They can be interesting or an annoying diversion from the ongoing story. This thankfully fell into the former.
I love where Lee ended up. It would’ve been so easy (and boring) to have her end up in some city in the US or something (okay, I guess that wouldn’t have made sense with the timeline, but you know what I’m saying) or go through the normal “Fallen” issues.
Fallen Angels in general are such an overused concept in fantasy – in standalone art, in stories, in badly written goth songs, that it really takes a good amount to stand out.
I think Lee’s personality is what saves the day. She’s not moping around after she falls. She just… keeps going, dealing with the situation at hand.
I found the village’s destruction very heartbreaking. I loved the origin of Lee’s “costume” as well. Can’t wait to see what happens next issue. 🙂
As I said. if there is such a pent-up demand for H-TE, then reprint it. I know there was other new material. I would have accepted that and paid for a normal book with 10 pages of PAD. But this just too expensive for me.
“Ah yes, the old standby. “I didn’t buy it because of this, so other people didn’t buy it because of this, so you lost a lot of money because of this.”
Jason; please read the whole post before you comment. I said, and I quote:
“I may be the only lost sale this book had because of this. But I kinda doubt it.”
This is an acknowledgement that I may be alone in my feelings, but I suspect I am not.”
If you think PAD does not want to hear reasons readers might not buy a book, other than; “Everything PAD writes SUCKS!” then so be it. I assume he might be interested.
I did read the entire post, Ed. In fact, the part of your post that you just quoted was exactly the part that I was commenting on. Your reason for not wanting the book is entirely valid. If you only want the 10 pages, then you have to decide if the 10 pages are worth the price.
The odd part of your post was the implication that there are other people out there who agree with you. You don’t need to say that. That’s a given. For anything anyone ever does, someone else does the same thing for the same reasons. So you don’t need to say “I may be the only lost sale this book had because of this. But I kinda doubt it.”
All it does is make you look like you’re trying to represent more people than the other side represents, like a puffer fish blowing itself up. The fact is, other people have already said that they bought the book specifically because of “The End”, and they’re probably not the only one’s either. So mentioning your own reasons is perfectly valid, but invoking phantom agreement is a weak tactic that weakens your position instead of strengthening it.
Reprinting old stories is very cheap compared to the new material. If you really didn’t think the other 18 pages of new material justified the price, then you should be saying that the PAD section should be in its own book, not that the 50 cents that was padded onto the price for the reprint was a bad idea.
Could we stop saying “10 pages?” I’m not sure of the length of the Pak piece, but the Champions story was 18 pages. I’m pretty sure Greg’s contribution was around ten, so that’s 28 pages of new material. Since a 22 page comic is $2.99, chances are a 28 page comic would be somewhere around $3.50. So basically it’s a lot of chest-beating over a $1.50 reprint of “The End” which is going for $30 and up on ebay. So I really don’t understand what the crabbing is about.
PAD
I liked both of the new stories (I read “The End” when it came out), but something bothered me about the Champions story. In the original “She Hulk” #1, both Banner and Jennifer Walters say and think about how they haven’t seen each other since Banner was in college. Unless this story takes place shortly after Walters became the She-Hulk, the story kinda doesn’t make sense continuity-wise… which is a shame since it was really good.
I literally thought it was just 10 pages of story. It doesn’t seem so bad now. Certainly better then the FF one-shot I think.
Lordy, lordy. Some people just really seem to like to complain. I loved “Giant-Sized Hulk #1”. First off, one of my most memorable books growing up was an issue of “The Champions” where they fought Swarm. It was so cool! And I had just started reading comics! A bit later I found out that Angel and iceman were originally on some other team. Some of you may have heard of it…
But that, plus PAD writing Savage hulk, plus the ending with Jen Walters made this story alone worth the cover price for me. And I DID love the Clinton/ Carter thing too:)
Toss in a cool Pak story that ties in to the current storyline and you have an absolute winner.
On top of THAT, if you add in a reprint of “Hulk:The End” – which I had never before gotten a copy of or been lucky enough to read, and I feel like a got a deal from the quarter bin! That’s how good it all was. Some of you need to chill.
Thank You, PAD.
“I liked both of the new stories (I read “The End” when it came out), but something bothered me about the Champions story. In the original “She Hulk” #1, both Banner and Jennifer Walters say and think about how they haven’t seen each other since Banner was in college. Unless this story takes place shortly after Walters became the She-Hulk, the story kinda doesn’t make sense continuity-wise… which is a shame since it was really good.”
When I started back up on “Hulk,” I can’t tell you the number of postings I read from fans who said, “Now Peter David used to write the Hulk, right?” or “Do I have to have read any of his previous Hulks, because I missed his run.” This codified for me what I refer to as “the ten year guideline.” Ten years is what appears to be the average for a generation of comic book readers. So anything that happened ten years ago, I feel free to believe that a significant portion of the current readership is unfamiliar with. And that unfamiliarity increases expontentially for every additional ten years.
That’s why, for instance, I didn’t hesitate to have Siryn refuse to believe Banshee was dead, even though I had done basically the same riff in an issue of “Hulk” when Nick Fury’s guys refused to believe Nick was gone for good. My belief was that a sizable enough portion of readers were unfamiliar with the previous story that it would a fresh concept to them (plus, need I point out, Nick did in fact return, so…)
It’s been more than TWENTY FIVE YEARS since “Savage She-Hulk #1.” I wanted the “Champions” story, focusing on a team that most readers are unfamiliar with, to have SOME resonance to modern day readers. So with the original material two-and-a-half times over the ten year guideline, I decided to ignore a single line of dialogue written a quarter of a century ago in favor of trying to make the story as effective as possible for today’s audience. Sometimes, as a writer, you find yourself in that sort of position.
I tried to underscore that need for fluidity when I had Hercules thinking that the president they had saved was Carter, only to be corrected by Iceman and told it was Clinton, and that Carter had been president when Iceman was a child. In point of fact, it WAS Carter. I put that bit in there to underscore the necessity of writers not to be completely hamstrung by continuity. Continuity should be a simple tool in writing a story, but it cannot, should not be the be-all/end-all of the story. You have to know where to push. Changing it so that Jen and Bruce had seen each other since college didn’t change things THAT dramatically, as opposed to, say, establishing that Jen and Bruce were not cousins, but ex-spouses.
PAD
10 years, huh? Well, that’s better than when DC thought a comics generation was 5 years in the golden age. They wouldn’t just ignore one line, they’d take an old Superman script and draw the *exact* same story again because they didn’t think anyone reading now would have read the old one!
The continuity issue is an interesting one. By the time Doctor Who was on its 26th season in the late 80s, they had 2 people whose full time job was checking for continuity errors. I really think that was a large part of what killed the show. I think the hardcore fans would get upset if continuity wasn’t addheared to religiously, but the constraints limited them so much that it contributed to all the casual fans leaving.
It’s not just generations, either. I don’t *want* to have to remember details from 10 years ago. It’s definitely cool to see something and recognise it from the past, but the more minor the detail, the closer more recent it should be.
I heard the same complaints when She-Hulk #100 came out. Even though it contained a special 60-page story by Dan Slott, some fans felt they were “ripped off” because the book contained reprint of Savage She-Hulk #1 and Sensational She-Hulk #1. I already own those issues but I thought buying the comic was well worth it. If fans like Ed Hopper have their way, we can kiss monster issue specials good-bye and the only way we will ever see old stories will be in stand alone trade paperbacks.
One quick question for PAD. I could not help but notice that Jen Walters in your story had green eyes. Was the coloring your idea, or was it mandated by the editors? Jen has green eyes in her current book, but originally she had brown eyes when she was in human form. Thanks!
BTW, as far as I am concerned PAD can re-write Savage She-Hulk #1 as much as he wants. As far as I am concerned, it was the weakest issue in the original run. And although I can understand Stan Lee wanting to explain the Hulk’s origin to new fans, it beggars the imagination that Jen Walters can grow to adulthood and graduate from law school with honors and still be the only person on the planet who doesn’t know her cousin is the Hulk.
It’s not crabbing, but the dissatisfaction stems from the fact that I picked up a large comic quickly and didn’t notice until I got home that the small print on the cover says that it includes a story I’ve already purchased. It is in the table of contents, which I should have read more closely in the store.
The ten-year guideline would work, Peter, only that SHE-HULK #1 saw print not only in SHE-HULK #3 back in December, the previous giant-sized extravaganza with “Hulk” in the title; but also ESSENTIAL SAVAGE SHE-HULK, which saw print… the exact same day GIANT-SIZED HULK #1 came out! It’s on the Marvel web site too.
Still, the story is otherwise pretty neat… and I picked up on the President bit straight away. It’s all a bit on the awkward side though, for two reasons – one the continuity kinks acknowledged here, and the other being that the Champions roster is a complete mismatch – but there’s not exactly anything you can do about that…
‘Fraid there was another continuity problem in the Hulk story as well.
At the end, the Black Widow comments how often Ivan told her when she was growing up “never to assume, because that makes an ášš out of u and me”.
Never knew before “assume”, “ášš”, and “me” were spelled the same in Russian as in English along with the letter “u” being a homonym for the word “you”.
Sorry, but it is key to Natasha’s background that she grew up in Russia, and that particular saying just doesn’t make any sense except in English…and it just isn’t one I can see getting used a lot in learning English.
(Not to mention that it’s a phrase I hate with a passion. Our whole cognitive structure is based on making assumptions, and we wouldn’t be able to function without doing so on a continuous basis. Yes, making bad assumptions is, well, bad. But the phrase tries to cast doubt on making any assumptions, which, to borrow from Penn & Teller, is bull****).
‘Fraid there was another continuity problem in the Hulk story as well.
At the end, the Black Widow comments how often Ivan told her when she was growing up “never to assume, because that makes an ášš out of u and me”.
Never knew before “assume”, “ášš”, and “me” were spelled the same in Russian as in English along with the letter “u” being a homonym for the word “you”.
Sorry, but it is key to Natasha’s background that she grew up in Russia, and that particular saying just doesn’t make any sense except in English…and it just isn’t one I can see getting used a lot in learning English.
(Not to mention that it’s a phrase I hate with a passion. Our whole cognitive structure is based on making assumptions, and we wouldn’t be able to function without doing so on a continuous basis. Yes, making bad assumptions is, well, bad. But the phrase tries to cast doubt on making any assumptions, which, to borrow from Penn & Teller, is bull****).
“Never knew before “assume”, “ášš”, and “me” were spelled the same in Russian as in English along with the letter “u” being a homonym for the word “you”. Sorry, but it is key to Natasha’s background that she grew up in Russia, and that particular saying just doesn’t make any sense except in English…and it just isn’t one I can see getting used a lot in learning English.”
He taught her English when she was a little girl and he brought it up then because his teachers drilled it into him when they were teaching him English.
Little known fact.
PAD
Speaking of a 10-year gap, PAD used the “ášš of u and me” bit in Supergirl not quite that long ago! Does the 10 year rule apply to comedic bits as well? Cause I’m waiting for the “Show Me the Monet” thing to come back as well. 🙂
Talk about a 10 year gap! ? Peter, you used the “ášš of u and me” bit not quite that long ago in Supergirl! Does the 10 year thing apply to comedic bits as well? I hope so, I’m waiting for a repeat of “Show me the Monet,” personally. 🙂
I’d like to say that the double post was a clever commentary about reusing the same material but sadly it was just about getting a Server error every few seconds on the site.