This Month in All-New OHOTMU A-Z #8... [Archive]

Sean McQuaid

08-30-2006, 01:37 AM

Subjects profiled in this issue include Nekra, New Men, New Son, N'Garai, Night Nurse, Night Raven, Night Thrasher, Nighthawk, Red Norvell, Nosferata, Nova (Rich Rider), Nova Omega (Garthan Saal), Number Nine, Oblivion, Ogre, Olivier, Onslaught, Origin, Outlaw Kid, Over-Mind, Pacific Overlords, Paibok, Patriot, Penance, Phantom Rider, Phat, Photon (Genis-Vell), Phyla, Piranha, Pixie, Plant-Man, Plodex, Powderkeg, Presence, Prester John, Priapus, Pride, Promise, Prosh, Proteus, Protocide, Prowler, Psionex, Puma and Quoi. 64 pages, $3.99 cover price, on sale this week...

-Sean

The Shadow

08-30-2006, 01:41 AM

Just a point... maybe change the heading a bit so people don't think you're spamming.

Thanks for the heads up.

Expletive Deleted

08-30-2006, 05:45 AM

Nah, Sean's cool.

Looks like a good Handbook this month, too.

Soundrave

08-30-2006, 05:55 AM

Just a point... maybe change the heading a bit so people don't think you're spamming.

If this is spamming, then it's spamming when Ed Brubaker promotes Criminal or when Dan Slott promotes Thing on every comic message board they can find. Clarification: I don't think any of the above are instances of spamming.

I'm really looking forward to Pacific Overlords and Protocide . . . I love those characters! And here I thought the NOP issue was going to be boring . . .

Sean McQuaid

08-30-2006, 08:42 AM

Just a point... maybe change the heading a bit so people don't think you're spamming.

I tend to keep the subject heading consistent from month to month so that folks who know what these updates are about and folks who are unfamiliar with them can both readily identify the subject matter.

Regardless, the posts are tailored to whichever board I post them at rather than mass-produced and mailed out indiscriminately; for instance, an Avengers-centric board would only be informed of Avengers-related characters in the latest issue, while a general MU board like this one gets a more complete list.

Most boards and most posters seem okay with it, though there's the occasional complaint. If a board's moderator or a significant number of posters don't like it, then I don't post there anymore (though that's only happened with one board so far, and in that case it was a problem with the moderator).

Was there a particular heading you had in mind that might sound less spammy?

Thanks for the heads up.

You're welcome.

-Sean

Sean McQuaid

08-30-2006, 08:52 AM

Nah, Sean's cool.

Vote of confidence appreciated. :cool:

Looks like a good Handbook this month, too.

In terms of the character assortment this month (without getting into overall product quality since I'm obviously biased), I think it's a honey of a handbook.

It seems like whenever Marvel or DC do these A-Z projects, there's always a bit of a lull somewhere close to halfway through -- not so many cool characters in the K-N span or thereabouts. Issue 7 of the Deluxe handbook run, for instance, was probably the weakest batch of characters in that series, and issue 7 of our own series was probably my least favourite of the current run in terms of the character line-up.

Nice batch of characters in the current issue, though. Lots of nifty stuff...

-Sean

Sean McQuaid

08-30-2006, 08:58 AM

I'm really looking forward to Pacific Overlords and Protocide . . . I love those characters! And here I thought the NOP issue was going to be boring . . .

I'm mighty fond of the Pacific Overlords myself, so I was glad they made the cut, too.

-Sean

The Shadow

08-30-2006, 12:49 PM

I tend to keep the subject heading consistent from month to month so that folks who know what these updates are about and folks who are unfamiliar with them can both readily identify the subject matter.
I've just never seen 3 pop up at one time is all.

Was there a particular heading you had in mind that might sound less spammy?
Nah... it's all cool!

Like I said, I hit refresh and suddenly there are 3 new posts with the same heading. It LOOKED like spam is all. :)

The Shadow

08-30-2006, 12:50 PM

If this is spamming, then it's spamming when Ed Brubaker promotes Criminal or when Dan Slott promotes Thing on every comic message board they can find. Clarification: I don't think any of the above are instances of spamming.
What I meant was that there have been times when someone hammers all the forums with "COME SEE THIS!" type of thing.

As I said to Sean I hit refresh and there were 3 posts in 3 different forums with the same title.

It LOOKED like a spam attack.

But it's all good!!!!

Sean Walsh

08-31-2006, 07:15 AM

I'm still kinda miffed that Arcade wasn't in #1, but who cares. I love this stuff.

One question: when did Dr. Demonicus come back (after he and the Overlords were presumably wiped out in Avengers WC)? I *vaguely* remember him coming back - and I know I can check out the Appendix site for the answer - but hey, I'm curious and it keeps the thread alive. ;) :p

Soundrave

08-31-2006, 09:33 AM

LordEd1976

08-31-2006, 12:42 PM

I think his first appearance since his "death" in West Coast Avengers was in New Avengers. And I think it was just another instance of poor Bendis research on New Avengers. It seems like he just picked up an old 1980s OHOTMU and just started picking a lot of cool-looking villains to include in the Raft break-out without doing any follow-up research to see if any of them had been killed or changed in the past 20 years, because a few of those guys hadn't been seen since their "deaths" long ago.

that would explain the appearance of Cutthroat in the Raft even though the last time I saw him, he had been killed by Crossbones and his body was disposed off in an unmarked grave.

With regards to the latest A-Z issue. Why are Nova (Rich Rider) and Phyla covered in two seperate handbook-style books in the same month?

Sean McQuaid

08-31-2006, 04:53 PM

I think his first appearance since his "death" in West Coast Avengers was in New Avengers.

Pretty much, yeah. He was among the many crooks reported as having escaped from the Raft after the NEW AVENGERS breakout.

-Sean

Sean McQuaid

08-31-2006, 05:00 PM

With regards to the latest A-Z issue. Why are Nova (Rich Rider) and Phyla covered in two seperate handbook-style books in the same month?

Fluke of timing. Phyla had never gotten a Handbook entry of any kind before, and Nova had never gotten the full deluxe profiling treatment as an active character (his previous Handbook appearances were when he was in retirement except for the point-form Master edition), and Nova had changed a lot since his previous coverage, so we didn't feel we could exclude either Nova or Phyla from the mainstream Handbook run; however, both are significant characters in Annihilation, too, so it didn't seem right to exclude them from that project, either.

Also, skipping Rich Rider in the standard handbook and just featuring him in Annihilation wouldn't have served the character very well -- there's so much info to cover in his case that a one-pager like the Annihilation format can only hit the highlights. But again, he's such a big part of Annihilation that leaving him out of that project wouldn't have made sense, either, so a little overlap seemed acceptable.

-Sean

firestarfan

09-01-2006, 01:37 PM

Where's Null the Living Darkness?!?!?! Man, us Defenders fans always get ripped off. (though thanks for Nighthawk!)

darkhawk76

09-04-2006, 02:48 AM

anyone else notice the get out clause in Night Trasher's entry "apparently died"

seems as though Marvel is leaving the way open for a future NW fan writer to undo their deaths, unless there's a twist at the end of Civil War

jpk

09-04-2006, 09:37 AM

Q: Will all 12 of these be collected in a trade at some point? I've picked hese up at my LCS but I don't want a dozen of these floating around when I want some background on a character.

Sean McQuaid

09-05-2006, 02:29 PM

Where's Null the Living Darkness?!?!?!

A twelve-issue run just isn't long enough to cover every significant character in the MU, so a few will always slip through the cracks here and there. But the longer we keep making Handbooks of various kinds, the better the odds of us covering just about all the significant characters eventually, so Null may yet turn up.

Man, us Defenders fans always get ripped off. (though thanks for Nighthawk!)

Hey, I'm a big Defenders fan myself, and we Defenderphiles didn't make out so badly this issue -- past core members Nighthawk and Over-Mind, Defenders-for-a-day Nova (Rich Rider) and Prowler (Hobie Brown), and Defenders foes Plantman and Presence. And there are more Defenders villains coming next month, too...

-Sean

Sean McQuaid

09-05-2006, 02:32 PM

anyone else notice the get out clause in Night Trasher's entry "apparently died". seems as though Marvel is leaving the way open for a future NW fan writer to undo their deaths, unless there's a twist at the end of Civil War

I can neither confirm nor deny any future plans for Thrasher or any of the other lost Warriors; regardless, it's pretty standard practice for the Handbooks to use qualifiers like "apparently" or "seemingly" in our texts since comic book death is so often temporary.

-Sean

Sean McQuaid

09-05-2006, 02:35 PM

Q: Will all 12 of these be collected in a trade at some point? I've picked hese up at my LCS but I don't want a dozen of these floating around when I want some background on a character.

Trade collections of this and other recent Handbook material have been discussed, but no concrete plans yet. And as always, the continued sales of the comic-format stuff will help determine whether we see any of this stuff in trade format somewhere down the road...

-Sean

Faded

09-05-2006, 07:55 PM

I really want to pick this up for Penance and Phat, but this month I'm a little tight on cash. I hope to remember to pick it up next month.

Flameworthy

09-05-2006, 10:24 PM

Isn't Persuasion deserving enough to have an entry?

Sean McQuaid

09-06-2006, 03:37 AM

Isn't Persuasion deserving enough to have an entry?

Deserving, sure -- but as noted above, in a series with this broad a mandate and this short a publication run, there are bound to be omissions. I think part of what hurt her chances was the fact that she got an UPDATE '89 entry which will be coming back into print via Essentials soon, and she hadn't changed all that much. Still, we've talked about doing a new entry for her somewhere in the Handbook line eventually, and it may yet come to pass...

-Sean

darkhawk76

09-06-2006, 06:21 AM

I can neither confirm nor deny any future plans for Thrasher or any of the other lost Warriors; regardless, it's pretty standard practice for the Handbooks to use qualifiers like "apparently" or "seemingly" in our texts since comic book death is so often temporary.

-Sean

okie dokie I didn't realise it was just a standard turn of phrase

can't say I've noticed it before when I got handbooks in the 80's

Dermie

09-06-2006, 06:27 AM

okie dokie I didn't realise it was just a standard turn of phrase

can't say I've noticed it before when I got handbooks in the 80's

The other thing to keep in mind is that characters have said several times that many of the bodies were so badly damaged in the blast that they could never be identified--if we don't have a confirmation of death, then it needs to be listed as 'apparently'.

Soundrave

09-06-2006, 07:39 AM

okie dokie I didn't realise it was just a standard turn of phrase

can't say I've noticed it before when I got handbooks in the 80's

That's because comic book superhero deaths weren't such a joke yet back in the 80s.

Joe Acro

09-06-2006, 09:04 AM

I can neither confirm nor deny any future plans for Thrasher or any of the other lost Warriors; regardless, it's pretty standard practice for the Handbooks to use qualifiers like "apparently" or "seemingly" in our temporary.
Yes, I've noticed that. However, if a character is assumed dead at the time of the publication, the character's power/abilities section is in past tense. Thrasher's does not follow this format.

blackphoenix

09-07-2006, 06:46 PM

Priapus is a Marvel character??? The Graeco-Roman god with the world's longest... penis?? I would provide a link to Wikipedia's entry on him, but I'm pretty sure we ain't supposed to link to sites with nudity :) Wonder if classical nudity counts? Better not tempt it.

Glad to see entries for Phyla and Photon. Wonder if they'll ever meet their half-brother Hulkling?

Night thrasher ain't dead--trust me.

Sean, will thee be an entry for Valkyrie? Namorita?

Sean McQuaid

09-08-2006, 02:10 PM

Priapus is a Marvel character???

Yup. Incredible but true...

Sean, will thee be an entry for Valkyrie? Namorita?

The current Valkyrie (Sam Parrington) and Namorita both got entries in last years OHOTMU: Women of Marvel 2005 edition, so it may be a while before they get profiled again; that being said, Nita could probably use some updating/expansion before too long. We've also discussed coverage of the original Valkyrie (Brunnhilde), but I can't confirm anything about that yet.

-Sean

blackphoenix

09-08-2006, 03:10 PM

So what about Threnody?? I wanna see if she's still a mutant and whatever happened to that kid of hers who was apparently X-Man's baby...

Speaking of which, howsabout X-Man? Was there a profile on him already?

Sasquatch? Sundragon? Sunfire? Thor? Turbo?

BTW, what is the official Marvel position on Lockjaw? Is he just a big stupid teleporting dog, or is he an Inhuman who became doglike due to the Terrigen Mists?

Sean McQuaid

09-08-2006, 04:37 PM

So what about Threnody?? I wanna see if she's still a mutant and whatever happened to that kid of hers who was apparently X-Man's baby...Speaking of which, howsabout X-Man? Was there a profile on him already?

I'm drawing a blank at the moment on whether there's any plans for Threnody, but X-Man has been profiled already -- he was in the OHOTMU Book of the Dead 2004.

Sasquatch? Sundragon? Sunfire? Thor? Turbo?

Sasquatch and Turbo will be in upcoming A-Z issues. Sundragon hasn't changed much since her UPDATE '89 profile which will soon be reprinted via the Essentials line. Sunfire was covered in the X-Men 2005 handbook. Thor was profiled in the Avengers 2004 and Book of the Dead 2004 handbooks.

BTW, what is the official Marvel position on Lockjaw? Is he just a big stupid teleporting dog, or is he an Inhuman who became doglike due to the Terrigen Mists?

Not really certain, partly because the policy has tended to shift over time depending on who you ask. I think recent portrayals tend to lean more "dog" than "not a dog", albeit certainly not a conventional dog.

-Sean