Ultimates #18.1 Discussion/Review *SPOILERS*

[Plawsky]

Ultimates 18.1 is meant to be a jumping point for new readers, the cover shows Thor & Iron Man alongside Captain America, but the issue ends with Cap informing he plans to form a new team that necessirily doesn't have to rely on Thor nor Iron Man due to them being unpredictable, which is just silly. If the intention is to hook up new readers, it should have shown us the new Ultimates to get the new reader intriqued.

Well, to be fair, Ultimates #1 (Millar) had the whole team on the cover, but only Cap was in it (and Tony at the end) and we didn't see some of them for a few issues. And Thor wasn't even on the team until the Hulk incident (and even then, he wasn't really "on the team"). I highly doubt that Thor and Iron Man are going to be gone from this book. Plus, all three were the focus of this issue.

[Drz]

Don't try to defend the .1 initiative Plawsky, alot of us know writers have failed to utilize it, just like alot of DC writers had problems with DC Zero Month, no shame in admitting that.

Still this was the best issue from Humphries, still highly flawed and not really feeling Ultimate, but yeah, it's comparable with the strongest Ultimates issues by Loeb.

[Plawsky]

I wasn't defending the Point One initiative, I was defending the cover.

But now that we're on the subject... I don't really care for the point one issues. I think there are some good reasons for them, but they're also way overused. The way they're being used in the Ultimate Line is an example of how they should be used - a place to catch up or set up new readers, especially when it's after an event. That said, releasing USM 16.1 when they did was stupid. Really, I'd rather they just skipped .1 all together, but this one at least served the purpose of a .1.

[Drz]

I wasn't defending the Point One initiative, I was defending the cover.

Oh yeah sure, i mean the cover does actually deliver giving us those 3 heroes, but i just feel if the idea is to bring out the new Humphries' ultimates, the issue should have focused on introducing them.

[Wolverine12]

There was absolutely nothing good about this book. What exactly was an improvement? It certainly wasn't the characters. I think posters are making excuses because they WANT to like it and they're desperate for the series to be good. It was barely readable. It further reminded me that The Ultimates is still in a rut. Anyone feel like that? I'm certain it will turn of thousand of readers considering getting into the UU. So you see, it actually failed miserably at being a good stand alone story, or any story for that matter.

Iron Patriot was finally revealed!!

And it was shockingly disappointing. The way he was revealed, it seemed as though Humphries was actually trying to annoy us fans. Like he was sticking his tongue out at us thinking 'You fools'.

C'mon Humphries, at least TRY to write well. You're not making any effort whatsoever.

I think part of the reason I would rate this as better than his #12 issue (and all the other issues dealing with Reed) is because he didn't take something amazing and destroy it. He has succeed in lowering my expectations of this book so that when he does something that remotely resembles a decent story I am now pleasantly surprised. I'm not trying to say that it is okay that I now expect Ultimates to dissapoint, but we've been here before with Loeb so I'm just treating it as another rough patch and will just wait it out as always.

Edit: I will say that after reading your first 2 posts about the issue I would downgrade the issue from "meh" to "bad."

[Orbytal]

A day late in getting to read issue 18.1…but Double-U Tee Eff was that !?!

The best part of this issue was the cover.

Good review Plawsky. I can agree with most of what you said and Robbie Jee, you nailed it. I don’t need to repeat what either of you posted.

Like Sage6paths, I may have to start skimming this line until it improves as well.

Some of my favorite characters are in this title and with the bar set so high early on in the series it’s hard to excuse the direction it has taken.

Maybe Marvel should release UXM the same week as the Ultimates, might take some of the sting out of it all…

[Robbie_Jee]

I think part of the reason I would rate this as better than his #12 issue (and all the other issues dealing with Reed) is because he didn't take something amazing and destroy it. He has succeed in lowering my expectations of this book so that when he does something that remotely resembles a decent story I am now pleasantly surprised. I'm not trying to say that it is okay that I now expect Ultimates to dissapoint, but we've been here before with Loeb so I'm just treating it as another rough patch and will just wait it out as always.

Edit: I will say that after reading your first 2 posts about the issue I would downgrade the issue from "meh" to "bad."

Well it's nice to be an influence, even if it is a negative consensus. :)

I thought #12 was disappointing but still reasonably enjoyable. Whereas with #18.1 I thought it was disappointing, and with literally nothing I liked about it. I do agree that #12 was fundamentally a more disappointing issue than #18.1 but I thought it was still a fair bit 'better' in terms of overall quality.

I'm gona complain a little more...
Even if the issue WAS well written. Even if Titanium Man WAS an interesting villain. With everything going all Condition: Black after the first couple pages - yet again - and after seeing Hawkeye getting hit with a blast that should have killed him, there's no way I could take this book seriously. It was like a cartoon made for kids. Titanium Man was a hunk of junk! I honestly couldn't tell what he really looked like. I couldn't really see those supposedly powerful gauntlets either. The artist was pretty good in this. A couple of the panels looked really beautiful, but Titanium Man was just a mess.

The plot itself was dreadful. I know I'm repeating myself and I know I should probably be a bit more constructive, rather than just labelling the story as 'dreadful'. But there's literally nothing I can really say about it that's positive. It was just.. dreadful.

[Wolverine12]

Well it's nice to be an influence, even if it is a negative consensus. :)

I thought #12 was disappointing but still reasonably enjoyable. Whereas with #18.1 I thought it was disappointing, and with literally nothing I liked about it. I do agree that #12 was fundamentally a more disappointing issue than #18.1 but I thought it was still a fair bit 'better' in terms of overall quality.

I'm gona complain a little more...
Even if the issue WAS well written. Even if Titanium Man WAS an interesting villain. With everything going all Condition: Black after the first couple pages - yet again - and after seeing Hawkeye getting hit with a blast that should have killed him, there's no way I could take this book seriously. It was like a cartoon made for kids. Titanium Man was a hunk of junk! I honestly couldn't tell what he really looked like. I couldn't really see those supposedly powerful gauntlets either. The artist was pretty good in this. A couple of the panels looked really beautiful, but Titanium Man was just a mess.

The plot itself was dreadful. I know I'm repeating myself and I know I should probably be a bit more constructive, rather than just labelling the story as 'dreadful'. But there's literally nothing I can really say about it that's positive. It was just.. dreadful.

You certainly have a valid point about Titanium Man not looking right. Other than that I enjoyed the art. The positive aspect I took away was the Ultimates expanding, hopefully with the W.A.K.O.S or West Coast Ultimates or whatever you want to call them. I thought the part where Cap and Tony talk to Thor about his anger and directing it in a more useful arena was good and felt like a classic Cap move so it felt right. Hawkeye and Monica were atrocious though, the whole part with Monica listing off each new code condition felt like she was telling me all the colors of a rainbow.

Also, have these "quarks" been talked about before or is this a new energy source used for the issue?

[J/O/J/O]

F**k...
Good thing I did not pay to read this or I would have been mighthy pissed.This was meh IMO.Gonna check if next issue has Falcon or Captain Britain and if not....I'm out.
As an add on Iron Patriot was not completely terrible.Guess that's something.

[J/O/J/O]

Also this is kinda important to me:
-Iron Man is a fan of Jimi Hendrix!!!!!

[Wellman]

Seems to be lacking the epic nature that made Hickman and Millar's runs so memorable and engaging.

I am hoping that with the next arc, with a new Ultimates team being assembled and all of the previous Ultimate story lines almost resolved (I wonder if anyone will ever discuss the mutant camps in this book) I hope Humphries will be able to actually leave his own mark and show he can do the epic story telling as well. He is serviceable at this point but that won't improve this book nor the Ultimate line as a whole stock.

[Nitz the Bloody]

Seems to be lacking the epic nature that made Hickman and Millar's runs so memorable and engaging.

I am hoping that with the next arc, with a new Ultimates team being assembled and all of the previous Ultimate story lines almost resolved (I wonder if anyone will ever discuss the mutant camps in this book) I hope Humphries will be able to actually leave his own mark and show he can do the epic story telling as well. He is serviceable at this point but that won't improve this book nor the Ultimate line as a whole stock.

I thought that the best part of the original Ultimates wasn't so much that it was epic (it was), but that it had a uniquely flawed interpretation of the Marvel characters. Despite--or perhaps because of-- all their quirks, they felt more like real human beings trying (and in some cases, outright failing) to be heroes. I didn't get that as much from Hickman's run, which had more of the spectacle but fewer of the quiet moments that gave the spectacle meaning.

I'm enjoying Humphries' stories because he's done a good job making the characters believable.

[Codah]

For whatever reason, I think that here on out, Ultimates is going to get a lot better. I'll eat my words if I'm wrong but I've got a feeling.

[CrazyShady]

I stuck through that entire event and I'll probably read til #20, to get a feel for the next storyline, but man oh man is Humphries killing me. Cant take much more of the mediocrity. So many other books now out that deserve my money more unfortunately

[Robbie_Jee]

For whatever reason, I think that here on out, Ultimates is going to get a lot better. I'll eat my words if I'm wrong but I've got a feeling.

I doubt it..