Avengers Arena: News and Speculation

[West]

But your "scrutiny" is perversely distorted by bias, as shown over and over again, and is therefore utterly unreliable, so why should anyone pay it any heed?

Hazmat is being driven by the realization that she was that Surge-lite pissy drama queen, and when the cards are finally on the table she's desperate, driven and adrift. That's compelling, and it's what she originally promised as a character, rather than the watered-down after-school special drama we got in the latter half of Academy.

She was a teenaged girl with an inability to touch anyone or anything without risking giving them Cancer. Have you ever seen the movie Darkman? Because it's sort of like that minus the borderline insanity and extreme nerve damage. You trying to puff up Arena as the best damn thing sense sliced bred is factually dishonest IMO

[JaggedFel]

I must say I dislike your avatar. It makes me think of Mettle getting shafted followed by a whole lot of other POC who got s***ty deaths.

[Majin Gojira]

But your "scrutiny" is perversely distorted by bias, as shown over and over again, and is therefore utterly unreliable, so why should anyone pay it any heed?

1) Ad Hominem, and therefore wortheless. Address the argument and nothing else. Frankly, you have little room to throw stones considering your stance on favorites and un-favorites.

2) I practice here for a bigger stage. I have no problem being wrong and copping to it. I have yet to see strong enough evidence here for the larger problems of this series.

Hazmat is being driven by the realization that she was that Surge-lite pissy drama queen, and when the cards are finally on the table she's desperate, driven and adrift. That's compelling, and it's what she originally promised as a character, rather than the watered-down after-school special drama we got in the latter half of Academy.

1) "being" driven. It hasn't happened yet. Currently, we are just being told it, an example of "Tell" over "Show", which is bad writing. You are reading into the scene deeply.
2) Surge's PTSD is nothing to sneeze at or dismiss casually. Her being written badly later is just that.
3) It does not address my point of which is the deeper motivation. At least, not directly.
4) This does not change the fact that it's a hampered "Women in Refrigerators" arc with the genders inverted. If that's good writing to you, that's your opinion, But structurally, it's not much to gloat over.

[Majin Gojira]

Aquagirl has been done suboptimally, but Bloodstone, Apex and Ryker have been done well. Kid Britain looks to be a good antagonist but is going to die and painfully. Visual design is a big thing. Bloodstone hasn't had much space and is already quite clearly a hidden badass. I don't think he is terribly moral or benevolent but I think he will be the most interesting of the Hogwarts kids.

Visual design is a HUGE thing. It cannot be underestimated. People stereotype naturally, and writers often take advantage of it. Their first line may contradict that design a little (think Hagrid), but the design can say all we need to know about a character. Did an paper on it for The Incredibles. Facinating stuff.

This. To build a character, you do not make them brilliant and add stuff. You make them perfect by subtracting and wounding them, making life harsh and unfair. The only person she could both be emotionally and physically intimate with is in pieces, and my avatar. She was really one note in Academy.

The Rogue thing she had going on, remember? Loss of the perfect life? Am I the only one who remembers that? Or apparently thinks it counts . . .

I agree about the glory of doing horrible things to characters to make them more interesting, but c'mon! Remember the past!

[klinton]

I must say I dislike your avatar. It makes me think of Mettle getting shafted followed by a whole lot of other POC who got s***ty deaths.

He was bright red. With a skull for a face.

He resembles no ethnicity I've ever seen. To latch onto the death of that hideous visage as an example of racist tropes is reaching. You're just trying to be pissed off now.

[gregyo]

She was a teenaged girl with an inability to touch anyone or anything without risking giving them Cancer. Have you ever seen the movie Darkman? Because it's sort of like that minus the borderline insanity and extreme nerve damage. You trying to puff up Arena as the best damn thing sense sliced bred is factually dishonest IMO

Just realized the reason that Hazmat was lame before Arena: She was Rogue at her most uninteresting.

[Majin Gojira]

He was bright red. With a skull for a face.

He resembles no ethnicity I've ever seen. To latch onto the death of that hideous visage as an example of racist tropes is reaching. You're just trying to be pissed off now.

He was human before the transformation and a non-white Half-Jew. Either he was black, Polynesian or some other mix that could be found in Hawaii. We do not know for certain.

So no, it's not just straining for things to complain about, it's a legit complaint.

A lesser one, but one nonetheless.

[gregyo]

1) Ad Hominem, and therefore wortheless. Address the argument and nothing else. Frankly, you have little room to throw stones considering your stance on favorites and un-favorites.

2) I practice here for a bigger stage. I have no problem being wrong and copping to it. I have yet to see strong enough evidence here for the larger problems of this series.



1) "being" driven. It hasn't happened yet. Currently, we are just being told it, an example of "Tell" over "Show", which is bad writing. You are reading into the scene deeply.
2) Surge's PTSD is nothing to sneeze at or dismiss casually. Her being written badly later is just that.
3) It does not address my point of which is the deeper motivation. At least, not directly.
4) This does not change the fact that it's a hampered "Women in Refrigerators" arc with the genders inverted. If that's good writing to you, that's your opinion, But structurally, it's not much to gloat over.

I don't think it was a fridging at all. Mettle died to establish the serious tone of the book, not to inspire Hazmat. Like it or dislike it, but lets be accurate. "Women in refridgerators" is not synonymous with "anyone who is part of a couple who dies, ever"

[gregyo]

He was bright red. With a skull for a face.

He resembles no ethnicity I've ever seen. To latch onto the death of that hideous visage as an example of racist tropes is reaching. You're just trying to be pissed off now.

To be honest, I think a lot of the hate is people just trying to be pissed off. S/D is an exception, as I think he's genuine.

[Lady_Alternate]

1) Ad Hominem, and therefore wortheless. Address the argument and nothing else. Frankly, you have little room to throw stones considering your stance on favorites and un-favorites.

I'll address whatever I like, thank you very much.

Your desperate need to disparage and throw shade at the title since before it's launch, jumping on to every comment in virtually every thread just goes to show how well crafted and successful this book is; that it engenders such a visceral and violent reaction within you that you feel the need to try and tear it down at every single turn means that the pitch has achieved it's goal and worked magnificently. It couldn't be doing it's job better, right now.

It has people talking about it, week after week, month after month. A lot of the talk is positive, as demonstrated here again by various posters all bringing their thoughts and ideas together, even in the face of the relentless hate; be that out and out tirades on the evil of the book or faux-criticism declaiming that the writing can't possibly be worth anything because they don't like it and everyone else's opinions be damned.

It's a great book, with compelling characters who are having the best of themselves drawn out by the writer for all to see by facing death. There's no room for bluster or bravado, and we get to see a simple honesty within these characters. We saw it first with Hazmat because so much of her previous character was just bluster and surliness; to see that stripped away is a demonstration of what Murder World can and will do to these characters.

They'll become something more than they've ever been, and yes, some of them will die.

But they'll die honest, as Mettle did.

[klinton]

He was human before the transformation and a non-white Half-Jew. Either he was black, Polynesian or some other mix that could be found in Hawaii. We do not know for certain.

So no, it's not just straining for things to complain about, it's a legit complaint.

A lesser one, but one nonetheless.

No, it's in no way legit. You can't even say what race is being 'victimized'.

If anything, it's an attack on Marvel Universe nazis, as he looks more like Red Skull than anything else.

Geezuz.

[USERNAME TAKEN]

I'll address whatever I like, thank you very much.

Your desperate need to disparage and throw shade at the title since before it's launch, jumping on to every comment in virtually every thread just goes to show how well crafted and successful this book is; that it engenders such a visceral and violent reaction within you that you feel the need to try and tear it down at every single turn means that the pitch has achieved it's goal and worked magnificently. It couldn't be doing it's job better, right now.

It has people talking about it, week after week, month after month. A lot of the talk is positive, as demonstrated here again by various posters all bringing their thoughts and ideas together, even in the face of the relentless hate; be that out and out tirades on the evil of the book or faux-criticism declaiming that the writing can't possibly be worth anything because they don't like it and everyone else's opinions be damned.

It's a great book, with compelling characters who are having the best of themselves drawn out by the writer for all to see by facing death. There's no room for bluster or bravado, and we get to see a simple honesty within these characters. We saw it first with Hazmat because so much of her previous character was just bluster and surliness; to see that stripped away is a demonstration of what Murder World can and will do to these characters.

They'll become something more than they've ever been, and yes, some of them will die.

But they'll die honest, as Mettle did.

Mind=blown.

Well said.

[Majin Gojira]

I don't think it was a fridging at all. Mettle died to establish the serious tone of the book, not to inspire Hazmat. Like it or dislike it, but lets be accurate. "Women in refridgerators" is not synonymous with "anyone who is part of a couple who dies, ever"

Point. It's somewhere between WiR and a Red Shirt death in Star Trek (as you described, 'to show a threat is serious', even lampshaded by Arcade before he did it). It's a little better than what Tasha Yar got in TNG, which (despite her lead status) was a Red Shirt style kill. Is that a better term for it?

It's not as Red Shirt-y as Red Raven, mind you and it makes me question why anyone would go for that sort of death for a series with dramatic deaths as it's core and think a style that is thuroughly and rightfully mocked for its shallowness is worth emulating. What it says only lasts for a moment when it could be so much more.

[gregyo]

Point. It's somewhere between WiR and a Red Shirt death in Star Trek (as you described, 'to show a threat is serious', even lampshaded by Arcade before he did it). It's a little better than what Tasha Yar got in TNG, which (despite her lead status) was a Red Shirt style kill. Is that a better term for it?

It's not as Red Shirt-y as Red Raven, mind you and it makes me question why anyone would go for that sort of death for a series with dramatic deaths as it's core and think a style that is thuroughly and rightfully mocked for its shallowness is worth emulating. What it says only lasts for a moment when it could be so much more.

I apologize for the misunderstanding. I agree that Red Raven is a total redshirt, but Mettle was definitely not. Star Trek's red-shirts were flat, one-note characters who show up once, just so they can die in the episode. Mettle was NOT one of those. Mettle's death was more of the "Wow, I can't believe he killed that guy!" variety. Red-shirts are to show that a situation is dangerous, but the main characters will never die. Mettle's death was to show that there are no safe characters in the book. That is the difference between a red-shirt and Mettle.

[Mikey Brown]

"Ad Hominem" has now replaced "strawman argument".