XPost: alt.comics.lnh

A stage, with three silhouetted figures facing away from us! One by one they turn around, revealing themselves in the light!

The first one turns around! A young approximately-girl with ribbons in their dark hair, wearing a tweed jacket over a button-down shirt and tie, and holding a spiral notebook! "Numen Kid Review!"

The second one turns around! Pale skin, spiky pink hair and short-adult proportions under a flower-print labcoat! "Pneuma Kid Review!"

The third one turns around! Purple hair in twintails, wearing a leather jacket with metal rings hanging off of it and studs on the back making the periodic table entry for magnesium! "Ekpyrosis Kid Review!"

"Have arrived!"

Ekpyrosis Kid Review steps forward. "And we're gonna smack down your style sheets!"

"I--" Pneuma Kid Review pauses, turns to them. "No, what?"

"No no no!" Numen Kid Review hops down and starts gesticulating wildly! "What we're *actually* gonna do is start reviewing stuff in a new way! Specifically we
just, had a reason to want to re-read Beige Countdown while we were putting it up on the wiki and we decided like, why not just go over it issue by issue and talk about each one? So we did, so here we go!!"

====

Prologue: I love this nonsense. <3

#12: I've read the Infinite Leadership Crisis a couple times, so I remember the status quo leading up to this point pretty well. This issue sets up where things
are going to go next, and it's good at it; the stuff about the LNH leadership election is, of course, very relevant to stuff I've been working on.

#11: I love the weird, metafictional dread of the opening scene. Arthur is really good at evoking discomfort and presenting a situation which you can't quite grasp onto the metaphor of in a way that increases the ambiguity and the uncanniness.

#10: God, every time I come around to Rob's writing it impresses me. Even knowing how good he is, you forget the lavish amounts of detail and the thoughtfully worked-in gags that slide in and energize every paragraph. And here, he's taking a whole bunch of Legionnaires he doesn't usually write and exploring each of them, throwing them into situations that are custom-made to show off what's interesting about them. He even throws in wonderful detail about
the koala-focused ship design of the Christicantthinkofagoodname Empire. Aaaaaaaa I want to be this good at all of this.

Betterman's Last Flight: My god, this is a lavish story that makes you think you
know exactly what's going to happen and then rugpulls you perfectly. :D

#9: Rob is pushing himself hard in this one, exploring all kinds of superheroic themes, stretching characters and the things they represent. It feels like kind of a struggle, one that's flawed at times, and I wonder if that's why #8 hasn't come out yet; but it's a worthwhile effort, interesting, engaging, and enjoyable. Jack Kirby's musings on art are my favorite part, and they're an expression of this fundamental problem, you know? It's worth slapping up what you can and getting it out there.

Special: I love this so much. The terrible fantasy of an awful guy and it's hilarious.

#7: Ripping Dancer's darkest moment. This is fraught and good. In another writer's hands, Lucas Dunn's story could feel exploitative, but here, it's just... what happens, sometimes. You have to put your hand out to help, even if it may not be taken.

#6: I love Irony Man's absolute tiredness and done-ness here, the feeling like the life is being sucked out of him by this deal, and the ambiguity as to whether he threw the election. (Also, I'm absolutely bringing back a gag from this.)

#5: Oh my god this is such a ridiculously good psychological profile story. Holy
shit with Bicycle Repair Lad peeling away Hex's facade. It's so good, holy shit.
Arthur mentions at the end being worried about getting BRL wrong but this is perfeeeect.

#1: Another spectacular character exploration story. This is the alpha and the omega of the Ultimate Ninja, or at least, Arthur's take on him, a creature deeply entwined with violence, finding happiness in violence, letting it lead him to peace, but finding out that, in truth, he's become more deeply entwined with responsibility - not heroism, but a simple sense of a job that needs to be done, and which shall be done, with violence. It's gooooooooood.

#0: This is where it all comes together, and wow, it *comes together* into this tangled ball (complimentary) of emotion, legacy, tragedy, continuity, magic, death, and strangeness. It's a slide toward the inevitable, but one that shows how it's been held off, again and again, and presents the possibility that it can be stopped, and the possibility that it can't. Weird and strong.

====

"We wanna do this with Beige Midnight too!" enthuses Pneuma Kid Review. "But we might do something else first! Who knows!! I sure don't!!!"

"And if you're wondering why there's three of us now..." Ekpyrosis Kid Review shrugs. "Don't worry about it!"

====

Drew "trying out a lot of new stuff from now on" Nilium

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Monday, July 31, 2023 at 5:14:50 PM UTC-7, Drew Nilium wrote:

"No no no!" Numen Kid Review hops down and starts gesticulating wildly! "What
we're *actually* gonna do is start reviewing stuff in a new way! Specifically we
just, had a reason to want to re-read Beige Countdown while we were putting it
up on the wiki and we decided like, why not just go over it issue by issue and
talk about each one? So we did, so here we go!!"

Man, it's a review of a 16 year old LNH miniseries!

#10: God, every time I come around to Rob's writing it impresses me. Even knowing how good he is, you forget the lavish amounts of detail and the thoughtfully worked-in gags that slide in and energize every paragraph. And here, he's taking a whole bunch of Legionnaires he doesn't usually write and exploring each of them, throwing them into situations that are custom-made to
show off what's interesting about them. He even throws in wonderful detail about
the koala-focused ship design of the Christicantthinkofagoodname Empire. Aaaaaaaa I want to be this good at all of this.

Betterman's Last Flight: My god, this is a lavish story that makes you think you
know exactly what's going to happen and then rugpulls you perfectly. :D

#9: Rob is pushing himself hard in this one, exploring all kinds of superheroic
themes, stretching characters and the things they represent. It feels like kind
of a struggle, one that's flawed at times, and I wonder if that's why #8 hasn't
come out yet; but it's a worthwhile effort, interesting, engaging, and enjoyable. Jack Kirby's musings on art are my favorite part, and they're an expression of this fundamental problem, you know? It's worth slapping up what
you can and getting it out there.

Yeah, Rob's stuff is all great. I do really want to read #8 one of these days, but
there are probably a lot more better and more rewarding things Rob could do with his time so I'm totally understanding if that never actually happens.

#0: This is where it all comes together, and wow, it *comes together* into this
tangled ball (complimentary) of emotion, legacy, tragedy, continuity, magic, death, and strangeness. It's a slide toward the inevitable, but one that shows
how it's been held off, again and again, and presents the possibility that it
can be stopped, and the possibility that it can't. Weird and strong.

Thanks for all the kind words. My Ultimate goal was to just do something better
than the Countdown to Final Crisis series (which I think I accomplished).

Arthur "A long, long time ago..." Spitzer

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

I never responded to this??? Ramble gramble...

On 8/1/23 6:37 PM, Arthur Spitzer wrote:

On Monday, July 31, 2023 at 5:14:50 PM UTC-7, Drew Nilium wrote:

"No no no!" Numen Kid Review hops down and starts gesticulating wildly! "What
we're *actually* gonna do is start reviewing stuff in a new way! Specifically we
just, had a reason to want to re-read Beige Countdown while we were putting it
up on the wiki and we decided like, why not just go over it issue by issue and
talk about each one? So we did, so here we go!!"

Man, it's a review of a 16 year old LNH miniseries!

It is! :D

Yeah, Rob's stuff is all great. I do really want to read #8 one of these days, but
there are probably a lot more better and more rewarding things Rob could do with his time so I'm totally understanding if that never actually happens.

I very much want to read #8 as well. <3.<3 But yes, he should take all the time he needs to, you know, have a life. X>

Thanks for all the kind words. My Ultimate goal was to just do something better
than the Countdown to Final Crisis series (which I think I accomplished).

You really, *really* did. X3

Drew "people have forgotten how bad Countdown was, thank goodness" Nilium

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)