Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

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KXXX
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by KXXX »

Jmatt, dude... I have a little man-crush on you this morning.

Because YES TO EVERYTHING YOU SAID.

YES TO MOST OF WHAT EVERYONE ELSE SAID.

What's funny to me is that it seems like most of the people in the facebook groups seem to lament this book ending.

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by leonmallett »

bygranddesign wrote:Agree with much of what you said Craig

But Ivar wasn't a miss

if it concludes in a satisfactory way (and I believe FVL when he says 12 issues was always the intention)

Then it was a creative success ... And I would put it on the plus column

We can criticize the marketing push for the title ... But I respect that Valiant had enough confidence in FVL's vision that they allowed him to tell this story. No crossovers. No gimmicks. Just a 12 issue story that (hopefully) tells a complete and satisfying story. And I look forward to buying the hardcover so I can read it all over again.
:thumb:
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by jmatt »

KXXX wrote:What's funny to me is that it seems like most of the people in the facebook groups seem to lament this book ending.
I lament that they couldn't make it work.

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by ShadowTuga »

I will miss this book. I seriously don't get the hate towards it, but I'm cool with that.
I really, as in REALLY liked the last arcs (Malgam and War Monger). This comedy finale comes out of nowhere, I bought god-knows how many #1's in part because I thought this was our Avengers/JLA book that was going to stick for years.
:|
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by Bl00dsh0t »

looking forward to a better (and longer running) team book that actually has some structure to it and is, funnily enough, made up of a 'team of superheroes, rather than Unity, which was a bunch of individuals.

ahem, Secret Weapons...

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by leonmallett »

jmatt wrote:
KXXX wrote:What's funny to me is that it seems like most of the people in the facebook groups seem to lament this book ending.
I lament that they couldn't make it work.
:thumb:
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by jmatt »

ShadowTuga wrote:I will miss this book. I seriously don't get the hate towards it, but I'm cool with that.
I really, as in REALLY liked the last arcs (Malgam and War Monger). This comedy finale comes out of nowhere, I bought god-knows how many #1's in part because I thought this was our Avengers/JLA book that was going to stick for years.
:|
I don't know if anyone's hating on it. It's just a review of what some readers saw as odd choices. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I enjoyed most of it, even the solo issues. But they just stuck out as wrong for a team book.

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by leonmallett »

jmatt wrote:
ShadowTuga wrote:I will miss this book. I seriously don't get the hate towards it, but I'm cool with that.
I really, as in REALLY liked the last arcs (Malgam and War Monger). This comedy finale comes out of nowhere, I bought god-knows how many #1's in part because I thought this was our Avengers/JLA book that was going to stick for years.
:|
I don't know if anyone's hating on it. It's just a review of what some readers saw as odd choices. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I enjoyed most of it, even the solo issues. But they just stuck out as wrong for a team book.
To me it has felt more and more an intellectual exercise for Kindt in trying out story structures, rather than a well-planned, well-plotted and ultimately well-told action adventure series.

From the outset it was promised to be something quite different, and I suspect that the high promise probably has not been met, even Kindt does feel he has met what he set out to do (that none of us cananswer for, only Kindt himself of course). That is what leads me to think of this as more of an experiment on Kindt's behalf than VEI.

The idea of a non-team has done before. A government-sanctioned team has done before. Taking separate POV chapters has been done since the first super-teams in the 1940's (it was the JSA blue-print). Nothing was really new.

Kindt even promised to the idea of exploring how such a team would impact the wider world by including the blogger at the start, but that fizzled out. Books like Authority and Ultimates have looked at those ideas in better ways. Hell I found the Ultimates play on the anti-Ultimates (the Liberators) far more compelling and well-constructed than the United arc.

VEI launched the book with a glut of variant covers. The book had a strong slaes opening, and tumbled to indy obscurity. Basically what was promised was not delivered. Everything in there had been done before, it was not new, and as I said above, it seemed to me to become a vehicle for Kindt exploring story construction, and sorry to say, there are better exponents of that kind of experimentation.
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by SwiftMann »

I could simply never buy into the original "go after X-O" premise of the book and everything came across as contrived after that. I didn't mind the idea of the solo issues, but it was too much. The current War-Monger arc isn't bad in concept, but the execution is boring. I've also lost my patience for Kindt's variations on the monologue-as-only-way-to-write-a-comic approach, which made him a baffling choice for a "team" book.

Plus, I blame Unity #1 for VEI's current glut of variants on every issue ever. I didn't mind 1-2 regular covers (or 3 if it was a theme month) with some retailer incentives, but five-plus generic regular covers and retailer incentives is ridiculous.
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by jmatt »

SwiftMann wrote:I didn't mind 1-2 regular covers (or 3 if it was a theme month) with some retailer incentives, but five-plus generic regular covers and retailer incentives is ridiculous.
I would argue that it even makes them less valuable. If you can't get them all, why bother getting any of them?

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by QUARTZ »

I thought the team was just starting to really gel. Oh well. Maybe it will be back in the future with different heroes. I'm just sad it didn't work out. I'd like to see the HARD Corps come back!

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by Keith »

QUARTZ wrote:Maybe it will be back in the future with different heroes.
Based on the teases that A&A and Harbinger will be returning (aka give a good story idea and a title will return), and Book of Death mentioning other Unity teams... I think that is pretty much guaranteed.
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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by Bl00dsh0t »

QUARTZ wrote:I thought the team was just starting to really gel. Oh well. Maybe it will be back in the future with different heroes. I'm just sad it didn't work out. I'd like to see the HARD Corps come back!
Same here - Unity as a team have only worked on a handful of missions. I'd love to see the team concept continue much like Avengers with a rotating cast. Hopefully we get a Unity #1 or Secret Weapons #1 early in the year which acts as Valiant's team book.

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by QUARTZ »

Bl00dsh0t wrote:
QUARTZ wrote:I thought the team was just starting to really gel. Oh well. Maybe it will be back in the future with different heroes. I'm just sad it didn't work out. I'd like to see the HARD Corps come back!
Same here - Unity as a team have only worked on a handful of missions. I'd love to see the team concept continue much like Avengers with a rotating cast. Hopefully we get a Unity #1 or Secret Weapons #1 early in the year which acts as Valiant's team book.
That'd be cool. They could also use the series to kind of state where things are in the Valiant universe as a whole. Get away from the personal stories and keep it about escalating conflicts and issues facing the Valiant universe that might not be addressed in other comics; like an hundred foot view of what's happening in the universe as a whole. I don't think they have even addressed Imperium yet, what about the Vine ships entering orbit in X-O Manowar, or all the Book of Death stuff? How does that fit in? Maybe use the series to kind of plug those gaps? I mean, it kind of requires a familiarity with the Valiant Universe to begin with, might as well run with that ball...

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by Spylocke »

I'd also love a H.A.R.D. Corps series.

My problem with Unity was that I liked the characters individually but not as a team. Sometimes having a great guitarist, drummer, bassist and singer produces a mediocre band. It seemed like an idea that came about because every company needs their version of the Justice League and Avengers.

Has anybody here read Global Frequency? That is how I think a Valiant super team should be set up. If there is a techno problem, call Livewire, need somebody killed quietly call Ninjak, think there's not enough creepy old men around Dr. Silk is your man, et cetera. You know what would be a great name for this cabal of on-call temporary heroes? Secret Weapons.

It could also be a way to explore the Valiant universe to test the waters with different ideas like Fred Bender: Agent of The Void.

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Re: Unity: A casually negative pre-mortem

Post by paradise »

Next storyline of Unity will bring it all back together. The first issue is fantastic. It's Armor Hunters crossover 2.0. Great stuff.
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