You’re right, I had no idea Sabertooth was dead. Gotta catch up on my Xmen. But it proves your point.

Case in point, Bucky in Captain America. Who would ever think that Cap would be killed off and have his “robin” like sidekick come back from the dead and replace him AND the book is just about better if not better in most cases? I would have never thought that.

But now that Cap died and the press blew it up, everyone thinks that their books needs the killing off of characters, when they really dont. Killing off a character has to have some kind of reason to it, otherwise it comes off as lazy storytelling. Batman dying should have had more impact on me, but it didnt. Why? Two things:

1. It was so convoluted and post modern that the impression of Batman dying was lost on me and just about every reader because we were too busy wondering how he died and what the hell else was going on. BIG mistake.

2. Just by killing off a character doesnt vault the book up higher. Look at Sabretooth being killed of in Wolverine issue 55. No normally Sabretooth is around to fight Wolverine, but throwing in some cockamamie story about wolves and cats and some kind of uber sword that can kill off Sabretooth isnt necessary. What have we gained from Sabretooth’s death? Nothing. No mention of it in any story since, and most people probably didnt even know Sabretooth was dead. Big mistake.

Even the legendary Joss Whedon is guilty of this. He has announced that Kitty Pryde is his favorite X character. He ended up “killing” her off in Astonishing X-Men, but with constant delays and a strange premise for her character to die ended up losing the impact it had on me. A giant bullet being shot through space? Lame.

So those are my biggest gripes with character deaths in comics. There has to be some kind of reason for it, and if not, well that is why there are like 500 retcons in comics nowadays. Bringing back characters who needlessly died or killing off ones because some writer doesnt like or know how to write for that character.

As for Hulk Vs. Wolverine, I may skim that one and I’m wondering if anyone saw the “Hulk Vs.” DVD that recently came out? Tiny I enjoyed that immensely.

For starters, it was always an unwritten rule at Marvel that Bucky stays dead. As does Ben Parker. These are deaths that serve to make the character what he is. Bucky was never even a character in the old Cap stories. His death was always off frame and told as anecdotes but it never really “happened” in the normal comic time line. Bucky’s death is one of those things that has always driven CA and made the book what it was.

Jason Todd is another one of those characters. As soon as that event happened in the 80′s with the call in numbers and all of that, DC has been all about making his death a huge part of what makes Batman a tortured hero these days. He’s constantly referenced in the books.

Now, Bucky returning was a huge event but I think everyone agrees that Brubaker did and outstanding job with it. He didn’t just make it tolerable, I think it’s made the book far better than it has ever been.

This shit that DC keeps trying to do with Jason is just hacked. It’s never been treated with respect or with any sort of care. It’s always been the big shovel that they use to “shock” the Batman audience. And that makes it a poor, poor use of this character and makes the book shittier.

And while I agree that the Jason Todd thing could be a trick, I can’t figure out who else it would be based on his “thought bubbles”.

I also grabbed Battle for the Cowl on John’s recommendation and I’m actually liking it a lot more than I thought I would. This whole “Batman is dead” shit seemed like a huge DC cash grab to me, and it is, but there have been a few really good stories that have come out of it. Namely, this series and the Neil Gaimen run in Detective Comics.