Since we’ve unveiled our favorite comic book series of this year, we’ve decided to flip that coin over and give you our worst! The following results shocked us, because we’re both fans of the universe they exist in, but are sad to see it gone astray.
Read ComicUI’s Best Comic Book Series of 2014 before you proceed, although…there aren’t any spoilers below. Oh well. What was your least favorite series this year?
Brian – All New Ultimates
Mark Millar’s “Ultimates” are arguably what got me back into comics after childhood. Showing a reinvention of my favorite characters in a more cinematic and adult light was really ground breaking at the time, and I think anyone who has watched Marvel Studio’s movies will agree that a lot of the Marvel Cinematic Universe was pulled from the early years of the Ultimate Universe. That being said, All New Ultimates is embarrassing. Right down to the name. Marvel launched their All New Marvel NOW earlier this year and understandably we’ve seen a lot of tittles with “The All New…” prefix, but I challenge you to find one of those series that doesn’t take place in the main 616 universe. Now, in the aftermath of Cataclysm, when Marvel should be advertising their Ultimate Universe a having SURVIVED the Cataclysm, they hit us with this all new series that feels straight out of 616. This may seem like a small detail, but everything else about this series is even worse. The writer isn’t horrible, but as far as I can tell the author is new to Marvel. The artwork is par for Marvel, which again feels sad for the Ultimate Universe as early Ultimates issues had an almost photorealistic style to them. The series is also much more focused around teens and teen problems, making it seem petty compared to early Ultimates problems like Ant Man and Wasp’s domestic violence issues, or Thor seriously questioning his sanity in Ultimates 2. At this point I really can’t wait for 2015’s “Ultimate End”. R.I.P. Ultimate U 2000-2014 :’-(.
Chris – Cataclysm/AXIS
“I agree that Ultimate Comics has really diminished in quality after Cataclysm. It was another Ultimatum, where a bunch of characters are killed off, series are ended, and a mild ‘reboot’ was started. This was a damn shame, since Ultimate Comics – Ultimates was the finest series for several years. Starting with Jonathan Hickman (fav writer right now) and ending with Joshua Fialkov (so good!), it was upended by a stupid Galactus crossover that only served to give us ‘false’ deaths and a lack of actual fun. As Brian put it, they essentially executed the universe in one fell swoop. The Galactus Cataclysm was caused by the White Event in Age of Ultron comic series, another one I detest vehemently. Boo! (Addendum: Avengers & X-Men: AXIS is shaping up to be a very close tie to this series, but we have a few issues left to go.)
