The last of Marvel’s 70th Anniversary Frame variants shipped this week.  I’ve made my feelings about these books pretty clear, but as a true Marvel Zombie I couldn’t just let them pass by.  So, consider this my digital revenge as I add them to my “virtual collection.”  Take that, Marvel!

See if you can spot some sneakiness on Marvel’s part with a few of these covers…

The following issues feature Marvel 70th Anniversary frame variant covers:

• Amazing Spider-Man #601
• Amazing Spider-Man #602
• Amazing Spider-Man #603
• Avengers: The Initiative #27
• Black Panther #7
• Cable #17
• Captain America: Reborn #2
• Daredevil #500
• Dark Avengers #8
• Dark Wolverine #77
• Deadpool #13
• Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth #2
• Exiles #5
• Fantastic Four #570
• Guardians of the Galaxy #17
• Hulk #13
• Incredible Hulk #601
• Incredible Hercules #133
• The Invincible Iron Man #16
• The Might Avengers #28
• Ms. Marvel #43
• New Avengers #56
• New Mutants #4
• Nova #28
• Punisher #8
• Secret Warriors #7
• Son of Hulk #14
• Uncanny X-Men #514
• War Machine #7
• Wolverine: First Class #18
• Wolverine: Origins #39
• Wolverine: Weapon X #4
• X-Factor #47
• X-Force #18
• X-Men: Legacy #227
• X-Men Forever #5

I think I like Entourage, but I’m having a lot of trouble getting invested this season.  Who cares about Vincent Chase?  So his friends are busy.  This is what his story amounts to.  Given the fact that I am completely unsympathetic to his situation, he doesn’t make for the best protagonist.

Angie thinks viewers could relate to Drama, since they’ve probably met people that repulsive.  I’d rather watch him save Kim Bauer from a mountain lion.  Pizza Boy and Joker Face are not interesting and difficult to watch.  They dangle the girl from the Zohan in front of the viewers and do nothing with her for weeks.  Turtle is really the only character semi-relatable of the core group, but he still has it pretty good.  Two new luxury cars for your birthday does not make you the everyman.

Ari Gold is still the best reason to watch.  His story is the only one that seems meaningful this season.  There’s been an interesting progression to his being a decent husband and father underneath his brash exterior.  I genuinely like Piven as an actor, but it seemed like the audience hated him by the end of his appearance on The Tonight Show Tuesday night.  I’ll keep watching for now, but I’m questioning how long I’ll be sticking with this show.

I know this is coming almost two weeks after the book shipped, but I was pressed (slightly) into doing this by Kevin (who also reviewed it here). He’s very interested in my DC purchases lately.  For anyone who’s not familiar with the Wednesday Comics project, it’s a Sunday newspaper style “comic book” featuring a series of one page stories that will continue weekly over the course of twelve weeks.  The quotes are not meant to demean the “book,” I’m honestly not sure what to call it.

I had an immediate reaction to this “book” the moment I laid eyes on it.  Newsprint automatically equals cheap in my mind.  Even though it’s actually pretty high quality paper, I just thought that there was no way it should cost $3.99.  That’s just the price of comics at this point though and it’s one of the more expensive “books” on the shelf (I think most books are still $2.99, for now).

While the format is cool, really cool, I found it hard to read at times since the pages kept folding over on me.  The artwork is amazing at that size, but a one page story is just not enough to hook me in.  In fact, the Superman “story” hardly even qualifies as a story as they are only about 20 words and it’s the villain basically saying “you’re an alien, Superman.”

The other stories (15 in all) have a lot more substance to them, with the Kamandi story being my favorite, which is saying something since my only knowledge of the character is as a source of comedy as the go to obscure DC character that gets referenced from time to time.  The Hawkman story and Strange Adventures come in as strong runners up. I’d love to see where these stories are going, though I don’t see myself coming back for subsequent weeks.  I lead a serialized life, but the one page stories are just too low dosage.

Most of the movies that have come in the mail from Netflix recently don’t really merit a full post, so I’ll keep this brief to avoid spending any more time with these movies in my head.

Disaster Movie was just that.

Transporter 3 was no Crank 2.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button would have been better as The Tragedy of Mearth from Earth.

My Best Friend’s Girl was like the story of The Three Bears: too good for Jason Biggs, not good enough for Kate Hudson, and just right for Dane Cook.

Big Stan must have failed to hold my attention since I’m watching it as I write this.

Caprica was worth writing more than one sentence about.

Sunday: Sunscreen. Just how exactly does this stuff work? Apparently by absorbing high energy UV photons and releasing the energy difference as heat or visible fluorescence. All that really matters is that it kept me safe through nine innings of baseball.

Monday: Pets. Do pets get homesick? I’m not sure, but I know they get car sick.

Tuesday: Mets fans. This may actually be a comment on the lack of Baltimore Orioles fans. Despite $8 tickets, a beautiful stadium and a killer block party, more Mets fans were in attendance that local supporters.

Wednesday: New iPhone software. This was almost disappointingly simple. Glad to see Apple worked out the kinks and staggered the release of the software and the new iPhone after the disaster of the last upgrade.

Thursday: SEPTA. When it’s raining and there’s an afternoon baseball game and it’s rush hour, it would be reasonable to have enough cars on the tracks to handle it.

Friday: USPS. So is the US Post Office really that bad? I’m considering spending $12 extra dollars on an order of comic books next week to not have the USPS ship my books.

I realize this post is decidedly negative, and involves a lot of baseball.  To compensate: Go Phils!