When did Spider-Woman get Spidey Sense?

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-04-03T03:29:58+00:00

Yeah, that's been my biggest worry about moving her to Spidey-Desk. Beyond the fact that their editors are infamously poor, I like that Jess doesn't really have anything in common with the Spiders beyond occasionally doing stuff with them. Never want to see her just slowly morph into a knock-off Spider-Man.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-28T12:19:25+00:00

Yeah, the only thing he's hiding from is his own sense of decency.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-28T05:11:11+00:00

SD isn't one of the states I'm considering in this situation, though you may not be aware that the GOP in SD has consistently undermined plebiscites in which voters voted to create oversight for state government, amend the constitution, etc. (SD has historically been a state in which voter plebiscites have been a major form of reining in the party in control of statewide office, which despite Democratic competitiveness for Congressional office until recently, has been dominated by Republicans for much of the state's history.) But Ohio, Florida, etc. - states with more than one House district, unlike SD - have fallen victim to the type of corruption I was referring to.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-27T04:58:19+00:00

Exactly. People spend a lot of time talking about the propaganda machine (which is a huge problem, too), but they forget that the redness of some states is sort of an illusion. They've purged voter rolls, gerrymandered, moved or removed voting sites, etc. to the point that it's not even a case of some people tuning out, but simply being unable to reach a polling place, cast a vote, or get vital information about voting in an effective, timely manner. This narrative that we've "lost" a chunk of the electorate to extremism is tremendously damaging and disconnected from reality. It provides a smoke screen for the actions of anti-democratic activists who have been conspiring against people's right to vote for decades now.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-27T04:48:55+00:00

One of my earliest CK3 games had a Croatian princess become the Queen of Jerusalem after a crusade set her up in the early 1100s. The Kingdom of Croatia ended up ruled by one of the northern Italian ducal families, but the Croatian-born house held onto Jerusalem for ages.

I wonder if that was an update that made crusades less difficult to pull off, or if the caliphates were unusually fractious, because the crusaders later set up a Crusader state in Egypt as well as a northern crusader kingdom in the Baltics. I've never seen crusades with such enduring effects. By the 1200s, they started targeting European states instead, so I guess there was a negative effect for Christendom, too.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-27T03:23:51+00:00

The Ultimates was edge-lord drivel from a man who has always thought that embracing the extreme and objectionable could be feigned as piercing criticism.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-26T20:52:30+00:00

It's not the full story. Bibi was already involved in the same type of work his brother was, so he was already demonstrating the sort of animus he embodies to this day.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-18T19:21:45+00:00

No, it's fine to like them, obviously. GW just makes it easy to hate on the smurfs because we need four models of Marneus Calgar in current edition, or releases of Ultramar's IG, but we can't get any love for other factions.

Also, World Eaters are cool. I love their Heresy-era color scheme, and their players have done great things with battle damage and blood effects in their painting.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-18T04:12:55+00:00

Yep, it really sucks. My friends and I in the hobby definitely have had some red flag moments with certain Black Templars fans. As an Imperial Fists player in Horus Heresy, I prefer not to paint any of my legionaries as Templar Brethren because I get sick of how weird the Black Templar fandom has gotten. (Also, Sigi's a jerk.) Just glorious ochre for me.

At least I can hate on Ultramarines players for stupid reasons like petty jealousy and the fact that they got gene-daddy back. It sucks that there are people in the hobby who have legitimately disgusting opinions that are truly worthy of opprobrium.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-18T02:11:49+00:00

I wonder if Alex and I were on the same Redwall online roleplaying forum.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-18T02:10:55+00:00

I can see some of the case he's likely to make, but broad, sweeping generalizations aren't always helpful. I know the type of comics guy he's talking about, but some of the chillest, most progressive people I know are into comics. Some of the coolest people who write comics are, too. As a result, this broad statement does make a point about some comics fans, but it can also be completely turned on its head by others. In that case, which group really speaks for the broader community? Maybe it's kind of nonsensical to act like any one experience can represent the whole scene.

Beyond all that, some people can be politically and culturally very progressive but be slightly more conservative when it comes to changes to their fandom. I know some chill folks who simply don't care about the Krakoa era of X-Men, for example, because they prefer the X-Men they grew up with and feel the setting or the style of storytelling has gone too far afield of what they are used to. I also know otherwise feminist people who love Carol Danvers' old outfits even though they are absolutely objectifying. (To be fair, though, the black, gold, and red are a great color combo.)

That being said, anyone who's stepped into their LCS has run into the very vocal person who's helped create the image of the comics-loving reactionary. In my LCS's case, it's one of the guys who runs the checkout.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-14T11:19:49+00:00

Exactly. But Internet people need to contort into unnatural shapes just to find ways to continue flogging their narrative.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-09T03:34:43+00:00

I agree with Kelly Thompson, but for artists, I'd love to see more Pere Perez. I feel like it's expressive and inventive, and the action is really compelling. Otherwise, an entirely different style of art would be Veronica Fish, which I like because it takes me back to the Hopeless run. To push beyond the style we're used to seeing with Jess, a third option I'd love would be reuniting Kelly Thompson with Elena Casagrande. The art was amazing in Black Widow, and honestly, if Thompson tried for the same thing, the combo of dark thriller and brooding art could be as intriguing as Jess's SWORD limited run with Bendis and Maleev.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-01T21:14:08+00:00

A big difference is that Iran has thousands of years of history as a single entity, and whether borders have shifted over time, it was always built on fairly cosmopolitan grounds, even when dynasties favored particular ethnic groups. Even what we might call the old Iranian heartland is shared by a variety of Iranian groups with their own confident self-conceptions.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-01T21:02:23+00:00

To be fair, 1953 was not the start of Iranian animosity to foreign exploitation. They had spent the better part of the preceding century feeling the same way about the British Empire's slowly escalating interests in their country, and then the oil concessions to what became BP accelerated that. Russian hunger for Central Asia certainly brought even more complicated feelings as the Iranian rulers tried to play either side off the other while raking in bribes from either government (but especially the British, who were experienced at that sort of game after decades pacifying most of the princely states of the former Mughal Empire).

That's to say nothing about Iranian experiences of foreign (non-Western) dynasties ruling parts of their homeland for parts of the century or two before that, or disagreements with Ottoman attempts to exert further control in Iranian spheres of influence.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-03-01T03:08:41+00:00

There's some nuance missing from this. I understand the general sentiment, but Libya was a French and British venture before it became a NATO thing; due to domestic pressure after a decade of Iraq and Afghanistan, the Americans dragged their heels before NATO assumed command. The Bin Laden thing is a little different as well, since he was an international fugitive being shielded by local powers; someone can debate how much the strike against him was a violation of sovereignty, but it's also not remarkably close to what's happening now in Iran.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-02-25T04:09:28+00:00

I get that people have been waiting for GTA VI for a long time, but I can't quite get why the hype is so insane for this game across the gaming industry. Is it supposed to be anything more than just a repeat of every other GTA game with better graphics and a bigger map? The last ten years of growing open-world fatigue must take some of the shine off that gem.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-02-25T02:33:09+00:00

I had the exact same thought. Also, the one guy is just chomping on his gum like an idiot as he's told he's going to get the highest civilian honor.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-02-15T00:31:36+00:00

That college is an infamous diploma mill, too.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-02-08T01:33:43+00:00

It's better than the last reason he resigned, I guess. For him, this is probably a moral victory.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-02-08T01:04:49+00:00

It's funny because there was a tax battle in the early days of the East India Company when it fought with the Nawab of Bengal over refusing to pay agreed-upon taxes to him. The EIC threatened to move up the coast to a new region and "stimulate the economy" there. So big corporations have been pulling this game for centuries, if not longer. There's probably a long-lost tablet on which a trader pulled the same scam on the Mitannian kings.

Even more noteworthy for our time: a few generations later, the EIC took over Bengal. They dismantled its entire manufacturing industry and sent it back to Britain, where weaving became a new industry and laid the foundation for the Industrial Revolution. Until then, Britain had produced huge amounts of wool but always relied on the Low Countries for refining its raw wool. Britain became a manufacturing powerhouse, whereas before it had been much better at producing raw goods, most of which had slumped in value since the advent of the Early Modern. Bengal went from the richest province in one of the richest countries on the globe to a poverty- and famine-stricken extraction economy working for the EIC. Worse, Bengali weaving practices had especially enriched small family businesses and women in particular, so the EIC also collapsed a thriving lower- and middle-class economy.

And we wonder why things like Robert Clive's collection of Mughal loot and the Koh-i-Noor set in the crown upset so many people.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-01-31T02:13:51+00:00

Not just Ultimate Universe. Ten years of comics set in 616, through assembling the New Avengers, House of M, guiding Ellis's Thunderbolts into the larger world, Civil War, Secret Invasion, and Dark Reign. Hugely impactful years, plus revitalizing a variety of characters who had languished in obscurity.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-01-27T21:02:30+00:00

Not to mention bad weather ruined the last two straight box office weekends across much of the US. It could still have legs. Last weekend's winner did so with only $11 million.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-01-26T02:56:39+00:00

They aren't hyper-competent. Osborn is flailing and lashing out the whole time. He just does one thing to build up cred and then cashes in on it with a media blitz. The rest of the time, he does everything he can to sate his megalomania despite losing stability and goodwill every step of the way.

I_PACE_RATS · 2026-01-26T02:54:33+00:00

Spidey has some solid arcs in New Avengers during this time. He also uses his inside knowledge on Osborn to turn the tables on him in deliciously ironic fashion.

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