I tell people Im the number 1 Bendis hater...His single star series usually work out well...I'll even say greats with his Daredevil/Cage/Alias universe and especially his Ultimate Spider-man.

But the problem is Bendis has a hard time following any form of continuity that he didnt come up with, and while he can do some cool small group noir stories, when it comes to team books and epic climaxes he is too many words not enough action...case in point Marvel doing an entirely different AvX book to show the actual fighting because the bendis book was too much talk.

His Avengers book didnt seem like the A Team avengers book and he mostly used it to bring in the characters he always used: Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Spider-man...and then there were the 2 things that really really urked me: the hinted love affair between Squirrel Girl and Wolverine, The fake baby skrull tease at the end of Secret Invasion....speaking of...he also wasnt happy about Howard the Duck being in the splash pages of the comic.

The 2 biggest strikes many have with him are 1: Moon Knight: the character had a good run that got some hype so bendis said "Let me try" and essentially turned him into a 1 man avengers book with him replacing his 3 alternate identities with Spider-man, Cap, and Wolverine.

And THOR. JMS was doing the best run of Thor (imo) where he was keeping him pretty self contained as he rebuilt asgard...then Bendis essentially wants to undo his hard work and kill loki as part of his big swan song of leaving the avengers (for moon knight)

Now...I learned about the LEGION thanks to Clix, and while most of the books arent for me (the old stuff is really campy) I LOVED the Abnett and Lanning LEGION series they did with the whole post apocalyptic Invasion of the Body Snatchers thing they did with the Blight. But then again...its Abnett and Lanning...they turned a talking raccoon and a sentient tree into the number 1 buddy duo in Marvel (With help from Keith Giffen who set up the pairing)

The following isn't wrong.
I'd swear that maybe around the time the Ultimate Universe was just getting started, and possibly as late as when his Secret War was happening, I read an interview with him somewhere (Jinxworld maybe?) that he out-and-out said that not only did he not know much about (Marvel) continuity but that he (mostly) didn't care. He made no secret about not knowing that Spider-Woman's name wasn't Jessica Jones. I find it impossible to reconcile that he had greater plans for Luke Cage all along than his initial use in Alias.

That attitude kinda worked in the beginning of the Ultimate Universe... until it didn't. Ultimate Team-up basically had to be ignored for Ultimate F4 to make any sense.

Given all that I've written about the guy, because DC Comics were much more foundational for me than Marvel comics... as much as I detested the Bendis Avengers oeuvre... I can pretty much look around it because for me, the Avengers will always be a second tier hero group. At Marvel, for me it is the X-men at #1, with the F4 #2 as having (at one point) the best team dynamic and history. I expected his Superman time to be a flash-in-the-pan, much like many other 'top talents' given flagship titles.

I certainly tired of Bendis Avengers teams taking on bands of ninjas, and for it to actually be a somewhat even fight.

You're misremembering. Alias was developed as a Jessica Drew book, Jessica Jones was created as not to damage Jessica Drew in case Marvel ever wanted to use her again.

I am positive that I read an interview with, or column by, Bendis where he said the origin of Alias was to use Spider-Woman as the de-powered heroine, and that he forgot her name. Now maybe he explicitly was told he couldn't use Spider-Woman, but AFAIK he actually wrote the scripts/outline assuming that her name was Jessica Jones. I could be misremembering things, but IIRC it isn't at all important (or revealed) what the super-identity of the heroine was, so maybe it was all a sort of shrug. I mean... it's not like Spider-Woman hadn't already had some retconning!

There are definitely some peculiar echoes between Jessica Jones' background and elements of Jessica Drew's (up to that point) so it doesn't look like he ultimately changed much except make her not be Spider-Woman (and then have Spider-Woman guest star).

Seeing all this Bendis hate warms my heart.

That being said, I was able to avoid his Avengers run but still enjoy the Avengers thanks to the Civil War/Dark Reign getting us Might Avengers and Avengers Academy done by Dan Slott. Slotts Mighty Avengers run felt like an Avengers book, Hank Pym mourning Wasp, dealing with his continuity of how not only the Avengers see him but him being replaced by a skrull, speaking of replacements: The team was filled with nearly replacement heros: USAgent for Cap, Herc for Thor, Stature for Wasp, Vision 2 for Vision, Cho for Pym (at one point wearing his old ant man helmet) and **** for Wanda. It was a wild fun book where they new they werent the big A book that was coming out but it had all the feeling of an Avengers book...with a great showdown with Pym vs Osborne over the Cosmic Cube.

I definitely don't hate BNB. He seems to be a genuine human being, with a pretty normal range of interests and human interactions. He has never given me the *ick* and appears to be a pretty well-adjusted guy.

There aren't that many comic creators I know that much about (any more)... let's blame my growing disinterest with comics and my almost complete disengagement from the "comics press"... but I'd put Brian Michael Bendis near the very bottom of the list of creators I'd expect to do anything that would make me question their decency(*1).

I also think he's near the bottom of the list of comic creators to cast a spell on me, but that is a different list.

(*1) There are a few creators that I think are pretty decent but I'm not entirely sure that they have their heads screwed on correctly. I mean, who among us hasn't paid taxes on income, and then been completely surprised by the IRS?

Barf. I was aware that there were multiple comics hinting that, but didn't know who started it. And I'm pretty sure it was hinted she was underage when he did the deed.

I remember my brother believing at one point Luke Cage and Spider Woman were an item. I'm starting to see why...

Yeah cuz she was just starting college when she was the Avengers Babysitter, before that she was dating Speedball, so if it was before speedball she was rather young...like Ultimate Spider-man young. (But again...Bendis doesnt follow NonBendis Continuity so she might have been older, but they didnt really break up until post Civil War when he was doing the Penance thing *GLA Summer Bash.

Avengers Academy Yeah, the side books of that era were enjoyable. Luke Cage moving over to Thunderbolts sure felt like the more appropriate place for him.

That actually jogs my memory for the main reason I didn't like Bendis back then: his use of Cage.

So my comic shop didn't have the Great Darkness Saga, but I stumbled upon the Linkara video talking about it. Yeah, I feel that twist is pivotal to making the story exciting.

I've been showing my friend the Legion cartoon. She grew up with Teen Titans and Justice League, but she never heard of this one. I suppose it not being on Cable had something to do with that. Also, maybe the characters not being as fleshed out as in Teen Titans might've had something to do with it being overshadowed.

Back in the old days, when we had rings to turn the clix dials, one of our players not only wore his regularly, but had painted it to be a Legion flight ring.

1. It's a mystery. Knowing the end makes it less exciting. While that might be true for any story, when I think about watching DC Animated movies, Mystery of the Batwoman never makes it because it's not a mystery anymore. Definitely worth watching once, highly recommended.

2. It's that time of year, leaning into Christmas present buying, when stores like Barnes and Noble have sales on graphic novels like Buy 2 get 1 free. Might be a good time to go check them - or some other similar bookstore - for those you have always wanted to read. Some stores even have a frequent buyer club which can save you even more money.

In the decades since The Great Darkness Saga was published (1982!) I don't think it is the obvious (per TPB covers!) giveaway, so much as that it began a ramp-up for Darkseid as the default villain whenever there was anything involving more than one issue (especially 'limited series') and heroic team-ups (because Darkseid!).

The guy was chosen to anchor the final season of Superfriends, was the mastermind behind the rebranding event of Legends, had a star turn in a prestige book (Cosmic Odyssey), etc. The Ambush Bug series turned out to be prescient, because the guy has had more regularly scheduled appearances than a post-Thanksgiving shopping mall Santa Claus.

Now I pretty much roll my eyes at every re-use of Darkseid. This is not to say that I didn't find something like Morrison's Fourth/Fifth/Four-point-Five World stuff to be imaginative, but the character has become a trope, along with "Apokolips versions of characters you thought you knew!" I find it especially bad when Darkseid becomes a literal punching bag.

JLU and TT having Saturday evening slots on Cartoon Network certainly seemed like a better deal back then than the Legion's Saturday morning slot on Kids WB (if it was that, at the time).

Though later, Young Justice built a good following there on Saturday mornings.