Tuum Libertates Intermissa Usque Ultra Arguit*

 
*"Your Liberties Are Suspended Until Further Notice"

If I recall correctly, The Siege from 2010 was the last crossover event that I collected before pulling the plug on retail purchases of new Marvel comics. I remember having trudged through 2008's Secret Invasion and, before that, the 2006 Civil War series, and realizing I'd pretty much had my fill of infighting between Marvel characters who took sides against each other due to the Super-Human Registration Act but then found themselves helpless to halt the massive capital initiative launched by their creators designed to keep that lucrative ball rolling for several years. Initially, however, the SHRA in itself was intriguing and was clearly given a good deal of thought in terms of plotting. And its underlying argument made sense to explore--after all, how long could the government stand for super-powered people causing large-scale destruction and casualties before putting its collective foot down and not only hold them accountable but regulate their operations?

As it happened, Marvel turned out a well-produced and coordinated effort with Civil War, a series that turned the "Marvel universe" upside down and played a major part in breaking with how their readers perceived these characters. I didn't collect all of the various tie-ins that were connected to the main series, but I was intrigued enough to invest time and $$$ in a few of them. (Comics at the time were $3.00 a pop--nothing like the stratosphere prices of today, but enough to play a part in my selection process.) The main "blam-blam" title, certainly--one or two offshoots which piqued my curiosity, such as The Return--and a few that were based on characters I wanted to check in with in particular, such as the Winter Soldier and the Sub-Mariner. But if you were looking for something that didn't simply continue under another masthead the arguments and the conflict of one side vs. the other, you might have preferred the behind-the-scenes approach of Front Line, an 11-issue series-within-a-series written by Paul Jenkins and illustrated by Ramon Bachs which digs a little further into how from Day One the SHRA has affected and impacted the lives of not just the principal characters but others who had to find ways to cope with the new law of the land.

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