Punchy wrote:
I just don't think it's fair to negatively review a comic because of a story from 4 years ago that is only very tangentially related. It seems like for some people, reviewing Spider-Man has become impossible, because they can't get over it.
It's fair because the stories are serialized and thus interconnected. Consider this from the opposite point of view: If a new issue makes you think of an old issue and, as a result, you enjoy the new story more than you would have otherwise, is your enthusiastic assessment of the comic unfair? Of course not. Last week, a number of posters gushed over the DD relaunch and noted that this new direction reminded them of classic DD. They (Starlord included) obviously enjoyed the book in part because it evoked memories of "very tangentially related" old stories that they loved.
Others could have dismissed such praise as being overly sentimental and thus unfair. Look at Yoni's review as a contrast. He rightly noted that aside from the tone change in the book, the issue was standard and lacked a strong dramatic hook. I agreed with him, and noted that the cliffhanger was weak. Should Yoni have criticized Starlord's critique of the book as unfair, because it seemed that Starlord was loving the book not for what was in the story itself but rather how the story related to the larger DD history?
With serialized stories, it's difficult to assess each arc on its own without considering how it's connected to (or how it makes you feel about) the grand fictional history of these much-loved, decades-old characters.