The Ultimates

The Ultimates
The Ultimates #1-13; The Ultimates Annual #1; The Ultimates 2 #1-11
I'm a fan of the Ultimate Fantastic Four and of Ultimate Spider-Man, and I just recently started getting into Ultimate X-Men and I mostly like that title too. However, there is something wrong with a line that has The Ultimates as its namesake book. I could see myself living in the main Marvel Universe, twisted as it has become nowadays. I pray to God that I never end up living in the Ultimate Universe. This title is an embodiment of everything that is most wrong with America and the world. Where America is nothing less than a benign fascist dictatorship, and S.H.I.E.L.D. is basically its SS. Sure, our country is headed in a direction that scares me, but it's still nowhere near this interpretation. Nick Fury is a power-hungry globally-manipulating hawk, Captain America is a fascist nutcase, Giant Man is an abusive psychopath, Wasp is a masochist, Betty Ross is a manipulative two-faced bitch, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch are incestuous lovers...and Iron Man is basically the same as in the normal Marvel Universe. The most empathetic/sympathetic character on the entire team is the depressed, crazed, mass-murdering Hulk, so what does that say about the rest of them?
I like Thor a lot, but honestly, he's not really part of the team.
Reading the book is addictive, for precisely the same reason as Tom Clancy novels are. It's just so WRONG it make you want to choke, yet keeps you reading to see what ridiculous notions they have for the rest of our world. They truly seem to feel that this is the way the world should be, because nowhere in the book does it even imply from a mainstream point of view that something is terribly wrong with S.H.I.E.L.D., and especially Nick Fury, not discounting the rest of the Ultimates team.
This title makes me glad that I don't live in the Ultimate Universe, and I'm glad that there is very little crossover between the Ultimates title and the other ongoing series, which I happen to like. However, I just read all of the Ultimates, volume 1, and as much of volume 2 as has been released, and, honestly, I'm a bit sickened. The art is solid, and the writing is good, but the feeling and the idea is just complete wrong. This series deserves an ASS rating for that reason alone, aside from the fact that it's been chronically late. I really hope that their stories do not impact the rest of the Ultimate Universe, because when they do, I may stop enjoying the rest of the titles altogether. The only reason to read this title is Thor. I hope he gets his own Ultimate book.