To be honest, I was a little disappointed with The List. I thought Avengers and Daredevil were good, and who doesn't love watching Nick Fury punch Norman Osborne in the face, but the rest were very underwhelming. I thought it could have been so much more than it was. The art was way under par in some of them. Wolverine fighting zombies? Namor dancing with a deranged sea monster? Daken offing the Punisher (and leading into the questionable Frankencastle)? I haven't read any Frankencastle, but the idea seems silly.

Anyway, I wasn't thrilled. I assumed Osborne would, you know, not look like a huge wimp and actually manage to capture/eliminate more than a couple heroes. Not to mention that The List: X-Men barely even had them in it. If The List had been taken more seriously, I think it could have made for a great focus title of Dark Reign, like Civil War or Secret Invasion. As it is, I think it cheapens the intimidation factor of Dark Reign. The heroes are supposed to be getting owned at this point, right? So, if we're going to have all of this lead to Siege and ultimately bring our heroes back in full fashion, why not make the Dark Reign as dark as possible? Don't cheapen it with anticlimactic single issues that have very little effect.

That said, I still love Marvel, and I can't wait to see how it all unfolds.

I actually have to disagree with you. The List was Norman thinking that he could advance to the next stage in his "schemes" and start taking care of his biggest threats to power. With The List, we actually started to see even more cracks in Norman's armor as he realized that it wasn't going to be as easy as he thought- enter the Fall of Osborn!

As far as Frankencastle goes, I've actually really come to enjoy the story- even being the biggest detractor of the story before it even began. The story is just fun and filled monsters, Nazi heads in glass jars and the Legion of Monsters! I actually suggest tying it out as the story has come to be one of the books that I look forward to monthly now!