It's not as simple as "I like happy stories and dislike dark ones." The Death of Gwen Stacy is a dark story and one of my favourites. Also, Harry Osborn as the Goblin is my favourite Spidey villain BECAUSE of how messed up it is when he goes crazy and attacks the people he loves because he feels like he has to.
I didn't mean to boil it down that simply or to suggest any kind of insult in your tastes so I hope that you didn't feel like you had to explain or defend yourself. I was generalizing, but it's true that the kind of things you like, generally and for the most part, are "happy" stories. I also didn't mean to suggest there was anything wrong with that whatsoever. Different strokes for different folks.
To counter - those stories are definitely dark for the times they were written, no doubt, but compared to more current "dark" stories they are pretty tame. Still great stories and not reflective of what was going on in superhero books at the time, but pretty tame. I personally wouldn't put them in the same category, but I absolutely recognize what they meant at the time (particularly Gwen Stacy's death).
And I really liked it when Ultimate Fury had run-ins with Ultimate Peter Parker because the contrast of youthful idealism and hardened cynicism was really cool. The first issue of the Ultimates I ever read was the first annual where Fury hires the retired assassin to kill him just to see if he'll do it and then kills him for accepting the job. That put a bad taste in my mouth, but most of the rest of the series isn't that bad.
That was a little gratuitous and I didn't think it really reflected what the themes in the regular series, so yeah I can see getting turned off by that. Dillon's art doesn't help.
In Watchmen, I just felt like it was so twisted. Nobody was worth rooting for. I actually couldn't finish it. The furthest I got was when Rorchach is remembering cutting dogs heads open or something. (He was taking a rorchach test).
Yep - agreed it was twisted, but it WAS reflective of everything else going on in that universe at the time. If it had been gratuitous and unnecessary it would've bothered me too - not because it was gory - but that single scene did a LOT in explaining and expanding on the character of Rorschach.
And All-Star Superman is just weird. I really struggle to like anything Grant Morrison does. Some of it's good (like his Batman stuff), and some is decent (like hi X-Men stuff). But most of it is just so odd. I should go back and reread All-Star Superman, though. I think the weirdness just caught me off guard the first time. Maybe if I go in knowing what to expect it will be different.
I thought the same thing at first, especially when he takes Lois to the Fortress of Solitude early on, but it is a fun kind of weirdness and makes sense in context with what happens in issue 1. He gets exposed to massive amounts of sun and triples his strength, intelligence, curiosity, etc. - it makes total sense that the book would have triple the weirdness of any other Superman book.
(Coincidentally I was reading the first couple of issues the other day and Superman's demeanor really struck me. There's a scene in #2 where Lois zaps him with a Kryptonite gun and he says something to the effect of "Mind if I just take that?" - I don't know what it is but his kind personality is so vivid there and perfectly exemplifies why I like the book.)
I hate to sound like I'm trying to convince someone to like something, but knowing what you like and don't like it surprises me that you don't love it; that's all I was saying.
On a side-note, why is it that all of our best conversations happen off-topic?
It had meandered all over the place because we've broadened the topic so much but I think we're doing a pretty good job keeping on topic on this one, actually.
