Mostly Comics
Jan. 19th, 2010 10:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexsarllThis one's going to get geeky, so let's start by establishing that yes, I do sometimes engage in more socially well-adjusted activities. Well, if you can count going to the V&A (they have so much pretty stuff, but what is it *for* when lots of that stuff would be equally at home in the British Museum?), or attending a Britpop night in a Geneva t-shirt, or hanging out with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fugitivemotel and at one stage uttering the phrase "Oz Season 7, starring Wizbit". And OK, at the party I attended on Saturday I did have a conversation about the Sisters of Mercy's much-better-than-other-bands-called-Sisters cover of 'Comfortably Numb'. So yes, it would seem I am in fact a hopeless case. Oh well.
It was September when I last posted a general State of the Comics Union moan. Since when, not much has changed. I've dropped an increasing number of series which, even if I vaguely want to read, I know I'll never want to reread. More are coming - when Astonishing X-Men and Ultimate Avengers reach the end of the current stories, they're out, because they're not bad little superhero romps but nor are they worth more than a quick read courtesy of the library and, if I've mis-guessed what the library will get in, I'll live. Buffy was in line for the same treatment after the sheer galling idiocy both of the identity of the season's Big Bad, and of the manner in which said identity was revealed (online via fake leak, not in the comic itself) - but Joss Whedon wrote the most recent issue himself and reminded me that it was seldom the big stories which made Buffy so much as the little moments, and this was they. Of course, the next arc is by Brad Meltzer and is going to have a Mature Readers warning, between which and his previous work we can doubtless expect some gratuitously rapey mess which gets me right back to quitsville.
But there's just so much coasting going on - and miserable coasting at that. Both DC and Marvel claim that a bright new direction is coming once the grim'n'gritty carnage of current events is done, but I've heard it all before (and I'm barely been reading anything from DC in ages, they're in such a joyless tangle). At Marvel what seemed like a brilliant idea for a while (businessman Norman Osborn aka the Green Goblin talked himself out of responsibility for his crimes and ended up effectively running the country, as the very rich always seem to manage - ring any bells, bankers?) has just been plodding on and on and remorselessly on. And now it has finally reached its endgame - Osborn and his forces attacking Asgard, home of Thor and his fellow gods, which J Michael Straczynski's run on Thor had relocated to Oklahoma. But the comic telling this story, Siege, feels from its first issue more like it's going through the motions of amending the status quo than like the epic story it should be. Brian Bendis, the writer, has previously had problems with the pacing in the middle acts of his big event comics, and this one was shorter so should have been better, but it's as if he's cut not the padded kidriff, but the kick-ass opening.
There's still good stuff, of course; of the titles I praised in September, Ultimate Spider-Man and The Boys are still delivering. The Walking Dead gets better and better, and I don't even much like zombie stories. Vertigo, previously responsible for Sandman, Preacher and The Invisibles among others, has become relevant again with Mike Carey's The Unwritten and Peter Milligan's Greek Street, two very different examinations of the unexpected legacy legends and fictions can have in the modern world. But, will either of them last? The economics of comics are so horribly marginal, it can never be guaranteed; both writers have a string of prematurely-cancelled titles behind them. Word of another casualty has just come in; Phonogram's Kieron Gillen has been doing some lovely work on a space-based screwball comedy X-Men spin-off called S.W.O.R.D., but weak sales mean it ends with the fifth issue. Meanwhile, he's trying his best on Thor but the aforementioned Straczysnki run left him with having to pick up from such a moronic start point (Latveria Is So Bracing!)* that he's really swimming against the current.
Another writer I usually think of as reliably great, Grant Morrison, is in more position to be master of his fate and work, but isn't really putting it to best use. His Batman & Robin hasn't maintained its strong start, getting bogged down in themes he's already done better elsewhere; I feel a real lack of anticipation for the imminent Joe the Barbarian; and as for his Authority...well, OK, it's not really his anymore. It's Keith Giffen scripting Morrison's plots, because Grant stormed off in a huff. And Giffen's a competent enough writer, usually, but it turns out that he can't write British. So Morrison's most thoroughly, heartbreakingly British lead since Greg Feely in The Filth now talks about leaving things in his other 'pants', and his first 'apartment'. The issue of The Boys set amidst the baguette-jousting inhabitants of the village of Franglais had a better ear for dialect than this.
And as if that little diatribe weren't bad enough, today the main thing lifting me out of the sense of 'meh' which comes with this horrible sinus-y cold is the storming victory my new-look Tyranid army managed in last night's game of Warhammer 40,000.
*I love Babylon 5 - mostly - but JMS' comics career has been one frustration after another. Either he loses the plot, or he falls out with the publisher and storms off, or in extreme cases, both. People told me his Thor was excellent but having been burned before, I waited. And I finally read the first two collections recently and lo and behold, this was one of the cases of 'both'. There's a lot to love: instead of talking in cod-Shakespearean English as previous writers so clumsily attempted, his Asgardians speak formally but coherently; it's the themes which echo Shakespeare now, with the prince uneasy on his father's throne, the adviser who whispers poison in a good but naive ear. And the abiding question: what do gods do when their legend is over? If they survived Ragnarok, what now? Yes, in a sense it would have been a better theme back in those days when we were told we'd seen the End of History, but it's still a fascinating one.
However. There are scenes in post-Katrina New Orleans and war-torn Africa which demonstrate that Straczynski hasn't learned a damn thing since his legendarily bad Amazing Spider-Man issue where Doctor Doom stood in the wreckage of the World Trade Centre and wept. And, though I've yet to read the third volume which fully explains how he got to where he left the series, I've seen enough to know that yes, what looked like a stupid idea which Gillen was obliged to pick up, was also a stupid idea approached from the other end.
fugitivemotel and at one stage uttering the phrase "Oz Season 7, starring Wizbit". And OK, at the party I attended on Saturday I did have a conversation about the Sisters of Mercy's much-better-than-other-bands-called-Sisters cover of 'Comfortably Numb'. So yes, it would seem I am in fact a hopeless case. Oh well. It was September when I last posted a general State of the Comics Union moan. Since when, not much has changed. I've dropped an increasing number of series which, even if I vaguely want to read, I know I'll never want to reread. More are coming - when Astonishing X-Men and Ultimate Avengers reach the end of the current stories, they're out, because they're not bad little superhero romps but nor are they worth more than a quick read courtesy of the library and, if I've mis-guessed what the library will get in, I'll live. Buffy was in line for the same treatment after the sheer galling idiocy both of the identity of the season's Big Bad, and of the manner in which said identity was revealed (online via fake leak, not in the comic itself) - but Joss Whedon wrote the most recent issue himself and reminded me that it was seldom the big stories which made Buffy so much as the little moments, and this was they. Of course, the next arc is by Brad Meltzer and is going to have a Mature Readers warning, between which and his previous work we can doubtless expect some gratuitously rapey mess which gets me right back to quitsville.
But there's just so much coasting going on - and miserable coasting at that. Both DC and Marvel claim that a bright new direction is coming once the grim'n'gritty carnage of current events is done, but I've heard it all before (and I'm barely been reading anything from DC in ages, they're in such a joyless tangle). At Marvel what seemed like a brilliant idea for a while (businessman Norman Osborn aka the Green Goblin talked himself out of responsibility for his crimes and ended up effectively running the country, as the very rich always seem to manage - ring any bells, bankers?) has just been plodding on and on and remorselessly on. And now it has finally reached its endgame - Osborn and his forces attacking Asgard, home of Thor and his fellow gods, which J Michael Straczynski's run on Thor had relocated to Oklahoma. But the comic telling this story, Siege, feels from its first issue more like it's going through the motions of amending the status quo than like the epic story it should be. Brian Bendis, the writer, has previously had problems with the pacing in the middle acts of his big event comics, and this one was shorter so should have been better, but it's as if he's cut not the padded kidriff, but the kick-ass opening.
There's still good stuff, of course; of the titles I praised in September, Ultimate Spider-Man and The Boys are still delivering. The Walking Dead gets better and better, and I don't even much like zombie stories. Vertigo, previously responsible for Sandman, Preacher and The Invisibles among others, has become relevant again with Mike Carey's The Unwritten and Peter Milligan's Greek Street, two very different examinations of the unexpected legacy legends and fictions can have in the modern world. But, will either of them last? The economics of comics are so horribly marginal, it can never be guaranteed; both writers have a string of prematurely-cancelled titles behind them. Word of another casualty has just come in; Phonogram's Kieron Gillen has been doing some lovely work on a space-based screwball comedy X-Men spin-off called S.W.O.R.D., but weak sales mean it ends with the fifth issue. Meanwhile, he's trying his best on Thor but the aforementioned Straczysnki run left him with having to pick up from such a moronic start point (Latveria Is So Bracing!)* that he's really swimming against the current.
Another writer I usually think of as reliably great, Grant Morrison, is in more position to be master of his fate and work, but isn't really putting it to best use. His Batman & Robin hasn't maintained its strong start, getting bogged down in themes he's already done better elsewhere; I feel a real lack of anticipation for the imminent Joe the Barbarian; and as for his Authority...well, OK, it's not really his anymore. It's Keith Giffen scripting Morrison's plots, because Grant stormed off in a huff. And Giffen's a competent enough writer, usually, but it turns out that he can't write British. So Morrison's most thoroughly, heartbreakingly British lead since Greg Feely in The Filth now talks about leaving things in his other 'pants', and his first 'apartment'. The issue of The Boys set amidst the baguette-jousting inhabitants of the village of Franglais had a better ear for dialect than this.
And as if that little diatribe weren't bad enough, today the main thing lifting me out of the sense of 'meh' which comes with this horrible sinus-y cold is the storming victory my new-look Tyranid army managed in last night's game of Warhammer 40,000.
*I love Babylon 5 - mostly - but JMS' comics career has been one frustration after another. Either he loses the plot, or he falls out with the publisher and storms off, or in extreme cases, both. People told me his Thor was excellent but having been burned before, I waited. And I finally read the first two collections recently and lo and behold, this was one of the cases of 'both'. There's a lot to love: instead of talking in cod-Shakespearean English as previous writers so clumsily attempted, his Asgardians speak formally but coherently; it's the themes which echo Shakespeare now, with the prince uneasy on his father's throne, the adviser who whispers poison in a good but naive ear. And the abiding question: what do gods do when their legend is over? If they survived Ragnarok, what now? Yes, in a sense it would have been a better theme back in those days when we were told we'd seen the End of History, but it's still a fascinating one.
However. There are scenes in post-Katrina New Orleans and war-torn Africa which demonstrate that Straczynski hasn't learned a damn thing since his legendarily bad Amazing Spider-Man issue where Doctor Doom stood in the wreckage of the World Trade Centre and wept. And, though I've yet to read the third volume which fully explains how he got to where he left the series, I've seen enough to know that yes, what looked like a stupid idea which Gillen was obliged to pick up, was also a stupid idea approached from the other end.
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 11:03 am (UTC)Plus, you were totaslly socially well adjusted at the V and A; for one thing, you occasioanlly looked me in the eyes, unlike Heather :P
no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 11:13 am (UTC)Alas, the idea of using Tyranids to destroy one's enemies generally works about as well as the old 'let's invite the Romans/British in to help us get one over on the neighbouring tribe'. Except with more being eaten.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 11:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 02:00 pm (UTC)Is there any of this geeky stuff that is worth me reading?
no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 02:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 02:48 pm (UTC)It doesn't mention Detective comics though which is surely the most amazing comic around currently. (OKay I am reading Gotham City Sirens and Cinderella ATM so I would say that!!) Did you mention it before?
no subject
Date: 2010-01-19 02:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-20 12:29 pm (UTC)also I thought the second volume was one of the most beautifully crafted story arcs I'd ever read..... and it's the only comic collection I've ever kept on my bookshelf and also given to someone else as a christmas present, I honestly think it's that good
no subject
Date: 2010-01-20 09:48 pm (UTC)I thought the neatness of Loki's time-loop was astonishing - that's the level of craft I expect from JMS and I'm glad that on a good day he can still manage that. And the Odin stuff, for all that I often find father/son stuff really forced, was very good too. But the whole Latveria bit...sure, Balder is naive, and manipulated, and feels he has something to prove. But the Asgardians are a warrior people who sing of their great deeds at their banquets. Has Thor really never mentioned Dr Doom during one of those tales, and how camping out in his back garden might be a poor plan?
no subject
Date: 2010-01-21 12:24 pm (UTC)and yeah the africa scene could have been better, but the whole "I am in a freakin' lot of pain, but I must still reach my stick" was quite good....
but back to the post-katrina scene.... i thought it was brilliant, the whole thing was about how the heros never came, while an analogy to the us government stuff, was really well written, and jebus the confruntation with iron man was good..... the whole "i could have fixed it in a flash, why did noone else" was brutall harsh... I just loved it.....
No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-21 12:33 pm (UTC)In the Marvel U, any hero confronted about 'why did you not save my city' could legitimately cite the several dozen times they saved the entire sodding world, and then ask the complainer if they have honestly never once messed up at work.
(Same for the DCU, obviously. It always annoyed me in the socially aware Green Lantern/Green Arrow run when someone asks GL hey, I heard about you saving the purple men and the orange men and so on - what about the black men? Look, I save this entire mudball and all its inhabitants of every hue on a regular basis, stop whining).
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-21 12:38 pm (UTC)Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-21 12:39 pm (UTC)Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 12:33 pm (UTC)Which is not to say that I don't think superhero comics can address this stuff, I just think they do it better when they do it obliquely - whether that's mutants as a stand-in for real-world minorities. or the issue of Ultimates set in New York after a Hulk rampage, which handled post-9/11 trauma brilliantly precisely because it used a world-appropriate surrogate incident.
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 12:36 pm (UTC)the point was that they didn't care enough to send damage control to do something good, they decided to get them to keep the center of new york clean.... etc etc.....
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 12:44 pm (UTC)I get the feeling that JMS doesn't really play well in shared universes. Which is fine, it's not for everyone - but that being the case, he ought to stop *trying* to work in shared universes, and then getting all surprised and hurt when editorial start giving him direction.
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 12:53 pm (UTC)not really trying to argue, but it's like taking that episode of bsg called scar, and focussing on the conveniese of the majority of the fleet being out of the picture for one episode, rather than the brilliance of the episode itself
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 01:13 pm (UTC)Do you like 'Scar'? I much preferred it to the s3 stand-alone episodes, but I don't think of it as a classic or anything.
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 01:17 pm (UTC)and yeah I liked scar, one of the highlights of that series, although obviously not a candle to the one with the dance
Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 01:25 pm (UTC)Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 01:29 pm (UTC)Re: No spoilers!
Date: 2010-01-22 01:34 pm (UTC)