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Why do people scurry? I've been noticing it a lot in these cold, foggy nights - people see me looming out of the haze, and they start scurrying - hunch shoulders, head down, pace uneasily quickened. Scurrying never helped anyone. I mean, I used to work with a guy who did it really badly, even in the office in the daytime, and even though I quite liked him and have never done anything of the sort in my life, I still had to clamp down on an atavistic reflex which wanted to mug him. And this guy was forever getting mugged, assaulted and what-have-you, to a degree which would be baffling if it weren't for the way he walked. Seriously, if you want to take evasive action - cross the road, speed up, whatever - then fine. In many circumstances, it might be the sensible thing to do. But for heavens' sake, do it with your head held high and your spine straight, because the minute you start scurrying, you look like prey. And if whoever's looming out of the fog is a predator, they will notice that, and you will have become one more contributor to the ranks of self-fulfilling prophecies.
(And not that I should have to say this, but this verges on certain sensitive issues so for the sake of clarity - no, this is not to even remotely absolve the predators and no, this is not to say that walking (apparently) unafraid is an entirely infallible strategy for avoiding harm. But it does work a lot better than scurrying)
Over-rated Fables scribe Bill Willingham has written a piece opposing grim'n'gritty 'superhero decadence', and arguing that ' the superhero genre should be “different, better, with higher standards, loftier ideals and a more virtuous — more American — point of view.”' Cue applauding comments from the sort of charmers who object to foreigners and non-white superheroes, or have plain creepy thoughts about Lois Lane, which for all Willingham's noted right-wing politics, is possibly not quite what he was getting at. More to the point, just as this C-lister is claiming that his own Elementals was one of the comics which kicked off the darker trend - a claim I've never seen from anyone but him - he's now acting as though he's the first to object to the trend, a trend he presents as still at its height through highly selective quoting of recent comics and films. Alan Moore - who alongside Frank Miller and maybe Howard Chaykin, *actually* started grim and gritty - has been saying for years that it got silly, that comics have had enough solve and now need a little coagula (or as the less alchemical* might put it, enough deconstruction and now need some reconstruction). Grant Morrison has been arguing something similar since at least Flex Mentallo, whose final issue was meant to be taking us past the Dark Age and into the Neon Age; you could argue that Final Crisis shows a funny way of going about this agenda, but All Star Superman was as purestrain heroic as the Superman comics Willingham seems to want, even if it was perhaps a little lacking in USA! USA! jingoism for his tastes.
*Speaking of alchemy, I never mentioned anything about Foucault's Pendulum on here, did I? From now on, I'm going to tell every conspiracy theorist I meet to read that book before they try it on with their controlled-demolition-of-Twin-Towers crap. Because even if it doesn't convince them - and part of the dark beauty of a real conspiracy mindset is, nothing will - then 650 pages should buy me a fair period of peace.
(And not that I should have to say this, but this verges on certain sensitive issues so for the sake of clarity - no, this is not to even remotely absolve the predators and no, this is not to say that walking (apparently) unafraid is an entirely infallible strategy for avoiding harm. But it does work a lot better than scurrying)
Over-rated Fables scribe Bill Willingham has written a piece opposing grim'n'gritty 'superhero decadence', and arguing that ' the superhero genre should be “different, better, with higher standards, loftier ideals and a more virtuous — more American — point of view.”' Cue applauding comments from the sort of charmers who object to foreigners and non-white superheroes, or have plain creepy thoughts about Lois Lane, which for all Willingham's noted right-wing politics, is possibly not quite what he was getting at. More to the point, just as this C-lister is claiming that his own Elementals was one of the comics which kicked off the darker trend - a claim I've never seen from anyone but him - he's now acting as though he's the first to object to the trend, a trend he presents as still at its height through highly selective quoting of recent comics and films. Alan Moore - who alongside Frank Miller and maybe Howard Chaykin, *actually* started grim and gritty - has been saying for years that it got silly, that comics have had enough solve and now need a little coagula (or as the less alchemical* might put it, enough deconstruction and now need some reconstruction). Grant Morrison has been arguing something similar since at least Flex Mentallo, whose final issue was meant to be taking us past the Dark Age and into the Neon Age; you could argue that Final Crisis shows a funny way of going about this agenda, but All Star Superman was as purestrain heroic as the Superman comics Willingham seems to want, even if it was perhaps a little lacking in USA! USA! jingoism for his tastes.
*Speaking of alchemy, I never mentioned anything about Foucault's Pendulum on here, did I? From now on, I'm going to tell every conspiracy theorist I meet to read that book before they try it on with their controlled-demolition-of-Twin-Towers crap. Because even if it doesn't convince them - and part of the dark beauty of a real conspiracy mindset is, nothing will - then 650 pages should buy me a fair period of peace.
