A special treat for you fine folks this week, as we take a break from the TPB guide to give you a sort of preview of the cool stuff you can expect for the five days from myself and Tim Stevens’ coverage of the San Diego International Comic Con.
On my way back from Connecticut this past Sunday night (where I was visiting my oft-mentioned supermodel girlfriend), I received a pleasant surprise in the form of a call from Tim Stevens, the Orpheus to my Batman. Tim called to check up on a few last minute details for the San Diego expedition, but when all was said and done, my final hour on the Mass Pike was spent in a passionate conversation about comics, comics, and what a narc our friend Dan from college was/is.
This of course gives me the opportunity to do one of my all-time favorite types of columns: the good old fashioned stream of consciousness job. This recap of the topics we discussed will give you the briefest of glimpse into how scattershot and glorious the comic (both funny book and humor) gold flows once Tim and I get going.
These are mostly my opinions (so I apologize to Mark Millar in advance as always) but I’ll throw stuff Tim said in as necessary (so I apologize to fans of former Avengers member Starfox as always). Let’s do the mind warp again, baby…
-I loved Identity Crisis #2 and think the series is incredible, but the nitpicker in me found a few flaws. The first and more serious is that though it was a vital, powerful and central moment, I didn’t like Dr. Light’s “rape†of Sue Dibny; the reason for this is just that Sue, to me, from her introduction on, has been the one super-hero girlfriend who bucks the “damsel in distress†label and can stand up for herself, even against supervillains, another reason her and Ralph made such a great team. Yes, it helped moved the story along and was for the greater good, etc. but I dunno, it just irked me. The second point was a continuity/timeline one: when the Leaguers are voting on what to do with Dr. Light, the explanation given for why Barry chooses the side he does is that Iris had died less than a year ago. Now I’m admittedly kind of unsure when it comes to my pre-Crisis Flash history, but I thought the “death†of Iris Allen took place a lot closer to the Crisis…which would put it after Dr. Light’s first few appearances in New Teen Titans (in which he was a buffoon) and definitely after his late 70s appearances in other titles (in which he was a buffoon). Thus, if they did perform the “lobotomy†until at least six months after Iris’ death, doesn’t that mean he still should have been more of a threat in his early Titans appearances? Again, I have no idea and would be happy to be corrected here. Nonetheless, Tim and I agree that this is an ingenious way to make a lot of villains more potentially deadly again while still keeping continuity straight in a neat little package; this series rocks.
-If I get to ask Joe Quesada one question at Comic Con, it will be one I raised in The Roundtable last week: how important is Fantastic Four to the future of Marvel movies? With the developments of the last couple of days, Bryan Singer jumping from X3 to Superman and Kirsten Dunst stating that Spider-Man 3 will probably be the last one in the series, this question becomes even more vital. X-Men and Spider-Man were Marvel’s only “sure thing†franchises and they performed well up to expectations; Daredevil, The Punisher, et al did alright, but they didn’t set the world on fire. DC’s got a solid Batman ready to go and now it seems they’re getting Superman ready as well; they’ve got plenty more recognizable properties and potential sequels to do damage with. Marvel’s got a lot of characters only comic book fans and a few others have heard of. If Fantastic Four does only Daredevil numbers, is that ok? Does it signal the end of the Marvel era of movie dominance? If the X-Men and Spider-Man franchises are indeed winding down, Marvel needs a new go-to property, and (with the possible exception of Captain America) FF is their best bet. I’d like to know, Mr. Quesada.
-I know most people are up in arms and I’m probably putting my own life at risk by saying this (particularly a day before I’ll be surrounded by thousands of rabid comic fans)…but I can’t wait for the Jack Black Green Lantern movie. Yes, it might have a lot to do with the fact that I’ve really never been that enamored with the character (I’ve liked every incarnation and love the concept, but I’m not rabid about GL), but I see potential in this project. Yes, Catwoman and Constantine are going to suck, but I don’t think that’s so much because they diverted too far away from the source material as they just look like crappy movies. Say what you will about the idea of Jack Black as GL, but the bottom line is that pretty much without fail (the exception being Shallow Hal, oh the irony…oh, and Saving Silverman) Black’s movies are funny and entertaining. If I were a GL fan I’d probably be very pissed and I see where they’re coming from, but from my perspective, this could be cool, and there are probably a lot more people who will go see a Jack Black movie that looks good than there are GL fans.
-Looking back, I think I need it explained to me exactly why Green Lantern fans are the way they are when it comes to Hal vs Kyle. The reason for this is that by the time Kyle came along, you must have all known that the precedent was there in Wally West taking the Flash mantel from Barry Allen for a new character to be as good if not better than the original. Was it that Wally was a pre-existing character and Kyle wasn’t? Was it the way Hal went out? Seeing as how he was sharing the name with a billion other character anyhow, I just don’t get it sometimes.
-Kurt Busiek on JLA is the greatest news I have heard all year. Period. Lost in the maelstrom though is the fact that Ron Garney is coming on board as well. Garney’s recent work on Uncanny X-Men…well…to be frank, it sucked hard (Tim agrees, but he hates anything with an X in it anyways). I flipped through JLA #101 and wasn’t blown away by that either. But the fact is, Garney is capable of better, I’ve seen it. JLA: Our Worlds at War was awesome, as was his run on Captain America. I think he just needs the motivation and Busiek will give that to him. Obviously Busiek/Perez would be the JLA dream team, but Perez deserves the graceful semi-retirement and I don’t want to see him injure himself again. Busiek/Garney is a damn good team.
-After a discussion of what Busiek’s JLA roster may be, Tim asked me who I would put on the team (in response to my complain that Wonder Woman has been the only female member in forever); my response breaks down into a few simple guidelines…first, that there should be more former Titans members on the team. This could be original sidekicks who have graduated like Troia, Nightwing, or Tempest (I don’t think Arsenal is ready) or even better it could be somebody like Starfire. I complained in my Teen Titans review this week that Starfire is no longer the likeable character she once was and that has mostly to do with that she was at her best as a naïve but lovable outsider in over her head and now she has been shoved into a mentor role. Starfire in the JLA would again put her somewhat over her head and her interactions with Flash (former teammate), Wonder Woman (natural female rival) and especially Batman (former wannabe creepy father figure) would be awesome. Second, I think there should always be a time-lost member of the Legion of Super-Heroes on the team, my personal preference being Ultra Boy. My reasoning here is that the LSH are teenagers, but they are essentially the big guns, the authority figures, in the 30th century; a Legionnaire shoved onto the JLA would constantly be at odds with the adults who think its natural for them to be bossing him around when he’s used to operating without any supervision; trust me, it’s gold. Lastly, Guy Gardner should always be on the team, always.
-My Starfire suggestion prompted Tim to ask whatever happened to Nightwing and Starfire as a couple…which made me sad. I explained that in storyline terms, an evil Raven broke up their wedding and messed Starfire up with some sort of demon seed, but in behind the scenes terms, the Bat books wanted Dick back with no girlfriend baggage (to which Tim, ever the gentleman, replied “because that’s all women areâ€) and Marv Wolfman was a beaten man who wanted off Titans at that point (Wolfman being forced by a contract to stay on Titans while after his heart was out of it by DC is one of the saddest stories in comics to me, particularly as the man is one of my idols). A lot of people are torn up about Nightwing and Oracle breaking up, but to me Dick and Kory belong together and in my heart of hearts I still hope against all odds they will one day find their way back to each other because aside from Wally & Linda and Peter & MJ they’re probably my favorite comic book romance.
-It was at this point that the topic of the conversation switched from JLA to Avengers and I began railing against Brian Michael Bendis, one of Tim’s favorites, but the man who has patterned his hairstyle and way of life after BMB remained surprisingly cool. As indicated in a recent Ultimate X-Men review I did, I’m not happy with Bendis as of late (despite usually being a fan of him) because of the cavalier way in which he is killing off characters. From interviews I’ve read, he seems to get a real kick out of killing off characters. I understand death in comics is inevitable, but there are the right ways to do it and the wrong ways to do it: 1. As long as it’s in service to the story, it can usually (not always) be forgiven). 2. If you’re going to do a shock value death (and sometimes you can), use a character that other people can’t do any better with if you can. I maintain that the optimum example of this remains Geoff Johns’ recent sendoff of Jack of Hearts; he was a pretty lame character who it was unlikely future writers were going to use anyways, so Geoff gave him a great sendoff issue that didn’t especially tie into any larger storyline, but did give the character a nice note to go out on. Conversely, Bendis’ killing of Beast in Ultimate X-Men was senseless, contributed nothing to the story, and robbed future writers of a good character, an especially selfish move given that it was his last issue on the title. In the preview shown for Avengers #500, we see that Ant-Man is killed off in one panel; fine, whatever, this is another character who others probably won’t use and it got the shock value point across nicely, but as for the other apparent death…
-…Bendis’ treatment of and comments on The Vision convince me more and more that Mark Millar has become a very bad influence; both are good writers who have let success make them lazy in many instances, but Bendis has yet to fully succumb and I’m holding out hope for him. Anyhow, both Millar and Bendis have made “funny†comments in recent interviews about how (and I’m paraphrasing) “The Vision is just a vacuum cleaner that talks and it is creepy that nobody ever think the Scarlet Witch sleeping with him is weird.†Wow. Have these guys not read Roy Thomas’ classic run on Avengers? Because it would seem to me that if you’re freakin’ writing the book (or the Ultimate version) you need to read if not everything that has come before, at least the essentials, and Thomas is the guy who transformed Avengers from Marvel’s Justice League to a truly awesome book. If Millar & Bendis have only read some of the later lamer stories about the Vision and Scarlet Witch, I can understand how they might mock the couple, but if they sat down and read Thomas’ work (and that of his immediate successors, Shooter, Englehart, et al) I can’t understand how they can’t see the Vision-Scarlet Witch romance as one of the most touching sagas in the annals of Marvel. “A vacuum cleaner that talksâ€? For shame…
-So getting back to the subject at hand, Tim and I agree that the Vision is “the J’onn J’onzz of Marvel†(Tim’s words actually): an incredible character with infinite potential that is just waiting for the right writer to come along and do something with him; if Bendis kills him off (especially in three pages with no friggin’ build up at all…Jack of Hearts had build up…Ferro Lad had build up…f’n Maggot had build up!), it’s another selfish move from a writer who seems to be adopting some nasty selfish tendencies.
-But we do know that if not Vision (and maybe even if Vision), then somebody bigger than Ant-Man needs to die in Avengers Disassemble. We’ll assume the “big three†(Captain America, Iron Man, Thor) is off-limits. She-Hulk has her own series. Falcon does too. Captain Britain is just more cannon fodder. Hawkeye has an outside shot, but I see him as Marvel’s go-to-guy who they can always base a new series or something around. Essentially, aside from The Vision, I think it boils down to Yellowjacket, the Scarlet Witch, or the Wasp. Of those three, I really hope they don’t kill Wasp if only because Marvel has so few strong female characters and she is a truly unique one. Frankly, the same could be said of Scarlet Witch, but for some reason, I won’t be as bummed if she’s the one to go and could see some great stories emerging from it given her ties to so many characters (Vision, Quicksilver, Magneto, etc.). From Bendis’ comments in Wizard, it seems Yellowjacket’s head is on the chopping block; whatever, I don’t have any particular attachment to the character, but his recent treatment at the hands of Chuck Austen has been absurd; let’s get into that.
-Chuck Austen’s recent run on Avengers was horrible (Tim nods his head) and this comes from a guy who will occasionally defend the man. In Austen we seem to have an even worse example of a guy simply not reading the work of his predecessors. That scene where half the Avengers are suddenly shocked that Hank beat Jan at one point made me both laugh and cry, and neither for good reasons. Even if it hadn’t occurred years ago and been addressed in literally dozens of comics involving all the characters present, there was a friggin’ public trial! Was Hawkeye busy polishing his arrow heads or something? And Hawkeye’s whole “he hasn’t been my friend since he hit you†thing is ridiculous given that, as many online have already brought up, he was a key figure in helping Hank to rehabilitate in Avengers West Coast following the incident. I really want to sympathize with and stick up for Austen who I genuinely believe is talented, but the way he so frequently outright ignores what has come before just to tell the story he wants is another example of selfish writing.
-The biggest victim in all this Avengers hoopla is not Yellowjacket or the Vision though, it’s artist Scott Kolins. This guy was amazing on The Flash and had a tremendous fan following and then he came to Avengers…and it may have been the worst move of his career. The Marvel fans never really caught on to his unique style and you can assume now that with David Finch (who doesn’t usually need fill-ins) on art, Kolins is out a regular gig (whereas Olivier Coipel is getting a spot as Alan Davis’ fill-in guy on Uncanny X-Men so that Marvel can make it seem as if their only real high profile steal from DC over the last few years hasn’t been the tremendous disappointment he’s been so far). I love Kolins’ work and wish him the best in the future; if he truly enjoyed penciling Avengers, I am happy for him, but I hope it doesn’t derail him permanently.
-As a final note, if BMB either isn’t really killing off The Vision or does manage to make it into a really memorable part of a great story, it goes without saying that all is forgiven (for now).
And then Tim cut his head shaving it and the conversation ended.
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg, folks! More Morse/Stevens yummy goodness to come! See you from San Diego!
