04/12/2006
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RIP
i don't know what to think about comic books anymore.
marvel and dc are both STUCK in this loop of huge-consequence, reality-warping, universe-in-jeopardy storylines... and they fucking suck. i LOVE superheroes, but i also need something clever done with them. i need my superheroes to have interesting powers, interesting stories, good dialogue; i could give a rat's ass if the world's going to "forever be altered!"
this rant is inspired by my picking up a recent issue of dc's "infinite crisis" story arc, only to see the human bomb BRUTALLY beaten to death by bizarro. i've always LIKED the human bomb. the guy's been around since 1940! he debuted in the same issue of police comics as plastic man! give him a fucking break! these big stories, in dc and marvel, both seem to be killing off supporting characters like they're no big deal. but they're the characters i like!
that's the thing: it seems like every time i read a comic that i really enjoy, the characters all get murdered. i just recently read keith giffens EXCELLENT "super-buddies" comics, a humorous take on the justice league of the mid-nineties, when i suddenly realized that most of them are dead or missing now. another good book i've read was the "new warriors: reality check" graphic novel; a great take on a team that's always been kind of useless. here's the thing about this one: they've taken an older team, breathed brilliant new life into, made a very good book with solid characters and clever dialogue... and exactly one summer after the miniseries was released, the team has all died in an explosion to kick off marvel's new "CIVIL WAR" storyline. what? they killed them off as soon as i was starting to like them! next they're gonna kill off she-hulk i bet, because hers is my current favorite comic.
here are some of the current deaths that have really bothered me. this is excluding characters who are sure to / are due to be brought back to life like Shazam or Hawkeye.
first, from marvel:
the new warriors - see above... characters killed off just as i was starting to like them. some, like speedball, i've always really liked the idea of but have never felt they were written well: their last mniseries changed that and i finally felt they had some real promise. now they're all dead.
the vision - a classic character and my second favorite avenger, torn in half by my favorite avenger. this also had weird side-effects on the she-hulk comic, which is very light and silly in tone. the writers were forced to grudgingly make mention of the fact that she-hulk had gone on a brutal murderous rampage through new york city, though in her own book she was still worrying about her job at the law firm, and getting a date. it made me feel like brian michael bendis wasn't working at all with any of the other marvel writers when he made some of those decisions. the she-hulk in her own book would never have acted the way she did in his book.
magneto - this one i can't even begin to understand. first he was in a coma, then he died when the sentinels attacked genosha. okay. i thought it odd, but alright. then a new character named xorn joined the x-men, and i kind of liked him. his powers were all based on healing, which i felt had never really been done before, so fine. i'll accept him. a year or two later, once i've gotten to enjoy him, he was unmasked to be magneto (how was magneto healing people?) and tried to conquer new york city (where were the avengers, spider-man, daredevil, the fantastic four, etc during all this?). he murdered jean grey (who comes back to life all the time) and was then beheaded by wolverine (with his METAL claws... what?). then, when they needed magneto for another storyline, it was suddenly all "no that wasn't magneto that was an imposter magneto in disguise as xorn". an imposter in disguise. then the real xorn showed up i guess, was thrown slap-dash back into the x-men, and magneto was free to be in stories again. then the house of m happened, and now he's gone missing? don't ask me to explain it: i read the graphic novel but i can't say it made sense.
now for dc:
the blue beetle - a character i've always liked. the dc universe is sort of short on "gadget" superheroes, and i've always thought that asthetically his little ship and knockout gun were really cool. he was also sort of the spider-man of dc, an easygoing, wisecracking superhero who lightens the mood of big, doomy super-hero battles. blue beetle was shot in the face. shot... in... the... face. with a gun. not a raygun or anything. a fucking bullet in his forehead. he was shot by max lord, another character i've always liked, who was subsequently killed by wonder woman. i admit there was some drama to this story arc, but i'm still angry that they've killed a likeable character in such a definitive way. it's hard to come back from a bullet in the face. the blue beetle has now been replaced by a hispanic teenager. see also: firestorm.
the human bomb - see above. killed along with most of the other freedom fighters... these are characters that were created in the forties, when comics were at their most creative. it worries me when sort of obscure characters get killed, because there's a slim chance someone's even going to bother to bring this guy back to life. and that sucks, because i think he's got one of the coolest super-powers ever: the power to explode!
rocket red - a similar situation to the human bomb... who's gonna give this guy a big "back from the dead!" story? he doesn't really rate one. but now he's dead. for no real reason! he bravely sacrificed himself to destroy two of the OMAC robots... before everyone found out that there were THOUSANDS of them! he was like the only russian character in the whole dc comics universe. now there aren't any. i bet they'll replace him with a woman in the same armor. that seems like something they'd do.
the fury - anybody who's read neil gaiman's sandman comics should be a little unnerved that they killed off lyta hall, who was one of the main characters. she killed morpheus, and is the mother of his replacement, daniel. now she's dead. wouldn't the dream king have something to say?
superboy - another character that i was just starting to like. what started out as a silly 90's characters w/ a leather jacket and earring was finally transforming into a compelling, interesting character in the teen titans comic. he died "saving the universe!" but whatever, he's still fucking dead. i think they're just trying to trim down the teen titans to the characters from the tv show, rather than shelling out a few extra bucks to get the rights to put superboy IN the tv show. it can't be that expensive... doesn't warner brothers own the rights to all of it?!
mister miracle - another really neat superhero and part of the inspiration for the escapist in michael chabon's pulitzer-prize-winning "the amazing adventures of kavalier and clay", i don't even know where scott free has ended up. i can't find any mention of his quitting or dying, but there's a new guy calling himself mister miracle now. please don't tell me if they killed him off... i thought it was comic book law that you didn't fuck with anything jack kirby created.
firestorm - last but not least: one of my favorite super-heroes ever died within the span of two panels during "infinite crisis". anyone who knows me knows that my super powers firestorm action figure was the first toy i ever picked out on my own at the toy store, and "fire-tom" rivaled even "tuperman" and "pider-man" in my eyes growing up. one of the most fascinating character ideas ever in the history of comics. with his dual personality, there was so much promise for some really weird, character-driven story-lines... that never happened. this is a character that should have been given his own book, not fucking blown up! firestorm has been resurrected as a sassy black kid from the inner city, much like blue beetle has been resurrected as a street-smart hispanic kid. because fucking god knoows, when you sit down a couple of white, 40-year-old comic book writers, they're really gonna' make that teenage slang sound REAL. that's really going to be good race relations; the unavoidable uses of words like "word" and "dog" that no self-respecting highschooler would ever use outside of jest. check out ANY of jakeem thunder's dialogue in the JSA comics (i liked johnny thunder too! dead.) to see what the average comics writer thinks of black people. why is it so fucking hard to get a black writer to make a completely new black character and sell it! you don't need to turn popular white characters black and try to trick people into being racially concious! just make a good comic with black people in it! i remember milestone comics, dc's african-american based comics line, where black writers and black artists were allowed to invent all-new black characters. that's where they pulled "static shock" of cartoon network fame from. that show is pretty good, where's his comic? why do you have to kill one of my favorite characters in a NUCLEAR BLAST just so you can reach some sort of "black youth market"? also: the new firestorm got his powers by being visited by the "firestorm force". what the fuck? the original got his powers because he was ground-zero at a nuclear meltdown. "firestorm force" my ass.
and that's just a tiny list culled from a much greater list of dead characters from the past year or so. check out wikipedia for full lists of all the casualties. just type in "avengers disassumbled" or "infinite crisis".
that sad truth is, comics wax and wane in popularity. whenever they fade out for a few years, it ALWAYS seems to happen after a big dumb crossover story like these ones. they're too big and too confusing, and the amount of supporting cast members and obscure references alienates all but the few hardcore super-hero enthusiasts. people stop reading them because they're confusing and convoluted.
comics always seem to return from these down periods with some great, character-driven stories by excited new writers like judd wynick and dan slott. they start letting keith giffen write the silly stories that he's good at. maybe a few good movies get made when they take chances on non-action directors like ang lee and brian singer for their superhero movies. it all is based on the comic book publishers being willing to take risks, which they only seem to be willing to do when they're NOT making a profit. as soon as they start making money, they fall back on the old "someone will die!" "the end of the universe as they know it!" storylines that have gotten comic books made fun of since the 1950's. i just wish we could reach a time when comics are a respected enough medium that clever, unique comics like "district x" and "manhunter" could be the norm, and the publishers wouldn't freak out and blow up the galaxy whenever sales slip a little.
also, don't tell me that comics are for kids: i know that full well. and i think kids would benefit from good character-driven writing too. imagine a world where a kid could pick up an "x-men" comic and not be bombarded with these huge storylines and a million characters attempting to cover any conceivable nationality. imagine that spider-man starting fighting crime again, instead of being on ten different super-hero teams and being featured in 20 different books a month. i think it's fully possible to keep continuity fairly stable and stories easily readable while allowing writers a lot of creative control. shit, look what neil gaiman did with the "sandman" comics! that all took place in the dc universe with a lot of dc superheroes, yet it was also a complex story, nominated for a fuck-ton of awards and hailed as one of the best comic books ever by comic fans AND people who barely ever even READ comic books. that's what comics can be, if they try.
oh well. i haven't slept for days. end nerd rant here.