"And most of all, I want to know why in the FUCK these people who want the Silver Age back SO DAMN BAD seem to want everything BUT the essential optimism that characterized the fucking Silver Age brought back. I can't be the only person who's noticed this, can I?" -kazekage
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Reviews by Diana Kingston-Gabai
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27 comments:
Kazekage
said...
Good grief. :) I'm glad I'm giving voice to a legit grievance and not just venting my spleen and sputtering in anger like I usually do. :)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
Well, honestly, it's a point that needs to be made, and loudly so: they need to stop with the nostalgia BS and take a look at what they're actually doing.
Kazekage
said...
Well, now that the "Rise of Arsenal" business has made the rounds as the new "This is as bad as it can be" thing, the likelihood that it'll get any traction is slim (after all "any publicity is good publicity," in their eyes) but it's liable to be ultimately remembered as just another nail in the coffin of comics in general . . .
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
You know, I'm sure that somewhere on this great big Net is a website that lists, chronologically, the major fubars of the Big Two over the past decade: Crotchgate, the Gay Purge, New Robin with Extra Power Drill Action, Mephisto: Divorce Attorney to the Stars, and now this Arsenal business... and I'd go looking for it, if that theoretical list wouldn't break the absolute last thread of patience I have with mainstream comics...
Kazekage
said...
. . .ComicsAlliance? It's like half their content, now.
One of the reasons I did the whole "list of awesomeness" thing a couple weeks back was because I sometimes get so ground down by these joyless, arbitrary and wholly depressing things that constantly prod me to complain about them, and . . .God, I sometimes get tired of hearing myself complain and so try as best I can to cleanse my pallet before I cross the Ellis event horizon, grow a bear, and become a big ol' sourpuss with a blog full of bitchiness.
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
Well, they must be having a ball with the whole Arsenal fiasco...
I did the same thing with the Critics once, and then someone pointed out that the overwhelming majority of my top 50 moments happened 5-10 years ago, if not more. I don't think I could ever cross the Ellis line, though: it takes a lot of investment and energy to harp on things the way he does, and I think my current reaction to comics is more subdued, apathetic disappointment than actual rage. I burnt through that rather quickly. :)
Kazekage
said...
I think someone on Savage Critics this week said he was looking forward to the last issue of Rise of Arsenal more than anything, and I'm not entirely sure that was the intent of everyone criticizing it.
Ehh . . .hardly matters when or what time frame in which they took place, I'd say. That said, my real problem is that so much dumb stuff is constantly happening that my tendency is to explode in anger and say that none of it is worth a damn.
To keep myself from Warren Ellis, when moments like that hit, I go out for ice cream and miniature golf. :)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
It's probably just that schadenfreude is a wonderful thing, and "The Rise of Arsenal" is just awful enough that we can feel comfortable laughing at it rather than recoil in horror. :)
Isn't that a contradiction, though? If none of it is worth a damn (and more often than not that's usually the case), how can it provoke an angry reaction in the first place?
I hear Warren tried that once, but the grass at the golf course kept dying everywhere he went. And three different vendors insisted that they didn't have Nanobot Vanilla. :)
Kazekage
said...
I think so. It's something like Refuge in Awfulness, I think.
It probably is, but then, I exist as a multitude of contradictions anyway, so I usually hardly notice. :)
The real tragedy of it is that it was all Astroturf and it still died. :)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
It's a one-armed man using dead cats as nunchaku. Tweak it sideways just a bit and it becomes parody. :)
I think I'm at the Cartman Stage at this point. Wake me when the next EIC comes by. ;)
Warren Ellis: more corrosive than a bleeding Alien.
Kazekage
said...
It doesn't even take tweaking to make that happen. For God's sake, the book is called The Rise Of Arsenal and a subplot in the book is about his erectile dysfunction.
Maybe he'll get kicked upstairs and someone else'll get a turn.
More corrosive even than a double feature of Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
It's one of those situations where I honestly can't imagine an editor giving the proposal a once-over and saying "Yep, looks fine to me." Forget crucifying the writer, it's editors like Sean Ryan who should be held accountable for this sort of toxic waste...
Of course, with our luck, his successor will probably be Paul Jenkins or some other useless twit.
How corrosive is he? The Blob spat him back out. :)
Kazekage
said...
Well, one of the inevitable consequences of "celebrity slumming" is that the writers don't get edited, which explains a lot.
Oh yeah! You know, it's ironic that at one time Tom DeFalco was history's greatest villain once upon a time. How far we've come.
"Ew! I'm tasting Essex!" PTUI!
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
Which makes it even funnier when Tom Brevoort goes online and tries to explain Brian Bendis' latest fiasco. "Er... yes, well, that's what we meant, of course..." Uh huh. :)
Something about the position of EiC is absolutely poisonous; I can't think of a single one who wasn't vilified (and justifiably so, at least to an extent)...
And then it went home and purged for three hours. :)
Kazekage
said...
Brevoort cut his teeth flacking for the Clone Saga--he spins failure like a dervish.
Well . . .maybe Len Wein, but that's only because had the job for a week. Oh, and Archie Goodwin, because. . .Archie Goodwin. I'm picking nits. :)
I like that I have a friend I can exchange vomit jokes with. :)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
Ah, the Clone Saga. Potentially good idea, horrific execution. Which is about right for almost anything Brevoort's had his hands on since. :)
Apparently he only spent a year in the position and didn't do much with it, which may explain why there aren't any grand denunciations of the man's legacy. Well, that or the fact that his successor was Jim Shooter, a much bigger target.
As do I. :)
Kazekage
said...
I think he's been at the point of these for so long now, "Brevoort" ought to be a verb. :) Witless Dictionary ahoy!
Well, and no one seems to have a bad Archie Goodwin story. It's rather astonishing, but the man was beloved by everyone, not least because Manhunter was damn awesome.
Oh, Jim Shooter. Like America's founders, it is often difficult to balance the good they did (enshrining freedom, getting Marvel's books on schedule) with the bad (owning slaves, the New Universe) Yes, I made that impertinent, spurious comparison. ;)
A friend is someone who will always jam their finger down your throat, metaphorically speaking. You can see why I'm not in the business of writing greeting cards, can't you?
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
"Doing The Brevoort: A dance move made popular in the aftermath of 'Doing The Urkel', the Brevoort consists of spreading your arms as far as possible and spinning yourself around in wide circles. Don't worry if you knock things over and make a mess, it's all part of Doing The Brevoort!" :)
I suppose Shooter deserves some credit: he turned what would've been a standard "women should know their place" narrative into one of the defining moments of X-Men history by insisting that Jean Grey die for the crimes of the Dark Phoenix. For that, at the very least, I'm grateful.
Eh, Hallmark's done worse, I'm sure. :)
Kazekage
said...
You assume Brevoot has a lot more rhythm than he probably has in real life. Urkel could probably be on the Soul Train Line by comparison.
Oh Shooter had some great ideas. He also had some tremendously stupid ones (the New Universe was . . .well, I liked it better 5 years later when it was called Valiant and he'd debugged it sufficiently)In short, he was just like every other editor in chief, I suppose. :)
Well, I was sort of shocked to see "accidental pregnancy" cards, yes. ;)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
And now I'm imagining him in this. You brought that on yourself. :)
In theory, the New Universe always sounded like it was meant to correct the inherent flaws of the Marvel Universe - the sort of structural problems you couldn't really fix without a Crisis-level reboot (and even then it wouldn't work). But as I understand it, things fell apart rather quickly there. Which, come to think of it, describes the Ultimate universe to a T as well...
I was thinking more of Marcy D'Arcy's circumcision card from "Married with Children":
"We heard about your little loss.
We know you'll make it through.
Thankfully the part they took
Was of no use to you.
And if they took more than you like
The good luck is, you see:
Another quarter inch
It'd be a full lobotomy!" :)
Kazekage
said...
Why do you think Don Cornelius retired? ;)
Well, it was really more of an attempt to do "realistic" superheroes--generally they would hew more to understood scientific rules, have more plausible powers than "warping reality," that sort of thing. Except for being started in Secret Wars II and crossing over with it again after it was defunct, it really had little impact on the Marvel U.
That right there is why Al kept calling her a chicken all the damn time. ;)
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
I'd always attributed that to this, but Cameron Diaz may actually be worse. :)
Actually, those were the "flaws" I was referring to - not anything tied to a specific story, but rather the general workings of the Marvel Universe: the nature of superpowers, public reaction, that sort of thing. Any problems with those formulae couldn't (and still can't) be fixed without taking the whole MU apart, but apparently the NU was very consciously trying to avoid those same pitfalls.
True, though one of my favorite episodes was when he and Marcy bonded over their utterly useless spouses and realized they had a lot in common after all. :)
Kazekage
said...
It didn't help, let's just say that. :)
Well, it may have been intended to be so, but it ultimately became its own kind of darker take on things after Shooter left when they decided to kill off everyone. Really, you can't undo the rules once they've been set down without screwing everything up (as Civil War proved) but newer universes are fertile ground for that sort of thing, and you'd be surprised how many people in comics miss than distinction (no you wouldn't.)
I never saw that episode, actually. I think I checked out around the time Ted McGinley came on board . . .
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
Not in the least, since that's exactly what happened with the 2099 line: as soon as the lynchpin figure was removed, it all fell apart. And the end results were cheap deaths and some duly apocalyptic silliness that brought the story to the most arbitrary conclusion possible.
They actually had a few good seasons after that before it got too repetitive/gimmicky...
Kazekage
said...
Yeah, I checked out before that happened--but I heard it pretty much killed the line dead. Is there no way to undertake a planned demolition of a comic universe without pulling the disaster card?
Well, I mean it was one for . . .well, pretty much forever, wasn't it?
Diana Kingston-Gabai
said...
I suppose there's some merit for using an apocalyptic disaster to push stories to the endgame stage - anything less could probably be dealt with in the usual fashion (or, God forbid, a team-up). But those disasters also have the unfortunate side-effect of being monstrously unsubtle, so if you do end up pulling that card, it's likely not going to lead anywhere dramatically satisfying.
It was a sitcom... :)
Kazekage
said...
There is, but you never really see it done well. It usually look like what it is--a deck-clearing exercise that's just there to sweep away what didn't work and there's no real plan driving things forward.
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