tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18018495694787357242024-03-13T11:06:05.843-07:00Phantasmic BlogThis is the blog for www.phantasmictales.com , a webcomics site featuring "Night Shift", "Lemuria", and "Freak U." among others. Please check us out!Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.comBlogger126125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-33739940888453628472019-04-08T15:32:00.000-07:002019-04-08T15:37:33.418-07:00This is Us<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AxJd_bqHgYw/XKvNGQ0NE9I/AAAAAAAAAGA/KFSwXd0gy7cvwC8aVWtiv9a1b6Q3oki6QCLcBGAs/s1600/Us.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="275" data-original-width="183" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AxJd_bqHgYw/XKvNGQ0NE9I/AAAAAAAAAGA/KFSwXd0gy7cvwC8aVWtiv9a1b6Q3oki6QCLcBGAs/s1600/Us.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
So US is a big hit, elevating Jordan Peele from promising
novice filmmaker to budding cultural phenomenon; he’s going to be inescapable
in 2019, with the newest Twilight Zone relaunch smartly dropping last month and
a bunch of other TV projects with his name attached headed our way shortly. The
dude’s even going to be in Toy Story 4. Whenever an exciting new talent like
this flares up as fast as Peele has—yeah, he’s been around, but his directorial
rise has been meteoric—there’s always that little shiver of trepidation that
they’ll get a little too high on their own success and burn out before truly
following up on the thing that put them on the map. With Peele that’s somewhat
combined with the concern that he might spread himself too thin; just roll by
his IMDB page and you’ll see he seems to be planning a career’s worth of
creative work in the next two years. I guess that at least somewhat undercuts
the first thing?<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But <i>US</i>, at least, turned out to be a good movie, sparing Peele
the fate of an overhyped one-hit wonder. The comparisons to Spielberg that have
been tossed around lately are pretty baffling, but at least he’s avoided
becoming the next M. Night Shyamalan.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(Speaking of other genre filmmakers, as a director, at
least, the one I’m most tempted to compare Peele to is John Carpenter. Am I
crazy for detecting echoes of <i>Prince of Darkness</i> in <i>US</i>?
But anyway.)<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As a movie, <i>US</i> is not particularly subtle
with its central metaphor, but that’s not really a criticism; horror movies are
allowed to blunt-force their way into whatever discussion they’re meant to be
sparking, and <i>US</i> is still more subtle than <i>Get Out</i>,
which may as well have come with a Greek chorus to explain its themes to the
audience. (And that’s STILL not a criticism. <i>Get Out</i> would
frankly have been a lesser film if it hadn’t yelled its ideas through a
bullhorn. On top of everything else, it’s a movie for the Trump era.)<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But <i>US</i> is a quirkier creature—even if its
haves-vs-have-nots theme doesn’t take much sussing out, there’s more going on
there that I haven’t seen anyone really engage with yet. (At this point, be
advised that I’m basically about to spoil the whole movie, so turn back now and
get to the theater if you haven’t gone yet.)<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The idea of an evil twin, a changeling, a personified shadow,
is obviously common enough, and fertile grounds for discussion; the class
warfare aspect is, as I say, pretty obvious; even the idea of a vast evil mind-controlling
conspiracy being developed in a secret underground complex that apparently
spans the country, which Peele the writer amusingly breezes past at 60 mph
without looking back, is basically a narrative device from we can extrapolate
whatever details make sense to us. (I think one of the things I like best about
Peele’s short career as a filmmaker so far is how unapologetically batshit and
ornate his horror mythologies are, while still being quickly and efficiently
outlined when they appear. It’s the essence of horror storytelling, really—casually
suggesting something that sounds insane but which part of you has always
suspected, deep down, to be true.)<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But there’s another aspect to the film that’s been weirdly
glossed over, possibly because it’s so much easier to talk about that other
stuff, and also possibly because by the time it starts to really emerge in the
third act the movie has got us surfing along with its own demented logic so we
just nod along, going, ‘yeah, sure, ok’. And that is—<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
YOU GUYS THE VILLAIN’S BIG PLAN IN THIS MOVIE IS TO RE-ENACT
“HANDS ACROSS AMERICA”<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s pretty weird, right? I mean, it’s a weird movie but
that’s *really* weird. And it’s not like there’s an obvious tie to the whole “evil
twin” concept. The fact that the movie’s “about America” is there from the
start (<i>the title is a double meaning, folks</i>) and there’s the
neat use of paper-cut-out imagery, but otherwise—what is <i>up</i>
with that, guys? Why is that the movie’s endgame?<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hilariously, there might be a key to this in an article
about Peele that came out a few weeks ago and was circulated on social media,
in which Peele talked about being offered a chance to go from writing for Fox’s
attempt at a late night sketch comedy franchise, MADTV, to the big leagues of <i>Saturday
Night Live</i>. His bosses at MAD wouldn’t let him out of his contract,
and Peele supposedly retreated to his basement to “smoke pot and plan revenge”.
His whole career since then, obviously, has been said revenge, and—<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Look, I’m not going to say that <i>US</i> is
literally about Jordan Peele’s psychic battle to escape from one sketch comedy
show to another, more profitable sketch comedy show, but it’s there,
encapsulated in a submerged theme that runs throughout the film. Lupita Nyong’o’s
Adelaide is, for reasons that eventually become clear, a quiet, inexpressive
woman. For most of the movie—assuming you haven’t guessed the twist—the assumption
is that she’s still suffering from PTSD from her childhood encounter with her
doppelganger “Red”. But of course Red *is* Adelaide, traumatized from her
brutal, subhuman childhood and finding herself raised to what must seem like Elysian
heights. She’s got everything she could ever want—why would she make waves? Why
wouldn’t she try to blend in, go with the flow?<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her parents encourage her to express herself after her
trauma by drawing, being creative. Ultimately she does find her creative
impulse in dance—something that, it’s implied, Adelaide never would have done
if they hadn’t swapped. But it seems to be something that she ultimately put
aside to live the life of a well-off housewife. Elizabeth Moss’s character
Kitty spells it all out when she sighs about how she could have been an
actress, but, well. When you’re living a life of beachhouses and boats I guess
you don’t have that drive, that hunger, to perform. To speak out. To make a
statement.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Shoving that creative impulse down is probably unhealthy,
right? I mean, you can’t just kill that part of you.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ultimately the fact that Red’s plan is to make a statement—not
to sneak in and switch places again, something that she probably could have
done pretty easily, or even to foment a true revolution—is key here. Red’s not
sane, and she seems to have given up on re-integrating with the upstairs world.
She just wanted to do that one thing. To get people to notice her, however
doomed—and the final shot suggests pretty strongly that the Tethered are doomed,
in the way disruptions to the American status quo always seem to be. But before
she goes out, she has everyone’s attention, and an army of loyal followers,
something every artist dreams of, right?<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So yeah: <i>Us</i> is a movie by a guy who’s
found himself, miraculously, with a megaphone, and he is <i>going for it.</i><br />
<br />
<br />
<i>(If you like this blog, check out my podcasts: <a href="https://destroy-all-clickbait.pinecast.co/">Destroy All Clickbait </a>and <a href="http://neversleepsnetwork.com/series/what-mad-universe/">What Mad Universe?!?</a>, or my <a href="https://www.comixology.com/Phantasmic-Tales/comics-publisher/793-0?ref=c2VhcmNoL2luZGV4L2Rlc2t0b3Avc2xpZGVyTGlzdC9pbXByaW50U2xpZGVy">comics on Comixology</a>. You could also subscribe to my <a href="https://www.patreon.com/user/overview?u=404623">Patreon</a>. Thanks!) </i></div>
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-90621064987124967482015-01-27T07:38:00.002-08:002015-01-27T07:39:16.703-08:00Important Lifestyle Advice<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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We live in a time of rapid and incredible progress, one in
which we have more lifestyle options than ever before. As more and more people
choose make their career or their personal interests the focus of their lives,
the impulse to bring new life into the world, which for so much of human
history has been paramount, has come to seem less and less pressing. I believe
it's important to respect the choices made by the individual, especially on
this important subject, and I acknowledge that everyone is different;
nevertheless, I believe that a lot of people simply don't understand the
bone-deep, fundamental joys of being impregnated by the millipedal spawn of
Chitha'arkis the Devourer. <br />
<br />
This has become a bone of contention in some ways, as those who flee the
oviraptorous drones that throng the sky each lunar cycle often feel pressured
by those of us who have chosen to offer up our orifices for the gestation of
the insectile multitudes. I don't mean to judge anyone on this point; many
believe it is their sacred duty to surrender their flesh to
All-Consuming Chitha'arkis, that his offspring may cover the globe in a
squirming carpet from pole to pole. I don't feel this way. Like many of my generation,
I looked at those who had come before me, watched as one by one they had eggs
deposited in their abdominal cavity by the chittering nightmares, and thought, <i>that's
never going to be me</i>. I had a successful career and a loving girlfriend who
felt the same way. I was young, I had lots of disposable income, and I loved
the freedom of being able to drink all night, or drop everything and head out
on a vacation at a moment's notice. Indeed, I didn't see any advantage
whatsoever in becoming a sessile, bloated host for the multi-legged larvae of
The Devourer. <br />
<br />
Then me and Terri got careless, getting drunk and staying out too late in an
Infestation Zone, and the next thing you know we're filled with eggs. Don't
misunderstand me: becoming a host is not easy. You bloat up to three times your
original size, your skin stretches, your veins pop, and you're permanently
enmeshed in a cocoon of mucus. As a result you tend to lose touch with your
friends, you stop being able to keep up with the latest pop culture, you're fed
intravenously through the umbilical tendrils of the division brood-mother.
There are a lot of sacrifices, and your life basically ends up revolving around
the clutch of monsters gestating within you. <br />
<br />
But the rewards are worth a thousand times the hardships. I never thought I
could feel as fulfilled on a psychological--even spiritual--level as I did the
first time the eggs hatched and I first felt the pitter-patter of tiny
tarsomeres within me. To know that your body is providing sustenance for another
being, that you're part of an ancient circle of life that was old when our sun
was young...well, I know it's a cliché, but it's really the kind of fulfillment
you just can't put into words. Mostly, though, it's the way the pleasure
centers of your brain are stimulated by the chemicals released by the
ever-growing larvae. That's what makes it all worthwhile.<br />
<br />
Look, I know you've probably heard this before, from a lot of confirmed
non-gestaters who have suddenly discovered the delights of Chitha'arkis and can't
shut up about it. Like I say, I used to be one of those people. But there's a
reason why, once they've gotten a little older and been dragged off screaming
to the breeding hives, so many people come around to being willing hosts for
the Devourer's endlessly churning brood. You just wake up one day, you've grown
up, your outlook has changed, and you realize that the reason for your species'
entire existence is to provide biological material for the enslaving armies of
the Predecessors, who will be here long after our planet has been hollowed out
and its rind cast into the sun. <br />
<br />
Besides, if you hold out on the breeding thing, you're going to be eaten anyway
by Chitha'arkis's exponentially multiplying hordes. Embrace your doom, and
you'll be a better person for it. I know I am.</div>
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-27886418410533741162015-01-23T20:30:00.000-08:002015-01-23T20:30:19.871-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Mister Miracle #7--"The Apokolips Trap!!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld34.jpg" /><br />
<br />
<b>“HORSEPLAY WITH THE DIGNITY OF KANTO MAY PROVE TO BE <i>FATAL</i>!!”</b><br />
<br />
Partly
because of the nature of the times, and partly due to the work itself,
Kirby and Stan Lee’s comics started to garner a certain level of cachet
with a more culturally discriminating crowd as the 60s wore on. College
students and other cultural commentators began to focus their attention
on Marvel’s superhero work, praising it for any number of reasons, and
Lee was certainly happy to encourage them. This new gravitas they
attributed to Kirby’s work seems to have made him more determined to
lend depth and meaning to his comics, which is what helped spawn the Fourth World
in the first place. Fortunately, Kirby never started taking himself so
seriously that he forgot what had made people love his work in the first
place; so when, for example, he started to incorporate literary
references into his work, far from being pretentious, it was usually as
delightfully insane and entertaining as anything else he did. (Well, OK,
maybe it was a <i>little</i> pretentious.) <br />
<br />
On the
other hand, comics have been borrowing (and “borrowing”) from literature
since they first began; The Hulk is just Dr. Jekyll crossed with
Frankenstein’s monster, the Joker owes a huge debt to Victor Hugo’s “The
Man Who Laughs”, and so on. So it didn’t have to be literary
pretentions that inspired Kirby to use “Oliver Twist” as the basis for
Mister Miracle, but that may be why Kirby felt the need to make the
point more clearly in this and future installments, starting with a
return to where Scott grew up: Granny Goodness’s Happiness Home on
Apokolips. <br />
<br />
On Apololips, an “Aero-carrier” discharges a
load of frightened, miserable kids into the hands of a group of
“Harassers”, who make it absolutely plain that the kids aren’t here on a
field trip. “<b>When the worms disembark, let ‘em know where they are!!</b>” Bellows one meatheaded creep in unlovely close-up. “<b>No Goddling!! No Faltering!!</b>” screams another, though I’m kind of assuming he meant “coddling”. Proper spelling will not be tolerated on Apokolips!<br />
<br />
The
point is made ad nauseum over the course of four pages, as the
Harassers sneer cruelly and begin marshalling their pathetic charges
across the plain, beneath the ominous shadow of Darkseid’s statue, and
into the waiting arms of Granny Goodness. No opportunity is spared to
dole out a punitive whack, and of course there’s much talk of molding
them from quaking little wussies into disciplined soldiers. Granny
herself, of course, provides both the carrot and the stick, offering
cooing, sarcastic words of encouragement to the kiddies right before
encouraging her lieutenants to boot them in the behind. She spends a
moment chatting with her right-hand man, Hoogin, who we learn was once
much higher-ranked but has been busted down—seems he was the leader of a
squadron that was home to a certain mister Scott Free, and accepted
responsibility for his escape, hence his demotion. Nevertheless, he’s
itching to get his hands on Scott once more, an opportunity Granny
assures him he will soon have. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile, back at Casa
Del Free, we’re witnessing a tearful scene as Scott and Barda make
plans to return to Apokolips, following up their decision of last issue.
As usual for this series, the motivations are a little vague, but the
idea seems to be that Scott’s prior escape was somehow bending the
rules, whereas if he goes back and escapes again in full view of
everyone, he’ll have earned his freedom under these Apokoliptian codes
of conduct we keep hearing about, and they’ll have to leave him alone.
Or something. Look, don’t ask me—I think that being able to escape from
an incredibly hostile and well-guarded fortress-planet in another
dimension ought to count as an achievement no matter the circumstances
under which it’s done. But apparently Scott, and for that matter
Darkseid, don’t see it that way.<br />
<br />
Oberon is, predictably, giving Scott a hard time about this decision. “<b>Don’t</b> fill this room with sentimental slop!” sneers Barda. “Just say good-bye—and <b>blow!!</b>”
There follows one of those scenes you always get in buddy movies, where
the two characters are insulting each other to mask the fact that they
really care about each other. It ends with Obie and Barda hugging while
Obie calls her a “<b>loudmouthed, military, man-killing harpy</b>” and Barda stutters, “Oh, <b>shut-up!--</b> or I’ll—I’ll—" <br />
<br />
Anyway,
Barda and Scott whisk themselves away to Grayborders, while Oberon
suffers a last-minute attack of nerves or something and goes running
into the room, screaming at them not to go, as they fade from view.
“Oberon eyes the wisp of vapor where his friends have <b>been!</b> --And knows that he’s truly--<b>alone!</b>” Yeah, laying it on a bit thick there, aren’t you, Kirby?<br />
<br />
I
mentioned “Grayborders”, the region of Apokolips to which the pair are
headed—but it’s not the same area in which the Orphanage is located—that
would be “Night-Time”. I think the idea is that part of Apokolips is
constantly in daylight and part in shadow—presumably, the part that
faces New Genesis is the “light” area. Though obviously that would make
for a pretty inhospitable environment. More inhospitable than it already
is, I mean. <br />
<br />
Anyway, Barda has taken them to the border instead of the actual Orphanage region because…wait, why? <br />
<br />
(Checks)<br />
<br />
Oh, it’s because Barda is insane. <br />
<br />
Seriously,
she literally materializes them right under a patrol. I guess she
couldn’t control that part of it, but she was literally cackling about
“fighting their way” to the orphanage as they faded out, and when the
patrol orders them to stay put, she starts barking at them that she
wants to commandeer their vehicle. “<b>You recognize an officer’s uniform—don’t you?</b>”
she bellows. Given that the Female Furies don’t seem to wear anything
resembling a consistent uniform, this seems more than a little like
picking a fight. Which it is. Barda brings a column down on the hapless
patrolmen (Shouting “Run a check on <b>this,</b> you clod!!!”) to which Scott calmly replies, “Well—as they say—in the standard cliché—the <b>fat’s in the fire!!</b>” “Sure! I <b>like</b> it that way!!” responds Barda, and proceeds to hijack a car and ride it into downtown Apokalips. It’s like <i>Grand Theft Auto: Apokolips Edition</i>.<br />
<br />
As
the two of them blast down the “Long-Shadow” road to Night-Time, their
car is suddenly brought to a grinding halt by a saboteur’s blast, and it
is here that Scott meets his latest opponent: Kanto the Weapon-Master.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld34a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Despite
looking like a guy who the Renfest nerds beat up, Kanto’s able to
overcome Barda with her own Mega-Rod, prompting Scott’s surrender. And
if you guessed that he’s about to put him in an elaborate deathtrap from
which Scott will escape using some heretofore-unseen gadget, give
yourself a gold star!<br />
<br />
In this case, the trap is
strapping Scott into a metronome that moves back and forth against a
target, while Kanto’s men take shots at him. <br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld34b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
The escape involves, literally, deploying an airbag. No, I’m not kidding. <br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld34c.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Geez,
I could laugh death in the face too, if I had a giant inflatable cocoon
that I could deploy every time things looked hot. To hell with it, I
could use something like that anyway. “Hey, Adam, did you finish that
TPS report?” WHOMP! “Damn, I thought I saw him in here, but the room is
empty except for a gigantic cocoon of some sort.” <br />
<br />
Scott
traps Kanto in another cocoon, while leaping free of his own, but is
quickly ensnared by Kanto’s men again (prompting the hilarious
“horseplay” line at the top of this post). They rope his boot and start
dragging him around in an Aero-cycle, but Scott escapes by—no, not
unwinding the cable from his leg, but by sending an <i>electrical charge</i> from his shoe up the wire to the vehicle, causing it to <i>explode</i>. Hey, here’s an idea, Kanto: take Scott’s damn boots off. Then we’ll see who’s mister fancy-pants escapist. <br />
<br />
After
all that, Kanto just hauls Scott up and points Barda’s Mega-Rod at him
point blank…but Scott’s able to talk his way out of it, mostly because
Kanto’s grown bored with trying to kill him, and because Scott knows how
to pour on the flattery. Kanto laughs and lets them proceed onwards to
the Orphanage, where Scott has a really anticlimactic encounter with
Hoogin, basically marching up and demanding that he challenge Granny to
trial by combat. Granny orders Scott sent out to “Section Zero” to face
one of Kirby’s most bizarre creations: The Lump.<br />
<br />
So now
I’m wondering why Oliver Twist didn’t end with the hero battling a glob
of pink protoplasm in a mental arena. To hell with literary references,
Kirby <i>outdid</i> the classics.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-40014887924090187842015-01-15T19:08:00.000-08:002015-01-15T19:15:43.653-08:00REVIEW: BEYOND THE BLACK RAINBOW<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.thenorthernlight.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Beyond-the-Black-Rainbow.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.thenorthernlight.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Beyond-the-Black-Rainbow.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>When we call something “Cronenbergian” we’re usually
referring to body horror. But there’s another aesthetic I associate with
Cronenberg, at least his early flicks: a fascination with the place where
science, (or at least pseudo-science) and the fringey counterculture mindset
intersect. We might call it “hippie science”, this image of New Age ideologies
and crackpot fringe theories being taken seriously enough to merit study in well-funded,
superficially respectable institutes. It had its heyday right when Cronenberg
was first making a name for himself as a filmmaker, and it pops up repeatedly
in most of his early work. I don’t know if there were ever actually private
institutions devoted to studying “Psycho-plasmics” or Cathode Ray Missions for
allowing homeless people access to media signals, but this kind of thing was
everywhere in pop culture for a while; it’s actually become part of our
collective memory of the era, typified most memorably in
<i>Lost</i>’s Dharma initiative with its synth music-backed videos
and straight-faced statements about the betterment of humanity. Despite the
memorably era-specific coat of paint, though, it’s really just a front for our
old pal Meddling In God’s Domain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Arboria Institute of <b>Beyond the Black
Rainbow</b> may as well be the Dharma Institute under another name. The
movie even begins with a similarly trippy propaganda video filled with bold
proclamations on the part of its founder, “Mercurio Arboria” (I’m guessing
that’s not the name he was born with). Dr. Arboria (Scott Hylands) is,
predictably enough, a pop science guru whose specialty is pharmaceuticals, and
whose institute is devoted to the usual blather about how tripping balls will
usher in the next phase of human consciousness. Back in the 60s he performed
some radical experiments in chemistry on himself and his inner circle,
including his wife and his protégé Barry Nyle (Michael Rogers). The result of
this, or one of the results, was the birth of a child, Helena, who seems to have
superhuman powers. I think Helena
is Mercurio’s daughter, but to be honest it’s a little hard to tell what the
hell is going on in the flashback to 1966 due to heavily blown-out,
high-contrast cinematography. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The rest of the movie, set in 1983, is less
impenetrable visually but still somewhat opaque narratively; we eventually
learn that Dr. Arboria is clinging to a grotesque parody of life somewhere in
an inner chamber while Nyle runs the institute, a job that largely consists of
studying and psycholanalyzing the imprisoned Helena (the strikingly elfin Eva Allen). Unfortunately,
in the proud tradition of movie psychiatrists everywhere, Nyle’s kind of a
dick…well, no, actually, “kind of a dick” is <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>putting it mildly, though we don’t understand
<i>how</i> mildly until the movie’s most of the way to act three. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><i>Beyond The Black Rainbow</i> is not
for everyone. It’s way too languid and artsy for people who prefer mainstream
thrills and chills, and while ultimately a horror film it’s not in a hurry to
announce itself as such. Of course, the movie also makes no bones about being a
head film, starting with the title, so hopefully anyone who stumbles across it
on Netflix will enter into it with the proper expectation that it’s a sensory
experience first and a narrative second. The lush colours and warbly ambient
soundscape are carefully constructed to draw you in in a way few movies bother
with these days; Kubrick is obviously a touchstone, as is Mario Bava. In terms
of mise en scene, though, it leans more to pre-Star Wars 70s SF, hence my
evoking Cronenberg earlier. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>What’s most intriguing about the movie to me, though,
is how it uses the genre trappings of the era it’s examining to comment on it
seemingly without even trying. The movie presents a SF re-enactment of the
death of the hippie dream, Hunter S. Thompson’s high water mark embodied in the
shift of pop culture tropes over two decades. Begun with earnest ambition to
make a better world, the Arboria Institute has become a house of horrors, its
gurus detached from humanity, the chemicals meant to enhance lives become a
withering addiction. Even the movie’s structural veer from portentious
thoughtfulness to slasher flick echoes this decline. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Setting out deliberately to make a “cult film” is
usually a bad idea in the same way that a movie intended as “Oscar bait” spells
trouble; you can’t force people to feel a certain way about your film just by
using certain signifiers. But while I won’t claim that you can’t sometimes see
<i>Black Rainbow</i> trying to deliberately weird you out, director
Panos Cosmatos clearly has something to say behind his posturing. It’s
definitely notable that I found this movie worthwhile, even though it’s the
kind of thing I usually find to be a slog. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Q1ertVYn750" width="560"></iframe> </span></div>
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-10383007154567638092013-03-15T20:49:00.001-07:002013-03-15T21:00:09.862-07:00Fourth World Fridays: New Gods #7--"The Pact"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33.jpg" /><br />
<br />
<b>MAY THE SOURCE BE WITH YOU.</b><br />
<br />
So, I should probably talk about Star Wars at this point.<br />
<br />
I’ve
been tiptoeing around it for most of this series of articles, but it’s
pretty widely acknowledged that the Fourth World Saga was a *huge*
influence on George Lucas, and if you’ve been paying attention to my
recaps, you’ve probably noticed this yourself. We’ve got a mythological
cosmic epic that takes the form of a space opera but conceals more a
primal, archetypal sensibility; good and evil in impossibly pure forms,
with good represented by verdancy and the rejection of violence, and
evil by the totalitarian domination of a chilling but charismatic master
manipulator; an elaborate mythology full of strange beings, with a
pre-existing backstory; and lots of other details, big and small. More
obviously, you’ve got a villain named, phonetically, “Dark Side”, whose
ruthless personality and will-to-power are more than a little
reminiscent of a certain Sith Lord with whom we’re all familiar; throw
in the physical characteristics (mutilated body encased in cloak and
armour) of another of Kirby’s classic villains, Dr. Doom, and the
connection is even more obvious. You’ve also got heroes worshiping and
deriving their powers from something called “The Source” (and one from
“The Astro-Force”), a gigantic technological hell-planet with great
circular pits, and even Laser Swords make a brief appearance at one
point. And there’s another major point of similarity which has been
pretty heavily hinted at throughout the series, but which this issue,
one of the best of the whole meta-series, will make abundantly plain.
(This is gonna be a long one.) <br />
<br />
“<b>In the Beginning--</b>The <b>New Gods</b> were formless in image and aimless in deed!!! On <b>each</b> of their <b>two</b> new worlds, their races had sprung from a <b>survivor</b> of the old!! The living atoms of <b>Balduur</b> gave nobility and strength to one!!—and the shadow planet was saturated with the cunning and evil which was once a <b>sorceress!!</b>"<br />
<br />
With
this opening caption, Kirby comes as close as he ever does to admitting
that, yes, the Fourth World is supposed to have emerged literally from
the wreckage of his imaginary destruction of the Marvel Universe, or at
least the Asgard segment of it. I’m not sure why he even bothered to
change the name of “Balder”, since he’s a mythological entity, and thus,
not owned by Marvel. Although the way copyright laws are going…<br />
<br />
So
yeah, to recap, once he split with Stan the Man and the House of Ideas,
Kirby basically performed a pretty stunning mental purge,
metaphorically destroying the universe he’d worked on for so long and
summoning a new work out of the ashes. It’s not hard to see how stuff
like Countdown to Infinite Crisis That’s Final For Really Reals This
Time and Spider-Man Sells His Continuity To The Devil and all the other
status-quo-smashin’, father killin’,
nothing-you-know-will-ever-be-the-same-again reinventions of the DC and
Marvel Universes over the years were taking their cue from what Kirby
did here—but none of them ever did it with the kind of breathtaking
commitment Kirby brought to it (even though the world he ‘destroyed’
remained alive and static at the company he left behind). <br />
<br />
There
are almost too many ramifications to this to sort through, though as I
mentioned elsewhere, it lends a surprising amount of logical consistency
to the series if you imagine that the New Gods come from a parallel
universe—this aforementioned far-future Marvel Universe that’s been
destroyed and reborn. It would explain why they talk about Earth like
it’s a relic of their own history, why they’re seemingly millions of
years old despite the fact that their predecessors are clearly the gods
of Earth mythology, and why no one in the DCU ever stumbled across them
until Darkseid decided to stop by. <br />
<br />
Of course, there’s still some stuff
that doesn’t really make sense, and it starts right on the first page,
when we meet Izaya The Inheritor and his wife Avia, reposing in bucolic
splendour on New Genesis. <br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Now,
here’s the thing: Izaya is the man who will one day be known as
“All-Father”, and I think Kirby meant for this to be a surprise, but I
literally never even thought to question that they were the same guy
until the end of the story; his beard isn’t grey, but otherwise the
resemblance is obvious. Of course, there are some issues raised by this,
like, um, New Gods can age? Also, he’s described as a warrior…yet we’re
told that this is at a time before New Genesis and Apokolips went to
war. So what was he fighting against? Did the New Gods just pull
themselves out of the cosmic goop left by the Old Gods and say, “Hey,
those guys fought a lot. We oughtta get some warriors, too! They get all
the chicks!” <br />
<br />
Tragically, Izaya is about to learn the true meaning of being a warrior, as he and his bride are attacked by Steppenwolf.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
I’ve been waiting <i>months</i> to do that joke. And it was <i>totally worth it.</i><br />
<br />
No, this is the Steppenwolf we’re talking about:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33c.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Steppenwolf
is simply German for “wolf of the steppes” (or Coyote), so it’s
probably just a coincidence that it’s a band (and a Hermann Hesse novel)
as well as a Kirby character. This particular Steppenwolf lives up to
his name by being a pack hunter, who hunts the deadliest game of all:
MAN. Or actually, NEW GOD. Yes, in what seems like a fairly suicidal
move to me, Stepp has decided to hunt and kill a leader of their
neighbouring planet for sport. Diplomacy: not an Apokoliptish strong
point.<br />
<br />
But then, this may be a classic case of a dumb,
spoiled rich kid getting in way over his head, for you see, Stepp is the
brother of Heggra, the witchly ruler of Apokolips…and mother of
Darkseid. Who, we learn in very short order, was the one who suggested
this hunting excursion in the first place. And while Izaya gives them a
good run for their money at first, he’s rendered spiritless by the
sudden death of Avia, who wandered back onto the battlefield to prevent
Izzy from killing Stepp and got whacked herself. Izzy then gets taken
out by Darkseid’s “Killing-Gloves” and left for dead. Stepp is just
barely bright enough to suspect that something’s rotten in Denmark:<br />
<br />
STEPPENWOLF: I <b>don’t</b> trust you, nephew! --<b>Or</b> your bizarre companions!<br />
DARKSEID: Would you care to <b>examine</b> the body, noble Steppenwolf??<br />
STEPPENWOLF: There’s no need! I <b>know</b> I’ll find <b>no</b> sign of life!!! Let me add further, <b>Darkseid!!</b> I <b>don’t</b> like you! You’re clever and cunning—and a <b>plotter!!</b><br />
<br />
Yeah,
good thing you’re none of those things, Stepp. “I don’t trust you! Let
me demonstrate this by falling into your trap with a minimum of
goading!” <br />
<br />
For of course, Darkseid set this whole thing
up to ensnare New Genesis and Apokolips in a war. Izaya wasn’t killed,
and when he wakes up, he’s ready to do some serious vengeance-taking
against those who killed his wife. Darkseid’s motivations in setting up
the war are never really spelled out as such, though obviously focusing
Izaya’s wrath on his mother and uncle is going to help him seize power
later. Plus, Apokolips seems to have been created as a world of warriors
and weapon-makers, so it was inevitable that they would find someone to
fight against. It just doesn’t speak very well of Stepp or Heggra that
it took Darkseid to figure this out for them. What were they doing for
the first few thousand years of their existence? Holding lavish
banquets?<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33d.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Oh.<br />
<br />
The
Darkseid family basically sits around rather pathetically in a bunker,
squabbling for no particularly good reason except for the fact that
they’re <i>eeeee-vil</i>, while the Monitors of New Genesis bomb the surface flat. Heggra castigates Steppenwolf: "You’re <b>brash!! Arrogant! Loud!!</b> You command an army which only produces <b>battles</b> and <b>body counts!</b>” As opposed to what, sensible shoes? Again, for all their sinister, warlike appearance and cackling and basically <i>looking</i>
the part of a bunch of ruthless intergalactic warlords, these guys sure
need the essence of conflict spelled out for them, don’t they?
Fortunately, Darkseid is planning to betray them all and seize power,
and it can’t happen soon enough—even though he’s clearly a million times
more competent, it’s still kind of goofy to see Darkseid playing the
part of someone’s runty nephew. (By the way, Hegg and Stepp and the rest
of Darkseid’s immediate family are a bunch of lemon-yellow, red-eyed
weirdos, looking like severely stylized versions of Ming the Merciless,
but Darkseid is his usual, rocky self. I know, I know, they’re gods, and
aren’t constrained to follow the usual laws of genetics. But still, he
kinda sticks out.) <br />
<br />
Darkseid is showing off a
mysterious “X-Element” that he (or Desaad, who he’s apparently already
got working for him) have stumbled upon in the labs. Suddenly, the party
is interrupted by Metron, uncharacteristically flustered, bursting in
and pleading like a little bitch with Darkseid to be given the
X-Element. <br />
<br />
If you remember, way back when, I mentioned
that Metron’s status as a good guy was a little shaky, and that Orion
was basically right to distrust him. This scene is a big part of why.
Metron is overtly described as being part of New Genesis, yet he <i>completely</i>
sells them out here, agreeing to use the X-Element to open the “Matter
Threshold” that will allow Apokolips to transport heavy weaponry
directly to New Genesis. His reasoning is that he desperately needs the
X-Element to build his Mobius Chair. <br />
<br />
“You’re a <b>nice</b> boy!!” croons Heggra. “Does it <b>bother</b> you---to create the <b>means</b> for mass slaughter??” “I have <b>no</b> link with the Old Gods—or New!!” rationalizes Metron. “I am something--<b>different!</b> Something that was <b>unforeseen!!</b>--On New Genesis—or here!!” “You’ll betray us all in <b>time</b>, Metron!” Glowers Darkseid. “But <b>this</b> thing—you shall build—for <b>us!!</b>”<br />
<br />
OK,
so, we’re going with a Cat’s Cradle-style “the detatched immorality of
science” thing here, apparently; Metron just wants to build and
discover, and he doesn’t give a thought to what anyone might do with his
inventions. Makes him kind of a dick, though, and you have to wonder
how New Genesis ever got around to trusting him ever again. As Metron
leaves, Heggra laughs with joy, praising her son, and Darkseid grins for I
think the only time in the entire series:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33e.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Creepy.<br />
<br />
Next
thing you know, the Dragon Tanks and canine cavalry of Apokolips are
blazing across the serene fields of New Genesis, led by Steppenwolf,
who, with his tiny, tiny brain, has gone back to thinking well of
Darkseid simply because he let his uncle lead the raid. Of course, the
inevitable happens: Izaya the Inheritor appears from between the ranks
and gets his revenge on Steppenwolf, driving off the Apokoliptish forces
while he’s at it. <br />
<br />
Metron appears to be castigated by
Izaya—though not nearly enough, it seems to me—and makes a lot of “Ooh,
that Darkseid! I hate him so much!” noises which are apparently
sufficient to placate Izzy. <br />
<br />
Over the next couple of
pages, the war and the carnage grow ever greater, as the two forces turn
to genetic engineering and bacteriological warfare, call down asteroids
to slam into each others’ planets, focus the energy of the sun into
gigantic flaming lasers (Kirby literally draws them as huge, flaming
gouts cutting across space) and just basically making a mess of the
entire universe. Somehow, despite being right next door to each other,
the two planets don’t manage to wipe each other out, but New Genesis is
transformed into a barren wasteland littered with ruins, over which
Izaya looks sorrowfully. <br />
<br />
“We are <b>worse</b> than the Old Gods!” He cries, in a bout of typically Kirbian anguish. “They destroyed <b>themselves!!</b> We destroy <b>everything!!</b> This is <b>Darkseid’s</b> way! I am <b>infected</b> by Darkseid!! To save New Genesis—I must find <b>Izaya!!</b>”<br />
<br />
He
proceeds to wander out into the wilderness and do a whole “biblical
prophet” thing, ruminating on his past choices, declaring that he
rejects the way of war, ripping the armor and war-staff from his body
and declaring that he’s rejecting the way of war forever, as the wind
whips itself into a frenzy around him. “<b>Darkseid’s game is not mine!!</b>” He howls. “<b>Where is Izaya!!!?? Where is IZAYA!!!??</b>”<br />
<br />
In
the middle of a re-enactment of 2001: A Space Odyssey, as it turns out,
as suddenly a gigantic monolith comes into view across the plain. OK,
so this one’s white and has a goofy little pointing-finger icon that
writes “THE SOURCE” across it in fiery letters. Hey, I just realized:
the Source is a Mac. <br />
<br />
Some time elapses. Izaya returns
to his throne in new robes, with a new staff; Darkseid, meanwhile,
succeeds to the throne of Apokolips following the demise of his mother,
and suddenly the war cools off. Darkseid and Izaya make a secret pact
which involves their respective, and so-far unseen sons.<br />
<br />
Yep, Darkseid’s got a kid: in fact, it seems he’s been married all this time, to this woman:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld33f.jpg" /><br />
<br />
And
as it turns out, the kid takes more after his mom, with the flaming red
hair and the violence, than his rocky, pontificating dad. It’s not so
surprising, either, since Darkseid never really wanted to raise a family
anyway, and his son was raised on the other side of the planet, never
knowing his dad. So the terms of the Pact seem fairly agreeable to him:
he and Izaya will swap kids, the way ancient rulers were known to do, in
order to cement a new truce between the two worlds. Of course, as it
pretty much goes without saying, Darkseid just wants to buy some time
and re-evaluate his options, so when Izaya’s young son is carried in by
Granny Goodness, he immediately hatches a plan to someday break the
truce: the kid will be raised in Granny’s Soldier-Orphanage, but he’ll
harbour the dream of escape—and if he ever manages to do so, it’ll break
the Pact and provide a convenient excuse to resume hostilities. In
honour of this day, Granny names the kid “Scott Free”. (You’ve got to
feel bad for Scott—it seems like his whole life, including his rebellion
against evil, has been planned out by his archnemesis already. So much
for being the living embodiment of freedom…)<br />
<br />
At the
signal, Darkseid’s son is thrust through his own Threshold and finds
himself in a warren of tunnels, fighting and kicking the whole way. He’d
kept a weapon secreted in his sleeve, and he now turns it on the first
figure he comes across: Izaya, now in his white-bearded form of
All-Father, offering him friendship and trust for the first time in his
life. Orion—for it is he—screams that his father hates him, but Izaya
responds with “‘Hate’ is <b>no</b> longer a word in this place!!!” Uh…but you just <i>said</i>…oh, never mind. <br />
<br />
The
point is that Orion is obviously in desperate need of a daddy, and with
All-Father offering to fulfill this role, he decides to symbolically
drop the weapon and embrace his new destiny as protector of New Genesis.
Fade out.<br />
<br />
Once again, I’m impressed by how much more
confident Kirby’s storytelling is here than on the other series. The
plot comes together much more tightly than I ever would have expected,
and while I wish Kirby’s dialogue was smoother and more subtle, the
underlying ideas are so powerful that it almost doesn’t matter. These
characters’ actions convey who they are beautifully, even if what comes
out of their mouth is kind of clunky, and while the forces of evil still
seem to be more intellectually engaged (as it often does in these kinds
of stories), the good guys actually manage to steal the show this time
out. As usual, it’s hard not to think that Kirby was working out some
personal issues in the sequence where Izaya rejects violence; perhaps he
was coming to see the inherent conflicts in a cosmic war epic that
revolved around hippie ideas of peace and brotherhood, and was making an
effort to resolve them a little more clearly. As it is, this issue is a
crucial peace of mythology that elevates the whole story quite
effectively.<br />
<br />
Oh, and that whole “hero turns out to be
the son of the villain” thing? That’s a great idea. Someone ought to
steal that for their own space epic.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-82343487650895457482013-02-15T19:55:00.000-08:002013-02-15T20:01:09.798-08:00<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld32.jpg" /><br />
<br />
When
last we left Jimmy O., he’d been genetically regressed into a Caveman
by Simyan and Mokkari, the Apokoliptish scientists who run the Evil
Factory, or <b>Brigadoom</b> as we recently discovered it to be named. Once
again, Kirby shows that he’s willing to play along with the rules of the
comic he’s reinventing, since of course Jimmy Olsen was being
transformed into something bizarre on a regular basis all throughout the
Silver Age. Now he’s broken loose and is trashing S & M’s
laboratory as the two watch impassively. “You know, there’s something
about his general appearance that resembles—your <b>own!!!</b>” cracks
Mokkari to Simyan. Of course, he’s one to talk, since Simyan’s just a
relatively hairy, ugly guy, and Mok’s a dopey-looking lemon-flavoured
Darth Maul. <br />
<br />
In fact, this leads to some bad feeling
between the two as Jimmy cuts loose and starts wailing on Mokkari—while
Simyan takes his sweet time with the tranq gun. “Experimentors take
risks—even with <b>humor,</b> Mokkari!!” says Simyan dryly. <br />
<br />
Of
course, their dazzling repartee is interrupted by the alarm, so they
take off, leaving Jimmy lying, unconscious but unrestrained, in the
middle of their lab filled with equipment that a moment ago they were
worried he was going to trash. And naturally Scrapper and his Scrapper
Trooper walk through the door immediately, bemoaning what the two creeps
have done to their pal.<br />
<br />
And now it’s time once again
to check in on Superman and Dubbilex, whose plotline seems to be moving
forward at an absolutely glacial pace. Fortunately, Kirby assures us
that “the fates are weaving a master channel for all to meet!” but
they’d better hurry the hell up, that’s all I can say. In the meantime,
Dubbilex is practicing with his newfound psychokinetic powers on the
Hippie Lois Lane, Terry Dean, who doesn’t seem to mind at all that a
purple horned dude is tossing and buffeting her around like a rag doll
with a mysterious mental ability that he literally just learned about a
few minutes ago, and which he still can’t control very well, and just <i>try</i> and tell me he isn’t looking at her cleavage here:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld32a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Terry’s ultimate response is a simple, “Mister Dubbilex, you’re weird and <b>wonderful!!!</b>”
Oh, for the heady days of the sexual revolution, when a freakish alien
dude could manhandle a girl with mental powers and still have her
wanting to sleep with him. Let’s hear it for women’s lib.<br />
<br />
Superman describes Dub’s power as “<b>E.S.P.</b>--only <b>ten</b> times more potent!” but the Guardian, emerging from the floor, corrects him: “<b>E.P.S.</b> is more like it, Superman! ‘<b>Extra-Physical Status!</b>’
I’ve heard the geneticists at the ‘Project’ discussing it!!” Uh, no
doubt. Because that totally doesn’t sound like something you just made
up.<br />
<br />
The Guardian, it turns out, was investigating the
abandoned tunnels beneath the club from which the homicidal musicians
attacked the gang in the previous two issues. So, wait, wait—they had
Superman and a telekinetic mutant handy, and those two decided to hang
around the club while the unpowered Guardian went down and explored a
maze of dangerous tunnels? Is he like a Superhero Pledge, who has to do
all the dirty and dangerous work for the senior members?<br />
<br />
The
Guardian pretty much reaffirms what we already knew, that the tunnels
lead to the Project. For some reason, Superman then reasons that “The <b>war</b> between New Genesis and Apokolips—now involves the <b>’Project!’</b>”
Which isn’t a huge shock, since Morgan Edge, dupe of Intergang, tried
to blow it up, but I guess Superman doesn’t know who Edge is working
for…since he’s made <i>absolutely no attempt to find out</i> other than
barging into Edge’s office a couple of times, right before heading back
out on dodgy assignments that invariably end up turning lethal. So,
umm…what was my point again?<br />
<br />
Anyway, Superman now
decides that, since The Guardian wasn’t attacked by any more low-rent
Sgt. Pepper’s wannabes (and I’m talking the Peter Frampton/Bee Gees Sgt.
Pepper’s, here), it’s safe for the <i>invulnerable Man of Steel</i> to
go down. Man, when did he become such a Super-pussy? Zipping down the
tunnels at his usual blinding speed, he encounters… “a <b>light</b> up ahead!! It’s growing brighter!! --<b>Brighter!!</b>” Can your heart take the suspense?!?<br />
<br />
Yet
another group of our intrepid adventurers are, at that very moment,
smashing through the Evil Factory in the Whiz Wagon, causing even more
chaos, until they’re hit by a “Repello-beam” that spins them around,
knocks them unconscious, and sets them down on the ground. Simyan and
Mokkari emerge in a little floating bucket, identify the Newsboys by
name—even Tommy, who I don’t think has even had a line of dialogue since
this storyline began—and grabs hold of the Wagon with a grappling hook
that whisks it over to a conveyor belt, leading to the atomic
incinerator. Then, in classic bad guy tradition, they leave the room. <br />
<br />
…OK, I can’t judge them <i>too</i>
harshly, here—I don’t find myself staring at garbage as it goes down
the chute, either—but still, do you really want to give these guys the
opening?<br />
<br />
But either way, their intelligence level
remains in question, given their amazement when they return back to the
lab and find Jimmy Olsen missing. Somehow they intuit that Scrapper and
his double are behind this, since there’s obviously no way the specimen
could have just, I don’t know, gotten up and walked away.<br />
<br />
This
seems to be a common misconception, since Scrapper and Trooper didn’t
bother to tie Jimmy down either, while making their getaway on one of
those tiny airport golf carts (included with every mid-sized villain’s
lair). Recovering from his tranquilized sleep instantly, Jimmy picks up
the golf cart and starts trying to swat Scrapper with it. Because
Neanderthals were <i>just that strong</i>, you know. <br />
<br />
This
is more serious than you might have thought, because as it happens
they’re passing the cages containing hordes of bizarre genetic
aberrations—the kind that have supposedly been bedeviling the Scottish
highlands for the last few months. Sure enough, CaveJimmy manages to
smash the power supply, shutting down the electric fence and setting
free a saber-toothed tiger. Now, if movies starring Raquel Welsh and
Ringo Starr have taught us anything, it’s that cavemen and saber-toothed
tigers are mortal enemies, which works to Scrapper and Trooper’s
advantage, but the outcome is still surprising: CaveJimmy<br />
Pounds
on the tiger and knocks him out with one blow, then beats his chest and
wanders off. Man, if all cavemen were like that, it’s no wonder the
Smilodon went extinct. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile (and I really hope
the characters reunite soon, so I don’t have to keep writing
“meanwhile”), the intense heat of the furnace has revived the Newsboys,
or at least Flippa Dippa, just in time. Given Flip’s orgasmic obsession
with water, you’d expect him to freak out at the sight of fire this
close to devouring them, but he remains admirably cool and shows he’s
not completely useless when not in his element. Realizing the Wagon’s
hooked to the track, he drops a concussion bomb right underneath the
vehicle, causing some damage but shaking them free. He then proceeds to
go all French Connection on Brigadoom’s inner corridors, sideswiping
hordes of the Factory’s heretofore-unseen workers. But then, it seems
like most of them were running away in a panic anyway. From what? From
this:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld32b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
In
the midst of this stampede, the Newsboy Legion is reunited, but
CaveJimmy spots Simyan and Mokkari trying to shut the titanium doors to
their little bunker, but he leaps in and blocks the door with an iron
bar (showing remarkable presence of mind for a rampaging brute). He then
proceeds to lay out some serious payback on the dudes who have been
tampering with his DNA. <br />
<br />
Actually, this whole comic is a
brilliant example of Kirby doing what he does best—it’s just non-stop
chaos, destruction, and hairbreadth escapes from about the moment the
Whiz Wagon bursts in. Things get crazier and more tense, until they
climax with Jimmy’s rampage: <br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld32c.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Until
the second-last page is literally nothing but a series of explosions.
Brigadoom is, needless to say, done for—and the Newsboys and Jimmy have
to scramble to escape not only the blast that takes out the entire
compound, but the potential for being trapped as microscopic beings
forever. Remember, Brigadoom is actually really tiny, and to get in you
have to pass through a shrink ray—but once Brigadoom goes up, the
reverse grow-ray that people pass through to leave goes with it.
Needless to say, Jimmy and the Newsboys make it out by a whisker, and
the last page shows the aftermath of the destruction: Jimmy passed out
in a quiet dale, the Whiz Wagon planted nose-first in the hillside, and a
tiny crater where the Evil Factory once resided. <br />
<br />
I
gotta say—apart from the interesting subtext of his first few issues,
this is probably the highlight of Kirby’s run on Jimmy Olsen,
accomplishing much more successfully what he tried to do with “The Big
Boom” back in <a href="http://phantasmicblog.blogspot.ca/2011/11/fourth-world-fridays-supermans-pal.html">#138</a>.
At least part of the reason it works better here is that there actually
IS a “Big Boom” at the end, but it’s also the conclusion of the main
plot running through the series, which lends it a satisfying finality.
After this, Kirby gets to toy with a storyline that he hinted at
earlier, and which he wanted to make the focus of his run on the book,
which probably would have made everything more interesting. Certainly,
given that the book was cancelled a few issues later, you’d think Kirby
had a better idea of what he was doing. It’s too bad this couldn’t be
the end—it would have let him go out with a bang instead of a whimper.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-78426202639917688032013-02-13T18:50:00.001-08:002013-02-13T18:50:50.492-08:00Here's One For TV Tropes<div style="text-align: center;">
<img alt="Charlize Theron, Snow White and the Huntsman" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-492" height="393" src="http://www.optionated.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Charlize-Theron-in-Snow-White-and-the-Huntsman-clip.jpg" title="Charlize Theron in Snow White and the Huntsman clip" width="500" /></div>
<br />
So here's an annoying pop culture cliche I've recently become aware of: the Older Woman as Vampire.<br />
<br />
Obviously this is something that goes back to Snow White and similar myths, but it's something which I notice modern Hollywood has had no problem embracing recently. Including in the two recent Snow White adaptations. The place where I first noticed it, though, was (God help me) the Halle Berry <b>Catwoman</b> movie. In my defense, I haven't watched this all the way through, because it was pretty much unwatchable. But I saw enough to register that Sharon Stone's villain was apparently drawing some kind of superpower (stone skin? WTF?) from the cosmetic products she was trying to sell, which were also apparently going to mutate everyone who used them, or some such nonsense. It was clearly meant as an oh-so-satirical takedown of the beauty industry and how desperate some women are to hold onto their looks and blah blah blah.<br />
<br />
It popped up again in <b>Stardust</b>, with Michelle Pfeiffer as the evil aged witch who wanted to cut out Claire Danes' heart to restore her youth (and her sisters'), and then, of course, in <b>Mirror Mirror</b> and Snow White and the Huntsman. There are other, similar examples, and echoes of it that don't follow the trope exactly, but the gist of it is: older woman who resorts to horrific, unnatural means to keep her looks, which puts her at odds with a younger, naturally pretty girl. The former is the villain, the latter is the hero.<br />
<br />
Like, for instance, the "Magical Negro", this is a trope that might not actually be so bad if it didn't keep popping up over and over again, to the point of cliche. I mean, vanity is a bad thing, and people have indeed resorted to unpleasant means throughout history to stave off their own mortality. Obviously heart-eating is to be frowned on. But the problem here is where the dart of empathy is aimed: always at the young. The cumulative effect is to value young and "naturally" pretty girls over older women, whose looks are fading and who, thus, have less value in their own eyes...and the people telling the stories don't do much to suggest that they disagree, frankly.<br />
<br />
I don't think I'm breaking any radical new ground here; I'm sure any feminists reading this are thinking "Wow, such dazzling insight, Adam! Now do you have any thoughts in re: the wetness of water?" But I do think it's worth commenting on how much Hollywood seems to exaggerate this effect. There's a pretty clear hierarchy at work here: if you're a young, hot starlet, you get to play the heroine; if you've been able to drink for a decade, it's time to start relegating yourself to villainous roles. Yes, yes, I know, twas ever thus, but it seems like there's a renewed <i>meanness</i> to it of late, particularly the Sharon Stone bit. All of these women are still gorgeous, particularly Theron, who isn't even fucking <i>40</i> yet, but here they are playing decaying hags, and worse, <b>evil</b> decaying hags who only exist to make life hard for some vapid pretty girl.<br />
<br />
"Yes, Adam, and FIRE HOT," chant the feminists. <br />
<br />
I know, I know. And I am used to women being valued only for their looks in the movies. But even in this superficial context, can't we at least get some movie producers capable of recognizing female beauty in someone over 30? I mean, it's not rocket science. You don't have to use some kind of formula. Yet it kind of seems like that's what's being used to determine what makes a woman "hot", as opposed to, y'know, <i>looking</i>.<br />
<br />
And the end result is that not only are women being treated as if only the young ones matter, but women are written as if they themselves believe it. At the end of the day, I think this is one of the more inherently pernicious concepts in storytelling, far more than simple sexualization. There's no inherent reason a sexualized woman in a movie can't be an interesting, well-fleshed out character (I mean, they usually <i>aren't</i>, but there's no reason they can't be). But relying on the "evil queen" who's jealous of a younger woman--no matter how subtly it's played--automatically reduces women to the status of objects. It'd be nice if more people in the media paid attention to what they're saying with their stories.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-34116771447226442702013-02-08T17:57:00.003-08:002013-02-08T21:40:24.152-08:00Fourth World Fridays: The Forever People #7--"I'll Find You In Yesterday!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld31.jpg" /><br />
<br />
As
you recall, the last we saw, the FPs were being menaced by Darkseid’s
Really For Reals Ultimate Weapon, the Omega Effect, which he had somehow
forgotten he had access to until just now. The Omega Effect, as was
loudly trumpeted last issue, “WIPES YOU OUT OF EXISTENCE!!!” Yep, hit by
the Omega Beam, and you’re a goner, completely vaporized, eradicated
completely from the space-time continuum, demolished utterly and
completely, as if you had never existed.<br />
<br />
Mostly. <br />
<br />
Because,
at the last moment, Darkseid seems to have once again remembered a
crucial detail: he can use the Omega Effect to do other stuff besides
totally annihilating his enemies. So, rather capriciously, he’s decided
to do something much, much less evil.<br />
<br />
More on this momentarily, for now we must check in with <b>The Council of the Young!</b>
As you may remember, there’s been some talk about how the young are
revered on New Genesis, but of course Highfather still runs the place.
With the first four pages of this issue, we see this in action:
apparently there’s a council which the young and goofily-attired of New
Genesis can use to petition Highfather for help, and they’re doing so
now on behalf of the Forever People.<br />
<br />
What’s more, it
seems that the adults of New Genesis have been unaware, until now, that
the Forev Peeps had actually skipped town (Supertown, that is) and
headed to Earth to take on Darkseid. So their young friends are
essentially coming to Highfather and admitting, “Geez, we screwed up
bad, pops, can you fix everything for us?” Well, OK, the FPs have been
awfully brave and done some serious damage to Darkseid so far, and they
did come to Earth in the first place to rescue their friend Beautiful
Dreamer, so their heart was in the right place, but still, for all the
praise directed to the young generation in these comics, it’s pretty
clear who holds the Wonder-Staff in New Genesis: the old, white, male,
Abrahamic authority figures. Speaking of which, you can kind of read
this whole sequence as a Deus Ex Machina, with the children basically
praying to a godlike leader out in a cosmic dimension to bail out the
heroes.<br />
<br />
The conversation between High-Father, the kids,
and Metron (who’s also present, having apparently been the one who
figured out that the FPs were in trouble and reported it to High-Father)
goes back in forth in Kirby’s usual expository way, until Esak comes
forward. Esak, you may recall, is the cherubic little kid in hotpants
that Metron was showing around the universe back in New Gods #4. “Is one
of the youngest of New Genesis to add his voice against my edicts!?”
asks Highfather. “<b>Not</b> against your edicts, High-Father!!” Replies Snot-nose, “But <b>for</b> our friends!! Is this <b>not</b> a world of friends!? <b>Save our friends,</b> Highfather! <b>Save Them!</b>” Then he breaks down weeping. And when that’s not enough, he resorts to really incomprehensible ass-kissing:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld31a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
So basically, policy on New Genesis is formulated by six-year-olds.<br />
<br />
But now
we check in with the Forever People, or at least Mark and Beauty, who we
now learn, have not been eliminated at all. No, Darkseid has instead
given them...theater tickets.<br />
<br />
I’m
not kidding. The theater in question is Ford’s, and the year is
1865. Darkseid has sent them back into Earth’s past. As you can see,
this comic is in full compliance with the rule that time travelers in
comic books never wind up someplace where nothing of note is occurring.
They’re always within a few days, and usually a few moments, of some
momentous occasion. <br />
<br />
Beautiful Dreamer declares them to be “marooned” in the past, but I’d say this is a pretty good alternative to being <i>completely wiped out of existence.</i>
Indeed, within moments the two young ones seem to be enjoying
themselves, using BD’s powers of illusion to conjure up
period-appropriate costumes and trying to remember what they know about
the time period. We learn Big Bear is the team’s historian (though
apparently he couldn’t be bothered to read up on <a href="http://fourthworldfridays.blogspot.com/2008/02/forever-people-6-omega-effect.html">local traffic laws</a>)
but Mark is savvy enough to recognize the time period as post-civil
war. However, he fails to recognize Lincoln when he walks in, at least
at first. <br />
<br />
Lincoln is of course a staple of superhero
books; if you’re a silver age character, and you’re sent back in time,
chances are excellent you’re going to run into one of a) Lincoln, b)
King Arthur, c) Robin Hood or d) Julius Caesar. I always wonder if the
DC and Marvel Universe versions of these historical personages don’t
start to get annoyed by being constantly pestered by time travelers. But
I like Kirby’s rendition of Lincoln, who he describes as “seem[ing]
scarred by grave tragedy in his time!!” “He looks wise—and old—and
tired—“ says Beauty. Lincoln has no lines in this comic, but he’s still
more interesting than any other comic book Lincoln I can think of. <br />
<br />
Ah. And only in comics would I have to expend so much thought distinguishing between multiple Lincolns. Moving on.<br />
<br />
Mark
finally twigs to the significance of their current circumstances
(Beautiful Dreamer apparently knows nothing about history, ‘cuz she’s a
girl and stuff) and rushes backstage to try and prevent the impending
assassination. No thoughts of preserving history here, it would seem.
But the two are met by a squad of policemen backstage, demanding
identification. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile, Vykin the Black finds
himself in Florida circa the early 1500s, just in time for an encounter
with, you guessed it, Ponce De Leon’s men. Wait, no, apparently they’re
not with Ponce but instead are…deserters? Or even rivals? It’s never
made clear. Nevertheless, they’re nasty, racist folks who are out for
gold, so I guess Kirby didn’t want to demonize Ponce (who I’m sure
thought all races were equal and had no interest in gold whatsoever).
Their first move is to try and grab Vykin. “Who are you cats?” Asks
Vykin. “Why are you <b>behaving</b> this way??” When this diplomacy
fails, he proceeds to pound the living crap out of them. This doesn’t do
much to change their attitude towards “the black”, as they refer to
Vykin every two seconds. “Being a <b>language major,</b> I should be able to <b>deal</b>
with them!” thinks Vykin. Um, yeah, these guys seem naturally
receptive. Realizing that they’re only interested in one thing, Vykin
declares that he’s “<b>equipped</b> to ferret out hidden minerals” and
agrees to lead them to a cache of it nearby. But, you’ll be shocked to
learn, the pirates plan to betray him once they get there. <br />
<br />
And now it’s Big Bear’s turn. He comes flopping out of the timestream and right into a nearby band of warriors. “<b>Medieval dawn man!</b>” declares BB, delightedly. “<b>Celtic</b> or <b>Saxon</b>
emergence!” Sure enough, he’s in Roman-controlled Britain, surrounded
by Celts who declare him to be, alternately, a warlock, a druid, and a
bear spirit (well, they’re not too far off there.) BB picks up their
speech with a universal translator in his ear-circuits-making me wonder
why Vykin had to be a “language major” to understand the Spaniards—and
figures out that they’re preparing to attack the Romans as they pull out
from Britain for the last time. This makes no sense, because a) they
seem to want the Romans to leave anyway, and b) there’s like five guys
against an immense Roman army.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld31b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Again,
we can see the shift in sensibilities that society had been undergoing
starting to take hold in Kirby’s comics—most pre-1970 comics would have
cast the Romans solidly in the “good guy” camp, and comparing them to
Darkseid, which seems fairly acute, nevertheless represents a pretty
major about-face. Of course, the dirty, disorganized Celtic rabble
doesn’t seem particularly heroic either, which may be why Big Bear says
he “would like to <b>avoid</b> any partisan feelings at this moment” and
just observe this key moment in history. Because, as we just learned
two pages ago, he’s a history buff. <br />
<br />
He’s actually so
determined to sit back and enjoy that he grabs all the Celt’s weapons
and drives them into a nearby tree with the force of his throw. You can
see where this is going, right?<br />
<br />
That leaves Serifan,
who you may recall was left by himself in the present, due to Darkseid’s
apparent laziness. Of course, if my only remaining enemy was Serifan, I
don’t think I’d be too worried either. As you may recall from <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%E2%80%9Dhttp://prankster36.livejournal.com/52536.html%E2%80%9D">the previous installment</a>,
he had just gotten back to the Super-Cycle when a wave of Glorious
Godfrey’s Justifiers swept down on him. Or, um, up at him, since they
were climbing a cliff. Godfrey, by his own admission, “wastes” his
zealots for a while by throwing them into the heavy laser fire produced
by the Super-Cycle, before finally producing an “Induction Ray” and
bringing the mountain down on top of him. “Serifan is transfixed by the <b>terrifying</b> fall of rock,” narrates Kirby, “--and, so, misses seeing the <b>alpha bullet</b> streaking toward him!!” The what now? <br />
<br />
“<b>Alpha bullets!!</b> Never seen before on Earth—originate from a different hand!! <b>The hand which governs New Genesis!!</b>”
Turns out that the cure for the Omega Effect is an Alpha bullet,
produced by Highfather. Highfather’s the Alpha, and Darkseid’s the
Omega. Do you get it? Huh? Huh? Do ya?!?<br />
<br />
Anyway,
Highfather is indeed sending Alpha Bullets through time to rescue the
FPs, having responded to Esak’s whining—so now we get the other halves
of the various vignettes. In 1865, Mark and Beauty have managed to get
past the cops with illusory identification, and have made it down the
hall to confront John Wilkes Booth, again, with no apparent mind to what
effect this might have on history. But this seems to be one of those
deals where the future’s already set, and everything’s predestined,
because just then the Alpha Bullet catches them and sends them back to
their own time. Booth dismisses them, a little too casually, as
hallucinations…though Kirby seems to be suggesting that Booth was just
nuts. Admittedly, the Kennedy assassination was only a few years in the
past at that point, so equating presidential killers with lone nuts was
probably pretty natural, but I thought it was always pretty clear
Booth’s actions were politically motivated.<br />
<br />
I just
bring this up because the Big Bear segment, which we cut to next,
displays a decent grasp of history. It’s been suggested that, during his
famous sojourn at Marvel, Kirby became a voracious reader, and this
informed his work. You can definitely see fairly literate ideas popping
up in Kirby’s work from time to time, but then there’s weird
misapprehensions like the Booth thing. Anyway, Big Bear brings up the
very good question of what the Celts are so angry about if the Romans
are leaving, but their anger now seems to be turned towards the
Romanized Celts they left in charge, like a certain Arta the Sentry. In
fact, they’d gladly kill the guy, if their weapons weren’t still
embedded in that tree. Big Bear, trying to mollify them, suggests that
Arta is probably a decent guy, and the knowledge he learned from the
Romans could be useful now that, y’know, the entire country’s
infrastructure has packed up and gone south. To cement the deal, he lets
Arta, and only Arta, pull a sword out of the tree, which wins him the
love of the other Celts, who have names like Gwane and Lanslac. This is
actually pretty subtle, by Kirby’s standards, though as awesome as Big
Bear is I’m not sure he squares up properly with the Merlin of legend. <br />
<br />
Vykin’s subplot ends rather abruptly when he leads the pirates to a crumbling mine, which he claims was constructed by “the <b>ancients</b>
who passed here on their way further south” (again, spackling over the
small issue of the fact that Kirby’s designed the mine to look Mayan).
The pirates, of course, are getting ready to literally stab Vykin in the
back, when we get a double Deus Ex Machina: first Vykin’s hit by the
Alpha Bullet, then the ground beneath the conquistadores collapses, and
they all plummet into the Earth to be with their beloved gold. Way to
wrap things up in two panels, Kirby!<br />
<br />
The four time
travelers are reunited in the present by the mound of rocks, from which
the Super-Cycle then extracts itself. The group is reunited, except for
the strangely-absent Serifan. “He <b>must</b> be alive!” Declares Beautiful Dreamer. “If Darkseid spared <b>us</b>, he <b>couldn’t</b>
have harmed Serifan!!” Yeah, mm-hmm, that’s some logic there, sweetie.
Surely the embodiment of pure evil couldn’t have capriciously killed
anyone if he spared someone else!<br />
<br />
But of course he is alive, and in Honshu, Japan. “Of course!!” says Mark, “Where <b>else</b> would Darkseid have sent <b>Sonny Sumo?</b>”
Right, because he was careful to send all the other characters to times
and places in which they would feel comfortable and could integrate
easily. <br />
<br />
Sure enough, Serifan’s in a temple in Honshu,
where a group of monks have a gift for him: the Mother Box that Sonny
had with him. It seems that Sonny had lived a rich and full life full of
good works in ancient Japan, and bequeathed the Box to the monks with
instructions to keep it until the FPs came for it many centuries later.
In other words, he got what he always wanted: to live in a simpler time
when straightforward honour and heroism were still possible. From one
perspective, it’s a very nice conclusion to his character arc.<br />
<br />
From another, it makes <i>no sense whatsoever</i>. I mean…<i>Darkseid</i>
granted his greatest wish?!? More crucially, he sent away the one guy
he’d supposedly been searching for for years, the holder of the
Anti-Life Equation?!? Is Darkseid easily distracted by shiny objects?<br />
<br />
I’ll
give Highfather a pass for not rescuing Sonny from history, since he
probably knew somehow that he was happier there, but it’s still kind of
annoying that Kirby created this Japanese superhero with great fanfare
and then proceeded to get rid of him in three issues. Of course, if he
hadn’t, Sonny would probably have kicked around the DC Universe for a
few years, being badly written by a series of hacks, and then been
horribly killed off in some stupid crossover event. So perhaps it’s for
the best. [Future Edit: Of course, Grant Morrison proceeded to use Sonny Sumo in the pages of "Final Crisis", so it's possible the guy
might suffer some ignominious fate after all. Morrison seems to
appreciate Sonny's awesomeness, however.]<br />
<br />
The final two
pages are another Lonar story. Basically, Lonar and his battle-horse,
now named Thunderer, run across Orion, who’s moping around in a
loincloth on the surface of New Genesis. Yup, two dudes in panties, just
hangin’ out together. Orion admires Lonar’s battle-horse and tries to
pet it, but it rears up in fright and takes off. There is no subtext to
this story whatsoever.<br />
<br />
Next time: the further adventures of Caveman Jimmy.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-11879419252487378542013-02-01T21:22:00.000-08:002013-02-01T21:22:16.054-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #145--"Brigadoom!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld30.jpg" /><br />
<br />
<br />It’s time yet again to visit with our friend and Superman’s, Jimmy Olsen, as he gets to the bottom of the Loch N…Loch <i>Trevor</i> Monster and yet another attempt on his bosses’ part to murder him with really hot platinum-haired Scottish chicks.<br />
<br />
As
you may recall, said assassin-chick and her fake dad were helping the
Newsboy Legion find a monster in Loch Trevor, one which had apparently
grabbed the headlines around the world, but which only Jimmy Olsen had
been willing to follow up. Oh, as <i>if</i> the media would over-report a
story like that, and then completely fail to follow it up! As if their
attention spans are that short! So unrealistic, Kirby.<br />
<br />
Anyway,
the MacGregors ended up trying to kill them at Intergang’s behest, but
were foiled by the monster. You might think this would lead to one of
those traditional scenes where a dubious-looking authority-figure
laughed them out of the police station once they tried to explain what
had happened—Jimmy even seems to expect it—but no, the Scotland Yard
regional chief (that would be the Scottish branch of Scotland Yard) is
quite accepting, and on the next page we see why. It turns out that
Scotland has been plagued lately with bizarre, mythical creatures, which
the cops have dutifully rounded up and stuck in their “special custody”
room. So, basically, vague rumours of a big monster in a Scottish Lake
is worldwide news, but freakin’ Basilisks and Chimeras that are <i>actually being held in police custody</i> have gone unmentioned up ‘til now. Boy, I’ve heard of police stonewalling, but this is ridiculous.<br />
<br />
The
monsters in the lockup include a Griffin, a Unicorn (in a nice touch,
it looks a lot like a Rhino, medieval reports of which are what inspired
the myth of the Unicorn in the first place) and the aforementioned
Chimera and Basilisks, neither of which bear any resemblance to their
mythical forebears. The Chimera is basically a huge chameleon, and the
Basilisks are tiny little hairballs that resemble Ewoks crossed with pug
dogs. Flippa Dippa, for once not wearing his scuba suit, looks on in
amazement, and Jimmy Olsen proclaims “<b>Jumping Jars of Jellied Jaguars!!!”</b>. And “Big Words” is reduced to responding “<b>Yeah! Wow!!!</b>” <br />
<br />
But the biggest surprise is being kept at the end of the hall in a special, titanium-coated cell. ANGRY CHARLIE.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld30a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Charlie
leaps forward and tries to grab them, and the cops rush in to
tranquilize him, as Chief Inspector McQuarrie rolls his R’s at random
(“Alar-r-rms” and “tranquilizer-r gun” bear the brunt of his
verbalizations). He claims these strange animals are all somehow coming
from “Brigadaoom”—“A Scottish fairy tale city—that becomes the object of
a real hunt the next day!” (It’s “Brigadoon”, of course—Kirby
apparently got so caught up in his little pun that he forgot the real
name.) Of course, we cut to the Olsen crew hunting for it so fast that
we don’t get a chance to find out how the heck the Inspector knows that
that’s where the monsters are coming from. Maybe this is a technique we
should adopt in North America. “My deduction—the killer is from
Shangri-La!” <br />
<br />
We immediately cut to the Whiz Wagon in
aquatic mode, plumbing the depths of Loch Trevor. Wha--?!? They couldn’t
have done that back when they were looking for the monster the other
day?!? Of course, if they had, MacGregor would have just killed them,
since it was the monster wrecking their boat that enabled them to
escape. So yay for short attention spans.<br />
<br />
Also shaky
logic. Jimmy and Scrapper have been sent to look for an “overland
route”, so they’re not on board the Wagon; instead they’re traipsing
mindlessly through a field of brambles and overgrowth and, after a few
panels of effort, immediately falling asleep. Who knew Scrapper and
Jimmy were so damn lazy? <br />
<br />
The Scrapper Trooper is left to stand guard, “But <b>nothing</b> can guard against the <b>compressor wave!</b> It comes out of nowhere—and does its <b>strange</b> work!” Scrapper one wakes up to find the Trooper staring him in the face—on his level. <br />
<br />
SCRAPPER: <b>Hey!</b> You <b>ain’t</b> little any more!—Or is it—that <b>I</b> ain’t <b>big</b> any more!!??<br />
TROOPER: I told you that I saw something <b>weird</b> happen to you!! In short—you’ve been <b>shortened!!</b><br />
<br />
Naturally,
you can’t really faze residents of the DC Universe with this kind of
stuff, but Scrapper does get a little concerned about “<b>Big boids!!</b>”, so the Trooper leads them under a rock—then keeps going, driven by some instinct “like all graduates of the <b>D.N.A. Project</b>”.
This is significant, and ties back into that stuff about parts of the
Guardian’s brain being active that they didn’t understand, though
unfortunately this plotline never gets totally resolved. However,
there’ll be more on it in this issue.<br />
<br />
Beneath the rock, the Trooper finds Brigadoom.<br />
<br />
Yes,
Brigadoom is a microscopic fortress hidden under a small rock. That’s
why no one’s been able to find it. And what’s more, this isn’t just some
random mythical city; it’s a place that the Scrapper Trooper inherently
recognizes, and which Jimmy Olsen, using his journalistic know-how,
deduces to be the source of not just he mythical animals back on the
surface but all the bizarre monsters that have been plaguing them
lately. Yep, it’s the Evil Factory itself.<br />
<br />
What makes
this a neat reveal is that you’re half-convinced Kirby had totally
forgotten about that plot thread, and that even if he hadn’t he’d have
just pulled something out of his butt. The fact that he manages to weave
it into an ongoing story, and one where its presence makes perfect
sense (well, by comic book standards) is pretty impressive, considering
how random this has been so far.<br />
<br />
Anyway, confirming
their suspicions, Simyan and Mokkari suddenly arrive, Mokkari dressed in
a goofy-looking suit of armour that protects him from Jimmy’s fire, and
knocks them out with “well-placed paralysis beams.” “Luckily, in
dealing with Earthmen, our <b>Apokolips</b> clothing fabric is <b>resistant</b> to their weapons!” Cackles Mokkari. Um, yes, I think the “fabric” of a suit of armour tends to work that way on Earth, too.<br />
<br />
We
now suddenly cut to Superman’s far more interesting plotline—he and
NotLois had gone to a disco where they had discovered a secret passage,
run into Superman’s horned, purple-skinned mutant friend Dubbilex, and
then the evil hippie house band brought the house down—as in, literally.
How will Superman and everyone else survive? Well, Superman will
survive because he’s Superman. Everyone else…um…I have no way of
knowing, because we suddenly cut to the tunnel under the disco, where
Superman, Dubbilex and NotLois are all safe and sound. I guess the other
Disco patrons were crushed to death, but hey, they were into disco. No
big loss.<br />
<br />
Dubbilex has, between issues, captured the
homicidal rock band (they’re called The San Diego Five String Mob) with
what Superman calls “Kinetic powers”. They’re hovering in a clump in the
middle of the tunnel, to NotLois’s consternation. “Terry [NotLois] <b>doesn’t</b> know Dubbilex is a <b>D.N.Alien!</b>”
Thinks Superman, slyly. Yes, I guess she’ll have to continue labouring
under the assumption that he’s one of those telekinetic, horned purple
guys you see thronging the streets of Metropolis. “Mister Dubbilex!!
You’re weird!!” is her response. <br />
<br />
Of course, Dubbilex’s
powers are still developing, and thus, he’s not able to hold them long.
As soon as they drop to the floor, they conjure up a Boom Tube and make
their getaway (“The <b>San Diego Five String Mob</b> is now a <b>road show!!</b>”). “<b>Don’t</b> go near it!” Warns Superman. “Let these kids <b>go!!</b> And <b>don’t</b> ask questions!” What are you hiding all of a sudden, Superman? Oh, right. Secret identity.<br />
<br />
Back
at Loch Trevor. The Whiz Wagon actually came upon the monster about
three seconds after submerging in the last segment and drove it off with
some concussion charges. Following behind, the Newsboys suddenly see
the monster vanish after heading into the same compression-wave effect
we saw earlier. “There’s <b>no</b> sign of him!!” Declares Big Words. “All I get is a <b>tiny</b> blip on my scope!” Yes, <i>no sign whatsoever</i>. <br />
<br />
Flippa
Dippa, of course, sees an excuse to make himself useful and pops out
the airlock, at which point he is not only sucked in, but somehow pulls
the Whiz Wagon in after him. Smooth! <br />
<br />
Meanwhile, Scrapper and his Trooper are locked up while Simyan and Mokkari have Jimmy strapped down to an operating table. <br />
<br />
MOKKARI: And now the <b>new</b> “bombardment” method!! Millions of <b>gene nuclei</b> shot through his open pores!!<br />
SIMYAN: They develop like wildfire! Olsen will change rapidly!! Becoming what the Gene dictates!! Sad to say—these are <b>regressive</b> and <b>powerful!!</b><br />
<br />
Am
I the only one who pictures Kirby writing this stuff by flipping
through medical textbooks and pulling out words at random? Of course,
maybe he does the same with thesauruses every time he writes. Long story
short, they have a ray that reverses the process of evolution and
devolves organisms. They’ve done this on a “monitor lizard” to produce a
T-Rex, which they immediately sic on Scrapper and Trooper. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile
meanwhile, the Whiz Wagon pops up in the underwater pens used to keep
Trevor the monster when he’s at home. Which means we get two scenes with
giant lizards—the Whiz Wagon leaps out of the pens and tears down a
nearby hallway, while the Scrapper Trooper manages to sedate the dino
with “chemical ‘mace’” he had secreted in his helmet. And I don’t mean
he had it tucked away, I mean his helmet squirts mace from out the
inside. Must be a pain in the ass to avoid macing yourself on a
near-constant basis.<br />
<br />
Scrapper and the Trooper escape, but too late to help Jimmy, who’s been regressed into caveman form!<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld30b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Huh…I guess Jimmy wasn’t that evolved to begin with.<br />
<br />
And
on that exciting cliffhanger, we reach the end of the second Fourth
World Archive volume, and the halfway point of the saga! Next week: Part
3 begins, including the end for Olsen and friends…Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-2549751747687748782013-01-29T21:25:00.000-08:002013-02-13T19:09:25.116-08:00Justified<div style="text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<img alt="Dredd (2012) Poster" height="317" itemprop="image" src="http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BODkyNDQzMzUzOF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwODYyMDEyOA@@._V1_SX214_.jpg" title="Dredd (2012)" width="214" /></div>
2012 was a somewhat odd year for movies for a number of reasons, but one of the oddest was the fact that it featured a great number of enjoyable summer blockbusters...almost none of which actually opened in the summer.<br />
<br />
I'm not so jaded that I can't enjoy a big fireworks display of a movie, as long as it's done with a certain level of inventiveness and panache, and <i>Chronicle, The Hunger Games, The Cabin In the Woods, Looper, 21 Jump Street, Rise of the Guardians</i>, <i>John Carter, </i>and <i>The Pirates!</i> all scratched that itch rather better than a lot of Hollywood's recent offerings in this arena. A couple of them are downright great, and even the ones that were merely passable diversions were loads more fun than the movies that opened during the actual summer season*, the soggy likes of <i>Battleship</i> and <i>Prometheus</i> and that Snow White movie (no, not that one, the other one). Even Pixar and Christopher Nolan let me down this year. Oh yeah, there was <i>The Avengers</i>, which was almost the platonic ideal of a popcorn movie, but that opened on May 1st, which, sorry, ain't summer where I come from. (I come from Canada.)<br />
<br />
And then there was <i>Dredd</i>. (Spoilers follow.)<br />
<br />
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<img class="rg_i" data-sz="f" name="EoYaajhJGHMp1M:" 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SDI0nrT19HK5OW2WHFuL27UdlapSVAQT91MCACUnvK1MgHKJPzVWLq9dfhbys+UFKUjKlKByCUJACRPIDlVhsPhXcuZcxDWYwEwFq312MaSAemnMxT23+EbCHAyu7Wt5QJyNpbR3RoVd8mQCYkUG0jJFd4Pw4qcLpEJbkDxWoQY8hPvVqeVRZ4I+xFKTdLQ2oxLqAtvMonulxBHZEnYq7pmN6NuuFHgSBlVGwzQT5Tp9ahJ7HSK24KgUmjrllSCUrSUkciINClNLYwM63oaqd8s5zV0cRoapt+j+IarASRZsPvopqzilUdrFABUycZri9pnoe6i9oxWqrx7d50geVBDG/GhcVvA6jxp8ePjJNi5MilFoTtWYI3qENwa1DhHOtkOV6B5xuoVrNYkzXgTrWox7WVLcoAAqAKo0Y8WaxB9qzJRj7IShIG53rUYgCQdqiKJNHuNpSAJ1NR26cyglKTmJrMw3wjgtx5IWpYQk+EmKt1jiLdmzkzEpRzNaYdaLCQlRjQe1U/i4LQ7k+7uD+KufJjeSk+i+PKobXZPj3HTr/dSMiB9fOk1xjLy/mWaCArCKrGEYqkSlJydsmaWtRgKPudKZM2SHkjIDmbntDO/Q60qQ4YjlTzA1AA6ROh8a0nQEKykpkp0KdR6Uc3ii+zzFIOu401qHEGsij40I28Uwn7pNJXJDKTj0ELxQ75fc/pQr16tW59BpW968DlSBGUGepUTJPhpA9KHSn6VRRSA5tngFb9iecCpEonYE+AnTUbx4TTPD8IWs/KlA8dTz9t+fQUwoFaNpT3lIKo1E6DQKVr/Sfai8Q4gcUC2FQkSIRonc9PmGx9atTNqlCdAjTUryhahuZlXhm+WBB3oyx4aN63vDQJ/jKSCgqGhDY3cMz8sDqoVgFAwy0U8vbupgnkI5D6fSur4FhqGycwQ0lDfa3C0JS2UtcmxlggrykeSVcxrWcJw1pN4u3ZC8jbyWv4hSVFYKkuKOUARKVADpzNNMQv1fYcTUDKk3TDZ5dxBSAk+BVm/qNBhLbecQG3s3rwpAUhA7NAHdQVEIZbgckz6mTTXEOHUXdqgtryvtALZfHzByJJKuYJ3HjSc2bd9hzjaFCHmxkJ5LSQpBP+4VXvhxx2pgfY3wUraUUid4B1T5jbyqCWrHs6PwziCb61UHkDtElTNw0qCA4nRYI/CRqPAikuHA2z6rB1RUiCu0WoyotgEqt1E/MUASDvAPStlXotcSQ8j/ANG/RlUOj7QzNq9W8wP+ihviW8rs27hnVy2WHEny+YE9CJHrWYUF3uVyW3EhRElM8wBqmdwoDUEeVVq9wgBHatKztTB/EhX4Vxv4K5+FG3WKpeKHWjoQhxPhmAUBrS1nFOxvCjZm6SDH4c0lJA6pWCKnQRdcaJNUq5X3z51eVHOhWkEKUhQGyXEHKoDw5jwNVN7DVZjpzqkGLIrCV1Kmehq122AN8yKPbwphPMelVAUpDSjsk0S1h7h+7V4Zt2E6n/PpRtt2KlZUCT50NGOWX1ips94RNDCr1x+3lSE5QNvOqMU600XaAxvgOH9oqtMQs8rsVthOJlkyBUj952zuYiKtriS3YvuR3wK2v8MU3lJIOYSI5edeO/8AqetGY0DCVA6RBqb7HQuzwNqkQ9mUBHhU1k6FCCNqgfR2bkjrNHxZrLG7wepxsLQqVRtVedZdYXqCkg9NPerRhHEUAaxVhYv2nUKKgFac6ZqxU67Kza8VrcQEn5hzqC+bVcpAJAVO5qW54fSDnZJ3MjcR4URh+FqcbcWme4QNefWlrQfIqc4ecSO4pB5+J8qWXVrHzE5hy/Y06OKFJjpS/F3grakGArBIUuD0NN24ERsKT4eqFE+FMUuzSSQUe4gnMP18KUl6BEa9fKmzz4DevXSlSGs646mtj0GRoDmMk0ws2x4f0o/UUSMEQkSp1A8pVUyLa2ywVrJ65OXgMw+tPYoQ28mPmGg8TJ8hp0FSOYohCMoJJGoGgHgY235n3qDJagQC+Y6ZUA+c5qg+15dGGwg/jJK1+JzHRGkzlAoGLVgvZ5O2eLjjiSFBlvuraCVAhbk6LMALCANusxXRPtrL/wDEQtMQSlSEggpVBAy9oAY1101JkamuCYZiq2XMwJOvj4mfzPvV+wW7lSXGCCh3N2qCYhcZu0b5AK1zDQDfrToDbEuK4gUYncOJJJQ404me7mDYSRryCgQJ3hVM8UeS1cOOKJVY4ohJKxMIcOokakFKhqOijzTSDiHFkOXhWhTUjTM2FBJWmUEmdFBScuogEDQJ2DjBeIWy0WnUZ2F6LaMEoX+Nsn38fAg0Fsz0wHCcWewx3sXZLKzmSoapIP30EaQdJj+9P8b4b/6hFxbKSLpIBEd3tkgaEn/3ANJ5jfrVfxIC2QET9osXTKfxN/zNKPyKB3TtvMTIjwHGl2bwbzFTau80vaQdo/KORFK0+0FP7LXYcTB6xUl4BFxZqSuFSIU2oZj1HdLnuelXa5u7VTTiVuohSTzKhtI1GlD4fd2j47S4aQ24oAKWuAFDYEk+HOo8Rdw4Ezd2pI+6XkHTpE0OP4G/0R4EhCLJlDjjaVoU42QpQCsiHFpQqN9QBSniRk9nbuCCQVa+AUladR/qNG4s/YOkkKt1nwXE+WVVJcVuGblSAHFshKUoABztBI02ABBOuuu9K4B5HmG4lF2+lWqVqQrykpQo/wDMq/2irgrh0dK5lduqRcuqWAkFBCTIKVQUJSUkaEmJjlXZcPfztIX+JKVe4BqU/iOtnMrTDlmnFvhE7kfShGbxKfvCpTjiRzqTlJjUgfi7D+zaBBpdwI8S+MxJHrU/FGNJcZgGkXDGKhpwE6U8eTgxXVjL4m3YVcBI2H6VTU7024svu1uCoGaUsnWunEqiicux4xhuZEjcVBbtwo+FasYiUbVKwokKV1ro0R2AJVK/WmTic2lKToasCbIlpK5G1Kux2KGsOPaQNCdqkXYOKlJEqHLn6U6dtQ42CjRaaCXiSgQHE94fe2NPSEtiMFSDBkU0ssR1yzWmL34WAIBPXnS1hCgdBSPQ62PmcYUhXdNN8GxkgkbA6xyJ5yKqIJBk702w9tcKcSJyDMR1A3HtSrsz6NeJWcrmZPyr18jzFJnXdKa8S46LlSS2jIhAgAkFR/1fWkmc1mthXRvb70WF0LbjepVTSsJJcuSAPWo7JcEq8/2/U1o+dfIV4kwmsujDVC0KRmXmmTsYETA38qlXbthKVgkpVofvKSsbp7q0g6EKBkaHwodDXdSPT9J90miEWiSqUGInuq11/wBQE7TpFRc6HonShhQhLiULABGftEpVrBzZ8xQdtQpQMbJ1NCvpU0uFpgxqDzSdJBGiknXUSK0uLdwAnKCEnVQKTGaAOeYa8oG9TjEVFopcAcTuAqZSrmUrnMNj7AEkaU6kBoVXFuc2moMa+egJ6T+c1My0/wBi72a1dkiC4kKISQohAWUzCgSBy6VoHTGUwR4gGDzgkaelQKcKzlB0Gp/c1RCkRbMTFGWKiQSDqkagn5h0/vyqBx6QRsOVRBEDNRMWzCr1BGVerLnzzplO3aRyg6Hw8q8GFlpZtrhpxxpKs7bjYJUiYJAUAdCIkeE9DSKzxDKqTMH5o69f0NPrPiZa1IYSJzEIBVByoJjcbgA7GaYSmNW7WwKp+y3Dh8SCdJ0hTgPI8uVOG8CZyApw9YGsFZa8tR3jTfCrm0bORJAUACSUhR73VRnvHUwnaabm8aOy1qHhlT6aCmsSjnV1bNag2iR/pJSfpApa7hbSlQAtlXIK1T5Zht9dq6NiLlsPmanQa6Zp5iQN9udKrm1ac1YdhQ/7b3yq/lC9Snz18qV7GRzh/MFFpzfl/q+6QfHafGu18OskWlvmEHsW5HQ5BIrjuLsZrppCUkKUtKcit0qK8pQY8RpGmum9d6U10rjzHRjPm7/qbhrdpTiudBpVRDdwRtVWhSW9tFJTJJg1HhttnXFTu3ZWmDWWHcUCKF6DWye/4ccmQKULYKFQrSrs1jAI1oG+YQ7of7jyoKddmcSsl0VNb30aCpLvAXEapBWnwGo8x+1L2h3h19tqspX0I19hd0rTavLa6XokExWz6NjyP5VjLBPeA+U0EzUWLACVKIBEjl1p3e4WladUxP8AmhqnYa+pDmYaHerU3xOtfzAGBpVkyTQuVweCe5JHMnlUmJYQhhEggmvbrG3yDGiTyFIr/FVEQZ9aLoytgNwZVVr4daPZrhKljKZCQToesDSqnbaqk7V0xePLscIQ5bBOa4VCjGYpTB3HpHrU4js5jiOGrZVC0xOo8qFmrjeKN42lUSdimNc3OKn4S+Gzz1xDrZ7FI1VITJ5QN6EtBi7KjaHrReUdKfcf8OC0usqBCChJHnqD+lV1o1J72OCvHU+YFb5ZgVETr6k1OwNRG501g7+B06076AEBAAkgTMgjcAA9N99vAVsE9JkAbZzrE/d1GlepbKDMJI+93UkDYiRGnM+lbIZzAqyyfNY8NgqpWMbC1/Hm5EGVQeu51EAiR+lDOE5Z68vDcGd5+beikW5ITIiY2UrSVRpqdYy+9R37ASlBlUrlXeOYwMoBmBuc3t40Y9gYtdVXkwI9/HpRN7b5Q31Ukr9CogfQUKFaeZP+e8e1WoU0Kpoq3t8wkmEioGWp5T4f5tRraUnRa0pHQST9KBjR2wSFJAX80a689/0pralLSwhGwWnvGApU5SJjxJ0oY27IazBwEgwEmQSNRIB8QDUba+8D4A/0mdKBho1fFN06epB+gqwWnEJ2qsXaQLs/zAH9KZO2ECRvTxsV0WpN0FjU7899dqS3q8hI9aVW2KlGhqe8vM4miLVF04DtmHXu0cbCnUoltZ1KcpgxynvDXer0pWtc4+F7hNwR/Is/+I/aukLAmuXJ2Xh0fMKW6nQBUrVgTuaLZwkdR70zQECNqFShBOySfSm7NglPT0FGNIR0J9qXiNYpt7NauUeZ/amDGEq5n2FFZyn5Uj86YWd8TvA9P3paQSfD7ERqCakf4bZcnM2iSImBm9FbiiG3fGimjPKaJjnGNYGu2Vkc7yFSW1jY/wApjZXhShu4UjMBz3rtD2FB5soWgKSeRH18/GqvifwvXGZgyBJyK1PklfTwM08ZCuJU7K2zJ8a0LRCo2Fb3eEXDStULSRv3Vaeu1RN4utOikhXgR+RroRFh6XlNDRSVpPI0FiimVJzAkK5pP6Gtbi4aKc0ZT05UlfdzHwotmiiRpcmBVoaukN2+RUwfz8Kq7CsutWPhi0L7oUv5U7DxoRDIfYRZoYbC0JWXV7IJ6/ePSnOE390w4HSoH8SORTzHnRYsQgZgJnnQdziYQNQSnnHKncSafkF+M+KIWq0UhIOZCyTzyykZT6/lXNVOjKYO+w5+tdIu7dD6ARCo+WeU7iubXdsUOKBEEE6ftUHGiylYP/8An71PctFtZSdCkj30NQp00o+4dS8gEqAdSIVMjtEgd1QVtniBrvAomDLK+g8l5hCk8iN4gaA9CNqYqsRAyqlBAKQZBA7/AHVDaRkUNCRppoarVo9B1MQDHnyEk6U4/wCqAISFKHypkAg7OvBQgHQ9m4DrFRcXeh7QQ2QklGg0lPOVLGXLy+9l5fcV4Uvx0ntinSEBKRHkFEe6iKgdxNEykEqgd70EmD48veaCfuyr/NT4k+dUjGhWwjFHwXNNkBKB5JGv1ml5NeqOgo+zsQYJmfKR7c/enAQNMnSUqV5AxReQRosN+BQUz/upnbNOggtpQ5HJMJV/Sakultq3Llu7GxBSCfFCv0oAK6/ZLTuQQdiDIV5GtEqM6dIqW5WpMhQQf5gAD5gpj61gjur66EVght9cytpfUftVswV0KRBqlXKu4jwMf59KdYRiORJ8aaLFkifGbKNuZpOxckKg0de4pJpQDJkVmZI6h8LlDtnV8kt5f6lA/wDxNXxd4Jrn3wxR/AeXESsJ8wlIV+azVyDietceR7LxSo4g0140W0I2rKyqsVBzNwVCIoxnDVnasrKAUNLfB1jfWmVrgYPLWsrKARvbYABqYpizZtp3isrKAQwPIG1TIvByFZWVrAbFPaCCJB6iqTiXwfQ6+XEuFCFGSgDY84ryspk2gNFB494IesnZCVKYPyq3g8wenrVR2rKyqxdiNGJOtWbBb4tgERXlZTrsV9F0t8ezpCZgVpe7RyNZWVfwQEyH1WzkxLat/Ct+I8DTcJDrcZgP6h0NZWVOSHKQlkhRSQQRpHOa9uLQgSEqB8jH9jWVlSKgwdIrwqrKyiYmbtCswiFE8pAPsaidTBiII0jxG9ZWUDBVhahatdhTVNxlUJ2rKygYfO4MHGw6wqDzjkahRxD2iFMXEdoNlLSFJV0CgRI8xWVlMhSq4myEkgoKD4ElJ8gdqC7QxHSsrKwxLnlHkaJZc7orKygYkUmRNSNMHKOh18dNNKyso1oB1LgW2yYejTVS3Vf81JB9kipH21ZtzWVlcr7LLo//2Q==" style="height: 168px; margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; width: 300px;" /> </div>
<br />
<i>Dredd</i> didn't do very well in theatres, though I'm told that it's the best-selling DVD of the admittedly young year. This fact has awakened some hope of a sequel amongst the film's nascent cult, and it's this fact that made me consider some issues about this film...which I'm not entirely comfortable with.<br />
<br />
To get the obvious out of the way, Judge Dredd was created in 1977 by John Wagner (writer) and Carlos Esquerra (artist), first appearing in only the second-ever issue of the evergreen British comics anthology <i>2000 AD</i>. The character is part of the wave of punk-rock comics of the time, created as a satire of the American fetish for rogue law enforcement officers who act as "judge, jury and executioner", and inhabiting a berzerk cyberpunk world that played a major role in defining "cyberpunk" in the first place. As with rock 'n' roll, Americans may have invented comics, but the British were the ones who really saw the art forms' potential, and a level of tongue-in-cheek irony of a kind foreign to contemporary American superhero stories pervaded the strip. Dredd became, and remains, a wildly popular character in the UK, but Americans mostly know him from the awful 1996 Sylvester Stallone movie. The fact that Dredd removed his helmet was the least of the movie's problems; more than anything else, it seemed like adapting Dredd into an <i>actual</i> big-budget American action movie had robbed the movie of its ironic, subversive charge. (<i>Robocop</i> was heavily inspired by Judge Dredd, and I'd argue it captures the strip better than ether of the nominal adaptations. Perhaps not coincidentally, director Paul Verhoeven is European.)<br />
<br />
<i>Dredd</i> is a fun, quite well-made movie, and I enjoyed it tremendously. But it falls prey to a tendency that's become overwhelming in geeky adaptations: they labour under a weird, creeping sense of <i>obligation</i> that sometimes overwhelms the need to make the best movie possible, or even the best adaptation possible.<br />
<br />
With this movie, director Pete Travis set out to make a movie that would be much truer to the character--which actually seems to boil down to the fact that they wanted a Dredd movie where he never took his helmet off.<br />
<br />
Look, I get that this is a big deal in the comic, but this is a movie, people. In much the same way that geeks moan endlessly when an actress of the wrong hair colour is cast for a comic-book role, this seems like a weird fixation on a superficial detail. I'm not saying that it's not nice that Karl Urban's Dredd keeps his helmet on; I'm just saying that making that the lynchpin of the movie resulted in a rather underwhelming story.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<img class="rg_i" data-src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTsdpOYjYtabfy_OysJg2Fi1JzH7_U1ePNISvxycFeHh9QGZYLk" data-sz="f" name="c_KhoHDqnDM_iM:" src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTsdpOYjYtabfy_OysJg2Fi1JzH7_U1ePNISvxycFeHh9QGZYLk" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" /></div>
<br />
Because if you switch out the character of Dredd, you'd be left with a relatively generic, though well-made, action story (as everyone keeps saying, the similarities to <i>The Raid: Redemption</i> are inescapable), and that seems like a missed opportunity. Travis and company were quite open about the fact that they were going to make a small-scale story due to budget issues, and while that's fine as far as it goes, the problem is that the <i>script</i> thinks too small. The vast, sprawling, nightmare world of Mega-City One is basically ignored (and what little we see of it just looks like a generic, modern metropolis) and the bulk of the action reduced to a single, admittedly huge, apartment building. Fair enough, but there's no sense of the personality of the city surrounding it either. Indeed, there's little trace of the tonal subversiveness or snotty nose-thumbing that makes the comic so memorable either. Even Dredd himself is given very little to play off of; sure, he's the authoritarian hard-ass we expect, but this isn't really explored by the story in any serious way. Dredd never, for instance, has to make a choice between following the rules and basic humanity, and the ramifications of this borderline-fascist legal system don't play a role in the plot at all, other than the shock of a cadre of corrupt Judges who pop up at the halfway point. <br />
<br />
And therein lies the rub: this movie seems to have been made solely to validate the character after the Stallone debacle, to give fans of the character something to point to to show that he's actually good. In that way, it plays directly into the modern idea that movies are somehow "better" than other media, and that no matter how much you love that comic or novel or TV show, it hasn't arrived until it's been turned into a big-budget CGI-fest. Even this wouldn't be so bad if the resulting movies didn't end up feeling like they were made using a checklist, afraid to take too many chances, providing as direct a transcription as possible for the sake of the fans. We're a long way from the era when <i>Jaws</i> and the <i>Godfather</i> ended up being a vast improvement on the original pulp novels. <br />
<br />
Which brings us to the possibility of a sequel. Again, the filmmakers are on record as saying that, should the first film do well, we'd be getting a sequel featuring some of the more unique elements of the comic. Again, I get the necessity inherent here, but this seems to be the standard approach for far too many comic-book and other "geek" properties--a small-scale, unambitious movie that sets up a potentially better sequel. This doesn't <i>have</i> to be bad, of course, but too often it seems like the filmmakers are shirking their responsibility by doling out the property in bite-sized chunks rather than straining themselves to deliver the best movie they possibly can. It's like if the first Star Wars movie had only hinted at the big Death Star battle, with Lucas promising we'd get to see it if the first movie made enough money. <br />
<br />
What I really object to about this is that it puts a burden on the movie-consuming public--<i>give lots of money to the corporation, and maybe you'll get a treat!</i> Obviously this attitude popped up organically among film nerds over the years, but Hollywood has been quick to exploit it. Essentially they're trying to be rewarded for stretching the property as thin as they possibly can, and it smacks of a con job.<br />
<br />
Don't get me wrong: if a <i>Dredd</i> sequel gets made, I'll be first in line. But it would be nice to get the sense that the filmmakers had given it their all the first time, that they weren't selling a promise as much as a movie.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
*And then, just to compound the weirdness, the two best movies of the summer were <i>Moonrise Kingdom</i> and <i>Beasts of the Southern Wild</i>, both ultra-precious indie movies of the kind that usually haunts arthouses in the early fall. And they did well!Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-2510458417470171162013-01-25T17:59:00.000-08:002013-01-25T17:59:12.733-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Mister Miracle #6--"Funky Flashman!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld29.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Funky
Flashman, as we will learn on the first page, is a con artist,
swindler, and all-round self-interested douchebag. As the caption
informs us, he “preys on all things like a cannibal!! –Including <b>you!!!</b>”
Well, by definition a cannibal would have to. Anyway, Funky, who bears
an odd resemblance to Bob Hope in a couple of panels, lives in the
crumbling antebellum mansion known as Mockingbird Estates. Somehow, he
managed to get himself named Colonel Mockingbird’s heir apparent, but
the deal came with strings attached: rather than gaining immediate
access to a fat trust fund, Funky gets a weekly allowance, doled out in a
very strange manner: every week, the hideous bust of the Colonel makes a
loud “BAAAAW!” sound and the mouth flips open to reveal a small wad of
bills.<br />
<br />
Kirby, rather insanely, refers to this process
as “waiting for Godot”. Yes, seriously. OK, listen, Stan Lee obviously
had great success writing hip, Beat-influenced, pop-culture-referencing
heroes, and, as I’ve mentioned, it’s natural enough that Kirby would
want to try and imitate his most well-known collaborator. But Kirby
really, really wasn’t suited to this, and the results aren’t just
clunky, they actively make you fear for the man’s sanity. If Lee
sometimes seemed hilariously square in his attempts to write “with-it”
dialogue, Kirby comes off as borderline <i>senile</i>. I mean, “Waiting for Godot”? How pathetic is that name-drop, even in 1972? <br />
<br />
OK, OK. Moving on. Funky and his fawning manservant Houseroy—yes, <i>Houseroy</i>--have
an exposition-laden conversation about his plans to pull another con in
order to shore up their measly funds. Their mark, of course, is Mister
Miracle, who they’ve learned about from the performance he gave at an
orphanage fundraiser.<br />
<br />
…Wait, wait, wait. Mister Miracle? Performing his act in public, for an audience? And this happened <i>off-panel?!?</i>
Surely this momentous occasion could have warranted a panel or two! But
then, the whole thrust of this story seems to suggest that Kirby
realized that the logistics of Mr. M’s act may have been a bit lacking.
More on that in a moment. Although I am interested to know, given the
nature of Mr. M’s stunts, how many orphans were killed during that
performance. <br />
<br />
Anyway, Funky slaps on a fake hairpiece
and beard, all the while engaging in extremely, um, flamboyant dialogue.
Houseroy says that he thinks Scott Free will prove “quite <b>edible!!</b>”
and Funky calls him “Sweetie”. I have to wonder if Kirby wasn’t
slipping in a whole other subtext on top of making him, you know, a
two-faced conniver. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile, it’s time for our
standard Mr. Miracle opening splash—Mr. M in the clutches of some
ludicrously awesome mechanical deathtrap that he’ll escape from once,
let it destroy itself, and then never use again! This time he’s shackled
into a crazy-looking rocket sled—it even says “NASA proving ground” on
it—on a track that ends on a sheer cliff. The sled takes off in a blast
of Kirby Krackle, and, with nanoseconds to spare, Scott…<br />
<br />
…ejects. <br />
<br />
Huh.
The rocket sled had an ejector seat, complete with parachutes. I don’t
know whether that’s shrewd or cowardly on Scott’s part. Oh, sure, he had
to get out of the shackles in time to hit the eject button, but still.
Do <i>real</i> super escape artists need parachutes?<br />
<br />
Anyway,
after the standard, “Oh God, he’s dead, those crazy contraptions
finally killed him! Buh—WHA?!? You’re alive!” reaction from Oberon,
Scott mentions that he thinks the crowds will enjoy this stunt…which
broaches that taboo subject of money. “You’ve been <b>hinting</b> about going on tour!!” needles Obie. “Well!! –Why not!! It’s <b>time</b> this act began making money!” <br />
<br />
Really, Oberon? Are you sure? We don’t want to rush into this, after all. Maybe Scott should wreck a few more <i>NASA rocket sleds</i> before he makes a rash move like trying to make any money out of his antics. Maybe he ought to purchase a few more <i>antique civil war cannons</i>,
too. I mean, these things do grow on trees, after all. And risking your
life in radical, foolhardy ways just isn’t the same if there are people
watching. People who might inadvertently be entertained. It cheapens
the whole act, man.<br />
<br />
Whew. Well, while that bit of
thudding obviousity is being taken care of, interesting events are
unfolding back at Casa Del Free: Flashman has made the pilgrimage to see
Scott, only to be met with Big Barda. I mentioned a while back that
Barda was basically Kirby’s wife Roz in personality, and this scene is a
variation on something that apparently happened a lot in the Kirby
household: some shyster or corporate shark comes to the door while the
King is trying to work, and his missus gently discourages him by, um,
crushing a gun in her bare fist. Funky is apparently a hard one to
dissuade, however, and Barda gives up and goes to take a bath (?) just
as Scott walks in. Apparently splashing around in the water is one of
her default reactions when she gets sick of hitting things. <br />
<br />
Funky
announces his presence and introduces himself to Oberon—“mentioned
briefly in your letter,” as Funky puts it. And yes, that’s supposed to
be a short joke. Can someone explain to me why it’s been OK to make
little-person jokes long after we stopped making fun of people’s other
disabilities? I mean, if you mocked a guy in a wheelchair by calling him
“Hell on wheels” no one would think you were clever. They’d think you
were a huge jerk. Of course, Funky’s a huge jerk anyway, pinching
Oberon’s cheek and then suddenly attempting to drop kick him as soon as
Scott’s back is turned. Charming. <br />
<br />
As soon as Oberon’s departed to make some coffee, Funky launches into his spiel, declaring it a “<b>tingly, wingly</b> thrill!!—To actally be in the very setting where the <b>hallowed</b> Thaddeus Brown, like a warlock of ancient yore—conjured up his <b>majestic</b>
manipulations!!” He proceeds to lay it on thick with flowery verbiage.
More than a few people have commented that Funky seems to be channeling
Stan Lee in this sequence, beard included. By the way, if he’s using his
real name, why did he bother with a fake beard? That would seem to
clinch the idea that Kirby wanted to evoke Lee. I mean, a pompous con
artist with a grandiose way of talking---what else were we supposed to
think? <br />
<br />
We cut to Barda in the bath. This page was
apparently scripted by Mark Evanier to fill space when Kirby
accidentally came up short in the page count, and he claims it doesn’t
add to the story at all, but I don’t know if that’s quite true—it
includes a panel where her “warning circuits” detect a “carrier beam”
from Apokolips, without which the next page would seem to pretty much
come out of nowhere. She gets dressed (in her bikini-thing rather than
her full battle armour) and goes downstairs to meet…MAD HARRIET!<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld29a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Harriet’s
one of the Female Furies, the Charlie’s Angels of Apokolips to which
Barda formerly belonged. Her weapons are her freaky appearance,
disturbing giggle, and a row of razor-tipped brass knuckles, and
ruthless efficiency, and nice red uniforms…OK, sorry, I’ll come in
again. She’s a homicidal maniac in a Geisha costume, is my point, and
she’s here to take out Barda for her betrayal of Apokolips. As is her
partner Stompa, who joins her a few panels later, and as of now is
merely a disembodied boot. After trashing some furniture, they phase
out, just as Scott comes barging in. Boy, that guy is missing most of
the action in this issue, isn’t he. <br />
<br />
In fact, it turns out he’s been closing a deal with Funky to manage their coming tour. “He’s a <b>transparent second-rater—</b>but
he’ll have to do!!” Um, really? You aren’t going to bother looking
around for a better option, Scott? Obviously this arrangement parallels
Kirby’s partnership with Stan the Man, but that just makes it seem like
he should have tried for something better himself…<br />
<br />
Oddly,
we now cut to a day later. Wow, the Female Furies sure like to take
their time in toying with their prey. Funky’s apparently rented out a
rehearsal studio (complete with…klieg lights?) and dressed himself up in
what he calls his “Uneasy Rider outfit” which apparently has him under
the delusion that he’s John Huston. Scott proceeds to strap himself to a
wooden platform that feeds into a gigantic sawblade, prompting this
reaction:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld29c.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Yeah, thanks, Oberon, that’s much more helpful.<br />
<br />
Scott
immediately follows this with a second escape: he crawls inside a
gigantic, clear-plastic fishbowl, tightens the hatch, and lets a
concussion bomb drop into the bowl. This one he escapes, somehow, by
curling up in “the <b>proper</b> position.” Funky, duly impressed,
lathers on the praise, leading Scott to melt a little and reveal one of
his secrets: namely, the Mother Box. “But <b>no one</b> can build her!!” Admonishes Scott. “She must be <b>earned!!</b>”
I have to admit, I don’t really get what Mother Boxes are supposed to
represent. They seem to be a symbol of immense power that’s bestowed
only on the worthy, but, I mean, they are basically just a piece of
technology. How does one “earn” a Mother Box, exactly? At any rate, it’s
clear Funky isn’t worthy, and it’s just as clear that he’s suddenly
eager to get his hands on it. <br />
<br />
His lust for power is
interrupted by the belated arrival of Lashina, another one of the
Furies. (Barda mentioned that there were only four, but as we’ll see
later, that’s completely inaccurate.) Lashina’s another neat character
design:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld29b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
But
before her lash (capable of cutting through solid metal) can land on
Scott, Barda swoops out of the shadows and engages her in a page-long
fight. Barda STILL hasn’t bothered to put on her armour, by the way. I
guess Kirby knew which side his bread was buttered on. Barda manages to
subdue her, and she teleports away just as—you guessed it—Scott and
Oberon come running in. Barda once again describes her battle and speaks
warily of the fourth Fury, Burnadeth, who happens to be Desaad’s
sister. They’ve been able to find Scott by tracking his Mother Box, but
suddenly it’s gone missing—Scott left in such a hurry that he didn’t
notice that Funky ran off with it. <br />
<br />
I think you can see
what’s coming, can’t you? Funky’s back at Mockingbird Estate,
practicing his public speaking, when the Furies come for him and decide
to kill him out of spite. Burnadeth fires a “fahren-knife” that will
“penetrate dimensionally—and <b>barbecue</b> him from the <b>inside!!!</b>”
Funky apparently avoids it, andthrows his faithful butler Houseroy into
the fray in order to hold them off for a few minutes while he makes his
escape from the house, which explodes behind him. After mourning the
loss of his family (?) estate (which Kirby takes a moment to remind us
was founded on slave labour) Funky, his hair and beard blown off, walks
off down the road to new schemes, apparently unconcerned by all that’s
transpired.<br />
<br />
We get a brief epilogue here where we
reveal that Mr. Miracle and Barda arrived on the scene to pull Houseroy
from the flames (oh, comics code) and engage the Furies, driving them
off with explosives. This all happened off-panel, of course. The issue
ends with Scott and Barda finally making a decision: instead of waiting
on Earth and taking on their Apokoliptish adversaries one by one in
easily defeatable permutations, they’re going to head back to the planet
itself and take on Darkseid, Granny, and the hordes of Apokolips on
their own turf.<br />
<br />
Gee. Good thinking.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-40848746162891318152013-01-21T10:07:00.000-08:002013-01-21T10:09:40.582-08:00Muckraking<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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" style="height: 168px; margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; width: 299px;" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">The last two reviews I’ve
done for Thor’s Comics Column (<a href="http://www.chud.com/122705/thors-comic-column-11113/">The End Times of Bram and Ben</a>
and <a href="http://www.chud.com/123527/thors-comic-column-118/">Todd, the Ugliest Kid in the World</a>
) have inadvertently been thematically linked. Both of these books are
deliberately, gleefully offensive, something that’s become a time-honoured
tradition in the medium of comics since at least the era of “Tales From the
Crypt”…and really, it goes back to at least the days of 18<sup>th</sup>-century
political cartoons. Or hell, dirty paintings on cave walls. Comics seem more inclined
to this kind of assault on good taste than most other media, something I
accredit partly to how few overseers the standard comic has in the production
phase, and partly to how far beneath the radar the average indie comic is able
to fly. But even without those aspects I feel like there’s something in the
medium itself that lends itself to assaulting people’s delicate social mores—a
certain underlying anarchy implicit in portraying reality in stylized form.
(Animation has something similar going on, from the classic Loony Tunes to the
modern slew of R-rated cartoon shows.) </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">As you might be able to tell,
I’m generally in favour of pushing boundaries, but that doesn’t mean I
automatically salute comics creators who publish whatever juvenile, offensive
nonsense they can get away with. As I said in the reviews linked above, I think
taking a scattergun to good taste can be a positive thing…if done in an
intelligent context. The more over-the-top your shock value, the more carefully
it has to be deployed, and there’s no quicker way to get on my bad side than
being shocking for the sake of being shocking. Perhaps more importantly, if
you’re going to talk the talk, I expect you to walk the walk. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">I’ve been to the San Diego
Comic-Con a few times, thanks largely to friend and collaborator <a href="http://pewfell.thecomicseries.com/">Chuck Whelon</a>. My first time there, in 2004, was juuuuust before the huge crowds of
non-nerds caught on that this was a chance to catch a glimpse of big movies and
their stars and directors before they were released, and it was still possible
to get in to see them without spending most of the convention waiting in line. In
later visits I tended to skip the madness of Hall H and focus on the actual
comics, but that first trip was spent planted in the big lecture halls watching
advance clips of The Incredibles and listening to the creators of Sky Captain
and the World of Tomorrow (it was a pretty good year for neat geek projects, in
retrospect). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">One of the presentations I
saw that year was for Team America:
World Police. I knew Trey Parker and Matt Stone were working on an all-puppet
action movie that would lampoon the war on terror in the style of the
Thunderbirds, and while I wasn’t the world’s biggest fan of the duo, I thought
the combination of the uniqueness of the medium and the subject matter made it
sound like an exciting flick. What I saw on the stage, though, turned me
against Parker and Stone for life. I understand that they were in the late
stages of finishing the movie and were rather exhausted, but the hour-long
presentation consisted of nothing but whining from the duo—whining about how
much they hated actors, whining about how much harder it was to work with
puppets, whining about how much hard work this all had been. When you factor in
the incredibly simplistic, half-assed animation of South Park,
it became clear to me that these were a pair of over-privileged jerks who
thought it was the height of hilarity to mock everyone else but whose own
inconvenience warranted a jeremiad. This was emphasized when the movie came out
and large chunks of it were devoted to repetitive, tiresome “takedowns” of
everyone in Hollywood Parker and Stone personally disliked, including a
nonsensical plotline springing from their personal vendetta against Michael
Moore. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Now, I know what you’re
thinking: “He’s only saying that because his political beliefs are being
tweaked.” But actually it’s just the opposite. I’m a hardcore leftie, but I’d
LOVE it if someone delivered a smart, incisive takedown of Michael Moore.
That’s not what Parker and Stone did, though. The Michael Moore segments of the
movie are simply Parker and Stone taking revenge on a guy who done them wrong
(Parker and Stone were featured in Bowling for Columbine but refused to make an
animated segment for the movie; Moore proceeded to make one in the style of
South Park and place it right after the Parker and Stone segment, which the duo
felt mislead people into thinking they’d been active participants in the movie rather
than interview subjects). There’s no real criticism of Moore’s beliefs other than linking him to the
movie’s half-baked “liberals are terrorists” theme, which isn’t any more
well-thought-out than the kinds of idiocies that right-wing talking heads were
spewing during the Bush years. What’s almost worse is that Parker and Stone
present this whole thing as surrounded by ironic quote marks, dramatizing
right-wing talking points with a veneer of ridiculousness so that if called on
it they can say they’re satirizing it. It’s the ultimate in having their cake
and eating it too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">For the record, I have
enjoyed South Park in the past, and I’m not trying to
argue that Parker and Stone are are right-wing lunatics. Actually that’s almost
the problem: I don’t think they actually believe in anything, and are simply
taking an aggressively contrarian stand to get noticed. Which wouldn’t be so
bad in and of itself, but combined with the aforementioned sense of privilege
and whininess, it becomes excruciating. (A gay acquaintance of mine was extremely
angry at the episode that called for people to ease off on criticism of “the f
word”: “So, these privileged heterosexual Republican-voters are going to
lecture me on being offended by a slur aimed specifically at people like me?”
was the thrust of his complaint.) Apparently a recent South Park episode
featured metacommentary on Parker and Stone’s growing displeasure at their need
to be relentlessly cynical and negative towards everything, to which I can only
quote Porky Pig: “You b-b-b-b-buttered your bread, now you can lie in it.” </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Another guy about whom I have
similarly mixed feelings is <a href="http://phantasmicblog.blogspot.ca/2011/03/cassidy-conundrum.html">Garth Ennis</a></span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">. Unlike Parker and Stone, I don’t think Ennis is a nihilist, and in fact, I
think he can be a really excellent writer. But as anyone who’s read a lot of
his work knows, he can very definitely fall into the same adolescent contrarian
stance. There’s his incredibly, often pointlessly graphic violence, his
depiction of superheroes as out-of-control, amoral hedonists in The Boys, and
his juvenile mockery of religion in Preacher. I’ve actually read Preacher
multiple times and own the entire series; it’s unquestionably an engaging,
entertaining story, but I’m consistently disappointed by how Ennis keeps trying
to pretend he has something to say, about religion or America or anything else,
when it’s pretty clear he doesn’t. Christianity only exists in Preacher as
something he can bring up for a cheap, shocking gag once in a while; the only
people who are going to be offended by it are the kind of fundamentalists who
wouldn’t be reading the comic in the first place. It’s a nonstop parade of “Hey,
you hold this stuff sacred? Well, fuck you, I’mma smear shit all over it! Ha
ha!” Ennis never even really gets around to explaining WHY religion is bad; he
just takes it as self-evident. He’s shooting fish in a barrel. (And no, I’m not
religious. If I’m offended by any of this jive it’s not the subject matter but
how much contempt Ennis has for his readers.) </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><a class="rg_l" href="http://www.google.ca/imgres?um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&sa=N&tbo=d&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&authuser=0&biw=1280&bih=887&tbm=isch&tbnid=ZblAWlCjTgQ6RM:&imgrefurl=http://comiczine-fa.com/%3Fp%3D1158&docid=jwWX5HM4eIESWM&imgurl=http://comiczine-fa.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/preacher6.jpg&w=1415&h=803&ei=IYP9UJ2EMszH0AGC94CwAQ&zoom=1&ved=1t:3588,r:36,s:0,i:239" style="height: 169px; left: 0px; width: 297px;"><img class="rg_i" data-src="https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR4PxtHdtB7NSE6MjpJIvr9dWnQ2XcNPURrqM9FpbFXazGAbkwU" data-sz="f" name="ZblAWlCjTgQ6RM:" src="https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR4PxtHdtB7NSE6MjpJIvr9dWnQ2XcNPURrqM9FpbFXazGAbkwU" style="height: 169px; margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; width: 298px;" /></a></span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">More on this subject here: <a href="http://hoodedutilitarian.com/2012/10/subversion-satire-and-shut-the-fuck-up-deflection-and-lazy-thinking-in-comics-criticism-2/">http://hoodedutilitarian.com/2012/10/subversion-satire-and-shut-the-fuck-up-deflection-and-lazy-thinking-in-comics-criticism-2/</a></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">After all that, I probably
come off as a hopeless prude, but I reiterate my original point: I’m a strong
supporter of thinkers and storytellers who attempt to push boundaries. My issue
is with people who take “causing offense” as a starting point. To stay on the
religion thing, Charles Darwin didn’t sit down and attempt to destroy the bible
by writing The Origin of Species (regardless of what certain fundamentalists
seem to think); he simply followed his thoughts to their rational conclusion,
and came back with a book that shocked half the world. The same is true of
Alfred Kinsey or Friedrich Nietzsche. This may seem like a somewhat lopsided
argument, that I’m holding up an impossible standard to pop culture
storytellers, but you see my point—nothing is ever more shocking than ideas. An
obvious provocation can garner attention in the short term, but all you’re
doing is shoving something into the muck. Muck washes off. Exposing an existing
rot within your chosen subject—that’s far more dangerous, and it’s what art
should be doing. </span></div>
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-50936485500210138332013-01-18T18:28:00.000-08:002013-01-18T18:29:09.454-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #144--"A Big Thing In A Deep Scottish Lake!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld28.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Word to the wise: if you don’t like Scottish accents, <i>bail out now</i>.
You’re about to be subjected to the worst Scottish accents this side of
Kevin Costner in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. And for those of you
saying, “But Adam, Costner was supposed to be doing an <i>English</i> accent,” I say--<b>exactly</b>.<br />
<br />
This
issue is credited to “Jock Kirrbie”, for crying out loud. And the
opening splash features a dude in a speedboat, racing along the black
waters of a certain well-known Scottish lake, yelling “<b>Come out, y’beastie!!</b> If y’rr truly doon therrr, Ian MacGregor would like a <b>look</b>
at ye!!” Well, you have to admire Kirby’s restraint in not naming the
character “Scotchy MacTartan”. By the way, I love how this guy thinks
that, after remaining a mystery for decades if not centuries, he’s going
to expose this Monster by blasting around in a speedboat and yelling at
it. <br />
<br />
Well, apparently, it’s a more effective tactic than you might think, because moments later, …<i> something</i>
rears out of the water, smashing the boat to kindling. MacGregor
escapes to tell the tale to the newspapers, which of course he does,
since, as Kirby informs us, “No Scotsman will remain silent when his
boat is wrecked!!” Um, I’m pretty sure that holds true for most
nationalities, Jack. It’s not like those Kurds or Norwegians or
Laotians are known for building an impenetrable wall of silence around
their accidental boat-wreckings. <br />
<br />
At any rate, I’m
assuming Kirby’s coyness has been to no avail, and that everyone reading
this has long since guessed what we’re dealing with here. I’m not sure
why he even bothered to try and make it a surprise, I mean, hasn’t
everyone heard of the world famous Loch Trevor Monster?...<br />
<br />
…Wait, what? Must be a misprint. Moving on.<br />
<br />
At
any rate, Jimmy and the Newsboys are attempting their monthly
confrontation with Morgan Edge over his attempts to, y’know, blow them
up. I don’t understand why they’re not making more headway with this—I
mean, their strategy is to march into his office and loudly accuse him
of putting a bomb in their Whiz Wagon. Edge is too crafty for them,
though—he (get this) <i>denies everything</i>. This puts an unexpected
crimp in the master journalists’ plans. What’s a crimesolver to do when
the suspect won’t just voluntarily confess the moment you confront him?
It’s clearly stalemated the Newsboy Legion, but Morgan Edge outdoes them
again by suggesting a new assignment. “I could assign you to follow up
this new <b>fish story--</b>and--” “Fish story?” jumps in Flippa Dippa. “You mean fish—like in <b>water??</b>” Oh Lord, he’s off on that again. Amusingly, even Jimmy seems to be getting sick of him:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld28a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
Well,
at least Flippa has a forceful personality, because all the other
Newsboys immediately fall into line on this dubious assignment granted
them by a man <i>who tries to kill them every time he sends them to cover a story</i>.
What makes it all the worse is how clearly sensationalistic and
tabloid-esque the assignments he sends them on are. I could
accredit this to a very subtle bit of satire on Kirby’s part, with Edge
buying up the Daily Planet and turning it into a yellow rag, a la Rupert
Murdoch. But then I’m forced to remember the kinds of non-stories the
Planet generally covered <i>before</i> Edge bought them out—vital
stories like “Jimmy Olsen receives medal” and “An interview with
Superman, by Lois Lane, part 72856 of a series,” and I have to wonder if
Edge hasn’t actually classed the joint up somewhat.<br />
<br />
Besides,
as is not hard to figure out, “tabloid journalism” in the DC Universe
is a whole other ballgame, since alien love babies, werewolves, demonic
entities, and other such folderol <i>actually exist</i>. In the DC
Universe, the Weekly World News and the National Enquirer would be
vital, respected publications, a point Grant Morrison made in his recent
“Manhattan Guardian” miniseries, part of the Seven Soldiers project.
Hey, and that story featured the Newsboy Legion as well. And Grant
Morrison is Scottish!!! IT’S ALL FALLING INTO PLACE!!!<br />
<br />
I
don’t need to mention that Morgan Edge gets in touch with another
Intergang operative the minute Jimmy and company have left the room and
orders them killed again, do I? I assume not.<br />
<br />
But
where’s Superman? Why couldn’t he be bothered to provide backup for
Jimmy’s confrontation with Edge? For a very good reason: he’s been
invited to a discotheque. <br />
<br />
Yes, in an odd attempt to
drum up publicity, Terry Dean—the odd not-Lois Lane character who’s been
popping up for a panel or two here and there—has invited Superman (and
the Guardian, for good measure) to the opening of a new nightclub, where
he’s immediately bombarded by autograph seekers and made to feel
uncomfortable as “a charter member of the <b>establishment</b>”. Hmmm, I
was going to ask why no one had ever thought to invite Superman to an
event like this before, but I guess there’s your answer. By the way, I
think it’s safe to say that Kirby was never in a discotheque in his
life, judging by his odd portrayal of same: basically, it’s a mash-up of
counterculture elements from many different eras, hippie, beatnik, and,
um, seventies. In particular, the house band resembles a demented
version of the Partridge Family—and “demented” may be the right word, as
they immediately make it clear that they’re working for Darkseid and
are concerned that Superman’s going to wreck everything. <br />
<br />
As
if this wasn’t enough, Dubbilex suddenly shows up. Remember Dubbilex?
He’s the long-suffering, purple, horned mutant that The Project bred as a
sideshow attraction, or something. He’s here to inform Superman about
some suspicious goings-on that relate to The Project. Superman looks
relieved at having an excuse not to have to do any disco dancing. You
and me both, Kal. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile, SHENANIGANS! As the
Newsboy Legion is whisked to Scotland in, apparently, Edge’s own private
Lear Jet. Scrapper dresses up in a full tartan outfit, complete with
kilt, and they all pile into the Whiz Wagon, which is dumped out at Loch
Trevor.<br />
<br />
Son of a…yes, <i>Loch Trevor.</i> Not Loch Ness. They’re here to uncover the mystery of the Loch Trevor Monster. <br />
<br />
It’s
often hard to tell what Kirby was thinking when he made decisions like
this. I doubt that Kirby was so skeptical about Nessie that
he invented an entirely new creature—I mean, even if he was a skeptic
in real life, the guy just finished a storyline about vampires and
wolfmen who came from a microscopic planet. I do know that the citizens
of Loch Ness are very, very protective of their “pet monster” and don’t
like seeing it portrayed as smashing boats and eating people; it could
be that Kirby got wind of this and decided to respect their wishes by
moving the monster to a different Scottish Loch. Everyone knows that the
Loch Trevorites are a bunch of jerks anyway, so they deserve to have a
nasty monster. <br />
<br />
Anyway, on landing, they almost manage
to run over their contact, a cartoonish Scotsman by the name of Felix
MacFinney. Naturally the dialogue that follows is full of “rrrrr”s and
“ooo”s and “bless me tartan!” and oh just kill me now. <br />
<br />
Oh,
good, let’s go back to the disco with Supes and Dubbilex. Dub reveals
that he found a tunnel leading from the Project all the way to this
club—what, this specific club, or just Metropolis in general?—built by
someone other than the Hairies. This is the cue for the House Band,
known as “The San Diego Five String Mob”, to try and rub out the heroes
with the power of music. Seriously. Their instruments, when played in
conjunction with a heretofore unseen sixth member named Barriboy—who
pops up right behind Superman’s table—can summon, like, bad vibrations,
man. Vibrations which bring the club’s ceiling crashing down. <br />
<br />
Meanwhile,
back to Scotland, where, according to the caption, “Chaos is far from
the order!” I don’t know wha that means, but I don’t begrudge it this
time, because our first panel is of MacFinney introducing his ultra-hot
miniskirted daughter, Ginny.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld28b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
I
should use this opportunity to mention that I’ve been to Scotland, and
even have ancestors from there, and I actually *love* Scottish accents.
Real ones. Especially coming from cute girls. It’s this ridiculous
comic-book approximation I find dopey. But I guess if I imagine everyone
talking in the voice of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0531808/">Kelly MacDonald</a> I’ll be OK. Mmm…Kelly MacDonald…<br />
<br />
An
exposition-filled dinner reveals that MacFinney has built a sonar
whistle that will, apparently, call the Loch Trevor Monster to them.
Gee, that’s convenient. You’ve lived in Loch Trevor for years, and
you’ve just now invented a device that will help you prove the existence
of the monster. Also, he calls Big Words “Big Wurrds”. Oh, and by the
way, Scrapper brought that little “Scrapper Trooper” he’s been carrying
around since he left the Project, apparently under the belief that it
will provide a magical solution to any problems that come up.<br />
<br />
The
next day, the whole gang is out on the Loch, and Flippa Dippa is, of
course, in hog heaven as he gets to make himself useful for a change.
Unfortunately, just as he’s turning on his searchlight, hands reach in
and grab at his air hose. The above-water Legion members lose contact,
and just as they’re preparing to go in after Flippa, MacFinney seizes
the opportunity to reveal himself as a turncoat. Yep, he’s working for
the Scottish branch of Intergang, or as he puts it, “Interrr-gaang”, as a
“Prrofishn’l <b>killer</b>.” So…after nearly letting himself get run
over by the Whiz Wagon as it landed, he took them home, made them dinner
and gave them a pleasant night’s rest, let Jimmy sleep with his
daughter (I’m assuming—<a href="http://www.blogger.com/%E2%80%9Dhttp://www.the-isb.com/?p=270%E2%80%9D">Olsen</a> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%E2%80%9Dhttp://www.the-isb.com/?p=205%E2%80%9D">is</a> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%E2%80%9Dhttp://www.the-isb.com/?p=87%E2%80%9D">a playa</a>,
after all) and loaded up his special equipment on the boat, and THEN
finally decided to kill them? That’s the most ridiculously delayed hit
job I’ve ever seen. This guy works for Intergang, alright.<br />
<br />
Jimmy
tries to distract MacFinney by getting him monologuing, but
surprisingly, it doesn’t work. However, it does give Scrapper a chance
to employ his mini-me and activate the sonar device that will summon the
monster. (By the way, there’s actually a decent reason for why
MacFinney would have access to a device to summon a monster that
supposedly no one’s ever seen clearly; it’s revealed in the next issue.
But you’d think our ace reporters might be a little suspicious.) The
Lake Trevor monster does indeed come when called, trashing their boat
and sending them into the water; MacFinney is apparently dragged down by
the monster off-panel. The Newsboys swim to shore, bemoaning the loss
of Flippa Dippa, but it turns out he’s alive and well and waiting for
them. Well, I’ll be. It turns out that Flippa Dippa really is actually
competent in his native element, because he was able to overcome his
assailant—it’s Ginny, unsurprisingly (though, to my chagrin, she’s not
actually Scottish, nor is she really MacFinney’s daughter).<br />
<br />
The
story ends rather abruptly with Jimmy swearing to stick around Scotland
until he gets to the bottom of what’s going on. That’s fine by me,
Jimmy. Stay in Scotland for as long as you like. It’d be nice if I
didn’t have to read about it, though.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-18274618190860160762012-12-28T17:24:00.001-08:002012-12-28T17:24:27.781-08:00Fourth World Fridays: The New Gods #6--"The Glory Boat!!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld27.jpg" /><br />
<br />
That's the Glory <i><b>Boat</b></i>, you pervs.<br />
<br />
What, you thought I wouldn’t go there? I only have class inasmuch as it stands in the way of my making an obvious joke.<br />
<br />
We’re
now getting into the run of New Gods issues that Kirby feels was the
strongest thing he ever did, and the energy is palpable. As you might
recall, the last issue brought us face to face with the horrifying
Leviathan the Deep Six (“Mystic Mutators of the Deep”) had unleashed on
the world: a gigantic pink warthog-whale thing bigger than an oil
tanker. You know how I can tell that? Because in the opening pages of
this issue, the thing eats an oil tanker. <br />
<br />
Well, it doesn’t “eat” it so much as it gores it with its tusks and that weird phallic ram-thing under its chin.<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld27a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
My favourite moment in this sequence: a sailor, spotting the leviathan, announces, “The <b>closer</b> it gets—the <b>bigger</b>
it gets!!” He’s just discovered the magic of perspective! Also, the oil
tanker, despite being specifically described as being made of steel, is
coloured to look like an old-fashioned wooden sailing ship. <br />
<br />
There’s
now a montage of the Leviathan trashing ships all across the ocean,
ending with a nice panel of a life saver marked “S. S. Aurora” floating
empty in the water to segue to the main story. It seems that one of the
vessels wrecked was a yacht owned by a wealthy industrialist named
Farley Sheridan and his two children, who are now floating in a life
raft in the middle of the sea. These three, who we’ll be getting to know
better in a few pages, provide our “everyman” perspective on the
following events, starting with Orion blasting out of the water a few
meters away from them. Farley immediately jumps to the rather odd
conclusion that “he’s some kind of <b>new</b> Navy frogman type!” Right, because navy officers are always dressing up in flamboyant, skintight clothing.<br />
<br />
…Well, OK, but not while they’re <i>on duty</i>.<br />
<br />
Orion,
rather dickishly, chooses not to talk to the lost and frightened people
on the raft, but first does a sweep of the area while caught up in his
own expositional thoughts (basically recapping the last issue).
Eventually, he does deign to lend a hand, shooting a tractor beam-ish
thing to grab hold of the raft, or as he puts it, “A <b>magnetic force</b> will <b>saturate</b> your craft’s atomic structure!—And bind us as <b>one!!</b>” Kirby sure had a thing for the phrase “atomic structure”, didn’t he? Oh, atomic structures! Is there anything you can’t do?<br />
<br />
Orion
offers them rescue, but he points out that he’s on a dangerous mission,
and that tagging along with him could result in their death. Here we
get our introduction to the basic character dilemma of this issue:
Farley, a WWII vet, claims that he’ll happily jump into the fray if
it’ll get them off the raft, whereas his son Richard, a pacifist, is
reluctant, and his daughter Lynn is basically a nonentity. (It’s an
unfortunate feature of Kirby’s books that, in a given group, the woman
will usually be the one most devoid of personality and least
helpful…though there are a couple of major exceptions, like Barda.)
Richard, meanwhile, is the one who starts to maybe get a teensy inkling
that possibly, perhaps, the helmeted guy on the flying harness with the
futuristic technology isn’t a naval officer.<br />
<br />
After
skimming across the ocean for a while (shown from above in another very
nice panel), Orion finds what Mother Box has been leading him towards: a
weirdly shaped wooden boat (actually, it’s more like a raft with a a
temple-like cabin built on top) and a human-shaped figure bound in some
kind of weird wrappings where the mast would be. Mother Box indicates
that it’s alive.<br />
<br />
“Well, there’s <b>one</b> way to strip those bonds away!-- <b>Orion’s</b> way! The way of the <b>Astro-Force!!</b>” Are you surprised? This is how Orion solves all his problems. <br />
<br />
“Locked myself out of the car again! I’ll handle this Orion’s way! The way of the Astro-Force!” (Melts car with laser blast.) <br />
<br />
“My microwave is broken! I’ll handle this Orion’s way! The way of the Astro-Force!” (Chars bagel to a smoking cinder.)<br />
<br />
“America has become crippled by political partisanship! I’ll
handle this Orion’s way! The way of the Astro-Force!” (Starts randomly
shooting people.)<br />
<br />
Anyway, the bandages—which turn out
to be more of that malevolent mutated kelp Orion encountered a while
back—come off, revealing none other than Lightray, who, it turns out,
broke his promise to Highfather to join the war against Apokolips. Mere
panels later, Orion declares that “Your kind brings an <b>undeserved</b>
honor to war!” Well, someone’s honor’s undeserved, anyway. With Orion
and Lightray now together, the pompous speechifying picks up. “Now—to
see what <b>demon’s swill</b> the Deep Six have served up <b>inside</b>
this craft!!” declares Orion, marching inside. Meanwhile, the Sheridan
family introduces themselves to Lightray, with Farley making clear his
sneering contempt for his son’s non-violent ways. “I’m a <b>conscientious objector!</b>” declares Richard, “I <b>don’t</b> like war, violence, or killing!!” “Is that right?” muses Lightray. Well, I know of a place where <b>everybody’s</b> like that!” <br />
<br />
Hmmm…so
conscientious objectors are like New Genesisians? That’s actually
logical in a way, despite the amount of fighting they do—the idea seems
to be that they only go to war when it’s absolutely necessary. Of
course, that assumes that the magic wall that tells them what to do is
always correct and good and just; somehow I think that a real-world
conscientious objector would have a hard time falling into line with
that.<br />
<br />
Orion calls for Lightray, and they enter the hold
to find a big, green, icky creature crouching in the corner, which they
dub a “Sender” and an “organic director”. “There’s a mountainous sea
beast out there, destroying ships!--And this—<b>this is its brain!!</b>” Um…wouldn’t a better place for its brain be, y’know, in its skull? <br />
<br />
“It <b>shouldn’t</b> be destroyed!” reasons Lightray. “It should be <b>changed!! Light! Light!</b>--not to glisten on swordblades!—But light at play with <b>atoms</b>--to make them sing in <b>other</b> ways!!” Are you perhaps getting the sense that Orion and Lightray are allegorical characters? <br />
<br />
Lightray transforms the critter into a “living <b>basic</b>
life form!!” which apparently means a big cube of jell-o. There’s a lot
of technobabble here, but basically they’re going to “imprint it with
the image of New Genesis” and cause the leviathan to turn around and
head back to the ship. Which it does, accompanied by another of the Deep
Six, named Jaffar. Yes, Jaffar. Sadly, he does not own a wisecracking
parrot voiced by Gilbert Gottfried. He does, however, have the ability
to turn invisible and slip past the beams of light Lightray is sending
down to the ocean floor in an effort to spot him. You’d think they’d
know that about the guy and thus not waste their time, but…<br />
<br />
Back
on the boat, Richard is succeeding in pounding it into his dad that
they may be just a tad over their heads here. By the way, I love how
Orion was just casually going to let them go into battle, despite the
fact that they’re regular humans, and thus would presumably be creamed
by the forces of Apokolips. Well, he did give them a choice, I suppose.
Nevertheless, having seen the “life cube” beginning to grow into a
gigantic, bleeping machine, and “with Lynn to consider”, Farley is
having second thoughts about staying. So, uh, Farley, you knew there was
going to be a fight, and you were willing to risk your daughter, but as
soon as weird mechanical cubes get involved, suddenly you’re determined
to keep her from harm? You’re kind of a douche, Farley. This is driven
home by the fact that, despite his admittance that his son is correct,
he’s still getting shots in at him as a coward.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately,
a clean getaway isn’t in the cards, as Jaffar shows up to menace them.
Richard starts calling for them to escape, but Farley is paralyzed with
fear (as, I guess, is Lynn, but she’s barely in panel for this
sequence). Richard suddenly finds himself galvanized into action and
leaps forward into battle, threatening to fight Jaffar to the death to
protect his family. But despite his newfound courage, this has about the
same result you’d expect, i.e., none at all. Jaffar grabs him and uses
his mutating touch to kill Richard by, basically, erasing his face. It’s
a pretty damn creepy sequence. <br />
<br />
Of course, <i>now</i>
Orion shows up. Yeesh. If you knew the guy was going to return to the
ship, why didn’t you just stay and protect them? Anyway, he blasts
Jaffar off the ship with the Astro-Force, but Jaffar is already gloating
that he’s impossible to kill in the water. So what does Orion do? He
shoots him over and over again, <i>keeping him in the air</i> each time, until he’s exploded. Ouch.<br />
<br />
Orion
returns to the ship to find Farley babbling, lost in the delusion that
his son has “joined his platoon—on the beach!! Yes--<b>that’s</b> it!!”
And Lynn, as usual, just standing around crying. Jeez, why is she even
in this story? Orion straps her into his harness and sends her up and
away, out of the story to safety, even as her father refuses to leave. <br />
<br />
Declaring Richard to be “<b>another</b>
faceless hero!” Lightray sets him alongside the machinery in the cabin.
Then, as the wind rises ominously and fish are seen streaming past, the
remaining Deep Six—the Deep Four, I guess—launch their attack. The
remaining Deeps are Shaligo, “the flying finback”, Trok, who has a
whirling axe on a whip, Gole, who…has no special powers that I can see,
and Pyron, who flies the manta ship with its flamethrowers. You wouldn’t
think flamethrowers would be a huge benefit underwater, but they turn
out to be useful when Orion repels the attack and Pyron sets fire to the boat.
<br />
<br />
Orion seeks to get away, but Lightray has apparently
gone insane. First, he’s tied Farley to the mast (!). Then he draws
Orion into the cabin, where Richard’s face has been
restored—whatever—and their weapon has taken shape, even as the
Leviathan and the manta-ship bear down on them. <br />
<br />
From
all accounts, Kirby claimed the next two pages to be the best things he
ever did. On one side: the Deep Four, zipping alongside the vast pink
monster as it rears out of the water. On the other, a bizarre missile
formed from the techno-active cube, with Richard’s body lying
pread-eagled on top, Lightray standing right at the tip, and Orion
clinging onto the side, brandishing his fist at their oncoming foe. <br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld27b.jpg" /><br />
<br />
It’s pretty awesome. <br />
<br />
The
two forces meet and explode, but of course Lightray is able to pull
Orion from the point of contact at, y’know, lightspeed. We’re left with
the image of Farley—who we’re hastily told was “<b>backlashed</b> far
from the flaming area!!” left floating, adrift at sea, alone with his
guilt that his supposedly cowardly son was able to fight when he
couldn’t. (A tiny ship, visible on the horizon headed towards him,
obviously implies that he’ll be rescued.) <br />
<br />
As we’ve
seen, of course, the Fourth World is full of this kind of tension,
between the old and the young, between violence and non-violence, but
here we have probably the purest expression of it. Kirby, as we all
know, was a WWII vet himself, but he also seemed to have a lot of
affection for the hippie types that presumably made up a chunk of his
audience…and here we see the two types coming into conflict. The fact
that the young pacifist seems to be proven to be in the right--though
maybe not in a way that a real pacifist would agree with—is interesting; the point <i>seems </i>to be that, when the chips are down, Fairley, the war vet, is frozen in panic, whereas the pacifist leaps into the fight heroically.<br />
<br />
This is a bit confusing. If we're meant to find irony in the fact that the two men act differently from how they behave, that's problematic because it sort of implies negative things about pacifism. That clearly wasn't Kirby's intent, and indeed, Richard is clearly the more likeable character both before AND after the battle begins and his true colours are shown, to the point where it seems like Kirby's almost pandering a little. But then, the point is apparently to praise people who "speak softly and carry a big stick". In fact, there's a fairly subtle and crucial point here being made about pacifism: it's not about cowardice or suicidal nonviolence, it's about keeping violence at a distance unless absolutely necessary, and not using it as a rhetorical club.<br />
<br />
One thing's for sure, it's interesting that Kirby is so willing to write off the WWII vet while showing the representative of the younger generation in a more positive light. This is a theme the Fourth World comes back to again and again, a reverent awe for the flower power generation, which carries a lot more weight coming from someone who wasn't actually part of that generation. It's perhaps not hard to see how the Baby Boomers ended up with such high opinions of themselves. Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-48848635573872336592012-12-22T17:56:00.003-08:002012-12-22T17:59:56.652-08:00Mirror, MaskThere’s a phenomenon I’ve been fascinated with ever since I first had it elucidated for me in Scott McCloud’s “Understanding Comics”. McCloud calls it “the masking effect”.<br />
<br />
Basically, cartoons can achieve a kind of universality that isn’t directly available to any other medium, through their sheer simplicity. We’re visual creatures, and to us the world outside is a rich, textured environment, and the people we deal with every day are distinguished via the details that we slowly become familiar with. Other people are something we observe, and take on an elaborate shape in our minds. But, McCloud says, most of us aren’t nearly as familiar with our own face, because we only see it comparatively rarely. To us, on the other side of the mask, our face exists more as a concept, or a series of non-visual sensations. We imagine the basic placement of eyes, mouth, nose, but we don’t connect it in a concrete way with how we look at any given moment. We don’t picture our freckles or pores or the spot we missed shaving, whereas to anyone encountering us these are prominent features. Everyone else is part of the physical architecture, but we exist to ourselves in an almost Platonic, semi-abstract state.<br />
<br />
In other words, a simple, undetailed cartoon rendering of a face is a reasonably close approximation of how we see <i>ourselves</i>, and for this reason, McCloud argues, we’re far more likely to project ourselves onto it. The more details you add, the more potential there becomes for the image to break with how you see yourselves, and the more layers of potential detachment you’ve now added to the character. A smiley face could be literally anyone, of any race, age, gender. A detailed drawing of, say, Wonder Woman is a <i>specific</i> person, one with whom you’re likely to have certain differences.<br />
<br />
Obviously that doesn’t mean you can’t relate to, or like, a detailed character; it’s just that that, unless you’re a statuesque Amazon brunette, that lavishly rendered Wonder Woman is someone else. The smiley face is YOU.<br />
<br />
Of course books take you even more deeply into the character’s heads, but in the kind of story in which we can actually SEE our protagonist, only cartooning really allows for this “pure” a level of projection. But of course this whole principle exists along a continuum: a character played by an actor, for instance, presents us with a specific person, who, by definition, isn’t “us”. However, if the actor is a white male, it’s statistically more likely (in North America) that we’ll be able to project ourselves onto that character than if the actor is a black woman, for instance.<br />
<br />
Yes, this is a ludicrous oversimplification that completely discounts the ability of humans to feel empathy for someone different. This is actually part of what I want to talk about. But for now, as relates to the “masking” effect, the idea is that the more universal the character, the more heightened the ability one has to project yourself onto them. Once you cast an actor to play your character, you’re limiting the ability of some of your audience to literally see themselves in their shoes in this way, but you can still trend towards the most “universal” type of look, be it in terms of race, gender (you’ve instantly got to discount 50% of the population there, no matter which way you go!), age, height, weight, etc. etc. etc.<br />
<br />
And yeah, I think you may be getting an inkling of why this is a problem.<br />
<br />
This goes beyond visuals; the same principle holds true of basic narrative, too. Consider this guy:
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
We’ve all heard more than we ever needed to about the “Hero’s Journey” and the “Monomyth” and all of Joseph Campbell’s theories in relation to Star Wars—which has, of course, become the template for much of pop culture. Well, what is “The Hero With A Thousand Faces” but a narrative application of the masking effect? Luke Skywalker’s a bland character—that’s not a bug, that’s a feature. He’s supposed to be a stand-in for the viewer, an empty vessel you can pour yourself into for a purer experience in narrative immersion.<br />
<br />
Han Solo? There’s a character. He’s a specific person. Because of that, he works on a different level of narrative immersion—the kind that was more common before Star Wars came along. Because of course we want to be Han Solo. Why wouldn’t you? He’s awesome! He’s a badass smuggler who quips and flies a cool spaceship and gets the girl. Luke may have the awesome laser sword, but I’m guessing more little boys pretended to be Han.<br />
<br />
So that blows my “masking” theory to shreds, right?<br />
<br />
Not really. It’s just that Han represents a different philosophy of storytelling than Luke does. And here’s where we start getting to the root of an issue I have with modern pop culture wizards (because you knew I was going there eventually, right?)<br />
<br />
Movies, in the olden days, strove more for Han-style characters. It’s not that there weren’t bland leads—Lord, were there ever!—but for the most part I don’t think they were trying for that. The idea was generally to produce textured characters who felt like real, which is to say, <i>specific</i> people. I do think there was some understanding of the masking effect, though it may have been rooted more in cultural concerns—of course the hero is going to be a square-jawed white guy—or marketing ones (as with the sudden shift to teenage heroes in the postwar years as they became a lucrative market). The idea of appealing to as broad a part of the population as possible isn’t some revelation, and “viewer insert” characters.<br />
<br />
But there was something else at work: movies knew they set the trends for culture, and that people would look up to them to a certain extent. The people who made movies knew that if they could make X look cool, people would flock to X. Humphrey Bogart wasn’t an everyman. Marilyn Monroe wasn’t an everywoman. They were who they were, and people tried to be like <i>them</i>. Not vice versa. The movies, and thus pop culture, were dominated by the Han Solos.<br />
<br />
This is one of many things Star Wars changed when everyone decided it was going to be the new bedrock for genre storytelling. The use of the masking effect was one of George Lucas’s triumphs, and it’s probably the single greatest reason that Star Wars was glommed onto as a formula—it (supposedly) provides a quick, easy way to make sure your audience of desirably young and cash-flush nerds can instantly relate to and love your story. Make your lead a bland everyman, and the viewer will fill in the blank themselves—with themselves. This is why, for instance, Harry Potter is such a blank slate, while his friends and teachers and enemies are so much more vivid characters. It’s why so many movies about other cultures are seen through the eyes of a white American, a la “Dances With Wolves”. And it’s why Hollywood is stocked full of blandly pretty leading men and women.<br />
<br />
Perhaps you’ve noticed that I’ve gone from implicitly praising the masking effect to condemning it. In truth, the masking effect can be employed in far more sophisticated and complex ways. It’s shorthand, a nifty technique that can be laudable in the right hands. There’s nothing wrong with using a viewer insertion character to ease us into a strange world, for instance. But like so many useful artistic techniques, Hollywood has tried to reduce it to a formula, a crutch, or just an excuse to deliver vapid, bland characters. Perhaps more destructively, it’s led to a pop culture where so many protagonists are white heterosexual males in their late teens-early 30s without a distinctive job or any particularly strong beliefs, cultural background, or engagement in the world.<br />
<br />
Because the problem is that we still crave Han Solos. Sure, we like being fooled into projecting ourselves into the role of a hero. But we can only be met halfway on this. On some level, when we read or watch stories, we’re looking for role models and aspirational figures. We need someone to admire. The masking effect essentially turns protagonists into mirrors—and thus, we’re constantly being told that <i>we’re</i> the heroes, <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%E2%80%9D" http:="http:" v="m3SjCzA71eM”" watch="watch" www.youtube.com="www.youtube.com">if just for one day.</a> (Not a coincidence that there are quote marks around that title!) As flattering as that may be, at the end of the day it becomes hollow, a deification of emptiness. If you keep portraying heroes who aren’t fully realized, who stumble through the world without viewpoints or ideas, who are only there to have things <i>happen</i> to them—then that’s the kind of figure people will start emulating.<br />
<br />
But then, maybe that’s for the best. Those are exactly the kind of people who are easiest to sell movie tickets to. And everything else.<br />
<br />
(I’ll have more to say on this subject after the holidays. Can you stand the suspense?!?)
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-67420229398941274822012-12-21T21:06:00.000-08:002012-12-21T21:06:41.030-08:00Fourth World Fridays: The Forever People #6--"The Omega Effect!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld26.jpg" /><br />
<br />
<i>The Forever People</i> is becoming quite the saga at this point—it’s the closest of the Fourth World books to the formula Marvel had evolved at that point, of endless, ongoing plot threads that weave in and out of an interconnected narrative. We’re now on our fourth issue that comes in sequence, and this is only made more explicit by the return of Glorious Godfrey and his Justifiers, who as you may recall were instrumental in the capture of the Forever People at the end of issue #3. The FP’s had left their vehicle, the Super-Cycle, on the cliff’s above Godfrey’s revival tent, and now a swarm of Justifiers in goofy flying shoes come across it and attempt to destroy it . <br />
<br />
However, as the captions tell us…“On New Genesis, the creed is <b>“life!”</b> Programmed to ward off “death”, the “Super-cycle” <b>defends</b> itself!!!” Kirby, it seems, enjoyed using “quotation marks” for “no reason”. <br />
<br />
The Super-cycle does an Optimus Prime bit and morphs into a high-tech self-defending fortress with, as far as I can make out, a radar dish made out of one of the wheels, and a laser gun formed from the chrome headers:<br />
<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld26a.jpg" /><br />
<br />
It incapacitates the patrol and earns the ire of Godfrey, who then sends an entire legion of new recruits to take the thing on (I couldn’t help chuckling—and thinking of Anakin Skywalker—as the recruits scream “YAHOOO!!!” with childlike glee on being sent out as cannon fodder.) “What’s the secret, Godfrey?” Asks his bespectacled sidekick. “The <b>helmet?</b> The <b>uniform?</b> The <b>creed??</b>” “Earthmen are given all those things at <b>birth!!</b>” beams Godfrey. “I merely <b>justify</b> their readiness to use them!!” Hey! I wasn’t issued a helmet and uniform at birth! Ripoff!!<br />
<br />
Anyway, back to the FPs themselves. As you may recall, in the last few issues the Forever People were captured by Darkseid and held captive in Desaad’s torture palace/amusement park, Happyland, until their Mother Box escaped and found a warrior named Sonny Sumo who came and rescued them. Sonny also turned out to possess the power of the Anti-Life Equation which, when used in conjunction with the Mother Box, could be used to destroy free will, and Sonny is currently using it over the park’s loudspeaker to get the guards to surrender and release the prisoners. <br />
<br />
Last time I mentioned that it was a little creepy to see the good guys wielding such a nasty power, and in this issue there’s at least some brief discussion of the morality of this. Obviously I can’t really blame them for making use of this ability when thrust into such a tight spot, but Beautiful Dreamer still comments on how “horrible” it is. Mark Moonrider says that, “as <b>wielder</b> of the power, Sonny Sumo is even <b>greater</b> than <b>Darkseid</b> himself!!” which seems like something you might not want to advertise. I mean, what if Sonny decides he likes using this power so much that he’s not going to give it up? It’s a lucky thing he’s shown himself to be such a noble warrior with a great moral code and all that. Also, what would happen if Sonny was to encounter Darkseid himself and start ordering *him* around? <br />
<br />
It’s hard not to be a little frustrated here, since Kirby was trying to make a profound comic in some ways, that he pretty much ditched all these questions as soon as they come up. I guess that, for Kirby, when the urge to make a comic that “said something” conflicted with the urge to make a crazy explosive punch-up, the latter won out. It pretty much gets to the root of what I was saying earlier, about superhero comics being somewhat limited in their addressing of more subtle or complex topics due to their insistence on good guys and bad guys. Oh well.<br />
<br />
Moonrider blasts a few bits of machinery, starting a chain reaction that causes Happyland to destroy itself. The prisoners crawl to safety, and the police arrive to arrest the meekly compliant guards (though, somehow, the Justifiers get away in their boxy shuttlecraft). Or, at least, most of them do—Big Bear manages to grab hold of one of them as he’s leaving and starts clowning around with it, thus providing this issue’s requisite Big Bear is Awesome moment: <br />
<br />
JUSTIFIER: Mad-dog <b>hippie!!</b> You’re holding back this tonnage with your bare hands!!...<br />
BIG BEAR: My stars, sir!! Can it be that <b>high density</b> atoms flow through, and reinforce my <b>own</b> atomic structure?<br />
JUSTIFIER: You moving <b>mattress!!</b> You’re from <b>New Genesis!!</b> <br />
<i>(He shoots at Big Bear, grazing his skull. Big Bear makes a goofy face.)</i> <br />
BIG BEAR: <b>Oops!!</b> Well, <b>Big Bear</b> is my name, sir! – and <b>power</b> is my game!! That’s my bag, sir!! I store an <b>excess</b> of free atoms and send them where they’re <b>needed!! Here,</b> perhaps!!!<br />
<br />
Then he hits the bottom of the shuttle and sends the Justifier flying, cartoon-like, out of frame. <br />
<br />
(If they ever make a movie of the Fourth World, Big Bear will have to be played by a young version of Brian Blessed. Or possibly Jonathan Rhys-Davies.) <br />
<br />
More Justifiers streak in and start firing before being put to sleep by Sonny’s voice power. “I’m <b>glad</b> you stopped this, Sonny!” proclaims Beautiful Dreamer. “Big Bear could have <b>hurt</b> these men!!” Sonny expresses confusion: “But I thought I was saving <b>him!!</b>” Like Big Bear ever needs saving, Sonny. He’s mostly just ticked off about “getting involved in <b>all</b> kinds of violence!!”<br />
<br />
Off in the corner, Darkseid and Desaad are having a petty and slightly pathetic blame-fest of a conversation, in which Desaad whinges and Darkseid verbally lambastes him. “<b>Don’t</b> think I shall overlook your cowardice!! Then, all tormentors are <b>notorious</b> for this trait!!” As Desaad points out that there’s not much he can do against the Anti-Life Equation, Darkseid responds with, “<b>Boldness, </b> Desaad! <b>Risk!!</b> The raw meat of existence!!! <b>I</b> shall <b>strike</b> with these!!...And the <b>Omega Effect!!!</b>” Yeah, that’s right, Darkseid, castigate him for not taking risks, then whip out this heretofore-unseen superpower of yours that will let you destroy them all by remote control, without even leaving the room. That’s risk for you. Douchebag. <br />
<br />
Darkseid proceeds to generate “finder beams” that shoot out of his eyes and start swooping around in vast curlicues. They don’t have far to look at first: Vykin the Black, hotheaded as always, has decided to barge in and confront Darkseid alone. This is really, really stupid, as, in traditional horror-movie fashion, the black guy dies first. Or gets eradicated from existence first. Yes, the Omega Effect is “The end—the total wipe-out!”, and now it’s streaking around, seeking the FPs. <br />
<br />
Mark yells at Sonny to use the Mother Box to protect them, but Sonny and Mother Box are the next ones to go. One by one the FPs are annhiliated by the beams—Moonrider tells the remaining FPs to split up, but oddly, Beautiful Dreamer declares that she won’t leave him, and they go “foom” together. (That’s a little strange—there’d been a vague assumption on my part that Mark and Dreamer are lovers, but this is the closest thing we get to confirmation. And even this is a little vague, to say the least.) <br />
<br />
The only one left is Serifan, who immediately breaks down sobbing and attempts to move into the path of the beam to end it all. What a wuss. Unfortunately for him (?) Darkseid turns off the finder beams, having lost interest in killing them all now that “the threat to us—has <b>passed!!</b>” Desaaad screams at him “You would leave such a dramatic experience <b>incomplete? No, sire, no!</b>” But Darkseid slaps him away. The kicker is that I would have bought it much more easily if he’d simply said that he wanted to keep Serifan alive and tormented by the knowledge that he’d failed—I mean, I agree Serifan doesn’t seem like much of a threat—but Darkseid explicitly says that he “doesn’t have the stomach” for Desaad’s sadism. So he’s decided to act like an idiot instead?<br />
<br />
It gets even worse: Darkseid suddenly confesses that he didn’t actually destroy the Forever People: he just removed them from existence…in the present. OK, this makes no sense. It’s the height of convenient “villain leaves the room” behaviour that assures these guys will always be defeated. And besides, he just teleported the guy with the Anti-Life Equation—you know, the thing he’s utterly fixated on finding?—completely beyond his own reach. Smooth, Darkseid!<br />
<br />
Serifan pulls himself together for the nonce, piles into the Justifier’s shuttle which Big Bear captured and uses it to head back to the super-cycle. Unfortunately, he manages to arrive just as the Justifiers from before launch their attack on it. (Wait—it took them all day to climb the cliffs?) Anyway, we’re now To Be Continued once more…<br />
<br />
But wait! There’s a double-dose of Big Bear awesomeness in this issue, with a short back-up feature about he and Serifan fighting off an Apokoliptish patrol back in the days before the two planets openly went to war. Well, actually, it’s about Big Bear fighting them off, and Serifan whining and almost getting killed. My favourite moment is when Serifan glimpses the gigantic cannon the intruders plan to use to bring down Supertown: “It’s a horribly ugly pollutant!” Um, and it’s also about to wreck your home, Serifan. I’m concerned about the environment too, but geez. Meanwhile, Big Bear shows up carrying a huge log, gets shot at, declares “You’ve destroyed my exercise!” and proceeds to trash the invaders. Both of these guys are delusional and self-absorbed, but only one of them is AWESOME. Guess which.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-65707386091320036482012-12-05T19:35:00.002-08:002012-12-05T19:38:11.629-08:00Comics Quickies: Saga<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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I'm strangely conflicted about Brian K. Vaughn as a writer. It's not that I don't like his comics; indeed, his work is usually a must-buy for me. But as much as I enjoy his stuff while I'm reading it, in the days afterwards there's always a cascade of "refrigerator moments" where the narrative logic starts to fray, or I start to find some of his narrative cutesiness and SHOCKING TWISTS annoying or cheap in retrospect. But the biggest criticism I have of him is that he's one of these guys who feels like he'd rather be writing for TV or movies--indeed, Vaughn wrote multiple episodes of LOST--and this sensibility mars his comics somewhat. As propulsive and page-turning as they are, the pacing and structure is pure TV, with little attempt to make use of the medium of comics. Even the visuals in his comics tend to be pretty low-key and mundane, relying heavily on naturalism, real-world reference, and the "acting" of his characters. To his credit, he almost always pulls this off, which is a testament to the quality of the artists he's worked with as much as his writing, but it's disappointing to see his focus lie so far from the kind of stuff comics can achieve.<br />
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Which is what's refreshing about <b>Saga</b>. This new epic SF/fantasy hybrid comic sees Vaughn stepping well outside his comfort zone, tackling more grandiose and comic-y subject matter, and even starting to take advantage of the visual possibilities of the medium in a way he generally doesn't. Some of the credit here must surely go to his artist, Fiona Staples, whose style is looser and more expressionistic than <b>Y: The Last Man</b>'s Pia Guerra or <b>Ex Machina</b>'s Tony Harris, but there's an overall feeling that Vaughn is stretching himself, too, creating narrative captions that are scrawled diagrammatically across the panels, robots who communicate their inner thoughts by flashing pictures on their TV-screen heads, and an unrelentingly fantastical universe full of weird imagery.<br />
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Though set against the backdrop of an intergalactic war and filled with pulp SF tropes like spaceships, robots, bounty hunters and pleasure planets, Saga is really a fantasy story in the sprawling, multi-book mode we're all familiar with. It opens with the narrator's birth, which makes it safe to assume that events will be playing out over an extensive period of time, and possibly spanning multiple generations, as the title would suggest. For now, the focus is on Marko, a horned magic-user, and Alana, a winged high-tech warrior, whose planets are at brutal, unending war. The two have defied their respective governments by falling in love, marrying, and producing a child, and now they're on the run across the planet, and eventually the galaxy, pursued by bounty hunters and a member of a strange, as-yet-unexplained robot royal family. The world Vaughn creates is rich and detailed and full of imagination, setting a grand stage for years of adventures to come, and his characterizations are more heartfelt than usual (though Alana can sometimes fall into the reflexive, hipper-than-thou posturing a lot of Vaughn's characters are guilty of). Vaughn has, ironically, stretched himself by embracing what could be considered a more traditional "comic book world", and the results are quite appealling. While the cynic in me is positive Saga will eventually fall prey to the slightly rushed and credibility-straining plotting that dogged Y and Ex Machina (though admittedly it never completely derailed either of those series), for now, Saga is another typically strong start for Vaughn, and an interesting promise of something different than what he usually offers. Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-36092516559131277182012-11-24T16:59:00.005-08:002012-11-24T17:00:32.223-08:00Treklife: This Is Not The Kirk I Was Promised<br />
I only watched the classic Trek for the first time in its entirety a few years ago. As a <a href="http://phantasmicblog.blogspot.ca/2012/11/a-life-in-trek.html">TNG-loving teen</a> I'd made a few attempts over the years, most notably dipping into a Trek marathon that aired on Canada's Space Station over...the holidays, I think? Or possibly while I was out of school, sick? I honestly don't remember, though being sick might explain my inability to engage with it. Or maybe that's just because I was, y'know, a teenager. Camp is the bane of teenagers, and TOS was campy even at the time it was made. I was outgrowing the kinds of clunky TV shows I'd uncritically consumed as a kid and embracing a whole new set of supposedly cooler shows, ones that offered more superficial appeal and engaged with my adolescent reptile thrill-seeking brain. You know the drill. You went through it yourself.<br />
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This dorky, extremely low-budget series with its hammy acting was too ripe for my newly minted sense of reflexive irony. I've actually always been a little more open towards older movies and TV shows than many, even as a kid, but Trek just didn't click. I think it might have been the fact that it was nominally connected to The Next Generation--instead of being free to be its own thing, I could only view it through the lens of the new show. I ended up sitting there and nitpicking how ridiculous the Klassic Klingons looked and trying to concoct reasons for why the Cardassians or the Ferengi weren't on anyone's radar back then. <br />
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As an older, "wiser" specimen, I've actually found my tastes becoming broader and my willingness to engage with art on its own terms expanding, and thus, with J. J. Abrams' reboot was threatening to hit the screens, I borrowed the box sets from a friend and delved in.<br />
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(My thoughts on Abrams' remake have cooled quite a bit, but I enjoyed it at the time, and in fact wrote <a href="http://phantasmicblog.blogspot.ca/2009/05/hey-ive-always-wondered-if-spock-is.html">this snotty review of Trek in general</a> that ticked a lot of people off. I did mean it tongue-in-cheek, but yeah, that was kind of dickish of me. You should probably read that before continuing.)<br />
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I think one of the things that caused me to write that review--that caused me to fall away from Trek in the first place--was my reading about the backstage travails of how it came to the screen. You see, I really *believed* in the ideals of Trek. I still do. Exploration, rationality, communication and compromise, striving towards a better future. These have become a major part of my moral makeup, and Trek is a big part of why. And I was naive enough to believe that the show's creators shared these ideals.<br />
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But of course, it's just a fucking TV show.<br />
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It's not even some story of Hollywood backbiting that drove me off (though it became clear later that Rick Berman was quite a tool.) It was the underlying cynicism and laziness that was beginning to seep into the show, the way the writers didn't seem to care much about exploring the issues they raised anymore, the way continuity was shredded and characters treated callously. Basically, all the stuff I wrote about in my last post on the subject. But it was exacerbated by my growing awareness of the way TV shows were made.<br />
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Look, I'm aware that art isn't some perfect, pure process in which the muses flit down on wings of saffron and caress the artist's brow to provide inspiration, and even if it were the process of getting it to the screen would require change and compromise. I know that the ethereal, platonic magic that stirs your soul has to go through a mundane process of realization, which <i>can</i> be reduced to charts and graphs and scripts and outlines and formulas. All artists have a physical process. I know that <i>now</i>. <br />
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But at the time I felt deeply, deeply betrayed by uncovering Trek's relationship to showbiz, and combined with the way that, in the latter seasons of TNG, no one involved seemed to care all that much, it provoked a hostililty that lingered all the way to 2009, when I wrote that review.<br />
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So there's that.<br />
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Really, though, what I was still reeling from--and what I now find fascinating--is just to what degree classic Trek isn't the thing everyone seems to think it is.<br />
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We all know the litany: a post-scarcity future with prosperity and enlightenment for all. The Vulcan reverence for Logic. The Prime Directive. The emphasis on communication and co-operation. The glimpse of a better future for mankind. These are things that have a powerful appeal.<br />
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Which is why it's so astounding that the classic series was so conflicted about all this stuff.<br />
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Decades later, Roddenberry and the fans codified the above ideas as the core of Trek, and it's been that way since the movies. But the thing is, Roddenberry wasn't that great a writer, and he left a lot of the work to a talented team that seemed to have different ideas about what Trek would be. This clash of ideologies made it into everyone's Platonic ideal of the show to a degree, but Roddenberry's vision has been the one that prevailed.<br />
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Roddenberry clearly was a socialist democrat who believed in military
adventurism (I’d argue he was more mainstream in the 60s, some of the
more offbeat stuff that crept into his thinking–a slightly creepy
collectivism, for instance–having come later) but the show had
libertarian and counterculture writers as well. Likewise there are
episodes like “The Way to Eden” which is pretty contemptuous of the
youth culture of the time, yet a lot of other Trek stories seem to
embrace it in more subtle ways, particularly the idea that there’s
something ridiculous about authority and that love, peace and harmony
can triumph over evil (and “Way of the Gun” sees the crew using passive
resistance and an oddly Buddhist mindset to overcome violence.) There
are episodes that can be read as both for and against the Vietnam war
(which is really what the Prime Directive was about in the first place)
and episodes that are both for and against organized religion.<br />
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As for
Spock, he definitely seems to have been created as a straw man--someone to show the value of humanity and the perils of relying on logic entirely. And yet
it doesn’t take too long before the writers seem to start siding with Spock on a lot of things–in fact, he almost seems to be the representative
for the counterculture at times, his spirituality being almost as big a
point as his logic. In “Space Seed” Spock is appalled to hear everyone
else speaking well of Khan, and I can’t imagine we aren’t supposed to,
at the very least, sympathize, if not completely agree. (And it’s
interesting to me that the supposedly detached, logical character is the
one taking the firm moral stance while the more emotional humans can
admire the historical monster, if somewhat back-handedly; conventional
storytelling would have flipped that to criticize Spock's logic, but here it seems like humanity is the one that’s in
danger of falling under the sway of a charismatic figure.) Of course
there are plenty of “silly Spock, there’s more to life than logic”
episodes as well, but the character was no Agent Scully, there just to
voice the “wrong” opinions. (Actually I’d argue even Agent Scully wasn’t
an Agent Scully, but I’m drifting from the point here.) <br />
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Likewise, there's the idea of a post-scarcity society without money, which looms so large over
discussions of Trek, but which barely seems present on the original
series. It’s implied by the replicators and so on, but the way
everyone’s needs seem to be taken care of could be chalked up just as
much to the fact that this is a pseudo-military organization as to
anything else. Isn’t there discussion of mercantile arrangements in the
early episodes? Isn’t Harry Mudd basically a con artist? What’s he
swindling people out of if not their money? And I could have sworn
Scotty or someone mentioned getting paid, though of course he could have
been speaking figuratively. <br />
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Finally, there's the Prime Directive. The fact that Kirk violated the Directive practically every week is, by now, a cliche, but what's even more interesting is that, looking at the original series in isolation I honestly couldn’t tell you if the writers meant for it to be seen as a good thing or a bad thing. It often seems more like a dramatic obstacle than a philosophy, something that was just there so that Kirk could show off what a badass renegade he was--the Cop Who Plays By His Own Rules transposed into the 23rd century. And indeed, Starfleet in general seems to be heavily populated with stiff bureaucrats who exist only to make Kirk's life miserable.<br />
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Utopian future? I don't think so.<br />
<br />
It's a fascinating series precisely because of these contradictions, and it's ironic that the show's own creator asserting his creative vision arguably produced something less interesting. It's certainly a handy riposte to people who think Trek's vision of a relentlessly positive future is naive or unworkable: that vision <i>never really existed...</i><br />
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<br />Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-64352036968614624532012-11-23T18:43:00.002-08:002012-11-23T18:44:22.513-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Mister Miracle #5--"Murder Machine!"<br />
<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld25.jpg" /><br />
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I <b>love</b> that cover. I love that Vundabar wasn’t quite certain enough of the flamethrower and the gun and the <i>A-bomb</i>, so he added a dagger. To kill a guy fully encased in a <i>metal casket</i>. <br />
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Proving that shamelessly gratuitous cheesecake pinups are just as much a part of Kirby’s <i>ouevre</i> as any other adventure artist’s, this issue opens with a full-page splash of Barda in her red bikini mode, doing calisthenics. He even provides audience surrogates, in the form of a bunch of deliverymen who have come to deliver a civil war cannon Scott’s ordered, but get an eyeful of Barda and make construction-worker noises at her. She of course puts them in their place by picking up the 20-ton cannon (with one hand!) and carting it off, leading to the traditional “This ‘women’s lib’ thing is getting more <b>serious</b> than I thought!” reaction. <br />
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A word, please? If you don’t mind? Thank you. I’m 100% on the side of feminist superhero fans who find the subculture creepy and weird and misogynist at times, but I don’t think stuff like gratuitous shots of a muscular, bikini-clad woman exercising is what bothers them. I think the real sticking point is when female characters are badly or thinly written AND they’re constantly being offered up for oglement by the artist. The female character serves no point and is in no way memorable or interesting except as a sex object—hence “objectification”. <br />
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There’s a certain trope comics frequently use to try and spackle over this kind of exploitation, namely, the “Generic Kickass Female” argument. The character is superficially heroic, strong, can fight off an army of ninjas with one hand behind her back, etc. So, argue the writers and artists, she’s a positive female role model! That’s all well and good, but just making her “kickass” doesn’t totally mitigate the sexism. Turning a vapid, scantily-clad sexpot into a vapid, scantily-clad sexpot who punches people a lot is not exactly a great blow for women’s rights; it’s just a knee-jerk bit of ass-covering. And honestly, it’s become such a cliché that it always bothers me when it shows up.<br />
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So why don’t I think the brazenly cheescakey Barda sequences in Mister Miracle count against this? Well, the answer is more or less implied by the above. Barda is not only a memorable character, she often comes close to overshadowing the hero of the book by force of her personality alone. Furthermore, she’s not really a traditional image of beauty (maybe less so now than in 1971, but still). If anything, this whole sequence is a pretty solid example of being sexy without being exploitative. Still, I had to admit I was rolling my eyes a bit at the deliverymen’s “Bu-WHA?!?” reaction. <br />
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But on to the actual story, which, fortuitously for my purposes, involves one of those villains that only Kirby could have thought up. Okay, maybe he’s not the only one who could have thought him up, but he’s the only one who would have done so and then actually had the guts to build a comic book around him.<br />
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His name is Doctor Virman Vundabar.<br />
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<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld25a.jpg" /><br />
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And yes, he’s basically a cartoonish, 19th century Prussian dictator. <br />
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For the record, I’m pretty sure that Kirby was somewhat aware of the camp value of this comic and even saw it as a selling point; witness Big Bear’s comments about their décor in <i>The Forever People</i> #2. And this is a comic book, which at that time still benefited from being cheap, disposable entertainment for kids, and could thus get away with stuff most other media couldn’t. <br />
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Still, Vundabar is pushing it. And yet, Kirby manages to add another, interesting level to all this later on, as we’ll see. <br />
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At the moment, one of Vundabar’s lackeys, name of Hydrik, is displaying his prototype deathtrap which Vundabar, natch, intends to use on Mr. Miracle. The trap—in which a dummy is shackled to a hydraulic spinner—is a pretty spectacular failure; not only does it self-destruct, but the Mister Miracle dummy is thrown clear! The point being to demonstrate that Miracle would have escaped, but honestly, the fact that a <i>lifeless mannekin</i> was able to escape shows that Hydrik’s competence at building deathtraps is roughly akin to that of a Narwhal’s. To top it all off, Hydrik’s machine “severely impairs” him when it explodes, and a sneering Vundabar puts a bullet in his head as he lies there helplessly. You know, I know it’s standard M.O. for supervillains to cack a henchman or two to prove their evilness, but this one bordered on a mercy killing.<br />
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Meanwhile, Scott is setting up his new civil war cannon (where’d he get the money to afford that, again?) while Oberon complains that Scott’s got him dressed up in a Confederate outfit. Or maybe it’s a Union. Whichever one is blue. (Hey, I’m a Canadian. We didn’t learn this stuff in school.) Of course, Oberon’s complaints that Scott is robbing him of his dignity are entirely justified, but he continues to go along with it after Scott gives him an extremely perfunctory “Hey, you’re as important to the act as I am!” speech. <br />
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At least Oberon manages to wheedle some more information out of Scott and his backstory while he’s about it. Scott explains about Granny’s Orphanage between his escape from being strapped to the cannon while it’s lit (a pretty perfunctory escape, actually, though Oberon naturally does a lot of squealing about it). We get the basic idea that we’ve pretty much already figured out: that there’s a weird, never-fully-explained code of honour restricting the Apokoliptians from just tromping over and killing Scott…despite the fact that they fight dirty on several occasions. <br />
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Perhaps more interesting is that extra layer to the inherent campiness of the comic that I was talking about earlier. Vundabar, like Scott himself, is an alumnus of the orphanage, where, it’s now made clear, the orphans were given silly names in Kirby’s homage to <i>Oliver Twist</i>. But more than that, they were given ridiculous identities, themes, and traits by Granny, and by extension, Darkseid. Vundabar took his to extremes, but all the orphans of Apokalips have had their personalities, basically, <i>assigned</i> to them—which makes their goofiness kind of tragic, when you think about it. It’s a very nice fit with the themes of the comic, and the Fourth World as a whole: the various ridiculous personalities of the Apokaliptians are a cruel joke on the part of Darkseid, and a measure of just how determined he is to control everyone and everything. He’s essentially condemning his soldiers to lifelong humiliation, and getting them to play along with the joke. Scott’s escaped from this humiliation just as he’s escaped from his homeworld, by building his own personality.<br />
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(Though there’s a bit of an irony here, in that Granny named him “Scott Free”….so by rebelling and escaping, he’s still fulfilling the destiny Darkseid handed down to him. Which adds yet another level of complexity to Darkseid’s motivations, which I’ll discuss in a later entry.)<br />
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Anyway, while Scott and Oberon are rehearsing, Barda’s completing her cheesecake quota for the issue by splashing around in a nearby pond. She reflects on how much pleasant it is here than on Apokalips, though interestingly when she name-drops Darkseid, even negatively, she can’t help but add “great” to the beginning of his name, a nice, subtle way of reinforcing just how much brainwashing she’s undergone. Meanwhile, a bunch of Granny’s pointy-headed troops have snuck up behind her, but of course Barda’s too good to be taken by surprise like that; she activates her armour, which materializes around her, and begins laying waste. So naturally the pointy-heads have a secret weapon up their sleeve to conveniently neutralize her so they can carry her off. Even though she put in a good showing, I still say she went down a little too easily for the kick-assiest warrior babe of the Fourth World, but never mind. <br />
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Scott catches sight of the “Magna-lift” as it departs over the treetops, and somehow intuits that Barda’s been kidnapped, which means of course that it’s time to summon his aero-discs and follow after. Scott somehow further intuits that Barda’s been taken to the remote Barclay Canyon, and even more astonishingly, figures out that it’s Virman Vundabar who took her. Man, Scott’s become a psychic. Sure enough, he finds a bright orange complex waiting for him with Vundabar’s image greeting him on an image=screen at one end. “It probably also serves as a <b>door</b> to your trap! Very <b>efficient</b>, Virman!!!” Um, <i>that’s</i> how you prove Virman’s love of efficiency? What about the fact that he went to all the trouble of kidnapping Barda, even though Bedlam was able to sucker him in just by offering a challenge? <br />
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Vundabar starts ordering Scott to enter the compound. “<b>What</b> if I tell you to go blow your nose!?!” spits Scott, master of the snappy comeback. (As you’ll recall from the end of issue #2.) But of course, Vundabar’s offering Barda’s life in exchange for Scott’s compliance, so he steps onto the track and is immediately encased in the conveyor belt o’ doom pictured on the cover. On the next page, he’s battered by giant metal hammers and electrocuted by what Vundabar’s new henchman Klepp calls "a <b>controlled</b> atom blast”. Vundabar refuses to gloat until he knows for certain Scott is dead, but lest you gain any respect for him at this point, he then turns his attention away to provoke Barda. There’s an interesting exchange here:<br />
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BARDA: That’s why I deserted Apokolips! I can <b>no</b> longer soldier in the company of <b>twisted</b> fiends like yourself-who worship their <b>power</b>--more than <b>Darkseid!</b><br />
VUNDABAR: <b>Silence!</b> I want no further <b>blasphemy! Great Darkseid</b> rules Apokolips like a <b>colossus!!</b> His is the creed of destruction! --<b>Not</b> fair play! I accommodate my <b>whims</b>--but I also know that my opponent must be <b>destroyed!</b><br />
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OK, that’s pretty confusing. Shouldn’t Vundabar be saying, “<i>Darkseid</i> accommodates my whims”? How do you accommodate your own whims? But the general idea here seems to be that Barda is accusing Vundabar of being disloyal to Darkseid, in a purely intellectual sense at least. What’s more, she seems to be admitting that she still feels loyalty to Darkseid! Or rather, that she’s still committed to the <i>idea</i> of Darkseid. This seems to be a case of being so faithful to the image of someone that you have to rebel against them when they fail to live up to their own standards. Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see what happens when the two of them meet…<br />
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Anyway, the Murder Machine passes through flamethrowers and then an acid pit at the end that melts it into nothingness. The toadying Klepp proceeds to ask “If I cannot laugh now, please allow me to <b>applaud!!</b>” To which Vundabar replies, “Laugh away, Klepp! Here -! I’ll <b>join</b> you! <b>AHAHAHAHAHA!!</b>” That’s pretty funny—Vundabar apparently doesn’t allow himself to laugh very often. <br />
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And need I point out that Mr. Miracle is standing right behind him in this panel, looking smug?<br />
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Yet again, the villains are horrified to find that Scott escaped from a locked cabinet which they couldn’t see inside of. “A <b>mother-box!</b>” Screams Vundabar. “With the aid of a Mother-box, you <b>thinned</b> your atomic structure and <b>transferred</b> yourself <b>out</b> of that coffer!” “<b>Not so!</b>” replies Scott. “Even in the ‘crunch’ I play it fair—and you <b>know</b> it!!! You thought of everything, Vundabar--<b>except</b> the <b>soles of my shoes!!</b> You <b>couldn’t</b> see the laser-jets activate!! The jets burned <b>through</b> my foot clamps but <b>not</b> those that held the coffer fast to the moving track! Then, with a short by powerful laser beam, I blasted <b>downward!!</b>” And crawled out through the hole, digging downwards and coming up behind Vundabar.<br />
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So, um. Using the Mother Box is cheating…but using foot-rockets isn’t? This is what keeps bothering me about this comic. Most of the time, Scott escapes simply by using whatever gadgets he happens to have brought with him, even if we’ve never heard of them up ‘til now. Scott rarely uses actual escape skill or even his wits to get away. Sometimes it’s worse than others—the “Paranoid Pill” business was actually pretty clever—but this falls under the discussion of whether Superman is a lousy hero because he can save lives and do what’s right without much exertion on his part. <br />
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Anyway, Vundabar immediately proceeds to try and cheat by blasting Scott at point-blank range, whereupon the floor collapses underneath them—Scott had dug it away, after all. He then lifts Barda in the classic “Creature From the Black Lagoon” pose and carries her off. <br />
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<img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld25b.jpg" /><br />
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Wow, condescending much, Scott? So much for powerful female role models…Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-45505951647799425262012-11-21T20:40:00.001-08:002012-11-21T20:41:19.844-08:00In Praise of Mediocrity<br />
So <i>Star Wars.</i><br />
<br />
Someone tweeted recently (sorry, I can't remember who or I'd attribute it) that there was no better exemplar of the human capacity for optimism than the speed at which "New Star Wars" went from a punchline to a prayer. It's particularly bizarre when you consider that this is inspired by the series creator very deliberately bowing out of being directly creatively involved and handing over control to a massive multinational corporation. Seriously, that sentence I just wrote, divorced from context, makes me want to jump off the nearest balcony.<br />
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But blow me if the recent proceedings haven't been filling me with a thrill of hope. In spite of everything, Star Wars is still something I care about--not the merchandising and spinoffs and gubbery per se, but the original three films. I still think they're an incredible feat of filmmaking and resonate with me on a primal level that I'll never be able to put aside entirely, for all the intellectual arguments (many of which I accept) for how lame and culturally reactionary they are, how they damaged film as an artform and turned SF and Fantasy from the genres of imagination and ideas to a bunch of formulaic whizz-bangery. They still work, goddammit. And the chance of getting more that might work on the level that the classic films do is something that can legitimately get me excited. <br />
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To be clear here, I'm not the kind of nerd who wants everything they love on endless replay forever. I was honestly kind of "blah" in the lead-up to The Avengers (which may be why I was able to walk in with reasonable expectations and legitimately enjoy it), I thought the Chris Nolan Batman films probably should have ended with The Dark Knight, and I honestly was not feeling any particular excitement about The Hobbit even before they announced that it was going to be split pointlessly into three films. I can get very excited by the upcoming work of a particular filmmaker, but "franchises" do little or nothing for me. <br />
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What's more, I 100% agree with what a number of people are saying, that some of the directors that the nerderati* are excitedly suggesting to helm the new movies are inappropriate because they're too interesting and creative and they don't deserve to be shackled to a massive franchise that will limit their creativity. It's true that Sam Raimi and Chris Nolan were able to bring their talents to bear on major comic-book superhero movies and leverage them into other great movies, but other cinematic talents haven't fared nearly as well. I thought Brian Singer was a legitimately promising director who did a great job with his X-Men films, but somehow jumped the shark in a major way starting with Superman Returns. Peter Jackson was a favourite of mine in the 90s, but Lord of the Rings seems to have sucked him dry of his reckless imagination and ballsiness. Jon Favreau's career suffered major diminishing returns after Iron Man. And I'm honestly kinda worried about Joss Whedon now**. <br />
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*Is that a new word? Did I just create that? Patent pending!<br />
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**Yeah, I still like Joss Whedon. Fuck you.<br />
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Favreau's name has been floated as a likely candidate to direct Star Wars episode VII, though, and I actually think he'd be perfect. This is yet another of the bizarrely paradoxical aspects of how interested I am in this whole announcement. I want certain filmmakers to keep away from new Star Wars for their own sakes, but oddly, I kind of want it for the sake of Star Wars, too.<br />
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Because what works about Star Wars is something very simple and pure. It's become a cliche, but Star Wars really does tap into some of the primal urge for myth-making that we've felt since we were hairy grunting jerks huddled around a campfire, and it weds it both to the old-Hollywood desire to entertain and the geeky proclivity for world-building. It's not about re-inventing cinema, it's about stripping it down to its essence and then encrusting it with a lot of entertaining bric-a-brac. The elegance with which the OT captures this "mythical modern" feel--something that the Prequels quite spectacularly failed to do, of course, and for all that people tear apart the Prequels, that particular shortcoming is rarely mentioned--requires a certain kind of talent to capture. It's very definitely not the province of visionary artists; it's more like the sphere of extra-competent journeymen who somehow capture lightning in a bottle.<br />
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Take, for example, Michael Arndt, who's apparently been hired as head writer for the new trilogy. (Lawrence Kasdan, co-writer of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, was recently announced as probably writing Episode VIII, along with Simon Kinberg, but they're likely to be working from Arndt's outline.) Arndt wrote Little Miss Sunshine, which is a movie I really don't care for. The performances slightly elevate it, but the script is an incredibly cynical and rather formulaic attempt to imitate a "quirkie indie comedy". And yet, somehow, it's these qualities that make me think Arndt's going to be just right for new Star Wars movies. You don't need to have authenticity to write Star Wars. If anything, I feel like that would just get in the way. What you need is a rock-solid understanding of the basics of storytelling, and how to get past your audiences' defenses and give them what they want. To pander, if you will. <br />
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Arndt's apparently taught screenwriting classes using Star Wars as a model for great story structure. He's not wrong. I don't really want this guy within twelve miles of a movie that has a shot at challenging the audience or subverting the rules of drama, but from what little I know about the guy, handing him the keys to Star Wars feels like destiny.<br />
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Which brings me to Favreau. A number of similar journeyman directors have been suggested for this--Joe Johnston, Brad Bird (who's already begged off), Matthew Vaughn. Those are all pretty suitable choices, filmmakers with solid storytelling skills who've mostly been content to stay within the realm of crowd-pleasing spectacle, but who do so very well. Favreau has a couple of extra points in his favour, though: for one thing, he's the first director in a decade to get an actual performance out of Harrison Ford (who I'm really hoping will make one last visit to the Star Wars universe, if only to give Han Solo the send-off he deserves). He also has a great philosophy of special effects, having stated on multiple occasions that it's important not to rely on CGI alone, and that stuff like puppetry and stop-motion can still have a place in modern movies, as demonstrated by his rather charming SF kid's movie Zathura. That sounds like an ideal fit with Star Wars, which showcased some of the wondrous things that can be done with practical effects, before ironically sinking into a quagmire of halfassed CGI with the prequels. Since the visuals and effects are an important part of Star Wars, having Favreau in charge would be genuinely exciting to me. Imagine, this series that set the tone for special effects becoming a celebration of the retro.<br />
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Mostly, though, I like Favreau for this because, even at his worst, he's always understood the need to bring humanity to the biggest blockbusters--and humanity is something that Star Wars has lost rather badly over the decades.<br />
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So essentially, with the new Star Wars movies, we have a weird situation where a ton of individual elements that I don't like very much seem weirdly likely to come together to produce something great.<br />
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Or it could end up sucking really, really badly.<br />
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I have to admit that the latter is every bit as likely as the former. But hey. It's been an increasingly depressing decade for nerd culture. If something like this stirs the embers of optimism in me, no matter how inexplicably, I think it deserves credit for that. <br />
<br />Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-40555105667972308422012-11-16T18:55:00.001-08:002012-11-16T19:03:12.937-08:00Fourth World Fridays: Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #143--"The Genocide Spray!" <br><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld24.jpg"><br /><br />So to recap: the guy who everyone thought was Dracula is actually a microscopic resident of a horned planet that’s hovering in the basement of a mausoleum, surrounded by fog and camera-like objects. And he’s embiggened (OK, I believe the technical term is ‘re-biggulated’) himself in order to discover the date that his creator had planned for the tiny world’s destruction, which for some reason was coded onto the individual Photostat dots of a photograph in the mad scientist’s lab. <br /><br />Now, this being Kirby, most aspects of this bizarre situation are not explained in any way, shape or form, but interestingly enough, <i>one</i> of them is. And the explanation is so bizarre that you’ll be sorry you asked. <br /><br />See, the “cameras” are actually movie projectors…and they’ve been projecting horror movies into the skies of Transilvane for “generations”, causing the sentient inhabitants to mold their entire culture on them. I’m going to assume that time moves faster on Transilvane, since its creator Dabney Donovan (described as “A <b>never-seen</b>, brilliant, <b>wild, wild</b> scientist!”) hasn’t been at this for very long. As for how the Transilvanids actually came to look like vampires and wolfmen, well, we’re told at the very end that “Those people are natural <b>“copiers!”</b> They have a fluid atomic base! After generations of watching <b>sky movies—they became what they saw!!!</b>” <br /><br />MmmmmMMMM, that’s good technobabble.<br /><br />The only explanation the narration gives us for this demented arrangement is that “Scientists are <b>human beings!!</b> And it’s when they play <b>“God”</b>--that human beings make their <b>worst</b> mistakes!!” So I guess Donovan gave into the weak, all-too-human urge to create a miniaturized planet filled with horror movie monsters. You know you’d do the same, in his shoes.<br /><br />Anyway, Superman finds a hidden chamber by moving the arm of a nearby statue, and moving “<b>forward</b> into the <b>strange, dark</b> and <b>goose-bumpy</b> caverns”, he and Jimmy come across Count Dragorin and Lupek resting in their coffins. Except, as Superman theorizes, they aren’t coffins at all, but decompression chambers, necessary for restoring the Transilvanids after their molecular expansion from microscopic to human-sized. <br /><br />My God, I must be reading too many of these comics, because that actually sort of made sense to me.<br /><br />Of course, apparently decompression isn’t enough to stop Lupek from leaping from his coffin behind Superman and leaping on them. Then, while the two of them are distracted, a third Transilvanid, this one looking like Frankenstein’s monster, goes after Jimmy. “<b>Superman!!</b> It’s a <b>triple feature!!</b>” Superman’s elegantly logical solution is to throw the wolfman at the Frankenstein. It’s just basic math, people. <br /><br />Unfortunately, not only are a horde of Transilvanids emerging, but Count Dragorin is now up and active, using “the sign of the Mystican” to…explode Superman and Jimmy. No really. It’s a glowing occult type-sigil that appears on the floor, tracks the heroes like a laser sight, and then goes “WAHAAMMMM” and goes up in a gout of pink smoke (and Kirby Crackle, natch). This puts out Jim and Superman (supposedly, at least). <br /><br />Now it’s back to the Newsboy Legion, who, when last we left them, had found themselves, via a ludicrously unlikely series of coincidences, in the same room with the man who shot their dear friend, the original <strike>Manhattan</strike> Guardian, just as he was announcing that fact loudly into the telephone. “You heard me! I said that you <b>couldn’t</b> have seen the <b>Guardian!</b> Because, detective <b>Jim Harper</b> was the Guardian—and <b>I shot Harper!!</b> I’ll say it <b>again,</b> see! <b>I shot and killed Jim Harper!</b>” I swear, he’s about two panels away from just painting a big bull’s eye on his back. And again I ask, how did this low-level crook know the Guardian’s secret identity? <br /><br />Naturally, the Newsboys try to subdue him, and also naturally, they somehow manage to screw it up. Fortunately, the Intergang types on the other line overhear that our nameless thug has been caught, and send a giant, floating bomb—with a TV monitor on it!—to explode him up real nice. (I love the idea of a bomb with a monitor on it. Intergang clearly has money to burn.) The Newsboys, a few pages later, stumble across his body and decide that justice has been served. Yeah, I’ll say. First this guy practically falls in your lap, then he gets blown up for you, keeping your hands blood-free. Luck favours the obnoxious 30s style street urchin, or so they say.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the Transilvanids have Superman strapped to a torture device: a gigantic crushing press covered in spikes (which is curiously referred to as “the rack”). “Well, I’ve played along with the visiting firemen from Transilvane long enough,” thinks Superman. (<i>Firemen?</i>) He casually frees himself, and the monsters start to freak out that “the hour of the demon dog” is approaching. “The <b> ‘picture-prophecy’</b> in our skies--<b>cannot</b> be altered!!” moans Dragorin, but Superman implores him to “stay <b>calm</b> and think <b>logically!!</b>” Yes, of course. You’re a microscopic lifeform evolved to look like Dracula, trying to prevent the horror movies that you’ve been watching in the sky for generations from coming true. If you’d only think <i>logically</i>, I’m sure you could find the solution to your problems.<br /><br />A bell tolls for the Transilvanids—literally—and they pretty much dissolve into helpless wailing. Superman, being a more proactive sort, digs away at the wall and finds a secret passage to Donovan’s hidden lair—just in time to miss the Demon Dog as it zooms past. Predictably, the Demon Dog is a robot, programmed to fly out and sweep Transilvane clean of biological life with a blast of industrial-strength pesticide. <br /><br />Perhaps this is a good time to note the odd fact that <i>we never meet Dabney Donovan</i>, and thus, we never get any answers as to what the hell was going through his mind when he created this whole bizarre situation. The fact that he’s forever off-screen, and that even his personal secretary never met him face to face, seems to suggest that he was an agent of Apokalips—maybe even Darkseid himself? But then, why go to all the trouble of creating an entire planet full of Universal Horror monsters—which does seem like the kind of thing Darkseid’s minions would do—if you’re just going to wipe them out at around the same time the whole New Genesis/Apokalips war is getting started?!? Alternatively, if there was some other reveal in mind further down the road for Donovan--<i>he was actually Flippa Dippa all along!!!</i>--it’s tragically aborted by the cancellation of the Jimmy Olsen comic in five issues’ time…<br /><br />Anyway, there’s some extremely mild suspense as we wonder if Superman can possibly catch the Demon Dog before it destroys Transilvane (hint: he can. Because he is <b>Superman</b>. Also, the Demon Dog is a procrastinator.) Jimmy wakes up, having spent the climax of, again, <i>his own comic</i> lying passed out on the floor, just in time to look through a micro-telescope thingie and see a fleet of coffins flying/shrinking back down to Transilvane. Superman pontificates a bit on the Demon Dog—“The symbol of <b>their</b> destruction! – As our <b>own</b> is forecast in the prophecies <b>we’ve</b> inherited!!” I’m sorry, exactly what movie was that, again? If there’s a lost Hammer or International horror movie about a flying demon dog that destroys the world, I’d kind of like to track that down. <br /><br />The hilarious ending shows Superman and Jimmy sitting down to watch the new movie Superman’s chosen to broadcast to the people of Transilvane, in hopes of changing their culture. A little movie called “Oklahoma!” <br /><br />Oh man, as wonderfully demented as the whole Transilvane idea is to begin with, that ending just makes it that much more awesome. You just KNOW Kirby was going to do a follow-up storyline further down the line, where Superman shrinks himself down to visit a microscopic world of singin’, dancin’, vampire cowboys. Forget Kirby, someone needs to do a follow up to this story right now. I mean, who wouldn’t pay to see that? “Superman shrinks himself down to visit a microscopic world of singing, dancing, vampire cowboys.” Just throw that description in the next issue of Previews and watch the comic book industry recover instantly. Warner Brothers would adapt it into movie form and beat Titanic’s box office gross. You could build an entire “Final Crisis”-style event around it. <br /><br />OK, I’ll stop now.Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-62605733304987399772012-11-15T15:18:00.001-08:002012-11-15T15:27:12.718-08:00A Life In Trek<br>
Hi! Miss me?
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It’s been a tumultuous six months or so for me, encompassing a move, a new job and a whackload of freelance projects, and this blog has seemed like something that’s easy enough to shrug off. But I’m finding myself wasting so much time on Twitter and various message boards that I might as well post my thoughts on stuff here instead. Plus, I’m trying to get more serious as a writer and attempting regular blog posts is a good way to discipline myself.
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So anyway, let’s talk about Star Trek.
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<i>Star Trek: The Next Generation</i> was the pop cultural equivalent of my first adolescent crush. I’d loved TV shows before that, in much the same way that you love people as a small child, largely because they are present and bringing you food. TNG was the first show that was “mine” properly speaking—the first pop cultural artifact that I actively sought out and became properly obsessed over.
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And I do mean obsessed. I think my interest in the show coincided with it becoming syndicated for the first time, though I was too young to be sure about that. I think I started out somewhere in the second season, because I specifically remember seeing the first season for the first time and thinking how cheesy it looked and how much the show had evolved. I watched those first three seasons on a freaking loop—I taped them and rewatched them every day, and I absolutely had to be home to watch the syndicated rerun no matter how many times I’d seen the episode before. I bought all the spinoff novels (fortunately there weren’t too many of those to blow my money on) and most of the technical manuals, alien race guides, and eventually the <i>TNG Companion</i> became one of my proudest possessions. I wrote up elaborate encyclopedia-style listings of the various alien races, planets, and technology (thank God the internet wasn’t really a thing back then…though, wait, is the fact that I wrote these for my own amusement more or less sad than creating a Wiki?) It got so I could identify an episode by watching the first couple of seconds and…sigh, yes...hearing Picard recite the Stardate.
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So yeah, pretty damn nerdy.
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What’s weird about this is that I never really felt compelled to check out the original series. Part of that was that I don’t think it was airing in syndication on any of the channels I received at the time, or at least, nowhere that was convenient for me. My ten-year-old brain was wired kind of weirdly. I’d religiously plunk myself down in front of the TV right after school and watch cartoons, old sitcoms, and TNG, but I rarely felt compelled to watch in the evening.
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Until, of course, I twigged to the fact that there were actual NEW EPISODES of TNG airing later in the evening (along with some other shows, like that “Simpsons” thing my VCR-obsessed family friend used to show me whenever I came over). I had discovered…<b>Prime Time</b>.
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(Look, I’ve lived a very boring life, OK? Without exaggerated pomposity my autobiography’s going to be basically unreadable.)
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Friday nights at 10, the night that TNG aired, became appointment television for me and my family—because I of course sucked them into it too. I’m always a little amazed at how my sisters, especially, picked up my pop cultural obsessions, for all that they acted like I was annoying them at the time; one of them can still remember albums worth of Weird Al lyrics, and the other owns an enormous prestige hardcover collection of Sandman and V For Vendetta. I’m contagious!
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As for my parents, my dad likes anything tech-heavy, and my mom (a British ex-pat) likes watching theatrically trained Brit actors go at it. Of course my dad especially couldn’t help making snarky remarks through some of the show’s worst excesses, particularly the often stiff acting, but hey, family bonding is family bonding.
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Oddly, it was around the time that <i>Deep Space Nine</i> spun off that I started to sour on Trek. Believe it or not, DS9 is the reason I’m delving into this whole subject, which is going to take up several blog posts—I’ve been working my way through it recently—but at the time, I found myself developing an aversion to it pretty fast, despite the slick production values. Part of it might be that I couldn’t interest the rest of my family in it, so I was watching it alone for season two. But another part of it was that that obsessive childhood brain of mine—man, this is really making me sound like I have OCD or something, isn’t it?—had fixated on what I thought were the “rules” of Trek, and DS9 was starting to break those rules. You can’t really blame me; this obsession with Trek was partly about me discovering how stories were told, visually and textually, and of course there’s no-one who gloms onto formulas like a student adrift in the vast, scary sea of creativity. But at the time it seemed like a betrayal. More on that anon.
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Anyway, this was actually pretty small potatoes, if interesting in retrospect; the real issue was that the cracks were starting to show in TNG for me. The laziness of their treatment of aliens was a huge factor, for a start. I’m not just talking about the lameness of those infamous “bumpy forehead” designs (which were partly a budget issue, after all—even as a kid I understood these guys didn’t have George Lucas’s budget). It was the way the word “alien” never seemed to mean anything to the Trek writers. Aside from Klingons, Borg, and a handful of others, every alien species on this show spoke, acted, and emoted like a human being, and that’s just lame writing. It didn’t help that most of them appeared for a single episode and then vanished, never to be heard from again, which didn’t exactly help build a rich and detailed world. Likewise, the show’s continuity started to seem slapdash; I was interested in the “nodular” nature of TV storytelling at the time, but even then I thought it was a bit of a ripoff that so many major ideas could get sidelined and even abandoned. I mean are Trill people with weird foreheads or with dots down their necks I ASK YOU TREK PRODUCERS.
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Ahem. I did mention that I was a nerd, right?
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My list of problems with the show started to pile up until it was at least as large as the stuff I liked about it—something that’s become part of my makeup as a fan, unfortunately—but I kept watching all the way through to the finale, “All Good Things…” which I remember being really very good. And then that was that.
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I think part of me knew it was in my best interests to make a clean break from Trek, and I even recall a vague sense of relief. <i>Take this geeky burden from off me, Lord!</i> Not that I hadn’t found new geek interests—I think <i>The X-Files</i> had grabbed most of my attention at the time, concurrent with <i>Batman: The Animated Series</i>--and those distracted me long enough to keep me from re-visiting TNG.
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When I finally decided to start catching up on Trek a few years back, I made a conscious decision NOT to watch TNG, and in fact I don’t plan to ever revisit the show. I’m not the kind to wallow in nostalgia (ask me about Transformers sometime, and how my childhood love for them quickly became bemusement, leading into seething hatred thanks to the likes of Michael Bay) but <i>Star Trek: The Next Generation</i> seems to be the embodiment, for me, of a memory that the real thing will never be able to match.
Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-48835023217019130072012-06-15T17:57:00.002-07:002012-06-15T18:07:15.582-07:00Fourth World Fridays: Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #142--"The Man From Transilvane"<br><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld23.jpg"><br /><br />As I’ve suggested in previous installments, the first few issues of The New Gods, Mister Miracle and The Forever People seem to show Kirby’s confidence and enthusiasm for the project growing at a remarkable rate, and by the time Mike Royer jumped on board as inker, Kirby really seemed to be pushing himself to a new level. However, this new seriousness with which he approached the core three books seems to contrast with his work on Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen. I already mentioned that the fact that Colletta remained as inker on that book made it seem as though Kirby was treating it like a red-headed stepchild (so to speak), and this is reinforced by the fact that the Fourth World elements mostly seemed to vanish from the comic around this point, except for one major issue near the end of the run, and a series of expository backup features, which Kirby used to flesh out his world. <br /><br />If I was *really* cynical, I would say that Kirby completely stopped giving a damn about SPJO altogether—but that’s not really fair, as there are still some neat story beats to come, even in this issue. Besides, Kirby not giving a damn still means plenty of crazy, stream-of-consciousness crap for us all to enjoy and mock! And the coming two-part storyline is a doozy as far as that goes…<br /><br />For starters, the opening caption of Jimmy Olsen #142 features another howler of a sentence:<br /><br />“Amid the <b>strange</b> sounds at midnight, this <b>classic</b> horror figure never fails to emerge and haunt our dreams with terrifying effectiveness!”<br /><br />Yes. He NEVER FAILS to emerge. <i>Every time</i> you hear sounds at midnight, it’s immediately followed by a vampire emerging, and proceeding to haunt your dreams with terrifying effectiveness. By the way, does that description make anyone else think of <b>Monsters, Inc.</b>? “Sully, you’ve haunted another child’s dreams with terrifying effectiveness. You win Employee of the Month yet again.” “Thanks, chief, but I bet I can make my effectiveness at least 20% more terrifying if I work at it!” <br /><br />Aaaaaaanyway. <br /><br />The comics code was still in effect at this point, though it was getting a bit creaky—the very next year would see the famous Spider-man issue that ran without the Code, effectively dealing it a death-blow—so vampirism was a bit of a dodgy subject. This is why vampires are treated in such an odd, convoluted fashion in the silver and early bronze age, usually relying on some kind of pseudoscience to explain them away—but of course, no one could come up with a more convoluted or pseudoscientific explanation than Kirby!<br /><br />We kick this off by witnessing a vampire emerging from the forest with a werewolf companion to menace a sleeping woman. But again, because of that pesky code, he can’t do anything as scandalous as biting her. Instead, he shoots out eyebeams that fly through the air and hit her neck, creating vampire-like puncture marks (!) Thank you, Comics Code, for protecting our nations’ youth from the sight of neck-biting, and necessitating this kind of crap. <br /><br /> “What has been done—is now done!! The results of it will rival the most <b>awesome</b> events <b>ever</b> recorded!” The first sentence fulfills this issue’s redundancy quotient; the second, the hyperbole quotient. Also, the first sentence fulfills this issue’s redundancy quotient.<br /><br />The woman, by the way, is Morgan Edge’s secretary, Miss Conway, and the next morning, we see that Clark and Jimmy, WORLD’S MOST PATHETIC REPORTERS, are <i>still arguing with the goddamn secretary</i> about getting in to see Morgan Edge. That’s Clark Kent, the man who can throw planets around, stymied by a chica in a miniskirt at a desk. He can’t be bothered to take stronger action against the man who tried to kill him and blow up a secret research facility full of his friends. But to give him credit, he’ll wait in that waiting room as long as he has to! Provided the magazines aren’t too old!<br /><br />Of course, Miss Conway makes for a bit of a distraction, with her increasingly chalk-white skin and the fangs she reveals when she talks. Then she faints, prompting Jimmy to lean in and Clark to swat him back with the baffling comment, “One side, <b>diplomat!</b>” He quickly notices the “bitemarks” and the fact that Miss Conway is suddenly no longer visible in the mirror. The caption declares that “A pattern is followed—a complete and total pattern!” A pattern terrifying in its effectiveness! And completeness! And totality!<br /><br />Throughout the next few panels, Miss Conway takes on a really unnatural chalk-white complexion that seems to move over her like colour on an inkjet printer. “The total pattern must <b>remain</b> fixed!!” continue the captions, growing more and more incoherent as the sequence grows on. Basically, what Kirby’s trying to say is that he knows what a bunch of horror movie clichés all these story beats are, but just stick with him, there’s an explanation. (And there is, and man…you’re going to have to see it to believe that the human mind could come up with something so insane.) <br /><br />Anyway, in keeping with the total pattern, a bat flies in and transforms himself into a pale, cape-wrapped figure who introduces himself as “Count Dragorin of Transilvane”. (At this point, I’m wondering if the makers of The Rocky Horror Picture Show derived some inspiration from this comic.) “I <b>regret</b> the intrusion upon your many activities in this place,” sneers the Count. I love how sarcastic that sounds, like he doesn’t quite believe Clark and Jimmy actually do anything at the Planet. That’s very perceptive of you, Count.<br /><br />This recap is going to balloon to Russian novel-length if I quote and deconstruct all the bizarre, nonsensical dialogue, so I’ll just say that Dragorin insists he’s in a hurry, and continues to do so while making no move to do anything. Meanwhile, Jimmy spouts a lot of random phrases like “I <b>second</b> Clark’s motion!” and Clark tries asking him politely if he wouldn’t mind restoring Miss Conway from her cursed eternal unrest. Dragorin responds by zapping him with the Evil Eye, which literally sends them flying back in a burst of light.<br /><br />Jimmy is knocked unconscious, but as Clark thinks to himself, “<b>I</b> have more effective protection! It’s called <b>Superman!</b>” As the colouring takes on an eerie greenish hue, Dragorin causes Miss Conway to rise and begin delivering details about her former employer, Dabney Donovan. Her only real bit of advice is to check Nasa’s Science Research Center, where, it seems, Dabney was Researching Science. Clark takes advantage of the Count’s moment of distraction to leap on him, but he vanishes in the classic puff of smoke. As Jimmy and Miss Conway come round (Conway suddenly cured of her vampirism), Clark assures them he “got a lead on” the Count “before he bugged out.” I guess that’s how Clark gets all his leads: by feigning unconsciousness until a vampire soliloquizes about something. No wonder he’s such an ace reporter.<br /><br />After bundling Miss Conway off to “the clinic” off-panel—gee, that doesn’t sound creepy at all—Clark and Jimmy head out to the Science Research Center, where Science is Researched. There they find a door ajar, and inside, waiting for them, is Dragorin’s briefly-seen henchman Lupek, a werewolf. Ish. Thing. He attacks Clark and puts him down for the count, or at least he does as far as Jimmy knows. Credit where credit is due: our red-headed, freckle-faced pal shows he’s got courage by pulling up a steel fence post and using it to keep the lycanthrope away from his supine friend. Lupek chases him away down the corridor, giving Clark time to change into Superman and come to his rescue. “<b>Superman</b>, I’m your fan for life!” declares Jimmy. Yes, Jimmy, that is the role you play in the series. You don’t need to spell it out for us at random intervals. <br /><br />Dragorin suddenly materializes, blasts Jimmy and Supes again with his Evil Eye, and disappears with his henchman. Handy, that. But while Superman and Jimmy ransack the abandoned Science Research Center and all of its Science Research for clues, Superman comes up with an odd theory to explain Dragorin’s disappearances: “Suppose they became <b>smaller!!</b> Too small to <b>see!</b>” Yes, um, that makes more sense than him being an actual supernatural entity, alright. <br /><br />Superman also explains away Clark’s absence by saying he sent him back to town for medical help. Dabney Donovan, meanwhile, he describes as “the closest thing to a <b>mad</b> scientist we have! Well, I guess <b>wild</b> would be a <b>better</b> word!” He seems to be vaguely connected with the Project in some way, though he doesn’t explain how. He and Jimmy then proceed to make a series of rather, um, <i>creative</i> logical leaps: first, that the picture of a green orb with horns on the wall is a picture of planet Transilvane; then that there’s a message implanted on the picture that Supes can read with his microvision, which turns out to be correct. The message reads “Bloodmoor destruct date 1971”, which points them towards, you guessed it, an old cemetery of that name.<br /><br />Meanwhile! We pick up with the Newsboy Legion, who as you may recall had snuck out of The Project and were boating down an underground river. Predictably, this has Flippa Dippa practically orgasming in delight. Because he enjoys water, don’t you know. Reaching the end of their underground tunnel, Flippa dives in and discovers an exit with an elevator at the end. By an absolutely <i>astounding</i> coincidence, this just happens to lead them to a secret room being used by an operative of Intergang—and not just any operative. This particular guy <i>just happens</i> to be yelling into the phone at the exact moment the Newsboys emerge behind him, identifying himself as the man who killed Jim Harper. <br /><br />That’s the <i>original</i> Jim Harper, of course—the one who would have been an old man by now. His death was, you’ll recall, mentioned passingly several issues back. Apparently the presence of the new Guardian has both taken the heat off this guy and made his Intergang masters displeased, since they now assume he failed to kill Harper. (Somehow, these guys know Harper was the Guardian. Bang-up job protecting your secret identity, Jim…) Anyway, the last panel of this sequence shows the Newsboys roiling with anger as they realize they’re confronting the man who killed their…parent’s guardian. Who I’m sure they felt a great deal of affection for, and all, but honestly it seems like Kirby forgot these aren’t the original Newsboys, and thus, probably weren’t as emotionally attached as their dads would have been…<br /><br />Nevertheless, “The drama of life begins to <b>mount</b> in many quarters!!” as the endlessly hilarious captions inform us. We transition to Superman and Jimmy landing in Bloodmoor, as Superman continues to opine that they’re not facing real monsters. “I wish we’d <b>waited</b> for Clark!” Mutters Jimmy. “He’d get <b>facts!--Not</b> opinions!” Yes, solid facts like “I somehow got a lead on that vampire in the three milliseconds before he evaporated! Don’t question me, just go!” <br /><br />As they approach the mausoleum, Jimmy is hung up on the idea that they’ve found the vampire’s coffin, and Superman continues to be skeptical, theorizing that the huge slab blocking the door could be circumvented by growing very small. “<b>Think small!</b>” He says to Jimmy. “Like Dabney Donovan—who undertook to simulate cosmic matter in small terms! Small <b>continents! Oceans! Life! </b> In short--<b>a small planet! Welcome to Transilvane, Jimmy!</b> and at that moment, they descend the stairs and witness…<br /><br />Well, words can’t do it justice. <br /><br /><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld23a.jpg"><br /><br />Yes. Transilvane is a tiny planet, hovering in fog, surrounded by holographic projections, in the basement of a mausoleum, in a graveyard. <br /><br />And believe it or not, that’s <i>not the craziest thing about this scenario</i>, as we’ll discover in the next chapter…Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-15203419557245271732012-04-06T21:14:00.003-07:002012-04-06T21:23:31.537-07:00Fourth World Fridays: The New Gods #5--"Spawn!"<br><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld22.jpg"><br /><br />It’s not an exaggeration to say that this issue of “New Gods” is monumental. And that’s being quite literal—we both begin and end the issue with gigantic splash shots of titanic creatures, and in between there’s as much Kirby Bigness as you could ask for. But perhaps the most monumental aspect of this comic is the change in the art. This issue introduces a new inker, Mike Royer, who replaced Vince Colletta on most of the Fourth World books at this time. <br /><br />Colletta’s a bit of a flashpoint for comics afficianados. He inked a sizable chunk of Kirby’s stuff during his glory years at Marvel in the 60s—possibly more than anyone else. I can’t verify that, but it’s clear he did several of the crucial issues of Fantastic Four (including the legendary Galactus trilogy and the wedding of Reed and Sue) and most of his run on Thor, and as such, is inextricably associated with that classic Marvel work. Which makes it a shame that he wasn’t actually very good.<br /><br />Now I readily admit to not being the greatest artist in the world, and the question has been debated ad nauseum amongst the leading lights of the industry. Some feel that Colletta’s work, which was undeniably <i>competent</i>, has gotten far too much of a bad rap over the years. But speaking personally, I find Royer’s work to be far more pleasing to the eye—there’s more line variance, energy, and detail. The latter is hardly surprising, since Colletta was apparently notorious for erasing details of the pencils that he was in too much of a hurry to ink (like Kirby, Colletta was ludicrously productive). Exactly to what degree Kirby wanted Colletta on board the Fourth World is up for debate; clearly he valued loyalty and was happy to keep the team together, but at the same time, Royer was apparently Kirby’s first choice for purely geographic reasons (he was in California, like Jack, and Colletta was in New York). The details of why Colletta was replaced (he stayed on Jimmy Olsen, which it’s now safe to say was the Fourth World book Kirby cared the least about) are a muddle—some say it was a falling out, others say his assistants encouraged the notoriously nonconfrontational Kirby to take charge of his own work—but when the dust had settled, Royer was in. And it most certainly made a difference. <br /><br />At any rate, this issue of The New Gods begins, like so many others, with Metron, roaming the cut-and-paste montage galaxy in his Mobius Chair, because, as the narrative captions inform us, “this point in the saga of the great <b>Celestials</b>…<b>can’t</b> be told--<b>outside</b> the context of the larger tapestry—the <b>universe!</b>” Well, that certainly is a large tapestry, alright. I’m glad not every story requires an epic, cosmic prologue like this. “Call me Ishmael. I am the product of billions of years of evolution on a tiny speck of a planet in a galaxy called the milky way…” “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, notwithstanding the Big Bang, a cosmic maelstrom that gave birth to the universe…” Man, I’m already exhausted. <br /><br />Today’s installment of Metron Presents: Our Crazy Universe takes place in “The Promethean Galaxy”, where a gigantic green dude, “larger than a star cluster”, floats bound to a gigantic slab. Apparently he and his pals tried to penetrate the Final Barrier at the edge of the Universe, beyond which is The Source; their strategy was to enlarge their atomic structure to such a size that they would…um…outgrow the Universe? Yikes. Kirby’s Kosmology has a way of making my head hurt. Anyway, they ended up slowing down their own subjective time and now float nearly motionless, taking “a <b>billion</b> Earth years to feel one heartbeat!!” It’s not really clear, but Kirby seems to imply that Metron had been planning on risking the final barrier himself, but seeing the fate of the Prometheans changes his mind and heads back to New Genesis, to the place where the Source makes contact with the New Gods through High-Father’s Staff.<br /><br />Hey…is that an allegory for religion vs. science? You know, I think it might be!<br /><br />Anyway, time to go back to Earth and catch up on the fallout from the previous issue. As you may recall, Orion had attained a bunch of Earthly disciples who he quickly transformed into a street gang. None of that namby-pamby healing the sick or preaching the eternal love of the divine for Orion, no sir! They helped Orion infiltrate Intergang, only to see him take off into the ocean for a confrontation with Darkseid’s aquatic troops, the Deep Six. Now, apparently, the police have rounded up the remaining Intergang thugs and dragged P.I. Dave Lincoln off for questioning. The sergeant is a burly bulldog of a man named Terrible Turpin, who will be stealing the show in a few issue’s time; for now, he lets Lincoln know something fishy’s going on and turns him loose. Meanwhile, after a brief burst of competence last issue, the rest of the O’Ryan Mob has been sitting around uselessly in Lincoln’s apartment, cleaning out his refrigerator, tracking dirt all over the place, and watching movies on pay-per-view. Lincoln shows up, and they all clear out…except Claudia Shane, who pointedly sticks around. She and Lincoln are doubtless swapping spit the instant we cut away. <br /><br />And cut away we do, to Orion…who’s rather ignominiously managed to get his foot stuck in a clam.<br /><br />Seriously. <br /><br />OK, OK, it’s a mutant clam. What happened is, see, the leader of the Deep Six, an amphibian-like fellow name of Slig, used his touch to mutate it into a monster killer clam, and it’s now entrapped Orion in his underground, cavernous lair. Yes, Slig can mutate stuff just by touching it with his right hand, as he demonstrates by turning a nearby crustacean into a weird kind of dragon-thing:<br /><br /><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld22a.jpg"><br /><br />Then he kills it with his other hand, which can explode things. <br /><br />Orion watches all this in shock, even though you’d think he’d know all this already, if he knew who Slig was. Slig, in classic comic book villain fashion, is enough of an egotist that seeing Orion humbled is enough to get him to leave the room without killing him. Jackass.<br /><br />Naturally, Orion has a way out—he can channel the Astro-Force into an emergency blast through his wristband. The clam lets him go and, in a sequence that really shows off the energy Royer brings to Kirby’s work, rears up, revealing an elongated trunk that “draws energy deep in the bowels of the Earth”, to do battle with Orion. Orion blasts the thing to Clam Heaven, then takes out a sentient shark-man standing guard and stumbles into a huge cavern, where a vast harness lies empty. This is some nice foreshadowing—Orion remembers glimpsing something huge, something monstrous, in that harness before the lights went out last issue, and Slig verifies that they have indeed unleashed something horrifying on the seas of Earth. That would be the titular Spawn. <br /><br /><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld18c.jpg"><br /><br />Man, I can’t stop making that joke. Seriously though, there are times when I feel like everything in comics for the last 30 years has come from people just flipping through Kirby’s work, picking out random elements, and expanding on them.<br /><br />Back on the surface, Terrible Turpin has indeed twigged to what’s going on by interrogating an officer of his, bandaged from head to foot after an apparent encounter with the forces of Apokalips. I have no idea who this guy is, and I don’t think we’ve seen him before. Apparently the idea is just that the war of the New Gods is raging all over the place now, and regular folks are getting caught up in it as well. But it comes off as the ravings of a guy who just went through severe physical and mental trauma, being taken with utmost seriousness by his dour police chief. “A <b>gang war!!</b>--between super-spooks!!” Turpin muses, thoughtfully. When another officer puts down the guy’s testimony as “sounding like a UFO sighting”, Turpin employs his impeccable logic: <br /><br /><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld22b.jpg"><br /><br />Uh…<i>huh</i>.<br /><br />Anyway, we cut back to Claudia and Dave, lying in bed, smoking cigarettes—<br /><br />Ha ha! Just kidding. This is the era of the comics code. They’re fully dressed and staring at the window. But to anyone who doubts these two are going at it hot and heavy, I’d like you to please explain what they’ve they been doing all this time? Playing Pachinko? It’s not like they actually have anything to contribute to Orion’s efforts other than to sit around worrying. <br /><br />At least it’s <i>well-founded</i> worrying, as we soon see. The thunder outside roils and crackles and transforms into the shape of a Boom Tube, which spews forth an old buddy of ours: Kalibak the Cruel, now dressed to the nines in a spiffy green centurion suit. His first act, of course, is to start smashing stuff. Again, Royer really takes Kirby’s work to a new level in this sequence, which is also enhanced by Kirby’s strong storytelling. I love how we glimpsed most of these characters knocking around in the first issue, and now they’re showing up on Earth one by one. “The New Gods” really is the most coherent, narratively tight comic Kirby ever did.<br /><br />Meanwhile, back in the actual plot, Slig has discovered the trail of incapacitated (dead?) guards leading from the cavern where Orion had been. I didn’t mention it before, but there was a couple of panels on a previous page where Orion was running through the tunnels, homing in on his equipment, and you see him carrying on an inner monologue, checking his wrist monitor, and looking pensive while casually putting the beat-down on an amphibian-monster <i>with one hand</i>. Orion is <i>hardcore</i>. Don’t believe me? Watch what happens next. <br /><br />Slig bursts in just as Orion is strapping on his Astro-Force equipment. “Allowing you to <b>live</b> was a <b>mistake</b>, Orion!!!” Growls Slig. Um, yes, I would say so. Orion takes the opportunity to blast Slig from point blank range, and then, when that doesn’t finish him off, we get <i>one of the greatest sequences in the history of comics</i>. And no, that’s not my usual sarcasm. <br /><br />Slig weakly protests his defiance, and Orion starts laughing like a madman, drops his equipment, and runs forward to start pounding Slig to death with his bare hands. “Talk, Slig, <b>talk!!</b> You seemed so <b>fond</b>of it when I seemed to be at <b>your</b> mercy!!!...You dogs of Apokalips are <b>eloquent</b> when destiny <b>favors</b> you!!!” With that, he rips off Slig’s headdress, revealing his Mother Box, and crushes it until it self-destructs to stop the pain. <br /><br /><img src="http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee223/Prankster36/Fourthworld22c.jpg"><br /><br />Slig still stirs, weakly insisting “I’ll <b>kill</b> you for the <b>sham</b> you are!!--” (What?) In the heat of the fight, Orion’s face has gone from his pretty-boy visage to the ugly mug we glimpsed in the second issue, which the dying Slig sneers at—“<b>HAHAHA!! ORION IS HIS VERY OWN MONSTER!! HAHAHA!!”</b>—and prophecies that, even if he can’t kill Orion, his penchant for destruction will catch up with him eventually. Orion pretty much shrugs and says “Yeah, OK,” and then pitches Slig off a cliff to his death.<br /><br />So after several issues of telling us how Orion was an out-of-control violent maniac who rejoiced in battle, we actually get to <i>see</i> it. Kirby’s development as a storyteller in a mere few issues is pretty astounding. Also, <i>that was the awesomest thing ever</i>.<br /><br />And with a mere two pages to go, Kirby and Royer <i>still</i> keep the awesomeness coming, ending with that final shot of a Leviathan I mentioned earlier. Orion rockets out into the ocean to confront the monster Slig turned loose on the world, and here we finally see it in the final splash page: A GIANT PINK WHALE!!! WITH TUSKS!!!!<br /><br />(Seriously, it looks cool when Kirby draws it.)Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801849569478735724.post-25138540921522599262012-04-05T15:15:00.000-07:002012-04-05T15:16:54.108-07:00Pop Culture Will Eat Itself<br>I haven’t been making much use of this blog lately, and it’s not because I don’t want to—just the opposite. I keep coming up with ever more elaborate and baroque ideas for blog essays, many of them part of a putative in-depth series, but my problem is that I never want to launch into them without getting my ideas organized first. Clearly this is leading to literary paralysis, so I’ve decided to just launch into a post, or series of posts, and let it develop as it comes. All of this is to say, if the following seems somewhat on the vague side, you may understand why.<br /><br />Aaaaaanyway.<br /><br />Being a geek on the internet, I can’t help but notice the contentious tone that’s settled into fandoms of various stripes. (Thank you, doctor obvious.) I choose to stay away from the more sordid corners of the net and cleave to the more intelligent and thoughtful writers on pop culture, but that doesn’t mean I’m more likely to avoid contentiousness. Just the opposite, in fact. Some of the smartest and most insightful bloggers in geekdom, or any subdomain thereof, have (often delightfully) acid tongues. But there’s an interesting attitude that’s been forming for a while now among the nerd literati—the desire to inject some much-needed self-awareness into the culture of geekdom through criticism. There’s no getting around the fact that the more ravening segments of fandom have gotten out of control, feeding a sense of entitlement grown ludicrously bloated (see, for example, the petition or whatever it was to change the ending of Mass Effect 3) and bizarre tribalism centered around serving the finances of huge corporations (here see the decision by many geeks to side with Marvel against the Kirby heirs, or, slightly less toxically, the caterwauling over The Dark Knight’s failure to win Best Picture or beat Titanic at the box office.) And of course, it’s become de rigeur for nerds to reject considered criticism of their Favourite Thing as a mortal insult that cannot be allowed to stand, leading to an unfortunate watering down of serious analytical reviews. In the face of all this, an attitude of contempt and disdain towards geekdom is not only understandable but often laudable.<br /><br />And yet.<br /><br />A knee-jerk attitude from an intelligent contrarian standing against mindless groupthink is nevertheless a knee-jerk attitude, and I feel like we’re starting to see some negative blowback. Essentially, there’s an ultra-defensive elitist mindset forming that seems to feel they can take it for granted that [pop culture property X] is a waste of time propagated by the dregs of the net, and that anyone who speaks up in its defense is <i>by default</i> an unwashed, unselfaware nerd. This is the “Oh, now a bunch of NERDS are gonna complain that I dissed Arkham Asylum” response, and it seems to tilt perilously close to shutting down debate just as the rabid hordes of fanboyism do. If you post your thoughts on the internet, you’re likely to find people disagreeing with you; that’s sort of the point of the internet. <br /><br />But I didn’t really want to talk about the Great Nerd Wars in particular, I wanted to investigate a particular aspect of this attitude: namely, the way some pop culture properties are elevated above others, both in the short term and the long term. <br /><br />Here is a list of things:<br /><br />--Lord of the Rings.<br />--Mass Effect.<br />--Marvel Comics.<br />--DC Comics.<br />--Watchmen.<br />--Scott Pilgrim.<br />--Firefly.<br />--Game of Thrones. <br />--The Wire.<br />--Star Trek.<br />--Doctor Who.<br />--Star Wars.<br />--The Prisoner.<br />--My Little Pony.<br />--Rap music.<br />--They Might Be Giants.<br />--The Beatles.<br />--The Coen Brothers. <br />--David Cronenberg.<br />--Joss Whedon.<br />--Rob Zombie. <br />--The Boston Red Sox.<br /><br />I’m guessing that you see that as a pretty varied list—I don’t just mean your personal likes and dislikes, I mean that these all seem to occupy wildly different places in the pop cultural sphere. Some of them are “classics”, part of the canon of the 20th or earlier 21st century, and some of them are trash culture or ephemeral entertainments, and some fall somewhere in between. I bet your mind sorted them out to an almost subconscious degree. And yet, all of these are the subject of passionate pop cultural fandoms—what we’ve collectively decided to refer to as “geekdom”. Some of these aren’t thought of as “geeky” per se, and yet the passion they engender seems very much of the same quality. And to a degree, it’s rather surprising that we separate them in this way. <br /><br />Please understand, I am NOT trying to make an argument that everything’s subjective, as a springboard to excusing my own taste’s or anyone’s. This might seem like the first step down the path towards the argument that Citizen Kane and The Transformers Movie are both equally valid works of art*, and that isn’t my intention. I’m just saying that these properties all have essentially the same qualities, in the scientific sense; they’re all, fundamentally, the same kind of thing. So why are some easily dismissable and require a burden of proof from anyone trying to argue in their favour, while others demand to be taken seriously, even by their detractors? <br /><br />Look at Lord of the Rings, which is the one thing on this list that could potentially escape this little Pop Culture Ghetto I’ve devised. (And I think “ghetto” is precisely the wrong word for it, but let’s leave it for now.) LOTR was written as a sideline, a hobby of sorts, by a literary professor with a day job. It was his life’s work, and it was produced as an artistic statement rather than an attempt to make money or win an audience**, and it’s had a significant literary impact; it wouldn’t be unreasonable to elevate it to the position of “literature”. But it’s a work of pop culture, too, one whose fanbase and impact are very much in the same mode as all the others on this list, if perhaps more literate and thoughtful than the average Rob Zombie fan.<br /><br />…And see, there I go—knee, jerking away. The fact that I personally find Tolkien’s work to be more deserving of merit than Mr. Zombie’s oeuvre doesn’t mean that I somehow “outrank” them. Or that LOTR doesn’t occupy the same nerdosphere. I know for a fact there are supremely intelligent horror fans out there who have elegant arguments in favour of The Devil’s Rejects, and I know just as surely that there are some awful dimwits out there who love LOTR and think that that alone makes them discriminating and classy. <br /><br />“Classy”. That might be a useful word for this discussion.<br /><br />I actually don’t want to dwell too much on Tolkien, because he’s something I’ve been wanting to blog about in depth and I’ll probably have lots to say in another series of posts, but for now my question is this: If Tolkien had come along a decade or two later, would we be as quick to elevate him above stuff like Star Trek? That’s not a knock on Tolkien so much as it is an elevation of everything else; after all, Star Trek was an intelligent, ambitious show. But it also shares with Tolkien, and the rest of my little canon there, a world of arcane details to which the fans have developed an attachment beyond mere entertainment. They even share made-up languages that have spawned real-world speakers. <br /><br />Let’s move on to something closer to the other end of the scale, or rather two things: Doctor Who and old Superhero comics. These are two properties to which my exposure was limited as a kid, but in which I began to take an interest as an adult partly because they have so many intelligent defenders, particularly on the web. Neither of them escapes being seen as a “nerdy” pursuit by the mainstream, or as silly or inaccessible to outsiders, and yet, within geekdom, both are taken relatively seriously. There’s an underlying belief that there are fundamentally interesting and intelligent stories to be told by these properties, and the people who blog passionately about them are able to articulate these arguments more than most fandoms. They are, to return to the word, “classy”, in a way that 80s cartoons and video games aren’t. And yet, it’s often hard to argue for the merits of a given Silver Age comic or an early-80s episode of Who, which are not only frequently threadbare or slapdash, they’re often outright nonsensical. Even stupid. And it’s not like the defenders of these two properties will argue otherwise. So what makes these particular pop cultural emanations “classier” than others?<br /><br />To be continued….<br /><br />*Well, I’m not going to refuse to entertain such an argument if it’s well-reasoned enough, but that would have to be one hell of an argument. “They both have Orson Welles in them” might not be the place to start. <br /><br />**Probably a drastic oversimplification, but it’s surely not unfair to say that Tolkien wasn’t really dreaming of tearing up the paperback bestsellers list, right?Pranksterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00676528953675160889noreply@blogger.com1