TF Views

Dominic wrote:I always understood "yeoman's job" to mean "adequate at best".

I've only seen it rarely and only to mean working hard and doing well at gruntwork.
"performed or rendered in a loyal, valiant, useful, or workmanlike manner, especially in situations that involve a great deal of effort or labor: He did a yeoman job on the problem. " per http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/yeoman

I can understand that. But, plenty of other people will enjoy that series.

There were pages, even mere panels, that should have been enough to sell this book to somebody flipping through it casually. Instead, those pages may well have deterred sales for looking so sloppy. (Seriously. They screwed up scale and perspective in ways you would expect a child to.)

I can enjoy art for art's sake, but in a comic book it has to have narrative value as well, otherwise you're just buying someone's sketches bound in mass produced form. There are much better artists out there no matter what artist you're talking about, and on its own merits I don't give a crap if they do it in a week's time any more than I care about the caricaturist who knocks out page after page of caricatures in a theme park. It has to have meaning, substance, to justify that value.

Conversely, I will forgive some level of artistic mistakes in a comic book if they don't get in the way of the narrative, the aforementioned scale issues if they are clear on character and movement won't be an automatic shutdown for me, just keep striking the balance of story and picture to keep me content.

Have you seen his stuff from the last 10 years?

At this point, his name will keep me away, retroactively in some cases. (I am avoiding stuff I used to like because his name is on it.)

No, it was just a joke though, especially since the series we are dreaming up would be Filecard for Joes and TFs in this crossover series, and Hama doesn't do TF. But again, I don't care what mistakes he's made in the past if he does well today and tomorrow.

Onslaught Six wrote:Funfact: The first comic book I ever bought myself, (and may have even read), was part of the "Venom On Trial" arc, which was written by...Larry Hama. (I recently found my copy, and it holds up alright for being a comic from 1997.)

Hama's vintage Joe ranges from good to middling at best, but he has largely been enjoying coasting for a long time, and has said multiple times that he has no great love for the property. Still, I have read summaries of his revived ARAH book (Regen One for GI Joe, essentially) and it seems like it's bringing some at least semi-interesting things to the table. (There is apparently a 'Blue Ninjas' faction of cyborgs now.)

Very cool.

I hear ya, when I met him at Comic-Con my buddy Richard was gushing over the GI Joe work and Hama was very polite and autographed copies Richard had brought, but seemed very much like he wasn't so much his passion.

I've only seen it rarely and only to mean working hard and doing well at gruntwork.
"performed or rendered in a loyal, valiant, useful, or workmanlike manner, especially in situations that involve a great deal of effort or labor: He did a yeoman job on the problem. " per http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/yeoman

The way I have seen it used, it would work out as "caps off at competent". Either way, the DDP comics sucked.

Conversely, I will forgive some level of artistic mistakes in a comic book if they don't get in the way of the narrative, the aforementioned scale issues if they are clear on character and movement won't be an automatic shutdown for me, just keep striking the balance of story and picture to keep me content.

I generally agree. But, the art was *really* bad.

A book like a Joe/TF crossover should be able to sell itself with a few panels of art visible while it is being flipped through. In this case, the art was bad enough to make somebody think twice about buying the book.

Very cool.

I hear ya, when I met him at Comic-Con my buddy Richard was gushing over the GI Joe work and Hama was very polite and autographed copies Richard had brought, but seemed very much like he wasn't so much his passion.

The new Joe book is "Archie with guns". It is one of the most aimless and pointless things out there. I have flipped through more than one issue over the last few years, and have always come away validated for not buying that book.

At this stage in his life, Hama is a guy who has done more than comics and could do things other than comics. But, he can paid for doing comics with minimal effort, so he is going to do comics. Hama can still sell books, which means he can get money.

~30 years ago, Hama landed a sweet gig. Marvel put him on "GI Joe". I forget the details. But, in general terms, as long as Hama did not royally screw up, "GI Joe" was his to do with as he pleased. He wrote all but 2 issues of the original 150+ issue run. There may have also been a few stories in the annuals that he did not write.

Hama had a story to tell. And, he was more or less done with it by issue 100 or so. (When Cobra Commander returned, the book declined in quality. And Cobra Commander's return was a pretty obvious back-write.) After issue 100, there were only two significant issues that related to Hama's main story, and they both related heavily to material he wrote years earlier. Issue 126 was a big reveal about Firefly that had been seeded for nearly a decade before. (There were plenty of hints that were apparent if one looked back after reading issue 126.) And, I would bet money that Hama wrote issue 155 (the last new content issue) about a decade before it was published based on its tone, quality and content.



Dom
-would still recommend "Nth Man" to anybody, comic reader or not....

Dominic wrote:I generally agree. But, the art was *really* bad.

A book like a Joe/TF crossover should be able to sell itself with a few panels of art visible while it is being flipped through. In this case, the art was bad enough to make somebody think twice about buying the book.

I don't remember the art being THAT bad, unless you hate orange-tinted panels, then it was grating IIRC.

The opposite book, the TF vs Joe series from Dreamwave, that one had horrendously bad art. That was one I flipped through and the art was a massive problem.

The new Joe book is "Archie with guns". It is one of the most aimless and pointless things out there. I have flipped through more than one issue over the last few years, and have always come away validated for not buying that book.

C'mon, Archie with guns would be awesome. Reggie getting shot in the face with blue and red lasers every issue would be hilarious, and Mr. Weatherbee hauling his fat ass up a hill carrying a rocket launcher would write itself.

~30 years ago, Hama landed a sweet gig. Marvel put him on "GI Joe". I forget the details. But, in general terms, as long as Hama did not royally screw up, "GI Joe" was his to do with as he pleased. He wrote all but 2 issues of the original 150+ issue run. There may have also been a few stories in the annuals that he did not write.

The details were that NOBODY ELSE AT MARVEL WOULD TAKE THE JOB. Larry Hama was the very last writer at Marvel who would touch it, and thus he became the best, the worst, and the only.

Hama had a story to tell. And, he was more or less done with it by issue 100 or so. (When Cobra Commander returned, the book declined in quality. And Cobra Commander's return was a pretty obvious back-write.) After issue 100, there were only two significant issues that related to Hama's main story, and they both related heavily to material he wrote years earlier. Issue 126 was a big reveal about Firefly that had been seeded for nearly a decade before. (There were plenty of hints that were apparent if one looked back after reading issue 126.) And, I would bet money that Hama wrote issue 155 (the last new content issue) about a decade before it was published based on its tone, quality and content.

You act as if Hasbro had no say or requirements. I may not have read the run, but you know that they had to have.

Editorial problems don't excuse lazy backwriting--when faced with an armoured Cobra Commander toy in 1987ish, Hama turned the concept on its head and turned him into a Crimson Guard who killed Cobra Commander and impersonated him, and providing a good few years (?) of entertainment in doing so. (It also, arguably, pushed the idea that 'Cobra Commander' could be anybody, instead of a specific individual, which IDW up and ran with recently.)

Really? Nobody else would take the job?

Well, Hama took it and ran with it. That might also explain how he was able to say "no" to Habro on various things, the most notable being Cobra-La. He wrote the file cards, but left them out of the comics.


The Fred VII Commander was a good turn. I was a bit annoyed when Cobra Commander came back. (That was the first time that a comic I had been reading long-term really went off the tracks.)

Onslaught Six wrote:Editorial problems don't excuse lazy backwriting--when faced with an armoured Cobra Commander toy in 1987ish, Hama turned the concept on its head and turned him into a Crimson Guard who killed Cobra Commander and impersonated him, and providing a good few years (?) of entertainment in doing so. (It also, arguably, pushed the idea that 'Cobra Commander' could be anybody, instead of a specific individual, which IDW up and ran with recently.)

Editorial problems sometimes excuse backwriting in my opinion, but that one you have there is an interesting example.

I hate to like the idea that CC could be anybody, that it's a title, only because the cartoon made CC such a specific character (assuming you don't put robotic reverb on it ), but that is an interesting idea.

Dominic wrote:Really? Nobody else would take the job?

Well, Hama took it and ran with it. That might also explain how he was able to say "no" to Habro on various things, the most notable being Cobra-La. He wrote the file cards, but left them out of the comics.

Jim Shooter says that Hama was the very last writer at Marvel left to take the job, every single other person Shooter had offered it to there had passed on it (which was everybody), but Hama had already been thinking about a similar idea spinning off Nick Fury into a commando unit like that, and it just all came together.

I have heard Cobra-La wasn't meant to be used as a name, that it was a mere placeholder for the concept work-in-progress and the execs just ran with it.

Naming aside, Cobra-La was a concept that Hama did not like and refused to put in the comics. (Aside: I was suprised to find out how much Hama disliked Serpentor given how good some of that run of books was.)


The idea that Cobra Commander could be anybody was consistent with both the original file card (which implied multiple Commanders) and with the concept of Cobra Commander as "the everyman from hell". Cobra Commander was the American Dream twisted around. He was the anonymous everyman who eventually rose to power by exploiting the worst in himself and those around him. When Fred VII (one of the faceless legions of Cobra and man who was merely a number) took over, that was a logical extension of that idea.

When Hama bumped Fred off, I was more bothered with the how and why than the what. (Why not bring another CC in?)


Dom
-not a fan of Krake the badass Cobra Commander either....