Comics are Awesome III

[Sparky Prime]

Green Lantern 23.3 - Black Hand
A Black Lantern ring resurrects Black Hand on Earth, although he has amnesia, serving as a way for new readers to discover who the character is as he quickly relearns who he is and his powers throughout this issue. And in some ways, this issue is a follow up to the Green Lantern Annual that came out last year as Black Hand eventually remembers what he'd been doing and returns to the cemetery where Hal Jordan's father is buried, where he raises him as a zombie and takes his arm for his own. I guess for nothing more but the symbolism of wanting to kill Hal with his father's hand. My favorite scene of this book has to be when a cop says this is why they have zombie training for, but otherwise, I'd been hoping for a bit more from this book. Like some indication of what Black Hand will do now that he's back.

Green Lantern 23.4 - Sinestro
It's been a long time since I've read the original Sinestro origin story, but from what I recall, this is a fairly accurate retelling of it. Basically this issue highlights how Sinestro became a Green Lantern, his eventual subjugation of his home planet that lead to his expulsion and then creation of his own Corps among more recent events. Pretty good issue to cover the character's basic history for those unfamiliar with his history. It's interesting to see Abin Sur is the first to suggest using rings powered by other emotions here, now that we know Abin would eventually start the Indigo Tribe in secret, while Sinestro would eventually go on to start his own Corps. The issue ends off with Lyssa Drak discovering some Korugarians are still alive, saying that Sinestro must return for their sake. I enjoyed reading this issue, even though I'm already familiar with the character.

Green Lantern 24-
Still investigating what's wrong with the Central Battery, none of the Green Lanterns can figure out what's up with the power outages they've been experiencing. Kyle's group suddenly teleports in and updates them on the situation with Relic, who shows up not long after, announcing he is there to take their power because he believes that's how he can save this universe. Of course they fight back, but Relic's technology is too much for them, and eventually they fail to protect the Willpower in the Central Battery, which Relic then destroys. Salaak then explains without the Central Battery, Oa will be destroyed. So wait... This isn't the first time the Central Battery has been destroyed with out Oa being destroyed... What makes this time any different? Any way, pretty standard opening issue for a new story arc. Starts out with a pretty big event if Oa's going to come apart though.

[Dominic]

I'd been hoping for a bit more from this book. Like some indication of what Black Hand will do now that he's back.

I am guessing that Black Hand is up to no good. Gut feeling.

Dom always spouts off with comments like this, judging outside the merits of its own time and refusing to actually even give the material its own fair shake on its own level. He only will judge comics against his favorites of the last 15 years.

Older comics were published to a lower standard. I understand that. But, I am not going to say that the lower standard makes bad writing and art okay.

When I read a defining story or run ("Armor Wars" from Michelinie's "Iron Man" or most of Gruenwald's "Captain America" run), I expect a certain amount of problems because they were published in the 80s. But, even if I expect it, I am only going to "allow" for so much of it before I start taking off point because it is still a problem even if most writers were commiting the same sins in the 80s.

Oh, and also because they're cheaper and more satisfying in small bites than wading through months and months of dubious writing and overblown shiny art just to get to an overblown, underwhelming conclusion to an artificially-inflated story arc (or you get to the end of a run and realize the author stopped having something to say so they just ended it prematurely for fear of merely telling interesting stories until they got back on track).

Compared to the brilliantly articulated insights of the Silver and Golden Age writers?

If the author does not have anything to say, they should not be writing. (I can understand them farming a pay check. But, I am not going to be on board for them farming said check.) Ending a book (or a writer's time on a book) when they have run out of things to say is not a "premature" ending.

"Oh yays, Batman stops another bank robbery" simply does not compare with, say....Gillen's recent run on "Iron Man" (as much as the last two issues failed on multiple levels). Similarly, give me a Grant/Breyfogle run on Batman over anything pre-O'Neil/Adams.

No, the 2010s are preaching to a different choir and to ensnare them with different, more manipulative tools. The '40s are more honest and direct.

You are right. It was not a commercial enterprise back in the 40s....except that it was. It is odd that you say the 40s were more honest, when those writers usually had less to say, they were also frequently uncredited or writing under aliases.

[andersonh1]

I'm more of a character driven reader myself, so I get that. But I still just don't see what your gripes with the New 52 is. Some characters have had some fairly significant changes to them, I'll grant you, but I don't see that they've really become so different.

A lot of it is, admittedly, subjective. I think you and I disagreed about changes to Hal Jordan, for example. I still feel he's become much more juvenile and less intelligent and experienced. I read eight issues of Superman and still didn't recognize the character and couldn't get a bead on who he was or what he believed. In contrast, Grant Morrison's Superman over in Action Comics had a very clearly defined personality and set of beliefs. The JSA characters are all wildly different than the old versions. There's probably more detail in the reviews I wrote at the time. And so on.

As Dom said, new and different is the point, and I understand that, but when I like certain things about a character and those things compel me to buy a book, and then those characterstics are removed, then my interest in the character goes with them or is lessened.

Older comics were published to a lower standard. I understand that. But, I am not going to say that the lower standard makes bad writing and art okay.

Martin Nodell’s art on Green Lantern is, objectively, poor. I’m not a big fan of Bob Kane’s early work either. On the other hand, E. E. Hibbard does a decent job drawing the Flash despite limited panel size and layouts, and Carmine Infantino certainly turns out some decent artwork with Black Canary. I could go on. Dick Sprang may draw a cartoony Batman, but his backgrounds and level of detail and panel composition is excellent.

Admittedly I used to think the same thing you do, but you can’t paint with a broad brush and say that all old comics have bad art. They don’t. It varies from artist to artist.

You have to put the writing in the same context. I was honestly a bit surprised to see stories about loan sharks or swindled inheritances or protection rackets in comics aimed at 10-12 year old readers, as I assume these books were. I wouldn’t have thought the subject matter would be of any interest to them. I think what we have in older comics is an attempt at multi-level storytelling, with crime stories for the older readers and super heroes in colorful costumes for the younger readers. And that doesn’t even get into all the veiled bondage references in Wonder Woman. The writing is a good bit more multi-layered than you might think, even if it is simplistic in its approach.

And it has to be noted that there’s a big stylistic shift from Golden Age books to Silver Age. The Silver Age is where things really started to get crazy and out-there. The 40s are a lot more grounded in the real world than the 60s, at least until Marvel came along and took another shot at making characters real people with fantasy problems.

The bottom line: there’s bad writing and bad art in every era. Comics before 1985 aren’t all bad simply because they fall before a certain date. Every era has comics worth reading, in my view. Yes, the medium as a whole has evolved and become more sophisticated, and I do prefer more modern writing and art. But I’ve found a lot to enjoy in older comics as well. As long as I like the character and the story is entertaining, then the writer and artists have done their job.

Compared to the brilliantly articulated insights of the Silver and Golden Age writers?

If the author does not have anything to say, they should not be writing.

Why does an author need to “say” anything? If they write an entertaining story about the main character, surely that’s the main requirement. Anything beyond that is icing on the cake.

"Oh yays, Batman stops another bank robbery" simply does not compare with, say....Gillen's recent run on "Iron Man" (as much as the last two issues failed on multiple levels). Similarly, give me a Grant/Breyfogle run on Batman over anything pre-O'Neil/Adams.

The fact that modern comics are objectively better in many ways doesn’t mean the older stuff isn’t enjoyable or worth reading.

[Dominic]

The further back one looks, the fewer good comics one is likely to find. And, I cannot think of anything published before the 70s that worked on more than one level aside from the artist occassionally slipping something rude in to the art.

Just writing a story about a character is not enough. The big two have over 5 years worth of "stories about characters". There are plenty of those. If a writer is not going to say something or write something particularly good or ground-breaking, why should anybody care about what they are writing? Love "Final Crisis" or hate it, at least Morrison made made the structure of the story match the point of the story while giving an in-story reason for it. (The comic got progressively more disjointed because it was a riff on event comic, a story about stories and in-story time was collapsing.) That takes ambition and skill to to pull off.

I am still a fan of Gillen. But, I am not going to give him a pass on the last two issues of "Iron Man". He did not say or do anything with those issues that have not been done dozens of times over the years. On the other hand, I am loving "Uber". That book is amazing. (Frankly, this book makes me okay with the killing and destruction of WWII. It is just that good.) There is not a single admirable character in that book. The big hero guy ends up getting killed off in his first fight at the end of the first arc. But, none of that matters because Gillen can write about ideas and the book is good. If Gillen could not write and articulate ideas, I would not care how nice and likable the characters were. I would drop "Uber".

[Shockwave]

Not necessarily. There are reasons for reading comics beyond the writer "making a point". Remember, this is a largely entertainment driven medium (meaning people's primary reason for getting into the medium is solely for entertainment). And while the older golden age comics may not have had huge event driven books or epic six issue "point driven" storylines, they still had a lot going on. Extortion and crime are issues that were important in those ages and sometimes people just like seeing criminals get their comeupance. We like seeing criminals lose and that's what those stories had to offer. Not to mention social commentary on the causes of criminalities as well. I think if we were to look at comic book villains and their motivations through the different eras we would see society's attitudes on the subject reflected in those stories. This is just like when you dropped MTMTE. There's a lot going on there and you're just missing it because you can't get passed what's on the surface.

Now that I think about it, this almost like comparing an 18th century sailing ship to an aircraft carrier. Just because the sailing ship is old doesn't mean it was poorly constructed.

[Onslaught Six]

I have always defended Dom's POV, even if I can't always understand it. But I get where he's coming, to some degree.

Think of it like this: There's a fuckload of stories where Batman stops the Joker from some goofy scheme. When Nolan started his batman films, he didn't start with the Joker, he started with a lesser-known villain we hadnt seen before. And when he did get to the Joker, he made sure he portrayed him differently than other live action adaptations.

I mean, we all are kind of sick of the archetypical "Optimus Prime fights Megatron over he macguffin" bullshit, right? Why do that anymore when the quintessential version of that scene already exists? (For he record, it's in TFTM.) I mean, there's a lot of more interesting ways for you to use those two characters, and you can use them to convey a point, like Mccarhy in AHM, where they both have a cool throwdown 'and' it furthers the story.

[Shockwave]

I have always defended Dom's POV, even if I can't always understand it. But I get where he's coming, to some degree.

Think of it like this: There's a fuckload of stories where Batman stops the Joker from some goofy scheme. When Nolan started his batman films, he didn't start with the Joker, he started with a lesser-known villain we hadnt seen before. And when he did get to the Joker, he made sure he portrayed him differently than other live action adaptations.

I mean, we all are kind of sick of the archetypical "Optimus Prime fights Megatron over he macguffin" bullshit, right? Why do that anymore when the quintessential version of that scene already exists? (For he record, it's in TFTM.) I mean, there's a lot of more interesting ways for you to use those two characters, and you can use them to convey a point, like Mccarhy in AHM, where they both have a cool throwdown 'and' it furthers the story.

I'm actually kind of the opposite in the sense that I've always understood his POV, but haven't always defended it.

But, Nolan's Joker story doesn't invalidate the other previous Joker stories, nor does it necessarily make them "crap". I'm not saying writing shouldn't have a point, I'm just saying that sometimes that point is entertainment, not some enlightening message or social commentary. We can have the best of both worlds and one doesn't invalidate the other. Dom seems to be completely dismissing an entire era of comic books based solely on the fact that they were written before a certain date. You're going to get good and bad quality in all eras of writing and if all of that was so terrible then why is it referred to as "Golden Age"? There were a lot of new characters and ideas presented during those years and that was when writers were doing things that were new and interesting and playing around with concepts. Those character concepts were so highly regarded at the time that they have no become iconic. Something doesn't reach that level if it's crap.

[Sparky Prime]

I am guessing that Black Hand is up to no good. Gut feeling.

Har har... I think that's a given. I was talking about what those plans are.

A lot of it is, admittedly, subjective. I think you and I disagreed about changes to Hal Jordan, for example. I still feel he's become much more juvenile and less intelligent and experienced.

Yeah, the stories I've read from before Hal becoming Parallax, I'd really have to say he's portrayed the same way he is now. He's always been a cocky fighter pilot type. And in the old comics, he's actually little prone to knocking himself out. I've seen a couple websites dedicated to such examples. But like you say, it's subjective. I don't see that the characters have changed as much as you do.

[andersonh1]

Salaak then explains without the Central Battery, Oa will be destroyed. So wait... This isn't the first time the Central Battery has been destroyed with out Oa being destroyed... What makes this time any different? Any way, pretty standard opening issue for a new story arc. Starts out with a pretty big event if Oa's going to come apart though.

You're right, I think the central battery was destroyed at the end of GL volume 2 (which was Green Lantern Corps at the time) and then again when Hal sucked all the power out of it as Parallax and then Kyle destroyed Oa during Zero Hour. The question is, do those previous occasions count? Did they even happen in the New 52?

Yeah, the stories I've read from before Hal becoming Parallax, I'd really have to say he's portrayed the same way he is now. He's always been a cocky fighter pilot type. And in the old comics, he's actually little prone to knocking himself out. I've seen a couple websites dedicated to such examples. But like you say, it's subjective. I don't see that the characters have changed as much as you do.

It depends who is writing him and at what point in his life you're reading. Denny O'Neil turned him into a bit of a strawman who wouldn't question authority so that Green Arrow could rant at him. He got whiny and mopey when Steve Englehart was writing. Gerard Jones made him older and wiser and a bit slower to act at times. I think aspects of his personality get played up with some authors, maybe even taken to extremes, while other authors go in other directions. I've already seen a difference between Geoff Johns and Robert Vendetti's characterization just in the New 52 issues.

But it's a shared universe, and a long running character with many authors over the years is bound to be inconsistently written, at least to some extent. It's more evident that Batman and Superman have gone through various eras where the characters were fundamentally different to past iterations. The eras are a little more subtle with Hal Jordan, but they are there.

[Sparky Prime]

You're right, I think the central battery was destroyed at the end of GL volume 2 (which was Green Lantern Corps at the time) and then again when Hal sucked all the power out of it as Parallax and then Kyle destroyed Oa during Zero Hour. The question is, do those previous occasions count? Did they even happen in the New 52?

The first issue of New Guardians showed us a decimated Oa after Hal's rampage as Parallax, where Ganthet creates the power ring he'd give to Kyle. So that event we can certainly say still happened in the New 52. The scene shows the Central Battery is still intact in the background, but completely drained of power. Although from what Salaak says about the Central Battery powering Oa, it doesn't sound like that would make a difference. Emptied or destroyed, it would cause the destruction of Oa either way. And can't say about the other times the Central Battery has been destroyed or drained of power, since those stories haven't come up in the New 52.