Bully, the little stuffed bull, is at ComicCon. He's doing a phenomenal job covering the Con from the floor.

Here's the first post, and here's the second.

Coffee with JenIn

Facebook is funny. Not only have I recently got back in touch with Mere, but I'm also now back in touch with a former KOHSer, JenIn. I haven't seen much of Jen since her Freshman year at UT (she's a year behind me), but as I understand it, she's got all kinds of book learnin' under her belt these days and is still in Austin.

Anyhoo, I'm grabbing coffee with her tomorrow, if anyone wants me to pass along a message.


ComicCon is On

Comic Con International has started in San Diego, and once again, I am not there.

That's okay, though, because you can usually get all the Con news I'd care about within 8 hours or so on the interwebs.

There was some good information on what us Superman comic fans can expect.

And Johns and Van Sciver on Flash. (That Flash image alone gives me hope)

Johns and Morrison are saving the DC line of comics, in spite of itself. Apparently the reception for Trinity (Busiek) and Final Crisis (Morrison) is pretty mediocre, according to reporting on the DC Nation Panel. Honestly, I've loved my Final Crisis reading, so I'm not sure what the deal is there. Trinity... may not be my cup of tea. Which is weird, because I do like Busiek's stuff, and it stars Bats, Superman and Wonder Woman.

I'm also increasingly excited about the reporting and images for DCU Online. Holy smokes, does this look like fun. (And, Hey Sony Online Entertainment! I'm available!)

They also had this to say about character design:

When asked about the creation of customizable characters, Chris Cao explained that there would be two different ways to generate an avatar for the game: a “free form method” that is completely customizable and an “inspired method” that allows for theme based concepts to be employed which allow a player to be “like Batman if they want to be.”

Rad.


Hello, Dolly!

It rained like crazy here today. And by crazy, I mean in brief, violent spurts on and off throughout the afternoon and evening. We need the rain. That's good. Unfortunately I think it messed up the travel today for Jamie (coming back from San Marcos), KareBear (coming back from New Braunfels), and The Admiral (flying back in from Brazil). I think Jamie was stuck on a 2 mile stretch of road for about an hour and a half today. Apparently a bus drove into a semi and spilled oil all over I-35.

But its also been so @#$%ing hot and dry here this summer, we needed every drop of the deluge. Austin gets its water from the Edwards Aquifer, which sits under the town. If it doesn't rain in Austin, we don't have water. When I lived in Phoenix, the city was living under a sort of mass denial in regards to their water sources and would become agitated if you pointed out: (a) we're using more water here than is probably smart in the desert, and (b) we're sort of wasteful with the water here in Phoenix, what with things like that cannon fountain in Fountain Hills, and the blue-dyed ponds in all the posher neighborhoods (seriously, gross).

Anyone whose lived in Central Texas for a while is pretty aware of the water issue. Sometimes you let your lawn die, because you'd rather take showers and have drinking water. And we tend to get our dander up when developers try to pave over the recharge zones or run-off areas. It isn't some crazy environmental issue, so don't get your political dander up. This is pretty straightforward stuff. If we want to have drinking water, we have to be careful with our natural spaces and consumption. And we have to be a little happy when the rain comes down.

Smash Comics!

A little while ago I did a post over at Comic Fodder on how today's comics might relate to kids.

One of the things that I mentioned was that I thought was that kids might not have spinner racks at drug stores, but they do have internet connections. A little while after I posted the column, I was contacted by the team at SmashComic.com. They're doing an all ages comic, and, seriously, this looks like a lot of fun. Maybe in the spirit of "HeroBear and the Kid", with a pretty sharp injection of Calvin & Hobbes' "Stupendous Man".

There's not a ton of content up yet, but from what I see, I absolutely love the art style. It's a great mix of cartooning and superhero-style artistry. And the design for our title character is perfect.



So, parents, kids, Leaguers... Check it out! I think this is really cool not just from a storytelling perspective, but from a distribution model.

Colonel Blimp, revisited...

Well, I'll be dipped.

It seems that when I shot my mouth off in this recent post regarding a Batman back-issue, I should have bit my tongue.

In the post, after praising the comic, I said the following:

The problem: Not only is our terrorist wearing a grape-colored chauffer's outfit, his nom-de-crime? Colonel Blimp.

Not exactly a name geared toward striking fear in the hearts of the populace. And a little on the nose, I think. I am unsure why Conway and or Kupperberg slacked so badly on the villain's name, but there you have it.

Let this be a lesson to YOU, Leaguers. ALWAYS GOOGLE IT.

According to Wikipedia, Colonel Blimp was not originally a DC Comics creation, but, in fact, a sly nod to a British cartoon character of the same name. See the Wikipedia entry.

From the post:

Blimp was a satire on the reactionary opinions of the British establishment of the 1930s and 1940s.

Interesting, no?

This Col. Blimp character must have been pretty popular. There's even a movie called: The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp that received the Criterion Edition treatment.

Further, it seems the Col. Blimp in the issue was actually a call back to a very early Batman comic featuring a villain named Carl Kruger. Who employed a dirigible of some sort.

It would be interesting to learn a bit more about what Gerry Conway was thinking, employing the name (but not the likeness) of the other Col. Blimp. It seems highly unlikely the use of the name was a coincidence.

So, there goes the one weird things about Detective 519. Go figure.

By the way, if you haven't read the comments in the original post, we were honored to have Mr. Paul Kupperberg, who scripted the issue, drop by and discuss the artist, Don Newton, and a few other items.

I'm off to go dig the Carl Kruger story up in a reprint. I must have read it a while back. Plus, I may look for this Col. Blimp movie.

Man, I love comics. And the internets.

My first Batman Comic!

About a year ago I was digging through some back issues at Austin Books and I stumbled across Detective Comics #519.

Detective Comics #519 is the first Batman comic I ever recall reading. I think my dad bought it for me and just dropped it on me at some point, right about the summer before third grade. I remember this for a somewhat specific reason, which I'll get to in a minute. It was also the only Batman comic I would read between 3rd grade and 5th grade.


The issue's writing is handled by two of my favorites from pre-Crisis DC. Gerry Conway on plot. Paul Kupperberg on script. Pencils are by a "Don Newton". I don't know Don's work, but its really, really nice. Well rendered in an illustrative style. I don't think this cover is Newton. It might be Aparo, but I have no idea.
(update: The cover is Aparo. And, sadly, it seems Don Newton died suddenly in 1984. Here's a web-gallery of his work for you to enjoy.)

The story is the second half of a tale (which began in the previous issue) wherein Batman confronts a terrorist holding Washington DC hostage with exploding blimps. Its actually a pretty cool story, with Batman unravelling the villain's scheme.

The problem: Not only is our terrorist wearing a grape-colored chauffer's outfit, his nom-de-crime? Colonel Blimp.

Not exactly a name geared toward striking fear in the hearts of the populace. And a little on the nose, I think. I am unsure why Conway and or Kupperberg slacked so badly on the villain's name, but there you have it.

Blimp is also awesome enough to give his henchmen themed outfits.


I can't tell you how much I would pay for exactly that same shirt.

Part of the plot includes Blimp's henchmen trying to hi-jack nuclear subs in the arctic. Robin heads off to run interference, which seems short-sited with his perpensity of wearing green undies and precious little else south of the equator. Fortunately, the Bat-team seem to have ready-to-wear bat-onesies.



Robin looks adorable in his little outfit.

I was especially impressed by a "Batman escapes from the exploding blimp" sequence. Well rendered, well-framed, and with the appropriate sense of tension. Jack Bauer, eat your heart out.





click on these panels for full detail

Now, THAT is an explosion. Well done, Don Newton! It's almost like you didn't use Hindenburg photo reference.

Now, why was this my last Batman comic for a while?

Back in the 80's, DC had opened the door to writers using the words "damn" and "hell". At the Steans house, profanity was taken with all seriousness. We could see movies with "dirty words", but it wasn't until the Eddie Murphy incident of 1984 that blue language began to creep into our household's entertainment with any regularity.

Marvel always substituted words like "blazes" for "hell". And in the X-books, people couldn't make a cup of coffee without telling someone "it hurt like blazes" or to "go to blazes". And I think, honestly, it was part of why I started reading Marve before DC. That, and Marvel was never was all-out weird and apocalyptic as DC could get.

Anyway, all I could recall about this comic 20-odd years later was that it had a swear in it somewhere. Lo, those many years ago I'd been pretty scarred by stumbling across a swear in my funnybook.

In fact, when my third grade teacher put some comics on a shelf for us to enjoy during quiet reading time, I was horrified to see the image of Colonel Blimp and Batman on one of the comics and made a special point of telling Ms. Martin that those batman comics were for older kids because they had swears in them.

After scanning the comic, this is the only use of any four-letter word in the entire comic:

Wow. I was a sensitive kid. My parents didn't even have to find this smut themselves, I was so busy self-censoring.

It was TWO YEARS before I read Batman again. And I honestly have no idea what happened to that copy of this comic. Just as I have no idea where my Bugs Bunny comics, etc... went.

But I don't think Ms. Martin ever pulled those comics off the shelf, for which I salute her

I don't think we ever saw the likes of Colonel Blimp appear again in the Batbooks. Perhaps because it was just a little tough to take even our Dark Knight seriously when he's delivering lines like:



So a salute to sweet, sheltered little Ryan and a life before he used swears with all kinds of regularity. And a salute to this comic, which is still really good after all these years.

A meandering post

Sorry about the lack of substantive posting. But, you know, not a whole lot to report. Jamie and I have been sticking close to the homefront, and not much has been going on.

Mer B.


Facebook is a strange and funny place. Thanks to Facebook, I think Jamie's circle of high school pals is having an impromptu reunion of some sort this fall.

But, I am not without people who once liked me.

This evening an old High School Chum called. For those of you KOHS folks, it was Meredith B., now married and still a Meredith B. Mer sounds great, and it was fantastic to catch up with her. And, yes, she'd found me on Facebook.

In high school I adored Meredith. She was smart, funny and if you were looking for someone to make spot on observational snark, she was your gal. We were in drama together, and were in plays from "The Crucible", to "All My Sons". And she a good actor, too, if I recall.

Meredith's moment of "the show must go on" took place when, in the middle of a show, she was supposed to be breaking ice with an ice pick and neatly stabbed her hand, just above the thumb. Meredith, being Meredith, just stuck her hand in the ice to slow the bleeding and then carried on the scene and then the play. Just one of many, many reasons why I tip my hat to the lady.

She's now in N. Carolina, married to a great guy and mother to three boys. My, how life marches on.

Bagging and Boarding

As for me:

I've been bagging, boarding, boxing and inventorying about 8-9 months worth of comics. Not all bad, but a little tedious. I've also set aside a stack of comics I've decided not to keep in the collection. Not bad stuff, just... it doesn't need to disappear into the closet in a polybag. I can share the wealth, if anyone wants me to send them some comics.

I'm increasingly of the opinion that I need to find a process for shedding some of the stuff I like reading, but won't ever return to. I will want to hang onto Action Comics and Superman, but the stack of Fantastic Four and Black Panther? A good read, sure... but I'm just not all that attached.

I am increasingly more pleased with my Superman comic collection, but its also true that it is a teeny, tiny fraction of the total published Superman comics over the years. There's just so much out there. And so little of it in reprint. With back-issues costing more than a new comic, my purchase of the back issues has to be managed. Lest Ryan go broke and crazy.

Still, it makes it a hobby, I suppose. If I could get my hands on all that stuff easily, what would be the fun?


Web Comics

Which makes me really, really wish Marvel and DC would get their @#$% together on the whole digital comics thing. How wasteful is it to have trees cut down and pulped, paper printed (using noxious chemicals), shipped (using fuel), and taking up space on a shelf, shoved in a plastic bag to take home, and then read in about fifteen minutes or less? And for obsessive guys like me, a ploybag and board?

Digital comics, DC and Marvel. Oh, I'll still pick up my paper copies of my collector titles (Superman, GL, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc...). And I might still pick up trade collections of series that were really good which I'd read online.

I want to love you, monthly installments, but you're killing the earth. You'd be cheaper if you had no physical form until I say you do. I do wonder what the tipping point would be for DC and Marvel before the cost of printing was high enough, and the cost of shipping impacted cost enough that retailers couldn't move the product...?

I wonder how strong web comics proponents (like Lea Hernandez) foresee the whole web-comics thing, if and when it plays out, affecting retailers?

I'm not trying to put the Direct Market out of business. That certainly seems like it would be an unintended side-effect. But I also wonder, if the cost were right, how that might affect the number of actual readers per comic.

Keep in mind, comics used to be shared and traded by kids, so the publishers saw only the profit of one purchase to something like 5-10 actual readers.

I'm just saying.


Ub Iwerks

Also watched a really good documentary on Walt Disney collaborator Ub Iwerks I recorded off Ovation, The Hand Behind the Mouse: The Ub Iwerks Story. If you don't know who Ub Iwerks is/ was, I highly recommend reading up on the man. His contribution to animation is incalculable, and he later turned that same genius to film technology.

The documentary is well done, but seems cleaned up by Disney to make the history fit a little better into Disney's version of things ( I believe they produced or released the doc).

Anyhow, I'm going to be looking at those DVD collections of really inexpensive cartoons to see if they have any of the Iwerks non-Disney cartoons available.

Read here
and here
and here

Completely inappropriate Superman link

Whatever you do, do not click through to read the following article. Especially you, Mom. DO NOT CLICK THROUGH. DO SO AT YOUR PERIL.

Sent, of course, by Randy.

New Post Up

I have a new post up at Comic Fodder.

The League is back at Comic Fodder

Hey, Leaguers!

Some of you may recall my stint as editor at Comic Fodder in 2007. Well, Travis has been doing a bang up job over there, and I miss being in the mix... so.

I'm now contributing as an Op/Ed sort of guy. Posting maybe once a week on items in the DCU, etc... I dunno. We'll see how it goes.

You can find my posts with an icon depicting patron saint of League of Melbotis, Krypto the Superdog.



And, here's a link to my first, very lengthy post. Written a bit in response to someone's questions regarding "what went wrong with Countdown and 'Death of the new Gods'".

Please feel free to drop by and comment.

Krypto

Superman's canine companion, Krypto, graces the September cover of Superman (issue #680).

For full September solicitations, go here.

Final Crisis - Morrison speaks

In a Newsarama interview posted on Monday, Grant Morrison informs readers, basically, that they were better off ignoring "Countdown" and "Death of the New Gods".

For those of you keeping score, the conclusion of "Death of the New Gods" and "Countdown" not jiving with each other at all should have given you a serious moment of pause. Throw into the mix the beginning of "Final Crisis", and you have a potentially cataclysmic problem at DC Editorial.

It should come as no small surprise that Didio's pet writing team on Countdown fell down on the job. The insult, then, being the 52 issues of a series some of us picked up, and which wound up as a colossal disappointment. This is to say nothing of the embarassing outing that was "Death of the New Gods" (in which Jim Starlin proved that he had almost no ability to channel Kirby's vision for the New Gods, and/ or was just cashing a check). And, it should be mentioned, Salvation Run will now also be largely pointless and forgotten.

The long and the short of it seems to read something like this:

Unless a DC book is written by Morrison, Johns, Rucka and possibly Gail Simone, its best to just consider it ancillary and out of continuity. And that, Leaguers, is kind of messed up. Even if its sort of the sneaking suspicion DC fans should have come to by the end of 52 and the OYL year-long implosion.

In general, I think I give DC a lot of leeway. Some of that is in reaction to the Marvel Fan game of trying to blow every minor mistake DC makes into some sort of catastrophe and point to conflated issues as evidence that DC is a fraud. Much of the time, those mistakes are either inconsequential or, occasionally, not a mistake at all.

But how DC can push a series like Final Crisis, with all the hype and supporting series attached by big name writers and make the error of not including someone like Morrison in the planning process for the "countdown" to his story is, frankly, unforgiveable from an editorial standpoint.

Its sad that DC saw the fervor caused by the discrepancies between "Final Crisis", "Countdown" and "Death of the New Gods" and had to ask Morrison to answer for DC's editorial incompetence in order to try to find a way to salvage "Final Crisis" before the fire got much bigger.

I believe in continuity, but there's a lot of work that has to go into making these events work. And something as big as "the final battle between Dakseid and Orion" seems big enough (in the DCU, anyway), that it seems imperative that a company wide decree on how this was going to work should have been issued. Let alone, asking Morrison what events were going to work or NOT work with Final Crisis, if Final Crisis was intended to be the last word in big event comics from DC for a while.

I was concerned that Morrison's comments would somehow distort my vigorous defense of Final Crisis #1from last week, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I'm not so sure I can be as kind to my "accessibility and comics" rant.

Incongruent continuity, flatly, makes comics hard to follow. It makes the stories around them tough to read, and conflicting portrayals of events are a show stopper for both long-time fans and, especially, for those new to the concepts. When you've seen the same character die 3 times in three weeks in three different ways, it leads to some serious cognitive dissonance that is going to pull you out of the story.

DC, get your mess together.

Didio not only owes his customers an apology, he owes us a solemn promise that he has seen his editorial goof for the colossal mistake that it was and that such a mistake will NOT happen again lest he will fall on his own sword. Not ask Grant Morrison to go smooth things over for him.

But, honestly, if I were Levitz, I'd be calling him on the carpet.

For the first time in a long time, I feel screwed by DC as a reader. This wasn't a case of me disagreeing with the direction of a comic. This was about a serious mistake in editorial. A clerical error that should have been spotted. And mostly it looks like Didio and whomever is closest to him is whispering to him their ideas for how they can ride on Morrison's coattails and make everyone a WINNAH!. But, by not working with the goose, their trampling all over the golden eggs on the way to the market.

For all of that, they asked readers to pu their faith in a comic that was going to supposedly effect the entire DCU (it didn't), and lead into a highly anticipated event (it didn't).

So what was "Countdown"? A cynical cash grab? A failed follow up to "52" once the success of the series became obvious? An honest attempt to build a "spine" to the DCU? An experiment that went up like the Hindenburg?

What were all those awful Countdown spin-offs?
The promise of storylines that never really happened (Why did Jimmy Olsen have to die again? And what did that have to do with the Joker?)
Countdown Arena?
the go-nowhere plot with the Monarch?
Was that really the plan with Ray Palmer from the beginning?
What was the point of Salvation Run?
Likewise, Death of the New Gods?

So, so many questions...


I'm tired of being an apologist for Didio and his cadre of incompetent creative teams. There's too much else going on at DC that works.

Batman
Detective
Robin is even okay with Dixon back
Superman
Action
All Star Superman
Green Lantern
GL Corps
Legion (now that Shooter's taken over. Go figure.)
Checkmate
Blue Beetle
Justice Society America is rock solid
Justice League America is okay when they aren't desperately tying into events
Booster Gold

All really good, solid titles. Even Simone's Wonder Woman is showing promise. Heck, even Supergirl has been on a major upswing.

I'm still highly recommending Final Crisis. I don't think its that complicated (and if you have a question, feel free to ask, and maybe I can help). But I am seriously questioning how many more DC titles I would add in the future as Morrison, Johns, Rucka, etc... leave. My days of giving titles the benefit of the doubt is coming to an end. Especially for books not written and drawn by teams I already trust.

Accessibility in Comics

I just want to make sure you guys understand that the column below is an opinion. I sincerely believe a lot of what I say below. I don't think this is controversial, but in the comics-blogosphere, there are certain elements of "common wisdom" about comics that people accept as fact.

One of these issues is the inaccessibility of comics.

The slippery slope here is that there just isn't much in the way of fact and statistics to hang onto when expressing an opinion or making a point about comics fandom, etc... So this post was actually a bit hard for me to put together with little in the way of data to pull from.

Anyway, its an opinion. And its not based on any particular evidence, other than a trend I've been seeing at Newsarama and other trafficked websites.

Since I have no data, I'd really like to hear your opinions in the comments section. If I'm way off base, I'm way off base. But I'd at least like to challenge this particular notion of "accessibility".


Comics, as an industry, are not in a great financial position. Top selling comics usually sell around 100,000 copies. I'm at a loss for what the "mean" might be for comic sales, but comics from the Big 2 (Marvel and DC) start facing cancellation in the 20K range and lower. To put it in perspective, some of the lowest rated TV shows on network TV (NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox and CW) are pulling in around 2 million viewers (Example: The Pussycat Dolls present: Girlicious). Or, roughly, 100 times the number of people buying that issue of Blue Beetle, which is only movinga round 20K per month.

The Problem

After the 1940's and 50's, when titles sold in the millions annually, the common wisdom surrounding why comics go mostly unread these days is that comics are "inaccessible". It should be noted that this inaccessibility is believed to exist despite the $100 million opening weekends for movies like Iron Man (whose comic of the same name sold 38,000 copies in April 2008).

The definition of "accessibility" in comic blogging parlance is (I guess): the complication a reader may experience while attempting to become engaged in a superhero comic narrative. This complication may be due to the intricate nature of a storyline and character(s) who have amassed considerable back story, which the reader may feel they need to know before engaging the current story in its full capacity.

So the problem may be seen as: Comic superhero narratives extend over years, and, in many cases, decades. So that if Sally Newreader picks up an issue of, say Iron Man, the world she would encounter with a single issue's read would be SO MINDBOGGLING that she would give up on Iron Man, and (perhaps) comics forever.

Narrative Complexity

The truth is that comics DO have ongoing narratives. Picking up any single issue of a series might drop you mid-stream into a story, and there's no guarantee the reader will feel they have adequately caught up by the end of the issue. Add in the idea that any single issue of Iron Man is but a peek into a character who has been around since the early 60's, which has been a part of a larger universe since that same time, with dozens of comics released each month defining that universe... and all the characters that have appeared in that series, and all of the storylines which have appeared... And, technically.... yes. It could be seen as a bit daunting to jump into a comic on the strength of one issue.

Just who is reading these things?

I think its important to understand who comprises the comic audience. DC and Marvel don't really go out of their way to hype their marketing research, but a few stats I've seen suggest that the audience is HUGELY male, and in their 20's or older. One report stating the audience was 90% male, and respondents were an average age of 29 (29!). Johanna had some words of wisdom on the issue about a year ago.

This is in sharp contrast to the audience which was believed to consume comics from the 1930's - 1970's and the rise of the comic fan movement (if you'll pardon the expression) which began the change in demographics.

Today's superhero reader is most likely a male, much older than the school children of years past. My guess is that they have been reading comics for many years, and that they have specific characters and titles which they follow. Although, increasingly, readers will move from title to title to follow a writer and/ or artists.

Where can I get these funnybooks?

Its also, I believe, key to understanding the accessibility of comics to understand where comics are available and the cost of a single issue of a comic. Comics are now available in the traditional format (20 pieces of paper folded and stapled together) almost exclusively in specialty retail shops. These comics now cost around $3.00 a pop. To make my point, the spinner racks in the magazine aisle are now long gone. Comics are no longer distributed through the same channel as magazines. Instead, a single distribution company holds a monopoly, and they work almost exclusively with the small retailers of comic shops (there are no big, nationwide chains of comic stores.).

In short, the point of physical access for readers and comics has all but evaporated. When Marvel and DC decided to quit competing for space on the newsstand, they made a decision to become a product for boutique retailers. This decision was either consciously, or unconsciously made to keep kids out of the equation. But...

Kids = new readers

new readers = growth (or at least a sustainable business model)

A trip down memory lane...

Returning to the idea that comics are inaccessible, I have only my own recollections, and the anecdotes of a few other folks to go by.

My first issue of Uncanny X-Men (a series of which I have 172 issues) was issue 210. It occurred between two well known storylines, the conclusion of the Rachel Summers/ Phoenix/ Selene storyline and was one issue before the Mutant Massacre. I had no idea what a mutant was, who this "Rachel" person was, what battle occurred that everyone was so worried about, or what was going on. But I was hooked. And I think 172 issues speaks pretty well for how devoted I became until the post-Claremont flailing.

I also started reading Batman comics right before the notorious "Dial in and kill Robin" stunt. I really didn't understand who this second Robin was, what his background might be, how he related to Batman, or what the past 45 years of Batman comics were like. But I was similarly fascinated.


So what...?

Question #1: The question, then, is: Do adult readers, coming to a shop for a specific purchase and more entrenched feelings regarding brand loyalty, etc... truly find new comics inaccessible, or do they simply not find new concepts and comics worth exploring?

Question #2: Are kids and their natural sense of exploration a more apt audience for the endless mythologies of mainstream comic superheroes?

My opinion is that it's not a clear cut answer. New series rise and fall, just as they once did on the newstands. But the audience is just so much smaller with comics unavailable to the general public.

The argument I would make is that the narrative of comics is not what is keeping NEW READERS away. The barrier seems more likely to be the limited availability of comics due to the boutique nature of comic shops. Add in the price point, which many may find a bit steep, and its a tough sell.


Won't someone think of the children...?

And, geez... You're going to need those kids. Find a way to reach them. And, for the love of Wertham, make sure the content isn't going to sink the industry. Johnny DC is a GREAT start (seriously, I love the Johnny DC titles). But also get the other stuff out there, too.

But unless those comics end up in the candy aisle or in the toy section at Target, I have no idea how kids are going to find them. Moms aren't taking their 8-year-old to the comic shop, and it seems like there's a market here.*

For those sad, unsatisfied fanboys...

I have no answer. I have my suspicions. I don't think adult readers, already invested in a number of titles are likely to be willing to expend either money or energy to uncover the mysteries of, say, Iron Man in the way they might have done at age 11 when first getting into superhero comics.

From the comments I've seen, it does seem that there's a rush to condemn event comics such as Final Crisis for not sticking to some indefinable simplicity out of a Universe in which many of the commenters have seemingly never before taken interest. I'm not sure how to solve that accessibility gap. In some ways, it seems, someone new to superhero comics would be at an advantage. They would not assume they should have all a priori knowledge, and write off concepts they might not immediately recognize as "inaccessible".

As per most other titles... unless you're talking Morrison's Doom Patrol or Invisibles, accessibility into the worlds of each title isn't a huge issue. Marvel spends a page at the beginning of each issue recapping previous events. DC has a marvelously crafted blurb explaining who each titular character is on the title page.

In my opinion, things seem complicated not because they actually ARE that complicated, but because the readers feel its easier to pass judgment rather than actually checking out the series (as a Superman nut, I'm particularly sensitive to this issue). But could anything be more convoluted than a team-book like X-Men? Or a character like Batman, managed by how many creative teams across how many comics? And still these comics sell okay to the existing fanboy audience.

When I was a kid...

As I mentioned, my first issue of Uncanny X-Men was issue 210. Today, my run begins with issue 169.

My point being: Yes, X-Men had a complicated past, running 209 issues before I tapped into the X-Universe. And in those days, in order to get the back story, I had to talk Karebear into driving me down to Austin Books so I could pillage their back-issue bin. There weren't trades in the 80's. But, even as a kid, I didn't feel that I needed to start from the beginning. Instead, if issue numbers were referenced, I saved my pennies and went looking for the back-issues.

It wasn't "inaccessible", it was something to uncover. And, honestly, its sort of how I feel about Superman comics these days. Nothing like doing a victory dance because you stumbled across a beat up comic featuring the first appearance of Parasite (again, thanks, Austin Books!).


So in conclusion...

I don't buy the "inaccessibility" argument. Maybe for some, limited titles. But I certainly don't buy it for most of the mainstream DCU or Marvel U titles. To me, it sounds like an excuse. After all, the audience got into comics at some point. Often as children. And while I do honestly believe today's superhero comics are more sophisticated than those of the 70's and 80's (and much of the Image-tastic 90's), I don't believe that literate adults really find the 22 page floppies impenetrable.

What I do believe is that the readers simply lack the switch which once turned them on to new ideas, new characters, etc... that aren't part of the superhero comics with which they're already familiar.

In my opinion, making those comics accessible is part of the fun. Good writing in current issues has often made me want to learn more. And, today, its easier to do so than ever with collections, Marvel's Digital Comics, well-timed re-prints, etc... But... I think more often than that, good writers also don't assume readers will know everything and give the readers what they need to know. The problem comes when a assumption is made that the knowledge is there by poor writing.

That said, the comics exist within SHARED UNIVERSES. Event comics do sell well, and are probably good for not just the strength of the companies, but as a reminder to writers that their comics and characters don't exist in a bubble. To suggest that comics referring to the shared universes and their complexity shouldn't exist is asking the the Big 2 to give up on one of the most exciting parts of what makes these universes great.







*Have you stood in the toy aisle at Target? Literally half the folks are NOT shopping for the kid who is with them, but for a present. How easy would it be to sell comics as a cheap substitute for a toy to some kid pouting because he's not getting a Transformer? Especially when your comic ties into the toys on that same aisle...

2 things

Hey Leaguers,

Apropos of nothing

Austin Books is a heck of a store. And they had a darn good Free Comic Book Day. I salute them.

Hi, Brad!


Summer Movies

Austin's Paramount Theater has already started the 2008 Summer Film Series. And there's a lot of great stuff coming up.

In June, they're showing
-The Exorcist
-Mary Poppins (and I LOVE Mary Poppins. Shut up.)
-Harold and Maude - never seen it
-Laura (this movie is really good. No lie.)
-The Birds (Oskar Sala!)
-Psycho

July
-Frankenstein & Revenge of Frankenstein (why they didn't grab Bride of Frankenstein, I have no idea)
-The Haunting
-Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
-1776
-The Last Picture Show - never seen it
-Hud - never seen it
-Three Days of the Condor - never seen it
-Village of the Damned - only seen the re-make
-The Time Machine
-Planet of the Apes
-The French Connection

August
-Destry Rides Again
-Blazing Saddles
-Vertigo
-2001
-Gone With the Wind

September
-Bridge on the River Kwai
-Rear Window
-(and your endurance test) Lawrence of Arabia

Not bad. If anyone is interested in any of these movies (or something I didn't mention), let me know, and we'll make an appointment.

Ten-Cents to Fifty Dollars - Won't someone think of the children

For my birthday, M.I.L. gave me a copy of David Hadju's recent book "The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How it Changed America". It's a brisk read at under 400 pages, and Hadju's pacing is to be commended. Much more than that, however, is Hadju's ability to seemingly depart the freeway to explore the nearby neighborhoods, only to make you realize that without an understanding of the neighborhoods you've passed through, the destination wouldn't make much sense at all.

The book does not center entirely on Dr. Fredric Wertham and his book "Seduction of the Innocent", but its importance to the story is undeniable. As are the why's-and-wherefore's of the early comic industry. In fact, first reading "Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the Comic Book" is highly recommended before plummeting headfirst into Hadju's account.

From their inception, comics were considered unfit for reading for impressionable minds, from children to the lower class immigrants of New York who read Barney Google and Little Nemo. Culture was not to be considered democratic, but controlled and appreciated entirely by the moneyed and those of breeding and taste.

Comics were... something else altogether.

This is nothing new. Prior to the comic books, penny-dreadfuls and pockets books were considered a danger to children at and before the turn of the century (read up on Varney the Vampire and its ilk sometime). Then pulps. Then gangster pictures. Later, Rock'n'Roll, television, and leading up to today's questions whether watching The Matrix then playing five hours of Halo will lead to a psychic meltdown which ends in murder.

"The Ten-Cent Plague" tracks the development of comics in parallel with the post WWII and Cold War paranoia and topic-of-the-moment, Juvenile Delinquency. Comics, being something kids consumed as readily as, say, Grand Theft Auto or Halo in today's market, were a mass media for the children of the mid-20th century. In part due to the rise of public concern over "Juvenile Delinquency" (see: Rebel Without a Cause), Wertham (and many others) saw a direct causal link between the consumption of comics and Juvenile Delinquency drawn seemingly from the fact that his patients would verify that they had read comics.

To clarify, comics of the era were not all superhero comics, but covered many areas from Romance, to Westerns, to GI combat, and especially crime, with no small amount of horror thrown in by EC and others. The modern equivalent might be to ask that all video games be taken off the shelf because a psychologist found his criminally psychotic patients had played X-Box.

Wertham (and many others) took up the crusade against comics, and found politicians happy to play along. Whether politicians were sincere or cynically vote-grubbing is unknown as they beat the drum to save the hearts and minds of the nation's children by putting comics out of business.

The book has a certain tragic, march to doom feel about the proceedings, especially when you're aware of how things will pan out for the industry.

I honestly thought Hadju could have done a little less to villify the antagonists. Sometimes it seems Hadju simply cannot withhold his contempt, and his criticisms seem a bit on the nitpicky side, even when he's correct.

What Hadju does do well is remind the reader that it was only 60 years ago that the outrage was such over comics (including Superman, Batman, and others...) that children were incited to collect comics and burn them in public displays. In addition, these same organizations would pressure shopkeeps to quit carrying comics or face a boycott in small towns where the children (and their parents) kept the stores afloat. Ironically, even as foes of comics decried the content within and held burnings, they denounced censorship as a tool of commies and fascists. And I might point out, this book burning was going on just five years or so after the conclusion of WWII and America's horror at the book burnings of Hitler's Germany.

The metatext of the story, really, is that the issue is as current today as it was when EC Comics folded. Politicians looking for an easy, bullet proof cause by targeting a non-issue which supposedly effects "families". Pop psychology playing into a national fervor about a largely imaginary concern played up by the media. The adults convinced that children must live in a state of eden-like innocence until they're 18 and ready to put on a military uniform, and that any naughty words will warp their fragile little minds. Inane rhetoric questioning "who is patriotic?".

In short, parents were told to fear comics by the press, government and someone trying to sell a book. And it led to the hamstringing of an entire medium in the US, garnering it a reputation for children and the dull-witted, which continues to this day.

Fundamentally, I agree with Hadju's point-of-view. I find any attempt at censorship to be highly suspect, so I'm sort of the choir to whom he's preaching. And I find the sorts of "won't anyone think of the children?" pleas unconvincing when the goal is so broad and undefined.

But I don't have children, and most likely never will. I will never stop to wonder whether the video games, movies and internet content that Clark, Diana or Little Bruce were viewing would melt their brain and turn them into little sociopaths capable of MURDER.

However, I think at this point we don't NEED research to know that people, society, etc... are far more complicated than to believe that Cause A will have Effect B (and that is more or less what Wertham claimed during official hearings). But somehow the opposite is generally "common wisdom". And once the press smells a story and fans the flames of a "controversy", it can begin to border on an hysteria.

Perhaps because there's always a new generation of parents who never gave the matter of media and childhood development much thought until faced with the challange of parenting... Or perhaps because they found their kids either watching some god-awful movie which will warp their fragile little mind, or they look for someone/ something to explain why junior was caught selling bags of the dope... blaming the ills of society on purveyors of entertainment is a never-ending issue in the press.

And, yes, there's always somebody whose got a screw loose and decides to re-enact Taxi Driver, and (with all due respect to the tragic deaths in question) that tends to cast a disproportionate level of concern versus the millions of other consumers who did not go Travis Bickle.

It seems the difference between the era in which Wertham and the modern era is the litigiousness of the modern era versus the public shaming by committee of the HUAC-era. As such, lawsuits are filed all the time these days against, well, mostly Rockstar Entertainment. The suits blame the game maker for deaths "inspired" by Grand Theft Auto. Just as Wertham and Co. pinned violence among children to comics, as well as a host of other crimes, so too, do today's attorneys and the parents that retain those attorneys.

Its worth noting that at the same time that the above linked lawsuit was going into place against Rockstar, congress passed a bill keeping citizens from suing the actual gun manufacturers, effectively stating that a gun manufacturer is in no way culpable, but pixels on a screen are still up for debate. The next year, a Tennessee congressman put a bill into consideration (in the State Senate) banning the sale or rental of violent video games to anyone. And if you want to feel your brain begin to melt, Google something like "bill to ban video game".

And so it goes on and on. But don't think comic shops are off the radar. Read up on Gordon Lee. Despite the age of comic readership having a mean of something like 23, many folks still believe comics are created for and aimed at small children. And that leaves today's comic creators in a precarious position when it comes to community standards, etc...

Like penny dreadfuls, comic strips, comic books, Jazz, Rock'n'Roll, horror movies, and whatever else that came before... Video Games will enjoy the slings and arrows of the generation which did not spawn it. But I do understand that video games are not passive entertainment. The user CHOOSES to partake in the action of the story, and increasingly so in games as complex as GTA. But the rules seem largely the same.

To be clear, I DO believe in ratings systems, and that stores would do well to self-monitor ratings for both comics and games. After all, parents should have some sort of guide to assist them in making an informed decision. They can't possibly pre-consume every game, book, movie, etc... that their children will wish to view. Without these kinds of tools, we run the risk of living in the world which has to be sanitized entirely for the youngest audiences, or government dictates for censorship and the can of worms that opens up.

New Comic Suggestion: Guardians of the Galaxy

Hey, Leaguers!

Last week a new title debuted from Marvel, and as the series is just starting, I thought I'd suggest "Guardians of the Galaxy".

The series is about a band of space-faring adventurers who, after a series of messy cosmic cataclysms decide to actually get organized and fight THREATS IN SPACE. In the classic action tradition, it's a band of rag-tag adventurers who have little in common other than that they have a mission.



Its entirely possible that the series is a bit too wrapped up in Marvel continuity for new readers, but I think series writers Abnett and Lanning do a pretty good job of making the first issue accessible (and, yeah, I think Marvel is actually far worse about continuity being an issue to new readers these days than DC).

The team includes a lot of familiar faces from the recent annihilation series, including Drax, Gamora, and the characters from the Star Lord mini-series. And that means ROCKET RACCOON (one of my favorite Marvel characters of all time). Nova makes an appearance, but is not on the team.

Mostly, the series seems like it will be fun. And The League is always looking for FUN IN SPACE. The dialog is sharp, the art is pretty nifty, and the characters just work very well together (some of whom suggest a certain light tough to the series). And, so far, it looks like the story is pointed in an interesting direction.

Apparently there was a previous series or two called Guardians of the Galaxy, which was dreamed up by the amazing Gene Colan. But, you know, I have a hard time keeping up with every darn comic that ever saw the light of day.

Anyhow, give it a shot.

Superman Red/ Superman Blue

Over the weekend, DC Comics revealed that they are planning a mini-series to be released in the weeks leading up to the very real 2008 presidential election. The series will be entitled "DCU: Decisions".

Here for a Newsarama interview with DCU Editor-in-Chief, Dan Didio.

"Decisions" is supposed to define the political leanings of various folks within the DCU. I assume we'll see some folks pop out exactly as previously defined. Green Arrow as the lefty, Green Lantern as his right-swinging pal. Hawkman coming out as a firm GOP'er. Ambush Bug as a registered Democrat.


See..!

A large part of me wonders about the wisdom of bothering to identify the political leanings of characters from whom you're trying to derive a profit. Had this been the months leading up to the highly devisive 2004 election, I would have felt Didio and Co. had lost their marbles altogether.

Politics are almost always only mentioned in some super-villainous light in super-hero comics. In 2000, Lex Luthor took the Oval Office (with Pete Ross, Superman's boyhood chum, as VP). The story seemed a bit forced, but was mostly intended to put Lex not just completely outside of Superman's grasp as a deputized officer of the law, but to give Lex the one thing he'd always wanted: the adoration of the people/ almost unlimited power.

The story didn't really bounce off of devotees of either side of the aisle too badly as Lex ran as a third party candidate, and pretty much tried to act as President as he had as CEO of LuthorCorp.

It's worth noting that real life events, such as 9-11 and the real-life US's entry into Iraq and Afghanistan, are mentioned mostly in allegory in the comics.

Anyway, Lex left office under less than ideal circumstances. Whether he achieved his goals, foreign and doemstic, seems unlikely.


Unlike Nixon, Lex knew how to leave office with a little panache

Unfortunately, I can't shake the notion that the continuity nutty and emotionally stunted fans of super-hero-dom in comics will handle the series with acomplete lack of the perspective that Didio is assuming that reasonable and mature adults are supposed to keep in mind when discussing politics. I've been on the message boards.

In short, I think that with "Decisions", DC is opening the door for a series that's just going to welcome people to abruptly turn on some of their characters when they find out that, say, Cyborg votes Libertarian. And, in the long run, that's going to cause DC some readers/ dollars.

No matter the intention of the series, people come to politics with a boatload of pre-conceived notions about "the other guys". Even today, as Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama continue the drudgery of the 2008 campaign to clinch the Democratic Nomination, the actual policy differences are fairly limited. Most of the discrepancy is in how each candidate wants to achieve the exact same goals. Yet, right now the Democratic party is suffering major upheavals as the schizm causes silly in-fighting so "our guy" can win instead of "your guy".

Apply that to a system with essentially two parties. Each has significant platform differences and where they DO agree, they might choose vastly different paths for achieving the same outcomes. No big deal, but for those of us who didn't snooze their way through 2001-2004 and how unnecessarily uncivilized it became, I'm foreseeing a lot of unhappiness with readership if these real-life political wedges are driven into their super-heroes. Isn't fighting off Despero enough? Ithat a school voucher issue?

The DC Universe is populated with characters who the reader is supposed to like. Even Ollie Queen (Green Arrow) and his nutty liberalism could be embraced by right-wingers, as Ollie can be a caricature of the beatnik with half-baked ideas. It's not too far off from how conservatives caricature liberals to begin with. Especially a limousine liberal like billionaire Ollie Queen. In the end, everyone can find something to like.

However, most of the characters aren't so well defined, and DC has carefully side-stepped getting in too much political discussion over the years. I had assumed that this tac was taken so that anyone could just assume that the hero(es) they've chosen to follow might fall in with their own basic set of beliefs. All are do-gooders, all lend a helping hand to those who need it, just as most folks would like to believe they would. If they had heat-vision.

This isn't necessarily limited to comics. When one considers the characters on TV, how often does one think about the political affiliations of their favorite sitcom characters? The characters may occasionally express some political notions, but the characters are usually portrayed as center of the road quite intentionally, so as to keep the viewership within a large tent and ensure the show reaches all kinds of audiences.

Defining, say, Aquaman, as a member of the Democrats may surprise right-leaning readers who had otherwise not given the matter much thought (I have no idea what party Aquaman would throw in with. He'd be a nut for environmental matters, but as a monarch... well... it just seems that he wouldn't buy much into all this voting business, anyway.). Why give your audience an opportunity to suddenly question their own loyalty to a character? Especially these days, when loyalty is largely what's keeping the DCU afloat.

Further, why take the opportunity to further define and explore the characters away from writers/ editors/ etc... who will handle the character in the future? Writers are not without their own biases. If I, as a writer, believe that all GOPers think Alaska serves no purpose but as a place to drill for oil, and Red Tornado has been cast as a Republican, can I write a story about Reddy fighting off evil corporate merchants hellbent on destroying the Alaskan wilderness for fun and profit?

My hope is that the "Decisions" series will explore the heroes while keeping the discussion open ended and friendly, just as its often fascinating to learn more about your own friends of all different political stripes. Part of why I became a DC fan was that, as I became an adult and found myself in the workplace, I recognized the JLA, the JSA, and the partnership between Batman and Superman for what it was... people putting aside their differences, and even their motivations, to work toward a common cause. Where Marvel's FF had unbreakable family bonds and a cosmic accident which forged their team, the JLA had only their intentions and good-will to pull them together. Where the X-Men were a team of folks banding together to fight a common cause by accident of their birth (which I still see as a great set-up), the JSA pulled together, at least initially, as a domestic front to battle our WWII enemies. That dynamic, which reflected a friendly working relationship was easier for me to identify with than the Steans Clan being bathed in cosmic rays, and JLA became something I could relate to.

If the "Decisions" series is complex enough, if it takes the time to explore and appreciate nuance... then there's a place for this series beyond the shrill point-counterpoint of the cable news networks and their talking heads. Do I think DC can actually pull that off...?

I have my doubts. It a 4-issue series with two writers which Didio has promised have diametrically opposing viewpoints. Part of my wariness may be taste, given the two writers they've listed. Neither of whom I particularly trust.

Right now, I'm also not ready for DC's PR push on this one and the inevitable, attention getting headlines during an election year: "Wonder Woman a LaRouche Democrat?"

Yurgh.

Last year, Marvel's epic "Civil War" painted a picture of government obedience for masked vigilantes. Some have accused the DCU of following suit with a devisive topic, but I never felt that Marvel's "analogy" really worked. After all, it seems unlikely that in any universe that laws would not be passed managing crime-fighting. Or that crime-fighting without a license of some sort wouldn't be looked upon a bit suspiciously by law-enforcement and the citizenry alike. If the analogy was supposed to be about getting on-board because the government says so, they needed something a bit trickier than the story they presented. And it's possible that "Decisions" will be all too concrete and preachy.

Mostly, I worry about defining any of DC's Big 3 (Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman) in any political light. As law-eforcing (and somewhat abiding) do-gooders, one could paint the characters either way. And, in my opinion, part of the attraction of such larger-than-life figures is that all 3 characters have well-developed personalities, given the current writing, and the writers (and fans) would have an idea as to the opinions of the Trinity on any given topic. But rather than discuss those topics, the characters can express their beliefs through their actions, staying above the petty squabbling of political discourse. After all, none of the three ever stopped to ask a politicians to take on crime, social injustice, etc... They've always simply acted where others have not. That's the ideal for the costumed, crime-fighting, super-hero, anyway. Respecting the law while always being forced to live just outside of it in order to do what others cannot.

To complicate matters, many superheroes, especially Batman and Superman, were born out of the issues and circumstances of the Depression, with a huge dose of the idealism that comes with youth (Siegel and Shuster were in their mid-20's when Superman hit the stands for the first time. As were Bob Kane and Bill Finger when Batman first appeared.). Crime was rampant, families still fought poverty, and the world was in a precarious political position. However, in the post WWII years, and thanks to editorial codes, increased marketing, and various other influences, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman each changed greatly. Just as they would again and again, reflecting the time and place in which they were written.

I have my personal opinions. And occasionally you'll see them in print here at The League. I also see how certain characters are defined by their actions and how they've been written for years. And I'm comfortable with that. I also believe in followong one of the basic rules of writing a narrative: show, don't tell. "DCU Decisions" seems to be doing exactly the opposite of all that.

And, honestly, having my opinions of each character's political leanings hasn't ever taken away my enjoyment of the comics.

I personally don't talk politics here because I believe in a big tent, just like those sit-com producers. But, like the JLA, I also think most folks who come to The League can agree on end results, if not the way we get there. And when we can't agree on those end-results, on what we really, really want.... well, hopefully we can hear each other well enough to agree to disagree and move on. Nothing that can't be smoothed out on with a good sit on the back porch with a drink.

After all, just as Supermans Red and Blue learned... there are two ways to do everything, and when they work together... they end all crime, solve all social injustice, and each get a girl of their dreams.

Leaguers... behold. Two sides, working together: Superman Red/ Superman Blue



Make of that what you will.

Items for Wednesday

ITEM! Randy finds a strip that is all too accurate.

ITEM! It's only taken, like, two years, but they're finally wrapping up the "Last Son" storyline in Action Comics Annual #11 coming out this week. Great googledy-moogledy. I'd heard the Kubert Brother working on this had "health" problems that kept him from working on this comic and getting it in on time. He also helps run the Joe Kubert School of Cartooning or whatever in NYC. I understand health issues can be private, so I'm not looking for an explanation. But I wish DC had hired another artist and wrapped this up a while back. Hopefully DC has their scheduling straightened out for the foreseeable future on the Superman titles.

ITEM! Hi, Denise! How are you? How are the kids?

ITEM! Entertainment Weekly has preview pages of Final Crisis #1

ITEM! Jason, Jamie, Julia... sorry about the whole Speed Racer thing last night. I had passes to a sneak peek, but I thought they were for the nearby Westgate Theater. When I grabbed them to get ready to go, I realized they were for the Gateway Theater on the other end of town. So... we didn't end up going due to the time.

ITEM! The Met has a show right now called "Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy", featuring superhero costumes right alongside some of the more extreme fashion ideas. Especially from the 80's, I think.

Click here for The Beat's report and to see an amazing statue of DC's Trinity. They also had one of Lynda Carter's costumes. Whoo!

ITEM! I don't remember where I read it, but there's a rumor that Matthew McConaughey may have landed the role of Captain America. Which... Really? I always thought he was more of a young Michael Biehn.

Of all superheroes, Cap is really the American Superhero ideal. He's the barrel-chested, baritone voiced, two-fisted slugger fighting against fascism. Is that McConaughey? I've never seen his more action oriented flicks. And I don't want a Vin Diesel or some pro-wrestler putting on the feather-headed cowl, so...

And I don't know how many of you have seen the circa 1980 Cap movies made for TV, or the 1990 movie which never made it to theaters (starring no less than the son of JD Salinger), but the costume sorta doesn't work in real life. But I think if they took a look at Hitch's designs for Cap in The Ultimates, then, maybe it won't make him look like a member of the cast of a Superbowl Halftime Show.

Movies for Boys of Summer?

Occasional Superheroine had an article up today about the lack of movies which come out in the summer which are "geared towards women". I found Valerie's questions legitimate, to an extent. But I think it oversimplifies the business of the Blockbuster movie and how and why it is made.

Valerie's post actually was spawned by an article in The Times entitled "Come Summer, Is There a Real Woman in the Multiplex?", which reminded me entirely too much of the sort of stuff you would read in RTF's Narrative Strategies class.

What becomes clear after a quick read of the article isn't that there's a lack of movies with a female audience in mind (and I would argue, the huge blockbusters try to be a big tent and include women as well). Rather, it seems that author Manohla Dargis basically doesn't care for the mainstream faire that comes out in the summertime. And has blacked out many movies and arguments which she might find inconvenient to her thesis.

Because the article reminds me so of RTF course quibbling, it relies on the same mish-mash of Gender Studies 101 to condemn the Apatow movies for showing non-He-Men, who discuss their emotions and should therefore be identified as women. An odd condemnation when she's simultaneously condemning summer movies for their machismo. What perfect balance of yin and yang Dargis is seeking in her male stars is as elusive as what she seeks in her female stars and stories.

With the other hand, Dargis complains that the women of "Sex in the City" are also not "real" women. Especially interesting as the debut of "Sex in the City" on HBO was, according to critics and fans alike, heralding a realistic depiction of the urban sophisticate. She has no praise for the Travelling Pants, Momma Mia!, or any other movie she has yet to see, and damnation for those she has seen.

So what, exactly, is Dargis looking for? It's easy to roll your eyes at movie's coming out, and its okay to criticize if you have a point. But her premise of "not enough movies for REAL women" seems a bit... well, if I was a lady, I'd be a bit offended. What movie is Dargis prescribing? If you enjoy the adventures of Indiana Jones, are you a traitor to your sex? What is this perfect movie of complicated female characters that would make he same $200 million opening weekend as Iron Man? Because it seems Dargis is completely dismissive of action movies in general, so I wouldn't bring up the recent spate of B-movies featuring tough-guy ladies fighting zombies, werewolves, vampires... what have you.

Val asks some questions.

1. Has Hollywood decided that women are not a viable audience?
No. But female-centric movies don't open to $200 million. Just as male-centric movies featuring martial arts, etc... don't open at $200 million.

There's a difference between there being no movies for women and the marketing push the Tentpole pictures receive. The sheer number of ads for Speed Racer and Iron man may give a feeling of some disproportionate balance, which may or may not actually exist. But the actual movie is not the point of a big summer pre-packaged blockbuster. "Sex in the City" won't sell millions in action figures at Target. Nor will "Made of Honor". You won't see Patrick Dempsey's face on a Coke cup at Burger King. Or Sarah Jessica Parker dolls in the BK Kids' Club meal. If "Made of Honor" loses money, the machine of the Hollywood Blockbuster won't make sure everyone gets paid. Whether Iron Man makes or loses money at the box office, the license rights alone may make up the deficit.

2. What movies DO women watch? In what format? Theater, DVD, what?
You know, back when I asked What Do Women Want in Superhero Comics, I got slammed pretty hard for asking what women want, as if I was asking a herd of people who all behaved alike. I think the question shouldn't be "women". It should be: how do mothers of 5-10 years olds enjoy entertainment? Do they take their children to see Iron Man? Do they make time for themselves to see movies of their choice? What about bad mothers who don't know they shouldn't take their kid to see "Saw"? What about Grandmothers? And professionals? Are they watching Lost on DVD instead of going to movies? Do they have time to go to the theater? Are they more aware of who the stars are than what movies they're actually in?

But, mostly, its a goofy question. What do guys watch? They don't all watch the same things. Now, comic book nerdy guys... we kind of do all watch the same things. We just enjoy them to varying degrees.

3. Does Hollywood assume that women either do not watch movies in theaters or will go to wherever their significant others will take them to see or that they are so busy mopping floors that they haven't even given the topic much thought?

Well, that's a loaded question. And I won't speak for Hollywood. Or women. But with movies costing $200 million dollars, I'm pretty sure the studios do some research to figure out what is going to be profitable.

But if the last five movies "for women" came out and all made between 50-75 million, how much are you going to spend on the next one you make to ensure a profit? Probably less than $50 million, I'd assume. From that point, I assume people who know more about marketing a movie than I would know how to narrowcast advertising to the presumd audience.

Anecdotally, I do believe women are more likely to see a movie of their partner's choosing than their male partner will really, really want to see "27 Dresses". Other than that, I refuse to comment on this, because it seems like talking about this would lead me into trouble with Jamie. Who went with Jason and me to see "Doomsday", even though we all agreed she would not like it.

4. Is a movie like "Indiana Jones," as mentioned in the article, not a movie of female interest because Indy and his sidekick themselves are not females? Or is this sort of reductionist?

I think its kind of reductionist.

As I mentioned, some movies are just going to overwhelm those niche categories. As an example: Titanic didn't make a billion dollars because of squeeing 13 year old girls who found Leo non-threatening. A lot of people saw that movie. It seems that a franchise like Indiana Jones can also have that cross-over appeal, once its ingrained in popular culture.

5. According to the article, the amount of female movie directors is something like 6%. Is this the movie studios fault for not hiring these women? Are these women not applying for the director track? Are they not applying to the director track because they are not interested, or because they are discouraged from doing so in school?

Uh... the Director track? In school? I went to film school, so I think I have a little bit of experience with this one (and there was no "director's track" at UT RTF. You're all doing everything from camera to feeding your actors). Honestly, my years in film school were sort of the opposite of discouraging women. They seemed a lot more focused on the opposite ideal, to look at narratives from non-traditional points of view and encourage everyone who wanted to participate.

And the hard numbers: our production track was about 40% women, 60% guys. But I would also question whether that has a direct effect on the number of directors as much as I would ask (1) if that figure 6% is accurate, (2) how many women went out to try to get features made, (3) are you counting television, documentary and directors of non-main-stream films, and (4) perhaps a bit of a rough point, but as in any industry... Life often complicates things. There are female CEO's and some female directors, producers and studio execs. But how many women decide to have a family and are unable to keep up the break-neck pace of working in the film industry to get to a point where they are given the opportunity to direct? Let alone decide to pursue something else requiring less time once the kids need parenting?

Looking for some sort of male-dominated conspiracy from film school to the directors chair is giving Hollywood entirely too much credit. There's a lot of money at play here, and decisions are made about how to be profitable. Its not a conspiracy as much as too much caution about unknown commodities.

My point being, in order to try to make a good investment, Hollywood mostly goes with what it knows. If "March of the Penguins" makes money, we get two animated penguin movies and a Bob Saget Penguin spoof within a year or so. If Iron Man made $200 million in an opening weekend, you make Iron Man 2. If Catwoman and Elektra failed to make any money (and, in fact, lost money) you put the brakes on hoping sexiness in a costume is enough to drag folks in. Then you take a long, hard look at your script for Wonder Woman and don't assume its going to rush into theaters because of T&A and a magic lasso. And if you think they're taking too long between pictures... How long between Superman IV and Superman Returns?

And, by the way, a woman is directing the next Punisher movie. So it seems Marvel doesn't believe women are off-limits when it comes to their movies.

One of the greater challenges for comic-to-movie adaptations has to be that most of the time-tested characters and ideas came from a time and place where diversity wasn't as valued as it is today, and where women held a different place in society. Keep in mind, Action Comics #1 premiered about 19 years after the 19th amendment passed. Finding female characters who starred in their own titles in a genre that typically featured male heroic archetypes for decades is going to be a bit slimmer pickings. And with the failure of two high profile characters like Elektra and Catwoman on the big screen (with terrible scripts to blame, really. Yes, I've watched most of Catwoman), its difficult to pick out who could be the female Iron Man.

Not that I think that's what Dargis is looking for. Really, I think what she'd like is to see the Oscar-season movies open in the summer and do 200 million in their first weekend. That's my guess, anyway. I'm not sure which "real" women she wants at the cinema. Are there not silly, ridiculous women in real life? Or are those silly women who will appear in comedies this summer, or the women of Sex in the City just not her cup of tea, in movies about topics which she holds in contempt, or are they just not the kind of person she personally likes to pal around with? "Real" women.

All this said, at last check, I'm not a lady. But I do know a few. And they like all kinds of movies, just how guys like all kinds of movies. CB likes Scorcese, horror, John Waters, and all kinds of stuff. Jamie likes fantasy movies and smart comedies. Nicole watches stuff that's a bit more art-house, and she likes Ocean's 11.

So if you want to know what I think at least Jamie's thinking this summer? I think she'd echo Marion Ravenhood from the first reel of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Indiana Jones. Always knew someday you'd come walking back through my door.

But, again, I'm not going to speak for her.

FCBD and DC Universe #0

This is the first year that I think I did not insist on dragging Jamie and/ or Jason along with me to check out Free Comic Book Day (if you didn't go today, you sort of missed it. But you might be able to get free comics over the next week or so as the shops clear out their stock of free comics. There's an economics lesson in there about keeping inventory that, by definition, cannot draw any profit.).

This year I hit two of Austin's remaining comic shops. At this point, I'm not sure how many are left in town. Three of the four shops that were owned by the same person have shut down since I arrived, and the remaining one (Funny Papers) has recently been sold to some enterprising youths. I did visit Funny Papers to check out their sale items and pick up my weekly comics. And I visited Austin Books to check out their back issue offerings, see what was goi