Jim's Comics Reviews: Thoughts On DEATH OF THE FAMILY

MASSIVE SPOILERS AHEAD - READ NO FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT THE ENDING SPOILED

Okay, now that's out of the way, so I can get to the meat of the discussion.  Yesterday, comics shops across the land released DC Comics' Batman #17, the concluding issue of the Death Of The Family crossover event.  The event was helmed by writer Scott Snyder, with the help of several talented artists, most notably Greg Capullo.  The crossover tied in most of the Bat-titles in DC's current lineup, and if you need a complete list, you can find one here:  (Reading Order)  However, for the purpose of the review, I'm going to assume the reader has read the story and understands a little of how it relates to previous cannon.

The Good:  Scott Snyder's writing was good throughout, with exceptions that can (possibly) be explained away by the interfering hand of editorial.  He managed several intertwining plot threads deftly, and gave us a clear story with an awareness of pacing, especially during the clear build-up to the climax across Batman issues 16-17.  There were several nail-biting moments, especially the reveals in later issues, that got the adrenaline going and held the reader on a plateau of excitement across multiple pages.

True to his word, Snyder delivered a story one could navigate reading only the core title (Batman). There were certain issues of other titles I consider an enhancement to the story, or indeed essential for overall effect, but the narrative core of issues 14-17 did not suffer greatly, if at all, for being part of the event, nor would the reader of only the core title be unduly upset by omission of key events.  I can only imagine the task of having to thread together such a sprawling tie-in involving various writers, artists, and books, each with their own stories to tell and their own schedules to adhere to, but the resulting story arc has a very clear shape and direction.  The story did, at the least, convey the change in relationship between Batman and his lieutenants, and the reasons for it, which might be enough justification for a crossover for some readers (more on that in the next section).

Greg Capulo's art was no hindrance to story either. His style isn't necessarily one everyone agrees with: He likes fluid forms and line-driven textures in the vein of Marc Silvestri, but with a better sense of dimensionality to faces. He uses exaggerated anatomy and perspective that is mood-driven and, at times, cartoon-like. I like it. At the very least, he "got" the scene and conveyed it well throughout. Colors were okay on the core title, but at times a little to exaggerated for my taste, and a little too inconsistent on light sourcing (yeah, the Joker looks spookier with an under-lit face, but sometimes you can't explain where the hell it comes from).

The Bad:  The size of the thing.  I'm a big fan of sprawling, epic stories, so long as the plot pieces fit and are necessary to story.  I'm also no stranger to larger publishers' yen to expand stories to dollar-maximizing proportions.  But there were several issues included in the crossover that didn't merit the DoTF marquis.  Don't get me wrong, this isn't R.I.P. all over again.  However, I came away from several of the tie-ins, including early issues of Batgirl and Detective Comics, thinking DC editorial was definitely lending "suggestions" concerning their inclusion in the event.  Lest you think I missed the inclusion of several of Batman's rogue's gallery in the final few issues, and forgot how their machinations early on led into Joker's plot  through those seemingly tenuous story links, I will say this:  The vast majority of the villains present for Joker's big gathering simply didn't need to be there, as illustrated by both Batman and Joker dismissing them handily in issue #16 before the real conflagration in #17.  Some of the best villains in Batman's rogues' gallery were built into the story via a small aside in an earlier issue, only to be ushered stage left so quickly it made my head spin.  This cheapened both those characters and the story that contained them.  If one conjectures simply that they were there to illustrate the gravitas of the event, well, then I say there had better be some earth-shaking consequences to said event to justify their presence.

Which brings me to my next concern:   There were no earth-shaking consequences to this event. True, the story convincingly delivers the reasons for the wedge between Batman and the other members of the Bat-Family, but the wedge itself is seemingly nothing a group with a strong, almost familial, bond couldn't get past.  It's illustrated at the last by (gasp!) various excuses for the sidekicks not to show up at Bruce's planned victory dinner.  True, some of the lead-in to the conclusion such as the "face supper" was unnerving, but nothing the reader wouldn't dismiss as trickery after a moment's thought as to the far-reaching consequences to characters in multiple series.  Perhaps we've grown too complacent in the status quo, but I don't think anyone believed Nightwing, Robin, Red Robin, Red Hood, and Batgirl were going back to their respective series sans mug.

As an indulgence, about halfway through the event, I came up with a possible motivation for the Joker's actions, and said as much on the From The Booth podcast:   The Joker was goading the various sidekicks to attempted murder, and would subject Batman to the possibility that any one of his trainees could become another Red Hood.  The evidence seemed to support it:  Each death trap resulted in the decision by each sidekick to either attempt murder (in two separate instances with a gun), or be complacent while murder took place. Imagine Batman faced with the notion that his greatest failure (Jason) could be exploited and repeated!  At the very least, the wedge would have been driven more deeply, and maybe we'd have gotten a more worthy ending than the "we're still facebook friends, but don't expect a card on your birthday" moments we got at the end.


Overall, though, I have to say the story was enjoyable.  While it didn't have the payoff I had hoped for, and it suffered, in my opinion, from crossover-itis, I did think the story was well-handled logistically, it was cohesive, and it had several edge-of-your-seat moments that made it worthwhile on a more visceral level.

Let me know what you think!

Jim's Comic Reviews - Week of 9 January

Fantastic Four #3

So, now that we've settled in, what can we glean about the direction Fraction and co. have undertaken with this title? I have to say, it's exactly as expected:  The first family of comics is in another realm entirely, disconnected from the events of Earth-616, partaking in adventure of a very Trek or Lost in Space vibe.   Bagley's art is competent, Mount's colors are all very whiz-bang, as you'd expect on such a title, and the characters are true to their nature...but I'm a little bored with it, to be honest.  The one thing the issue lacks is a complex, motivated nemesis, and the being they encounter instead is very Trek-like and just...well, generic sci-fi. It's all very predictable, and this is one title that's gotta be anything but.  The vibe they're going for is "boundless adventure" and what you get is something that, although executed with competence, you've seen before.  If 50's and 60's sci-fi nostalgia is what trips your trigger, I'd say give it a look-see, but even then, if you're more Whovian than Trekkie in your taste for weird sci-fi plots you'll want to give it a pass.  For myself, I've seen this episode dozens of times, it's just that Shatner was playing his own version of Mr. Fantastic.

Thunderbolts #3

I gotta say, this was a fun read.  Way's giving us a motley of characters that are all very broken, and delights in those moments of interplay within the team that make the book what it is. He's one of those few that can get legitimate, consistent hilarity out of the over-used Deadpool, who's played as the perfect foil to everyone else's weighty concerns. Dillon's art is what it is, though...you never want for clues as to the characters' emotional states, and the storytelling, character blocking and composition is all there...but there's an element of same-face to characters and, well, to put it bluntly there's just something wrong with everyone's mouths and eyes.  The line weights are just too uniform around facial features and they lack any sense of texture. That, and character movements and poses are all very uninspired.  With a character like Red Hulk, for example, I want more "tank-like" and less "slightly taller than Frank Castle, if you check his driver's license" That being said, this title is going on my pull list tomorrow, great art or no.

Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files:  Ghoul Goblin #1

Apparently, there's a set of novels and a tv show about this Dresden guy, and I've never seen any of it...go figure.  I'm judging the work as an introduction to a reader who's starting out cold, so fans should bear that in mind.  Love the art work in this issue: the Cooper/Mohan team gives us images well suited for the story, which concerns the adventures of Harry Dresden, Wizard-For-Hire.  Now, that's a job title that just screams for a unique character and a bizarre plot to go with it.  While the plot here seems original in it's underpinnings, the execution is rather flat. I haven't followed the character in works past, so maybe there's back-story and motivation I'm unaware of that fans will just "get", but I didn't think the book did a convincing job of laying out the basics.  I'm thinking they were going for "hard-boiled" and "noir-ish", but they end up with a sort of faceless guy who deals in the fantastic in a way that's very parochial.  I don't recommend it as an introduction for non-fans of the character, but I'd guess that long-time fans might like it.

Batman Detective Comics #16

While the issue is without the mask cover of the other, sometimes more relevant, pieces of the Death Of The Family crossover event, it does have the crossover billing over the marqis.  I suppose the guts of the story  kinda depend on DotF going on, but it's definitely a side-line arc that could have, with a few tiny tweaks, ended up well outside the bounds of the crossover.  Nevertheless, Layman once again lays out a tight, engaging script that's perfectly suited for the title, and could definitely stand as it's own story. An up-and-coming villain is bent on taking control of the Gotham crime syndicate currently headed by the Penguin, and he's definitely proving himself willing to embrace Gotham's own brand of intricate, violent weirdness to do it. Layman is setting us up for many issues to come, and it's a fun ride.  The art is pretty stellar, too.

Thor God Of Thunder #4

Just go buy it already.  I can't believe Marvel is putting out such consistent quality with this title at such a fast pace.  Probably the best run of Thor since JMS was on the character a few years back, and I daresay it's even better.  The art, imho, is a runaway best of the new Marvel NOW! line, and I'd put it up against any current monthly title by any publisher.

Action Comics #16

Somewhere in here is a good Superman story, I'm convinced of it...but it seems, once again, Mr. Morrison has confounded it with a jumbled aesthetic and an incomprehensible narrative, and it'll probably take another six issues to glean enough pieces to even begin the work of puzzling it all together.  Maybe it is hard to come up with an unfamiliar-sounding Superman story after 75 years, but is the character so far gone that finding such a story involves LSD?

Earth 2 #8

Earth 2 has been on-again, off-again with the quality, but I thought this issue was rather solid.  It gives us a view from the other side of the conflict, and really serves to cement the idea that in this dimension, things can be allowed to spiral out of control, upsetting the status quo on a world scale and examining the consequences in a way that, let's face it, you just can't in the regular DCU, no matter how many times you push the reboot/reset button.  The Steppenwolf of Earth 2, having been trapped on the wrong side of a boom tube, is embracing the new world he's found himself in, and like Caesar in Gaul, he's got his sights set on conquering the scattered barbarians he finds there and bringing them to heel.  Convenient, then, that he's found the perfect fictional nation to home base in.  This title is, the way I see it, so very necessary to DC as a sort of end-game fulfillment of the what they billed the New 52 reboot as being:  Truly new, truly different...and assertively NOT dependent on 75 year-old characters in familiar settings with familiar motivations, to make it tick.  All in all, a very good read, if a tad on the dry side.

Superior Spider-Man #1

I've made no bones on the podcast nor in previous blog entries about the fact I think some of the decades-old characters of comics could use an ending to their stories...in truth, I've found the idea of a new psyche inhabiting the body of Spider-Man immensely intriguing, perhaps even worthy of an indefinite status with one of Marvel's linchpin properties.  But do I end up liking this character?  I don't know yet.  Octavius of the comics has always been written as kinda petty, and while it is an interesting premise to have such a self-centered mind saddled with Parker's everlasting guilt trip, yet stuck in a body capable of the sort of wish fulfillment every villain dreams of, you still get the sense things are in a state of flux, and it's tough, at least in this first issue, to get behind it.  You want the diverse motivational elements to get to detente, so you can take a look at the singular result with new eyes, but you still get the sense this is two characters jumbled into one, ala someone like Firestorm.  Perhaps it's just the stutter of changing gears, and things will all shake out after we've had some time with the character.  Nevertheless, it is FUN, and treated somewhat lightly, and I'm genuinely interested in a Spider-Man title for the first time in years.  Stegman's art is perfect for the cartoony, frenetic tone of OctoParker's endeavors, and it's scripted about as well as can be expected.  Good for Mr. Slott for venturing down this path...we could use a few more such risks with established characters....and a risk, it definitely is.

Anyway, it's been a great week for comics.  Thanks for reading!  

Superheroes: Why Can't They Die?

"Death is a fact of life," is a phrase I think we've all heard at one time or another.  It's a fact of art, too.  It's portrayed in film in every fashion imaginable, from casual slayings in action and horror movies, to tearful goodbyes in more sentimental efforts, to dramatic disappearances (off a cliff, into a vortex) of the main villain in various Disney films.
Being truthful, as I look back on my childhood, some of my first emotional experiences of death were fictional portrayals in media.  The slaying of Bambi's father and the execution of Ol' Yeller were experiences that pre-date any real wake services I was allowed to attend, at least according to my memory.  At those points in my life, if I'm honest with my self, a vague knowledge of the story of the Passion of Christ, imparted via Sunday mass and the teachings of my parents, simply didn't hit as hard.
I think I was about three when I remember accidentally seeing someone killed on a tv show. I think they had been shot, but however it was, I remember clearly thinking that it were real, and my mortified parents having to explain to me that it was an imaginary thing, and that the actor was indeed ok. As I grew older, of course there were more fictional portrayals, many treated with less care for younger sensibilities:  The death of King Kong, the act of revenge in a saw mill in Walking Tall, the administration of various coups de grace by Mr. James Bond, are all stand-out movie experiences in my mind. My experiences with assigned reading in early adolescence were no doubt more meaningful:  The devastating mercy-killing of Lennie in Of Mice And Men,  Finny's death, preceded by a supreme act of forgiveness, in A Separate Peace.  For myself, I was an avid reader of science fiction and fantasy by the time I was twelve, and even these rarely shied from portrayals of death both meaningful and incidental.  I'll never forget reading The Lord of the Rings for the first time, and realizing that Tolkien, at the height of his storytelling power, had created in his fantasy world a place where death was not only re-defined metaphorically, but as a matter of the economy of his universe as well. I would wonder later if, having experienced world wars, the author had a need to ascribe additional meaning to a character death than was likely for the vast majority of the millions who died senselessly in those conflicts.
And yes, death is portrayed in comics.  In fact, if one were to list the most impactful comics in recent memory, they almost to a one portray the death of some important character.  Alan Moore's Watchmen,  DC's first (and last) Crisis event, the Death of Superman, the assassination of Captain America, The Dark Knight Returns, the list goes on....and now, as I write this, Spider-Man is seemingly joining the ranks.  But he isn't truly dead, to be sure....these super-heroes just can't stay dead, can they?  Even Rorschach survives in print media after his obliteration, having wholly and completely served his character's purpose, albeit in prequel fashion in some inferior attempt to ring the registers one more time without covering any new, meaningful ground (in my humble opinion).  Why is that?
Part of it, to be sure, is in their nature as characters:  What is Superman, if not an icon of human virtue set loose with all our human frailties erased?  We've been ascribing such abilities to gods and goddesses, to magical beings of folklore and myth and religion for thousands of years...why wouldn't illustrated fiction create a character with abilities "far beyond those of mortal men"?  And why wouldn't such a character survive through the decades?  What is Batman, but a timeless representation of human need for justice and order amidst the deadly chaos of lawlessness?  A character who, in every respect, represents the pinnacle of human aspiration....the perfect detective, the most knowledgeable of consultants, the most capable martial artist, the richest of businessmen, the most prepared to defeat evil. His connection to his parents (really, the only thing distinctly human about him), and their death, represents a life-debt owed him by criminality that can never be paid, despite his unceasing efforts to collect, and connects us to the character in ways as old as civilization.  We've all experienced loss, we all have a need for order, we all fear lawlessness but are occasionally subject to circumstances that don't demonstrate care for the well-being of ourselves or our loved ones.  Who wouldn't want to read about a character who, although human, ceaselessly prepares for the worst, who stays at the pinnacle of physical prowess, whose mental faculties are forever keen, who stands as a bulwark of order in the darkness...who, after remaining in his thirties for 75 years, give or take, is human AND immortal? The cardinal sin in the latest cinematic portrayal of the character, for many fans, was that Batman demonstrated human frailty:  He wasn't prepared.  His detective skills weren't perfect.  He aged, he lost, and eventually, having experienced both fundamental loss and fleeting moments of triumph, he stopped.
And what is Spider-Man, but an iconic portrayal of the responsibility of those entrusted with great power?  Of the human need, even in the face of time's unrelenting march forward, to attempt to re-set the clock with actions that, however heroic, cannot affect the failings of the past?  The character, no matter how many punches he delivers, can't change the story of how his uncle was killed, and what he could have done to prevent it.  We, the readers, can see the futile nature of this conflict with things already past.  Strange, then, that some of those same readers purporting to "love" the character of Peter Parker, and who indubitably "get" the nature of his heroism at odds with a past he can't change, seem to balk at the seeming end of his story....as if the ending of that story could invalidate fifty years of storytelling...as if his humanity (you know, the humanity Marvel became a household name for giving their characters in the first place) and mortality were the absolute worst thing a writer could illustrate.  To me, the events of the last issue of Amazing are fitting:  The character is demonstrated as mortal, but in death, he sets one of his greatest enemies on a path to heroism that continues.  His heroic act, at the last, ensures the continuation of his crusade, and stamps his legacy on his world well past his own "sell-by" date.
These stories all start from places literature had trod for thousands of years prior, and will likely go on with for that much more.  The question is not from whence they come, but rather, as characters, where they're capable of going:  How fully realized can a character be at some frozen state of development?  How many times can we open the cover to find them on the same mission, motivated by the same compulsion, at the same age, with only slight tweaks to the nature of their nemeses to clue us in to the fact that this story could be any different from those that came before it?  How many times must any changes to the status quo be redacted to please nostalgia, to assuage reader insecurities in the face of an uncertain future, to give them the dependable, static portrayal of their fantasies before any semblance of truth or lasting meaning bounces off the literary wall like bullets off the iconic "S"?  True, there are those works in comics where these paragons seemingly experience loss, are hurt, come to new realizations about themselves, enter into new relationships, etc.  Those are all character arcs, right?  But can they stick?  Do they ever change things in some fundamental way?  And if they do not do so, where is the meaning, and how can there be real progress?  
What is the cost, then, of such faithfulness to iconography? Superman, for example, purports to be a beacon of hope to the masses, an example for us to follow...but how can the character realize this, either literally or within the fiction, unless humanity is left in some way changed by his presence?  The seeming fact is that neither real fans nor the fictional Metropolis can deal with a world without a Superman. Instead, it appears they're stuck in some sort of nostalgic time-loop that's dependent on he being there, unchanged, for next month's episode.  In a character where any lasting change to him, or to the fictional landscape that hosts him, is forbidden, there can be no real character arc, can there?  Forbidding lasting change, forbidding death itself, preserves the character for future generations...or does it?  Do those stories all disappear if the character dies?  And if we keep him alive and unchanged, how is there hope that the story has meaning beyond what it had fifty years ago?
Some would explain that there is a conservationist value in the everlasting icon itself, that its immortality parallels for us some unceasing battle that mankind must fight against the darkness, and I'll admit there is some literary value in this.  But there is a reality that concerns me at work here:  We of this earth are mortal.  We crave things with staying power, things that deny aging, and the idea that our existence is memorable in some way.  We don't want our stories to end.  But eventually, end they will, and we can immortalize ourselves only by creating lasting change, whether through our works or our human progeny.  To be sure, I'd like for my daughter to enjoy the works of fantasy and fiction her father enjoyed on life's journey, but I would hope that her generation is able to create their own such works to surpass those that came before.  I wonder to what extent we, the aging fan base of comics, have put boundaries around what will come after with our demand for dependability in the characters we love.  I love the medium of comics as a concept, but I question whether the endeavor is served, after 75 years or so, by an aging fan base laying the yoke of their iconic, unchanging characters around the necks of so many of their brightest young writing and artistic talents.  How much paper is enough to devote to these characters?  How much of the industry's resources must revolve around them? How much of our young talent should be devoted to a re-treatment the essentials of which haven't changed in decades?  And how much storytelling opportunity is wasted by denying ourselves the two words most essential to all our childhood fables:

The End.