4chan is infamous.
Things like the thread below, beginning with the first response displayed, are why.
(Strangely, I’ve found that a higher-than-average number of the denizens there can actually spell, find the shift key, and punctuate. I don’t know if this worries me more or less…)
The people of Scans_Daily are invested in their comics. I mean really invested in their comics.
It’s not like we didn’t know this was coming, but still. In what universe is this childish sack of ambulatory refuse good enough for Diana?
Okay, well, I can certainly understand a bit of passion when it comes to your favorite stories and characters. Lord knows I grumble when some of my favorite characters are written poorly. But I have my limits. “the Azure Cascade” does not:
These comic book creators, they have TOO MUCH POWER and they’ve PROVEN THEY CANNOT BE TRUSTED!!!! D’you see what you’ve driven me to here, Gail? I’ve gone Batman-level nuts over this. I hope you’re happy.
I’m sure writer Gail Simone is happy. I’m sure she’s so thrilled she’s investing in kevlar vests because Wonder Woman fans are psychotic. From the comments:
This is why it’s stupid to trust any storyteller, regardless of media. Believing that a once-decent writer won’t eventually fuck up beyond repair (see also: almost every brand-name writer in comics right now) is like believing that the universe is ruled by a benevolent God - it’s a form of faith that will always be disproven eventually.
Or:
*dies a little inside* Gah. The lip thing is just the worse part of it there, AND with the whole ‘bedroom eyes’. Skrull. I know this isn’t Marvel but I don’t care. That’s my answer and I’m sticking to it. *prefers denial*
Or:
I’ve found, after punching walls from the similar treatment of Oracle, that a steak will help that bruise.
Or (bonus misogyny points!!!!!!):
I find this quite realistic, despite your complaining. That’s how women are. They like assholes. She’s Wonder Woman, yeah, but she’s still a woman.
Simone herself responded to the original post, because she’s Gail Simone and generally pretty hip to the “online interaction” thing. She basically fell all over herself to explain the situation and ask for people to consider context. “the Azure Cascade” took this to be Simone “chastising” her.
Wired Magazine’s blogger Geekdad did a (hyper-predictable) rundown of 10 superhero comics your kids should be reading right now. Commentors begin to offer suggestions that aren’t from Marvel and DC and everything seems fine and dandy. That is, of course, until “hsing lee” shows up to impart a special kind of magic to the proceedings.
oh man… essay time. My apologies in advance for being long winded.I grew up on comic books. Learned to read quite proficiently by age three thanks to Stan Lee’s Hulk, Thor, Spider-Man, FF, Avengers and X-Men. Grew up with DC’s JLA, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman.
I also learned a hell of a lot of critical thinking from Green Arrow, Green Lantern, Silver Surfer and of course the one and only Captain America… more on Cap later.
The way these comics are written helps kids pick up a vocabulary FAST, as they’re able to derive the meaning of words they don’t know via contextual inference from the words prior to and after the unknown word.
But there IS a problem inherent in sticking to just Marvel and/or DC comics. There is a definite America-centric nationalism and pro-military industrial complex fascism to be found in the pages of these comics, especially in Iron Man, and Superman. KEEP YOUR KIDS WAY THE HELL AWAY FROM IRON MAN unless you want them to be pro-war and lifelong Republicans.
The balance to these views my parents included in my comic book obsession was to add Asterix, Tin Tin, and comic book adaptions of the literary classics to my reading list. The adaptations of the classics were so helpful that I was reading the REAL classics, and even Shakespeare, by age five… the comics breed a desire to explore the subject matter of classic literature on a more in-depth level.
I grant you, my reading skills were atypically fast. But the model can be applied to others at their own pace. I actually helped tutor some kids in High School, fellow students who were in my English classes - using the exact same methodology my parents used on me… Comics, Sesame Street and Electric Company… to help some kids who really couldn’t read at all get caught up by the time they hit Grade 10.
But something sinister is happening at Marvel and DC today. Marvel’s Ultimate Universe comics have turned Captain America into a rude and violent Nationalist fascist with an anti-constitutional theocratic mind set. Where he once stood for the ideals set out in the founding papers of the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill Of Rights, where he once stood as a champion of ALL oppressed people, where he once stood as a symbol of the need for an informed public to do their patriotic duty by standing up to their government when the government does wrong, the Marvel Ultimate Universe Captain America is now a mouthpiece of the Bush Administration and a pro-torture, pro-killing, pro-government secrecy, anti-habeas corpus, anti-Constitutional rights asshole.
And in the normal Marvel Comics line, they killed off Steve Rogers, the old Cap, and replaced him with a new Cap who is a former DIA and KGB assassin who carries a gun and kills people.
Marvel and DC have always been intricately connected with US government social engineering. Most people don’t realize that Stan Lee was an official member of military intelligence for a number of years. From wiki…“…Lee entered the U.S. Army in early 1942 and served stateside in the Signal Corps, writing manuals, training films, and slogans, and occasionally cartooning. His military classification, he says, was “playwright”; he adds that only nine men in the U.S. Army were given that title… …Lee returned from his World War II military service in 1945…”
America needed Scientists during the Cold War. Physicists, biochemists, engineers, were needed badly in order for America to stay ahead of the Soviets. Take a look at Stan Lee’s Marvel Line up…
-Hulk/Bruce Banner - Gamma Ray physicist.
-Mr.Fantastic/Reed Richards - Renaissance man scientist with the world’s hottest girlfriend.
-Iron Man/Tony Stark - billionaire industrialist who got rich making weapons due to his skill as an applied science engineer.
-Thor/Donald Blake - a physician.
-Ant-Man/Hank Pym - Bio-engineer.
-The Beast/Henry Pym - Bio-engineer.
-Spider-Man/Peter Parker - science student so gifted that he made his own web shooters.
- Dr. Strange - formerly one of the world’s top surgeons.
They created these characters to encourage kids to stay in school, learn about science, and become tomorrow’s leaders. And it bloody well worked. Today, America has a brain drain. Half of all your theoretical and applied physics scientists will be of retirement age within ten years, and there are barely any students in the pipeline to replace them. Which is why so many of these old Scientists turned Superhero are now getting $100 million dollar movies greenlighted by Hollywood… your government wants to fill the brain gap once again.
The only problem is, this time around we don’t have the socially liberal Stan Lee at the helm, and a very dangerous National Socialist agenda is being pushed alongside the idea that science is cool, stay in school.
My advice would be to keep your kids way, way, WAY away from any of the Ultimate Marvel comics until they’re old enough to know the difference between fiction and propaganda. The Ultimates are a great adult read, but they’re also potentially dangerous to give an unformed and uninformed young mind.
Marvel Adventures is cool. Asterix is cool. TinTin is cool. Adaptations of the Literary classics are cool. But beware the Ultimates. Down that path lies a generation of Hitler Youth.
So, the powers that be at Warner Brothers are in the process of making a Justice League movie, featuring all the big guns: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, etc, etc, et cetera. Now the problem here in many people’s minds is that it will confuse filmgoers expecting to see Routh as our favorite Kryptonian or Patrick Bateman as Batman. A reasonable concern, especially considering as how everybody seemed positively baffled that Smallville had nothing to do with Superman Returns.
Thankfully, K-DoG7p7 has a solution:
So.. the JLA movie is back on track and start shooting the first week in May. Yet not a singel fan of the characters are enjoying the news.. the closes i have yet to hear is “Ohh a JLA movie that nice.. but….” there is always a but…
Like setting the movie in an alternate universe then the other DC movies being made at the same time!, New actors for part that are already filled by other actors..Brandon Ruth is Superman, Christan Bale is Batman.. get it in to your heads!!
Riding the PC train to death by using John Stewart.. even worse is the fact that there is a GL movie coming about Hal..Now if WB really wants a JLA movie and really want to NOT use the actors already playing the parts.. then I have a really easy solution..
MAKE ‘KINGDOM COME‘!!
you get all the major characters..
you get a good reason to cast different actors (as superman and batman are quite a bit older)
you get a larger cast and get to show off more of the DCU
you get to show the fans the true difference between Supeman and Batman..
Also…Superman vs Captain Marvel!
so please WB.. can the JLA movie and make Kingdom Come instead!
That’s right - cast aside the youth-oriented summer blockbuster you’re making and instead use one of the most continuity-dependent comics in the history of the medium as the basis for a film where Superman creates gulags for his enemies, Batman’s turned Gotham into a fascist state, and Wonder Woman looks like the least successful M2F ever.
The whole thread’s pretty golden, so make sure you click over. Thanks to Jeff at Conditional Axe for pointing this out!
So there’s a poll on Newsarama asking people What person has ruined more comics than any other, and the responses already in place seem to indicate that this is going to be fun. You’ll want to check back with it, but here’s the highlights I’ve come across so far.
Grievous has some of the most… unique capitalization I’ve seen:
Fortunately I can’t say any of the above have ruined any comics for me.I wish Mark Millar was not so cocky and has thise “buy my comics” attitude because they are so so so so so good.
Dan Didio is the reason I got back into comics, Ever since Identity Crisis I have being compelled by most of the projects,crossovers and new books in the DCU, doesn’t mean I think everything is classic,
jeph Loeb is hit or miss for me, I loved Hush and his colour Books but some of his writing comes off very hokey and pedestrian.
Joe Q is doing Great business for marvel, Controversy sells, You have got to hand it to the man, he is making the Dollars for marvel, that being said I would not touch Brand new day with a barge pole.
Judd winick is decent writer, who makes silly ideas every now and then
And if his quirky, arty use of the shift key isn’t enough for you, there’s the sudden lapse to Bizarro speak here:
Funny thing, I have never read a bruce jones issue ever,You am half tempted to buy the first issue of the war that time forgot, but then again I probably won’t bother.
As always, my favorite comments are when somebody takes a normal, defensible position such as “I think Alex Ross should be more aware of his high profile” and transmogrify it into the sort of rhetoric that would appear spew from the piehole of Glenn Beck:
Alex Ross is the most contemptible piece of crap to ever express interest in the genre, and does nothing but embarass himself, by acting like the spoiled, overhyped diva he is.
It looks like you’re not going to be on Alvatron’s Christmas card list, Mr. Ross. Try to console yourself with the hundred dollar bills stuffed into your pillow.
