15 Things that Linkara objects to over the DC miniseries "Identity Crisis."
NOTE: Due to the length of this episode, I'm also including it in split form.
Monday, January 23, 2012
15 Things That Are Wrong With Identity Crisis
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241 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 241 of 241Good afternoon, all.
The Exiled One, January 29, 2012 5:39 AM
I really liked Blackest Night...until I, in an attempt to better appreciate it, read the story character-by-character. Basically, I read only Hal Jordan's dialogue until I finished the book. Then I read only the Flash's dialogue until I finished the book. I did this for every major character until I ran out of them.
And what I found was, there's no real character-development, in ANYBODY. There are so many characters in so short a space that nobody gets a substantial plot.
One of the writers in the annotations section at the end said something like, "This is where Mera really gets a chance to shine." And I'm thinking, "The same Mera who complained for a page or two about how the Atlanteans sucked, and then barely spoke for the rest of the entire Blackest Night storyline? That Mera?"
This is what I get for thinking about things. A perfectly enjoyable story turns into an empty cameo-fest with a cool premise and nice artwork. I cringe to think what other books in my library are just waiting to disappoint me.
Glad you're still able to enjoy the book, though.
Lewis, someone earlier in the comments was talking about "Batman: The Killing Joke" and I was wondering what was DC's problem with Barbara Gordon that they did not want her as Batgirl anymore and have her paralyzed? Believe me that pissed me off because man was she hot. :)
If it was to show some shocking twist I can kind of understand but still.
Hope you can give me a clear explanation about this.
I have 3 things I want to say, will keep it breif.
1- The Deathstroke scene. 'Cool' or 'badarse' cliches a pet peeve of mine. Paritcularly Batman disappearing mid speech or anyone walking away from an explosion. When you think about it, it's so petty. I just imagine then thinking "Omg, I'm so cool look how cool I am I hope they think I'm cool".
2- The comment about using sniper rifle would be more effective than superpowers. I get what you are saying, but oddly the deathstroke scene a sniper wouldn't have been usful since snipers rely on suprise, ambushes and fear. Generally being better prepaired than their enemy.
3- I don't want to get into a debate, but I disagree with the "rape should never be a plot device" thing. Barachiel made the case I was going to. I'd add alot to it but this isn't the place for rape debate.
I will say though that you could argue a case for this story not needing rape and handling it poorly. I think the idea that rape sould never be a plot device ever is a bad one that you don't justify or explain enough.
I agree with you on Mike Turner's figure and expression drawing, Linkara.
Turner wasn't actually known for his character art, he was more well known for, like you said, his composition and layout work (heck, his first job at Top Cow was doing backgrounds).
While I still, personally, enjoy Michael's art (he was a fellow Tennesseean and attended my Alma Mater, and Volunteers stick together =D ) I do agree with your critique of his art.
In fact, I kinda relate what you're saying to a lot of comic book artists nowadays.
Maybe it's a biproduct of the Dark Age, but a lot of artists seem to assume that all human faces are alike save for skin tone and hair. Jim Lee--while a fantastic artist--tends to have the same facial structure for almost all his characters with only minute differences.
But when you look at artists like Neal Adams or Joe Kubert or Will Eisner, if you wanna go way back, expressive facial anatomy can add a lot to a piece.
What's your take on it Lewis? Is it a stylistic thing where if you bring it up the artist retorts, "Well, that's just my style so shut up"? Or should more comic artists focus on expressive anatomy?
"So what you meant was that it was editorially mandated. Well, I have news for you: every story is editorially mandated. The writers are assigned a series, a goal and limits. The fact that it is a lead-in or a tie-in is irrelevant. A serious writer with an idea in mind will be able to do something within those limits while others will just write mechanically to get from point A to point B, with a villain in the way. How can you claim to know what Meltzer was thinking when his footnotes say the exact opposite?"
Actually, not ALL stories are, in and of themselves, editorially mandated. Oftentimes, however, editorial mandates screw with what the author intends, creating books like Countdown, Cry for Justice, and One More Day. As Linkara has said, time and again, stories that come about as the result of editorial mandates show us something: Editors should stick to editing and leave the storytelling to, y'know, the writers telling the story.
"The Deathstroke scene. 'Cool' or 'badarse' cliches a pet peeve of mine. Paritcularly Batman disappearing mid speech or anyone walking away from an explosion. When you think about it, it's so petty. I just imagine then thinking "Omg, I'm so cool look how cool I am I hope they think I'm cool"."
Except Batman disappearing mid speech is NOT a 'cool' cliche. It's part of his character: He's reclusive, so he tells people what they need to know, and then leaves when they turn away from him and start talking to themselves about what they were just told. I do agree with you about the "walking away from an explosion" thing, if only because the explosions in those sort of scenes never start until the character starts walking slowly away from the explosion point, despite the fact that, logically, WALKING away from a giant explosion would cause you to get horribly burned, but whatever.
"Actually, not ALL stories are, in and of themselves, editorially mandated. Oftentimes, however, editorial mandates screw with what the author intends, creating books like Countdown, Cry for Justice, and One More Day. As Linkara has said, time and again, stories that come about as the result of editorial mandates show us something: Editors should stick to editing and leave the storytelling to, y'know, the writers telling the story."
Agreed but this is something else, too much bad intervention by editors, in particular by the executives.
This does not contradict the fact that every series is ordered and monitored by editors. The level of involvement just varies.
I just finished this series and after I figured out the resolution I was astonished at how fucking stupid this story was.
I mean this book had A LOT of really great character moments. Tim Drake and his dad, Captain Boomerang and his son, Oliver and his son, Ralph and Sue, Martha and Clark, Jean and Ray tons of great moments.
But then they ruined the whole fucking story by making a character who from what I can tell was a strong independent, right minded woman who was divorcing her husband turn into some crazy person (probably because they didn't have a resolution to this shitfest) for the sole reason of she wanted him back...BUT SHE WAS DIVORCING HIM. They made that clear like three times!
In addition to ruining the character of Jean, it also ruined the character of Doctor Light by making him some kind of demented rapist for no reason, Oliver Queen (who i'm not really a big fan to begin with) with the mind wiping, and took a shit all over Captain Boomerang (I like Captain Boomerang).
Also they ruined the Justice League, who were a bunch of super heroes who banded together to fight crime together, and you know they were close to each other and were friends with one another. Now they're a bunch of paranoid crazy people who mind wipe each other and secretly suspect that their buddies will turn on them or do something bad to them at any point in time.
I don't know much about Deathstroke (other then the Teen Titans TV show) but so much stupid happened in that fight it's just mind numbing. I know that guys like Deathstroke would probably fucking die in 1 second to heroes like Flash and Green Lantern but for the sake of a fight scene, I let the stupid flash stab go because he had set up traps *shrug*. But what really pissed me off is that when Carter attempts to attack Deathstroke he just lets his wings get cut off...uh why wasn't he watching? What if Deathstroke just decided to stab him in the heart? Clearly he wasn't giving enough of a damn to avoid getting his wings cut off. Also I'm pretty sure Doctor Light is a fairly capable fighter, why didn't he jump in and fight? I'm sure he would have a better shot at taking down Green Lantern then Deathstroke.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the "Clark hears what he wants to hear" bit. What the fuck does that mean exactly? That Clark Kent is just choosing to ignore the fact that they mind wiped Doctor Light and Batman? I mean Ollie says it when Clark is standing like 10 feet away. So either it means that Clark has selective hearing (aka bullshit. I have no idea how Ollie would know that) or that Clark Kent is just choosing to ignore the mind wipe of one of his closest friends.
Also why did Captain Boomerang and his son practice with exploding/razor boomerangs? Like...Captain Boomerang almost died because of it. I know it's a nitpick but it's just weird
"I'm surprised you didn't mention the "Clark hears what he wants to hear" bit. What the fuck does that mean exactly? That Clark Kent is just choosing to ignore the fact that they mind wiped Doctor Light and Batman? I mean Ollie says it when Clark is standing like 10 feet away. So either it means that Clark has selective hearing (aka bullshit. I have no idea how Ollie would know that) or that Clark Kent is just choosing to ignore the mind wipe of one of his closest friends."
Part of why I never mention it is that it can be interpreted in different ways and not necessarily that he's selectively ignorant of the proceedings.
Also because it's such a stupid line that I always forget that it happened at all, preferring to focus on the bigger issues with the miniseries.
Jarkes-
I would get that about Batman if he did leave mid speech regardless of if they were facing him, but it's that he waits for them to turn around. I wonder what's going through his mind while he waits for that opportune moment. All the things I can think of are not good for the character. That said, my experience with this is mainly his film and TV appearances. It still seems really dumb in the same way as other faux bad arse moments.
Hello again Linkara. First off I want to thank you for the reply on the M.
Again I wasn't attempting to use Michael Turner's death to sway your opinion, in fact the very opposite. Dead of alive work speaks for itself.
I just believed that he deserved more than a splash comment over a cover as you talked about another artist. I've seen you go in to very much more detail on lesser covers. That's all I'm sayin. I enjoyed your opinion on the matter and can agree, however a lot can be forgiven for his attention to detail, looking at some of the stuff for Witchblade, Darkness, Soulfire, Aspen. Mostly when it comes to costume designs like armor and such. But again that's my opinion.
Thank you though. I'd just wished you'd taken the time to talk about that in your review.
--Criss
"DC Comics. You care, We kill."
That actually fits Marvel as well. Especially all of the big event comics written by Bendis. (coughSecretInvasioncoughWasp'sDeathcoughcough)
You said that Jean's original plan wouldn't have worked, because everyone would have just assumed that Sue fainted because she was pregnant. That's true, but Jean didn't know about the pregnancy, so it was a legitimate mistake for her to make.
Well, to start off with sorry for the late response... computer died on me having to use a family members to watch and post now!
Well on the subject of the comic I still want a copy of this to read myself the story does still sound interesting even with all these flaws! It does sort of have Watchmen like elements to it to me! Especially with that good group photo on the cover and in the book!
The only counter I got to a point you had here even though I haven't read the book myself is I read somewhere the reason Sue never did the whole dealing with the rape thing was she was mindwiped too and so was her husband so they forgot all about it happening... I don't know it that's a big moral thing and all but it sounds more humane if that was possible in that universe!
Also, as a Batman fan and giving him a lot more credit than I really should but he's been showed before to have such high mental abilities shouldn't that mindwipe not have worked!? He's been showed to fight off mental attacks by psychic villains because he's so mentally disciplined! Ain't I right?!
Can't wait to watch the other videos on back logue!
Lovely. Sums up my feelings about this series pretty well.
Except - you missed one.
Batman. The World's Greatest Detective. Struggling with this puzzler. And what's the epiphany, the realization that finally breaks the case for him?
"Who benefits?"
That's right. Batman finally figures it out when he remembers that criminals have motives.
Sorry about the lateness of this comment, but something seems a little off about this review.
You keep referring to the rape happening several years before. Maybe I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that time in the DC (and Marvel, and Archie, and most other comic universes) was, well wonky, and the rape would have happened about two weeks ago in-canon
"You keep referring to the rape happening several years before. Maybe I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that time in the DC (and Marvel, and Archie, and most other comic universes) was, well wonky, and the rape would have happened about two weeks ago in-canon"
Nope, that's not it in the slightest. The Satellite era for them happened YEARS previously. Now, for us it happened DECADES earlier, but that's the sliding scale of time for you. It would make absolutely no sense for it only be two weeks previously unless about four or five Justice League eras were crammed into a two week period.
Okay... Prepare for a big ass defense of Identity Crisis because I really like the book.
First off... I agree with a lot of what was said in this review. Jean Loring being the killer... Was very unlikely and not explained adequately. They went out of their way to throw us off. It could have just as easily been fucking Dumbledore who killed Sue Dibny if Jean Loring did it in those conditions.
But that's all fridge logic to me. I finished the book happy and an hour later thought "Waaaait a minute, I call bullshit!"
The point is, I don't think Identity Crisis really even is a murder mystery story. I never thought of it that way.
The fact that there is a murderer abound who knows identities is really just an event that calls up all this past drama and conspiracy, and brings to attention the importance of hidden identities (I love Ollies "The Mask Protects" speech).
Identity Crisis should, IMHO, be renamed "Shit Happens." with the subtitle "Even to Superheroes." That's sort of more apt. It's not so much a story arc as it is a beautifully recorded account of a chain of events in the DC Universe. Yes it sacrifices a certain amount of focus, and though Firestorms death was a very touching scene to me, it was definitely not given enough ceremony or just cause.
Also, Jack Drake's death is one of my favourite scenes in comics. You know it's coming, you feel it jump on you with the turn of the page, but it's the anticipation that kills.
Maybe I like it all because everything is so well done that I don't care that it's essentially meaningless. Maybe I was too easily wrapped up in the emotional investment.
On the "Love letter to the Silver Age thing" I think that what he meant was that the story doesn't pretend those silly stories never happened. For example, Ollie's reference to the body-switching event. How could that happen without all the villains knowing the secret identities? The mind-wiping brings these old stories into cohesion with modern tales, without making excuses for them or pretending they never happened.
On Doctor Light, you said it made no sense he was a moron, because he'd subdued the Justice League before...
I'm probably not totally up to date on the times of certain events and comic stories, but I thought that was the point of the lobotomy? He went from high profile villain to punching bag of the teen titans due to his mind being taken from him.
And on Jean Loring, the rape and females in general.... Ugh. Yeah, not much can be said. I mean, maybe if we could see Jean Loring at home, going over her days with Ray, bursting into tears at her desk, losing touch with workmates, anything! Something that could serve as both a clue to the identity of the killer AND add to the slap-dash motivation of the woman...
Likewise, the rape could have been acceptable to me... If we saw just a little of the dreadful impact of that event that just happened to happen to Sue... Even a hint of it... Even Ralph mentioning "She's been putting on a brave face about it for years" to explain why we never heard mention of this again... But instead, the Rape might as well have been stealing her favourite lamp or something for all the repercussions it gives.
And TBH, I'm fine with them using Arkham for emotional impact. I mean, who cares, Arkham doesn't make any narrative sense anywho. Add some damn security people, or would you just feel guilty denying Joker's number of escapes getting into the quadruple digits?
You can't really complain about an extrajudicial involuntary committal in Arkham in the DCU, given that that's exactly what becomes of Psycho Pirate in Crisis.
All of his role in the plot of Animal Man is predicated on that fact. Although, in as much as the matter relates to his role in Animal Man, "Why was he committed to Arkham without a trial?", "Because Grant Morrison says so" is an acceptable and sufficient answer in that instance.
My feeling from reading it was that Ray was so ashamed for his own part in Jean's actions and insanity that she wasn't arrested, he had her committed for her own safety, medicated and just left, before vanishing himself, mainly to spare the superhero community from the embarrassment and pain of a public trial. Batman had already ascertained and deduced her guilt and it's fair to assume he keeps tabs on Arkham admissions and would have found her.
"You keep referring to the rape happening several years before. Maybe I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that time in the DC (and Marvel, and Archie, and most other comic universes) was, well wonky, and the rape would have happened about two weeks ago in-canon"
At this stage, about a year pre-Infinite Crisis, DC Continuity had not been majorly tweaked since Zero Hour, ten years earlier.
Love or hate Zero Hour (I veer far more towards "confused and bored" rather than outright hate, it did do something which CoIE and Infinite Crisis didn't do, which was to provide at the end of the final issue, in which the reboot occurred, a complete and comprehensive timeline of key events and when they were supposed to have now happened - Dick Grayson quits as Robin, Jason Todd's death, what things now never happened and what still did etc., etc. Overall, the effect was that the past still happened (with minor tweaks -*ahem* and Hawkman - and more consistent dates, but the future was an open book (the Legion was rewritten from scratch, most notably)).
Although the story was bad, there was at least a sense in which you felt as if they had actually sat down, figured out what needed to be fixed and tried to do it in a consistent way, and then given you some means to easily understand it without belabouring the reader with months or years of confusing and contradictory info-dump.
Something I really wish they had gone out of their way to do in the New 52. There is now no way that John Stewart, Bart Allen, Barbara Gordon or Jason Todd's characters make sense anymore and the only way to fix them must be via some kind of tongue-in-cheek Animal Man/Supreme self-conscious acknowledgement that their lives don't make any sense to even themselves.
Oliver Queen is the worst, though. He appears to have been de-aged 20 years and merged with his own son in the belief that will encourage people who enjoyed Smallville to become regular comics readers, erasing all of the Green Lantern/Green Arrow hard-travelling heroes years completely.
None of these characters make any sense anymore, because their past no longer happened. They've been thoroughly Amy Pond-ed in fact.
There were more than two mindwipes in any case. And it's important to distinguish the removal of specific memories from psychic lobotomies, which is was was done to Doctor Light (by mistake, to a certain extent; it's made pretty clear that their intent was to make him Not-a-Rapist, rather than make him a buffoon and they just took to much and left him more messed up than they intended.).
Using the catch-all term "mindwipe" covers a multitude of sins.
They specifically reference the fact that they had removed villains memories (specifically of their secret identities) prior to this presumably with Superman and Batman's tacit consent; if you've already crossed the moral line of removing memories for a self-interested reason, it's not much of a leap, particularly as a spur-of-the-moment decision in panic to do it to one of your friends when you've clearly been caught out doing something that you shouldn't, which looks really bad.
Which is part of the point, I think. Once you've crossed the line, you lose your sense of where the line is, but the point is made pretty firmly - that line had already been crossed and for good reason and Batman and Superman at the very least looked the other way or decided they didn't want to know.
But they certainly weren't the only "fixings" done; Identity Crisis *did* have tie-ins, including Wally West receiving a letter from Barry explaining his seemingly out-of-character vote about Light, and also further explaining that they had "fixed" The Top, after he had learnt the identity of Barry's parents (around Flash 300), gone on a rampage and come close to murdering them, before he had Zatanna remove the memories and make him into yet another buffoon, a situation he begs Wally from beyond the grave to put right.
Catwoman too had been "fixed", and seemingly (although more ambiguously) perhaps with Batman's knowledge, which causes her to question her moralistic turn-around.
The implication at the time was that, as a practice, it had been rife, but that the Batman memory wipe was just a step too far for everyone and that brought it to a halt.
"Something I really wish they had gone out of their way to do in the New 52. There is now no way that John Stewart, Bart Allen, Barbara Gordon or Jason Todd's characters make sense anymore and the only way to fix them must be via some kind of tongue-in-cheek Animal Man/Supreme self-conscious acknowledgement that their lives don't make any sense to even themselves.
Oliver Queen is the worst, though. He appears to have been de-aged 20 years and merged with his own son in the belief that will encourage people who enjoyed Smallville to become regular comics readers, erasing all of the Green Lantern/Green Arrow hard-travelling heroes years completely.
None of these characters make any sense anymore, because their past no longer happened. They've been thoroughly Amy Pond-ed in fact."
More than that! Since the Golden Age heroes never existed in that world now characters like Jade shouldn't never have come to be so a lot of back story for characters like Kyle Reyner Green Lantern should be completely different!
I've become very interested in understand all the wonky history of the DCU and want to get and read the trades on all the major Crisis(s), but before that I had to do a wiki search just so I knew which came before the others as DC thought it was cleaver giving them all the same name nearly! And while doing that research I read the basic plot out lines and found that the original CoIE sounds pretty awesome, but all the others sound completely insane and confusing and too close to each other. Basically in a little over 20 years they've done it 5 times.
Ok I'm rambling now and lost my train of thought...
You know, the more I watch this, the more appropriate I realize the Jack McCoy reference is.
Because the death of Sue Dibny would have made a great episode. We have an ambiguously sane lawyer who killed the wife of her ex. She confesses to him, and the cops investigate. Everything fits. DA Benjamin Stone gives the go-ahead.
Jack McCoy steps up to the plate. Through witness after witness, scene after scene, he hammers at the point: Jean Loring fled the scene. She denied involvement. This demonstrates that she was aware her actions were wrong. She is not legally insane, and deserves to be in Blackgate, not Arkham.
At the thirty-minute mark of the show, with the jury returning a guilty verdict, we see Detective Ed Green sitting at the Dibney family computer. He stops his scrolling a moment, turns, and yells: "Lennie!"
The Justice League has done something to Batman. Something terrible. The investigation reveals that they have tampered with the mind of not only Batman, but also Doctor Light. Jack McCoy can't prove the proper order of events, that Batman was tampered with to prevent him telling anyone about what was done to Doctor Light. The logs for the satellite won't support it, since they were changes to cover it up. But he can prove that both had their minds altered by Zatanna and around roughly the same time.
ADA Abbie Carmicheal proposes a solution: nail Zatanna for mindwiping Doctor Light to cover up the fact they mindwiped Batman. They can prove that to a jury.
The show ends with Zatanna pleading out to a twenty-year sentence in Bedford. Thus proving that you should never try to play chicanery games with Jack McCoy, because he will beat you with experience.
Like I said, this would be an awesome episode.
You left me scratching my head around 30:26. I thought you were just referencing "Batman's hatred of Rock & Roll" as a running gag. You seriously consider that to be a real part of Batman's character now?
*Why?* Just because DC put their rubber-stamp on it?
Huge corporations like Marvel and DC are *GOING* to make bad decisions. That's a fact of life. They are *GOING* to ruin the franchise. That's what big companies DO. It's the same thing with the Star Wars prequels.
If you're not even capable of IGNORING the books that got it wrong unless some big universe-altering event tells you it's okay, why are you even slightly interested in these characters or their stories?
Just switch to reading some superhero webcomic where all the characters and settings are owned, written, and drawn BY the individual artist. That way you won't show up expecting a good story, and instead get some amateur hack bullshit that completely ruins ALL THE PREVIOUS STORIES!
It's like you have Stockholm Syndrome for the Big Two or something. Just cut your ties and break your dependence on them.
Anyone can write a great internally consistent story about an original super-human character who is various shades of relatable and paragon.
There have got to be plenty of writers and artists already out there on the internet doing just that.
Hell, you even made your own superhero webcomic. You know how much those independent artists need your support. So why are you instead giving all your money to Diamond's monopoly and the Big Two?
The Big Two don't deserve your business.
They are run by corporate idiots who don't know what they're doing.
They are written by editors who couldn't tell a decent story to save their life.
The Big Two are ruining comics. That's all they know how to do. It's all they're good for since the 90's. Anyone in this industry who ever knew what they were doing is either dead, gone mad with power, or suppressed by editors.
Stop helping them! Stop giving them the resources to kill off your favorite characters and piss all over their established legacies!
Just read something else!
"
Anonymous said...
You left me scratching my head around 30:26. I thought you were just referencing "Batman's hatred of Rock & Roll" as a running gag. You seriously consider that to be a real part of Batman's character now?
*Why?* Just because DC put their rubber-stamp on it?"
No, no, no, of course I don't think it's legitimately canon. However, there's nothing on the book to indicate that it's meant to be an Elseworlds or a What If story or the like - everything that's on it and in it suggests that it's MEANT to be in-continuity, and if that IS the case, then it's a really bad retcon that was quickly forgotten.
It's actually weird, Lewis. I didn't like Identity Crisis either, but almost for the exact opposite reasons you didn't. See, I actually liked a lot of the continuity changes, (Sue's rape and Batman's mindwipe notwithstanding) because I felt it actually introduced a lot of new plot elements, that despite being pretty confused and inappropriately dark, did make me a hell of a lot more interested in what was going on, and after the series was over, I was curious as to what future (better) writers would do with it. That said, I felt the story itself was crap, pure and simple. People complain about Infinite Crisis having plot holes and yet never seem to notice that this thing is the biggest piece of swiss cheese ever? Yeah, I just wanted to scare Sue, so I brought a flamethrower! Oh, but don't worry, that doesn't matter because we're throwing in adult sh*t like rape! F*ckin' rape is mature! Who knows, maybe it just served as a set-up to Infinite Crisis, which it, to its credit, it did pretty well.
After watching your review I decided to read this book for myself to see why it is so beloved...and instantly I slammed the book shut for a bit upon reading the part with Sue's death... I've not seen anything that mean-spirited and wrongfully heartbreaking in quite some time.
I know this is way too late, but I hadn't seen this episode before today. How come you keep making shots at Michael Turner. The dude died of bone cancer at age 37. Died doing what he loved. Seriously please stop.
"I know this is way too late, but I hadn't seen this episode before today. How come you keep making shots at Michael Turner. The dude died of bone cancer at age 37. Died doing what he loved. Seriously please stop."
His death was indeed terrible and tragic and I wouldn't wish it on anybody.
But I'm sorry, I'm not going to pretend like I thought his art was good. I think his art was terrible.
Turner's artwork was Cheesecake-tastic.
I like that and it has it's place - it's very much an erotic, impressionistic art style in the same way that the Rob Lifeld Xtreme School is arguably homoerotic, and Fathom has plenty of female fans for that very reason.
Linkara has made the point before (and I concede, it's not without some merit), that that made Turner a VERY poor choice to reintroduce and define the decidedly not-yet-legal Kara Zor El Supergirl; that was a real "what the hell is wrong with you?!" decision - but then again, can you really imagine his take on the far-more-buxon and savvy Power Girl?.
I don't recall his name off-hand, but there was an artist with a Latino name (and LOTS of sisters) who took on Supergirl and the first thing he did was put a pair of shorts on her under the skirt and remind everyone that she was like 15 and spends most of her time in the air.
Turner had her in micro-panties.
That isn't really his fault - he was just the wrong pick for it, so it's a an editorial SNAFU that they refused to correct.
I like his covers, he does statuesque really well and I appreciate the scratchiness of them. But I don't think he's a good action / sequential artist in that sense - but men and women standing around in Lycra striking poses really works for him.
But I do agree - the interior art on IC was FAR better and the covers were pretty damn boring by comparison.
And it's not speaking ill of the dead to express a critical opinion - if I want to say Vinnie Coletta was a hack who ruined some of Kirby's best art, I can; my thinking Mike Wiringo is Tha Bomb doesn't increase or decrease my appreciation of his work just because I know the dude died tragically young.
What would Steve Ditko do? Well, we know that when he got his comps and saw Colleta's name on the inside, he would throw it in the trash and make sure everyone knew what he was doing; I doubt he regretted that once Colletta died .
Once Vinnie passed, there were people coming out and making excuses for the guy, acting as apologists for hackery and that's just critically and intellectually dishonest.
Re-watching this, I noticed your comments on Green Lantern being taken down by Deathstroke, who took over his ring by superior willpower.
And I remembered a much worse take down that happened afterwards.
In one issue (of Batman Confidential? Not sure...), Batman took down Green Lantern by wrapping a rope around his wrist.
That's it. That's all it took.
~ Mik
I agree that its stupid that Deathstroke can "will" the ring by holding Kyles hand. But it has actually been done before in JLA Year One, were Brain makes a body out of the members of the Leagues body-parts, including Hals ring-arm. Aquaman stops the Brain the same way Deathstroke does, well more or less. So apparently it IS just a really big flaw in the ring:)
Ok, I think to start with you've kinda missed the point of this. Who is saying that this was done because Marvel's "darker" books were doing better? Ever though they just wanted to do a book that showed that the heroes are just human too. It's a darker story because it's something that could have happened, so they retcon in an event to allow it to happen, it's still excellent character development, to say that all the heroes have to have good times and punch, because they aren't Marvel character is shallow beyond all compare.
1. Because we don't see a trial, doesn't mean there wasn't one, and there are still forms and paperwork to fill out even after a court ordered committal.
3 Minor. There are things in life that remind us of events that jog our memory of other events, whether it comes to us in the form of dejavu, or a full blown memory cascade, I had one myself not so long back and I wasn't even sure it was real, because I was so certain that it DIDN'T happen. I saw a toy online and I remembered having one, though I couldn't pin point where or when, and then it was confirmed that I did indeed have one. As for Doctor Light, his personality and memories have returned, but the memories he had in the interim years didn't go away, he still remembers having his ass kicked time and time again, he's not "running off to tweet about it" he is retreating to plan for an attack. You are just attempting to make it look stupider than it is, while I respect your opinions and often agree with the things you've said on the the show over the years, this belittling of something because you can;t think of a real reason why it annoys you is just sad.
4. That is exactly the point! Batman attacked them first and they stopped him. They know that they are in trouble and what they are doing is wrong, they have committed a crime, and they must cover it up. While there is somewhat of a moral standpoint what the heroes did to Light was criminal. You are are supposed to feel torn about the group of heroes in this book. They are heroes, but like I said above, they are also human, they've made mistakes, and this is a big one. Like anyone trying to cover a lie or crime, they construct new lies to hide the first.
5. She's INSANE! Get over it!
Actually that comment about crazy people not being functional could be rather offensive. People who are insane, to the extent of Jean's sociopathic paranoia would still be functional, and be able to think straight and plan these things to get the attention she needs. What would be switched off is her sense of morality, that makes her insane, she's not someone who is schizophrenic, or sees faeries/
6. How about, Jean and Sue are friends and they don't suspect her, because the evidence only suggests is that Jean visited sue? Also so what if the phone records show that Jean called Sue? Again that's no reason to suspect her, not until the footprints are found on Sue's brain.
All the writing in the narration boxes is her attempting to justify herself to Ray, juxtaposed over images of what actually happened. Read the book, not just the words. She's clearly in distress, but composed and her actions are fore planned.
8. This is an event, as well as the actual murder, there are other plot developments that lead in and lead out from the event. This is one of them, it has nothing to do with the death of Sue, or the capturing of Jean, but it occurred at the time.
If they started the new Firestorm series, and say in the pages of that book, that the previous Firestorm died during Identity Crisis, you;d be complaining that they didn't show it. There are a lot of heroes going off half cocked int his story, and this is an example of one of them. It adds nothing to the major plot, or any of the minor ones except for it's own. There's nothing wrong with that, unless of course your view of the world is, that in a situation where people are investigating super villains for the murder of someone, that NOTHING ELSE can go wrong.
Also, never get to see mourned? The second you finished saying that we see Vixen crying... do you want to see the full funeral of every character that ever died? Actually that would be a good way to make money, double sized funeral issues.
9. The noncontiguous art is a problem that I can agree on. HOWEVER, there are gloves, there is a gag and it's tied around her neck in the panel before she unshrinks into the noose, it's not being tied into her mouth. There's a difference between continuity issues, and making a mistake with the continuity, because you don;t get it the first time. Besides those could easily be her own hands. When some behind her were to tie a gag that way, the thumbs would be tilted towards the head, if she was doing it herself they would be tilted away from the head. Guess what, THE THUMBS ARE TILTED AWAY.
Are you saying after she tied the gag, that she couldn't take it off to make it easier for herself, AFTER the phone was damaged?
9 Part 2. The Batman Dr. Light memory thing is not just a misdirection, it's a set up to lead out of the event and provides a sense of mistrust and tention between the characters. Again because of their anger towards Dr. Light, that is their main focus, thus once again allowing the heroes to be wrong. They are only human.
9 Part 2. The Batman Dr. Light memory thing is not just a misdirection, it's a set up to lead out of the event and provides a sense of mistrust and tention between the characters. Again because of their anger towards Dr. Light, that is their main focus, thus once again allowing the heroes to be wrong. They are only human.
10. Makes perfect sense. Living a lie, and keeping it shtun. I see no problem here...
11. Rape exists... saying that it can't happen in a comic is ridiculous. On top of that your reasoning is flawed. The heroes needed a catalyst, this is true, but in order to lower themselves to the point of erasing and altering the mind of Dr. Light it has to be a sick and twisted crime. Rape is sick and twisted enough for me, would you rather he murder her?
It's got nothing to do with being edgy or adult, these criticisms are not based on fact, but are your own assumptions, of what you think was going through the writers mind at the time. That would be like me saying I don't like My Little Pony, that's a welcome opinion, just as you don't like Identity Crisis, that's your prerogative. However what you are doing here by putting your own faulty reasoning into this is like me saying "I don't like My Little Pony because it's a nihilistic metaphor about how all religion is wrong and corrupting our children to be homosexual murderers."
The rape is there because it's a powerful image, shock value, I can go with, but enough damage is done, that mind wipe and reconfiguring can be seen as a step up. No one is going to side with a rapist. (That said mind wiping could be seen as a type of rape... draw your own moral conclusions on that little tidbit.)
11 minor. None of the narrators are women... ok now you are LOOKING for something to complain about.
12. This has nothing to do with the comic it's self...
13. Actually yes, that is exactly what that is supposed to show. It's blurring the line between the heroes and the villains for you to come to your own conclusion on the matter. The heroes are banding together and supporting one another in trying to find a murderer of a member of their family, very noble. The heroes are mind wiping villains and other heroes, metaphorically raping them, very ignoble. A villain has actually raped Sue Dibney, very ignoble. A villain wants to reconnect with his estranged son, very noble.
14. Again that's the point made in Identity Crisis, he was once a threat and then turned silly. This is also brought up in Teen Titans, and I believe Infinite Crisis later.
15. It sets up the next several YEARS of the DCU, I'd say it accomplishes a lot. I loved Infinite Crisis and it sets a lot of the ground work for Villain United. if it wasn't for the mind wipe thing, Villains United would be a much lesser union, now they are joined under the common concern that the heroes are deleting memories, and as far as they are aware, no one knows what has been erased from who. Was Light a one off case? I know if I were a villain I would be panicking about now.
While you can claim that Infinite Crisis was set up from this and the tone of the DCU was changed from this book onwards (not BECAUSE of it...), you can't blame this book for bad writing in the future, like Countdown, Amazon's Attack or Cry For Justice. These things have NOTHING to do with Identity Crisis, aside from the whole, find Ray Palmer thing... You could argue that Cry For Justice uses the same characters, and the same darker premise, and even has Ray Palmer using Jean's technique to get information out of Promethius, but that's not directly related to the book, you can't judge one book by the failings of another unless they aredirectly sequential. Lord of the Rings can be read as one long book, which means the failing of one of the books, can spoil the other two, Identity Crisis stands alone, and so cannot spoil or be spoiled by Amazons Attack or Cry for Justice.
This is faulty logic.
While you can attempt to claim that if it weren't for Identity Crisis the tone of comics wouldn't be this dark, this is the direction DC wanted to go, Identity Crisis or no, chances are Amazons Attack and Cry for Justice would still have come out, and you would be complaining about another stand-alone that initiated this change.
No one has said in this book or in interviews that darker is better, but so many people are passing this as a reason why comic companies make darker books, how about they just have a darker story to tell? Why can't DC just be saying, "Ok we've done this for so many years, let's try taking it in this direction..." Why is it so wrong for a comic book company to tell an adult tale?
I've heard this argument about the DCnU too. That DC is and I quote "acting like some teen aged child locking themselves in their parents basement, listening to silly music, wearing all black, with piercings and outrageous hair styles, claiming that they are an adult now." So Catwoman having sex with Batman is proof that they are childish, Starfires personality and costume change is proof that they are childish, angsty, angry Batman is proof that they are childish, angsty, angry Superman is proof that they are childish... I think not. Would you say that people who make porn are childish, because there's sex and boobs? Would you say that H.P. Lovecraft was childish, because he has a very dark story to tell with some insane and angsty characters? Would you say Ridly Scott was childish because of his gore and big guns? There is a lot of adult themes in the world that could be looked down upon as childish, because only immature minds would laugh at that, or only immature minds would be swayed by that. As far as I can tell the immature ones are the ones who are constantly talking about this crap.
I enjoyed Catwoman, why? Because I didn't go "Oooh look boobies! I must register my disgust online, while secretly giggling at the page."
I read it straight, like it was meant to be an adult book, and I enjoyed it. I didn't bring in any prejudice that it's a comic thus, it must be for kids, as so many people bring to this arena. Darker, adult, sexy stories occur, because they have a darker, adult, sexy story to tell. A Tameranian shagging around my seem like she's a slut to us, and thus we label it childish, where as to them sex is just another activity, they have no morality wrapped up in it. Darker isn't better, it's just not something they had done a lot of before this book was released, and it was something they wanted to try, this was the set up, nothing more.
People really need to get over their preconceptions, Superheroes may not exist in real life, but they exist in a world that is as near to ours as possible. That means that the characters are only human (or whatever the hell they are), they have their hopes and fears, their achievements and their failings. It means they do questionable things, and regret it later. It means they fall in love, or succumb to lust, it means they have sex. The characters are male and female, that means some of the have boobs. They come from different cultures that may not see things the same way we do. Not every alien has to subscribe to our strict yet flawed moral code.
They may have powers, but they are also normal people, not Paragon's of morality. This is a speciesist notion.
"Who is saying that this was done because Marvel's "darker" books were doing better?"
Not going to reply to your every point because it's a matter of a difference of opinion, but this question? Who's saying that?
Valerie D'Orazio. She worked at DC at the time and was an editor on Identity Crisis.
I’m old enough to remember reading when Ray Palmer and Jean Loring divorced in the early 80s: a few panels of tears and emotional accusations, giving way to a reluctant but thoroughly mature acceptance of the inevitable, not only by Ray and Jean but by the writer of the comic as well.
DC Comics revisits this 30 years later, and they turn Jean Loring into a scheming psychopath with a Joker-like rictus.
The most terrifying thing isn’t that superhero publishers, desperate for cheap publicity, consider the latter plotline — pointless, ridiculous and misogynist in equal measure — superior to the first, on account of it being “gritty and realistic” or what have you.
The most terrifying thing is that superhero fanboys do too.
"Superheroes may not exist in real life, but they exist in a world that is as near to ours as possible."
This is what superhero fanboys actually believe.
My introduction to the DCU as a whole(Previously I'd mainly read Green Lantern and a few Captain Marvel trades here'n'there, otherwise I was a Marvel fan) was Kingdom Come. The beautiful artwork by Alex Ross and the serious and stern Superman standing in the center at an emerald Round Table on the cover of the trade plus the extra material of sketches in stock by Ross were too tempting NOT to buy. That lead to me reading Identity Crisis because it got a lot of praise as well. You can imagine my reaction.
I knew from the getgo that the main DCU was not like Kingdom Come, due to my experience with Captain Marvel and Green Lantern previously, but I did expect drama and heroism like I was used to in most of those books. Then came a story that might as well have come from the 90s with better artwork. Then the movie "Man of Steel" hit.
My disappointment was so big that I now only follow the more outlandish DC heroes, like Aquaman, Amethyst and the Demon Knights, but sadly Batman, who is affected the most by the "darkening", is still a top seller, making DiDio and other execs think that the dark stuff and action schlock are more profitable than good, self-contained stories. And don't get me started on "event fatique", although that affects most books of Marvel as well(A good example of NOT following that trend so far is the new She-Hulk book, YAY for ass kicking heroines)
Oh, and of course another Death of Superman is coming. The New52 is just loathesome, more bad and bleh has come from the reboot than good, and barely any of the good was accessible for new readers.
I feel that Identity Crisis get's criticized too often. Reading through it, reading the notes by the authors and artists, and reading what the authors intended, I could see how much they were trying to do something special. Something moving. And it was.
As a horror writer myself, I can say that building up Ralph and Sue's relationship is what made her death so brutal, the explanation knocking the wind out of you. This pansy crap of "Comics are too dark" is just that. It is weak. Wishing our heroes to always be virtuous and to always make choices we like is insane. If this was dealt better in the issues that followed it would have been received better.
If it had stood on its own instead of changing the continuity, if it was a what if comic no one would give a damn and would praise the writing and art like they should. Should they have spent another ten pages on the consequences of the rape. Maybe. But that is something that could have had its own comic. Her death was what was tragic. Her rape was awful and spurred some difficult choices that people had to carry.
Some mistakes were made, but this is still one of my favorite, most human comics. Life is dirty, and being angry for comics refusing to bow down to a silly standard all the time is simply limiting to the authors who clearly love what they are doing.
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