My other blogs are Giant-Sized this week, and so is Playing Favorites. Enjoy.
Full
disclosure; I’ve only read, like a half-dozen individual Black Panther
comics. That’s not even ‘Black Panther’ comics where his name was on the
title. Half of those were ‘Fantastic Four’ issues where Reed and Sue
were on vacation after Civil War and newlyweds Black Panther and Storm
were filling in. I honestly only picked those up because they ended up
dimension-hopping to the Marvel Zombies Universe. I got one from after
that arc where they were on racist retard Skrull planet (just like in
the classic Star Trek episode, “A Piece of the Action”), but that…had to
be an accident; I don’t think that comic came out while I was still
drinking heavily.
Anyway, I like Black Panther because
he’s the trifecta; the technology, magic, and national support of Doctor
Doom, the drive, abilities, and wealth of Batman, and the something
something of someone else who isn’t memorable because they aren’t Doctor
Doom or Batman(maybe ‘integrity’ and ‘Captain America’). But really,
aren’t Batman and Doctor Doom enough to make a trifecta? Possibly more?
Is the sum of two and two three? No, it would be foolish to say such is
so, but it would not be so foolish to say that two and two is greater
than three.
But The Black Panther manages to be more
than either Batman or Doctor Doom alone (Yes, between my fingers
refusing to type that and my computer bursting into flames, it took
about a dozen tries to type that out.). What I mean by that is that
Black Panther isn’t a solitary, obsessive figure whose entire existence
is circumscribed by his one-man quest to…protect Wakanda from the
outside world. He follows his conscience and protects his country.
Sometimes, this gets him into trouble, especially with the more
traditional members of Wakanda’s vaguely defined tribally-based
governmental structure, but just as I’ve only had a taste of Katy Kane’s
civil conflicts to spark my interest in the character, the small bit of
internal strife I’ve seen in Wakanda (I didn’t pick up ‘Doomwar’ after
the first few issues because it was the final comic for me that had
Deadpool and didn’t need Deadpool. It was pretty mediocre to bad on its
own, and I did know that while Deadpool wouldn’t make it a good
political story [with superheroes!], he could indeed make it a worse
story that was kind of about politics, but was mostly stupid.) has
excited me with the prospect of seeing more. Black Panther can be a
rogue actor in any large-scale conflict (just as he was in Civil War,
when a distinctly-American registration act went into effect) who can be
either protagonist or antagonist (though it’s hard to play protagonists
renown for their integrity as antagonists, because then it looks like
they’re being aggressively bad or indifferently bad, neither of which is
good for them.)
Black Panther is a versatile
supporting character. I’d like to say that I’d like an arc where he gets
this to happen, or that to happen, but honestly, that arc has probably
already been done but no one cared because it was the Black Panther and I
don’t know because I’ve really only read a tiny bit of his stuff. I
like Black Panther because he has potential, but I should look into him
more before putting him onto my top ten list.
So, as it sits right now, my list is:
The Midnighter(Warren Ellis/Mark Millar)
Jenny Sparks(Warren Eillis/Mark Millar)
The Batman
Booster Gold (???)
Damian Wayne (Grant Morrison)
Steve Rogers(Ultimates Vol 1 & 2)
Cloud 9 (Dan Slott)
Superman (All-Star Superman)
Which
leaves me two men (or women) down. This is actually pretty hard. I
mean, let me go down another short-list: Crusader, Freedom Ring, anyone
from the Divided We Stand miniseries(which includes Mageneto, even
though all he did was sip fucking tea and tell Hellion to quit
love-hating on the X-Men), X-Men (I know, it’s almost conspicuous that
the closest I’ve come to an X-Man is a guy who recently married one and
the only X-related thing I mentioned is ‘Doomwar,’ which I did not-- if
you’ve been keeping up--like very much.), Nick Fury is cool in
everything. Ever.
Jack Hawksmoor, Elijah Snow,
Hardball, Gauntlet, Aaron Stack, Captain Marvel(cancer), Captain
Marvel(light), Captain Marvel(Boy), Ultimate Spider-Man, Spider-Man,
Gargoyle from X-Men 2099, the Sentry’s wife for shooting him that one
time, Morgan LaFey for killing The Sentry that other time, Molecule Man
for dissolving The Sentry between both of those other two times, Apollo,
regular Superman, Dick Greyson as Batman (referred to hereafter as
Dickbats), Owlman (complete with twisted logic about how Owlman could be
seen as a protagonist because he is so cool and James Woods is cool for
voicing him), Martian Manhunter for having a top-notch power suite,
Hellfire (because it’s an awesome answer and you know it), Thor (who’s
had some good books as of late), Elisa Bloodstone, Jakita Wagner,
Plastic Man, MVP, Drums, The Engineer, Deadpool(Cable &
Deadpool), Deadpool(The Circle Chase), Cable (Cable &
Deadpool),The Pene-Traitor, Bob-Agent of Hydra, Trauma, The Captain,
Havok, Polaris, Strong Guy, Wolfsbane, Multiple Man, etc..
A
lot of these guys are here because they were part of exceptional
ensemble casts: Planetary, X-Factor, The Authority, Nextwave, People Who
Killed The Sentry, The Initiative, The Starjammers (yes, I read stuff
with Papa Summers in it. No, it wasn’t very good, but it had Havok and
Polaris in it, and they were both in X-Factor once upon a time and I was
dating Octavio and it seemed like a responsible thing at the time and
please don’t judge me it was terrible.)
For the most
part, the ensemble books I have read have been pretty awesome (most
likely because I’m a comics consumer of the highest discretion and
taste, but even more most likely because I take good advice from smart
people), but that doesn’t mean that the individual characters in them
are great heroes. Now, ‘Nextwave’ is all too easy an example, so let’s
look at ‘Planetary’ instead. It does transmute from a comic with a theme
of fiction from the past century well-mixed with recognizable superhero
elements into a balls-to-the walls mission to fuck up Those Guys Who
Aren’t The Fantastic Four If The Members Of The Fantastic Four Who
Weren’t Reed Richards Were Dicks Too. Elijah Snow is obviously our guide
through this; we’re introduced to Planetary through his eyes and he’s
the one that turns it back into a proactive force. That said, it isn’t
until they actually begin fighting The Four that any heroics happen.
And
I haven’t really gotten that book yet, but I’m sure it’s awesome and
once I read it, Elijah Snow may kick Batman in the balls and occupy the
top three slots of this list (no, the list is not in order), but as of
right now, Elijah Snow is just a gripey, crotchety old man who’s
relearning that he can do some good in this world. Likeable? Yes. Human?
Yeah. Top-tier superheroics? Not quite.
The Authority,
in case you and I have never talked in person, is a really good series.
The characters are all pretty good, and deep. Well, deep considering
that they pretty much just punch global threats until they get some
breathing room, then come up with cunning ways to finish them off in a
cinematically appealing fashion because punching it until it shrivels up
and dies, even if it explodes like a giant cosmic spoilsport in the
process—Anti-Monitor—isn’t quite big enough for The Authority. It’s a
fun series, and if there’s any crime committed, it’s that there isn’t
room for more than characterization beyond Jenny Sparks and spicing up
the brutal, superhuman assaults beyond The Midnighter.
X-Factor
is an ensemble book. It better be anyway, because it features just shy
of a dozen B- to C-List characters. I think we seriously need to
confront Peter David; he is hoarding X-people.
“Peter David, how many mutants are in X-Factor currently?”
“Um, I don’t know exactly, it couldn’t be more than five or six. Seven at most.”
“There are twelve.”
“Did you count Threnody?”
“No.”
“You should. I just added her while we were talking.”
“Peter, your friends think you have a problem. They think you’re hoarding X-people.”
“That’s not true. I don’t have that many. Look at Chris Claremont; he got an entire universe of them.”
“Yes, but he’s using most of them. When was the last time Siryn had a story?”
“When…when she had Jamie’s baby.”
“And how long ago was that, Peter?”
“About a year.”
“It was two years. Look, why don’t we take Syrin off the team?”
“No! I need Syrin. She’s Jamie’s love interest, it’s just that grown-up
future Layla is sort of here right now, but she’s going to end up with
Shatterstar after he and Darwin-“
“Alright, Peter. Alright. What about Guido?”
“He…he flirts with Monet. See? It was in issues 502 and 514…by the 700th issue, they’ll be ready to start dating!”
“And how big will the cast be by then?”
“700. I wanted it to fit logically…oh my god…I…I think I have problem. Oh, god…I think I’m…hoarding mutants.”
“Admitting you have a problem is the first step, Peter David. Congratulations”
But
seriously, I love X-Factor and contrary to what you just read, Peter
David does an excellent job of working with a massive cast and having
pieces of story for each of them. That said, Jamie Madrox is the best
characterized of the lot, and he doesn’t have much more than two,
equally glacially-paced plots: his dupes are becoming dicks and he has a
romance developing with Layla Miller (Yes, the girl that advances slow
moving plot lines. Don’t worry, she got SORASed, so it’s not that
creepy).
Oh, and aside, I did not know that they
kept using Threnody after The Legacy Virus thing. I mean, she has a
Wikipedia entry. Most webcomics can’t get a Wikipedia entry. How fucked
up is that? Here’s everything you need to know about Threnody, “Sinister
almost used her to stop The Legacy Virus, but then a Russian farmboy
made out of metal did it. Then she fucked Nate Grey. She does zombies
now.” The actual article is three pages long.
Alright,
you know that The Authority is awesome, but it tops out at The
Midnighter and Jenny Sparks. You know Planetary is good, but I haven’t
quite gotten to the part where its heroes come through their greatest
challenges and count themselves amongst the greatest heroes of Earth. If
you haven’t put it together yet, Warren Ellis is one of the best
contemporary comic book writers. Depending on just how Morrison’s
“Batman, Inc.” goes, he may be the absolute best. Depending on how much
crazier Alan Moore gets, perhaps the best of all time (including
hypertime).
It should come as no surprise to you that
Nextwave is a hilarious parody of modern and somewhat-less-than-modern
superhero comics. More importantly, it’s fun to read. Even if (like me)
you don’t immediately catch that everyone is wearing trench coats or get
the nationalistic references to Ultimate Captain America, you get that
these are the types of superheroes you would be if you were a
dysfunctional superhero team. Exposition is melded seamlessly with
action and jokes and not a word or panel is missed where it could be
funny, witty, or set up another for the same. Nextwave sets the
standard for superhero action/comedies that could only be surpassed if
Ellis somehow ended up penning the graphic novel adaptation of The One
True Trifecta of Entertainment: True Lies.
The
characters are good; this isn’t a series where there isn’t enough time
to focus on the cast or the cast isn’t active enough to define
themselves with respect to the challenges they face. With the exception
of Tabby (or ‘Taby,’ depending on who’s spelling), most of these guys
get adequate action, storylines, and backstory to flesh them out in
detail. Yes, even The Captain, who’s pretty much just a guy of average
intelligence and moral values with superpowers trying to make his way in
a world where having superpowers is supposed to generally work out for
you (Comparing his story of having Captain America kick his ass for
being Captain ****** to Booster Gold’s story of Superman taking away his
cape because he “couldn’t handle a cape”…well, you don’t need to
compare. They’re both awesome stories and I’m immeasurably pleased that
I’ve read them both.) is worthy of mention even though he is almost by
definition a generic superhero.
The thing about
‘Nextwave’ is that I know that if I ever pick up a comic book with these
guys in it, they won’t be the same characters (I believe that Tabby has
already been recharacterized in “X-Force” and even the official
editorial line is that while ‘Nextwave’ is [somehow] [miraculously]
[unbelievably] [seriously, unbelievably] canon, the Nextwave
Corporation/H.A.T.E. chemically altered their personalities and memories
before they went rogue.). I know that’s true for Cloud 9 and I know
that no other Superman will be All-Star Superman, so I shouldn’t bother
me when Monica Rambeau shows up in Heroes for Hire (or something) for
more than two panels and doesn’t mention how she used to lead The
Avengers. Hell, it should bother me if she did, since there’d be a
pretty big chance that she’d just be a one-note character after that
(and it would. Whoever the hell is writing ‘Heroes for Hire,’ take note;
skip Monica Rambeau, you’re screwed either way).
Maybe
that’s what bugs me. The characters in ‘Nextwave’ are not having fun.
The Captain has a few sheepish grins, but everyone else is deadpan.
Hell, I think that a few panels with Monica actually grimaced a hole in
the opposite page. There are a few moments where they enjoy what they’re
doing (“Oh my god. They explode!”), but for the most part, their
collective emotional spectrum ranges from anger to desperation to rage
to satisfaction to annoyance. Maybe part of why ‘Nextwave’ works is
because we’re convinced that this is the real world for these people;
red tyrannosaurs with snifters of brandy and revolvers are dead serious
things that are deadly and serious. I mean, yeah, T-Rex with gun is
serious—more serious than a regular T-Rex and a T-Rex armed with
anything short of Velociraptor-Chucks—but it’s ridiculous unless you’re
staring one down. The next time I see any one of these guys, they won’t
be a serious team of self-unaware misfits fighting against ridiculous
enemies in a context so lethal they can’t step back and laugh at it;
they’ll be someone else somewhere else.
But again, the
context should be irrelevant. Why isn’t Monica Rambeau as good as Cloud
9? She doesn’t have an arc, really. None of them do. They learn a few
things, but that “fail, lesson, and success” model of showing character
growth doesn’t happen here. They just fight through, succeeding as a
team though one or two of them fall short, then pull it out and straight
up rule in the final battles. The characters have informative
backgrounds and they even work together as a team in the end, but the
real triumph isn’t one for any single character, but for the group as a
single unit. The individual characters, in terms of growth and depth,
can’t be separated from the group. In fact, when it comes to pacing
downtime, there isn’t much of that in either ‘The Authority’ or
‘Nextwave.’ I guess that’s a drawback of Ellis’ decompressed
storytelling.
If I get rip-roaring adventures out of it though, I guess I can live with that.
Seriously, True Lies is the Action/Comedy/Romance movie you should watch on your next date.
‘Irredeemable’
is another good book that is good. It's written by Mark Waid, who's
probably the best comic book writer who's written something you've read
and enjoyed, but doesn't get much acclaim for anything beyond “Kingdom
Come.” Despite the fact that “Kingdom Come” is in my top three comics of
all time, I haven't really seen myself as someone who sees him
deserving acclaim; I've been of the mind that he deserves recognition
for consistently putting out good comics, but acclaim as an icon of
comics was something I wouldn't argue against, but couldn't see myself
supporting. “Kingdome Come” as a high-quality book, but it was
essentially a reaction to Dark Age sensibilities with a 'what-if' future
stuffed full of apocalyptic scripture. I'm not saying that doesn't
deserve praise or that it isn't an amazing piece of comics (some say it
even marked the ending of The Dark Age, and I wouldn't argue with that
either), but I couldn't see putting Waid onto that next tier.
‘Irredeemable’
was the comic that got me agreeing with all of those things I wouldn't
commit to earlier in this paragraph. On the surface, it’s about a
superhero who's totally not-Superman with super-strength, speed,
hearing, vision, laser eyes, etc. getting fed up with acting like a
paragon and never being loved quite enough by the populace and always
paying for his mistakes (I talk about superhero karma a little further
down) and—well, as you read more of the series you find out that there's
a lot of reasons that govern why he stops trying to be a paragon and
starts wreaking violent righteousness upon the Earth (Except instead of
say, collaring purse thieves, he sinks Malaysia because their UN
representative lied to him. Dude has a shit-list a mile long and
super-speed. Thankfully for both the readership and the series itself,
he also develops a flair for the dramatic, so you've got some time to
appreciate super-dickery that puts Silver Age Superman to shame. “Choose
ten.”). It's an amazing series that's just as much about how his former
teammates—who aren't the Justice League—react to the fact that he's
gone insane and try to stop him/save themselves. While a lot of comics
have been touted as 'realistic' superhero tales, “Irredeemable” does the
best job of convincing me that it is the holder of that title (with the
accompanying, boring, obligatory remarks about yes, there's a dude that
flies and shoots lasers out of his eyes and another guy with a
lumberjack build who flies with wings, but you get what I'm saying
here). No one from ‘Irredeemable’ makes this list because they're all
just normal guys who tried to do good, fucked up on occasion, and looked
after each other until The Plutonian went insane. Now they're just
trying to survive and find a way to save the world and themselves from
The Plutonian, the super-villains who might be able to stop him, and
even each other. It's great, but while a lot of these characters are
developing and have a lot of depth, none of them have flaws or benefits
which make them fascinating in any context but ‘Irredeemable.’ Well,
maybe they do, but being in ‘Irredeemable’ isn't giving any information
on them aside from that which feeds directly into the plot at hand.
Maybe some of them will survive and we'll see more on them in other
comics, but I doubt it.
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