K-BOMB!

I need a bigger one.

Back from a week in Texas spent doing a lot of nothing. It was rad.

That last one there is of two dudes from Ryan Kelly’s FUNRAMA. You should definitely check that out here: http://funrama.tumblr.com/

The mainstream corporate comics mindset is a weird place. One only has to take a quick look at any comic shop dealing in the “big two” companies’ books or message boards set up for the discussion of them to see that, a majority of the people buying monthly comics and reading and discussing them are the most set-in-their-ways, whiny, self-important manchildren. This is a thought that springs to mind often when observing the comments of the typical reader who feels the needs to actual speak out about their beloved old guard characters, though most recently, as a result of the reactionary response to Marvel’s recent promo images of two of the new characters to be featured in their new book “Avengers Academy.”

It seems that a lot of the hostility and anger, and in some cases, apathy, towards the book (which hasn’t even been solicited yet, mind you) comes from the fact that these are two brand new characters that nobody knows about. The premise of the book, as it’s currently understood, is that younger and new characters are to be trained by established characters to become superheroes in a school of sorts. So the only thing that anybody seems to care about? Finding out who the teachers of the new characters will be. All anyone wants to know is “Who can I keep reading about?” There’s an attachment to these old characters that completely stops all attempted progress dead in it’s tracks. Look at a lot of the outspoken response to Rick Remender’s treatment of the Punisher, as people tear it apart because it’s not what they’re used to. Remender takes a decades old character, and fully immerses him into the Marvel universe, turning him into a Frankenstein’s monster that hangs out with Man-Thing and vampires in a sewer, and somehow, this “doesn’t fit the character” or “doesn’t make sense in the established universe of Marvel continuity.” There’s a cyclical nature to corporate comics, and the second a writer steps out of it, people riot. In fact, one could even say that the cyclical nature is a requirement for these books to continue on the way they have for years.

I think it’s a pretty well documented fact that major corporate cape books come out of editorial retreats and come down from that to their writers. It’s called “work for hire” for a reason. A writer can pitch something all he or she wants, but when it comes down to it, they have a job they were hired for, and everything written has to be pitched to and then approved by editorial. This happens because of that undeniable cyclical nature of long-running corporate-owned cash cow character use, especially when it comes to the serialization of ongoing stories. Disney bought out Marvel to use as an R&D unit, for further exploitation of the characters that have been set in a repeating motion for decades. Since I have no interest in reading editorially mandated stories for the sake of continued milking of these sacred cash cow characters, I tend to avoid a vast majority of the two major comic publishers’ cape books.

Upon reading my thoughts on it, someone asked me if that meant that I hated all major Hollywood films, seeing not much of a difference between the two. The thing is, that’s not an equal comparison.

Hollywood films often stand alone without any sense of what came out before, what will come out tomorrow, and what can be done with these characters to ensure that 1) people will follow them again and 2) buy a t-shirt with their face on it. Sure, within the major comics structure, there’s plenty of fine and decent stories, but to say that they exist solely to tell stories that stand on their own for the sake of being is unfortunately false. We won’t be seeing the Amazing Ongoing Stories of Peter Parker, the Racist Rapist Spider-Man, and that’s because nobody will buy that action figure and there will be a huge outcry over it. That’s a book I’d probably read though, because at least it’s different an interesting. This is the same reason that nobody will kill off those major characters. After a while, how excited can a person get when reading a story in which they know the main characters are all going to be okay at the end? There’s never any sense of dread or excitement or intrigue that maybe something major will happen, because you know that, no matter what, the main character will be back next month, just as it’s been for decades before.

Going back to “Avengers Academy” though. Here we have a book that, as far as we know from these promos, features new characters in this huge established sandbox that can do whatever they want, and that alone can stand to be potentially exciting or interesting. Look at Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos’ “Alias.” As the story of Jessica Jones, “Alias” featured a totally new character that works as a private investigator within the Marvel universe. It was able to step away from the capes and the kid-friendly wall around sex, language, and violence so often present in corporate comics, and do whatever it wanted without worrying if someone would buy the Jessica Jones action figure with “FUCK SHIT FUCK FUCK” soundbyte action. Not only that, but it worked to make some change in established characters: Luke Cage wasn’t interesting until he fucked a girl in the ass on page, and comics are probably at least a little better as a result.