Growth Rings as the Core Metaphor in Swamp Thing

Since that last post I’ve read the next two volumes – Love and Death and The Curse. Again, I feel like I have a lot to say but don’t know where to begin with it all. I guess the big thing I finally noticed is how there is a great visual metaphor used that reflects the structure of the plot.

Growth Rings. Much like the way new growth on a tree expands from the centre (as well as up) the plot for the series begins to reflect itself and grow to reinforce itself. Depending on how you look at it, these levels appear different. If you cut it open and look down, you see the rings forming into themselves, but if you tap it from the side you only see lines in sequence.

Having these stories in collected form lets me as a first time reader see the cycles and reinforcements much easier. I’ve got the collected firewood, so to say. But, I can imagine getting Swamp Thing month after month you would only see the lines in sequence (at first). Once you see where they come from you can adapt your perception to the wider whole. The lines are part of a bisected circle.

Anyway, growth rings are a great metaphor here, not just for the organic and organized nature of the larger plot that begins to support itself, but hey, he’s a conscious plant. What I have also come to notice is that this cyclical metaphor (here growth rings in a tree) are also used in Moore’s other works, particularly Watchmen and to some extent in Promethea. A perfect circle is symmetrical, and well, just open the pages of Promethea to any random pages and you’ll see the symmetry of the layout fairly clearly. In Watchmen, there are the cogs of the watch that Jon Osterman was working on when his father chucks it out. Again, the cogs are important in reinforcing the cyclical nature of time – something I’ll be exploring elsewhere in a bit more detail (I hope).

So where in Watchmen the circular cogs have specific points of contact that as a whole can create some kind of meaning (making a watch move and tell time, or how the heroes lives create some terrible and fragile peace) the growth rings of Swamp Thing show the organic progression from monthly comic towards comprehensive graphic novel.

Make sense? Perhaps I’ll find the time to write more on it.

Dipping a toe in the swamp

Okay, just wanted to check in with any lost souls shambling in a muck-encrusted way to this here site and give a very quick update. Finished reading Saga of the Swamp Thing, and will be posting something in greater detail soon (I hope). But, I wanted to get one thing out there first.

What really struck me in the first issue was the contrasting panel layouts between Swamp Thing’s story and Sunderland (or whoever the old man is in the story). Swamp Thing’s story is told in organic panels without borders that grow and merge into one-another, while the old man is presented in hard, sharp angled frames that are both slightly off kilter and confining.

Both feel slightly threatening in different ways, but a wonderful visual metaphor for what I’ve seen as a theme being established in the first few stories. The connected whole of the organic earth struggling against the conscious constructions of man.

Death of an Icon

There's something to be said about reading a much hyped comic long after the hype has died.

No, I've still not had a chance to get to that Swamp Thing trade, but I did get the Death of Captain America trade. Again, I'm just completely bowled over by Brubaker as a writer and how he's handling these editorially mandated stories. I mean talk about a clunker! And yet, you still have a generally readable item, but man, would I not want to come to this thing cold!

While there are a lot of good things here, from the great characters found in The Winter Soldier and Falcon, to the new array of retrofitted Cap villains, there is a huge millstone around the neck of this story - Civil War. I read the trades leading up to this story but not Civil War so I was okay in understanding some of the backstory and motivation. Being a former comic book blogger (reformed) and knowing the general plot of Civil War meant I knew some of the main plots even if I have no idea why Peter Parker is in the black suit. But coming in cold? Nope, this would not be very fun to read at all.

You'd still enjoy the character moments but I could barely piece together the larger picture which kept forcing itself onto the plot. There is almost no way to separate the larger Marvel Universe from the plot of the story and really, that is unfortunate. I have no problem with how the title was both updating itself and honoring its history. Kind of making all the old villains new again, so why not the same with Cap? The idea flowed well, but then we've got someone I had no idea was Tony Stark in a SHIELD outfit, and cap's corpse looking Skrullish.

Part of me just wishes I didn't know the bigger picture but then I'd be completely lost rather than kind of lost and bit disappointed at what could have been a great and timeless story. I guess this is a great example of how comics haven't really changed only rather than getting them out as fast as possible now it's getting them out while meeting some kind of mass crossover content. In both cases you do the best with what you got, only now the reader kind of needs to have a lot of money (or less scruples and a bittorrent connection, I suppose).

What Brubaker can offer is always high quality but what Marvel offers is a bit unfortunate.

Hiatus in Review

Okay, looking at that last post before the extended hiatus I should report a few things. I didn't read Labyrinths of Reason or Wasteland. Much like Swamp Thing I'm a bit shocked I haven't read Wasteland yet. I'll likely pick it up when I pick up Fallout 3 for the ol' X-box 360 some day. It's a series that I was really excited for when it was announced but I couldn't get a copy in Ottawa and well, it just sort of stayed that way until the trades started coming out and I was just lazy about picking it up. Huh, funny how that always happens. I guess it means I get to savor its post-apocalyptic goodness with a fine electronic parallel. And I'm still on the waiting list for the Hellblazer trades at the library, which seems really weird to me. I had no idea that many people wanted to read John Constantine comics from the Ottawa library.

I guess we should start with the comics first hey?

Wanted. Read it before the movie and I think the changes they made were completely necessary. The comic only works as a comic and well, I don't need to be told I'm a worthless prick for not being a completely selfish asshole. Otherwise, it's a rollicking villainous adventure. Liked the movie a bit more to be honest.

Sleeper and Criminal. Reading these made me kind of depressed knowing I would never write anything this good. I read a lot of Ed Brubaker and I really thought these were fantastic crime stories. Sleeper is the comic villain equivalent of something like Good Fellas, Donnie Brasko or The Departed in that you have a hero, Holden Carver, you become a bit unsure of and you start to understand the circumstances of the bad guys. I always appreciate the skill going into making killers seem sympathetic, something the Animated Batman series did amazingly well or Pulp Fiction did to a mass audience. Yeah they're the bad guys but you feel bad for them, you can relate to them on a basic level to a point where you're reacting to them much like Holden Carver is. Criminal, is a living breathing world where crime is the one thing tying everyone's story together. It's like the shared superhero universes only with a continuity that reveals itself rather than feel forced to make sense of things that weren't meant to be tied together. And with capers and characters that rival any in this genre, there was no doubt this would be a winner with me.

Scott Pilgim Gets it Together. It took me a long time to finally get this book. I did. I read it. I was slightly less charmed by it this time. I don't really know why because it's still great comics but I almost feel a bit too out of touch with the youth ethos in it as I get less lost in my own life.

Cpt. America – Red Menace and Winter Soldier. I can't remember the last time I ever read a Captain America comic book. These were the same solid procedurals in a superhero dressing that Brubaker presented in his other work. The more realistic based artwork really worked in these stories as it tried to humanize a symbol and bring him back to the real world. Yes, grown men in silly costumes do a lot of damage to each other and the world around them, but having things look almost real made the stories seem a bit more real as well. And that's the goal of comics isn't it, to have the art reflect the words – it works well here.

Watchmen. Just as good as the first time I read it. Actually, slightly better because you catch more of the things you missed the first time. I tried to explain it to my wife after we saw the movie preview and while it was a kooky rambling effort on my part she did consider reading it for about ten minutes after our chat. Never really understood the pirate comics until I read a few more interviews with the creators – makes sense that a world with superheroes wouldn't have superhero comics. Seeing a few more examples of how deep the metaphors run, especially visually, was a real treat. From the recurrence of clockwork mechanisms, to the marquee showing the band Crystalnache playing just before the tragedy brought onto the city's population by some self-proclaimed superior human.

Books (without pictures)

Catch-22. Great metaphor, great message, but really, I got it long before the book ended. How can you be sane in an insane situation when you have no sane option or sane action. I do understand why it's considered a great work of fiction but I also understand why people don't like it either. It can be tough to sit and read such a looping text once you understand that the characters are living their lives in the same way the text is written – reliving events over and over and feeling trapped by them only to relive them all over again when something similar happens. Perhaps the point is to get you to give up on the whole mess?

The Chrysalids. Man I love John Wyndham's writing and how his stories are considered sci-fi without any real noticeable sci-fi elements or stand-bys. I think he helped lay the foundation for the genre expectations so reading this book felt completely new to me. It's about the human condition more than anything with a few fantastical ideas thrown in there. The kids struggle for freedom only to find it in a society that is just as intolerant only in line with their abilities. Is this a reflection on the role religion plays in human society? Most likely showing how the exclusionary message of anything is not something that helps anyone except those preaching and conforming. Like the atheists say, be good for goodness sake. I'll be making a stronger effort to read more Wyndham, and really, I'd like a lot of superhero comic writers to do the same to see how you can get a message attached to a story with fantastic elements.

Blood Sucking Fiends and You Suck. These were fun and the perfect read just around Halloween. I mean having a group of late night grocery store employees called The Animals who become vampire hunters is in and of itself enough of a fun idea but throw it in with the rest of the loveable characters, and you've got a great series. Although I enjoyed the first book more.

And finally, skated into work today in a bit of a snowstorm. The canal looked like a frozen ocean with the mini-snowdrifts across the ice. Hitting them sort of slowed me down so it felt a bit more dangerous than it was. There was less than an inch of snow down but there was a solid sheet of ice down under the snow. Was listening to Gorillaz - Demon Days which was the perfect mix of creepy and fun.

Not a New Year's Resolution

Hi there ten or so people that remember this was once a blog about comics. It's a new year and I got a new idea. Oh, this will still be about comics and all that but I'm not really buying weekly floppies anymore and haven't for quite some time. Nope, I've been kind of doing this random read through the history and current publications of comics in their trade paperback form or "graphic novel" format. I've not really had any desire to post online for a while then something strange happened this Christmas.

My wife bought me the first trade of Alan Mooe's Saga of the Swamp Thing. And, well, I thought it would be kind of neat to record my thoughts on this book seeing as I've never read it. Mike Sterling is shaking his head in disbelief as are most comic fans, I'd imagine. Don't feel sad, feel glad, let's see where this goes.

This isn't a resolution or anything. I'll try to post some interesting things as often as possible but I'm not going to try to create a daily blog, others do it much better than I. My only real resolution was to try and skate to work as much as possible this winter. The Rideau Canal froze on New Year's Day (although I didn't know until the 3rd because I was cocooned in my house) and I've since started skating to work. I think that makes me the most Canadian comic book blogger online right now, not that it's a contest.

This is most likely the end

Well, life has certainly got in the way with my updating the blog for the last few months and I'm pretty sure I've all but pulled the plug on the machine keeping this thing artifically alive. I'm a bit unwilling to drive a stake into the undead heart of this blog, but for all intents and purposes I think anyone still coming here can agree it's over and done with.

So, one last parting shot. Here's my summer reading list:

Proper Books:

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. I've been meaning to read this book for a long time and I finally got around to it, with a couple of chapters left to get through. It's taken me a while to get through it and I do find it almost terrifying in its ability to perfectly capture the inherent evil of any bureaucratic system. Stark reality is found here in a book about the cyclical nature of our lives and the horror wrought because of a larger system guiding us that is beyond the control of an individual, and cannot address the needs of an individual. Yossarian is a true anti-hero in that he does everything completely opposite of a classic hero. He isn't the anti-hero in the sense of the hero who uses bad methods to get good ends, but he does everything humanly possible to not act like a hero - he uses bad methods for selfish ends, yet he's the hero for standing up to the completely batshit insane system he's thrown into.

Blood Sucking Fiends and You Suck by Christopher Moore. My wife bought me Blood Sucking Fiends for Christmas and I just haven't had a time to read it yet. Nothing like an undead romance for some beach reading.

Labyrinths of Knowledge by William Poundstone. Because I feel like blowing my mind sans chemicals for a little while this summer. Give the synapses a workout rather than make them surrender.

The Chrysalids by John Wyndham. I just read Day of the Triffids this past year and really enjoyed it. I'm always a fan of apocalyptic type fiction and this also comes highly recommended from my wife. Plus, it's a short book which is perfect for the long hours and weekends of summer.

Comic Books

Right now I'm just about to start reading Mark Millar's Wanted because my wife wants to go see the movie. I was as shocked as anyone because I wasn't totally interested. Maybe I should see the movie first in case I need to rinse out my brain with the comic book version?

I'm apparently going to read a lot of Ed Brubaker this summer. And why not? On top of my pile are Sleeper and Criminal because I've heard nothing but good things. But to balance it out with good and proper superhero fisticuffs I've also got four volumes of Captain America ready to go - the Red Menace and Winter Soldier story arcs.

In between I'm still reading any Hellblazer trades I can get from the library. Nothing like demon stories involving a complete dick who fucks them over in the hazy humid summer days. Well, it might not seem right to you but I really like it.

I'm hoping to finally getting around to the fourth volume of Scott Pilgrim, and starting Wasteland which I've been meaning to read since it came out.

And finally, I'm planning on re-reading Watchmen before the movie hype starts and I run the risk of soul erosion and desolation.

Time to fire that chimp at the keyboard.

Well it has been quite a long time since I had a moment of free time to dedicate to the old blog here.  If there is anyone still out there remotely interested, here's the quick hits of what I have read over the last month or so along with a few initial thoughts.

 

The Essential Avengers, Volume 1.

I had this book for quite a long time and started reading it when I was home sick with the flu.  That long?  Really?  Wow, I'm almost embarrassed to say I never actually finished reading it.  I love to see the Jack Kirby art on it's own, well, inked I guess.  It just gives such a great view of how to lay out a panel, and a page for super action in a constrained time/format.  Then Don Heck takes over and suddenly the page layouts appear a lot more vertical.  Panels rise and stretch up as opposed to Kirby's much more horizontal spreads.  It's actually quite impressive that although Kirby's panels are generally smaller they seem to contain way more action.  He really is the master of having the panel frame the action to a point where the frame implies there is much more going on outside of it.  Don Heck's panels tend to completely contain all the action.  The weird part is, when I was younger and thinking of comics in my daydreams, I was probably thinking of Don Heck's art.  He just seems to be the image of what I remember Marvel Comics being.  Not so much these days, but still, he's good at being generic I guess.  That wasn't meant to be an insult, it's what I think any work for hire artist needs to work for – like the Hardy Boys authors or whatever.  It doesn't ruin the work, but they survive by being quick and consistent not rule breaking and bold.

 

Planetary Books 1-3 and Crossing Worlds

I really loved this collection.  Nothing like a bit of comics more or less about comics, in my opinion.  I'm a bit of a sucker about media examining itself and playing with the form and genre assumptions.  I like the relationships that are build and how the story is build around an espionage story but it's really about the relationship of comic books and pop culture.

 

30 Days of Night: 3 Tales and Spread the Disease.

They do a decent job of tying together some loose ends and random characters from the other stories.  Decent X-files type material with special agents and vampires.  Also, vampires in space is a great idea.

 

Corto Maltese: Encore un peu plus loin

This collection shows how Hugo Pratt really shines in the short tale.  I enjoyed this collection of short Corto Maltese stories a million times more than the book length adventure I had read previously (which is still exceptionally good).  A few of the characters from Tango are introduced in this collection, and the art being in black and white means there is just that much more wonderful linework to take in.  It's simply breathtaking.  There are a bunch of small morality tales and the double-triple-cross taste of your own medicine adventure yarn.  But really, what other collection of comics will have a surly amnesic sailor regain his memory by taking magic mushrooms, a zombie-priest led island uprising revolution, and a WWI British soldier relive a battle through his dying delusions?  There is a lot to enjoy here, but mostly Pratt's love of the Caribbean and South America.

 

Now, I've read a bunch more of the Ultimate Spider-man trades as well and I'm trying to figure out how to say "I liked it and it's good comics, but it won't really challenge your assumption of the medium or anything, which is really the point I guess anyway, so while inessential in the long run, still enjoyable when you read the story" in more than one way.  I do have to say that I really don't know how I would feel about the stories if I was reading them in the monthly format.  I think it would completely remove the level of enjoyment I get out of the stories.

 

The Decompression Project without Orange and Purple Armour

I've managed to read the Ultimate Spider-man collection starring Silver Sable.  I have to say I'm kind of disappointed with the update.  I thought she was a fine enough character and all but where was the ridiculous hair and the purple and orange jumpsuited Wild Pack?  Really, without the gaudy armor it's not The Wild Pack.  Otherwise this was more or less a decent story that didn't try to be something more than just a random encounter in Peter Parker's life as Spider-man.

 

There's some fun dialogue with the bumbling Wild Pack, a bit of mistaken identity as Peter gets tracked to his school and a great issue that allowed the creative team to do something a bit different when summing up the lives of the triumvirate at the centre of the story.  The little break was well executed and appreciated even if it didn't completely flow with the story – the Ultimate Spider-man epic to this point has more or less followed a similar pattern so anything slightly different is extremely noticeable.  That's not a bad or good thing really, just noticeable in and of itself.

 

So this was a neat story of how difficult it would be to track down an anonymous superhero.  It won't change your life or explain the world in a new way, but you'll be engaged from start to end and really, there are much worse things in the world.

 

*sent via e-mail

That was Unfortunate

Last night the Ottawa Senators lost for the third straight time in the NHL playoffs and while that has very little to do with comics there was this odd connection. It was the home opener of the playoff series last night and if you don't know anything about hockey or this team in particular you should know that their logo is this Roman Centurion.

Skip ahead to last night and the opening ceremonies for the home run was one of the weirdest things I've ever seen. It was one of those moments where me and my wife watching at home both got embarrassed watching this thing. There was this video of the hockey players watching this centurion guy walking out and then there's this guy in a 300 Halloween costume with a wonky microphone trying to yell something. It didn't really sound like any language I've heard and well, I felt bad enough for the actor. I'm guessing he was probably some local wrestling entertainer but he really looked like he was trying out for the porno version of 300. It was ridiculous to the point of insulting Frank Miller.

I guess if this happened last year, or whenever the movie came out, it would have helped a bit by being slightly more current but I don't think that idiocy could have been saved no matter what. And he was still better than the performance put on by the team.

Comics and Hockey

Sorry for the crappy html hyperlink text, but this was on CBC and I found it incredibly poignant for my two current interests.

 

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/instigator/index.html

 

I really hope Ottawa wins tonight but I won't be holding my breath.  I've always liked Pigpen.

 

*Sent via e-mail.

The Decompression Project: Warriors

Oh right.  I also managed to read the Ultimate Spider-man version of professional wrestling's Royal Rumble - "Warriors."

 

This collection is just a huge bust up as Hammerhead decides to move in on Kingpin's turf.  Add Spider-man, Black Cat, Iron Fist, Shang Chi, Elektra, Moon Knight and the Kingpin's three thugs I can never remember the name of.  It'll come to me after I e-mail in this post I'm sure.

 

Well, it's a fun little story arc full of over the top fisticuffs.  And in the end, I should have seen it coming, there is a reveal that removes the one single good thing I was seeing develop in Peter Parker's life.  Other than Black Cat, and there is some great developments in that relationship as well.

 

My only real complaint is that even though heroes and villains get stabbed – one even in the back of the skull – they all end up in comas, which just feels like a huge cheat.  Yes, I know it's a superhero comic.

 

I'll also get to the Avengers collection at some point.  I seem to have been reading that thing forever.

Corto Maltese: Tango

I've been sitting on this book for quite some time for quite a few reasons.  Well, three really: New job, the book is in French and I had the flu.  Add to that, other outside time commitments and the Ottawa Senators sucking in the lead up to the NHL playoffs my mind wasn't exactly in a frame to read something in my second language.  

 

Well, I've persevered and I'm always glad I did whenever I read some Bandes Designes.  I'm such a genre whore when it comes to comic books that whenever I read something non-North American it feels like a revelation because it isn't about superheroes.  Not that that's all I read, but it's a fairly substantial amount.  Heck these days it's mostly just Ultimate Spiderman trades at that.  Anyway, having a straight up adventure serial to read is gloriously refreshing from the over-exuberance of superheroics.  This is like the cultured European cousin that just inherently has more style, knows it, and is quietly confident in what s/he is.  There is a bigger size format to the thing which sort of announces to the world what you are reading, but it's artistic enough content wise that you don't look like you're reading about super-boobies.  

 

Ever since my first random Corto Maltese purchase during my lean years living in South London I've felt that Hugo Pratt has created the comic book equivalent of the Indiana Jones movies.  He's a scruffily handsome man that can take care of himself and moves around the world with a swagger and confidence that verges on cockiness but is never so blatant that people are put off by him.  Yes, the major differences are that Corto is a sailor and Indy is a treasure hunting archeologist but the core characteristics are quite similar.

 

I guess the two sentence movie pitch is that Corto Maltese is Tintin as an adult (without the dog and with Cpt. Haddock's job).  He's entirely more laconic than Tintin but just as able to give and take a punch when the need arises.  Also, Hugo Pratt was Italian so there are lots of lovely women characters as well.  In that respect I'm reminded a bit of Eisner's Spirit work with lots of strong, sexy women who aren't all the same character in different costumes.

 

As for this volume in particular, I kind of just picked it up at random because I was at the library one day and the idea of reading more Corto Maltese books popped into my head and well, there was this one and another one I'm now reading.  I really should have read them in the opposite order because Tango is one of the last collections.  Heck, some of the characters that Corto visits in this book are introduced for the first time in the collection I'm reading at the moment, so that's slightly annoying when trying to make sense of what's what.  Also, the French doesn't help.

 

What drew me in initially was the massive text introductions.  They're all about the history of prostitution in Argentina, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.  As for the story itself, I was mostly lost I'll admit, because shockingly it's not just super hero comics that require a slight continuity obsession to keep everything straight.  The story here is about Corto trying to find a long lost friend who was kidnapped (I believe) by a prostitution ring.  In his searches for her he runs into a bunch of characters from his older adventures which you don't really need to have read to understand this story but it did feel confusing.  Almost like you were invited out with someone you knew from work who proceeds to only make in-jokes with his or her friends all night long.  Universal themes will come through but you'll be lost on the details.

 

And I think it's the timing of when this book was created that speaks a lot towards how I felt towards most aspects.  It was later in Pratt's career and it felt a bit like he was taking a few things for granted, almost cutting corners.  The art is, for the most part beautiful as I've come to expect, but the action in the panels is not as dynamic as other Corto Maltese stories.  There are only a few poses and expressions used, and while there may be some unbelievable artwork when he's drawing a car chase sequence the inking process seems to be a bit thick, almost as if an edged marker was used in places (mostly on noses too, which is just odd looking).  It all makes the action seem somewhat less dynamic than it should be, and with a story that isn't exactly action packed that is somewhat unfortunate.

 

I still think Pratt's style is one of the best but in comparison to his other work this one just isn't as good, in my opinion.  There is a lot of research text prefacing this book, and a lot of potential (and while I'm sure I missed a lot because of my language barrier) so it was disappointing to have the story and art let me down.

 

This is a story of corruption on multiple levels in a location that I know next to nothing about and really, if I can stay engaged in a story written in a foreign language I can mostly read then it's doing something right.  It was an unfortunate choice of texts to get back into Corto Maltese with, but it's out of the way and I'm reading an earlier volume that is making up all the ground this book let down on.

 

 

I've not abandonned the blog just yet

I'm just exceptionally busy at my new job and suffering from some kind of evil virus which makes me not really want to think because it hurts my sinuses.

I will say that reading the first volume of Essential Avengers while not feeling the best is a real treat. I'm shocked at how bad I feel for Hank Pym for being married to Jan and her very obvious lust for pretty much every other man. I know it was a different time and I'm probably seeing it totally out of context but holy moly talk about your troubled marriage. I don't think it's bad for her to be open about her sexuality or desires but right next to your husband?

And then there's the way they chair their meetings and pass motions that only serve to put words to what is going on anyway. Like when Iron Man is missing and they can't reach him at all they vote to give him a leave of absence. Coming from my history with the Green Party, I have to say that The Avengers, even in their absurd manner, manage to conduct board meetings better than that political party.

And finally I noticed that the major shift between Kirby and Heck on art is that Don Heck seems to lay out his pages in a much more vertical aspect.

The Decompression Project - Teenage Wasteland

Okay I guess I got a little bit confused between collections I was reading in yesterday's post.  It seems that the scene with Spider-man and the police officer was in the Hobgoblin collection and not the Superstars collection.  My comments still stand, that I think it is a solid bit of development and it's a refreshing change to see Peter being reluctant to accept a mentor, and more so that there is what appears to be a decent mentor figure being developed for him.  They're not quite colleagues but they certainly are aiming for the same goals and with somewhat similar attitudes although she is able to better express herself.

 

Now, I know the Harry Osborn story and most people had exposure to a version of it in Spiderman 3.  This Ultimate version is done exceptionally well.  Whenever Peter fought Norman it was completely one sided, in that one figure was superior in all regards but was constantly defeated because of his pride in his science.  Peter's strength isn't from his person or even from his belief in himself but his ability to consider others no matter the cost.  That is what helps him win the day, along with a few well timed kicks and webbings.

 

With Harry, things are different because Peter is being forced into a situation that isn't just personal but also one of equals.  Both Peter and Harry are victims of circumstance and end up clashing because of outside influences.  Neither of them want to do it, which makes the situation entirely tragic.  They are characters without the freedom to avoid this clash.  It is tragic because it is simply unavoidable no matter how hard both try to avoid the situation.

 

And there is major heartbreak here too as Peter starts to actually react to the death and violence that has occurred simply because he exists.  Yes, his actions ultimately led to Uncle Ben's death but it was his existence that led to Gwens, and really, in both cases he was never directly responsible.  Here we see a teenager begin to grieve by simply not being able to process his role or accept that he was entirely helpless.  He's terrified for his loved ones and the art and dialogue capture that sentiment note perfectly here.

 

Now the Harry Osborn story is also captured quite well in that it is never quite clear what is real and what isn't.  Yes there were hypnotherapy sessions, but what is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s role in all of this?  Did Harry bring it on himself or was he programmed by his father?  Was he exposed accidentally to be latently activated or did he experiment upon himself?  There are no answers here and while it helps enforce how scary dealing with mental illness can be it also makes Harry a sympathetic character as well.  He is dealing with demons just like Peter is, but this is the result of having (letting or being programmed to) the demons win.  It moves him to embody rage and destruction of anything connected to him, which is what Peter is feeling but he manages to embody the sadness and grief that is required to process these situations.

 

This collection ends with a MJ centric issue that manages to hit all the notes that the Aunt May issue flubbed.  She is given believable situations to react to, rather than talking to a therapist about seemingly random fears that have no bearing on her day to day existence.  It's about MJ and why she loves Peter and in the end it is a solid issue offering a fly on the wall point-of-view for a day in the life of a superhero's girlfriend.  Suddenly, I feel like MJ has a bit more depth, which is what I needed from the series quite a while ago so it was nice to see it here.

 

*sent via e-mail

The Decompression Project Cuts Loose and Has a Bit of Fun

This volume is all about the guest stars.  There is Wolverine, The Human Torch, Dr. Strange and The Ultimates.  And, you know what?  It's a solid volume nonetheless.  I think it's because the stories managed to change their pace a bit and while some were relatively forgettable you actually get to read a fun little caper involving Marvel's two guest stars – Spidey and Wolverine.

 

Yes, it is very easy to be cynical about these two characters.  They're completely over used and exploited to the point of ridiculousness but Bendis manages to create a story that is very much in the spirit of yesteryear Marvel hijinx.  You get a story that Bendis introduces as himself with a rather wry sense of humor, and he goes on to poke fun at his own creations during the intro to the second part that even he couldn't force three issues out of this story.  And, well, the story is that Wolverine and Spider-man swap minds.  That's pretty much it.  There is no explanation, they just wake up and deal with each other's reality.  It's hackneyed, it's been done to death, but it hasn't been done since probably the early seventies with any sense of humour about the whole thing and it's just a fun little break from the bleak seriousness.

 

The Human Torch story is slightly forgettable but it's a decent riff on the friendship between the two characters of relatively the same age that has been in comics for quite some time.  And the Ultimate Dr. Strange was a decent enough, trapped in your own nightmare scenario that seems kind of like Peter is just going through the physical psychokinetic nightmare version of a recap of his comic up to now.  It's kind of like a visually interesting take on what he discusses anyway, so decent but somewhat unnecessary except for the intro of the good doctor and another interesting step towards a budding relationship with a police officer.  Not romantic but I do like how it is developing as it's a nice change of pace from his normal interactions.  Kind of a mentor relationship is being put forth, which I have to say is something I can't really remember from Spider-man 616 but I'm no authority on the matter.  I know he had Dr. Curt Connors and some people at the Bugle that were decent colleagues but nobody he really had as any sort of mentor role, and I guess I'll see how it all goes down.  With my luck it all happens in the Ultimate Team-Up book or something.

 

And that would be my only complaint about this collection.  That while I could certainly read the stories on their own and follow the action there was enough of a sense of being lost because I don't read all the Ultimate titles to be distracting from what is here in these stories.  I could sort of get a feel for what is happening in the FF book but I had no idea how many times Peter met Logan other than that one time he went to Westchester in his own book, and whether Wolverine was even there.  Still it was a very slight story and very upfront about it, which is very welcome in my book.  Yes, it's a cheat in the end but it wouldn't have been as good if it wasn't.

 

Now, in the end, I think where the story is going with the internal struggle Peter is facing is a very good setup for some good melodrama.  Spider-man is a character tuned into the proper "life gone awry and I don't know how to handle it" vibe.  The character is just as well suited for that as the silver-aged flavoured silliness here.  I think the continued fall out from Gwen, uncle Ben and the rest of it is spot on.  Peter is a character full of pathos and he reacts like a freaked out teenager would act in the final story here.  If there is one thing I consistently enjoy in these books, it's that Peter is constantly fighting with the control of himself and his emotions.  He wants to lose control but he won't let himself, and it's handled in these books extremely well.  He has highs and lows and they all bring him back to the character he is – responsible and surrounded by tragedy.  He is heroic because of his actual deeds but more so because of his inability to stop despite what happens that is out of his control.  It is taking it's toll on the kid and it was nice to have some stories that let Peter just be the goofy version of Spider-man because I see the return of Harry Osborn is coming in the next collection, so that should be a full on matching of psychological misery matched with physical violence.

 

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Bloody Cold Nights

30 Days of Night

by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith

 

When the movie came out I remembered that I had been meaning to read 30 Days of Night for a while now.  I finally got around to it after not going to watch the movie.

 

In many ways I feel this is a dark coffee table art book with some words attached.  I really like Templesmith's artwork and it really does fit the genre.  It's always dark, it's unclear at points but it's frightening on a core level.  The somewhat unfinished, unpolished look helps it terrify the reader.  I'm using unpolished here to mean that there isn't a lot of tight linework with colouring precisely defined by those lines.  Nope, here colours, textures and art materials are used to bleed into one another making things beautifully muddled.  The bones are loose but the colour is tight.  I really love what he manages with such a limited palette of colour.

 

Sadly, I found that it was the art to be partly problematic to the actual plot.  While the art is so bloody cool the plotting and characterization needs to be next to perfect.  With the art being kinetic and emotional I found that jumps in story and characterization to be slightly confusing.  In fact I got lost a few times.  It starts out strong but by the time the plot is halfway through there seems to be one too many massive jumps in plot that were kind of frustrating to read while remaining artistically strong.

 

It starts strong, the idea is sound, the art suits it perfectly, the pacing and narrative sort of falls off.  I guess that's the sum up.

 

I hate criticizing works that I actually enjoy, for the most part.  I think I'm getting slightly more curmudgeonly as the snow continues to pile up here in Ottawa and I'm suffering from sleep deprivation because of the stupid hour change being moved.  Reading about a bunch of vicious beasts on a murderous winter rampage is a little too close to home as people are starting to crack because their sidewalks aren't cleared and pedestrians are forced to fight traffic in the streets.  Winter madness is setting in with the approach of Spring and 30 Days of Night captures the feeling of it a bit too precisely in that respect.

 

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Comics Just Aren't HD

No comics reading since I picked up a new TV and my friend left his X-Box 360 at my place.  Too much time has been spent trying to kill the Locust in Gears of War, Nazis in Call of Duty 3 and awesome drum fills in Rock Band - all in glorious High Definition.

 

Now if I could only figure out how to CBC HD from Rogers Digital Cable I'd be set.  Man, if you want a lesson in a website design that shows your customers how much you loathe and despise them then head over to theirs.  That thing is full of something that has the appearance of information but is next to incomprehensible and is generally useless.  I have no idea how to find out if I already have one channel included in my current package, and if not which package is it actually included in.  Thankfully it is in my wife's name so she gets to call them about this today.  The last time I called, they tried to blame me for a pay-per-view hockey game losing its feed.  Seriously.  It was batshit insane, not simply bad customer service.

The Decompression Project - Oh the Carnage!

I should seriously consider just changing the name of this blog to Jon's Once a Week Thoughts on the Ultimate Spider-man Trade Collections.  But I'm not totally into the whole, overly descriptive thing.  If you've read any of my posts, you'll most likely agree.  Anyway, I do have some Corto Maltese comics at home but reading in French takes a lot more effort than I'm able to give these days (new job, started yesterday) and I've been slowly enjoying the first Essential Avengers collection – more marvelous marvel machinations soon!  Ugh, too much Stan Lee in my brain.

 

So, on with The Decompression Project.  You know, I have to say that for the most part I've been enjoying my time spent with Ultimate Spider-man.  I think this is a great interpretation on both Spider-man and Peter Parker.  It works well with him as a high-school student although it would be nice to have him a bit more science geeky and just once I'd like him to remain confident and non-emo for one entire story arc.  Okay that's probably not ever going to happen, since that is the core of the character.  Bad things happen, he feels bad and perseveres simply because it is the right thing to do no matter how much he tries to dress it up with recurring inspirational quotes.  He almost can't help himself and that point is brought home in this story where we have the Ultimate version of Spider-man No More for about a half issue or so.

 

I do find this a weird series though because while on the one hand it is very slow on the other hand it is guilty of skimming the surface of the conflict.  Yes, I like the character moments but there needs to be further examination into the conflict as well as the personal.  The formula appears to be spend a lot of time with Peter and MJ (as well as the rest of Peter's personal life cast) then the same amount of pages only with big splash fight panels for the villain of the week.  I have no problems whatsoever with the villain of the week approach, in fact I quite like it.  No, I just find that each issue feels like wasted opportunity to really delve into the differences, themes and metaphors presented by each conflict as Spider-man.

 

This book is obviously about Carnage.  Now, I'm lucky in that I managed to never read a Carnage comic.  I mean, Venom I can handle but giving the suit to a maniac, okay more maniacal maniac, was just a bit too much.  It always felt like, hey kids, Carnage, the new Spidey villain is like Venom only more extreme, to the max!  And in that regard I do like what they did with the Ultimate Carnage.  Simply removing any humanity from the character helps make it actually somewhat terrifying and moves it into Dr. Frankenstein territory for Dr. Connors.  That is not such a terrible move.

 

Having Curt Connors as a sympathetic character was a decent break from the Ultimate villains as actual scary threats.  It allows Spider-man to not only have a scary brainless thug to beat on, in the doctor's monstrous creation, but a victim of circumstance for Peter to interact with.  It's never a bad thing to add a bit of humanity to your villains when you are exploring potential for conflict.  The good doctor is trying his hardest but is fated to fail because he cannot see beyond himself and his own beliefs in what he is doing, in his own reasons for acting.

 

And then we have the death of Gwen, which cheapens the whole thing for me.  Okay, I don't need total rehash of the original story, but why the heck was Carnage the villain to do the deed?  I guess it should work because it is a creation of Peter in a certain sense.  That Peter's life has a direct effect on those around him is probably what the driving idea was but it just felt like the book was required to set Carnage up as a major threat and since everyone knew Gwen was fated to die anyway….. So it goes.

 

It's too bad because I think it should have all been handled a bit better, and could have been within the story.  There were some great aspects that simply weren't connected as well as they should have been – Peter giving birth to a perverted image of himself and his father, Dr. Connors in the role of Dr. Frankenstein, and well just evil genetic stuff.  There was some very strong stuff to work with but in the end it rang hollow to me.  I won't presume to be able to do a better job or anything but while the connections are there under the surface of the story, I may just be seeing things that were never intended and that's where my criticism comes in.

The Boys Need Pegg

So with Garth Ennis's The Boys being picked up for Hollywood, how long before the internet campaign to get Simon Pegg attached starts? Oh wait, I think it just did!

The Rebirth of Superman

Supreme – The Return

Having read and loved Alan Moore’s Supreme: The Story of the Year collection it was a No-Brainer Supreme for me to pick up this follow up collection. You know how I really like Grant Morrison’s All-Star Superman? Well, Alan Moore did something rather similar with Superman a few years ago, only he didn’t exactly have Superman so he called his character Supreme. Everything is the same but different in the mythos, but talk about your love of silver-age goofyness. It permeates these stories to the point where the goofy stories are actually the driving conflicts of the plots here.

Supreme and the supporting cast jump through time to old Supreme adventures that visually manifest themselves as if they were old comic books. Why try to erase the goofy past of comics rather than accept and celebrate them, seems to be the message here. Goofy stories do not preclude bad stories or take away from the kewlness of the nineties, or anything else for that matter. So rather than reinvent bits of Supreme from square one for a new generation of readers, Moore is basically showing how you can restart a character by accepting all iterations before the current one. These are comics, have fun with them for a change.