Getting Reality Right, by Dennis O’Neil
Vinnie Bartilucci said it better than I did. Commenting on a couple of columns that asked, sort of, if the science in comics should be real, Vinnie wrote, “… once a writer chooses to mention actual, proper science, he should get it right.”
Yes. Exactly. Well put.
But I wonder if we shouldn’t extend the idea to other real life areas. Social problems, for example. Or such knotty personal problems as addiction. One of the difficulties is, there isn’t the kind of consensus on personal and societal quandaries that there is on the basics of, say, physics. All but the most skeptical – or reactionary – can agree that Newton’s three laws are on the money and Einstein was right about relativity, both general and special, and even Heisenberg’s principle doesn’t seem terribly uncertain these days.
But, to pluck just one example from the ether…addiction? What, exactly, is it? My imperfect understanding is that many, if not most, addictions are caused by environment acting on genetics. In other words, nature and nurture combine to rot out somebody’s life. But, with patience, determination, and rigorous self-honesty, the addict can put his demons in the coal bin, and if he’s able to continue being patient, determined, and honest, they’ll stay there until he dies and they die with him. Addiction is not exactly a disease, in the conventional sense, but it’s more that than character defect.
That was, more or less, the version of addiction I posited in an extended comic book continuity some years ago, and most people who saw the stories seemed to agree with me. But not everyone. A source I trust told me that a person much higher on the corporate food chain than either my editor or me thought that the fictional addict should have just…I don’t know – snap out of it? (In fairness to all concerned, the executive in question never confronted me personally, so I am taking a trusted somebody’s word for what happened.) On another occasion, an excellent artist, a man I respect, refused, politely, to draw a one-page shot of a hero dreaming he was drunk – just dreaming, mind you – because, in the artist’s opinion, heroes don’t behave like louts, even when snoozing.
I think both of these people are, on the whole, wrong, but I’m not as convinced that they’re wrong as they are apparently convinced that they’re right. One size, alas, never fits all. I know of no junkie or juicer who just snapped out of it and got on with his/her life, but I also don’t doubt that it could have happened.
In matters such as these, the truth is slippery.
So what’s a comic book writer to do? Not address difficult topics at all? I think not. We ought to do anything that we can do. Rather, we should simply tell the truth as we know it with these provisos: don’t think you know the truth because what you’re positing is what you’ve always believed and don’t think you know the truth because Dad, or gramps, or teacher, or Father Flotsky down at the parish hall tells you it’s the truth. If you don’t exactly know how you know what you’re presenting, do some research? Then write the best damn story you can.
RECOMMENDED READING: The Comics: An Illustrated History of Comic Strip Art, by Jerry Robinson. This is an early, but still valid and entertaining, look at the subject written by one of the medium’s truly great guys.
Dennis O’Neil is an award-winning editor and writer of Batman, The Question, Iron Man, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, and The Shadow – among others – as well as many novels, stories and articles. The Question: Poisoned Ground, reprinting the second six issues of his classic series with artists Denys Cowan and Rick Magyar, is on sale right now, and his novelization of The Dark Knight will be available in a heartbeat.
It’s my understanding that certain drugs create physiological changes, especially in the brain. So, whereas initially using or experimenting with a drug might be a consequence of Nature versus Nurtrue (and we can debate until the cows come home how much of a persons personality flaws can be attributed to which), a DRUG ADDICT has to deal with real physical and mental shifts brought on by the drug. Withdrawal symptoms aren’t just psychosomatic. Dependencies are real. Drugs can be insidious.
It’s unrealistic to ask people who have been physically altered and have an altered mind-state to "just say no." In many cases, without some outside intervention, they just can’t. They aren’t physically or mentally capable. At a certain point it’s not a failing of genetics but the success of the drug. We’ve built the drug too well.
Yes, some people are affected by drugs more than others. Some people have predispositions toward certain addictions. Big deal. We don’t tell people who have allergies that they should just get over sneezing. Or that their allergies are some defect in their personality or genetics. The fact is, you aren’t allergic to something until you get what is called a "precipitating dose" of the allergen. You can go through life with a predisposition toward a shellfish allergy, but if you never eat a shrimp, you will never get allergic.
I remember reading "Snowbirds Don’t Fly" when I was a kid. I borrowed the comics from a friend. It’s been more than thirty years since I read those issues of Green Lantern and Green Arrow. There a certain scenes, images and bits of that story that stand out vividly in my head. It made an impact.
Did that story keep me from experimenting with drugs and messing up my life? No. But that story kept me from experimenting with heroin! So kudos to you, Denny.
Should our super-heroes exemplify what is BEST in all of us. Yes. But that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have flaws, failings or even genetic predispositions toward allergies or addiction. Frankly, it’s Bruce Wayne’s torment over the death of his parents that makes him interesting and believable. Only a tortured soul could be that driven. It’s how characters deal with problems that make them heroes.
I can think of three times that a hero has been portrayed as an addict. I’m sure there are many more. But only three stand out in my head. Speedy was a heroin junkie. (Not a speed addict as his name implies.) Tony Stark is an alcoholic. And Batman has been addicted to Venom (which I’ve always imagined as a combination of speed and performance enhancing drugs like steroids).
Why haven’t there been more superhero stories about steroids and performance enhancing drugs? I would think that somebody as insecure as Guy Gardner would have wrecked his liver or have arthritis or something from all the stuff I assume he’s injected to maintain an edge.
Fictional stories can’t portray perfectly or accurately all the nuances and complexities of drug addiction. But that doesn’t mean the stories should be avoided.
In "Snowbirds Don’t Fly," Speedy overcomes his addiction. This is his triumph. It’s part of what makes him a hero. But as I recall, the real hero of that story was Black Canary, who just used her compassion to save one lost soul, when the rest of the world, including the boy’s mentor, had turned away. She sets the example.
The speed of light is a fact, or as close to a fact as science can get. So too the measurement of gravity acceleration as defined by "g", the formula for the area of a circle and the adhesive properties of Mary-Ann's pancake syrup. (ok, the last one's still under debate)But the proper treatment of addiction? Now we're straying from fact and into the realm of "educated opinion". It's a challenge to get the "facts" right. Also, as soon as you try to do a story about Hot Topic X, you run the risk of upsetting people who disagree with your chosen position, and just plain turning off people who are sick of hearing about said topic.Here's a part of an interview I did with Jim Shooter some years back. The question was initially about the apocryphal "There are no gays in the Marvel Universe" quote, but turned into Shooter's philosophy on how to tell "topical" stories in comics. A brief snippet: "I used to just tell guys, if you do a good story, and inherent in that story is any point about the human condition, that's good. That's called "Content", I like it. But if you set out to do a story that's really about your political point of view, I don't want it. "I don't feel the need to have "real life issues" in my superhero comics, if only because I consider them to be "escapist literature". Personally, "Very Special" issues and episodes initially turn me off, unless the writer has proven to me that they can entertain me first, and educate me second. Michael Moore usedto be able to do that; he's since become far too full of himself the remember that he's an entertainer and not a preacher. Sergio Aragones and Mark Evanier work their political beliefs into Groo with a sledgehammer, but the book is so entertaining I don't mind the parable. I think the single best weavers of "educational tales that entertain first" working today are the folks at Big Idea, creators of Veggie Tales. Say what you will about the Bible and its teachings, these guys manage time after time to deliver screamingly funny material that perfectly delivers the messages they're trying to get across. The Jonah movie is magnificent, and it's a more accurate and detailed adaptation of the Jonah story than any I've ever seen, even with the catastrophic irrational fixation on cheese curls. And their second film, The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything, doesn't mention Christ ONCE…just like The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe never did.I hasten to add, I've never had issue with either your topical work, or that of our own Mr. Ostrander; you've both been weaving the difficult stuff into your work expertly, and without crossing the line to preaching. But AFAIC, if a creator never bothered to touch on Topics Of Importance once in their career, and just kept it to entertainment, I wouldn't mind at all.
Can I ask what are "Real life issues" ??? as I remember a comic from DC called Hawkworld where Hawkwoman/girl dated a person of a differant colour and thought nothing of it until two months later when the letter page lighted up !!! and never understood why !!! so was Mr Ostrander playing with "real life issues" ?? or was it just small minded people unwilling to think ??
Hawkwoman WOULD date a person of a different color and not think anything of it because she was from a different planet. They had their own issues but color wasn't one. It doesn't mean it wouldn't be an issue in our society especially at the time the story was published. For some, it still would be. That's a "real life issue".
Just to update you, there have been a few marvel-side. Morrison's run on "X-Men" dealt with "Kick" (though not nearly as sensitively as O'Neal dealt with Speedy), "Ultimate X-Men" introduced steroid dependency in its version of Collossus, "Young Avengers" has a character who'd been addicted to MGH – a fictional steroid in the Marvel universe – which unfortunately was dealt with in a quick fashion, and I'd like to see if he still goes through withdrawal and struggles with it all.
It was the different mindset of the Thanagarians that made Hawkworld so interesting. I recall an issue where Katar Hol casually mentioned to two Earth ladies he was dining with that he was a virgin. Totally unembarassed about it, since it wasn't a taboo subject to him. The two ladies, of course, saw him as upspoiled territory (and in those just exposed to AIDS days, a "safe lay") and were instantly attracted. And he didn't catch on to it at all.I commented on it on the Compuserve boards, and the writer of the series asked me to write in to the comic wth the comment, as he thought it rather cogent. This started my bright but short career as a letterhack.As for the writer, well, god only knows where he ended up…