Mike Gold: Marvel, You’re Murdering Us!

Mike Gold

ComicMix's award-winning and spectacularly shy editor-in-chief Mike Gold also performs the weekly two-hour Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind ass-kicking rock, blues and blather radio show on The Point, www.getthepointradio.com and on iNetRadio, www.iNetRadio.com (search: Hit Oldies) every Sunday at 7:00 PM Eastern, rebroadcast three times during the week – check www.getthepointradio.com above for times and on-demand streaming information.

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9 Responses

  1. George Haberberger says:

    “Hey, this time Iron Man is on the side of the angels!”
    The first time, (2007), he was pro-registration. Wasn’t that the side of the angels? After all, super powers are analogous to weapons.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Nice one, George. Well-played. And I absolutely get your point.

      The difference, of course, is that super-hero comic books are (usually) heroic fantasy. Not real, and not necessarily wish fulfillment. Take a look at the comics work of several of our columnists — Denny O’Neil, Martha Thomases, John Ostrander, to name but three. All three are known for their liberal points of view. John wrote that Batman: Seduction of the Gun bit. Martha is a card-carrying pacifist, on the board of directors of one of our leading anti-war organizations. Denny — is Denny O’Neil, damn it, and we can use a few more. All have written the adventures of gun-toting men and women. Lots of them. Some might see that as hypocrisy, but it’s just fantasy and impossible fantasy at that.

      And if we had no impossible fantasy, we’d have no porn. And if we had no porn, we probably wouldn’t have the Internet. And if we had no Internet…

      • George Haberberger says:

        “The difference, of course, is that super-hero comic books are (usually) heroic fantasy. Not real, and not necessarily wish fulfillment. “

        Come on Mike. It is a bit disingenuous to claim that comic stories are not intended to have real-world parallels. Writers love to make analogies and well they should.

        My problem with the 2007 Civil War was Millar’s needing to ignore the obvious political alignment Cap and Iron Man would have had.

        It would have been nice if the two groups had remained sympathetic characters but Iron Man and the pro-registration faction were quickly demonized. I guess that made it an easier story to write. There was a scene in which Stark held up a sheaf of papers and said something like, “I have here a list of names…” evoking the tactics of Joe McCarthy. Of course anyone who is using McCarthy’s tactics is automatically the bad guy.

        The aspect of the series that soured me on the story was that the pro-registration faction was portrayed as the conservative (read “wrong”) side. The idea that people with super-powers should have to register with the government seems to be a liberal view. In the case of some characters, their powers would be akin to a person in our world having a rocket launcher or nuclear weapon. Conservatives are usually anti-registration. Liberals favor registration. Yet in Civil War the views are reversed. I think Captain America would be against registration but that is a conservative view. Captain America was the sympathetic character so obviously he could not be conservative.

        “All have written the adventures of gun-toting men and women. Lots of them. Some might see that as hypocrisy,…”

        Yes, that’s exactly what it is. When Hollywood, no hotbed of conservative views, makes movies that have a liberal bent, The Green Zone, Redacted, In the Valley of Elah, Stop-Loss; they lose money. The movies that make money are pro-military and patriotic, American Sniper, and I suspect 13 Hours, when it comes out this week.

        • Mike Gold says:

          Sure, comics touch on real-world parallels, and the reader is pretty much free to read into it what he or she wants. Sometimes that’s a bit extreme, sometimes it’s unwarranted and sometimes it’s not based in what some psychiatrists call “reality,” but, hell, I can’t stop the reader from fantasizing over a fantasy story. Nor would I want to. It’s far more fun to watch ’em mumble.

          I can argue your point about specific movies and list dozens of very successful and enduring movies that are commonly perceived as having a liberal event, but I wouldn’t want to out such noted “Hollywood liberals” as John Wayne, John Ford, Clint Eastwood, Dennis Hopper, Robert Duvall, Kelsey Grammer, James Woods, Gary Sinise, Jon Voight, Larry Miller and Sly Stallone – all of whom I respect as filmmakers and performers – and Adam Sandler.

          Let us note that Tony Stark’s repulser rays are totally defensive. Unless he gets drunk and screws around. There’s a lesson in that for us all.

          And that’s about as political as I get at ComicMix… usually. We can pick this topic up at our next Communist cell meeting, George.

          • George Haberberger says:

            Well, Clint Eastwood and Robert Duvall are 85, Jon Voight is 77 and John Wayne, John Ford and Dennis Hopper are dead. That’s 50% of your list. Except for Stallone, the rest are not really giant stars, like Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Sean Penn or Tim Robbins.

            “We can pick this topic up at our next Communist cell meeting, George.”

            See you there.

  2. Mindy Newell says:

    It all started with the Beatles:

    Paul is dead.