Tagged: Geoff Johns

Marc Alan Fishman: Dear Marvel and DC…

Columns
November 8, 2014

Dear Marvel and DC,

It’s been too long since I’ve written you, and for that I am very sorry. I’d think it awkward, given that I was once a weekly reviewer of your monthly publications, but I’ve essentially all but given up on them over the last six months. And it’s not because of financial concerns, or even a matter of proximity. Certainly sparing ten to twenty bucks a week for a decent load of your wares from one of the fine comic shops mere blocks from my office was once a weekly delight. But over time, my pull list dwindled and dwindled. Each book in your respective repertoire began to feel repetitive, dull, or forced. And as insult to the injury… the shop I frequented only carried indie books they “knew would actually sell” unless I specifically sought them to be ordered and held. It was a dark time, and I flew a white flag.

I’ve done this in the past. Like a jilted lover, sometime absence makes the heart grow fonder. I figured I’d soon see the new announcements stemming from successful dalliances on TV and the multiplex. With a growing fan-base learning about Hydra and Kree maps, or hearing the name Black Adam whispered with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson being cast, there was no doubt in my mind you knew that the world was set to look at your publishing ventures as potential incubators for those next great ideas.

And then, as if you’d not learned from past mistakes, you started announcing one major-huge-epic-don’t-miss-it-or-by-Rao-you’ll-be-out-of-the-loop-for-decades event after another.

I believe in tough love. It’s never easy to swallow, I know. In my life, it’s always followed by a period of reflection and growth. My high school art teacher said I couldn’t draw my way out of a paper bag. I went to art school and learned how. My college professor said I’d only get out of my art what I put into it. In response, I completed an 8′ x 10′ woodcut with a 1mm gouge. My first employer after graduation said I’d never amount to an art director. I’ve been one now for going on eight years. So trust me when I say that this comes from a place of kindness:

Your events, by and large, really suck.

Yeah, I know you’ve got sales data to prove me wrong. But you know what I have? I have an informed opinion. Civil War was cool. How did The Initiative do for you shortly after? Identity Crisis was excellent, until it got rapey. Fear Itself was novel for a hot minute until I realized it was a D&D campaign from 1996. Flashpoint, Countdown to Final Crisis, and yeah Final Crisis were worth more as toilet paper than as solid fiction. Oh, I’m sorry, I was supposed to read them in 3-D, and backwards because Grant Morrison said it’d make more sense that way? I said the same thing when I tried to convince my wife sweatpants were a viable option for date-night.

And here with both of you announcing and announcing cryptic apocalyptic coinciding crises sometime in the spring? It’s reminiscent of The Producers. I mean, how many dancing Charlie Xaviers will we need before we start guessing it’s all one big joke to you?

The fact of the matter is no amount of adjective-dropping will entice me away from my most glorious hibernation. You’ve both cried wolf far too many times now. Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me thirty-two times with multiple X-Men deaths and rebirths, time-bullets, time-vampires, ret-conned continuities, and multiple-multiverses… shame on you. You seem to forget that after every one of these universe shattering events comes fallout. Canceled series of stalwart brands. Bold new books that will be canceled long before their given a chance to find a rhythm and fan base. Not to be lewd about it, but guys, you can’t shit the bed and then expect us to clean it up with a smile.

I don’t care if Tony is going to be a power-sharing super-douche. Or that Alexander Luthor never really died. Or that Wolverine is dead until Shadowcat phase-pulls his rotting corpse out of his statue-self followed by a trip back through time using Booster Gold’s leftover suit. I don’t even care if you’re exploring new What-If universes with Spider-Gwen. It doesn’t get me hot and bothered that you’re potentially ret-conning away the New52. No matter your proposed gimmick, I’m not buying it.

At the end of the day, I smell your desperation a mile away. It wasn’t like this when Mark Waid was batting 1000 on Daredevil. It wasn’t like this when Geoff Johns was expanding the Green Lantern and Flash mythos without traveling outside the borders of their respective books. You know you can be better than this, but instead are trying to win over everyone with a grand sweeping motion. It’s just not necessary.

And when you realize that? I’ll be back in the shop with my money in hand.

Sincerely,

Marc Alan Fishman

Ex-Pat. Indie Creator. Bridge Burner.

Martha Thomases: The Comic Book Fan as Retailer

Columns
October 10, 2014

The New York Comic-Con is this week, which is hardly about comics at all anymore. It attracts more than a hundred thousand people to the unbearable Javits Center, all of them drawn to a celebration of pop culture, fantasy, and science fiction.

With all these people clearly interested in the genre, why do so few of them buy comics?

There isn’t one single answer, of course, but today I’m going to discuss the way the comic book publishers market their wares. Specifically, I’m going to talk about how they sell their books to retailers.

Comic books used to be distributed to the marketplace like other periodicals. The publishers would print and ship many more copies than they thought they could sell, ship them to newsstands and other outlets, and accept returns on the unsold copies. Because most comics and graphic novels are now distributed through the direct market, retailers order (and pay for) only the quantity they think they can sell.

Therefore, the primary customer for the publishers is the retailer and not the reader. The publisher does not care, in the short terms, if the retailer sells all the copies ordered. The publisher still gets paid. Of course, a thoughtful publisher will realize that selling the retailer too many copies will eventually cause the retailer to go bankrupt.

Too many publishers are not thoughtful. And too many retailers get into the business only because they love comics, not because they understand marketing. Or business.

If you read the (brilliant, I think) post in the link, you’ll see what information retailers are given to make their ordering decisions. He cites the example of Superman Unchained as a tragic lost opportunity. The book began at the same time the Man of Steel movie was released. It had Scott Snyder on script and Jim Lee on art. It should have been a huge hit.

Instead, it’s dribbling to a close.

The writer of the original post gives a lot of good reasons why he thinks this happened (bad title, unreliable scheduling). I think, if we step back, there are even more reasons.

The biggest problem is that the publisher thinks every possible customer is just like the retailer.

I love Scott Snyder as a writer, and I think Jim Lee’s art is dynamic and appealing. That said, I don’t think very many of the people who went to the movie know who either man is. Therefore, any new series designed to take advantage of the buzz about the movie needs to stress the character and the story more than the creative team.

The same is true for this summer’s bit Superman event, the Geoff Johns/John Romita, Jr. team. To comics fans this is great, but to the average person, a complete enigma. This is especially sad because I think Johns does a great job when he focuses on the most human and engaging aspects of the characters. His Superman is open and appealing to everyone, not just people who have been reading comics for decades.

And those people won’t ever know it, if the only way the title is promoted is to hype the creative team.

One of the biggest changes to happen to comics in my lifetime is that we now celebrate the talent. Fans know their favorite writers and artists, and will sample many different kinds of books because their favorites are involved. This is a terrific development. It shows the marketplace has matured, and allows creators to leverage their popularity into actual money.

The downside is when publishers think hiring great talent is all they need to do. Writers and artists can do fantastic work, but if the publishers don’t market these creations so that customers know what they are buying, it won’t matter.

Retailers have a responsibility as well. A well-promoted and designed store will invite in new customers and display merchandise in a way that is both fun and informative.

Consider other entertainment options that you purchase. When you decide to go to a movie, for example, you might consider the cast and, if you’re more involved, the director and the screenwriter. But first you want to know if it will make you laugh or cry, shiver with terror or clap your hands with delight. You want to know what kind of experience is being offered.

Comic book stores and comic book publishers who rely only on customers who are already customers will fail. We, as an industry, need to create new customers every day.

Or at least every Wednesday.

Snarky Synopsis: “Original Sin” #0

Reviews
May 1, 2014

Original Sin #0. Written by Mark Waid. Art by Jim Cheung, Paco Medina, Mark Morales, Guillermo Ortego, Dave Meikis, Juan Vlasco, and Justin Ponsor.

It’s that time again. No, not when the swallows return from Capistrano. No, not when Dan DiDio polishes his head in the Shine-O-Ball-O. It’s epic-crossover time, kiddos! Marvelous Mark Waid puts his pen to paper for Original Sin #0, a cosmic odyssey that focuses on the supreme perv of the 616, The Watcher. Ole’ Uatu is destined for a possible dirt nap, and let’s just assume a ton of fallout will occur. But I’m getting ahead of myself. You’d clearly have known that… had you been an all powerful, big headed, poorly dressed voyeur. But you’re not, so you’re likely wanting to know how the prequel – such as it were – fares. If I were to bestow upon you a fair and just warning that a major cosmic event is about to occur? You’d be long dead before it comes up concerning this review.

Issue 0 of Original Sin anchors itself with the newest Nova of Earth, Sam Alexander. Waid is quick to establish his voice – cosmic Peter Parker. Simply put, it’s impossible to read through the issue and not be reminded by Marvel’s everyman. As Sam quips, zaps, and stumbles his way through the issue, every smirk that crept to my mouth was adjoined by the feeling I’d been there before. The plot, as it were, is as straight-forward as you might get. Nova, in between telling himself his life story (assuming he doesn’t know he’s a comic character), comes to a great and grand universal mystery: Why does the Watcher watch? This is opposed to Who Watches the Watchmen, which everyone knows already. So, with the innocence of a child, Sammy takes to the moon to ask Uatu if he watches Dateline: To Catch A Predator.

(more…)

The Point Radio: SLEEPY HOLLOW Reimagines The Scary

Podcasts
September 13, 2013

Fans of ONCE UPON A TIME and GRIMM should love the new Fox series, SLEEPY HOLLOW. It takes the timeless tale of Ichabod Crane and transports it (and him) to modern times. We talk to the starts of the show about how they are helping to construct this new fish-out-of-water story – plus THE KILLING gets killed again and Geoff Johns says farewell to AQUAMAN.
A quick reminder to be back here on Monday when we look at the that the Guinness people say is the most watched show on TV – BREAKING BAD. We talk exclusively to Bryan Cranston, Anna Gun, Aaron Paul and creator Vince Gilligan on how these last episodes will play out – and what happens after.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE! The Point Radio App is now in the iTunes App store – and it’s FREE! Just search under “pop culture The Point”. The Point Radio – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or on any other mobile device with the Tune In Radio app – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

John Ostrander: Never Ending

Columns
August 18, 2013

In the beginning, the Justice League of America on Earth-1 met the Justice Society of America on Earth-2 for an Annual Crisis and it was good. Usually it was really damn good. You waited for each yearly team-up eagerly.

And this begat Crisis on Infinite Earths and that was stupendous. A real game changer for DC. Continuity was never the same again. And this is turn begat Legends, a smaller miniseries that helped re-define the major DC characters and launched several books such as Suicide Squad, Justice League, and an all-new Flash. And it was good. Well, it was very good to me. It helped launch my career at DC and gave me two books, the aforementioned Suicide Squad and I would up taking over Firestorm. And those begat a lot more work for me and that was very, very good so far as I’m concerned.

These also begat a lot of sales and the lesson was not lost on Mighty Marvel and so begat Secret Wars, Secret Wars II, The Infinity Gauntlet, the Infinity Gauntlet Rides Again and so on. And all of these, both at DC and Marvel, begat tie-ins and spin-offs, selling books and making money but also increasingly disgruntling fans. And that’s not so good.

Okay, I’m not going to push the biblical phraseology thing any further because it stops being clever and just gets real annoying real fast. That’s my point – things get old quickly. These days, the “events” happen so much on the heels of one another that its gets hard to tell where one ends and another begins.

I can’t really complain – it’s getting me some work. I’m doing the Cheetah issue for Villains Month that’s part of Forever Evil and I was happy to get it (and – yes – to plug it). I also had some room to play with the character’s background and, I think/hope, the issue has wound up as a pretty good story. I don’t want to be a hypocrite – I can’t decry something in which I’m a participant.

I’d also like to suggest this – the main writer on a lot of DC’s events these days is Geoff Johns, just as Brian Michael Bendis has done on a lot of the Marvel Crossover Events. These are two top talents working at the top of their respective games. They both weave stories, working in plot threads that have appeared in other books leading up to the Event. It does give an epic quality to DC/Marvel’s respective canons.

However, I’m concerned that it could lead to Reader Burn-out. (Hm! The title for the next big crossover event – Burnout!) The books cost money and its not just the central core books of the event. True, most of the spin off books you don’t have to buy (except for the Cheetah one shot connected to Forever Evil; that one you really have to buy) but all the hype connected with any Event starts to numb the reader (IMO). I’m going to sound like a COF (Crusty Old Fart) but I really do think it was better in the old days when the JLA met the JSA just once a year. It was an event to which you could look forward instead of just lurching from one Can’t Miss story to another.

Maybe the point is sales and if the Events sell and garner a big chunk of overall sales that month, maybe that’s all they need to do. I have no objections to that.

Especially if it’s the Cheetah spin-off. Buy lots of copies of that. Buy spare copies to give to friends and family. Pre-order it now.

Hmmm. Maybe I understand Event programming better than I thought.

MONDAY MORNING: Mindy Newell

TUESDAY MORNING: Emily S. Whitten

REVIEW: Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox

Reviews
July 31, 2013

The larger and more sweeping the cosmic event, the more the audience needs a character to act as the anchor. This was a lesson Marv Wolfman learned while writing the first such event, Crisis on Infinite Earths. Years later, when he was afforded the opportunity to novelize it, he focused on The Flash as his focal point. Similarly, Geoff Johns built the entire Flashpoint miniseries around Barry Allen and used it to upend the DC Universe and set the stage for the new 52.

While the miniseries was a beautifully drawn, sprawling mess that made little sense whatsoever, the animated adaptation does a better job honing the story and its spinoffs into a tighter, more focused tale. It still doesn’t make a whole heck of a lot of sense but it’s entertaining to watch. Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox is now out on Blu-ray from Warner Home Video and it’s a strong entry in the line.

Essentially, the Flash, despite knowing better, goes back in time to prevent his mother’s death, an inexplicable decision exacerbated by his 25^th century foe, Eobard Thawne, t

he Reverse Flash. Thawne channels the speed force, which they both access, to create some sort of time distorting “speed boom” that totally alters the DC Universe. As a result, Allen awakes up in a world where Mom is happily alive but not for long as Atlantis and Themyscira are waging a war that threatens to shatter the planet. He also no longer has his powers.

Among the “subtle” alterations is that Kal-El’s rocket misses Kansas and is captured by the U.S. government; Thomas Wayne survives but Bruce is shot by Joe Chill; the wizard Shazam shares his power with multiple kids, and Steve Trevor never arrived on Paradise Island, a.k.a. Themyscira. There are others but it’s a dark, depressing place to live when you have the unrepentant Len Snart running around as the beloved Citizen Cold.

While focusing on the core JL characters, plus Cyborg for those needing affirmative action, it totally ignores the heroes and champions of bygone eras (except for some version of Sandman), most of whom would gladly come out of retirement to prevent the war from happening. Occult beings such as the Spectre or Dr. Fate certainly would have intervened. And then we have Grifter, who was never a part of the DCU here so it’s a mess.

Allen convinces the alcoholic Dark Knight to help him regain his speed and then they race to stop global Armageddon, allying themselves with an odd assortment of other metahumans. They also rescue the Kryptonian from custody and he miraculously demonstrates all his powers within hours of exposure to the sun although it took him years in the other reality to develop them and just as long to master them.

But things zip along at such a dizzying pace, you just watch. Director Jay Oliva has a sure hand with the film, as he has in the last handful of outings. He’s saddled, though, with fairly unattractive character designs that once more over emphasize the upper half of the male bodies and give everyone pointy chins. Jim Krieg, another Warner animation vet, does a nice job making the necessary modifications to contain the story in 81 minutes. A few too many characters show up and don’t do anything but it’s nice to see them.

As usual, Andrea Romano brings in an A-list assortment of actors to voice the players led by Justin Chambers as Allen, Kevin McKidd as Thomas Wayne, and C. Thomas Howell as Thawne. The other major players include Vanessa Marshall (Wonder Woman), Cary Elwes (Aquaman), Michael B. Jordan (Cyborg), Kevin Conroy (Batman), Dana Delany (Lois Lane), Nathan Fillion (Hal Jordan’) and Tim Daly (Superman).

The miniseries worked as a transition by establishing the DC, Vertigo and WidlStorm universes as three parallel worlds (out of 52 known parallel universes) being brought together into a New DC Universe. The only real hint that the reformed timeline at the film’s end is the modified Flash costume Allen wears. Otherwise, it all seems the same but do watch the film through to the end of the credits for a 10 second hint of the following film, the first to resemble the New 52.

The disc comes with the usual assortment of supplemental features. You get audio commentary from Producer James Tucker, director Olivia, screenwriter Krieg and Johns as they chat about adapting the comics to film although there’s little new revealed here.

Rather than provided newcomers with a primer as to what this is all about, you get “A Flash in Time: Time Travel in the Flash Universe” (22 minutes) as The Hero’s Journey author Phil Cousineau provides more historic perspective than the others do for the comics that influenced the miniseries. Cousineau takes himself too seriously and the source material underexplained. Then there’s “My Favorite Villain! The Flash Bad Guys” (19 minutes) as Cousineau, Krieg, Johns and current Flash writer Brian Buccellato discuss some of the colorful foes making up the legendary Flash Rogues’ Gallery. For Blu-ray viewers, there are Flash-centric episodes from

Justice League and Batman: The Brave and the Bold. Finally, there’s a Sneak Peak at Justice League: War (8 minutes) and Flashpoint #1 Digital Comic Excerpt (a mere 8 pages in the hopes you go out and buy the graphic novel).

REVIEW: Justice League #22 – When The Tale Wags the Dog

News / Reviews
July 10, 2013

Justice League #22 came out today, touching the fuse for DC’s summer event, Trinity War, which we already know leads into the fall event, Forever Evil.

(Obviously, there’s your mandatory SPOILER ALERT!)

In all fairness, it’s a heck of a setup issue – the battle lines are drawn, it is made abundantly clear the stakes are high, and there are wheels within wheels of which few of the players are aware. It’s a book that absolutely brings you back next week to see what will happen. Geoff Johns is a master of this – he weaves a long-form plot into his books that all ties up into bows whenever he chooses to pull the plot threads. I don’t think he’s ever written a book that didn’t delight me in all his years at DC.

Add to that his wonderful ability to pull obscure characters and plot threads out of the distant past and make them relevant and exciting today. We saw the Shaggy Man make his debut in the New 52 recently, and in this issue we see the on-screen premiere of The Outsider, an old Batman villain (and a long story in and of himself), and a variant version appearing in the Flashpoint minis, written by James Robinson, the mini which I went on record as being my favorite of the bunch, and the one “new” character I said I’d most like to see find his way to the New 52. I’ll be curious of the details of this new iteration of the character.

Having said that, the book had several things going on in the book that I found infuriating, more as a reflection of what’s going in comics in general today.

Death, Death and Death

We saw two characters (seemingly) die in the book – one brand new and one very old. Old Firestorm villain Plastique took out Madame Xanadu, and thanks to The Outsider’s manipulations, Superman seems to have killed the brand spanking new Doctor Light. The former is annoying because of the legacy of the character, the latter, not only because the character was seemingly created solely to be killed, it’s another minority character to have been used in the same fashion. Geoff caught some hell for a similar scenario in Aquaman – a new character of middle eastern descent was killed off in her first adventure – a flashback, no less.

I say “seemingly” because a sub-issue is while DC has sworn blind that the new status quo is “dead is dead,” they don’t seem to mind swerving the readers with the heavy suggestion that a character has died only to reveal the next issue that they’re fine, it was just a flesh wound, they switched at the last minute, etc. Now that’s a tried and true device, used endlessly in the Republic serials, but as Annie Wilkes explained, it’s not good storytelling, it’s cheating. Catwoman never got into the cockadoodie chair.

So it’s entirely possible that Madame Xanadu teleported, or was teleported away, and that Doctor Light will return with even more amazing powers and a serious mad on for the heroes. But the point is, the moment was designed to shock us, provide a hotshot to get us back for the next issue, as opposed to creating a solid dramatic moment. In a documentary, Hitchcock talks about the difference between shock and suspense: one provides a moment of excitement that passes quickly, and one provides a long scene of emotional duress that people will talk about for a long time. Both of these deaths were mere moments. And if they turn out to be false alarms, they’ll be empty moments.

Stories Without End

Literally and figuratively. Event crossovers, mini-series, any story, really, but finite, limited stories should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. There’s lots of opportunity to lay plot threads that can be returned to should the need arise, but time was you’d close the last issue and think “That was a good story.” Or at least, “That wasn’t that good, but at least it’s over”.

The Empire Strikes Back may be the first example in modern narrative where that didn’t happen. They already knew they were making a third film, so there was less of an impetus to make the film end definitively. It didn’t really end – it just paused for three years. Everyone was safe and all, but there were so many questions left unanswered it felt more like a season finale than a film.

So too in comics, the event / maximegacrossovers don’t quite end as much as they seem to just lead straight into the next one. The defeat of the Big Bad only serves to set up the next one, and not even in a few months – sometimes right at the end of the last issue. Marvel’s been doing this for some years now – each big event would set up the next, and the event wouldn’t quite…end, it’d just say “Join us for next event in a few weeks!”

Geoff Johns had been writing one big long story in Green Lantern, one that included several huge crossover events. But they were all discrete, they ended, they had winners and losers, and there was a sense that something had been achieved. Even if the next big plot point was teased at the end, it was given months, even years to grow and bloom.

DC has done a couple of these in the past. The Oracle: The Cure mini-series had an overcrowded mess of a climax (what pro wrestling fans refer to as a “Schmoz” finish) that literally ended with “The story continues in Batgirl #1!” James Robinson’s much maligned mini Justice League: Cry for Justice(!) Seemed to have gone through quite an overhaul – originally pitched as a more “pro-active” League, it quickly turned into nothing but a springboard for Green Arrow’s new plot twist. AND it was chock full of death that only happened to make the main characters angry and “Justice!”-yelly. James was good enough to un-do one of the more egregious demises, and did it well.

This is DC’s first attempt at Marvel’s “direct flow” format in a big way, but at least they’re being fair about it. We’ve already been told, clearly and distinctly, that the events of Trinity War will cause the villains to win, which will be portrayed in September’s Forever Evil event, and the “villains month” of books. We don’t know “The ending” per se, but we do know that it won’t be an ending, per se. It’ll be a direct segue to the next event, and a very expensive event it’ll be, if you’re the type that likes to get every part of the story.

It effectively changes Trinity War from the main event to a mere prologue to the next event. I do not expect many plot points to resolve here, save for the various teams realizing they need to team up to fight the real threat. I expect the actions of Superman to be explained to the public very quickly and quickly forgotten, far different from the way they dealt with Wonder Woman’s killing of max lord in the last universe, and the stellar way Gail Simone is dealing with the death of her own brother, and Commissioner Gordon’s (a.k.a. her father) witness of the act.

The Roots Are Too Deep

There’s nothing wrong with foreshadowing. It’s the sign of quality literature. Before Crisis on Infinite Earths, they teased The Monitor in DC titles a full year ahead of time. In this event, at least one title, Justice League America, seems to have been set up for the express purpose of setting up this event. It exists not because there was enough demand for a third JL series (tho sales suggests the audience was happy to accept it), but only to serve as a place to put all the plot that would be needed to have Trinity War make sense.

This has been happening for some years now. Dwayne McDuffie’s run on Justice League was severely hindered by Editorial asking him to shoehorn in plot points that only served to set up an upcoming event, and in some cases, being asked to step aside entirely for a couple months.

There’ve been more than a few examples of Editorial getting in the way of the creators since the New 52 came to be as well, many of them ending in creators leaving said books, willingly or no. There’s nothing wrong with an Editor wanting to work with the writer on the stories. When the editor starts taking more of a role than the writer, conflict is almost certainly to follow. There hasn’t been an editor good enough to do that in several decades, and I don’t see one coming along anytime soon.

We’re seeing too many stories that exist only to set up an upcoming event, stories that don’t quite fit in the continuing narrative of the titles, ones that don’t quite end, and ones that just plain get in the way. They cause a small jump in sales as collectors grab the “first chapter” of the next big event, but they rarely bring new readers long-term.

There’s every ability for a writer to turn out a great story, even if any or all of these issues appear. I fully expect to enjoy the rollercoaster ride that Geoff and his cronies have set up. But it’ll be in spite of what I describe above, not because of them.

Marc Alan Fishman: OK WB, Now What?

Columns / Reviews
June 22, 2013

I’ve little to no doubt by the time I write this article everyone on this site, and every other comic-ish site will have weighed in on Man of Steel. For what it’s worth? I liked it a whole bunch. Disaster porn? Sure. The controversial ending? Made complete sense to me. And I’m not even a pessimist. I found the flick to be a popcorn chomping, scenery eating behemoth on par with Marvel’s Cap or Thor. Feel free to disagree with me. This li’l op-ed though isn’t about Man of Steel as much as it’s about what it means for DC in the near and not-so-near future.

The fact is the movie is making money. Good money. The most money to come in for the month of June in fact. And with no “big” weekend coming to theaters presumably until The Lone Ranger bombs, DC should be on the road now to adding some serious shekels to their calamitous coffers. Many nerds (myself included) all figured that all this time Marvel was running away with all the sick-movie profits. But let’s look at the tale of the tape:

According to Box Office Mojo: Iron Man 1 and 2, Captain America, Thor, The Incredible Hulk, and The Avengers totaled roughly 1.75 billion dollars domestically. In the same amount of time Nolan’s Batman franchise, Watchmen, The Losers, Jonah Hex, and Green Lantern earned 1.45 billion. All things considered? It’s not necessarily a run away gravy train for Mickey now is it?

We all know the old adage: war is won with a single battle. Man of Steel rights a train derailed with Green Lantern. The fact of the matter is in the last five years of blockbusters, Mickey was laying foundation while DC merely rented a timeshare. It’s no secret (especially if you read comic book movie news on the Internet) that the Brothers Warner wanted Man of Steel to be the initial volley towards a larger franchise universe of their own. It’s fair enough to consider the movie to be a success. So, what’s next?

We know there’s talks to get Supes back in the multiplex as soon as late next year. Unless they actually know how to reverse time by flying around the Earth though? Color me doubtful. And the rumor mill has also turned out gems like a possible Batman / Superman team up. Or a Justice League movie that will spin-out into single character franchises. I envision the execs over at the Warner lot looking at a pile of New 52 books, with a sweaty Dan DiDio and Geoff Johns (no doubt wearing a dunce cap over his Green Lantern: The Movie cap) doing their best to help them plan. And somewhere behind two-way glass, Christopher Nolan sits in his private Inception pod (yeah it’s a pod now) smugly scoffing.

Enough pussy-footing around. If the reigns were in my hands, I’d bank on what made Warner money. While every comic-classicist sharpens their knives I boldly say the unthinkable. If you made money going real and dark? Go real and dark. There was optimism, hope, and smiles to be had in Man of Steel. Seriously. If DC uses that at it’s base, and builds a Justice League that stands with Big Blue in their front court? Those are big shoulders to do it with. Add in Jospeh Gordon-Leavitt’s Batman (heresy!) and introduce the movie-going public to Flash, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and Cyborg? Well, it’ll sure give Whedon and his Bro-Vengers a little competition. Put the movie in the hands of a capable comic-inspired director. Say… Brad Bird. And if Nolan can assist in crafting a picture that isn’t just filler, quips, and a fifty minute fight sequence… you’ve got yourself the making of a real counter blow to the powerhouse mouse.

At the end of the day, Man of Steel was a solid start to a new beginning. While many our brethren ball their fists and curse at the wind, many others are finding a new take on a familiar face. I hope sincerely that DC and WB figure out what worked (Optimism. Confidence.) and what didn’t (Wanton destruction.) and use it to find solid footing on a new course. The world needs a Justice League movie. We need a great Wonder Woman franchise. They need a movie DCU. It’s time to look up, up, and away from the past and soar towards a more profitable future. And I for one will be looking forward to the movies.

Because you know, their comics sure ain’t doing it for me right now.*

*My apologies to Scott Snyder and Gail Simone who totally get a pass

SUNDAY: John Ostrander

MONDAY: Mindy Newell

REVIEW: Superman Unbound

Reviews
May 5, 2013

Superman is a science fiction story. What else can you say about the sole survivor of a doomed planet coming to live on Earth? As a result, some of the best stories about the Man of Steel have been science fiction in nature so it’s a wonder that it has taken this long before one of his confrontations with fellow alien Brainiac was brought to the screen. The feature films keep reusing Lex Luthor and General Zod, ignoring the computer construct from the distant world of Colu, who has captured specimen cities from countless worlds, including one from Krypton.

Thankfully, the folk at Warner Animation have recognized his incredible potential, first by reimagining him as a closer part of the mythos in their Superman: the Animated Series and now in Superman Unbound. The core story is lifted from Action Comics #866-870 by Geoff Johns and Garry Frank and collected under the title Superman: Brainiac. To place this in perspective, the story comes after the Infinite Crisis reboot of the DC Universe continuity, meaning Supergirl is still adjusting to being on Earth and neither has encountered Brainiac before.

Bob Goodman, who did an admirable job turning The Dark Knight Returns into the previous two films, once more, tackles the iconic characters. Here, he has a far more emotional story to deal with and made only a handful of major modifications, notably downplaying Pa Kent’s role and keeping Lois and Clark single folk. He and director James Tucker make for a good team and the story moves fairly seamlessly but the action pieces are where things fall apart. We’re told repeatedly how utterly Brainiac is and yet he continues to send endless constructs after Superman despite it being obvious that they are ineffective. How shall I put this….it doesn’t make any freakin’ sense except to give the animators something fun to do.

There’s tension between Superman and Supergirl over her readiness to be Earth’s protector; there’s tension between Clark and Lois about their relationship being stalled by his overprotectiveness and then there’s the larger problem of Brainiac having stolen Kandor and now attempting to bottle up Metropolis. There are nice resonances established between these three threads and Goodman does a good job making Supergirl and Lois well-defined characters.

Once more Andrea Romano delivers with an excellent vocal cast, bringing verve to Goodman’s script. Castle’s Stana Katic makes for a powerful Lois (and I thought Dana Delany had it nailed) and she’s well paired with her TV costar Molly Quinn, who is a vulnerable teen Kryptonian. Matt Bomer drops his voice to a tone deeper than his usual White Collar character and is almost unrecognizable. On the other hand, Fringe’s John Noble is wonderfully creepy as Brainiac.

Tucker, though, botches the character design. Superman’s square jaw is now a tapered, pointy thing that robs him of power. Lois is way too thin for normal proportions and Pa Kent is a caricature of the influential father he should be. Tucker does better with Brainiac and his ship along with the Kandorians (and kudos for the Ultra the Multi-Alien cameo).

Overall, this is a satisfying adventure with a nice emotional undercurrent.

The 75 minute feature is supplemented on the Blu-ray with two nice thirty minute featurettes: Kandor: History of the Bottle City provides the historic context for how this was introduced and how it altered the mythos. Marv Wolfman, Mike Carlin, Bob Goodman, Geoff Johns and Dan DiDio all chime in on the bottle city and its charms. Heath Corson is also included, a writer with no connection to Superman or DC or context provided so he’s an annoying presence. The second piece, Brainiac: Technology and Terror is less successful since there is tremendous confusion between what is said and what is shown. Despite having Wolfman and Carlin to provide some history, everyone goes from discussing the original Silver Age creation to his reimagining in the latter years then skip ahead to his modern day incarnation. But visually, the goateed Milton Fine is seen from the John Byrne era reboot but never mentioned. Similarly, we’re shown images of Brainiac 5 from early Mike Grell Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes but he is never mentioned so Brainiac’s legacy in the history of the DCU is also absent.

The Blu-ray has, exclusively, the Kandor feature and four episodes of Superman: The Animated Series and a digital excerpt from the Superman: Brainiac collected edition. The combo pack comes with the Blu-ray, DVD (with the Brainiac featurette) and an Ultraviolet digital copy.

John Ostrander: The Art of the Fill-In

Columns
April 28, 2013

Well, it’s been officially announced: I’m scripting issue 20 of Aquaman for Geoff Johns and Company. It brings me back to my old DC stomping grounds and I’m both happy for the opportunity and pleased with the result. I hope everyone out there will feel the same when the book appears next month.

It also gives me a chance to talk about the art of doing a fill-in which has its own special skill set whether you’re a writer or an artist. Usually it’s a single issue although it can be for two.

If you’re getting a call from an editor of a given book for a fill-in, it will usually be on short notice. I once got a call from an editor on a Friday morning. He needed the fill-in script by Monday. The way that scripting usually works is that I submit springboards (one paragraph plot ideas and I usually try to give a few) and the editor decides which he or she likes. I then do a plot overview and then finally write a full script. Collapsing the time stream, that’s about a week. I had maybe four days from a standing start.

By early afternoon, the editor had the springboards. We talked on the phone, he picked the one he liked, I wrote up the plot outline by late afternoon. The editor approved it with his comments before the end of the day and I was off and writing. The script was in by Monday.

The question is not how creative you are (although you have to be that) but how professional, how disciplined, you are. How well do you know your craft? This goes for the artist as well as the writer. You get the job done.

Here’s why: The publisher has lined up printing time and there are only so many presses that print comics. They’re generally booked pretty full so if you don’t get the book to the printer on time, you miss your slot, you have to wait until one opens up and you’ll probably pay a fee for it. If the books ships late as a result, unsold copies can be returned (not the case with an on-time book). That costs money and the offending editor will not be held in high regard.

Here’s some things to remember if you’re writing a fill-in issue. It has to fit into the current continuity but not move that continuity forward (that’s the main writer’s job/prerogative). You might be given a few things that current writer wants to advance but don’t presume. You must know what that current continuity is in order to write the character as s/he appears in the book. You probably won’t be able to play with the supporting cast unless they aren’t in the current storyline or you are asked to use them.

Don’t rewrite the origin. Don’t recreate or reinterpret the origin (again, that’s the regular writer’s domain). Don’t kill off characters. The story is complete in that issue; no dangling threads. Don’t play with the regular writer’s dangling threads (so to speak) without permission. Don’t correct any continuity flaws that you may have perceived. Don’t base it on any trivia points that you know.

Did I forget to mention that the story also has to be wonderful? The reader is not getting the usual team on the book; you don’t want then to feel ripped-off. The comic book market is volatile these days and the publisher doesn’t want to give the fans a reason to leave. That said – fill-ins are just about inevitable. The crush and stress of doing a monthly book is tough.

Aquaman 20 is not the first time I’ve done a fill-in issue for the character. The first time I was asked, my initial reaction was, “Oh great. Aquaman. The blonde geek who swims fast and talks to fishes.” You know – a lot of people’s reaction. Current writer Geoff Johns, who has done a brilliant job of making Aquaman very readable, has cunningly used that perception in some of his scripts. So I had to find something in the character that would interest me or the script would just lie there like a filleted flounder.

I used that reaction I had to Aquaman to fuel the story. I used what I call an “oblique angler” to create the story. The story, in this case, would be about Aquaman using peoples’ reactions to Aquaman. It was a story about stories. I created a news reporter who is assigned to do a write-up about Aquaman; he has the same “talks to fishies” reaction I had when getting the assignment. The reporter then investigates and finds some first person accounts about Aquaman, giving us a variety of interps. In the process, the reporter himself grows and changes. It remains one of my own personal favorite stories.

“Fill-in” does not or should not mean “generic.” All the rules of a good story apply; it’s just that you have a single issue with which to do it. And that should be true whether you have a GN, a miniseries, a long run or a fill-in. You tell a good story. That’s always the job.