Leaping tall buildings

[John C]

Jeez! You are just SO negative, John C.
Now you want stories to be ABOUT something, too. Just dig the groovy pictures, Man! GGA and all that. You READ comics?

Peace, Jim (|:{>

I try!

Semi-seriously, though, I don't see how one can be negative when the situation is that the best-selling comics run about a tenth of the distribution of the most awful comics of the '60s.  I can understand the drop from the heights of war (where escapism and money were in short supply), but I think the market pressure has come from the stories.

I mean, purely objectively, the "pictures" have gotten better over time, for the most part, right?  We've gone from Fletcher Hanks to quasi-photorealism.  And sales have dropped with it.  Either prospective comic fans hate art, or there's another factor at work.

The way I see it, comic books are really the only medium with no budgetary restrictions where you can get a complete story that can also be part of a larger mosaic.  The further you get from that strength, the harder it is to compete against a movie (which costs about two comic books, today, often has prettier, even more scantily-clad girls, and lasts around five times as long) or, y'know, going outside, which is free, and the pictures are unbelievably realistic.

[JVJ (RIP)]

Quite seriously, John,
I believe that the heightened realism in comics is part of their downfall. Artists and writers forgot the story-telling aspects of the medium and concentrated on the new "technology". Writers can spend pages expounding on something that Stan and Jack (or Robert and Curt) would have handled in a panel or two. Sure you get more "pictures" but the "story" is so diluted (and the price point necessary to support the new "technology" is so high) that there is a spiraling downward of the point of diminishing returns. Why would anyone pay $3 for one tenth of the story they used to get for 20¢? And the artists are called upon to pad out the pages with panels that have little to do with forwarding the plot and so the pictures have stopped telling the story - the very DEFINITION of the comic book has been superseded by verbose, elongated books filled with panels that barely relate to the plot and certainly not to each other.

The dense, impenetrable plots are a Catch 22. If they made them simpler and shorter, they would probably lose the small audience they have with little likelihood of immediately enticing replacements. And because the fans refuse to acknowledge the inherent flaws in the current status quo, they won't accept a return to simpler story-telling with panels and stories that flow effortlessly from page to page. Remember when it was possible to "read" a comic book just by looking at the pictures and reading a caption or two? Hah! I knew you did. Know anyone who would even consider attempting that these days? Me neither.

Peace, Jim (|:{>

[John C]

Right, and I do want to clarify that by "story," I didn't necessarily mean "writing" in the prose sense.  If the dialogue and art don't support each other (which it hasn't often, in at least twenty years or so), I feel like someone doesn't understand his job.

The format is definitely one part of it.  At some point, someone got the idea that comic books could be written like movies, and I think that's where a lot of padding came from.  We got the sweeping splash pages that fry a two-page spread to show someone posing with gritted teeth, and we got the series of identical panels to convey time passing, but there's no content, so we skip over them (I love the row of panels of a hand picking something up off a table, as if we couldn't guess how the character came to hold the object).  When I sampled the "New 52" books, it was digital-only, and I was reading faster than I could turn the pages, to give an idea of "story density."

But I do think the stories themselves are a big deal, as well, and probably the biggest nail in the coffin.  The stories have become more about the world earlier comics have established than about the characters doing interesting things.  I remember a JLA comic during the 2000-ish relaunch, where Grant Morrison was interviewed about his latest story, and he explained that he built up the entire thing because...?

"I always wanted to shave the Shaggy Man."

Not, "I wanted to investigate man's inhumanity to man," "it's an adaptation of Moby Dick," or "I wanted to write a fun adventure," all of which would be clichéd, but at least suggests that the story was worth reading or even writing.  Instead, nothing in the story (running across several issues, of course) was important, except for the punchline.  It was all a set piece, made entirely from "props" the theater company (DC) left around.  Do you know who the Shaggy Man is?  Do you care?  Of course not, and the writer can't be bothered to convince you otherwise.

Hopefully, that's also the way out.  Keep "writing for the trade," but tell novel-length stories (real stories, not encyclopedia references) in every six issues, and get the writer and artist communicating beyond "make sure Batman's in the picture."  I think the existing fans will stay on-board, and they'll bring other readers in over time.

Well, as long as the creators can stop whining that they're not being "taken seriously as an art form," I mean.  Every time I hear something like that, it sounds like a child screaming that he's not trusted to stay out past curfew.  Show you're responsible first, even when nobody's watching, and then we recognize it...

[JVJ (RIP)]

I totally agree, John,
and didn't mean to imply otherwise with my post that didn't delve into that aspect of it. Elsewhere on the Timely/Atlas site there has been some discussion of the Marvel Method of writing a comic book story. It was pointed out that Stan Lee took advantage of those artists who could assist him in the storytelling by working from a plot outline. The real kicker there was "could". Kirby and Ditko certainly could, but could Paul Reinman or Jack Keller? Dunno. Probably. But telling a story graphically is comprised of more than drawing the swaggering figures or angst-ridden poses. It involves, as you say, the arrangement of panels to further the story and it's a learned and, I believe, a rare skill.

Without a story to further, the art and the artist become more and more redundant (the point I was trying to make) and so story-telling is replaced by page-filling, because that's what the writer wants. The sequence of hands reaching for an object might simply be a matter of an inept story-teller OR it might be that the lack of story necessitates stretching whatever is (not) happening over more space - after all, it's a six-part saga...

No, I don't know who Shaggy Man is/was and one would think that Grant Morrison might have been perceptive enough to suggest that he wanted to explore the notion of self when the raison d'être has been removed. THAT might have flown a bit further. Sadly, he's not that good of a writer, it seems.

Peace, Jim (|:{>

[John C]

My actual point about the Shaggy Man story wasn't (as seems a typical criticism) that Morrison was using obscure details, by the way.  It was more that he seemed to think that the inclusion of obscure details created a story.

It's probably not an experience that anybody born outside of the 1970s would have had, but having grown up at the time when "action figures" were plentiful and cheap, I remember many lazy weekends at home as a kid doing basically the same thing.  You improvise a mediocre story based on whatever characters you have in the drawer, hoping somewhere in the back of your mind that you sound vaguely like a comic book.

That's what it feels like comic book writing has become, and (since a lot of the writers are about my age) I wonder how far from the truth that really is.  The improvisational nature would explain why stories go on for half a year without anything happening.  It would also explain why a lot of fans have been reduced to Pavlovian responses of, "oh, he used my favorite version of my favorite character, so he's a good writer" or "Oh, they've dared to CHANGE Spider-Man, so the world is hereby over!"

As an example, a few years back, I had the misfortune to read DC's "Identity Crisis."  I gave it a shot because (a) someone loaned it to me and (b) it was written by a "real" writer, from outside the industry.  What I got out of it was seven issues with two parallel plots.  The "A plot" was that the Justice League made some incoherent leaps of logic to assume that their secret identities were in danger and that they clearly new who the suspect was.  The "B plot" was a drunken lurch from red herring to red herring, packed with characters who, frankly, don't matter.  In the background, the "arc" revealed that the Justice League had "really" been obsessive authoritarians in protecting their secrets.  Oh, and in the background, we also learn that the villains have apparently unionized and they all get together every week for Evil Board Meetings or something I couldn't make heads or tails of.

(I don't think I'll ever understand the number of meetings these costumed types voluntarily sit through, either.  Are the creators jealous of those of us who have corporate jobs?  Because for a couple of bucks, I'll happily let them go to real meetings on my behalf...)

But people didn't like it.  That shouldn't be surprising.  What should be surprising is that the majority didn't like it because the story was triggered by brutally murdering the supporting character of a not-so-popular superhero.  That it was a hundred pages of incoherent nonsense that undermined its own concept (that secret identities are an important part of the genre...I think) didn't seem to enter into the discussion.

[JVJ (RIP)]

My actual point about the Shaggy Man story wasn't (as seems a typical criticism) that Morrison was using obscure details, by the way.  It was more that he seemed to think that the inclusion of obscure details created a story.

Your point was well-made, John, and very clear - to me, anyway. Shaving Shaggy Man is not a story it's a one-liner. Then he's not "shaggy", get it!? Nobody cares other than the writer since, as you point out, nobody knows or cares about Shaggy Man to begin with. My suggestion for the story that could have been built from the shaving was "What happens to someone who identifies himself as Shaggy Man when he's not shaggy anymore?"

For instance, I've had a beard since 1966. Once in 1973 I was obliged to shave it off to treat a skin condition. There was a VERY strange mental gyration that occurred when I caught a glimpse of "myself" in a window or mirror. It wasn't "me" that I was seeing. Imagine how a Shaggy Man might have had infinitely greater "self" image problems if he could never connect himself with his reflection. Could have been an interesting exploration of the Id AND let Morrison shave Shaggy Man. How can "I" still be the "Shaggy Man" if I'm not. Then who am I? Etc.

I would have read that story. You don't have to know anything about "Shaggy Man" to enjoy the idea.

Peace, Jim (|:{>

[John C]

Very true, it would have been very simple to springboard from the "set piece," as they say in movies (where you've rented the space and the props, so the movie is damned well going to contain that scene, no matter how awkward it is) to a real story.  But no.  Such things are beneath us.

Instead, as I recall, a nutty military man had his brain transplanted into the robot(?) body, and so of course he needed to shave his head.

What's funny is that I think a lot of the current writers would be wonderful editors.  They have a good sense of good "germs" of a story, and can make quick connections to stories in an enormous body of literature.  Having a Grant Morrison or Geoff Johns oversee a project with some raw writing talent could be a great thing to see.  Unfortunately, I get the impression that "editor" in comic book land doesn't mean what it means anywhere else in the world, and egos prevent shifting people to where they can do the most good.