Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Mongrel]

So, uh... Lobo is Bishie now?



Jesus Christ, DC.

Holy Fraggaroley

[Büge]

http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/09/want-to-be-a-dc-artist-just-draw-harley-quinn-naked-committing-suicide

seriously, what the fudge

[Thad]

So, uh... Lobo is Bishie now?

Given that Lobo's entire thing is that he vacillates between being a parody of the excesses of the comics industry and a perfect example of them, I am totally okay with this.

And speaking of situations where it's difficult to tell the difference between a parody of DC and totally-serious DC:

http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/09/want-to-be-a-dc-artist-just-draw-harley-quinn-naked-committing-suicide

seriously, what the fudge

My first reaction on reading this was "Wait, isn't this a Connor/Palmiotti book?"

And sure enough, via The Outhousers, Palmiotti claims that the scene is a parody of the terrible things writers have been doing to Harley Quinn.

DC editorial hasn't earned the benefit of the doubt, but Mr. and Mrs. Amanda Connor have.  I still plan on picking up the issue.

[Mothra]

Oh, so they turn a prominent male hero completely, 100% flaming gay, and still you guys complain!

[Mongrel]

oh, yeah, fuck.  that reminds me:





Wonder Woman's official costume versus a porn parody costume.

http://io9.com/who-has-the-best-live-action-wonder-woman-outfit-the-w-458956801

The one on the bottom could uh, stand to cover a little more vulva, of course.

[Thad]

Man, Axel Braun has just been KILLING it.

The Batman '66 parody has to be the best one, of course -- they had the guy playing the Joker grow a mustache JUST SO HE COULD COVER IT WITH MAKEUP like Cesar Romero -- but my God they're ALL pretty spectacular.  He just did a Wolverine one with a comic-accurate Lady Deathstrike.  (Er, aside from the claws, I would hope.)

[Büge]

Given that Lobo's entire thing is that he vacillates between being a parody of the excesses of the comics industry and a perfect example of them, I am totally okay with this.

It did provide Coelasquid with some material, that's for sure.

[Büge]

http://www.theouthousers.com/index.php/news/123915-what-no-aquaman-is-not-married-to-mera-why-would-you-think-that.html

[Thad]

On the plus side, it's pretty clear that DC's not anti-gay, just anti-marriage.

[Büge]

DC is against anything that progresses a relationship past third base. Because the more a relationship develops, the less they can do with a character, right? It also means that it's just another thing to undo once a new writer comes along with their own preconceived notions of what the character should be like. Besides, people don't read comics to read about relationships. That's boring! It has nothing to do with punching, laser eyes, the batmobile, two-page spreads of battle scenes, or close-ups of ladies' bottoms, which is why people really read comics.

Ugh. Oof. Excuse me, I think I'm coming down with a case of Didio.

[Zaratustra]

I just realized the other day that fighting and stuff, in videogames as much as comics, is a substitute for actual change. You have a lot of shit flying and people punching each other to disguise the fact that, at the end of the issue, everything returns to the status quo because that's simpler in the long run.

[Thad]

DC is against anything that progresses a relationship past third base. [...] Ugh. Oof. Excuse me, I think I'm coming down with a case of Didio.

You say this like they're not just following Marvel and Joe Q's lead.

Granted, DC/National invented this shit, when they nixed The K-Metal from Krypton in 1940.

I often wonder about just how different American comics would be if that story had been published.  I think that was a critical moment, when the guys who invented this shit really wanted to shake things up and the publisher refused to mess with a good thing.  The last 73 years of American superhero comics have been iterations on that single moment, I think.

(And of course an entirely different critical moment occurred in the 1950's and decimated every other American comics genre.)

I just realized the other day that fighting and stuff, in videogames as much as comics, is a substitute for actual change. You have a lot of shit flying and people punching each other to disguise the fact that, at the end of the issue, everything returns to the status quo because that's simpler in the long run.

I just finished reading The Untold Story of Marvel Comics, and one of the recurring themes is Stan Lee's mandate that stories only provide "the illusion of change", and not ACTUAL change.

(Stan, ironically, is responsible for the MJ marriage mandate which was later, messily, overturned for a reversion to status quo.  Now, that marriage actually WAS a terrible idea, but that's precisely BECAUSE it was an editorial/marketing mandate that made absolutely no sense in the context of the then-current Spider-Man comics -- MJ hadn't even been a major character for years.)

Futurama nailed it pretty hard, too, all the way back in (production) season 1:

Fry: Married? Jenny can't get married.
Leela: Why not? It's clever, it's unexpected.
Fry: But that's not why people watch TV. Clever things make people feel stupid, and unexpected things make them feel scared.

...it occurs to me that Futurama just ended with [spoiler]Fry and Leela getting married and growing old together and then everything being reset at the end of the episode[/spoiler].  That seems appropriate.

[Mongrel]

Talking about 90's-era funnybooks elsewhere brought this classic up:

seriously this shit should be in a museum; no matter what order your eyes gaze upon them, every element of this cover is funnier/worse than the last

you have captain america, who is now a werewolf
you have cable saying "back off, fur face!"
while wearing what appears to be a flotation device
and the rare male example of the impossible "boobs and butt" pose
and the final caption, "WHO WILL BE LORD OF THE WOLVES?"
wolverine is just chilling in the background, because it's the 90s and that's what you do

[Büge]

Well, yeah, they had to have Cap do SOMEthing in the '90s to justify keeping his book around. He'd stopped being Nomad and The Captain at that point, so what do you do once you're done reclaiming your superhero identity from a corrupt government? Become a werewolf, of course.

[Thad]

Valiant teases "The (Original) World's Worst Superhero Team".

Which had damn-well-better mean Priest and Bright.

Even if it's only the handful of finished-but-unpublished issues of the original Q&W, I'll take it.  But I sure hope it's something new.

[Zaratustra]

Sandman prequel. Thankfully, by Neil Gaiman.

http://www.vertigocomics.com/comics/the-sandman-overture-2013/the-sandman-overture-1

[Thad]

Gaiman may be the last creator left who DC has the good sense not to piss off.

This may be because DC has some goodwill to a man who has made them hundreds of millions of dollars.  Or it could be because he's the most prominent example of a creator who has successfully sued a comics publisher.



(It's probably actually the former.  Or, at least, that they know they'll make more money with his name on it than with him urging a boycott.  Gaiman's victory over McFarlane was an important moment, but he doesn't really have any case for ownership of Sandman and has said as much.)

[Ted Belmont]

Valiant teases "The (Original) World's Worst Superhero Team".

Which had damn-well-better mean Priest and Bright.

Even if it's only the handful of finished-but-unpublished issues of the original Q&W, I'll take it.  But I sure hope it's something new.

Yep.

[Thad]

And another interview at CBR.

On the plot: it picks up 20 years after the original series.

Basically, Woody is off living his life, the Quantum character reappears on the news and some news chopper gets a shot of Quantum in action. At first, Woody is kind of scoffing at him, because he knows Eric's way too old to be running around like this now. But then he sees on the news that Quantum has a new partner -- and the partner's like a teenage sidekick. Woody thinks Eric's lost his mind, that he's being really reckless and irresponsible, endangering some kid. In theory, Woody thinks he has to seek Quantum out and confront him about this new behavior and talk some sense into him. That's the inciting incident for the story that brings them back into each others' lives.

And on being asked to do it:

For reasons that only Dinesh could possibly know, Valiant went out of their way -- and I mean really out of their way -- to approach us. They kind of went down to the old comic book creators' home and dragged us out in our wheelchairs and said, "Hey, we want you guys to do this."

This has been a rollercoaster, but as both a fan of the comics and of the creators I really couldn't be happier right now.  In a world where I've come to expect the worst from publishers, it's wonderful to be wrong.

From here on in, any time I hear something bad about Dinesh Shamdasani, he gets the benefit of the doubt.

[Royal☭]

Steve Niles 'loses everything' to flood

And like all successful, well-known comics creators he doesn't have the money for insurance so he needs help. Honestly, how many creators need to be ruined before we end this system?