[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at Jack Kirby's New Gods.]
“Monster in the Morgue”
This latest issue borrows from the DC Brave and the Bold concept with the New Genesis teens beginning a team up with the newly resurrected Deadman. The afterword in the Omnibus explains that this plot was foisted upon Jack Kirby by DC editorial which Kirby wasn’t that enthused about. However his displeasure is not palpable as Kirby blends his fourth world characters well with elements of the horror genre.
We’re introduced to the villain of the week who is definitely cut from the mad scientist cloth. “Doc” Gideon is a part time morgue worker who’s obsessed with resurrection. His Frankenstein monster is a large male in tattered clothes and a bandaged head. When he pulls the lever which sends an “electro-organic” shock through the corpse, it doesn’t reanimate him. Rather, it brings back Deadman, the ghost of circus trapeze artist Boston Brand who possesses the ability to jump into and control living beings. This resurrection is lost on Gideon who returns to his home to sulk.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Free Form Comments
Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Uncanny X-Men #239
[Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Claremont's X-Men]
“Vanities”
Claremont loves to keep things varied. The previous four issues were dense with political allegory and metaphor, and featured comparatively quiet villains who wore sweaters or prosaic military regalia rather than gaudy supersuits, and whose most heinous acts included simply the complacent, apathetic acceptance of indoctrinated racism.
Now, Uncanny #239 is hosted by Mr. Sinister, who, at least on the surface – with his rhyming name, chalk-white face and flamboyant purple costume – is the most one-dimensionally comic-opera super villain in Claremont’s entire X-mythos. To go from Genosha to Mr. Sinister is a fairly intense swerve; a cold plunge into storylines that had been left dangling for a couple of years by this point. As such, the issue has an incredibly invigorating quality to it. It is somewhat dark, in its way – but it is not the brutal, racist murkiness of the Genoshan material. “Vanities” is thick instead with melodramatic pronouncements, soap-opera-esque sexuality, and one or two classically kinetic action sequences. In a word, it’s fun.
“Vanities”
Claremont loves to keep things varied. The previous four issues were dense with political allegory and metaphor, and featured comparatively quiet villains who wore sweaters or prosaic military regalia rather than gaudy supersuits, and whose most heinous acts included simply the complacent, apathetic acceptance of indoctrinated racism.
Now, Uncanny #239 is hosted by Mr. Sinister, who, at least on the surface – with his rhyming name, chalk-white face and flamboyant purple costume – is the most one-dimensionally comic-opera super villain in Claremont’s entire X-mythos. To go from Genosha to Mr. Sinister is a fairly intense swerve; a cold plunge into storylines that had been left dangling for a couple of years by this point. As such, the issue has an incredibly invigorating quality to it. It is somewhat dark, in its way – but it is not the brutal, racist murkiness of the Genoshan material. “Vanities” is thick instead with melodramatic pronouncements, soap-opera-esque sexuality, and one or two classically kinetic action sequences. In a word, it’s fun.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
How to Start: Punch Drunk Love, Night Ripper, and Kill Bill
The first 2 minutes and 40 seconds of Punch Drunk Love are pretty well amazing.
You learn everything you need to know about the movie's universe in those first 2 minutes and 40 seconds: This man is lonely (the shot puts him in the corner, and nothing adorns the empty space), smart (he figures out this company has a coupon reward thing that rewards more than the product is worth), and he lives in this world where no one cares (the guy on the other end of the phone is apathetic), and where violence can come out of nowhere (at the crack of dawn this weirdly peaceful moment is broken as an SUV just flips over disastrously, careening off camera and it is never returned to). But his salvation is there as well: out of nowhere, in this cold and violent place, this quirky funny old beautiful instrument just APPEARS, a herald of the salvation, the old fashioned old testament GRACE (which you do not do anything to get but which is simply thrust upon you) that he will find in quirky Emily Watson. Before the movie starts you get the whole thing in micro.
You learn everything you need to know about the movie's universe in those first 2 minutes and 40 seconds: This man is lonely (the shot puts him in the corner, and nothing adorns the empty space), smart (he figures out this company has a coupon reward thing that rewards more than the product is worth), and he lives in this world where no one cares (the guy on the other end of the phone is apathetic), and where violence can come out of nowhere (at the crack of dawn this weirdly peaceful moment is broken as an SUV just flips over disastrously, careening off camera and it is never returned to). But his salvation is there as well: out of nowhere, in this cold and violent place, this quirky funny old beautiful instrument just APPEARS, a herald of the salvation, the old fashioned old testament GRACE (which you do not do anything to get but which is simply thrust upon you) that he will find in quirky Emily Watson. Before the movie starts you get the whole thing in micro.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Mister Miracle #8
[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at Jack Kirby's New Gods -- though he will be missing a few issues, as he explains. I make a brief comment below.]
“The Battle of the Id!!”
NOTE: This is usually the point where I would review the Jimmy Olsen title. However after reading issue #148, I found little to write about. The comic has become independent of the Fourth World saga, and the stories have become generic. I will continue to read the issues and will make a note in a subsequent column if I find anything interesting. But for now, I am just going to focus on New Gods, Forever People and today’s installment, Mister Miracle.
This issue is the conclusion of Mister Miracle’s, aka Scott Free’s assault on Apokolips to resolve his lingering issues from his tormented childhood. In the last issue, Miracle willingly surrendered to Granny Goodness in order to get closer to her whereabouts. Instead he was shipped off to section zero, which is rumored to be the worst Apokolips has to offer. His companion, Big Barda, is determined to save Scott but realizes she will need an army to do so. She returns to the home of the Female Furies, an all female team of women warriors which she used to command. The opening splash age depicts the Furies is a wild state of agitation. They’re fighting over who will command the team with Barda gone and the debate as devolved into battle. The Furies’ costumes have that Kirby signature look which makes one wonder what a Wonder Woman book would have looked like under Kirby’s pen. Another distinct detail is that many of the furies (and another woman seen later in the book) have wide eyes and tiny pupils, a look that says “madness”. Kirby seems to subscribe to the theory that war is a man’s game and any woman who stays long enough on Apokolips will be driven over the edge by it. At the sight of this bickering, Barda separates two combatants and proclaims herself leader once more. Simple, but effective.
“The Battle of the Id!!”
NOTE: This is usually the point where I would review the Jimmy Olsen title. However after reading issue #148, I found little to write about. The comic has become independent of the Fourth World saga, and the stories have become generic. I will continue to read the issues and will make a note in a subsequent column if I find anything interesting. But for now, I am just going to focus on New Gods, Forever People and today’s installment, Mister Miracle.
This issue is the conclusion of Mister Miracle’s, aka Scott Free’s assault on Apokolips to resolve his lingering issues from his tormented childhood. In the last issue, Miracle willingly surrendered to Granny Goodness in order to get closer to her whereabouts. Instead he was shipped off to section zero, which is rumored to be the worst Apokolips has to offer. His companion, Big Barda, is determined to save Scott but realizes she will need an army to do so. She returns to the home of the Female Furies, an all female team of women warriors which she used to command. The opening splash age depicts the Furies is a wild state of agitation. They’re fighting over who will command the team with Barda gone and the debate as devolved into battle. The Furies’ costumes have that Kirby signature look which makes one wonder what a Wonder Woman book would have looked like under Kirby’s pen. Another distinct detail is that many of the furies (and another woman seen later in the book) have wide eyes and tiny pupils, a look that says “madness”. Kirby seems to subscribe to the theory that war is a man’s game and any woman who stays long enough on Apokolips will be driven over the edge by it. At the sight of this bickering, Barda separates two combatants and proclaims herself leader once more. Simple, but effective.
Free Form Comments
Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Uncanny X-Men #238
[Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Claremont's X-Men.]
“Gonna Be a Revolution”
Neal Adams set down so many rules for how the X-Men should be done – he established an extraordinary number of precedents in his brief tenure on the series in 1969. Speaking of it years later in an interview, he said, “I never thought the X-Men should be a story then a story then a story – it should be this tapestry that goes on and on and on.” Indeed, we see that phenomenon in his and Roy Thomas’ issues. One chapter will conclude, but the next will begin by flashing back to before the previous one ended.
Claremont followed that example for years. Here, in the conclusion to the four-part Genoshan story, the author spends a massive percentage of the available 22 pages dwelling on Madelyne Pryor’s development into something otherworldly – it’s all less to do with Genosha and more to do with the upcoming “Inferno” crossover. But Claremont blends the two concepts rather seamlessly, and ultimately his creative decision doesn’t detract from the Genosha plot, but enhances it in bizarre, occasionally ineffable ways.
“Gonna Be a Revolution”
Neal Adams set down so many rules for how the X-Men should be done – he established an extraordinary number of precedents in his brief tenure on the series in 1969. Speaking of it years later in an interview, he said, “I never thought the X-Men should be a story then a story then a story – it should be this tapestry that goes on and on and on.” Indeed, we see that phenomenon in his and Roy Thomas’ issues. One chapter will conclude, but the next will begin by flashing back to before the previous one ended.
Claremont followed that example for years. Here, in the conclusion to the four-part Genoshan story, the author spends a massive percentage of the available 22 pages dwelling on Madelyne Pryor’s development into something otherworldly – it’s all less to do with Genosha and more to do with the upcoming “Inferno” crossover. But Claremont blends the two concepts rather seamlessly, and ultimately his creative decision doesn’t detract from the Genosha plot, but enhances it in bizarre, occasionally ineffable ways.
Monday, September 21, 2009
New Gods #8
[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at Jack Kirby's New Gods. I make a brief comment below, that spoils the end of Final Crisis (I don't think I need spoiler warnings if the thing has gone to graphic novel, right?)]
“The Death Wish of Terrible Turpin!”
The struggle between my preexisting knowledge of the animated New Gods and the original Fourth World comics comes to a head with this, Dan Turpin’s swan song. There was no way to read this comic without the feelings resurfacing from watching Apokolips...Now!, The two part season finale of Superman: The Animated Series. For those who are unaware, Dan Turpin is featured throughout the second season of the cartoon as a Detective of the Metropolis Police Department. He’s also modeled to resemble King Kirby himself and has a sacrifice in these episodes which mirrors the one in this issue. The real life Kirby died right around the time of the episodes so the whole thing becomes a very poignant emotional event for comic book fans. This issue has some strong character moments, but they don’t have the emotional resonance that Bruce Timm and his crew provided on the small screen.
The premise to this issue is not a new one to comic book readers. Villain (Kalibak) cuts a path of destruction through the city (Metropolis) in order to bring out the hero (Orion) to do battle. Orion heads this call, with his partner Light Ray at his side. Again, I’m enjoying the dynamic between the two of them as it doesn’t fall into cliche bickering like, for instance, the DC characters Hawk and Dove. Light Ray is the answer to Orion’s mercurial temper, asking Orion to be cautious or to think things through. However Light Ray also realizes they’re at war and does not cross Orions path during this crucial battle.
Kalibak’s motivations are simple hatred towards all of New Genesis, however in the Superman animated series, they added jealousy for Darkseid’s attention. Orion still fights for New Genesis, but the glee he takes in hurting Kaliback is as apparent as it was taking down Slig in issue 5. During the battle, Orion loses his helmet and Light Ray retrieves it for him. Ashamed of his visage, Orion keeps his head pointed away from Light Ray and yells “You saw my true face!”. Of course Orion had revealed his “true face” long before the Helmet came off.
Kalibak is defeated by then end of the issue, however it takes the intervention of the mortal Dan Turpin to do so. Turpin has been keeping track of the Fourth World invasion of his city/planet and is determined to put an end to it. Like most humans, Turpin is unnerved by the otherworldly or alien, and must make the supernatural fit into his world view. His refrain throughout the issue is that he’s going to put all of the New Gods behind bars, as if a human prison could hold any of them. Despite his officers pleas, Turin continues to jump into the battle with Kaliback, firing weapons and launching grenades while his body endures a tremendous amount of damage. Fighting towards victory without concern for one’s life is something Kirby saw a lot of during wartime. He might have drawn inspiration from wild cowboys and cutthroat soldiers from the movies as well. I also saw the battle as a meta struggle between the early “cops and robbers” comics Kirby started on and the superhero comics of the Silver Age. A guy in a fedora and a gun couldn’t compete with Spiderman or the Fantastic Four with young males in this era. Yet those older comics are where Kirby got his start, so he holds them in high regard. Why else would he bring back characters like Turpin and the Newsboy Legion? I doubt this was a conscious decision on Kirby’s part, but it’s something I saw from my point of view.
It takes the full electrical output from the city to knock out Kalbak - a moment to reinforce the power of humanity. Turpin appears to survive the experience, which is something his animated counterpart does not. Because of this discrepancy, I assumed Turpin would die by the end of the comic. This doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the issue, but it does make me realize that my objectivity for this project is ultimately compromised by the interpretation of these characters in other media.
Final Musings
-So Orion is in Metropolis, then? Maybe that’s the reason for all the traveling in the Jimmy Olsen title. I’m hoping for an Orion/Superman team-up down the road.
-Under Kirby’s pencil, people that have been beaten up take on a rocky, cragged look to their faces - not unlike The Thing from the Fantastic Four
-As pointed out in the forward, Kalibak has been on that building, doing his best King Kong impression, since New Gods #5. Not a big error in my book
-There’s some ambiguity in Orion and Kalibak’s shared past. Orion says the two fought when they were young, however Kalibak constantly refers to him as a New Genesis being and seems shocked at the reveal of Orion’s face. Hopefully we’re in for another flashback ala The Pact!
[Dan Turpin takes on a very strange role in Morrison's Final Crisis: he becomes the unwilling human host for Darkseid and dies when he dies (i think) -- from Batman's Bullet or Superman's singing or something. It is a strange fate to give him, especially when you remember that a lot of people thought he was a stand in for Kirby. The human trying to stand against the New Gods, BECOMES the worst of them; Kirby is figured as his most horrible and despotic creation? This reading does not really work for me -- there must be a better way to read Turpin in Final Crisis: who's got it?]
[I have also been thinking about the "Modernization" of Darkseid in post-Kirby appearances and I guess the things that don't ring right with me are just the fact that more than once Darkseid appears wearing a mask, which seems beneath his Satanic grandeur, and the fact that he comes from somewhere, that he was young at some point. Morrison writes him as a cosmic force of nature (Darkseid IS), and I like that. I bet there is a great argument that Darkseid is weaker in Morrison's hands, and I am totally open to hearing it.]
“The Death Wish of Terrible Turpin!”
The struggle between my preexisting knowledge of the animated New Gods and the original Fourth World comics comes to a head with this, Dan Turpin’s swan song. There was no way to read this comic without the feelings resurfacing from watching Apokolips...Now!, The two part season finale of Superman: The Animated Series. For those who are unaware, Dan Turpin is featured throughout the second season of the cartoon as a Detective of the Metropolis Police Department. He’s also modeled to resemble King Kirby himself and has a sacrifice in these episodes which mirrors the one in this issue. The real life Kirby died right around the time of the episodes so the whole thing becomes a very poignant emotional event for comic book fans. This issue has some strong character moments, but they don’t have the emotional resonance that Bruce Timm and his crew provided on the small screen.
The premise to this issue is not a new one to comic book readers. Villain (Kalibak) cuts a path of destruction through the city (Metropolis) in order to bring out the hero (Orion) to do battle. Orion heads this call, with his partner Light Ray at his side. Again, I’m enjoying the dynamic between the two of them as it doesn’t fall into cliche bickering like, for instance, the DC characters Hawk and Dove. Light Ray is the answer to Orion’s mercurial temper, asking Orion to be cautious or to think things through. However Light Ray also realizes they’re at war and does not cross Orions path during this crucial battle.
Kalibak’s motivations are simple hatred towards all of New Genesis, however in the Superman animated series, they added jealousy for Darkseid’s attention. Orion still fights for New Genesis, but the glee he takes in hurting Kaliback is as apparent as it was taking down Slig in issue 5. During the battle, Orion loses his helmet and Light Ray retrieves it for him. Ashamed of his visage, Orion keeps his head pointed away from Light Ray and yells “You saw my true face!”. Of course Orion had revealed his “true face” long before the Helmet came off.
Kalibak is defeated by then end of the issue, however it takes the intervention of the mortal Dan Turpin to do so. Turpin has been keeping track of the Fourth World invasion of his city/planet and is determined to put an end to it. Like most humans, Turpin is unnerved by the otherworldly or alien, and must make the supernatural fit into his world view. His refrain throughout the issue is that he’s going to put all of the New Gods behind bars, as if a human prison could hold any of them. Despite his officers pleas, Turin continues to jump into the battle with Kaliback, firing weapons and launching grenades while his body endures a tremendous amount of damage. Fighting towards victory without concern for one’s life is something Kirby saw a lot of during wartime. He might have drawn inspiration from wild cowboys and cutthroat soldiers from the movies as well. I also saw the battle as a meta struggle between the early “cops and robbers” comics Kirby started on and the superhero comics of the Silver Age. A guy in a fedora and a gun couldn’t compete with Spiderman or the Fantastic Four with young males in this era. Yet those older comics are where Kirby got his start, so he holds them in high regard. Why else would he bring back characters like Turpin and the Newsboy Legion? I doubt this was a conscious decision on Kirby’s part, but it’s something I saw from my point of view.
It takes the full electrical output from the city to knock out Kalbak - a moment to reinforce the power of humanity. Turpin appears to survive the experience, which is something his animated counterpart does not. Because of this discrepancy, I assumed Turpin would die by the end of the comic. This doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the issue, but it does make me realize that my objectivity for this project is ultimately compromised by the interpretation of these characters in other media.
Final Musings
-So Orion is in Metropolis, then? Maybe that’s the reason for all the traveling in the Jimmy Olsen title. I’m hoping for an Orion/Superman team-up down the road.
-Under Kirby’s pencil, people that have been beaten up take on a rocky, cragged look to their faces - not unlike The Thing from the Fantastic Four
-As pointed out in the forward, Kalibak has been on that building, doing his best King Kong impression, since New Gods #5. Not a big error in my book
-There’s some ambiguity in Orion and Kalibak’s shared past. Orion says the two fought when they were young, however Kalibak constantly refers to him as a New Genesis being and seems shocked at the reveal of Orion’s face. Hopefully we’re in for another flashback ala The Pact!
[Dan Turpin takes on a very strange role in Morrison's Final Crisis: he becomes the unwilling human host for Darkseid and dies when he dies (i think) -- from Batman's Bullet or Superman's singing or something. It is a strange fate to give him, especially when you remember that a lot of people thought he was a stand in for Kirby. The human trying to stand against the New Gods, BECOMES the worst of them; Kirby is figured as his most horrible and despotic creation? This reading does not really work for me -- there must be a better way to read Turpin in Final Crisis: who's got it?]
[I have also been thinking about the "Modernization" of Darkseid in post-Kirby appearances and I guess the things that don't ring right with me are just the fact that more than once Darkseid appears wearing a mask, which seems beneath his Satanic grandeur, and the fact that he comes from somewhere, that he was young at some point. Morrison writes him as a cosmic force of nature (Darkseid IS), and I like that. I bet there is a great argument that Darkseid is weaker in Morrison's hands, and I am totally open to hearing it.]
Friday, September 18, 2009
The Regurgitation Of Kitty Pryde
[Plok concludes his epic and fun three part guest blog on lazy storytelling. This has been a truly exciting series, and Plok is welcome to come back any time he wants.]
Oh, sorry: I lied.
Bob just doesn't fit, after all.
Or...maybe he does?
Hmm...I think maybe Arthur C. Clarke might fit better, actually...
But the hell with it, I'm gonna make Bob fit, even if he doesn't, even if there are better options out there! Because Bob Hope was another one who came up through the cracks in the showbiz mantle, although of course he did get the million-dollar paycheques...but there was a reason for that. It was because he was both very good, and very seasoned. They say by the time he was thirty years old he had such command of his craft, that if a bomb had gone off somewhere in the theatre he would've just used it...subsumed it into his act like Zeus subsumed the Titanic powers, and no one the wiser. Did he write his own jokes? Well, no...because that was a job done by all the other Old Pros, who came up blinking into the sunlight along with him, the journeymen without "finer" careers, who could always get a job, so long as it was a job...
But we shouldn't get on Bob too much, just because he used other people's material.
Because after all, what do we do, if not that?
Beats and touchstones, touchstones and beats...they infect everything. We mock the aging Bob Hope who toured the continent in a Winnebago like Mentor without Billy...and never knew where he was, because it didn't matter: "Boy, that Mayor So-And-So sure is a pistol, isn't he?" The very template for every entertainer-figure in every SF satire from his day to ours...gimme a "C", a bouncy "C"...
But he had an excuse for it. He wasn't doing it in the dark. He was an old man by the time he started pulling that shit, for God's sake...an old man with a fifty-year career behind him. Absolutely, at a certain point he was just out there cashing the cheques...but what was he supposed to do, retire?
Twin Peaks, Season 2 Episode 18 (or episode 25)
By Jill Duffy, girl reporter
[Jill Duffy continues her episode by episode look at Twin Peaks]
I used to have a literature professor who, before discussing a new work that the class had read, would start the class by asking, “What happened?” meaning, “Let’s recap the thing we all just read.” We’d talk about “what happened” in only a few minutes. It’s such a basic question, but it oriented everyone. It also made us understand what other people in the class saw as the most important or most striking features of the text. (It’s also an unintimidating question that gets people talking.)
After we had answered that question, the professor would say, “Okay. So, what’d ya think?”
We were allowed to answer that question generally at first (“I liked it”), but she’d eventually press and ask, “What part did you like?” “What character did you like?” And finally: “Why did you like it?”
[Jill Duffy continues her episode by episode look at Twin Peaks]
I used to have a literature professor who, before discussing a new work that the class had read, would start the class by asking, “What happened?” meaning, “Let’s recap the thing we all just read.” We’d talk about “what happened” in only a few minutes. It’s such a basic question, but it oriented everyone. It also made us understand what other people in the class saw as the most important or most striking features of the text. (It’s also an unintimidating question that gets people talking.)
After we had answered that question, the professor would say, “Okay. So, what’d ya think?”
We were allowed to answer that question generally at first (“I liked it”), but she’d eventually press and ask, “What part did you like?” “What character did you like?” And finally: “Why did you like it?”
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Fear Of A Nazi Coffeepot
[Plok continues his post from Tuesday -- and will conclude tomorrow.]
So to continue, then...
Is it now, finally, to be Painkiller Jane?
Well, you bet it is! It's just that we're going to get there by way of Akira and Bob Hope and Gilligan's
Island!
Uh...
HIP, HIP...!
(plays cricket sounds on dictaphone)
...hooray?
(rewinds; plays again)
...Because okay, there I was, all set to write a post for Geoff under the title "Throwing Out The Laundry List", and make it all about how when a lot of people make a piece of entertainment these days, they cheat: they just identify beats, and hit them, and leave out the soul. Twists and subverted expectations and the like, these are all formulaic things now, you just have to have 'em: the nice old man was really the killer all along, because that's what the beats tell you is required as the least-expected thing...but of course once you see the formula there in front of you, whatever is least-expected becomes most-expected, and then it's hard to keep caring. It becomes difficult not to see a given TV show, movie, comic book as just ticking off items on the laundry list labelled "Show", just going through the motions, and if the beats are bloody STUPID then they're still the beats, so you're still stuck with them, even if they don't make any sense at all, even if they commit the most phenomenal atrocities of irony on their way to arriving at the dumb place they never planned to go anywhere else but...!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Forever People #8
[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at Jack Kirby's New Gods. I make a brief comment below.]
“The Power!”
In the last Mister Miracle review, Geoff and I questioned Kirby’s ultimate definition of the anti-life equation. This issue of Forever People provides the most concrete depiction of the equation yet, however I’m not convinced Kirby will not change the rules further down the road.
The latest human to wield to power of command is ‘Billion dollar’ Bates, a stereotypical southern business tycoon who has gathered massive wealth and power by using his power of persuasion in business dealings. Early on in his career, he searches out a satanic cult known as The Sect who defines his ability as an otherworldly power. The Sect consists of an underground race of pink, hairless humanoid beings dressed in blue robes. In the prologue, several unseen people infiltrate the Sect and plan something involving Bates. In the following captions, Kirby explains Bates has built a massive compound above The Sect which is protected by his own private military. The caption is composed as a limerick, with much alliteration. It flows well - better than certain text pieces in past issues.
“The Power!”
In the last Mister Miracle review, Geoff and I questioned Kirby’s ultimate definition of the anti-life equation. This issue of Forever People provides the most concrete depiction of the equation yet, however I’m not convinced Kirby will not change the rules further down the road.
The latest human to wield to power of command is ‘Billion dollar’ Bates, a stereotypical southern business tycoon who has gathered massive wealth and power by using his power of persuasion in business dealings. Early on in his career, he searches out a satanic cult known as The Sect who defines his ability as an otherworldly power. The Sect consists of an underground race of pink, hairless humanoid beings dressed in blue robes. In the prologue, several unseen people infiltrate the Sect and plan something involving Bates. In the following captions, Kirby explains Bates has built a massive compound above The Sect which is protected by his own private military. The caption is composed as a limerick, with much alliteration. It flows well - better than certain text pieces in past issues.
Free Form Comments
Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Mark Twain's Wife...
[Guest Blogger Plok writes the first of a three part thing, all of which will be up this week.]
...She knew the words, but not the music!
Hello, Remarkablists; I've been watching TV. Normally I don't get a whole lot of the fancier channels, where the really interesting filler material is brought out, but while I've been away on a working holiday the last couple of weeks I've been enjoying a rather full plate of trash...which Geoff has kindly offered to let me empty on this here blog, and so here I am, and looking forward to it too. Actually, I think this is the best possible place for the diatribe I have in mind, because this is a blog that doesn't sneer at trash (I don't either), but instead examines it for clues to the way pop-culture conventions tend to slip and slide and change their skins...everywhere a narrative exploding or flipping inside-out, to revise itself -- and memory revealing itself to be, just as Bertrand Russell had it, much more a performance of the present than a record of the past...
...She knew the words, but not the music!
Hello, Remarkablists; I've been watching TV. Normally I don't get a whole lot of the fancier channels, where the really interesting filler material is brought out, but while I've been away on a working holiday the last couple of weeks I've been enjoying a rather full plate of trash...which Geoff has kindly offered to let me empty on this here blog, and so here I am, and looking forward to it too. Actually, I think this is the best possible place for the diatribe I have in mind, because this is a blog that doesn't sneer at trash (I don't either), but instead examines it for clues to the way pop-culture conventions tend to slip and slide and change their skins...everywhere a narrative exploding or flipping inside-out, to revise itself -- and memory revealing itself to be, just as Bertrand Russell had it, much more a performance of the present than a record of the past...
Uncanny X-Men #237
[Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Claremont's X-Men.]
“Who’s Human?”
In terms of the X-Men’s characterization, Leonardi (this time teamed with classic X-inker Terry Austin) takes things one step back after the previous issue’s tremendous leap forward. Claremont takes dialogue cues from his artist’s visuals, and when writing for Leonardi’s cartoonishly baby-faced women and massively broad-shouldered men, he loses some of the coolness that Silvestri brings out in him. So when Claremont reprises the trick of the previous issue – i.e., having the bulk of the team only appear for four pages – the effect is less discomfiting, and more cutesy. (Note Claremont’s mockery of his own narrative trick in the first caption: “Elsewhere on the island ... guess who’s (finally) arrived ...”)
“Who’s Human?”
In terms of the X-Men’s characterization, Leonardi (this time teamed with classic X-inker Terry Austin) takes things one step back after the previous issue’s tremendous leap forward. Claremont takes dialogue cues from his artist’s visuals, and when writing for Leonardi’s cartoonishly baby-faced women and massively broad-shouldered men, he loses some of the coolness that Silvestri brings out in him. So when Claremont reprises the trick of the previous issue – i.e., having the bulk of the team only appear for four pages – the effect is less discomfiting, and more cutesy. (Note Claremont’s mockery of his own narrative trick in the first caption: “Elsewhere on the island ... guess who’s (finally) arrived ...”)
Monday, September 14, 2009
Pleased Pleased ME!
[Scott discusses the Beatles Remasters]
Critiquing the Beatles catalogue would be like critiquing Shakespeare or the Bible; it’s quite simply one of the most influential bodies of work ever created and we all have our most favorite components as well as those parts that we think aren’t so good, all of which have probably been discussed ad infinitum. So, with that in mind, when looking at the newly remastered Beatles’ discs, it is best we look at what is new.
First of all, the aspect of these reissues that people have most anxiously been awaiting: the sound. When I first heard they were going to be doing these remasters, I wondered about the necessity. Having grown up with the 1987 CD releases and, since my parents did not have an extensive Beatles record collection (unlike the parents of many in my generation), I always felt that the Beatles CDs sounded fine; better, in fact, than more recently recorded albums available on CD. U2’s Rattle & Hum, for example, recorded in 1988, one year after those original issues of the Beatles catalogue, always sounded far more in need of a remastering than the Beatles (still does). In short, I thought the complaints in quality were the result of audiophiles who, as Johnny Greenwood once put it, “desperately wanted music to sound as good to them as it did when they were fifteen.” Upon my purchase of the complete stereo remasters boxed set, I must say that I couldn’t have been more wrong.
First of all, a word on the process (a more detailed description of this can be found in the August 18 Rolling Stone featuring the cover story of ‘Why The Beatles broke up, sorry, couldn’t find a link to this); the idea was not to replicate the vinyl versions of the album but, rather, to create a sound as close to the original master tape as possible. Additionally, as mono was the dominant format at the time, with the exception of Help! and Rubber Soul which were both given stereo mixes by George Martin for the 1987 release, this is the first time any real attention has been given to the stereo mixes of most of the albums. The band’s first three albums benefit the most from this process and, as clichéd as it may sound, it is truly like hearing them again for the first time.
At a casual listen, the first thing that you will notice is that the songs sound louder, crisper and fuller; that, in itself, is a major improvement. But, for long time Beatles fans, the real treat will come when you put your headphones on and find yourself hearing instruments you’ve never heard before. The differences are subtle but, at the same time, undeniably noticeable. McCartney’s serpentine bass lines from “Please Please Me” to “Paperback Writer” to “Something” are more at the forefront than they’ve ever been and little things like Lennon’s vocal having a little extra growl make songs you’ve heard a million times sound brand new. On “I Saw Her Standing There”, it sounds like Harrison is IN THE ROOM with you on the guitar solo. On “Twist and Shout”, one of the finest vocal performances in rock, you can actually hear Lennon’s vocal chords shredding (proving that great minds think alike, Anthonly DeCurtis made this EXACT same observation in his review of the set). Rockers like “Paperback Writer”, “Helter Skelter”, “Back In The USSR” and “Revolution” sound like the monsters that they always should have been and, when you get to the final orchestral swell of “The End”, it is a damn near transcendent experience. The clarity on these recordings is so great that even the slight degradation in quality that comes from transferring the files to mp3 barely affects their quality.
In addition to the sound, the packaging is a treat as well; all albums contain, when applicable, the original liner notes (my favorite is from Please Please Me where a reviewer declares the Beatles the most interesting band “since the Shadows”), many of which were not even available on the 1987 releases, in addition to newly penned historical notes as well as ‘recording notes’ that track the growth of the Beatles recording process from two track on their earliest recordings to eight track on their final. Each CD contains a ‘mini-documentary’ (most are about 3 minutes) that is playable on your computer but, if you get the boxed set, it comes with a DVD which contains all the mini-docs that can be played individually or back-to-back.
The boxed set contains all 12 studio albums, the Yellow Submarine soundtrack (so now I finally have “Hey Bulldog” and “All Together Now” in my library) and the Past Masters, now combined into a two disc set (16 discs in all). They come in a wrap-around case with a slip cover which, in an age where most of us rip our audio to our computers or iPods, provides a convenient method of storage until you feel the need to break them out again. All in all, it’s well worth the price tag (somewhere between 170-180 dollars but, for me, once I’d traded in my old Beatles discs-and a few other less notable CDs and DVDs-gotten an additional 20% on my trade in and an additional 10% discount, I ended up paying about 60).
For the serious Beatles fan, you MUST have this; go buy it now. For the more casual fan, put it on your Christmas Wish List and, in the mean time, go pick up a couple of your favorite albums just to give it a listen (if you’re a hardcore audiophile, the mono albums are also available in a more expensive and limited boxed set).
And, for the record, my favorite Beatle is Ringo and my favorite album alternates between Revolver and The White Album but, depending on my mood, I just might choose A Hard Day’s Night over them all (the best of their early albums and, in my opinion, the first ‘true’ Beatles album).
Critiquing the Beatles catalogue would be like critiquing Shakespeare or the Bible; it’s quite simply one of the most influential bodies of work ever created and we all have our most favorite components as well as those parts that we think aren’t so good, all of which have probably been discussed ad infinitum. So, with that in mind, when looking at the newly remastered Beatles’ discs, it is best we look at what is new.
First of all, the aspect of these reissues that people have most anxiously been awaiting: the sound. When I first heard they were going to be doing these remasters, I wondered about the necessity. Having grown up with the 1987 CD releases and, since my parents did not have an extensive Beatles record collection (unlike the parents of many in my generation), I always felt that the Beatles CDs sounded fine; better, in fact, than more recently recorded albums available on CD. U2’s Rattle & Hum, for example, recorded in 1988, one year after those original issues of the Beatles catalogue, always sounded far more in need of a remastering than the Beatles (still does). In short, I thought the complaints in quality were the result of audiophiles who, as Johnny Greenwood once put it, “desperately wanted music to sound as good to them as it did when they were fifteen.” Upon my purchase of the complete stereo remasters boxed set, I must say that I couldn’t have been more wrong.
First of all, a word on the process (a more detailed description of this can be found in the August 18 Rolling Stone featuring the cover story of ‘Why The Beatles broke up, sorry, couldn’t find a link to this); the idea was not to replicate the vinyl versions of the album but, rather, to create a sound as close to the original master tape as possible. Additionally, as mono was the dominant format at the time, with the exception of Help! and Rubber Soul which were both given stereo mixes by George Martin for the 1987 release, this is the first time any real attention has been given to the stereo mixes of most of the albums. The band’s first three albums benefit the most from this process and, as clichéd as it may sound, it is truly like hearing them again for the first time.
At a casual listen, the first thing that you will notice is that the songs sound louder, crisper and fuller; that, in itself, is a major improvement. But, for long time Beatles fans, the real treat will come when you put your headphones on and find yourself hearing instruments you’ve never heard before. The differences are subtle but, at the same time, undeniably noticeable. McCartney’s serpentine bass lines from “Please Please Me” to “Paperback Writer” to “Something” are more at the forefront than they’ve ever been and little things like Lennon’s vocal having a little extra growl make songs you’ve heard a million times sound brand new. On “I Saw Her Standing There”, it sounds like Harrison is IN THE ROOM with you on the guitar solo. On “Twist and Shout”, one of the finest vocal performances in rock, you can actually hear Lennon’s vocal chords shredding (proving that great minds think alike, Anthonly DeCurtis made this EXACT same observation in his review of the set). Rockers like “Paperback Writer”, “Helter Skelter”, “Back In The USSR” and “Revolution” sound like the monsters that they always should have been and, when you get to the final orchestral swell of “The End”, it is a damn near transcendent experience. The clarity on these recordings is so great that even the slight degradation in quality that comes from transferring the files to mp3 barely affects their quality.
In addition to the sound, the packaging is a treat as well; all albums contain, when applicable, the original liner notes (my favorite is from Please Please Me where a reviewer declares the Beatles the most interesting band “since the Shadows”), many of which were not even available on the 1987 releases, in addition to newly penned historical notes as well as ‘recording notes’ that track the growth of the Beatles recording process from two track on their earliest recordings to eight track on their final. Each CD contains a ‘mini-documentary’ (most are about 3 minutes) that is playable on your computer but, if you get the boxed set, it comes with a DVD which contains all the mini-docs that can be played individually or back-to-back.
The boxed set contains all 12 studio albums, the Yellow Submarine soundtrack (so now I finally have “Hey Bulldog” and “All Together Now” in my library) and the Past Masters, now combined into a two disc set (16 discs in all). They come in a wrap-around case with a slip cover which, in an age where most of us rip our audio to our computers or iPods, provides a convenient method of storage until you feel the need to break them out again. All in all, it’s well worth the price tag (somewhere between 170-180 dollars but, for me, once I’d traded in my old Beatles discs-and a few other less notable CDs and DVDs-gotten an additional 20% on my trade in and an additional 10% discount, I ended up paying about 60).
For the serious Beatles fan, you MUST have this; go buy it now. For the more casual fan, put it on your Christmas Wish List and, in the mean time, go pick up a couple of your favorite albums just to give it a listen (if you’re a hardcore audiophile, the mono albums are also available in a more expensive and limited boxed set).
And, for the record, my favorite Beatle is Ringo and my favorite album alternates between Revolver and The White Album but, depending on my mood, I just might choose A Hard Day’s Night over them all (the best of their early albums and, in my opinion, the first ‘true’ Beatles album).
With love. From me. To You.
[Andy Bentley writes about Beatles: Rock Band]
One of the happiest experiences of my life occurred in the winter of 2006 at Skidmore College’s Beatlemania. Professor of Music, Gordon Thompson, organizes the concert each year to allow students and faculty to perform The Fab Four’s songs and to celebrate all things Beatles. My brother was in his senior year there, and we organized a group with two of my friends, Tom and Adam. Being mostly non-faculty now student, we were relegated to one song, Eight Days A Week. To say I was nervous is to put it mildly. As I walked on stage, my guitar became a foreign object and my hands began to sweat. I shook myself out of it and began the infamous upward chord progression
I glanced over at a group of Asian girls who were swaying to the beat in the front row and I smiled and nodded. I knew all would be well, even if I missed a note or two. It was amazing to be on stage playing this song everyone in the room knew and loved. My mom came up to us afterwards, beaming with pride and wearing her Beatles pin - an original from her youth. I put up video of the performance on Youtube the next day with some trepidation. We all know how nasty the internet can get and I didn’t want this experience marred by an 11 year old with a ‘tude. I’m happy to say it’s up to about 80,000 views and barring a few complaints, it has mostly received praise from the viewers.
The Beatles are a universal truth, maybe one of the last ones we’ll ever experience. Nathan Rabin of the Onion’s AV podcast suggests that the emotional response to Michael Jackson’s death was not just for the performer, but for the death of a cultural consensus. Every fan of music had Thriller, and everyone had Sgt. Peppers. But today’s music has become very splintered for a myriad of reasons. He goes on to say that current works of art that do have a wide spanning audience such as The Davinci Code have to be watered down and homogenized for the masses. There is a nostalgia factor at work there, yet I still can’t see another Beatles ever happening. What music form the 90’s would have such a massive presence in forty years? Nirvana? Maybe, but I don’t think they were around long enough. It’s an interesting topic, one not limited to music. No one is going to touch the ratings record MASH’s finale had because there’s so many choices on cable TV. Comics probably aren’t ever going to hit that 1 million orders mark they used to. Even video games don’t have the massive hold on youth as they used to.
But I digress. I’m supposed to be reviewing The Beatles: Rock Band for you. I purchased the game-only PS3 edition as I already had the instruments from the first Rock Band. The trademark Beatles instruments are fun, but just not in my budget for this week. The Guitar Hero/Rock Band phenomenon began with studio musicians recording the tracks for game because Harmonix couldn’t afford the rights to the originals. As the games grew in popularity, and the music industry fell into the toilet, bands suddenly realized this was a great marketing tool to get their music to new and young consumers. So by now, it was safe enough for Sir Paul and Ringo to sign off on this recreation of their careers. George’s son, Dhani, also contributed heavily to the game.
The game follows the careers of the Beatles as they move from the Cavern in Liverpool, to the Ed Sullivan Show, Shea Stadium, Budokahn, the studio and finally the roof top of Abbey Road. The character models are cartoonish at times, but they thankfully don’t veer into creepy animatronic mode. The gameplay is essentially Rock Band 2 and ranges to being very easy to quite difficult (I still can’t get 5 stars on I Saw Her Standing There in expert mode!!!). 48 tracks total and you can soon go online and purchase Abbey Road, Sgt Peppers and Rubber Soul. The greatest part of the game are the dreamscapes that accompany songs that weren’t performed live. These are pure sugar for Beatles fans:
There are plenty of people who find the whole idea of Rock Band or Guitar Hero rather silly. But for a long time gamer like myself, I just see it as further immersing yourself in the experience of the game, which from the look of Nintendo Wii sales seems to be the future for the gaming industry. When I got home and played my first song, I got a little bit of that feeling I had back at Beatlemania. I recommend the game for any Beatles fan who is willing to try something different or a gamer for is a fan of the Rock Band series.
One of the happiest experiences of my life occurred in the winter of 2006 at Skidmore College’s Beatlemania. Professor of Music, Gordon Thompson, organizes the concert each year to allow students and faculty to perform The Fab Four’s songs and to celebrate all things Beatles. My brother was in his senior year there, and we organized a group with two of my friends, Tom and Adam. Being mostly non-faculty now student, we were relegated to one song, Eight Days A Week. To say I was nervous is to put it mildly. As I walked on stage, my guitar became a foreign object and my hands began to sweat. I shook myself out of it and began the infamous upward chord progression
I glanced over at a group of Asian girls who were swaying to the beat in the front row and I smiled and nodded. I knew all would be well, even if I missed a note or two. It was amazing to be on stage playing this song everyone in the room knew and loved. My mom came up to us afterwards, beaming with pride and wearing her Beatles pin - an original from her youth. I put up video of the performance on Youtube the next day with some trepidation. We all know how nasty the internet can get and I didn’t want this experience marred by an 11 year old with a ‘tude. I’m happy to say it’s up to about 80,000 views and barring a few complaints, it has mostly received praise from the viewers.
The Beatles are a universal truth, maybe one of the last ones we’ll ever experience. Nathan Rabin of the Onion’s AV podcast suggests that the emotional response to Michael Jackson’s death was not just for the performer, but for the death of a cultural consensus. Every fan of music had Thriller, and everyone had Sgt. Peppers. But today’s music has become very splintered for a myriad of reasons. He goes on to say that current works of art that do have a wide spanning audience such as The Davinci Code have to be watered down and homogenized for the masses. There is a nostalgia factor at work there, yet I still can’t see another Beatles ever happening. What music form the 90’s would have such a massive presence in forty years? Nirvana? Maybe, but I don’t think they were around long enough. It’s an interesting topic, one not limited to music. No one is going to touch the ratings record MASH’s finale had because there’s so many choices on cable TV. Comics probably aren’t ever going to hit that 1 million orders mark they used to. Even video games don’t have the massive hold on youth as they used to.
But I digress. I’m supposed to be reviewing The Beatles: Rock Band for you. I purchased the game-only PS3 edition as I already had the instruments from the first Rock Band. The trademark Beatles instruments are fun, but just not in my budget for this week. The Guitar Hero/Rock Band phenomenon began with studio musicians recording the tracks for game because Harmonix couldn’t afford the rights to the originals. As the games grew in popularity, and the music industry fell into the toilet, bands suddenly realized this was a great marketing tool to get their music to new and young consumers. So by now, it was safe enough for Sir Paul and Ringo to sign off on this recreation of their careers. George’s son, Dhani, also contributed heavily to the game.
The game follows the careers of the Beatles as they move from the Cavern in Liverpool, to the Ed Sullivan Show, Shea Stadium, Budokahn, the studio and finally the roof top of Abbey Road. The character models are cartoonish at times, but they thankfully don’t veer into creepy animatronic mode. The gameplay is essentially Rock Band 2 and ranges to being very easy to quite difficult (I still can’t get 5 stars on I Saw Her Standing There in expert mode!!!). 48 tracks total and you can soon go online and purchase Abbey Road, Sgt Peppers and Rubber Soul. The greatest part of the game are the dreamscapes that accompany songs that weren’t performed live. These are pure sugar for Beatles fans:
There are plenty of people who find the whole idea of Rock Band or Guitar Hero rather silly. But for a long time gamer like myself, I just see it as further immersing yourself in the experience of the game, which from the look of Nintendo Wii sales seems to be the future for the gaming industry. When I got home and played my first song, I got a little bit of that feeling I had back at Beatlemania. I recommend the game for any Beatles fan who is willing to try something different or a gamer for is a fan of the Rock Band series.
Friday, September 11, 2009
The Muppets and Gnosticism
[I put this post up yesterday, but forgot to change the timestamp, which was set to the day I started writing it, so it got buried with posts from four days ago. Sorry if you are seeing this again.]
For Sara's birthday I got her a bunch of Muppet DVDs and the first thing we did was watch The Muppet Movie and The Muppets Take Manhattan. We had this discussion at dinner about the movie that I thought might be worth getting down in blog form.
The main thing that stuck me was the ending of the first movie. Kermit has traveled from the swamp to Hollywood picking up muppets along the way, finally getting to the office of Orson Wells' Lew Lords, who gives them the "standard rich and famous contract." The next scene is the muppets themselves making their movie, which is the movie we have just finished watching, with cardboard sets. The film could have ended there, and if it had the point would have been that their hard work paid off, and that they found friends and became successful so you should follow your dreams and so on.
But it does not end like that. It ends as Gonzo floats up high on the movie set and crashes into the cardboard rainbow which falls and breaks the whole set and then the ceiling explodes opening up a huge hole -- and a REAL rainbow comes through. There is a close-up of Kermit singing which backs out so that you see all the muppets, then backs out some more so we see a host of Jim Henson creations all bathed in the light of the rainbow. This ending is quite different because it identifies the rainbow light of the imagination (which Shelley uses at the end of Adonais) as an otherworldly force, something emphasized by the fact that the rainbow lights characters that are beyond the scope of the film -- this is not the imagination of Kermit or the muppets, but of their creator.
(And THE Creator -- remember that the rainbow is figured in the bible as the sign from God after the flood, his promise that he will not destroy the world again.)
The other thing about the Muppet movie that struck me as particularly gnostic was the way the characters recognize each other. In gnosticism some people have that "spark" of god in them and these are your people -- you have to find them, especially because as part of the fall into the mortal world they have forgotten where they come from and may not recognize themselves as chosen (think of how Morpheus finds Neo in the Matrix). A wonderful unspoken joke in the Muppet world is that while we the audience can see that that one is a muppet while that one is Eliot Gould, the characters in the movie cannot break the world into such categories. When Miss Piggy runs off with Charles Grodin in The Great Muppet Caper no one says to Charles Grodin "why would you want to date a muppet rather than a human woman." As far as anyone in the world of the films are concerned muppets are no more different from humans than humans are from each other. Part of the fun for kids watching the Muppet movie is that they know, of all the people Kermit could talk to in one scene, he is going to talk to Rolf the Dog -- because WE know they are both muppets, and we know he will be invited to join Kermit in his quest for Hollywood. We know Rolf is one of Kermit's people before Kermit does, and it is satisfying to watch him work it out -- as for example in how they both sing together and harmonize within moments of meeting each other (music, for the muppets is the great shibboleth). Gonzo's "There's not a word yet, for old friends who just met" is an absolutely gnostic maxim. You are old friends because the spark of god comes from the same ancient source, but you have not yet met in the fallen world.
And this notion of the fall making you forget who you are is a key part of the third act of Muppets take Manhattan, in which Kermit looses his memory and forgets who he is. He thinks he should be working for an ad agency (staffed by frogs) and does not know the power that is lost inside of him -- except it cant stay hidden, as he plays a tune at the diner unconsciously, alerting all of his friends to who he really is. It is a good ratcheting up of the conflict in the first movie: there, muppets did not know they were muppets; here, Kermit -- the origin, the gnostic muppet messiah -- does not know he is Kermit.
(Notice also how the Muppets Take Manhattan simply reverses the structure of the first film. In the first film Kermit starts from nowhere, gathers people and goes to get his wishes fulfilled on in Hollywood by a very Wizard of Oz Orson Wells. The "sequel" does not have much in the way of continuity as they start at the end of their college days, get rejected by Dabney Coleman as they were accepted by Wells, then scatter, then Kermit forgets who he is and becomes a indistinguishable nobody -- Phil, surrounded by Gil, Lil, and Bill. It is only a last minute lucky reversal in The Muppets Take Manhattan that does not end Kermit in the obscurity that he began at in the opening of The Muppet Movie.
And in the end he gathers all the minor muppets he has met in Manhattan and says "That's what the show has been missing -- all of you" and he puts them on stage. See, because they all BELONG on stage, and he can remind them of who they really are, just as he recently remembered. And the human waitress Jenny? Well she can make the costumes but she does not go up on stage, because at the end of the day SHE IS NOT ONE OF THEM.
I am not sure about that last paragraph, but I am sticking with it just for now. Sara may have more to add in the comments.
For Sara's birthday I got her a bunch of Muppet DVDs and the first thing we did was watch The Muppet Movie and The Muppets Take Manhattan. We had this discussion at dinner about the movie that I thought might be worth getting down in blog form.
The main thing that stuck me was the ending of the first movie. Kermit has traveled from the swamp to Hollywood picking up muppets along the way, finally getting to the office of Orson Wells' Lew Lords, who gives them the "standard rich and famous contract." The next scene is the muppets themselves making their movie, which is the movie we have just finished watching, with cardboard sets. The film could have ended there, and if it had the point would have been that their hard work paid off, and that they found friends and became successful so you should follow your dreams and so on.
But it does not end like that. It ends as Gonzo floats up high on the movie set and crashes into the cardboard rainbow which falls and breaks the whole set and then the ceiling explodes opening up a huge hole -- and a REAL rainbow comes through. There is a close-up of Kermit singing which backs out so that you see all the muppets, then backs out some more so we see a host of Jim Henson creations all bathed in the light of the rainbow. This ending is quite different because it identifies the rainbow light of the imagination (which Shelley uses at the end of Adonais) as an otherworldly force, something emphasized by the fact that the rainbow lights characters that are beyond the scope of the film -- this is not the imagination of Kermit or the muppets, but of their creator.
(And THE Creator -- remember that the rainbow is figured in the bible as the sign from God after the flood, his promise that he will not destroy the world again.)
The other thing about the Muppet movie that struck me as particularly gnostic was the way the characters recognize each other. In gnosticism some people have that "spark" of god in them and these are your people -- you have to find them, especially because as part of the fall into the mortal world they have forgotten where they come from and may not recognize themselves as chosen (think of how Morpheus finds Neo in the Matrix). A wonderful unspoken joke in the Muppet world is that while we the audience can see that that one is a muppet while that one is Eliot Gould, the characters in the movie cannot break the world into such categories. When Miss Piggy runs off with Charles Grodin in The Great Muppet Caper no one says to Charles Grodin "why would you want to date a muppet rather than a human woman." As far as anyone in the world of the films are concerned muppets are no more different from humans than humans are from each other. Part of the fun for kids watching the Muppet movie is that they know, of all the people Kermit could talk to in one scene, he is going to talk to Rolf the Dog -- because WE know they are both muppets, and we know he will be invited to join Kermit in his quest for Hollywood. We know Rolf is one of Kermit's people before Kermit does, and it is satisfying to watch him work it out -- as for example in how they both sing together and harmonize within moments of meeting each other (music, for the muppets is the great shibboleth). Gonzo's "There's not a word yet, for old friends who just met" is an absolutely gnostic maxim. You are old friends because the spark of god comes from the same ancient source, but you have not yet met in the fallen world.
And this notion of the fall making you forget who you are is a key part of the third act of Muppets take Manhattan, in which Kermit looses his memory and forgets who he is. He thinks he should be working for an ad agency (staffed by frogs) and does not know the power that is lost inside of him -- except it cant stay hidden, as he plays a tune at the diner unconsciously, alerting all of his friends to who he really is. It is a good ratcheting up of the conflict in the first movie: there, muppets did not know they were muppets; here, Kermit -- the origin, the gnostic muppet messiah -- does not know he is Kermit.
(Notice also how the Muppets Take Manhattan simply reverses the structure of the first film. In the first film Kermit starts from nowhere, gathers people and goes to get his wishes fulfilled on in Hollywood by a very Wizard of Oz Orson Wells. The "sequel" does not have much in the way of continuity as they start at the end of their college days, get rejected by Dabney Coleman as they were accepted by Wells, then scatter, then Kermit forgets who he is and becomes a indistinguishable nobody -- Phil, surrounded by Gil, Lil, and Bill. It is only a last minute lucky reversal in The Muppets Take Manhattan that does not end Kermit in the obscurity that he began at in the opening of The Muppet Movie.
And in the end he gathers all the minor muppets he has met in Manhattan and says "That's what the show has been missing -- all of you" and he puts them on stage. See, because they all BELONG on stage, and he can remind them of who they really are, just as he recently remembered. And the human waitress Jenny? Well she can make the costumes but she does not go up on stage, because at the end of the day SHE IS NOT ONE OF THEM.
I am not sure about that last paragraph, but I am sticking with it just for now. Sara may have more to add in the comments.
Twin Peaks, Season 2 Episode 17 (or episode 24)
By Jill Duffy, girl reporter [continuing her episode by episode look at Twin Peaks.]
When was the last time someone asked you to seriously examine yourself? When was the last time you willfully dismissed the consequences of your own actions, knowing someone else is taking a huge hit for your actions, or as the Log Lady puts it, ruined by a horrible “sadness.” Sadness is a surprising word.
We might usually presume someone hurt by our actions would respond with fury, or revenge, or a long-held grudge. But perhaps a great and deep sadness is really all it is. This set up asks us to exam our own lives, as well as those of the protagonists in Twin Peaks. Many of the protagonists have shifted, like on a carousel, turning round slowly from one position on their high horse, to another, where they, having hurt someone, must now look them in the eyes.
A few new people turn in up this episode: Annie, from the convent, a woman named Jones who turns up like a thorn in Catherine’s side. We hear of a dead body that was autopsied, for which no cause of death could be determined, and which only weighed 65 pounds, a suggestion that something from the body was now missing, but no one could determine what it was—its soul?
There’s a silly scene at the end of with a loose weasel wreaking havoc at a party, sort of like in those old cartoons when a mouse in the house causes some high-heeled woman to stand on a chair, screaming for her life.
When was the last time someone asked you to seriously examine yourself? When was the last time you willfully dismissed the consequences of your own actions, knowing someone else is taking a huge hit for your actions, or as the Log Lady puts it, ruined by a horrible “sadness.” Sadness is a surprising word.
We might usually presume someone hurt by our actions would respond with fury, or revenge, or a long-held grudge. But perhaps a great and deep sadness is really all it is. This set up asks us to exam our own lives, as well as those of the protagonists in Twin Peaks. Many of the protagonists have shifted, like on a carousel, turning round slowly from one position on their high horse, to another, where they, having hurt someone, must now look them in the eyes.
A few new people turn in up this episode: Annie, from the convent, a woman named Jones who turns up like a thorn in Catherine’s side. We hear of a dead body that was autopsied, for which no cause of death could be determined, and which only weighed 65 pounds, a suggestion that something from the body was now missing, but no one could determine what it was—its soul?
There’s a silly scene at the end of with a loose weasel wreaking havoc at a party, sort of like in those old cartoons when a mouse in the house causes some high-heeled woman to stand on a chair, screaming for her life.
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Jimmy Olsen #147
[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at Jack Kirby's New Gods. I make a brief comment at the end.]
A Superman in Supertown!
This was the first enjoyable issue of Jimmy Olsen in a long time. The Pact! seems to have open the floodgates to the Fourth World as Superman is finally allowed to reach Supertown and even interact with Highfather, the man who made the pact all those years ago. Jimmy and the boys get into their usual hijinks, but the wild Kirby designs in this issue make it a visual feast even if it isn’t an intellectual one.
The story starts in the hospital with Jimmy back to normal and the newsies filling him in on the details. They now have a pet in the form of Angry Charlie, the last survivor of the mutants from the evil factory. Following in the tradition of many Hannah Barbara sidekicks, Charlie is food crazed, and causes trouble at every turn. The boys agree they’ve had enough of Scotland and power up the wiz wagon to return home. The trip is derailed, however, when the wagon is dragged toward an open volcano. The wagon lands on a tethered platform where self-proclaimed pseudo-men leap forth and zap the wiz wagon to parts unknown. These pseudo-men are essentially robots, so points to Kirby for the name and the odd all-orange design. The boys awake to find themselves dressed in new robes (creepy!) and the guests of Victor Volcanum. Volcanum, like our last villain, Kanto, has an aristocratic nature to his speech and dress. He drinks from a goblet of fire which means he’s more than human and he aspires to be the King of Earth.
Meanwhile, Superman has been following the tunnel looking for signs of invaders from Apokolips. So has Magnar, a New Genesis warrior and the two of them engage one another in combat thinking the other is the bad guy. They tussle through a Boom Tube and suddenly we have Superman on New Genesis. The fighting eventually stops once identities are made clear and Superman turns his attention towards Supertown, the place he’s been yearning for since the 1st omnibus. Magnar and his troops guide him to the city where Superman believes he will feel at home amongst the other super powered. Instead, he finds himself creating cultural faux pas over and over. The woman under the falling pillar doesn’t need saving, and the big metal robot is here to assist, not destroy. Mentally exhausted, Superman decides to take a seat where coincidentally Highfather is also resting. This is a great tease of a scene. This is our first appearance of Highfather since we’ve learned his origin so we’re eager to learn more about him. However, he’s in the book for one page, merely sitting and relaxing like anyone would. Superman explains his frustrations to him and Highfather, with a Santa Clause-like all-knowing, gently eases Superman into the mind frame that this place isn’t his destiny, however he’s needed back on his adoptive home planet. Highfather offers a way home via his wonder staff and in a flash, Superman is back on Earth. In fact, he’s inside the volcano with the boys who in the span of Superman’s travels, have been hung from a metal cage by Volcanum. Superman is about to leap to rescue them when the rocks of the volcano spring forth and pin the Man of Steel. To be continued...
What’s exciting about this issue is the economy of storytelling. Kirby interrupts right at the first turn of Volcanum from gracious host to mad man to tell the Superman story. Once we return, the boys are already in the standard death trap, and we can pretty much fill in how they got there. Kirby’s art was a standout here with the scenery on New Genesis and the design of Volcanum and his abode. The Jimmy issues had started to feel too distant from the Fourth world saga, and this trip to Supertown helps bridge that gap. . Hopefully this is a trend that will continue.
Final Musings
-The homesick Superman never felt quite right in my head, nor does the one that feels like he has to be amongst super people. His parents gave him his humanity in the form of Clark Kent which allows him to sneak into anonymity
-Volcanum is just odd. He has a mod apartment inside a volcano, he drinks fire and wears civil war mutton chops. Oh an he’s exceptionally tall. There has to be some more explanation next issue.
-An advanced referential moment occurs when Big Words (newsie with glasses) reacts to Volcanum’s intent to be the King of Earth: “That’s the kind of premise sold in “Golden Age Comics!!”. I didn’t think that terminology was that common in this era. Although Jack and Stan used to put themselves in the Fantastic Four’s NYC and there was a Marvel Comics in the Marvel universe the two worked for. Thinking of Spidey reading his own adventures used to make my brain hurt as a child.
[The essays with the Omnibus explain that A Superman in Supertown was supposed to be a kind of superhero version of It's A Wonderful Life with Highfather playing the angel to Superman's Jimmy Stewart, which is a really interesting idea -- except for various reason Kirby was dealing with other things and never really did the story justice except in a very truncated form. Which is too bad, because even though I agree with Bentley (and Grant Morrison) that Superman should be a pretty comfortable guy without a lot of angst about his "outsider" status it is a story I would like to read. The idea of a kind of Frank Capra/Jack Kirby crossover sounds really fun.]
A Superman in Supertown!
This was the first enjoyable issue of Jimmy Olsen in a long time. The Pact! seems to have open the floodgates to the Fourth World as Superman is finally allowed to reach Supertown and even interact with Highfather, the man who made the pact all those years ago. Jimmy and the boys get into their usual hijinks, but the wild Kirby designs in this issue make it a visual feast even if it isn’t an intellectual one.
The story starts in the hospital with Jimmy back to normal and the newsies filling him in on the details. They now have a pet in the form of Angry Charlie, the last survivor of the mutants from the evil factory. Following in the tradition of many Hannah Barbara sidekicks, Charlie is food crazed, and causes trouble at every turn. The boys agree they’ve had enough of Scotland and power up the wiz wagon to return home. The trip is derailed, however, when the wagon is dragged toward an open volcano. The wagon lands on a tethered platform where self-proclaimed pseudo-men leap forth and zap the wiz wagon to parts unknown. These pseudo-men are essentially robots, so points to Kirby for the name and the odd all-orange design. The boys awake to find themselves dressed in new robes (creepy!) and the guests of Victor Volcanum. Volcanum, like our last villain, Kanto, has an aristocratic nature to his speech and dress. He drinks from a goblet of fire which means he’s more than human and he aspires to be the King of Earth.
Meanwhile, Superman has been following the tunnel looking for signs of invaders from Apokolips. So has Magnar, a New Genesis warrior and the two of them engage one another in combat thinking the other is the bad guy. They tussle through a Boom Tube and suddenly we have Superman on New Genesis. The fighting eventually stops once identities are made clear and Superman turns his attention towards Supertown, the place he’s been yearning for since the 1st omnibus. Magnar and his troops guide him to the city where Superman believes he will feel at home amongst the other super powered. Instead, he finds himself creating cultural faux pas over and over. The woman under the falling pillar doesn’t need saving, and the big metal robot is here to assist, not destroy. Mentally exhausted, Superman decides to take a seat where coincidentally Highfather is also resting. This is a great tease of a scene. This is our first appearance of Highfather since we’ve learned his origin so we’re eager to learn more about him. However, he’s in the book for one page, merely sitting and relaxing like anyone would. Superman explains his frustrations to him and Highfather, with a Santa Clause-like all-knowing, gently eases Superman into the mind frame that this place isn’t his destiny, however he’s needed back on his adoptive home planet. Highfather offers a way home via his wonder staff and in a flash, Superman is back on Earth. In fact, he’s inside the volcano with the boys who in the span of Superman’s travels, have been hung from a metal cage by Volcanum. Superman is about to leap to rescue them when the rocks of the volcano spring forth and pin the Man of Steel. To be continued...
What’s exciting about this issue is the economy of storytelling. Kirby interrupts right at the first turn of Volcanum from gracious host to mad man to tell the Superman story. Once we return, the boys are already in the standard death trap, and we can pretty much fill in how they got there. Kirby’s art was a standout here with the scenery on New Genesis and the design of Volcanum and his abode. The Jimmy issues had started to feel too distant from the Fourth world saga, and this trip to Supertown helps bridge that gap. . Hopefully this is a trend that will continue.
Final Musings
-The homesick Superman never felt quite right in my head, nor does the one that feels like he has to be amongst super people. His parents gave him his humanity in the form of Clark Kent which allows him to sneak into anonymity
-Volcanum is just odd. He has a mod apartment inside a volcano, he drinks fire and wears civil war mutton chops. Oh an he’s exceptionally tall. There has to be some more explanation next issue.
-An advanced referential moment occurs when Big Words (newsie with glasses) reacts to Volcanum’s intent to be the King of Earth: “That’s the kind of premise sold in “Golden Age Comics!!”. I didn’t think that terminology was that common in this era. Although Jack and Stan used to put themselves in the Fantastic Four’s NYC and there was a Marvel Comics in the Marvel universe the two worked for. Thinking of Spidey reading his own adventures used to make my brain hurt as a child.
[The essays with the Omnibus explain that A Superman in Supertown was supposed to be a kind of superhero version of It's A Wonderful Life with Highfather playing the angel to Superman's Jimmy Stewart, which is a really interesting idea -- except for various reason Kirby was dealing with other things and never really did the story justice except in a very truncated form. Which is too bad, because even though I agree with Bentley (and Grant Morrison) that Superman should be a pretty comfortable guy without a lot of angst about his "outsider" status it is a story I would like to read. The idea of a kind of Frank Capra/Jack Kirby crossover sounds really fun.]
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WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music and books.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music and books.
Tuesday, September 08, 2009
Uncanny X-Men #236
[Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Claremont's X-Men. This is a particularly good entry.]
“Busting Loose”
Silvestri and Green return for the second part of the Genoshan storyline (which, because of its bi-weekly release schedule, required penciller Rick Leonardi and guest-inkers to pitch in on both odd-numbered chapters). Silvestri and Green open strong, producing the finest of all their X-Men covers, a dramatic “photograph” of Wolverine and Rogue strung up by their feet and flanked my smirking Genoshan magistrates. It’s an emblem for one of the running motifs of the story – the smug complacency of evil. (Note the way the soldier on the right casually and cavalierly lets his gun rest atop folded hands.)
The intensity is ramped up entirely in Part 2, Claremont possibly having been emboldened by Silvestri and Green’s more grittily intense style (versus Leonardi’s cartoonishness). Once again, as in Uncanny X-Men #s 229 and 232, the title characters have an almost alienating coolness to them. Note that the bulk of the team only appear on four pages out of a total 22, and in that time make a disconcerting impression, as they interrogate the magistrates caught by Crocodile Dundee in the previous issue. Inflamed by the unabashed racism of their antagonists, the X-Men are merciless in dealing with then:
Magistrate: “You here to finish us off, genejoke?”
Storm: “Do not tempt me. That word – ‘genejoke’ – I not like it.”
Magistrate: “Makes us even. I don’t like you!”
Storm: “Good. That will make this more ... pleasant. I require information about our missing friends.”
Magistrate: “I won’t talk!”
Storm: “You will not have to. Psylocke, he is yours.”
Silvestri has given Ororo a shit-eating grin -- as she faces the officer with steely, supernal calm -- making the moment that much more frightening. Later, after Betsy has picked their brains (in a sequence eerily saturated in Pyslocke’s trademark pinks and violets by guest colorist Petra Scotese), she begins to psychically torture them. In contrast to Storm’s icy resolve, Elizabeth is maniacally incensed:
Pyslocke: “May you rot for what you’ve done!”
Magistrate: “NO!”
Psylocke: “May you burn!”
Magistrate: “MERCY--!”
Psylocke: “And what have you shown, magistrate – you so-called upholder of the law – to the mutants you’ve enslaved and tortured and slain?!”
Colossus: “Psylocke – stop – for pity’s sake – would you kill these men?”
Psylocke: “No, Colossus. That would be too quick. Too easy.”
These X-Men are murderous, scary, righteously enraged. This was new in 1988; the first time that the “oppressed minority” aspect of the X-Men premise is being genuinely, deeply felt. For all that there have been a few dozen examples over the last 25 years of the X-Men fighting for “mutant rights,” they have never been so horrified as now by an oppressing entity (in this case, the government of Genosha) and its treatment of their kind. The series has been a long time waiting for this, but the pay-off has proven worth it. Never before this moment have the X-Men (either the team nor the series) felt so simultaneously powerful and indignant. The effect upon the narrative is utterly electrifying. As the title suggests, the X-Men are indeed “Busting Loose”: Free of the complacency of the conservative politics that derived them; free from their inability to connect in any visceral way the civil rights struggle – the Xavier “dream” -- that they supposedly embody; free from their privileged perch nested above the fray. They are truly in it now, and the series has never felt more right.
The formidability of the lead characters is also supported via third-party accounts, most particularly the Chief Magistrate’s report to the Genegineer. The scene is marvelously economical, conveying information about the relationship between these two new characters, even as they share data about the X-Men. Claremont even executes a nod to very old continuity, reminding readers of the computer virus that Kitty Pryde and the Starjammers created all the way back in Uncanny #158. In what is perhaps deliberate synchronicity by Claremont, issue 158 was also the first appearance of Rogue in an Uncanny issue, and the first on-panel encounter between her and Carol Danvers. Much of the Danvers/Rogue material first inaugurated there comes into play in “Busting Loose” as well. The use of the series’ long-term continuity here is brilliant.
Meanwhile, in one of the darkest turns the X-Men has yet taken, Rogue becomes deeply traumatized by molestation at the hands of the magistrates. The dialogue makes vague allusions to “liberties” being taken, and the narration clarifies that “All they did was touch her” ... but Claremont’s intent lies only a tiny bit below the Comics Code-approved surface. We cannot help but think that whatever happened to Rogue was very close to rape. Silvestri’s images of the character crouched in the corner of her jail cell, arms and legs wrapped tightly, are heartbreaking, and the parallels with this story’s overarching theme are devastating.
And there is yet more that Uncanny #235 accomplishes, as much of the issue is given over to sketching out the layered complexity of Genosha itself. Chris Claremont’s work has long been pigeon-holed, too often torn to shreds by those quick to point out the “Claremont clichés.” One such cliché is the team of generically nasty bad-guys, each identified by some appropriately hard-edged appellation. (See, for example, the recent Brood story, and its team comprised of Brickbat, Lockup, Tension, Whiphand, etc.) Yet here Claremont proves just as capable of creating subtler antagonists, whose relationships are not so prosaic and one-sided.
With the Genegineer, for example, Claremont primes readers for a one-dimensional conception, naming the character David Moreau (thus, a “Dr. Moreau” whose field is genetic mutation, living on an “island” nation). But instead of an outré lunatic, the character’s first appearance has him studiously at work in his own back garden, dressed in a sweater and bantering with his teenage son. (He even quotes Stan Lee!) This may be Claremont’s riposte to Louise Simonson’s “Island of Dr. Moreau” riff in issues 59-61 of New Mutants, replacing Simonson’s maniacal gene-splicer with something more insidiously evil. Indeed, the Genegineer actually seems somewhat sympathetic in his early scenes -- most notably his chastisement of the Chief Magistrate for allowing Rogue’s molestation:
Chief: “Those responsible have been disciplined. It won’t happen again.”
Genegineer: “If it does, Chief Anderson, you’ll answer for it. I thought your people were professionals.”
Chief: “They’re human. They’re fallible.”
Moreau is painted with at least some modicum of compassion, while Anderson seems incredibly heartless, rationalizing rape as the result of mere human fallibility in order to sweep her officers’ transgressions under the table.
Yet during Moreau’s later confrontation with his son, Phillip, the former’s true colors become obvious. The Genegineer heartlessly describes the process to which he plans to subject Phillip’s mutant girlfriend, Jennifer, changing her natural mutant power – a healing ability – into an ability more useful to Genoshan industry. Claremont creates more harsh imagery (in an issue already packed full with it), as David explains that “instead of bending flesh to her will, [Jennifer will] cut through rock, shape stone and steel ...” Just as Jennifer’s seemingly benign ability is to be warped for something hard and brutal, so are we slowly shown that David’s seemingly soft exterior disguises a dark, evil core – he is as heartless as the Chief Magistrate he reprimanded. And of course, this is also emblematic of the entire country, which disguises its cruel system of slavery and apartheid behind bright, shiny “Green and Pleasant” slogans.
Phillip, meanwhile, is clearly marked to be the main character of this entire piece – the character who will truly change over the course of the rest of the story. When we first meet him, Phillip seems genial and well intentioned, yet is surprisingly and sickeningly numb to the grotesque sight of a large, bald mutant – his syntax as labored and stilted as the mutant killed early in the previous chapter – decked out in a rainbow-hued skintight costume. When the Genegineer’s garden is charred by a magistrate vehicle’s afterburners, Phillip casually commands the brightly colored (or “Coloured,” as it would be put in South Africa) mutant servant to “Fix it, willya, boy?” and departs the scene.
Phillip is as numb as anyone else to his country’s amorality, and his eyes are not opened until his girlfriend and her family become targets. Claremont is as horrifying here as in every other scene of the comic: Phillip’s terror is tangible as he is nearly beaten by a magistrate, and then the terror becomes sheer awfulness when the magistrate – having realized Phillip’s identity – instead becomes almost sexually cajoling in his desperation not be reported to the Genegineer. The sequence gives a true and visceral sense of the profound moral rot that exists on every tier of Genoshan society.
Amidst all this, Claremont also weaves in the threads of Madelyne’s seduction by S’ym from issue 234. We are introduced to another demon, N’astirh, who appears on a computer screen in the X-Men’s Outback fortress, claiming to be a messenger from S’ym. N’astirh will turn out to be a major player during the “Inferno” crossover; he’s not important here, and Claremont could have kept his appearances in this issue limited to the single one in the Outback. Instead, he complicates the story and increases the density of information found in “Busting Loose,” having the demon show up again, this time in Genosha! It’s yet another discordant element contributing to issue 236’s overall eerie tone.
Finally, Claremont also brings a surprising new wrinkle to Rogue’s characterization, as we learn that Carol Danvers’ personality is not only still present in Rogue’s psyche, but also entirely self-sufficient. She is, furthermore, eager and willing to take over for Rogue while the latter nurses her own psychological wounds. Danvers’ entrance during the astral-plane sequence is incredibly striking – she look as sexy as any Silvestri woman, yet simultaneously classy in her Dave Cockrum-designed costume. Claremont clearly always had an affinity for the Ms. Marvel character, one of his most confidently conceived feminist superheroes. Her appearance here reflects Claremont’s idealization – from her first moment on-panel she stands as beacon of purity and strength amidst internal corruption. More than any individual X-Man, Carol is the superhero of the story, the one who – after “busting loose” from her prison inside Rogue’s head – arrives just in time to come to the rescue, to save the day. And she does so with style and panache, inviting the readers to stand up and cheer for her. (Note, too, Scotese’s clever touch on Rogue’s eyes: In the first few pages, they’re brown, but later, once Danvers has taken control, they become bright blue.)
Ultimately then, “Busting Loose” has all the trappings of a conventional superhero story: There are evil masterminds, people in trouble, a city buried under moral corruption – and a bright, primary colored superhero who emerges toward the end to take care of everything. Claremont’s genius is in both complicating and enhancing all of these story beats, making the danger harsher, the morality murkier, the heroes more troubled – then clothing it all in a real-world allegory.
With its powerfully realized antagonists, morally outraged heroes, breathtakingly designed setting, superbly complex character dynamics and surprising political astuteness, issue 236 is a true triumph on the part of Claremont and company. In some ways, “Busting Loose” is the apex of Claremont’s creativity and expression on the Uncanny X-Men series, a peak blend of intelligence, action and drama that few X-Men issues before or after would match.
“Busting Loose”
Silvestri and Green return for the second part of the Genoshan storyline (which, because of its bi-weekly release schedule, required penciller Rick Leonardi and guest-inkers to pitch in on both odd-numbered chapters). Silvestri and Green open strong, producing the finest of all their X-Men covers, a dramatic “photograph” of Wolverine and Rogue strung up by their feet and flanked my smirking Genoshan magistrates. It’s an emblem for one of the running motifs of the story – the smug complacency of evil. (Note the way the soldier on the right casually and cavalierly lets his gun rest atop folded hands.)
The intensity is ramped up entirely in Part 2, Claremont possibly having been emboldened by Silvestri and Green’s more grittily intense style (versus Leonardi’s cartoonishness). Once again, as in Uncanny X-Men #s 229 and 232, the title characters have an almost alienating coolness to them. Note that the bulk of the team only appear on four pages out of a total 22, and in that time make a disconcerting impression, as they interrogate the magistrates caught by Crocodile Dundee in the previous issue. Inflamed by the unabashed racism of their antagonists, the X-Men are merciless in dealing with then:
Magistrate: “You here to finish us off, genejoke?”
Storm: “Do not tempt me. That word – ‘genejoke’ – I not like it.”
Magistrate: “Makes us even. I don’t like you!”
Storm: “Good. That will make this more ... pleasant. I require information about our missing friends.”
Magistrate: “I won’t talk!”
Storm: “You will not have to. Psylocke, he is yours.”
Silvestri has given Ororo a shit-eating grin -- as she faces the officer with steely, supernal calm -- making the moment that much more frightening. Later, after Betsy has picked their brains (in a sequence eerily saturated in Pyslocke’s trademark pinks and violets by guest colorist Petra Scotese), she begins to psychically torture them. In contrast to Storm’s icy resolve, Elizabeth is maniacally incensed:
Pyslocke: “May you rot for what you’ve done!”
Magistrate: “NO!”
Psylocke: “May you burn!”
Magistrate: “MERCY--!”
Psylocke: “And what have you shown, magistrate – you so-called upholder of the law – to the mutants you’ve enslaved and tortured and slain?!”
Colossus: “Psylocke – stop – for pity’s sake – would you kill these men?”
Psylocke: “No, Colossus. That would be too quick. Too easy.”
These X-Men are murderous, scary, righteously enraged. This was new in 1988; the first time that the “oppressed minority” aspect of the X-Men premise is being genuinely, deeply felt. For all that there have been a few dozen examples over the last 25 years of the X-Men fighting for “mutant rights,” they have never been so horrified as now by an oppressing entity (in this case, the government of Genosha) and its treatment of their kind. The series has been a long time waiting for this, but the pay-off has proven worth it. Never before this moment have the X-Men (either the team nor the series) felt so simultaneously powerful and indignant. The effect upon the narrative is utterly electrifying. As the title suggests, the X-Men are indeed “Busting Loose”: Free of the complacency of the conservative politics that derived them; free from their inability to connect in any visceral way the civil rights struggle – the Xavier “dream” -- that they supposedly embody; free from their privileged perch nested above the fray. They are truly in it now, and the series has never felt more right.
The formidability of the lead characters is also supported via third-party accounts, most particularly the Chief Magistrate’s report to the Genegineer. The scene is marvelously economical, conveying information about the relationship between these two new characters, even as they share data about the X-Men. Claremont even executes a nod to very old continuity, reminding readers of the computer virus that Kitty Pryde and the Starjammers created all the way back in Uncanny #158. In what is perhaps deliberate synchronicity by Claremont, issue 158 was also the first appearance of Rogue in an Uncanny issue, and the first on-panel encounter between her and Carol Danvers. Much of the Danvers/Rogue material first inaugurated there comes into play in “Busting Loose” as well. The use of the series’ long-term continuity here is brilliant.
Meanwhile, in one of the darkest turns the X-Men has yet taken, Rogue becomes deeply traumatized by molestation at the hands of the magistrates. The dialogue makes vague allusions to “liberties” being taken, and the narration clarifies that “All they did was touch her” ... but Claremont’s intent lies only a tiny bit below the Comics Code-approved surface. We cannot help but think that whatever happened to Rogue was very close to rape. Silvestri’s images of the character crouched in the corner of her jail cell, arms and legs wrapped tightly, are heartbreaking, and the parallels with this story’s overarching theme are devastating.
And there is yet more that Uncanny #235 accomplishes, as much of the issue is given over to sketching out the layered complexity of Genosha itself. Chris Claremont’s work has long been pigeon-holed, too often torn to shreds by those quick to point out the “Claremont clichés.” One such cliché is the team of generically nasty bad-guys, each identified by some appropriately hard-edged appellation. (See, for example, the recent Brood story, and its team comprised of Brickbat, Lockup, Tension, Whiphand, etc.) Yet here Claremont proves just as capable of creating subtler antagonists, whose relationships are not so prosaic and one-sided.
With the Genegineer, for example, Claremont primes readers for a one-dimensional conception, naming the character David Moreau (thus, a “Dr. Moreau” whose field is genetic mutation, living on an “island” nation). But instead of an outré lunatic, the character’s first appearance has him studiously at work in his own back garden, dressed in a sweater and bantering with his teenage son. (He even quotes Stan Lee!) This may be Claremont’s riposte to Louise Simonson’s “Island of Dr. Moreau” riff in issues 59-61 of New Mutants, replacing Simonson’s maniacal gene-splicer with something more insidiously evil. Indeed, the Genegineer actually seems somewhat sympathetic in his early scenes -- most notably his chastisement of the Chief Magistrate for allowing Rogue’s molestation:
Chief: “Those responsible have been disciplined. It won’t happen again.”
Genegineer: “If it does, Chief Anderson, you’ll answer for it. I thought your people were professionals.”
Chief: “They’re human. They’re fallible.”
Moreau is painted with at least some modicum of compassion, while Anderson seems incredibly heartless, rationalizing rape as the result of mere human fallibility in order to sweep her officers’ transgressions under the table.
Yet during Moreau’s later confrontation with his son, Phillip, the former’s true colors become obvious. The Genegineer heartlessly describes the process to which he plans to subject Phillip’s mutant girlfriend, Jennifer, changing her natural mutant power – a healing ability – into an ability more useful to Genoshan industry. Claremont creates more harsh imagery (in an issue already packed full with it), as David explains that “instead of bending flesh to her will, [Jennifer will] cut through rock, shape stone and steel ...” Just as Jennifer’s seemingly benign ability is to be warped for something hard and brutal, so are we slowly shown that David’s seemingly soft exterior disguises a dark, evil core – he is as heartless as the Chief Magistrate he reprimanded. And of course, this is also emblematic of the entire country, which disguises its cruel system of slavery and apartheid behind bright, shiny “Green and Pleasant” slogans.
Phillip, meanwhile, is clearly marked to be the main character of this entire piece – the character who will truly change over the course of the rest of the story. When we first meet him, Phillip seems genial and well intentioned, yet is surprisingly and sickeningly numb to the grotesque sight of a large, bald mutant – his syntax as labored and stilted as the mutant killed early in the previous chapter – decked out in a rainbow-hued skintight costume. When the Genegineer’s garden is charred by a magistrate vehicle’s afterburners, Phillip casually commands the brightly colored (or “Coloured,” as it would be put in South Africa) mutant servant to “Fix it, willya, boy?” and departs the scene.
Phillip is as numb as anyone else to his country’s amorality, and his eyes are not opened until his girlfriend and her family become targets. Claremont is as horrifying here as in every other scene of the comic: Phillip’s terror is tangible as he is nearly beaten by a magistrate, and then the terror becomes sheer awfulness when the magistrate – having realized Phillip’s identity – instead becomes almost sexually cajoling in his desperation not be reported to the Genegineer. The sequence gives a true and visceral sense of the profound moral rot that exists on every tier of Genoshan society.
Amidst all this, Claremont also weaves in the threads of Madelyne’s seduction by S’ym from issue 234. We are introduced to another demon, N’astirh, who appears on a computer screen in the X-Men’s Outback fortress, claiming to be a messenger from S’ym. N’astirh will turn out to be a major player during the “Inferno” crossover; he’s not important here, and Claremont could have kept his appearances in this issue limited to the single one in the Outback. Instead, he complicates the story and increases the density of information found in “Busting Loose,” having the demon show up again, this time in Genosha! It’s yet another discordant element contributing to issue 236’s overall eerie tone.
Finally, Claremont also brings a surprising new wrinkle to Rogue’s characterization, as we learn that Carol Danvers’ personality is not only still present in Rogue’s psyche, but also entirely self-sufficient. She is, furthermore, eager and willing to take over for Rogue while the latter nurses her own psychological wounds. Danvers’ entrance during the astral-plane sequence is incredibly striking – she look as sexy as any Silvestri woman, yet simultaneously classy in her Dave Cockrum-designed costume. Claremont clearly always had an affinity for the Ms. Marvel character, one of his most confidently conceived feminist superheroes. Her appearance here reflects Claremont’s idealization – from her first moment on-panel she stands as beacon of purity and strength amidst internal corruption. More than any individual X-Man, Carol is the superhero of the story, the one who – after “busting loose” from her prison inside Rogue’s head – arrives just in time to come to the rescue, to save the day. And she does so with style and panache, inviting the readers to stand up and cheer for her. (Note, too, Scotese’s clever touch on Rogue’s eyes: In the first few pages, they’re brown, but later, once Danvers has taken control, they become bright blue.)
Ultimately then, “Busting Loose” has all the trappings of a conventional superhero story: There are evil masterminds, people in trouble, a city buried under moral corruption – and a bright, primary colored superhero who emerges toward the end to take care of everything. Claremont’s genius is in both complicating and enhancing all of these story beats, making the danger harsher, the morality murkier, the heroes more troubled – then clothing it all in a real-world allegory.
With its powerfully realized antagonists, morally outraged heroes, breathtakingly designed setting, superbly complex character dynamics and surprising political astuteness, issue 236 is a true triumph on the part of Claremont and company. In some ways, “Busting Loose” is the apex of Claremont’s creativity and expression on the Uncanny X-Men series, a peak blend of intelligence, action and drama that few X-Men issues before or after would match.
Thursday, September 03, 2009
Pocoyo: Whale's Birthday (and Sara's Too)
In honor of Sara's birthday: one of our favorite cartoons, which we used to get up at 630am just to watch in England (and then go back to bed). Narrated by Stephen Fry, and designed by geniuses.
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Free Form Comments
Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music and books.
ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.
AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.
You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.
WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music and books.
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Uncanny X-Men #235
[Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Claremont's X-Men run.]
“Welcome to Genosha ... A Green and Pleasant Land ...”
Illustrated by guest artists Rick Leonardi and P. Craig Russell, Uncanny #235 inaugurates the four-part Genosha storyline, Claremont’s hugely ambitious attempt to apply the mutant metaphor to South African apartheid. In June of 1988, when the issue was published, apartheid had been in place in South Africa for 40 years.
The story is one of Claremont’s all-time finest, applying its analogies deftly and carefully – and keeping them implicit throughout. There is no garish use of vile, real-life pejoratives (as in “God Loves, Man Kills”), nor any attempt to make a fetish out of another culture’s seeming exoticisms (as in “LifeDeath II: Heart of Darkness”). Instead, Claremont places the world of Genosha squarely inside the fictional bounds of the Marvel Universe – or more specifically, his own corner of it – allowing it to be read entirely inside those artificial lines if one is so inclined. However, the signifiers to the story’s larger context are all right there, for anyone with eyes to see. Claremont’s ability to write toward both perspectives throughout all four installments of this saga is one of his most impressive achievements.
In service of this dual-minded approach, Claremont constructs each chapter of the “Welcome to Genosha” epic to contain at least one sequence of wrenching brutality and tragedy (always set in the titular African nation), juxtaposed against at least one containing straightforward superhero action. It’s an altogether unsubtle example of using spoonfuls of four-color fun to make the commentary go down, and Claremont is even kind enough to signal us that the action bits – as well-executed as they are – exist more to fulfill genre requirements than because the story requires them. “C’mon, Havok,” says Psylocke, just before the X-Men take down a squad of Genoshan magistrates. “Time for some gratuitous heroics.”
The action is indeed gratuitous; what’s more important in the present issue is all the evidence of Claremont’s universe-building. The world of Genosha is rigorously illustrated right from the opening page: an obnoxious propaganda billboard, whose text doubles as the issue’s title, and whose final word, “freedom,” is obstructed by a fleeing mutant fugitive clutching a baby in his arms. Claremont is offering us a witty mutation of the traditional opening splash page -- which so often presents a big, bold image of characters in violent battle (e.g., the opening splashes of Uncanny 222 or 234). Claremont replaces those bold images with giant, uppercase text, which then in turn is fought, or contradicted, by the image set against it. We don’t yet know what Genosha is or why an X-Men story is beginning there, but our attention is immediately snapped in by the simple and direct irony of a disenfranchised fugitive (who, we know thanks to the shorthand of the baby, is innocent) stumbling past the word “FREEDOM!” The story has now been firmly framed in an instance of visual irony, which is appropriate.
This segues into a fast and brutal sequence (given added poignancy by Glynis Oliver’s violent swaths of color) wherein a mutant father – whose syntax is mangled and awkward, inexplicably at this point in the story – dies in battle against racist antagonists calling themselves “magistrates.” The magistrates are armed with tech that, thanks to Leonardi, has a subtly futuristic sci-fi look to it, and their vernacular includes a new epithet for mutants besides the long-familiar Stan-Lee-ism “mutie.” They call the fugitive a “genejoke” – a particularly strong linguistic invention by Claremont, containing a certain sci-fi exotica as well as a surprising phonetic harshness.
The hypocrisy upon which Genosha is predicated – pointed out in the blatant opening splash – is implicit here as well, though it won’t be explained until later chapters: The Genoshan tech used to take down the mutant by bigots is, in fact, made possible by the country’s mutant population. Possibly influenced by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ world-building in Watchmen (which suggested that 1980s America would look like an exotic sci-fi metropolis if it truly contained superhumans), Claremont has fashioned Genosha as a place whose superhuman resources – i.e., its mutant population – have been rigorously exploited in order to put the country at the technological forefront, especially in terms of its military. That technology is in turn used to keep its mutants oppressed, which is a brutal irony.
Much of this is not spelled out in the opening chapter, of course. Still, the hints of the nightmarish world of Genosha (basically an iteration of a classic sci-fi trope, the utopia with a dark secret at the core) are rather disquieting right from the start. The repeated mentions of someone called “the Genegineer” (a lovely portmanteau from Claremont), the alien-ness of the Press Gang (whose modem-centric member, Pipeline, is one of comics’ first Information-Age super villains), the magistrates’ fascistic resolve, the political intrigues, the kidnapping of a baby ... it all conspires to be something quite chilling and disquieting.
Even Claremont’s one-page denouement is exciting in its way -- with its incorporation (as in X-Men Annual #12) of the X-Men’s new eight-point-star logo and its somewhat wacky inclusion of an Australian police inspector called Mick Dundee -- and constitutes another example of leavening the dark allegory of the overarching plot with more playfully “comic-booky” bits.
“Welcome to Genosha ... A Green and Pleasant Land ...”
Illustrated by guest artists Rick Leonardi and P. Craig Russell, Uncanny #235 inaugurates the four-part Genosha storyline, Claremont’s hugely ambitious attempt to apply the mutant metaphor to South African apartheid. In June of 1988, when the issue was published, apartheid had been in place in South Africa for 40 years.
The story is one of Claremont’s all-time finest, applying its analogies deftly and carefully – and keeping them implicit throughout. There is no garish use of vile, real-life pejoratives (as in “God Loves, Man Kills”), nor any attempt to make a fetish out of another culture’s seeming exoticisms (as in “LifeDeath II: Heart of Darkness”). Instead, Claremont places the world of Genosha squarely inside the fictional bounds of the Marvel Universe – or more specifically, his own corner of it – allowing it to be read entirely inside those artificial lines if one is so inclined. However, the signifiers to the story’s larger context are all right there, for anyone with eyes to see. Claremont’s ability to write toward both perspectives throughout all four installments of this saga is one of his most impressive achievements.
In service of this dual-minded approach, Claremont constructs each chapter of the “Welcome to Genosha” epic to contain at least one sequence of wrenching brutality and tragedy (always set in the titular African nation), juxtaposed against at least one containing straightforward superhero action. It’s an altogether unsubtle example of using spoonfuls of four-color fun to make the commentary go down, and Claremont is even kind enough to signal us that the action bits – as well-executed as they are – exist more to fulfill genre requirements than because the story requires them. “C’mon, Havok,” says Psylocke, just before the X-Men take down a squad of Genoshan magistrates. “Time for some gratuitous heroics.”
The action is indeed gratuitous; what’s more important in the present issue is all the evidence of Claremont’s universe-building. The world of Genosha is rigorously illustrated right from the opening page: an obnoxious propaganda billboard, whose text doubles as the issue’s title, and whose final word, “freedom,” is obstructed by a fleeing mutant fugitive clutching a baby in his arms. Claremont is offering us a witty mutation of the traditional opening splash page -- which so often presents a big, bold image of characters in violent battle (e.g., the opening splashes of Uncanny 222 or 234). Claremont replaces those bold images with giant, uppercase text, which then in turn is fought, or contradicted, by the image set against it. We don’t yet know what Genosha is or why an X-Men story is beginning there, but our attention is immediately snapped in by the simple and direct irony of a disenfranchised fugitive (who, we know thanks to the shorthand of the baby, is innocent) stumbling past the word “FREEDOM!” The story has now been firmly framed in an instance of visual irony, which is appropriate.
This segues into a fast and brutal sequence (given added poignancy by Glynis Oliver’s violent swaths of color) wherein a mutant father – whose syntax is mangled and awkward, inexplicably at this point in the story – dies in battle against racist antagonists calling themselves “magistrates.” The magistrates are armed with tech that, thanks to Leonardi, has a subtly futuristic sci-fi look to it, and their vernacular includes a new epithet for mutants besides the long-familiar Stan-Lee-ism “mutie.” They call the fugitive a “genejoke” – a particularly strong linguistic invention by Claremont, containing a certain sci-fi exotica as well as a surprising phonetic harshness.
The hypocrisy upon which Genosha is predicated – pointed out in the blatant opening splash – is implicit here as well, though it won’t be explained until later chapters: The Genoshan tech used to take down the mutant by bigots is, in fact, made possible by the country’s mutant population. Possibly influenced by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ world-building in Watchmen (which suggested that 1980s America would look like an exotic sci-fi metropolis if it truly contained superhumans), Claremont has fashioned Genosha as a place whose superhuman resources – i.e., its mutant population – have been rigorously exploited in order to put the country at the technological forefront, especially in terms of its military. That technology is in turn used to keep its mutants oppressed, which is a brutal irony.
Much of this is not spelled out in the opening chapter, of course. Still, the hints of the nightmarish world of Genosha (basically an iteration of a classic sci-fi trope, the utopia with a dark secret at the core) are rather disquieting right from the start. The repeated mentions of someone called “the Genegineer” (a lovely portmanteau from Claremont), the alien-ness of the Press Gang (whose modem-centric member, Pipeline, is one of comics’ first Information-Age super villains), the magistrates’ fascistic resolve, the political intrigues, the kidnapping of a baby ... it all conspires to be something quite chilling and disquieting.
Even Claremont’s one-page denouement is exciting in its way -- with its incorporation (as in X-Men Annual #12) of the X-Men’s new eight-point-star logo and its somewhat wacky inclusion of an Australian police inspector called Mick Dundee -- and constitutes another example of leavening the dark allegory of the overarching plot with more playfully “comic-booky” bits.
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