Sara in a Show!
Jason Powell on Bizarre Adventures 27, Uncanny 153, 152
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Weekly Roundup
[Is this a useful feature? I feel like it is redundant from the "most recent posts" thing on the toolbar, but I guess that is pretty far down. Jog does it so he must have a good reason.]
Sara in a Show!
Sara in a Show!
Saturday, August 09, 2008
Sara is in a show!
Sara will have two paintings in the DUMBO Arts Festival in Brooklyn, September 26-28! 150,000 people came to last year's show, roughly the same number of people that live in the Sooloo islands.
Jason Powell on Bizarre Adventures #27, first story
[Guest blogger Jason Powell continues his issue by issue look at Chris Claremont’s Uncanny X-Men Run. For more in this series, see the toolbar on the right.]
“Phoenix”
Claremont loves building large supporting casts for the series he works on, and he loves to make as many of those supporting cast members women. Occasionally he seems to introduce female characters into his comics with no clear idea of how he’ll eventually use them. One example occurred in Uncanny X-Men #136, when Jean was revealed for the first time to have an older sister named Sara, already married with children. It’s possible that Sara would have become a significant part of the cast had Jean not been killed off. As it was, Claremont never thought of anything to do with her – except one time.
In mid-1981 – around the same time that Uncanny X-Men was seeing an expansion of the supporting cast in the form of such notable females as Stevie Hunter, Carol Danvers and Illyana Rasputin – Marvel’s black-and-white tabloid-size comic book Bizarre Adventures came out with an X-themed issue. Of the three X-Men stories contained therein, only one is by Claremont; entitled simply “Phoenix,” it focuses on Jean’s sister Sara as she remembers an “untold tale” of Jean Grey, presumably set circa Uncanny #110. Allowing Claremont to indulge his penchant for writing loving female relationships (this one recalls the Misty/Jean material from Classic X-Men #13, which it predates), it also features some of Claremont’s ideas for Jean’s “secret origin” -- an idea shot down at one point by Byrne on the grounds that her “origin” began when she arrived at the mansion by taxi in X-Men #1.
Claremont, however, exercising his characteristic favoritism for the female members of his cast, decides here that although Jean was the last to join the original Lee/Kirby X-Men, she was actually Xavier’s first student. In a flashback-within-a-flashback (a curiously sloppy technique on Claremont’s part) we learn that Xavier became Jean’s tutor almost immediately after the Lucifer adventure that crippled him. She had been traumatized after accidentally creating a telepathic rapport with her best friend Annie Richardson in the moments of Annie’s death, and only Xavier – another telepath – could help her deal with the after effects. This is ret-con smooths over a flaw in the Silver Age continuity, wherein Jean became a telepath because Xavier gave part of his powers to her (a premise hard to buy given the parameters of how mutant powers are supposed to work in the Marvel Universe). In Claremont’s flashback here, Xavier is depicted as putting blocks on Jean’s telepathy before she joined the X-Men, and helping her to develop her latent telekinetic talent instead. The implication thus being that all he did back in the 1960s to make Jean telepathic was to remove that imposed seal.
The effect of this added back-story for Jean and Charles is twofold: As discussed above, it irons out a wrinkle in the Silver Age X-Men continuity, and more significantly, it retroactively adds another resonance to the penultimate chapter of the Dark Phoenix Saga, which showed Xavier binding Jean’s powers with “psychic circuit breakers” in order to save her. Here, that part of the story takes on a layer of irony: Xavier saved Jean from herself twice, and both times utilized the same methods.
The rest of the Bizarre Adventures story is a weirdly conceived battle between Phoenix and an undersea villain called Attuma. As an adventure story it’s not at all noteworthy, although the artwork by John Buscema and Klaus Janson – which is excellent – flags up an interesting problem that dogs Claremont’s every attempt to be a feminist writer. His female heroines, while strong and capable – especially when compared to how women were written in other Marvel Comics of the time – always seem to end up in tight and/or revealing outfits.
True, Claremont’s comic-book-level feminism was ultimately a positive step, particularly for the X-franchise (actresses involved in the X-Men films occasionally commented on their pleasant surprise at how many strong female roles the franchise contained). But stories like this one, which feature Jean and her sister in swimsuits or slave outfits for large stretches of time, make one wonder if maybe there wasn’t a fetish at work there as well.
“Phoenix”
Claremont loves building large supporting casts for the series he works on, and he loves to make as many of those supporting cast members women. Occasionally he seems to introduce female characters into his comics with no clear idea of how he’ll eventually use them. One example occurred in Uncanny X-Men #136, when Jean was revealed for the first time to have an older sister named Sara, already married with children. It’s possible that Sara would have become a significant part of the cast had Jean not been killed off. As it was, Claremont never thought of anything to do with her – except one time.
In mid-1981 – around the same time that Uncanny X-Men was seeing an expansion of the supporting cast in the form of such notable females as Stevie Hunter, Carol Danvers and Illyana Rasputin – Marvel’s black-and-white tabloid-size comic book Bizarre Adventures came out with an X-themed issue. Of the three X-Men stories contained therein, only one is by Claremont; entitled simply “Phoenix,” it focuses on Jean’s sister Sara as she remembers an “untold tale” of Jean Grey, presumably set circa Uncanny #110. Allowing Claremont to indulge his penchant for writing loving female relationships (this one recalls the Misty/Jean material from Classic X-Men #13, which it predates), it also features some of Claremont’s ideas for Jean’s “secret origin” -- an idea shot down at one point by Byrne on the grounds that her “origin” began when she arrived at the mansion by taxi in X-Men #1.
Claremont, however, exercising his characteristic favoritism for the female members of his cast, decides here that although Jean was the last to join the original Lee/Kirby X-Men, she was actually Xavier’s first student. In a flashback-within-a-flashback (a curiously sloppy technique on Claremont’s part) we learn that Xavier became Jean’s tutor almost immediately after the Lucifer adventure that crippled him. She had been traumatized after accidentally creating a telepathic rapport with her best friend Annie Richardson in the moments of Annie’s death, and only Xavier – another telepath – could help her deal with the after effects. This is ret-con smooths over a flaw in the Silver Age continuity, wherein Jean became a telepath because Xavier gave part of his powers to her (a premise hard to buy given the parameters of how mutant powers are supposed to work in the Marvel Universe). In Claremont’s flashback here, Xavier is depicted as putting blocks on Jean’s telepathy before she joined the X-Men, and helping her to develop her latent telekinetic talent instead. The implication thus being that all he did back in the 1960s to make Jean telepathic was to remove that imposed seal.
The effect of this added back-story for Jean and Charles is twofold: As discussed above, it irons out a wrinkle in the Silver Age X-Men continuity, and more significantly, it retroactively adds another resonance to the penultimate chapter of the Dark Phoenix Saga, which showed Xavier binding Jean’s powers with “psychic circuit breakers” in order to save her. Here, that part of the story takes on a layer of irony: Xavier saved Jean from herself twice, and both times utilized the same methods.
The rest of the Bizarre Adventures story is a weirdly conceived battle between Phoenix and an undersea villain called Attuma. As an adventure story it’s not at all noteworthy, although the artwork by John Buscema and Klaus Janson – which is excellent – flags up an interesting problem that dogs Claremont’s every attempt to be a feminist writer. His female heroines, while strong and capable – especially when compared to how women were written in other Marvel Comics of the time – always seem to end up in tight and/or revealing outfits.
True, Claremont’s comic-book-level feminism was ultimately a positive step, particularly for the X-franchise (actresses involved in the X-Men films occasionally commented on their pleasant surprise at how many strong female roles the franchise contained). But stories like this one, which feature Jean and her sister in swimsuits or slave outfits for large stretches of time, make one wonder if maybe there wasn’t a fetish at work there as well.
Friday, August 08, 2008
Comics Out Aug 6, 2008
Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
Let be be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
There is this big gap between the first and second stanzas of this two stanza poem -- you have to bridge the gap and make the connection, and see that the exuberant hedonism of the first stanza is thrown into high relief by the reminder of death in the second.
This is Morrisons style in Final Crisis -- because the previous Crisis books are so jam packed full of stuff, they make up for space by alluding to past events and knowing you will know they story there. But Morrison has chosen to deal with the info-overload by just skipping over things: Martian Manhunter's capture and any kind of buildup to his death, Turpin's story after the Darksied club thing, the final image of this issue -- Morrison keeps skipping over stuff, and focusing on minor characters. It is an odd approach to be sure, but it is not without merit. It is almost like he expects you to imagine your own tie-ins, like his Crisis is built on imaginary tie-ins that would flesh some of this stuff out. In THEORY is brilliant. In PRACTICE the jury is still out. Maybe, as a style, it just needs some honing.
As for this issue: Superhero comics of course tell the same story over and over, and it is somewhat unfair to complain about repetitiveness. But our heroes arrive in the future to a world ruled by Darkseid was in Morrison's JLA: Rock of Ages, the focus on minor characters literally at times the Seven Soldiers, the superhero draft thing is feeling a little like Morrisons World War Three, the bullet fired across time -- wasn't that in JLA One Million?
(As a side note let me say I like the sidelining of the major characters for minor ones, even if I have seen it before: that is where a lot of the interest is, cause they can, you know, change, especially with Green Lantern, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman taken off the board for now. I love the Super Young Team -- i just think a better book would have been if Morrison had focused his talents on a Super Young Team tie in book while someone else did the fan boy dance in the main title).
Finally, Morrison, so famous for that crazy imagination, seems to be sputtering a bit. The mind control helmet is dull, as is Libra and his idiotic Bible of Crime rhetoric; did Luthor think he could just go in and threaten Libra cause he seems SHOCKED when a flame thrower is aimed at him -- if only someone could have anticipated that. The superhero draft lacks a any spark as an idea, as does the anti-life mass email; and I know the black racer is a really goofy Kirby character, but Morrison used him to wonderful effect in JLA: Rock of Ages and without shame; now the racer is made to look like some kind of upsetting 90s anti-hero.
And I cannot believe they put the final page reveal ON THE COVER. Where are the fanboys with their cries of SPOILERS now? I mean I had a guy threaten to do me bodily harm because I said the monster from Cloverfield had little crab things come off of him. Sheesh.
Click the label below for my reviews of the earlier Final Crisis issues.
Thursday, August 07, 2008
Avatar: The Last Airbender Finale (spoilers)
Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of my favorite television shows. It is the proper inheritor of Buffy (Sokka IS Xander Harris, part of the gang who follow the one chosen to save the world as they also learn to grow up). It airs alongside of shows like Kappa Mikey, but is a proper "adult" form narrative. Characters experience persuasive change (Zuko for example), and the series (rather than the episode or season) is the biggest plot arc. It can be very intimidating to just join in watching on TV: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Book Three: Fire, Volume 4, Sozin's Comet, Part Two, The Old Masters. While I am no anime expert, it seems to my untrained eye to take the best of the genre and ditch all the excesses (such as the 43 Hiroshimas that seem to follow everyone around every time I watch anime). (HC Duvall: did I steal that point from you?) In one of my favorite details on the show the various styles of fighting are closely modeled on real fighting styles, which lends the thing some weight and historical relevance.
(As a side bar to talking about the finale I want to say that the episode before the finale was my favorite episode of Avatar period, alongside the Beach and the one where Ang cannot sleep. It featured the gang going to a play that told the story of their adventures, unauthorized, for the fire nation. The comedy revolved around our character's reacting to the on stage versions of themselves, and the drama came out when Ang saw that Zuko and Kitara shared a moment together. For the audience it served as a massive series recap that was tons more exciting than the X-Files finale series recap, and also served as a dark reminder of what is at stake in the finale -- at the end of the play the Firelord beats Ang and takes over the world. But the best part was that the show sent up itself completely, making fun of itself with, for example, the scene in which Jet is defeated:"Did Jet just die?" someone asks. "It was kind of unclear" says Sokka. One imagines Jet's unclear defeat at the end of season three was the result of not being able to clearly kill a character on a kid's show).
The finale was overall excellent and satisfying, and I still consider Avatar to be one of my favorite shows: Azula's final descent into madness was stunning, for example, and I was riveted the whole time. But the finale was also severely limited. For one thing it reminded me of something I had forgotten: Avatar is a kid's show. This seems silly, but if you have seen the show you will be surprised how easily you forget this, it is so well written. No one can die, which felt like the wrong kind of end for this show; someone will surely call me a sadist, but the journey needs to COST something -- Tolkin taught us that.
But most egregious was that the finale completely compromised the ending that had been set up. Ang, in meditation with a guru, had given up many things of this world to unblock his ability to reach the Avatar state, but balked at the idea that earthly love for Katara should be one of those things. His chakra was blocked, and remained so for a while because (it seemed) he would someday have to make a choice between saving the world and having Katara, who clearly should have been with Zuko, the water to his fire. Ang, you will notice at the end, is a Monk. Either his boy hood pet goes the way of all flesh in an amazing tear filled sacrifice, allowing him to grow up into sexual love, or he stands above the earthly round, serene. In the end Ang's chakra becomes unblocked -- because the Fire Lord hits the small of his back against a rock. So the spiritual and thematic conflict is resolved through an accidental physical blow. That is the laziest storytelling move I have seen since James Franco developed amnesia in Spiderman 3 for no reason other than the screenwriters had too much going on to include him in the movie's second act.
In the end the Avatar ending is a lot like the Sport's Night ending. The show is cancelled, and everyone gets their happy reward early and a little out of nowhere. It is very sweet; it does not really work, but you feel like such a grump begrudging them good feelings.
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