An Uncivil Mess
Posted on
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
by Gary A. Ballard
Hear now the wails of a long-suffering comics fan. Comic books are the wellspring of my writing, the very fountainhead of most of my creative inspiration. Since I was six years old, and was given a Batman comic by my parents, I've been enraptured by the serial comic narratives. I've written my own unpublished comics, and I've read comics all through the decades since that first comic. When I see a comic narrative like the latest Marvel gimmick event Civil War come so horribly unglued as it has, I feel a duty as a font of Marvel Comics trivia to speak up. Civil War #6 and Civil War Frontline #10 together represent a depth in comics that hasn't been plumbed since the invention of the gimmick foil cover.
For a few years, at least since the beginning of Avengers Disassembled (the point at which everything started to go wrong in Marvel land narratively speaking), continuity has taken a back seat to everything else, especially if everything else boosts sales. I don't just mean the typical definition of comics continuity, which involves pedantic twaddling over the merest of minutiae of a character's costumes, or the fruitless trivia over what issue Captain America first fought Doctor Faustus. No, Marvel's biggest problem was that well-established characters were not even being consistent with themselves.
The Scarlet Witch becomes this universe-altering schizophrenic with no qualms about murdering her husband, friends and Hawkeye. Then Quicksilver makes her create an entire other world in House of M where mutants rule. In the wake of that event, Quicksilver suddenly becomes a child-kidnapping lunatic who steals the birthright of another race and begins handing it out like candy to former mutants. Even in his long-past evil mutant days, Quicksilver just isn't that type of guy, no matter how arrogant an ass he can be. In fact, over many years, he's rebelled against that type of attitude, the attitude of his father, Magneto. And now in Civil War, we are being told that Tony Stark is really just a fascist in playboy's clothing. According to both these books, there is some secret Stark is hiding which explains it all and it's so simple, no one can believe they didn't see it before.
Now, I'm well-versed in the kinds of secrets comic book heroes have which lead to their actions taking so drastic a turn as this. They usually involve some form of mind control, whether it be from alien parasite, Skrull body snatching, telepathic domination or if we are to believe the Scarlet Witch's reversal, going batshit insane over offhanded comments around the pool. What is unfortunate for Marvel and the writer Mark Millar, to use any of those explanations would cheapen the massive negative impact that Civil War has had. And if we are then told that Stark's done all these things to make more money, that rather pedestrian explanation would seem even more ridiculous in the Marvel universe than the more science-fictiony super-hero MacGuffins mentioned above.
What makes Civil War worse is the ham-fisted parallels to current headlines. I can't help but draw correlations between Stark and the Cheney/Haliburton duo of no-bid contracts for Iraq. The Negative Zone prison and its permanent/not permanent status is entirely too obvious a reference to Guantanamo Bay and its illegal military tribunals. And if I never hear a super-hero being referred to as a "person/weapon of mass destruction" again, it'll be too soon. Political commentary in comics or any literature works best when its subtle. These attempts are not subtle.
But all that could be forgiven if the story was worth reading. But it isn't. The characters not only do not act consistent from book to book, they don't even act like they have for 40-something years. Captain America works with the Punisher. Iron Man sends known mass murderers like Venom to attack former allies. Reed Richards makes clones out of a fucking Thunder God's DNA, then when said Thorbot kills one of Reed's friends, Reed just tinkers with Thorbot's head and sends him out again. Reed and Pym create super-heroes from scratch. These actions might be acceptable in a "What If?" story, but here they just feel forced.
The artwork for the main Civil War book is quite pretty, but it symbolizes something that's been bugging me about comics. I gather that the artist chose to use a rectangular shape to most of the panels to evoke the feeling of watching a widescreen movie. While this might give the comic a more cinematic feel, it also minimizes the amount of acceptable dialogue that can fit on the page. What little dialogue there is squeezed, and all issues of the book feel lightweight, as if they were written on two-pages of plain white paper. In short, the plots feel like editorial memos with dialogue attached, customized to fit within the confines of a graphic novel. Perhaps that sells better in bookstores but for monthly comics, I feel short-changed. When comics cost $3, I feel positively violated. Marvel is not alone in this practice, but to pay those prices for what is a narrative inhalation is galling.
Perhaps this story can be wrapped up satisfactorily. But given that plans have been announced for new books, including a Defenders book masquerading as a New Avengers book, all of which will take their queues from Civil War, I don't think the series will wrap up with any sort of finality. No, we'll be stuck with another disappointing Bendis-who-is-the-mystery-hero-in-Ronin's-costume graphic novel, and a whole lot of narrative dead ends. I hope the sales are good, because Marvel's brands have been ruined by this whole cycle.
For a few years, at least since the beginning of Avengers Disassembled (the point at which everything started to go wrong in Marvel land narratively speaking), continuity has taken a back seat to everything else, especially if everything else boosts sales. I don't just mean the typical definition of comics continuity, which involves pedantic twaddling over the merest of minutiae of a character's costumes, or the fruitless trivia over what issue Captain America first fought Doctor Faustus. No, Marvel's biggest problem was that well-established characters were not even being consistent with themselves.
The Scarlet Witch becomes this universe-altering schizophrenic with no qualms about murdering her husband, friends and Hawkeye. Then Quicksilver makes her create an entire other world in House of M where mutants rule. In the wake of that event, Quicksilver suddenly becomes a child-kidnapping lunatic who steals the birthright of another race and begins handing it out like candy to former mutants. Even in his long-past evil mutant days, Quicksilver just isn't that type of guy, no matter how arrogant an ass he can be. In fact, over many years, he's rebelled against that type of attitude, the attitude of his father, Magneto. And now in Civil War, we are being told that Tony Stark is really just a fascist in playboy's clothing. According to both these books, there is some secret Stark is hiding which explains it all and it's so simple, no one can believe they didn't see it before.
Now, I'm well-versed in the kinds of secrets comic book heroes have which lead to their actions taking so drastic a turn as this. They usually involve some form of mind control, whether it be from alien parasite, Skrull body snatching, telepathic domination or if we are to believe the Scarlet Witch's reversal, going batshit insane over offhanded comments around the pool. What is unfortunate for Marvel and the writer Mark Millar, to use any of those explanations would cheapen the massive negative impact that Civil War has had. And if we are then told that Stark's done all these things to make more money, that rather pedestrian explanation would seem even more ridiculous in the Marvel universe than the more science-fictiony super-hero MacGuffins mentioned above.
What makes Civil War worse is the ham-fisted parallels to current headlines. I can't help but draw correlations between Stark and the Cheney/Haliburton duo of no-bid contracts for Iraq. The Negative Zone prison and its permanent/not permanent status is entirely too obvious a reference to Guantanamo Bay and its illegal military tribunals. And if I never hear a super-hero being referred to as a "person/weapon of mass destruction" again, it'll be too soon. Political commentary in comics or any literature works best when its subtle. These attempts are not subtle.
But all that could be forgiven if the story was worth reading. But it isn't. The characters not only do not act consistent from book to book, they don't even act like they have for 40-something years. Captain America works with the Punisher. Iron Man sends known mass murderers like Venom to attack former allies. Reed Richards makes clones out of a fucking Thunder God's DNA, then when said Thorbot kills one of Reed's friends, Reed just tinkers with Thorbot's head and sends him out again. Reed and Pym create super-heroes from scratch. These actions might be acceptable in a "What If?" story, but here they just feel forced.
The artwork for the main Civil War book is quite pretty, but it symbolizes something that's been bugging me about comics. I gather that the artist chose to use a rectangular shape to most of the panels to evoke the feeling of watching a widescreen movie. While this might give the comic a more cinematic feel, it also minimizes the amount of acceptable dialogue that can fit on the page. What little dialogue there is squeezed, and all issues of the book feel lightweight, as if they were written on two-pages of plain white paper. In short, the plots feel like editorial memos with dialogue attached, customized to fit within the confines of a graphic novel. Perhaps that sells better in bookstores but for monthly comics, I feel short-changed. When comics cost $3, I feel positively violated. Marvel is not alone in this practice, but to pay those prices for what is a narrative inhalation is galling.
Perhaps this story can be wrapped up satisfactorily. But given that plans have been announced for new books, including a Defenders book masquerading as a New Avengers book, all of which will take their queues from Civil War, I don't think the series will wrap up with any sort of finality. No, we'll be stuck with another disappointing Bendis-who-is-the-mystery-hero-in-Ronin's-costume graphic novel, and a whole lot of narrative dead ends. I hope the sales are good, because Marvel's brands have been ruined by this whole cycle.
Labels: Comics, Literature
posted by Gary A. Ballard @ 9:31 AM
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