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thehefnerAnyone want to tell me why, exactly, this series wasn't on any "Best Comics of the Decade" lists?
Because I remember the hype it got when it came out, and that hype is certainly justified. It's not the most brilliant thing I've ever read, but it hits all the right notes to qualify it for noteworthiness. Great to know that Joe Kelly can still knock it out of the park when he tries, and this was easily the best thing I've ever read of his.
For that matter, why has no one been talking about how great THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD has been? Do people not even notice that they're being written by J. Frickin' Michael Goddamned STRACZYNSKI???
JMS has written some not-great stuff in his time, but when he's on his game, there are few writers who can tell such... poetic and moving sci-fi and fantasy stories. I mean, BABYLON 5 was so great, you didn't even care that half the cast couldn't act their way out of a nutsack!
And even before that, he made the Saturday morning REAL GHOSTBUSTERS cartoon far more excellent than it had any right being! Not to mention that around that time, he wrote one of the greatest Two-Face stories of all time, a story borne out of the unlikely meeting between two characters you wouldn't expect to interact.
I hope the editor who collects THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD is smart enough to include the Two-Face/Cyborg story, because JMS' work now is a direct continuation of those sensibilities. These aren't world-shaking event stories of action, but rather wonderful nuggests of character exploration.
Not that it's been without its flaws. The Flash/Blackhawks issue was too blunt in its "the soldiers are the REAL heroes!" moral, and the otherwise-great Batman/Brother Power issue suffered from having a Batman that sounds more like Dick, even though it's definitely Bruce (he has flashbacks to his childhood, but as an adult he also says things like, "Okay, fine, screw it."). But the strengths made up for it enough to make them flawed but great stories.
Until the most recent issue. TB&TB #30 one was flat-out wonderful.
No big action scenes, or much action at all, for that matter. Just a conversation between Hal and a time-displaced dead friend. It's rare to be moved by a superhero comic, but this issue did it for me.
It's only of the only times I've ever cared about Dr. Fate (I've wanted to love him, with that awesome costume and all, but no writer's ever made him click for me), and my god, that's the kind of Hal Jordan I wish we'd see from Geoff Johns!
Holy heck, can you imagine JMS writing GREEN LANTERN, tackling Hal and the whole GLC? Can you? Seriously. Start imagining. It's brilliantly perfect, isn't it? Someone make this happen.
Right right, quittin' time!
Because I remember the hype it got when it came out, and that hype is certainly justified. It's not the most brilliant thing I've ever read, but it hits all the right notes to qualify it for noteworthiness. Great to know that Joe Kelly can still knock it out of the park when he tries, and this was easily the best thing I've ever read of his.
For that matter, why has no one been talking about how great THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD has been? Do people not even notice that they're being written by J. Frickin' Michael Goddamned STRACZYNSKI???
JMS has written some not-great stuff in his time, but when he's on his game, there are few writers who can tell such... poetic and moving sci-fi and fantasy stories. I mean, BABYLON 5 was so great, you didn't even care that half the cast couldn't act their way out of a nutsack!
And even before that, he made the Saturday morning REAL GHOSTBUSTERS cartoon far more excellent than it had any right being! Not to mention that around that time, he wrote one of the greatest Two-Face stories of all time, a story borne out of the unlikely meeting between two characters you wouldn't expect to interact.
I hope the editor who collects THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD is smart enough to include the Two-Face/Cyborg story, because JMS' work now is a direct continuation of those sensibilities. These aren't world-shaking event stories of action, but rather wonderful nuggests of character exploration.
Not that it's been without its flaws. The Flash/Blackhawks issue was too blunt in its "the soldiers are the REAL heroes!" moral, and the otherwise-great Batman/Brother Power issue suffered from having a Batman that sounds more like Dick, even though it's definitely Bruce (he has flashbacks to his childhood, but as an adult he also says things like, "Okay, fine, screw it."). But the strengths made up for it enough to make them flawed but great stories.
Until the most recent issue. TB&TB #30 one was flat-out wonderful.
No big action scenes, or much action at all, for that matter. Just a conversation between Hal and a time-displaced dead friend. It's rare to be moved by a superhero comic, but this issue did it for me.
It's only of the only times I've ever cared about Dr. Fate (I've wanted to love him, with that awesome costume and all, but no writer's ever made him click for me), and my god, that's the kind of Hal Jordan I wish we'd see from Geoff Johns!
Holy heck, can you imagine JMS writing GREEN LANTERN, tackling Hal and the whole GLC? Can you? Seriously. Start imagining. It's brilliantly perfect, isn't it? Someone make this happen.
Right right, quittin' time!
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-07 02:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-07 02:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-07 05:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-07 03:48 pm (UTC)I can't deny that he's a really great writer when he's on, but between that, OMD, and his "move out of your parents' basement" bullshit in response to criticism of his Doctor Doom at Ground Zero scene--incredibly churlish and trollish even for a noted curmudgeon--it's no surprise that people don't automatically grab anything that he does.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-07 04:02 pm (UTC)But the upcoming EARTH-ONE SUPERMAN puts me in mind of how he can possibly work: doing original out-of-continuity graphic novels. Done-in-one stories that he wouldn't abandon. In that manner, he really could conceivably and realistically deliver a magnificent GLC epic. Or at worst, promise to and then never deliver, which is better than leaving us hanging.
It's no real loss when Frank Miller or Kevin Smith do that, but JMS? Total comics blue balls.
Oh, he's an ass, of that I have no doubt. But like Alan Moore, he's been a brilliant enough ass that I can put it aside. As for OMD, didn't he openly disown that whole story as Quesada's doing, like, at the very same time it was coming out?