The Fractal Hall Journal

Wolverine gets a lot of stick, some of it deserved. Though I’ve never been much of a fan, there’s obviously something going on there because there aren’t many characters created specifically to fill a team role who go on to sustain not only their own books, but who can be deployed as a guaranteed sales-raising guest star. Whether or not this is a good thing is, as always, open to conjecture.

Core Genre: Wolverine is the super-hero version of the Man With No Name, an outlaw with a violent, uncertain past in line with the darker, more ambiguous post-Leone kind of cowboy. So I’m enclined to place him under Western, although considering his nationality that’s more of a North Western. The Frontier Fiction of Jack London, maybe.

Before the Jemas/Quesada/Jenkins/Kubert Origin, it was accepted that to give Wolverine a definitive backstory would kill the mystery of the character, and take the character with it. I’ve seen the series criticised by some for doing exactly that. I disagree.

First of all, the idea that Wolverine’s backstory is in anyway mysterious is wrong. From the very beginning his creator Len Wein intended for him to be a mutated wolverine, though thank fuck they didn’t follow through on that. Claremont and Byrne, the creators most responsible for shaping the character’s early days, also intended for the character to be old enough to have fought in the Second World War.

Of course, the readers didn’t know all this yet, but it wasn’t long before the gaps started to get filled in. Alpha Flight, Weapon X, a long history with Sabretooth, fighting alongside Captain America in the ’40s; not a definitive timeline, perhaps, but plenty of things to delineate his history. Heavy hints of wetwork for intelligence agencies. And as soon as we get into his solo series we have the Japan stuff, a bizarre story about a boy raised by actual wolverines, life with Silver Fox and her subsequent murder, and so on. Although how much of this come under the ‘implanted memory’ get-out clause is anyone’s guess.

Regardless of how much of this is later retconned or proven false, it shows how his writers have been playing around with his origins for a long time. Considering how much fans and creators protest that his backstory should be hidden, they’ve certainly engaged with a lot of books over time that deal with possible origins. Ditto for the ‘angry loner who hunts alone’ thing. Guy’s supporting cast is bigger than the Batman Family.

A) Healing factor
B) Animal senses
C) Claws
D) Adamantium-laced skeleton
E) Berserker rage
F) Is (sigh) the best there is at what he does, and what he does isn’t pretty.

If nothing else, Wolverine is a survivor. His healing factor is the centre of his character, survival as mutant power. I like the idea that the reason for his memory issues is the healing factor crudely patching up a damaged psychology.

Who are Wolverine’s villains? Every damn thing. Everyone he’s ever met, every situation he’s ever been in. He’s his own worst enemy, and that doesn’t just mean the character as he’s defined in his present, but also the person he used to be. Every different aspect of his past, whether nobleman, frontiersman, assassin or samurai, becomes a different enemy, and creates a new conflict that Wolverine has to survive. Wolverine never triumphs. The best he can hope for is that he sees another day.

Actually, considering everything he’s been through, maybe that’s wrong. He can’t really be killed, not considering his core power, so he can’t escape any of his actions. He won’t even get the peace of the grave. Even survival itself becomes his enemy, because the best he can hope for is achieving a measure of peace.

There’s some depressing stuff behind that yellow spandex.

But it’s not really the nihilism people come for. Everyone likes a rogue, and if we think of the action movie culture that brought characters like Wolverine and the Punisher to prominence in the 80s we can see that the attraction was mostly a surface one. Blood, rage and Rambo. Luckily for Logan, there was still enough to him that he stayed popular after circumstances changed.

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Comics writers are fond of bringing in Z-list heroes without their own titles into their team books. There’s more than one reason for this. Dan Didio, referring to the new Teen Titans line up, is right in saying that this is a way to keep telling stories with characters that have potential, but can’t sustain their own books. Other writers continually site the difficulties with progressing character when progress is only allowed to happen in the home title, with a completely different set of editors and writers.

All true, of course. But you have to ask yourself whether your readers want to read a book about Blue Beetle, or Huntress, or fucking Geo-Force. The realities of day-to-day publishing may get in the way, but if people want to read about the Magnificent Seven then maybe that’s who should be in the JLA.

Sorry, got a bit distracted there.

The point is, the practicalities of juggling characters spread over various titles make Big Gun team books difficult to handle, making runs like Morrison’s JLA even more impressive. This isn’t a new problem, and is the main reason why Avengers isn’t really expected to be a Big Gun title in the same way Justice League is. Hawkeye and Wonder Man and whoever allow the team book writer to own some characters.

The best execution of this kind of team book has to be the X-Men. The mutants are so successful, in fact, that they’ve been able to spin off several characters that can stand on their own feet, although Wolverine’s probably the only really successful one (and more on him next week). But most of the X-Men are resolutely one-note, in both power-gimmick and character, and this is very deliberate.

Core Genre: Science Fiction, with the usual Marvel mixture of everything else.

The X-Men should be taken as a single character, a plural protagonist in the nomenclature of screenwriting. Their conflict occurs on two levels; drama between the various X-Men themselves, and the external conflict with their villains. The operatics of the X-Soap has always been the most-discussed element of the book, and it probably goes without saying by now that the psychology of the thing isn’t what I’m going to concentrate on, so as usual I’ll skip over that in favour of the mechanics of the thing.

A) A team
B) of mutant
C) students
D) with distinct powers
E) and access to advanced technology
F) defend a world that fears and hates them

Considering the complexity of its implications, that’s one of the most elegant concepts you’re going to find in comics. Stan Lee and his various colleagues really were that good.

What’s interesting here is that every element here is the root of both internal and external conflict. Hmm, it looks like I will be talking psychology after all. Well, it’s the X-Men. You just can’t avoid it. Their personal conflict stems from their powers, or their race, or their relationship with non-mutants. They argue with each other as well as the outside world. And this is mirrored in their conflict with their antagonists.

Factor A tells us their mode of interaction, a gestalt identity. B is the source of their abilities, and also the inciting element of their conflict, either with other mutants or with non-mutants. B leads to both D (how they interact with antagonists) and F (which gives context to the interaction). Personally, I could live without the advanced technology of factor E, but the jets and the danger rooms and Cerebro/Cerebra have been integral from the start, shaping how the villains are located and put into context.

And their villains are very interesting. Intolerant Homo Sapiens, and intolerant Homo Superior. Peaceful integration is the ultimate goal, even if it has to be fought for. It’s easy to cast a cynical eye over superheroes and their drive to solve problems with their fists, but I’m reminded of a quote from author (and daughter of the Fair Country) Jo Walton, as found in the sidebar of Making Light: “Peace means something different from ‘not fighting’… Peace is an active and complex thing and sometimes fighting is part of what it takes to get it.”

Factor C is the controlling element of the stories. The adventures are all centred round a school or academy, a place of learning. It gives the team its character. It’s also the thing that gives the book a sinister edge.

The idea that a trusted teacher of children sends them out to war is unavoidably creepy. It’s a concept that’s been played with many times since Claremont. I don’t know if this odd vibe was deliberate on the part of Lee and Kirby or just another oddity of 60s Marvel, but it plays to other themes present since the beginning. I’m not sure it can all be considered coincidental, though it may be subconscious rather than conscious.

Student unrest tied in with movements wanting to change the status quo is one of the primary images we have of the Sixties, not only in America but across the world. Stan Lee explicitly wrote this into Spider-man, so it wasn’t something he was oblivious too. I wonder how much this informed the structure of the X-Men. The radicalisation of the young by influential figures is a perennial concern to the Daily Mail crowd, something that can be found in modern hysteria regarding Islamic university organisations, Victorian political concerns, right back to Socrates and Plato.

I’m probably reading too much into it, but the X-Men concept does play into anti-intellectual fears of an educated populace, with university education seen as a threat. Like I say, it’s nothing new but there’s been a lot of it in recent years (and if I was feeling particularly tin-hattish, I’d say it’s yet another tactic to discourage the masses from bettering themselves and to keep education strictly for the privileged few, but that’s just crazy talk isn’t it now.)

Also, the world is run by lizards.

Conclusion: If we dig around there’s some ugly things lurking in the X-Men concept. Of course, that can only help in terms of drama, action and conflict. It shouldn’t be a surprise that, when handled properly, the books are amongst the most popular ever made.

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Dead Space

Holy crap, is this game terrifying. And that’s just the intro. Sure, the creepy nursery rhyme theme is a little derivative but I think that’s something computer games are actually really good at. You take the really good bits from genre work (films mostly) and you squish it all together (see Halo, amongst many others). It’s not art, but it’s fun. And this game is packed full of blood-squirty dismembering fun.

The only possible hiccup is that like Condemned and Call of Cthulhu before it, it may be too scary to finish.

Why yes, I am a scaredy cat.

Fallout 3

Depending on what mood I’m in, I could well call Oblivion my favourite computer game. It’s certainly the game I’ve spent the most amount of hours on, by a hee-uge margin. I got it years ago, and because of the finding time thing, I still haven’t completed it. So I’m very much in the target market for a post-apocalyptic version.

Not spent loads of time on it yet because I really do want to finish Dead Space, but I should imagine a lot of ‘09 is going to spent on this one. And, hopefully, Elder Scrolls V in ‘10.

The Rise and Fall of the Shi’ar Empire

I’ve been meaning to get this one for a while. The follow up to Deadly Genesis (reviewed here previously), and like the previous story an entertaining yarn. Brubaker’s an excellent writer, and very good at doing a Claremont-style story in the modern Marvel house style. I feel like I’m damning with faint praise, but that’s not the intention. To be honest, it’s nice to read a superhero comic that doesn’t irritate me on any level.

Lovecraft’s Haunt of Horror and Cthulhu Tales

Sorry, that last one got a bit catty.

A couple of Mythos comics were added to the haul this year, and although I haven’t had chance to read them yet I’ve skimmed through. The MAX title is the hardcover of Richard Corben’s straightforward Lovecraft adaptations, and looks gorgeous. The second is the first paperback collection of BOOM! Studio’s ongoing anothology title. BOOM! Haven’t made a single misstep yet with their Cthulhu titles, and I doubt they’re going to start here.

Arkham Asylum 15th Anniversary edition

Really needs a post to itself. In short: brilliant, better than I remember it. Unfortunately the good bits were all left in Morrison’s original script, so this is the first version I’ve ever read that makes a damned bit of sense. A flawed masterpiece.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War

Late to the party on this one, as I’ve only just upgraded to a graphics card that can handle the game. I assume we’re all geeks here, and we’re all familiar with the Games Workshop property that is, perhaps, nerdness incarnate.

Let’s just say, if Fallout 3 doesn’t suck up all of my time, then Dawn of War will be getting the rest. Hoo boy, I hope you’re all ready for another dip in productivity. Damn shame I’m fucking awful at RTS games.

The Steel Remains, by Richard Morgan

Britain’s best SF writer tackles fantasy. Half way through this, and it’s very good.

The Birthing House by Christopher Ransom

Picked up at random for being a haunted house book on the cheap at Asda. Last book I got from there was Joe Hill’s Heart Shaped Box, and that one was fantastic.

Again, only half way through it. Good points and bad points and I haven’t made my mind up about it yet, but it’s entertaining and it cost about three quid so I shouldn’t really complain either way.

That’s that faint praise thing again, isn’t it?

Anyway, turns out there’s a competition running in connection with the book, and the first prize is a weekend in that haunted hotel in Ludlow (Ludlow?) that’s been mentioned here before, more than once. The town’s obviously cornering the market in this kind of thing.

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Hey, folks. A bit of a snarl-up with Wordpress’ autopostinator (I blame the Bank Holiday weekend), so apologies for being slightly later than usual.

I have to say, link site io9.com has turned into a handy stop for skiffy information, even if it can get a little too horny-fanboy when it comes to anyone in SF with two X chromosomes. And after mentioning recently the possibility of a power-scuffle between the producers and the director on the Wolverine film, lo and behold, the rumours begin. And the issue, of course, is what rating the film should be placed at in order to maximise the audience. I hate to go on about it again, but this is the system British publishers want to use for children’s books? Well, that’s just fucking genius, isn’t it?

Anyone, bollocks to the X-franchise, you know what’s awesome? Hellboy II. Way, way better than the first one, and while it’s still more Del Toro’s thing than Mignola’s, the story is far more self-consistant, and it doesn’t have any extraneous characters in it. The world of the film in incredibly well realised (the lair of the Angel of Death, and the Angel’s character design being the stand-out for me), and it’s the perfect balance of funny, creepy and Hellboy punching or shooting things.

And I’m torn over what exactly the best bit is. Drinking in the shower? The locker-room fight? Duffing up the Golden Army, or the forest spirit? Hellboy himself’s brilliant, Liz gets a whole lot more to do than most women in comic-book movies, Johan is absolutely pitch-perfect, although (as all the characters are) subtly different from the character in the comics. Which isn’t a bad thing, the more I think about it. The problem with changing things from the source material, movies in particular, is it’s done in a hamfisted way by people who don’t have the talent of the original creators (see, amongst many, many other things, From Hell). This isn’t a problem here because Del Toro is just as talented in his own field as Mignola is in his.

Actually, I do know what the best thing about the film was. Abe Sapien finally coming into his own. He was such an afterthought in the first film, getting beaten up then sidelined in a tank for the second half. He’s such an interesting character in the comic, and Del Toro handled his and Hellboy’s friendship really well in the more recent flick. Sure, I’d have prefered the more reserved, stoic figure from the BPRD books, Hellboy’s Bones McCoy, but I suppose the problem with working under all that makeup and prosthesis is that you need all the sweeping gestures and hand movements just to get any character across at all, even if it does come out a bit campy. At least Doug Jones finally got to use his own voice in the film, after being overdubbed by Laurence Fishburne in FF2 and David Hyde Pierce in the previous Hellboy. I found it a lot easier to watch without Frasier’s brother’s voice breaking the illusion.

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I mentioned yesterday that I prefer Cyclops to Wolverine in the X-Men, although most people can’t seem to stick him. I guess I just think he’s got a cool power. His personality is a little dull, sure, but that really is the fault of the writers. Because you need that kind of dullish leader-character, the person who keeps everything together; the Nico in Runaways, the Jack in Lost. You remove that character from the team dynamic and, like a plot-vacuum, someone else steps in to the breach, and all you end up doing is watering down that character, whether it’s a neutered Logan in X-Men 3 or an edgeless Sawyer in the latter part of That Weird Island Show.

Grant Morrison, as always, handles the character best, by realising that an uncompromising idealist in the Marvel U, one that believes completely in Xavier’s dream, that believes he will trumph in any situation regardless of the odds, must have one personality characteristic above all others. He’d have to be completely fucking barmy. The “ice-cold lunacy” Wolverine refers to in the very first Morrison issue. It’s a great spin, a way of making the character compelling while retaining the idealism, and also goes someway to explaining the whole leaving the mother of his child for the woman she was cloned from plot point of the 80s, a character twist meant to make the boring character more interesting but ultimately kind of broke him.

Morrison’s take also allowed for an interesting comparison between Scott Summers and the Hairy Short Guy, examining the way their relationship could oscillate between friendship and antagonism. It led to the Assault on Weapon Plus storyline that had him and Logan team up for a mismatched buddies on a mission vibe, like a mutant Lethal Weapon. And for future reference, I would absolutely pay cold, hard cash to watch a Wolverine/Cyclops road trip flick.

Right, what else has tweaked the radar recently? Looking forward to Hellboy 2, finally landing this side of the Pond on Thursday. I know I had a bit of a go at the original film a couple of weeks ago, but this one looks like Del Toro has more of a grip on what he wants to do. I think I’m a little more used to the idea that it is Del Toro’s world rather than Mignola’s, and with that in mind I’m interested to see what kind of original take he has on it. I watched the first one last week, and while I don’t disagree with the negative things I’ve written about it (it really doesn’t quite hold together), what it gets right, it gets very right, and ultimately it’s a fun, engaging, good natured film, which bodes well. Ron Perlman was born to play the role, and John Hurt was brilliant too. And the sequence set in 1944 is absolutely brilliant, really spot on, and I hope the second film takes its cue from that.

And speaking of live action, BBC 4’s been showing a lot of the old 60s Batman series. I keep forgetting they’re on, so I haven’t managed to catch a whole one, but I caught the end of the one with the Green Hornet and Kato in it. It is beyond strange to watch Bruce Lee turn up in Batman. I’ve also watched a few YouTube clips of Kevin Smith doing his lecture series, ones where he mentioned his abortive attempts at writing screenplays for The Six Million Dollar Man and Green Hornet. The idea of Smith doing Green Hornet is really laughable, and it’s not really surprising the pitch was based in the 90s. The infamous First Wave of John Peters-driven superhero movies led to so many crazy properties being thrown round on the grounds that any of that shit would make money, regardless of whether the world really wanted a film version of the Lone Ranger’s grand-nephew.

Of course, what’s even crazier is that now were in the Second Wave, shit is still being flung just to see what sticks, and now Seth Rogen’s on writing duties. This is how insane Hollywood is. Kevin Smith writes about Superman’s sex life, so obviously he’s the man who should do Green Hornet, regardless of suitability. And when he can’t do it, they employ another funny fat guy on the grounds that, I don’t know, he also writes films with lots of naughty words in them.

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Holy crap do I want to own an Alien/Predator chessboard. I have no idea where this sudden need for overpriced AVP tat is coming from, but boy is it intense.

I also notice io9 reporting an American live-action remake of Akira. Oh no oh no oh no. Is not going to work. Whinge whinge whinge.

In nicer news, getting through the latter half of Series 3 of Battlestar Galactica. It’s been awesome to see Dean Stockwell, Al Calavicci from Quantum Leap, turn up again, this time as a bad guy. Reminds me of how creepy he was as Devil-Al in that QL episode with Stephen King in it. Damn, I loved that show, and damn the show’s final episode was shitty. I really hope Galactica doesn’t screw the pooch when it comes to an end, because the rest of it’s been so very good.

With all the other superhero films doing so well, it’s going to be interesting to see how the X-Men franchise pans out in the next couple of years. It’s really the series that proved the viability of a new approach to rubber-trouser characters, in terms of faithfulness to the themes and stories of the original material, and a way of taking the best bits of what went before. Sure, Blade is technically the first of the successful comic book adaptations, but that really is in spite of the original rather than because. And I like the Tomb Of Dracula stuff.

If I were being pessimistic, I’d say I don’t have a whole lot of hope with the Magneto prequel. First of all, you’re not likely to find a young actor as good as Ian McKellan to take over the role, and someone of the calibre of, say, Hayden Christensen isn’t going to be able to handle what will inevitably be a pretty dark film. It was never going to be all bright pink flower-bunnies, but after The Dark Knight you can bet the message Hollywood will be taking from the public reaction is nightmarish, unrelenting grim is what’s required. There’s too much scope to mishandle this one.

Wolverine, on the other hand, had got Hugh Jackman going for it. The stupidest thing about X-Men 3 was the way Cyclops was killed off for essentially being a boring goody-goody leader type, only to be immediately replaced by a neutered Logan in the exact same role. A prequel means angry loner Logan, hopefully with a dollop of the sinister slaughter from X-Men 2. Also, Deadpool, and who doesn’t want to see a cinematic Deadpool? I just hope they use some of Grant Morrison’s take on the Weapon X programme; after all, there was a split-second shot of a “Weapon Plus” vial in The Incredible Hulk. Also, I don’t notice any stinkers on director Gavin Hood’s IMDB page, in the way that Brett Ratner’s previous convictions correctly indicated a screw-up.

Negatives? Well, Morrison aside I’ve never liked the Weapon X stuff. Gambit’s in it. The last X-Men film was poor and allegedly plagued with studio meddling, so is that going to play out this time too?

Wolverine’s a funny old character. First time I saw him was in Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends when I was but a lad. He used his claws to make an impromptu kebab. So I kind of missed out on the edgy killer persona that so captivated a generation. Then he turned up in a few places- a Hulk comic, Spider-Man, a few other things- and he was, frankly, a bit of a dickhead. I must have missed out on the nuance of his mysterious loner thing, but then he was a short-arse in yellow lycra with a daft haircut who was being a twat to Peter Parker. I couldn’t really see the attraction, and to make it worse he turned up in every fucking issue of every fucking comic during the 90s.

I wouldn’t say I ever really warmed to the character, but he certainly bugged me less as time went on. And thanks to Jackman’s performance in the first film, I finally understood where the character was coming from. It was properly surprising, really, but I ended up rooting for him, in particular during the aforementioned rampage in the mansion in the second film. Funny how things change, but that really goes to show how good Jackman did at grounding the character, leaving me more optimistic than not for the solo film.

Still prefer Cyclops, though.

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I haven’t read an X-Men comic since the unintelligible mess that followed Grant Morrison’s departure from the flagship title. And that was a while ago.

It’s odd to think of the Avengers being the biggest brand Marvel currently have, considering the way their mutant line has dominated the company for twenty-odd years. With the cartoon and then the movies it seemed they were also the highest-profile property beyond the source material too.

And then came Spider-Man, and the Scotsman’s departure, and the next thing you know Brett Ratner’s cocked up the gravy train and even Captain America (Captain America?) is kicking your arse in the Diamond sales chart.

Funny, but I’ve never been the biggest X-Men fan. I’ve never disliked them, but I can’t say I’d rank them in the top ten, maybe even top twenty of characters or titles. But I’ve read a lot of their comics over the years, mostly thanks to dear friend Triggi and the British reprint titles he bought through the 90s.

Outside of pressed trees, I enjoyed the cartoon for what it was, and went nuts for the first two films. Thanks to a lack of reverence for the Claremont years (just never really got his work, I suppose, which so informed the X-Men’s world that it probably explains why I’ve never rated them all that highly) I wasn’t horrified by Morrison’s take. The opposite, really. So there was no way to be anything but disappointed with what followed, and after a short time I dropped the title. I wasn’t as taken by the Whedon stuff as some (although the art was very pretty), but then I don’t quite understand the Kitty Pryde fetish readers who are slightly older than me seem to have.

After spending about three hundred words telling you about why I find the X-Men a bit meh, imagine my surprise that recently I’ve been missing them. Because there really is a unique atmosphere to Xavier’s team. More often than not the soap-operatics are cringe-worthy, the dialogue (for the international characters in particular) awful, the reoccurring situations tiresome (the Savage Land again?) and worst of all, the continuity impossibly convoluted even in an industry that thrives on minutiae of detail.

Of course, you take that all together and there’s a familiarity to all of that, something that plays to the mindset of someone who, for example, spends decades reading the same damn kids’ stuff over and over. The X-Men are like super-hero comfort food (well, insofar as super-hero comics are all comfort-eating of a kind), everything you’re addicted to in one easy package.

I picked up X-Men: Deadly Genesis on impulse. I mean, the aftermath of House of M wasn’t so interesting to me that I need to know what happened next, and further twists to Summers family history isn’t exactly compulsive, but damn if Ed Brubaker hasn’t earned some credit thanks to his exceptional work on Daredevil.

Turns out, the collection is exactly what’s needed to get me back into the X-Men. Brubaker’s talented enough to sidestep the annoying pitfalls usually associated with the characters (although, great big FAIL for regional accents), writing a pretty straightforward mutant adventure. It’s far more traditional than Morrison’s take, a lot more nostalgic, but still streamlined enough for modern sensibilities. Nothing hugely consequential happens (though the marketing material wants you to think so) besides Banshee’s death (but come on, did people really freak out about that? An X-Man dying? Seriously?), and that’s OK because all we put our money down for Beast being smart, Wolverine being stealthy knife guy, and everyone else standing round looking angsty. Professor Xavier comes across as a bit of a dick, but come on, he sticks teenagers in leather and makes them fight. He is a bit of a dick.

All-in-all, a comfortable comicky read.

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A lot of fragmentary thought round these parts this week.

Popping back to the Doctor again, how random was it that Mike from the Young Ones is playing the Sontaran commander? Weird. I wonder who they’ll get to play Davros.

It shouldn’t really be a surprise that it appears to be the Dalek’s creator who’s the major bad guy in Series 4. He’s really the only major one left to show up again, after the Master. I’m not too sure how I feel about it, outside the fact that it’s Russell T., so it’s bound to be awesome. Rose showing up seems a bit of a shame, as her character arc finished so perfectly, and her return’s a bit of a gimmicky.

I think the problem with Davros is something that’s been mentioned a number of times in Who fandom: before him, the Daleks were a threat all on their own, but after he turned up they just sort of ended up being Evil Henchmen. The new series has put so much into making the Daleks deadly once again it’s a damned pity they’re going to get relegated. I’d rather have had the Cult of Skaro developed a bit more as Dalek leaders, but then the last Dalek two-parter turned Sec into a tentacle-headed American and it all fell a bit flat. Maybe they do need the old guy back again, although I have to say I’d rather have seen a modern spin on the Sea Devils.

I’m in a bit of a quandry about continuing to get Morrison’s Batman monthly, too. I recently picked up Brubaker’s X-Men: Deadly Genesis in hardback (more on that soon), and it’s  a really great format to read the story in. With the Batman delays, plus the fact that the story so far reads so much better in one go rather than month by month (or longer, lets face it), I’m enclined to switch to the trades for Batman RIP. The same kind of goes for Final Crisis, or its tie-ins. I suppose the question is whether month-to-month delays and a fragmented story line will be better or worse than having all the good bits spoiled in advance.

And finally, I picked up this month’s Empire with the coverage of the Summer superhero films, and I have to say the more I see of The Incredible Hulk the more I like the look of it. Sure, it’s going to suck, but if I could make room in my heart for Ghost Rider then this one shouldn’t be too much of a leap. Despite enjoying the first Hulk, I do think they fumbled the ball a bit by largely ignoring the TV series.

The thing is, that’s the touchstone for most people and the character, and stuff like the pre-transformation green contact lenses generate the kind of pleasant memory the film-makers should be taking advantage of. Plus, part of the “hero’s journey” this time is Banner’s acceptance that, by the end of the film, the world needs a monster like the Hulk to save it (or, at least, New York), and isn’t that the kind of thing we read comics for?

Oh, and just so no one thinks I’ve forgotten, I’ll do a round-up at some point of all the Changaround posts, if not next week then the week after. Cheers to everyone who’s taken part so far.

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Mortal Kombat vs. DC

As crazy as it sounds, of all the news to come out of the convention at the weekend this was the one I was most excited about, mostly because it was so unexpected. I had no idea there was another Mortal Kombat game in the pipeline, never mind a comic book crossover.

There’s not much to say about it at this point, but hell, I’ve only got one other post listed under “Games” over there in the right-hand column, looking all lonely. Even “Manga” has more entries.

Mortal Kombat is a fondly remembered childhood game, a remnant of a more innocent past where me and my friends would trade information on the best way to gruesomely dispatch opponents during the finishing move window at the end of a successful bout. I never really got the hang of Street Fighter, but I was always more of a Sega fan, so MK was my first choice. Like the rest of the world, I favoured the ninjas: Reptile from the sequel, Scorpion in the original. Ah, great times. The more recent entries in the franchise weren’t up to much according to the reviews, so I never bothered with them.

By the same token, while comic book computer games are usually utter pants, there have been some really good ones in the past ten years or so: X-Men Legends was good, and the Spider-Man 2 game was absolutely fantastic. So a great DC comics fighter would be awesome. So yeah, they’ve got me coming and going with this one. In fact, as long as it isn’t utterly unplayable there’s not much chance I’m not going to pick this up. I remember the Star Wars fighter (Masters of Teras-Kasi? Something like that) from years ago that most reviewers didn’t rate, but me and the posse (oh yeah, I had a posse. Believe it) lost hours on, just because we got to use a lightsabre and be Chewbacca.

Final Crisis

I wasn’t expecting to look forward to this at all, what with event fatigue and everything, and oh, I am conflicted. On one hand, I’ve lost all patience with DC obsessively crossing over every single title in their line with a frankly incomprehensible and (worse yet) fucking boring overarching plot. Never mind yet another Crisis.

But. But but but. Grant Morrison.

The interview with him over at Comic Book Resources last week utterly sold me on Batman RIP and this summer’s event, albeit with a few reservations. Obviously, Morrison is awesome and I check out damn near anything he writes, the epic scope of the DCU is never better than when he handles it, and the series promises (really really promises, honest this time) not to cross itself over to destruction. Heck, I’ve not got a huge interest in Darkseid or the Fourth World (one of these days I’ll get round to a post explaining why), and yet Morrison’s got me intrigued between the hints from 52 and the Mister Miracle section of Seven Soldiers.

The reservations: Will Morrison get micro-managed, especially if it looks like the series is already running late? Despite assurances, is it really going to be self-contained? If Geoff Johns and Peter Tomasi are on form with their tie-ins (both were involved in the Sinestro Corps War, remember, the best crossovery thing for many a year and a brilliant story in its own right) then I won’t mind dropping some cash on them, but I’m not a huge Greg Rucka fan and I’m not getting his issues so I’m hoping nothing important happens in them, and by important I mean “necessary for enjoyment and understanding of the greater story arc”, not “someone dies horribly”. I recall the fun of DC 1,000,000 being curtailed because of some important points that happened in fucking Resurrection Man, of all titles.

Speaking of the death thing, once again a story is being driven by someone important dying, and seriously, I don’t give a shit. Really I don’t. Used way too many times to be anything other than a cliché, so I really hope Morrison knows this and is going to go somewhere interesting and surprising with it (same goes for Batman RIP, actually). And from the interview, that looks like what he’s got planned, so I’ve got my fingers crossed that he’s going to pull it off. I have faith.

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Following on from Wednesday, and good Lord do the post tags get long when I write about comic characters and creators.

Geoff Johns on X-Men: One: Johns has a solid history with team/squad titles. Two: He’s really good at delving into a character’s backstory, and not only coming up with a different spin on things but also in streamlining and simplifying what can sometimes be pretty confusing and contradictory stuff. Three: Isn’t this exactly what the X titles need?

John Romita, Jr on Wonder Woman: One of the best, most consistant pencillers of the last twenty-five (if not more) years, yet never worked on a mainstream DC title. While he’s be an awesome fit on damn near anything, I suspect the title that would benefit the most would be Wonder Woman.

Grant Morrison on Daredevil: And everyone just starts looking at me funny. No, honestly, I’m serious. The fact that it’s not the kind of thing anyone would expect would work in its favour, because any way the coin falls would benefit the reader. Either Morrison would channel the best of his Batman work into a crime title (it’s not all sci-fi closet flying saucers; think Gothic), or he’d get odd (as it were) with Daredevil, and give us a fresh take. I mean, how much grim and gritty crime drama can the character really bear? Well, loads more. But you get my point.

Mike Mignola on Aquaman: Widening the net to outside the Big Two, and I reckon a Lovecraft-style horror spin on Arthur Curry/Orin/Whomever would be a great direction to take the character in. Not as a permanent status-quo change, but just for a year or so. Because we never really get a feeling of how cold and dark it is in the deep sea, or of all the squiddy-headed nasties that are down there. Half the time it looks like the Little Fucking Mermaid in Poseidonis. The Dweller in the Deep was practically Cthulhu in an orange shirt, after all.

James Robinson and Marcos Martin on Silver Surfer: He proved he could do cosmic stuff with Starman, and I think a long term 60-odd issue run in that kind of vein would be the perfect way to explore a great (but famously tricky) character. As for Marcos Martin, the last work of his I saw was for Marvel, on the excellent Doctor Strange: The Oath, although the first place I saw his extraordinary art was on DC’s Breach. He’d fit the Surfer book perfectly.

Matt Fraction on The Flash: Another writer who, as far as I know, hasn’t done any work for DC. As per the other posts about the Flash this month, the title should be (a) about big, crazy ideas, (b) have a lot of heart, (c) be electrifying and/or hyperkinetic, and (d) always seems to benefit from fresh perspectives and very individual writers. Fraction’s one of the few comic writers working today that ticks all those boxes.

Michael Alan Nelson on Doctor Strange: Great on BOOM! Studios’ Fall of Cthulhu, can’t imagine he’d do a bad job on the sorceror.

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