Heroes Never Rust #104: A Final Note

29 Wednesday Jul 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

Tags

1985, Escapism, Mark Millar, Marvel

Heroes Never Rust #104 by Sean Ironman

A Final Note

With Marvel 1985 issue six, no reader will be surprised when Toby returns to the real world with the Marvel heroes, and the villains are soon defeated. Does anyone ever expect the heroes to lose in these stories? But just because the inevitable good-triumphing-over-evil occurs, the story does offer interesting developments.

In an effort to stop the villains, Toby’s father is gunned down by Red Skull. There’s a dark comedic vein running through the scene of Toby’s father confronting the villains, and Red Skull calmly taking out his pistol and killing the father. The story doesn’t end there. Nor does it end with the villains defeated, the heroes returning to their world, or even with Toby’s father’s funeral.

The comic ends years later, when Toby is an adult. He’s on his laptop writing a comic called 1985, and in the final two pages, his father wakes up in the Marvel Universe under the care of Jane Foster, a nurse and a love interest for Thor. Earlier in the comic series, his father said that he had a crush on Jane Foster, so years later, Toby gives his father his wish—his father asks Jane out on a date and she says yes. Marvel 1985 ends with his father looking out at the New York City of the Marvel Universe in anticipation for the possibilities.

This brings up an interesting aspect of superhero stories, and fiction as a whole—the idea of wish fulfillment. Why write fiction? Why write superhero stories? The superhero genre isn’t well respected. Even now, much of the respect it has earned is only because of the hundred of millions superhero films bring in at the box office. While comics have gained more respect in recent years, mainly by people who resist calling comics comics and instead refer to them as graphic or sequential narrative or other terms showing their embarrassment over comics, the superhero genre is still thought of in a similar way as fantasy YA novels are thought of in the literary community.

Superhero stories, though, serve an important function for the literary community. Due to many factors, like the rise of creative nonfiction and the focus on a global community, so much of writing is about our world. Even in fiction, our reality plays an important role. Stories must be real. Stories must show the world as it is, people as they are. Stories seem to be gritty and characters gray. But superhero stories offer a break from all that. Instead of showing the world as it is, readers (and writers) get to use their imagination and look at a different world.

But, this isn’t escapism.

I don’t like that word, escapism. Whenever I hear someone say they like a certain book or a certain film or a certain genre because it offers them an escape, I just feel bad for that person, that he or she lives such an awful existence or views the world in such an awful way that they must shut down for a couple of hours and escape. Superhero stories are not escapism. They can comment on what it means to be human just as much as any literary story. Does each superhero story do that? Of course not, but neither does every literary short story. Does Superman really save the day? Does Spider-man? Batman? etc. No, they don’t. Superman fights a man or a robot or a monster with his fists and he puts off evil temporarily. But, that’s not where the story is at.

Superman’s story is with Lois Lane, Perry White, the Kents. It’s the people and the effect Superman has on them as people. If literary means a focus on craft and that the story comments on what it means to be human, then superhero stories are literary. A story doesn’t have to comment on how the world is for the reader to learn about the world. You can learn about our world, not just by studying what it is, but by studying what it is not.

With all the technological advancements and heroics in a superhero comic, the world is not better off. The Marvel Universe still has the same problems as our world. There is still greed and selfishness. There is still violence. Kids still go to bed hungry. Sexism still exists. Racism does too. Superheroes are just window dressing on the same world. Even with the help of superheroes, them saving our lives, the human beings are still the same human beings as we are. The presence of a superhero doesn’t change what it means to be human. It just allows a different view of our world.

Many of us complain about mass shootings (rightly so). Many of us complain about space travel no longer being a priority. Many of us want something in place to stop the government from doing whatever the government wants to do. Yet, even in a world of superheroes, there are still mass shootings, people aren’t traveling freely to other planets, and government officials are still corrupt. A superpowered savior will not save us from being us. I think that makes a greater comment on humanity than many realist short stories and novels. We may wish for something magical to save us, some kind of easy solution to our problems, but superhero stories show us that that will never happen. We are who we are. Nothing will stop us from the faults of Man. Only we can do that.

_______

Photo by John King

Sean Ironman (Episode 102) earned his MFA at the University of Central Florida. Currently, he teaches creative nonfiction and digital media at the University of Central Arkansas as a visiting professor. His work can be read in The Writer’s Chronicle, Redivider, and Breakers: A Comics Anthology, among others.

Heroes Never Rust #103: 1985, & Doing Something New

22 Wednesday Jul 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Comic Books, Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Heroes Never Rust #103 by Sean Ironman

1985: Doing Something New

There have been a lot of comic books made in the last hundred years. Millions of stories, with a large chunk of them revolving around superheroes. Most of these stories range from terrible to merely adequate. I love superheroes, but even I can’t defend each one. I don’t know if it’s the schedule of having to turn out a complete superhero tale each month (written, penciled, inked, colored, lettered, and edited), or if it’s just the nature of storytelling, but most superhero tales do nothing new. Sure, they plug in a different character into the protagonist spot, another in the villain spot, another in the best friend role, and so on. These stories can still be entertaining in the way that when you’re done you’re not upset you wasted fifteen minutes of your life on the comic, but rarely are they memorable. But, how does a writer bring something new to a genre that’s had millions of stories already told?

In the fifth issue of 1985, Toby finds himself in the Marvel Universe. From the portal between dimensions, he lands on a street corner, still on the run from the Trapster, who is dispatched pretty quickly by a sedan as he chases Toby across the street. Toby heads to Avengers Mansion, where Jarvis, the butler (an actual butler in the comics, not software), hands Toby a pin and unconvinced Toby is being truthful, Jarvis tells him to get the Fantastic Four. At the Baxter Building, Toby is made to fill out a form full-bureaucracy style beside a few others who also have an emergency that requires the help of the Fantastic Four. The superhero team will help on a first-come first-serve basis. In need of help, Toby heads to the Daily Bugle to get Peter Parker’s help, which seems to work. Toby’s adventures in the Marvel Universe are fun and interesting, even though he doesn’t run into any superheroes until the end of his journey. The issue works because it’s rare that we get a look at the ground level of the Marvel Universe.

I think that’s the key to doing something new—point-of-view. Style and structure can do a lot in a story, but to really deliver something new, I think the key lies with point of view. The superheroes remain the superheroes we know and love. They are reinvented. But, by getting a look at them from a different angle, in this case Toby’s, we can experience them in a new way. Perhaps this is why superhero films can’t seem to go even three films without losing steam (How many great superhero trilogies are there? I can’t think of any.) Ultimately, the superhero’s story, if they are to stay a superhero, can only be repeated so many times. Only so many times can new villains and supporting characters reinvigorate a series. But, a new point of view could create a whole new story. How interesting would it be to see a Superman film that is told from the point of view of a priest, someone who believes Man has been made in the image of God, that Man is God’s chosen creature? How would that affect the priest’s faith? Superman would stay Superman, but we as the audience would see a new side of the character.

One of Marvel Comics’ greatest series, and one that I can’t help but feel that Marvel 1985 was meant to be a new version of, was Marvels. In Marvels, the reader followed Phil Sheldon, an everyman character and photographer for the Daily Bugle. Readers saw the birth of the Marvel Universe through different eyes. And it was great. Readers got a new understanding of the comics, from the impact that Captain America had on the United States to why the X-men were hated for their mutant powers and the Fantastic Four were loved for their superpowers.

Marvel has done a few more comics like this in recent years, such as the Civil War tie-in Frontline. I really hope we get these types of comics as film someday. Not yet, it’s too soon, but in ten years, I think they would be wonderful. How many times can we see the same story over and over again? I’m not saying I dislike superhero comics, or I’m unhappy with what’s being published today. But, if a genre is going to thrive, it needs to evolve and offer readers new experiences. Point of view is a great way to do that. Some of the best Batman stories from the last twenty years have been found in Gotham Central, a comic about the police force in Gotham City. One of the best Superman stories is It’s a Bird, from the point of view of the writer of Superman comics. A great, and somewhat forgotten, Spider-man storyline (“The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man”) is about a child with leukemia whose dying wish is to meet Spider-man. The whole issue is Spider-man and the kid hanging out in the kid’s bedroom talking. And it was incredible because readers saw Spider-man in a different way. So, if you’re thinking of tackling a superhero tale, or any genre work that’s been done to death, try thinking of a different character as your narrator. You’ll get the best of both worlds—a story that has what readers love and something new.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #102: 1985, and Keeping Revelations from the Reader

15 Wednesday Jul 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Heroes Never Rust #102 by Sean Ironman

1985: Keeping Revelations from the Reader

In issue four of Marvel 1985, Toby and his father escape from the Lizard and find their way to safety. Shortly afterward, Toby’s father runs off to rescue his ex-wife, leaving Toby with a few friends. Then, Toby turns to his buddies and says, “You’ve all been reading comics your entire lives. We’ve practically got a degree in these characters. Who else is going to beat them.” After a beat, he asks, “You coming or not?” His friends don’t join him and Toby runs off to save the day. The next few pages feature Toby running by carnage as Marvel villains go to war with the town. He runs to the old house from earlier in the series, the one where he first spotted the Red Skull, and he heads into the basement to a door labeled “PRIVATE” and jumps through, right into the Marvel Universe.

The problem I have with this development is that I have no idea what mission Toby is on. I understand he is on a task to save the day and stop the Marvel villains, but what I don’t understand is how he goes from escaping from the Lizard and deciding that there is a portal to another world in this other house. And, if he really didn’t know that there was a portal, what his plan was to do at the house, and why he went straight to the basement? This kind of development is common, I find, in popular fiction. The protagonist, or sometimes another character, decides that he or she has a plan, and then the character implements the plan. The problem I have with this style is when, in order to keep the reader interested, the writer withholds the plan from the reader. The protagonist then moves toward a goal that is hidden from the reader. Laying out the plan for the reader may be boring, but I feel that if a reader is following the protagonist closely, then the reader should understand the what and why of the protagonist’s actions.

For me, this style creates a number of problems. For one, it makes me feel dumb, as if I should be understanding why Toby is running off and where he’s going, but I wasn’t a strong enough reader to “get it.” There was a jump made in the story, and I missed it.

The second problem is that the reader can sense the writer in the story. There’s no real reason Toby doesn’t tell his friends where he’s going. After all, he asks for their help, and to successfully get their help, he should tell them his plan. The reader is then treated to false tension. Another problem, and probably a greater one, lies with point of view. If the reader is following Toby page after page, and the reader is seeing the world through the eyes of Toby, then the reader should understand Toby as a character. Even though in a comic book, point of view is loose. We don’t really see the world from the point of view of Toby because we as readers see characters and events that Toby does not see. Perhaps that’s how the story thinks it can get away with not revealing Toby’s plan. But, even if the story is not told from a first person point of view, or even a limited third person point of view, Toby is still our protagonist. The reader should, at a basic level, understand what the protagonist is doing, and at least be able to guess as to why.

Recently, I read the short story “Blackberries” by Leslie Norris. In that story, a boy goes to get a haircut, then a cap, then goes out with his father. The events don’t really add up until the end, but at every moment, the reader understands the task at hand. I think that’s the trick of storytelling. A character can go anywhere, the story can go off track in an direction, but if the reader understands what the protagonist is doing, and to a degree, why, then the reader will follow the character. When a story takes this jump with Toby, it can feel as if the writer is trying to control the story. The characters need to move into position in order to get to the climax that the writer has planned.

The story no longer is character-driven.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #101: 1985 and Villainy

07 Tuesday Jul 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

1985, Mark Millar

Heroes Never Rust #101 by Sean Ironman

1985: Villainy

In Marvel: 1985 issue three, Marvel villains continue to invade the real world. The Hulk was seen in the second issue, but no other Marvel heroes seem to be around, leaving humanity with limited support to fight off the bad guys. While this issue does feature Fin Fang Foom, a giant green alien Buddhist dragon and the Iron Man villain that has been sorely missing from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there are no world-conquering plans afoot. So many times in superhero stories, and in summer blockbusters and other popular writing works, the stakes are raised for not only a person or a small town but the whole world. In the mainstream comic universes, there are very few serial rapists. There may be petty thieves Spider-man dispatches early in an adventure, but most villains have wonderfully complex and grandiose plans. While the audience gets to see a lot of destruction, with many battles toppling skyscrapers, the men and women caught in the middle rarely get much attention. This ends up taking the bite out of the violence. I’m not necessarily a fan of violence, but I do think that if a story shows violence than it has a responsibility to show the full ramifications.

Also, by focusing on such large, complex villainous plans, the reader, or viewer, is actually kept at a distance from the story. A few weeks ago, I read an article on the new Jurassic World and why the CGI looks bad compared to the original Jurassic Park. A lot of reasons were given, but one that hit me the hardest is that filmmakers, for Jurassic World and for other films like The Hobbit trilogy, go overboard, not with how many frames are CGI but with what happens with the CGI. Because filmmakers can do whatever they want, they do. But, the audience doesn’t really have a frame of reference for what’s going on. When the helicopter in Jurassic World gets attacked, spins out of control, breaks through a large aviary, crashes, blows up, and dinosaurs flee from the wreckage, the audience can’t process what’s going on. The scene is too foreign. I though back to that article when reading the third issue of 1985.

Here, the villains are truly terrifying. MODOK, probably one of the goofiest looking villains in comics, is incredibly creepy as he mind controls a group of townspeople and leads them to drown in the river. One woman even holds a baby, and everyone slowly walks single file into the waters. MODOK doesn’t kill a whole city. He’s not out to rule the world. The simplicity of the scene is why it’s creepy. I can imagine that scene, and because I can imagine it, the scene becomes horrific. I become afraid. If the villain’s plan becomes to ambitious and elaborate, if the action scenes have too much going on, then the whole thing seems cartoonish, and instead of building tension, the scene becomes laughable.

The issue ends with our protagonist Toby and his father driving down a road, and the Lizard, one of Spider-Man’s set of bad guys, jumps onto the roof and tries to claw at the boy and his father. The issue ends without a resolution, but the cliffhanger works because the scene builds terror and tension. The Lizard doesn’t have some crazy plan of turning everyone into lizards with some kind of new technology that readers have no idea how it works. The Lizard is a monstrous half-lizard half-man creature atop a car trying to kill, and possibly eat, the occupants. We don’t need anything else. If we care for the protagonist and his father, the danger doesn’t have to be incredibly complex with all these moving parts. The kid is in danger. We like the kid. We don’t want the kid to die. That’s it. We, as writers, or at least the writers of the usual summer blockbusters, are making storytelling more difficult for themselves. What difference does it make if our protagonist is going to be killed by a two-by-four or by some kind of alien technology? Well, the difference is that we can imagine what would happen if the character is beaten by a two-by-four. We can imagine it, and that’s why we don’t want it to happen.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this topic as I see trailers for Terminator: Genisys. The original Terminator still looks more terrifying, and I think it has nothing to do with the R rating of the original versus the PG-13 of the new one, or the CGI in the new film. In the original film, the Terminator walks into a police station and shoots a whole bunch of cops. The building doesn’t blow up. The Terminator isn’t flinging vehicles at the heroes. There isn’t some kind of domino effect of falling debris. It’s one man, or robot in this case, walking confidently down a hallway and shooting whatever is in his path. In the new film, the Terminator is jumping out of a helicopter into another one. A bus falls from the bridge with the heroes inside, clinging to each other to avoid falling to their deaths. The film is trying to be too big. Last year, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes was released. Obviously there was a ton of CGI used for the apes. Yet, the film seemed more real than most summer blockbusters because the action scenes weren’t over the top. The audience was grounded. Our imaginations help drive tension. For me, a horrifying act for a villain would be to have the villain walk up to a person and shoot the person point in blank in the head. I don’t want to get shot. I can imagine what getting shot would do to me. I don’t know what being turned into a lizard man would do to me. And I don’t know what a MODOK is, but I can imagine being drowned in a river, and that is terrifying.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #100: Adequacy is Okay

01 Wednesday Jul 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

1985, Goodfellas, Mark Millar, Tommy Lee Edwards

Heroes Never Rust #100 by Sean Ironman

1985: Adequacy is Okay

At the end of issue one of Marvel’s 1985, Toby, the protagonist, runs into the Hulk one night in the woods. The second issue picks up from that point, with the Hulk asking Toby if he’s seen the Juggernaut, who is apparently causing trouble. To many people, the Hulk is thought to be the mindless alter ego of Bruce Banner, who is the intelligent scientist. While that is true in the comics, for the most part, there have been times where Banner has been able to control the Hulk and speak normally. The mid-eighties was one of these times. But, because many readers may be put off by a Hulk that speaks intelligently, the Hulk tells Toby, “Please, there’s no need to be afraid. My monstrous id has been completely suppressed by my academic super-ego.” The line has no bearing on the story. It furthers no plot, and it doesn’t even further that scene. It’s only role is as exposition, so the reader is not confused by the Hulk acting differently than the reader may expect. The line is not interesting, but it is inoffensive. The line is adequate, in that it does what it must, and then the story moves on.

The dialogue reminded me of a moment last week at the New Harmony Writers Workshop in New Harmony, Indiana. My workshop instructor was Stuart Dybek. During a discussion on one writer’s short story, Dybek told an anecdote (he seems to love anecdotes) of his son’s first novel. He recalled one section of prose and said that the section was not good but it got the job done. It was adequate, Dybek said. But, sometimes, adequate is the best we can do.

In university courses, I was taught each word must be perfect, must be chosen carefully. With my own creative writing, I pour over it dozens of times working out not only the characters and scenes, but every description, every line of dialogue, everything. I believe a writer must write good sentences, I do. And I also believe some writers spend too long concentrating on sentences and the story escapes them (one of the reasons I believe literary fiction is not very popular these days). Sometimes, though, I believe, as Dybek said, the best we can do is adequate. How many novels have at least one mistake in them? Or if you don’t want to call it a mistake, one thing that could be better? How many memoirs? Poems? Films? Comics? I’m not speaking about bad sentences, unclear constructions, or the reliance on clichés. I’m merely talking about the descriptions or dialogue or any other sentence that will not go down in history as interesting. These adequate sections do their job and are not so terrible to distract readers. I feel that I should avoid suggesting a writer should strive toward adequacy because I know that if every sentence is merely adequate, the story will suffer. But, perhaps writers should be happy with a story as long as it hits the emotional beats the writer set out for, even if a sentence or two will never be described as great.

Many years ago, I wrote mainly screenplays. I wanted to work in comics and in film. One lesson I was taught about screenwriting was that a good screenplay needed just three excellent scenes. If it had three excellent scenes, the audience would enjoy the movie. The other scenes couldn’t be bad, but they didn’t have to be great. At the time, I found it offensive, like the instructor was trying to say we couldn’t write a film filled with great scenes so to aim lower. But, I am starting to see the truth in that argument. When I think of a great film like Goodfellas, I don’t think of every scene, of every moment. I think of the long shot of Ray Liotta taking Lorraine Bracco through the club. I think of the montage set to “Layla.” I think of individual moments and lines of dialogue. That goes with any film, any novel, any memoir. Moments stick out to me but not the whole narrative.

Adequacy in small areas of a story should not be looked down on. Writer Mark Millar needed to tell the reader that the Hulk can talk, to not be confused. Perhaps he could have thought long and hard and come up with something amazing, but perhaps not. Not all parts to a car are beautiful. Not all parts to a house. There should be amazing moments in a story, as well as wonderful lines of dialogue and interesting descriptions, but don’t lose sight of what you’re trying to do. If the point gets across to the reader for something that doesn’t need a lot of attention, adequacy will do just fine.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #99: 1985

24 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Mark Millar, Marvel 1985, Tommy Lee Edwards

Heroes Never Rust #99 by Sean Ironman

1985

I grew up reading comics, specifically X-Men comics. At first, my father would come home with a bag full of random comics for me, my brother, and my sister. My siblings lost interest over the years, but my interest grew. As a teenager, I would go weekly to the comic book shop. My mom never really understood my interest in comic books, but in her defense, reading comics in a time before superhero movies took over Hollywood and made hundreds of millions of dollars was very different. She would look at the covers of my weekly purchases and point at a muscular male character and joke that I was reading comics because I could imagine myself as that character. If a female character, drawn voluptuously as many female comic book characters are, my mom would joke that the reason I didn’t have a girlfriend was because I was looking for a woman who looked like that. I never understood why she thought I read comics because I wanted to be one of the superheroes. I’ve never understood that argument for any story in any medium. I have never wanted to be Superman, Spider-man, Cyclops, Wolverine, Batman, or any other superhero you can name. I have never imagined myself in their costumes or living out their adventures. But, on trips to visit family in New York during the summer, I would imagine Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters (later renamed Xavier’s Institute for Higher Learning). I didn’t want to be a specific character, I only wanted to be me, but I wanted to live in a world where the X-Men existed. Being a superhero, with all the powers that would come with it, wasn’t nearly as interesting as living in a world of superheroes. The world of Marvel Comics with all those locales and interconnected stories and continuity sparked my imagination (the importance of world building may also be why Marvel films are reliable hits these days). I must not have been the only one to want to live in the world of Marvel Comics.

A few years ago, Marvel 1985 was released. Written by Mark Millar and with art by Tommy Lee Edwards, the six-issue miniseries sees the villains and heroes of the Marvel Universe enter our world. Toby Goodman, a Marvel Comics fan, sees the Red Skull one day in his neighborhood while walking with father. Toby lives in our world, in 1985. From May 1984 to April 1985, Marvel Comics released Secret Wars, a crossover between Spider-Man, the Avengers, the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four in which a cosmic entity known as the Beyonder creates a planet for the villains and heroes to do battle. In Marvel 1985, the villains have snuck into our world. There are no big entrances in the middle of New York City with portals opening in the sky and villains pouring out. The Red Skull, Dr. Doom, the Vulture, and the Mole Man live in an old house in the woods., the kind of house kids probably thought was haunted. I grew up in a South Florida suburb, and we had no house that was haunted, but we still had the houses we treaded carefully by as we passed by on our bikes. We still wondered what happened on the inside of those houses, mostly owned by childless couples or single men, who were rarely seen in their yards. The cars were parked in the garage, and we would only see the garage door open, a car pull away, and then the door close. After someone moved out of a house, we could sneak in, but without furniture and personal belongings, the houses were no longer interesting.

Most of my youth was spent reading and watching popular fiction: comic books, sword and sorcery fantasy, science fiction. Even in comic books, I wanted the fantasy. Characters without superpowers were not interesting to me. Real life to me was going to school a few blocks away. It was watching my parents work jobs they hated and living paycheck to paycheck. I wanted those houses on our block to contain something new and exciting. I liked the X-Men most of all because a mutant could be anyone. They didn’t need to be super smart, or super athletic, or super rich. They didn’t need to be in the right place at the right time and just happen to get struck by cosmic rays or radiation. The X-Men were just people, kids who reached puberty and gained mutant powers. In some ways, the X-Men were the most believable out of all the comic book characters. How many of us feel like we have more to offer, that there’s something inside that people haven’t seen? Comic book universes allowed us to imagine. Not imagine us with superpowers, or at least not just superpowers, but us coming across some bizarre and otherworldly creature walking through those strange houses.

My mom wouldn’t allowed me to play Dungeons & Dragons because she thought people who played were much too into it and weren’t able to separate fantasy from reality. But, we knew going through those houses that there weren’t really strange creatures, horrific monsters, or alien technology. But, that’s not the point to imagination. How many things do we have today that were once a part of a person’s imagination? Imagination lets us see a different world, and we might come back from our imaginations with something we could use in the real world. I’ll admit, though, we don’t need imagination. Many people live their lives without exercising their imaginations. But, those lives seem so empty to me. Imagination lets us be kids again, riding through our neighborhood staring at houses and creating stories.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #98: The Graphic Nature of Storytelling

17 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

sean ironman, Terror Inc., Violence

Heroes Never Rust #98 by Sean Ironman

Terror Inc.: The Graphic Nature of Storytelling

Terror Inc. is part of Marvel’s MAX imprint—a collection of comics geared toward an adult audience. The imprint was launched in 2001 and is known for featuring explicit content: sex, violence, profanity. Stan Lee, who co-created the Marvel universe, has spoken out against the imprint, saying, “I don’t know why they’re doing that. I don’t think that I would do those kinds of stories.” You see, some people do not want to read stories with sex, violence, and profanity. I know, shocking. Of course, I feel differently than Stan Lee, but I do understand that there are a lot of people who will not stand a story with questionable content. Check out these Amazon reviews:

One star review for Reservior Dogs: “All Tarantino dialogues sound like something a high school kid came up with. Just goes to show that anyone can make a lot of money with vulgarity and no talent.”
One star review for South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut: “This is a R-rated movie? Yea right! This sure seems like an x-rated movie! The languege is so awful! Those four foul mouthed boys should be given a bath!T hey say the F-word about 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,0oo,ooo,ooo,ooo,ooo,ooo, ooo,ooo,ooo,ooo,ooo,ooo times in it!It sould not be viewed by anyone! I would have voted no stars,but no!Ii had to vote 1!”
One star review for season one of Game of Thrones: “Way too much explicit sex for a science fiction action story.”
Two star review for season one of Masters of Sex: “pretty much just porn”

Apparently, there is a common thought that only valid content should be used in storytelling. Of course, anything in a story can be too much (I’ve discussed this before). There can be too much sex in a story, too much profanity, just as there can be too many conversations, too many scenes of characters hand-holding. This seems to be the main topic when discussing popular fiction these days. How many articles about nudity in Girls have been written? How many people have announced they are boycotting Game of Thrones because of an act of silence in the newest episode? Just a few minutes ago, I saw that George R.R. Martin has once again been asked about his thoughts on the violence against women in Game of Thrones. We will never decide this matter. I can tell you how much I want my stories to reflect the real world, and in order to do so, a story must contain content that I do not enjoy. I can appreciate a graphic violent act in a story and not condone the actions in real life. I think sex and, especially, nudity creates an intimacy between me, as view or reader, and the characters. But, I am after something different when I read or watch a story.

A story is a complex creation, meaning it could be used for multiple purposes: entertainment or art. Escape or thought. Entertainment makes us feel good, while art challenges us. David Cronenberg said, “Entertainment wants to give you what you want. Art wants to give you what you don’t know you want.” Now, I believe a work could be both. It’s more of a sliding scale between entertainment and art than two disparate choices. But, that seems to be at the root of the matter: some people watch a TV show or a film, or read a novel or a comic book as entertainment. Others look for something deeper. There is no convincing a person who only wants to be entertained with a story lacking any difficult or graphic content that the story should have such content. And vice versa, a person looking for something deeper will continue to pick apart summer blockbusters.

Stories, in general, are capable of giving a reader, or a watcher, a different experience. Yet, each story is geared toward a specific purpose: entertainment or art. People will go on complaining about a story having inappropriate content, and others will complain about stories not having enough depth. The only thing storytellers can do is to make certain the audience knows what they are getting into before they start. Marvel’s MAX imprint does just that. If a reader prefers his or her stories without violently graphic content, then he or she can pass by the book on the shelf. There are enough people out there, enough possible readers. If someone doesn’t like the content, then it’s not for them.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #97: How Bad is Bad

10 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Heroes Never Rust #97 by Sean Ironman

Terror Inc.: How Bad is Bad

The third issue of Terror Inc. focuses on the villains. The main villain is revealed as Talita, a woman Terror loved eight hundred years ago. Her team is called Death’s Reign, a group of South American thugs turned special forces. There seems to be a religious aspect to their following of Talita, with one member sacrificing himself so Talita may use his body to make herself stronger. As he dies, he yells out, “Rapture.” Death’s Reign are more than bad guys. One offers this bit of small talk as they search for Terror: “So this bitch is doin’ her thing, and the H kicks in like a ton of bricks. She has a heart attack and dies in my lap. Best I ever had.” Another two have this conversation: “Dude, Man, I fuckin’ cut that ho.” The other replies, “I know, dude. I cut ‘er too. She was gooood.” This group does not just kill for money, or for religion, or for any purpose that could be considered good. They are evil through and through.

In fiction courses, there is a focus, and rightfully so, on crafting three-dimensional characters. Everybody does what they feel is right, students are taught. No one is evil. People do things for reasons. I agree with this, mostly. Yet, in the real world, we have murders, rapes, greed, racism, sexism, etc. Of course, murderers and rapists have, at one point in their life, done something good or had (or have) good qualities. Doing something bad does not mean there are no good qualities. Yet, some people are real scumbags. Some people do not just kill someone because they had to. Some people enjoy doing the bad things. Take a look at Louis CK’s recent SNL monologue. As he humorously discusses, child molesters enjoy molesting children. If it wasn’t enjoyable at some level, people wouldn’t do it.

There seems to be, at least to me, a “rule” writers confine themselves to: characters must have a reason for acting the way they do. Under this “rule,” writers try to explain why a bad character is bad. In X-Men comics, Magneto is no longer just a villain—he is a terrorist because he is a Holocaust survivor and doesn’t want to see mutants treated the same way as the Jews. In Wicked, the Wicked Witch of the West is no longer just an evil with—she was born with green skin and was despised by her father. And in Smallville, Lex Luthor is a boy who had to grow up under the rule of a disappointed and hard father. Sure, no one does anything just because. There are reasons behind people’s actions and words. But, writers should be careful about trying to explain. Explanations can take readers out of the story by showing the writer. Sometimes, giving the villain an interesting back story or reason for being a villain works well. Magneto is one of the greatest comic book villains. But, he became that way because he straddled the line between hero and villain—once, he even ran Xavier’s school when the professor was thought to have been killed. When he was first created, Magneto had no Holocaust background. Chris Claremont took a typical comic book villain and ran with the new idea of Magneto as survivor. But, even though Magneto has a reason, he is still a terrorist. He’s still a bad guy. The reasoning behind his actions make him a fully rounded character, and being a Holocaust survivor gets readers to understand why a person would think a race of people could be wiped off the planet, but the goal of adding this reasoning wasn’t to make Magneto less evil.

There are bad people in the world. There are people who are just pieces of shit, that if they were to die, the world would be a better place. Studies have shown people gain empathy by reading. Entering into a character’s mind allows people to see and feel the world from a different point of view. But, perhaps that same empathy is also blocking us from the simple fact that some people are bastards. A bad upbringing for Lex Luthor doesn’t make him less evil. Some people do bad things for reasons that are still bad, even if they view them as right. Having empathy isn’t the same as forgiving or excusing actions. Readers need to understand a character’s actions—they need to feel that the character could be real.

Currently, I’m on a road trip, and while driving through northern Arkansas I passed a billboard advertising “White Pride Radio.” I would like you to their website, but personally I feel no one should give these people the time of day. And, just a couple of weeks ago, while looking at reviews for Mad Max: Fury Road (a fantastic film, by the way), I came across the news that a group was boycotting the film because of the strong female characters in the film. This group felt that the film should be focused on Max and lose the feminist angle—their reasoning was solely that the film was harming masculinity because it showed tough women. Again, I will not be linking to their website (which contains far worse sexist and homophobic comments) because they do not deserve the attention.

In yet another example, it was recently discovered that when a person searched “nigga house” on Google maps, the result showed the White House. The reason for that had little to do with Google as a company. Searches adjust to how people use the terms, so “nigga house” led to the White House because enough people online used the term to describe the White House. Yes, I understand that the people behind my examples have been molded with these views based on environment, but that doesn’t change how wrong these actions are.

My point is that sometimes providing a villain with a tragic backstory works well (Magneto), but writers shouldn’t be forced, or feel forced, into making a character sympathetic. A villain doesn’t have to regret his or her actions, or feel that there’s no other way. A villain doesn’t need to murder someone and go home and take care of his or her dog, who the villain loves more than anything. Some people beat dogs. Some people kill dogs. Some people are racist. Sexist. Homophobic. Some people are filled with hate. And whether they are that way because of a good reason or a bad reason, the reason doesn’t change who they are. Feel free, as writers, to have villains like in Terror Inc., villains who are scum and not go out of your way to explain why. That, too, can lead to an interesting story.

Watch the recent film Nightcrawler, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, which is about the most least likeable main character I have seen on film. Tell your stories. Use the good and the bad. Your goal as a writer isn’t to just write well-rounded characters, but to create a real, well-rounded world, and unfortunately, even though there’s a lot of love in our world, there’s a lot of shit too.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #96: Characters Who Cannot Die

03 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Batman, Terror Inc.

Heroes Never Rust #96 by Sean Ironman

Terror Inc.: Characters Who Cannot Die

At the end of the first issue of Terror Inc., Terror is tricked and defeated. Issue two opens with the bad guys, a shady government group, placing Terror’s body parts in acid, melting him, and flushing the remnants down the toilet. Due to his curse of not being able to die, Terror soon takes control of a frog, then fights a cat and becomes a cat-frog hybrid. He finally finds a human host in a despicable man who beat his son and is hiding from his ex-wife to avoid paying child support. Before long, Terror is back at it. But, where’s the conflict in following a superhero, or a super-powered being for those who may not find Terror all that heroic, who cannot be killed? Terror can escape, seemingly, any situation. There is bound to be a living creature nearby, and, since he cannot be killed, even if his body is decimated, another creature may eventually come by and he will take control of that creature—even if he has to wait years. This begs the questions of what the conflict is in Terror’s tale and what is at stake for our hero. How do you craft a story without conflict?

Well, for one, anyone who reads a comic, or any story for that matter, about one character should probably expect that character to make it to the climax of the story. So, for Terror Inc., it’s a safe bet that Terror, even if he could be killed, would make it to the final issue. Spider-man is not immortal, but I expect him to live in each story. I would be shocked to see Spider-man die at the end of his next film. Characters do die in comics, but most of them do not stay dead for long. When I see a James Bond film, I do not worry if James Bond will be killed. There seems to be this approach in creative writing, especially in the visual mediums of film and comics, to amp up the conflict and what is at stake in a story—mainly the main character’s life, their lover’s or family member’s life, and the lives of a city or the world as a whole. That makes things exciting, some people say.

I guess. To me, it gets old. But, anyway, that’s another topic for another day.

I, personally, do not care much about high stakes—I need clear stakes. I need to understand what is at stake, even if it’s something small. Of course, I want a reason the protagonist must succeed, but life and death does not have to be brought into it. I like Terror Inc. not because it keeps me on the edge of my seat—it’s entertaining to watch Terror go from obstacle to obstacle. I like seeing the inventive ways he continues on his story. I know he’ll succeed in the end—I don’t care that I know the end.

Why do we read? And I don’t mean in some high philosophical way that so many academics like to talk about. What are we reading for? There are multiple answers to this question, I am sure, but I think there are very few that involve trying to figure out the ending. Personally, I dislike works, both in print and in film, that work to only surprise the audience with an ending. M. Night Shymalan’s Unbreakable, to me, is superior to The Sixth Sense, which seems to be his most popular film with the mainstream audience, because Unbreakable, while it has a nice added twist at the end, does not rely on the ending to tell the story. The Sixth Sense is crafted for that surprise ending. Reading, or watching, to figure our the ending of a story does not make much sense to me. I like to take my time with stories, which is one reason I dislike binge watching, like with the new Daredevil TV show on Netflix. Finishing a story is not what I am after. I want an overall narrative arc, but as the years go on and I read and watch more stories, I realize that I prefer strong individual scenes. I want them to add up to something as a whole, but it’s more important to me that the in-the-moment scenes are more important. When I read an essay, I’ll follow it wherever it goes as long as each paragraph is interesting. Deadwood is a great TV show, not because of the overall narrative, but because each scene is magnificent. Terror Inc. is an interesting comic book because each issue is fun and filled with adventure and cool visuals and characters.

In a way, introducing the idea that the main character may die is an easy way to get the audience interested in the story. In 1943, Columbia Pictures released a 15-chapter Batman serial. Batman and Robin fought Dr. Daka, a Japanese agent. At the end of one chapter, Batman and Robin are in a plane that has landed, and then the plane blows up. This takes place about halfway through the fifteen chapters. The next chapter shows Batman and Robin escaping through the plane’s door moments before the plane explodes. Placing the main characters in danger was supposed to create tension, but there is no tension because the audience knows Batman and Robin will not be killed halfway through the story. Instead, the audience waits for the next chapter to see how Batman and Robin happen to escape, not if they escape. Today, the scene comes across as silly.

When I was an undergraduate (and before), most of my stories had the protagonist in mortal danger, with quite a few having the protagonist die at the end. (How many stories from undergraduates end with the protagonist dying?) To get out of the habit, I wrote a comic about a character who is immortal. In that sixty-issue story, I could not rely on cheap thrills and cliffhangers with the protagonist in mortal danger. It helped me craft different stories. One of the reasons writers put a character’s life in danger is that death is the most horrible consequence of characters failing their mission that the writer can think of. Perhaps writers just need to do some hard thinking. There’s worse things that could happen to a person than death. Not everything needs to be about characters fighting for their lives. There’s a lot more to life than death.

_______

Photo by John King

Heroes Never Rust #95: Superpowers

27 Wednesday May 2015

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Heroes Never Rust

≈ Leave a comment

Heroes Never Rust #95 by Sean Ironman

Terror Inc.: Superpowers

After so many decades of superheroes, new superpowers are difficult to come by. We have our heroes that represent normal human abilities at an extreme: Captain America, Superman, The Flash, etc. We have our heroes mixed with animal motifs: Spider-man, Hawkman, Ant-Man, etc. We have our mystical heroes: Doctor Strange, Daimon Hellstrom, John Constantine, etc. There are thousands of superheroes, each with their own power, many of which are similar. Now, though, it has become difficult to make a hero with unique superpowers. There are a few aspects that go into deciding on a character’s powers. First, powers must be useful in some way, especially in a fight. A superhero having the ability to make a villain sneeze wouldn’t be too helpful. Second, powers must be visually interesting. Comics is a visual medium after all. Even powers like telepathy are shown in a visual manner. Third, and perhaps most importantly, powers have to relate to some aspect of humanity, are a kind of wish fulfillment.. Superman’s powers are a wish fulfillment. The super soldier serum injected into Steve Rogers that makes him Captain America lets people see what humanity is capable of. It’s been a long time since I have seen an interesting new power in a superhero.

Until I read Terror Inc. by David Lapham and Patrick Zircher.

The main character, Terror, is fifteen-and-a-half centuries old. Originally a member of the Vandals who sacked Rome, Terror was cursed by the Romans. The curse decomposes Terror’s body, but the curse also keeps him alive. He trades his rotting body parts with fresh parts. For example, he can rip his leg off and replace it with someone else’s leg. Or, at one point in the first issue, he rips his head off and replaces it with another’s head so that he can go undercover. He can replace his body with animals as well.

Terror’s superpowers are interesting because they are unique. Even when it comes to darker superheroes, I can’t think of one who acts as a kind of cannibal, consuming body parts to get the job done. Going back to the superpower guidelines listed earlier, Terror’s powers are useful. First, he can’t be killed—unless, of course, he finds a way to rid himself of the curse. And, when he needs to overpower a foe, he can take body parts off a larger, stronger person, or perhaps even a bear or other powerful animal. He can change his body to fit the need for the mission. In a later issue, he’s in the body of a frog. His powers allow for unique storytelling. Some times in superhero comics, the situation the hero finds himself in is similar to the situation of another superhero. How many times has Daredevil or Captain America comics been similar to Batman, and vice versa? But, with Terror, writers can create suicide missions with the suicide. His powers are also visually interesting. Artists are not confined to true anatomy with Terror. Different size arms and legs fit—even animal body parts on a human body part. Readers are easily able to keep track of Terror using his powers. Finally, his powers relate to a basic human need—survival. Terror’s powers are based in immortality. Who hasn’t thought of living forever? Yet, his powers are also his curse—he cannot die and will forever be damned with a body that rots and must be replaced.

The cost of magic is necessary, which is a reason why I find most fantasy stories lacking. A character who lives forever must have some kind of conflict. Magic cannot just give power—it must take, as well. Superpowers cost heroes something—they do not just grant enormous strength, or the power of flight, or the ability to wall crawl. Spider-man must give up his personal life, must lie to his aunt, must let down those who love Peter Parker because he has superpowers. Superman must live beside human beings without ever truly being a part of them. He is a permanent outsider. Captain America’s powers allowed him to live following the war frozen in ice, but now he must continue on after everyone he knew and loved has died. There must be a downside to superpowers. If not, the character will no longer be relatable. We readers need our heroes down to Earth.

Also, Terror’s powers are grotesque. Some readers may be put off by him severing a limb and fusing it to his own body, but it has an instant emotional reaction. The uniqueness of Terror’s situation is memorable, whether one finds it gross or awesome.

_______

Photo by John King