"“Superman Returns,” the 2006 Bryan Singer dirge, didn't fail because audiences no longer resonate with a super being that can fly, shoot heat from his eyes and is immune to bullets. It failed because Superman is the epitome of good morals and justice, which today's audience find boring and childish...Perhaps if Clark picked up a crack whore and painted her with feces, then he'd be approaching "cool" again. "The Big Blue Boy Scout" as he is called by cynical fanboys and Guy Gardener, only works in a patriotic America. Changing him through some sort of rebranding effort or Warner reboot won't make things different."
Monster-Size Hulk is a tribute to the "giant"-sized Marvel monster comic book of the 1970s (who can forget "Giant-Sized Man-Thing"?), complete with multiple stories and even an all-text Dracula tale penned by Peter David. Of course, the Giant-Sized editions of the 1970s were around 50 cents...but in this day and age $3.99 for double-sized issue of original material (albeit some which are...gasp...only words) is not bad.
The main story features the Hulk vs. Frankenstein slugfest we have all been waiting for (have those two ever fought before?). This is no flat-topped generic Frankenstein's monster but the one with the funky mohair vest and hippie hair from the short-lived Marvel monster comic. Of course, though the two monsters duke it out, they eventually realize they have more in common than differences. The end of the story seems to set up Frankenstein's Monster for further adventures in the Marvel universe; consult the comic itself for details. Perhaps he can join the Avengers.
The other stories feature a Hulk/Werewolf By Night tale done in the moody black & whites of the old Marvel magazines, a cute two-page gag featuring Googam, and the aforementioned Peter David text piece. The part in the Werewolf By Night story where Bruce Banner suspects Jack Russell's possession of a human-sized cage to be some sort of "illegal and weird" pastime takes us out of the nostalgia-era mindset a little bit, but for the most part these stories are pretty timeless.
Superman & Batman Vs. Vampires & Werewolves has a rather utilitarian title that will no doubt keep in in backlist for some time to come. The story is about...Superman & Batman Vs. vampires & werewolves.
The moody illustrations of Tom Mandrake channel Gene Colan as ordinary mortals morph into dark creatures and Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman gape at the horror of it all. The first issue seems very much a throwback to an earlier time -- perhaps hearkening a bit to the monster comics of the Seventies, but also to the DC comics in general of that time period. I kept hallucinating and thinking the artist was Jim Aparo.
I've long been fascinated by bootleg toys. They're usually crappy, but I like the crappy. I like when they get the color on Robin's outfit wrong. I like when some company overseas mixes disparate characters together in one package, offering us juxtapositions we might otherwise never see. I want to see Snoopy hanging out with Spongebob Squarepants, the two of them using iPods. I want to see that.
One of my first bootleg toys was a Mickey Mouse figural pencil sharpener. He looked like the Japanese icon of the "salary man," with sunglasses, a business suit, and briefcase. He was pretty obese. They had a geisha Minnie Mouse as well. Most certainly not licensed by Disney.
Then there was fake Voltron, which to this day I refer to as "Foltron."
Recently my interest in these fabulous fakes was reawakened upon the discovery of action figure multi-packs that feature some really strange bedfellows:
As you can see, in this set we have Superman, a Ninja Turtle, Buzz Lightyear, Batman, and Spider-Man. All for around 6-8 dollars. What a deal! And the colorful and unique packaging promise even more wonders: The Incredibles. The Fantastic Four. Maybe even Venom!
It's heart-warming how all the companies got together to bring this unique toy set to light.
Of particular interest is the Superman figure, which boasts a large "Superman Returns" head on a much smaller, "Justice League Unlimited" body. And his chest lights up. And they have some part fused into his hand from when they stole the mold from Mattel.
"Collections Them All!"
In this next set, called "Superman Returns," we get an army of Supermen plus Metallo. Though cartoony, the Supermen look not so much like they were stolen from the "animated series" as they resemble the Ed McGuinness version. Were they stolen from the DC Direct figures and shrunk down? Is this an original sculpt? Who knows. The only thing I know for sure is that you get not only Superman but apparently Captain Atom and Shazam as well.
Superman, Shazam, and Captain Atom- - with light-up chest action!
And the chests all light up. Because you want that in your toys.
The capes in the "Superman Returns" collection are all frayed pieces of cloth glued sloppily on the back, and Metallo is widely out of proportion with the other figures. The packaging tells us to "Collections Them All!" And, also, "Let' s Fence Against The Earth!"
Finally, we have here a picture of two Iron Man figures. Can you guess which one is the fake?
One of these figures is a big liar
Unlike the superhero sets, the bootleg Iron Man figures seem to have been created with much more care -- the fake Prada of fake action figures. The intent to fool people into thinking they are the real Hasbro product is quite evident in the packaging, which are direct copies of the originals. The only way you could really tell a fake package and a real one apart, in fact, is in the luster of the paper used. Hasbro's packaging is crisper, with a bit of a gloss, while the fakes are matte and faded.
As for the figures themselves, the originals have more joints, with crisper color. However, the fake apparently has War Machine's accessories -- and, of course, the friggin' light-up chest. Because you need that.
el fake-o
This post is not an endorsement of unlicensed superhero toys. Though many have theoretical suggested age ranges on the packaging, I would never give these toys to a child; most have sloppy production values and sometimes include sharp edges, tiny/loose pieces that could get swallowed, and even weird-smelling paint. And, in the case of the Iron Man figures, the intent was clearly to fool consumers into thinking they were buying the real thing, getting out of the realm of "camp" counterfeits completely and diving head-first into complete fraud.
However, even that cool Batman collectibles book by Chip Kidd several years ago offered us lovingly photographed images of bootleg toys. Their crappiness have seized our imagination.
The cover depicts Batman holding a gun and making Robin and Jimmy Olsen dig their own graves. To the side, Superman watches in glee.
As we all know, Batman has a very strict code against killing, especially with guns. Yet not only do we have this cover, but inside there are a host of gory scenes that are inappropriate:
* Jimmy Olsen and Robin are roasted by Superman's heat vision, their skin melting.
* The hearts of Jimmy and Robin are cut out and placed in a Lucite case.
I don't care if this is an imaginary story -- it's cruel and hurtful and breaks down everything these characters stand for.
Diamond's Scoop blog has a picture of a 1933 advertisement for the pulp "Doc Savage" that predates "Superman" by 5 years. The catch? The ad clearly refers to Doc as "Superman."
I can has more lawsuits?
Who owns the rights to Doc Savage nowadays, anyway?
"Comics' original sin echoes over the course of its history. It rips to the surface in a variety of nasty ways to which old men, widows and children mournfully testify. It spawns a thousand and one grinning doppelgangers carrying a bag of the oldest tricks. It rains abuse on a creative class that at times bristles, at times is grimly accepting, and at times gives birth to one or two poor, depraved souls that will fight for the imagined rightness of someone else, many someone elses, to benefit from an inspired act of creation ahead of that creator. What happened to Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster isn't history, not in the way history is usually defined. It is close, and it is awful, and it can't help but make you just a little bit sad."
The quote reminds me of that scene in the New Frontier animated movie where the artist at his table finishes his book about man's inhumanity to man and then blows his brains out. When I first watched that, I immediately read it as a reference to the angst many of these comic creators went through -- and read the artist at his drawing table as being a comic book artist. In fact, it seemed so obvious and stark a reference that it really really shocked me.
However, I will go one step further and say that I think this type of exploitation and frustration is everywhere in this society -- school teachers experience it, TV writers experience it, store clerks experience it. I think there is a fundamental mechanism built in some human beings -- or maybe it's in all of us, and it's only "active" in some -- that leads them to take from others without producing and exploit the weak.
In the Comics Reporter piece, the way Siegel/Shuster was treated by DC is referred to as the industry's original sin. That may be true, but it's just part of a far far earlier state of affairs. It's only the fact that superhero books like Superman are supposed to be about "Truth, Justice, and The American Way" that makes the story so remarkable, and so ironic.
Actual photo of Superman and God, proving that they are not one-and-the-same person. No photographic evidence yet clearing Clark Kent, however.
I don't moderate all my comments, though I try to read most of them.
Among the comments not moderated by me was one that my co-moderator would only refer to as "nasty."
It said something along the lines that I should be (literally) arrested for saying anything disparaging about DC, and that the commentor was going to contact Blogger to have my blog taken down.
Meanwhile, 2000 dead in Georgia, Russia is at war, and an American has gotten stabbed to death at the Olympics. Today.
But what was really important to this person was that nobody disparage DC Comics or question their rights over Superman. (If it was indeed the Superman post he was referring to. It could have been those Countdown posts).
In this person's mind, there might have even been a connection to it all; that if we besmirch an American institution like DC, if we weaken its hold on Superman -- the "commies" win. Yeah, we might end up in a conflict with China or Russia one day -- and that's when we need Superman and the Justice Society intact. And we can't have people screwing around with Green Lantern, either.
It reminds me that some fans have a near-religious attachment to their superheroes. Scratch "near" -- it's just plain religious.
I mean, what do you do in a religion? You have sacred books. "Crisis." "Kingdom Come." "Infinite Crisis."
You also quote those books a lot, and refer to specific passages.
Then, there is the concept of what's canonical, and what's apocrypha. As you know, many many people have died in religious disputes over these issues -- and continue to do so.
But you just have to have continuity. Or else -- it all falls apart. And you can't let "wrongheaded" beliefs -- like Spider-Man shouldn't be with Mary Jane for the rest of his life -- hold sway. Because then you have heresy. And you know what they do with heretics.
Looking back on it, I feel DC knew very well the fervor with which their loyalest fans held to their characters. And this goes beyond standard comic book readership, to just people who idolize Superman or Batman but don't know a lot about the monthly comics themselves. I always thought that if DC could really get those particular fans to buy the comics, they'd really be swimming in dough.
So at DC I was told that we had a very special job -- we were the caretakers of icons.
As such, there was a protocol, especially for the most popular characters.
"Superman" can't do this, "Batman" can't do that. The logos on the chest had to be drawn just right. And Power Girl's breasts needed to be a certain size. Seriously. It's a trademark.
But there was a sense that we were to avoid any scandal relating to the company or the characters at all costs -- that nothing should darken the aura of Superman in any way, directly or indirectly.
And we took that pretty seriously. That's why a lot of us were very neurotic about doing the wrong thing -- in terms of how we interacted with the public, in terms of what the characters were allowed to say in their word balloons, everything. I know some people joke about DC being "The Kremlin" -- this is probably why.
And for companies that have such iconic characters as Superman in their stable, this can be common.
Take, for example, Disney. When I was editing Disney books for Acclaim, one of our writers came up with a story called "Dopey The Genius," in which the Snow White character temporarily becomes smart. Disney completely rejected this on the grounds that it too radically challenged the concept of "Dopey." As our Disney contact told us: "Dopey is sacred here."
Obviously, Superman is not Dopey. Neither is he God. Neither is he a real person.
What Superman is, at best, is an inspirational symbol. But inspirational symbols are tricky.
You should let the symbol inspire you, but you shouldn't get too attached to it. Let Superman inspire you "in the moment" -- but then step out of that headspace and admit to yourself that he was a character created by two kids who were in turn inspired by other heroes. Admit to yourself that back in the 1940s, the company that would eventually become DC Comics took a chance on a concept, saw that it had a lot of potential, and sought to retain as much rights and financial gain on the concept as possible -- as many companies did and do.
Admit to yourself that one day, DC Comics will lose the exclusive copyright on Superman, and that many many artists and writers of varying degrees of talent and varying motives and political leanings will seize upon this character and do a 1,000 different things with it.
Yes. They will. A few might even make him gay.
And what will be done then? Will a holy war be declared to suss out just who the "correct" Superman is? Is it like "Crisis On Infinite Earths" -- but for real???
And as much lip-service as is paid to the Loyalists -- and indeed, DC has of late largely shaped their output to cater to them -- when the new generations are in full bloom, and if the tide changes, and if the 2012 equivalent of Rob Liefeld and Alan Moore shows up on the doorstep of collective comic book culture with the Latest Thing, those sacred continuities and characterization might just be bent and morphed to serve the current climate.
***
I don't cotton to the notion of superheroes or fictional characters as religious icons. I mean, it's fun to look at it all and play around with the concept, in Joseph Campbellian terms -- it's a nice place, and all, but I wouldn't want to live there.
I think religion -- real religion, that induces faith and mobilizes people to act -- is something very very delicate. The thought of that mixed with the place where I got my free comps every week and which fed me potato chips from the conveniently-placed vending machines -- kinda makes want to vomit. That, and the idea of Power Girl as the Virgin Mary. Or Mary Marvel as the Virgin Mary, for that matter.
And one of the things that religious fervor can -- but certainly not always -- do is make one excuse/cover up whatever indiscretions, scandals, negativities, and wrongs that have been committed by the agents of said religion. Because the power of the religion -- or the government, or family unit, or what have you -- is in the belief in its essential infallibility.
In such a mindset, the Siegel situation is a potential apocalypse -- Siegel and Siegel's heirs being considered the Adversary. What is worth more: Superman the intact icon with the DC bullet (or is that a swirl?) to the top left of him, or some creator's rights issues? Icon of millions versus some heirs to some guy?
But if you really love Superman -- Superman in its entirety, the real Superman -- you have to take it all into consideration. You can't hate its creator.
If you really idolize a person or an icon or an entity, but blind yourself to any warts that might obscure the picture -- you're worshiping something that is incomplete, and largely a product of your own mind more than its reality. You don't have to focus on the warts -- but shooting the messengers and burying the victims doesn't make the warts go away.
According to unearthed correspondence between DC Comics and Jerry Siegel dating back to the 1940s, Siegel & Shuster were repeatedly told that their work was (I'm paraphrasing here) shitty.
...that the duo's work often bordered on the "unacceptable"
...that Superman was drawn "too gay"
...that Lois was drawn "too fat" -- asking Shuster to give Lois "an abortion" to lose all the "weight" around her middle.
...that the company questioned the popularity of Superman in relation to, say, a real crowd-pleaser like Zatara.
Reading this correspondence, it strikes me how much DC deserved to be left with just Zatara. I think there are levels of bad karma, and I'm sure most companies -- comics or not -- have incurred them. But to build a company (and a company identity) around one character that had been so utterly bitterly contested by its creators, and have that bad energy follow it around for almost 70 years...
I really have to wonder, in that early stage of the comic book industry, if Siegel & Shuster saw their work in a very personal way -- as indy comic creators who own the rights to their own work today feel -- or was it just a business thing? Did they want to grow as creators, did they want to take Superman to new places creatively & content-wise? When they saw completely different teams handle their work, did they feel outraged, or heartsick, like it was "their baby?" When they read letters where their work was summarily dismissed -- and dissed -- did they take it personally?
And did resentment over these letters -- some of which were pretty harsh, even for standard editorial criticism -- help fuel Siegel's many decades of fighting over the character he helped create? Did these documents, in some of which he was talked down to as if he was a hick or a child, make everything more personal?
That said, it should be reiterated that these documents are pretty old -- and shouldn't be construed as indicative of the company's current methodology of handling talent. I'm sure if they they had another talent today with the sort of groundbreaking vision that Siegel and Schuster had at the dawn of Golden Age, they wouldn't be so pedantic, shortsighted, and alienating. At least, I would like to think so.
(read Jeff Trexler's excellent analysis of the documents here, and read the documents themselves here.)
I received a trio of Superman links on my Google Alerts and I decided to reference all three...
In the first, rdxdave explains why he thinks Superman is, among other things, kinda stupid:
"Superman is like Brett Favre: strong, good looking, literate; but I somehow doubt that he's doing the Sudoku puzzle in the paper."
The second, by Chris Kiser, explains why he thinks Superman is a Liberal:
"Even at his worst, Superman mostly embodies the good side of liberalism, and the universe he occupies is basically a vision of what the world would be if liberals were right. My argument does, however, lend further validity to the notion that Batman is the superior character, and that he, like most conservatives facing liberals, could probably defeat Superman in a fight."
The last post, on Sir Martin's Outclass, is more like an overview of Superman's history over the last 15 years, and how it impacted the author:
"Over the past year, two writers made their mark in the Superman books. On Superman, Kurt Busiek depicted a Superman that is confident in himself and his powers. He believed that Superman is a man of great consequence and that his role is to help humanity endure against all odds. On Action Comics, Geoff Johns brought Superman back to the very core of the character and polished all the continuity gems such as the Legion, the Daily Planet, and Brainiac while enhancing the Superman mythology.
Both writers also reflect the current zeitgeist of a post-9/11 world. Azzarello wrote very much in the 9/11 era where we would question our heroes and our values. The post-9/11 world is a reaffirmation of who we are, what makes us strong, and how we are vital to the human race. I saw that reflected in my own work as a history teacher, and this also reflects in how I view Superman as a character."
All three posts remind me that iconic heroes like Superman and Spider-Man are mirrors with which we are assisted in seeing our own worlds...we think these characters are the same for everybody, but actually it's a mite bit more subjective than that...
Mattel's Justice League Unlimited display at New York Comic Con was most impressive: a big, multi-level glass case filled to the gills with the little figures. I have no idea when they (or if they) are going to release this multitude, but it basically encompasses the great majority of DC's characters:
Justice League Unlimited Orion, Fire, and others
Is this Batman Justice League Unlimited figure a reference to the upcoming Brave and the Bold series?
Justice League Unlimited classic Vigilante
Justice League Unlimited bad guys, including Lex Luthor and the Red Hood
Justice League Unlimited Star Sapphire (thanks!), Brainiac, and more
Justice League Unlimited Caption Atom, John Stewart Green Lantern, Supergirl, more
Justice League Unlimited Stars, Bizarro, New Gods, more
It has never occurred to me that there might actually be comic fans who are against creator's rights. But, the reaction by a selection of fans on the Blog@Newsarama boards regarding the recent Superman copyright ruling educated me otherwise. Their basic opinions, to sum up:
1) The Siegels are "greedy" 2) It was Siegel & Schuster's own fault for losing the rights 3) Time Warner is being victimized 4) The Siegels are "stealing" Superman
Here is a selection of the negativity against the Siegel ruling on the board in question:
"Why they sold the rights they shouldnt get anything."
"Siegle and Schuster signed away the rights. Its their own fault. I don’t think they should have any creative control over the franchise. They should have huge, huge, HUGE royalties, but not creative control. Its not theirs."
"They shouldnt even get royalties they gave up that when they signed over the rights."
"THEY SIGNED THE RIGHTS AWAY NOT WITH A GUN TO THEIR HEAD AND NOT ONCE BUT TWICE WHEN THEY SETTLED IN COURT IN 1948. ENOUGH ALREADY."
"Gimme a break. They were paid in 1938. They were paid off in 1968. Again in 1978. They kept taking the money and suing again, Time Warner will keep this tied up for decades and that’s good."
"As the end consumers.. we will be the ones paying for this. Keep this in mind next time comics prices rise, or your favorite book gets cancelled because it’s not selling well enough (less profit = less flexibility), or when they decide that making a Superman Movie or cartoon is not financially viable because of “licensing” fees."
"Total Crap! The families are just money hungry."
"I’m sorry, the ruling may be correct under the law, but in that case, it’s a bad law. The property should belong to the party that bought it, under the terms of the agreement between the buyer and the seller. The government has no business changing the law, as it did in 1976, to (among other things) take Superman away from its rightful owners. I sympathize with the Siegels, but this is just wrong."
"Yes, shame on us for calling shenanigans on the greed of people who did nothing to deserve it. Was the deal those two guys signed appropriate, given what Superman has become? Probably not, but hindsight is twenty-twenty. Punishing Time-Warner now for something that a former version of one of its many subsidiaries did decades ago is grossly immoral. The justice system you people have is hopelessly flawed if this is allowed to happen."
"Superman Created by Siegel and Shuster Raised by DC Killed by the Siegels"
"In retrospect, DC (or National Comics) should have avoided giving its artists and writers any credit at all. Perhaps they should adopt a policy of total creative anonymity now, and consider all of its comics to be authored by the corporation."
"Seigels family was just on Foxs and say they don’t care about Superman or the Fans They want the Money because they don’t feel like working the rest of their life"
"i really don’t know what to say. to be honest i’m not happy because i’m worried that we might lose superman forever. i know. selfish. but can’t help it. that’s just the way im feeling at the moment."
Beware, folks: this is the nexus-point between where When Fangirls Attack and Playboy meet in the blogosphere! Comets and small asteroids get pulled in by the tractor beam of their conjunction and crushed into those little smooth pebbles you get with those good-luck bamboo stalks.
You know, Fox News should do one of those "crisis" special reports on men getting the implants. Like: "Our World In Turmoil: Pectoral Implants!" "Are Men Getting Too Damn Pretty? What Does It Mean? Are Our Children At Risk?" "Terrorism and Pec Implants: The Next Weapon Of Mass Destruction?"
