I have an employee who is into geek-culture stuff in a way that doesn't include actual comics. She likes horror movies,
Army of Darkness, and watches the TV shows and movies based on comics. She just finished watching
Daredevil (so say we all), and she was wearing a
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt with art from the 90's cartoon while she was talking to me about the show.
"You know," I said, "
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a by-product of
Daredevil."
She eyed me, somewhat skeptically.
"Frank Miller made ninjas cool in comics via the
Daredevil comics run they're adapting for the show. After that, ninjas were everywhere in comics, but Miller did them best. It was the 1980's and Eastman and Laird were drinking beer and figuring out what might be popular for a comic and, hey, NINJAS. The 'Teenage Mutant' part is referring to some X-Men stuff. New Mutants, I think."
The look of skepticism was giving way to a bit of fear.
"Yes, I think you can argue that Bruce Lee started the craze, but in comics, I point to Frank Miller."
"Okay."
"Yeah," I said, refusing to let it go. "The crazy turtle uses sai, right? Elektra! That's Miller. What's the name of the bad guys the Shredder works with?"
She felt a trap. "The Foot?" she ventured.
"Uh huh. And the name of the ninjas in
Daredevil?"
"...the Hand?"
"Right. Now... let's talk about how Frank Miller is responsible for
Batman v. Superman."
She was not impressed.
"Directly or indirectly, Jack Kirby and Frank Miller are responsible for everything in media right now," I concluded.
I don't think she bought a word of it.
In general, I'd argue the conversations the comics kids are having online these days don't seem to talk so much about what's happening in their comics as they do the characters in broad strokes, undergrad 101 media criticism of race and gender (which I welcome) and the creators, like they're following demi-celebrities who might talk back to them.*