Guest Post - Jamie reads Wonder Woman #1

Hey, Signal Corps!  We've got a guest post I wasn't expecting.

Jamie plays it down, but she actually reads a lot of comics.  She does buy her own stuff from time to time, but mostly she reads my comics when the mood strikes her.  This weekend she picked up my copy of Wonder Woman off the coffee table, breezed through it and then started talking to me about it.  

In talking about the book, I thought she made some good points, so I asked her to put some of that down in a post.

Jamie hasn't been overly curious about the rest of New 52 launch, and as far as I know, this is the only one of the books I brought home that she's read.  But she's a woman of mystery, so for all I know, she's read everything off the coffee table while I'm at the gym.


As Jamie is actually pretty familiar with the last decade or so of Wonder Woman comics (I don't think she realizes those trades are pretty much everything going back to 2000 or so), but isn't particularly invested in DC or their publishing efforts, I thought it would be useful to hear what she had to say.  She also (I think) likes Wonder Woman on her own, and I would think a young, well-read, bright woman such as herself might be someone DC would want to buy their comics.

Ryan asked me to post a short review of the new Wonder Woman (#1 in the "New 52" relaunch).  I am not a regular reader of WW, aside from a few trades and a few issues here and there that Ryan has tossed my direction.  Nevertheless, I still felt a bit sheepish when halfway through the first issue of this reboot I looked up at Ryan and confessed, "I have no idea what's going on".  

I have never been particularly good with reviews, which is why I tended to avoid them on my own retired blog, but let me just quickly tick off a couple of issues I had with this...issue.

1. I admit, I got lost right after Diana and her new friend the Pantsless Wonder were sucked back to Virginia and the black and green voiceover boxes started popping up.*  Who the hell is this talking?  Is it the horse people?  Who are these horsey people?  Ryan kindly explained that the voiceover was coming from Glowy Eyes and his possessed lady friends back in Singapore from the opening pages.  I was embarrassed to have not picked up on this myself, but in my defense it had been 14 pages since we'd even seen Glowy Eyes and I don't like having to flip back through a comic trying to figure out what I'd missed.

Honestly if I didn't know about this relaunch and the book didn't have a "#1" slapped on the cover, I would have no idea this was the beginning of a new story.  It felt like any other of Ryan's WW issues I'd randomly read over the years where I knew I needed to just let some stuff go because I wasn't completely caught up. 

2. Not enough Diana.  For an issue that's attempting to draw in new readers, I would have liked to have seen more Wonder Woman in my Wonder Woman.  I understand that they are trying to lay down a story and it's just the first issue, but new readers are going to be picking this up expecting to see Diana in action.  

Like I said, my knowledge of WW and her mythos is less than impressive so I have no idea if this series is going to truly take her back to her roots or what.  My favorite incarnation of WW so far was the Greg Rucka era around 2004-5 of Ambassador Diana where she had no secret identity and a great cast of secondary characters with which to interact.**  I prefer to read comics that have a little joy in them from time to time as opposed to all violence and angst.  Personal preference, of course.  

All in all, I liked the art, and wasn't turned off enough by the story or the initial confusion to refuse to read any more.  I'll stick around for a few more issues, at least.

*I'm sure it's not called a voiceover box, but please cut me some slack, I don't know the lingo.

**Minotaur buddy? That's pretty awesome.

Signal Watch Reads: Wonder Woman #1 (of the New 52)

Wonder Woman #1
The Visitation
writer - Brian Azzarello
artist & cover - Cliff Chiang
colorist - Matthew Wilson
letters - Jared K. Fletcher
associate editor - Chris Conroy
editor - Matt Idleson

I am not a fan of too much of the work of Brian Azzarello.

I still associate Azzarello with his work on Batman: Broken City, the multi-issue epic that drug out over a year and somehow never managed to tell a story, and Superman: For Tomorrow, which derailed Superman for a year with unrelated and uninspired plotpoints, and a nonsensical conclusion.  And, of course, his Joker graphic novel, which was more or less a testament as to why we don't treat super-villains like actual criminals and psychotics in comics (its not particularly fun reading), but unintentionally raised the question as to why the Joker wasn't put down by a twitchy henchman on his second outing.  And his Luthor series just doesn't hold together as an actual story.

In all honesty, I get the feeling from his work that Azzarello more or less holds a lot of contempt for superheroes, but he knows that's where the money is.  And as long as there are young men looking for "more realistic" superheroes (ie: more blood), then Azzarello is going to be able to move comics and get hired.

Between you, me and the wall, I don't think Azzarello actually knows how to tell a story.  I think he knows how to provide a good set-up, and he knows some interesting beats he wants to put into those stories, but he doesn't seal the deal with either tying the narrative together or with taking the characters through an arc, so much as making them bystanders to a series of events he puts in motion.

Maybe his crime comics do a better job of this, but I don't know.  I still haven't read the 100 Bullets trade I picked up a while back.

So when it comes to Azzarello approaching Wonder Woman, I'm more than a bit skeptical.

DC Comics New 52, Week 3 - Part 2

• I'm breaking this week up week 3 into three parts.  In Part 1, I reviewed Supergirl #1.   I'm of the opinion that Wonder Woman #1 warrants its own post.  

So, this is Week 3.

• FYI - I did not pick up:
• 
  
• BIRDS OF PREY #1 - I wasn't interested in this rebooted team, characters or creative
• CAPTAIN ATOM #1 - waiting for feedback and will tradewait
• CATWOMAN #1 - no, and now that I've heard so much about the issue, I know this isn't for me
• DC UNIVERSE PRESENTS #1 - I completely forgot to get this, but Austin Books is doing a great job of getting what they can from the warehouse and ordering 2nd prints.
• GREEN LANTERN CORPS #1 - trade waiting
• NIGHTWING #1 - no.  I'm not a die-hard Nightwing fan, but I figured if the notices were good, it'd be a fun trade
• RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #1 - no

So, onto my Week 3 reads.

Signal Watch Reads: Supergirl #1 (New 52)

Supergirl #1
Last Daughter of Krypton
writers - Michael Green & Mike Johnson
penciller - Mahmud Asrar
inkers - Dan Green with Asrar
colorist - Dave McCraig
letterer - John J. Hill
cover - Asrar & McCraig
editor - Wil Moss
group editor - Matt Idleson
this review is of the print edition

So.

Firstly, because I see no way to avoid discussing it:  I think the new Supergirl costume is absolutely great, at least from the top of her head to her navel.  And then, somehow, as you head south the rest of the outfit is a bit of a trainwreck.  At least how its being drawn in this comic.

I bring this up because, as a reader, I became utterly distracted by how much I could not not notice how terrible I found Supergirl's new get-up.  Why is she wearing a strange red patch over her, uh, lower abdomen?  I assumed I just wasn't getting how this would work in the preview art, but no...  I don't care what planet she's from - that just seems poorly conceived.  It really looks like some sort of awkward medical device or improvised covering when she had to run out of the house with no pants on.

Reminder: "War of the Worlds" (1953) showing at Alamo South on Saturday

SimonUK reminded me today - the Alamo Kids Club is showing the 1953 version of War of the Worlds at Alamo South on Lamar on Saturday.

You can see info here.

The showtime is 11:45, but I'll be there a full hour early.  Why?  The show is free!  And that means lots of folks come early to ensure they get a seat.

If you've never seen the 1953 War of the Worlds, its an incredible movie.  I like it enough that my b-day present to myself this year was a scale model of one of the Martian ships.

they are here to chew bubble gum and heat blast earthlings.  And they're all outta bubblegum.

I confess, I find a bit weird to show this to small kids as I remember it spooking me a bit even when I saw it in 6th grade (I was not raised on horror movies and was a sensitive child, I guess).  But the effects are fan-freaking-tastic, and the aliens are not kidding around with their plans to heat-beam us all into smithereens.

I hope to see you there!

Laura Hudson's Post Re: Sex and Women in Comics

Look.  So, yesterday the comics internet decided to explode in one of its usual firestorms of outrage over something I do, actually, take fairly seriously.   This is such a usual occurrence that I think its, from time to time, worth looking at what is being said versus what is happening.  And so I talked a bit about the "controversy".

I absolutely do not share everyone's views, and/ but I am not dismissive of negative representations of women in comics.  Or the under-representation of women in the industry.  I do think we're going through growing pains as women have joined the ranks of readers in the past few years in numbers that I find truly surprising and welcome.

Like any critical read of a work of "art", there's always more than one point of view.  Any kind of reading from a feminist perspective is constantly undergoing convulsions as the narrative of gender roles is no longer defined by the mores of the 1970's culture movements. 

Yesterday via Twitter, Comics Alliance EiC Laura Hudson declared her fury regarding the comics we talked about yesterday.  In fact, its how I became alerted to the issue.

Today Hudson wrote a post that I think addressed some of what I was discussing (though not at me, because it is extremely, extremely unlikely anybody but NTT and myself actually read yesterday's post).  But enough people must have raised a hand in question that she went ahead and put together a thoughtful post that went well beyond the usual Gender Studies 101 rhetoric that usually defines these conversations.  I appreciate her honesty.  I don't agree with everything she says, and I'd actually argue her one example of an "acceptable" approach is open to the same criticism she ladles elsewhere, but I very much recommend reading her post. 

You can find it at Comics Alliance.

The trouble is:  I think Hudson is hitting a cross-roads that a lot of us are hitting.  DC just relaunched.  Its seeking new readers.  Its counting on old readers to stick around, but there's a calculated move going on to appeal to a very certain demographic.

In which I talk about comics fans and sex in comics (with little to no context)

Look. I get it, but no. Comics fans, I am not jumping on the gravy train of complaining about "sexiness" in a couple of DC Comics released this week.

I'm not reading any Red Hood comics. Partially because I'm not interested in either the characters or seeming arc of where DC is taking these characters and partially I'm just not interested in "back-to-life" Jason Todd. It was a bad narrative choice that should have been corrected with the ReLaunch.

I'm a little surprised by the one page I saw online that everyone is having conniptions over but

1) I have no idea what that exchange about not remembering any of Starfire's old pals the Teen Titans is about.  Amnesia?  Clever joke about continuity mishaps?  I have no idea.
2) Its not exactly out of character from what I recall about Starfire - and this is going back to middle-school
3) complaining about Starfire's look in 2011 is approximately 30 years too late and only demonstrates - you haven't been paying attention.  Those horses are out of the barn and across the state line.
4) she and Dick Grayson all-nekked-in-bed broke ground for comics... when I was in grade school
5) if Gail Simone wrote that scene, we'd all be throwing rose petals at her feet for being so darn clever
6) DC quit pretending to sell comics to kids with the conclusion of the CCA a year ago, so you are forbidden from playing that card
7) and most importantly:  a woman dictating her own sexuality and when and with whom she has sex, is not sexist.  For those of you who missed that class your freshman year of college: on the contrary, the power to make those decisions and not be sold to some guy over the hill for a goat and a couple of acres of land is the hardest won battle of women's rights next to the vote and pretty damned well ingrained in life outside your comic shop or, apparently, your Colorado City commune.*

DC's December Solicits Got Me Thinking...

Its terribly interesting that stories are already surfacing of creative-team shake-ups on some of DC's New 52.  I'm curious if DC is committed to the characters enough to give them a year and chuck creators who aren't pleasing fans (and by employing interns to read reviews, it'd be easy enough to get some data beyond sales, which aren't indicative at this point as EVERYTHING is selling out) and try to, say, make, say Tremendous Man work with a new writer rather than blame Tremendous Man.

There's something to that, I think.  DC has a core of characters that it should be trying to make work, and my assumption is that the New 52 likely contained all of those characters (why else is Aquaman getting a shot by one DC's top talents?).  Heck, we've already heard Static ALSO had a creative shake-up, and I'm not surprised that DC wants that title to work.  Static is incredibly lunchbox friendly.

DC needs to be able to demonstrate to the folks upstairs that they can make The Super Friends sell.  That's the intellectual property.  The people upstairs don't care who makes it work, so long as it works.

But, the solicitations.  DC released solicitations for December books on Monday, and the New 52 party rolls on!

I found the solicits interesting for three major reasons:

1)  Flex Mentallo

I, The Juror!

You know what was weird?  Jury duty.

absolutely nothing this good happened today at Austin's Municipal Courtroom 2A

From the fact that the parking directions sucked, to the sheer number of people called to fill a six person jury for what seemed to be a minor issue (and one, frankly, the defendant should have just taken the ticket on), today was a bit odd.

Making justice, I suppose, is a bit like making sausage.  I have a Mr. Smith Goes to Washington-level of naive faith in the system.  I really, really believe in trials of juries by peers, that we have a system that is much, much better than local bureaucrats determining your fate by whether or not they like the cut of your jib...  but today was also a bit eye-opening.

I don't know why there were more than 3 dozen of us called in to fill 6 seats.  I don't know why we were summoned at 9:00, dismissed at 9:45 and then told to come back at 1:45.  And why there were more of us at 1:45 than 9:00.

I did like voir dire, which was interesting to see everybody taking their part in the process with the utmost sincerity.  But I also realized that my idea of what is "reasonable" is going to get me bounced from jury selection every time on these sorts of minor criminal tickets.  But I also had never really thought too much about the fact that if its just a ticket in Texas, you aren't assigned a public defender.  And, frankly, I'm not sure from what little our defendant said and did today that he was competent enough to make decisions for himself like "I should go to trial" instead of "I'll just pay the ticket".

That's not to say the guy was guilty, but I'm a bit soft hearted when it comes to watching people getting in over their heads, and this fellow seemed to be tanking just having to listen to voir dire.  And clearly I wasn't the only one pretty sure nobody had counseled this fellow at all.

Sitting there, I began to wonder about whether I really could impartially review evidence.  I can do this at work to make decisions, but that's something I'm practiced at.  How well can I look at a ticket, impartially hear a witness description of an incident, and divorce myself from my mixed feelings about police, about what got this guy to the point he's in the courtroom, and what will happen to him should he wind up losing the trial?

I tend to think I could have made the distinction between "reasonable doubt" and "all possible doubt", an issue that took up, I think, a pretty good amount of time in our courtroom (and somehow nobody brought up CSI), and I like to think you can rely on witness testimony.  Mostly.

Lady Justice looks different to everyone, and so I think I could have done it.  Of course, at the end of the day they basically picked jurors 1-6 and sent the rest of us home after all that (I was juror 20.  The Rural Juror, I like to think).

What I liked best was the fact that despite my misgivings, my ego was a bit shattered that they didn't look upon me and see my innate sense of pure justice, just rolling off me in waves.  Also, I think I got bounced from consideration anyway because I said I thought a $500 fine for having marijuana paraphernalia seemed a bit steep.

JimD's Daredevil Deposition of Mark Waid!

JimD, the original Signal Corpsman, and one of the contributors at the always fine Abnormal Use law blog, has landed an interview with comics scribe Mark Waid (one of my personal heroes).

As you may know, Mark Waid is currently writing (Here Comes) Daredevil, and like everything else the man has touched the past decade, its just another darn fine comic.  Our protagonist, Daredevil, is, by day, attorney Matt Murdock.  And thus: our connection.

Don't take our word for it - read JimD's post and then go to your local comic shop this week and find Daredevil #4.  And then buy the previous issues if they're on the shelf.

You have to like it.  Cap AND Daredevil.