4 posts tagged “comics”
Here is a semi-contrarian view of the Disney purchase of Marvel which kind of expands on criticisms I have of Disney as well. Disney is buying entry into a market it has been dead to for about a decade. Surprisingly, I didn't make a snide joke about it in my brief post noting it, I've been telling people who would here me that Disney has hit a brick wall; the people they seem able to relate to are tween and teen girls. I would not be surprised to learn that they have a last ditch project in the Imagineering Labs to make young boys look and behave more like young girls. That would explain the Jonas Brothers.
As recently as the 90s, Disney could themselves release films that were broad, critically acclaimed hits. Today's Disney can be described as selling fairy tale princesses to girls. What is remarkable is how much its other properties (with the obvious exception of ESPN) has femmed up. ABC TV is essentially the WB Network for grown ups (h/t Jaime Weinman). The Disney Channel, which used to be home to shows like Jet Jackson, The Jersey and Even Stevens (starring a pre-Transformers Shia LeBeouf) is now almost entirely devoted to shows starring future female Disney pop stars. Miley Cyrus. Selena Gomez (summary). Again, the Jonas. And for all of the work Disney spent relaunching little watched Toon Disney into Disney XD as a male counterpart to The Disney Channel, XD is still far more popular with girls. (Curiously, it may be because they write the boys in XD shows as having doubts and insecurities, which would make them more appealing to girls than boys. Quote the article: "Amid their tomfoolery, the lead characters sometimes turn to the camera to agonize over decisions, expressing self-doubt in a way that is reassuring to girl audiences,")
For this entire decade, Disney could not pay a boy to partake in entertainment from the castle branded company. Now the House of Mouse pins its hopes on the House of Ideas, though critics will note the ideas are still 30 plus years old. They will still need good people to execute those ideas. Whether or not Marvel has those people remain to be seen,
Where do you do your online shopping?
Funny enough, I just cancelled my free trial of Amazon Prime. Unlike Joe, even with the extra shopping spurred by free two-day shipping, I didn't spend nearly enough to justify the $80 yearly fee that would have been levied. In addition, the free "Super Saver Shipping" option frequently got my stuff delivered two days after order, even though Amazon would over estimate shipping time by a week. Right now, since I have a order I placed two days after my trial expired, I have Amazon estimating it won't arrive until between the 22nd and the 29th, however UPS is estimating the delivery to happen on the 21st. UPS is always right in these cases.
I joined Amazon Prime because it was offered as a free trial when I ordered Justice League Unlimited season 1 (and technically 2, too) when it came out in October, along with Teen Titans season 1.
Following that, I've been using Amazon.com to build up my trade paperback collection of Wonder Woman starting from the 80s relaunch. (I actually had picked up the first book in 2005 so I could have something for George Perez to sign at Baltimore Comic Con in 2005. He couldn't make it in 2005, but he was there in 2006, so he I got him to sign it then. And he and Marv Wolfman were nice enough to pose for a picture as well, which I wasn't expecting. Eventually, I should get it off of my digital camera and onto some more permanent medium.) Anyway, since I have the first paperbacks, I thought I may as well get the rest as they come out so I can follow the story to its apparent conclusion at spring 2006, after which it was relaunched again. I don't follow comics enough to know why, though.So, while I had Prime, I've ordered Beauty and the Beasts, Destiny Calling, Spirit of Truth, and JLA: League of One. Not counting Spirit as it is out of print and I bought it from a collector who had it signed by Paul Dini and Alex Ross (and thus sold it for $30 through Amazon), the other books from Amazon came to cost about $30, thus not justifying any membership for Prime.
Simple blogging because I am sick...
They're going to redesign the Archie comics characters. Understandable, since as I look at Archie right now, the house style screams 1950s, and not in a cool-timeless way, but in a way that repels anybody who was born after 1960. Archie looks archaic.
That said, this redesign looks ugly. The cover looks repulsive, lacking in simple grace and style that at least the archaic Archie had. As someone who has criticized Manga-ization as a cheap way to try to make things new and hip, I wish they had opted for a more Manga style (no, I'm not going to go more into specifics than that). That said, my opinion doesn't mean anything, since I have never in my life bought or read an Archie comic. I may have watched a cartoon of it while ill and too sick to find the remote, throw a rock at the TV, or will myself into unconsciousness.
When an artist draws something like this, you'd think he'd earn a permanent ban from the industry. So why do people keep hiring Rob Liefeld? Or better yet, why does he beloved by some fans? This was a comment posted in a long running thread at "The Drawing Board" by Chris Knowles.
I think the massive size of this thread speaks somewhat to Rob's hypnotic powers. I mean, you have to admit that it's a lot of fun deconstructing his work. If you want my take on it, I've always felt that the reason he and Todd and Michael Turner and the rest were/are so popular is that they draw like fans. They draw like precocious high school kids. Betty Edwards has said that adolescent boys are fascinated by intricate surface detail and complexity. It's part of the way their brains process visual information. I think you see in Comics that slick artists who have weak basic drawing skills but have a knack for decorative detail are usually the fan favorites. I think the fact that the superhero audience is getting older accounts for the growing popularity of photo-tracing and "widescreen" artists- older fans are more sophisticated in their visual tastes and want the patina of film and photography (and perhaps "maturity") in their comics. Younger readers are drawn to Manga, which of course the Image crowd borrowed heavily from. Perhaps if there were more younger ( and I mean 13-20 yo) readers for superhero books, Rob Liefeld would still be very highly in demand. Carmine Infantino had said that Neal Adams never had any big sellers in comics because his style appealed to older readers, and it was the younger kids (7-12 yo) who were still the overwhelming bulk of the audience. The Adams style mutated a bit when Byrne synthesized it with Kirby and Ditko and made it popular with teens.
