Bendis Hates Tigra, Brubaker Hates Milla, BKV Hates Black People
January 30th, 2008 by david brothers | Tags: avengers, bendis, black people, ed brubaker, interview, mary jane watson, patriot, tigra, young avengersOr do they?
How long do you give a story before you judge it? If it’s obviously one part of a series, do you wait until it’s done or are you just so turned off that you shun it forever and cast it into outer darkness?
I tend to walk the line. If it’s a writer I trust, I’ll ride it out and see where it takes me. If it’s a writer I don’t trust… well, I don’t generally read books by writers I don’t trust, so that problem basically solves itself.
I mean, I saw one of the best black characters in comics catch a bullet to the dome a while back. It was a good scene and a good story, so I stayed interested instead of turned off.
Also, can we please stop talking about how much X writer hates Y character just because bad things happen to that character? One joke in an interview two years ago does not a vendetta make, no matter how often and how loudly it’s repeated. Bendis doesn’t hate Tigra any more than he hates Dr. Strange or Mary Jane.
I should probably also talk about Young Avengers #1: Patriot sometime soon, too, huh? I’m sure you’re all dying to know my thoughts on it.
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Out of curiousity, what brought about this declaration? I’m all for keeping the nerd-rage bottled up, but has this been a big trend in fandom recently?
PS: It kinda reminds me of the way people talk about Hank Pym as a huge wifebeater. One incident leads to a lifetime reputation.
It’s been a trend for years, I think, but I notice it more now. People don’t realize that writers don’t write characters they hate– they just leave them out of books entirely.
The Hank Pym is the perfect example. Spider-Man hit his wife when she was pregnant and spent a multipart (3?) storyline trying to straight up murder her.
But, you know, he isn’t Spider-Man: Wifebeater.
I think most writers would. But I find it hard to buy that Bendis LIKES Tigra. From Jarvis of all people calling her a bitch, to her treatment as Hank’s slut girlfriend and her multiple beatings to show-case newest pet The Hood’s bad-assery? I think its quite possible BMB does dislike the character and is being petty about it. Maybe he’ll surprise me with a bad-ass redemptive finale to this story arc for her character. But I somehow doubt it…
As for Brubaker and Milla, once he took over the book he had to do SOMETHING with the character’s and situations he inherited from the BMB run…
Where in the world did the “BKV hate Black People” bit come from? The last few issues of Y?
The haters at the FBB were discussing this on their private chat line and possibly at a podcast near you, but the way that Marvel’s writers have been given free reign, it will be more likely will be seeing this stuff in action. These storylines that don’t really have a definitive end. So where do you draw the line? We’re like in year 2 of the Tony Stark Grand Story Arc.
I need to have a reason to stick around through the bad times. Trust in the creators helps. Signs that there’s something different and substantive on the rise helps, too.
Ultimates vol. 1 is a good example. Very slow start. Very glad I stuck with it, though. I did so partly because of Millar, I assume, but wasn’t like anything else I’d ever seen and there seemed to be a lot of effort on display.
These days, I’m less trusting. Loeb, for instance, is on my $#!+ list (as a creator – I dunno the man). Flash over substance has its place, but it’s not very filling all year long.
“We’re like in year 2 of the Tony Stark Grand Story Arc.”
That reminds me, you probably could put together a solid case for Paul Jenkins hating Iron Man during Civil War. It’d still be circumstantial without statements straight from the dude’s mouth; but if it was me who really hated a character and was forced to use them, I’d go for character assassination rather than piling on humiliations.
You forgot to mention “Dan Slott Hates Juggernaut” in the title.
To hell with Slott. I’ll pick up the first Peter David She-Hulk trade just because of the Juggernaut bit in the latest issue.
But I find it hard to buy that Bendis LIKES Tigra. From Jarvis of all people calling her a bitch, to her treatment as Hank’s slut girlfriend and her multiple beatings to show-case newest pet The Hood’s bad-assery? I think its quite possible BMB does dislike the character and is being petty about it.
Thing is, Bendis has never, ever shown a tendency to do this to a character. Does he hate Tigra so much that he was holding this in his back pocket to pull out when he’s doing the run-up to 2008’s big event? The guy who has tightly plotted every run on a Marvel book he’s ever done?
You can see Liz Allen’s being a mutant (or at least a person with powers) foreshadowed probably 30 or 40 issues ago in Ultimate Spider-Man. Secret Invasion has been building since Secret War, which was written before New Avengers even launched.
He suddenly decides that he just really doesn’t like this Tigra person so he’s gonna crap on her every chance he gets in his two biggest books, both of which are closely tied to the upcoming Skrull storyline? The man isn’t that petty or foolish.
Plus, “Hank’s slut girlfriend?” What in the world makes her a slut? Hank and Janet have been divorced for years and the only person making waves about their relationship is his ex-wife, who is pictured as being pretty much completely out of line and the last person to criticize his dating choices, and maybe Black Widow in one panel or two, who should be reminded that it’s none of her business. Plus, the two of them were friends and teammates– sometimes these things happen.
Also, honestly, a dude sleeping with a catgirl is funny, and Bendis treating it as such works. It’s part of the sublime elements of the superhero subset of comics. It doesn’t make her a slut, though.
What I’m saying is that, barring an insult from Jarvis and this Hood thing, which isn’t over, I’m not seeing the proof that Bendis hates Tigra. The Hood is a new villain and one of the rules is that when a new villain appears, someone has to catch a bad one. Instead of using Wolverine to take the fall, though granted Wolverine did get into it with him, he picked a character that’s been used like three times in seven years and is giving her some headline news-worthy events and a higher profile than she’s had since probably Byrne was doing the Avengers.
The BKV thing was a joke. However, Alex Wilder dated Nico Minoru, a Japanese girl, and died. Yorick declared his love for 355 and she was immediately shot in the head. 2 + 2 doesn’t always equal 4.
if it was me who really hated a character and was forced to use them, I’d go for character assassination rather than piling on humiliations.
Nah, Frontline was the brainchild of Joe Q and Paul. Some of that was editorial (being followed up in New Warriors now) and others were his idea, but I don’t know that he dislikes Iron Man so much as dislikes registration.
And Gavok, Slott doesn’t hate Juggernaut! He just hates when continuity doesn’t line up so much that he’ll make up dumb stories to fix them!
That’s kinda bass-ackwards, Gav. You’re gonna buy a PAD book to protest a character not being treated with nicely? I mean, is it wrong of me to assume Peter David will nine times out of ten take the maudlin path to wherever he’s going with a story? I know the article is about having faith in a writer’s storytelling, but come on. There are tones & moods other than “darkest before the dawn.”
I usually dig Peter David’s stuff, though I could easily come up with a list of stuff he’s done that I flat out disliked. Like the Last Avengers Story. Even then, I thought it had some interesting concepts.
And the latter parts of Slott’s She-Hulk run just plain irritated the hell out of me. His bias continuity rages started to pop up all over the place and it got ridiculous. The whole Juggernaut thing was the worst example. Going well out of his way to retcon a trivial moment that he didn’t agree with is probably the worst way he could have handled it. Which is funny, since his GLA summer special teased Byrne for doing the same exact thing with Dr. Doom/Squirrel Girl.
can we agree that joe q. hates mary jane?
I thinkif Joe Q hated MJ he would have had her cease to exist rather than unmarry her and Peter. And she probably wouldn’t have her own series (as out of continuity as it is).
mordicai: No, because there’s zero evidence for that. Quesada hates the idea of Peter being married, not the character Peter is married to.
And getting back to New Avengers, the original Tigra beating scene never struck me as the Hood establishing himself as being so badass that he could beat up Tigra (because that’s not really that remarkable), and more as a way of showcasing his methods of operation. It was a brutal scene that highlighted the Hood’s personality and gave Tigra a storyline, not your average villain buildup smackdown.
Really, I’ve liked the majority of New Avengers, but you need to have a certain investment in the Marvel Universe to fully appreciate it. Most of NA’s storylines played off of the major events at the time, or retroactively turned out to be buildup for Secret Invasion. It’s essentially served as the spine of the Marvel U. DC is even trying to copy that format with JLA, but it doesn’t work there because JLA’s writers didn’t get to establish the team (barring a few minor line-up changes) and have absolutely no hand in the direction of the DC Universe.
As for Pedro’s comment about storylines with no end, I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. That is, resolving individual plot threads should happen at some point, of course, but you can’t really wrap everything up into a neat bow, because that would mean there wouldn’t be anything to write about anymore. It’s just something you have to take in mind when you start reading superhero comics; With these kind of comics it’s the journey that matters, not the destination. That said, considering how much of this has been leading up to Secret Invasion, from the look of things we will be seeing a lot of stuff resolved there.
Man, does Tigra even have enough appearances to warrant disliking?
My only real problem with Tigra and Hank dating is that I really liked the idea of Hank and Firebird getting together permanently after BEYOND! But of course, we couldn’t have an A-minus-list hero appearing regularly in two or even three books involved with a C-lister banished to the Texas Rangers.
You know, I really could have done without that Y spoiler. Could you at least go back and put a warning or something? Thanks.
One of the interesting points here to me is “how much rope are you prepared to give a writer?” In the silver age it was easy. Stories were done in one, or at the most, two issues, and that was about all you needed for an informed opinion. Now individual stories are six issues long, and often even half a year’s worth of comics won’t give you enough information to make an informed comment about what’s happening in the comic.
Well sorry, but I’m not buying a dozen issues of a comic to find out if what seems to be a sucky attitude of the writer is merely a clever set up for a resolution a year later. If you are not going to give me some indication within a couple of issues that things are not as stupid and annoying as they appear, then you don’t get to keep taking my money. Mileage will vary depending on how much I trust the writer to deliver.
Yeah, the rope phrasing was definitely on purpose. When I got back into comics, I read a lot of Claremont books. I remembered him being pretty awesome.
I gave him so much rope that I’m still tripping over it these days.
I’m smarter now.
I like JMS but he simply cannot write Iron Man correctly as a character. The fight in Thor was great and a long time coming but JMS had Stark start it off by walking a slow circle around Thor (who he still wants as a friend, we’re to suppose) and talking a bunch of hard with-us-or-against-us shit at him, which is really out of character for Iron Man except in every book JMS has written since Civil War started.
So I wouldn’t say JMS hates Iron Man, but it’s like he wants a flat caricature of George Bush to beat up and has decided that Stark is it, which is just as bad.
You know, going by this whole logic of “If something bad happens to a character, then that totally means the writer hates that character” one could, then, say that Stan Lee REALLY had it in for Spider-Man.