Yo, I can’t fully become my mother’s guiding light
’til my dad returns to tell me what the other side is like
I keep the things you taught trapped in mind
I know you cared…
Even though you weren’t here half the time
But who am I to blame?
I’d probably do the same in your shoes
–Copywrite, “June”

Fathers are an important element of a lot of comics characters origins, and I haven’t really seen a lot of attention aimed in that direction. This is odd, because the three biggest comics characters (Super/Spider-/Batman) are orphans with surrogate parents. Superman has Jonathan and Martha Kent, Batman has Alfred, and Spider-Man has Aunt May and Uncle Ben. I’m going to talk about Jonathan Kent, and Ben Parker to a lesser extent, in specific here, I think.

(For what it is worth, Martha, Martha, and May [their supergroup is named 3M and May is lead singer] provided the compassion that fuels all three heroes in their daily interactions with the citizenry. In each case, both parents are vital and equal components of the hero’s heroic persona. That should probably be another post, however.)

I could probably do an essay apiece on these guys, so I’ll take it slow and focus specifically on the treatment of Jonathan Kent in All-Star Superman #6, “Funeral in Smallville.” I find the regular DCU Jonathan interesting, too, especially in light of Adventures of Superman #500, but I’ll get to that later.

Ben’s influence on Peter Parker is two-fold. First, he’s the source of Peter’s superheroic morality. “With great power comes great responsibility” is basically the reason that Spider-Man became a hero, instead of a celebrity. The other angle is that he’s a source of grief and guilt for Peter, providing a secondary reason for him to keep heroing. Ben Parker is, essentially, Peter Parker’s first failure. Gwen and Captain Stacy are two further failures.

Jonathan Kent, in light of this issue, is essentially Ben Parker. In this updated story about Clark Kent’s past, Jonathan is already elderly at this point, and has heart troubles. Three mysterious Supermen appear and attempt to prevent Clark from fighting a Chronovore. Instead, Clark presses on into battle and loses three minutes of his life. In those three minutes, his father suffers a fatal heart attack and dies.

Before this, Clark was essentially invincible. There was nothing he could not do. There was nothing he could fail at. However, his first failure was harsh enough to instill in him a resolution (I’d hesitate to call it a fear) to never fail again.

The scene where Jonathan dies is cut into the fight against the Chronovore, including a rough scene where Clark is flying so fast that his hair ignites while he screams that he can “save everybody.” The scene directly after that is the funeral, which explains the moral fiber that Jonathan instilled in his son.

“Jonathan Kent taught me that the strong have to stand up for the weak and that bullies don’t like being bullied back. […] He taught me about life and death.”

This page is about as good a summary of Superman’s modus operandi as you’re going to get. He’s there to work toward a better world, to protect those weaker than him, and to live up to his father’s example. In a very real way, Superman’s hero, the person he looks up to the most and attempts to emulate, is a normal man.

This adds an interesting wrinkle to the All-Star Superman. He’s already experienced the worst feeling in the world and it became a vital part of his character. He took the loss, adjusted, and now he’s there to try and live up to his father’s memory. It isn’t guilt, exactly– it’s more of a respect thing.

The twist in the issue is that one of the Supermen is actually our Superman, who has traveled back in time. He’s there for one last chance to be with his father. He knows that he can’t save him, and that sometimes bad things happen, but that you’ve got to take joy where you can get it. If that means talking with your father about your future just before he dies… so be it. It’s an experience to be treasured, yeah?

I haven’t really seen anyone talk much about the new Squadron Supreme 2 miniseries, so I thought I’d take a crack at it.

To really get into my thoughts on the first issue of the new miniseries, you have to look back at what brought us here in the first place. The original concept of the Squadron Supreme was brought to us by Roy Thomas as part of an Avengers storyline. The team would be the first example of what would eventually become a very hackneyed comic book cliché of one company copying another company’s characters and changing their names to keep things legally clean. Sometimes this works, like the time Plastic Man trained with an invisible monk, a super-strong monk and a fire monk. Most of the time it doesn’t work, like when Superman and Batman had to face the Ultimates/Avengers-based Maximums or when Garth Ennis thinks up yet another Superman knock-off for the sake of making fun.

The Squadron Supreme, of course, was based on the Justice League. It was a cool idea at the time and their alternate universe was instrumental in the Defenders. It was there that they laid down the groundwork for Mark Gruenwald’s opus maxi-series based on the Squadron Supreme universe.

If you haven’t read the original Squadron Supreme series, I’d suggest you do. It’s not the best comic ever, but in light of the last few years in comics, it comes across as an interesting bridge between the older days of superhero morality and the more sensitive times of now. It mainly dealt with the team taking over the government and giving themselves a year to fix up the damage they had caused during a mind-control episode. The big deal of their plan to change the world is that they used a special machine to alter the minds of their villains to make them good. The moral dilemmas weren’t lost on the story, as some heroes left due to disagreeing with the situation and one member of the team got kicked off for using the same machine on another teammate to make her love him. In the end, it became a Civil War situation with Hyperion’s side up against Nighthawk’s side.

The Squadron Supreme world could never successfully follow up on that series. There were stories here and there, including an arc in Exiles, but nothing special ever truly happened with it.

Read the rest of this entry �

Not Cam’ron, Mindy Owens‘s favorite rapper. I’m talking about Cameron Stewart, artist of Seaguy, Catwoman, Guardian, and a host of other books you should be checking for.

I recently found out that he has a blog, the Cameron Stewartwork Blog according to the header!

Stewart is one of my favorite artists. I first saw his work on Seaguy, most likely, and then Catwoman, 7 Soldiers: Guardian, and The Other Side. He does Sin Titulo weekly. It’s a part of the Transmission X network, one of the more interesting webcomics collectives out there. TX Comics also includes Luz, which is about peak oil, kind of.

Anyway, I really dig his style. He’s cartoony, expressive, and flexible in a way that I can admire. Beyond being drawn by the same dude, Seaguy, Sin Titulo, Other Side, and Catwoman don’t look like the same book. It’s like he’s always trying to switch up his style. As near as I can tell, it’s paying off. I’m just hoping that ST is going to end up collected at some point so I can throw some money at him.

Anyway, he’s got a blog he posts artwork on. He’s talked about Wall-E and a few other summer movies. He did a sketch of Black Cat that I would straight up kill for. (I wish he did commissions.) He also has a feature called Girl Fridays.

Girl Fridays is a series where Stewart draws a cute girl a week. It’s an exercise in style (both art and fashion), design, and color. It’s interesting to look at, and it’s Cam Stewart drawing cute girls. Who could hate that?

Thinking back to yesterday, I seem to recall Thor slaughtering Unus and then being easily beaten by Magneto. Now ManiacClown and I are back to finish off yet another fun week.

In case you were wondering, the original, untouched version of that last page has Ultron ranting about vibrators. Yes, really.

Thanks for reading. Unless we get another delay or two, get set for Week 5 in August.

Ultimate Edit Week 5

It’s that time of year again, when people barbecue, swim in pools, chill with family, and generally have a good time. I’m stuck in faux-sunny San Francisco for the weekend, though, so all of y’all can eat it. Would it kill global warming to speed up a little bit? I don’t even sweat on hot days here.

Anyway, though, I had a pretty well received post about Captain America and America last year. It’s 2008 now. I’m older, wiser, and meaner. Why not give it another go, yeah?

I’ve been feeling a little nasty lately. Thinking about movies, news, music, and politics. Even comics, man. The presidential race turned into some ugly “My -ism is worse than yours” race, and I’m honestly tired of hearing about how Obama is going to change everything ever, particularly when he took father’s day to air out fathers, but whatever whatever. My point is that I’ve been waiting for an excuse to bite a face. So, you’ll have to pardon any cynicism that leaks through.

You could say that Captain America represents the American Dream. I say American Dream, but if you think about it, it’s really the ideal. Tolerance, perspective, patience, and so on. He thinks before he acts and he does his best to do right. He believes in his country and her people and trusts them to make the right choice. He chooses to lead by example.

If Captain America represents the American Ideal, Luke Cage is living proof that the dream is a valid possibility.

Carl Lucas is a victim of America. He grew up poor in Harlem, had no way out, and ended up running with a fake comic book gang. His childhood is a slideshow of group homes and juvie. He wises up when he gets grown and tries to go legit. His best friend, Stryker, stays dirty, though. Lucas makes the mistake of being the guy his best friend’s ex-girlfriend runs to, which angers Stryker. Stryker frames him, snitches, and Lucas goes to jail in Georgia for some reason.

In prison, Lucas is broken and angry. He doesn’t care about anything, basically, fights constantly, and eventually is used as a guinea pig for a new variant of the Super Soldier formula. A vengeful security guard sabotages the experiment, accidentally granting Cage enhanced strength and hard skin, and Cage escapes in the confusion. He goes back to New York and starts a new life as Luke Cage, hero for hire. He rebuilds his social circle, finds new love, and gets on with life.

Cage was put through a lot, most of it through no fault of his own.

Nine times out of ten, seems like, most Cage talk tends to be about how he once flew to Latveria to get two hundred bucks from Doom, tiaras, ha ha blaxploitation, and jokes about anal sex. He’s kind of a punchline, but I don’t think people realize how far he’s come.

Cage went from the kind of vaguely-insulting, heart-in-the-right-place black character that was popular back then (and kind of still is now) to the guy who took Captain America’s spot in the Avengers. I’m getting ahead of myself, though.

Part of the American Dream is that frontiersman, wild west work ethic. Staking your claim and all that. You take what’s yours and you refine it, beat it into shape, and make it work how it’s supposed to. Cage applied this to real life. He’s a hero for hire, yes, but that doesn’t mean he won’t work pro bono. There’s a scene in a Daredevil comic where Cage proves this. Luke tells Matt to use his senses to scan the building. Is there anyone selling drugs, being violent, or doing crime in his building? No. Why? ’cause Cage laid down the law.

There’s a line from a rap song that goes “Handle your business before your business handles you.” You can sit and wait for people to fix something for you and get screwed over in the process, or you can fix it yourself. Cage fixed it himself. He handled his business. He did the right thing.

This is something that most heroes do not do. They don’t take a firm hand in policing their area. They just kinda mill around and look for crime, or in Superman’s case, actively ignore things sometimes in the name of “letting people govern themselves.” The problem is, most people aren’t going to govern themselves. Some people do not have that choice or made the wrong choice.

Cage’s method of operating is very similar to how Frank Miller approaches Batman. It’s kind of a benevolent dictator move– he knows what’s right, and he’s going to implement it and you’re gonna benefit, whether you like it or not. He uses the Avengers to clean up a single neighborhood. He believes that heroes should be constantly making a difference, not just fighting supervillains. Superheroes should be visible and lead by example. This isn’t just about fighting crime– it’s about making the world better.

He eventually marries Jessica Jones after the birth of their daughter, Danielle. He begins to take heroing even more seriously after that. What’s the point of having powers if you aren’t going to leave the world a better place? What’s the point of having principles if you aren’t going to stick with them?

Why would you want your daughter to grow up thinking that you’re a coward?

This is part of why his split from Tony Stark is so believable. He thinks that Tony made the wrong choice. He can’t live with going along with that choice if it’s the wrong one, so he chooses to play outlaw instead. He’s doing it for the future and he’s doing it for his daughter.

So, Cage is out there every day, putting in work and doing the best he can. The only way to make it in America, for most people anyway, is through blood, sweat, and tears. You have to get dirty.

Cage is getting dirty. In the process, he’s risen above his beginnings, he’s cultivated a circle of loyal friends, he’s protecting his neighborhood, and he’s providing for his family.

Why is all of this remarkable? Why isn’t it just standard issue? Why should Cage be admired for doing the right thing?

(this is where the cynicism hits, y’all)

The thing about America is that she eats her young. It was founded on the idea of freedom, civil liberties, and making your own way in life. In reality, it didn’t even begin to seriously approach those lofty goals until the mid-1900s, almost two hundred years after it was founded. Even then, the political equivalent of baby steps were what happened, not long strides. It still isn’t 100%.

You’re on your own in America, a lot of the times. Look at the prisons, poverty, and education. You think everyone in prison is there because they’re a bad person? No, I’m willing to bet that a significant number are there because they didn’t have any other choice, so they picked up that gun or bat or kilo and went to work.

Think about it. Say you’ve got a family and your kid won’t stop crying because she’s hungry. You can either hope for a call back from that temp agency or you can hit the corner for a day or two and come home with a roll of twenties.

Now, keep thinking. What kind of a world is this where you have to seriously contemplate the idea of losing your family versus poisoning someone else’s? Could you make that choice? Is it right that you should ever have to make that choice?

This is what I mean. The American Dream should be a reality, but it is still a pipe dream for a lot of people. It shouldn’t be– but it is.

But, that’s life, right?

Well, yeah, it’s harsh, but that’s life. Life isn’t fair. America is not, and has never been, fair. Will it one day be fair? I’d like to think so. Will I see it? Probably not. But, that’s no excuse not to try and do right and behave as if it is.

This is why I love Cage so much. He has every reason to be bitter, full of hate, and furious at the life he’s found himself in. Instead, though, he’s just living his life, trying to do right, and leave it better for the next generation.

That, to me, is the only proper execution of the American Dream. You may feel like Atlas with the weight of the heavens on your shoulders, but your knees don’t buckle and your spine doesn’t bend. When America hurts you, you remind it that throwing a punch is an invitation to catch one right back.

Sometimes, when you love America, you have to fight America. Sometimes, you have to even dislike America, even though you love it.

Cage gets it right. He proves that the Dream exists. You just have to be willing to fight for it.

Happy 4th.

Yesterday, Valkyrie got knocked out of the sky by Pyro and then Mastermind mastered her mind. Then Pyro received the nomination for Most Out-of-Character in a Jeph Loeb Production. Congratulations, Mr. Allerdyce.

Now we go to a Lord of the Rings battle sequence that’s reduced to three pages because MAD! can’t fit any more into his hefty schedule.

Tomorrow we’ll get a little conclusion to this scene, as well as more fun with robots to close out the week.

Thanks to ManiacClown, who’s good at translating our thoughts into Thor-speak.

Day Seven!

In our last installment, Hawkeye was saved by Ka-Zar, Shanna and a couple hungry tigers. Then Wolverine and Black Panther got punked by a guy calling himself the Juggernaut. Now we focus on Valkyrie.

Maybe in the next issue, we’ll see Ultimate Deadpool giving all his money to a mutant charity.

Get ready for tomorrow because that’s when ManiacClown and I will cover the EPIC* battle between Thor and Magneto!

*It isn’t epic by any means

Day Six!
Day Seven!

Continuing from yesterday’s installment, Hawkeye is getting a thrashing at the hands of Sabretooth. Now some of Ka-Zar’s little buddies join in the fight.

It’s funny. A day or so before this issue came out, I thought about how surprising it was that Loeb hadn’t resorted to a Juggernaut cameo yet. There goes that surprise.

Apologies to ManiacClown, as I ended up cutting a gag of his based around Gimpy Cain Marko being referred to as “the Buggernaut”.

Join us tomorrow for more from Valkyrie. Can’t wait.

Day Five!
Day Six!
Day Seven!

Marvel’s Mythos series is pretty interesting. They’re 32 page one-shots that re-tell, and sometimes re-adjust, the origins of a few Marvel heroes. They don’t fit into any ongoing series, so the collection will likely come in the form of a “Marvel Mythos” premiere hardcover sometime over the next year, hopefully. From the first solicit:

AN ALL-NEW SERIES OF PAINTED ONE-SHOTS FROM MARVEL, RECAPTURING THE EARLIEST DAYS OF OUR GREATEST HEROES! The first of a series of quintessential, stand-alone, done-in-one stories by Paul Jenkins and Paolo Rivera, MYTHOS: X-MEN takes readers back to the formative days of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, and recounts the first encounter between the nescient, teen-aged X-Men with their ultimate nemesis, Magneto! Filled with new detail and nuance, the MYTHOS books are also the perfect starter set for those readers new to the Marvel cast of characters, or to those who known them only from movies and television cartoons!

The line-up thus far has been pretty much par for the course. X-Men, Hulk, Spider-Man, Ghost Rider, Fantastic Four, and Captain America. The books haven’t really functioned as direct movie tie-ins, save for maybe Ghost Rider or Fantastic Four. Instead, they’re quick primers on the character that also serve as a light continuity patch. Characters are modernized and origins are retooled for the modern day. The FF were given their powers on a space station, instead of fighting Russkies, for example. Come to think, their origin is probably the most changed.

Usually, this is the exact kind of story I’m not interested in. Continuity Comix? Give it a miss. For some reason, though, I’m really digging them. I think it’s because they feel like a throwback. They’re like the backups that used to show up in Marvel comics, like “Here’s the secret of Spider-Man’s webshooters!” or “Here’s the layout of the X-Mansion!” Paul Jenkins and Paolo Rivera make it work, though.

Rivera’s art is fully painted, but still manages to come with enough of a retro flair to make it reminiscent of old comics. He uses a color palette that isn’t garishly dayglo, nor is it Alex Ross-y. It’s not subdued either. It feels just right. His facial expressions come through clearly, in part due to the large size of the panels giving him room to work. Johnny Storm’s casual embarrassment, the Congressman’s bemusement, and Sue Storm’s complete and utter lack of surprise at her little brother’s antics all are true to life. You can recognize them on sight. I also love that they included the schematic of the old school Baxter. I love seeing that stuff.

Paul Jenkins caught a lot of flack post-Civil War: Frontline. You’d think the man hadn’t written a good comic in his entire life, the way some people talk. However, looking back, he’s got The Sentry, Inhumans, and he had a killer run on Spider-Man. His last issue of Spectacular Spidey, with art by Mark Buckingham? That was one of the best issues of Spider-Man in years. It was pitch perfect.

The core of all of those stories that Jenkins did so well on lies in the relationships he puts on display. Ben and Peter, Norman and Peter, Black Bolt and his subjects, Black Bolt and Medusa, Sentry and his wife/friends, and so on. He’s putting in similar work on the Mythos books. They are about the origins, yeah, but more about the choices, or lack thereof, that led to the origins and the choices that followed. Reed desperately trying to talk Ben down, or Captain America thinking about the men he served with and the things he missed, are what makes these books so good. Johnny Blaze making the decision to sell his soul and Peter Parker’s rage and shame at realizing he caused the death of his uncle are more crucial scenes that succeed.

I started this post with the intention of talking about the Captain America book, but got way off track. The Cap book is a good one because it focuses on Steve Rogers, not Cap. It’s about his life, his dreams, and his regrets. I’d challenge anyone who thinks that Jenkins doesn’t “get” Captain America to read it. I’m willing to bet that you won’t come away with that feeling. This page alone is dead on. I love the dual Nick Fury appearances… and is that milk Cap is drinking?

The Jenkins/Rivera team is a great one. They’re telling tales that you’d think were inessential, but are actually really good. I’m hoping Marvel does the series justice when it collects it. I’m hoping for an oversized HC, myself, but that’s because I’m addicted. I also kind of want Jenkins to get a crack at the Fantastic Four for a while, too.

Also, this cover is basically the definition of awesome. I didn’t even catch the detail on the shield when I first picked up the book.

Ka-pow.