Next time you read an issue of Batman & Robin, make sure to do so with this cranking in the background.
Thanks to Yannick_B for bringing this kickass theme to my attention.
Also, stay tuned for later tonight. I should have another We Care a Lot up. This time it’s about Spider-Shemp.
6th Sense’s 4a.m. Instrumental provides a prelude to our latest Continuity Off: Adam Warlock vs Alfred. As in, Batman’s Alfred versus the Golden Messiah.
I break Warlock down from Kirby/Lee to Jim Starlin to the current incarnation, a feat which takes forever, and Esther explains how Alfred a) is 90 years old and b) was in love with a woman who could be his great grand-daughter and was also just a little older than Tim Drake. Whooo!
What time is it? Time for another Bat-cast? You know it!
We open on me eating a rice krispie treat (thanks Esther!), move to the Disney/Marvel lawsuits, hop over to Batgirl, and then talk over Batman & Robin! Who’s trying to block the Disney and Marvel merger? What’s up with the possible love interest in Batgirl? Why did David drop Batman & Robin?
We ran a little over time (by half an hour, dang) so look for a Continuity Off-specific episode in a couple weeks!
Esther Inglis-Arkell is on the ground with io9.com with an article about unexplored rapes in comics. You should go give it a read and then digg it in when you’re done, I think!
Before The Hunter came out, Selina’s Big Score was my favorite Darwyn Cooke book. I’ve liked Catwoman for years, but for no good reason. It wasn’t the spandex, because I got over “ooh, hot girl comics!” pretty quickly. It definitely wasn’t the character, as I only really liked her in Miller and Mazzucchelli’s Year One before I read SBC.
I think what it was that made Selina’s Big Score work so much for me was the tone. SBC is this dark, inky, noir-y heist tale. There’s no costumes, not really. It’s just about a woman who needs a big score, the team she gathers to make it work, and the troubles she runs into. More than anything, though, it’s glamourous. The cover promises the kind of heist tale that features fast chases, pretty people, and action, like the finest of ’70s crime cinema.
The insides more than deliver. Characters are introduced by text on black panels, a technique I’ve always loved when I’ve seen it in movies. The graphic novel is divided up into four separate books, making for easy chapter and story breaks.
The first chapter, Selina, sets the stage for the book. Selina had money, but lost it, and now she needs it back. The second chapter, Stark, focuses on the muscle. The third chapter, Slam, gives us the down low on the man chasing Selina. The fourth chapter, Score, gives us the heist itself.
The writing is sharp and fast-paced. Old friends and new enemies are introduced with aplomb, leaving you just enough to get going, but not so much that you can’t apply a bit of imagination into the mix. Cooke doesn’t overload on the first person captions, either. Slam’s section is appropriately hardboiled, Stark’s is cynical and, well, stark, and Selina’s is borderline hopeful. Rather than being a crutch, or another way to show the tortured existence of these heroes as they buckle under several tons of angst, the captions come across as genuine character builders.
Selina’s Big Score crawls across genres, too. Slam’s the tired avenger, the very picture of the good man alone in a hard world. Stark is Parker– impatient, amoral, skilled at violence, and professional to a fault. Chantel is a blaxploitation figure, a good girl in a bad situation, and uses her sass as a defensive mechanism. Jeff is your ’90s action movie criminal, seemingly all flash and recklessness, but with a surprisingly solid core. And Selina? She’s the ever-present femme fatale, but put into a position where she’s the focus, rather than a sidekick or villain.
Cooke mines several decades of American cinema to create the comic book heist story to end all comic book heist stories. It gives Selina Kyle the Year One treatment. It redefines her for a new era, re-contextualizes her as a character, and provides a focus that I feel like wasn’t there before. Pre-SBC, to me, Catwoman was another sexpot in spandex, all cat puns and tortured Jim Balent poses, clothes strategically torn. After? She’s viable, interesting, and has a movie-ready story that puts a lot of other books to shame.
6th Sense’s 4a.m. Instrumental brings us in as we discuss our three favorite Batman and Spider-Man villains, and just what makes them so great. Esther’s got Bane, Catwoman, and the Riddler, I’ve got Norman Osborn, Black Cat, and Doc Ock. There’s a surprised amount of similarities in our picks, even though we surprised each other.
After that is the Continuity Off to end all Continuity Offs, as Esther explains Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Hawkwoman, and Hawkworld, and I… well, give it a listen.
Grab the Fourcast! via RSS or iTunes.
I have said that I don’t warm up to new characters easily, and it’s true. If anything, I find myself hostile to new characters. Here’s a new person, taking up panels that could easily be devoted to characters that I already like.
Lately I’ve been examining what exactly causes a new character I hate to become someone I like. It helps when they’re shown to be someone I can understand, but I understand plenty of people I don’t like.
What it comes down to are ‘click’ moments, moment when the character is so fantastic that I’m lifted out of my knee-jerk misanthropy and become a fan. I haven’t found any particular common thread to these moments, but I’d like to share some with you.
Sasha Bordeaux: She becomes Batman’s sidekick for a little while. While sidekicking she meets up with Huntress during a crisis. Huntress saves her, and snarkily says, “You can thank me later.” Sasha replies, “Why wait? Thanks!” That’s when I began to like her, to cheer her on, and to follow her. She’s a decent person. Not a weak person. Not a soft person. A strong person with a level enough head not to answer rudeness with rudeness. She exemplified the strategy of turning the other cheek. In Gotham. That takes some doing.
Cheshire: In the Villains United miniseries, Mockingbird threatens to kill her child in order to keep her on the team. Her strategy? Immediately betray the team. Oh, and sleep with a man to get pregnant so she can ‘replace’ her child. When the other members rightly point out that his is sociopathic on a level never seen before, she says something like, ‘We were caught and only I managed to cut myself free. Because I dared.’ Damn. Just damn. It’s horrible and it’s fantastic.
Booster Gold: When he tried to save Ted Kord despite knowing the world would suck because of it. That’s just self-explanatory. What? I’m not made of stone!
Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown: These two entirely won me over when they spar until both of them vomit and then decide to do it again the next day. Their friendship is literally my lead-in to both characters. It features everything I like, people being kind to each other, being loyal, helping each other out, and a broken jaw every now and then. Really, it’s a chick flick waiting to happen.
Share your own ‘click’ moments, if you have them, below.
Because you demanded it!!!!, 4boys and 4girls, we’re bringing back the Continuity Off for our twelfth Fourcast!
ITEM! 6th Sense’s 4a.m. Instrumental is pretty good! I think this kid is gonna do big things one day!
ITEM! Yours truly starts off the Classic Comics Continuity Off with an explanation of the Summers-Grey family tree! It’s rotted and knotted, and after listening, you’ll wish you were besotted!
ITEM! If I got anything wrong, true believer, just play along! It’s almost certain that my version is probably better than what was actually printed back in the Roarin’ ’90s!
ITEM! Esther counters my onslaught with the history of Pre-Crisis Jason Todd! It must be seen/heard to be believed, and you may not believe it, even then!
ITEM! She hits me with the “two” of the one-two, as she discusses the Many Mothers of Jason Todd, Esq.!
ITEM! You can subscribe to the podcast via RSS or iTunes! If you go for iTunes, give yer humble comics site a review!
ITEM! If you haven’t yet, grab our full RSS feed or join the Facebook group!
See you next week, 4fans! Another week, another Fourcast!, another half hour or so of Comics Conversation in the Fantastic 4thletter Formula!
A friend of mine, who used to enjoy the Batman: The Animated Series back when it aired, recently told me that her regard for Batman was finally snuffed out.
Don’t worry, this isn’t a lead into griping about how Batman is being portrayed these days. I’ve done that enough. Read the rest of this entry �
