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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 26, 2021 11:17:17 GMT -5
Great subject, dbutler69 ! Alan Moore : I really, really, really disliked The Killing Joke. It's not that it was a bad story in the sense that the writer botched the job; it's that I find the story needlessly sadistic. I'm sure a critic could argue that it is possible to pen a well-written story that deals with a sadistic madman, sure, but I don't think that such a story is appropriate for a comic-book featuring established characters in long underwear. Besides, even if we admit that there's a place for an official DC comic in which it's appropriate for the Joker to torture Barbara and James Gordon in a most graphic way... the conclusion, in which Batman and the Joker share a hearty laugh, is simply obscene. I would have been less shocked if Bruce had just broken the Joker's neck then and there!!! With you here to the nth degree. There are no more unnerving descriptions of wartime violence than those found in the Iliad; none more disturbing than can be read in All Quiet on the Western Front (notably the description of the screaming, panicky horses caught in no-man's land during an artillery bombardment; no account of rape more shattering than Lavinia's in Titus Andronicus. But these scenes are all the more unsettling because they are entwined with genuine emotion; the characters are not being used as pawns by the writer to scratch a perverse itch; the violence to mind and body is not played out before us to titillate and shock us. And it is not thrust at us on page after page, but rather used to real to us the depths of human depravity, evil, whatever you want to call it. To be honest, I can't remember where Killing Joke fits into the continuum of gratuitous sadism in comics, whether it kicked off the trend, or was part of an already established one, but either way, the door was smashed in and suddenly it seems, every comic was luxuriating in and glorifying extreme, cruel, sadistic violence. Because they could. Even if we allow that Moore, as an excellent comics writer, should have the leeway to explore this kind of topic, the ripples created by this kind of approach eventually reach all shores, and thus, all kinds of inferior creators imitate what Moore did and the publishers give them de facto permission to outgross each other. And then, no act of violence -- rape, maiming, even excising one's own face (Isn't that what the Joker did in some fairly recent issue?) -- is ever enough to shock, stun, or repulse readers. And the line between old-fashioned super-hero and bloodthirsty vigilante was erased in spilled blood. To be fair, Alan Moore doesn't like The Killing Joke either.
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Post by Prince Hal on May 26, 2021 11:34:11 GMT -5
With you here to the nth degree. There are no more unnerving descriptions of wartime violence than those found in the Iliad; none more disturbing than can be read in All Quiet on the Western Front (notably the description of the screaming, panicky horses caught in no-man's land during an artillery bombardment; no account of rape more shattering than Lavinia's in Titus Andronicus. But these scenes are all the more unsettling because they are entwined with genuine emotion; the characters are not being used as pawns by the writer to scratch a perverse itch; the violence to mind and body is not played out before us to titillate and shock us. And it is not thrust at us on page after page, but rather used to real to us the depths of human depravity, evil, whatever you want to call it. To be honest, I can't remember where Killing Joke fits into the continuum of gratuitous sadism in comics, whether it kicked off the trend, or was part of an already established one, but either way, the door was smashed in and suddenly it seems, every comic was luxuriating in and glorifying extreme, cruel, sadistic violence. Because they could. Even if we allow that Moore, as an excellent comics writer, should have the leeway to explore this kind of topic, the ripples created by this kind of approach eventually reach all shores, and thus, all kinds of inferior creators imitate what Moore did and the publishers give them de facto permission to outgross each other. And then, no act of violence -- rape, maiming, even excising one's own face (Isn't that what the Joker did in some fairly recent issue?) -- is ever enough to shock, stun, or repulse readers. And the line between old-fashioned super-hero and bloodthirsty vigilante was erased in spilled blood. To be fair, Alan Moore doesn't like The Killing Joke either. That I didn't know.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 26, 2021 11:48:47 GMT -5
To be fair, Alan Moore doesn't like The Killing Joke either. That I didn't know. A couple of quotes from Moore..."I thought it was far too violent and sexualised a treatment for a simplistic comic book character like Batman and a regrettable misstep on my part." (during a Goodreads Q & A). "I’ve never really liked my story in The Killing Joke. I think it put far too much melodramatic weight upon a character that was never designed to carry it. It was too nasty, it was too physically violent." Interview at Mania.com. He was also upset that it was adopted in to continuity as it was originally intended as a stand-alone with no effect on the wider DCU. As to the laugh at the end, "And David, for the record, my intention at the end of that book was to have the two characters simply experiencing a brief moment of lucidity in their ongoing very weird and probably fatal relationship with each other, reaching a moment where they both perceive the hell that they are in, and can only laugh at their preposterous situation. A similar chuckle is shared by the doomed couple at the end of the remarkable Jim Thompson’s original novel, The Getaway."
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Post by Roquefort Raider on May 26, 2021 12:59:24 GMT -5
A couple of quotes from Moore..."I thought it was far too violent and sexualised a treatment for a simplistic comic book character like Batman and a regrettable misstep on my part." (during a Goodreads Q & A). "I’ve never really liked my story in The Killing Joke. I think it put far too much melodramatic weight upon a character that was never designed to carry it. It was too nasty, it was too physically violent." Interview at Mania.com. He was also upset that it was adopted in to continuity as it was originally intended as a stand-alone with no effect on the wider DCU. As to the laugh at the end, "And David, for the record, my intention at the end of that book was to have the two characters simply experiencing a brief moment of lucidity in their ongoing very weird and probably fatal relationship with each other, reaching a moment where they both perceive the hell that they are in, and can only laugh at their preposterous situation. A similar chuckle is shared by the doomed couple at the end of the remarkable Jim Thompson’s original novel, The Getaway." The intention was clear. It was just poorly executed. Frank Miller rendered such a moment of lucidity far better in The Dark Knight Returns as Bruce realizes that his ongoing dance with the Joker can only end with one man killing the other, and finding that even in the face of the wholesale murder of a crowd of innocents, he can't bring himself to become a murderer too. Even when the Joker taunts him to do so, and ends up killing himself as the next best thing. In The Killing Joke, there is no such sense of inescapable doom. The Joker cranks the nastiness up to eleven, Batman stops him, and the villain resignedly opines that he can now be beaten up and sent back to a cell. There's no feeling of the two men being in a hell of their own; just helplessness at always repeating the same actions, but with an increasingly high cost to bystanders. Bruce should not have laughed at the situation; he should have been enraged. Moore wrote much, much better scenes at the time!
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Post by dbutler69 on May 26, 2021 15:37:26 GMT -5
Making Peter Parker's parents murdered SHIELD agents was the stupidest idea Stan Lee ever had. Cei-U! I summon the not-so-everyman hero! Since you mentioned Stan Lee, how about Matt Murdock's "twin" brother Mike? Well, maybe the thing with Peter's parents was worse, but not by much!
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Post by dbutler69 on May 26, 2021 15:38:05 GMT -5
I think one of the main reasons I never got into X Men was because when a friend tried his hardest to convert me the book was in its late 80s team split up and scattered around phase and I found it totally incomprehensible I think the X-Universe had indeed ceased to be comprehensible by then.
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Post by berkley on May 27, 2021 23:04:40 GMT -5
Don't know if Stan Lee or Steve Ditko deserves the blame for this one but I thought the whole "Pincers of Power" episode near the end of that first long, multi-issue Dr. Strange epic in Strange Tales was a huge mistake: after such an effective build-up making Dormammu one of the most impressive villains ever created for Marvel before or since, what a deflating anti-climax it was to have him engage in physical combat with Dr. Strange at all, let alone be defeated so ignominiously. Yes, it might be defensible from the standpoint of the message they presumably wanted to get across (pride goeth before a fall, etc), but from a dramatic standpoint what a let-down and what a waste of an incredibly effective creation in Dormammu.
I'm not sure the character has ever fully recovered or become what it could have been: for example, I don't think Steve Englehart, possibly my favourite Dr. Strange writer, ever came up with a really great Strange/Dormammu epic of his own, though the Dormammumar storyline (as I saw it called in a letters page) that ran from I think around #6 to #9 contained some standout moments. One could argue he used the character to greater effect in the Avengers, though that's another problem for me in that I prefer keeping the whole Dr. Strange world with all its characters and so on separate from the superhero world of the MU. Too bad Englehart and Brunner didn't do a big Dormammu story, as I think Brunner drew a fantastic Dormammu.
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Post by mikelmidnight on May 28, 2021 11:24:51 GMT -5
Since you mentioned Stan Lee, how about Matt Murdock's "twin" brother Mike? Well, maybe the thing with Peter's parents was worse, but not by much!
I'm in a minority as I actually liked Mike Murdock!
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Post by Prince Hal on May 28, 2021 12:18:00 GMT -5
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Post by berkley on May 28, 2021 17:00:58 GMT -5
Since you mentioned Stan Lee, how about Matt Murdock's "twin" brother Mike? Well, maybe the thing with Peter's parents was worse, but not by much!
I'm in a minority as I actually liked Mike Murdock!
I don't know if I'd go so far as to say I liked him but the silliness of the whole idea has never bothered me the way it seems to do many other DD readers. And isn't it in keeping with the soap opera aspect of superhero comics? However implausible, twins are a kind of a standard trope of the genre, whether fake or evil or long-lost or what have you.
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Post by spoon on May 28, 2021 19:59:21 GMT -5
Nobody's perfect. Take a writer you think very highly of, someone you consider one of your favorite writers, and tell of something they wrote that didn't exactly work out so well. I'll start. Steve EnglehartHis retcon of the Falcon's origins, turning him into a former street hustler named Snap (Captain America #186) was a terrible idea! He sort of ruined a good character. I like to pretend that this never, ever happened. By the way, supposedly, didn't mean for this origin to stick, but was off the book before he had a chance to undo it, or whatever it is he had planned, then the next writer wasn't on the book long enough to do anything about it, then the next writer was Jack Kirby, who pretty much ignored Marvel continuity in his run, anyway. This is the right answer. Maybe Englehart was intoxicated by how well his brilliant retcon of the 1950s Captain America went, but the Falcon retcon was an embarrassing mistake. I think he may have thought Sam was too stereotypical as a sidekick. Too happy. But the opposite was the case. The original Sam Wilson had self-respect. Snap was degrading caricature.
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Post by spoon on May 28, 2021 20:02:29 GMT -5
Making Peter Parker's parents murdered SHIELD agents was the stupidest idea Stan Lee ever had. Cei-U! I summon the not-so-everyman hero! I so strongly agree. It undermines the essence of the character.
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Post by chadwilliam on May 28, 2021 21:10:24 GMT -5
Not really a favorite writer, but at a time when he was on a roll with Neal Adams, I kind of find some of Denny O' Neil's writing when paired up with other artists to be less than exemplary. This might sound natural - "Well next to Neal Adams, everyone is going to pale in comparison" - but it's hard to reconcile his "Joker's Five Way Revenge" from Batman 251 with his "This One'll Kill You, Batman!" from Batman 260 which boasts a tale where-in Batman's been drugged with a concoction designed to make him laugh himself to death after being exposed to one too many bad jokes.
Joker: A karate-chop in the liver for you, Batman! Batman: Hey -- that gives me -- chopped liver! Ha Ha Ha... Joker -- you're too much!
O'Neil's first Joker story after "Five Way Revenge" and compare the denouement of that issue - Batman's battle with a shark - with this one where he defeats his foe by "concentrat[ing] on the funniest scenes from all The Marx Brothers pictures!"
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Post by Graphic Autist on May 28, 2021 22:04:37 GMT -5
Jim Shooter writing a comic where Hank Pym is an abusive husband. Going on 40 years now.
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Post by foxley on May 29, 2021 1:26:50 GMT -5
Not really a favorite writer, but at a time when he was on a roll with Neal Adams, I kind of find some of Denny O' Neil's writing when paired up with other artists to be less than exemplary. This might sound natural - "Well next to Neal Adams, everyone is going to pale in comparison" - but it's hard to reconcile his "Joker's Five Way Revenge" from Batman 251 with his "This One'll Kill You, Batman!" from Batman 260 which boasts a tale where-in Batman's been drugged with a concoction designed to make him laugh himself to death after being exposed to one too many bad jokes. Joker: A karate-chop in the liver for you, Batman! Batman: Hey -- that gives me -- chopped liver! Ha Ha Ha... Joker -- you're too much! O'Neil's first Joker story after " Five Way Revenge" and compare the denouement of that issue - Batman's battle with a shark - with this one where he defeats his foe by "concentrat[ing] on the funniest scenes from all The Marx Brothers pictures!" Not an entirely accurate summary. The drug is intended to make a victim laugh themselves to death (a very Joker idea ) regardless of the circumstances, as witnessed by the first victim: a guard at Arkham. A side effect is that as the effect of the drug progresses, it causes the victim to laugh in inappropriate situations. At one point, Bruce Wayne has to dash out of a funeral and hide in his car because he is about to burst out in laughter.
Because of the 'laughing at the unfunny' aspect, bad jokes--the kind that would normally make you groan--make him double up with laughter. And the Joker, needless to say, knows a lot of bad jokes. It also impairs his judgement, so he responds to the Joker's joke, as witnessed by the 'chopped liver' quip. This element does not hold up so well, but I wanted to make it clear that Batman was not in the habit of making cheesy one-liners during this period.
And 'the Marx brothers' thing was because he reasoned that if he was being rendered helpless by the unfunny, the genuinely funny might have the opposite effect. It was a desperation move, but it worked and is exactly the kind of lateral thinking I expect from Batman whom i regard as the most resourceful crime fighter.
I realise that one person's classic is another person's clunker, but this story is quite important in my personal comics history, so I felt a need to defend it: just like any obsessive fanboy.
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