Conclusion again

It's time again to give it a rest
Well, I guess in my second effort to prove more items that I think could come in helpful, I've done what I could.

It's a shame that, just when I thought there might be light at the end of the tunnel, I and others of my standing were proven wrong. Both DC and Marvel have just kept going with their deaths for the sake of both that and publicity stunts, among other actions that simply register as tasteless. No valid or convincing human drama, no nothing, just more violence, deaths, and other vulgar acts for the sake of desperate publicity is what they're doing.

Worst part is how Geoff Johns and Joe Quesada were promoted to "chief creative officers" for their companies, and neither are any good, as time has told.

Sooner or later, Marvel and DC are going to find that their incompetence and lack of communication with the wider audience will lead to the shutdown of their book publishing divisions, and a large trail of destruction will be left behind.

Is there a way to save these great works of serial fiction? IMO, the best way to do that would be for someone with the money and an interest in the book publishing world to buy the comic book publishing arms of DC and Marvel, meaning that they'd be seperate from the toy and movie divisions (if Atari could split into 2 companies, as they did for nearly a decade, it's possible the same could be done with DC and Marvel). They could also shift to a format other than pamphlets with longer lifespans like trade/prestige format, and that could be the way to go. They could also do away with a lot of the junk this past decade has seen coughed up. Then, maybe they could regain the energy they once had.

But for now, that's just a pipe dream. I do hope that maybe someone who cares, loves superhero comics and has the money it takes can do as I suggest one day. Until then, there's no way we can tell what the future will hold for us.

Now, it's time once again to retire this blog, and only hope that one day, luck will turn the good way again for DC and Marvel.

Profile: Sif

Sif
First appearance: Journey into Mystery #102, March 1964

History: the sister of Heimdall and childhood friend of Thor and Balder the Brave, she had been born with golden hair like many other Asgardians, but due to a nasty trick played by Loki, and an attempt he made to fix it, she developed black hair instead. Thor thought she looked even lovelier as a brunette, and thus, Loki's attempt to ruin their happiness failed.

Current status: on Earth with a few other Asgardians, Thor included, in Oklahoma.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: during 2007-2008, when J. Michael Stracynski was writing Thor, and the Asgardians were reborn on Earth in the bodies of humans, he had Sif reborn in the body of an old woman suffering from cancer, with only a special mirror to help show her real image.

What's wrong with how this was done? Knowing Stracynski's modus operandi since the turn of the century, it doesn't take much to figure for starters that anything he does will be like turning gold into straw instead of lovely brunette hair - and his subversion of Sif to the sidelines during that weak story was, for lack of a better word, insulting.

Thankfully, as the storyline ended, her whereabouts were figured out, and she was taken out of the old woman's body and restored to normal. And we can only hope Stracynski never gets his mitts on Thor and the other Asgardians ever again, nor Spider-Man, for that matter.

Record: J. Michael Stracynski

A long overrated writer who first got his start mainly film producing and scripting, most notably with Babylon 5, a Star Trek ripoff, his track record with female characters isn't particularly impressive. Here are at least 2 examples of his own mistakes:

• He may have said he was against it, but he went along with whatever rewrites Joe Quesada did to Sins Past, and tarnished the image of Gwen Stacy, making her look more like a mindless slut than a flawed but otherwise decent girl, by implying that she had sex with Norman Osborn and had 2 kids as a result. Even if the resulting atrocity wasn't entirely his fault, the story he had in mind was pretty lame and needless to begin with, so I'm not excusing him so easily.
• He claimed he was against it, to the point of wanting his name removed from the writer's credits, but he went along with One More Day anyway, Peter and Mary Jane's sellout to Mephisto, and the erasure of the Spider-Marriage following one of the worst crossover tie-ins to date, Civil War. Given his prominent stature as a Hollywood producer, I've got a hard time believing it was that hard for him to refuse, and save himself a lot of embarrassment.
• When he was writing Thor for at least a year, he had Sif reborn within the body of an elderly woman named Mrs. Chambers who was suffering from cancer, courtesy of Loki's meddling.
  
• His plans for Wonder Woman, changing her timeline and all but reducing the Greek mythology in her background, for 2010's storyline, leave me with even less reason to buy that he's sincere.

As far as I'm concerned, Stracynski is nothing but a big charlatan with little true devotion to what makes Marvel and DC heroes tick, and little interest in real character development or interaction (he didn't use the supporting cast in Spidey much, if at all, nor did he try to come up with any new ones who could be used long-term. If he did though, I fear they would've been more along the lines of political correctness; he is a boilerplate Hollywood liberal, after all). He should not be working in comics, and it's high time already for him to go back to Tinseltown where he belongs.