The Comic Book Discrimination Dossiers

Conclusion again

2010-07-16T08:33:00.000-07:00

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

2010-07-14T11:04:00.000-07:00

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

2010-07-03T09:34:00.000-07:00

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.

Profile: Alanna Strange

2010-06-23T13:00:00.000-07:00

Alanna Strange
First appearance: Showcase #17, November 1958

History: the daughter of a humanoid scientist named Sardath on the planet Rann, she later became the wife of Adam Strange, the archaeologist who was transported across the galaxy courtesy of a Zeta ray, an invention of her father's, where Adam became a hero of the peoples of Rann (as the story went for many years, it had the annoying effect of wearing off and teleporting him back to Earth when he wasn't hoping for it). She joined him on many adventures in their galaxy sector, including some team-ups with the Hawks of Thanagar.

Current status: still adventuring, and mother to a young daughter as well.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in the miniseries Adam Strange: Man of Two Worlds from 1990, it was revealed that Rann's population had a negative opinion of him, and he'd just been teleported there to serve as a breeding stud (there had already been allusions to this premise first featured in an issue of Swamp Thing in 1987 written by Alan Moore). Alanna died while giving birth to their daughter Aleea. Adam was left feeling disgusted and disillusioned with Rann and went back to Earth where he dated another girl for awhile.

What's wrong with how this was done? Adam and Alanna Strange were more victims of political correctness, and possibly even that DC's writers were ashamed of their own stable of amazing works as supposedly too silly for words.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Thankfully, almost 8 years later, in JLA #20, Alanna's fate was reversed (written at a time when Grant Morrison was relatively better in handling superhero comics), and she and her daughter were reunited with Adam.

Even so, her initial fate was an early example of the kind of political correctness that ruined a lot of 1990s comics.

Profile: Tana Moon

2010-06-16T12:33:00.001-07:00

Tana Moon
First appearance: Adventures of Superman #501, June 1993.

History: the first love of Superboy, when Kon-El was debuting, she was a reporter for the fictional Galaxy Network Broadcasting company who gained some of her fame as a result of the Boy of Steel's provision of an exclusive interview for her. They maintained an on-off relationship for several years.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: died at the hands of Amanda Spence in 2000, via electrocution.

What's wrong with how this was done? I've got a sad feeling it was done less as a motivation for Superboy and more as a wish by the editors to just discard cast members as they were coming to the point of cancellation for the Superboy series.

Worst, she may have bitten the big weenie because she's not literally Lois Lane.

Profile: Mirage

2010-06-03T07:02:00.001-07:00

Danielle Moonstar, Mirage
First appearance: Marvel Graphic Novel #4: The New Mutants, 1982

History: an American Indian girl from Colorado, she has the ability to create illusions that could be based on her opponents' fears or wishes. She even acquired magical powers after an adventure in Asgard. She is of Cheyenne background, and was a leading member of the New Mutants and X-Force for many years.

Current status: unclear.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: during House of M, she was among many mutants who lost their powers. And Emma Frost threw her out of the Xavier school because she thought that without powers, she didn't belong.

What's wrong with how this was done? It's pretty obvious by now that House of M was not worth the paper it was printed on. But the story in New X-Men #22 in 2006 where Frost gave her an eviction notice only adds insult to injury. When Storm lost her powers for almost 2 years back in the 1980s, Prof. Xavier didn't tell her to scram, and recognized that even without superpowers, she could still be quite effective. What was done 4 years ago with Moonstar and Frost is just one more stupid example of writing that makes the latter look like a cad, which is not a good idea even for an anti-heroine.

And what's really sad is that one of the best characters who graduated from the New Mutants years ago has now been reduced to a state of mediocrity.

Record: James Robinson

2010-05-21T01:23:00.000-07:00

There isn't much I can think of to say about this once-lauded writer who penned the adventures of the original Starman's son in the 1990s, since it was only recently that he screwed up, big time. But what I have to offer for now is related to the miniseries where he threw all his credibility as a scriptwriter out the window - "Cry for Justice".

Some people have criticized Kara Zor-El's depiction since 2004 as over-sexualized. In Cry for Justice, such arguments were certainly valid - one of the advertisements for this junk featured her depicted "headless", that is, almost all her body but not the head, which is ridiculous, and the inner story pretty much featured this absurdity at least once more too. Robinson and company even insulted people's intellects with a coverscan that showed Supergirl and Capt. Marvel Jr. kissing, but not only does this not take place in the story, it turns out to be Prometheus in disguise.
At the end of this abomination, which saw a few characters killed for starters, Star City is destroyed along with close to 100,000 other people, and among the dead is Lian Harper, Roy Harper's daughter with Cheshire. All this in order to send Roy and mentor Ollie Queen down the road to darkness. To make matters worse, when Green Arrow shoots Prometheus to death at the end, in a followup miniseries the Justice League is depicted turning against him, including Barry Allen, sadly enough, because dealing out punishment against a supervillain for a violent crime is apparently illegal. Simply stupefying.

Robinson may have once been well regarded as a writer. But to do a hack job that was superfluous and only furthering the flood of contrived shock tactics and publicity stunts DC has become notorious for this past decade - destroys any notion he's sincere. Some of the worst storytelling effects in the DCU came as a result of their publicity stunts over the years. Robinson is not making things any better by collaborating in all these efforts.

Profile: Sarah Essen Gordon

2010-05-16T12:01:00.000-07:00

Sarah Essen Gordon
First appearance: Batman #405, March 1987

History: first introduced in the Batman: Year One story told in 1987, she was a detective partnered with Commisioner James Gordon who'd had an affair with him that led to the breakup of his first marriage. She later returned and revived her relationship with James Gordon, becoming his second wife.

Current status: dead since Detective Comics #741.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in the No Man's Land story of the late 90s, while trying to rescue a group of infants from the Joker, who was holding them hostage in the GCPD basement, the Clown Prince of Crime forced her to have to catch one of the infants, and following that, gunned her to death in the head. James Gordon, who'd caught up with them, could only react by shooting the Joker in the leg.

What's wrong with how this was done? A grave result of overusing the Joker because he signals sales spikes, this was particularly atrocious, not just because of how only so many minor characters or even unnamed civilians were being turned into sacrifices, but also because of how neither Jim nor anyone else was written as having what it took to deal the Joker the death blow he was asking for. How many more people have to be slaughtered in cold blood by the Clown Prince of Crime before this particular supervillain is finally put to death for his obscenities and abominations?

In the time since this terrible story was written, the Joker's use has been downplayed, but if you're familiar with how things are going under the reign of Dan DiDio and Geoff Johns in the past decade, you'll know they haven't improved, thus, no credit can be given.

Profile: White Queen

2010-05-15T13:11:00.000-07:00

Emma Frost, White Queen

First appearance: Uncanny X-Men #129, January 1980

History: she began as a member of the Hellfire Club, a gathering of mutants, and later became the leader of the Hellions, a kind of rival group to the New Mutants. After the Hellions were later slain by another gang of enemies, she talked the X-Men into accepting her as a member, became one of their closest allies, becoming one of the leaders of Generation X alongside Banshee. Her power is usually telepathy.

Current status: may still be hooked up with Cyclops.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: her personality depiction has been rather scattershot. She's been depicted as a vixen, a nutcase (and it was told at one time in GenX that she'd been in a mental institution), and even manipulative/exploitive. The writers/artists have sometimes even gone into the theater of the absurd with how she's depicted wearing almost slutty outfits.

What's wrong with how this is done? It seems like Marvel's powers are hell-bent on "normalizing" her very exploitive personality that she's been depicted with since the turn of the century. It's certainly not very appealing. She's even been made into Cyclops' paramour at Jean Grey's expense (and as of this writing, Jean may still be dead). Big problem is that she seems to be manipulating him, implying it's not a very authentic relationship.

In 2004, there was a miniseries telling (or rewriting) her background, and one of the problems with that was the covers, which were not only drawn by Greg Horn, a photo-realist artist with very stagnant talents, but also depicted her several times in that very questionable costume, making it a very discouraging and embarrassing product.

On top of all that, I'm not very impressed with how they've "developed" Frost in this decade gone by, and think it could use a very serious improvement.

Special notes: cities and unnamed civilians

2010-05-06T08:15:00.000-07:00

In some, if not all, of these nasty cases that have taken place since the early 1990s with established characters being killed off and villified, some of those who've suffered the worst next to them include whole cities and even tons of nameless civilians. DC is a serious offender in this, and Marvel has a few cases of their own too. This will be a special list of all cases I can think of where innocent nameless bystanders were also turned into horrific sacrifices.

Bloodlines
Here is one of the first crossovers where quite a few people ended up in a pool of blood. The idea of this reprehensible story was to introduce at least a few new superhero characters (including Anima, Argus, Gunfire and Hitman), most of whom vanished after barely 2 years. A race of aliens who can do things like what Aliens, The Terminator and Predator already featured, comes to earth to suck the spinal fluid out of humans at random, or even devour them altogether, and shed quite a bit of blood in the process. Challenging question: did they truly need to make this a bloodsoaked story in order to introduce these newcomers to the superhero community? Or couldn't they have done so in their own stand-alone stories, even within a miniseries of their own?

When the editors who mandated this can only resort to crossovers as a means of introducing new characters, or even serving as a lead-in to the same, that's what shows a severe lack of creativity, and an inability to create stories that can stand and be marketed on their own. It all culminated in a finale titled Bloodbath, which caps it with a manhole cover.

Coast City
This was certainly one of the most notable, when Mongul destroyed Hal Jordan's hometown, and later on, Hal went insane in despair. So many people may have gone down courtesy of this, and what was the point? Apparently, to destroy almost everything that made the GL Corp's amazing background, which signals that, despite initial work on nostalgic storytelling in the 90s, they were certainly not going in that direction with GL, if they were going to otherwise make Kyle Rayner the only Green Lantern for at least a few years.

Keystone City
When Geoff Johns took over the Flash, there was alarming violence and destruction on a level probably never seen before in the Scarlet Speedster's title, and the aforementioned Blood Will Run atrocity certainly saw quite a few bodies piled up in the morgue. And, even if the rest of his initial run didn't have as many bodies, it still featured more than enough wanton destruction and violence to sink a ship. (Did I mention issue 195, where the Top used a ludicrous eyesight bending power to cause Wally West quite a vomit-inducing headache? And if Wally could get his head knocked up that bad, we can only wonder if everyone else on the dock...)

Slorenia
This was the name of a fictionalized European country featured in the Ultron Unlimited storyline in the Avengers in 1998 that got wiped out by Ultron and an army of other robots he built. I have more respect for Kurt Busiek than I do for Geoff Johns, but this, to be honest, has me feeling depressed and wondering today if it was a good idea to take Ultron that far as a supervillain. After all, it would be one thing if Ultron had slaughtered a small number of people, but a whole country? Unless we look at this as a section of the former USSR, this can be troubling, and even bothersome as to whether it works or not.

Star City
Happened just recently, and was definitely one of the most disgusting and poorly written storylines, with not just Lian Harper biting the bullet, but also close to 100,000 other unnamed souls in Green Arrow's main home burg. James Robinson and company at DC fell back on the same mistake made with Green Lantern in 1994, coughing out a pointless story nobody asked for, and Robinson threw away his credibility as a writer.

This is what the list will comprise for now. In time, I'll see if there's any more input I can add. For now, I will say that DC is definitely the worse offender in terms of over-the-top violence on a global scale, and has been since as early as 1993. Also the most pointless when it comes to their awful violence-laden stunts.

Profile: Lian Harper

2010-04-28T08:06:00.000-07:00

Lian Harper
First appearance: New Teen Titans #21, Vol. 2, June 1986

History: Lian was conceived by Arsenal/Roy Harper with mercenary Cheshire/Jade Nguyen, whom Roy had a brief affair with when he was working as a special government agent to investigate her. (He still went by the Speedy handle at the time.) Eventually, following a special Nightwing story written by Marv Wolfman in Action Comics Weekly, Roy took up custody of Lian.

Current status: died in a citywide explosion in Star City, as the result of a bomb planted by Prometheus in the widely panned Cry for Justice miniseries in February 2010, which even wiped out almost 100,000 other residents as well.

What's wrong with how this was done? As if it weren't enough that Cry for Justice contained some of the most awful characterization ever seen in a modern day DC comic, depicted Roy getting his right arm gored off, and even depicted the League in a pretty negative, incompetant light, Lian's own death was pointless and offensive, even if we don't see her body in a mangled state. It must also be made clear that, even if Green Arrow did slay Prometheus at the end, it does not justify Lian's death any more than Josh Jackam's death when the Rogues' killed Inertia in Rogues' Revenge.

The Cry for Justice miniseries even imitated some of the same grave errors made with Green Lantern at the time Zero Hour was published: Coast City, Hal Jordan's own residential burg, was leveled by Mongul, and Jordan subsequently descended into madness. Now, Green Arrow's own city has fallen, and one of the worst things about this is how he's being villified for seeking justice against the supervillain who committed the horrific crime. Those against him include the League, and even the recently resurrected Barry Allen, Silver Age Flash. Not that I'm surprised, though. They have pulled this nonsense for long enough, allegedly making GA the real hero here at the expense of his fellow crimefighters and their common sense, yet it's not like even GA comes off well here either. Thus, it fails even at that.

James Robinson, who penned this miniseries, has thrown away all his credibility as a writer, and like Geoff Johns, does not deserve to write any more DC or Marvel comics. As long as DC continues to adhere to this monstrosity, to say nothing of a lot of other elements they've been using for about a decade now, then their output must be shunned. Lian's own fate must be reversed, just like with a lot of other DC characters who've been victims of character death and destruction.

First, they came for the adults. Now, as stories like these show, they're coming for the children.

Profile: Josh Jackam

2010-04-14T10:24:00.000-07:00

Josh Jackam
First appearance: The Flash #170 Vol. 2, March 2001

History: the son of the late Julie Jackam, the policewoman shoehorned into Wally West's life by Geoff Johns, he was taken into custody for a while by Iris West Allen, whom Julie had granted permission to serve as custodian should anything happen to her (and sadly, did).

Current status: dead.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: not only did he lose his mother, young Josh later lost his own life to Bart Allen's leading nemesis, Inertia. In Rogues' Revenge #3 in 2008, a Final Crisis tied miniseries, Darkseid tried to invade earth, and Libra kidnapped Josh from his grandmother, into whose custody he'd been passed, as a ploy to get the Rogues to fight on their side. But Inertia, who'd become a pathetic "Kid Zoom" sidekick to the neo-Zoom Hunter Zolomon, decided to end any hostage crisis by murdering Josh with a sonic wave blow at point blank range. Did I mention that his biological father, the Weather Wizard, had no problem with offing him earlier if that's what it took to get some increased powers?

What's wrong with how this was done? Not only did this useless story turn a once decent supercrook into an embarrassment, just like Dr. Light post-Identity Crisis, it went overboard with the pointless murder of an infant. Or, more precisely, Geoff Johns went overboard, and pretty much explained why I won't be reading his future output as a writer anymore. I will not give accolades to a writer who indulges in violence and shocks for the sake of it, and sullies a title that wasn't built on the kind of R-rated violence Johns has been forcing down people's throats for a decade now.

On this page, it tells that we don't actually see a body. Well I'm sorry to say, but that makes zero difference. What matters is that an infant was turned into a sacrifice in a violent crime for no good reason, and looks to be simply forgotten. This vile death of an infant preceded that of Lian Harper, the daughter of Roy Harper, by a year and a half, and while it may not be the first of its kind in DC Comics, it's still a sad signal that DC has added young children to their character-killing spree that's been going on since the early 90s.

I know there's been plenty of rightful outrage over Lian's death in Cry for Justice, which I want to write about as well. But where was the outrage over the monstrosity that is Rogues' Revenge, and the death of a young infant in that particular miniseries? Of all the shock tactics and repeated hammering of readers' senses Johns has pulled in his career of writing series like the Flash, this has got to be his worst yet, and if that's how he's going to handle things, he does not deserve to even be an editor.

Profile: Julie Jackam

2010-04-04T03:20:00.000-07:00

Julie Jackam
First appeared: The Flash #170 Vol. 2, 2001. Her only live appearance too.

History: it's not like there's much, but as Geoff Johns shoehorned into continuity, and not very well at that, Julie was a NYPD officer who'd had an affair with Wally West a few years before. She was murdered almost immediately by a member of the Cicada cult that was committing murders in the Flash's name(!), leaving behind a young son whose father turned out to be the Weather Wizard.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: already told above, but what I didn't mention till now was that, true to the title of the story, "Blood Will Run" her death featured quite a shed of red.

What's wrong with how this was done? While I'm quite familiar with the idea of characters introduced in order to be killed as part of the story drive, this one leaves me with a very bad aftertaste today, because of how it was built on a vile premise of a gang that was killing people the Scarlet Speedster once saved out of twisted worship for the Flash?!? It seems more like an insult to both the character and the reader by making it look as though his efforts had been for nothing.

Worse, it was a very bloody story to boot, featuring quite a few panels with blood dripping. And this ended up setting the tone, more or less, for the rest of Geoff Johns's run on the series at the time - that is, over the top violence and other disturbing elements, no matter how subtle, that seriously detracted from the entertainment value in a book that wasn't exactly built on that kind of R-rated mayhem when it first began years before.

And for someone who's supposed to have a family, the bad news is that since that time, Julie's son Josh, whom I want to write about next, if he represents said family, has sadly since gone to the great reward with her in "Rogues' Revenge".

Profile: Sha-Shan

2010-03-25T07:44:00.000-07:00

Sha-Shan
First appearance: Amazing Spider-Man #108, May 1972

History: the daughter of a Buddhist community leader in Vietnam, she had first met Flash Thompson while he was serving in the army there, and had been lost in the jungle during a battle with the Vietnamese commies. She helped save Flash's life after he was unfairly targeted by a gang of worshipers of her father's for supposedly causing him a coma after an air raid. She was pushed into an arranged marriage with a crook named Achmed Korba, later seen as Brother Power (and she as Sister Sun) as a supposed balance to his evil nature, but it backfired when Korba decided to attack Spider-Man, much to her displeasure, in Spectacular Spider-Man #3, February 1977. Korba was killed in an explosion, and Sha-Shan was then free to rekindle her relationship with Flash.

Current status: limbo (depending on your viewpoint, that is. I'll explain below why).

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: some of her appearances were fairly stereotypical in their depiction of an Asian. In 1986, apparently because the Vietnam background details were becoming outdated, she broke up with Flash and was dropped from the cast in Spidey's world, and was not mentioned again for many years.

What's wrong with how this was done? In honesty, there wasn't much done wrong with her departure, except for how they almost completely wrote her out, all because of how the Vietnam war background itself was becoming dated. Could they not have possibly retconned the story so that her country was a fictionalized one instead, which could've helped make the story more durable?

I guess this also highlights a notable problem with some of Marvel's early approaches circa the Silver/Bronze Age: they built stories based on real life countries and their problems of the times, rather than come up with fictionalized ones. Later on though, when characters like Silver Sable came along, the Marvel staff did use fictional countries like Symkaria as a home base.

That Sha was depicted in a stereotypical manner as an Asian woman who was all but submissive was certainly an unfortunate detractor.

Oddly enough, Sha-Shan has apparently resurfaced, but the problem is that it's post One More/Brand New Day, and if the Joe Quesada regime is going to ruin the Spider-Marriage, to say nothing of Peter Parker and company's own characterization, that's why it's invalid...and coming much too late.

Profile: Adam Grant

2010-03-19T01:05:00.000-07:00

Adam Grant/Morgan
First appearance: Adventures of Superman #429, June 1987

Current status: dead.

History: When Cat Grant was first introduced in 1987, she was a news columnist who'd come from Los Angeles to work for the Daily Planet, and she had a young son named Adam, via her ex-husband Joe Morgan, who'd been a cast member too.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: he was murdered by the Toyman (or as recently claimed, a robo-Toyman) in Superman #84, December 1993, after this villain kidnapped him along with several other children to his hideout. After Adam tried to help work an escape plan, Toyman decided to kill him for daring to "disobey". He even later told Cat Grant while in prison that he killed Adam because she was "a bad mommy".

What's wrong with how this was done? Although it had been established since Toyman/Winslow Schott's reintro in 1987 that he was capable of killing, he did have limits and an honor sense, drawing the line when it came to children. For example, when he discovered that Sleez from Apokalips was planning on harming children at the Happyland Amusement Park, he turned against him and even tried to blow Sleez to smithereens. Superman #84, penned by Dan Jurgens, usually a pretty good writer, was quite a departure from that initial characterization, taking an otherwise established villain and making him more reminiscient of those you'd see in Batman, making him hard to use without embarrassment for many years.

(In fact, I suspect the Batman movie of 1989, to say nothing of comics like Watchmen, might've had an unhealthy influence that led to this kind of bad storytelling that was harming comics in the mid-90s. I know that the Batman movie seemed to have influenced the short Flash TV series that aired during 1990-91.)

This is an early example of a young child becoming a sacrificial lamb instead of being developed as a character, and took place during the time when several other heroes/cast members were being offed, including at least 2 Infinity Inc. members I've already written about.

Was there anything good to come out of this? I don't think so. Recently, in Action Comics #865, Geoff Johns wrote a story claiming that it was actually a Toyman robot who committed this heinous deed. But how does that excuse the fact that a young child was slain as part of a mindset that went out of control in the 1990s, turning "minor" characters into sacrificial lambs? I'm afraid that's too easy to try and redeem a villain instead of try to turn back the clock on a young child's death in a world of fantasy. That's very weak and only suggests the writers/editors are treating this as fait accompli, exactly the reason why comics have become only so ghettoized and weaker in storytelling value as the years have gone by.

Resumption

2010-03-18T11:11:00.000-07:00

I'm going to write at least a few more items
It's been about 2 years since I'd last written on this little experiment of mine. Due to some new sad circumstances, I've decided I'll have to add at least a few more entries.

I'm coming away from the terrible news that Lian Harper - not to mention thousands of citizens of Star City - were turned into the latest of sacrificial lambs at DC in the abominable miniseries called Cry for Justice. And over at Marvel, I'm aware that Janet VanDyne, the Winsome Wasp, has also apparently bitten the bullet a year and a half ago in Secret Invasion.

That's why I decided I should update the blog a bit more, because there are a few more characters who could use an entry here if that's what is needed to combat the continuing problem with the big two turning their heroes and supporting casts into sacrificial lambs in the most sadistic ways possible.

Besides adding a few more profiles and records, as I've called them, I'll also be trying to come up with at least one entry dedicated to fictionalized cities and their unnamed citizenry who are also turned into sacrifices for the sake of it. Because even that's been getting way out of hand.

The problem can't be ignored. That's why I'm going to add more here.

Conclusion

2008-03-27T03:07:00.000-07:00

Time to give it a rest
Well, I’ve put in many entries whenever I could, and now, I think is the time to end. As Shakespeare once said, and Stan Lee may have quoted, “all good things must come to an end.”

So many posts did I write here on various ladies, and even a few men, whom I could find at least one thing done to them that could be or was discriminatory, as well as occasionally give mention to some writers and what they did wrong at their end too. It wasn’t that often, but, I did my best to see what info I could find, and even tried to update some of the entries whenever possible according to what developments had taken place of recent.

In the end, I wonder if maybe it hadn’t turned out to be quite what I had intended for this blog to be. Of course there were a few things where I might’ve done something awkward. But, I won’t worry about it too much. And I am happy that I was able to do as much as I did, entering data on as many different protagonists as I could find, and adding a picture too.

And did it come in helpful in dealing with the ghastly problems of discrimination against women in comics? I do hope it did, or can. The road ahead is still long, and as of this writing, there are still only so many problems that haven’t been fixed yet in DC and Marvel’s scriptwriting that still require it. As of this writing, I’m pleased to tell that I discovered that at least two grave errors so far have been fixed: Stephanie Brown has been returned to the living world, and Leslie Thompkins has thus been exonerated of any supposed crime against her too. And if those can be fixed, so can others.

I’ve seen at times people who think that even if a girl in comics has been killed off in the most offensive and tasteless of manners, or even turned into an evil villainess, that it should be left that way, because “dead is dead.” I fully disagree, because it does not solve anything, and does not counteract the bad taste left behind. Especially as these acts become more and more contrived, forced, and revolting as the years go by and anything of this sort continues to pile up. I tend to think of this mindset as “emperor’s new clothes syndrome,” and what if ten or twenty more ladies, major or minor, get killed off in any notable comic? Will they continue to think that even then? If they do, all that will happen then will be that comics get turned into a farce.

There’s been too much death and villification in comics in the past 5 years, most definitely in DC Comics. And because it’s been so close together, coming virtually every year now that someone dies an increasingly pointless death, that’s what makes it all the more unacceptable. And I think it’s time, not just to put a stop to it, but also to reverse any and all deaths that were really pointless and tasteless, and even threw away worthy potential (like, say, when Jade was killed in the Infinite Crisis-based Rann-Thanagar special), because the editors are too lazy to hire writers who can think up more positive ideas of what to do with their stable of protagonists, or, because they’ve got no idea where they’re even going.

And that’s probably why I maintained this blog, to give some mention to as many characters as I could think of who can and do have story potential that not enough are willing to give a chance to.

I’m sure there’s a few more female protagonists I could’ve added as well. Dani Moonstar, for example. But I felt that I had to stop, as it was getting harder to think of what could really be said.

And so, I will now be ceasing updates of this blog, as I feel the time has come to take a rest. I’d like to thank all who paid a visit here for taking a look around, as you may continue to do so with what entries have already been posted here in the 2 years I’ve put this together. I’m quite happy with what I’ve made an effort to write up here, and enjoyed it.

So now, I guess it’s time to say goodbye here, and thanks for visiting The Comic Book Discrimination Dossiers.

Profile: Wonder Girl 2

2008-03-22T15:01:00.000-07:00

Cassie Sandsmark, Wonder Girl 2
First appearance: Wonder Woman #105 Vol. 2, January 1996.

Current status: a leading member of the Teen Titans.

Was subjected to the followings acts of discrimination: when John Byrne introduced her years ago, it was a rather peculiar way to begin: he didn’t want for her to be a team player, despite that she can and does work well with one, and succeeding writers did make good use of her. Well, until more recently, that is. She also joined Supergirl, during Amazons Attack, in an assault on the president’s plane in the DCU that turns the US public against her.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The story in Amazons Attack was already bad enough in how it featured a ludicrous story that may have been intended as an swipe at the US administration for its policies on Iraq, depicting the Amazons out-of-character and depicting Cassie doing something as irresponsible as attacking the US president’s plane in order to bring him to the would-be Hyppolyta, who actually turned out to be Granny Goodness, was not helping matters one bit.

Even before this, she agreed with Ares during Infinite Crisis to accept special extra powers he’d give her to compensate for a loss she’d suffered when Zeus distanced himself from earth along with the rest of the Amazons, which raises some questions as to how kosher such an agreement really is. Lately, another big problem is that she seems to be defined only by her brief affair with Connor Kent, the newer Superboy, who was killed off during Infinite Crisis because of a copyright dispute with the Siegel estate. How can she stand out as her own character if that's all she's really known for, and laments about it too often?

And these are just some of the things that have led to the deterioration of the recent volume of Teen Titans. It could also explain why a recent miniseries written by J. Torres sold so abysmally – because, as something tied to the pointless crossovers DC Comics has been producing lately, it’s not really able to stand on its own.

Profile: She-Hulk

2008-03-09T13:21:00.000-07:00

Jennifer Walters, She-Hulk
First appearance: The Savage She-Hulk #1, February 1980. She was one of the last superhero-type protagonists created by Stan Lee, with John Buscema the co-creating artist. Her initial adventures, which were scripted mainly by David Anthony Kraft, were played mostly straight, but it was decided early on to make her into more of a tongue-in-cheek character who could have comedic potential, and 7 years after the first series ended, during which time she was an Avengers and Fantastic Four co-star, that potential was realized in The Sensational She-Hulk, which ran 1989-93.

Current status: continuing with her job as an attorney that she began in Los Angeles.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: while there were a good amount of stories in Fantastic Four where Jennifer shone, there were still a few cases where she got knocked down far too easily (on the cover of Fantastic Four #284, she was shown being kicked in the head). In West Coast Avengers, she certainly took a much too easy blow from the Mole Man when he zapped her with his cane. In the Red Zone storyline in the Avengers circa 2003, Jack of Hearts’ powers interfered with hers, initially all-but draining her own powers but then sending her berserk, later leading to a fight between her and her male cousin, the Hulk in a town called Bone in Idaho. In Avengers: Disassembled, she was sent berserk by the Scarlet Witch’s powers when her fellow Avenger was depicted out-of-character. And in Civil War, she leaned in the very direction that Tony Stark was, in support of the Superhero Registration Act.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Sometimes, when she took a tumble in Fantastic Four, it seemed way too easy – and biased. But the battle with the Mole Man in West Coast Avengers, where she can’t even take as much as her male counterparts can when facing him, that was really ludicrous and awful, one of John Byrne’s definite nadirs in writing.

As for “The Search for She-Hulk” that followed on the heels of Red Zone, aside from how that was a terrible story to begin with, the fight between her and the Hulk was one of the silliest and weakest clashes between even anti-heroes I’ve ever seen, or read about in dialogue (is writing dialogue like “I was here first!” the best that Geoff Johns could do?). Pretty anemic and lethargic. And the storyline featured in Disassembled was throughly egregious.

As of now, we can sure say that the way Jennifer was written in Civil War was definitely uncalled for. I think there was even a story that she was going to file suit on behalf of J. Jonah Jameson against Peter Parker for fraud, something that for now has been forgotten following what happened in the execrable One More Day. I don’t think Jenn would ever go against Spider-Man, and Civil War, and the storylines that it led to, were absolutely uncalled for.

Profile: Mary Marvel

2008-03-08T09:03:00.000-08:00

Mary Batson, Mary Marvel
First appearance: Captain Marvel Adventures #18, December 1942. She’s the twin sister of Billy Batson, Captain Marvel extraordinaire, who grew up under different legal guardians, and as his sibling, found herself also gifted with the powers that her twin brother received from the Egyptian wizard Shazam.

Current status: as far as I know, she is Mary Marvel again, after going to the dark side.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: after losing her personal powers, she went over to the dark side in Countdown to Final Crisis by taking up the powers of Black Adam, and becomes a darker, angrier version of herself that then comes to work with Eclipso, which was Jean Loring possessed by the evil diamond, and who’d come under the influence of Darkseid.

What’s wrong with how this was done? I think that’s easy to answer: Mary Batson was clearly seen by editorial as a sacrificial lamb, and unlike her brother Billy, the editors thought they could get away with it more easily, just like they thought they could get away with making Jean Loring into a new Eclipso. But, it was totally dumb, and pointless, if you ask me. Worse: Mary may have even been involved in the deaths of innocent people when getting involved with Darkseid’s bunch.

Upon becoming Mary Marvel again, she received a costume with a gray-colored lightning bolt, apparently to symbolize her being a fallen heroine. Let us note that it also symbolizes the fall of innocence, which is tragic.

Profile: Supergirl 1

2008-02-23T11:37:00.000-08:00

Kara Zor-El, Supergirl 1
First appearance: Action Comics #252, 1959. Her reintroduction was in Superman/Batman #8, 2004.

Current status: member of DCU again.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: during the Bronze Age, when she first had a solo series during the early 1970s, she’d be depicted quite a few times reacting to a failed romance by sobbing. Since her re-intro, or during the time between then and early 2007, they overly sexualized her with the way they draw her skirt almost sliding off her hips on the cover art. (Example: issue #21 of the current series.)

What’s wrong with how this was done? Her characterization during the early 70s was awkward at best and hardly at all a good way to depict someone dealing with failed love life. And today, as welcome as Kara’s return to the DCU is, it was still very awkward. To make her a beautiful Maiden [of Might] is important, certainly, but that doesn’t mean they should overly sexualize her, as they seem to have done since 2004.

Most surprisingly, no serious attempt has been made to give her an ongoing secret ID and regular civilian life, nor has she gotten any supporting cast of her own. Instead, we seem to have a case of the pointless Captain Boomerang Junior being a special guest star, as well as the various other DCU members who’ve made too many guest appearances since the series began.

But the most disturbing thing of all about whatever direction they’ve attempted to set up is that Kara may or may not have been assigned by her father Zor-El to slay Superman(!) out of a family-based grudge. The way they kept at this, you’d think it was some kind of a tasteless running gag. And that he may have even used her as a tool, either for slaying, or for exorcism of evil spirits that possessed some Kryptonians after being released from the Phantom Zone. A ludicrous, nigh-offensive story this was, co-written by Mark Sable, that may have (hopefully) been abandoned after issue #19.

Since Kara’s new series began in 2005, it’s lost a considerable amount of audience, and I suspect the only reason it got as much of an audience as it did when it began was because Jeph Loeb, at least at that time, was the writer. And thanks to their disinterest in allowing the writers a free reign to establish a secret ID and supporting cast, that may have been what really lost the new series its audience, with little garuntee for now that it’ll be able to regain it again successfully.

Profile: Big Barda

2008-02-09T12:12:00.000-08:00

Big Barda
First appearance: Mister Miracle #4, Vol. 1, October 1971. A most interesting twist Jack Kirby gave when creating her is that she is physically stronger than her husband, and is very protective of him.

Current status: apparently dead.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: during John Byrne’s run on Action Comics, in issues #592-593, a evictee from Apokalips named Sleez (getting the picture?) captures her and uses mind control to enslave her and also Superman when he comes to rescue her, subsequently pimping both of them out to a porn producer! Later, in 2007, in one fell swoop, she was killed in the first issue of the Death of the New Gods miniseries.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Does Byrne’s weird little story in Action Comics sound exploitative? You don't even know the half of it. As for Death of the New Gods - no fight till her last gasp, no nothing. She just turned up dead on the floor of hers and Mister Miracle's suburban house in Connecticut, and whether it was one of Darkseid’s minions who did her in is not important, it’s that DC editorial turned her into yet one more sacrifice for the sake of pointless “events” that is. A grave disservice was done to an excellent warrior.

I don’t what is to come of Final Crisis, and I honestly do not care. This is just one more death being done in advance to a crossover that was uncalled for.

Profile: Meggan

2008-02-01T01:01:00.000-08:00

Meggan
First appearance: Mighty World of Marvel #7, 1983. As a mutant human, she was born during a blizzard, and adapted to the weather by growing special fur. She fell in love with Brian Braddock, the former Capt. Britain, and they were married for a time.

Current status: unknown since House of M.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she had a rather strange upbringing as a child, being naïve and detached from reality. Because her parents were scared that she’d be persecuted (she was born near the site of an ancient British castle where dark magic was said to dwell), they hid her in their trailer where she watched a lot of television, and thought that Gerry Anderson’s world on television was real. Later on, during House of M, to stem a tidal wave of multiple realities coming from the Omniverse, she sacrificed herself to stop a lot of the chaotic energies coming from it.

What’s wrong with how this was done? House of M, which was an extension of Avengers: Disassembled, is just as awful as the previous miniseries and crossovers connected with it. By tossing away Meggan, that’s one of the ways in which Marvel has paralyzed character development, and, just like the One More Day story in Spider-Man, they threw out some good potential for really exploring the relationship of a married couple.

Brian Braddock as well as his sister Betsy, are now, for all I know, stuck in the paralell realities seen in Exiles, and I doubt that much could come from that.

Profile: Power Girl

2008-01-31T09:03:00.000-08:00

Karen Starr, Power Girl
First appearance: All-Star Comics #58, Jan/Feb 1976. She was created by Gerry Conway as the cousin of the Earth-2 Superman, though it was Paul Levitz who did much of the writing for her at the time.

Current status: member of Justice Society in its current formation.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: during the time she was with Justice League International, she was depowered so that she was considerably less tough than Superman, and Gerard Jones, when he took up the writing, would write sexist jokes at her expense. She was once impregnated by the magics of Arion in a storyline that tied in with Zero Hour, where her “son” Equinox fought a villain called Scarabus and then promptly disappeared. In Infinite Crisis, Superboy-Prime turns her into a “tuning fork” to be used by one of the Lex Luthor clones from the new Multiverses introduced before she’s rescued from it. There was also a pointless battle between her and the new incarnation of Kara Zor-El featured in the current Supergirl series.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The sexist jokes made about her in JLI under Jones' pen were questionable, and may need to be taken with a grain of salt. Infinite Crisis was overrated and little more than a pointless extension of the insults already seen in Identity Crisis. The battle between Karen Starr and Kara Zor-El was the work of Jeph Loeb; an overrated pastiche.

Seeing how bad Zero Hour was, I think that’s why the pregnancy was more pointless than need be too.

We could probably add how DC’s writers never gave a proper origin post-Crisis on Infinite Earths. Somehow, the angle that Geoff Johns went for doesn’t seem right, or it was done at the wrong time.

Record: Jeph Loeb

2008-01-13T09:51:00.000-08:00

I’ve thought about the works of Loeb for some time now. As far as I know, he may have first worked as an assistant to Steven Spielberg years ago in his former Amblin production company before he began to write comic books beginning in the early to mid-1990s. More recently, he’s been a producer for Heroes on TV, and has even written for Smallville and Lost. But, studying his works of the past decade, I’ve had to come to the conclusion that he’s an awfully overrated writer with very questionable elements featured in his writing, and I’ll try here to list some of them.

When Loeb first helmed the Superman/Batman team-up series, where the new take on Kara Zor-El first made her modern-day debut, he had her climb out of the spacecraft her father sent her in to escape Krypton’s destruction…naked. She then walked around Gotham, in whose vicinity she’d landed, that way, before getting a drape to over herself in. This had the fairly unpleasant effect of over-sexualizing the Maiden of Might, which ended up becoming a notable problem when her ongoing series began a year afterwards. And while the midriff costume she wears now is fine, the way that they took to oversexualizing her ruined everything, and I certainly did not like the overly sexualized costume she wore when she was captured and brainwashed briefly by Darkseid’s minions.
In the third chapter of the Supergirl reintro story, a young girl called Harbinger was killed by Darkseid’s minions on Themyscira with very little serious emotion involved. Just when Kara had the chance of finding a friend who could appear in a recurring role.
In a following story published in Superman/Batman #15, the Man of Steel and the Masked Manhunter enter an alternate universe where Superman breaks the neck of an alternate world version of Wonder Woman with her own lasso. Perfectly awful.
When Loeb launched the new Supergirl series, he began very sloppily with stories like where Kara ended up fighting Power Girl rather a supervillain, and even an evil duplicate of herself. The start of the series was dreadful, and because of likely editorial edictions that followed even after Loeb left, it lost a lot of audience. Suffice it to say that Supergirl was never given an actual secret ID to date, another big problem with Kara's reintroduction.
In the third issue of the third volume of the Ultimates, Loeb did what Mark Millar may have only hinted at – he openly revealed the Ultimate versions of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver as having an incestuous relationship, and even wrote Ultimate Tony Stark having a sex-tape scandal. Oh, did I mention the drug abuse and even some of the gore injected into that third issue? Guess I needn’t continue then.

There may be some more questionable steps that Jeph Loeb took in his writing at other times too, but that’s what I can find for now. And I think that people should really consider that a writer who sinks into that kind of shock tactic writing is really not someone – or something – to crow over. Loeb has succeeded in making me feel more and more disgusted at his writing as the years have gone by, and that until now, he may have succeeded in raking in tons of sales is disturbing. With lurid stuff like the above examples to his record, I don’t see why anyone with common sense should have to waste their time on him. He’s just one of various writers who’ve shown why the comics medium is losing audience and respect these days.

Profile: Marvel Girl 2

2008-01-03T13:49:00.000-08:00

Rachel Summers, Marvel Girl 2
First appearance: Uncanny X-Men #141, January 1981. She was the daughter of Jean Grey from what turned out to be an alternate future (going by what Alan Moore once established, that would be Earth 811), and was a member of both X-Men and Excalibur for many years.

Current status: last time I checked, she’d taken up the title of Marvel Girl.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: Rachel once tried to settle a grudge with Selene Gallio, a member and Black Queen of the Hellfire Club who’d either committed some murders or tried to (Uncanny X-Men #207). But before Rachel could finish off Selene after besting her in a clash, Wolverine arrived on the scene and stopped her by stabbing her in the chest. Later, suffering from grave injuries, she was lured into Mojoworld where she ended up at the mercy of Spiral.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Many know that Logan, aka Wolverine, didn’t have a problem with killing criminals himself, right? So what’s the whole point of his stopping Rachel from giving Gallio a ticket to the morgue for her crimes, other than trying to stop her from claiming his title as the best at what he does? I see none. It was pure theater of the absurd, and made Wolverine look like a hypocrite.

And as if that weren’t bad enough, she’d been tortured by Spiral when trapped in Mojoworld, and was fortunate enough to escape there later on. (That she had possesion of the Phoenix Force for a time may have been tacky though.) She later took up the title once held by her mother, as Marvel Girl.

Profile: Arachne

2007-12-19T14:00:00.000-08:00

Julia Carpenter, Spider-Woman 2/Arachne
First appearance: Secret Wars 1, issue #6, October 1984. She became a supporting cast member of West Coast Avengers and Force Works.

Current status: member of a new Omega Flight team following Civil War.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she was attacked and had her powers stolen, just like the first Spider-Woman, Jessica Drew, by the villainess Charlotte Witter, after which she retired from the superheroing business to raise the daughter she had as a regular mother. In Civil War, following her stint as a double agent, she’s arrested and her daughter taken from her. She had to agree to be a member of the new Omega Flight to sort things out.

What’s wrong with how this was done? She was thrown away as a character when she first had her powers robbed by Witter years earlier, and the Civil War storyline that led to her being a member of an Omega Flight team that, unlike the original crooks gang, is a heroic team, was badly done too.

So many things done wrong in the wake of Civil War, and she too is a victim.

Profile: Dr. Mid-Nite 2

2007-12-06T13:58:00.000-08:00

Beth Chapel, Dr. Mid-Nite 2
First appearance: Infinity Inc. #19, October 1985. She was a medical student of Charles McNider, the first Dr. Mid-Nite. She also had an affair with Rick Tyler, the son of the first Hourman.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: put to death in Eclipso #13 by the title villain, along with her fellow Infinitor, Yolanda Montez.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The same argument surrounding the death of Montez applies here too. A gratuitous death done only to get rid of a supposedly useless character.

She’s not alone though: shortly afterwards, Charles McNider was killed off in Zero Hour, along with the original Atom, Al Pratt. As was told once in JSA, they were hit the hardest from the assault conducted by the former Hawk.

Profile: Wildcat 2

2007-12-05T12:37:00.000-08:00

Yolanda Montez, Wildcat 2
First appearance: Infinity Inc. #12, March 1985. She was the goddaughter of Ted Grant, the first Wildcat. Unlike him, she had mutant powers including retractable claws.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: killed in Eclipso #13 by the title villain, along with the second Dr. Mid-Nite.

What’s wrong with how this was done? If you’re wondering where the whole notion of killing off characters that’s become so prevalent today began, look no further than the 1990s. This may have had what to do with a crossover called The Darkness Within, and it was just as bad as the Bloodlines crossover, which featured quite a bit of ugly bloodshed.

And this was all before Zero Hour too.

In a way, it’s also disturbing how Ted Grant, as the original Wildcat, is one of a couple characters who’s outlived his younger peers, whose own potential to develop into their own characters was thrown away.

Strangely enough, in 2006, an illegitimate son named Tom Bronson was introduced for Ted who also had superhuman powers (turning into a werecat!). Well if they could do that, surely they could revive Yolanda as well?

Profile: Fury

2007-11-28T10:45:00.000-08:00

Lyta Trevor/Kosmatos Hall, Fury
First appearance: Wonder Woman #300 Vol. 1, February 1983. She was originally created as the daughter of the Golden Age Earth-2 WW and Steve Trevor. After Crisis on Infinite Earths, she was reworked as the daughter of a Golden Age Greek superheroine of the same codename, whose real name was Helena Kosmatos, who appeared in All-Star Squadron. Lyta was one of the first members of Infinity Inc during the 1980s.

Current status: in death limbo along with her husband, Hector Hall (Silver Scarab and later a new Dr. Fate).

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she went nuts after Daniel Hall, her son, went MIA in the Sandman series. She was later captured and rendered unconscious by Mordru in JSA. She was later saved from this effect, but then, in 2005, she and her husband were banished by the Spectre to hell. Daniel Hall later brought them into the Dreaming, after which we see that they’re presumably dead with their spirits now in the Dreaming.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Just when there was a chance to develop some focus upon this notable couple anew, and how they try to rebuilt their lives, they’re dragged into the mechanisms of a crossover (Infinite Crisis) and tossed away. The Spectre and Jean Loring have both been misused, and with that storyline in JSA #80, we can now add Fury and her husband to the list.

Indeed, what was the whole point of bringing back Hector Hall, son of the Hawks, if all it could add up to was this? And they certainly weren’t helping matters if Fury was also being written out when she’d barely even returned.

Record: Mark Millar

2007-11-19T12:09:00.000-08:00

The errors I can find that Millar made in his own writing career took place in the Ultimate Marvel line during 2001-2003. Here are at least two examples of what this decidedly pretentious writer did:

In the Ultimates, just 5 issues into the series, he regurgitated the infamous 1981 Avengers story where Hank Pym beat up on Janet Van Dyne. Pure sensationalism. Of all the storylines that could’ve been used as fodder for a new twist, that’s not one we needed to see. Certainly not if Jan was being pegged as the one who’d provoked Hank into being violent towards her (but no, I don’t think I’ll try to describe just what happened).
He implied that the Ultimate versions of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver had an incestuous relationship.
In Ultimate X-Men, the Ultimate version of Wolverine leaves Cyclops stranded or for dead in a deep valley, all so that he can then seduce Jean Grey for sex (and she may be underage!). Yet he’s never expelled from the Ultimate X-Men. Supposing your own best friend left you stuck in a valley where you had to survive on rock plants for a week so that he could go and take advantage of your own girl Friday. Would you want him to continue maintaining membership in your own team? Would any of the other members want him to either?

Let’s just say that Millar is by far a crude, pretentious and overrated writer who did little more than to take some once effective cast members of famous team books and turn them into something otherwise unlikable. His work is so ludicrous, and I can’t understand what anyone sees that’s so great about it.

Profile: Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld

2007-11-07T12:15:00.000-08:00

Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld, aka Amy Winston
First appearance: Legion of Super-Heroes #298, April 1983, in a special promotional story that served as a lead-in to the maxi-series that followed a month afterwards. Originally a princess from the magical dimension/planet of Gemworld whose parents had been slain by the evil Dark Opal, she was sent to our dimension on Earth, where she was raised as a youngster named Amy by a couple called the Winstons. Since time moves differently between our world and hers, she became approximately five years younger on Earth. On her 13th birthday in her Earthly state, that’s when she found herself travelling to Gemworld again, where she became her older self and discovered her heritage, and did battle with Dark Opal.

Current status: after Infinite Crisis, not sure what it is, if at all.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she’d been blinded at one point, and later merged along with a Lord of Chaos called The Child with Gemworld itself in order to stop him from causing more disaster in the magical planet. Still later, she was wrecked even further in Legion of Super-Heroes, where her story background may have been retconned to be more part of the 30th century. And then, during the 1990s, she became a power-hungry witch in Book of Fate.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It’s sad enough that she had to be “killed” in order to stop The Child from carrying out his acts of terrorism for the Lords of Chaos. But even sadder still is how she ended up being turned into a villainess in Book of Fate, and bringing her back into the spotlight in the awful Day of Vengeance miniseries as well as Infinite Crisis was also a perfect way to sour people’s milk.

These days, of all the characters rendered almost completely unrecognizable and grossly misused, she definitely tops the list.

Profile: Fire

2007-10-31T10:49:00.000-07:00

Beatriz Bonilla da Costa, Fire
First appearance: she first appeared in Super-Friends #25, October 1979, and was created by E. Nelson Bridwell and Ramona Fradon. In the pre-Crisis time she was originally created in, she had been the president of Wayne Enterprises’ business branch in Brazil, and got her powers via magicians and mysticism. After the Crisis, her origin was redone, making her a model in Rio de Janeiro as well as an actress and a showgirl who became a special agent for the Brazilian government, and her powers were acquired after she was stuck in pyroplasmic explosion that gave her the power to produce eight-inch bursts of green-colored fire. She was reintroduced in Infinity Inc. #32, November 1986. She first took up the names Green Fury and Green Flame, and later changed it simply to Fire. She became a member of Justice League International for a couple years.

Current status: an agent for the new rendition of Checkmate.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: she was badly injured in the battle with Doomsday in 1992 and lost her powers for a while. Years after she’d got them back, during the time of Infinite Crisis, when she became a Checkmate agent, they wrote her into a killer, trained by her father, Colonel Ramon da Costa (aka Corvalho) when she was just a girl.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The steps taken during this new Checkmate are simply atrocious. Bea’s father, Corvalho, was written as an employee of a right-wing military dictatorship, who ordered thousands of innocent deaths in Operation Condor, a South American counter-terrorism mission. The apparently politicized storyline, which demonizes conservatives as not caring about innocents, is disgusting.

Interestingly enough, Bea is also depicted as killing a new Colonel Computron (a minor villain who’d first appeared in The Flash in 1981) after government agent Amanda Waller blackmails her into doing it under threat of exposing her father, whom Bea is later forced to turn in anyway for international war crimes. A perfect way to ruin a very good character for the sake PC-madness.

Profile: Catwoman

2007-10-18T14:22:00.000-07:00

Selina Kyle, Catwoman
First appearance: Batman #1, Spring 1940

Current status: may be joining Batman and the Outsiders in its new incarnation.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in 1986, sometime after she’d first reformed, she was tortured and brainwashed by Dr. Moon, which made her forget the first revelation she’d made about Batman’s secret identity, and returned to crime for awhile before reforming again. In 2005, it was revealed that her initial reformation was the result of brainwashing, by Zatanna, no less.

What’s wrong with how this was done? In the case of the latter example we have here, it considerably ruins much of the development made for Selina over the years of her career as the Feline Fatale, and makes a mockery out of her personality. That she knocked Zatanna out of a window after the magic maid told her this, even if Zee survived the fall, was also incredibly tacky.

I guess it’s also worth noting that this seems to be the justification they used to get from point A to point B – her killing a supervillain, Black Mask, who, curiously enough, in an attempt to “improve” himself as a crime kingpin, threatened some of the most important people in Selina’s life after learning her secret ID, namely, her occasional boyfriend detective Slam Bradley and also her best pal Holly. She took him by surprise in Catwoman #52 vol. 2 by blasting him in the head. But this seems more than a wee bit forced, as the approach Black Mask was using here may have been a retread of what Dr. Light was blabbering off with in Identity Crisis, and, come to think of it, Blockbuster, when he threatened Nightwing in an almost similar way in his own solo book, before the Tarantula seemingly gunned down Bludhaven’s own kingpin in 2004.

Nothing against even anti-heroes and anti-heroines killing, but if they’re going to use contrived circumstances to get to that point, then I think it’s a waste of time.

Profile: Enchantress

2007-10-09T14:37:00.000-07:00

June Moone, Enchantress
First appearance: Strange Adventures #187, April 1966. Besides having an origin almost similar to that of Captain Marvel/Billy Batson, it’s possible that the inspiration for Moone at the time may have been Elizabeth Montgomery’s comedic role as a young witch in the Bewitched television series, which ran from 1964-1972.

Current status: appeared in Shadowpact in 2006.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: as early as 1980, she was turned into a villainess in Superman Family #204, in a story starring Supergirl. Even after Crisis on Infinite Earths (where she’d been part of the villain’s army), this continued, with June next becoming a cast member of the Suicide Squad. Later on, in 1999, she was reworked again in Day of Judgement as less of a villainess but still far from a real heroine. However, the story had Faust (the son of Felix Faust, I think), murdering the Enchantress portion of June in order to restart the fires of hell, leaving June in a passive and almost catatonic state.

What’s wrong with how this was done? I know that by the time the whole change done in Superman Family came around, DC had long moved away from some of the goofier approaches they’d specialized in during the Silver Age, when Moone first appeared, but that’s still no excuse for turning a character who could’ve had comic relief potential into a crook! But Day of Judgement is worse, with a pretty ludicrous premise of June having her persona dealt another terrible blow. JLA: Black Baptism did fix things a little though, when a character named Anita Soulfeeda was revealed to be the Enchantress portion of June’s soul.

But with Shadowpact, which was scripted by the pretentious Bill Willingham, whose works I will not support after the jaw-droppingly crass job he did when he wrote Robin and Detective Comics, it only got worse again, because here, once again, a character who could be better repaired gets stuck in a story that’s little more than another abysmal effort to abuse Jean Loring as the new Eclipso. Need I continue?

Profile: Blue Beetle 2

2007-10-03T01:51:00.000-07:00

Ted Kord, Blue Beetle 2
First appearance: Captain Atom #83, November 1966. He was the second superhero to take this role after the first Beetle, Dan Garrett. In Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985-86, he and some of the other Charlton characters were merged more fully with the DCU.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in 2005’s “Countdown to Infinite Crisis”, he was targeted for death by an otherwise out-of-character Max Lord, the businessman who’d sponsored Justice League International years before.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Plenty! The whole story, co-written by Geoff Johns, Judd Winick and Greg Rucka, was done as part of an editorial mandate, but then those three writers themselves seem to be part of the inner party, which could explain why they’ve gone along in lock-step with almost everything DC Comics has done. Aside from that, there’s also the story, which depicts Ted, instead of trying to fight back boldly against his pursuers even one-man-army style, trying to telephone a couple other superheroes for help, and finding none. Worst was the part where Barbara Gordon puts him on hold, one of a few things that signals that this was done as an insult to the well-regarded miniseries Formerly Known as the Justice League, a reunion of several of the lower-ranking characters who appeared there during the late 80s-early 90s. And violence-wise, the worst part was the slaying itself, with Max blasting Ted Kord through the skull in a bloodbath.

It would seem that the message they were trying to create with this was that it’s wrong to be a hero by acting in your own defense, and that superheroes are crummy too. Not to mention that, if anything, Ted went down here without even trying to fight back.

They may have shown him turning up in the afterlife in recent publications (yes, really), but how does that counteract the bad taste the assassination story left behind? I’m afraid it does not.

Profile: May Parker

2007-09-16T13:01:00.000-07:00

Aunt May Parker
First appearance: Amazing Fantasy #15, 1962

Current status: last time I looked, she’d been sent into a coma in Amazing Spider-Man #544, September 2007.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: less than four years after she’d passed away in Amazing Spider-Man #400 during 1994, in what was meant to be a moving swan song at the time and could’ve been a perfect way for her to end her role in Spider-Man’s world, Bob Harras, then EIC at Marvel, decided to have her brought back from the dead by rewriting her “death” at the time as really being a DNA-duplicated actress hired by the Green Goblin to pretend she was Aunt May, while the real one was kidnapped and put in suspended animation, for what true purpose I have no idea. And, at the end of ASM’s Civil War tie-in, she took a horrendous gunshot wound that was meant for Mary Jane. The result was that she ended up in a coma.

What’s wrong with how this was done? In the case of her death by natural causes being undone, that was uncalled for, and was incredibly stupid. Especially when, in the ill-conceived “Final Chapter” (and we all know where that got us, eh?) told that she had a noxious implant inside her head that could kill her, even through detonation (don’t ask). Considering that, like I said, she died by natural causes (until that was contradicted, of course) that’s what made it by far the most tastefully done demise in years. She had served her purpose, and now, Spidey and Mary Jane could move on to other things (unless we talk about the horrid writing that followed, and marked the beginning of the end for Spidey in terms of quality writing to date). But alas, Harras had to ruin everything for a character who could’ve gotten the best send-off of all (it was J.M. DeMatties who’d written it with assistance from Stan Lee), leading to little more than what’s happened now in Civil War, a total disaster.

And now, the most irritating thing going on is aunt May’s coma situation caused by her injury. I really didn’t like J. Michael Stracynski’s characterization of Aunt May when he was writing the book, and the storyline in ASM #544, which he’s also written, is not going to bring me back to reading it, no matter what Aunt May’s fate turns out to be. And until Joe Quesada leaves office, ditto.

Thanks a lot, Bob Harras. You just had to bring poor May back for this gruesome ordeal.

Profile: Aurora

2007-09-06T07:30:00.000-07:00

Jeanne-Marie Beaubier, Aurora
First appearance: Uncanny X-Men #120, April 1979. Jeanne-Marie Beaubier began her superheroine career as a member of Alpha Flight.

Current status: hanging around the X-Mansion more recently.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: multiple personality disorder, and went through a beating at the hands of Malcolm Colcord, the director of Weapon X, a character created by Frank Tieri.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The split personalities Jeanne-Marie went through are mind-numbingly ghastly, and indicative of her creator John Byrne’s odd penchant for writing a few of the women in his books as going crazy (a definite example: Scarlet Witch, whom he sent insane during his run on West Coast Avengers, and also Tigra).

She may not have been as badly written as her twin brother Northstar ended up being, but still, that’s just simply horrendous! I sometimes wonder if John Byrne, who’d once lived in Canada but is said not to have liked it there, was taking a swipe at the Francophones through characters like her. The abuse she suffered at the hands of Colcord is also despicable.

Profile: Courtney Ross

2007-09-03T12:11:00.000-07:00

Courtney Ross
First appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #3, 1976. She was a college girlfriend of Brian Braddock who later became a banking official.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: she was kidnapped by Arcade and taken to “Murderworld” where she was forced to perform comedy in order to survive before being rescued by Excalibur. But in what’s surely got to be the most insane thing I’ve ever heard of: a counterpart from an alternate universe named Opal Lun Sat-Yr9 (and there was even another one from still another alternate world who was simply called Saturnyne) wiped her out and took up use of her identity, and since may still be going by the real Courtney’s identity.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Ugh, the second example I gave there has got to be the most mind-numbingly awful thing ever to take place in comics. And it only furthers my fears that the X-Men may have had more deaths of worthy supporting characters that I might’ve thought too. What's dismaying is how Claremont makes her very likable, then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he has her terminated. This is an early example of a story that deep-sixed the potential of a well-written supporting character by doing something unexpected, yet that adds little to later stories.

The otherworldly counterpart may have turned up during House of M, but the real Courtney apparently remains dead. Killing off characters rather than to just let them drop out of sight is simply a terrible idea by now.

Profile: Moira MacTaggart

2007-08-30T13:27:00.000-07:00

Moira MacTaggart
First appearance: Uncanny X-Men #96, December 1975. A scientist of Scottish heritage, she’d been a close associate and at one time a paramour of Prof. Xavier’s for many years.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: Mystique, assisted by Sabretooth, infiltrated her laboratory on Muir Island in X-Men #108 (sans-adjective series), 2000, where the villainess had the idea of forcing Moira to use her research talents to turn the legacy virus into something that would only affect non-mutant humans. Having no success, they destroyed Muir Island’s research center and gave Moira a lethal injury. Moira died while the X-Men were trying to fly her to a hospital and was later buried in her native Scotland.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Is it just me, or is the list of death victims among the X-Men’s cast higher than I previously thought? But Moira’s death was definitely another one totally uncalled for, as I think she made as much of a backbone for the series’ cast as Xavier did, even if her role was smaller.

To make matters worse, when House of M came out, dredging with it its whole alternate-reality theme that we’ve seen done much better in anthologies like What If, they had the sheer chutzpah to spit upon her corpse even more by declaring her a criminal because she’d wanted to cure her son Kevin of the mutant gene, and his psychosis. It even seemed to tie in with Exiles in an extension of the alternate reality thing. If she’d had a decent burial in X-Men #108, they certainly insulted it in House of M. Put another way, they desecrated her tomb.

Profile: Candy Southern

2007-08-29T09:44:00.000-07:00

Candy Southern
First appearance: X-Men #32, May 1967. She was a childhood sweetheart of Archangel (Warren Worthington)’s who became more involved with the X-Men and the superhero world after getting to meet them up front at Iceman’s 18th birthday. She later became a cast member of the Defenders. Roy Thomas, her creator, got the idea for her last name from the author Terry Southern.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: Cameron Hodge, a former friend of Candy’s and Warren’s who later became a villain against all mutants, kidnapped and murdered her by torturing her to death in X-Factor #34.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Too obviously, we had yet another case of bumping off the girlfriend for the sake of turning her paramour into a chest-thumping Neanderthal going the revenge route. And yes, did Warren ever go that way, because what he did to avenge her death was to behead Cameron, eye-for-eye style. Maybe villains like Hodge are deserving of their fate, but that doesn’t mean the leading lady has to be the one to suffer in order to justify that.

In Uncanny X-Men #306, it was later shown that her mind became absorbed by the Technarx/Phalanx as part of a plan they had to gain more information on the X-Men, continuing her life in a cloned body. But she sacrificed herself again in order to put an end to Cameron Hodge, whose mind had also been absorbed into the Phalanx systems. She let Warren know that she loved him before she passed away fully.

Was there anything good to come from this? You could say that she who may have died heroically then, given that she terminated herself in order to put an end to Hodge, but it still doesn’t excuse how yet one more girl in comics bit the bullet instead of finding story development, even with a different paramour than Archangel.

Profile: Hawk and Dove

2007-08-19T13:37:00.000-07:00

Hawk and Dove
First appearance: this entry features the first Hawk, Hank Hall, and both Doves, as well as two protagonists Mike Baron intro'd in the late 1990s, so it’ll thus feature the debut times of both those to take the latter role as well as when Hank first appeared. Hank and Don Hall, the first duo by this name, first appeared in Showcase #75 in 1967, a pair of twins, one a conservative and the other a liberal, who could never really agree on anything (i.e - how the use of force should be managed). Their powers of greater strength and agility were acquired via a mysterious voice. Both were created for DC by Steve Ditko and Steve Skeates, and had a short lived series that ran six issues, after which they became guest members in the Teen Titans many times. The second Dove, Dawn Granger, first debuted in a 1988 miniseries and was revealed to have gained her powers the moment that the original Dove lost them, some more on which anon. And another duo named Sasha Martens and Wiley Wolverman made their appearance in a miniseries written by Mike Baron circa 1997.

Current status: two out of three of them are pretty much dead, with Hank surely having suffered the worst destruction as he had been corrupted before officially being killed off during Armageddon 2001, published ten years earlier then its title features. Don was killed during Crisis on Infinite Earths, and Dawn was seemingly slain during Armageddon by the villainous Monarch, but turned up again in 2003. And Hank, well, he was corrupted and turned into Extant, some sort of a time-lording supervillain during Zero Hour before being killed in JSA in a time-travelling story published in 2000.

Were subjected to the following acts of discrimination: Indicated above, but that wasn’t all of it. The character destruction of Hank Hall, which could be considered by some to be an unfair swipe at conservatives, was the result of an editorial fiat that resulted after it was leaked that Captain Atom was going to be revealed as the time-travelling villain of Armageddon called Monarch.

What's wrong with how this was done? The editors apparently decided that with the ongoing Hawk and Dove series at the time losing buyers and set for cancellation that this made Hawk and Dove worthy of sacrifice for sales. This, of course, is just another show of disinterest in developing the characters through appearances in other ways like miniseries and guest roles in other books.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Close. In JSA #45-51, Dawn turned up alive again, and her “death” turned out to be a hoax mastered by the evil sorceror Mordru, who also turned out to be the one behind Hank’s going bananas. Okay, so they cleared things up for Hank in that case. However, writer Geoff Johns may have botched the attempt to introduce a new Hawk in the guise of Dawn’s sister from Britain named Holly when he featured them in the third volume of Teen Titans #22-24 going up against Dr. Light after the character destruction that villain went through in Identity Crisis. Talk about really blowing it! We did not need that particular story, that’s for sure.

Profile: Spider-Woman 1

2007-08-09T07:12:00.000-07:00

Jessica Drew, Spider-Woman 1
First appearance: Marvel Spotlight #32, Feb 1977. She was the daughter of British-born parents(?). She’d fallen victim to a deadly poison while her parents were living on Wundagore Mountain in Europe, the same place where Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver were raised following both Magneto and their mother Magda’s disappearances. Her father, a scientist, first tried to save her life by injecting her with an experimental spider serum of his own. But because it didn’t seem to have any real effect, he let the High Evolutionary, Herbert Wyndham, help her by putting her in a special genetic accelerator where she aged at a decelerated rate, emerging little the worse for wear when she was about 17 years old. Lady Bova of the New Men (and Woman) raised her during her first few years in the open on Wundagore.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: when HYDRA was under the leadership of Count Otto Vermis, he captured and brainwashed her in hopes of using her as one of his top minions. He even went so far as to convince her that she wasn’t human but rather, an evolved spider! It was during a mission on which she was told to attack SHIELD that she learned the truth and turned against HYDRA and going back to the good side again. However, she was later recaptured and brainwashed again by the sinister terrorist gang, but freed again after a confrontation with the Thing.

But she was subsequently depowered, following a case where she was stranded on the astral plane following a battle with Morgan Le Fay, and went all but unused for many years, only recently coming back into use again (and before that, there were even two different versions of the character introduced in her stead). Unfortunately, it appears that Joe Quesada’s staff, Brian Michael Bendis included, may have really done whatever they could to ruin her background: during the Civil War crossover, she was written to be a double agent, working for both SHIELD and HYDRA, and even a triple agent working for a crooked agent named Maria Hill.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Nothing wrong with her origin story from the late 70s, since that’s her character development of the time. However, there is something wrong with how she was just depowered and left to gather dust on a shelf for many years. There was a lot more that could’ve been done for her, yet editorial of the mid-80s canned her instead of allowing her potential to be realized fully. Not good. Of all the three Spider-Women there've been in the MCU, Jessica Drew's probably had the most interesting premise, yet they screwed up badly.

And the way Jessica was used during Civil War and other pointless crossovers of recent is a terrible way to bring her back, not allowing for her to develop in any plausible story of her own.

Profile: Dawnstar

2007-07-15T22:10:00.000-07:00

Dawnstar
First appearance: Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #226. Her name derives from the planet Venus as the “morning star”. She’s a native of the planet Starhaven in the 30th century.

Current status: since Zero Hour, everything is uncertain, although she seems to have turned up again in Justice Society of America #2(?).

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: some time after Crisis on Infinite Earths, she was possessed by an evil entity called Bounty, who cut off her wings and forced her to use her tracking power as an assassin. She was later freed of the villain’s control. However, this was never even resolved, and Dawnstar was erased from history during Zero Hour.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Taking away her gift of flying with her legendary wings was terrible. As for ZH, that was one of the worst company wide crossovers DC ever made that served little purpose other than to kill off characters whom the company apparently had no interest in developing.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Almost. It seems that she reappeared in the recent JLS/JSA story called “the Lightning Saga”. But this story is so awful and muddled, not to mention that it may have made some insulting implications about how they may be depicting her now, that it’s clear that any starting attempt to bring her back is a disaster.

Profile: Firestar

2007-07-06T01:01:00.000-07:00

Angelica Jones, Firestar
First appearance: when Angelica first appeared, it was as a cartoon character in Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends in 1981. She made her debut as a comic book character in 1985 in Uncanny X-Men #193, and even got her own miniseries about a year afterwards. There may only be a handful of characters out there who went from cartoon to comic, but of all those to make the transition, Firestar was probably the most successfully developed. She’s been a member of the Hellions, New Warriors, Avengers, and was even the paramour of Vance Astrovik (Marvel Boy, Justice).

Current status: it seems that she’s quit superheroing?

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: Civil War says it all. As if it weren’t bad enough that her relationship with Vance appears to be over, she retired from crimefighting because she didn’t want to be subject to the Superhuman Registration Act.

What’s wrong with how this was done? No true development as a heroine came out of this for her, instead, there was only tossing her into limbo. I can’t say I’m happy with how her love affair with Vance ended either.

That she would retire from being a superheroine is just symbolic of the defeatism evident in Civil War.

Record: Bill Willingham

2007-06-29T08:37:00.000-07:00

A writer whose works strike me as being more than bit overrated, but whose work on a few DC titles has certainly raised my eyebrows in concern. These include the following:

In Robin, he put in quite a few negative swipes at females. For example, at the beginning, there was a female contract shooter tracking the Teen Wonder. Then, there were two of the mercenary Ravens, featured during the Batman: War Games crossover, all for the sake of it. And then, to hammer things to the very bottom, we had Spoiler being tortured by Black Mask…with a drill. She died later on the operating table in the Batcave, and the Masked Manhunter showed no genuine sorrow over her death.
The above was made even worse in a subsequent story called War Crimes in Detective Comics where Leslie Thompkins says that she let Spoiler die to teach Batman a lesson about the perils of being a vigilante and superhero. She even invites him to shoot her dead with a firearm because she doesn’t have the courage to do it herself, of all the ludicrous things that could be thought of for a story like this.
In the Day of Vengeance miniseries, he turned Jean Loring, in a continuation of the villification she underwent in Identity Crisis, into a female version of Eclipso, for the purpose of influencing the Spectre to destroy magic in the DC universe. The worst part about it was that, as told by Columbus Alive, some of the dialect in the beginning part sounded like a woman being sexually harrassed.

A writer who writes crass ideas like that does not deserve to be working in entertainment. And it makes no difference whether the story is for adults, it would be distasteful at any time. Willingham should be ignored as a comics writer.

Record: Brian Michael Bendis

2007-06-20T22:08:00.000-07:00

What is so great about Bendis anyway? This hugely overrated writer with an inexplicable following based on his name alone may have first begun his career as a novelist, but certainly came to prominence following his work on Powers for Image Comics. While he may have come up with some effective women in the books he’s written, he’s still pulled some sexist acts, which I’ll try to highlight below.

In Avengers: Disassembled, we have the notorious case of Scarlet Witch going insane because she failed to have children, a storyline based on one of John Byrne’s worst works from 1990. She even sends the She-Hulk berserk during this. The worst part is how it invokes the stereotype of women being unable to cope with power.
Another one of the worst things about Disassembled was how it regurgitated the Hank Pym as abuser stigma: another character, possibly Tony Stark, asks Hank, “don’t you got a wife to beat?” It’s as offensive to Janet as it is to Hank, who does not deserve this kind of character assassination by now.
In the 26th issue of the current Avengers volume, he wrote a supremely silly story where Hawkeye and Scarlet Witch have a tryst without even trying to solve anything. Problem with this is how it made Wanda seem more like an airhead than anything else. It was a really dumb story that didn’t serve much purpose other than to seemingly assure readers that Hawkeye and Scarlet Witch are okay and little the worse for wear, yet at the same time did not seem to be written out of love for the characters.
He killed off the Wasp during Secret Invasion, one of the awful crossovers published in 2008.

Based on that and how Bendis has basically taken the Avengers and far removed them from the core premise and structure, that’s exactly why I can’t understand what’s so great about him. And I’d be very happy if, just like Joe Quesada, he would just leave Marvel already.

Profile: Arisia

2007-06-13T20:54:00.000-07:00

Arisia
First appearance: Tales of the Green Lantern Corps, May 1981

Current status: discovered alive and well on the Manhunter world of Biot.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: once, she received a blow to the head that caused her amnesia. She got over that, but was far from being in shape to be a GL again for a while. In Guy Gardner #43, she was choked to death by Major Force, a short while before he murdered Kyle Rayner’s girlfriend Alexandra.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It was really sick, and just symbolized what had gone wrong with some comics during the 1990s. Or, more precisely, it was Major Force who did. He has got to be one of the most superfluous of murderous villains in any comics universe.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Finally, in the 12th issue of the fourth GL volume, resurrected Hal Jordan finds her in a cocoon state on the planet of Biot, the Manhunters’ home planet. It turns out that her race had some healing abilities that revived her while she was buried underground. There’s the good news for you. But as far as death in the DCU is concerned, DC Comics still has a long way to go in order to restore credibility.

Profile: Diamond Lil

2007-06-03T20:58:00.000-07:00

Lillian Crawley-Jeffries, Diamond Lil
First appearance: Alpha Flight #1 Vol. 1, August 1983. She is the ladyfriend/wife of Madison Jeffries.

Current status: after taking up a sanctuary offer with the Xavier Institute post-House of M, she was among several to leave the grounds along with a strange figure called Mister M.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: from what I can tell of her background, she seems to have been a character who underwent a lot of suffering. She also joined up with the supercrook team of Omega Flight, a rival of Alpha’s, but was later pardoned for it. The most bizarre story was probably when she was discovered to have developed what was initially thought to be a kind of breast cancer tumor, and the problem was that her skin was too hard to penetrate in order to analyze the problem. It was after an alien encounter that she obtained a tool to do so properly, but it turned out to be just an infected cyst. She’d also been exploited by the (Canadian) government.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The supposed breast cancer she developed and the need for proper surgery is so bizarre, it’s…well, ridiculous! And that alone for now is the best example of excessive storytelling I can find here.

Of all the characters to inhabit Alpha Flight, I figure Lillian probably had it the worst.

Profile: Mera

2007-05-21T13:52:00.000-07:00

Mera
First appearance: Aquaman #11, September-October 1963. While like her estranged husband, Aquaman, she too is a water-breather, she is a native of a different dimension who ended up in our world, falling in love with and marrying the Sea King.

Current status: in 2006, she led a small band of rebels and helped her husband, who was then a fugitive from Atlantis.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: after the death of her son at the hands of the mercenary Black Manta, she was driven insane, and later left her husband. For a time, she was stuck in an awful dimension called Netherworld but later returned. Later on, she was turned into an air-breather by the Sorcery Elite.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Still another needless case of a woman being driven insane, and unable to cope with reality. The story in which Black Manta murdered her son, by the way, when it was originally written in 1977 in Adventure Comics #452, was one of the most abominably scripted pieces of slop ever seen in its time, containing ludicrous tones of racism, and I certainly hope that since Crisis on Infinite Earths, it was reworked so that it wasn’t so offensive as it was implausible.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Mera has since regained her full water-breathing abilities, and while she and Aquaman may still be estranged, they’ve since reconciled.

Record: Joe Quesada

2007-05-13T12:34:00.000-07:00

Now, here’s a wee bit of serious mistakes made by Marvel’s insular editor-in-chief, Quesada, comic artist and would-be writer who undeservedly ascended to the high position he’s currently got, where he allowed for discrimination to pass as legitimate in a couple items in past years. For example:

He allowed for J. Michael Straczynski, until recently the writer on Amazing Spider-Man, to tarnish the memory of Gwen Stacy in the abominable “Sins Past”, and even justified all this in a rock-bottom interview with Newsarama in 2004. He said: “Changing some of the Gwen backstory does little to affect the Peter/Spider-Man world outside of watching Peter grow as a character and the cast grow as people. It changes our way of thinking about Gwen, but she's been deader longer than many of our readers have been alive. Also, I think that when the story is finally told it makes her that more human to us and especially to Peter.” No more than this needs to be told, except that it just symbolizes the exceeding dishonesty to which many in comics have sunk to these days.
He allowed for Brian Bendis to perpetuate the sterotype of Hank Pym as a wife-beater in Avengers: Disassembled when he had Tony Stark, in one of many out-of-character moments, sarcastically ask, “don’t you got a wife to beat?” ECH! That was by far one of the ugliest cracks I’ve seen come down the pike as of recent.
He allowed for Scarlet Witch to be misused, turned into a lurid plot device in Avengers: Disassembled, all for the sake of Brian Bendis’ personal ideas of how to write a team book, rendering the book unrecognizable from it’s original conception. That she was more or less exonerated of any wrongdoing in the House of M crossover doesn’t excuse what came earlier, nor does it make the story any more readable.
His defense for using a manga-like cover for Heroes for Hire's 13th issue, which featured three girls tied up while menaced by tentacles was simply lethargic.

And there’s at least a handful of some of Quesada’s worst works as an editor. His departure from office is long overdue, though we must remember that this doesn’t mean that a better EIC will come along next. That’s only if we as fans do our part to work towards it.

Profile: Ms. Marvel 2

2007-05-02T21:53:00.000-07:00

Sharon Ventura, Ms. Marvel 2
First appearance: in the pages of The Thing.

Current status: unknown

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: through a similar situation to what the Fantastic Four went through (cosmic rays), she was turned into the She-Thing in 1989, and while she was cured of that, she was later turned into another beast, courtesy of Doctor Doom, who enslaved and depowered her in 1993. Finally, she underwent an even worse transformation that wrecked her mental capacity, eventually fleeing from Reed Richards’ lab while having cracked up completely, and fading into obscurity.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It was simply going way too far to the point of utter ludicrousness. Perfectly ghastly. If Marvel needed to break up Sharon and the Thing, there were plenty of better ways to do it without resorting to sending Sharon through some awful circumstances like what she went through in the mid-90s.

In FF #29 in 2000, she appeared as a member of the Frightful Four in its then incarnation. What a great idea, feature her being exploited even more, right? And she wasn’t even rescued from her dire predicament then either.

Record: Dan DiDio

2007-04-19T22:44:00.002-07:00

Now, let’s run a little record about an editor’s errors. What can be said about the mistakes that an editor makes in what he does? It’s what they allowed to happen, to be written and published, that counts. We’ll start first with DiDio, as he does seem to have quite a few very hideous things to shoulder blame for as editor-in-chief of DC Comics, which include:

The defeatist storyline in Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day, where Donna Troy was killed, even if only temporary, by a Superman robot that was unleashed by a female robot named Indigo (get it? Judd Winick’s story there has a woman to blame for the death of another!). Lilith Clay was also killed in this storyline, and since then, DiDio’s staff has been blatantly sweeping that under the rug.
Allowing a certain writer (Brad Meltzer) to abuse just about everyone and anyone in the pages of Identity Crisis, simply because he’s a “high profile novelist”, to make it almost entirely pro-masculine in its POV, and some of the most shoddy contempt for DC’s female cast ever.
Allowing for another writer (Bill Willingham) to write up an equally hostile-to-women story in the Batman x-over War Games, where Stephanie Brown, the Spoiler, was beaten to death, and even to further the insult by implying that nurse Leslie Thompkins killed Stephanie to teach Batman a lesson about the dangers of crimefighting! DiDio also allowed Willingham to write the vicious Day of Vengeance, which featured yet more degradation of Jean Loring for the sake of degradation.
Allowing for still more atrocious depictions of Dr. Light in the pages of Green Arrow, where the villain blabbers on and on about the “joys of rape”, and Ollie does not even seem to rebut any of it.
Letting Geoff Johns write up a scene in Infinite Crisis where Phantom Lady is stuck to death with a spear by Deathstroke in a show of “violence porn.” But then, we all know how Johns is a “hot” writer, so no interfering with his work, right?

There are some more examples, but for now, this should do quite well as an example of what bad things an editor of any high rank has allowed to happen on his watch. DiDio is a most dishonest man who’s been unwilling to answer any of the charges of misogyny leveled against the company, and certainly not honestly. For that, he does not deserve to be in his position.

Profile: Hellcat

2007-04-18T14:00:00.000-07:00

Patsy Walker, Hellcat
First appearance: Miss America #2, November 1944. She made appearances in the romance comics that Marvel did up until the early 1960s in such books as Patsy and Hedy, and was later officially established in the main Marvel universe when making a cameo appearance in the 1965 Fantastic Four Annual #3 (Marvel subsequently stopped publishing annuals for about a decade before trying them again). In Amazing Adventures #13 in 1973, that’s when she began to take up a more adventure filled life, when she met Beast and asked for his help in establishing a superheroine career. She officially became Hellcat in Avengers #144 in 1976. She also worked with the Defenders.

Current status: currently inactive as a crimefighter.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: Patsy later married Daimon Hellstrom, whose demonic inheritance took possession of him and in this case drove her insane. She was confined to a mental institution and later, the otherworldly villain named Deathurge drove her to commit suicide.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Exactly why must Patsy be the one to be driven nuts? Shouldn’t it have just been Daimon himself? IMO, it was a grave mistake, and Patsy did not have to be injected with insanity, and certainly not driven to suicide, which was awful.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Thankfully, when Kurt Busiek was writing the Avengers and the Thunderbolts in the past decade, he wrote that Hawkeye brought her back from hell, having mistook her for his own dead wife, Mockingbird. She maintained some special powers she’d obtained during her time there, though they later wore off. She joined the Defenders again for a time, until they again disbanded.

She became victim to editorial misuse, however, when during Civil War, she was on the pro-registration side of the whole crossover mess.

Profile: Mantis

2007-04-12T10:55:00.000-07:00

Mantis Khrul-Brandt
First appearance: The Avengers #112, June 1973. She was the daughter of a Vietnamese mother, Lua Khrul, and a German father, Gustav Brandt (Libra), who later became a terrorist, and was revealed to be the Celestial Madonna in Steve Englehart’s notable storyline from 1974-75. Her exact first name does indeed appear to be Mantis.* She later took up the pseudonym of Mandy Celestine when living in Connecticut.

Current status: not certain.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she had to give up custody of her child to her father’s people, and during her adventure in space with the Silver Surfer, she was struck by an explosion that caused her to literally split into multiple versions of herself, an effect that apparently had what to do with the powers she was developing, and she had to find all the pieces in order to set things – and her memories – right again. In 1995’s disastrous story, “The Crossing” she returned as the villainous bride of Kang the Conqueror, plagued with a lot of hatred towards the Avengers for telling her manipulative lies. This was later retconned by Kurt Busiek in 1998, when he wrote a story where it was revealed that it was actually a Space Phantom brainwashed into thinking he was Mantis.

What’s wrong with how this was done? “The Crossing” was one of the most awful ideas in the history of the Avengers that almost ruined a good character. That she had to abandon her child was probably also ill-advised, though he was still around, and later turned up again.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Kurt Busiek had a good idea to retcon the damage done in 1995, and in Avengers: Celestial Quest, Steve Englehart took up writing an Avengers story again in which he wrote that Mantis remerged with the remaining fragments of her personality that she’d split into, regaining a lot of her lost memory sections. During this miniseries, she and the Avengers traveled into space to find her son and save him from a clone of Thanos who was targeting him. It’s good that she got to reunite with her child in the end!

* Thanks to Kurt Busiek for providing some details on this.

Profile: Shrinking Violet

2007-04-07T10:18:00.000-07:00

Salu Digby, Shrinking Violet
First appearance: Action Comics #276, 1961. She was one of the first members introduced of the Legion of Super-Heroes in the 30th century, a native of the planet Imsk, and was co-created by Jerry Siegel and Jim Mooney.

Current status: she sometimes goes by the name of Atom Girl today.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she was once kidnapped by radicals from her home planet, and suffered a trauma from that. But she was also betrayed by Duplicate Boy, who hadn’t even tried to rescue her. In a story called “Battle of Venado Bay” in which she and her fellow Imskians were battling the home planet of Cosmic Boy, she had to save her fellow Legionnaire, who was badly injured, from her own fellow fighters. He was so crazy with pain that he didn’t recognize her and smashed her in the head, destroying her right eye and leaving a scar on her face. Shrinking Violet and Cosmic Boy reconciled later and she had her eye repaired, but left the scar intact. Prior to one of the relaunches of the Legion, she had one of her legs blown off and replaced with an artificial one.

What’s wrong with how this was done? I’d say the injury Salu sustained to her face was the most grisly thing she ever went through in her career as a superheroine. But as you can also see, she certainly did go through quite a lot of alarming injuries for a girl during the Bronze Age period.

An oddity: she’s got a fierce loyalty to Brainiac 5, so much that once, when Invisible Kid was spying wrongly on Brainiac, she beat him up but later forgave him. She seems to be quite comfortable with being taken for crazy.

Profile: Domino

2007-03-29T23:30:00.000-07:00

Domino
First appearance: X-Force #11, June 1992. Curious thing about her was that the overrated Rob Liefeld was the artist who co-created her at the time, along with Fabian Nicieza. And another interesting thing about her was that, shortly before she officially debuted, there was an imposter who appeared before her! (in New Mutants #98, the series that preceded X-Force.) Her exact name isn’t certain, but at times, she’s been identified as either Neena Thomas or Beatrice Thurman, the latter used when once married to a man named Milo Thurman.

Current status: still a member of both X-Force and another team called Six-Pack.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in 1996-97, in the "Operation: Zero Tolerance" crossover in a lot of the X-titles, she was taken prisoner by the meta-human villain Bastion, and he and his cohorts tortured her, which affected her mentally and physically.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It was going overboard. It was sadistic. That’s the best that can be said about it.

She was also once brainwashed into attempting to kill Cable, her occasional boyfriend. It really wasn’t called for either.

Profile: Donna Troy

2007-03-21T11:15:00.000-07:00

Donna Troy, aka Wonder Girl, Troia and Darkstar
First appearance: The Brave and the Bold, 1965. She was a founding member of the Teen Titans and first female member. When she first debuted, she was the adopted sister of pre-Crisis Wonder Woman, though their meetings and team-ups were rare at the time. Later on, in 1988, she got a new origin, where she’d been raised by the Titans of Myth during her childhood.

Current status: not entirely certain just now. She’d taken Diana of Themyscira’s place as WW last year in the third volume of her series, but that was largely botched due to writer Allen Heinberg’s astounding delays as scriptwriter, which led to his arc going otherwise unfinished. You could say that she’s become something of a counselor anew for the latest incarnation of the TT, and has certainly been getting involved again with her onetime boyfriend, Kyle Rayner, former Green Lantern.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: it’s odd, but, during a few of her first appearances under Bob Haney’s pen, she got knocked unconscious a few times by the crooks. Her initial premise as the adopted sister of Wonder Woman being erased and replaced by a different storyline was probably questionable, but what was really nasty was the time when, as Team Titans was beginning, she was pregnant with a child who in the future would become Lord Chaos, and had even come back in time to ensure that he’d be born. It was a really disgusting ordeal, both for her and the audience. The whole matter was solved, and her child became a normal one, but later on, fate would again raise its heavy hand. Her marriage to Terry Long fell apart and he took sole custody of their son.

Donna later had to undergo John Byrne’s disastrous run on Wonder Woman (circa issues #131-136) where he tried to rewrite her origin as being a mirror projection of Diana herself who’d been kidnapped as part of a plot to strike at Hyppolyta by making her daughter the one to suffer by being born into lives that would end in tragedy. And then, Terry and their son died in a car crash. Then, in 2003, she was seemingly killed by a Superman robot in Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day, one of the worst miniseries ever written, by Judd Winick, before being brought back to life again in The Return of Donna Troy in 2005.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The story that took place in Team Titans was awful, and almost reeked of sensationalism. The attempted rewrite in the latter part of Byrne’s run on WW was a grave error, because Donna, in contrast to Diana, was always meant to be born perfectly human, and that’s what made her work as a character, and also how her personality was built together. And as for the breakup of her marriage to Terry, that too was pretty forced. But it wasn’t Marv Wolfman’s fault. It was different writers who’d been assigned to write the story in which Donna and Terry split up, and also for when her former husband and her son were killed off, apparently because this is what was needed in order for her to become a single, more available girl again without too many obstacles to being an adventuress. And the miniseries written by Winick where she was momentarily killed off was very poorly written, depicting her incompetantly and not featuring a genuine enemy for the heroes to combat.

The story done at Byrne’s time has since been discarded, and the background written by Wolfman and George Perez in 1988-89 has been more or less restored. And her “death” in Graduation Day, as mentioned, has since been reversed, and she’s returned to being a notable crimefighter again.

Profile: Hawkgirl/Woman

2007-03-12T23:22:00.000-07:00

Hawkgirl/Woman
First appearance: since this entry features at least three ladies to carry the mantle, it’ll feature the place of debut for all of them as well. Sheira Saunders first appeared in Flash Comics #1 in 1940, and became Hawkgirl two years later, becoming possibly the first woman in comics to take up a role originated by a male protagonist. The second one, Shayera Thal, first appeared in The Brave and the Bold #34 in 1961, and after the Crisis on Infinite Earths, her post-Crisis appearance was in 1989’s Hawkworld miniseries. The third one, Kendra Saunders, grandniece of the original, first appeared in JSA: Secret Files in 1999. She’s said to now be inhabited by the original Hawkgirl, for reasons I’ll try to give below.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in Action Comics in 1987, in a story written by John Byrne, she was almost completely ineffective against the villains invading a spaceship, and was even smacked across the face by Hawkman (was it an imposter?) during the story. In 1994, during the Zero Hour crossover, Sheira was killed during a kind of merging of the two Hawkmans. (Who were later sent into a limbo-like dimension, where Katar Hol gave up his life in 2001 so that Carter Hall could return.) It was later, as revealed in the pages of JSA, that Sheira had been reincarnated within her own grandniece, who’d tried to commit suicide at age 17.

Kendra herself and her mother had been near-victims of an attempted rape by two racist police officers in their native west Texas, as told in the Hawkman series that spun out of JSA’s Return of Hawkman story. In the JSA: Fair Play story, she ended up in the mere role of a hostage, drugged unconscious and chained to a wall in a makeshift jungle from where Hawkman and Sand could rescue her, and did not play a significant part at all.

What’s wrong with how this was done? The Byrne story from 1987 was simply dreadful, one of the examples of negative attitudes that turns up in his work of yore as a writer. Perhaps Shiera’s de-facto killing off was needless too, just like a lot of Zero Hour itself, which seemed to exist only for the sake of killing off various JSA veterans such as the original Atom and Dr. Mid-Nite. And Kendra's depiction as a pawn rather than a player in Fair Play was pretty lamebrained too. Here, just when they had a chance to show how talented a young lady she could be in figuring her way out of a danger, they turned her into a mere hostage instead.

Was there anything good to come out of this? The background story for how Kendra came to be was well handled, but Rags Morales being the artist of Identity Crisis all but puts a cloud over it – since his role in that miniseries damages his credibility.

In fact, this reminds me of another very glaring flaw in IC – where was Sheira herself when Dr. Light violated Sue Dibny in the JLA space station in orbit? That she herself was absent and that Hawkman may have kept the incident a secret from her is one of the most insulting and offensive things about the miniseries.

Record: Chuck Austen

2007-03-04T13:56:00.000-08:00

Here it is, just the entry we could use, a little listing of some of the worst writing acts of a since forgotten hack writer whom both Marvel and DC had the gall to hire to write some of their most high profile books, how about that! Austen, as far as I know, was an animation producer for King of the Hill in the past decade, and surprisingly enough, he even penciled a few of the issues of the otherwise abortive Elektra series that ran under the now defunct Marvel Knights label. But it’s as a scriptwriter that he really played foul. For example:

He made Polaris into one of the most annoying characters in Uncanny X-Men. Really irritating dialect, and for a comic book, alarming too.
He wrote an affair between Archangel and Husk, a very questionable act too, since Husk, if memory serves, is underage (around 16-17 years old), and so, this was really going overboard.
He was even allowed to write Action Comics, probably the last insult to his record, but still one of the worst, and wrote a sappy rekindled affair between Clark Kent and Lana Lang. He may have even written a few issues under the pen name of “J.D. Finn” to avoid further embarrassment.

Austen is now gone, and if forgotten, it’s probably just as well. As a writer, toiling away with his half-hearted writing between 2002-2004, he was unusually bombastic, and didn’t even try to hide his contempt for the audience. He did at least one interview with Newsarama in which he sunk into victimhood, one of the biggest mistakes for a writer today to make, and he sure won’t be missed.

Profile: Huntress 2

2007-02-28T12:56:00.000-08:00

Helena Wayne/Bertinelli, Huntress 2
First appearance: originally during the pre-Crisis era in All-Star Comics #69 and DC Super-Stars #17 in December 1977, where she was first known as Helena Wayne, daughter of the Earth-2 Batman and Catwoman. In her daytime job then, she first worked as a lawyer. Her first post-Crisis appearance was in her own-titled series, The Huntress #1, in April 1989. This time, she was the daughter of an Italian mafia don who was murdered by a rival gang, and grew up with relatives in Sicily, later returning to the US to live and work as a high school teacher, and with her martial arts training, she took up the nighttime job as the Huntress.

Current status: member of Birds of Prey's cast.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she’d been sexually abused as a child, and later on, in Batman’s No Man’s Land crossover in the late 1990s, she did not fare very well, if at all, in combatting the villains.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Her post-Crisis origin, which told of the abuse she suffered, was well handled. However, the misuse she underwent in No Man’s Land is another matter altogether, and a distasteful one at that. Stephanie Brown, the Spoiler, clearly wasn’t the only one who had problems in that weak item.

Huntress does fare a lot better now in Birds of Prey, where she’s become a leading ally to Barbara Gordon in crimefighting.

Profile: Marlo Chandler-Jones

2007-02-17T12:28:00.000-08:00

Marlo Chandler-Jones
First appearance: The Incredible Hulk #347, 1988. She met Rick Jones, whom she’d later marry, through her first meeting the Hulk at the time he was rendered gray-skinned, in Las Vegas, where she worked as a call girl for a friendly casino owner who’d hired the Hulk as a security agent (under the name "Joe Fixit"). She also became a good friend of Betty Ross-Banner’s.

Current status: working as a talk show host(?)

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in 1992, she was murdered by Jackie Shorr, a psychotic woman posing as Rick’s mother, who’d once worked at the orphanages he’d lived at when he was a teenager, who was planning on killing him in her basement, but was later brought back to life when Rick made one of those Faustian deals, this one with the Leader, Sam Sterns, to use some technology he’d built in order to revive her. It worked, but she remained mindless for at least a few weeks before returning to full normal.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Not that much, except for the fact that I find it awfully annoying when they depict a woman as being the master planner behind what led to all this in the first place, namely Shorr, the former employee at Rick’s orphanage in Arizona. It really irritates me whenever that kind of a stereotype is featured. Are there not men who’re psychotic, and could do things like that too?

Was there anything good to come out of this? Marlo has since regained her life, little the worse for wear, and continued with a career she and Rick took up working on talk show hosting.

Record: Greg Rucka

2007-02-16T03:57:00.000-08:00

Nope, even he’s not going to evade criticism here, as I’ve concluded. Because he too seems to have a few errors in his writing portfolio, not the least being that he can’t seem to resist working for money (or so it would seem). So, what examples can I dish out for him? Let’s see:

Sasha Bordeaux was his creation, if I’m not mistaken? Seems that she was intro’d simply for a few worthless reasons: so that she could be framed for the murder of onetime Bat-cast member Vesper Fairchild, and then suffer in jail at the hands of other violent inmates, as Bruce Wayne initially thought of abandoning her there(!). This was in order to create a rift between the two, as Sasha then is approached by some special agents for Checkmate, who offer her a job, and then fake her death as a way of slipping her out of prison. Batman eventually finds out, but after a heated discussion with Sasha, leaves her in peace.
There’s something very odd about Rucka’s leading us to wonder if Ares is doubling back on his bad ways again in Wonder Woman, but then, it’s Hera herself who ends up causing injury to the Amazons via their magical fountain when she gets angry at how Zeus is de-facto cheating on her with his voyeuristic scans of Themyscira. Why, when I think about it now, do I start to feel very unpleasantly annoyed at that?
Rucka was also involved in co-writing Countdown to Infinite Crisis, and in blasting Ted Kord, aka Blue Beetle, to death.
In the OMAC Project miniseries, Sasha is turned into a cyborg, though this is reversed later on in Infinite Crisis. (But don’t think that makes it any better!)

Rucka, as I’ve concluded, while he may have some credible writing in store, also possesses some very stupid and foolish examples as well, and may not be as worthy of handling any DC or Marvel books he’s writing as one might think.

Record: Judd Winick

2007-02-15T05:45:00.000-08:00

I don’t own any of his books, and there are many stories he wrote that I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole. And here below are a handful of examples of what’s wrong with him, not the least being that he’s what’s come to be known today as a moonbat:

In 2003, he wrote Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day, in which he killed off Donna Troy and Lilith Clay, the latter who’s been largely swept under the rug by DC since, and let’s just say that the women in that would-be miniseries virtually all come off badly there. It was one of the most rushed and worst items ever made.
In 2005, he co-wrote Countdown to Infinite Crisis, in which Ted Kord, the Blue Beetle, was killed off in gruesome, excessive fashion.
When he took up writing Green Arrow, he wrote that Mia, who became a new Speedy, was infected with HIV in a forced storyline. Maybe not as bad as what Kevin Smith, when he intro’d her, did, but still uncalled for.
In the 57th issue of GA, Dr. Light gloats about the “joys” of rape. This issue was actually credited to a different writer(?), yet is written in a vicious manner not unlike Winick’s own forced manner of writing, to the point of where one can only wonder if what he did was hand a plot he’d done over to another writer in order to dodge any criticism on his part?
And speaking of vicious and forced, that could describe even his approach to writing on Green Lantern, Outsiders, and even Green Arrow too.
The lesbian subplot featured in the One Year Later storyline in Outsiders involving Thunder and Grace Choi was contrived and exploitive.

Winick is a very shameless writer whose works, when studying some of them more closely when possible, seem to have all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. He’s really not worth anyone’s time.

Profile: Jarella

2007-02-14T11:40:00.000-08:00

Jarella
First appearance: The Incredible Hulk 140, 1971. She was the queen of a magical kingdom on a subatomic planet called K’ai.

Current status: dead and buried

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in The Incredible Hulk #205 in 1976, she was killed by a falling slab of concrete from a damaged building while the Hulk was clashing with a robot called the Crypto-Man while saving a little boy from the same fate.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Nothing at all, really. It was pretty well handled in its time. Jarella died heroically while saving an innocent life from harm’s way.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Jarella’s story made for a very good one in its time. Even after her death, there was still much to be wrapped up, as the Hulk had to return her to her home planet where she could be given a decent burial, as was done in 1980.

It’s an all but overlooked story that, if and when published in trade paperback, would be quite worthwhile to try out.

Profile: Elektra

2007-02-10T13:12:00.000-08:00

Elektra Nachios
First appearance: Daredevil #168 Vol. 1, 1979

Current status: wandering the globe, not knowing what to really do with herself, certainly not the writers.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: murdered in bloody fashion by Bullseye in Daredevil #181 Vol. 1, 1983, one of the most vile acts of his career, but was resurrected in four years later (or was it in DD #190?). Since then, she has reformed, but has found little purpose, artistically anyway.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Elektra is a rather complicated matter. It’s not that there was actually anything wrong with her being offed by Bulleye in the first place, unless you were to count that it was meant to influence Matt Murdock’s own development rather than hers. But while resurrection in comics, certainly for females, is something that’s actually welcome, in her case it’s fairly questionable, since the writers who took up tasks of working on her since then have not been able to figure out much else to do with her. In the late 1990s, there was a brief series produced in which she got assistance from Dr. Strange on some cases she’d been working on, but that didn’t amount to much. Then, a few years later, when the Marvel Knights line was still around, she got another series, but not only did that not last long either, they didn’t even try to come up with a solid direction for it either. It went through as many as 4-5 writers and no one seemed to be able to make any lasting impression on it, or didn't try to.

Was there anything good to come out of this? That all depends on anyone’s POV. Decidedly, I’m not going to really object to her being resurrected, but, if they can’t offer a steady direction for the femme fatale either, then they shouldn’t be trying to launch an ongoing series for Elektra. I figure in fairness that it was probably Joe Quesada’s fault in part, since he seemed only interested in cashing in on her “bad girl” appeal. So, that could be what caused the problems of recent.

Profile: Golden Glider

2007-02-04T10:58:00.000-08:00

Lisa Snart, Golden Glider
First appearance: The Flash #250 Vol 1, 1977. The sister of Leonard Snart, aka Captain Cold, she was co-created by Irv Novick, who gave her a costume design almost similar to one worn by Talia al-Ghul that he drew for her in the Batbooks.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: Mark Waid, when writing the 1992 Flash Annual, reverted her to her criminal status, after all the time when, since Barry Allen had died in the Crisis on Infinite Earths, she’d reformed, not having any further purpose for being a criminal – the Flash was her only reason for being one, as she held him responsible for the death of her boyfriend, the Top, and wanted to seek revenge upon by targeting his loved ones, whether they be Iris West Allen or Barry’s parents. Then, in 1996, after being largely out of the picture for four years, Waid revealed her having been frozen to death by one of the Chillblaines she’d recruited as her crime partners/boyfriends.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Contrived, forced writing, for the purpose of bringing back an adversary who’d been effective in the time that Barry was around (her first three storylines were dynamite), but afterwards needed no more use as a criminal character. I remember reading Flash #18 Vol. 2, where she’d had a memorable role in the party the Rogues Gallery was holding as part of a reunion with a few other villains as well, and Waid decidedly didn’t respect what was done there by predecessor William Messner-Loebs. And then, after Waid had reverted her to being a criminal in the Flash Annual, he didn’t even make any more use out of her, and subsequently killed her off at the hands of one of her Chillblaines in 1996, when the latest one turned out to be smarter than he looked. Captain Cold later tracked down and killed this last one in 2002.

I know that with Iris West Allen returning to the picture in 1994, it’s not like Lisa Snart could’ve been a regular cast member or a friend of the main players so easily, since Iris had the most definite grudge against her and would no doubt have wanted to break her neck, but that doesn’t mean that they had to turn Lisa back into a crook again, even one who operated behind the scenes. That’s what’s come to be known as lazy writing, pure and simple.

Profile: Talia al-Ghul

2007-02-03T13:26:00.000-08:00

Talia al-Ghul
First appearance: Detective Comics #441, May 1971

Current status: a villainess, thanks to possible manipulation by ways of both her father Ra’s al-Ghul and half-sister Nyssa.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in Batman: Death and the Maidens, she was captured and brainwashed by Nyssa as part of a revenge plot against Ra’s, but was actually part of a larger plot in which Ra’s plotted to convince or brainwash both daughters into accepting roles as leaders of his League of Assassins, and the Demon gang. She disavowed her love for Batman during this time and turned against him as a result of the torture she underwent at the hands of Nyssa (who appears to have since been killed by Cassandra Cain).

What’s wrong with how this was done? They ruined one of the best anti-heroines in comics, and one of the best recurring characters in the Batbooks. All of this was apparently done to coincide with “events” leading up to Infinite Crisis, and as a tie to Villains United. That could explain in part why I wouldn’t buy that miniseries even if I were paid the money for it.

The whole premise involving Nyssa, while we’re on the subject, is decidedly offensive, since it depicts her as even more one-dimensional in her whole notion of revenge than Magneto, who, like her, was also written as a Holocaust survivor. And something tells me that the reintroduction of Talia and Bruce Wayne’s son, Damian, into continuity in “Batman and Son” was also ill-advised.

Profile: Magik

2007-01-26T05:46:00.000-08:00

Illyana Rasputina, Magik
First appearance: She was first seen as a child in Giant-Size X-Men #1, but her first actual appearance was Uncanny X-Men #160. She’s the younger sister of Piotr Rasputin (Colossus), and like him is also a native of Russia. (In English, her last name does not include the letter A at the end, but that appears to be how they spelled it not just for her, but even for her mother!) She was a member of New Mutants and a good friend of Kitty Pryde.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: held captive by the villainous Arcade and his assistant Miss Locke to use as a pawn in attacking the X-Men, held captive by a sorceror named Belasco in the Otherplace (Limbo) dimension, where he turned part of her soul demonic, used it to conjure up bloodstones, and even made her look part vampiric before she finally beat him in a battle and drove him out of his own realm, regaining her human form again. However, she later became infected with the Legacy virus, and died from it, which had the effect of sending Colossus over the edge and into Magneto’s Acolytes for a time.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It’s the fact that they killed her off that is. Instead of developing her character full time, they chose to kill her off, all for the purpose of a storyline that focuses on the effects this had on her brother, who for a time turned criminal. Another story wherein the female’s death serves as a catalyst for a male, instead of one where you can focus on the female’s personality, a much better idea.

And while her brother has been revived from a death of almost four years (in Astonishing X-Men, written by Joss Whedon), she still remains in the grave.

Record: Grant Morrison

2007-01-25T06:25:00.000-08:00

He’s overrated, and his criticism of Frank Miller on Newsarama was in poor taste, one more reason why his work will do quite well for scrutiny. So, what did he do that makes the list here? It’s mostly from his take on X-Men that this comes from.

He regurgitated the Phoenix farrago, had Cyclops utter a nerve-wracking sentence as if Jean were the Phoenix, warning her that she could “lose control” again, then started giving Jean Phoenix-style powers again under the claim that it was a “rogue manifestation”. Boring! Also uncalled for.
We get a stereotypical villainess in Cassandra Nova (and why did she have the codename of minor superhero Richard Ryder?). If you don’t know how she sliced a scientist named Trask to death, you won’t want to know even now. Filthy!
Morrison’s depiction of Magneto was one of the most obnoxious, crass abuses of an already misused character I’ve ever seen. It’s bad enough that Magneto may have caused tons of deaths in the early 1990s when he disrupted the earth’s magnetic fields, but this was going way too far.
At the end of his run, Morrison then “kills off” Jean, while turning her into the Phoenix again. The scene then shifts into a future time where some astronauts on the moon find a “phoenix egg”. Is that supposed to imply all hell breaks loose? And Cyclops seems to disavow his love for her too.

As far as his work on X-Men is concerned, I don’t like it at all. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that some comics writers from Britain (Morrison, Millar, Jenkins) are not really to my tastes (2000 AD was never my cup of tea either), but rather, that his whole idea of what mutants, metahumans, aliens or any other kind of lifeform are supposed to behave like or be like is numbingly wrongheaded. The same goes for his regurgitating of storylines we don’t need anymore.

Record: Kevin Smith

2007-01-17T12:02:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time, I wrote upon a message board where another poster said that, while Kevin Smith may be a good filmmaker (well, I guess that can be debated), he’s a pretty awful comic book writer. And after some of the examples I’m about to give here, I’m beginning to wonder the same thing.

Smith began the second volume of Daredevil that ran under the now defunct Marvel Knights label in 1998, and in issue #5, Karen Page came back into Matt Murdock’s life, tricked into thinking she fell ill with HIV only to be killed by Bullseye, instead of installing new life into her as a supporting character.
In Green Arrow vol. 2, he starts off his story with a crime kingpin about to sodomize a young girl (Mia?), before Oliver Queen comes in to save the day. Pretty excessive, if I do say so myself.
And then, most notorious, and most sloppy of all, for more reasons than one, was his Black Cat miniseries, which got stalled halfway through in 2002, but not before we were left with a cliffhanger leaving us wondering if a gangster is going to rape poor Felicia, and then, when it finally picked up almost two years later(!), even if she evaded that repugnant fate, we still get hit by an artificial retcon claiming that Felicia Hardy took to becoming the Black Cat because she’d been raped in college! Ahem. She took to becoming the Black Cat in 1979 – and initially, a burglar – because she was inspired by her late father’s own criminal career as a professional thief. The miniseries has since been written off by many in the audience, with good reason.

Kevin Smith, clearly, does not have the talent it takes to write a good comic book, let alone a good movie, and I should hope that the comics companies won’t hire him again, no matter how many comics his name alone can sell.

Record: Rags Morales

2007-01-14T09:26:00.000-08:00

Even artists have their share of faults and blame (someday, maybe I’ll let you know what I think of Dick Dillin for 2 or 3 nigh-offensive panels he drew in Justice League of America in the early 1970s), and in Mr. Morales’ case, he certainly hasn’t done himself much good by taking one positive item he drew, and then damaging his credibility upon that with another. What exactly am I referencing here? Well, that’ll come up in just a moment:

In Hawkman Vol. 4, we get the background of Kendra Saunders, current Hawkgirl, who, when she was around 13 years old, had been out with her mother Trina in the west Texas countryside where her mother, a skilled landscape painter, was spending the day working on her talent, when two racist patrolmen came along and took the two of them hostage at gunpoint, with the intention of raping Mrs. Saunders out of a hate crime (Kendra and her mother are of Hispanic background). Kendra fought back against one of the two policemen, whose name was Nedal, killing the second one, Darryl Jenkins, who came running up to them (and may have grazed the first with his own weapon). What made this storyline work was the fact that you did get a female viewpoint here, via Kendra herself as she reflects upon that ugly moment in her life, and it was neither excessive nor sensationalized in execution. Plus, Morales even drew it in black and white.
But then, Morales, as the artist of the above example, went along and ruined his credibility on that by drawing one of the ugliest, most poorly written examples of molestation in Identity Crisis, Dr. Light victimizing Sue Dibny, that in sharp contrast to the prior example, bore no female viewpoint whatsoever. Not only that, but he even told the AP Wire, "If nobody really cared, that's an insult to us. . . If they hate it, that's great. If they love it, that's great. But if they are like, 'Ehhh. . .So what? No big deal,' those are the ones that would bother us." Meaning in other words that Morales doesn’t want a following of fandom? It would almost seem that way.

This may not be a really long line of examples so far, but, it can serve as an important example of how a artist or a writer does something credible the one moment and then tosses it out the window, splattering all over the pavement, the next. As of this writing, either I haven’t heard of anything Mr. Morales has worked upon lately, or I just haven’t cared enough to pay any attention. Not that it matters, really. But I figure he does deserve to be written off and shunted into obscurity for being as rude as he was in his actions.

Profile: Jean DeWolff

2007-01-10T09:55:00.000-08:00

Jean DeWolff
First appearance: Marvel Team-Up #48. She was a NY police captain and frequent guest star for a time in Spider-Man’s adventures, proving a most helpful ally many times.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: she was terminated by her ex-lover Stan Carter, alias Sin-Eater.

What’s wrong with how this was done? I think it was a case of needlessly tossing out yet another cast member of Spidey’s world with potential. Jean had some very good moments, and why not give her some more?

Was there anything good to come out of this? That it may have had some dramatic impact and value to it. The story can be found today compiled in trade format, in Amazing Spider-Man: The Death of Jean DeWolff, co-authored by Peter David and Rich Buckler. It was revealed that her feeling towards Spidey may have been even warmer than what she may have usually indicated.

Profile: Ice

2007-01-03T08:24:00.000-08:00

Tora Olafsdotter, Ice (also Ice Maiden 2)
First appearance: Justice League International #12, April 1988. She was the daughter of a king of a tribe of magical ice people in Norway, and at one point she even took up the longer name of a predecessor, Ice Maiden, who’d first worked as the Global Guardians’ representative from Norway before her, that being Sigrid Nansen. She was also loved by Guy Gardner.

Current status: turned up alive, in a state of suspended animation, in the pages of Birds of Prey.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: she was killed while turning against the Overmaster, who’d offered her a power-up, in Justice League Task Force #14, July 1994.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Apparently, it was all part of an editorial mandate, something which, in fact, had originally been intended back around the time when she debuted. But when she started catching on with readers and received a much-deserved following, that’s what kept DC editorial from killing her off initially. Unfortunately, in 1994, the fate first intended caught up with her.

Mark Waid later said that regretted killing her off. But this may have just been a few years afterwards that he came to that conclusion. Given that this is comics, it may not be too late to fix these mistakes, but even so, he should’ve known better, as should DC editorial. And given that he’s been going along with the Identity Crisis debacle since 2004, it’s become hard now to credit his statement from the late 90s about what he did to Ice.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Now, the death has been reversed in Birds of Prey, where she turned up alive in a suspended animation storage.

Profile: Polaris

2006-12-28T07:52:00.000-08:00

Lorna Dane, Polaris
First appearance: The X-Men in 1967

Current status: occasional member of the X-Men.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: when the onetime hack writer Chuck Austen was assigned to write Uncanny X-Men in 2003, he savaged her character with alarming heavy-handedness, writing her with some of the most unbearable dialect you’ve ever heard in comics. All this in order to put her at odds with the rest of the X-Men, alienate her, and even to ruin her relationship with Havok.

What’s wrong with how this was done? No realism whatsoever, just character assassination by a writer who clearly had no respect for the characters, and was only interested in money.

It’s fortunate that this has since been dropped and forgotten, but that doesn’t excuse the negligence they led to in the first place, which could have been avoided, and was one of the biggest farces in comics history.

Record: Geoff Johns

2006-12-24T13:11:00.000-08:00

Whether or not it's been studied clearly, Johns too has more than a few noteworthy faults of his own that can be put on record here, as follows:

The use of Magenta in The Flash as an insane tool, and even the questionable characterization of Girder as a possible sex offender.
In the JSA storyline "Fair Play", Hawkgirl is chained as a hostage to be rescued in Roulette's most-dangerous-game settings. Umm, why exactly her and not Hawkman instead?
In The Flash #199, the neo-Reverse-Flash strikes Linda Park West to the ground with a vibrating shockwave, terminating her pregnancy until the time-warp effects in issues #224-225 change all that. Unfortunately, until we get to that point, we have to endure quite a few panels in which Linda is shown being assaulted, and prior to this story, Gorilla Grodd was tormenting Wally with images of his loved ones being tortured and put to death in the "Run Riot" storyline. This signals a serious problem Johns has of hammering the readers with filthy, rancid imagery, and probably thinking he can get away with it because it's not actually happening.
In The Flash #201, it's implied that Evan McCullogh, the second Mirror Master, has also committed a sex offense.
His story in The Flash #213 implying that the Turtle could be a child-molestor was a very serious misuse of a longtime character.
He went along with the whole Identity Crisis crap, even in the pages of JSA, with the first storyline stemming from that in 2004 being really painful (and autopsy on Sue). So too in fact was the second one a year later, with the Spectre, and the corrupted Jean Loring-as-Eclipso.
He wrote an awful story in Teen Titans featuring Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew, supposedly a commentary on Identity Crisis, but that’s no excuse for what could’ve been a delightful resurfacing of the Zoo Crew that could make people come away smiling. Instead, we’re hit in the face with an appalling and joyless story involving something like a murder mystery with animals in place of humans.
In Rogues' Revenge, he depicts Inertia, the main rival of Impulse/Bart Allen, slaying Josh Jackam, an infant who appeared earlier in the Flash. Must I point out how truly repugnant this is becoming when even infants are turned into sacrificial lambs?

So there we have a list, not a long one, but still a fairly sufficient one, detailing, even if only in small bits, some of the more wretched things that Johns did in his career to date, that reek of questionable violence and going overboard in character misuse.

Record: Brad Meltzer

2006-12-17T22:46:00.000-08:00

But of course this big phony was going to be listed here sooner or later, as no matter how big or small his standing in the industry is, it would be foolish to leave him out. In practically but a single miniseries, he has managed to establish himself as a most serious offender. His list of offenses include:

Making virtually all of the women in Identity Crisis into one-dimensional lemmings, panicky, hysterical, insane, needing to be coddled and calmed, unable to defend themselves from assaults by males, and acting totally out of character in contrast to past storytelling.
Depicting Dr. Light out-of-character, and having him violate Sue Dibny in one of the grossest storylines ever, written in the ways of a bad fanfic.
Depicting Zatanna being punched in the stomach by Deathstroke, also out-of-character.
Depicting Deathstroke attacking Black Canary by…no, forget it. It’s just too sadistic.
Even male characters do not emerge unscathed. Flash is stabbed by Deathstroke, who also slices Hawkman’s wings, making him crash implausibly to the ground, and where exactly did Slade Wilson ever get microscopic eye-vision to spot the Atom with? As far as I know, Slade doesn’t have any power like that of Superman. Nor does it make sense that he could possibly nullify Green Lantern’s power ring, considering that it’s a personalized item, and that it responds to whomever’s wearing it on his finger.
Wonder Woman is turned into a puppet doing Green Arrow’s bidding (to find out info from Slipknot), which almost makes Oliver Queen seem like a pimp.
And was Jean Loring really sexually assaulted as told in the pages of a tabloid paper? That’s surely the most irritating thing of all about the end of the book, the question of if this is true or not, and sadly, it appears that, as told in the context of the book, she was. Most definitely offensive here was that she invited her ex-husband to hit her.

There are quite a few other very degrading details to be found in the book, but for now, I think this should do quite nicely. I urge everyone to do themselves a favor, and not do any for Mr. Meltzer. Don’t buy his books (a writer who’s on the bestseller list of the New York Times doesn’t rate very high in my book, as it is), neither novels nor comics, as he is not one who needs any fame nor fortune.

Profile: Omen

2006-12-13T09:01:00.000-08:00

Lilith Clay, Omen
First appearance: Teen Titans #25 Vol. 1, 1970

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day in 2003, she was slain by a Superman robot along with Donna Troy. Two years later, Brother Blood tried to exploit hers and other dead Titans’ souls, for the purpose of getting Lilith to be his newest Mother Mayhem. After being thwarted, Lilith’s and the other dead Titans’ souls just returned to the afterlife.

What’s wrong with how this was done? This is symbolic of the unpleasant trend of late where, instead of trying to develop characters and breathing new life into them, the writers and editors can only think of killing them off. Just because Lilith Clay, until now, never really had an exact origin offered to her, doesn’t justify terminating her.

To make matters worse, DC Comics has been trying to sweep the whole case of Lilith under the rug since then, and when the third and current volume of TT premiered in 2003, she wasn’t even mentioned there, in contrast to Donna Troy, who was, and who’s since been revived. Lilith, on the other hand, still remains in the grave.

Profile: Psylocke

2006-12-09T09:16:00.000-08:00

Betsy Braddock, Psylocke
First appearance: 1976 in Captain Britain. She’s the twin sister of Brian Braddock, and at one point took up the role in his stead. In 1986, when she, along with kunoichi (female ninja) Kwannon, were captured by villainess Spiral, they had the essence of their bodies switched, and were even brainwashed as well, in one of the most bizarre storylines of the Bronze/Iron Age.

Current status: she has now joined the cast of Exiles. When Chris Claremont was assigned to write that book, she went where he did.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she was violently assaulted by the villain named Slaymaster (whom her brother Brian killed to defend her), and was blinded for a time. In 1996, she was gashed by Sabretooth, and it was thanks to the Crimson Dawn that she was healed. In 2001, she was slain by a villain named Vargas, all so that writer Chris Claremont could replace her with an obvious clone (in fighting style anyway), the former Black Queen of the Hellfire Club, in the pages of X-Treme X-Men (now cancelled). In New Excalibur, when she vanishes into the dimension of the Exiles, it would seem as though nobody can remember her except her own brother Brian.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Two violent acts of assault inflicted upon her at the hands of two violent villains is just two acts too many, and the second one was certainly overkill. And that Claremont would replace her so pointlessly with another protagonist was also stupid. The way that the annoying Pete Wisdom makes a remark about an "imaginary sister" to Brian Braddock is equally annoying, since, while I'm not as prone to attack Chris Claremont as some other people are, that was still insulting, even if she's still alive in the next dimension.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Since then, she’s alive and well again, having been found alive and little the worse for wear in Uncanny X-Men, and she’s returned to her role as a crimefighter again. She’s lucky to have the nine lives or more of the cat she is!

Profile: Storm

2006-12-01T02:23:00.000-08:00

Ororo Munroe, Storm
First appearance: Giant-Size X-Men #1, 1975

Current status: prominent field leader for the X-Men. She recently married T'Challa, alias the Black Panther, whom she'd met when she was in her early teens, and it had been told in later years that they'd been in love with each other in their younger years.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: she’d almost been raped when she was twelve and was trying to flee from Cairo, where she’d grown up most of her life. She killed her attacker with a knife in self-defense, but swore never to take another life. In the mid-80s, for about two years, she took on a ridiculous mohawk hairstyle. Later on, Henry Peter Gyrich, the Avengers’ unlikable UN liason, shot her with a Neutralizer device that drained her powers from her in Uncanny X-Men #185. It took until issue #227 for her to have her powers properly restored, when Forge, then her boyfriend, built an anti-Neutralizer to help reverse the effects.

There are also times when she’s gone insane from anguish, but which are too hard for me to find and compile together as examples just now.

What’s wrong with how this was done? That depends on what we’re talking about among the examples I’ve cited. In the case of her near-violation by a thug in North Africa, that looks like it was written in ways that make sense in terms of character development (better still, it wasn’t forced), though I will have to argue that, while I agree that killing is not something that most super-heroes should have to be confronted with as an option, I still have to wonder if Ororo’s vow not to kill again was really necessary. On the other hand, that Storm should turn to punk subculture with a mohawk haircut was decidedly forced and made little sense for a woman who’s much more classy than that. It was supremely silly, and doesn’t really serve in developing her character.

As for the time when she was de-powered, I think that was a shame, even if she could prove herself heroic without her powers, and goodness knows how many stories there are out there, plausible ones, mind you, where heroes prove themselves effective even without superpowers. But at least since then, she’s regained what she lost, and more!

Was there anything good to come out of this? Well, the examples that were written well when she first began her superheroine's career do involve character development for her. And, that she’s long since overcome some of the worst that was thrown her way. Thank goodness!

Record: The MSM Hall of Shame

2006-11-29T12:23:00.000-08:00

“MSM” is an acronym for the Main-Stream Media that can be found as a reference to it in many places across the blogosphere today. Like, say, to the New York Times, Boston Globe, CNN, Washington Post, Village Voice, Entertainment Weekly, and other assorted bastions of dishonesty in reporting the news. That dishonesty in news reporting, let me tell you, can and does extend to comic books as well. I’ve seen more than enough dumbed-down, sleazy, sensationalized, double-talking and extremely dishonest newspaper and TV articles on comics over the years, and this, a topic that can be expanded if and whenever I find something worth filing here, is where I’ll be posting some of the worst quotes I can find or that I know of from the loathsome MSM, with boldfaced linings included to emphasize the propaganda. Now, let us take a look at some of the biggest stinkers we have in store here, all courtesy of our real life versions of J. Jonah Jameson and the Daily Bugle.

First, there’s this treacly stuff:

A few weeks ago, I recommended DC's "Identity Crisis," a seven-issue miniseries by best-selling novelist Brad Meltzer ("The Zero Game," "The Millionaires"). Meltzer has 6 million books in print, two movies in production and a WB pilot that just finished shooting _ and his "Identity Crisis" has already drawn glowing commentary from The New York Times, New York Post and Spin magazine.

For a change, the Captain agrees with all the hype. "Identity Crisis" No. 1 is now on the stands, and it actually brought tears to my eyes.

As advertised, the miniseries begins with the death of a Justice Leaguer and plays into a larger mystery involving some early recruits of the JLA _ but not big guns like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Instead, the story focuses on "B-list" players like The Atom, Green Arrow, Hawkman, Elongated Man, Black Canary and Zatanna. But before we get into that, we have to pay respects to the victim. I'm not easily moved by a comic book, but this death was poignant, chilling and touching. Meltzer captures the characterization of DC's major and minor players flawlessly, while at the same time weaving an intricate tale of intrigue and profound grief. And the art is by Rags Morales ("Hawkman"), whose subtle and richly textured work wrings surprising emotion from chiseled faces and sculpted physiques.

No, I won't tell you who the victim is. Besides, most people _ even many comics fans _ wouldn't recognize the name of this character, who is actually pretty minor as these things are judged. But I will say it's a character who's been around since 1961, one I've always liked and one I'm chagrined to see take a dirt nap.

Which, despite the Revolving Door of Death in comics, I think is pretty permanent. Sure, a lot of characters come back from the dead in fantasy fiction; it's hard to name a superhero who hasn't been dead at least once. But some characters do join the choir invisible and remain there forever _ the population of the planet Krypton, for example, as well as Batman's parents, Spider-Man's Uncle Ben and Captain America's wartime partner, Bucky Barnes. And I'm pretty convinced that this character, in the parlance of comic-book fans, is "Bucky dead."

Which alone is pretty significant, and it's just the beginning. At the end of the first issue some Leaguers meet secretly to chase down the villain they're certain did the deed. And why they're so positive is part of the mystery ... because they keep alluding to something that happened in the League's early days, something unspeakable, something this group has been keeping secret (somehow) from the likes of Batman, Superman and J'onn J'onzz. That something, whatever it is, is the mystery behind the murder _and this ancient fanboy, who was around for the League's early days, can't wait to see the clues come together. - Andrew Smith, June 15, 2004, Scripps Howard News Service

Well, that’s strike one. He seems to think that the media attention alone is unique in and of itself, and his position isn't really clear either. Then, there’s this disgusting dud:

This seven-issue miniseries kicked off with the brutal murder of the wife of a Justice League member, a beloved character that’s been around for more than 40 years -- followed by a flashback revealing that she had once been raped by a supervillain. Add to that the revelation that some Justice Leaguers have used brainwashing in the past to alter the memories and personalities of certain villains. How can I possibly be enjoying this?

Well, possibly because it’s a riveting murder mystery by novelist Brad Meltzer, who’s also the creator of Jack & Bobby on The WB. And because it’s a challenging examination of the moral issues confronting those who fancy themselves heroes. And because it’s a crackling tale wherein the horrific events service the story, instead of being offered up as shock value.

Yeah, I’m still pretty appalled by the death of Sue Dibny, wife of The Elongated Man (seen recently on Cartoon Network’s Justice League Unlimited). And I’m distressed by the near-murder of Jean Loring, ex-wife of The Atom. And I’m flummoxed by the news that some of our heroes haven’t always acted altogether heroically.

But there are only three issues to go, and I still have no idea who the murderer is, or what his ultimate plan is. Or what the ramifications of the League’s dirty tricks will be. Or, for that matter, who will survive until the end. I may shocked, but I’m also fascinated. - Andrew Smith, October 3, 2004, Scripps-Howard News Service

Strike two. Sensationalizing Sue Dibny's death and violation, telling us all that it's "a riveting murder mystery" without even giving any points or details from within the book to strengthen his stance or explain more clearly why he thinks it's a wonderful book, and even implying that the League is actually the one to blame for this mess. Then, there’s this megabomb:

The most controversial series of 2004 was "Identity Crisis," a seven-issue miniseries by mystery novelist Brad Meltzer and artist Rags Morales starring DC's Justice League of America. In the first issue, the pregnant wife of second-tier superhero was murdered in a brutal way. While the murder mystery (one that was truly a challenge) was the "A" plot, the investigation by the superheroes set off a domino effect, revealing that the victim had been raped by a supervillain years ago _ and in retaliation (and self-defense), a small cabal of Leaguers used their superpowers to, effectively, render the villain mentally incompetent. This also had negative repercussions, which were revealed slowly like the layers of an onion.

The whodunnit was wrapped up with "Identity Crisis" No. 7, but the many unresolved red herrings and the ramifications of the League's moral lapse are just beginning to be addressed, and will spread throughout all of DC's books in 2005. Love it or loathe it, "Identity Crisis" was truly an event, a slow-motion car wreck that generated more than 100 pages of comments on my message board alone. - Andrew Smith, December 21, 2004, Scripps-Howard News Service

Three strikes and you’re out. It sounds more as though he's pre-determined his position, and whatever descriptions he does provide here are as superficial as ever.

In March 2005, he followed up with this junk, in dealing with Countdown:

Skip ahead to 2004, to another summer blockbuster called Identity Crisis. This story, by mystery novelist Brad Meltzer, killed off a long-running, semi-beloved, B-level character (the wife of The Elongated Man, for the record), but more importantly, established that the Justice League had a dark secret: Once, when a villain named Dr. Light (seen on Cartoon Network’s Teen Titans) threatened the Leaguers’ families, some of the second-tier members used magic to alter the man’s mind – and made him, essentially, a nincompoop. Worse, Batman caught them – and they used magic on him, too, to make him forget.

Oops. It may be bad form to tug on Superman’s cape, but one guy you really don’t want to keep a secret from is The World’s Greatest Detective. Oh yeah, Batman found out that his “friends” messed with his mind – his mind! – and he ain’t happy about it.

So we come to Countdown. And yes, Batman’s up to something. Something really ugly, it’s hinted darkly.

Yeah, but does Mr. Smith actually say whether that's a good or a bad thing from an artistic viewpoint? Not really. In fact, he doesn't even seem say much in the ways of an actual opinion at all. IMO, that rates as little more than just servicing the industry in pure knee-jerk style.

And Batman caught them? What's that supposed to mean, that he was opposed to their actions, when here, he himself had also approved of mindwipes in the Silver Age?

To make things even more insulting besides the injury, he even has the sheer gall to refer unclearly to Sue as "semi-beloved" and a "B-level character", as though that literally makes TPTB's actions legitimate. Why do I doubt that he's a comics fan? Then, there’s this little sopster:

Death was everywhere in the best comics of 2004

The dead had a very good year in comic books.

[…]

X-Men's Jean Grey died. Again.

A few of Marvel's Avengers died in a scenario that "dissembled" the legendary group.
Spider-Man thought his late girlfriend Gwen Stacey had returned from the grave, only to find a greater mystery involved.

There was death everywhere, the ramifications of which will be played out for months and maybe even years to come.

[…]

2. "The Avengers/ Dissembled Storyline" (Marvel). To shake up the series, Marvel is taking huge risks, alienating some longtime fans in the process. Favorite characters were killed off, and another went criminally insane, making for a fascinating tale of epic and often ugly proportions.

3. "Identity Crisis" (DC). Writer Brad Meltzer spun a murder-mystery nailbiter in which the Justice League had to confess a few of its own sins, proving superheroes can sometimes do the wrong thing for the right reasons. - Terry Morrow, Scripps-Howard News-Service, December 29, 2004

Don't be fooled by that last line, because despite that, the heroes' actions are portrayed in a negative light. As for the article, what's really dreadful is that it worships what you might call the golden calf of death.

From the ultra-establishment shoe-polisher, The Comic Fanatic:

"The killer wasn’t a superhero! In fact, the killer wasn’t even super-powered…just a craftier than usual, “normal” person with close ties to one of the Justice League!"

And it wasn't even challenging a discovery either. (And contrary to what this sugary article says, the "killer" didn't have all that close a tie to the League. What misleading propaganda.) If you've read the file, you'll notice how it doesn't even mention that the culprit was a woman, let alone poor Jean Loring. And you'll also notice just how sensationalistic the whole article is too.

My my, with comics coverage like this, is it any wonder comic books aren't taken seriously?

Then, what's this:

The past also gets a makeover in "Identity Crisis," a riveting seven-part series from DC Comics ending in December.

The series reveals that members of the Justice League of America tampered with the minds and memories of some supervillains in the past to keep loved ones safe.

That discovery leaves other heroes to question whether the end truly justifies the means.

Among those means: performing a sort of magical lobotomy on the villainous Dr. Light after he raped Sue Dibny, the wife of a long- time superhero, Elongated Man.

Sue is murdered by an unknown killer in the first issue; the rape, told mainly off-panel, is revealed in flashbacks.

Comic-book readers are used to villains plotting to take over the world. But rape?

"That is a little bit rougher," acknowledges Dan DiDio, vice president and executive editor of DC Comics.

"But we tried to tell that in the most responsible way possible."

The story has generated a great deal of controversy -- and DiDio couldn't be happier.

"The last thing I want to do is ever tell a story that is met with general apathy," he says.

"Identity Crisis" is part of an effort to give more emotional weight to the heroes of the DC Universe, home to Superman, Batman, the Flash and countless others.

"There's always been certain perceptions about DC characters being a little bit softer," DiDio says. "The DC characters have always been very proactive and very heroic and very set in their ways in how they do business, and we wanted to look at them in a different way."

The series will have longterm effects, DiDio promises.

"It's a tonal shift in how our characters act and behave in the DC Universe." - Bill Radford, Colorado Springs Gazette, November 7, 2004

It would seem that the writer was paying lip service to a lie. Tsk tsk tsk. 'Cause by now, just about anyone and everyone is aware of how "responsible" that all turned out to be. Longterm effects though? Sadly, yes, and in the worst ways possible.

A year later, the same writer wrote this following item:

DC's editors approached Meltzer after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. With those attacks giving Americans a new appreciation for firefighters and other everyday heroes, DC wanted a story that explored the risks its heroes faced when they donned masks and capes.

To give the story emotional weight, DC gave Meltzer a list of characters he could target for death.

But Meltzer, a best-selling novelist whose only comicbook work before "Identity Crisis" was a six-issue arc of DC's "Green Arrow," wasn't interested at first.

"I had no desire to kill a character for no good reason, not just shock value or sales," Meltzer says.

But in more talks with editors, an idea clicked.

"I said, 'You know what, I got it. Let me go.' In my head, it all made sense to me."

A few days later, he returned with the pitch for what would become "Identity Crisis" -- a murder-mystery that at its heart is a story of loss and families and heroism.

[...]

To protect their loved ones, DC's greatest heroes had voted to perform "mindwipes" on some villains, erasing key memories. The JLA went a step further with Dr. Light, performing a sort of magical lobotomy on him.

When one of their own, Batman, objected, a mindwipe was performed on him.

[...]

"I wanted to put a human face on both sides of this equation, hero and villain," Meltzer says.

What Meltzer didn't know was that executive editor Dan DiDio would seize the threads from "Identity Crisis" and pull them together in plotting the future of the DC universe.

The mindwipes have been a key element in various titles as relationships between DC's heroes have soured -- most notably the ties between the big three: Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman.

Similarly, the newly reinvigorated villains from "Identity Crisis" have proved critical to DC's current direction.

"The beauty here is that Dan saw what he had," Meltzer says. "I thought I made a sweater and he realized he was building a bigger quilt."

Meltzer has the inside scoop on what's ahead for DC's beleaguered heroes -- though he, of course, isn't telling. Geoff Johns, one of his closest friends, is writing the "Infinite Crisis" miniseries.

A longtime comics fan, Meltzer is thrilled to see so many stories spinning out of "Identity Crisis.

"To see this level built on something that we started, there's no greater kind of geek moment than that." - Bill Radford, Colorado Springs Gazette, September 12, 2005

There are a lot of things that remain unclear in the above, or that don't get told, or that are meant as excuses to plead innocence. But most dishonest of all is that, in contrast to the previous column by the same writer, the rape of Sue is not even mentioned in the piece. Incredible how dishonest the people working in comics today have become. Worst of all is that the newspaper that published the column printed it on the very week of the 9-11 memorial, which makes it all the more offensive.

Also, I noticed these reviews on the ultra-knee-jerk Newsarama. Contributor Troy Brownfield, whom I have a low opinion of, once again turned down credibility by saying that Jean Loring has been played repeatedly as a villianess over the years when reviewing the Day of Vengeance miniseries. Pure Wizard-worthy propaganda.

"Things kick off with arrival of the new Eclipso. If you don’t know already (and why shouldn’t you, if you’re interested? The preview pages have been on the DC site for weeks), that would be Jean Loring, ex-wife of the Atom and (IDENTITY CRISIS SPOILER!) killer of Sue Dibny. Frankly, I’m good with this. Regardless of what some people think, Loring has been played as a villain repeatedly in the past, so someone positioning her to receive the black diamond isn’t a crazy idea."

Excuse me? What's that you say, Mr. Brownfield? "Repeatedly"? Let's get some facts straight here, shall we?

The only times Jean Loring was portrayed as "bad" were in such stories as The Atom and Hawkman #45 in 1969 (and was cured of her insanity soon afterwards in Justice League of America #80-81), when she was brainwashed by a sub-atomic race called the Jimberin, who wanted to turn her into their puppet queen, and in Super-Team Family #11 in 1977, where she was brainwashed by another gang of bad aliens.

And if Brownfield in any ways thinks that The Atom #11 from 1964 is anything to back up his propaganda, well then, let's take a look at this synopsis right here, from Darkmark's Comics Indexing Domain:

Synopsis: Ray Palmer, on an ocean voyage, is forced to walk the plank by a woman who appears to be his fiancee, Jean Loring. As the Atom, he discovers that Jean and the rest of the crew and passengers have been replaced and imitated by invaders from another dimension.

So a villainess she was? Oh yeah, right, that's the best one I've heard all day.

What Mr. Brownfield's done here is little more than to trash talk the way Wizard magazine can and does, and to voice such an argument without confirming his facts only sinks it even further. Comics readers old and new deserve much better.

And here's something from Capt. Comics where he goes the wrong route with Scarlet Witch:

"But in a larger sense, "House of M" is the logical culmination of the Scarlet Witch's long, troubled and convoluted history." - Andrew Smith, April 17, 2005, Scripps Howard News Service.

What? Is he justifying Bendis's atrocity? Shameful.

Then, what’s this here:

What a year to be a comics reader.

It was like the two big comics companies, DC (publishers of Superman) and Marvel (publishers of Spider-Man), figured out exactly what fans wanted and gave it to them.

DC proved itself to be the biggest kid on the block with month after month of stories that led into "The Infinite Crisis," a story line so beautifully complex that it will take another year to play out.

The writers, led by Geoff Johns, looked at the human part of the superheroes, the man in Superman, and showed that they are just as susceptible to fear, love, hate, jealousy and every other human emotion. Batman devised a fail-safe anti-superpowers system that backfired, which ultimately led to Wonder Woman murdering a villain to save Superman's life.

By stooping to the level of the bad guys, the heroes caused the one thing to happen that they always feared -- the organizing of the villains into an army. Then the writers did something that many fans yearned for but never thought they would see: They brought back the original Superman. He's the one who started his career in 1938, aged, married Lois Lane and was last seen in 1986 flying off to the other end of the universe, never to be seen again.

Well, he's back, and he's not happy at what's happened while he was away.

Marvel, not to be outdone, changed reality by taking a third-rate character -- the Scarlet Witch -- and making her the shaper of worlds. The world that emerged when she was through is different and certainly more interesting.

The impressive thing about Marvel's project is that the writers, led by former Clevelander Brian Bendis, built on what had gone before. All the clues were there, especially with the Scarlet Witch. How could we not have noticed that her powers seemed to change to be whatever they needed to be?

What might have been sloppy writing two and three decades ago was turned into proof that there was a lot more to her powers than silly hex bolts. "Made you trip," whoopee.

After all, this was a woman who brought the original Human Torch back to life (the second or third time) and likewise Wonder Man, with just an errant thought. She also gave "birth" to two boys from her imagination. Is there anything she can't do?

In fact, would it surprise anyone to learn that the Scarlet Witch was responsible for a lot of the inexplicable things that have gone on in the Marvel Universe?

It's been a long time since things were this good.

Sure, both companies still put out some junk, but that's best left ignored. Look at the great stuff. - Michael Sangiacomo, Cleveland Plain Dealer, January 2006.

As far as I know, Wanda Maximoff's Hex power alters probabilities, not reality. Where does he get off implying otherwise? He even kept on with this a year and a half later:

Marvel Comics underwent not one, but two, such world-changing events in two years. The first occurred when the Scarlet Witch, a character long believed to be a B-level heroine with the unpredictable power to "hex" things, proved to be one of the most powerful people on Earth.

No one ever thought much about how her hex power worked, but it turns out that it affects the world on a fundamental level. She had been using her power subconsciously for years, but recently she went a little bit nuts. - Michael Sangiacomo, Cleveland Plain Dealer, June 2, 2007

Bleah. It only gets worse with this:

At Marvel, a superheroine called the Scarlet Witch went koo-koo last year and pretty much destroyed the Avengers. Not content with that, she used her reality-altering powers earlier this year to transform the world into an alternate one in which mutants were in charge, under supervillain Magneto - the "House of M."� So in recent months, familiar characters like Spider-Man, Hulk, Daredevil, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four have been doing some very unfamiliar things in an unfamiliar world. - Andrew Smith, Scripps-Howard News Service, October 4, 2005

From which this article must've come, I presume. The way he uses that word "koo-koo" is really insulting, as is the way he uses the boolean of "a" instead of "the" when referencing Wanda, as if she were literally some obscure character. The same tactic was also featured in this column too.

Next, there's this dismal take on Infinite Crisis:

Since the death of the Elongated Man's wife, Sue Dibny, in the spring of 2004, DC Comics has put its fans into an emotional and multilayered story crossing over most of its best titles (around 78 comic books, to be more exact), which has led up to the current, universe-shattering developments in this monumental seven-part miniseries. - Joseph Szadkowski, The Washington Times, January 28, 2006

GAH! Somebody please gag me with a spoon! And it only gets worse with this one:

Best-selling thriller author and architect of DC Comics' popular miniseries Identity Crisis, Brad Meltzer, begins the construction of a new era for the Justice League of America.

[...]

Overall, I am not sure how many times readers can deal with the shenanigans of comic-book publishers who feel they need to reinvent a series to boost sales. However, fans should give this new Justice League a chance, if only based on how Mr. Meltzer handled his Identity Crisis. - Joseph Szadkowski, The Washington Times, August 26, 2006

I usually find this newspaper better than some of the others, but "Mr. Zad" is decidedly a rhinestone in a bundle of gems. For by now, those more in touch with reality than Szadkowski is know just how exactly Mr. Meltzer handled his so-called miniseries.

Next up is something from a writer for the Weekly Standard and Philadelphia Inquirer who's lost my respect as a conservative:

Last year Brad Meltzer, the guy who got me back into comic books with his outrageously good Identity Crisis, rebooted DC's Justice League of America series. Like Identity Crisis, it was jaw-droppingly good. The stories were interesting and the characters were written more intelligently than you have any right to expect in a comic book. - Jonathan V. Last, on the Galley Slaves blog, September 17, 2007

I once thought Mr. Last was a great op-ed writer. But then I discovered what his taste in pop culture was like, as this could indicate, and my respect for him plummeted tremendously. What's really bizarre about this is how Last, a man who said once that he found DC's special called 9-11 September 11th 2001: The World's Finest Comic Book Writers and Artists Tell Stories to Remember, offensive because of moonbat storytelling angles that were injected into the book, completely fails to recognize that Identity Crisis may have very possibly contained similar left-wing storytelling approaches. But even without the political creepings, that he would legitimize a story with violence and misogyny as horrific as what IC contained is still disgusting enough.

As a conservative myself, I want to make perfectly clear that Mr. Last does not speak for me on the issues surrounding IC and should be absolutely ashamed of himself for his hypocrisy. He has lost my respect for him by upholding the perverted storytelling method employed in IC.

Then, what's this cliched comment we have here on Mary Marvel:

Mary Marvel couldn't buy face time in the past 10 years, but now that she's turned evil, she's hot. - Michael Sangiacomo, Cleveland Plain Dealer, January 5, 2008

Uh uh. No. she. is. not. And I'm sick of hearing that aggravating notion that only by turning the heroes evil will they be interesting.

Then, we have a case of another sugarcoater who says that Rags Morales:

...rose to the limelight with the groundbreaking mini-series "Identity Crisis" and some of DC's top books such as "Hawkman," "JSA," and "Wonder Woman." - John Hardick, Pennsylvania Express-Times, March 2, 2008

For crying out loud, put a lid on it already!

And there we have it, everybody. Explanations why I am fed up to the chin with the MSM, and why you should be too. If you’re a newspaper reporter/editor, or even an employee at some internet website who’s going the knee-jerk route and sensationalizing awful nightmares like Identity Crisis and Avengers: Disassembled, bear in mind that you will not escape scrutiny here, and for your insult to the public’s intellect, thou shalt have your disgraceful propaganda engraven here in stone. Some people may be afraid to take issue with you propagandists. I am not, and for your sins, you will face your punishment by my judge’s gavel.

Profile: Batgirl 2

2006-11-18T10:09:00.000-08:00

Cassandra Cain, Batgirl 2
First appearance: Batman #567, July 1999, during the No Man’s Land crossover.

Current status: believe it or not, not only did she abandon the path of goodness that the Masked Manhunter’s Gotham family tried to help her find, ditto her secret ID, she’s now become the leader of the League of Assassins. Yes, that very League that Ra’s al Ghul founded back in the Bronze Age.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: her [illegitimate?] father, ganglord David Cain, never taught her real vocal or written languages. Rather, he just taught her how to study body languages, for the purpose of making her an assassin. When she joined up with the Bat-family, she did learn more about how talk and communicate, yet she still remained very limited in dialect, and was unable to accomplish much in mathematics, if at all.

Batman is also guilty on his own end regarding his personal failure to provide Cassie with an education (it appears that no Bat-writer to date has written Babs Gordon, her predecessor, as giving her a real education either). Nor had she been taught any real social skills, and the Masked Manhunter even went so far in taking control of her as to forbid her to have any real contacts with the superhero community (come to think of it, he probably didn’t allow her much activity in the general public either). Finally, to add insult to injury, she abandoned her superheroine’s role and became a leader for the League of Assassins.

What’s wrong with how this was done? No real character development for Cassie, as a result. One could reasonably argue that there was some kind of editorial restriction and sabotage that kept a character whom readers do want to like from having any truly positive developments, like how she comes of age with learning to talk and read books, and now that I think of it, such an argument could have something to it. In any case, the failure to actually develop her seriously, and then, the only thing DC Comics could think of doing with Cassie was to turn her into a crook, not to mention their refusal to cut it out with the Bat-control-freakiness, just goes to show how badly the concept of character development has dropped out of sight within the industry.

So, despite any claims to the contrary, this can serve as but a bit of proof that comics today are very far from being “realistic”, and that the writers, publishers and editors who put these books out don’t really mean what they say when they tell you that they’re writing something realistic, or even developing the characters in any genuine way. Time will tell if we find out that editorial heavy-handedness had anything to do with these negative non-steps taken.

Profile: Robin 1/Nightwing

2006-11-16T08:33:00.000-08:00

Dick Grayson, Robin 1/Nightwing
First appearance: historically speaking, Dick Grayson first debuted in 1940 in Batman, though by today’s standards, that would be regarded as the Robin of Earth-2, who, while he grew up, he never took on a different codename for himself, and has since been written out of continuity. If it’s the Silver Age we’re talking about, that’s a good question. I would say that the Dick Grayson we know today debuted in the mid-1950s. He took up the role of Nightwing in 1984, at the time taking his name from an old Kryptonian legend, later on just thinking of the name himself in post-Crisis years.

Current status: still a member of the current Outsiders, though whether you could call him a leader with the way it’s being written is remains in question.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in Nightwing #93, he was raped by a villainess called Tarantula.

That does sound hard to believe, doesn’t it? But, in the age of the internet, little seems hard to swallow anymore. The writer, Devin Grayson, and DC themselves, admitted that this was what happened, but put it lightly, saying that they had “non-consensual sex.” There are plenty of search results available on Google, and you can see which ones are the best.

It took seven issues until Nightwing went after Tarantula in issue #100, beat her in a battle and took her to jail, and even that was underwhelming.

What’s wrong with how this was done? It was pointlessly written, in the ways of a sloppy fanfic. In fact, now that I recall, Devin Grayson did dabble in fanfiction writing before she’d turned to comics writing, but which doesn’t make this any good.

Seeing as this took place during the same year as Identity Crisis came out, one could wonder: was it done as some kind of a moral equivalence to put alongside Sue Dibny’s own violation at the hands of Dr. Light, to show that they’re capable of writing a story in which even a male character is victimized? There’s no way to be sure, but, what proof does DC have that the audience is asking across the board for even male characters to undergo rape?

Whether the victim is male or female, it’s not justified and it’s not called for either way. Period.

Profile: Jade

2006-11-15T13:03:00.000-08:00

Jennifer-Lynn Hayden, Jade
First appearance: All-Star Squadron #25, September 1983. A few months afterward, she became a team member in Infinity Inc, the teens-to-young adults series that starred the offspring of the Justice Society, which ran 1984-88.

Current status: resurrected in Blackest Night 8.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: while she may have shone her metaphysically acquired GL’s light in Infinity Inc, where she was a team member when she first started out, in later years, she became a very underwhelmingly used (underused?) character. For example, in Green Lantern #111 Vol. 3, when she had a chance to really prove herself in saving John Stewart from the villainess Fatality, Jenny-Lynn instead finds her power running low, and it’s thanks to the fact that then paramour Kyle Rayner comes back from space at that very moment that’s she saved from being trampled by Fatality. She lost her powers again in the following issue, and while she did acquire some similar to those of her mother, the Thorn, it was only when Kyle became a superbeing called Ion that he restored her power. Courtesy of an editorial mandate, she ended up turning against Kyle in a cynically written finale to the 3rd GL volume by dumping him for another guy. In the latest take on the Outsiders, she had some of the weakest lines like “I should be leader.” Then, in the Rann-Thanagar War special, she was killed, or at least it seemed that way, and the powers she was carrying went back to Kyle, turning him into Ion again. She’s turned up as a ghost recently.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Green Lantern #111 Vol. 3 was a colossal ripoff – instead of writing it as a showcase in which she could prove herself effective with even a half victory,* it denies her even that much, instead relying on Kyle to save the day. The editorially mandated finale in the third GL volume did not help matters either. Nor does killing her off in an Infinite Crisis lead-in story help.

And there you have it. A green-skinned chick with potential, maybe even She-Hulk style potential, was repeatedly trivialized for the sake of the male characters, or lack of interest from the writers. In fairness, it is possible that editorial fiats could’ve played a role in sabotaging any pitched possibilities to give her a real spotlight.

Of course, this is also what happens when the audience fails to show the same interest and offer the same support for DC heroes as they may for Marvel heroes. Maybe the Identity/Infinite Crisis debacle will help to change all that?

Was there anything good to come out of this? There's fortunate news, that yes, room was left for Jenny-Lynn to return, as she did turn up as a ghost in one of JSA’s last issues, and towards the end of Blackest Night, she was revived. Those who understand that “there are no bad characters, only bad writers” would do well to take note of the fact that they have a chance to think up proposals that could hopefully help Jade make a good comeback.

We could even suggest writing more fanfics about Jade. I only found one fanfic, and she may not exactly be the main star.

* I say that because I remembered a story from Incredible Hulk #218 from December 1977 in which Doc Samson scored a partial victory against the Rhino. As some might agree, a story like that could work for a lot of other protagonists as well, Jade included.

Record: Chris Claremont

2006-11-12T08:27:00.000-08:00

Unlike most others, I don’t participate in the Claremont-bashing that’s cropped up in the past several years. Well, not for the same reasons most others do anyway. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything that I don’t hold against him in complaint; there is sadly some things, and while it may not be that long a list, here’s a few things on his resume which really anger me.

The Phoenix story, which first appeared in X-Men in 1979. What is it exactly that disgusts me about it? Is it that IMO, it runs the gauntlet of stereotyping a women as a mass-executioner? Well, that could be one of the problems I personally have with it as of today. But I certainly am furious about it because of all the imitations it’s led to! Which will come up next.
Some time after Jean Grey had been absolved of the Phoenix fiasco, along comes another story in which Claremont recycled the story again, this time involving one Madelyne Pryor, a clone of Jean whom Scott ended up marrying for a time before breaking up.
In 2003, in the JLA: Scary Monsters miniseries…AUGH! It’s the Phoenix ripoff again! This is when Wonder Woman comes under the influence of a cursed pond, and is subsequently turned into what was described as “Dark Diana”! In other words, Claremont had the chutzpah to actually reference his own past work in a way. But all I can say in response is – enough!
In 2001, when he wrote X-Treme X-Men, he killed off Psylocke needlessly, when noone was asking for it, for nothing more than shock’s sake. Well at least I can thank him for bringing her back 4 years later, and be thankful that Joe Quesada backed off of his ridiculous barring of resurrections (this certainly held true for writers of Claremont’s standing; some others seemed to be granted special privileges to do it whenever they wanted to).

Well, that’s not a long list, is it? But it does tell in some ways, if not all, why I take issue with Claremont, which is not that he does like strong chicks who can prove themselves in combat and stuff like that, but that he a]writes a story in which a pretty lady is turned into a lethal monster, and b]recycles it ad nauseum to the point of where I really ended up shunning it, and also c]that he led to a lot of writers leading to character assassination upon said pretty lady, by not being able to decide what she is or isn’t!

The Phoenix saga is one that must be brought to an end.

Profile: Batgirl 1/Oracle

2006-11-08T12:13:00.000-08:00

Barbara Gordon, Batgirl 1/Oracle
First appearance: Detective Comics in 1967

Current status: today, she works as computer master Oracle, the info broker in the DCU for many superheroes and other crimefighters.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in 1988, in Batman: The Killing Joke, she was shot and paralyzed by the Joker, who’d arrived at her apartment with the intent of striking at both Commissioner Gordon and his niece. After shooting her, he added insult to injury by photographing her in her helpless state.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Some could argue that it was sensationalism gone amok. Perhaps additionally troubling is that DC decided to put the premise in actual continuity, when writer Alan Moore hadn't intended it that way when he first began it.

Was there anything good to come out of this? The good news is that Alan Moore, when he wrote that special back in 1988, did handle it well, by providing Babs with her own viewpoint/voice, and handled it with a lot more sensitivity than what you find in many of today’s writers. Also, Babs has since become Oracle, and proved herself effective even in a wheelchair, both as a combatant* and as a computer whiz.

And since then, the really grisly elements of the Killing Joke, such as the Joker’s porn photography, have been discarded from continuity.

* Not that she actually does go around as a vigilante; far from it, but when danger's about, she doesn't ever cop out.

Profile: Jesse Quick

2006-11-01T07:59:00.000-08:00

Jesse (Quick) Chambers
First appearance: Justice Society of America #1, 1992

Current status: officially joined the JSA and married Rick Tyler, son of the first Hourman.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: Geoff Johns didn’t exactly make much use out of her when he wrote the Flash from 2000-2005, and in the middle of the run, in issue #200, he wrote that she put all her energy into Wally West to fight the new Reverse-Flash, but as a result of doing so, she knocked the exact connection she has to her father’s special speed formula, which she first began taking at a young age, out of place, and couldn’t access it properly.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Her act in and of itself may have been with noble intentions, to help stop a demonic fiend, but it doesn’t excuse the fact that Johns seemed to have done it simply as a way of all but writing her out of use, instead of trying to make some real use out of her as a character.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Yes, in that Johns at least didn’t try to go overboard with Jesse the way that other writers, Johns himself included, did with other femmes during that year of 2005. Speedsters do have some kind of luck, don’t they? She has since become the new Liberty Belle, the role first assumed by her mother, Libby Lawrence, and has married Rick Tyler, who himself takes up the role first assumed by his father, Rex. The scientific experiments the two of them worked on must've even had a real romantic impact on each other, since as of now, they are a smokin' hot item together, to the point of where it'd look like they're "joined at the hip."

Profile: Mockingbird

2006-10-26T07:26:00.000-07:00

Bobbi Morse, Mockingbird
First appearance: Astonishing Tales #6, June 1971

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: at the end of West Coast Avengers in 1993, where she’d been a longtime member, she was shot in the back and murdered by Mephisto. Hawkeye/Clint Barton, her husband for several years, became a widower.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Yet another pointless offing of a female character, and what really made it bombastic was that, as far as I know, Mephisto had never been interested in actually killing anyone before. Put another way, it wasn't like him to try and take anyone's life for real.

Since then, there’s been one story in which she turned up as a corpse in a plot conceived by the Grim Reaper to destroy the Avengers. Yet, she remains dead, with no clear way to tell if she’ll ever be revived to full life again or not.

Profile: Pepper Potts

2006-10-18T11:07:00.000-07:00

Virginia "Pepper" Potts
First appearance: Tales of Suspense #45, 1963. She was executive secretary for Tony Stark/Iron Man and his business firms. She’d been married to another of his employees, Harold “Happy” Hogan for a time, but later divorced.

Current status: working in other businesses today, she still maintains some connections with Tony Stark.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: the only storyline I know of where Pepper was given the PC treatment was in Iron Man #52-54, when she was brutally beaten by a woman of Muslim background (!) from a Chechnya-like country named Ayisha with whom Tony had a brief affair with at one point, who fell victim to the effects of one of Tony’s own inventions, a “living” form of armor, and because it was preventing her from maintain any proper life, and also making it hard for her to commit suicide, so she sought to try and push him over the edge by going to Pepper’s house and assaulting her, and, worst of all, terminating a pregnancy Pepper had in the story.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Aside from the fact that the Religion of Peace was being used as a whitewashed plot device in all of this, Pepper herself was also being used as a plot device, with the notorious cliché of an ill-fated pregnancy also figuring into the script. The story with Ayisha was also abandoned pretty quickly, as this all turned out to be an excuse for Tony to fight a son of the Mandarin who didn’t even don the electro-rings that made the Mandarin the challenge he was to begin with, and then to unmask his secret identity, an idea that was all but subsequently discarded. Presumably, it was also written so that Pepper and Tony could rekindle their relationship yet again, but Mike Grell, who’d written the whole quagmire, was taken off the book about a year afterwards, which is just as well.

With the way he wrote this, Grell proved even less convincing as a writer than when he wrote Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters. Pepper deserves much better than what Grell wrote in Iron Man.

Record: Ron Marz

2006-10-09T07:22:00.000-07:00

Ron Marz – talented writer or just a hack for hire? You decide. But while his work at CrossGen was good while it lasted, there’s still a few things during his career since the early 90s that are worth questioning, and one act that most definitely requires scrutiny. Here are a few examples as follows:

In 1992, in Silver Surfer #75, he killed off the Human Torch’s onetime girlfriend, Frankie Raye, who’d become a herald for Galactus several years earlier.
In 1994, he took the task that DC gave him – he turned Hal Jordan into a villain (Parallax) and slew the GL Corps, including female members like Arisia.
His most notorious step, and the one that serves as the leading example over on WIR, was the murder of Kyle Rayner’s original girlfriend Alex at the hands of Major Force, who slaughtered her and then stuffed her corpse into the home refridgerator in 1996. And the big defeat in all this was that Kyle did not have the guts kill the villain himself. Instead, Guy Gardner had to do it (or so he thought he had). If it was supposed to be part of his character development, it failed miserably, especially after, instead of creating a new, rank-and-file citizen as his new gal pal, they just resorted to a character who’s already well known – Jenny-Lynn Hayden, aka Jade, daughter of Golden Age GL Alan Scott. And Kyle still came across as a whiny wimp long afterwards.
To add insult to injury, when Marz came back to DC after his stint as a writer/editor for CrossGen in 2004, he broke up Kyle and Jade in a most appalling manner, running the gauntlet of character assassination, and then, Kyle, coming to visit his mother’s house, found what appeared to be a repeat of the murder of his girlfriend 8 years before, by an inexplicably returned Major Force. Though MF said in the last issue of Green Lantern #181, Vol. 3, that it was just a mannequin, it makes no difference, especially after the whimpery resolution, with Kyle initially giving MF his power ring and only briefly afterwards coming to his senses and seizing it back and crippling the supervillain with it. The worst thing about this is how it almost all seems to imply that Alex wasn’t worth it to begin with. And that almost sums up the biggest problem with Kyle Rayner himself to begin with – they practically built him into a wimpy whiner of a character who was never properly developed, and whose book was abused by one succeeding writer, Judd Winick, for spouting his own biased views.
Even at CrossGen, there was one thing Marz did that I have to take issue with: in this case, something he said in an interview on Sojourn featured in the 2nd trade collection when he said that Mordath’s troll-general going back to his village to help euthanize his mother was “very human”. I’m no expert on Dr. Kevorkian, but the very idea of euthanasia just sickens me personally, and I think that was very irresponsible of Marz to say that.

Ron Marz is definitely not without his high points in writing, but the above, to say the least, are not among them. If anything, they certainly do put a shadow of doubt on some of his career by implying that he was just a hired hack due to the fact that he'd wiped out Hal Jordan and the Corps plus a supporting lady, and all because the company wanted him to, so he did it their behest. Well, so it seems.

Profile: Starfire

2006-10-07T10:16:00.000-07:00

Koriand'r, Starfire
First appearance: DC Comics Presents #26, 1980

Current status: looks like she’s joined Adam Strange on a space adventure!

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: following her sister Komand’r’s vicious attempt to put her to death in a gladiator-like battle, and betrayal of their home planet Tamaran, Koriand’r was sold into slavery, abused by the many slavemongers who kept custody of her, before being, along with the evil sister who’d betrayed her, subjected to an experiment by a race of alien scientists who performed a light-energy experiment upon the two of them that gave the two sisters their starbolt powers. In 1993, in the 100th issue of New Titans, Raven disrupted the wedding planned between her and Nightwing, injecting an influence into Starfire that made her decide to take a flight off into space.

What’s wrong with how this was done? There was nothing wrong with how Koriand’r’s origin was done, but there was with how the botched wedding was. It was just a needlessly nasty way of avoiding the possibility of having Dick Grayson and the princess of Tamaran tie the knot.

Was there anything good to come out of this? In the case of Starfire’s origin, it’s what helped build her character, as a girl who’d been violated, yet maintained a thick skin and managed to keep an optimistic viewpoint as the New Teen Titans and other DC superheroes gave her new hope on earth. And, it helped establish many stories involving her home planet, Tamaran.

Profile: Lana Lang

2006-10-01T05:39:00.000-07:00

Lana Lang
First appearance: Superboy #10 Vol. 1, 1950

Current status: she’d been married to Pete Ross, the vice president of the DCU’s United States, for a couple years, but their marriage later became a shambles.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: there aren’t many I know of that Lana went through, certainly not as many as Lois Lane during the Silver Age (in fact, no, I don’t know of anything so far from around that time). But, in 1987, in Superman #2, she was captured by a fluke by two of Lex Luthor’s goons while they were trying to search the Kent farmhouse estate to see if there were any clues there that could tell who the Man of Steel was, and while in the clutches of Luthor back in Metropolis, she had the stuffing beaten out of her, all in order to get Superman into action to confront Luthor and his gang about this. In the Lost Hearts storyline from 2003, she’d fled from the vice presidential residence to look for an Asian teenager called Girl-13 who’d asked for her help, and while spending her time down in the gutters of D.C, she was taken in by a porn pimp who hoped to exploit her. And, there was even a storyline a few years ago in Action Comics where you could say she came under the exploitive pen of Chuck Austen, a would-be writer who’s now been forgotten with good reason, in a very poorly written story in which she and Clark try another fling with each other.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Referring to her assault at the hands of Luthor’s gang, that was all in order to give Clark Kent, who, at least in the post-Crisis era, had made her one of the first people to know his secret ID as the Man of Steel, and hardly any developments for her, if at all, a leading problem with some of the works of writer/artist John Byrne from around that time. And the Austen-scripted manure-fest was just typical of the incredibly insulting portfolio that he put out within just three years, about the time in which he lasted in the comics medium.

Was there anything good to come out of this? In the case of the assault in Superman #2, I guess it’s that Lana recovered pretty well in the aftermath. In the case of Lost Hearts, what works there is that Clark, when rescuing Lana from the pimp, gave her a wooden board and told her to let him have it, to show that she’s no pushover. And that, if you ask me, is much better writing.

Other than this, there’s little I know about what Lana’s history is like, so I cannot provide much further data.

Profile: Lois Lane

2006-09-22T03:34:00.000-07:00

Lois Lane
First appearance: Action Comics #1 in June 1938. Note that this entry could refer to all incarnations of her, including as a resident of Earths One and Two, and today.

Current status: now married to the Man of Steel, and ever the crusading-for-justice journalist she’s always been.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: Lois has been through many situations that do raise questions and certainly are telling of the times in which she’s lived. In the Golden Age, she’d actually had to make do with put-downs from her boss, Perry White, among others who argued that certain jobs were more fit for a man than for a woman, and which may have included Superman himself (when Roy Thomas wrote All-Star Squadron in the 80s, he didn’t make things all that different. At least, not in how I saw him doing it in the 1984 annual). During the Silver Age, we had absurd slapstick situations such as those seen in Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane, in which she got turned into “The Fattest Woman in Metropolis!” or even was depicted as a startling vixen. That series, in fact, did have a problem at times of depicting women as pea-brained, venomous, petty obsessed and were desperate for a mate with whom to fulfill their lives. Lois herself was shrewish, petty and a schemer in her own series, which is quite alarming when you’d think that she, of all people, would surely have been touted as the most likely candidate for being someone whom working women could admire in a fictional story. It was only after the series ended in the Bronze Age that things started to improve for her characterization. Of course, we should also note that in the Iron Age, she got stuck in the “Byrne Hold” at the hands of Metallo, all for the sake of it, and, more recently, there was also her plot device-ish depiction in Identity Crisis, with her being depicted more as an entity whose feelings were clearly not important, and who only served as a vehicle of importance to the male characters in the book. In a storyline written by Greg Rucka in Superman, she was also shot and injured while on the job.

What’s wrong with how this was done? In the Golden and Silver Ages, let’s just say that, if only people had been more wide-minded than they were at the time! Wouldn’t that have been wonderful? In the case of the Byrne Hold, excess is the word for how she ended up being picked up by the neck. And, in the case of IC, it was total contempt for her character and her potential.

The really odd thing about the Super-Family during the Silver Age, if any, was that they were probably the least realistically depicted group of characters at the time. Most other couples in comics at the time, certainly under the pens of Gardner Fox and Bob Haney, usually led much more plausible relations as far as these things go in comic book worlds with sci-fi, fantasy and surrealism involved. Clark Kent’s and Lois Lane’s, by contrast, may have been all but the most neglected under those terms, until the Bronze Age, and certainly until the Iron Age, when succeeding writers began to depict them in more grownup fashion, and didn’t go too far with the slapstick effects.

Profile: Wonder Woman

2006-09-21T07:44:00.000-07:00

Wonder Woman
First appearance: 1941 in Sensation Comics. But let me note that this whole essay could discuss any misuse of Diana (or Hipolytta) in all the incarnations she’s had since then, both Earth-1, Earth-2, and today, not to mention both mother and daughter.

Current status: the mother is dead, having been killed off during the Our Worlds at War crossover in 2001, and the daughter is, currently, still working but not the star of her own book (she's in the new version of Justice League of America). Instead, it’s Donna Troy who’s currently the star.

Was subjected to the followings acts of discrimination: let’s see, there’s the times when she would end up tied up with bondage, chains, and even her own golden lasso during the Golden, Silver, and Bronze Ages. She would be paralyzed by having her magic bracelets tied together as well.* And, in more recent years, there’s the time when John Byrne wrote her in much more pathetic, exploitative form when he wrote her book in 1996, the only good thing about it being the introduction of a new Wonder Girl, Cassie Sandsmark (and then other writers bettered him on that!). And then, there’s the parts in Identity Crisis where Diana was depicted alternately as a zombie-like tool for interrogating Slipknot, and then as apathetic.

What’s wrong with how this was done? On the early depictions, it depends on how you look upon it, as either guilty pleasure or just some embarrassing form of gleeful tomfoolery. On the later depictions, that I can address more easily. In a battle with Darkseid’s minions, when they invaded Themyscira and caused injuries galore, instead of going to cry alongside her Amazonian sisters, she went and collapsed in her then boyfriend’s arms. Unfortunately, considering the storyline, it was not the tongue-in-cheek pleasure it might sound like, and could be in a different story setting.

The depiction in Identity Crisis is even worse, because it’s symbolic of the massive sexism that permeats the whole miniseries.

* Donna Troy, by contrast, besides being born human, was not affected by such effects, and while her golden lasso did not have the same power and influence that Diana’s does, she could not have her strength paralyzed by locking her own magic bracelets together, and unlike her adoptive older sister during the Silver Age, she could fly authentically, which would mean that she could also levitate in the air.

Profile: Marrina

2006-09-14T13:38:00.000-07:00

Marrina Smallwood
First appearance: Alpha Flight #1 Vol. 1. She was a member of the Canadian super-team AF, plus a guest member of the Avengers, whom Namor was in love with, and when they married (briefly), she became queen of his newly founded kingdom of Deluvia.

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in Avengers #272, we discovered that she’d suffered from a disease that damaged her face, but which was fortunately cured (following this, she and Namor married). But the troubles didn’t stop there. In Avengers #291, she went insane as a side effect of pregnancy with sea animals(?) and transformed into a colossal sea monster called Leviathan, and two issues later in Avengers #293, her husband, prince Namor of Atlantis was forced to kill her with Black Knight’s ebony blade.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Why did the prince of Atlantis have to suffer two losses of loves? First Lady Dorma and then Marrina as well? I feel that’s going way too far.

I wonder if it ever had anything to do with Roger Stern’s being taken off the series at around that time. Maybe because he didn’t want to kill off Marrina, but TPTB did, and so Stern was ejected and replaced with Ralph Macchio, who wrote the book for about a year. But so far, I have no clear way of telling.

Profile: Lady Dorma

2006-09-13T12:11:00.000-07:00

Lady Dorma
First appearance: Marvel Mystery Comics #82, May 1947

Current status: dead

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in Sub-Mariner #37 Vol. 2, May 1971, just shortly after her marriage to prince Namor of Atlantis, she was murdered by asphyxiation (she could not breathe above water) at the hands of the evil queen Llytra of Lemuria, who coveted Namor for herself to consolidate the two kingdoms and increase her own ruling influence. She had kidnapped Dorma in order to blackmail Namor, but he found out and tried to stop Llytra. Unfortunately, the evil queen, deciding that, if she couldn’t have Namor’s hand in marriage, that Dorma couldn’t either, broke the water tank where she was holding the Lady hostage, and Dorma choked to death on the upper air she could not adapt to, dying in Namor’s arms, and leaving him a widower on the very same day he wed.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Although Lady Dorma was a very weakly written supporting character during her Silver Age appearances, engulfed with melancholy thought balloons about the male lead (and her willingness to tolerate Subby’s crush on Sue Storm, who was already engaged to Mr. Fantastic, did not speak well of Dorma’s backbone), that does not mean it wasn’t possible to improve upon prior characterization, and make her more of an interesting protagonist, even if she still maintained the status of a minor character.

During Heros Reborn, there was an alternate reality version of herself featured in that since-scrapped pocket universe, who was even more rabid in personality than her own predecessor had been. But that, if you ask me, was only screwing up in the opposite direction.

Record: John Byrne

2006-09-06T07:57:00.000-07:00

John Byrne may be well known as the writer and artist of many Marvel and DC series and characters, to say nothing of his being a ret-con machine (Marvel Two-In-One #50 may have been a precursor to what he really ended up doing in subsequent years as a ret-conner), but he may also be known for a lot of discrimination against women in whatever he’s worked on as a writer, even subliminally. Between his debut in comic books in the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s, there were quite a few books he wrote where sexism had a presence, even if you couldn’t always see it. To enjoy any of his works can often require big doses of salt. Here is my own list of discriminatory acts Byrne included in his own writing resume in years past:

In Fantastic Four #239, a young nine-year-old girl is shown having an abusive drunk of a father, so drunk in fact that he doesn’t care that he’s struck his kid with a rolled-up newspaper for neglecting her household chores in front of Frankie Raye, the college student and foster daughter of Prof. Phineas Horton, inventor of the original Human Torch, who discovered she had powers similar to Johnny Storm, the second Human Torch. At least Byrne didn’t torture us with any scene of if the drunkard dad did give his daughter any worse.
Sue Storm is later turned into an evil antagonist named Malice by a villain named the Psycho-Man (whose operation on her she may have described as “mental rape”), during which time she wears a skimpy and spiky leather costume while attacking the FF. After being freed from the effects and exacting revenge upon Psycho-Man, that’s when she decided to change her name to Invisible Woman – because her experience under Psycho-Man’s influence is what helped her to grow into one.
Frankie Raye later becomes Nova, the new herald of Galactus (and later dies in his service in 1992, in Silver Surfer #75).
In The Thing #3-4, during an adventure with the Inhumans, it was “revealed” that Lockjaw, Crystal’s faithful pet, was really another Inhuman, or humanoid, himself. Need I continue with how embarrassingly bad this was? Let me just say that Peter David later undid this in X-Factor, writing that it was a ventriloquistic joke pulled by two of the Inhumans themselves (not that even that was any better though).
On the FF #264’s cover, we’re treated to a scene of She-Hulk being kicked in the head. And that’s just one of the problems with whenever Byrne wrote some, if not all, of the stories involving Jennifer Walters. During Fantastic Four #290, when battling Blastaar in the Negative Zone, She-Hulk rips a panel off a control deck to use as a club. That’s as far as she gets at that particular point, since Blastie, who can’t stand seeing his ship getting torn up, stuns her with one of his built-in beams. And, when Reed Richards’ hometown in California was enveloped by a strange force covering where time seemed to advance much faster more than on the regular plane (issue #293), Shulkie gets dragged inside, and, while I don’t have the exact issues available now, I think we were treated to a scene of her having aged drastically, and needing to have the effects reversed. The vibe I got from that story seemed to be that girls couldn’t handle themselves on their own.
In Man of Steel #2, when Superman foils a convenience store robbery, there’s one woman among the four armed thieves, who makes the declaration before opening fire, “DON’T JUST STAND THERE, WASTE THE MOTHER!” If that implies what I think it does, it sure doesn’t sound feminine to me. After felling the 3 other male thieves with her, Superman then knocks the female thief unconscious with a mere finger flick, all in order to make it safer to remove and disarm an explosive charge she’s got under her trenchcoat. Presumably, this is to make the woman seem crazier that she could be.
In Superman #1, where Byrne reintroduced Metallo, originally a minor character in the Silver Age, the villain, while holding Lois Lane hostage to force Supes into action, raises her at arms length by the neck after she annoys him by scoffing at his codename. This has come to be known as the “Byrne hold”.
In Action Comics #584, during a fight between a possessed Superman and the Teen Titans, Superman, after breaking free from Wonder Girl’s lasso, takes her too by the neck, and mouths off with what could be construed as implied rape, before Jericho puts a stop to all that by possessing Superman’s body, after which the crippled technologist in whose body Superman’s mind now happens to be shows up, and soon, the minds are switched back to normal. Another disturbing thing about this story when I pondered it later on, was that it seemed almost like a takeoff on the "fanboys in the basement" stereotype that's been around for almost two decades.
In Superman #2, Lex Luthor's goons beat the hell out of Lana Lang, whom they captured quite by chance while trying to search the house of the Kents in Smallville. Sure, she's okay following that, but just what exactly makes that whole encounter any better than being drugged, which, as a medic working for Luthor says, she's allergic to?
During the Legends crossover, Granny Goodness also gets seized in the Byrne hold, as performed by Darkseid.
While Superman and Hawkman are battling an armada of alien ships, Hawkwoman is beaten up by a villain, who smacks her across the face.
Byrne's run on West Coast Avengers in 1990 is surely one of the worst examples on his resume. Tigra starts becoming more cat than human, to say nothing of savage, and when restraining her, the USAgent smacks her on the face, not unlike how Hawkwoman was smacked by a villain in Action Comics. And Scarlet Witch is turned into a cartoon villainess, cutting her adorable red curls and going tomboy, oozing with embarrassingly bad stereotypical villainy, and, when paralyzing the Avengers at one point, she scratches Wonder Man across the chest. All this in order to make her father Magneto look good, because he’s trying to argue honorably about how to deal with the hero guests, while as for Quicksilver, he was just boringly handled. And as for the Wasp, she was little more than attractive wallpaper. I didn’t read how Byrne’s own storyline had ended (I think he was taken off the book shortly afterwards), but by now, I don’t even care. It’s like leaving a movie in the middle and not caring what happens next.
In The Sensational She-Hulk, whatever parody there is notwithstanding, the whole notion of a pregnant woman (NOT Jennifer, if that matters) being tortured in issue #1 is just plain sick. As is the part in issue #2 where Jen’s in danger of being beheaded, and, come to think of it, even her just sitting around captive while Spider-Man bests the crooks.
John Byrne’s Next Men has quite a bit of the women-in-danger-of-torture theme too, with the Next Women, shall we say, being subjected to some of this discrimination as well.
In his run on Wonder Woman in 1996, John Byrne screwed up there as well, with WW being more quick to violence and less smart than usual. Women are in quite a lot of alarming jeopardy here, and the only good thing about his run on the book is probably that it was he who introduced Cassie Sandsmark as the new Wonder Girl, and most succeeding writers made better use out of her than he did! (Byrne even had the chutzpah to put down his own creation, as can be seen at the botton of Cassie’s profile page in the Titans Tower.)

So, there you have it, this is a lot of, if not all, of what underlines John Byrne’s resume, and not very remarkable when you look at it more closely. Recalling the premise of Identity Crisis, one can only wonder if writer Brad Meltzer may have borrowed a page from Byrne. Which would suggest then that Byrne, for all his merits, may have simultaneously been a contributing factor to the downfall of comic books.

(Note: this'll be the first of a couple of entries I'll do every now and then that'll look at the problem engulfing comic books by examining the writer's and/or the artist's resume. And I'll try to add more data to even this topic as time goes by. It's not easy to complete all at once, since I need more time than ever to figure out what examples to cite.)

Profile: Dr. Light 2

2006-08-28T10:28:00.000-07:00

Kimiyo Hoshi, Dr. Light 2
First appearance: during Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985

Current status: as far as I know, she’s in okay shape, and was recuperating in the hospital. More on this below.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: in Green Arrow #54-55 in 2005, during all the hogwash going in between Identity Crisis and Infinite Crisis, the male Dr. Light (whose first name is Arthur), in a continuation of the out-of-character depiction first ascribed to him by Brad Meltzer in Identity Crisis, scuffled with her and upon knocking her unconscious, siphoned some of her own power for his own use. She didn’t die, but she did end up in the hospital.

What’s wrong with how this was done? One big mistake is that Hoshi was being brought back only so that she could serve as a kind of plot device – though she didn’t die from Arthur Light’s attack on her, she was still just there so she could be injured. But that’s not all. In Green Arrow #57, Arthur Light gloated about the “joys” of rape, as if they couldn’t have made him any more loathsome and out-of-character than they already did.

In fact, that’s what really makes the whole story in Green Arrow during the Infinite Crisis standoff a megabomb disaster. Because it was yet more tiresome shock tactics, that also do little more than to destroy a rogues gallery villain whose past history shows that he never committed acts like rape before, nor did he gloat about it. And Kimiyo Hoshi deserves much better than even a story where she’s wounded and spends time in the hospital.

Profile: Jocasta

2006-08-21T09:45:00.000-07:00

Jocasta
First appearance: Avengers #162, 1978. Originally built by Ultron to be his robotic bride, during which time he unsuccessfully tried to subject the Wasp to a brain-drain in his secret HQ in Nassau County, New York so that her thought patterns would animate those of his mechanical bride, Jocasta developed an independent mind of her own, and became a regular member of the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.

Current status: since then, she appears to have been sent to the scrap heap.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in Marvel Two-In-One #92-93, while battling her own creator, Ultron, alongside the Thing and Machine Man, she was destroyed. In Avengers Annual #17, she was rebuilt, only to be demolished once again.

What’s wrong with how this was done? A weak way to get rid of even a mechanical maiden, and her being repaired in the Avengers Annual #17 just so that she could be blown to smithereens again was appalling.

In Iron Man Annual #11, her head, of all things, was given to Madam Menace, supposedly for repairing, but it appears that she never tried to rebuild her, or anything else.

(There was a Machine Man miniseries once that had Madam Menace rebuilding Jocasta in an alternative future world, but again, they avoided any genuine attempt to bring her back, ditto the possibilities of character development. Considering that they pulled it off so well with the Vision, himself a machine, one would have to think they could do something similar with Jocasta, but, as in quite a few other cases, female character/story development was avoided.)

Profile: Raven

2006-08-11T00:41:00.000-07:00

Raven
First appearance: DC Comics Presents #26, 1980

Current status: returned in the third volume of Teen Titans in 2003 in a new body of her own.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: the Titans may have said they’d like to help rid her of the curse she was burdened with ever since Trigon birthed her through the rape of her mother, Arella. But for a long time, they did not make good on their promises, taking far too long to deal with her own problems. Later on, she was corrupted by Trigon into becoming evil, though after the Terror of Trigon storyline in 1984, she was freed from this tyrant’s grasp when he died. But, in 1986, she was corrupted again by Brother Blood’s gang on their convicts island, during which time Dick Grayson had been taken hostage there and brainwashed as well, and the Titans had to rescue them. Several years later, in 1993, she turned to evil again, and attacked Nightwing and Starfire at their wedding ceremony (in the end, the marriage was not to be). In 1996, towards the end of New Titans, the heroes destroyed her body, freeing her from much of the curse she was under until then, and she was free to reassess her place in the universe. Several years after that, however, Brother Blood, in the guise of a teenaged minor, resurrected her into a new body.

What’s wrong with how this was done? Well it wasn’t that the Titans’ negligence ended up leaving her vulnerable to an attack by Raven’s father, Trigon, that was the problem. She had actually been freed of a lot of the landmines that made experiencing human emotions exceedingly difficult circa 1987, after the battle against Brother Blood at the time. No, what was the problem was that they had to revert back to this in New Titans #100, and for heaven’s sake, what was the whole point of influencing Starfire to go on a journey into space just to be a distance from Raven’s evil side?

And to be honest, Raven’s own story ended with her becoming free of her flesh in 1996, and I’d have to think that she’d be much happier by not having to be returned to a life in flesh and blood again. So if you ask me, bringing Raven back in the third volume of Teen Titans (this is sans the “new” in any of these titles, of course), was as uncalled for as a lot of other stories where the character’s own personal tale and odyssey ended after a specific time.