Not Really About 2009...
This post has very little to do with 2009, but it does have to do with something that many nerds, including seemingly everyone around me, is anticipating--The "Watchmen" movie.
For anyone who hasn't read the book, I recommend that they do; not because I think it's the greatest comic book ever written, but because I want people to understand what spawned the sorry state of modern mythology today.
When "Watchmen" came out, it was part of a small movement to rethink heroics (along with the equally misguided works of Frank Miller) and re-allign them with the Charles Bronson revenge-mindset of 1980s American pop-culture. Unfortunately, the book did well. The book did so well that everyone writing superheroes decided that all superheroes need to be grim, tragic figures with chemical addictions or psychotic obsessions. If any of you happen across the book "The Greatest Science Fiction Films NEVER Made" you'd find a wonderful interview with Alan Moore, in which he regrets that he'd written Watchmen because everyone completely missed the point. At least he can admit it.
But I'm not angry at Alan Moore. I'm angry and movie studios and the fans who blindly believe them. The "Watchmen" trailers declare that the story is "the most celebrated graphic novel of all time." Recently converted comic book fans, converted no-doubt by "sin City" and other "adult" stories (as if hookers running around with katana is adult or mature) are actually believing the hype. The are reading Watchmen as if a new testament to the Bible has appeared from the skies. They sit around applauding it as the greatest story anyone could tell in this art-form.
Anyone who has actually read comics for more than a year will no that Watchmen is not "the most celebrated" anything. Watchmen, for all its supposed innovations, is simply a darkening of the superhero genre. That's it. The only truly literary thing about it is Alan Moore's ability to weave in and out of interlocking themes and styles of the same story. But the 1908s also saw the release of another comic book series, one that is actually "adult," and that is Art Speigelman's "Maus." Speigelman's book is the only comic to ever win the Pulitzer Prize. Ever. It was the first book (apart from Will Eisner's 1970s books that are just NOW being embraced by the new "fans") to do with adult stories and a truly mature storyline.
Anyone wishing to see comic books be viewed as equals to "normal" literature (as if being equal to "Twilight" is a compliment) should help these poor souls, these new "fans" of comics, and introduce them to better things before Hollywood convinces the entire populace that the greatest gem the comic world has to offer is more dark anti-heroes throwing people out of buildings.
And for god's sakes, do it before they actually start believing "The Spirit" is in anyway related to the source material.
For anyone who hasn't read the book, I recommend that they do; not because I think it's the greatest comic book ever written, but because I want people to understand what spawned the sorry state of modern mythology today.
When "Watchmen" came out, it was part of a small movement to rethink heroics (along with the equally misguided works of Frank Miller) and re-allign them with the Charles Bronson revenge-mindset of 1980s American pop-culture. Unfortunately, the book did well. The book did so well that everyone writing superheroes decided that all superheroes need to be grim, tragic figures with chemical addictions or psychotic obsessions. If any of you happen across the book "The Greatest Science Fiction Films NEVER Made" you'd find a wonderful interview with Alan Moore, in which he regrets that he'd written Watchmen because everyone completely missed the point. At least he can admit it.
But I'm not angry at Alan Moore. I'm angry and movie studios and the fans who blindly believe them. The "Watchmen" trailers declare that the story is "the most celebrated graphic novel of all time." Recently converted comic book fans, converted no-doubt by "sin City" and other "adult" stories (as if hookers running around with katana is adult or mature) are actually believing the hype. The are reading Watchmen as if a new testament to the Bible has appeared from the skies. They sit around applauding it as the greatest story anyone could tell in this art-form.
Anyone who has actually read comics for more than a year will no that Watchmen is not "the most celebrated" anything. Watchmen, for all its supposed innovations, is simply a darkening of the superhero genre. That's it. The only truly literary thing about it is Alan Moore's ability to weave in and out of interlocking themes and styles of the same story. But the 1908s also saw the release of another comic book series, one that is actually "adult," and that is Art Speigelman's "Maus." Speigelman's book is the only comic to ever win the Pulitzer Prize. Ever. It was the first book (apart from Will Eisner's 1970s books that are just NOW being embraced by the new "fans") to do with adult stories and a truly mature storyline.
Anyone wishing to see comic books be viewed as equals to "normal" literature (as if being equal to "Twilight" is a compliment) should help these poor souls, these new "fans" of comics, and introduce them to better things before Hollywood convinces the entire populace that the greatest gem the comic world has to offer is more dark anti-heroes throwing people out of buildings.
And for god's sakes, do it before they actually start believing "The Spirit" is in anyway related to the source material.