NO FOOL LIKE AN OLD PRO

 By odd coincidence, just as I decided to devote a little attention to the oeuvre of Gerry Conway, I became aware that back in May of this year he'd been fulminating against manga, as covered by this BOUNDING INTO COMICS essay. The substance of Conway's rant is that he wishes Japanese manga would be taken to task for "rampant sexism and misogyny."

Some respondents to the piece were quick to point out that Conway was a hypocrite, given that he had a hand in creating one of DC Comics' most outstanding (ha ha) sexy heroines, Power Girl. 

There's a pinch of truth in this riposte, but on the whole, I tend to think that Conway only barely sexualized Power Girl in the few "Justice Society" stories for which he was responsible. I suppose she basically fits with the "titillation" category I suggested here, but the stories are just basic superhero fare, so for the most part any later hyper-sexuality attributed to Power Girl in later years is really not Conway's fault. Further, though I have not read all of Conway's work, I would tend to state that in all of the considerable number of  stories that I have read, Conway tended to "work clean." Some of his collaborative artists-- particularly Wally Wood, the co-creator of Power Girl and her boob-window-- had a strong effect on how some of Conway's stories turned out. Further, if I were to compare Conway to another mainstream work-horse like Doug Moench, my verdict would be that Moench works a lot more sexuality into even theoretically G-rated material than Conway ever did. 

But even if one agrees that Conway tended to work clean, does that in any way validate his opinion of the Japanese manga industry, beyond the level of a statement of personal taste? Any regular reader of this blog will know that my own taste allows for quite a lot of transgressive material in my reading, so clearly my answer is likely to be "no," even IF Conway had mounted an articulate campaign against sexy manga. His tweets against "sexism and misogyny" as cited in the above essay provide no examples of the things he found offensive, and in a follow-up tweet, cited here, Conway merely conflates all manga sexism with the fetishization of underage girls.

Another riposte against Conway is that, even though at one point he largely left the comics field for the greener fields of television, he's filled with envy of the way that manga has eclipsed American comics-work in terms of American purchases. This is certainly very possible, though in theory one would not be wrong in pointing a particular publisher's sins despite the success of that publisher's wares. But Conway's tweets don't even come up to the level of Frederic Wertham's fulminations, which were often misleading and poorly sourced at the best of times.

In contrast, even though I have similar disagreements with Tony Isabella for a more recent tweet on comic-book sexuality, at least his rant is more focused. This month he was apparently filled with high dudgeon because DC Comics still makes use of the character Deathstroke, whom Isabella claims to be guilty of "child molestation." This article on BIC speculates that Isabella's ire may have raised because DC is due to debut a new mini-series, "Deathstroke Inc"-- which would be the first time the popular villain would enjoy his own series since his nineties feature.

I personally have little investment in the character, beyond recognizing that he has generally proven to be an effective villain in other characters' features, though considerably less so as a headliner. His claim to fame in the "offensive sexualization" sweepstakes is clearly his dalliance with the underaged psycho-villain Terra in NEW TEEN TITANS.

I thought the original sequence was nothing special. During their lauded NEW TEEN TITANS gig, creators Marv Wolfman and George Perez had put forth a number of stories in which Evil Older People attempt to take advantage of Pretty Younger People, whether in a non-sexual sense (Batman constantly bullying Robin) or in other sexual scenarios (the Greek god Zeus attempting to seduce Wonder Girl). It's my opinion that when Wolfman and Perez depicted, somewhat obliquely, a relationship between forty-year-old Deathstroke and fifteen-year-old Terra, the creators were just flogging a new version of a clansgression-trope they'd been using to good effect. I don't remember that in the day the storyline became a huge controversy, but in any case, it's now become enough of a hot button issue that some DC raconteurs even rewrote the story to elide the offensive material. 

Isabella's rant, though more focused, is not any better articulated than Conway's. Even though Wolfman and Conway presented Terra as both violent and demented, current politically correct fans have tried to eradicate any sense that she might be responsible for her own actions. The relationship, whatever it was, must be entirely the fault of the older man. To be sure, Isabella himself does not demand that the character should cease to exist, the way Conway would apparently like to see all manga scourged of their transgressive content; Isabella seemingly just wants to make sure Deathstroke doesn't star in any new series. Surprisingly, Isabella doesn't make an issue, as does Conway, of a deleterious effect on young readers, though I would not be surprised to find that to be one of his considerations.

The thing that both of these "old pros" have in common is the notion that comics in general ought to be held to the standard of the mainstream industry for which they have worked. Unlike a lot of the Journalistas of decades past, I personally can appreciate the need for a "G-rated" mainstream, and I've not been especially sanguine about the virtues of underground comics and their "let it all hang out" aesthhetic. But as far as I'm concerned, the genie got out of the bottle as soon as the American comics-medium became inevitably focused upon older readers. Some of these readers may yearn for the simple G-rated comics of their youth. But sex sells as much to them as to anyone else, and if current comics have any advantage over current Hollywood, it would be that the former can still occasionally do good stories (as well as bad) with transgressive sexual subject matter-- which I may define a little more extensively in a future essay.

AGREEABLE YOU

"I find it disturbing that Lois is so incredibly hot as a villainess."-- Tony Isabella, 1000 COMICS YOU SHOULD READ.









While thumbing through 1000 COMICS for a separate project from my current Kantian considerations, I came across the above quote from Tony Isabella, and immediately thought, "Is he kidding?" I've seen a lot of "incredibly hot" drawings of sexy women in comics, but few things seem less sexy to me than a drawing of Lois Lane by Wayne Boring.

Not that Boring was incapable of drawing a sexy woman: as I'll touch on later, he had such ability. But his renderings of Lois Lane are usually pretty "boring," eyepatch or no eyepatch.

However, Isabella's statement is an ideal illustration of Kant's concept of "agreeability." If the image of a villainous Lois Lane seemed sexy to Isabella when he encountered it, then he wasn't wrong, just as I am not wrong to find it uninteresting.

Such is the domain of Kant's category of "the agreeable," which is governed entirely by one's personal response to sensations, whether those sensations are real or conjured forth by the gestures of arts and entertainment.

Kant doesn't address the question in CRITIQUE OF AESTHETIC JUDGMENT as to whether or not there exist some raconteurs better able to evoke sensations of agreeability in large audiences. For instance, since Bill Ward was much better known for sexy drawings than Wayne Boring, it should follow that Ward was better able to evoke the kinesis of sexuality than Boring was, at least on a statistical basis. Possibly Boring could have done the same things Ward did had he wished to; perhaps his DC editors encouraged him to draw Lois Lane a certain way. All critics can judge, of course, is the final result.

Now Kant states that one's opinions on the "agreeable" (as well as the "absolutely good," which I'll put aside for this essay) do not carry the same forcefulness, the same insistence that others should acquiesce to that opinion, as do opinions relating to "the beautiful" and "the sublime."

I think Kant is somewhat refuted, in practice, by any number of Internet forums where individuals do indeed propound their personal likings with the same force as any "pure judgment of taste," and do indeed want all to acquiesce. However, Kant's theory is still good as a means for judging whether or not there is a species of reflective taste-judgment that rises above the level of personal interest.

I agree with Kant that such judgments do exist, though I note that he probably wouldn't have agreed with my belief that they can apply to popular fiction. Nevertheless, as my example of such a judgment (as well as demonstrating that Wayne Boring could draw sexy women when he so wished), I present this scene from the Jerry Siegel-Boring tale "Superman's Return to Krypton" (SUPERMAN #141, Nov 1960).









Once more I'll repeat the adumbrated quote that best sums up Kant's attitude toward the beautiful and the sublime:

"The beautiful in nature concerns the form of the object, which consists in its being bounded. But the sublime can also be found in a formless object, insofar as we present unboundedness..."-- Section 245.

Now, I don't agree with Kant that the only way one can judge something beautiful in his "disinterested" state is if the judgment can be proved (via logic) "universally valid." For me, dominant patterns alone demonstrate valid, though it's unlikely they could ever be deemed "universal."

Interestingly, Douglas Wolk, in trying to demonstrate the beauty in the images from "ugly" comics, asserts their value (in part) by "the way they function as part of a narrative."

By this criterion (which may or may not correctly represent Kant's rather convoluted take on "purposiveness in that which has no real purpose"), "Superman's Return to Krypton" would be more beautiful than "Lois Lane-- Outlaw" if one could demonstrate that the audience that experienced both stories found the former more dominantly "purposive" than the latter.

Obviously one cannot ask every comics-reader of that time period which story they found more "beautiful." However, a close structural reading of the former story will reveal a greater complexity than that of the latter story. If a disinterested appraisal of beauty stems from the human animal's ability to see the semblance of purpose in aspects of nature that have none, then the story that has a greater refinement of structure-- even within the boundaries of juvenile pop-fiction-- must be viewed as the "fairest of the two."

As for the sublime, in Kant's quote above he connects it with one's experience of the presentation of "boundlessness." The 1960 SUPERMAN story is certainly not primarily about "boundlessness," and yet in the romantic scene I show above, the hero and his new (and doomed) Kryptonian girlfriend is played out against a riot of elemental forces-- rainbows, lava-surges-- which mirror not only the passion of the lovers (in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY fashion) but also the unstable forces that will destroy Krypton.

There's another sense in which pop-culture stories can be sublime, beyond their actual depiction of "boundlessness." But I'll save that for a future essay.

THE MAYBE-THIRTY-PERCENT SOLUTION

The above title refers to the percentage to which I agree with Tony Isabella's choices in his new book, 1000 COMIC BOOKS YOU SHOULD READ.

I put in the "maybe" because of the "organizational problems" I mentioned having had with the book. Most of the time I can't tell whether or not Isabella is recommending particular comic books-- that is, the whole package as a collector would get it from a vendor-- or particular comic book stories. If Isabella had chosen one or the other, I could be surer of my percentage calculation, and thus I would've been able to satisfy the principal reason fans will have for buying the book: to check their lists, real or pending, against Isabella's.

I can't imagine any other reason for buying the book, as the sheer quantity of individual entries make the book pretty hermetic to someone not already acquainted with the history of comics. I can't see the book serving as an introduction of young readers to comics, despite the suggestion of same in Isabella's explanatory essay:

"...this book will introduce you to some of the best comic books ever published and the amazing writers and artists who created them."

I suppose that the book *could* introduce new readers to certain comics that they'd never heard of, but I think operatively speaking, only hardcore enthusiasts are likely to give it a shot. I think Isabella would have to look long and hard to find young readers to whom his book was a thoroughgoing "introduction."

In the same paragraph as the above quote, Isabella addresses his real audience:

"I won't include every milestone or even the best of the best. I'll most likely omit some of your favorites due to that pesky limit inherent in our title."

See what I mean? What do newbies know about milestones? How often do they have their own lists of "favorites?" Only hardcore fans are going to care about a project this detailed and time-consuming.

It's also a project which I often felt should have been titled 1000 COMIC BOOKS YOU SHOULD READ AT LEAST PART OF.

For instance, whenever Isabella recommends a collection of stories, such as the ENEMY ACE tales of the Silver Age, I think it's implied that Isabella thinks that everything in it is worth reading, and that satisfies the implications of his title.

Yet he also says of some entries, "Due to space limitations, I generally focus on just one story in any given issue [of an anthology title]. Those same limitations are why I also list just one or two writers or artists per issue, even though many more individuals contributed to these issues."

Thus, for instance, ACTION COMICS #1 is Isabella's first selection, and its only credits listed are for the first Superman story, implying that in this case that's the main "part" that Isabella's readers should be concerned with.

OTOH, for choice #12 Isabella recommends PLANET COMICS #1 not for any particular story, but for the whole package, because it "was the first comic book devoted entirely to science fiction."

I don't doubt that this kind of herky-jerky organization is exactly what Isabella wanted. And I can't say it will bother any of the fans who are its main audience, though I would think the whole point of making a list is so that others could easily check it twice or more.

I think Isabella's book would have been a more solid concept had it focused purely on spotlighting comics in one of two ways:

(1) Comics considered as whole packages-- which includes everything from a single issue's cover, which sells the book, to interior hype-tools like letercols and editorial soapboxes-- as well as collections of whole runs:

Or,

(2) Particular outstanding comic-book stories, whether they were stand-alone tales or continued arcs.

Since Isabella is a writer, and since he does have an encyclopedic knowledge of particular stories, I think he'd have done better to go with the latter.

Admittedly, I'm prejudiced in that I've often contemplated a list of outstanding stories that would combine the best of genre-comics and artcomix.

Also, had Isabella been more consistent, he also would not have tripped himself up as much. In the opening he writes:

"I will cheat our title at every opportunity, often counting collections, runs of issues, and story arcs as if they were merely single issues."

I don't have a problem with this. But once Isabella gets to the Silver Age, he's conferring two separate spots to separate parts of two-part stories, like JLA #21-22 (see pages 117-18) and FF #25-26 (pp. 121-22).

See what I mean about the difficulty of comparing one's own pending list with Isabella's? How can you trust someone who tells you he's going to cheat but doesn't cheat in the precise way he's said he will?

The other major failing of 1000 COMIC BOOKS is that Isabella, despite his warning about landmarks, all too often selects a given comic just because it launched a particular character or group of characters.

Sometimes this is appropriate. While it's true that the first BATMAN tale is nothing special as a story, one can see the beginnings of the Batman mythos in it, and this qualifies it as "exemplary" (which specialized term I'll explore more in THE EXEMPLARY AND THE EXCEPTIONAL PART 2).

In contrast, though, Isabella also selects AMAZING ADVENTURES #21, apparently for no reason than because it was the debut issue of writer Don McGregor on the book's main feature KILLRAVEN. It's true that McGregor was the most important writer who contributed to the opus of the character, though I've pointed out in BACK ISSUE #14 the importance of contributions by earlier writers as well. But the artist on AA #21 was Herb Trimpe, whose work there was some of his worst ever. Had KILLRAVEN struggled on with his art or something of similar quality, had the feature never enjoyed the creative visuals of Craig Russell, fans probably would not remember the series any better than SKULL THE SLAYER. McGregor was an important factor in the series' critical reception, but not, as Isabella's entry implies, the most important factor.

There are many other points on which I could carp (DARK KNIGHT RETURNS didn't make the cut, but an issue of TEEN TEMPTATIONS did?) But by and large the volume does at least communicate how much Tony Isabella loves comics, and even if I can't use his list for comparison purposes, it's hard to fault him too much.