| Author |
|
Mark Haslett
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 6419
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 3:13pm | IP Logged | 1
|
|
|
Peter: Me no understand.
**
Lol in complete agreement!
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133280
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 3:21pm | IP Logged | 2
|
|
|
Both Bond under Fleming and Holmes under Conan Doyle have coherent and consistent continuities. •• That's extremely generous!
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 4:19pm | IP Logged | 3
|
|
|
JB: When I was working on WONDER WOMAN, I had Nightwing appear. I
asked, simply for my own frame of reference, how old he was supposed to
be. I was told Dick was at that time 28. Which meant he had aged 18 years
since becoming Robin -- and so had Batman. And Superman. And Lois
Lane. Hard to maintain that Superman is eternally 29 when 18 years have
passed "on camera."
***
SER: An almost-thirty-year-old Dick Grayson is insane... and sad. The
"promise" of Robin is that he could become Batman when the latter retires.
The thirty-year-old boxer who isn't yet Ali is probably never going to
become Ali.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
|
| |
Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2364
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 5:07pm | IP Logged | 4
|
|
|
Whoever said 28 was crazy! Did "real time" take over for 5 years?
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Joe Zhang
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 12857
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 7:30pm | IP Logged | 5
|
|
|
The trouble with Superman is of course just a symptom of a larger problem. DC has no confidence in Superman, or most of their characters. Not in decades. Every few years the company goes through a spasmodic fit of attempted reinvention. What's different now is these episodes are increasing in frequency.
It would be easy to blame the dominance of Marvel for DC's chronic problems with self-esteem. But then again, Marvel has the same problem. Like back in the early 90's when Marvel desperately emulated Image, going so far as to hire Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld to do it for them. And in the 00's when they pursued the Indy and Manga styles as if it were a do-or-die thing for them.
Edited by Joe Zhang on 09 February 2016 at 7:32pm
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
e-mail
|
| |
Kevin Hagerman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 15 April 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 18017
|
| Posted: 09 February 2016 at 11:04pm | IP Logged | 6
|
|
|
The most important thing I ever learned about Superman is that Clark Kent is
Superman, not vice versa. Completely changed how I read the stories.
—
Kevin, would you explain what you mean and how it impacted your reading? *** I was never a huge DC reader but of course I knew Superman. How could I not? But I didn't, not really. I saw Clark Kent as a sham Superman hid behind, which doesn't really make any sense in retrospect. And when I read JB's stories (the first time I really got into the character) it brought out that Clark Kent was an incredibly realized, relatable person. He didn't pine for a Lois he could never have because he was competing with this Other Self, for example. Superman was the alter-ego. When JB wrote Reed Richards, it was as if his superpower was being a genius ("I do try to maintain as broad a base as possible, yes.") and his stretching power was virtually just something that made it easier to whip up a planet-saving frammistat from the contents of a city block. And with Superman, Clark Kent's decency was the extraordinary thing and being invulnerable, flying, and super-strong just increased the ways in which he could go out and fight the good fight.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Wallace Sellars
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 17698
|
| Posted: 10 February 2016 at 9:23am | IP Logged | 7
|
|
|
Thanks, Kevin. I thought that's what you were saying about the Clark
Kent/Superman relationship, but wanted to be sure.
Oh, and I agree.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
|
| |
James Woodcock
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 September 2007
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 7778
|
| Posted: 10 February 2016 at 5:16pm | IP Logged | 8
|
|
|
CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS, for me, is the start of where we end up today.
Prior to this, comics may have done multi-part stories that 'fixed' certain things. COIE was a multi-part story that took in the whole line, to fix a problem that wasn't really there, or if it was, could be fixed by not talking about it.
Think about now, comics seem to lurch from one multi crossover, fixing something, to another. Whether it's bad characters, continuity or something else, it's all about the continuity now, not about the character at all. Stop trying to fix things, all they are doing is making it more complicated.
Just tell different stories.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
e-mail
|
| |
Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
|
| Posted: 10 February 2016 at 5:49pm | IP Logged | 9
|
|
|
Superman as the "real" identity instead of Clark Kent is an example of a
premise that didn't make much sense other than it was always the premise.
Superman had a home in the Fortress of Solitude with technology that
could alert him to disasters far more effectively than anything at a
newspaper office. And his powers had increased to the point that he could
hear "cells divide" anyway. If he wanted to "relax" as a normal person, he
didn't need to be Clark Kent -- he could honestly be himself -- Kal-El -- by
shrinking and entering the bottle city of Kandor, where all the citizens knew
who he was and treated him like a "normal" person.
Of course, that wasn't the popular publicly known premise: Superman is
mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent, so they stuck with it even though "Clark
Kent" only complicated Superman's life. And his adoptive parents were
dead, so he might as well have just killed off Clark in an "accident" and
moved on.
JB's change in MAN OF STEEL made sense of the classic premise. Clark
doesn't have a "fake Batcave" in the North Pole. He lives like a normal
person (more normal than even Bruce Wayne) in a one-bedroom Metropolis
apartment. And he's a reporter because that's what he's good at. Oh, and
his adoptive parents are still alive, so it makes even more sense for him to
still live as Clark Kent and not Superman 24/7.
Unfortunately, it didn't take long for these barnacles to develop again.
Creators can't resist the Fortress of Solitude for some reason -- even
though it's just not as cool (uh, no pun intended) as the Bat Cave.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
|
| |
Sergio Saavedra
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 August 2007
Location: Spain
Posts: 454
|
| Posted: 11 February 2016 at 5:24am | IP Logged | 10
|
|
|
If I'm not wrong, Superman had been in existence for some 20 years when they begun to introduce elements such as the Fortress of Solitude, Kandor, Supergirl, Superboy, Superdog, multicoloured kryptonites, etc. I wonder why it is so difficult to get rid of those elements, specially when today's target audience is much older than in the early 60s.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Dave Phelps
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4184
|
| Posted: 11 February 2016 at 6:13am | IP Logged | 11
|
|
|
The Fortress was about 5-6 years in and Superboy was around 10, but you're correct about the rest. Thing is, it's been 50 years since the last of them so they're all pretty entrenched now.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Peter Martin
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 March 2008
Location: Canada
Posts: 15945
|
| Posted: 11 February 2016 at 6:50am | IP Logged | 12
|
|
|
I wonder why it is so difficult to get rid of those elements, specially when today's target audience is much older than in the early 60s.------------------------------- With regard to the fortress of solitude, it's in the Reeve's film, which means a lot of folks will see it as being a core element.
I don't think something being introduced a number of years after the initial formative years necessarily makes it any easier to strip out. Kryptonite didn't appear in a comic until more than a decade after Superman's debut, for example.
While I agree that Kandor and the Fortress are barnacles, they may be the favourite element of the mythos to somebody, somewhere, which is where the resistance comes from.
I suspect a lot of people (me included) have a soft spot in their heart for Krypto.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Topic Closed)
