Amy Reads the Week (of February 3rd, 2008)

Yesterday, Mr. Reads and I went out to A Nice Dinner With Friends, and as it often happens while driving, Gentle Reader, talk turned to comics. There has been Great Hubbub in the World about the “new” Captain America, and this led, naturally—in the Reads Household, that is!—to talk of legacies. Mr. Reads told me that apparently Rumor Has It that Batman may follow in Captain America’s footsteps, so to speak.

“Who would you pick as Batman’s replacement, then?” This Humble Author asked Her Darling Husband.

“I’m not sure,” Mr. Reads said. “Probably Dick.”

I would prefer Tim, and said so, although We Reads agree that Tim’s desire to be a grown-up Robin is smarter and Much More Interesting than a desire to be Batman.

“What if Wonder Woman died?” Mr. Reads asked in the hypothetical questioning that We Reads often enjoy during car rides. “Who would you pick for her replacement?”

I thought about this, Gentle Reader, long and hard. Who would be a suitable replacement for the Amazon Princess? Wonder Girl is, naturally, the Next In Line, but I think Cassie is too young to take on the mantle. Donna? Never. Here is my Secret Confession, Friends: I loathe Donna Troy as a character. I am just Uninterested in her storylines, and find her a Poor Replacement for The Wonder Woman.

“Grace,” I said, after much deliberation. “If Diana were to die, Grace Choi should become Wonder Woman.”

Grace, like Barda, like Diana, is one of the characters that This Humble Author is most fascinated by. There is something about the Amazon, the statuesque, incredibly strong woman that intrigues me. Perhaps—just perhaps, Gentle Reader!—it is because This Humble Author never attained the height she felt herself destined to be. I am, dare I say, completely and utterly average. Too short to be tall, and too tall to be short. In the middle of it all, I never felt comfortable here. I aspired to just shy of six feet. I stopped growing several inches shy.

When I dabble in the more creative arts, I find my heroines, again and again, to be tall. Some are preposterously tall for their time, while others, well, most, hover just around 5’10. My heroes, too, are Rather Tall, and My Most Beloved Hero is an astonishing 6’5. But for Grace, for Barda, and for Diana, we are presented not with the statuesque woman, who is tall and slender as a weed, but rather, with the Amazon. The woman who is tall, and muscled, and very, very strong. Most importantly, when drawn well, these characters are Very Strong Indeed, as their image projects. Wonder Woman is never as fascinating as when she is meaty. Barda is nothing if not muscled. And Grace? As a Bana Amazon, she, too, follows along those lines.

I confess, Gentle Reader, that I have not yet read the latest issue of Gail Simone’s fantastic run on The Amazon Princess, and so thus I confess that I have no review for you today. But I do have it, and am excited to finally (!) have the time to read. So I should run away and do that very thing, no?

Mid-Week Musings #2 (on Writing, on Personal Life, etc.)

It has been a Rather Strange Year, Gentle Reader. No, no, I don't mean 2008, as it has just started! As an academic, I determine all of my years by academic time. That is to say, my year begins with the school year, August, and ends with the school year, May. I'm not quite sure where that leaves June and July in my calendar, but you understand my point, no?

I've hinted at--but never revealed--the trials and tribulations of the beginning of the Reads Year. Not because I don't enjoy sharing with you, Most Constant of Readers, but because I feel that Personal Life in Blogging should be a bit like the good seasoning of a meal: for emphasis, for enjoyment, but never heavy-handed. That is, My Personal Life has little if any bearing on my Pop Culture Life, except, of course, when it does. But suffice to say that I had been hit on all sides: professionally, personally, health-wise, life-wise, and I've stood up Stalwart and True for all that.

Now it is true that This Humble Author is, as pointed out, rarely, if ever, Truly Humble. I don't believe in false humility, and I think that women, in particular, often become deferential and subservient in attempt to Make Others Feel Comfortable. I am Most Fond of Making Others Feel Comfortable, but I am always hesitant to resist the simple "thank you" response to a compliment. So, too, do I Freely Admit when Things Are Going Well, the same as I Freely Admit when Things Are Not. If I've cause to complain about a service rendered, then I complain. But if I've cause to praise, I praise. I am a Great Letter Writer and Phone Call Maker, because I believe that feedback, in all its varieties, is a necessary part of life.

A rather presumptuous and lengthy preamble to say that Said Life Difficulties, of all varieties, kept me from performing as wanted and, dare I admit so publicly?, as expected, on my Dissertation. I adore my Dissertation, Gentle Reader. It is enjoyable and exciting and--here is the Lack of Humility--the tiniest bit innovative. But most importantly, it is fun. I love my research, I love what I do, and while sometimes--just sometimes, Friends!--writing feels much like an Uncomfortable Trip to an Eighteenth-Century Dentist, I love writing, too.

Today marks several things, but most interestingly, a dream in which the final outline of this chapter--yes, the one that has plagued me for So Long--presented itself. Mr. Reads went off to work this morning laughing as he anticipated the many calls he would receive during the day as a result of my faith of The Dream Chapter.

Yes, it's true, Friends: I am letting my writing be led by the random misfirings of my sleeping brain.

But having spent already several hours working, an hour of which (so far!) has been spent in the Act Of Writing, I can say With Great Certainty, that the Dream Revealed Chapter is going well for all of that. Also, too, and here is where This Humble Author feels confessional, I am almost weepy with happiness. I am writing again, Gentle Reader, after such a long hiatus. A hiatus full of work, work, work, and even work of the writing and rewriting variety. But here I am producing Something New, and speaking of things Just Discovered, and it is enough to make even the Least Humble of Authors the tiniest bit dizzy.

Looking at the time, Friends, I must confess that my self-appointed "break time" is now over. I believe the next break, somewhere around the Lunch Hour, will be spent in pursuit of a backlog of recent comics. Wish me Happy Writing, Constant Readers!

Amy Reads the Week (of January 27th, 2008)

I've little for you today, Gentle Reader, as I've just (!) returned from A Trip Across Country. Flying and I mix together as well as, say, Batman and disorder, or Wonder Woman and disregard for tradition. Suffice to say that I am home, finally, and safe for all of that.

I did, however, have several hours in various airports Across The Country, and read the second book in Tasha Alexander's delightful series about Lady Emily Ashton. A Poisoned Season kept me quite comfortable through the long, turbulent hours overhead.

Also, too, did Stephen King's much older novel, The Colorado Kid which Mr. Reads has begged This Humble Author to read for Some Time. I did, and enjoyed it, particularly as it accompanied a rather unexpected--but lovely nonetheless--bump up to first class. This Humble Author must admit that she found herself Not-So-Humble away from hoi polloi, and must agree that five-to-six extra inches of room gives one quite enough space for comfort indeed!

I intend fully to return to comics reading this week, and Gentle Reader, I will keep you apprised of happenings in the Reads Reading World. Until then, I say to you that the world is truly a dimmer place without Mr. Ledger in it, and We Reads mourn the passing of a talented, creative, and bold actor.

Amy Reads the Week (of January 20th, 2008)

Although you can’t see it, Gentle Reader, I’ve a six-inch cut along the length of my right arm at the moment. No, no, please, do not worry for me! It is a surface cut which looks Much Worse than it is. Pup Reads jumped up to kiss me, and in her haste, accidentally scratched my arm and not-so-accidentally reminded us that it was Time to trim her (now rather long) Pup Nails.

But I’ve somewhere Rather Important to be this week, and my immediate thought, after “Ow!” was What Would Important People At Rather Important Engagement Think Of Said Scratch, If Said Scratch Was Seen? Given the population of dog-and-cat lovers in the world, probably not much at all. People get bumps-and-bruises, aches-and-pains all the time, and my soon-to-be-scar looks exactly like the thing it is: the accidental result of an over-eager puppy owned by-—I’m rather ashamed to say—-lazy puppy parents, when it comes to nail clippings.

But in the course of this concern came another thought regarding the bumps-and-bruises, aches-and-pains that We, As Humans, wear on our skin. The Body fascinates me, Gentle Reader, as I’m sure you have sussed out for yourself by now. Not only have I written on this subject before—-gratitude, Ms. Healey, for the opportunity to guest-blog on the Delightful Girls Read Comics (and They’re Pissed)--in my blogging life, but I’ve written on it in my academic life, as well. The very materiality of the body—what it does, how it is viewed, how it varies from gender to gender, sex to sex, person to person, age to age—simply fascinates me. Triple the fascination, and make it A Super Body, and make it Capable.

By Capable, I mean, of course, Able. Aware. Conscious of its position as A Super Body and Willing and Able to use Said Super Body for the good (or, woe to us all, the despair) of the world. Make it have a sonic cry, or super strength, or the ability to heal or create sparklers or fly or protect itself in armour, it doesn’t matter. This Humble Author is, by some strange accident of design-or-literature, fascinated by the Super Hero’s Body.

Even more fantastic, the Super Body’s ability to return from the dead, or shift, to lose power or to gain it. To expand, exponentially, or to contract, to become non-super, and still, to lead a life of surprise, of danger, of yes, Capability. Even more fantastic, Gentle Reader, is the presentation of limitless possibilities.

For what is the Cape Genre but the very real enactment of limitless possibilities?

Sometimes, a hero dies. Sometimes that hero is brought back and sometimes, she is never gone at all. Sometimes the hero must live alone, and sometimes, the hero must live ever in the moment. Sometimes the hero moves from the big-or-little screen to the four-colour-medium (gratitude, Buffy), and sometimes he moves the other way entirely (gratitude, The Dark Knight). But the comic book medium, it seems, exists solely to present the un-presentable, the limitless possibility, the proof that anything is possible in the marriage between image-and-text.

Because both the image and the text have to exist in harmony, no? The Image must be real enough to be believable, and the Text must transport us, The Readers, to unbelievable worlds. The Image cannot give us too much because we, The Readers, must still have the chance to envision those unbelievable worlds for ourselves.

Making the believable unbelievable and the unbelievable believable. Is this not at the heart of science fiction? Of fantasy? Of fiction itself?

I think on these things as I think on the very real materialities of the body, particularly after reading a few new issues today: Booster Gold, Angel: After the Fall, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight, in particular. Each of these comics, in unique and interesting ways, deal with the idea of the Super Body, and its limitless—or in the case of Angel, limited—possibilities. What do we see when we see this presentation of Super Body? How do we, in our very limited, very ordinary, not-Super-at-all bodies, respond to these Extraordinary Beings? More importantly, is it why we return, again and again, to the Super Hero Tale?

Simply musings today, Gentle Reader, to go with a rather odd story and some very spectacular comic books. And I cannot recommend these three stories enough.

Mid-Week Musings #1 (Sarah Connor Chronicles, That "Wonder Woman Thing," etc.)

I don't dare declare (say that ten times fast, Gentle Reader!) that I am beginning a Mid-Week Column—heaven forbid such a commitment, during such a time in my academic life!—but one of my New Year's Resolutions was a deeper commitment to blogging, an activity I Adore and have, unfortunately, let fall by the wayside. Not for lack of love for you, Constant Readers! Oh, No! Rather, I have been Quite Busy, and the Fall Semester was Rather Brutal with its slings, arrows, quests, and trials.

But now a New Year Dawns, and here I am, ready, and eager, to regal you with my opinions-—humble though they might be!-—and ideas. I envision this column—-o, how I hesitate to call it such! rather, this ongoing attempt at semi-regular postings falling roughly somewhere between Tuesdays and Thursdays-—as a brief foray into thoughts regarding My Pop Cultures.

Also, this post marks Arrogant Self-Reliance's 100th blog post at the new address. A celebratory number, yes? Then let us celebrate, Friends, my uncanny ability to speak, ad nauseam, about subjects Near and Dear to my heart--and also, my uncanny ability to enjoy The Sound Of My Own Voice, whether verbal, cyber, or otherwise.

Away then?

1) The Sarah Connor Chronicles – this television show is everything I had hoped for with The Bionic Woman, which failed, utterly, to succeed. The Sarah Connor Chronicles is smart, fun, well-written, well-plotted, and very, very enjoyable. Bonus: Summer Glau.

2) Juno – Lovely, referential (as in, full of smart references for the People of My Humble Generation—-"Thundercats are go!") and just plain witty. It's not often I can call something witty and mean it.

3) Wonder Woman Controversy – Yes, Wonder Woman's creator enjoyed alternative approaches to the fulfillment of the so-called "baser desires." Yes, Wonder Woman was, herself, somewhat influenced by said approaches. Does that mean that the Wonder Woman iconography should be used to sell nothing but sex? Further, how does The Young Lady In Question offer anything that necessitates such a Grandiose Comparison?

4) The Spice Girls – are reuniting, and Portishead has not released a new album in years? My musical faith is crumbling, Gentle Reader. Crumbling.

5) The New Frontier – The Reads Household has pre-ordered DC's DVD of the wonderful novel, The New Frontier, and we are giddy, yes, giddy in anticipation of such a fantastic adventure in animation.

Why Are Married People Just Not Interesting?: Some Thoughts on the Parker-Watson Controversy

An "Amy Reads the Week" Special Edition!

As many of you know by now, Gentle Reader, I am married, these three years, to the intrepid Mr. Reads, himself a long-time comic book reader and fan. In fact, our shared love of comic books and All Things Geek—sci fi novels, zombie movies, Buffy, once-obscure bands we-knew-when—is what sparked our romance, those many years ago. And as Constant Readers of This Humble Blog are likely to remember, This Humble Author is, tried and true, A DC Girl. All things DC, but mostly of the Amazonian variety—and the Batman variety, and the Super-School, and Teen Titans (Go!), etc. etc. ad nauseam.

But what You, Dear Friends, may not remember is that Mr. Reads is Quite The Spidey Fan. That is to say, The Amazon Princess is to Amy Reads as Your Friendly Neighborhood Web-Slinger is to Mr. Reads. As I salivate for Diana Prince storylines, so, too, does Mr. Reads for Peter Parker. As I anticipate excellent writers on board Tales From Themyscira—give me your Ruckas, your Simones—so, too, does Mr. Reads anticipate excellent writers for Books From The Big Apple—your Bendises, your McKeevers.

And while yes, some people believe that the Marriage State is the antithesis of An Interesting Life—a life of comfort and “sameness” and perhaps predictability—I would disagree. Perhaps it is because I find Mr. Reads infinitely more fascinating now than I did ten years ago, when we first met. Perhaps—just perhaps, Gentle Reader!—it is because he has grown up in those intervening ten years, and I have had The Privilege of growing with him.

Edit: For those Constant Readers who are, perhaps, not Constant Comic Book Readers, the Editors at Marvel Comics have just (!) dissolved the marriage between Peter Parker (Spider-Man) and Mary Jane. Read more here.

Not unlike fandom, no? Not unlike my twenty some-odd years of fandom for Wonder Woman, or Mr. Reads’s twenty some-odd years of fandom for Spider-Man. We have had The Privilege of watching Our Beloved Characters grow up in these intervening twenty years—even farther and even faster, these thirty, forty, fifty, seventy years of existence. And frankly, we have had The Privilege of growing with them.

Now while Mr. Reads is Quite the Fanboy for All Things Spidey, All The Time, I must regretfully decline fandom of the same. Oh, certainly, I enjoy the Spider-Man, but I am not A Rabid Fangirl for him. Rather, my interest in Spider-Man stems, almost solely, from enjoying something that Mr. Reads himself enjoys so much. He says the same of his burgeoning interest in Wonder Woman. As I am and always have been a DC Girl, Mr. Reads is a Marvel Boy. He knows all incarnations of Spidey villains, their real names, their aliases, their strengths and weaknesses. His wealth of knowledge of All Things Spidey is somewhat daunting, admittedly, but perhaps because This Humble Author must then admit that it is due to Mr. Reads’s now thirty-plus years of Spidey fandom.

And while This Humble Author cannot claim the same for herself, she can, however, point to two of the best stories she has read in the Comic Book Universe: Jim Butcher’s novel Spider-Man: The Darkest Hours, and Sean McKeever’s Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane series. The McKeever is, perhaps, a given. It is a smart, fun, well-illustrated series that touches on the birth of the relationship between Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson. McKeever is a fantastically successful young adult writer. That is, Mr. McKeever is a fantastically successful writer of young adults. He portrays teenagers in a way that I remember not only as a former teenager, but also as a former teacher of teenagers. They are realistic, and charming, and the tiniest bit frightening.

But Mr. Butcher’s novel might seem a strange choice, particularly coming from a comic book fan. What This Humble Author enjoys about comic books could fill many more pages than This Humble Entry would warrant, but no small part of this is because comic books are the ultimate marriage of image-and-text. I am perhaps The World’s Worst Artist—many aborted attempts at art in my younger days lie as testament to this fact—and because of my rather horrifying non-talent in the artistic world, I find myself Rather Interested in Art, in general. I collect artists, one could say, in that the Brother-Reads-In-Law and the Best-Friend-Reads are artists, both, and Rather Free with the fruits of their labours. Chez Reads is peppered with such artistic endeavours, and it is Rather Lovely to say the least.

A novel of a comic book hero, then, severs that dependency on art, and forces the story to prose form. I am Quite the Fan of Mr. Butcher’s Harry Dresden series, and find him a wonderful writer. And he approaches an older Peter Parker, a married, employed as a high school science teacher Peter Parker, and he gives us a wonderful tale.

An interesting tale, one in which Mary Jane Parker is integral—yes, Friends, integral--to the story. An interesting tale that is in No Small Part dependent on the marriage of Mary Jane Watson and Peter Parker to carry the storyline. And, wonder of wonders—at least, it stands to reason, wondrous to Marvel’s editorial staff—it is fantastic.

A few months back when Marvel first announced its plan to sever the marriage between Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson, I asked Mr. Reads how he felt about a new single Spider-Man. “Unhappy,” he said.

Unhappy. A fan with purchasing power, a rabid fan some twenty- to thirty-odd years in the making, unhappy. Because Peter Parker is more interesting with Mary Jane than without her. Because Peter Parker, married and happy, puts more at stake than Peter Parker, single and looking. Because Peter Parker proves that nice guys do not Finish Last, and that smart complex people Do Find Love, and that super-heroes have lives that require some finesse to write.

Jessica Jones and Luke Cage are infinitely more interesting together, with a child, than separately. Even farther and even faster on the Avengers front, Young or Otherwise, Teddy Altman (Hulkling) and Billy Kaplan (Wiccan) are more interesting, together, than separately. Superman is never Quite as Fascinating as he is with Lois Lane, and who doesn’t love the idea of Bruce Wayne, adopted father to Tim Drake? Super-heroes have ties, be those Marriage, Relationship, Parental, or otherwise, and those ties, the humanity beneath the mask, make the super-hero worth reading.

Gentle Reader, I say these things not only as a fan of Mary Jane Watson (which I am), and not only as a wife of a Spider-Man fan (which I am). I say these things as a Fan Of Good Stories. And with this decision, I fear that Spider-Man has just become a Rather Uninteresting Story Indeed. I say this as a Fan Of Good Stories who has enjoyed Spider-Man tales that involve Spider-Man and Mary Jane, particularly a tale involving a married, settled Spider-Man. That is the Spider-Man who fascinates me. That is the Spider-Man I want to know.

Spider-Man was ever the Super-Hero of the People: not a rich playboy like Bruce Wayne or an alien from Krypton like Kal-El, but a kid from New York who threw on a suit to help people because his uncle taught him so. Because Aunt May needed money for the mortgage. Because he wanted to impress a girl. He was the science geek who read books and got picked on by the non-geeks. And in the end, he fell in love and married his best friend who accepted him for who he was.

What’s not to love in a tale like that?

We Will Soon Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Broadcasting

Greetings, Gentle Reader, from the rather ominous sounding 2008! I am home, yes, but drowning, drowning, drowning in beginning of term syllabus writing, preparation, and unpacking. "Amy Reads the Week" will make its 2008 debut on Sunday, at its regularly scheduled time. Until then, Friends, wish me happy writing, and let me recommend what proved to be the best book I read in 2007: Max Brooks' World War Z: The Oral History of the Zombie War. Run, do not walk, but do run carefully, to Your Local Bookstore and purchase this gem of a novel, now available in shiny paperback.

Happy Christmas from Family Reads!

Happy Christmas, Gentle Reader, or whichever Winter Holiday you choose to celebrate. If you choose not to celebrate any at all, happy day-off from work! We Reads have had a lovely visit with Family, and I must admit, rather blushingly, that Mr. Reads and I have Raked Up The Gifts. Video Games, gift cards, lovely bags, and of course, the gift of a stereo receiver for We Reads, to each other.

This eve, we head off into the wild to dessert with family and friends, and then, This Humble Author is Away to Quite the Snowy State tomorrow morning! See you on the other side, and if I do not see you by then, have a lovely New Year.

Amy (Belatedly) Reads the Week (of December 16th, 2007)

I know, I know, Gentle Reader: I am Woefully Behind on my weekly column. But I have little to offer you this week. There is a post In The Works on Ms. Simone's fantastic new issue of Wonder Woman, and I have some enjoyable--and critical--things to say about recent pop culture events, like The Golden Compass, I Am Legend, Life on Mars, finally back on BBC America, Mike Carey's recent Dead Men's Boots (interlibrary loan, How I Adore Thee), etc. etc. ad nauseam.

But rather, I will leave you with Amy Reads' Best of the Year Lists, as soon, the Readses will pack up the car for The Journey Home for the Holidays. Yes, Amy Reads, Mr. Reads, and the intrepid Pup Reads will endure a long car ride home in order to celebrate the holidays with the Reads Family and the Reads-In-Laws. Therefore there is Much Laundry to be done, Lots of Packing, Great Amounts of Housekeeping, and, of course, dissertation planning. I promise to update here and there, but consider this column, belated as it is!, as the last official "Amy Reads the Week" column of 2007.

That being said, let's away to the lists!

Amy Reads' Best of 2007

Best Album
The White Stripes - Icky Thump
runner up: Tegan and Sara - The Con

Best Novel
Joe Hill - Heart-Shaped Box
runner up: Chelsea Cain - Heartsick
runner up: Mike Carey - The Felix Castor series

Best Rediscovered Novel
Edith Wharton - The House of Mirth
runner up: Alan Moore - The Watchmen

Best Movie
The Coen Brothers - No Country for Old Men
runner up: Paul Greengrass - The Bourne Ultimatum (it was loads of fun, Gentle Reader, sincerely)

Best Rediscovered Movie
Brian Percival - North and South (BBC)
runner up:Sam Raimi - Spider-Man II

Best New Television Series
ABC - Pushing Daisies
runner up: NBC - Life

Best Continuing Television Series
NBC - 30 Rock
runner up: CW - Supernatural

Best Comic: DC and Imprints
Gail Simone - Wonder Woman
runner up: Grant Morrison - Batman
runner up: Brian K. Vaughan - Y the Last Man

Best Comic: Marvel
Joss Whedon - Astonishing X-Men
runner up: Brian Michael Bendis - New Avengers
runner up: Joss Whedon - Runaways

Best Comic: Independent
Joss Whedon - Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 (Dark Horse)
runner up: Brian Lynch - Angel: After the Fall (IDW)

Any thoughts to add to the mix, Friends?

Pride of Armaghetto

-or-
Jimmy Olson is “Misdirection” in Countdown to Formal Criticism!?!

It’s birthday time once again, Gentle Reader, and unlike last year, I am not suffering from a terrible virus, complete with hospital stay (!!!). In fact, it’s lovely and cold here in The South, and Mr. Reads and I are planning a long day of playing Spider-Man: Friend or Foe on the Wii. Part of my birthday present included all four Wonder Woman action figures, and part of it includes the following from Dear Mr. Reads. He has written us Quite The Delightful Read and has been so gracious as to grace us with his cyber-presence. Please join me in welcoming him to Arrogant Self-Reliance, and thank him for picking up my Blogging Slack as a lovely Birthday Present!

Hey! This is the apparently-so-called Mister Reads reporting live from wherever I am. (Find me and win a shiny coin!).

In point-of-fact, my long-running e-dentity in has been “Mister Fiction,” which, I suppose makes my married name “Mister Fiction-Reads”. Apropos, that. By that same measure, you can also call me “Mister Poetry-Writes” and “Mister Argument-and-Literature-Teaches-at-the-University-Level”.

You know what? Don’t call me that. However, it is in that latter role that I have been thinking about our four-color friends recently. I have been experimenting with using the graphic novel as a topic of discussion and an artifact of literature in classes for a few years now. This started when I created a prompt which required my students to defend what they were a nerd about— any secret hobby or passion— against an oppositional audience. I am amused by how many to date who have admitted to secret readers, collectors, closet cartoonists, and so forth. This has evolved into a variety of assignments that either critically dissect a graphic novel or expand on arguments made in the text to...blah blah. Yeah, you don’t care.

The long, shortened, is that after looking at V for Vendetta last Fall as a political text (discussing not only the book’s anarchic arguments and incorporating it into a wider discussion of subversive argument, but also comparing it to contemporary political rhetoric, other propaganda-of-the-deed culture jammers like Adbusters, and the lessons of Nell’s Primer in Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age), I decided to step back from heady political rhetoric and consider a lighter, “funner” book, like Pride of Baghdad, by Brian K. Vaughan and Nico Henrichson.

This is the closest you are getting to a spoiler warning: I’m not going to bother with spoiler warnings. The literature is in suspended animation on the page; let’s not concern ourselves with base worries about “surprise.” I’ve now read through the book two dozen times and I am still surprised by the end-- not what happens, but how and why. If you haven’t read the book, go read the book.

And here’s where I’m cruel. Not that I taught a book where Disneyfied, wholly humanized characters are killed because they ran into Man’s story of the current war in Iraq—killed by history in the guise of artfully faceless American soldiers. (It really is a powerfully realized scene, you should have read the book. Now it is ruined. Good job!) The cruelty is that I did everything I could to avoid lecturing on surface topics like “theme” or “plot”. I put this cunning book, with its complex, implicit political arguments, in front of students and would not untangle its sticky politics for them. For their papers (and, to a one, they outperformed my expectations-- good on them) they had free reign to look at what happens in the book and what it means, but for the sake of my lectures given and questions asked, I was more interested in the bare mechanics of the storytelling. The who, the where, the how seen. Why is the more “feminine” lioness the less maternal? Is the construction of the family in the story natural or artificial? Why is Safa's rape necessary to the plot? How is it more than a “women in refrigerators”-style attempt to achieve character-depth via rape? Why do we keep seeing the same panel construction at rhythmic intervals: the splash image of the lion straddling the reader's perspective, framed against a sky empty but for one bird, with a sprig of vegetation around the lion's foot? Why are the horses just dumb animals when all other animals are anthropomorphized?

Mini-lesson. To utterly mangle the basics of genre studies, as you'll see it in any literature textbook, stories can be broken down into constituent parts, mechanical structure without which there is no story. The common seven are (and usually discussed in this order) character, setting, point-of-view, plot, symbolism, tone, and theme. There are theorists who break this down and explain the mechanism, but what I have seen again and again, as a reader, a writer, an editor, and a teacher, is that, without the first three, nothing else works. You need one or more actors and they must stand somewhere—even a bare stage, even a foggy nothingness for them to flip coins in—and the audience must have a vantage. Without any of these three, there is no plot, no theme, no story. However, as long as these three elements are interacting, the rest just happens. It’s the basis of your local improv group. “Name me a profession.” “Give me a location!” An astronaut! In court! And the audience provides its own p.o.v. by sitting out of the lamplight, sipping overpriced microbrews or Italian Cremes and thinking “There is no way this will be funny.”

Advanced lesson. Imagine a hungry rat and a sleeping baby in a canoe. There is a definite tension, but it never breaks. Where are you in relation to it? Is it coming closer to you? (Feel that anticipation). Is it moving away? (Regret, anger, desperation?) Is it sitting still in the middle of the placid lake, forever out of your reach? As soon as the reader can orient his or her relation to the story, plot just happens, tone, symbols, and themes start accumulating.

Take a basic character: The Flash. Put him in a setting that brings some tension: a crater blasted into a Keystone City street. Does the artist lift the audience's p.o.v. to look down at the wreckage, shrinking our hero in perspective to a red twist in the dark pit, allowing us to literally look down at him? Does the artist set us down, looking past the glowing bolt of iconic lighting on Wally's chest and up at his jaw's determined jut just before he...

And that's where I took my students, as best as I was able. Playing around not just with close readings of the text, genre theory, smatterings of deconstruction and feminist theory, and Scott Morse's “gutter”, but intentionally leading them away from discussions of patriotism, war, politics, and so forth in favor of looking at characters, settings, and our forced perspective on the story. Because that last one, right there, that's what comics do that other art forms can't. We are encouraged to help create and maintain the character in the fashion of prose and poetry (not relying on an actor's interpretation) and having your point-of-view mobile but forced on you (as in film, or carnival rides). Pride of Baghdad gets this right; the story is about the lions and their interaction with the history of Baghdad. The nature of war is lagniappe. America's pride, which many of my students wanted to their deep heart's core to be at the center of the story, is no great actor in this story, nor was meant to be; it is a functionary of the plot, like Fortinbras, like Polonius. Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse, almost. At times.

This is what event-books like Countdown have gotten completely wrong. It has taken everything that comic books have to offer—visually strong, iconic characters, bold, imaginative, symbol-rich settings, and the aforementioned cinematic use of perspective—and thrown it away in return for that most mechanical of story-elements, plot. The dull accumulation of stuff happening. The slow arch—or in comics, the slow wave—of things going bad, getting better, getting worse, and a return the status quo. This is the process that even the writers themselves call “the illusion of change.” No one believes that Big Barda will stay dead, that The Hulk is “tamed”, that Black Bolt is gone forever, that Risk won't have revenge-fueled prostheses the next time we see him.

At some point, the writers and editors have cut corners or lost focus and misread that we would care about these things just because they happened.

Theoretically, we care about the characters and not the tragedy that befalls them. We care about Sue Dibny not just because of the wealth of stories in her past, but because we see the sorrow melt Ralph. I haven't talked to anyone who is upset about Bart Allen dying because it hasn't been treated as a real death, with real consequences for those around him.

It feels like it's just a plot, not a story.

I have had students over the years jokingly curse me because they can't just enjoy “good enough” anymore. They have to ask why there is so much anti-immigrant rhetoric in the Transformers movie, how the cases aren't thrown out due to the unjust behavior done in the name of justice on any episode of Law & Order, and so on. It's my favorite thing about teaching; I love being there when people teach themselves to ask questions.

I have to wonder though, as I read Countdown – Arena, exactly how we've reached this nadir again, where poorly drawn stories of interchangeable variations of recognizable icons stabbing each other in the eyes, posing, and shouting slogans can be “good enough” for anyone. Stuff happens, but we're never given reason to care. Following not just in the footprints, but in the same footwear, as the story-rich 52, Countdown seemingly is junking everything in the name of “stuff happening often.” The characters are two-dimensional at best, actions have no consequences, the settings vary between the middle of a deserted Metropolis street (“...A GOD DIES!!!”) to a deserted section of Apokolips, and our point-of-view is bleak.

There is a horizon, though, if we rise to see it. I just read Marc Guggenheim's Resurrection which is about anything but what you think it will be. And, at the end of issue #1, a book the author describes as answering the plotty question “What. Happens. Next?” is running instead on well-drawn characters reacting to their settings in a rich, intriguing way. I cherished much the same in the new Angel- After the Fall, The Goon – Chinatown and the Mystery of Mr. Wicker, and (once you push past the discomfort of some of the textual tricks) Alan Moore's The Black Dossier. I really could just read continuations of these stories for years without any expectation of big plot payoffs. I just want to see more of their worlds and meet more of the people who live there.

Before I go, I also need to give credit to two recent books which have managed to create plot-heavy books which are entirely balanced are just telling nifty stories, DC's Booster Gold and Marvel's The Order—not necessarily my favorite two books in print, but the hooks I'm hanging my hopes for the future on.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled Amy Reads. Thanks for letting me ramble.

Amy Reads the Week (of December 9th, 2007)

What an exhausting week it has been, Gentle Reader, as the semester, and the fall television season, come to a close. Mr. Reads and I have been Quite Busy with the End of Term, and the end of Filmed Episodes of all of our favorite shows. Only a few more now, and then we shall wait, patiently, for the Networks to give the Writers their due.

But mainly, Netflix--o, beloved Netflix!--brought all four discs of The Wire, Season 4, and Mr. Reads and I have drowned, maddeningly, in the tales of our Baltimore Friends. More on that soon, when I've had the Proper Time to Reflect. But let me do say this: The Wire is just about as Perfect as Television can get.

And we've just returned--just!--from seeing Beowulf in digital 3-D, and I must admit, it was beautiful. The story was perfect, as I'm sure you, Gentle Reader, can imagine, as it was written by two great writers, Mr. Gaiman and Mr. Avary. The pacing, the story, the suspense, the twists, just wonderful, truly. This Humble Author has heard people express their displeasure of the digital effects, and I truly believe that seeing it in 3-D eliminates all of the complaints I've heard about the film. This was a movie made for digital 3-D. I assure you.

Other delights this week have included the final Pirates of the Caribbean movie (with the Delightful Ms. Knightley as The Pirate King), the Futurama movie, and Super Mario Party 8 on the Wii, which does me A Great Disservice as a Gamer, because I apparently cannot role animated dice to save my life, or the life of Daisy. But I outstrip Mr. Reads and our nemeses, Waluigi and Wario, on gold coins, hands down.

It is a rainy sleepy day here in Chez Reads, Friends, and I find myself in need of sustenance in order to continue. But this week promises further delights, as We Reads will go see The Mist (finally!), the Golden Compass, and I Am Legend on Friday, for the Amy Reads Birthday Celebration. What more to ask for in this world than good Indian food and a promising vampire movie? Not much, I say!

Amy Reads the Week (of December 3rd, 2007)

Last night I was A Bit Ill, and unfortunately, Gentle Reader, this has been Quite the Usual Case this past semester. But one great advantage of feeling ill is the self-permission to lie down in bed and read. Not a Room of One's Own, per se (gratitude, Ms. Woolf), but it does allow one to let herself go, just for a moment.

So This Humble Author decided to read some graphic novels scooped up from the library, and on the docket were Iron Man: Director of Shield, Moon Knight vol 1: The Bottom, and the graphic novel version of Gaiman's and Avary's Beowulf. Beowulf and Iron Man are, of course, Quite Familiar to This Humble Author, but not so much Moon Knight. I was surprised and a bit pleased by the foray into Marvel Comic's answer to The Batman Question.

Ultimately, what I enjoyed most was the introduction (to me, at least) and what I can only assume for familiar readers, reintroduction to a rather varied and interesting cast of characters. Marc Spector is a man driven half-mad over his god's abandonment of him. He finds himself alone, seemingly abandoned by all those who love him and who he loves: namely, best friend Jean-Paul and girlfriend Marlene.

What he discovers in the end is that if one has friends, one is not alone. And Marc does have friends, two of them, who despite the horrors he has put them through (horrors unknown to This Humble Author who is Rather New to This Storyline), trust him, and help him.

Help, and trust. Trust becomes the most important piece of humanity in this work, as is revealed when Jean-Paul's partner--and therefore his sexuality--is introduced to Marc. Marc tells Jean-Paul, "You should have told me," to which Jean-Paul responds, "C'est merde, Marc. I did. [...] Every day. I told you with my trust. With my life. With the hundreds of times I risked my life for you. For your cause. Your... god."

Ultimately, this is a book not about the hero but about those with whom the hero surrounds himself. The ones caught in the crossfire. The ones who, like Jean Paul, lose parts of themselves in sacrifice to the larger quest. The ones who, like Marlene, love the heroes enough to tell them the truth, even when it hurts. Even when it wounds. She tells Marc, "We sacrificed everything for you! We gave up our lives for yours. But when it got hard? You quit." The hero quits, and it is those left behind who must pick up the pieces. Marlene, despite the fact that she and Marc are no longer dating, despite the fact that she tells him, at the end, "I like my life. I don't want to go back all that--" she loves, and helps, and trusts.

Ultimately, Gentle Reader, this is a book about the evolution not of a hero but of the hero's life, separate, perhaps, from the hero himself. Marc finds not that his life has changed suddenly, but that his life has been different, always different, from what he perceived it to be. And that is, in the end, an excellent way to reintroduce characters to familiar readers, and to introduce, for the first time, characters to a new reader such as This Humble Author.

This is a Dark Little Offering from Mr. Huston and Mr. Finch, and by the end, I found myself Quite Intrigued by the complicated and rich storyline. In particular, I found the complexity of the minor secondary characters, Marlene and Jean-Paul, to be Utterly Fascinating.

Now, however, I must return to Work, Work, Work, as it is That Time Of The Semester. Which means, of course, grading, writing, dissertating, and reading, always reading. But We Reads do have lovely plans for the future, including holiday trips and shopping and Much Festive Making, particularly for This Humble Author's 31st birthday celebration next week. Let us hope it is better than last year's, which saw This Humble Author felled by a nasty virus!

And yourselves, Gentlest and Most Constant of Readers? Any plans for the winter festivities to come?