Welcome to the eighth installment of Comics Bulletin's reviews column devoted to DC's Wednesday Comics. In this week's column, I will be making a few comments about the series in general and about issue #8 in particular.
It's difficult to comment on weekly one-page comic strips without "spoiling" the action. However, efforts have been made to minimize the problem of giving out too much of the story. Be aware, though, that some spoilers may be embedded in the following commentary.
Thom Young: 
For this installment of "Wednesday Comments," I had planned to analyze and discuss the verse that Walt Simonson has been writing for the Demon's dialog in "The Demon and Catwoman." However, the Demon doesn't appear in this week's strip; his alter-ego Jason Blood does.
I could go back and look at the installments from weeks five through seven, since I haven't commented on those issues--and I might do that as a special edition of "Wednesday Comments" at some point before DC's weekly series ends. This week, though, I'm pressed for time as the deadline for this column looms (and then went passed, unfortunately), and I have a narrow window in my schedule in which I can write it.
In other words, no labor-intensive analyses this week of the breaks in the rhythm and meter of the Demon's verse. Instead, I'm offering a quick observation and then it's straight into the brief comments about each strip.
As you can tell from my bullet score of 2.5, I've lost a lot of enthusiasm for this series. For the most part, my declining interest has been due to the quality of the writing rather than the illustrations. More specifically, the problem is with the plots and the pacing of most of the stories.
There are a few notable exceptions where the plots have been better than average. However, most of these strips seem to be either losing their original focus or are dragging along as if the writers are just waiting to wrap up things in four more weeks.
I've hit upon a possible reason for this problem with the plots. It's that the editor of Wednesday Comics is DC's art director, Mike Chiarello. I am beginning to suspect that he has paid more attention to the look of Wednesday Comics (and it really is a beautifully designed package) than he has to the substance.
Visually, all of the strips are striking (even "Teen Titans," which has a style that doesn't personally appeal to me, but is usually well designed nonetheless--save for Donna Troy's lack of a face in the first installment). Yes, individually, the strips are great visual treats. Moreover, it's obvious that the entire package was put together by an art director who has a great sense of graphic design.
However, it seems Chiarello hasn't devoted as much time and energy in making sure the writing was on the same level as the illustrations. Aside from "Teen Titans," I wouldn't call any of the writing "bad" in terms of dialog, narrative, the integration of exposition, et cetera. Rather, the problems are in effectively using only 12 pages (albeit broadsheet pages) to tell a story that needs to be read in weekly installments.
It's perhaps telling that of the fifteen strips running in Wednesday Comics, only four of them are being written by men who began their careers as writers:
- Brian Azzarello on "Batman";
- John Arcudi on "Superman";
- Kurt Busiek on "Green Lantern"; and
- Neil Gaiman on "Metamorpho"
However, Arcudi is also the only one of the four who has not had prior work that has been held in high esteem among critics. Thus, it's the work of Azzarello, Busiek, and Gaiman that has been more of a disappointment. I suspect Chiarello has allowed the writing on all fifteen strips to go through with minimal oversight on his part--trusting his writers to deliver serviceable stories while he assembled illustrators whom he knew could deliver great visuals.
Perhaps due to Chiarello's background as a painter and art director, nine of the strips (60%) are being written by men who began their careers as graphic artists--either in the comic book industry or in film and animation:
- Dave Gibbons on "Kamandi";
- Dave Bullock on "Deadman";
- Paul Pope on "Strange Adventures";
- Jimmy Palmiotti on "Supergirl";
- Ben Caldwell on "Wonder Woman";
- Andy Kubert on "Sgt. Rock";
- Karl Kerschl on "Flash Comics";
- Walt Simonson on "The Demon and Catwoman";
- Kyle Baker on "Hawkman"
Thus, it's not surprising that the strips those five men are writing are five of the better stories since those writers should have a greater insight into not only how to illustrate for the broadsheet page but also how to write for it. Of course, it doesn't hurt that Gibbons has worked on weekly comics in the UK or that Palmiotti is essentially married to his illustrator on "Supergirl."
However, while those five strips are five of the best, only two of them have stood out as excellent over the first seven weeks (i.e., before this week): "Kamandi" and "Strange Adventures." The other three--"Supergirl," "The Demon and Catwoman," and "Hawkman"--have been mostly good, but they haven't been as good as "Kamandi" and "Strange Adventures."
Finally, the other two strips are being written by men who have had little (if any) experience in writing stories before Wednesday Comics: Eddie Berganza on "Teen Titans" and Dan Didio on "Metal Men." Both men's qualifications for being used as writers in Wednesday Comics would seem to have more to do with their positions at DC than in having a strong background as writers.
In theory, though, good story editors should be competent writers as well, and Berganza and Didio both have had years of experience as story editors, and so Chiarello probably didn't work closely with them on the development of their plots and how their stories would be paced. Didio's writing on "Metal Men" has been serviceable, but Berganza's "Teen Titans" remains my least favorite of the fifteen stories running through the periodical.
Other critics and I have commented in detail about what's wrong with the writing in "Teen Titans"--particularly in last week's column and in the column that I wrote for week four, so I won't beat a dead horse by continuing to point out the flaws in that strip.
Anyway, if Wednesday Comics returns next year--and I sincerely hope it does--then DC should make certain that as much attention should be devoted to the quality of the writing as is devoted to the quality of the visuals. Now here are my impressions of this week's installments:
"Batman" (Azzarello & Risso): This 2.5-bullet story might make more sense if I were to sit down and re-read all eight pages at once. However, at the rate of one-page-per week, I've lost track of the story's minutiae.
Unfortunately, Azzarello is not providing an initial caption that summarizes "the story so far." As it is, I don't recall what role the first victim's widow has in the murders nor who is being framed for what. I have forgotten what Batman knows (and when he knew it).
Azzarello's "Batman" will probably all make perfect sense when it's completed and assembled together in a collected edition--but that's not what the experience of reading these strips should rely upon.
Yes, it's great to be able to sit down and read an entire weekly story (such as "Prince Valiant") in one book that collects all the installments in one package. However, readers of the weekly Sunday Comics sections decades ago didn't have the eventuality of a collected edition to look forward to--nor did most of them bother to keep all of the previous installments so that they could re-read them each week before looking at the latest chapter.
"Kamandi--The Last Boy on Earth" (Gibbons & Sook): With "Kamandi," there aren't any minute details that have to be remembered each week. This 4.5-bullet story is being told on a grand scale, and the events are easy to recall from one week to the next. Nevertheless, Dave Gibbons provides a summary box at the beginning of each installment, and that consideration is very appreciated.
The summary boxes may seem odd when the strip is eventually collected into consecutive pages, but that's how all of the old Sunday comic strips read in their collected editions. When I read weekly strips that have been collected (such as Titan Books' collection of "Dan Dare" strips from Eagle), it's easy to skip over the box that relates "Our story thus far."
This week's installment of "Kamandi" was every bit as good as the previous seven.
"Superman" (Arcudi & Bermejo): It's not fair to say that this 2-bullet story is going nowhere, but it's certainly getting there slowly--and the destination doesn't look particularly interesting. This latest installment seems to confirm what I suspected would be the case--that the extraterrestrial in the first installment launched some sort of psychic attack that caused Superman to think that he "wasn't connected to Earth and everybody here."
The Man of Steel wonders, "How did I lose my way?"
I can tell him how. Bad writing.
Arcudi never sold the idea that Superman's sudden case of doubtfulness was authentic. It always seemed that it was either a case of Arcudi not understanding the character or the alien psychically influencing Superman. Either way, it would have been a case of bad writing on Arcudi's part. Now we simply know which way the bad writing went.
It's that Arcudi tried to make the readers believe Superman would have these doubts when he (Arcudi) only had six pages (weeks two through seven) in which to convince us. This story is a prime example of the writer not taking the weekly format and the limited number of pages into consideration. To sell longtime readers that a character with 71 years of history would develop authentic doubts about his life, Arcudi would have needed to write a lengthy novel--not a lengthy graphic novel, but a lengthy novel.
Chiarello should have sat down with Arcudi and mapped out the plot in terms of the limited number of pages. They would have found that the story Arcudi had planned couldn't work in 12 weekly pages. But, hey, at least Bermejo's work looks great!
"Deadman" (Bullock & Heuck): What looked like a potentially interesting murder mystery in the first two weeks has turned into a strange 2.5-bullet story of a demonic Bluebeard whose murdered "wives" are consigned to a hellish dimension that seems to be part of the demonic Bluebeard's psyche (or something like that). In all of this, Boston Brand has regained corporeal form.
Why has he regained corporeal form?
Uhm . . . it seems to be for no reason other than to allow Dave Bullock to be able to make the danger to the protagonist seem real. He has essentially deviated away from the conventions of a Deadman story in the same way that Jack Kirby did when he used the character in Forever People #9-10 back in 1972. In that story, Kirby gave Boston Brand a New Genesisian synthetic body that he could possess so that he could once again have a corporeal existence.
It was not one of Kirby's finest moments, and this "Deadman" strip is starting to rank up there with it. Fortunately, Vinton Heuck draws a nice-looking page that is reminiscent of the animated Batman series that he worked on a couple of years ago.
"Green Lantern" (Busiek & Quinones): Other than the title design, all Populuxe elements have been abandoned in this 3-bullet strip. While the logo says late 1950s to early 1960s, nothing else in the story brings that Populuxe era to mind. Even the astronaut-training flashback failed to capture a sense of that time when test pilots were examined to see if they had the right stuff.
My initial interest in this strip was in seeing a Green Lantern story that reflected the zeitgeist of the late 50s and early 60s. Instead, Busiek and Quinones have delivered a pedestrian story of Hal having to help his former pal from metamorphosing into an extraterrestrial bug. It's kind of like a main course of a generic superhero story that comes with a side order of watered-down Franz Kafka by way of a 1950s sci-fi plot.
All of the elements are there that can aid in invoking the desired zeitgeist, but the appropriate design elements were abandoned and Busiek's writing isn't good enough to pull off the effect on its own.
"Metamorpho" (Gaiman & Allred): Well, I'm sure my colleague (and boss) Jason Sacks absolutely loved this week's installment (I state, with a great deal of sarcasm).
While I haven't minded Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred's inclusion of offbeat design elements like a "Snakes and Ladders" game (though I haven't loved them either), this week's trek across the periodic table of the chemical elements was not only tedious but also pointless.
Actually, it was pointless to show it to us in this manner. The actual point in the story, of course, is that Metamorpho and Urania need to "put the right element on the right square in the right order" on a grand periodic table in order to prevent an antimatter beam from disintegrating them (or something like that).
However, this board game in which Metamorpho and Urania move from square to square while Gaiman emphasizes one or more letters in their dialog that correspond to the letter symbols for each element on the periodic table is just tedious and pointless in terms of maintaining the interest of the readers.
Yes, in a way, it's rather clever.
However, in a greater way, it's just tedious to read and visually boring to look at.
Rather than read the pointless dialog that is constructed to emphasize chemical symbols on the periodic table, I'd have much rather seen Allred illustrate our two Element People morphing into each element while we see the effects that the chemical processes have on the mechanism they are trying to unlock or prevent or whatever it is.
What's worse, the installment ends with the threat that this 2.5-bullet strip will give us the periodic table part two next week.
Won't that be a Euphoric thing to see?Gaiman and Allred seem to be having a lot of fun--or at least one of them is, though I can't necessarily tell which one.
Yes, I'm sure you agree it will be very Good.
I know I can't wait to see that Table next week.
However, I don't believe the majority of their readers (if any) are having fun with this story that mostly seems intent on treading water. I get the sense that it was essentially a three- to five-page story that Gaiman and Allred have needed to pad for the other seven to nine pages.
"Teen Titans" (Berganza & Galloway): This 1.5-bullet story is still bad, and still for the same reasons I've given in previous columns.
"Strange Adventures" (Paul Pope): What has consistently been one of the two best strips in Wednesday Comics each week dropped in quality this time to make this a 3-bullet installment.
Alanna-Sardath arrives at Ragathan, the mysterious city of the Northern Rock People (that seems to be their name). She introduces herself and is escorted into the Throne Room of the Royal Blood where she proceeds to deliver a compelling speech.
However, it’s a speech to which we aren't made privy. Instead, we get an authorial intrusion (I can see no other possible source for this narrative other than the author) in which we're told, "It's a pity no transcript exists documenting the words which transpire on this fateful night, for the daughter of Sardath is known to be skilled in the subtle arts of rhetoric + persuasion."
It seems likely that Pope simply couldn't write any compelling rhetoric that he could fit into the two panels he devoted to Alanna's speech. He would have run the risk of critics like me pointing out why Alanna's speech isn't convincing. Thus, instead of showing us Alanna's convincing rhetorical skills, Pope chose the easy way out by telling us she has amazing skills in rhetoric and persuasion.
I was also confused by the ending of this week's installment. The blue baboon at the end who says, "The Zeta Beam will be mine" is Lord Korgo--whom I believe led the attack on Ranagar in the first installment. Why does he suddenly show up in a panel inserted into Alanna's pact with Zotar, son of King Pithor, and former childhood friend of Lord Korgo?
And why does the pact between Alanna and Zotar cause Korgo to claim, "The Zeta Beam will be mine"? I'm certain the answer is forthcoming and that this strip will return to its previous high level, but this week's caption-heavy installment was a dud due to Pope choosing to tell us information through authorial intrusion rather than reveal it to us through characters interacting with each other.
"Supergirl" (Palmiotti & Conner): Even though I'm giving this week's installment 3 bullets, the story seems to have entered a mode of "spinning its wheels" as we wait for the conclusion to come. In this case, Palmiotti and Conner seem to have come up with an idea (the misbehaving adventures of Krpto and Streaky, the Super Pets) that couldn’t' be sustained in a 12-page story.
The first few weeks of mischievous shenanigans were cute, and my seven-year-old daughter had a lot of fun reading about her namesake (Kara Zor-El) chasing Krypto and Streaky as they went from one playful misdeed to the next. However, the weekly misadventures couldn't be maintained for long.
Two weeks of Aquaman being too busy to help, and now this week's installment of Dr. Mid-Nite running tests on the Super Pets while Supergirl reveals her attention-deficit disorder by channel surfing at a rate of one second per channel all seem to be time wasters rather than significant chapters that factor into a greater plot.
My daughter, Kara, lost interest in this story a few weeks ago. She hasn't asked to see it lately, and I can't say I blame her. Still, it’s a charming diversion that is far from a chore to read. In other words, its charm saves it from a lower bullet rating.
"Metal Men" (Didio & Garcia-Lopez): I'm also giving "Metal Men" a 3-bullet rating. It's just a conventional story that ends with a minor cliffhanger each week.
Even though it has the minor cliffhanger ending, Didio's story could (and perhaps should) run as a 12-page backup story in a standard comic book. There is no character development from week to week, and the plot is flowing like molasses in winter.
Chiarello should have sat down with his boss (Didio) and worked on the plot and the pace of the story long before the first issue of Wednesday Comics went to press. He probably just said, "Whatever you want to do, Dan, you're the boss!"
Didio's story is serviceable in an average way, and it's really Garcia Lopez's work that makes this strip a delight to see each week. I only wish it was as much of a delight to read.
"Wonder Woman" (Ben Caldwell): The colors on this strip are no longer murky. The strip is no longer filled with small panels that would be too difficult to see well if the colors were still murky (which, thankfully, they no longer are). Finally, the font that Caldwell is using is no longer difficult to read because it's no longer being written as small as he can make it because his story is no longer text heavy.
Whew!
At least all of those things are true of this week's 3-bullet installment (and there was a marked improvement last week as well, but this week there is even more improvement). It would appear that Caldwell heard the complaints (or recognized the problems on his own) and made the appropriate changes to his approach.
Rather than the 60 panels per page that he had been giving us, Caldwell scales back considerably this week with a mere 22 panels--which still sounds like a lot, but the effect is much better (especially now that the colors are no longer murky, did I mention that already?).
Some of the 22 panels are still very tiny, but that's due in part to one giant panel in the center of the page that depicts Fenrir, the Wolf of the Ragnarök in Teutonic mythology (also known as Fenris, as he is here, or Fenrisúlfr).
Why is the great wolf of the Ragnarök in a Wonder Woman story that you think would focus on elements from Hellenic myths?
That's a good question, but Caldwell has been having Wonder Woman meet and greet myths from other cultures throughout these dream adventures she's been having in this strip.
It doesn't actually make sense, but these are dreams after all.
The most obvious question is: How can Wonder Woman dream about elements that are associated with the myths of other cultures of which she should be unaware (given her youth and sheltered existence on Themyscira, Paradise Island)?
That's another good question. If I were to approach this topic for an academic paper, I would bring in the works of Carl Jung and discuss archetypes and his concept of the Collective Unconscious--which are things I sincerely love to bring up in academic papers.
After weeks of not working, this strip is finally starting to achieve what Caldwell seems to have been trying for all along. Some stronger editorial guidance before the first installment went to press would have been in order, but Caldwell appears to have finally managed to get a handle on the story he wants to tell and how he wants to tell it in a way that works with this weekly broadsheet format published on newsprint.
I still think Caldwell's story would work better as a 192-page standard-size graphic novel, but at least its becoming clear that he really did have a good story in those murky, tiny, text-heavy pages. If only he had had an editor who could have helped him develop it better--and helped him find a better venue for it.
"Sgt. Rock and Easy Company" (Kubert & Kubert): This 3-bullet strip is still paced in the manner of a 12-page story in a standard-size comic book anthology--such as teh old Our Army at War title. It's a good story, but it essentially ignores the weekly, broadsheet format.
"Flash Comics" (Kerschl & Fletcher): Karl Kerschl (who is normally a comic book illustrator) writes functional dialog and has some interesting concepts that he wants to play with in this 3-bullet strip. However, he seems to be operating under the misconception that "police scientist" Barry Allen is a physicist who is very knowledgeable in quantum mechanics and other such aspects of theoretical physics.
The story has become very confusing--which, I take it, is at least part of Kerschl's point as he conflates the mechanics of quantum physics with the mechanics of romantic relationships. It would be nice, though, to be able to make sense of the mechanics of the plot. I mean . . . I read a lot of books on quantum physics, and this entire story is just seeming more like a bunch of off-the-wall mumbo jumbo.
At least it's interesting and entertaining mumbo jumbo, and it might make more sense when the pages are read consecutively in a collected edition--which, of course, is not what these weekly stories should be relying upon. They should make sense when each page is read from week to week--and captions that summarize the story thus far should be used if the story is becoming too difficult to follow (which is the direction this story took weeks ago).
"The Demon and Catwoman" (Simonson & Stelfreeze): I really do want to devote a special edition of "Wednesday Comments" to this strip if I have time. For now I'll just say that this 3-bullet strip is entertaining.
Simonson's writing is mostly good, and Stelfreeze's illustrations are very well thought out. I particularly like how Stelfreeze makes Morgaine Le Fay look like she was designed by Jack Kirby (which this version was) without imitating Kirby's style.
In contrast, Catwoman looks like she was not designed by Kirby (which she wasn't, of course--though this version isn't exactly the character that Bob Kane designed either). It's interesting to see a Batman family member integrated into a strip that looks like Kirby's world without imitating Kirby's lines.
The story has a few problems, but on the whole "The Demon and Catwoman" is something I look forward to each week.
"Hawkman" (Kyle Baker): Finally, we have the 3-bullet "Hawkman" strip. Baker is designing beautiful pages that blend hyper-realistic details with exaggerated cartoon effects--such as last week's girl with the overly large head and huge glasses with Coke-bottle lenses.
The story has been one weird turn after another, and the whole thing seems to be following dream logic more than any other sort of logic as we've moved from extraterrestrial insects disguised as Middle Eastern terrorists to Hawkman and Company being stranded on "Dinosaur Island."
Someone should tell Baker (such as an editor, perhaps?) that brontosauri (or "brontosauruses") are no longer called by that name. Brontosaurus is the obsolete name for the species of dinosaur that is now known as apatosaurus (my daughter taught me that).
Additionally, apatosauri wouldn't be able to run as quickly as Baker depicts them running in this week's installment, nor would they likely have anything to fear from a tyrannosaurus rex. Of course, the two species didn't exist at the same time, but this is Dinosaur Island where they can exist simultaneously. However, T. rex probably wouldn't bother to take on an apatosaurus unless he was very hungry and the apatosaurus was very vulnerable.
A more appropriate (and quicker) herbivore that Baker could have used for this story is a stegosaurus (who would have lived at the same time as the apatosaurus, not as the T. rex). A stegosaurus would have been able to run faster than an apatosaurus, and it would have made for an easier target for T. rex.
Well, that's all for this week. Time to get this column posted. Better late than never.
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