Judd Winick’s take on the Big Red Cheese gets some press thanks to Scripps Howard News Service:
“Come on! People call him ‘The Big Red Cheese,’ ” comic-book writer Judd Winick said. “Even Aquaman doesn’t have a disparaging nickname.”
Nevertheless, when Winick started writing for DC Comics years ago, his goal was to tackle one of the oldest franchises in comics: Captain Marvel.
And now he’s getting his chance with “The Trials of Shazam,” a 12-part miniseries that sets out to redefine the character for a new generation of readers. “Trials” has been a hit for DC Comics so far.
The redefining includes a new costume, a different purpose and, DC hopes, more prestige.
They even managed to find someone to quote who likes the new take on the character. A preview of the fourth issue is up over at the mothership, along with a preview of the first issue of Jeff Smith’s long-awaited Shazam! mini-series.
November 27th, 2006 at 9:31 am
Did you guys catch the new Family Guy last night with the Chester Cheetah blowing cheetos up his nose? That’s what I thought this was about.
November 27th, 2006 at 10:07 am
“THERE IS NO DRUMMER GREATER THAN NEIL PEART!”
November 27th, 2006 at 10:31 am
It’s a fun series, but I was hoping it would focus on Billy. He doesn’t play a big role in the DCU, and he’s little more than a side character in Trials.
November 28th, 2006 at 6:36 am
This article read like something written for a college newspaper, not Scripps Howard. There were entire sentences I had to read three times to understand what the author was trying to say. And his use of quotes is selectively odd:
Winick calls his spin on Captain Marvel as akin to “Hellboy meets Captain Marvel meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”
Is it me or when you’re likening a project to something, one of the things you compare it to should not itself. Captain Marvel is akin to “character A meets himself meets Character B”–what the bleep?
“He’s not going to be stopping bank robberies and stuff like that,” Winick said.
That’s right. Should our hero happen to see a crime in progress, he’ll look the other way–because his beat is now on another plane–a magical plane. I get the gist of the quote, but the writer chose a bad quote. It would have been better to write something along the lines of: “Winick’s Captain Marvel will not be taking on bank robbers, his beat will be on the magical plane.” (OK, my rewrite is for crap as well…)
Captain Marvel will take over the role of mentor and the mantle of a wizard named Shazam. Taking over the name of “Captain Marvel” will be his sidekick for decades, the unfortunately named Captain Marvel Jr.
I’ve read one issue and was not greatly impressed. Now reading the big game plan, the prospect of making Billy assume the present day equivalent role of Knight Rider’s Devon Miles (what a great last name for that show…) is disheartening to say the least. The Knight Rider comparison is lame, but that’s intentional; I hope Winick’s game plan is not intentionally lame.
Bring on the Jeff Smith.