This post marks my official debut…and yet in a way it is a return, as I wrote for The Great Curve back in the days of Alex Segura and Chris Hunter. With this column, I’m feeling the “great power/great responsibility” vibe as I take on a column previously done by Kevin Melrose. Kevin, who has his plate full doing myriad other things for this blog and elsewhere, is a person who I have always respected immensely for his wit, intelligence and insight. For that matter, I find myself honored to be joining this blog as it consists of a group of people that brings a depth and perspective on comics (plus a periodic dose of skepticism) that is much needed. Of course, other folks offer up opinions with great depth and perspective (as well as some not so great…) that are worth noting–in this column. I won’t get all the snippets worth quoting, though, and when I do miss a good one, please do me a favor and mention it in the comments section. I hope to do well, but with the help of this blog’s comments regulars, I assume I can do better.
“Clearly, there’s only one cheerleader that can live up to those standards.That’s right, folks: It’s Isis, the captain of the East Compton High School Clovers, the greatest cheerleader in Bring It On history. And with her often-imitated, never-duplicated cheerleading skills and a squad that includes both LaFred and Jenelope, it’s not hard to see how she parallels Orson Randall and his Confederates of the Curious.”
- Chris Sims (of Invincible Super-Blog), both celebrating Bring It On week and reviewing The Immortal Iron Fist: Orson Randall and the Green Mist of Death at the same time
“Comics don’t always have to be ambitious to be worth one’s time. When people stressed the value of the disposable element of comics 10 years ago, it sounded like a defense mechanism for crap. And yet with a lot of different kinds of comics falling off the face of the earth, or at least withdrawing from easy distribution and even the barest hint of financial viability they had once upon a time, I’m thinking we can need all the little overpriced handouts with dumb jokes we can find.”
- Tom Spurgeon, making a larger point in his CR Review of the mini-comic, Bug Infested Comics #5
“There’s also a part of me that can’t help but wonder, fully aware that hindsight is of course 20/20, what could have been if the business practices of the comics industry, specifically Marvel in 1968, had been flexible and different enough to allow Jack and Ditko and others the financial recompense and creative voice they felt like was their due.”
- Johnny Bacardi, offering the ultimate What If
“[Clive] Owen is said to be similarly distraught, and has vowed to devote his now-empty life to playing hard boiled tough guys who never smile or miss a shot.”
- Heidi MacDonald, uniquely announcing her engagement to writer Ben McCool, of Birmingham, UK (Congrats to you both…Condolences to mourning single fanboys)
Five Years Ago…
“Comics will not fulfil its potential, in the culture or in the marketplace, as well as the other dramatic arts until it realises what it’s good for. The purpose of comics, like all the dramatic arts, is to tell stories that matter to people, to all people. Any act of creation is a volley against entropy, but an effort to drama is the search for order in human experience and meaning through our interactions with one another. People are the only measure of value, because they are the only ones who can assign it. Whatever meaning is in the stars is what we place there by seeing them.”
- Leland Purvis, in a Ninth Art February 14, 2003 guest editorial, on the key to good storytelling
One Year Ago…
“In the end, I think it’s fair that I (like many others) went into this with lowered expectations and yet somehow still found myself disappointed. But it’s still going to massively outsell everything else this month – and maybe this year – so really, what does my opinion matter?”
- Graeme McMillan, questioning his critical influence in a review of Civil War 7
