Ah, Warren. If you really hate writing other people’s heroes…STOP DOING IT!

Just had to say it.

Oh no, dissed by little people on the internet with no sense of humour or context. How WILL I survive the day?

That wasn’t cool Warren, just describing my life like that for all to share…

Mr. Ellis, you are an odd, sick bastard. Bless you.

So, is it good or bad to know that the “voodoo chicken guy” Ellis referred to is, presumably, Black Talon, a voodoo priest who appeared in AVENGERS #152 and other stories (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Talon_(comics) )?

There’s nothing wrong with knowing the characters well enough to understand sketchy or obscure references, but there is something wrong if a writer doesn’t know the characters at all, then proceeds to write stories as if his ignorance doesn’t matter.

SRS

Why all the anger? Have you guys ever read old, obscure Marvel comics? Completely unreadable. Bloodstone? That Killraven thing? Ka-Zar? Deathlok the Demolisher is a nice comic for about one issue– but by issue 2, he’s fighting, like, a werewolf. And that’s in the 70’s before the 80’s/90’s rolled around and they really gave up.

I saw a Chris Bachalo comic the other day called Ghost Rider 2099, the premise of which was that in the future, somebody built a robot that *ghost-rid* hither and dither. Why would you ever want to build a robot that didn’t come with a “ghost-ride” option? According to wikipedia, he fights the D/Monix corporation. D/Monix!

That’s ignoring the horrible, horrible war comics or monster comics. Marvel published a comic called “Monsters on the Prowl” — which I think was also the title for the movie they were filming with Rollergirl at the end of Boogie Nights. There was also a comic called Where Monsters Dwell– so fans had their pick of dwelling or prowling.

Granted, my favorite Marvel book right now is the Lethem Omega, so sometimes it works out… But X-Terminators? *X-Terminators* starring a character named Skids?? Fallen Angels? Morbius the Living Vampire, and the Nightstalkers, and all those terrible, terrible Midnight Sons books? These are simply things that were never meant to be read years or decades later, or at all, for that matter.

Where Monsters Dwell and Monsters On The Prowl (and Creatures On The Loose) were actually reprint books which mostly contained early 60s pre-hero fantasy stories from Tales To Astonish, Suspense etc. Those stories happen to be my favourite comics of all time, so there! But the last thing I want is to see the characters in them revived and shoehorned into MU continuity. Part of their appeal is that each one feels as separate as another night’s dream.

I’d much rather talk about them than about Warren Ellis, but I must say that these guys who post “Hey, mad genius bastard Warren” around the internet depress me, because their notion of what constitutes “mad genius” must be so DULL. Ellis’ work is the product of a thoroughly conventional, mediocre imagination. It’s the comics equivalent of those mid-80s indie crap-rock bands like The Mission or Southern Death Cult.

Joe S. Walker = WINNER.

Meanwhile, Black Summer #7 still hasn’t been released, Anna Mercury and Gravel are running late, and the third issue of newuniversal has been punted to September, yet mysteriously, Steve Kurth still has time to draw Iron Man: Director of S.H.I.E.L.D..