the Power of Supermyths?
[SIZE=1]You know… this thred is like having a cool little party in my living room[/SIZE]
Great point all around!!!
Chang Style Novice said:
Arthur and your other examples (Homeric epics, and we may as well throw in Gilgamesh, Beowulf, and the rest of 'em in there as well) are mostly distinguished by their strictly structured plots (see all them books by Joseph Campbell about mythological hero archetypes - you’ve probably heard a lot of that before.) Anyway, they have a well defined beginning middle and end, which is what a lot of hero comics lack. There’s a beginning and middle, but as long as it’s a profitable going concern, there’s no end. And endings are what give real dramatic and emotional power.
Good old Jo Campbell…who said comics are just for kids???
Let’s talk about Myth for a second. Perticularly those stemming from an oral tradition. These tails where told & retold countless times… generation after generation. Storytellers varied and each one (as humans are want to do) added & subtracted particular details as the situation demanded. Most often for the purpose of keeping the myth relevent for that particular audience in that particular location at that particular time. What we now read are much closer to the focilized remains… But I suspect ancient Babylon (or was is Sumeria) lived in perpetual hope of the return of Gilgamesh.
I wonder if the superhero is very much our modern equivelent. The details of the myths change and are retold. One time it’s Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben Dying, followed by Gwen Stacey years later. Another time it’s Aunt May, or Mary Jane. Or the Origen is retold & it turns out this time Mary Jane figures out he is Spiderman. Then it becomes a Movie & the Green Goblin is Normal Osborn & dies only after their first major encounter (while any comic reader know that GG haunted spiderman for a Looooooong time before his death). Still no mater the incarnation or details, the essence remains the same.
It seems when that essential aspect is changed (clone saga anyone?) the comic/myth suffer most.
That doesn’t mean I disagree with what you say about publishers. But also consider the responsibility towards that Myth. Yeah Superman is own by DC comics, which is inturn own By time-warner… etc… But the Myth of superman goes well beyond the charactor with a big red S on his chest. Sometimes it’s a lightning bolt, or a star or a lion’s head…
Certainly Superman’s much more important to a 12 year old kid with Asthma than to me… But as an “adult” there’s craft to consider, technique and method. The same story can be told often sometimes greatly, othertimes horribly…
I remember one particular comic… Superman & Batman must fight Mr Myxlplx and Bat Might… the whoel adventure happens in the space of heartbeat. Bruce Wayne was being interviewed by Clark Kent at the Daily Bugel when Jimmy Olsen trips and is about to spill coffee on Bruce when time stops , the coffee in mid air. The adventures occures, ends, and they return to their placed just in time for clark to get the coffee spilled on him. Olsen oppoligises and coments “wow that was weird it was like I fell in slow motion or something… what happened?” to this clark replies…“it’s called tripping Jimmy.”
Now was that comic written in the '50’s, '60’s, 80’s 90’s? and was it written for a 12 year old? or someone a bit more experienced?
BTW… I was lucky enough to have an extended conversation with Matt Wagner on the very subject of Superhero as Myth… a very good time indeed.
Did you ever read Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing? it’s being collected in TPB’s for any of you who haven’t. Theseries continued after he left it with varring degrees of success. Mark Miller who now writes Ultimate X-men & the Ultimates. Wrote the final story arch of the Swamp Thing comic to great effect. Picking up from Alan Moore almost seemlessly, and completing what he started with great dramatic impact.
So yet, stories with ending are quite nice.
My favorite by him is “Invisibles” where he more or less injects the opposite meaning into the power trip fantasy - a true power trip is an anarchist utopia where everyone is infinitely free to choose their own destiny and identity.
You do know that the final volume of that 3 volume masterpiece has just been collected? Great work indeed… for more on THAT… go here!
quiet man said:
Ever read Crumb’s “Mr. Natural” or Vaughn Bode?
Got really into Vaughn Bode while in highschool… Quite a few grafitti pieces where influenced by his charactors at the time. He & Raplh Bakshe created the not so great mivie WIZARDS together… rent it if you find it just for the joy of the moving charactors…
AND all of you SHOULD go home and rent CRUMB!!!
it’ll change how you see the creator & his art…[size=1]or not.[/size]
I want my superheroes to lose every once in a while (like Hellblazer, for example). Are there any such SH-comics out there? I think so.
Off the top of my head… Daredevil for noir.Powers for a more crime story feel in a superpowered world. New X meN of course. Xstatix for social comentary, humor, ironic not hero delemias, the cult of fame and death toll. Wildcats for interesting twists…
Hellblazer’s not remotely spanex…but still kicking.
what do you know/think of Croatian authors, living and/or working in USA and Canada: the late Edvin Biukovic (“Deaths&Devils”), Igor Kordej (“Tarzan”, Dark Horse), Esad Ribic (“Codename: Scorpio”, “Four Horsemen”), Danijel Zezelj, Mirko Ilic… any of these names ring a bell?
“Deaths&Devils” was great, as well as the follow up Devil’s choices… A loss to the form in his death.
Igor Kordej is illustraiting Soilder-X formally “CABLE” and has done some art for New X meN as well.
Loved the art in “4 Horsemen” didn’t he also do “outlaw nation”?
Anyone follow Paul Pope?
Question?
what pulls you most to a given comic?
Art?
Writer?
Charactor?
Title?
Publisher?
