Jim Shooter - Man Of The Atom

They just keep getting better...

As far as I'm concerned, so far this has been the year of Dark Horse Comics. Week after week as 2010 unfolds, the titles that consistently deliver the most original stories without leaving me feeling angry or disappointed are Dark Horse comics. In an age where shock and awe seem to have replaced genuine character development and legitimate plot lines, Dark Horse refuses to jump on board the bandwagon of sensationalism and is producing quality books where story rules the day and strong characters prevail over strong language and even stronger sexual overtones.

As other companies continue to stock their stables with ever raunchier purveyors of sleaze and soft core porn merchants, Dark Horse continues to provide a home for writers and artists who see the world as something more than a crap-hole that only looks good when filled with half naked women. Don't get me wrong, Dark Horse understands the nature of our imperfect world. Their books don't shy away from the realities of snakes feeding upon kittens or or the fallibility of the human species. Unlike other companies producing comic books these days Dark Horse also understands that in spite of the worst in the world there are moments of nobility and sacrifice that are just as valid as the muck and mire in which we spend much of our collective time.

Dark Horse recognizes the need for balance. Simply because nothing exists in a pure state doesn't negate the truth, reality or value of good. Even if the world is little more than a crap-hole, the real story is in the rising above and not in the wallowing within. I for one am tired of the wallowing stories where only the torment of the players and the final bloody body count are what matter to the tale. These stories may be sensational, but they are not the true story of the human condition. Yes, we may be less than the best we can be, but we are certainly more than the worst we can be. I want stories about more than the dark side of humanity. I want Doctor Solar.

Like Doctor Solar, each one of us contain the spark of divinity. Each of us possesses the ability to perform the miraculous and the power to change daily moments in ways that can change the world. Each of us also contains a dark spark of the ravenous beast that seeks only to feed upon the world and perpetuate no other survival but that of our own. And then there is our humanity; ignorant and unsure, trying to find our truth and purpose with little more to guide us than an insatiable curiosity about all things and a thirst for knowledge. For all his outward appearance of God like power Doctor Solar is still a man. He is an imperfect being with great power trying to make sense of the world and find his place in the universe.

Like all of us, Doctor Solar wields the power of the divine with the less than fully enlightened intellect of the common man. Sometimes he performs miracles and other times, in spite of his best intentions, he produces terrible tragedy. And just like every single one of us, Doctor Solar lives with memory of his actions and tries to make peace with himself and the world around him as best he can. This is the real story of the human condition and not the sleaze filled crap-hole where the only truth is: Abandon all hope, all ye who enter within. I don't care how many hip, young writers at D.C. and Marvel try to convince me that the only real story is that of us wallowing in the crap-hole. I don't care how often they promote the only truth as, nobody gets out of the world unscathed or alive. I've seen better and I know better.

Jim Shooter is the perfect writer for Doctor Solar. In many ways Jim Shooter is Doctor Solar. Jim's a great talent who has produced some amazing comic book work and yet there have been moments where he's stumbled over his own imperfect humanity and produced some incredible tragedy and disaster in both his personal and professional life. Jim has walked through the heavens and he's wallowed in the muck with the best of us. If anyone truly understands Doctor Solar, Jim Shooter is that man.

It is often said that a writer should write what he knows best. If that's really true, Jim Shooter should tell his own story through Doctor Solar- The story of great talent and fallible humanity learning from experience while surviving both great success and soul crushing tragedy and how he's come to make peace with both himself and the world around him. I'd pay money to read that story. And in the end, neither the character's past nor his potential future would matter as much to me as where he stands now. I would not ask of him the ultimate truth, I would only ask of him the truth he knows right now.

Whatever Jim has in store for Doctor Solar I'm just glad the two of them are back. I'm a big fan of both characters and the comic book world is a better place whenever they're a part of it.

Unwritten - Vertigo Comics

Unnecessary...

This book has been one of my favorite reads since I first picked up issue number one for ninety-nine cents. It has proven consistently well written and woven a sophisticated and engrossing story. I couldn't have been more surprised and disappointed in the crass and vulgar tale that to all appearances seems to have been some sort of ill conceived attempt to set a record for the most times the F-bomb has ever been dropped in a mainstream comic book.

I'll let the book speak for itself.

1. Twenty-two pages of story, only seven of which do not contain the F-Bomb at least once. (One of the seven pages contains the word, shit.)

2. A full list of curse words includes: ass, bastard, bitch, bullshit, cunt, f**k, f**king and shit.

3. Some of the most sophisticated and well written lines of dialog include: "Seriously, Bitch, do not get in my way." "--if you know what's--CUNT!" "You hairless f**king retard." "You flea bitten f**k." "Hey you. Cunt whisker." "Jesus f**king wept." "F**k, f**k, f**k, f**k, f**k, f**k, f**k." (Yes, it was seven straight times.) and more...

Seriously, this broadens the comic book base and encourages new readers to pick up and start reading comic books in what way? How many potential readers do you cost the industry for every potential reader you think you're attracting with this kind of content? Artistic integrity? Freedom of speech? At what cost to the vitality of the industry upon which your livelihood depends?

Mike Mignola is creating some of the most engrossing and sophisticated comic books in the marketplace today and you won't find him using such a list of profanity in his dialog. Mignola's stories do not suffer in the least because he makes a conscious choice to reach as many readers as possible without also offending as many of them at the same time.

Scott Allie when asked why he used symbols instead of expletives stated that he doesn't feel the need and that by not using them he isn't sending angry mothers racing down to their local comic book stores to rail at hapless clerks and store owners.

There is a time and a place for everything. Are mainstream comic books really the venue for the type of content some of these young writers are shoving down the throats of the American public? Since when did our only interest in comic books become to be shocked or outraged by every other page of content? Look, I'm a Liberal and an atheist, I believe in the importance and the need for a free press. I read periodicals including The Hightower Lowdown and Mother Jones. Why is it that the only place I'm being assailed by an avalanche of profanity is in the comic books I read? I read copious amounts of printed material including online articles and of all the reading I do on a daily basis only the comic book seems determined to shock and anger me. Why? To what possible benefit to me the consumer?

Telling me that if I don't like it, I'm free to walk away is not an answer that sells more comic books. Disregarding the opinions of others and aggressively alienating people have never been recommended sales tactics in any school of business theory I've ever studied. The industry is suffering because of the attitude of a group of writers who are far more concerned with their rights as individual creators than they are in fostering growth in the industry of which they are but a small part. These writers care about the opinions and interests of fewer and fewer people with every passing book and for all their best efforts they're killing the industry and blaming everything and everyone other than themselves and their childish infatuation with erotic and profanity riddled nonsense.

Its time to grow up and realize that being adult is more than liberal doses of breasts and curse words. Comic books don't need profanity to be sophisticated, hip or entertaining. This was an unnecessary exercise in profanity that wound up crapping all over what could have been a pretty good story. It was immature and childish and I expected better from what has up to this point been a mature and adult read.

Victorian Undead- Wildstorm Comics

"Alimentary Watson, alimentary."

There's been a lot going on lately so I've been a little too busy to blog. Things are finally calming down a little so it's time to catch up on some of my favorite comic books. Outside of the very cool things going on over at Dark Horse with the Agents of the B.P.R.D. program and the Hellboy/B.P.R.D. titles, Groo and Hellcyon this is being a rather lackluster year for comic books. One of the few exceptions I've found is a book called, Victorian Undead.

Okay, I picked this book up on a whim one day and I've been reading it ever since. Even though I'm normally not much of a zombie fan I am a lifetime fan of Sherlock Holmes and I guess that's what first attracted me to this title. What keeps me reading it is the wonderful little story written by Ian Edginton and tastefully illustrated by Davide Fabbri. This is just plain and simple, a fun and entertaining read. Seriously, this is exactly the kind of tale I think is so lacking in the industry today. Without impossibly endowed bimbos squeezed into ridiculously revealing costumes and the f-bomb dropping like raindrops upon the printed page Victorian Undead manages to provide an engaging and entertaining read.

This is a comic book anyone of any age can read and enjoy. My son and I can share this book without me having to worry about "adult" content that's just inappropriate for a youngster his age. And best of all it isn't ridiculously oversimplified infantile crap that he finds insultingly banal and boring. How interesting are kids comics that offer little more in a storyline than, "See Spider Man. Run, Spider Man, run." Duh...

Victorian Undead is good clean family fun and I recommend it highly. Again, zombies, Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty as the zombie lord combine for a great tale. Well worth reading!

Now, for those of you going to the big Chicago Con this weekend I'd strongly suggest you take the time to sign up for Dark Horse's Agents of the B.P.R.D. program. They've got some wonderful activities planned for you and you don't want to miss out on the fun.

Turn and face the strange...

Cha, cha changes...

After spending the entire weekend and the first two days of this week reading the entire Hellboy/B.P.R.D. series I'm ready to venture a couple of guesses as to what I think is coming in the months ahead for Hellboy and friends.

1. After walking parallel paths for so long it is time for one character to fight for what he's worked so hard to gain and another to regain what he's forgotten for so long. I think we're about to see the awakening of Abe to his true self and I don't think its gonna be pretty. Just as Hellboy will ascend to the light, I believe Abe Sapien will fall from grace. These two friends are about to do battle. Fire versus water. Its a Yin/Yang sort of thing...

2. Kate Corrigan is going to die. Come on, she's wrapped up most of her lines in the story and she now has a love interest. Need I say more? About all she's got left to finish is making her peace with Hellboy and she'll die in his arms when she's done. It'll serve as motivation for Hellboy to do what he's gotta do.

3. Abe is going to kill a lot of the people Hellboy loves in the B.P.R.D. as a misguided effort to anger Hellboy into forsaking his humanity and turning him to the dark side. Fans of the series are going to be screaming bloody murder.

4. I think we're finally going to learn the purpose of the secret organization that created Abe Sapien to be their tool at the end time. Just as we've seen those groups fighting against Hellboy's ascension to the throne so now we'll see the machinations of those who seek to goad him towards fulfilling his original purpose in destroying the human race. They'll serve the purpose of those in the bull ring who inflict any number of small wounds untill the bull is enraged and striking out at anything in front of it.

5. The time has come for Liz Sherman to die. She's been through enough and she's tired. Frankly, I'm ready for her to go. She's always been rather self absorbed and self-centered. She's never really paid much attention to the pain and suffering of those around her. Even though she's one of the most human of the gang she's also one of the least human too. She's isolated and disconnected. I think she'll go down in an act of self sacrifice that will finally raise her above the self adsorbed state of self pity and self loathing she's always waffled between and she'll finally understand that being a part of humanity is serving humanity. She'll discover her connection just as she's dying.

6. We're going to see the big reset button pushed and pushed hard. I think the only real mysteries remaining now are who will be the new stars and whether or not the B.P.R.D. survives the recession. Will there be two titles remaining after the bloodbath or will Hellboy take over the mantle of leadership on a temporary basis and bring the B.P.R.D. and Hellboy titles back together under one banner until such time as the economy rebounds?

We're in for some real changes folks and I think we're gonna see some real attention generated by a title willing to kill off so many of it's flag ship characters in one massive event. I'm not sure who or what will be remaining once the smoke clears, but I'm fairly certain we'll be hard pressed to recognize it as the B.P.R.D. or Hellboy books we've come to know and love.

I don't care what it looks like on screen!

Long live the king?

It was a little too quiet. Everything was resolving nicely and there were sighs of satisfaction as the good things happened to the good characters and bad things happened to the bad guys. And then came, King of Fear number three and everything you thought you knew about B.P.R.D. and Abe Sapien got turned upside down and turned inside out. If this is the beginning of the new things to come I'm locked, loaded and ready to roll. I've been thinking about this book for a couple of days now and it's finally dawned on me why I love Dark Horse comics so much.

You see, I love stories where the plot revolves around what the characters are doing instead of who they're doing and Dark Horse is one of the few places where those kind of tales are still being done. To me, it just seems that whenever I look at any of the mainstream superhero titles anymore its all about the soap opera drama. I spend more time watching the characters go on and on about their personal lives and whatever they're supposedly doing in the story gets bogged down in psychological minutia. This whole idea of making the characters as "real" as possible has gotten completely out of control.

Somehow a group of young writers have managed to grab the attention of company board members and convinced them that they know what we as comic book readers are interested in reading and they've turned our superhero fantasy world into a paper bound soap opera. And if these young guns are so correct in their assumptions and are indeed giving us, the reader, what we really want in our comic books why are sales dropping so hard and so fast? Why aren't we (the reader)buying more and more comic books if these guys are so zeroed in on what it is we want?

Maybe it's because they don't care about the comic book reader anymore and the only audience they're targeting and catering to is the film industry. Maybe they're so busy catering to what the corporate board members are concerned with, landing big name movie projects, that the real audience for comic books has fallen by the wayside. Readers don't seem to matter much to the new writers making books today. They're so busy writing stories designed towards the eventual film viewers that what they're giving us to read right now just isn't very interesting to us.

Look, the elements that work so well on the big screen just aren't the same as the elements that make a good comic book. The tension between emotionally involved characters that rivets the attention of the movie voyeur isn't the same as the action generated conflict that drives the reader towards a pulse pounding conclusion. Viewers want one thing from a story and readers want something else. The current crop of writers driving the industry right now just don't seem to understand this fact.

Dark Horse is about comic books first and movie deals if they come along. They make books for readers first and it makes their titles so enjoyable to those of us who want our characters doing things and not just talking us to death. There's nothing wrong with a little characterization, but when it becomes the entire focus of the story it bogs down the action and ruins the pace of the comic book. Enough of the screen plays already. Sales figures should be sending the message loud and clear. I don't care what the writers are saying to the board members, they're wrong and what they're doing right now isn't fixing anything. Someone needs to start writing with something more in mind than, "Wouldn't that make a cool movie?"

Dark Horse is publishing books where things happen and stuff gets down. Whether it translates onto the silver screen isn't as important as how it works in the book right now. Their stories keep the reader engrossed and coming back for more and that's what a real comic book should do. I for one am glad they don't have more screen writers working for them, those guys don't know crap about what makes a good read.

Go and read B.P.R.D. King of Fear number three and you'll know what I'm talking about.

Jim Shooter, he's back...

Free Comic Book Day, 1992

Thanks to Dark Horse Comics Jim Shooter is returning to the game and bringing with him both Solar, The Man Of The Atom and Magnus Robot Fighter. I couldn't be more excited about this fact and in preparation of his return I broke into the great white cardboard vault of my humble collection of books and broke the scotch tape seals upon the plastic storage containers of one of my all time favorite comic book reads; Unity, Time Is Not Absolute the Valiant Comics crossover event of 1992.

In my humble opinion this is still the best crossover event ever produced in the history of modern comics. For those of you who've never had the opportunity to read this eighteen chapter story you just don't know what you're missing. What made this crossover event so unique is that every single issue in the event really mattered. Each and every book in the crossover event was completely dedicated to the Unity, Time Is Not Absolute storyline and as the tale unfolded it was truly majestic in both scope and content. It was special and so were the group of creators who put the event together.

One of the key individuals responsible for this wonderful work was a young man named Jim Shooter. Called bad boy by some, maverick by others and visionary by most of the rest of us, this guy brought something to comics that hasn't been seen since the magical days of Valiant Comics. He brought excitement and promotions that had people waiting outside the doors of their local comic book stores drooling with anticipation. Valiant comics rocked the comic book world in their day. And Jim Shooter was the front man of the organization.

I've always thought of Jim Shooter as one third snake oil salesman, one third carnival barker and two thirds creative genius. Jim is one of the very rare artistic types who knows how to take care of business too. And he loves making money. And he's a bit ruthless. And people seem to think he's a loose cannon and dangerous to work with. I think if Jim Shooter had gone into politics he'd be Carl Rove, but man, I just love the guy. When he's on his game he brings a real excitement to comics.

I hope he just rocks with Doctor Solar and Magnus. I want to see Jim Shooter work his amazing mojo at Dark Horse and show the comic book fans of today what a real writer and a real promoter are all about. I think Dark Horse could use a little Jim Shooter magic. You see, the only complaint I've ever had about Dark Horse is that they're too darn humble and low key. Jim Shooter on the other hand has stones so big you could use them for Olympic Curling. He's got Chutzpah! And he isn't ashamed of the act of promotion like so many people at Dark Horse seem to be. He's loud and proud to be a promoter and he's darned good at it too.

Dark Horse could use a good front man. Don't get me wrong, they've got some talented names on the Marquee, but they're like the original members of the band, Van Halen. Each is extremely skilled in their own right, but they lack the real charisma of a David Lee Roth. Jim Shooter is a David Lee Roth kind of guy. He's got charisma and he draws attention and he holds it like a trained professional. He's star quality and I hope Dark Horse gets him out on the comic con circuit and let's him do what he does best. Jim Shooter will generate interest. Fans like myself would kill for a chance to shake his hand and say hello. Seriously, I'd much rather meet Jim in person than Stan Lee.

Thank you Dark Horse for bringing Jim Shooter, Doctor Solar and Magnus back to my comic book table. I couldn't be happier for everyone involved.

Jim, knock us all dead, Dude...

B.P.R.D. agent man...

Professor Trevor Bruttenholm needs you!

Good evening Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at sea. We interrupt our normally scheduled bog entry this evening to bring you a special news bulletin. Once again our country stands upon the precipice of war and the clarion call of patriotic duty now rings out across this great land. Paranormal activities are at an all time high and supernatural forces are preparing even at this very moment to launch attacks of unparalleled ferocity against the world and the human species that call it home. Now is the time for all good and courageous souls to come to the aid of mankind.

Do you have what it takes to fight the supernatural forces threatening not only our freedom, but perhaps even our continued existence upon the Earthly plane as well? Do you possess psychic abilities including but not limited to telekinesis, psychokinesis, or astral projection? Are you able to communicate with undead spirits? Are you currently a practicing psychic or medium? Do you have magical abilities? Are you skilled in the mystic arts of alchemy?

If you've answered yes to any of the questions above you may have what it takes to don the uniform of the the B.P.R.D. and fight side by side with the few, the proud, the elite against evil and the forces of darkness. If you think you've got the physical stamina, the spiritual fortitude and the purity of heart to stand toe to toe with the endless hordes of demonic denizens from Hell and prevail in the face of overwhelming adversity, don't hesitate another minute.

Contact
Trevor Bruttenhold



Hurry

The B.P.R.D. Needs You!


(Additional Secret Benefits will be revealed upon a need to know basis.)