I should say first that I liked the artwork, and that goes a long way for me. There's a line between overly artistic and overly comic, and Jones and Mahnke find the balance. The bound book is very appealing appearance-wise (I was tempted to buy it).
The overall plot is not difficult to figure out: really, really bad guys are beating the good guys. Some gods die. Parallel universes are falling to pieces. End of the world on its way. Yeah, I saw it all on Star Trek.
Unfortunately, all the stuff that probably makes the plot more fascinating (the nuances and internal references) are way over my head. I don't really hold this sort of thing against superhero/graphic novel writers. After all, they aren't writing for me (a person who watches superhero movies, reads Frank Miller, and did, once, collect The Next Nexus, but has no little investment than that).
On the other hand, I was able to read and enjoy the graphic novel Identity Crisis (Meltzer, Morales, and Bair) despite my lack of inside knowledge. In fact, I picked up on a lot of storylines and was able to put some scenes from Frank Miller's graphic novels into context. In other words, Identity Crisis furthered my interest in the DC characters. Final Crisis, however, just left me feeling, "That must be the character who died twice and...oh, who cares." Having said that, the story itself (if you ignore the participants) is engaging. It is rather like reading the Book of Revelations: you don't understand it, but boy, there's lots of great images and interesting ideas floating around.
Here's the downside: I'm not one of those people who has reread the Book of Revelations, not because I'm avoiding the depressing end-of-the-world colloquy. I just already know the end game: blood and guts and glory. Fun while it lasts, but not something to get excited about twice.
The fascinating thing about Identity Crisis, and the reason I've reread it 3-4 times, is that although I knew, sort of, where it would end up (not the WHO, just the WHAT), the story itself engaged me: it was touching and problematic, all about personal relationships and getting on with life. Final Crisis is, well, just that: final crisis.
This must be the same reason I can't get excited about comet-hitting-the-earth movies. I mean, the end of the world, WOW!
So...what's for dinner?
Final Crisis is interesting, but I'm glad I didn't buy it (libraries are wonderful places!).
I then read Joe the Barbarian and was super impressed!
I determined that the reason is a problem I mention above: Morrison dumps the reader into the story without background. You either know the context or you don't. The end result is that if you know (even) less about the Marvel/DC universe than you did 14 years ago, you have no clue what is going on.
Joe the Barbarian also dumps the reader into the middle--though the plot is more chronological--and the bulk of the novel has the same wild ride feel as Spirited Away. *Spoilers* As Joe, in hypoglycemic shock, attempts to make his way from his attic room to the kitchen (to get a soda and keep himself from passing out) and then to the basement to turn on the lights, he encounters worlds of action figures and floods and broken kingdoms and his noble rat Jack. Nothing is footnoted or explained. And the world isn't a dream. It's Joe's quest as a hero and has a wonderful reward.
I determined that the success of Joe the Barbarian is the single point of view. It is the same reason C.J. Cherryh's Foreigner series works despite an infinitely more complex world even than Marvel and DC. The point of view in the Foreigner series is relentlessly narrow (3rd person limited), being either Bren Cameron's or that of Cajeiri, the young heir.
Readers can follow a single character a very long way.
4 comments:
Yeah, alot of folk really loved it... I despise it, because fankly, it makes my head hurt. I suppose that one common claim is that is was the whole back history that made it for people, but knowing that history myself, I still didn't get much out of it. You sound as though you had a better experience than me... I just kept getting mad at how convoluted the whole thing was. Ah well.
But thank you helping me feel like I'm not crazy... cause most comic fans I know LOVED it... so I'm kinda in the minority. Nice to know not everyone is blown away by that piece of crap... lol.
Yeah--trust your instincts! While a complex work can be read and reread to pick up on new ideas, etc., an unclear work is just that--unclear. Besides, I've sat through way too many pseudo-profound discussions to be taken in by "Wow, that's a hard-to-understand idea, ergo, it must be important!" (To me the fascination of writing, and teaching, is trying to make ideas clear which often means continually attacking an idea from several angles until I get it right.)
I think Final Crisis contains some interesting ideas, but those ideas aren't communicated clearly; as I say to my students, "You can be poetic, but if you don't communicate your ideas clearly, the writing just isn't doing its job!"
Grant Morrison can be really uneven. I loved his run on Batman and JLA but didn't really care for his run on Action Comics (featuring Superman.) I can't judge Final Crises since I haven't read it. It is one of those massive crossover stories that I just ignore. That said all writers are to a certain degree uneven and comic writers especially so.
A lot of people hate Identity Crises, which again I haven't read and can't judge. From what I understand it has to do with the Elongated Man's wife having to been revealed to have been raped. The stories of the Elongated Man were very "Silver Age" so while not particularly sophisticated they worked as innocent fun. Introducing rape to his story was unnecessary.
I do think comics companies and DC in particular reprint a lot of the wrong things. As I said I don't care for the massive "important" crossover events. Smaller stories are usually better. You can get omnibuses of Grant Morrisons Batman run (which as I said I loved) and Scott Snyder's (which had some good ideas but I fell off of.) But you can't get omnibuses of Doug Moench's or Alan Grant's run on Batman which are really great. (You can find regular trades of Grant's run though.)
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