| | operative network | writing archive: columns - reviews - interviews - features
WARNING: Hannibal Tabu (influenced by an odd conversation with his eleven-year-old brother Chazz, a huge wrestling fan) has decided to refer to himself in the third person throughout this column. We apologize for any insanity this may inspire.
 On the news the other night, there was a story about the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) coming down on the Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey Circus for beating elephants into doing tricks, even showing videotaped "evidence" of the alleged crimes.
Now, Hannibal could give two farts on a breezy day about people, animals or how ethically one treats the other. However, something about this story (don't ask what) reminded your favorite columnist of the Barnum & Bailey combo in comics, Joe Quesada and Bill Jemas, the guys in charge up at Mighty Marvel. In particular, it reminded him of something he'd seen while flipping through Web sites one day a while back, an article on Comicon.com about in which Quesada and Jemas were decrying all the "negative" talk about the industry online when comics are on the comeback trail.
*Hannibal rolls his eyes*
Now, let's ignore for a fact that Quesada himself stated in his inaugural press conference that Marvel's retail presence diminished drastically over the last several years. Down from 75,000 retail outlets in the "glory days" to 15,000 at the time he took over as E-I-C. When was what? Nine months ago? Erase from your mind the fact that much of Marvel's "success" (i.e. the Ultimate line) consists of hyperbolic rehashes of Stan Lee's Greatest Hits. Please, completely forget that two of the company's titles with the greatest buzz outside the industry (Black Panther and Cable) are rewarded for their consistent artistic excellence with, respectively, a laughable amount of marketing support and the replacement of the latter title's writer after he spearheaded a fan campaign to save the book from cancellation.
 Quesada's "new ideas" (which, somehow, include making sure Jemas gets his name listed in the credits of every Marvel title) include: the incredibly uneven May premiere of Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely, Joe Casey and Ian Churchill on the X-Men franchise (are those guys actually getting page rate for those intro pages?), Straczynski telling an...interesting tale in Amazing Spider-Man that manages to cast the Webhead in an Elseworlds Batman mold (oh, Bruce, how will urban heroes ever live beyond your shadow?), or here's one: "Bad Girls For Fan Boys" (an idea that would have been revolutionary in, say, 1994) and an adult line that doesn't sound all that noticeably different from .Epic.
All around, it's a mixed bag. Yes, Quitely's stuff on The New X-Men looks good, but word on the street is that he's only doing two issues before a run of four fill-in issues. And, yes, Straczynski is hitting some solid emotional notes, but can you imagine a whole boardroom fulla spider-men (and women)? For the love of God, can somebody get Christopher Priest on another series?
Quesada and Jemas can dance for the cameras all they want, and they can pooh-pooh your columnist and others as naysayers, but riddle me this, Batman: Whither Ultimates, does there go Marvel?
 Hannibal is fortunate enough to live next door to a fairly average ten-year-old boy (okay, he's a little smarter than some, but whatever) and offered the kid five dollars to read Ultimate Spider-Man #7-9, Ultimate Marvel Team-Up #1-3 and Ultimate X-Men #1-6, and then be prepared to discuss what he thought of them. Despite the economic enticement, the lad claimed they were "boring" and he "couldn't finish" even two issues. He described the writing as "confusing" and wanted nothing to do with them. Considering this kid likes your average issue of Spawn and that when taken to the comic book store that same afternoon, he bought an anime title, ol' Hannibal has to believe it's not that he just doesn't "get" comics. Nor can he believe it's just his neighbor. Because despite Jemas and Quesada's claims of reaching "the kids" with the Ultimate line, Hannibal and everyone else with a lick of sense knows that's not entirely the case.
So take your hope where you can find it. Anyone with an ounce of concern for the fate of this wacky industry would love to believe the distorted ramblings of Jovial Joe and Bill-Payin' Bill, but following pied pipers almost never goes well, and while we're dancing on the lawn, the House of Ideas is on fire with shamefully mediocre comics like X-Treme X-Men and Iron Man feeding the flames.
Hannibal Tabu is a barking mad husband and brother living in the wilds of South Los Angeles. He also broadcasts his madness at the world from his own virtual clock tower, www.operative.net
|
