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It took me a while to get around to reading Green Arrow: Year One, despite the creative team that made one of my favorite recent-ish Vertigo titles being associated with it. While I could say that it was a general disinterest in the character or the overall poor quality of DC’s other “Year One” projects in the past year and change (if you ask me about Two Face: Year One, I’ll start ranting like a crazy man on the subway,) I’ll confess to laziness in the matter – the book has been part of the ever-growing stack of things I’m “going to get to” and every time I’ve thought about picking it up, something like the last Ennis Punisher Max trade (Oh my god, so good) or Tezuka’s Black Jack manages to hove into my view, distracting me.
Anyway.
I read Green Arrow: Year One yesterday and it’s a well-done, pulp-oriented take on the origin of the DC Universe’s most annoying liberal. The script takes about twice as long as it needs to, but it’s an easy enough ride thanks to Jock’s sumptuous, technicolor visuals and clear storytelling that allows Diggle to forego exposition. I particularly liked how Diggle set up a lot of Oliver Queen’s skills in the first act, making his abilities with a bow and arrow that much more plausible by the end of the book. As is typical for these things, I can’t imagine that a monthly dose would be remotely satisfying, but as a bound-together work, it’s worth a look.
So here’s the thing. It’s October and while I’m glad that many of my associates are indulging their predilections so well, I don’t get particularly excited for the holiday at this point in my life. In fact, I’ve been a bit sour on it since high school, and not for any particular reason that I can suss out. I love seeing kids having fun in costumes, and don’t even mind it when my friends dress up and have a fine time of things, but it just doesn’t occur to me that I should do something similar. Add in the fact that horror as a genre appeals to me very little – Yes, I wrote two Cthulhu Tales stories; the first only worked because I used my interest in music as a springboard, and the second, despite the herculean efforts of Joe Abraham, just isn’t that good – I typically just sort of ignore the overall mood for the month of October with this blog, instead choosing to focus on the usual sort of goofiness that the three dozen readers of my site have come to expect. However, in the spirit of the season and in the interest of full public disclosure, I feel like I should do something remote thematic, especially as I’ve squandered the first two-thirds of the month.
If you know me in real life, you’ve likely heard of my distaste for puppets (particularly marionettes) and clowns. It’s amazing how many people are sympathetic to these, especially the latter. I’m unsure if it’s John Wayne Gacy or Stephen King or The Joker that has brought a significant portion of the public around to my loathing and unease around people in greasepaint, but it’s comforting to know that so many people are on my side in that battle. The puppets thing is, logically, a bit more baffling. Was I not raised with The Muppets, for God’s sake? Do I not worship at the throne of Henson as so many of my generation do? Yes, I was, and no I don’t, but still, the kind ear is there, particularly when I discuss the movement of marionettes or how you can’t see the bottom half of puppets so you have no idea if there’s a mass of tentacles or what down there. However, these are sort of minor: I can cross the street to avoid a clown making balloon animals at Faneuil Hall and it’s usually just a channel flip or decision not to attend Avenue Q that keeps the puppets at bay.
Really, though, we’ve all got something, right? One of my friends gets very uneasy around repetitive patterns: a combination of vertigo and general easiness hits them when confronted with something as seemingly minor as polka dots while another has a case of arachnophobia that makes the poor pickle woman from Maury Povich look like she’d doing yoga. However, while I’ve been open about the whole hating-things-from-my-youth bit, there’s one fear that comes very close to an out-and-out phobia that I have that I’ve just recently opened up about at all.
It probably didn’t help that I saw Close Encounters of the Third Kind when I was at a supremely impressionable age and was obsessed with alien contact, reading book after book about UFOs from the library (including the now-thoroughly-debunked Communion
Not even cheaply-made FOX specials or any amount of scientific evidence has made this particular piece of unease vanish from my life. For the brief time we tried living with Kristin’s cat (my allergies won out and he’s since retired to Cape Cod before passing into the great beyond), I would cringe when I saw the odd shadow he’d cast underneath a door or when his footfall wasn’t just right, even in the middle of the afternoon. The Buff Ledge Abductions occured in broad daylight, after all.
It’s irrational, it’s persistent, and worst of all, it’s fascinating. As someone with an interest in both science and science fiction, the idea of alien vistations is something I pick at like a scab. While I won’t go so far as listening to Coast To Coast AM (unlike Mike Sterling,) the aforementioned Close Encounters is Spielberg in his early prime, so the cineast in me is enthralled with the characters, story, and presentation. I know that I’m going to end up a shuddering wreck later that night, but that movie moves so well and is so smart that for a little while, I’m pretty OK with having the Grays around.
Until that night, when Kristin’s asleep and I’m looking out at the few stars that manage to penetrate Boston’s light pollution. That’s when The Fear comes for a little while. I’m four or five years old again, worried about a boogieman from Omicron Persei Eight and the toolbox he’s brought for tinkering around with my innards.
Other projects are sucking up a bit more time than I’d like, plus Birdie’s cold came back, which means no new Rack until Monday, but he’s assured me that the brilliant script I’ve given him will be adequately rendered, so I’m just going to throw some links at you and you’re going to go look at them and everyone’s going to be happy. (Except for Mike Sterling, who is only happy when the cries of the children reach a certain volume.)
The collision between the cartoonish and the grotesque that informs and defines the first volume of Osamu Tezuka’s Black Jack is one of the most…interesting reading experiences I’ve had in some time. It’s obvious that Tezuka was unafraid of making the audience uncomfortable with detailed medical procedures amidst his usual round-faced characters with their exaggerated gestures and screwball physiques and it’s this bravura that helps sell the stories, which are full of dodgy science and slightly-stereotypical situations.
I found myself rooting for the mysterious, superhuman doctor that charges a fortune for his procedures, despite the character only being given the barest framework to exist within, and I’m not sure why. Perhaps it was the gentleness shown when he helped Pinoko find a body or the story of the love of his life and why he’s not with her. The usual Vertical design sensibilities make this an attractive package and your local shop can get you a Previews-exclusive hardcover if you feel like splashing a bit, while Amazon has it for $11.53.
A quasi-sequel to The Dark Knight and existing in the sort of continuity-free area that it needs, the Joker graphic novel is much more successful than most of writer Brian Azzarello’s previous work with superheroes and a notch above his previous archvillain-related material with artist Lee Bermejo, Lex Luthor: Man of Steel. The script (thankfully) leaves behind a few of the quirks that defined his 100 Bullets (narrative counterpoints to the visual, oblique dialogue) and provides a relatively straightforward ground-level look at crime and inevitability in Gotham City through the eyes of a thug that’s aligned himself with a fresh-out-of-Arkham Joker.
This isn’t to say that the work is the least bit generic: Azzarello’s new takes on familiar villains such as Killer Croc and The Riddler are infused with his sensibilities, with Bermejo’s designs providing a level of grit and believability that will make the book accessible to readers both casual and indoctrinated. Engrossing and capable of eliciting genuine shock from a character that is commonly thought of as well and truly played out, Joker is highly recommended.
The book is due to hit shelves on October 29th, and Amazon has it available to pre-order for $13.59, a significant savings over the $20 retail price.
