Bernard Chang.
19 Comments | Posted: October 10th, 2010 | Filed under: Meta, Uncategorized | Tags: bernard chang, nick spencer, supergirlA bit over four years ago, I wrote this review of How To Make Money Like A Porn Star, a book that I was not kind to. In fact, the sole exception to my fairly nasty screed was a brief portion in which I talked about Bernard Chang’s art, which I said reminded me of a more varied Phil Noto. I also said that I wanted to see him draw comics that weren’t so aggressively stupid. To be frank, Neil Strauss’s misogynistic, mean-spirited script deserved worse than I gave, and Chang’s work deserved more praise than I could muster.
Yesterday, I approached Chang’s table in Artist Alley at the New York Comic-Con and said that I liked what I’d seen from him lately. Chang told me that he wanted to kick my ass and that “if I were you, I’d leave right now.”
Today, Bernard Chang was announced as the new artist on Supergirl, working with Nick Spencer, a writer whose work I’ve very much enjoyed.
Bernard Chang, I hope you treat your peers better than the people who have praised your work in the past.
It’s unfortunate that after four years, Mr. Chang can’t more easily distinguish between reasonable criticism and button-pushing “drum up some traffic for my blog” fluff that probably DOES deserve a threat in response.
That’s what you get for focusing on the worth of the work as opposed to the work of the creator.
Good for you, handling it with class.
Oops, meant “WORTH of the creator” not “work” which makes no sense.
When you mentioned on Twitter that it’d been four years, I was shocked, because I remember reading that review when you posted it, and it didn’t feel like that long ago — but then, every day within the past five years feels like yesterday sometimes. The flip-side of this realization is that — hold on, the guy’s been nursing this grudge about a negative review that held up HIS work as pretty darned good for FOUR YEARS?! And made an angry threat over it?! I’m sure you’ve been hearing this from everyone for the last several hours, but let me throw my voice into the choir — that’s INSANE. That is completely insane. If that’s how he takes praise, I’d hate to see how he takes criticism.
To be honest, after reading the review in question, I’m not surprised he’d be angry about it. Even if you said his art was the bright spot of the book at the end, the beginning makes it sound like you were ripping on both of them pretty hard, and it’s quite possible he never got to the end of that review. He also might have put some input into the writing of the book.
It’s kind of weird for him to hold onto that grudge for so long, though.
I don’t think it’s that weird. Maybe he just doesn’t like you for whatever reasons he has. Who cares? By posting this story on your site, it doesn’t make you come off looking any better than him. It’s not like he’s been hunting you down for four years…he kept it to himself until you approached him. If you’re gonna review comics and then work as a comics professional and go to places where you are interacting with other professionals then situations like this are bound to happen.
Thanks, Joseph. It’s nice to see that people are willing to defend unsolicited threats in a small industry. That’s a brave stance to take.
That’s awesome that simply being a professional in the comics industry allows for threats of physical violence. Wait. Fuck that. It doesn’t. Part of being a professional is acting professional. Threatening people who have done nothing more than write a bad review of your work is so far from acting professional that I doubt Mr. Chang (and you Joseph) understand the meaning of the word. Look it up.
…bound to happen?
Joseph, do you really believe that kind of response to reasoned criticism is “professional” and “bound to happen”?
I still remember that time when James Patterson was swinging his fist around and howling at Michiko Kakutani, “To the MOON, Michiko! TO THE MOON!”
“By posting this story on your site, it doesn’t make you come off looking any better than him.”
So writing about how someone threatened to assault you is just as bad as threatening to assault someone? Good to know.
“If you’re gonna review comics and then work as a comics professional and go to places where you are interacting with other professionals then situations like this are bound to happen.”
Actually, there’s this little thing called “adulthood” that usually prevents situations like this.
Man, it’s stuff like that that kinda puts me off interacting with creators at cons.
… that and an eternal deep-seated fear of rejection
first off, i never threatened to “kick your ass”. my recollection of the event was you walking down the aisle, our eyes glanced, you stopped and walked over to my table and said, “i’m kevin church and i am a fan of your work.”
my response,”i know who you are and no you’re not.”
“no, i really am,” you replied.
to which i replied, “if i were you, i’d step the fuck away.”
and as you walked away, you spouted,”sorry for having an opinion.”
end scene.
yes, i do have a dislike for you because of your rather negative review of my book a few years ago. the main problem i had was after your review posted, you continued to slam it in your comments and other postings. i emailed you personally and thanked you for your honest review, but would appreciate it if you discontinued your bashing of the project in your comments and other postings. i might note harpercollins sent you a free review copy based on my direction (have you ever wondered why they have never sent you another review copy before or since). when you replied that you would refrain from additional comments, i thought it was over. but the very next day, you could not help but throw in another smart ass dig at my book when commenting on another subject.
in addition, i will note that you already knew i probably didn’t think of you favorably because you saw me avoid you at sdcc10, when you were sitting at the same table with mutual friend ming doyle. so if anything, you approaching me at nycc was probably you trying to elicit some kind of reaction. and well, if you’re stepping up to me, then i’m going to speak my mind.
this is america and we are all free to express ourselves. but why are you surprised when someone you talked shit about has a negative opinion of you in return? am i not allowed to express myself as well? “step the fuck away” is hardly “kick your ass”. and if you are to be respected as a blogger or journalist or reporter of the truth, then don’t make shit up, and don’t agree to one thing and then stab me in the back the next chance you get.
why am i not being allowed to comment on this?
why was my previous comment deleted?
don’t try to hide the truth, kevin.
Bernard:
Thank you for responding. As others can tell you, my site’s spam filter is extremely sensitive and long comments, particularly those with key words, end up being held in the dashboard until I can say that they’re not spam. For the most part, I welcome debate and, as you say, freedom of expression. There’s another comment by you that’s shorter and is duplicated in this one, so I’m deleting it.
first off, i never threatened to “kick your ass”. my recollection of the event was you walking down the aisle, our eyes glanced, you stopped and walked over to my table and said, “i’m kevin church and i am a fan of your work.”
my response,”i know who you are and no you’re not.”
“no, i really am,” you replied.
to which i replied, “if i were you, i’d step the fuck away.”
and as you walked away, you spouted,”sorry for having an opinion.”
end scene.
As far as what you say you said and what I heard, what can I say? You say you said one thing, I heard another. It was a noisy room, but I don’t think I’m lying or making up something that wasn’t said, even if you have a different recollection of events. I do remember saying that I was sorry for having an opinion and I was probably pretty sarcastic when I said it because I was taken aback by your behavior towards me. Honestly, I don’t know how I’d benefit from saying that you said something you didn’t, and if I didn’t feel that you’d threatened me, I’d likely not have posted this at all. I’m disliked by enough people that I understand differences of opinion, but your hostility was shocking, particularly as I approached you in good faith.
in addition, i will note that you already knew i probably didn’t think of you favorably because you saw me avoid you at sdcc10, when you were sitting at the same table with mutual friend ming doyle. so if anything, you approaching me at nycc was probably you trying to elicit some kind of reaction. and well, if you’re stepping up to me, then i’m going to speak my mind.
I don’t recall this incident and I honestly had no idea what you look like until yesterday when I saw you under the giant banner that read BERNARD CHANG. Seriously. I feel that you’re ascribing negative intentions to a situation where there was none on my part.
As far as the review of How To Make Money Like A Porn Star goes and comments I may have made after a conversation we had: I’m sincerely sorry if you feel betrayed or stabbed in the back. It’s been four years and change and I honestly don’t remember any discussions with you about the book. I searched in my Gmail archives, but I’m pretty vicious about deleting emails unless they are work-related.
Finally, I’m sorry if you feel that I personally attacked you or have harassed you in any way. It was not my intention.
just as i thought, now you want to play the victim card — like you had no idea i took a dislike to you from any of the email exchanges back when the first and only times we ever communicated directly a few years ago (until this past weekend). i would be glad to post them if you’d like.
truthfully, i don’t like you. and based on our history any sensible person in our positions would understand such. i mean, i don’t give you even a second of thought in my everyday life, but when you came up to me this past weekend, it was the first time we had ever “officially” met in person, and me telling you to go away was just an honest reaction.
i also find it opportunistic that despite this “awful” incident occurring on saturday morning of the show, it took until after you learned i was getting a regular gig on a book on late sunday, that you decided to tweet about it, four to five times (even sarcastically hoping i would injure a limb in return). i guess before then, it just wasn’t as newsworthy — or worthy of bodily harm?
this has nothing to do with your initial review of my book. yes, it was scathing (i’m sure your site traffic spiked as a result), and i took the punches like a man. but then after the review was posted, you continued to bash the book in other non-related posts, taking delight in mean spirited jabs, drumming up conspiracy theories, and even going on wikipedia to add part of your review to the text, all at my expense. when i asked you privately to refrain from continuing taking pot shots, you agreed, but the very next day, the verbal assaults continued. it was just too good — or too fun — to pile it on. to me, it showed you lacked character and integrity and is a demonstration of lower value.
you can hide under the victim card all you like, but i think you are too smart and manipulative to not know your actions will always have a reaction. and in this case, bravo! you got a few tweets and a blog post out of it. sadly, this will be my last comment about this. but please, don’t come up to me again, kevin. i just don’t like you as a person.
Kevin, you, pull a Zuckerberg with a passive aggressive and sarcastic public blog post seemingly aimed at getting readers to support your personal judgments of a specific person while also trying to backhandedly stick it to that person by revealing a potentially damaging and possibly untrue exchange between you and him. Even before Bernard commented, the post wreaked of the one-sidedness and exaggerated recollection that would come from someone writing in a state of anger instead of reasoned thought.
Condoning a physical threat is never something I meant to imply, and you are right for calling me out on that since the implication exists. IF Bernard actually made the threat, then that is unacceptable, but commenters describing your actions in putting up this post as classy and adult are pretty far off the mark.
(i’m sure your site traffic spiked as a result)
I did not write a bad review for traffic. I wrote a bad review because Neil Strauss’s script was misogynstic, stereotype-laden, and your art deserved a better platform.
after the review was posted, you continued to bash the book in other non-related posts, taking delight in mean spirited jabs, drumming up conspiracy theories, and even going on wikipedia to add part of your review to the text, all at my expense
Not at your expense, at the book’s expense. And I mentioned it four times total, including the review and this post. The two other times were when I was talking about a giveaway that Heavy Ink was running and again when doing a pre-reviews post when the book came out. Here are the google results that show when the book’s title has shown up on my site. If you Google your name, it only shows up twice. I do not spend time bashing your work, nor did I post about the book as much as you seem to think I did.
As far as the Wikipedia matter: fair enough, I see that I did edit in a link to the book, and then removed it the next day, which you can see in the article’s history.
also find it opportunistic that despite this “awful” incident occurring on saturday morning of the show, it took until after you learned i was getting a regular gig on a book on late sunday, that you decided to tweet about it, four to five times (even sarcastically hoping i would injure a limb in return). i guess before then, it just wasn’t as newsworthy — or worthy of bodily harm?
Fair enough, I was prompted by the announcement.
to me, it showed you lacked character and integrity and is a demonstration of lower value.
Imagine how I felt when you threatened me.
i just don’t like you as a person.
Then we’re agreed.