Daredevil comic question
Christian
collect the merchandise to go along with it. :p I've been out of the loop
as far as comics go for a few years now. my question is...is there anything
exciting going on in the Daredevil series right now? I'm looking forward to
the movie and it's gotten me back into what I call "comics mode" heh
Christian
Tom Galloway
Well, DD's Matt Murdock id was leaked to the press via a chain of Kingpin
flunky to FBI agent to reporter. Matt's denying it, and is suing the tabloid
newspaper that published the story for multi-millions of dollars. He's also
trying to maintain the Daredevil id as well. Currently, the Kingpin and
family have left New York, and there are various fights going on over his
territories, with the Owl being the most aggressive.
tyg t...@panix.com
Ian Boothby
Tom Galloway <t...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:b1em24$2nt$1...@panix3.panix.com...
> In article <CAA_9.16738$ni5.3...@news1.news.adelphia.net>,
> Christian <ssjchr...@adelphia.net> wrote:
> >I know I'm the kind of guy that gets all hyped about a movie so I have to
go
> >collect the merchandise to go along with it. :p I've been out of the
loop
> >as far as comics go for a few years now. my question is...is there
anything
> >exciting going on in the Daredevil series right now? I'm looking forward
to
> >the movie and it's gotten me back into what I call "comics mode" heh
The most exciting thing is that's it's really well written.
Frankob5
I have recently gotten back into Daredevil, along with a few other
Marvel and non-Marvel comics after a 20+ year absence. I was wondering
if Volume 2, #'s 20-25 have been collected in graphic novel format.
I'm frantically trying to catch up to the present month and I can't
seem to locate those particular issues in a collection anywhere.
Frank C.
Tue Sorensen
No, they have not. And it's too bad, because they were the only issues
that were similar in style and tone to what the DD book was like in
the "good old days" (meaning pre-1992 or so). They were written by Bob
Gale (who wrote the Back to the Future movies, among other things).
Some of us "old school" folks are not at all enjoying the current
Bendis run - which seems to get collected in hardcover and softcover
TPBs all over the place.
- Tue
jay
wrote:
> I have recently gotten back into Daredevil,
> along with a few other Marvel and non-Marvel
> comics after a 20+ year absence. I was
> wondering if Volume 2, #'s 20-25 have been
> collected in graphic novel format. I'm frantically
> trying to catch up to the present month and I
> can't seem to locate those particular issues in
> a collection anywhere.
That was the Bob Gale arc. It hasn't been
collected and probably never will. If you've
read it, you already know why. If you haven't,
consider yourself lucky. (It's the only black
mark in what has otherwise been the best run
of DD in about 15 years--the operational rule
is "Pretend it never happened.")
Brendan Carson
SNIP
>my question is...is there anything
> exciting going on in the Daredevil series right now?
Probably the best read on the market.
it's hard to tell what you like, but if you are the kind of person who
likes the Sopranos, the Godfather movies and books, intelligent tv
shows like The Practice and stuff like that, then this is the comic
for you. Good characterisation, complex characters with beleivable
problems, brilliant dialogue...
The author is Brian Michael Bendis, he's been on for quite a while and
he's the same guy who writes Ultimate Spiderman and Alias. DD is one
of the titles that as been favourably reviewed for months and months
(thefourthrail.com) and sales are actually increasing.
Recently the Kingpin has been taken down, Matt's identity has been
blown and various crime lords (including the Owl) are trying to pick
over his empire. Matt has tried and failed to save the White Tiger
from conviction and punishment. Plus he has a new girlfriend who has
not yet turned into a headcase or been killed by Bullseye! And
there's superero battles and supervillains too...
I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB) and Out (the
current one) are as good as anything in comics you've ever read.
BDC
Tue Sorensen
These comments are not at all helpful to anyone who liked the DD
stories of years past (pre-Bendis, that is). Would you also have us
pretend all the pre-Bendis stories (except for Miller's, of course)
never happened? You're a fine DD fan. <sarcasm>
The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old stories. Your
stand-offish Bendisophilia won't change that.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> "Christian" <ssjchr...@adelphia.net> wrote in message news:<CAA_9.16738$ni5.3...@news1.news.adelphia.net>...
> SNIP
> >my question is...is there anything
> > exciting going on in the Daredevil series right now?
>
> Probably the best read on the market.
Given *your* particular taste...
> it's hard to tell what you like, but if you are the kind of person who
> likes the Sopranos, the Godfather movies and books, intelligent tv
> shows like The Practice and stuff like that, then this is the comic
> for you. Good characterisation, complex characters with beleivable
> problems, brilliant dialogue...
>
> The author is Brian Michael Bendis, he's been on for quite a while and
> he's the same guy who writes Ultimate Spiderman and Alias. DD is one
> of the titles that as been favourably reviewed for months and months
> (thefourthrail.com) and sales are actually increasing.
>
> Recently the Kingpin has been taken down, Matt's identity has been
> blown and various crime lords (including the Owl) are trying to pick
> over his empire. Matt has tried and failed to save the White Tiger
> from conviction and punishment. Plus he has a new girlfriend who has
> not yet turned into a headcase or been killed by Bullseye! And
> there's superero battles and supervillains too...
Oh sure, on almost two whole pages every fifth issue.
> I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB) and Out (the
> current one) are as good as anything in comics you've ever read.
Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime fiction and
gritty realism. However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then
Bendis' DD just isn't worth your time, or your dime.
- Tue
Niels
> Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime fiction and gritty
> realism. However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its fantastic
> elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then Bendis' DD just
> isn't worth your time, or your dime.
>
> - Tue
Well put. I certainly don't want to read anything that compares to The
Sopranos or The Godfather. And if I did, why would I read superhero
comics?
//Niels
Magius
"Brendan Carson" <gunc...@optusnet.com.au> wrote in message
news:d61d52c1.03020...@posting.google.com...
> "Christian" <ssjchr...@adelphia.net> wrote in message
news:<CAA_9.16738$ni5.3...@news1.news.adelphia.net>...
> SNIP
> >my question is...is there anything
> > exciting going on in the Daredevil series right now?
>
> Probably the best read on the market.
>
> it's hard to tell what you like, but if you are the kind of person who
> likes the Sopranos, the Godfather movies and books, intelligent tv
> shows like The Practice and stuff like that, then this is the comic
> for you. Good characterisation, complex characters with beleivable
> problems, brilliant dialogue...
>
The Practice? Dunno anymore. Just saw the season where another serial
killer started stalking the one female lawyer and then got killed and then
her husband was put on trial and then they kill the most interesting
character. Just seems to me that they are going for shock now with the
various stories.
Lynley
jay
wrote:
>> I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB)
>> and Out (the current one) are as good as anything
>> in comics you've ever read.
>
> Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime
> fiction and gritty realism.
You wouldn't be reading Daredevil in the first place, if
you weren't looking for those things.
> However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
> fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high
> adventure, then Bendis' DD just isn't worth your
> time, or your dime.
But then again no one else's DD would be, either.
jay
wrote:
>>> I have recently gotten back into Daredevil,
>>> along with a few other Marvel and non-Marvel
>>> comics after a 20+ year absence. I was
>>> wondering if Volume 2, #'s 20-25 have been
>>> collected in graphic novel format. I'm frantically
>>> trying to catch up to the present month and I
>>> can't seem to locate those particular issues in
>>> a collection anywhere.
>>
>> That was the Bob Gale arc. It hasn't been
>> collected and probably never will. If you've
>> read it, you already know why. If you haven't,
>> consider yourself lucky. (It's the only black
>> mark in what has otherwise been the best run
>> of DD in about 15 years--the operational rule
>> is "Pretend it never happened.")
>
> These comments are not at all helpful to anyone
> who liked the DD stories of years past (pre-Bendis,
> that is). Would you also have us pretend all the
> pre-Bendis stories (except for Miller's, of course)
> never happened? You're a fine DD fan. <sarcasm>
I was a DD fan before you'd ever heard of DD or
even picked up a comic, and I'm not particularly
impressed when some carpetbagging
johnny-come-lately thinks he can show up and
challenge my fan credentials.
> The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old stories.
> Your stand-offish Bendisophilia won't change that.
If that were true, I would have liked it, instead of
recognizing it for the utter crap it was.
Brian Henderson
>On 4 Feb 2003 04:01:28 -0800, twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen)
>wrote:
>> Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime
>> fiction and gritty realism.
>
>You wouldn't be reading Daredevil in the first place, if
>you weren't looking for those things.
Agreed. DD isn't the superhero type. Other than having heightened
senses, he just doesn't qualify.
>> However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
>> fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high
>> adventure, then Bendis' DD just isn't worth your
>> time, or your dime.
>
>But then again no one else's DD would be, either.
If you wanted fantastic elements, you'd be reading Avengers or X-Men.
Daredevil, Elektra, even Batman to some degree, are adventure stories,
told about non-superpowered individuals who use their wits, not their
muscle to solve most problems. Sure, you get fisticuffs from time to
time, but Matt Murdock has never been the type to just jump into a
fight to solve a crime, he only goes outside the law when its utterly
necessary, not because it's fun like most other costumed superheroes.
Brendan Carson
> Given *your* particular taste...
Well, yes. That's what I said. I didn't say "studies have shown" or
"nine out of ten dentists agree" or anything. Obviousy it's my taste.
What other criteria should I use?
>>And
> > there's superero battles and supervillains too...
>
> Oh sure, on almost two whole pages every fifth issue.
>
Have you actually read the last issue?
> > I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB) and Out (the
> > current one) are as good as anything in comics you've ever read.
>
> Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime fiction and
> gritty realism. However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
> fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then
> Bendis' DD just isn't worth your time, or your dime.
What you mean is "I don't see anything in it so I don't reckon you
should even give it a look". You may not see anything fantastical in
scenes like Matt's crouching on the rooftops listening to the jurors
deliberating in the White Tiger case, but that doesn't mean it's not
there. And you may not see "high adventure" in DD being set up,
toppling a car to get at a dealer in mutant drugs, or Kingpin
returning from the alleged dead, but that doens't mean it's not there.
It says more about you and your taste than it does about any
intrinsic qualities of the book.
I don't know why you are so prissy about this. I didn't say "Buy this
book because it's full of escapist high adventure" or "This book was
publicly endorsed by Tue Sorensen, he will refund double your money if
you don't like it" or anything. I said "This is what I reckon it's
like, I like it, I don't know what your tastes are but if you like
these other things you might like DD."
It's obviously not the book for you. But not all comics have to be.
What about tolerating a bit of variety? High escapism might be the
ony thing that works for you, but that's you. DD works for me, and
most reviewers, and a growing number of fans.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> I certainly don't want to read anything that compares to The
> Sopranos or The Godfather.
Well then, DD is probably not for you. Back to those old issues of
Power Pack, or that Spiderman story with the guy with the electric
pig's head.
>And if I did, why would I read superhero
> comics?
This is closeminded wank. Do you read books, watch tv, go to movies
expecting to see only one kind of story, for only one purpose?
Perhaps you could publish a short list of what you consider acceptable
topics, plotlines or moods for the superhero comic field.
Maybe you could campaign for warning labels to be put on comics like
they have on foods: may contain traces of new ideas. That way you
could be sure that no-one would try to sneak anything through your
internal censor.
It's amazing that a genre that caters to the wildest and most
exuberant fantasies of its readers can still attract people with such
narrow views of what constitutes acceptable entertainment.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> The Practice? Dunno anymore. Just saw the season where another serial
> killer started stalking the one female lawyer and then got killed and then
> her husband was put on trial and then they kill the most interesting
> character. Just seems to me that they are going for shock now with the
> various stories.
You're probably right. Over here (Australia) we are about a million
episodes behind you lot, but the rot has already started to set in.
Individual talent has a half-life.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old stories. Your
> stand-offish Bendisophilia won't change that.
Worst arc in recorded history.
Firstly, name two worse villains for any superhero than the Jester and
the Ringmaster (?). Stiltman is one thing, but for God's sake...
I think if you compare the Jester to almost any of DD's villains, he
comes
out poorly. For a start, DC did the whole thing vastly better with
the
Joker, one of the few actually frightening villains in comics
(Bullseye and
the Kingpin are two others that spring to mind). Bullseye, the Owl,
Kingpin, all of them do things that although physically impossible,
are acceptable once we've done that suspension of belief thing we do
when we read a comic. Once you accept that someone is as strong as
the Kingpin is, you can accept him pulling someone's arm out by the
socket because that's what someone like that would do. But the Jester
doesn't do what a believable person would do. At best
the Jester's an irritant, and reading about an irritant is irritating.
And the Ringmaster with his Ultimate False Memory Syndrome. This was
a
mystery story where we (the readers who presumably were wondering all
the
time "who is doing this to our favourite superhero? how? why?) were
cheated. The answers were, in order, "some rather ridiculous looking
and
unmemorable villain", "via a technique so powerful that he could do
anything
to anybody but choses instead to trash a greenhouse", and "for no real
reason whatsoever". A deeply frustrating cop-out, like those stories
where
the protagonist wakes up and it has all been a dream.
BDC
Tue Sorensen
> On 4 Feb 2003 01:46:39 -0800, twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen)
> wrote:
>
> >>> I have recently gotten back into Daredevil,
> >>> along with a few other Marvel and non-Marvel
> >>> comics after a 20+ year absence. I was
> >>> wondering if Volume 2, #'s 20-25 have been
> >>> collected in graphic novel format. I'm frantically
> >>> trying to catch up to the present month and I
> >>> can't seem to locate those particular issues in
> >>> a collection anywhere.
> >>
> >> That was the Bob Gale arc. It hasn't been
> >> collected and probably never will. If you've
> >> read it, you already know why. If you haven't,
> >> consider yourself lucky. (It's the only black
> >> mark in what has otherwise been the best run
> >> of DD in about 15 years--the operational rule
> >> is "Pretend it never happened.")
> >
> > These comments are not at all helpful to anyone
> > who liked the DD stories of years past (pre-Bendis,
> > that is). Would you also have us pretend all the
> > pre-Bendis stories (except for Miller's, of course)
> > never happened? You're a fine DD fan. <sarcasm>
>
> I was a DD fan before you'd ever heard of DD or
> even picked up a comic
If that's the case I just don't understand your attitude to the
majority of the title's history. You obviously think that most issues
except for Miller's and Bendis' (and Nocenti's?) were hopelessly
inferior to the material by said writers, and that doesn't make you
much of a true DD fan as far as I'm concerned. Both Miller and
Nocenti's work, while superb, were special high-points in the title's
history. The standard DD material is all the rest, by Lee, Wolfman,
O'Neil, etc., and that stuff maintained, in my view, a pretty high
standard. Most importantly, a standard of *wonder and adventure*. Not
all this gangster crap. Current DD is a completely different comic
that DD used to be, and it's giving the finger to much of past DD
material. Excuse me for not jumping with joy over the Bendis run which
to me is Dull City.
- Tue
Niels
> "Niels" <na...@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk> wrote in message
> news:<pan.2003.02.04....@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk>...
>
>> I certainly don't want to read anything that compares to The Sopranos
>> or The Godfather.
>
> Well then, DD is probably not for you.
It used to be.
> Back to those old issues of Power
> Pack, or that Spiderman story with the guy with the electric pig's head.
Back to any Marvel book published before 1991.
>>And if I did, why would I read superhero
>> comics?
> This is closeminded wank. Do you read books, watch tv, go to movies
> expecting to see only one kind of story, for only one purpose?
No. When I pick up a DD comic, I expect a DD comic, not a stupid ganster
drama. When I pick up a superhero comic I expect a fantastic story of
wonder and heroism. Not some unusable postmodernistic, violent crap.
> Perhaps you
> could publish a short list of what you consider acceptable topics,
> plotlines or moods for the superhero comic field.
Perhaps you could tell us what the word "genre" means?
Do you like anything published in, say, the 70's? Why? You'd agree that
it's a completely different take on things?
> Maybe you could campaign for warning labels to be put on comics like
> they have on foods: may contain traces of new ideas.
It's already labeled: Daredevil. They just changed the product beyond that
description.
> That way you could be
> sure that no-one would try to sneak anything through your internal
> censor.
>
> It's amazing that a genre that caters to the wildest and most exuberant
> fantasies of its readers can still attract people with such narrow views
> of what constitutes acceptable entertainment.
Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
children. Values to build the coming generations. Heroism that'll make
grown men shudder. A bright outlook of our world. Wonderful.
//Niels
Charles Nicklow
> Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
> children. Values to build the coming generations. Heroism that'll make
> grown men shudder. A bright outlook of our world. Wonderful.
None of these things I require of my entertainment.
jay
wrote:
You have no idea what my attitude is to the
majority of the title's history. It's utter idiocy to
assume that I've been a a fan all these years
because I dislike the comic.
> You obviously think that most issues except
> for Miller's and Bendis' (and Nocenti's?) were
> hopelessly inferior to the material by said
> writers,
Miller's two runs were the high point of the
series--his second, the "Born Again" arc--is
one of the best superhero stories of all time.
It would be ridiculous to expect everything
to be the equal of those. You're the only
one assuming that this means everything
else totally sucks.
> and that doesn't make you much of a true DD
> fan as far as I'm concerned.
And, as I said before, I've been reading them
since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
carpetbagging johnny-come-lately.
> Both Miller and Nocenti's work, while superb,
> were special high-points in the title's history.
> The standard DD material is all the rest, by
> Lee, Wolfman, O'Neil, etc., and that stuff
> maintained, in my view, a pretty high
> standard.
Some of it is excellent, some of it mid-range,
and some of it pure crap. That's the way it is
with virtually any long-running character.
> Most importantly, a standard of *wonder and
> adventure*. Not all this gangster crap.
This "gangster crap" goes all the way back to
the title's--and the character's--origins. The
reason DD works best as a crime story is
because that's what the entire DD world is
geared for. OTOH, a lot of the "wonder and
adventure" injected into the book over the
years are pure crap. The Stiltman, anyone?
How about the Bird Man? Stories in which
the "good guy" character is interchangeable
with any other "good guy" character can be
fun, but their appeal is very limited.
> Current DD is a completely different comic that
> DD used to be,
You simply aren't going to find a lot of sympathetic
ears for the notion that a long-running title should
content itself with rehashing things that have
already been done (and done to death) before.
> and it's giving the finger to much of past DD
> material.
Bendis (and Smith and the awesome David Mack)
have given us the best DD run in 15 years--far from
"giving the finger" to the character, I can think of
no higher tribute to the character and his past.
Gale's grotesque arc is the only one in the present
run that took a dump on the character.
jay
Carson) wrote:
>> The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old
>> stories. Your stand-offish Bendisophilia won't
>> change that.
>
> Worst arc in recorded history.
Not quite--that honor would probably go to
Chichester. But the Gale tale was a big, stinking
pile.
Niels
Yes you do, even if you don't realize it. Maybe even more so.
So, what do you think makes good entertainment? Why is it that some books,
hundreds of years old, are still being read, but others from last year are
already forgotten? If you look at what historically makes great literature
(/entertainment), you'll find that few or none of those qualities are
present in the current Daredevil or Sopranos.
//Niels
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> So, what do you think makes good entertainment?
Being entertained. Since people's standards for what entertains them are
entirely different from each other -- which is a good thing -- there is no
other definition besides that.
> Why is it that some books,
> hundreds of years old, are still being read, but others from last year are
> already forgotten? If you look at what historically makes great literature
> (/entertainment), you'll find that few or none of those qualities are
> present in the current Daredevil or Sopranos.
I couldn't disagree more. If what you say were true, that would be a
thoroughly depressing prospect -- one which not only presumes that
storytelling techniques and themes have to stop evolving at some point, but
also that this point lies in the past.
The notion that one would know what current or recent works are going to be
considered classics in a hundred years based on nothing more than personal
preference is narrow-minded and silly at best.
If history has shown one thing in this context, then it's that those very
works which are dismissed by contemporary conservative critics for not
fitting established parameters have a habit of turning out to be the
enduring "classics" in the long run.
--Marc
Niels
> Niels wrote:
>
>> So, what do you think makes good entertainment?
>
> Being entertained. Since people's standards for what entertains them
> are entirely different from each other -- which is a good thing -- there
> is no other definition besides that.
Yes, yes, I was simply asking for examples.
>> Why is it that some books,
>> hundreds of years old, are still being read, but others from last year
>> are already forgotten? If you look at what historically makes great
>> literature (/entertainment), you'll find that few or none of those
>> qualities are present in the current Daredevil or Sopranos.
> I couldn't disagree more. If what you say were true, that would be a
> thoroughly depressing prospect -- one which not only presumes that
> storytelling techniques and themes have to stop evolving at some point,
> but also that this point lies in the past.
So which new themes have we seen lately? The way we use them have
certainly changed, as they should. But the basic themes in literature are
quite static. The problem I have with several new-style comicbooks is that
they don't have a theme at all, they're just about people going from
situation to situation.
> The notion that one would know what current or recent works are going to
> be considered classics in a hundred years based on nothing more than
> personal preference is narrow-minded and silly at best.
Silly? Me? Let's just wait a hundred years and see!
> If history has shown one thing in this context, then it's that those
> very works which are dismissed by contemporary conservative critics for
> not fitting established parameters have a habit of turning out to be the
> enduring "classics" in the long run.
Well, I'm not a conservative critic. Quite the opposite in fact. I'll
gladly endorse any new, good book I see. I have read a lot of books, and I
know what the good ones have in common. I know what the all-time classics
have in common, from classic greek texts to our modern action-oriented
tellings. It's not just a matter of personal preference. We use the words
"good" and "bad" on a personal level meaning "I like this" and "I don't
like this". But there's another type of quality, namely being able to
stand the tests of time. I assert that people will enjoy Lee's and
Miller's Daredevil a lot longer than that by Bendis.
I'm sure that if you look back on what you've read and seen on tv in the
last 40 years, you'll find many things that you thought were oh so cool
then, but now are almost forgotten or very silly. And some examples
(books, tv series, movies) stand out, they're still good. And you'll find
that often other people also remember these same things. These time-tested
examples have some obvious themes in common, no matter when and how
they're told.
Looking beyond the surface of art is challenging, but necessesary if you
want the complete experience of it. Being able to recognize intrinsic
quality is necessesary if you want to avoid falling for commercial ploys
and the flavour of the week.
If you're entertained by the current Daredevil, then you should be happy,
since many books is following its style. Good for you. I'm just sad that
the Daredevil I like is being substituted with one I don't like, as is in
general the entire concept of superheroism and literary quality.
//Niels
I V
<na...@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk> wrote:
> On Wed, 05 Feb 2003 21:20:12 +0100, Marc-Oliver Frisch wrote:
>> I couldn't disagree more. If what you say were true, that would be a
>> thoroughly depressing prospect -- one which not only presumes that
>> storytelling techniques and themes have to stop evolving at some point,
>> but also that this point lies in the past.
> So which new themes have we seen lately? The way we use them have
> certainly changed, as they should. But the basic themes in literature are
> quite static. The problem I have with several new-style comicbooks is that
> they don't have a theme at all, they're just about people going from
> situation to situation.
Can you give any examples? That's certainly not true of Bendis's
_Daredevil_, which has a very strong central theme (the problem of that
superheroes feel they need to deceive people in order to do good).
[snip]
> If you're entertained by the current Daredevil, then you should be happy,
> since many books is following its style. Good for you. I'm just sad that
> the Daredevil I like is being substituted with one I don't like, as is in
> general the entire concept of superheroism and literary quality.
Are you saying that Bendis's _Daredevil_ is an example of a decline of
literary quality in comics? If so, can you explain what you mean by
'literary quality', because by any standards I can think of, whether you
like his approach or not, Bendis is one of the most technically proficient comics
writers working today.
--
"He knows there's fewer more distressing sights than that
Of an Englishman in a baseball cap."
http://ivlenin.web-page.net/
Tue Sorensen
I was making an educated guess. Gale's story was good, and someone who
doesn't think so is a very strange DD fan, IMO.
> And, as I said before,
Yes, you repeat yourself a lot. Often quite verbatim. I hope for your
sake that other people here don't find it as tiresome as I do.
> > Both Miller and Nocenti's work, while superb,
> > were special high-points in the title's history.
> > The standard DD material is all the rest, by
> > Lee, Wolfman, O'Neil, etc., and that stuff
> > maintained, in my view, a pretty high
> > standard.
>
> Some of it is excellent, some of it mid-range,
> and some of it pure crap.
Your predilection for absolutes ("pure crap", "utter idiocy") is one
of your least becoming features, if I may say so. IMO, until
Chichester, no DD stories were as bad as "pure crap". They were
average at worst, with possibly a few fill-in issues here and there
going below average.
> > Most importantly, a standard of *wonder and
> > adventure*. Not all this gangster crap.
>
> This "gangster crap" goes all the way back to
> the title's--and the character's--origins. The
> reason DD works best as a crime story is
> because that's what the entire DD world is
> geared for.
No.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
>
> > The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old stories. Your
> > stand-offish Bendisophilia won't change that.
>
> Worst arc in recorded history.
>
> Firstly, name two worse villains for any superhero than the Jester and
> the Ringmaster (?). Stiltman is one thing, but for God's sake...
Firstly, these villains were used in lots of good old Marvel stories.
No reason they shouldn't be re-used in new ways in new stories. And
whether they're used "seriously" or not, silly supervillains should be
read as comedy and at least partial self-satire. Otherwise, how do you
react to a villain like The Condiment King in Birds of Prey #37? :-)
Besides, the Jester wasn't a villain in Gale's story. He was paid to
masquerade as one in order to serve DD his court notice. That was a
cool way to use the character.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
>
> > Given *your* particular taste...
>
> Well, yes. That's what I said. I didn't say "studies have shown" or
> "nine out of ten dentists agree" or anything. Obviousy it's my taste.
> What other criteria should I use?
None, but in that particular case you might have said "in my
opinion"...
> >>And
> > > there's superero battles and supervillains too...
> >
> > Oh sure, on almost two whole pages every fifth issue.
>
> Have you actually read the last issue?
No. I stopped buying DD with #29. I bought #37 because of Elektra, #40
because of Terry Dodson and #41 because it was 25c. But I've read a
lot of reviews and leafed through a lot of issues, so I think I know
quite enough about it to base an opinion on.
> > > I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB) and Out (the
> > > current one) are as good as anything in comics you've ever read.
> >
> > Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime fiction and
> > gritty realism. However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
> > fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then
> > Bendis' DD just isn't worth your time, or your dime.
>
> What you mean is "I don't see anything in it so I don't reckon you
> should even give it a look".
No - I meant "if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its fantastic
elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then Bendis' DD
just isn't worth your time, or your dime."
> You may not see anything fantastical in
> scenes like Matt's crouching on the rooftops listening to the jurors
> deliberating in the White Tiger case, but that doesn't mean it's not
> there.
That's only very slightly fantastic. :-)
> And you may not see "high adventure" in DD being set up,
> toppling a car to get at a dealer in mutant drugs, or Kingpin
> returning from the alleged dead, but that doens't mean it's not there.
Well, no, I wouldn't define that as "high adventure". High adventure
is light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapistic. What you just described
is basically standard action movie fare. Which we get in basically
every standard action movie, so why put it into comics? Makes me yawn.
> It says more about you and your taste than it does about any
> intrinsic qualities of the book.
No argument there!
> I don't know why you are so prissy about this. I didn't say "Buy this
> book because it's full of escapist high adventure" or "This book was
> publicly endorsed by Tue Sorensen, he will refund double your money if
> you don't like it" or anything. I said "This is what I reckon it's
> like, I like it, I don't know what your tastes are but if you like
> these other things you might like DD."
I'm not prissy, I just wanted to show the original poster that some
people have a very different opinion of the book than yours. Letting
your comments stand unopposed would present a one-sided, uncritical
attitude to the title. If you were insulted by my view, or if I gave
it in an insulting manner, I apologize.
> It's obviously not the book for you. But not all comics have to be.
> What about tolerating a bit of variety?
I tolerate lots. I'm not demanding that DD be cancelled or anything.
I'm just saying that I don't think the current DD stories are good DD
stories. They aren't DD stories I want to read. And since I'm a fairly
long-time DD fan, I feel entitled to complain. That's all.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> On Wed, 05 Feb 2003 04:34:12 -0800, Brendan Carson wrote:
> > Perhaps you
> > could publish a short list of what you consider acceptable topics,
> > plotlines or moods for the superhero comic field.
> Perhaps you could tell us what the word "genre" means?
Good come-back! The superhero genre may be nearly all-inclusive, but
that doesn't mean it should be reduced to crime fiction.
> > Maybe you could campaign for warning labels to be put on comics like
> > they have on foods: may contain traces of new ideas.
> It's already labeled: Daredevil. They just changed the product beyond that
> description.
;-)
> > It's amazing that a genre that caters to the wildest and most exuberant
> > fantasies of its readers can still attract people with such narrow views
> > of what constitutes acceptable entertainment.
> Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
> children. Values to build the coming generations. Heroism that'll make
> grown men shudder. A bright outlook of our world. Wonderful.
;-)
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> Niels wrote:
> > Why is it that some books,
> > hundreds of years old, are still being read, but others from last year are
> > already forgotten? If you look at what historically makes great literature
> > (/entertainment), you'll find that few or none of those qualities are
> > present in the current Daredevil or Sopranos.
>
> I couldn't disagree more. If what you say were true, that would be a
> thoroughly depressing prospect -- one which not only presumes that
> storytelling techniques and themes have to stop evolving at some point, but
> also that this point lies in the past.
In a sense it does. When has Shakespeare's storytelling technique ever
been equalled, much less bested? The highest standard that current-day
readers and writers can aspire to is to understand Shakespeare and
make use of the objective techniques that he identified as the most
effective. If we can do that, we will eventually reach a point where
the grand message of art (i.e. the unification of truth and beauty,
and knowing what that means) is finally hammered home to the masses,
and society will be transformed to something different, which will
require all-new, all-different storytelling techniques. Nothing would
stop evolving. It's those who do not know enough to acknowledge
Shakespeare's supreme accomplishment that is hindering further
evolution in entertainment. Seriously.
> The notion that one would know what current or recent works are going to be
> considered classics in a hundred years based on nothing more than personal
> preference is narrow-minded and silly at best.
Yes - unless the notion is based on something *more* than personal
preference... :-)
- Tue
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> > I couldn't disagree more. If what you say were true, that would be a
> > thoroughly depressing prospect -- one which not only presumes that
> > storytelling techniques and themes have to stop evolving at some point,
> > but also that this point lies in the past.
>
> So which new themes have we seen lately? The way we use them have
> certainly changed, as they should. But the basic themes in literature are
> quite static.
I didn't say that the themes "change", but that they "evolve" -- they keep
adapting to the times.
> The problem I have with several new-style comicbooks is that
> they don't have a theme at all, they're just about people going from
> situation to situation.
You're referring to a choice of storytelling, which has nothing to do with
whether there's a theme or not. MANHATTAN TRANSFER, for example, is all
about "people going from situation to situation," but that doesn't mean it
lacks a theme.
> > If history has shown one thing in this context, then it's that those
> > very works which are dismissed by contemporary conservative critics for
> > not fitting established parameters have a habit of turning out to be the
> > enduring "classics" in the long run.
>
> Well, I'm not a conservative critic. Quite the opposite in fact. I'll
> gladly endorse any new, good book I see. I have read a lot of books, and I
> know what the good ones have in common. I know what the all-time classics
> have in common, from classic greek texts to our modern action-oriented
> tellings.
Well, why not get straight to the point then -- enlighten me: What are
those great elements to make an alltime classic which Bendis' DAREDEVIL
lacks, as opposed to Miller's?
> Looking beyond the surface of art is challenging, but necessesary if you
> want the complete experience of it.
No need to tell ME that. YOU're the conservative chap who dismisses books
simply because they don't cater to your preconceived, silly notions about
what they "should" look like. :)
> If you're entertained by the current Daredevil, then you should be happy,
> since many books is following its style. Good for you. I'm just sad that
> the Daredevil I like is being substituted with one I don't like, as is in
> general the entire concept of superheroism and literary quality.
Bingo, you don't like it. That's perfectly okay, you know -- there's no
need to make any more of that than what it is.
--Marc
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> It's those who do not know enough to acknowledge
> Shakespeare's supreme accomplishment that is hindering further
> evolution in entertainment. Seriously.
Au contraire, mon frere. It's those who suppose Shakespeare's
accomplishment has to be the be-all, en-all of literary craft who are doing
that.
I'm sure poor old William would be spinning in his grave witnessing that
some people are still trying to turn his approach into a blueprint for
quality hundreds of years later, let alone using it as an argunment that
there is some "intrinsic quality" to be found in art and entertainment.
> > The notion that one would know what current or recent works are going to
be
> > considered classics in a hundred years based on nothing more than
personal
> > preference is narrow-minded and silly at best.
>
> Yes - unless the notion is based on something *more* than personal
> preference... :-)
Not a whole lot more, apparently.
--Marc
I V
wrote:
> "Niels" <na...@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk> wrote in message
> news:<pan.2003.02.05....@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk>...
>> On Wed, 05 Feb 2003 04:34:12 -0800, Brendan Carson wrote:
>> > Perhaps you
>> > could publish a short list of what you consider acceptable topics,
>> > plotlines or moods for the superhero comic field.
>> Perhaps you could tell us what the word "genre" means?
>
> Good come-back! The superhero genre may be nearly all-inclusive, but
> that doesn't mean it should be reduced to crime fiction.
True, but crime fiction is one influence on superhero stories -
emphasising that element seems to me to be a way to look at superheroes in
a new light. I don't think superhero fiction can be reduced to fantastic
adventure either, as you sometimes seem to suggest - that has been a
dominant strand, but it has always coexisted with other themes.
Tue Sorensen
> Tue Sorensen wrote:
>
> > It's those who do not know enough to acknowledge
> > Shakespeare's supreme accomplishment that is hindering further
> > evolution in entertainment. Seriously.
>
> Au contraire, mon frere. It's those who suppose Shakespeare's
> that.
>
> I'm sure poor old William would be spinning in his grave witnessing that
> some people are still trying to turn his approach into a blueprint for
> quality hundreds of years later, let alone using it as an argunment that
> there is some "intrinsic quality" to be found in art and entertainment.
You are expressing an ignorant postmodern viewpoint which is a
philosophical and ideological deadend. But, if that's what makes you
happy, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
- Tue
Brendan Carson
> > > Given *your* particular taste...
> >
> > Well, yes. That's what I said. I didn't say "studies have shown" or
> > "nine out of ten dentists agree" or anything. Obviousy it's my taste.
> > What other criteria should I use?
>
> None, but in that particular case you might have said "in my
> opinion"...
> > Have you actually read the last issue?
>
> No. I stopped buying DD with #29. I bought #37 because of Elektra, #40
> because of Terry Dodson and #41 because it was 25c. But I've read a
> lot of reviews and leafed through a lot of issues, so I think I know
> quite enough about it to base an opinion on.
Well, the current issue suggests otherwise. Far from being superhero
battles "almost two pages every fifth issue" there were two separate
"superhero battles" in the last issue!
> > > > I reckon Underboss (the last arc, available in TPB) and Out (the
> > > > current one) are as good as anything in comics you've ever read.
> > >
> > > Perhaps, if your usual preferred standards are crime fiction and
> > > gritty realism. However, if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its
> > > fantastic elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then
> > > Bendis' DD just isn't worth your time, or your dime.
> >
> > What you mean is "I don't see anything in it so I don't reckon you
> > should even give it a look".
>
> No - I meant "if you enjoy the fantastic genre for its fantastic
> elements; the superheroic escapist high adventure, then Bendis' DD
> just isn't worth your time, or your dime."
Perhaps then, in that particular case, you might have said "in my
opinion"...because that's all it is. The element of the fantastic is
there, the high adventure is there, the escapism is there. You don't
see it.
> > And you may not see "high adventure" in DD being set up,
> > toppling a car to get at a dealer in mutant drugs, or Kingpin
> > returning from the alleged dead, but that doens't mean it's not there.
>
> Well, no, I wouldn't define that as "high adventure". High adventure
> is light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapistic. What you just described
> is basically standard action movie fare. Which we get in basically
> every standard action movie, so why put it into comics? Makes me yawn.
Again, perhaps if you bought every issue rather than occasional ones
you'd have a different opinion. My opinion is that that "action
movies" are usually fairly so-so. For most people, the struggles are
internal, and in recent DD Daredevil has had to fight against Matt
Murdock. Psychological thriller, or whatever.
But if someone will only be pleased by a comic when it does not stray
from the "light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist" formula, then as I
said earlier, Bendis' DD isn't for them.
But I have to say, this is a very narrow set of criteria. Was Miller
"light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist" ? Was stuff like Ultimate
Spiderman #13, where Peter tells MJ he is Spiderman, which is
light-hearted in parts but not really escapist and not at all
swashbuckling? It's excluding a lot of good stuff.
The thing is, comics, like movies, are a medium, not a series of
variations on a single plotline. I feel there should be all kinds of
stories in comics, all kinds of stories about superheroes. You should
be able to pick up a uperhero comic and have the possibility of being
surprised: maybe the hero's life will enter a tragic phase, like in
the Death of Elektra series, maybe s/he'll fall in love and it'll be a
romance, like parts of that Echo storyline, maybe there'll be mystery,
maybe crime, maybe whatever. Legal drama, medical drama....at the
moment it's crime with a bit of romance, but as far as I know, there's
swashbuckling in every other mainstream title (except I think current
Hulk...) and in a few of the Ultimate ones.
There is not only one way to write about superheroes.
> I'm not prissy, I just wanted to show the original poster that some
> people have a very different opinion of the book than yours. Letting
> your comments stand unopposed would present a one-sided, uncritical
> attitude to the title. If you were insulted by my view, or if I gave
> it in an insulting manner, I apologize.
>
No need for that at all. I'm probably the more offensive one, sorry
about that. It's just I love these stories. I look forward to them
every month, I drive miles to get them, I read them to my
long-suffering wife. I can't articulate it, but BMB's DD and one or
two other comics have brought me back to the whole superhero thing.
The character means a lot to me. I just get enraged when I hear what
I feel is people "dissing" it.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> > the Ringmaster (?). Stiltman is one thing, but for God's sake...
>
> Firstly, these villains were used in lots of good old Marvel stories.
> No reason they shouldn't be re-used in new ways in new stories.
Hmmmm... I suppose it is possible that a good story could still be
written about the Jester. I liked the Leapfrog one, I suspect we will
differ on this. But I ddin't feel the Gale one was one. Maybe that
makes me a very strange DD fan....
And
> whether they're used "seriously" or not, silly supervillains should be
> read as comedy and at least partial self-satire. Otherwise, how do you
> react to a villain like The Condiment King in Birds of Prey #37? :-)
Don't know the character. He may have added spice to the storyline,
but I doubt he was worth his salt.
> Besides, the Jester wasn't a villain in Gale's story. He was paid to
> masquerade as one in order to serve DD his court notice. That was a
> cool way to use the character.
See, all the way though I was thinking unsuperheroic thoughts, like
"Maybe Matt could go to the Kingpin and pay him to have this guy
rubbed out. No-one'd know. Oh, look, this stickfigure in a clown
costume is running along a ledge, perhaps he'll trip and fall to his
death or permanent disfigurement... no? Maybe next page...."
BDC
Brendan Carson
> > Well then, DD is probably not for you.
> It used to be.
My sympathies. But you've still got >90% of the Marvel line and
probably >95% of mainstream DC.
> > This is closeminded wank. Do you read books, watch tv, go to movies
> > expecting to see only one kind of story, for only one purpose?
> No. When I pick up a DD comic, I expect a DD comic, not a stupid ganster
> drama. When I pick up a superhero comic I expect a fantastic story of
> wonder and heroism. Not some unusable postmodernistic, violent crap.
So when I said "do you only want one kind of story" and you said
"No... I expect a fantastic story of wonder and heroism", you actually
mean "yes"?
Just had a thought: people complain about the lack of fight scenes in
current Dd and they also complain about the high level of violence.
Maybe this is because BMB is showing the consequences of violence.
When people get stabbed, they come close to death, and the people
around them are devastated. That was one good thing about Smith's
recent arc - he showed the consequences of the violence, like BMB did
in Leapfrog.
Me, I hate violence. Since kids read these messages, I will just say
it is essentially messed up people doing messed up things to other
people to make them messed up. This is one reason I am iffy about a
diet of constant escapism.
> Perhaps you could tell us what the word "genre" means?
The thing is, like I posted to Tue on Thurs, there is not only one way
to write about superheroes. What I like is well-written stuff using
the idea of superheroes. It doesn't all have to be serious, or grim
and gritty crime noir, or realistic. Ultimate Spiderman is frequently
not serious (although touchingly realistic). The "crime" element in
Ultimates is negligible, if by crime you mean shady deals in smoky
rooms, with stabbings and back robberies.
But good stories can be told without lighthearted swashbuckling. Look
at Born Again. What made that great was the battle within the man as
much as the battle outside him, not the battle with the spandex-clad
Kingpin atop the Brooklyn Bridge while Karen struggled helplessly on
the railroad tracks.
> Do you like anything published in, say, the 70's? Why? You'd agree that
> it's a completely different take on things?
Yes I do! The thing is, I wouldn't like these 1970's stories if I
picked up, say, an old Iron Man story and said "where's the grim and
gritty crime?" I'd be disappointed, rather than being able to sit
down and enjoy the story for what it is - relatively light-hearted
escapist fare abotu being a superpowered, extremely rich, handsome man
who gets to smack bad guys around without actually hurting anyone. As
a light-hearted tale, current DD sucks. it's also a fairly poor
cookbook or a guide to the basis of diagnosing skin diseases. BUt for
what it is, it's wonderful. It means a lot to me. Your mileage
evidently varies.
> Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
> children.
Not at all, my kids get USM. But every good story does not have to be
G rated.
>Values to build the coming generations.
Excellent, I am glad you can see this.
Seriously, "valuable moral lessons" aren't essential in every story,
but I reckon they are there in this run of DD. The lesson that heroes
are human, that the consequences of your bad actions can come back to
you (Matt lied and sued the Globe, now the owner of the Globe is
dead... coincidence?), that true heroism consists of rising above your
own internal weaknesses as much as in smacking out supervillains, that
your friends can get smacked about when you fight as much as your
enemies do. MM makes mistakes, but he has a strong sense of right and
wrong and he doesn't give up.
BDC
Niels
> Well, why not get straight to the point then -- enlighten me: What are
> those great elements to make an alltime classic which Bendis' DAREDEVIL
> lacks, as opposed to Miller's?
Unfortunately noone can be told what the Matrix is... Well... Miller's run
may not be the best example. And it's difficult to explain in short, in
english. I think maybe asking questions like "how does this make the
reader a better person" and "what does this tell us about our world"
identifies solid, literary works. But it's a lacking answer to your
question.
>> Looking beyond the surface of art is challenging, but necessesary if
>> you want the complete experience of it.
> No need to tell ME that. YOU're the conservative chap who dismisses
> books simply because they don't cater to your preconceived, silly
> notions about what they "should" look like. :)
Thanks for that smiley!
It may be true that I have some very general form I like books to follow.
But it's on a very, very non-specific level. It's about the major themes.
The story can be told any which way, within reasonable limits.
>> If you're entertained by the current Daredevil, then you should be
>> happy, since many books is following its style. Good for you. I'm just
>> sad that the Daredevil I like is being substituted with one I don't
>> like, as is in general the entire concept of superheroism and literary
>> quality.
> Bingo, you don't like it. That's perfectly okay, you know -- there's no
> need to make any more of that than what it is.
well... yes there is. Everybody's entitled to an opinion, and everybody
can read what they like. I just have this silly notion that my opinion is
slightly more informed than many other's, since I'm such a clever guy ;-)
You should know that I didn't read Marvel as a kid, or many comicbooks at
all. I only started when I was in my early twenties. I see classic Marvel
(that is: up to ca. 1990) as a completely natural element of world
literature, of great fantasy action-suspence drama. I didn't much like
what happened in the 90's, and I really hate what's happening now. I'm
usually not very vocal about it, especially in english. But when good old
Hornhead, one of my favourites, get's butchered in the name of the flavour
of the month, I get a little upset.
//Niels
Niels
> So when I said "do you only want one kind of story" and you said "No...
> I expect a fantastic story of wonder and heroism", you actually mean
> "yes"?
No. "a fantastic story of wonder and heroism" is a multitude of stories.
It's not "one kind" it's a big "theme".
> Just had a thought: people complain about the lack of fight scenes in
> current Dd and they also complain about the high level of violence.
I didn't. But violence is a concern. I don't like it when violence becomes
a major plot tool, though that's not the big issue here.
> Maybe
> this is because BMB is showing the consequences of violence. When people
> get stabbed, they come close to death, and the people around them are
> devastated.
That's good. But it's only a small detail in a story.
> Me, I hate violence. Since kids read these messages, I will just say it
> is essentially messed up people doing messed up things to other people
> to make them messed up.
If that's the main ingredient for a book, I don't like it.
> This is one reason I am iffy about a diet of constant escapism.
Violence is fed by fear, uncertainty and doubt. Escapism and visionary
thoughts shown us a better way. These things goes hand in hand, and many
stories are about the conflict between the beauty and the beast, so to
speak. I know what I like.
> The thing is, like I posted to Tue on Thurs, there is not only one way
> to write about superheroes. What I like is well-written stuff using the
> idea of superheroes. It doesn't all have to be serious, or grim and
> gritty crime noir, or realistic.
That's good, that's fine. I'm all for it. It's just not exactly what I'm
seeing. And as an aside: I don't consider a $3 book I can read in 5
minutes "well-written", no matter the contents.
> Ultimate Spiderman is frequently not serious (although touchingly
> realistic). The "crime" element in Ultimates is negligible, if by crime
> you mean shady deals in smoky rooms, with stabbings and back robberies.
I must admit I've largely steered clear of all things ultimate. Partly
because it's not in the Marvel universe, but not much is these days. But
mostly because I've been very disappointed with the ones I've read.
> But good stories can be told without lighthearted swashbuckling. Look
> at Born Again. What made that great was the battle within the man as
> much as the battle outside him, not the battle with the spandex-clad
> Kingpin atop the Brooklyn Bridge while Karen struggled helplessly on the
> railroad tracks.
Possibly true, but it's been very long since I read that. Shame on me.
> The thing is, I wouldn't like these 1970's stories if I picked up, say,
> an old Iron Man story and said "where's the grim and gritty crime?" I'd
> be disappointed, rather than being able to sit down and enjoy the story
> for what it is - relatively light-hearted escapist fare abotu being a
> superpowered, extremely rich, handsome man who gets to smack bad guys
> around without actually hurting anyone.
On the surface, yes. The actual story in an individual issue may seem
light. But over a story arc, it'll touch upon big issues. Big themes. And
you can't read it in 4 minutes. Qualities I don't find many places these
days.
> As a light-hearted tale, current DD sucks.
The big thing about classic Marvel is that can be read both ways.
Light-hearted action/suspence for the immediate entertainment, and larger
underlying themes which are good for you in the long run. This last thing
seems to be a no-no with many current writers.
> it's also a fairly poor cookbook or a guide to the
> basis of diagnosing skin diseases. BUt for what it is, it's wonderful.
:-)
> It means a lot to me. Your mileage evidently varies.
You might say I don't run with a full tank...
>> Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
>> children.
> Not at all, my kids get USM. But every good story does not have to be G
> rated.
No, but given a good writer, most can be.
>>Values to build the coming generations.
> Excellent, I am glad you can see this.
> Seriously, "valuable moral lessons" aren't essential in every story, but
> I reckon they are there in this run of DD. The lesson that heroes are
> human, that the consequences of your bad actions can come back to you
> (Matt lied and sued the Globe, now the owner of the Globe is dead...
> coincidence?), that true heroism consists of rising above your own
> internal weaknesses as much as in smacking out supervillains, that your
> friends can get smacked about when you fight as much as your enemies do.
That's good to hear. But such morals can also be told in a nicer setting,
as indeed they have been for years in Daredevil and the other titles. And
with an exiting story which can be remembered, and takes some effort to
"get".
> MM makes mistakes, but he has a strong sense of right and wrong and he
> doesn't give up.
Uh-oh!
Well, thanks for your answer,
//Niels
Tue Sorensen
> On Thu, 06 Feb 2003 06:41:50 -0800, twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen)
> wrote:
> > "Niels" <na...@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk> wrote in message
> > news:<pan.2003.02.05....@nameofmyinternetprovider.dk>...
> >> On Wed, 05 Feb 2003 04:34:12 -0800, Brendan Carson wrote:
> >> > Perhaps you
> >> > could publish a short list of what you consider acceptable topics,
> >> > plotlines or moods for the superhero comic field.
> >> Perhaps you could tell us what the word "genre" means?
> >
> > Good come-back! The superhero genre may be nearly all-inclusive, but
> > that doesn't mean it should be reduced to crime fiction.
>
> True, but crime fiction is one influence on superhero stories -
> emphasising that element seems to me to be a way to look at superheroes in
> a new light. I don't think superhero fiction can be reduced to fantastic
> adventure either, as you sometimes seem to suggest - that has been a
> dominant strand, but it has always coexisted with other themes.
That's true - I just happen to think crime fiction is boring as hell.
Batman: Long Halloween bored me to tears about a couple of issues in,
and I couldn't read any more. BMB's Powers were nearly the same (I
bought the first TPB, and quickly got rid of it again).
- Tue
M-Wolverine
>
> > and that doesn't make you much of a true DD
> > fan as far as I'm concerned.
>
> And, as I said before, I've been reading them
> since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
> picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
> with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
> carpetbagging johnny-come-lately.
>
Hmmm, I'd actually ACT like I know a little about comic history before
I spew about it.....
If you've been reading letter pages (anyone remember those) for that
long, you'd know Tue has been around a loooooooong time.....so calling
hima "carpetbagging johnny-come-lately" is so ridiculous on it's face,
that it's kind of embarassing.
Now, I don't always agree with him (we had a discussion recently
elsewhere), but you can't knock his "fan cred" by any means.
I knew he wouldn't say that, but I think it needed to be said.
Chris C.
M-Wolverine
>
>
> > > Have you actually read the last issue?
> >
> > No. I stopped buying DD with #29. I bought #37 because of Elektra, #40
> > because of Terry Dodson and #41 because it was 25c. But I've read a
> > lot of reviews and leafed through a lot of issues, so I think I know
> > quite enough about it to base an opinion on.
>
> Well, the current issue suggests otherwise. Far from being superhero
> battles "almost two pages every fifth issue" there were two separate
> "superhero battles" in the last issue!
I haven't jumped in much, because I'm pretty much exhausted in my
Bendis bashing ;), but I thought I'd step in here to say to Tue that
the other reason, even though I agree with him, is that I'm giving
Bendis some leeway with this new arc, and if he's interested, give it
a try.
Because so far it DOES seem more like what he and I have been harping
about. Is it a complete turnaround for Bendis? No, if you hate
everything he does, then you probably still won't like it. But if you
can handle something between Bendis's usual work (with the no DD, the
cheap identity reveal - again, the shoddy characterization of
supporting characters, and it's utter slowness; but just paraphrasing
the arguments :), and "old-school" fare, he might be heading in the
right direction. He's keeping his style, but moving it along faster,
and actually letting us see a little Daredevil, too. So, I'm giving
this arc a chance.
Y'know, for all of it, the passion Bendis invokes is funny. Because I
don't think he's hardly doing the best work Daredevil has seen since
Miller, as some claim. But on the other hand, it's not hardly "bad"
work, certainly not the dark days of just writing anything, like right
before the relaunch.
With me, it's just this notion that this stuff is the greatest thing
since sliced bread that seems "forced" on everyone....
Chris C.
> > > And you may not see "high adventure" in DD being set up,
> > > toppling a car to get at a dealer in mutant drugs, or Kingpin
> > > returning from the alleged dead, but that doens't mean it's not there.
> >
> > Well, no, I wouldn't define that as "high adventure". High adventure
> > is light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapistic. What you just described
> > is basically standard action movie fare. Which we get in basically
> > every standard action movie, so why put it into comics? Makes me yawn.
Oh, and I'll just add on the adventure vs. realism thing in regard to
Miller:
Miller was, and kind of started, the whole "gritty" phase. But I'd
hardly call most of his stuff "realistic"; whereas I think Bendis DOES
write "real" well. The stuff Miller wrote was dark and gritty often,
but it was also epic, almost operatic. Dark Knight is obviously his
ultimate example of this. Elektra is Opera. Daredevil became "The
Devil" to the underworld. Bullseye is not realistic, but very
unrealistically cool. Kingpin was larger than life in more ways than
one. For example, Miller's Kingpin could take out 5 black belts
blindfolded; Bendis's Kingpin gets taken down by some thugs with
shivs. The latter is very realistic - it's what would happen. The
former makes the character an epic archtype, human, but more than
human too. Which you like better is a matter of taste. But I don't
know that it completely flies that Bendis is writing stories in the
"same style" as Miller. There are similarities, but differences too
(as there should be - he has the right to his own voice). But I don't
know his crime noire is any more similar than Noncenti's (yeah, I
killed the spelling, I'm sure) stories, which has supervillians and
the devil - she made it a grand, pathos, but maybe a bit less realism.
Bendis is real, and street, but I'm not getting the larger than life
quality.
-Chris C.
jay
>>> and that doesn't make you much of a true DD
>>> fan as far as I'm concerned.
>>
>> And, as I said before, I've been reading them
>> since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
>> picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
>> with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
>> carpetbagging johnny-come-lately.
>
> Hmmm, I'd actually ACT like I know a little about
> comic history before I spew about it.....
Maybe you shouldn't act as though you know things
about the posters around here if you don't.
> If you've been reading letter pages (anyone
> remember those) for that long, you'd know Tue
> has been around a loooooooong time.....
I know that, and I know I've been at it a lot
longer than he has, and refuse to have my DD
credentials, which were old before his had even
been minted, called into question by him.
> so calling hima "carpetbagging johnny-come-lately"
> is so ridiculous on it's face, that it's kind of
> embarassing.
If you read the exchange, you know the context.
Assuming he could possibly be anything more than
a wank on this matter is as embarassing in its
details as it is on its face.
> Now, I don't always agree with him (we had a
> discussion recently elsewhere), but you can't
> knock his "fan cred" by any means.
He's the only one knocking "fan cred" around
here--did you even bother to read this exchange
before commenting upon it?
> I knew he wouldn't say that, but I think it
> needed to be said.
Maybe you should assume there was a reason he
didn't say it, and maybe that should have prompted
you to read the exchange so you, too, could know
it.
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> You are expressing an ignorant postmodern viewpoint which is a
> philosophical and ideological deadend.
Considering our tastes and views are obviously diametrically opposed to each
other, I will take that as a compliment. :)
--Marc
Marc-Oliver Frisch
>
> > Well, why not get straight to the point then -- enlighten me: What are
> > those great elements to make an alltime classic which Bendis' DAREDEVIL
> > lacks, as opposed to Miller's?
>
> Unfortunately noone can be told what the Matrix is...
Alternatively, there's the possibility that the Matrix, while being an
interesting idea to play around and kill 90 minutes with, is ultimately
science fiction.
> Well... Miller's run
> may not be the best example. And it's difficult to explain in short, in
> english. I think maybe asking questions like "how does this make the
> reader a better person" and "what does this tell us about our world"
> identifies solid, literary works. But it's a lacking answer to your
> question.
The primary function of entertainment is to entertain, and the primary
function of art is to express... something -- for some, this includes the
kind of questions you are asking, while for others it doesn't. Ergo,
presuming for a moment that universal standards for determing quality in
entertainment or art exist, these questions cannot really be helpful in
determining it.
That said, Bendis' DAREDEVIL definitely provides enough substance to qualify
for both questions.
> Thanks for that smiley!
You're welcome. :)
> It may be true that I have some very general form I like books to follow.
> But it's on a very, very non-specific level.
If you see such a fundamental difference between Miller's DAREDEVIL and
Bendis' which makes one a work of quality entertainment but not the other,
it does look like it's a very narrow level.
> It's about the major themes.
> The story can be told any which way, within reasonable limits.
Then I'm even farther away from seeing where you're coming from than before:
As others have pointed out, there are plenty of themes in Bendis' DAREDEVIL.
> well... yes there is. Everybody's entitled to an opinion, and everybody
> can read what they like. I just have this silly notion that my opinion is
> slightly more informed than many other's, since I'm such a clever guy ;-)
I see. I would say that the degree of how informed an opinion is generally
depends much more on experience than on sheer cleverness, though.
--Marc
M-Wolverine
> On 7 Feb 2003 07:48:28 -0800, mwo...@umich.edu (M-Wolverine) wrote:
>
> >>> and that doesn't make you much of a true DD
> >>> fan as far as I'm concerned.
> >>
> >> And, as I said before, I've been reading them
> >> since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
> >> picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
> >> with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
> >> carpetbagging johnny-come-lately.
> >
> > Hmmm, I'd actually ACT like I know a little about
> > comic history before I spew about it.....
>
> Maybe you shouldn't act as though you know things
> about the posters around here if you don't.
You're rubber and I'm glue?
> > If you've been reading letter pages (anyone
> > remember those) for that long, you'd know Tue
> > has been around a loooooooong time.....
>
> I know that, and I know I've been at it a lot
> longer than he has, and refuse to have my DD
> credentials, which were old before his had even
> been minted, called into question by him.
I bet you were even reading Daredevil before it was being written!!
If you actually read, rather than just flamed, you understand he never
questioned your cred, (you were the only one doing that) - he simply
couldn't understand how a fan of such a long time could feel this way
about the older stories vs. the new. Rather than illustrating
longevity holds no connection to knowledge and reason.
> > so calling hima "carpetbagging johnny-come-lately"
> > is so ridiculous on it's face, that it's kind of
> > embarassing.
>
> If you read the exchange, you know the context.
> Assuming he could possibly be anything more than
> a wank on this matter is as embarassing in its
> details as it is on its face.
I usually find anyone calling someone else a "wank" is usually
describing themselves much more.
> > Now, I don't always agree with him (we had a
> > discussion recently elsewhere), but you can't
> > knock his "fan cred" by any means.
>
> He's the only one knocking "fan cred" around
> here--did you even bother to read this exchange
> before commenting upon it?
Yes, but you apparently don't read what you write yourself. And it
shows.
> > I knew he wouldn't say that, but I think it
> > needed to be said.
>
> Maybe you should assume there was a reason he
> didn't say it, and maybe that should have prompted
> you to read the exchange so you, too, could know
> it.
Well, I won't put words in his mouth, which seems to be your M.O.
But hey, if you think being a rude ass somehow makes you feel
superior, go for it....glory be the king of Usenet.
-Chris C.
jay
> If you actually read, rather than just flamed, you
> understand he never questioned your cred, (you
> were the only one doing that) - he simply couldn't
> understand how a fan of such a long time could
> feel this way about the older stories vs. the new.
I don't feel the way he says I do about the older
stuff--he made that up as part of his attack on my
fan credentials.
Him:
"Would you also have us pretend all the pre-Bendis
stories (except for Miller's, of course) never happened?
You're a fine DD fan. <sarcasm>"
And:
"The Gale arc was a treat for fans of the old stories."
This was after I'd said the Gale arc was the only
dark spot in an otherwise great run. Again:
"...I just don't understand your attitude to the majority
of the title's history. You obviously think that most
issues except for Miller's and Bendis' (and Nocenti's?)
were hopelessly inferior to the material by said writers,
and that doesn't make you much of a true DD fan as
far as I'm concerned."
And so on. I haven't questioned his fan credentials
anywhere, so that was just a lie on your part, and
no more appreciated by me than Tue's bullshit. If
you're going to comment on this exchange, I'm
going to insist that you read it first.
>>> I knew he wouldn't say that, but I think it
>>> needed to be said.
>>
>> Maybe you should assume there was a reason he
>> didn't say it, and maybe that should have prompted
>> you to read the exchange so you, too, could know
>> it.
>
> Well, I won't put words in his mouth, which seems
> to be your M.O.
He created an anti-DD attitude for me right out of the
thin air, then proceeded to say I wasn't a DD fan because
I had that attitude.
> But hey, if you think being a rude ass somehow
> makes you feel superior, go for it....glory be the
> king of Usenet.
I'm happy to let people around here read the exchange
and identify the rude asses around here.
Tue Sorensen
> I haven't jumped in much, because I'm pretty much exhausted in my
> Bendis bashing ;), but I thought I'd step in here to say to Tue that
> the other reason, even though I agree with him, is that I'm giving
> Bendis some leeway with this new arc, and if he's interested, give it
> a try.
>
> Because so far it DOES seem more like what he and I have been harping
> about. Is it a complete turnaround for Bendis? No, if you hate
> everything he does, then you probably still won't like it. But if you
> can handle something between Bendis's usual work (with the no DD, the
> cheap identity reveal - again, the shoddy characterization of
> supporting characters, and it's utter slowness; but just paraphrasing
> the arguments :), and "old-school" fare, he might be heading in the
> right direction. He's keeping his style, but moving it along faster,
> and actually letting us see a little Daredevil, too. So, I'm giving
> this arc a chance.
I had actually planned to, also, but I got too annoyed and irritated
with the writing style to follow through. It's not impossible for
Bendis' DD to capture my attention for a while, but the intriguing
elements have so far always been quickly overpowered by dismaying
elements. A book with such a fixed street (almost gutter) level focus
just intensifies the negative elements of current society that I want
to see changed. Good stories should not just be mercilessly realistic;
they should address reality's problems by way of suggesting
alternatives; solutions. I don't get that from Bendis' DD.
> Y'know, for all of it, the passion Bendis invokes is funny. Because I
> don't think he's hardly doing the best work Daredevil has seen since
> Miller, as some claim.
Couldn't agree more.
> But on the other hand, it's not hardly "bad"
> work, certainly not the dark days of just writing anything, like right
> before the relaunch.
Bendis has a purpose with his stories, and maintains a certain style,
no doubt about that. While it can be wildly uneven and terribly thinly
worded (which might actually be an editorial decree), it isn't shoddy
workmanship. It's the basic philosophy of the storytelling and its
premise that I don't care for, or agree with (for more on that, see
below).
> With me, it's just this notion that this stuff is the greatest thing
> since sliced bread that seems "forced" on everyone....
Ain't that the truth! But with massively hyped stuff, that's the
nature of the beast. Great hype spawns great praise from the gullible
and uncritical masses! ;-)
> Miller was, and kind of started, the whole "gritty" phase. But I'd
> hardly call most of his stuff "realistic"
True - Miller's work was hugely artistic and stylistic, and it is
first of all an aesthetic pleasure to read it. It certainly has an
edge of intensity which is unusual in mainstream superhero comics, but
I don't see how it is particularly more realistic than the pre- and
post-Miller DD.
I like to compare the death of Elektra by Miller to the death of Karen
Page by Smith. Miller manages to make a very unpleasant act of
murderous sadism fascinating, while Smith (and was it Quesada that
drew it?) utterly fails to make the murder of Karen Page anything but
repulsive and unnecessary (all the more so because it was intolerably
derivative). Karen Page's death has completely ruined the Smith run
for me, which otherwise I thought started off pretty well.
>; whereas I think Bendis DOES
> write "real" well. The stuff Miller wrote was dark and gritty often,
> but it was also epic, almost operatic. Dark Knight is obviously his
> ultimate example of this. Elektra is Opera. Daredevil became "The
> Devil" to the underworld. Bullseye is not realistic, but very
> unrealistically cool. Kingpin was larger than life in more ways than
> one. For example, Miller's Kingpin could take out 5 black belts
> blindfolded; Bendis's Kingpin gets taken down by some thugs with
> shivs. The latter is very realistic - it's what would happen. The
> former makes the character an epic archtype, human, but more than
> human too.
You are so right! This is exactly the kind of "larger themes" that I
(and Niels) have been talking about, which ought to be (and once was)
profusely integrated in good superhero stories. By using archetypes
instead of individuals with nothing going for them but their
"realism", you tell a much greater and grander story which has the
potential to become a future classic, retaining a broad, timeless
appeal. Some writers just aren't capable of this, however, and that's
why their work will soon be forgotten. (And yes I mean that to include
Bendis.) I called old-school (i.e. Stan Leesque) superhero comics the
vanguard of pop culture because they contained so much "future
classic" mettle that they overwhelmingly outshone anything else in the
modern entertainment industry. My problem with current superhero
comics is that most of this past greatness has now been lost due to
the obsession with "realism" and "good stories" (read: independent of
continuity), and this effectively amounts to a closing of the
imaginative mind. When imagination is compromised, so are all the
concomitant themes that made this industry's little corner of pop
culture great.
> Which you like better is a matter of taste.
It is, in fact, also a matter of an informed perspective. The heroic
moral of the superhero genre - the ceaseless saving of the world, etc.
- entails that both we and the heroes should do what we can to make
the world a better place; change it into something new and improved.
This is what can be gradually demonstrated and accomplished with the
grander themes, while the myopic postmodernist obsession with
"realism" is just a wallowing in our own despair and bitterness,
without showing any path out of it (and hence that intellectual
premise is a philosophical deadend, as I called it in another post).
> But I don't
> know that it completely flies that Bendis is writing stories in the
> "same style" as Miller. There are similarities, but differences too
> (as there should be - he has the right to his own voice). But I don't
> know his crime noire is any more similar than Nocenti's
> stories, which has supervillians and
> the devil - she made it a grand, pathos, but maybe a bit less realism.
> Bendis is real, and street, but I'm not getting the larger than life
> quality.
'S exactly right, and why I don't read him.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> > > toppling a car to get at a dealer in mutant drugs, or Kingpin
> > > returning from the alleged dead, but that doens't mean it's not there.
> >
> > Well, no, I wouldn't define that as "high adventure". High adventure
> > is light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapistic. What you just described
> > is basically standard action movie fare. Which we get in basically
> > every standard action movie, so why put it into comics? Makes me yawn.
>
> Again, perhaps if you bought every issue rather than occasional ones
> you'd have a different opinion.
I buy enough comics I barely enjoy. Why should I buy some I *don't*
enjoy?
> My opinion is that that "action
> movies" are usually fairly so-so. For most people, the struggles are
> internal, and in recent DD Daredevil has had to fight against Matt
> Murdock. Psychological thriller, or whatever.
> But if someone will only be pleased by a comic when it does not stray
> from the "light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist" formula, then as I
> said earlier, Bendis' DD isn't for them.
And indeed, I haven't enjoyed a single one of the BMB stories I've
read.
> But I have to say, this is a very narrow set of criteria. Was Miller
> "light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist" ?
No. (More below.)
> Was stuff like Ultimate
> Spiderman #13, where Peter tells MJ he is Spiderman, which is
> light-hearted in parts but not really escapist and not at all
> swashbuckling?
I finally pulled myself together to stop buying it at #12. I have now
gotten rid of all issues save #1. I think USM is a failure. There's no
way these stories will be as timeless as the originals. They're far
too current, and far too draaaawn-out in their plots, and they seem to
me to be written for scatterbrained teenagers. It's really not
material I have any interest in. I do think that Spider-Man, as a
character, is kind of swashbuckling, though!
> It's excluding a lot of good stuff.
>
> The thing is, comics, like movies, are a medium, not a series of
> variations on a single plotline. I feel there should be all kinds of
> stories in comics, all kinds of stories about superheroes. You should
> be able to pick up a superhero comic and have the possibility of being
> surprised: maybe the hero's life will enter a tragic phase, like in
> the Death of Elektra series, maybe s/he'll fall in love and it'll be a
> romance, like parts of that Echo storyline, maybe there'll be mystery,
> maybe crime, maybe whatever. Legal drama, medical drama....at the
> moment it's crime with a bit of romance, but as far as I know, there's
> swashbuckling in every other mainstream title (except I think current
> Hulk...) and in a few of the Ultimate ones.
>
> There is not only one way to write about superheroes.
What I meant was that, *generally and overall*, the superhero genre is
at its best in the light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist mode (which
was to a large extent created by Stan Lee). Obivously there are plenty
of exceptions, and Miller's DD is one. "Kraven's Last Hunt" is
another, and brilliant, one. For the past 15 years I've maintained
that there is a superhero story about absolutely anything. That all
kinds of stories can be told in the superhero genre. And they can. The
examples are legion. But that doesn't change the predominantly
easy-going tenets of the basic, archetypal superhero comic as refined
nearly to perfection by Stan Lee.
> It's just I love these stories. I look forward to them
> every month, I drive miles to get them, I read them to my
> long-suffering wife.
Tell her that she has my sympathy! :-)
> I can't articulate it, but BMB's DD and one or
> two other comics have brought me back to the whole superhero thing.
> The character means a lot to me. I just get enraged when I hear what
> I feel is people "dissing" it.
Well, it's good for you that you enjoy it. I know the feeling. It's
giving you something. That's cool. It's just not my cup of tea, and I
am driven to bitch about it because I would prefer a different DD. Not
much you and I can do about it other than agree to disagree.
<shrug>:-)
- Tue
Amos Keppler
The 25 cent issue did it for me - fooled me into buying it regularly, and it seems I have missed a lot of
good stuff. The stiltman coming into Murdoch's office scene was just priceless.
Amos the Witch
========================================
ShadowWalk http://midnight-fire.net/sw
One of the most controversial novels
ever written.
========================================
Jason Michael
I have a question.
First you say:
"Tue Sorensen" <twoc...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com...
>the superhero genre is
> at its best in the light-hearted, swashbuckling, escapist mode (which
> was to a large extent created by Stan Lee).
and then you say:
> But that doesn't change the predominantly
> easy-going tenets of the basic, archetypal superhero comic as refined
> nearly to perfection by Stan Lee.
>
So if the superhero comic was both created by Stan Lee, and refined to
perfection by Stan Lee, why do you bother reading anything other than the
work of Stan Lee? And why does anybody else bother to write, publish, or
read books by other people? All the best work possible has already been done
by Stan!
Just wondering, :)
Jason
Brendan Carson
> enjoy?
>
One day someone will explain this to me. Why do you buy comics you
don't enjoy?
As an aside, I go to my comics shop and feel bad if I walk out with
more than my two or three comics a month plus trades, because I'bve
blown my budget. But last week there was a guy in there spending one
hundred and fifty dollars (Australian - with shipping and all that
probably translates to about eighty dollars US). I suspect this is
not a record. How much do people spend? and how do people afford
this?
>Not
> much you and I can do about it other than agree to disagree.
True.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> If you've been reading letter pages (anyone remember those) for that
> long, you'd know Tue has been around a loooooooong time.....
SNIP
> Now, I don't always agree with him (we had a discussion recently
> elsewhere), but you can't knock his "fan cred" by any means.
>
The following is not specifically about any one particular person.
I don't feel I understand this idea of quantifying someone's
credibility or whatever as a fan. I don't know that there's much
point quantifying people's achievements on the basis of how many Iron
Man comics they have. Say Fred has every issue of Iron Man going back
to the Eisenhower Administration, but Wilma has some from the days of
Prohibition. That doesn't mean Wilma has more important stuff to say
than Fred. It doesn't mean that Wilma's more eloquent, or that her
opinion s any more valid. Wilma may be the person to go to to find
out trivia, like when Iron Man first met insert character here, but
that's about it.
Maybe outside of questions of objective historical detail, it's a
meaningless concept.
It probably makes more sense to do what most people do - read stuff by
people and quantify their credibility on how much they agree with you
:)
BDC
jay
<jwmi...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> Tue,
> I have a question.
> First you say:
>
>> the superhero genre is at its best in the light-hearted,
>> swashbuckling, escapist mode (which was to a large
>> extent created by Stan Lee).
>
> and then you say:
>
>> But that doesn't change the predominantly easy-going
>> tenets of the basic, archetypal superhero comic as
>> refined nearly to perfection by Stan Lee.
>
> So if the superhero comic was both created by Stan
> Lee, and refined to perfection by Stan Lee, why do
> you bother reading anything other than the work of
> Stan Lee? And why does anybody else bother to
> write, publish, or read books by other people? All the
> best work possible has already been done by Stan!
> Just wondering, :)
LOL! Tue is very confused about a lot of things.
He'll tell you a superhero story can be about anything,
then turn around and say any superhero story, to be
a real one, should conform to six or seven dozen
restrictions he, himself, has made up which dictate,
down to a micon, every detail of the character, the
character's world, and the character's adventures.
Brendan Carson
> That's good, that's fine. I'm all for it. It's just not exactly what I'm
> seeing. And as an aside: I don't consider a $3 book I can read in 5
> minutes "well-written", no matter the contents.
>
Bendis not wordy enough for you? :)
> The big thing about classic Marvel is that can be read both ways.
> Light-hearted action/suspence for the immediate entertainment, and larger
> underlying themes which are good for you in the long run. This last thing
> seems to be a no-no with many current writers.
>
Ah. This is the core of the disagreement: is such and such a story
good for you?
Lots of answers (not all serious). I could say it's good for me to be
entertained, and BMB's DD does that. I could say depictions of the
consequences of violence are "good for me", and if televisions showed
more kids missing limbs (grim and gritty realism) and less planes
swooping and rocket's red glare (swashbuckling escapism) the world
would become a better place. I could say depicting a hero's refusal
to give up is good for me, and you can't depict that without making
his superheroing life deeply uncomfortable, like Bendis is doing.
But seriously... I'm not sure that good stories and stories that are
good for you are exacly the same thing, and I'm not sure that
lighthearted swashbuckling sories are the only way to tell these "good
for you and tastes good too!" stories.
Look at Shakespeare. The pack murder in Julius Caesar. The teenage
suicide that helped bring everyone together in Romeo and Juliet. The
unrelenting blood of Hamlet, or even Titus Andronicus. But great
stories, and omitting Shakespeare won't make you a better person.
> > It means a lot to me. Your mileage evidently varies.
> You might say I don't run with a full tank...
>
Don't worry, for the last few hours I think I've been running on
weedkiller.
> >> Yes, this is wonderful entertainment... Something to read with your
> >> children.
> > Not at all, my kids get USM. But every good story does not have to be G
> > rated.
> No, but given a good writer, most can be.
See above.
> Well, thanks for your answer,
You too. I suspect we will end up agreeing to disagree. Maybe part
of it is your longer term view - I have only seriously been reading
comics for two ro three years now, and compared to what some people
spend, I don't appear remotely serious now. I'm not saying BMB is the
"best" comics writer ever, by me that was Carl Barks. Historically,
Stan Lee et al would have to be the "best" superhero writers. But in
the end these are subjective terms. Things like BMB's DD and Millar's
Ultimates mean a lot to me, and I enjoy reading their stories more
than I do those of Miller, or even Lee, Kirby and so on. I can't say
they make me a better person, but my moral development is not Bendis's
or Millar's responsibility. In the end, the hours where I can sit out
on the back porch and watch the rosellas and drink cider with my
brother*, reading Daredevil and Ultimates are pretty damn good. All I
can hope for.
BDC
*He'd agree with you. "Look at this stuff - why is it always night?
That stick figure is a superhero? I could cane him myself! Here, read
these old issues of Spiderman - the death of Gwen Stacey - that was a
story!"
BDC
M-Wolverine
> On 7 Feb 2003 15:43:01 -0800, mwo...@umich.edu (M-Wolverine) wrote:
>
>
>
> And so on. I haven't questioned his fan credentials
> anywhere, so that was just a lie on your part,
"And, as I said before, I've been reading them
since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
carpetbagging johnny-come-lately." Jay, to Tue.
and
> no more appreciated by me than Tue's bullshit. If
> you're going to comment on this exchange, I'm
> going to insist that you read it first.
>
And I rest my case....
Chris C.
M-Wolverine
Cut out a lot of nice stuff by Tue....
>
>
I liken it to differences in tastes set up by some modern popular
works that fall into two categories, and often, though not
universally, are defined by taste.
I see Something like Watchmen, and Marvels, which takes a look at what
superheroes would be like in the real world, often the example of one
readers taste. On the other hand is Dark Knight, and Kingdom Come,
which really looks at these characters as bigger than life, gods in
the pantheon. One represents regular people in irregular
circumstances. The other is a representation of the best we can be
(and the worst). One is a humanistic, close form of tale telling.
The other is epic, larger than life.
Liking one or another isn't right or wrong (all my examples are great
works); but I think it helps define tastes (particularly when
comparing each one from their era, rather than just as a group whole).
Chris C.
jay
>> And so on. I haven't questioned his fan credentials
>> anywhere, so that was just a lie on your part,
>
> "And, as I said before, I've been reading them
> since before you'd ever even heard of DD or
> picked up a comic, and I'm not at all impressed
> with a challenge to my fan credentials by a
> carpetbagging johnny-come-lately." Jay, to Tue.
>
> and
>> no more appreciated by me than Tue's bullshit. If
>> you're going to comment on this exchange, I'm
>> going to insist that you read it first.
>
> And I rest my case....
Then you don't have a case. Telling him he's out of
line in challenging mine can't be transformed into
challenging his, no matter how you huff and puff.
Tue Sorensen
Details, Jason, details! Unlike mr. jay I don't work in dismissive
absolutes (it's not possible to understand the world that way), but in
inclusive generalism, which always has plenty of exceptions. Note the
caveats "to a large extent" and "nearly" in the quoted examples. Stan
Lee is the master who provided the basic style and criteria for the
perfection of the superhero as a universal archetype that predates the
common action hero. But ultimately he only laid the groundwork. The
final polishing of the full-fledged shared universe concept, which
turned it into a serious Grand Narrative, came in the early seventies,
when Lee had stopped writing a lot of the characters. The coherent
universe then continued in fine style until around 1990-91 (and much
of its success up to and beyond that point can be attributed to the
auspices of Jim Shooter), when the crappy, sensationalist '90s
started, and capitalism killed the comics. Now, then, we have an
administration that doesn't like/understand superheroes and
continuity, and the modern superhero as Stan Lee created it is pretty
much dead - or at least in suspended animation until some competent
talent brings it back.
My comments and preferences probably strike some people as
conservative and backward-looking, but this is not the case. I want
new stories to be as modern and up-to-date and groundbreaking as
possible, but in order for them to be that, they must retain the best
elements of the past stories; build on them. And to do so we must
first understand the classic stories properly. It is not possible to
stand on the shoulders of giants if we cannot even grab hold of their
socks.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
>
> > I buy enough comics I barely enjoy. Why should I buy some I *don't*
> > enjoy?
>
> One day someone will explain this to me. Why do you buy comics you
> don't enjoy?
Because you keep recommending them to me? :-) Well, I do of course
try to buy only stuff I enjoy, and I'm constantly considering dropping
stuff. The problem is that there is so much that is straddling the
line. Waid's FF, for instance, have been so-so thus far, and I was
going to drop it, but I thought the latest issue (#65, I think) was
better than the others, so I'll be sticking with it for a while yet.
And so on and so forth. As I'm certain many people on this newsgroup
can attest to, it's damn hard to drop major titles starring characters
you've been very fond of for fifteen years or more - *especially* if
you're a big-time fan of the MU and its continuity (as, needless to
say, I am).
> As an aside, I go to my comics shop and feel bad if I walk out with
> more than my two or three comics a month plus trades, because I'dve
> blown my budget. But last week there was a guy in there spending one
> hundred and fifty dollars (Australian - with shipping and all that
> probably translates to about eighty dollars US). I suspect this is
> not a record.
I spend that amount every month. At least. And when they have surveys
of what people buy over on the www.comicon.com message boards, I see
lots of people who buy much more than I do.
> How much do people spend?
I buy in the vicinity of 25-27 monthly titles (Marvel, DC and indies
all told), plus probably a similar amount of (cheaper) backissues.
But, you know, as a collector I'm embroiled in an ongoing project to
complete the good parts of the Marvel Universe, so it's probably (?) a
quite different way of buying and reading than yours.
> and how do people afford this?
Well, now that I have a complete set of the Arden Shakespeare I don't
have anything better to spend my money on... I love comics. The
fantastic genre is the literature of the age. In the future, pop
culture will be classic literature! The best of of it, anyway... And I
do see myself as a bit of a comics scholar, so my monthly habit is
actually comparable to the way an academic needs to keep up with the
published articles in his field... :-)
And, if I had more money I'm sure I'd buy more stuff (more trades,
too, that I tend to buy very few of). But, it's probably a good thing
I haven't, because most of the titles I'd buy in that case aren't
really worth their cover price. Take Batgirl, for instance. She's a
pretty cool character, doing pretty cool stuff, but her title suffers
from the same affliction as so many current comics: things happen
waaaay too slowly (plus, I'm not crazy about the art, either). There's
not enough bang for your buck. So I wait until I can find such comics
at reduced prices later on.
As for some stats on average expenditure and such, I don't know. In
the beginning of Unbreakable it says that the average collector owns
about 3300 comics. Personally I have five times that, but I'm a
fanatic! :-)
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
>
> I don't feel I understand this idea of quantifying someone's
> credibility or whatever as a fan. I don't know that there's much
> point quantifying people's achievements on the basis of how many Iron
> Man comics they have.
Aw, you're just saying that because you haven't got very many Iron Man
comics... ;-)
> Say Fred has every issue of Iron Man going back
> to the Eisenhower Administration, but Wilma has some from the days of
> Prohibition. That doesn't mean Wilma has more important stuff to say
> than Fred. It doesn't mean that Wilma's more eloquent, or that her
> opinion is any more valid. Wilma may be the person to go to to find
> out trivia, like when Iron Man first met insert character here, but
> that's about it.
>
> Maybe outside of questions of objective historical detail, it's a
> meaningless concept.
>
> It probably makes more sense to do what most people do - read stuff by
> people and quantify their credibility on how much they agree with you
> :)
All completely true! I had no intention of challenging anyone's "fan
credentials" - although I did imply that jay doesn't fit *my*
definition of a DD fan. But that was, as you say, merely in relation
to how much/little he agreed with me (and half of the reason, of
course, was just to be rude to him - which he deserved). Of course
*my* prime definition of a DD fan is one who shares *my* DD opinions!
But that doesn't mean I don't acknowledge the validity of other
definitions.
In any case, how long you've been reading doesn't necessarily give you
better "fan credentials". In terms of DD, there is only a finite
number of DD comics, and I doubt that jay has read substantially more
of those than I have, although he may have begun earlier. I also doubt
that jay has read more comics all in all than I have - I do have a
15,000+ collection, which, in terms of statistical probability, is
almost certainly more than he has. Let him speak up if this is not the
case.
Not that anyone's keeping score. :-)
- Tue
Brendan Carson
> Ain't that the truth! But with massively hyped stuff, that's the
> nature of the beast. Great hype spawns great praise from the gullible
> and uncritical masses! ;-)
Ah, that'd be my problem then....
> True - Miller's work was hugely artistic and stylistic, and it is
> first of all an aesthetic pleasure to read it. It certainly has an
> edge of intensity which is unusual in mainstream superhero comics, but
> I don't see how it is particularly more realistic than the pre- and
> post-Miller DD.
To me, if a pre-Miller story has DD battling Birdman, Catman and
Theotheranimalman, and DD getting barely hit but not at all hurt, and
never reflecting on the perosnal or other consequences of his actions
because there probably are none, and coming out of this utterly
unchanged, whereas the Miller story has DD involved in a struggle
against a man who is both the ruler of a vast criminal empire and a
respected businessman, who uses the law against DD and blows up his
apartment and, in a world full of superheroes has a few personal
superbeings in his pocket, then the preMiller one is unrealistic and
the Miller one is realistic.
Similarly, the Gale arc had a man who could do virtually anything
decide to trash a greenhouse, a court full of legal experts accept
that a man dressed as Daredevil was legally identical to Daredevil,
and a man who dresses as a mediaeval jester regarded as a sinister
threat rather than a loon. Bendis had a man who has a secret identity
and an inability to keep his mouth shut finally run into some static,
a man who was stabbed repeatedly fall to the ground and nearly die,
and enemies who are subtle, murderous men trying to get by, rather
than gaudily garbed but essentially harmless people who merely wanted
world domination or the contents of a vault.
It's open and shut what is realistic and what is not.
> I like to compare the death of Elektra by Miller to the death of Karen
> Page by Smith. ....
Karen Page's death has completely ruined the Smith run
> for me, which otherwise I thought started off pretty well.
Me personally, I find Kevin Smith's stuff pretty over-rated. Part of
that was the "I have escaped from the Island of Doctor Moreau" art.
M-wolverine (?) wrote
Dark Knight is obviously his
> > ultimate example of this. Elektra is Opera. Daredevil became "The
> > Devil" to the underworld. Bullseye is not realistic, but very
> > unrealistically cool. Kingpin was larger than life in more ways than
> > one. For example, Miller's Kingpin could take out 5 black belts
> > blindfolded; Bendis's Kingpin gets taken down by some thugs with
> > shivs. The latter is very realistic - it's what would happen. The
> > former makes the character an epic archtype, human, but more than
> > human too.
The latter is an archetype (or evokes archtypes, depending on the
sense of the word) as well. An archetypal figure does not have to be
more than human - look at Falstaff. He was no more than human in his
capabilities, but he was an archtypal figure. Rather than opera,
which I know little about (although I can imagine a scene where
Frederico and Matteo argue about whether Matt should keep on
Daredevilin', with the press camped outside as a chorus...), I will
now compare and contrast BMB's Underboss and Out with can look the
great classics of Western Literature and see how smoothly he will fit
into his allotted place when the time comes*. I will draw upon the
cornerstones of our language and culture: the Greek and Roman
classics, Biblical figures, Shakespeare and his contemporaries.
To me, BMB's stuff resonates with a lot of classical stuff. The
blinded king - Lear, Oedipus, the Kingpin. The loving mother become a
heartless, avenging fury - Medea, Lady Macbeth, Vanessa. The great
man brought low by a single unwise act of love - Antony, the Kingpin
again. The ravening crowd who lately cheered the saviour on but then
turn on him when he is weakened - Christ entering Jerusalem, the press
on Matt's doorstep. Plus the ungrateful son, the treacherous guest,
the whole cycle of a man brought low standing up again... exquisite
stuff.
Like I've said before, to me this is a story of great heroism. Matt's
bravery has been shown like almost never before, not since the
oft-cited Miller. To dress up in a bright costume and fight against
men who can kill you for no reward is brave. To do so when you are
blind is a whole 'nother step, something only a Man without Fear could
do. But to keep on doing it when those same men know who you are, and
know that you are blind, when your only advantage has been taken away,
is awe-inspiring. This is not a supersoldier or a man in a steel
suit, this is a blind man.
> By using archetypes
> instead of individuals with nothing going for them but their
> "realism", you tell a much greater and grander story which has the
> potential to become a future classic, retaining a broad, timeless
> appeal.
Like I said, archetypal figures and realistic characters are not
mutually exclusive.
Archetypes do not make a bad story good. And superpowering someone
does not make him an archetype.
>Some writers just aren't capable of this, however, and that's
> why their work will soon be forgotten. (And yes I mean that to include
> Bendis.)
Any day now.....
>My problem with current superhero
> comics is that most of this past greatness has now been lost due to
> the obsession with "realism" and "good stories" (read: independent of
> continuity), and this effectively amounts to a closing of the
> imaginative mind.
It amounts to the exact opposite.
> > Which you like better is a matter of taste.
>
> It is, in fact, also a matter of an informed perspective.
I don't know if you realise what you are saying here, but this is the
crux of the matter. It seems to me you aren't content to attribute
this to a difference in taste. I may be wrong, but it seems to me you
are trying to claim some intellectual or cultural higher ground here:
the "informed opinion" versus the "gullible and uninformed masses", as
if there is some objective court of final appeal which can confirm
that you are right, I am wrong and Bendis is crap.
There is no such beast. Arguing that enjoying the
Catman/Birdman/Whatever story and disliking Bendis's work means you
are cut from a finer cloth than the rest of us is futile and silly,
and bound to enrage more people than you convert.
Gloves off. I am not a particularly stupid man. I'm not grossly
undereducated. I don't know that my taste is any less informed than
anyone else's. I do know that it would be tempting to believe that my
taste in comics demonstrates something prasieworthy about me, but I
know it's a temptation I'd be smarter to resist. I think in the end
it's a matter of choice. Vanilla is not objectively better than
chocolate, I just like it better. If I can't see any merit in
Avengers, say, that doesn't mean it's not there, or that Avengers fans
are somehow underinformed. It means different people like different
things.
>The heroic
> moral of the superhero genre - the ceaseless saving of the world, etc.
> - entails that both we and the heroes should do what we can to make
> the world a better place; change it into something new and improved.
> This is what can be gradually demonstrated and accomplished with the
> grander themes, while the myopic postmodernist obsession with
> "realism" is just a wallowing in our own despair and bitterness,
> without showing any path out of it (and hence that intellectual
> premise is a philosophical deadend, as I called it in another post).
Wrong. Despair would have been if Matt had given up. Single most
important fact about DD.
BDC
*Don't take this bit as entirely serious.
Rob Hansen
Carson) wrote:
>I don't feel I understand this idea of quantifying someone's
>credibility or whatever as a fan. I don't know that there's much
>point quantifying people's achievements on the basis of how many Iron
>Man comics they have. Say Fred has every issue of Iron Man going back
>to the Eisenhower Administration, but Wilma has some from the days of
>Prohibition. That doesn't mean Wilma has more important stuff to say
>than Fred. It doesn't mean that Wilma's more eloquent, or that her
>opinion s any more valid. Wilma may be the person to go to to find
>out trivia, like when Iron Man first met insert character here, but
>that's about it.
As someone who bought the first issues of DD and X-MEN hot off the
stands in the early 1960s, I agree.
--
Rob Hansen
=============================================
Home Page: http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/rob/
Rob Hansen
Carson) wrote:
>twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
>
>> > Firstly, name two worse villains for any superhero than the Jester and
>> > the Ringmaster (?). Stiltman is one thing, but for God's sake...
>>
>> Firstly, these villains were used in lots of good old Marvel stories.
>> No reason they shouldn't be re-used in new ways in new stories.
>
>Hmmmm... I suppose it is possible that a good story could still be
>written about the Jester. I liked the Leapfrog one, I suspect we will
>differ on this.
The Silver Age DD's rogue's gallery was just about the lamest of any
major superhero. But, as Alan Moore said "there are no bad characters,
only bad writers". In other words, a good enough writer could probably
write a story that makes Stiltman seem exciting.
Michael Alan Chary
Rob Hansen <r...@fiawol.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>On 6 Feb 2003 13:45:22 -0800, gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan
>Carson) wrote:
>
>>twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
>>
>>> > Firstly, name two worse villains for any superhero than the Jester and
>>> > the Ringmaster (?). Stiltman is one thing, but for God's sake...
>>>
>>> Firstly, these villains were used in lots of good old Marvel stories.
>>> No reason they shouldn't be re-used in new ways in new stories.
>>
>>Hmmmm... I suppose it is possible that a good story could still be
>>written about the Jester. I liked the Leapfrog one, I suspect we will
>>differ on this.
>
>The Silver Age DD's rogue's gallery was just about the lamest of any
>major superhero. But, as Alan Moore said "there are no bad characters,
>only bad writers". In other words, a good enough writer could probably
>write a story that makes Stiltman seem exciting.
Yes, but what are the chances that James Joyce, St. John the Divine or
Mark twain will write Daredevil?
Actually, there's nothing wrong with Stiltman that couldn't be solved by
making him a mastermind. The great thing about him is that he's so
obvious that you *have* to stop him. He's anywhere up to a hundred feet
tall. So while he's taking on DD, ten of his buddies are doing something
else, but what is DD going to do? Not fight Stiltman? Fine, so while DD's
off fighting the other guys, Stiltman actually gets away with it. That's
embarassing.
--
"There's only one god / He is the sun god / Ra! - Ra! - Ra!"
--ancient Egyptian religious chant, attrib. to Robert Anton Wilson
"Woah. Edsger Dijkstra died. GOTO a better place, Eddie."
- Geoffrey Kinnel
James William Moar
> The Silver Age DD's rogue's gallery was just about the lamest of any
> major superhero. But, as Alan Moore said "there are no bad characters,
> only bad writers".
I'd agree, with the caveat that I believe in the existence of unpromising
characters.
> In other words, a good enough writer could probably
> write a story that makes Stiltman seem exciting.
He's surreal, which is a good start...
--
James Moar
W. Blaine Dowler
> In other words, a good enough writer could probably
> write a story that makes Stiltman seem exciting.
Brian Bendis made him interesting and useful in the 25 cent issue.
--
- Blaine
http://www.bureau42.com
XFW # 299792458, WM, SW, WNS, NRMTPB, FPSSG
SVS# 0.00729735308002..., CoC #36, SSUCS
Amos Keppler
Well, Stiltman was the best I've seen him in Murdoch's office... without
stilts.
Amos the witch
Tue Sorensen
already! This is all a big can of worms, and my side of it has to do
with a not exactly politically correct theory on the nature of art
which indeed is bound to cause controversy. Because it is impossible
to be progressive and innovative without challenging conventional
wisdom.
Simply put, what it's all about is changing the world; save it; solve
the world situation; create a rational society without needless
suffering. If human nature is good, as I am convinced, then it follows
that such a thing is possible. The greater a work of art, the greater
its potential for conveying world-changing messages - once it has been
understood. Shakespeare's work, for instance, is so full of obscure
double meanings that the questions in his plays "resist solutions", as
it says at the end of the introduction to the latest Arden Tempest.
But I believe that when we find the key to the most profound meaning
(and, of course, I have a theory about what that key is), then radical
and world-changing things will reveal themselves (and not just in
Shakespeare, either). Shakespeare, of course, works with stronger and
more specific archetypes than anyone else - and then there're the
double meanings -, and consequently he crams more relevant meaning
into his work than anyone else. The more you use the major devices of
classic literature, the more meaning your art contains. It's the same
with the Romantic poets, Hans Christian Andersen, James Joyce. And the
more meaning there is in your work, the faster it will bring about
change.
So, when I criticize something it's not because it isn't good craft,
or fine stories. It's because it doesn't contain a lot of
world-changing power. It may have all the necessary elements, but
they're not put together in a way that clearly says, "Look, there are
these problems in the world, and this is one way of solving them, so
let's get to it." That, whether, in clear or symbolical terms, is what
I want from good pop culture, and actually I get a lot of it. These
elements (most often in symbol language, of course) are everywhere,
even in the most commercial of entertainment. Our cultural discourse
often includes these elements despite the writers not even being aware
of it. It's part of the process of collective cultural evolution. But,
in my view, the world-changing power in BMB's DD just isn't very
great. It's too much of rubbing our noses in bleak, crime-ridden urban
reality without trying to rise above it; without trying, at least on a
symbolical level, to reform it. (Matt, of course, is trying to fight
it, but the success of his efforts are miniscule.)
I hope this makes you understand my perspective a bit better. In order
to effectively change the world we have to give people stories of the
human spirit (for instance in the shape of a superhero) conquering
everything. And I mean *everything*. Not just the human spirit getting
by, or persevering. But *triumphing* over all the hardships of the
human condition. Either that, or use the mode of the tragedy, which is
a warning, telling us how bad things will get if we don't wise up
fast. But the tragic genre isn't a good fit for pop culture.
This is not to say that there shouldn't be different kinds of stories
with a more down-to-earth, realistic focus. Such stories can work very
well in some cases. BMB's DD just doesn't do it for me.
gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > True - Miller's work was hugely artistic and stylistic, and it is
> > first of all an aesthetic pleasure to read it. It certainly has an
> > edge of intensity which is unusual in mainstream superhero comics, but
> > I don't see how it is particularly more realistic than the pre- and
> > post-Miller DD.
>
> To me, if a pre-Miller story has DD battling Birdman, Catman and
> Theotheranimalman
It is not fair to use DD vol. 1 #10 as an example. It is notoriously
silly and not at all representative.
> Similarly, the Gale arc had a man who could do virtually anything
> decide to trash a greenhouse, a court full of legal experts accept
> that a man dressed as Daredevil was legally identical to Daredevil,
> and a man who dresses as a mediaeval jester regarded as a sinister
> threat rather than a loon.
There was no point in the Gale story where the Jester was regarded as
a sinister threat.
> M-wolverine (?) wrote
>
> Dark Knight is obviously his
> > > ultimate example of this. Elektra is Opera. Daredevil became "The
> > > Devil" to the underworld. Bullseye is not realistic, but very
> > > unrealistically cool. Kingpin was larger than life in more ways than
> > > one. For example, Miller's Kingpin could take out 5 black belts
> > > blindfolded; Bendis's Kingpin gets taken down by some thugs with
> > > shivs. The latter is very realistic - it's what would happen. The
> > > former makes the character an epic archtype, human, but more than
> > > human too.
>
> The latter is an archetype (or evokes archtypes, depending on the
> sense of the word) as well. An archetypal figure does not have to be
> more than human - look at Falstaff. He was no more than human in his
> capabilities, but he was an archtypal figure.
This is almost true. Falstaff certainly is archetypal, and as such he
represents a lot of people. He's more than an *individual* person;
he's an allegorical symbol. One of the things he symbolizes is
Shakespeare'd outrageously bawdy and seedily establishmentarian
dimension; a dimension which is abandoned and replaced with a
seriously revolutionary dimension as Hal comes into royal power.
> To me, BMB's stuff resonates with a lot of classical stuff. The
> blinded king - Lear, Oedipus, the Kingpin. The loving mother become a
> heartless, avenging fury - Medea, Lady Macbeth, Vanessa. The great
> man brought low by a single unwise act of love - Antony, the Kingpin
> again. The ravening crowd who lately cheered the saviour on but then
> turn on him when he is weakened - Christ entering Jerusalem, the press
> on Matt's doorstep. Plus the ungrateful son, the treacherous guest,
> the whole cycle of a man brought low standing up again... exquisite
> stuff.
These are elements of tragedy, the corruption of love/loss of
innocence, betrayal, the Full Circle theme - all worthy and worthwhile
devices. But they tend to eclipse what little radical and redemptive
content is also present. I need to see things *advance* - not merely
come full circle. In terms of the overall setting, I don't see much of
a change in the status quo here. Maybe it's there, but it is sloooow.
Too slow for me.
> Like I've said before, to me this is a story of great heroism. Matt's
> bravery has been shown like almost never before, not since the
> oft-cited Miller. To dress up in a bright costume and fight against
> men who can kill you for no reward is brave. To do so when you are
> blind is a whole 'nother step, something only a Man without Fear could
> do. But to keep on doing it when those same men know who you are, and
> know that you are blind, when your only advantage has been taken away,
> is awe-inspiring. This is not a supersoldier or a man in a steel
> suit, this is a blind man.
Let's not get too sentimental. A blind man, yes, but with a radar
sense, Olympic-level athletic skills and who's always been close to
violence - remember who his father is. In any case, the things you
mention here are not endemic to BMB's run. It's been like that as long
as he's had his own comic.
> > By using archetypes
> > instead of individuals with nothing going for them but their
> > "realism", you tell a much greater and grander story which has the
> > potential to become a future classic, retaining a broad, timeless
> > appeal.
>
> Like I said, archetypal figures and realistic characters are not
> mutually exclusive.
Not in theory, no, but in practice they very often are.
> Archetypes do not make a bad story good.
Not necessarily, no; of course the story needs to be well told.
> And superpowering someone does not make him an archetype.
Well, that depends. If the "someone" is a hero, it does. But it also
depends on the general setting or world in which the story happens,
and which rules guide that world. I think the Marvel Universe is full
of archetypes, or at least characters who have great potentials as
archetypes, if handled right.
> > My problem with current superhero
> > comics is that most of this past greatness has now been lost due to
> > the obsession with "realism" and "good stories" (read: independent of
> > continuity), and this effectively amounts to a closing of the
> > imaginative mind.
>
> It amounts to the exact opposite.
You really have to explain a nonsensical statement like that. Are you
trying to claim that an obsession with realism amounts to a
particularly imaginative outlook? Sounds nonsensical to me, but people
define "realism" differently (which is why I usually put it in
citation marks). In my view, the usual popular definition of realism
is something that rejects fantasy and imagination and dwells on what
is rather than what might be. This is very closeminded, and ultimately
creates a distorted and incomplete view of reality because reality is
impossible to understand without theorizing beyond the immediately
known and obvious. As Fellini said, "only the visionary is a true
realist."
To me, science fiction (/the fantastic genre) is the most truly
realistic subject with which we can be concerned. The future is where
we are going to spend the rest of our lives. The questions of how to
organize future society and technology are of paramount important to
society's imminent well-being. And we will deal better with these
questions if we can learn to think "out of the box" and continue to
build on the achievements of the past.
> > > Which you like better is a matter of taste.
> >
> > It is, in fact, also a matter of an informed perspective.
>
> I don't know if you realise what you are saying here, but this is the
> crux of the matter. It seems to me you aren't content to attribute
> this to a difference in taste. I may be wrong, but it seems to me you
> are trying to claim some intellectual or cultural higher ground here:
> the "informed opinion" versus the "gullible and uninformed masses", as
> if there is some objective court of final appeal which can confirm
> that you are right, I am wrong and Bendis is crap.
>
> There is no such beast.
See my opening comments. The real crux of the matter is whether the
strength of your desire to change the world can be correlated with
your knowledge of how the world, society and human nature work. I say
it can. The higher the degree of knowledge you have, the more clearly
you can see solutions to the world's problems, and the more eagerly
you should desire to apply those solutions in order to create a better
world. As you can see, I take heroism very seriously.
And yes, I judge most fiction on its world-changing merits (though of
course it also has to work dramatically). Radical, progressive fiction
with a high and effective symbol content (as most classic superhero
comics have) captures my attention and my enthusiasm. The rest
doesn't.
> >The heroic
> > moral of the superhero genre - the ceaseless saving of the world, etc.
> > - entails that both we and the heroes should do what we can to make
> > the world a better place; change it into something new and improved.
> > This is what can be gradually demonstrated and accomplished with the
> > grander themes, while the myopic postmodernist obsession with
> > "realism" is just a wallowing in our own despair and bitterness,
> > without showing any path out of it (and hence that intellectual
> > premise is a philosophical deadend, as I called it in another post).
>
> Wrong. Despair would have been if Matt had given up.
I'm not talking about Matt so much as the world he exists in. Matt
himself is a constant in the Daredevil comic per se - his current
world, however, is BMB's contribution. Don't you think the ending of
DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
- Tue
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> I'm not talking about Matt so much as the world he exists in. Matt
> himself is a constant in the Daredevil comic per se - his current
> world, however, is BMB's contribution. Don't you think the ending of
> DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
It shows an imperfect world, and a heroic character who acknowledges this
imperfection and decides to carry on, anyway. You can't presume to change
the world for the better without first acknowledging its present state and
its flaws. You need solid ground beneath your feet before you start to
build a ladder to that higher place you want to reach, so to speak, if
you're in a metaphorical mood.
--Marc
Brendan Carson
> The Silver Age DD's rogue's gallery was just about the lamest of any
> major superhero. But, as Alan Moore said "there are no bad characters,
> only bad writers". In other words, a good enough writer could probably
> write a story that makes Stiltman seem exciting.
This is so true. I don't know that there was anything intrinsically
great about the characters in Watchmen that, if the characters were
reusable like most superheroes, would have made the series
consistently brilliant once it was being written by someone else. My
list of the greatest characters in comics would start with Batman,
Spiderman and the Silver Surfer, and God knows each of them could fill
a truck with non-great stories. On the "other side", there may have
been bad Joker stories, and there have been bad Green Goblin and
Kingpin stories.
As you probably know, Stiltman did turn up in recent DD. I read it
and it was a great scene - funny and believeable. Later on I was
thinking - that couple of panels made Stiltman interesting.
BDC
Tue Sorensen
Yes, but I usually take that solid ground for granted and prefer to
focus on the ladder.
- Tue
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> > It shows an imperfect world, and a heroic character who acknowledges
this
> > imperfection and decides to carry on, anyway. You can't presume to
change
> > the world for the better without first acknowledging its present state
and
> > its flaws. You need solid ground beneath your feet before you start to
> > build a ladder to that higher place you want to reach, so to speak, if
> > you're in a metaphorical mood.
>
> Yes, but I usually take that solid ground for granted and prefer to
> focus on the ladder.
I think taking solid ground for granted is a dangerous thing in any sense or
situation -- particularly if you want to place a ladder.
--Marc
M-Wolverine
If calling someone a "carpetbagging johnny-come-lately" isn't
questioning someone cred, to you, then you don't live in the same
plane of reality os the rest of us. So I guess we'll have to agree to
live in seperate worlds.
-Chris C.
M-Wolverine
> gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> >
> > > I buy enough comics I barely enjoy. Why should I buy some I *don't*
> > > enjoy?
> >
> > One day someone will explain this to me. Why do you buy comics you
> > don't enjoy?
>
> Because you keep recommending them to me? :-)
HA!!
Well, I do of course
> try to buy only stuff I enjoy, and I'm constantly considering dropping
> stuff. The problem is that there is so much that is straddling the
> line. Waid's FF, for instance, have been so-so thus far, and I was
> going to drop it, but I thought the latest issue (#65, I think) was
> better than the others, so I'll be sticking with it for a while yet.
> And so on and so forth. As I'm certain many people on this newsgroup
> can attest to, it's damn hard to drop major titles starring characters
> you've been very fond of for fifteen years or more - *especially* if
> you're a big-time fan of the MU and its continuity (as, needless to
> say, I am).
And if you don't keep collecting the title, someone calls you out and
says you don't know as much as them because you don't have as many
issues. :)
But really, everyone wants great stories.....but some also have a
great love for the character. And want to know what's going to happen
to them. And that sometimes means staying through the bad as well as
the good....
> > As an aside, I go to my comics shop and feel bad if I walk out with
> > more than my two or three comics a month plus trades, because I'dve
> > blown my budget.
Hmmm, if I may ask to Brendan, how old are you? Because if you're
young, you'll find your disposable income moving up....and if you're
older, with kids, well, then you have more important things to spend
your money on....
But last week there was a guy in there spending one
> > hundred and fifty dollars (Australian - with shipping and all that
> > probably translates to about eighty dollars US). I suspect this is
> > not a record.
>
> I spend that amount every month. At least. And when they have surveys
> of what people buy over on the www.comicon.com message boards, I see
> lots of people who buy much more than I do.
>
> > How much do people spend?
>
> I buy in the vicinity of 25-27 monthly titles (Marvel, DC and indies
> all told), plus probably a similar amount of (cheaper) backissues.
> But, you know, as a collector I'm embroiled in an ongoing project to
> complete the good parts of the Marvel Universe, so it's probably (?) a
> quite different way of buying and reading than yours.
I guess I'm in the collector category too. With the recent price
increases, I'm lucky to ever get out of a week with less than $50
spent. And god forbid a trade or graphic novel should come out. But
then, I'm beginning to think it's getting to be too much, and am
looking to maybe cut stuff, if I can find the will....
(First things to go - Marvel's hype machines....don't think I'm
finishing Truth - that scream you hear is the completist in me dying -
and didn't pick up Rawhide Kid. Ultimate titles might be next).
> > and how do people afford this?
>
-Chris C.
Who's happily in the age bracket where he's making enough $$$ to have
some spending cash, but not all the responsibilities of family.
Tue Sorensen
> > gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > can attest to, it's damn hard to drop major titles starring characters
> > you've been very fond of for fifteen years or more - *especially* if
> > you're a big-time fan of the MU and its continuity (as, needless to
> > say, I am).
>
> And if you don't keep collecting the title, someone calls you out and
> says you don't know as much as them because you don't have as many
> issues. :)
That, too! :-)
> But really, everyone wants great stories.....but some also have a
> great love for the character. And want to know what's going to happen
> to them. And that sometimes means staying through the bad as well as
> the good....
Hate to admit it, but year. At the time when Claremont left the X-Men
in 1991 I was such a big fan of the X-Men that I kept buying the
X-titles for another *four years* before finally realizing that they
were never going to regain the glories that they'd achieved under
Claremont... But in most other cases I've stopped buying titles
whenever they fell under the standard I find acceptable. I didn't buy
Spidey-titles in most of the '90s, for instance (well, there are
exceptions - as there always is).
> > > But last week there was a guy in there spending one
> > > hundred and fifty dollars (Australian - with shipping and all that
> > > probably translates to about eighty dollars US). I suspect this is
> > > not a record.
> >
> > I spend that amount every month. At least. And when they have surveys
> > of what people buy over on the www.comicon.com message boards, I see
> > lots of people who buy much more than I do.
> >
> > > How much do people spend?
> >
> > I buy in the vicinity of 25-27 monthly titles (Marvel, DC and indies
> > all told), plus probably a similar amount of (cheaper) backissues.
> > But, you know, as a collector I'm embroiled in an ongoing project to
> > complete the good parts of the Marvel Universe, so it's probably (?) a
> > quite different way of buying and reading than yours.
>
> I guess I'm in the collector category too. With the recent price
> increases, I'm lucky to ever get out of a week with less than $50
> spent.
You mean $200 a month? So, some people *are* more fanatical than I am
- I suspected as much! :-)
> And god forbid a trade or graphic novel should come out. But
> then, I'm beginning to think it's getting to be too much, and am
> looking to maybe cut stuff, if I can find the will....
Old habits die hard...
> (First things to go - Marvel's hype machines....don't think I'm
> finishing Truth
I am, though. It is, after all, a bit of a milestone... sort of.
> - that scream you hear is the completist in me dying -
Yeah, well... Although long consecutive runs are very nice, I've never
called myself a completist. But again, it depends on your definition.
Of course I'd like to have a complete collection of The Good Stuff -
whatever it is. But "completist" in the sense of having all issues of
a given run just to have all the issues (even if the stories are bad)
- that's never been my shtick. If some character I hate makes an
appearance (like for instance Carnage), I'm happy to skip those
issues.
> and didn't pick up Rawhide Kid.
Why the hell would anyone want to pick up Rawhide Kid?! Never crossed
my mind.
> Ultimate titles might be next).
I stopped getting USM and UXM over a year ago. I'm still getting
Ultimates, but I'm seriously considering dropping it. I haven't
enjoyed it since #3 or 4. All the characters are unlikable and have
nothing to do with heroes. The reason I'm still getting it is that
it's a very influential book; a vanguard book of what's popularly
considered hot (although I don't agree). The background of the book is
fairly complex (what with all it owes to The Authority and all), and
it's riding and exemplifying a lot of current trends. That, and Bryan
Hitch's art is very nice.
- Tue
Brendan Carson
>
> Hmmm, if I may ask to Brendan, how old are you? Because if you're
> young, you'll find your disposable income moving up....and if you're
> older, with kids, well, then you have more important things to spend
> your money on....
>
I am exceedingly old (36 a few days ago), and I've just finished a
shift and I feel ancient. And I have a reasonable job. The income is
going at the moment on the various debts, like paying for the
education that enabled me to get the job to afford the money to pay
for the education that I needed to .... waitaminnit...
I have two kids, who are the best in the world.
> I guess I'm in the collector category too. With the recent price
> increases, I'm lucky to ever get out of a week with less than $50
> spent. And god forbid a trade or graphic novel should come out. But
> then, I'm beginning to think it's getting to be too much, and am
> looking to maybe cut stuff, if I can find the will....
>
> (First things to go - Marvel's hype machines....don't think I'm
> finishing Truth - that scream you hear is the completist in me dying -
> and didn't pick up Rawhide Kid. Ultimate titles might be next).
I have to agree about Truth. I might be spoilt by excellent artwork,
but those characters looked like cartoons. I really wanted this to be
a story I liked. But it's losing out to either Thor (once they get
back to the story, might end up just as a TPB) and/or New Xmen
(haven't bought any Xmen for three years). And Rawhide Kid stayed
right where I found it.
Comics are weird, aren't they: with books you tend to follow an
author (except for those relatively few but increasingly common
authors who write series), but in comics, due to their nature, you end
up following a character. And in cases like Tues, where an author he
doesn't care for takes over a character he does, there's a lot of
angst.
I bought New Xmen the other day, because I'd read some other stuff by
Morrison that I liked. Don't know if I'll read stuff written before
or after him, though. There is an essay in the back of the TPB that
discusses continuity and so forth. It is bound to offend many people.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> already!
You still had enough breath in you to write the odd paragraph ;)
Seriously, this is getting long. FIrstly, thanks for your articulate
and courteous post. I think we have deep irreconcilable and probably
permanent philosophical differences. Some of the things you say are
startling to me.
Anyhow: some of the differences -
> Simply put, what it's all about is changing the world;
I don't know that art has a "purpose", except maybe to mean something.
To me, meaningless stuff isn't art.
>If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
Huge difference. I think human nature is not inherently good, in
fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited. I think
that people are basically bad: selfish, deceitful, servile and cruel,
but keen to believe they are selfless, honest, independent and kind
(except for me and a few of my friends, who really are selfless,
honest, independent and kind....). Our capacity to feel love for our
fellows is limited to a small circle of friends, our capacity to hate
or to just dismiss appears infinite.
Of course, I am a really good guy. But the other day I walked past a
person collecting money for the MS society to buy my DD comic.
I suspect neither of us will shift on this, and each sees the other's
view as absurd.
>The more you use the major devices of
> classic literature, the more meaning your art contains.
THis is not my field. The question as I see it is whether meaning
resides in a text or it at least partly attributed by the viewer. If
I read Underboss and get a story of heroism, and you read it and do
not, who is right? Is there a objective "meaning-detector"? Should
we take the author' word for it, or the majority word for it, or your
word, or mine? Do I see something that isn't there, or do you not see
something
that is there?
Or is there no objective, absolute, quantifiable reproducible meaning,
no standard, no reference? In tghe end, is meaning inherent, or is it
created by the reader, by a combination of his/her views, experiences
and expectations and what the author put on the page? Is HSakespeare
objectively good, or is part of his primacy the fact that he is the
premier poet/playwright of the culture that conquered the world, or
does that question not even make sense now that we are living in a
world that has been shaped by Shakespeare? Has the question mark key
on this typewriter given up yet?
Deep stuff. No wonder I didn't do this in Uni.
> I hope this makes you understand my perspective a bit better. In order
> to effectively change the world we have to give people stories of the
> human spirit (for instance in the shape of a superhero) conquering
> everything. And I mean *everything*. Not just the human spirit getting
> by, or persevering. But *triumphing* over all the hardships of the
> human condition.
As I've said, to me DD's greatest triumphs have been in Underboss and
Born Again.
>
> These are elements of tragedy, the corruption of love/loss of
> innocence, betrayal, the Full Circle theme - all worthy and worthwhile
> devices. But they tend to eclipse what little radical and redemptive
> content is also present.
Like I said, to me it is redemptive ... and probably more radical than
anything else.
>
> > Like I've said before, to me this is a story of great heroism. Matt's
> > bravery has been shown like almost never before, not since the
> > oft-cited Miller. To dress up in a bright costume and fight against
> > men who can kill you for no reward is brave. To do so when you are
> > blind is a whole 'nother step, something only a Man without Fear could
> > do. But to keep on doing it when those same men know who you are, and
> > know that you are blind, when your only advantage has been taken away,
> > is awe-inspiring. This is not a supersoldier or a man in a steel
> > suit, this is a blind man.
>
> Let's not get too sentimental. A blind man, yes, but with a radar
> sense, Olympic-level athletic skills and who's always been close to
> violence - remember who his father is. In any case, the things you
> mention here are not endemic to BMB's run. It's been like that as long
> as he's had his own comic.
I meant the fact that everyone knows, that Dd'ing is now more
dangerous than ever before, that as Foggy says teh smart thing would
be to quit, but the heroic thing would be to keep n doing what he kept
on doing. BMB raised the stakes.
> See my opening comments. The real crux of the matter is whether the
> strength of your desire to change the world can be correlated with
> your knowledge of how the world, society and human nature work. I say
> it can. The higher the degree of knowledge you have, the more clearly
> you can see solutions to the world's problems, and the more eagerly
> you should desire to apply those solutions in order to create a better
> world. As you can see, I take heroism very seriously.
Admirable stuff. The question is to what extent this can be used to
define and delineate good vs bad art. I don't believe it can.
Don't you think the ending of
> DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing. If
BMB had shown the White Tiger having been a bad man, that would have
been a reason to despair. And living justly in a just world would be
easy, like being good when you are surrounded by good people. But to
be good in a flawed world, or to be just in an unjust world, that
takes heroism.
WT died, shot by the people he sought to protect. None of that makes
him less of a hero, or lessens his achievement, or says "there is no
point being good, go out and sell smack to schoolkids". If being good
menat winning, eveyone would do it. If superheroes always won, they
wouldn't need to be superheroes.
Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
when it is too late, is an old and powerful story, whether it's set in
New York, Sherwood Forest or Jerusalem. He's in pretty good company.
BDC
Tue Sorensen
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
>
> I don't know that art has a "purpose", except maybe to mean something.
> To me, meaningless stuff isn't art.
The meaning of most great art (and esp. that dealing with archetypes)
is to increase human self-understanding; to inform us about "the human
condition", i.e. our general situation in the world
(socio-culturai/psychological evolution); to demonstrate to us what
human nature is. This is done by giving attention (most often
symbolical) to the oft-used concepts "truth" and "beauty", which many
people will disagree as to the nature of. To me, truth is scientific
knowledge, which is the only real source of knowledge, and beauty is
the ultimate nature of our most basic positive emotions, which is love
and the desire to live (a life motivation, if you will). The purpose
of art which seeks to unify truth and beauty is to urge us on to find
the scientific description of the life motivation/love. The red rose
is a general symbol of the material basis for love. And yes, this is
very deep and very controversial stuff, esp. seeing as most people
never think to associate art with science. But the association is
there. All the cultural high-points in history (Ancient Greece, the
Renaissance, the Enlightenment) have considered art and science
allies. Art's purpose is to make us know ourselves. Our natural
selves.
> >If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
>
> Huge difference. I think human nature is not inherently good, in
> fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited. I think
> that people are basically bad: selfish, deceitful, servile and cruel,
> but keen to believe they are selfless, honest, independent and kind
> (except for me and a few of my friends, who really are selfless,
> honest, independent and kind....). Our capacity to feel love for our
> fellows is limited to a small circle of friends, our capacity to hate
> or to just dismiss appears infinite.
I am very sad that you believe this, and can only urge you to
reconsider. All people in the world struggle to do good; to be good.
It's just that their social environment too often doesn't make it
possible. People can't be blamed for reacting as they do in a harsh
world. The answer is to change the world into something better, giving
people the opportunity to be their real selves; be good to each other.
If this was not possible, then the sacrifices of someone like Jesus
would have been all in vain, wouldn't it? If you meet people with hate
and distrust, people naturally become hateful and distrusting.
Conversely, if you meet them with love and kindness, they will respond
in kind. So "all" we need is to turn the world in a kinder direction.
Ultimately we will get there.
> Of course, I am a really good guy.
That's one of the things I've always failed to understand. Many people
who don't believe that human nature is good still believe that *their
own* nature is good. I call that inconsistent reasoning. But I guess
your explanation is that people are different - in which case there
wouldn't even be a universal "human nature". Well, I don't believe so.
Not on the most basic emotional level. No, what happens is that people
react to their *different environments*, and so *become* different.
> But the other day I walked past a
> person collecting money for the MS society to buy my DD comic.
What's the MS society?
> > The more you use the major devices of
> > classic literature, the more meaning your art contains.
>
> THis is not my field. The question as I see it is whether meaning
> resides in a text or it at least partly attributed by the viewer.
A lot depends on the recipient. As Shakespeare says in the epilogue to
The Tempest, "breath of yours my sails must fill". Your knowledge
qualifies your reading; "adds feather to the learned's wing". With
Shakespeare, the works are skeletons, or perhaps more accurately DNA
strands, encoding incedible messages that the knowledge we bring to
the work will release.
And in some cases, as in overtly commercial fiction, an interpretation
such as mine (with allegories and archetypes) may put more into it
than was intended by the author. But that doesn't necessarily make the
interpretation faulty. Because the nature of symbols and archetypes is
that they reside in the collective conscious, and used often without
the authors realizing it.
> If
> I read Underboss and get a story of heroism, and you read it and do
> not, who is right? Is there a objective "meaning-detector"? Should
> we take the author' word for it, or the majority word for it, or your
> word, or mine? Do I see something that isn't there, or do you not see
> something
> that is there?
In this case, both. Obviously you get something out ot it, and there
probably is a kind of "kindred spirit" rapport between the author and
you.
> Or is there no objective, absolute, quantifiable reproducible meaning,
> no standard, no reference?
I believe there are certain objective rules that great art should
conform to, but this is an enormously controversial view.
> In the end, is meaning inherent, or is it
> created by the reader, by a combination of his/her views, experiences
> and expectations and what the author put on the page?
Yes, both! :-)
> Is Shakespeare
> objectively good, or is part of his primacy the fact that he is the
> premier poet/playwright of the culture that conquered the world, or
> does that question not even make sense now that we are living in a
> world that has been shaped by Shakespeare?
It makes sense, and there certainly are objective superlative
qualities to his work. Shakespeare is a force not yet truly reckoned
with. If I'm right, we've only been looking at the surface dimension
of his work so far.
> Has the question mark key on this typewriter given up yet?
But you see, I have answers to most of these questions, so it's
different for me. Now all I have to do is convince everybody else.
I've got my work cut out for me! :-)
> > These are elements of tragedy, the corruption of love/loss of
> > innocence, betrayal, the Full Circle theme - all worthy and worthwhile
> > devices. But they tend to eclipse what little radical and redemptive
> > content is also present.
>
> Like I said, to me it is redemptive ... and probably more radical than
> anything else.
Perhaps it is because you look at it from Matt's P.O.V., whereas I
think the basic scenario or setting of the book is what carries the
important (and in this case deficient) messages.
> I meant the fact that everyone knows, that Dd'ing is now more
> dangerous than ever before, that as Foggy says the smart thing would
> be to quit, but the heroic thing would be to keep on doing what he kept
> on doing. BMB raised the stakes.
In one of the issues I read, bystanders on the street see DD and say
"No way that guy is blind". I don't think "everybody knows".
"Everybody" is dubious, and many are skeptical. After all, there is no
proof.
But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects). This
introduces elements of dubious morals that I don't think fit DD's
original archetype. I don't mind stories that focus on such things,
but I don't think the leading superhero should be the object of those
dubious morals. They needlessly overshadow his heroism; undermine the
purity of his symbolism. Although apparently you see it differently.
You see it, I think, as a story of Matt's personal perseverance, but
to me that's more the description of an ordinary person than a hero,
much less an archetypal one. It is regressive, not progressive. As I
argued to jay in an earlier thread, Stan Lee's superhero type
transcends all that because there's much more world-changing power in
showing characters who use their incredible powers responsibly, and so
sabotage the cynical and pessimistic view that power corrupts. It
communicates to the readers that humanity has come a long way (which
is the case), and now we should start using our power (which is
greater than we think) to make changes, to create a better world. It's
possible. However, many of the current writers just can't see where
current civilization stands, and instead they draw inspiration from
the postmodern grayness to delve back into all the "power corrupts"
and "nothing new under the sun" stuff that we should collectively have
gotten beyond long ago. Ultimately, I attribute this development to
negative trends that have gone on in society since the '70s. The level
of knowledge in the general population has decreased, and with it the
level of optimism. Despondency has become more prevalent. I consider
this state of affairs a serious and major world problem.
> Don't you think the ending of
> > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
>
> No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing.
But it got him killed! What sort of conclusion is the reader supposed
to draw from that? To me it says: good isn't possible in this world. I
don't appreciate messages like that. (And besides, as a character I
*liked* the White Tiger! The MU is the poorer without him.)
> If
> BMB had shown the White Tiger having been a bad man, that would have
> been a reason to despair.
Again, the difference here is that you focus on the man, and I focus
on society.
> And living justly in a just world would be
> easy, like being good when you are surrounded by good people.
Ah, so you acknowledge that human nature is dependent on the given
social environment? If society improves, so will people's manifested
goodness.
> But to
> be good in a flawed world, or to be just in an unjust world, that
> takes heroism.
True. Which is why good heroic examples are so important. People need
inspiration in order to act more heroically themselves.
> WT died, shot by the people he sought to protect. None of that makes
> him less of a hero, or lessens his achievement, or says "there is no
> point being good, go out and sell smack to schoolkids". If being good
> meant winning, eveyone would do it.
:-) And one day we will have created a good enough society for that to
be the case!
> If superheroes always won, they wouldn't need to be superheroes.
Well, that depends! If new villains kept coming out of the woodwork,
heroes *would* be needed! And besides, the "need" for superheroes,
from my p.o.v., is not so much tied to the nature of their own
fictional world as to the symbolic power they have when their morals
are applied to the real world. They are symbols of optimism and the
possibility of triumph and overcoming. So they should win nearly all
the time. (Note the "nearly" - for storytelling purposes it is of
course good to have the pathos of a non-win occasionally!)
> Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
> accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
> when it is too late
But did he?
> is an old and powerful story, whether it's set in
> New York, Sherwood Forest or Jerusalem. He's in pretty good company.
Yes, when you choose to look at it that way (which is certainly
valid). But Jesus was 2000 years ago. We should have come a lot
further now.
- Tue
M-Wolverine
> mwo...@umich.edu (M-Wolverine) wrote in message news:<bb035269.03021...@posting.google.com>...
>
> >
> > Hmmm, if I may ask to Brendan, how old are you? Because if you're
> > young, you'll find your disposable income moving up....and if you're
> > older, with kids, well, then you have more important things to spend
> > your money on....
> >
>
> I am exceedingly old (36 a few days ago), and I've just finished a
> shift and I feel ancient. And I have a reasonable job. The income is
> going at the moment on the various debts, like paying for the
> education that enabled me to get the job to afford the money to pay
> for the education that I needed to .... waitaminnit...
>
> I have two kids, who are the best in the world.
SEE??!!?? You have, like, A LIFE!! You have to get rid of that if
you want to seriously collect comics, dontcha know......? ;)
>
> Comics are weird, aren't they: with books you tend to follow an
> author (except for those relatively few but increasingly common
> authors who write series), but in comics, due to their nature, you end
> up following a character. And in cases like Tues, where an author he
> doesn't care for takes over a character he does, there's a lot of
> angst.
>
It's different, but not completely alien. Movie sequels have
different directors. People buy Star Trek, or Star Wars books, with
different authors. Heck, it might most be like serial tv. Different
writers and directors, ongoing storylines, quality and tone changes.
How long does a show have to turn bad before you turn it off?
(Alright, hands! who watched X-Files until the end?).
You care about a show, it's characters, and stick with it, even after
it's jumped the shark.
The one major difference than most of these, is that they've been
published so long, that the major ones will get another chance with
another creator, before long, so if you don't like what's going on,
but still want to know what's going on, you keep collecting to keep
up. I mean, if a Bond movie ever bombs, the studio will probably give
them another chance to right the ship, with all the money it's made
over the years. But look at Batman, the movie, and other franchaises;
they might not get a second chance, or have to wait for a long time,
and TV shows get cancelled quick nowaday.
-Chris C.
M-Wolverine
> mwo...@umich.edu (M-Wolverine) wrote in message news:<bb035269.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> > > gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > > > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
>
> > I guess I'm in the collector category too. With the recent price
> > increases, I'm lucky to ever get out of a week with less than $50
> > spent.
>
> You mean $200 a month? So, some people *are* more fanatical than I am
> - I suspected as much! :-)
Well, the price increase are going nuts again. ;)
(Remember it getting to $20 a week, then over $30, and now it's time
to get it back down again).
> > And god forbid a trade or graphic novel should come out. But
> > then, I'm beginning to think it's getting to be too much, and am
> > looking to maybe cut stuff, if I can find the will....
>
> Old habits die hard...
>
> > (First things to go - Marvel's hype machines....don't think I'm
> > finishing Truth
>
> I am, though. It is, after all, a bit of a milestone... sort of.
That's my issue too. The only reason I bought it. But as I'm going
on, it seems to have Spiderman: Chapter One written all over it.
> > - that scream you hear is the completist in me dying -
>
> Yeah, well... Although long consecutive runs are very nice, I've never
> called myself a completist. But again, it depends on your definition.
Well, in this case I was talking on how hard it is to pick up the
beginning of a limited series, but not the end. But I might not...
> > and didn't pick up Rawhide Kid.
>
> Why the hell would anyone want to pick up Rawhide Kid?! Never crossed
> my mind.
Better question is why would anyone want to publish it?
> > Ultimate titles might be next).
>
> I stopped getting USM and UXM over a year ago. I'm still getting
> Ultimates, but I'm seriously considering dropping it. I haven't
> enjoyed it since #3 or 4. All the characters are unlikable and have
> nothing to do with heroes.
I'm not getting into this one again so soon...... :)
The reason I'm still getting it is that
> it's a very influential book; a vanguard book of what's popularly
> considered hot (although I don't agree). The background of the book is
> fairly complex (what with all it owes to The Authority and all), and
> it's riding and exemplifying a lot of current trends. That, and Bryan
> Hitch's art is very nice.
>
At least there's someone who'll admit the pretty pictures are a big
attraction.
Chris C.
M-Wolverine
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
Cutting bunches of stuff because, as said, it is getting long...
> >If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
>
> Huge difference. I think human nature is not inherently good, in
> fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited. I think
> that people are basically bad: selfish, deceitful, servile and cruel,
> but keen to believe they are selfless, honest, independent and kind
> (except for me and a few of my friends, who really are selfless,
> honest, independent and kind....). Our capacity to feel love for our
> fellows is limited to a small circle of friends, our capacity to hate
> or to just dismiss appears infinite.
I agree with you on the "not inherently good" thing. However, that's
one of the reasons I look to comic books, so I can see what can be the
best of humanity. I can look out my window for the worst.
> Don't you think the ending of
> > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
>
> No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing. If
> BMB had shown the White Tiger having been a bad man, that would have
> been a reason to despair. And living justly in a just world would be
> easy, like being good when you are surrounded by good people. But to
> be good in a flawed world, or to be just in an unjust world, that
> takes heroism.
>
> WT died, shot by the people he sought to protect. None of that makes
> him less of a hero, or lessens his achievement, or says "there is no
> point being good, go out and sell smack to schoolkids". If being good
> menat winning, eveyone would do it. If superheroes always won, they
> wouldn't need to be superheroes.
>
> Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
> accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
> when it is too late, is an old and powerful story, whether it's set in
> New York, Sherwood Forest or Jerusalem. He's in pretty good company.
>
> BDC
Actually, I'm going to disagree with you here - White Tiger did give
up. And obviously too soon, as it didn't take that long afterwards to
prove his innocence. He didn't continue to fight the good fight; he
basically committed suicide. Now, some of the examples of sacrifice
you mention might be considered suicide missions too. But they gave
up something to get something. Tiger didn't give up his life in the
pursuit of gaining anything; he gave it up in despair, giving up on
any chance for redemption he might have, in the process.
The heroic things was, even if you don't believe in the system, to
keep fighting to prove what is right, to show your innocence; to make
the system work, in spite of itself. That's heroic, and shows a world
where justice exists, even if you have to fight hard for it. To have
him basically kill himself, only to be absolved later of his crimes?
Ironic at best. But there's nothing heroic in giving up. Fighting
after failure? Fighting when all seems lost? Fighting, even when you
can't win? That's heroism.
Chris C.
M-Wolverine
> gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.0302...@posting.google.com>...
> > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > > Simply put, what it's all about is changing the world;
> >
>
>
> reconsider. All people in the world struggle to do good; to be good.
> It's just that their social environment too often doesn't make it
> possible. People can't be blamed for reacting as they do in a harsh
> world. The answer is to change the world into something better, giving
> people the opportunity to be their real selves; be good to each other.
> If this was not possible, then the sacrifices of someone like Jesus
> would have been all in vain, wouldn't it? If you meet people with hate
> and distrust, people naturally become hateful and distrusting.
> Conversely, if you meet them with love and kindness, they will respond
> in kind. So "all" we need is to turn the world in a kinder direction.
> Ultimately we will get there.
But which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Does the world
environment become better and make people better because of it; but do
we need better people to create a better world environment? Which
comes first?
See, people are at base, animals, who have the same motivations. Just
we have created social constructs that promote "good", as it helps
society, and it is bonded into us to make us feel good by doing good.
But when push comes to shove...
> > Of course, I am a really good guy.
>
> That's one of the things I've always failed to understand. Many people
> who don't believe that human nature is good still believe that *their
> own* nature is good. I call that inconsistent reasoning. But I guess
> your explanation is that people are different - in which case there
> wouldn't even be a universal "human nature". Well, I don't believe so.
> Not on the most basic emotional level. No, what happens is that people
> react to their *different environments*, and so *become* different.
Well, actually, I think I'm a rat bastard.....
> > But the other day I walked past a
> > person collecting money for the MS society to buy my DD comic.
>
> What's the MS society?
Excuse the spelling, but Multiple-Scloresis (prevention of) society.
>
> In one of the issues I read, bystanders on the street see DD and say
> "No way that guy is blind". I don't think "everybody knows".
> "Everybody" is dubious, and many are skeptical. After all, there is no
> proof.
>
> But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
> with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
> fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects).
Y'know, this helps bring up a point, that may or may not come to bear
in the storyline.........IF DD's ID ends up being blown, doesn't that
wreck one of the great secret identity concepts in the comic world?
The blind man can't be a superhero thing? That was one of Stan Lee's
finest, and if it becomes public, believed knowledge (which we're not
at yet), there's no reason for him to just not walk around like he can
"see" is there?
Of course, a company with a coherent editorial staff wouldn't let 3 of
their characters have their secret ID blown all at the same time.
Chris C.
ANIM8Rfsk
<< But which comes first, the chicken or the egg? >>
The egg. Chickens evolved from some earlier non chickenoid but clearly egg
laying creature. Therefore, the egg came before the chicken.
Brendan Carson
> The meaning of most great art (and esp. that dealing with archetypes)
> is to increase human self-understanding; to inform us about "the human
> condition", i.e. our general situation in the world
> (socio-culturai/psychological evolution); to demonstrate to us what
> human nature is.
As I said, we may have to disagree on this. I didn't write my
response very clearly.
I think "art" is almost indefinable, but a guess would be if someone
creates something that has no "function" but means something to other
people, maybe that's art. That's a crap definition, but I can't think
of any others.
So Hamlet is art, the "Man from Snowy River" is art, the Simpsons is
art. I am a Philistine and those exhibitions where you go somewhere
and see a bit of a bicycle hanging from a rope or a painting that is
just a lot of purple and they say that this is the product of an
"exciting new artist" BUT NOBODY GOES TO SEE IT, BECAUSE IT IS
MEANINGLESS TO THEM, maybe that's not great art. But in the end it's
an individual thing.
To me, it's risky to attempt to quantify good versus bad art.
Historical fashions change. Artists who were incredibly popular in
their lifetime are now forgotten, those who starved to death have
their stuff sold for the "price of a hospital wing". History is full
of failed attempts to successfully or objectively quantify art
according to some theory.
To me current Daredevil means something, it evokes emotion, makes me
think and feel. It "works", it's art. To you it means something
else, or doesn't mean anything much. There isn't a "right" answer to
this, in the end there is an element of "which is better, vanilla or
chocolate".
>
> > >If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
> >
> > I think human nature is not inherently good, in
> > fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited.
> I am very sad that you believe this, and can only urge you to
> reconsider.
I wish I beleived you. But the evidence is stacked against you. From
an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on. The last
rider is that people are under normal circumstances programmed to
beleive that they are good, caring, decent people.
> > Of course, I am a really good guy.
>
> That's one of the things I've always failed to understand. Many people
> who don't believe that human nature is good still believe that *their
> own* nature is good. I call that inconsistent reasoning.
Sorry, should have put one of these things :) or whatever. I'm not
particularly good, on a good day I'm mid-range.
>But I guess
> your explanation is that people are different - in which case there
> wouldn't even be a universal "human nature".
There definitely is a human nature. It's like I described above. Not
as nice as it thinks it is.
>Well, I don't believe so.
> Not on the most basic emotional level. No, what happens is that people
> react to their *different environments*, and so *become* different.
Certainly how you are raised is half the story. I am not dismissive
of the social environment in which someone lives, it is very
important, and we can change the social environment but not the genes.
But upbringing is not some force working on an infinitely malleable
substance, or someone writing what s/he likes on a blank slate.
BUt environment is not all the story. People have inherent, inborn,
differences. I could not have been raised to be an Olympic
high-jumper, or a concert pianist.
And I don't believe that all of this "programming" is set in stone, or
that because we are "wired" to be bad we should therefore be bad. I
believe that we should make the effort to be good. The fact that we
are wired to be selfish means we should be on the lookout for our own
selfish behaviours and act accordingly, not that we should throw up
our hands and say "don't blame me, blame my serotonin levels". I'm
going to start talking religious stuff here, so I'll shut up.
Anyhow, this is as off-topic as I can imagine.
> What's the MS society?
>
Multiple Sclerosis
> > THis is not my field. The question as I see it is whether meaning
> > resides in a text or it at least partly attributed by the viewer.
>
> A lot depends on the recipient.
Snip some stuff we agree on....
> I believe there are certain objective rules that great art should
> conform to, but this is an enormously controversial view.
And some we don't...
> Perhaps it is because you look at it from Matt's P.O.V., whereas I
> think the basic scenario or setting of the book is what carries the
> important (and in this case deficient) messages.
You may be right.
> > I meant the fact that everyone knows, that Dd'ing is now more
> > dangerous than ever before, that as Foggy says the smart thing would
> > be to quit, but the heroic thing would be to keep on doing what he kept
> > on doing. BMB raised the stakes.
>
> In one of the issues I read, bystanders on the street see DD and say
> "No way that guy is blind". I don't think "everybody knows".
> "Everybody" is dubious, and many are skeptical. After all, there is no
> proof.
>
True. But Matt is in much more danger now, as shown by the contract
put out on his life. DD doesn;t have MM as a refuge. He'll have to
be on the alert all the time for some supervillain who reads the
papers and says "might be true... let's kill him just in case".
> But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
> with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
> fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects). This
> introduces elements of dubious morals that I don't think fit DD's
> original archetype.
You should read some of the early issues of DD ;)
the ones where he forges papers to get Typhoid Mary locked up, or
where he deliberately drops Bullseye to what should have been death,
or where he treats Glorianna O'Brien like crap, or the recent Gale arc
where he perpetrates massive fraud on the legal system by substituting
a witness, or.... maybe he's always been a man and not a superman.
>Although apparently you see it differently.
> You see it, I think, as a story of Matt's personal perseverance, but
> to me that's more the description of an ordinary person than a hero,
> much less an archetypal one. It is regressive, not progressive.
I see him as an ordinary person with extraordinary gifts. Anyhow, we
look for different things.
>Ultimately, I attribute this development to
> negative trends that have gone on in society since the '70s. The level
> of knowledge in the general population has decreased, and with it the
> level of optimism. Despondency has become more prevalent. I consider
> this state of affairs a serious and major world problem.
>
I am not going to be able to aruge this successfully with you. I
don't think knowledge has decreased since the seventies. I don't
think optimism and feeling good is always a good thing, you tend to
see it in countries just before they go to war and kill people.
> > Don't you think the ending of
> > > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
> >
> > No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing.
>
> But it got him killed! What sort of conclusion is the reader supposed
> to draw from that?
That sometimes doing the right thing does not get rewarded, but that
heroes do it anyway.
>(And besides, as a character I
> *liked* the White Tiger! The MU is the poorer without him.)
I don't know the duration of death in the MU, it doesn't seem very
long...
>If society improves, so will people's manifested
> goodness.
You may be right. I suspect sometimes that society tends to improve
in the way of televisions and motorcars, not teachings and morals. We
have got more stuff than our forefathers but I am not convinced we are
better people. However, there have been improvements, (I'd rather be
a darkskinned American now than 1903), but we are probably making more
landmines now than ever before.
> > Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
> > accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
> > when it is too late
>
> But did he?
The kid whom DD sent to confess would presumably clear his name. But
even if he hadn't, a he'd still be a heroic martyr.
I don't know if I'll be able to keep replying to these at such length.
But thanks anyway.
BDC
Brendan Carson
> I agree with you on the "not inherently good" thing. However, that's
> one of the reasons I look to comic books, so I can see what can be the
> best of humanity. I can look out my window for the worst.
>
:(
Look, up in the sky! Is it a bird? Is it a plane.... yes, it's a
B-52.
>
> Actually, I'm going to disagree with you here - White Tiger did give
> up. And obviously too soon, as it didn't take that long afterwards to
> prove his innocence. He didn't continue to fight the good fight; he
> basically committed suicide.
Good point. I think he cracked under pressure. I don't know that he
did the "bad thing", but maybe he was weighed and found wanting. I
think you're right.
BDC
James William Moar
> To me current Daredevil means something, it evokes emotion, makes me
> think and feel. It "works", it's art. To you it means something
> else, or doesn't mean anything much. There isn't a "right" answer to
> this, in the end there is an element of "which is better, vanilla or
> chocolate".
Chocolate. Duh.
> I wish I beleived you. But the evidence is stacked against you. From
> an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
> to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
> close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
> except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
> extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
> the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
> much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
> four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
> anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on. The last
> rider is that people are under normal circumstances programmed to
> beleive that they are good, caring, decent people.
I think there's a fair bit in this, though I'm not so pessimistic - the
divisions seem to me less extreme in many people, and there's potential
for people seeing all of humanity as their "tribe".
> >Ultimately, I attribute this development to
> > negative trends that have gone on in society since the '70s. The level
> > of knowledge in the general population has decreased, and with it the
> > level of optimism. Despondency has become more prevalent. I consider
> > this state of affairs a serious and major world problem.
> >
>
> I am not going to be able to aruge this successfully with you. I
> don't think knowledge has decreased since the seventies. I don't
> think optimism and feeling good is always a good thing, you tend to
> see it in countries just before they go to war and kill people.
I'm inclined to think that the belief that civilisation is in decline is
part of human nature - it crops up through history in rather similar
terms, and it's part of the framework of quite a few religions.
The division between writing heroic archetypes and writing flawed
individuals also goes way back, as least as far as the Greek Tragedians.
Sophocles said that he wrote people as they ought to be, whilst Euripides
wrote people as they are. (Euripides used the Greek myths as his material
for this, which produced some strange results at times)
To introduce a tenuous Daredevil link here, I'll point to Aeschylus' and
Euripides' rendition of the story of the original Electra. Aeschylus
tells it as a story of sanctified vengeance, Euripides makes it a study of
the sort of son and daughter who could kill their mother.
More of Euripides' plays survive than Aeschylus' or Sophocles' put
together, though he wrote fewer than either. Whether that's the luck of
the draw, or a sign of something, I don't know.
--
James Moar
M-Wolverine
Just to be clear: I agree, I don't think he necessarily did a "bad
thing"; just a very human one. But by not doing bad, doesn't
necessarily make it heroic either. So I wasn't slamming him for
making a natural reaction. Just that I don't know that at THAT POINT
he was still heroically fighting a lost battle. But I think we're on
the same page.
Chris C.
M-Wolverine
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03021...@posting.google.com>...
>
> I wish I beleived you. But the evidence is stacked against you. From
> an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
> to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
> close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
> except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
> extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
> the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
> much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
> four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
> anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on.
Ha! This is a great example. My football team losing can send me
into a funk for days......I can't say the Challenger disaster hit me
as hard. Is that right? Of course not. But is it human nature? I
think so.
Chris C.
~consul
> But really, everyone wants great stories.....but some also have a great love for the character. And want to know what's going to happen
> to them. And that sometimes means staying through the bad as well as the good....
Some folks seem to think that if life isn't all happy rah-rah all the time, then something
is wrong. Great things only seem great if we have the lows (or 'casuals') to compare them
to. Being on a high all the time is unrealistic and ultimately destructive.
--
"... I remember times when we would be walking, and she would casually slip her hand into
mine ..."
till next time,
Jameson Stalanthas Yu http://www.dolphins-cove.com
dedesi...@Xdolphins-cove.com (remove x's to reply)
Tue Sorensen
> At least there's someone who'll admit the pretty pictures are a big
> attraction.
Are you kidding? Half of the comics I buy - maybe more - are because
of the pretty pictures. Of course, I prefer good stories to go with
them, but you can't always get what you want.
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> > gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.0302...@posting.google.com>...
> > > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
> > It's just that their social environment too often doesn't make it
> > possible. People can't be blamed for reacting as they do in a harsh
> > world. The answer is to change the world into something better, giving
> > people the opportunity to be their real selves; be good to each other.
> > If this was not possible, then the sacrifices of someone like Jesus
> > would have been all in vain, wouldn't it? If you meet people with hate
> > and distrust, people naturally become hateful and distrusting.
> > Conversely, if you meet them with love and kindness, they will respond
> > in kind. So "all" we need is to turn the world in a kinder direction.
> > Ultimately we will get there.
>
> But which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Does the world
> environment become better and make people better because of it; but do
> we need better people to create a better world environment? Which
> comes first?
Neither. It's evolution. The two co-evolve, acting dialectically upon
one another, pushing them onward to new emergent states. That's how
everything works. There are no isolated causes and effects.
Ultimately, everything in the universe is one big simultaneous cause
and effect. This is one of the most basic lessons of science.
> See, people are at base, animals, who have the same motivations. Just
> we have created social constructs that promote "good", as it helps
> society, and it is bonded into us to make us feel good by doing good.
Indeed.
> But when push comes to shove...
Yeah, but the struggle to improve goes on. And as time goes by we can
be more and more diplomatic and less and less violent. If you look at
Western culture per se (which is an incomplete but not therefore
invalid perspective), this is certainly the case. There has been no
war between Western nations for 58 years - an unprecedented triumph of
diplomacy!
The human condition is a process of coming to know ourselves, and
changing our environment to suit the real us. That's what cultural
evolution is about. Eventually we will reach perfect scientific
self-knowledge, abolish violent diagreement and create a rational
society that focuses on positive common values and the advancement of
all humanity. This development, in fact, has been outlined and
projected by art and literature for many centuries now, and in vaguer
terms also in religious myths.
> Well, actually, I think I'm a rat bastard.....
No you don't. :-)
> > What's the MS society?
>
> Excuse the spelling, but Multiple-Scloresis (prevention of) society.
Ah.
> > But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
> > with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
> > fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects).
>
> Y'know, this helps bring up a point, that may or may not come to bear
> in the storyline.........IF DD's ID ends up being blown, doesn't that
> wreck one of the great secret identity concepts in the comic world?
> The blind man can't be a superhero thing? That was one of Stan Lee's
> finest, and if it becomes public, believed knowledge (which we're not
> at yet), there's no reason for him to just not walk around like he can
> "see" is there?
>
> Of course, a company with a coherent editorial staff wouldn't let 3 of
> their characters have their secret ID blown all at the same time.
As is probably clear to most people here, I agree with all this. :-)
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> creates something that has no "function" but means something to other
> people, maybe that's art. That's a crap definition, but I can't think
> of any others.
Art is tricky to define, and I don't think there is a generally
accepted definition. I have often tended to define it just as you do:
whatever is meaningful to somebody. Anybody. The problem is that this
reduces art to opinion, and prevents it from having much of a purpose
except for "appealing to somebody in some way". Some people may be
okay with that, but I believe that art, in order to be a meaningful
concept on its own, has, or should have, certain objective criteria,
quite like science (but functioning by various different mechanisms,
of course, like symbolism, etc.). I'm not saying that I want these
criteria to be narrow and highly specific, because art is a medium of
inventive and innovative forms of communication. New devices can
always be dreamed up and put to artistic use. But I feel that art
should have a particular and directed thrust to is. And my feelings
about the nature of art is not so much something I've arrived at on my
own as it is something I've concluded by looking at, and appreciating,
existing art. I think I am defining a purpose that is already there,
rather than trying to dictate it. And this purpose, as I mentioned, is
ultimately to increase human self-knowledge of all kinds, and reform
us in the direction of this self-knowledge, so we can solve the basic
conflicts of our social situations and move beyond them. This would
take us to a state of decreased suffering and increased pleasure where
we could concern ourselves with the really important things, such as
loving each other, learning about the universe, advancing our species
to new levels of civilization; colonize space.
But, the purpose of art that I speak of here need not be super-potent
in all works. You mention The Simpsons. It's a really great show, and
I have no problem calling it art. It is funny, it points out quirky
things and makes us wonder about them, it enhances certain
perspectives through caricature, etc., etc. All these things help the
purpose I speak of. It makes us think, and it gives us pleasure. It
throws ourselves and parts of our society into sharp relief, all of
which helps us to understand our society.
> So Hamlet is art, the "Man from Snowy River" is art, the Simpsons is
> art. I am a Philistine and those exhibitions where you go somewhere
> and see a bit of a bicycle hanging from a rope or a painting that is
> just a lot of purple and they say that this is the product of an
> "exciting new artist" BUT NOBODY GOES TO SEE IT, BECAUSE IT IS
> MEANINGLESS TO THEM, maybe that's not great art. But in the end it's
> an individual thing.
Art has a lot to do with the context that it is supposed to be
meaningful in. A lot of people may not perceive the precise context of
a given piece of art, which is why it is meaningless to them and
meaningful to others. But most art that is meaningful only to a few
cannot be said to be very effective art.
> To me, it's risky to attempt to quantify good versus bad art.
But it needs to be done if we want to determine the purpose of art -
and every theory of art does! :-) If, in the process, we offend a
number of accepted ideas about the inclusive and diffuse nature of
art, it's just something that goes with the territory. And
occupational hazard for theorists.
> Historical fashions change. Artists who were incredibly popular in
> their lifetime are now forgotten, those who starved to death have
> their stuff sold for the "price of a hospital wing". History is full
> of failed attempts to successfully or objectively quantify art
> according to some theory.
I don't think all of them failed. And I think that for every theory
that failed, we learned something new and ultimately approached
greater enlightenment. As long as there are unresolved questions,
forming new theories about them is worthwhile and can only enrich us
in the long run.
> To me current Daredevil means something, it evokes emotion, makes me
> think and feel. It "works", it's art. To you it means something
> else, or doesn't mean anything much. There isn't a "right" answer to
> this, in the end there is an element of "which is better, vanilla or
> chocolate".
That depends on what you consider authoritative. I choose to consider
my art theory authoritative, which means that, to me, BMB's DD is
rather poor art, which in the great scheme of things may even do more
harm than good, because it rides a number of trends that I consider
negative. If this offends you I'm sorry, but my theory stands.
> > > >If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
> > >
> > > I think human nature is not inherently good, in
> > > fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited.
>
> > I am very sad that you believe this, and can only urge you to
> > reconsider.
>
> I wish I beleived you. But the evidence is stacked against you. From
> an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
> to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
> close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
> except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
> extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
> the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
> much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
> four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
> anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on.
Well - no. The evidence is not stacked against me; on the contrary.
Caring about others has to do with what your particular perspective
is. You are formulating a theory about everybody based on your
personal perspective, and it's a theory that obviously doesn't account
for those people who do care about the entire planet (/humanity); a
theory that doesn't account, for instance, for me. Now, it would be
extremely complex to explain in detail what my theory is, but I will
try to do it briefishly.
Reason and emotion go together. They are closely associated and quite
dependent on each other. Personality, to a great degree, is formed
according to how the two interact in a given individual. In early
cultures, when reason had just evolved, it was a superstructure that
imposed itself on emotion and suppressed it - hence the origin of the
subconscious. Ever since, emotion has been trying to free itself from
the dominance of reason, and gradually come to know that reason can be
a great ally. Thus, the course of human history is a process of reason
and emotion slowly and painstakingly learning to interact harmonically
- a process which is of course not over yet.
Reason and emotion are tied together because, as Keats said, "truth is
beauty"; reason *is* emotion, it's just a new way of using emotion.
Emotion is inherent and instinctive; we are born with vast amounts of
it. The basic neurochemistry - the synaptic impulses between neurons -
*is* emotion. Reason is also emotion, but heavily disciplined emotion.
Reason can either suppress or free emotion. Suppressing it creates
negative emotion, freeing it creates positive emotion. (I hope you can
follow me here!) That's why being forced to do or learn something is
unpleasant, whereas doing or learning something because you genuinely
find it interesting is pleasant. Acquiring knowledge because you love
knowledge will unlock a lot of positive emotion in you. Thus, reason
and emotion, in the large cultural perspective, become increasingly
interactive and harmonic as mankind progresses and becomes more
knowledgeable (and engages more in art and entertainment). This quite
simply means that, the more your cognitive perspective is opened up,
the greater an emotional range you will also have. This in turn means
that you will appreciate more of reality than the bits of it that
influence you directly in your everyday life. If you are a passionate
follower of popular science, you will be interested in knowing about
the lifespans of stars and the geological activity on Jovian moons,
not to mention the status of our Grand Unified Theories, and so on. If
you follow international politics, world events will be meaningful to
you, although most of them don't impact on you directly. The more you
know, the more you become interesting in knowing. The more you know,
the more you care, because the more everything matters to you; the
more you see the beauty of things. Ultimately, everything in the
universe impacts on everything else, and none of it can be
disregarded. Ultimately, the entire universe and everything and
everyone in it will be beautiful and important to you. That's where
I'm at, and I know of many kindred spirits, esp. in the world of art
and literature. And I insist that the purpose of most great art and
literature is to bring all the rest of you to that kind of perspective
as well.
> There definitely is a human nature. It's like I described above. Not
> as nice as it thinks it is.
How do you explain its aspiration to be better than it is? Because it
feels better to believe that? Well, if it feels better then it must be
closer to what our true, natural feelings are - mustn't it?
> Certainly how you are raised is half the story. I am not dismissive
> of the social environment in which someone lives, it is very
> important, and we can change the social environment but not the genes.
Yes, but a crucial element in a debate like this is: You cannot know
the nature of the genes (in terms of human nature; how they make us
behave) until you have determined just how great the influence of the
environment is. And we haven't yet, which means we should rightly give
the genes the benefit of the doubt.
> But environment is not all the story. People have inherent, inborn,
> differences. I could not have been raised to be an Olympic
> high-jumper, or a concert pianist.
I'm going to assume that this is because of your specific anatomy
(which I don't think is all that relevant to this discussion of
mental/emotional human nature). Or do you think it has something to do
with personality/temper?
I think people's brains are, from birth and genetically, incredibly
similar. Even more similar than the other organs and body parts.
Because what matters in the brain is simply the collection of neurons.
Not the shape or the size of the brain (as long as it is normally
human), but its simple, basic capacity for learning; for structuring
neuronic pathways according to the experiences that brain is subjected
to in the course of its life. Whether inherent personality traits
exist, I am not sure. I know many people seem to inherit personality
traits and tempers from their parents, but maybe this is just because
they have grown up in a very similar environment, and had the parents'
ways of thinking and feeling transferred to them. Again, as long as we
are unsure of the exact range of the environmental influence, we
should give the genes the benefit of the doubt. Not formulate strict
ideas about just how much is because of the genes and how much is
because if the environment. What we know is that the environment
matters a great deal. Until we know just how much, we must, in the
interest of science, remain unsure about how much the genes matter.
> And I don't believe that all of this "programming" is set in stone, or
> that because we are "wired" to be bad we should therefore be bad. I
> believe that we should make the effort to be good.
Most people do. If they didn't, how would the concept of "good" have
arisen? All of our concepts and language have arisen in large cultural
contexts which are in turn defined by our human nature. (And, I don't
believe anybody is "wired" to be bad, either. Good is our default
condition, which unfortunately in many cases and places is corrupted
by a harsh social and natural environment.)
> The fact that we
> are wired to be selfish means we should be on the lookout for our own
> selfish behaviours and act accordingly, not that we should throw up
> our hands and say "don't blame me, blame my serotonin levels". I'm
> going to start talking religious stuff here, so I'll shut up.
Thanks! ;-) I don't believe we are wired to be selfish. Selfishness
is a stress reaction. Because our natural good emotions have been
corrupted and replaced by diverse forms of fear and other unpleasant
emotions, we are perceiving our situation as desperate and uncertain,
which is activating our back-up instincts which nature built into us
to enable us to survive short periods of great hardship. Of course,
when survival is on the line, we look out for our own genes, i.e.
ourselves and our immediate family. Current society is, as has been
for a long long time, in a situation where we are so far removed from
our harmonic natural state that most of us - often without realizing
it in the slightest - walk around in a stupor of fear and loathing,
running on instinct and making sure that we secure the resources
necessary for basic survival. Even if we live in a civilization where
that ought not to be necessary; where we ought to help each other and
cooperate to a much greater degree. And again, I find that optimism
and an increased sense of wonder can gradually cure us of this
collective stress trauma.
> Anyhow, this is as off-topic as I can imagine.
Don't let that stop you! :-)
> > What's the MS society?
> >
> Multiple Sclerosis
Right.
> > > THis is not my field. The question as I see it is whether meaning
> > > resides in a text or it at least partly attributed by the viewer.
> >
> > A lot depends on the recipient.
>
> Snip some stuff we agree on....
Oh, good!
> > But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
> > with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
> > fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects). This
> > introduces elements of dubious morals that I don't think fit DD's
> > original archetype.
>
> You should read some of the early issues of DD ;)
> the ones where he forges papers to get Typhoid Mary locked up
Well, he was out on a limb in that story - which, in turn, was perhaps
the only correct way to deal with Typhoid!
> or
> where he deliberately drops Bullseye to what should have been death,
I really can't blame him. Some villains are just too murderous. I'm
against the death penalty, but some mass murderers who obviously will
be virtually irreformable, may deserve to die. If I had my way, Batman
would have killed the Joker long ago. Despite my principle of not
believing superheroes should kill. Some cases call for exceptions.
> or where he treats Glorianna O'Brien like crap
Yeah, not to mention Heather Glenn, whom he basically drove to
suicide! Actually, I think those stories neglected to give us a good
reason why Matt acted like that. Did I miss something?
> or the recent Gale arc
> where he perpetrates massive fraud on the legal system by substituting
> a witness
All part of the fun! This was done in a comicky way that doesn't
relate to the same thing in reality.
>, or.... maybe he's always been a man and not a superman.
Matt/DD has, in point of fact, always been a superhero in a comic
book.
> > Ultimately, I attribute this development to
> > negative trends that have gone on in society since the '70s. The level
> > of knowledge in the general population has decreased, and with it the
> > level of optimism. Despondency has become more prevalent. I consider
> > this state of affairs a serious and major world problem.
>
> I am not going to be able to argue this successfully with you. I
> don't think knowledge has decreased since the seventies. I don't
> think optimism and feeling good is always a good thing, you tend to
> see it in countries just before they go to war and kill people.
You are, undoubtedly, thinking of the time just before the World Wars
- I think those are bloated, abnormal cases where certain very large
developments came to a head. Not something to generalize from. To
suggest that optimism and feeling good probably have causal
connections to war and killing is, frankly, absurd. I can go on about
this with many examples from history if you so desire.
And as for knowledge; there are many kinds of knowledge. Obviously the
world as a whole has gained immense knowledge in many areas in this
age of modern science, but the population's general level of knowledge
about both itself and the social mechanisms it is a part of, have
waned, and so has it progressive resolve. But I have high hopes that
all this will turn around in the next couple of decades, thanks to
both new knowledge and new methods of disseminating it (such as the
Internet, which I think is probably humanity's greatest achievement
ever).
> > > Don't you think the ending of
> > > > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
> > >
> > > No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing.
> >
> > But it got him killed! What sort of conclusion is the reader supposed
> > to draw from that?
>
> That sometimes doing the right thing does not get rewarded, but that
> heroes do it anyway.
And meet an ignominious end because of it. Maybe that's a good message
for religious people who believe that man's salvation is either after
death or at some extremely distant point in time, the slow, gradual
reaching of which we need inspirational martyrs in order to endure.
But I believe that Western culture's current potential for grand
changes for the better is huge and could start really happening any
day now. The doomsday projected by all myths and religions has
basically come and gone - it was the nuclear ragnarok we nearly
succumbed to during the Cold War -, and the road towards a new Golden
Age (based on science and cultural as well as individual
self-understanding) now lies unobstructed before us.
> > If society improves, so will people's manifested
> > goodness.
>
> You may be right. I suspect sometimes that society tends to improve
> in the way of televisions and motorcars, not teachings and morals. We
> have got more stuff than our forefathers but I am not convinced we are
> better people. However, there have been improvements, (I'd rather be
> a darkskinned American now than 1903), but we are probably making more
> landmines now than ever before.
The planet is still engaged in a process of cultural competition, and
this means that the stronger cultures are conquering or destroying the
weaker ones. Of course, for all caring people this is very
unfortunate, and I preach peaceful persuasion instead of martial. I do
believe in the superiority of the basic values and achievements of
Western culture, but I think we ought to share non-martial technology
and other resources and help educate non-Western cultures, gradually
bringing their standard of living up to speed with ours. The more we
can cooperate, the more we can enrich each other's cultures. Just
bombing the people we don't like, making terrorists out of them, is to
shoot ourselves in the foot. Unfortunately, we still live in a
roughhouse world which, in terms of global politics, is unaccustomed
to basic kindness. But one day this will change.
> > > Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
> > > accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
> > > when it is too late
> >
> > But did he?
>
> The kid whom DD sent to confess would presumably clear his name.
Presumably? So BMB didn't even make that clear? O boy...
> I don't know if I'll be able to keep replying to these at such length.
> But thanks anyway.
You, too. :-)
- Tue
Tue Sorensen
> On 11 Feb 2003, Brendan Carson wrote:
> > From
> > an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
> > to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
> > close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
> > except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
> > extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
> > the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
> > much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
> > four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
> > anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on. The last
> > rider is that people are under normal circumstances programmed to
> > beleive that they are good, caring, decent people.
>
> I think there's a fair bit in this, though I'm not so pessimistic - the
> divisions seem to me less extreme in many people, and there's potential
> for people seeing all of humanity as their "tribe".
Exactly. The expanding of the rational and emotional range is a
process that has been going on since the dawn of history. As a tribe
grows into a country, the individual members change their loyalties
accordingly. The same is also happening now that the world situation
is progressing from nationalized to globalized. I have always
considered myself a citizen of the world, and accepted part of the
responsibility of taking good care of the entire planet and its
people. The capitalist social system as we know it now is the
manifestation of a certain cultural mindset which is gradually coming
to an end, being replaced by a more humane and collectively oriented
one.
> I'm inclined to think that the belief that civilisation is in decline is
> part of human nature - it crops up through history in rather similar
> terms, and it's part of the framework of quite a few religions.
I'm taking a course on The Enlightenment right now, and the thinkers
of that era believed in alternating ages of reason and belief,
respectively. And while they did believe that Antiquity was even more
glorious than the 1700s, they were also the first to operate with the
concept of continuous progress; continuous social and cultural
improvement. The cycle of reason vs. belief could be broken if the
latest age of reason was sufficiently dominant. And in fact it has
been. We've had continuous progress ever since the Renaissance, with
only brief minor set-backs (such as the fascist movement) that were
insufficient to brake the momentum of Western culture. I am a optimist
and even a positivist. But that doesn't mean I don't acknowledge the
negative developments that occur alongside the positive. But I do
choose to focus on the positive developments and minimize the negative
by pointing them out and describing them so they can be better
understood and so disposed of more easily. That's what I was doing
when I pointed out that the general level of knowledge in the
population has decreased since the 1970s. But there are lots of
positive developments as well, and generally I do not believe Western
culture is in decline. I do believe that the era of advanced
postmodernism (which may be past its apex, or may not have quite
reached it yet) is a cultural crisis, however. The relativism of the
postmodern perspective casts all knowledge into doubt and gives no
reason why some knowledge should be better or more true (regardless of
its qualifications) than other knowlegde. This effectively means that
the intelligentsia of Western culture - writers, academics,
intellectuals - is currently unable to really use all the fantastic
scientific knowledge we have accumulated in recent decades. If we can
get beyond that particular hurdle - and surely that's only a question
of time -, great new things are going to start happening. Wonderful
things. Mouthwatering, spicy knowledge is going to be released to the
starving masses, and there will be a magnificent feeding frenzy! :-)
Aaany day now...
- Tue
M-Wolverine
> mwo...@umich.edu (M-Wolverine) wrote in message news:<bb035269.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> > > gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.0302...@posting.google.com>...
> > > > twoc...@hotmail.com (Tue Sorensen) wrote in message news:<c50450f6.03020...@posting.google.com>...
>
> > Well, actually, I think I'm a rat bastard.....
>
> No you don't. :-)
>
Don't tell me what I think and what I don't. If I say I'm a rat
bastard, then I'm a rat bastard....
uh, wait a minute.....
;)
-Chris C.
Brendan Carson
> Art is tricky to define, and I don't think there is a generally
> accepted definition. I have often tended to define it just as you do:
> whatever is meaningful to somebody. Anybody. The problem is that this
> reduces art to opinion, and prevents it from having much of a purpose
> except for "appealing to somebody in some way".
SNIP
....But I feel that art
> should have a particular and directed thrust to is. And my feelings
> about the nature of art is not so much something I've arrived at on my
> own as it is something I've concluded by looking at, and appreciating,
> existing art. I think I am defining a purpose that is already there,
> rather than trying to dictate it.
We may be going around in circles here. In the nicest possible way, I
completely disagree with you. I don't believe in an objective,
universal purpose of art.
Look at artists, critics, commercial speculators and the public: they
all disagree amongst themselves as to "the purpose" of what they are
doing. I believe individual artists have indicvvidual purposes for
what they do: some create for the sheer joy, or to assuage pain,
others to get food on the table, some possibly for theoretical
reasons. Critics disagree with each other, speculators rarely concur,
and the public has a wide variety of opinions on whether a certain
piece of work is good or not, whether it serves it's purpose. If
there is a common, underliying purpose to art, it is unknown to most
artists, critics, speculators and the public.
All you have in the end is a theory you believe in that art has "a
purpose" and that you know what that purpose is. But that doesn't
mean it's right.
In the end, this comes down to the same fundamental philosophical
differences: I suspect you believe meaning is inherent and
objectively quantifiable, whereas I beleive it is created and not
discovered. We can't measure the objective meaning of anything, all
we can do is talk about the subjective: why it means something to us.
If we try to demonstrate the presence or absence of objective meaning
in art, all we end up doing is "proving" that stuff we like is
"really" good and "demonstarting" that stuff we don't like can be
almost scientifically proved to be crap.
In the end, I suspect, we may walk away from this with me thinking
"our tastes differ with regard to current DD" and you thinking "he is
wrong about current DD". We are different people.
>And this purpose, as I mentioned, is
> ultimately to increase human self-knowledge of all kinds, and reform
> us in the direction of this self-knowledge, so we can solve the basic
> conflicts of our social situations and move beyond them.
This would be nice, and it's an admirable aim for a social programme
or part of some twelve step self improvement thing, but I don't see it
has anything to do with art. You may interpret art in terms of this
purpose, but where is the proof that this is a useful tool for
differentiating good and bad art?
Put it this way. If you had some sort of theory that explained the
movement of the planets, we could test it. We could say "Look,
Sorensen's theory that the planets move in ellipses with one focal
point at the sun works, because it makes successful predictions", or
"What was Sorenson thinking? His theory that as planets move, they
spell out obscene words in Urdu doesn't work at all!". But we can't
test your theory, so it's never going to be more than you saying "what
I reckon is ...". Your theory may say "look, this is the purpose of
art and I can predict what is good art or bad art by seeing how it
fits with my theory", but where is the evidence that it is a useful
theory to anyone other than you?
By me, your theory about art and purpose and so on is not doing that
well because it's already led you to erroneous conclusions about
current DD. For you, of course, it confirms your feelings that stuff
you like is good and stuff you dislike is crap, so maybe it's useful
for you, but again, that's you.
> > To me, it's risky to attempt to quantify good versus bad art.
>
> But it needs to be done if we want to determine the purpose of art -
> and every theory of art does! :-) If, in the process, we offend a
> number of accepted ideas about the inclusive and diffuse nature of
> art, it's just something that goes with the territory. And
> occupational hazard for theorists.
I'm not offended by it, I'm just not convinced. The internet is full
of theories that neither offend nor convince me.
> That depends on what you consider authoritative. I choose to consider
> my art theory authoritative, which means that, to me, BMB's DD is
> rather poor art, which in the great scheme of things may even do more
> harm than good, because it rides a number of trends that I consider
> negative. If this offends you I'm sorry, but my theory stands.
By "my theory stands" you mean "I am of the same opinion still". No
worries, it's a free country. But as you say, you choose to consider
your theory authoritative.
Perhaps we could test things by seeing if society as a whole is harmed
by the release of the TPB, but I don't know how we'd set that up.
> > > > >If human nature is good, as I am convinced,
> > > >
> > > > I think human nature is not inherently good, in
> > > > fact, our inherent capacity for goodness is pretty limited.
>
> > > I am very sad that you believe this, and can only urge you to
> > > reconsider.
> >
> > I wish I beleived you. But the evidence is stacked against you. From
> > an evolutionary point of view, I believe we are pretty much hardwired
> > to care deeply about a small group of people (our family, maybe a few
> > close friends in our "tribe"), care a bit (under normal circumstances,
> > except for temporary incresases in times of war, etc.) for our
> > extended tribe (our nation, our "team") and to care jack shit about
> > the vast numbers of other living breathing people. This explains so
> > much: it explains why I actually grieve more for my football team's
> > four point loss on the weekend than for the death of however many
> > anonymous little brown people starved today, and so on.
>
> Well - no. The evidence is not stacked against me; on the contrary.
> Caring about others has to do with what your particular perspective
> is. You are formulating a theory about everybody based on your
> personal perspective, and it's a theory that obviously doesn't account
> for those people who do care about the entire planet (/humanity); a
> theory that doesn't account, for instance, for me.
I hate conversations like this. Nothing personal is meant in the next
paragraph.
What I said before was most people are hardwired to be pretty selfish,
but also hardwired to believe they are good. What you yourself have
posted strongly suggests this is the case.
You are quite probably a fairly decent man, as human beings go. But I
believe you have a large collection of comics, which I am sure give
you great pleasure, and for which you have worked hard. You could
sell those comics on Ebay and donate all the money to an orphanage in
Vietnam. Doing so would save many lives - I don't know, get them
measles injections or something.
But you don't.
The only possible explanation is that having a complete set of Iron
Man comics is more important for you than saving some anonymous kid's
life.
It would seem obvious to me that what we commonly mean by a "Good
Person" would not let a child die for a few comics.
But that is what you (and the rest of us) do.
And yet you (and the rest of us) believe we are Good People.
The only explanation I can think of for this is evolutionarily
supplied hardwiring, because it's certainly not the result of careful,
objective reasoning. Pretty close to QED.
Please understand, I don't think you are a particularly bad person. I
am sure you are well regarded by your friends, coworkers and by the
law enforcement agencies. You're almost certainly "better" than me.
You may well be above average. But I believe the average is not very
high, and that it's wired to believe it's better than it thinks it is.
Again, from an evolutionary standpoint, the advantage of concentric
circles of selfishness is readily apparent - we help those who will be
close enough to help us. And the advantage of being able to believe
you are a good person, rather than an almost stunningly selfish and
hypocritical monster, is pretty plain too. It may not be true that we
are good, or idealistic to beleive that, but evolution does not run on
truth and idealism, it runs on "what works".
An interesting book on this is "The Origin of Virtue" by Matt Ridley.
I do not agree with many of his political opinions, but as a science
writer he's one of the best. Steven Pinker(?) has also written "The
Blank Slate", which is a substantial but informative read. Again, I
don't agree with his politics, but his science stuff seems to work.
> Reason and emotion go together.
Snip stuff on reason and emotion, because I don't know that you and I
are even using the words to mean the same thing.
> > There definitely is a human nature. It's like I described above. Not
> > as nice as it thinks it is.
>
> How do you explain its aspiration to be better than it is?
Well, first I would look at whether there is an "aspiration to be
better". I doubt there is one, or if it is it is less strong than the
aspiration to, say, collect comics or watch the Simpsons. If there is
some mysterious human drive towards moral advancement, it's not
working. I don't beleive we are morally better than we were a few
centuries back. I think we have a need to think about ourselves as
good, and a tendency to talk as if we are trying to be good, maybe a
tendency to try to convince others that we are good so they will trust
us and we can co-operate to kill off a common enemy or lead our
partners on until we rip them off, but that's about it.
>Well, if it feels better then it must be
> closer to what our true, natural feelings are - mustn't it?
No, not really.
> > But environment is not all the story. People have inherent, inborn,
> > differences. I could not have been raised to be an Olympic
> > high-jumper, or a concert pianist.
>
> I'm going to assume that this is because of your specific anatomy
> (which I don't think is all that relevant to this discussion of
> mental/emotional human nature). Or do you think it has something to do
> with personality/temper?
Lots of things. Anatomy (short and fat). Physical co-ordination
(minimal). Personality (I'm a meanderer, people who excell in one
particular field tend to go further in one direction). As far as I
can work out, there is such a thing as musical talent, and I haven't
got it. All of these are partly environmental, but also partly
genetic.
> I think people's brains are, from birth and genetically, incredibly
> similar. Even more similar than the other organs and body parts.
I disagree. Look at the most extreme cases of "different brains" -
mental illness. Hereditary tendencies to mental illness can be very
strong (in the case of schizophrenia), and exist for schizophrenia,
bipolar disorder, anxiety and depression. Look at the biggy - maximum
intelligence is at least partly (maybe more than 50%) genetic. Look
at identical twins separated at birth. Look at familial tendencies
towards violence, risktaking, substance abuse. On chomosome 17 there
is a gene for a serotonin transporter protein, the gene can be longer
or shorter (it varies from person to person, family to family). The
shorter it is, the more anxious you are likely to be. Minds have been
shaped by evolution as much as hands have, and for something to have
been shaped by evolution implies inherent variation. Brains are
different.
Before anyone mentions this, if anyone is still reading, I don't
believe anything about genes is particularly relevant to anything said
about "race", because genes are real and "race" is largely crap.
>What we know is that the environment
> matters a great deal.
True. And it's something we can do something about. But in the end,
it's silk purses and sow's ears.
>Until we know just how much, we must, in the
> interest of science, remain unsure about how much the genes matter.
Actually, the measure of "how much genes matter" is called concordance
and it's relatively easy to measure. 100% concordance means a
characteristic is "100% genetic". Schizophrenia has a higher
concordance than obesity which has a higher concordance than liking to
listen to the blues.
>(And, I don't
> believe anybody is "wired" to be bad, either. Good is our default
> condition, which unfortunately in many cases and places is corrupted
> by a harsh social and natural environment.)
There is no proof for this at all, and a vast amount of proof for the
reverse. Where are these "good by default" people? Where is the
society that produces these deeply ethical people? Where is the
evidence that this "harmonic natural state" you talk about is anything
other than a pleasing fiction, the kind of thing that would naturally
lodge in the head of a being with a hardwired, genetic tendency to
delude itself that things were better than they were?
People all over the world, in every kind of society, of every age, are
capable of acts of stunning selfishness and appalling cruelty. People
in "stone age" communities murder each other. People in religious
communities lie and cheat. People in socialist utopias, people in
free, democratic societies, people in what could be technologically
advanced paradises (if it weren't for the people), children in
playgrounds and venerable elders in retirement villages deceive,
victimise and steal.
> > > But I disagree with Bendis' whole approach. A lot of this has to do
> > > with Matt having to lie to the public, and even to DD's staunchest
> > > fans (like some of the people on the street that he protects). This
> > > introduces elements of dubious morals that I don't think fit DD's
> > > original archetype.
> >
> > You should read some of the early issues of DD ;)
> > the ones where he forges papers to get Typhoid Mary locked up
>
> Well, he was out on a limb in that story - which, in turn, was perhaps
> the only correct way to deal with Typhoid!
Exceptions one, Tue's theory nil.
> > or
> > where he deliberately drops Bullseye to what should have been death,
>
> I really can't blame him. Some villains are just too murderous. I'm
> against the death penalty, but some mass murderers who obviously will
> be virtually irreformable, may deserve to die. If I had my way, Batman
> would have killed the Joker long ago. Despite my principle of not
> believing superheroes should kill. Some cases call for exceptions.
Exceptions two, Tue's theory nil.
> > or where he treats Glorianna O'Brien like crap
>
> Yeah, not to mention Heather Glenn, whom he basically drove to
> suicide! Actually, I think those stories neglected to give us a good
> reason why Matt acted like that. Did I miss something?
Exceptions three, Tue's theory nil.
> > or the recent Gale arc
> > where he perpetrates massive fraud on the legal system by substituting
> > a witness
>
> All part of the fun! This was done in a comicky way that doesn't
> relate to the same thing in reality.
>
Hmmm, did he "do it" or not? I'll say Exceptions three and a half,
Tue's theory nil.
> >, or.... maybe he's always been a man and not a superman.
>
> Matt/DD has, in point of fact, always been a superhero in a comic
> book.
This does not follow from what we've just discussed, in fact the
precise opposite does.
> > I am not going to be able to argue this successfully with you. I
> > don't think knowledge has decreased since the seventies. I don't
> > think optimism and feeling good is always a good thing, you tend to
> > see it in countries just before they go to war and kill people.
>
> You are, undoubtedly, thinking of the time just before the World Wars
No, I'm thinking of here and now.
> - I think those are bloated, abnormal cases where certain very large
> developments came to a head.
War is not abnormal. It is the normal state of human beings. That is
why this "abnormality" has been present in every century in every
state, why over forty wars are being fought today, why the only
nations not currently involved in wars are those who can get what they
want more cheaply by unfair trade deals and economic or political
extortion.
>Not something to generalize from. To
> suggest that optimism and feeling good probably have causal
> connections to war and killing is, frankly, absurd. I can go on about
> this with many examples from history if you so desire.
Feel free. What I am saying is before they go to war, people are
pumped up on optimism and fervour, therefore optimism is not
necessarily a good thing. Look outside your window, if you life in
the US get a patriotimeter and watch it slide off the scale.
> > > > Don't you think the ending of
> > > > > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
> > > >
> > > > No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing.
> > >
> > > But it got him killed! What sort of conclusion is the reader supposed
> > > to draw from that?
> >
> > That sometimes doing the right thing does not get rewarded, but that
> > heroes do it anyway.
>
> And meet an ignominious end because of it.
But heroes shouldn't care about ignominy. They shouldn't care about
their "good name" at all. They should do what they do, even at the
risk of their own life, even if they are reviled adn crusaded against,
because it is the right thing to do. If public opinion was the
purpose of superheroing, Peter Parker would have been mad to be
Spiderman, and the Xmen should have had their various oddly shaped
heads examined. That's another reason why Dd going to court because
some businessman said he broke some glass in his glasshouse was such
uninspiring viewing. Why did he give a damn?
> But I believe that Western culture's current potential for grand
> changes for the better is huge and could start really happening any
> day now.
Any day now....
>The doomsday projected by all myths and religions has
> basically come and gone - it was the nuclear ragnarok we nearly
> succumbed to during the Cold War -,
With the greatest possible respect, I do not know that your
pronouncements on religion have that much authority.
>and the road towards a new Golden
> Age (based on science and cultural as well as individual
> self-understanding) now lies unobstructed before us.
Straight out of one of those Victorian magazines, or those 1950s
science fiction novels. We have always had the potential to make the
world a better place for all. We have never done it, instead we have
used every advance to make the world a better place for ourselves.
The road to the universal Golden Age has always been obstructed by us.
I'm not saying this is how it will always be, and I share some of
your optimism about our potential, but on current form, the smart
money is not on any meaningful moral renaissance any time soon.
> > > > Archetype-wise, the hero of a downtrodden people who is unjustly
> > > > accused and slain by the mob, only to have his true stature revealed
> > > > when it is too late
> > >
> > > But did he?
> >
> > The kid whom DD sent to confess would presumably clear his name.
>
> Presumably? So BMB didn't even make that clear? O boy...
>
Well, he turned up to the police station saying something like "I want
to confess a murder" or something like that. It's pretty clear. But
even if it hadn't been, the fact is the WT didn't do the wrong thing.
He stayed a hero.
BDC
Tue Sorensen
so we may not get much further in this debate. Still, I've responded
to your points once again, in the hope of perhaps setting a few new
ideas in motion. It's quite long, though...
gunc...@optusnet.com.au (Brendan Carson) wrote in message news:<d61d52c1.03021...@posting.google.com>...
> We may be going around in circles here. In the nicest possible way, I
> completely disagree with you. I don't believe in an objective,
> universal purpose of art.
>
> Look at artists, critics, commercial speculators and the public: they
> all disagree amongst themselves as to "the purpose" of what they are
> doing. I believe individual artists have indicvvidual purposes for
> what they do: some create for the sheer joy, or to assuage pain,
> others to get food on the table, some possibly for theoretical
> reasons. Critics disagree with each other, speculators rarely concur,
> and the public has a wide variety of opinions on whether a certain
> piece of work is good or not, whether it serves it's purpose.
People disagree because they at least have the courage to *have* an
opinion about the nature of art. In the middle ages people disagreed
about how to understand the world - did the sun orbot the Earth or
vice cersa? In time science supplied the answer, and I am confident
the same thing will happen again. I don't think that pointing to
disagreement about it makes it out for a valid argument against any
objective purpose of art. In fact, it suggests that you have given up
on formulating any opinion about it yourself. (And sorry if it sounds
like an insult - it is not intended that way.)
> If
> there is a common, underlying purpose to art, it is unknown to most
> artists, critics, speculators and the public.
Certainly. But with time, hard work and good ideas, maybe it will
eventually become known.
> All you have in the end is a theory you believe in that art has "a
> purpose" and that you know what that purpose is. But that doesn't
> mean it's right.
Nor that it's wrong.
> In the end, this comes down to the same fundamental philosophical
> differences: I suspect you believe meaning is inherent and
> objectively quantifiable, whereas I beleive it is created and not
> discovered. We can't measure the objective meaning of anything, all
> we can do is talk about the subjective: why it means something to us.
But if we share a common human nature it can mean the same to all of
us, which makes it objective.
> If we try to demonstrate the presence or absence of objective meaning
> in art, all we end up doing is "proving" that stuff we like is
> "really" good and "demonstrating" that stuff we don't like can be
> almost scientifically proved to be crap.
Well, that's obviously what you think I'm doing, and of course I do
think that I am genuinely attracted to good art and not to bad, but
I'm not claiming that, "coincidentally", my tastes are in perfect
concordance with the objective criteria I'm speaking of. My rational
analysis and my personal tastes are complementary and the one
continuously informs and qualifies the other, so that, by a very
conscious effort, the two are kept fairly close together. I'm not
simply out to justify my own tastes, but to inform the rest of the
world of the elements that make art mean something to us, thus
explaining the universal appeal of the great classics (like, again,
Shakespeare). My purpose is to influence art in a direction that is
increasingly informed by the fundamental devices that make
Shakespeare's and other great artists' work so meaningful to us, so we
can get at the minutiae of that meaning and be the wiser because of
it.
> >And this purpose, as I mentioned, is
> > ultimately to increase human self-knowledge of all kinds, and reform
> > us in the direction of this self-knowledge, so we can solve the basic
> > conflicts of our social situations and move beyond them.
>
> This would be nice, and it's an admirable aim for a social programme
> or part of some twelve step self improvement thing, but I don't see it
> has anything to do with art. You may interpret art in terms of this
> purpose, but where is the proof that this is a useful tool for
> differentiating good and bad art?
Working on it, working on it...
> Put it this way. If you had some sort of theory that explained the
> movement of the planets, we could test it. We could say "Look,
> Sorensen's theory that the planets move in ellipses with one focal
> point at the sun works, because it makes successful predictions", or
> "What was Sorenson thinking? His theory that as planets move, they
> spell out obscene words in Urdu doesn't work at all!". But we can't
> test your theory, so it's never going to be more than you saying "what
> I reckon is ...". Your theory may say "look, this is the purpose of
> art and I can predict what is good art or bad art by seeing how it
> fits with my theory", but where is the evidence that it is a useful
> theory to anyone other than you?
The evidence is in the application of the interpretive model to the
great classics, and I am planning several books that go into this in
persuasive detail.
> You are quite probably a fairly decent man, as human beings go. But I
> believe you have a large collection of comics, which I am sure give
> you great pleasure, and for which you have worked hard. You could
> sell those comics on Ebay and donate all the money to an orphanage in
> Vietnam. Doing so would save many lives - I don't know, get them
> measles injections or something.
>
> But you don't.
>
> The only possible explanation is that having a complete set of Iron
> Man comics is more important for you than saving some anonymous kid's
> life.
>
> It would seem obvious to me that what we commonly mean by a "Good
> Person" would not let a child die for a few comics.
>
> But that is what you (and the rest of us) do.
I'm afraid I must completely disagree. You're not seeing the large
perspective. What one normal person (i.e. someone who isn't a head of
state or something) can directly do makes an infinitesimal difference
and is often a waste of a much greater potential. The best thing
individuals can do is to educate themselves, understand the situation,
and *then* solve the world problems through large-scale cooperation.
The developments we're dealing with are far too large for any
individuals to take on alone. The best thing I can do is to push my
government to use its resources to help do something about Third World
suffering. They aren't listening yet, but in time I am quite convinced
they will. The Western World is getting still wealthier, which means
it's getting more and more obvious and ever easier for us to use that
wealth to do some good in the world. This will, at some future point,
be understood, and accepted, and things will start happening. It will
be a popular demand - *if* we actively and consciously push in that
direction.
> And yet you (and the rest of us) believe we are Good People.
>
> The only explanation I can think of for this is evolutionarily
> supplied hardwiring, because it's certainly not the result of careful,
> objective reasoning. Pretty close to QED.
The explanation is simply sheer ignorance of how large cultural
mechanisms work. The more knowledgeable we become, the more our
ability to successfully address these problems will grow. That's why
they say that knowledge is power.
> Again, from an evolutionary standpoint, the advantage of concentric
> circles of selfishness is readily apparent - we help those who will be
> close enough to help us. And the advantage of being able to believe
> you are a good person, rather than an almost stunningly selfish and
> hypocritical monster, is pretty plain too. It may not be true that we
> are good, or idealistic to beleive that, but evolution does not run on
> truth and idealism, it runs on "what works".
If we continue practicing capitalism and resource expenditure as we do
now, in a few short centuries this system won't "work" anymore. I
don't believe current humanity is part of normal evolution. I think we
are part of a transition period from our animal state to a rational
human state that is only gradually being achieved and which has many
pitfalls and obstacles along the way, incl. the very real possibility
that we destroy ourselves in nuclear war if we aren't very careful.
The natural thing for intelligent beings to do is to reshape their
environment according to the dictates of our cultural development, and
since this development includes things like genetic engineering, the
fate of modern civilization is to one day be able to control its own
evolution. The sooner we realize this, the sooner we will get there.
Selfishness is merely a stress reaction experienced while we're going
through the harsh motions of fear, superstition and ignorance in our
passage from beast to man.
> An interesting book on this is "The Origin of Virtue" by Matt Ridley.
> I do not agree with many of his political opinions, but as a science
> writer he's one of the best. Steven Pinker(?) has also written "The
> Blank Slate", which is a substantial but informative read. Again, I
> don't agree with his politics, but his science stuff seems to work.
There are many of these books, and each have their faults and
limitations, as well as their good points. Back when I studied biology
in 1995-96 a co-student wrote a paper called "The Origin of Kindness".
Current science still suffers from a number of paradigmatic models of
interpretation which need to be reformed. One of my favorite reformers
so far is Edward O. Wilson, in books such as "Confluence".
> > Reason and emotion go together.
>
> Snip stuff on reason and emotion, because I don't know that you and I
> are even using the words to mean the same thing.
It's very tricky to define these concepts, and that's because nobody
really knows what they are. Thus, one has to have a theory about that
before the terms can be meaningfully used in any kind of scientific
context.
> If there is
> some mysterious human drive towards moral advancement, it's not
> working. I don't believe we are morally better than we were a few
> centuries back.
Oh. So the abolishing of the death penalty (everywhere else but in the
U.S.), the vastly increased male/female equality, the bill of human
(and animal) rights, the passionate popular engagement in anti-war
efforts, the work of environmental and relief organizations, the
development of the welfare state, the increasingly strict laws against
additives and pollution, etc. all mean nothing? Most of these are
popular and democratic demands, you know.
Tell me, if the standard of living, and the ethical standards, of the
Western World were world-wide, would you believe the same? Because
it's my impression that people who argue that we haven't really
changed tend to point to the Third World and how we often deal much
too harshly with them. For instance, people often mention how the 20th
century has been more war-torn than ny previous century, despite the
fact that inwardly, the West has had peace and near-harmony since
1945. True, there are terrible conflicts going on elsewhere, and of
course there are some vested Western interests in those conflicts, but
in terms of human nature they are merely instances of friction between
people who haven't yet agreed on the same world view and world order,
as we pretty much have inwardly in the West. It's just a matter of
time before other cultures are absorbed into a World Culture. This is,
or will be, fantastic progress, a fantastic change. And we in the West
are virtually there already. We are hugely, immensely, immeasurably
more civilized than we were centuries ago. Right down to every
individual, incl. yourself. Face it: You are, without a doubt, more
knowledgeable and more decent and have a better sense of justice than
your ancestors of a few generations past. Because of modern science
you understand far more of the world, and because of modern
entertainment media you have read far more books and comics, seen far
more movies and almost certainly heard far more music than your
ancestors. Which, acc. to my theory, also means that you have a much
greater emotional range, which in turn qualifies your modern morals
acc. to your modern knowledge.
> I think we have a need to think about ourselves as
> good, and a tendency to talk as if we are trying to be good, maybe a
> tendency to try to convince others that we are good so they will trust
> us and we can co-operate to kill off a common enemy or lead our
> partners on until we rip them off, but that's about it.
That's a bleak view of human nature, man. I'm glad it isn't true!
> > I'm going to assume that this is because of your specific anatomy
> > (which I don't think is all that relevant to this discussion of
> > mental/emotional human nature). Or do you think it has something to do
> > with personality/temper?
>
> Lots of things. Anatomy (short and fat). Physical co-ordination
> (minimal). Personality (I'm a meanderer, people who excell in one
> particular field tend to go further in one direction).
Some of the greatest geniuses ever were polymaths. Leonardo Da Vinci,
for one.
> As far as I
> can work out, there is such a thing as musical talent, and I haven't
> got it. All of these are partly environmental, but also partly
> genetic.
The concept of "talent" is one of my pet peeves. Maybe there are
slight genetic predispositions for certain things, but 99% of most
abilities are acquired (distinct anatomical fitness aside)
> > I think people's brains are, from birth and genetically, incredibly
> > similar. Even more similar than the other organs and body parts.
>
> I disagree. Look at the most extreme cases of "different brains" -
> mental illness. Hereditary tendencies to mental illness can be very
> strong (in the case of schizophrenia), and exist for schizophrenia,
> bipolar disorder, anxiety and depression. Look at the biggy - maximum
> intelligence is at least partly (maybe more than 50%) genetic.
Schizophrenia can be hereditary, yes, but I still believe much of it
is environmental. I know a mother and a daughter with the same mental
illness, and I am convinced that the daughter's knowledge of the
mother's condition played a huge part in her own development of those
symptoms - even though I also acknowledge a genetic predisposition.
As for intelligence, sorry. Don't believe in genetic predisposition
for great intelligence (and that's despite my being a Mensan). Are you
referring to factor analysis (championed, I do believe, by Danish
researchers like Arthur Jensen and Helmut Nyborg), which shows that
children approach their parents' intelligence levels with up to 85%
certainty? I can't accept those results at all, for the same reasons I
cited earlier; we do not yet understand just how much the environment
means, and we must doubt the influence of the genes until we have
determined the extent of environmental influence. That, and we have no
knowledge of the true natural capacity of the brain. Plus we have no
generally accepted and meaningful definition of what intelligence is.
In my view, intelligence has to do with how much you were mentally
stimulated in childhood. If you were taught (or in some other way
influenced) to think for yourself, to wonder about things and
fantasize about how things might be different, then you become an
innovative and independent thinker. If you had a harsh and suppressive
upbringing where you were forced to think in certain patterns (like
children from very religious households), then independent thinking
won't be your shtick. Ultimately, intelligence has everything to do
with passionate interest in something - anything. This is something
that we can all develop if properly stimulated early (or even late) in
life. I believe everybody can be geniuses. Under ideal circumstances.
> Look at identical twins separated at birth.
Inconclusive evidence.
> Look at familial tendencies
> towards violence, risktaking, substance abuse.
Similar environments breed similar patterns of behavior.
> On chomosome 17 there
> is a gene for a serotonin transporter protein, the gene can be longer
> or shorter (it varies from person to person, family to family). The
> shorter it is, the more anxious you are likely to be.
I don't accept those results, at least not unconditionally. Anxiety as
well as most other mental states are results of a synergy of many
different social and psychological factors, and if someone with a
short such gene lived in a loving social environment, I don't believe
it would make him noticeably more anxious than average. Still, since
most people today do not live in an ideal environment, those genetic
manifestations may occur. But, again, until the full influence of the
environment has been mapped out, we cannot presume to know the exact
nature of the genetic factor.
> Minds have been
> shaped by evolution as much as hands have, and for something to have
> been shaped by evolution implies inherent variation.
The rational capacity of our minds; how they deal with the challenges
of culture and civilization, have not had the time to be shaped by
evolution. The natural life of homo sapiens was purely emotional until
the relatively recent rise of reason, which I allege is simply a new
way of using emotion. Physically, we have not evolved since the first
origin of culture. You don't find any significant genetic difference
between, say, Westerners, who've had at least rudimentary culture for
30,000 years, and Aborigines, who until a few generations ago lived
exactly as hunters/gatherers of 50,000 years ago or more. As you say,
"race" is largely crap.
> Before anyone mentions this, if anyone is still reading, I don't
> believe anything about genes is particularly relevant to anything said
> about "race", because genes are real and "race" is largely crap.
>
> >What we know is that the environment
> > matters a great deal.
>
> True. And it's something we can do something about. But in the end,
> it's silk purses and sow's ears.
Hm, don't understand what that means... I'm not a native English
speaker - although I hopefully sound like I am! :-)
> >Until we know just how much, we must, in the
> > interest of science, remain unsure about how much the genes matter.
>
> Actually, the measure of "how much genes matter" is called concordance
> and it's relatively easy to measure. 100% concordance means a
> characteristic is "100% genetic". Schizophrenia has a higher
> concordance than obesity which has a higher concordance than liking to
> listen to the blues.
For the fifth time, such results are grossly unreliable until we
understand the full extent of the environmental dimension. Which we
don't yet. The Absolute Truth that people tend to attribute to
arguments about genes is misunderstood.
> >(And, I don't
> > believe anybody is "wired" to be bad, either. Good is our default
> > condition, which unfortunately in many cases and places is corrupted
> > by a harsh social and natural environment.)
>
> There is no proof for this at all, and a vast amount of proof for the
> reverse. Where are these "good by default" people?
Oh, here and there!
> Where is the society that produces these deeply ethical people?
All around. People are flexible, willful creatures. Some (such as,
say, Hemingway) bow to the oppressive force of the world, while others
refuse to be broken and persevere. Those with the most powerful human
spirit can transcend society's ills and reform themselves in the image
of progressive morals that go far beyond the norm. That's how society
progresses, that's how great art is created, that's what propels
cultural evolution.
> Where is the
> evidence that this "harmonic natural state" you talk about is anything
> other than a pleasing fiction
It's there. Waiting to be pointed out. I'm working on it.
>, the kind of thing that would naturally
> lodge in the head of a being with a hardwired, genetic tendency to
> delude itself that things were better than they were?
So I guess you haven't got much faith in the power of free will.
> People all over the world, in every kind of society, of every age, are
> capable of acts of stunning selfishness and appalling cruelty.
A pessimist chooses to attribute superior important to the negative.
Do you think that argument of yours negates the fact that people all
over the world, in every kind of society, of every age, have been
capable of acts of stunning *un*selfishness and fabulous kindness,
devotion and self-sacrifice? Even most religion is about seeing and
reaching for something greater than oneself; about seeing the glory
and goodness in positive human values. Over time, society has become
increasingly organized according to more and more humane principles.
Yes, there has been cruelty. But we are more civilized now and in the
future will become more civilized still.
> People
> in "stone age" communities murder each other. People in religious
> communities lie and cheat. People in socialist utopias, people in
> free, democratic societies, people in what could be technologically
> advanced paradises (if it weren't for the people), children in
> playgrounds and venerable elders in retirement villages deceive,
> victimise and steal.
With such an attitude it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Try to
believe that most people aspire to something more, something better.
And that they gradually succeed.
> Exceptions one, Tue's theory nil.
> Exceptions two, Tue's theory nil.
> Exceptions three, Tue's theory nil.
> Exceptions three and a half, Tue's theory nil.
Without acknowledging all of these as proper exceptions to my
principles, I will say again that I am a generalist, and that all
general rules have exceptions, and that this is how it should be.
Nothing embarrassing in it. Large mechanisms involving human nature
and thought *can only* be described and understood in general terms.
> > >, or.... maybe he's always been a man and not a superman.
> >
> > Matt/DD has, in point of fact, always been a superhero in a comic
> > book.
>
> This does not follow from what we've just discussed, in fact the
> precise opposite does.
I'm not sure what you mean. DD was meant to be a superhero from the
moment he was created. Of course, in the comic he's a man, but a man
who's a superhero.
> War is not abnormal. It is the normal state of human beings. That is
> why this "abnormality" has been present in every century in every
> state, why over forty wars are being fought today, why the only
> nations not currently involved in wars are those who can get what they
> want more cheaply by unfair trade deals and economic or political
> extortion.
We live in an age of cultural competition. Large mechanisms are
asserting themselves in this struggle, and the unfortunate result is
that a lot of people gets killed. We should - and I dare say most
people understand this point of view - aspire to solve our differences
by peaceful, diplomatic means, and I believe we are in fact
approaching a greater realization of these aspirations. To say that
war, whether we like it or not, is the normal state of human beings
and just can't be helped, practically amounts to being a war monger.
Your desire for personal and cultural self-improvement obviously is
extremely weak, and you do not believe that things can be changed.
What a shame.
> >Not something to generalize from. To
> > suggest that optimism and feeling good probably have causal
> > connections to war and killing is, frankly, absurd. I can go on about
> > this with many examples from history if you so desire.
>
> Feel free. What I am saying is before they go to war, people are
> pumped up on optimism and fervour, therefore optimism is not
> necessarily a good thing. Look outside your window, if you life in
> the US get a patriotimeter and watch it slide off the scale.
I can't accept this argument at all. A bunch of manic patriots
celebrating the perceived glories of their own country is nowhere near
my definition of "optimism". I'm speaking of a general outlook on life
in all its variety. Optimism is about what's possible, about doing
something about our problems, about finding out how to change things
for the better. About applying imagination to the way things are, so
that better alternatives become apparent. Optimism and the concomitant
wonder of innovative thinking is the true source of all human
progress.
I'm in Denmark, by the way, not the U.S.
> > > > > Don't you think the ending of
> > > > > > DD #40 conveyed despair and showed a world without justice?
> > > > >
> > > > > No!!!! The White Tiger didn't give up. He did the right thing.
> > > >
> > > > But it got him killed! What sort of conclusion is the reader supposed
> > > > to draw from that?
> > >
> > > That sometimes doing the right thing does not get rewarded, but that
> > > heroes do it anyway.
> >
> > And meet an ignominious end because of it.
>
> But heroes shouldn't care about ignominy. They shouldn't care about
> their "good name" at all. They should do what they do, even at the
> risk of their own life, even if they are reviled and crusaded against,
> because it is the right thing to do.
Yes, but again, I was referring to the depiction of society's
conditions, or lack of conditions, for heroism, not to the hero's own
viewpoint.
> If public opinion was the
> purpose of superheroing, Peter Parker would have been mad to be
> Spiderman, and the Xmen should have had their various oddly shaped
> heads examined. That's another reason why Dd going to court because
> some businessman said he broke some glass in his glasshouse was such
> uninspiring viewing. Why did he give a damn?
Because it made a fun story.
> >and the road towards a new Golden
> > Age (based on science and cultural as well as individual
> > self-understanding) now lies unobstructed before us.
>
> Straight out of one of those Victorian magazines, or those 1950s
> science fiction novels. We have always had the potential to make the
> world a better place for all. We have never done it
I can't believe you can't see that we ARE doing it. Slowly but surely.
>, instead we have
> used every advance to make the world a better place for ourselves.
Ah, yes, but "ourselves" is a quickly expanding group of people.
Ultimately "ourselves" and "all" will be the same. As our level of
civilized conduct rises, our humane standards become more inclusive.
Or, at least, as Western culture becomes more dominant (and it does),
the rights enjoyed by Western citizens will eventually also be
extended to everybody else. Sure, we start by taking care of
ourselves. It has to begin somewhere. And grow from there until all
are included under the umbrella. It's happening. It's inevitable. Yes,
there are many casualties along the way, and that's regrettable.
People, and cultures, aren't born perfect. They have to work at it to
improve themselves. That's what the human condition is about.
> The road to the universal Golden Age has always been obstructed by us.
Yes, so far. But things change.
> I'm not saying this is how it will always be, and I share some of
> your optimism about our potential
I'm happy about that, at least.
- Tue
Marc-Oliver Frisch
> People disagree because they at least have the courage to *have* an
> opinion about the nature of art. In the middle ages people disagreed
> about how to understand the world - did the sun orbot the Earth or
> vice cersa? In time science supplied the answer, and I am confident
> the same thing will happen again.
Happens all the time -- in 1984, for example.
Very relaxing for the brain.
--Marc