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We3 #1

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miss wonderstarr

07:49 / 02.09.04

Do I look bothered though. Does he? Well, he will do. I've already seen some pictures where he looks troubled.

Easy to laugh now, but Morrison just made the classic mistake in comic book lore: don't piss on the people who are holding you up to your lofty heights. They might just drop you.

Moore did this in 1987 when he announced he was going to leave Britain because "it's cold and mean and I don't like it anymore" (source: half-remembered quote, 87) There followed a wilderness period when Moore effectively wandered across the Atlantic and back, touting his work in vain.

Big Numbers? reached the very small number of 2 issues.
Lost Girls? the public rejected this amateurishly-drawn pornography.
From Hell? staggered into publication with year-long gaps between episodes.

Have you actually seen pictures of Moore in the late 1990s when he was "forgiven" again and his comics started to sell. He looks like a wild man...straggling hair and beard. His looks and grooming suffered those years when the comics-buying public said no, we're not going to take your arrogance anymore.

If Morrison thinks he can blame US for HIS mistakes, we need to hit him where it counts. His wallet. I have already received a private message saying "re. GM....wat u talking about", ie. asking for more information about my campaign, so this is just the beginning.

07:49 / 02.09.04

Sorry, Dave, yr over-complicating something very simple. All this "Gud"/"God" crap..... Honestly! It's a fucking dog looking up at you all doe-eyed and innocent and asking "Is dog good?"/"Is good dog?", and that's all it is. It's there to freak you out a bit ("Aaaarghah! Talking beast!") and to induce soppy feelings ("Yes, yes, whosagoodboy, then?"). There are no - I repeat: NO! - philosophical implications there whatsoever. I'm happy to talk symbol and metaphor, but this kind of speculation's just creative writing 101.

Oy. For both Varriage and, to a lesser extent, kovacs... first of all, I mostly threw that suggestion out there because, as I said, Grant wrote this. Which, as much as I like Grant, means that a sentence could have it's own entire meaning seperate from any real connection to previous narrative.

Second, had I actually been all that serious with this suggestion, I might have actually bothered to expound on it a little more than I did. No one else seemed to have a bug up their ass about throwing anything else to discuss about the issue out there, so I tossed that in the air. No more, no less.

There are no - I repeat: NO! - philosophical implications there whatsoever.

Thas' funny, see, I could've sworn the writer was listed as 'Grant Morrison', and not 'Varriage'. I'll have to dig the issue out again.

but this kind of speculation's just creative writing 101.
That's... needlessly insulting. But ok. Again, didn't have all that much invested in that particular train.

Besides which, there's a mistake being made in the pursuit of this; in that what we, as humans, would consider a "God-being" may not necessarily be "God" for a dog imbued with greater cognitive abilities, but that's still the standard being applied. Or maybe the animals are all atheists. Not a big concern either way.

08:08 / 02.09.04

Mods, feel free to delete 1/2 for the double posts.

Kovacs, I have to ask, where is all this sudden anger coming from? There was a story bit that was unclear for some. Grant cleared up what he meant with that sequence in an interview. This seems to, for some reason, have touched a nerve with you, which is where I get lost. What's up? I'm not really sure where you're getting this Sermon from the Mount vibe with that interview, to be honest.

miss wonderstarr

08:43 / 02.09.04

I have to admit my anger abated a bit after I burned Morrison's "New Adventures of Hitler" on a bonfire in my back garden. The smoke formed a sigil of the words Let This Be A Lesson, and then resolved into Grant's face, which looked shocked then penitent.

08:45 / 02.09.04

Completely agree with you Kovacs. I for one was completely disgusted when Moore insulted our fine nation way back in 87. No more invites round mine for afternoon tea in quite a while I can tell you. I also wrote a stern letter to the Daily Mail but they neglected to print it. And you're right about his comic output for a while after that. Pornographic trash and hippy mystic nonsense. I was glad when he got back to the supermen.

Morrison arrogance seems to be going the same way. Along with the atrocious 'SAVE' fiasco I just feel let down by the whole thing really. I mean, are these things meant to be animals or robots?? Beats me. Or are they meant to be some sort of mutant mixture? Kind of like an ANIBOT.

I certainly won't be buying the Small Soldiers comic either!!

08:57 / 02.09.04

I actually didn't think the storyline was totally obscure... there are some things which aren't totally clear, like the animals' restraints being taken off for their feed; but I thought the fact that Roseanne had elected not to hit 'save' was fairly obvious - when you hit a command on a computer screen, the dialogue box closes - so, since it's still on the screen, it seems clear that she has not executed the command which was part of the 'decommissioning' (which is clear from the syringes she is holding). And, from subsequent events, it becomes clear that she deliberately left the restraints off.

Anyway, I thought any minor confusion was totally outweighed by the beautiful double-page picture of the animals' break for freedom.

09:06 / 02.09.04

Korvacs said
Moore did this in 1987 when he announced he was going to leave Britain because "it's cold and mean and I don't like it anymore" (source: half-remembered quote, 87

That's a quote from his introduction to V for Vendetta, a prose piece where Moore talks at length about his disenchantment with British politics in the wake of Margret Thatcher's third electoral victory. Not really a comment on British comic readers.

Also I think its a bit of a stretch to claim the failure of Big numbers to get past issue 2 on a lack of interest in his work or petulent fans. Big Numbers, as most readers will recall hit trouble when Billy the Sink found Moore's approach to making comics too demanding - and his replacement artist suffered some kind of breakdown. Around this time Moore's rather unconventional marriage finally broke down. I also seem to remember that Mad Love, the company that published Big Numbers was owned in part by Moore's wife. This was not a happy period for Moore professionally or personally but one thing I am pretty sure of - Moore wasn't crying himself to sleep every night wondering why his fickle fans were punishing him, if indeed any actually were.

miss wonderstarr

10:02 / 02.09.04

Well Moore looked like he had let his appearance slide during that period... his hair was long and he had a big beard. I can't believe fan rejection didn't have a great deal to do with his "change of image".

10:10 / 02.09.04

correct me if i'm wrong, but doesn't Moore still have long hair and a beard?

Regrettable Juvenilia

10:29 / 02.09.04

Surely kovacs is taking the piss now, if he wasn't already?

10:49 / 02.09.04

I had hoped that was the case, but...

11:15 / 02.09.04

Oh he is taking the piss.

Kinda obvious.

12:37 / 02.09.04

>> Some people seemed a little confused by the 'Save' sequence on the computer screen. God help them, I know, but hopefully I can clear it up -

The "God help them, I know" comes off a tiny bit smug, but I think it's meant to be with a playful tone. I was a bit off-put by this for just a milli-moment but then got over myself.

If this is the only time Grant gives his readers a hard time (and from my knowledge, it is), I'm fine with that. (I know he's joked about people over-analyzing every little bit of his stuff, too, I think.)

Is kovacs taking the piss? Somehow I don't feel Alan Moore's more indy efforts sold poorly because he said his home country was 'big and cold and mean.'

The Natural Way

12:38 / 02.09.04

I fucking hope Kovacs is taking the piss.

You are, aren't you?

Tell me you are!

Otherwise I'm just going to have to pretend you are, because nobody could be that stupid.

Thas' funny, see, I could've sworn the writer was listed as 'Grant Morrison', and not 'Varriage'. I'll have to dig the issue out again.

I'll tell you one thing, Bjork, as far as I'm aware yr not the writer either, and, you know what? After 15 or so years with my head buried in Grunt comics and forever warbling about his themes on this site, I can tell you right now that I trust my instincts and I say yr reaching.

Reaching for something really boring.

The Natural Way

12:45 / 02.09.04

Oh, and one more thing: so far, it seems there's quite a sizeable number of people who weren't overly confused by the whole 'Save' thing, SO IT COULDN'T HAVE BEEN THAT DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND.

AAAARGH!

God, I'm coming off as a grumpy bunny today!

In an attack suit.

And, yes, Wolf, Moore's indie years had little or nothing to do w/ his intro for V. Kovacs is being silly.

12:48 / 02.09.04

So was GM, I do believe. Hands up all who're pisstaking, before someone gets hurt...

I'm with Kit-Kat Club; while some of the specifics of the SAVE sequence weren't all that clear, the general sense became clear in context.

The discussion about the animals' voices/speech patterns is interesting, I think. The idea that the dog, being more people-oriented, is the one who's really wrestling with questions of language and meaning, while the cat just uses the power of human speech to effectively communicate her desire to be left the hell alone. And the rabbit spits out disjointed words as his attention hops around. "Distracted", as Grant said.

I love the fact that he used The Private Life of the Rabbit by R.M. Lockley for research - that's cited a lot by Richard Adams in Watership Down, which is still one of my favorite books ever.

13:16 / 02.09.04

>>>If this is the only time Grant gives his readers a hard time (and from my knowledge, it is), I'm fine with that.<<<

Heh...wait til you read that Arthur magazine interview.

13:26 / 02.09.04

Well, I don't mind him giving us a hard time now and then... he doesn't seem like the kind of guy who is going to insult his readers in any real or vicious kind of way. and sometimes comic book fans need a good dose of 'lighten up'. I wonder if we'll get highlights from the Arthur interview from someone who has it...?

miss wonderstarr

14:40 / 02.09.04

Gosh it's hard sometimes for comic fans to be comical. My fault I'm sure. Thanx for the laffs... to be honest I did feel "God help them" was a bit patronising given that his writing didn't convey clearly (I still maintain) what he thought was obvious but the rest, yes, was me being daft.

17:24 / 02.09.04

It was worth it all for this bit: I have to admit my anger abated a bit after I burned Morrison's "New Adventures of Hitler" on a bonfire in my back garden. The smoke formed a sigil of the words Let This Be A Lesson, and then resolved into Grant's face, which looked shocked then penitent.

So.

Mmmyeah. Quitely is peerless, as you'd expect.

I think that's him and the Grant in the pet van on the floor, in one of those crazy 'self-insertions' the latter is so fond of.

But it feels, as M.Fluxington doth have it, a little characterless. Apart from Bandit, who's kinda pathetic; as a dog person I can feel myself bridling at the author's obvious cat-bias.

Last three pages are great, but when all the pre-match hype says 'best comic ever' I can't help but feel a little disappointed.

Though I am, like the Stoat, a wee bit text-centric.

Professor Silly

19:14 / 02.09.04

Obviously when dealing with something so jam-packed with visual narritive and what-not while also including the mega violence that gets the reader excited tends to lead toward sloppy reading.

When reading this issue the first time through I read it so fast that I missed a lot. I caught the whole "save" thing no problem, but was utterly confused by the animals conversation outside (I didn't realize they where referring to each other as numbers...so the "1 knows 0" seemed like nonsense).

My second and third readings, when I took my time and really examined the art-work made all of this stuff much more clear. I'm especially blown away by the security camera pages--on my first (lightning-fast) reading I caught the gist of what was happening, but upon further examination the layout of the building did start to become clear as well as who was who and the motivation behind every action.

Deep breaths...

Give it time...

more deep breaths....

The Natural Way

19:47 / 02.09.04

That's right - there's so much detail, it takes a while to unpack it all. And that's the joy of We3 for me - it does improve with rereads. Quitely's use of movement is fucking amazing - when the eye adjusts to Quitely-vision it all starts to look like animation. Check the treadmill stopping, the burst of movement as the animals fastlane it into the tea-lady, Bandit and Pirate bounding/bouncing into adventure at the end (you can just feel the super-enhanced hopping, and just how much bone would smash should one of them kick you).....

The Bird.

All that shit with the bird.

2 leaping for his prey - Lone Wolf w/ cats.

I could go on and on.....

This is collaboration at it's finest, really.

03:27 / 03.09.04

Much as I'd like to, I just can't let the "GUD DOG" conversation die ...

"GUD DOG. IS GUD DOG?"

I went back and looked at dialog and 1's expression, and in addition to him doing the doggy seeking reassurance thing, I'm now wondering whether he's asking "Am I a good god?" in two related senses:

1) He's wondering whether or not he even is a dog any more. In other words, is he good at being the creature he was born as.

2) He's questioning whether or not he's a "good" dog in a moral sense, given what he's now been turned into.

Grant and Quitely did a really nice job with the combined ambiguity of the dialog and expression in that panel.

The Natural Way

09:54 / 03.09.04

Alright, I have to say the moral question is a little more interesting. Morrison does describe the dog as the animal most obviously trying to wrestle with concepts. I suppose I wouldn't snarl and growl too much at that suggestion.

But the God stuff doesn't sit well with me at all. Assuming 1 does understand *God* as a concept (or assuming he's attempting to), doesn't it seem a bit random for him to start whiffling on about it at that point in the narrative? "Oh look, the senator's frightened, let's discuss theology"? I don't know about that. Isn't it far more likely that the senator's's anxiety simply provokes 1's need for reassurance: Is he being a good dog? if he is, why's the senator shitting it?

Occam's razor favours the simpler, more elegant interpretation, I think.

But whatever.

miss wonderstarr

11:39 / 03.09.04

Can someone explain why, when "good" is obviously translating to "GUD", we should consider whether Bandit is talking about "God"?

12:15 / 03.09.04

Not I.

I had another go on it, and I get the composite geography of the base now, nice and Metal Gear.

I loved that game.

The Natural Way

14:42 / 03.09.04

Can someone explain why, when "good" is obviously translating to "GUD", we should consider whether Bandit is talking about "God"?

There's no reason at all, Kovacs, apart from "hey, this is a Grant Morrison book, it must be knee-deep with 5D squids!" type reasoning. I love the way, whenever anyone points out how lame and pedantic the theorising is on this thread, they receive a barrage of responses about how beardy Morrison's work is and how we should expect to find this stuff in there.

Yes, yes we should; there's plenty of meaty ideas in a morri-book, BUT this "God" poo isn't one of them.

15:08 / 03.09.04

balls.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:11 / 03.09.04

Well, I don't mind him giving us a hard time now and then... he doesn't seem like the kind of guy who is going to insult his readers in any real or vicious kind of way

Yes. He is also an accomplished and surprisingly tender lover.

God in Heaven... it's like the Jason Donovan fan club chatroom in here sometimes. Except, you know, with people.

miss wonderstarr

15:51 / 03.09.04

If We3 was released every week, instead of every three months, none of this increasingly desperate analysis of the single issue we have -- a discussion now plagued with grinding, Groundhog-Day repetition, idiotic trolling (me), barrel-scraping dredging for detail and speculation spiralling up the cosmic anus -- would have happened.

Yet another example of Morrison's selfishness and disdain for the people who put him where he is today.

Haus of Mystery

16:10 / 03.09.04

Repeat after me. Oranges not lemons.

Oranges not lemons.

Oranges.

The Natural Way

20:36 / 03.09.04

Gambit, you don't really believe all this God stuff, do you?

Come on, it's just not there. That bloody dog is not wondering if he is God, or if the general is God, or querying the nature of God.

Oh, fuck it, try and persuade me. I want to see the weird permutations of yr head.

08:19 / 04.09.04

There's no reason at all, Kovacs, apart from "hey, this is a Grant Morrison book, it must be knee-deep with 5D squids!" type reasoning. I love the way, whenever anyone points out how lame and pedantic the theorising is on this thread, they receive a barrage of responses about how beardy Morrison's work is and how we should expect to find this stuff in there.

Yes, yes we should; there's plenty of meaty ideas in a morri-book, BUT this "God" poo isn't one of them.

Jesus, are you just desperately determined to not let this go? I threw that out there as an aside, with the smallest bit of theorizing imaginable behind it. You may have noticed where I explained that bit in my last post. I tossed it out there to be kicked around, likely punctured, and tossed out. Fuck all, instead of this, why don't you actually bring up something else to discuss about the book? Revolutionary idea, I know.
If it makes you feel better/smarter/more well endowed to keep harping on this shit, though, feel free.

08:48 / 04.09.04

Kovacs, that wasn't " idiotic " trolling, that was more it's far less common sister, the very amusing variety. So don't put yerself down, lad.

14:58 / 04.09.04

People seem to be concentrating on the story too much (in my opinion), the "story" is just there to provide something to pin the supercool spectacle and set peices on, this is western manga after all, sequential immediate cool one would think is the effect trying to be created, which is something that seems to be missing from most western actiony comics. (Again in my opinion) We3 isn't meant to be thought about too much just auto-enjoyed for the imagery and huhuh coolness.

An another thing that i dont get is this whole western manga Jive, I mean its been done. Those image comics chaps (Jim Lee, Sir Rob Leifieled and McFarlane) did super dynamic joycore (debatable) Chinese/Japanese influenced art with frankly utterly disposable stories, and that shit was HUGE at least for a while anyway. So is there much point?

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