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In another thread, Falcon sez:
If you want to talk about the current Captain America comic which is, to be fair, fairly unremittently grim (but also, to my mind, possessed of - in its milieu - about unrivalled structural integrity) I'd suggest Captain America in the news is probably the place to do so.
Which is a good point, and I did kind of send the other thread spiralling off-topic, and apologies for that.
Anyway -- what with Barbelith singing the praises of Brubaker over hill and dale, I've been a little reluctant to get into this in any detail, but I really haven't enjoyed Brubaker's run that much -- largely because all his big beats seem to be direct lifts of Gruenwald storylines, but with a factory "grim verité" stamp that sucks all the fun out of the proceedings.
In fairness:
I came to the Brubaker run late, after it had been praised (and possibly over-praised) to the high heavens, and perhaps had my expectations set too high;
The best parts of Gruenwald's run (long before the oft-snarked-at CapWolf bits) came out when Young MattShepherd was 10 or 11 or so, and in his "comics are awesome!" phase without much of a critical approach;
I'll acknowledge that Brubaker is a better writer than Gruenwald as far as the sheer mechanics of writing go;
I'm about two issues behind on Brubaker's Cap, so maybe it has reached heights of dizzying Shakespearean brilliance in the last 48-ish pages of story, pages that have redefined the medium and I'll come back later and admit that I was totally, totally wrong about all of this.
That being said, up to where I've left off with Brubaker, his main storylines that have attracted the most oohing and ahhing have been:
1. Bringing back Bucky, who was the Gold Standard for dead Marvel characters (well, him and Uncle Ben), who turns out to be dangerously unstable but overcomes this to become a long-haired violent seeker of grim emo justice;
2. Shooting Steve Rogers in the head, and -- anticipating a little -- replacing him with a grimmer, grittier Captain America who will, I have no doubts (and which has ALREADY happened with CaPunisher) discover that the Cap boots are big ones to fill and perhaps there's no replacement for the Real Steve Rogers.
Both of which have been done by Gruenwald -- the first with the Jack Monroe Bucky/Nomad, the second with the resignation/John Walker/Captain storyline.
None of this is a slam on Brubaker's meat-and-potatoes writing, mind. I like Brubaker's writing, generally speaking. I like it a lot. Sleeper was awesome, Criminal is great, and his Batman was -- well, fine, but not bad. And his plotting and dialogue on Captain America are technically great, everything ticks mechanically along like a well-worn crime novel.
He writes a great Red Skull, too, which almost lets the character live down the bwah-ha-ha-eeeeevil Acts of Vengeance-era Skull.
But the whole thing is just so desperately dreary and joyless that I can't for the life of me see what everyone is getting out of it. Even the colour scheme -- relentless grey and blue, everyone washed-out and frowning. At times I catch myself wondering if Brubaker is taking the piss out of the fatbeards by delivering "adult" comics; if this is just a more sophisticated version of the AzBats gag, one where he re-writes decades-old plots without any shred of fun to see who'll bite.
It also smacks of a writer hungry to leave a mark. It's not enough to write a good run of a flagship character, you have to (a) resurrect the one character that was the only reliably dead costumed adventurer in the whole MU, and (b) shoot the title character in the head. The word "kewl" apparently makes Falcon flinch, but that's the impression I get -- there are a million ways to write Steve Rogers out of the comic to explore other avenues, but none as blatantly designed to get headlines and get the jaw-dropped eye-popped ZOMG I CANT BELEEVE THEY DID THAT!!!1! reaction as, well, blowing Steve Rogers' brains out.
Looking back over the run, this is the legacy to date:
The one dead character in the Marvel Universe that you can rely on to stay dead is no longer dead, resurrected as a USSR super-assassin that breaks his programming in a story that combines the very best elements of Universal Soldier and that Star Trek: TNG episode where Picard sees four lights.
Shooting Steve Rogers in the brains and not even pretending it's going to stick.
Falcon, in old thread, re. Gruenwald:
I'm not particularly of the belief that all superhero comics should be 'joyous' and it had CapWolf is all I know, really.
Yes, CapWolf. Somebody always brings up CapWolf.
Make no mistake: Gruenwald was a far better idea man than he was an actual writer, again obviously in my opinion. I think Brubaker's a better writer than Gruenwald, and maybe Gruenwald just generated so many ideas (ranging from excellent to atrocious) in his run on Cap that it's impossible to avoid hitting some of them.
But if Brubaker's next big move is to have a secret society of serpent-themed villains crop up, but this time instead of pulling robberies they murder children, because that is more grim and real-world, well, don't say I didn't warn you.
And, well, I like me some grim comics too. Bendis did some great grim comics with Daredevil, Alias and Powers. I like Criminal and I have a feeling I will like Immortal Iron Fist when I get around to it (that last bit being more pro-Brubaker than pro-grim, I guess). I like Batman grim and punching muggers more than I like Batmaaaaan in Spaaaaace over at DC.
But this whole thing to date feels like a misstep to me, for Brubaker, for Marvel, for the character. Like Falcon, I'm not particularly of the belief that all superhero comics should be 'joyous'.
But I'm also not particularly of the belief that blowing the title character's brains out is a sign of brilliance, necessarily. Maybe this is editorially mandated stakes-raising -- DC killed Superman and murdered Sue Dibney, eh? Well, let's see them top this!
Until Brubaker gets on Spider-Man and they find Uncle Ben living in a secret compartment with a 60-year-old stash of heroin and child porn (but bound to, I dunno, shake off Norman Osborne's evil influence and become a grim-faced ex-addict with a burning desire to redeem himself), I can't think of much else that can be done to Marvel canon characters to make them more "realistic."
As Mario says over here:
"Realism" doesn't have to be cynical or depressing. I'd much rather read a comic about a happily married couple who run a detective agency (of sorts), than one that involves rape and murder. Both are equally realistic, even if the husband CAN stretch.
Which I agree with.
This has turned into a very long tirade against a writer I actually like -- and I don't even dislike this run on Captain America THAT much -- it's better written than most of the prior runs of the book. I just dislike where Brubaker's gone with it.
There's castigation of DC as being "sadfaced" right now, but Captain America is currently the saddest book on the market, moreso because none of these storylines are even particularly new.
Bucky's already been brought back, gone crazy, and clawed his way back to sanity to become a long-haired emo warrior.
Steve Rogers has already been written out of the identity (sans his brains exploding] to be replaced by a grim-faced Cap who will doubtlessly get cycled out to put Steve back in the costume.
I just remember it being more fun the first time around. |
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