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Someone alleged the other week (in a thread re Smallville, I think it was) that Warren Ellis is perhaps the world’s most successful writer of slash fiction, and I thought that was an interesting point, if essentially not true. However, it set me to thinking about Warren, and I couldn’t help coming to some conclusions, which I’ll get to in a moment.
First up, though, I’d like to make it clear that I LIKE a large amount of Warren’s work, and have followed his career since the days when Lazarus Churchyard was first printed in Blast! (late 80s?) to the present day. When he’s on form, I think Ellis is one of the best writers comics has, he deals with issues which non-comics readers will appreciate, and is one of the most articulate commentators on, and proponents of, the medium. The comics world would be, I think, less interesting and the poorer without him in it.
BUT. There are areas of weakness, some in terms of his methods, and some of which seem to contradict many of Ellis’s comments about improving the medium, and I can’t easily see how they’re reconciled. So, my list :
1. Pacing, or padding : call it what you will, there are some issues of Transmetropolitan which feature pages of Spider Jerusalem sitting and smoking, or drinking, or walking down the street. I know Warren’s allegedly gone on record as saying that he’s been experimenting with pacing in a manga-influenced style, but in a 22-page comic, that’s not really the place to be experimenting. Save it for the 128-page OGN (see point 3, below) Same thing applies to Authority, where the ‘widescreen comics’ idea does much the same sort of thing, and even Warren himself joked about ‘this [story] took four issues every time?’ (or words to that effect) in one of Gail Simone’s YABS columns over on comicbookresources.com. And again in Planetary, the number of panels per page is very low. I’m not saying that of necessity a comic has to take ages to write to be any good (John Wagner’s scripts are legendarily short, but the man balances text and art masterfully, whereas Alan Moore’s scripts are at the other extreme, but Moore also knows how many or how few words a panel can cope with). In this regard, Warren’s like the anti-Kevin Smith. Just like his films, Smith’s comics are overladen with dialogue, but at least someone who takes 15 minutes to read Green Arrow (or ‘Overdialogued Archer’ as Smith knowingly referred to it) might feel that they’ve got their money’s worth. Which is an important consideration if we want people to keep coming back to the medium (certainly why I only buy Transmet in TPB form; I feel less like I’m spending £2 on a 4min read).
2. New projects : I know that Warren’s been ill, and I understand that this has affected Batman/Planetary, Planetary itself, Ministry of Space (though I think that’s encountered more production-related problems as well ?), and probably other titles that I don’t recall offhand. Fair enough, everyone gets ill (for example, Kurt Busiek, another fine writer) and I’d be churlish and ignorant to berate solely on that basis. However, despite the fact that these titles are late by some margin, Warren keeps on announcing new projects in development or whatever. I think delivering ones which have already been solicited or otherwise promised would surely be the way to go… but for the issue of talent, one might almost draw a comparison with Rob Leifeld, who seemed to constantly announce new stuff whilst old stuff remains unfinished, to suitable ridicule. Such a comparison would just be insulting, and not accurate, but…I think you know what I mean.
3. Supporting the TPB and GN formats : sounds good to me, they very probably ARE the way forward for the medium (McCloud’s support for the internet notwithstanding). But Warren does precious little work in these formats – even his Caliber work tends to come out in what he’s dismissively referred to as ‘pamphlets’. I understand that it might make business sense, but… well, money where the mouth is and all that. Warren’s mocked Mark Alessi’s Crossgen in the past, but Alessi did risk his cash for the medium. I’m not saying Warren has to sling all his money into self-publishing or whatever (god knows he doesn’t need to – quite rightly, there are many publishers who are happy to publish his work), but howsabout he issues something as an Original Graphic Novel, instead of as issues which are then collected ? That would show real support for OGNs and TPBs as the way of the future.
4. Superheroes : Warren has said many times – and quite rightly, to my mind – that there are too many superhero comics, and that it unbalances the medium in the same was as if one genre dominated the publishing industry by a 70% margin. Very true, say I. But what are Planetary and Authority if not thinly-veiled superhero titles ?
All right, I’ll stop here, because I’d be interested in people’s responses. But let me reiterate that I think Warren is a good writer, and a fine and intelligent proponent of much of what the medium needs to do to develop and grow, and we need more like him. And his Forum on Delphi is a very interesting place to spend time, and to pick up news (though I suspect this post might make me unwelcome there again). But sometimes I fear that his love for the medium, and his obvious abilities, are rather at odds with … perhaps an over-savvy approach to the business of comics. Which is a shame.
Comments, anyone ?
DBC |
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