The Four Color Media Monitor

Comic Book Club Live listed 54 questions asked to Mark Waid at this year's Wondercon, and here's what I thought could be pondered:

Has he read every DC comic ever? He’s read every Superman comic ever, and most Batman comics. “Wonder Woman, yes.” Also Flash, Green Lantern. “Have I read any good fiction books in the past twenty years? No.”

Interesting he should say that, because if we cite DC/Marvel as the example, they collapsed artistically within the last 2 decades or so, and there were some comics and series that fell down even earlier. The list could even include Waid's own writings since that time, because his Daredevil run was pretentious.

Characters sold their so[ul] in Underworld Unleashed, will they ever get it back? “Not my responsibility.

Perhaps it is? The biggest victim of Underworld Unleashed had to have been Blue Devil, who was depicted asking to be changed to a real devil or anthropomorth(!), rather than ask if he could regain his human form. And his assistant, Marla Bloom, was killed in the crossover, and today has been practically obliterated from memory. I'd think that, if Waid wanted, he could demand all those embarrassments from UU be reversed. And maybe someday, he will. For now, his answer was certainly disappointing.

The big chunk of kryptonite being introduced in Superman Unlimited? “That’s a question for Dan Slott.”

And if Waid's got no complaints about Slott's bad writing, that's very disappointing.

Favorite issue of 52? The issue where they introduce Blood Kryptonite, though only because that’s the first one he could remember.

He never reversed anything bad that took place in Identity Crisis when he wrote the 52 weekly, so I think the citation of that comic is tasteless.

Thoughts and feelings on Bart Allen? “What? I created Bart Allen.” He has the original design sketch for the character on his wall.

I wonder how he feels about the mess and the joke Geoff Johns turned Impulse into over 2 decades ago when he wrote a new volume of Teen Titans? Something Bart Allen's never recovered from since.

Top three books that have made you cry? Death of Jean Grey; Superman #148, which he read as an adult and is called “Superman Owes A Billion Dollars,” where an IRS agent realizes Superman owes a billion dollars in back taxes; and the third one was a Superman novel titled Miracle Monday.

But does he find it sad Jim Shooter even allowed Jean to be changed into a monster? Or that Stan Lee did nothing to prevent it himself? Sure, it was reversed a few years later around 1985, but even so, I myself find it appalling they wouldn't create a new character to serve the role in the late 70s. That kind of conduct served as a precursor to some of the more woke directions seen since the mid-2000s.

The biggest continuity twist to deal with in New History of the DC Universe? He notes that the previous history had 100 pages in 1986, he has 120 pages for 80 years. “I’m doing my best,” says Waid. “The hardest one to wrangle, besides Hawkman — nobody understands Hawkman,” is Wonder Girl. He also notes it’s the current DC Universe, not any of the pre-Crisis continuities, which helps a little bit.

Well if he realizes even Geoff Johns and James Robinson didn't know what to do with Hawkman, at least that's getting somewhere. But as I mentioned before, it was at the dawn of the 90s when the Silver Age Hawkman was turned into a shambles.

Favorite memory of the DC implosion? In 1978, DC was doing a big expansion of the line with more books, which cost more money. None of the books were on the stands, but his neighbor’s cousin filled him in on what happened — that DC had to actually cut back because of lack of faith from Warner Bros. “That sucked.”

Gee, that could also describe recent times, where they obviously don't have faith in something they only continue to own for the movie prospects. For all the good it's been doing lately, of course.

How involved are you in the new Superman movie? He’s not involved, but “Everything I’ve heard gives me confidence.”

Except James Gunn, IMO, and there are signs wokeness affects this new screenplay too.

Do you ever get bothered when someone doesn’t follow your canon? Yes, but “it’s just the rules of the game, you have to live with it.”

Whether or not his canonizations are followed, it's nothing compared to when characterization is corrupted as horrifically as it's been since the mid-2000s.

What’s the most important thing about a comic book script? “They have emotion, they have heart, they have human moments because that’s all people care about.” He notes that early on he made the mistake that plot was the most important part, when it’s actually the emotion.

Unfortunately, even emotion can be twisted into something implausible and phony, and that was definitely the case with Identity Crisis in 2004, a miniseries that seemed to appeal to people who hated superheroes and the themes of heroism they're built upon. But, it's also true that at the same time, the main problem with said miniseries is that it was plot-driven, not character driven. And the minimization of serious issues like sexual violence was the most utterly offensive part of the whole shambles.

You ever miss working in comics journalism? “I really… Don’t? I enjoyed it at the time.” It helped him network with comics people, and the other thing that helped him was he was the gofer at conventions.

I had no idea until he ever worked in journalism until now, but it's decidedly enough to wonder if he ever had an issue with how J. Jonah Jameson was meant to serve as a metaphor for news writers who can do bad things. I've never understood how journalists who take bad positions, political or otherwise, never seemed to have a problem with what Jameson represents in the Marvel universe, yet they continued to read Spider-Man and other Marvel books he could appear in anyway. Most bewildering, if you ask me.

Favorite person he picked up at the airport? Dave Sim, one day after he divorced his wife, which “he wanted to talk about, a lot.”

Is that the Canadian cartoonist who drew Cerebus, and had a record of behavior considered offensive to women? Whatever anybody saw in Sim, I'll never know, but here we are years later, and only in the time after Cerebus finally ended did anybody on the left have the audacity to distance themselves from such a pretentious artist. Yet Waid still speaks favorably of him? Well that's sad.

Favorite JSA character? Original Mr. Terrific.

Odd he should bring up Terry Sloane in that sense, because I think the original Mr. Terrific only appeared once or twice in the Golden Age Justice Society tales (same with Wildcat, IIRC), even if he did appear with them again in the Silver Age another time or two.

What does the Fantastic Four movie has to nail to get it right? “They have to find a balance between adventure and comedy… They need to do something truly imaginative that you have never seen before?” Matt Fraction told him, “you’re going to love this.”

When he cites left-wing ideologues like those, that says all you need to know something's wrong, and besides, when an ideologue like Pedro Pascal is cast as Mr. Fantastic, that's another indication something already has gone wrong. It's a shame, obviously, but points to a sad situation where the FF, of all Marvel creations, has possibly been the most mishandled ever since being adapted to live action.

Favorite Superman villain and why? Lex Luthor. “I like the idea that Lex and Superman were friends as kids,” because “a core element of Superman is his loneliness.”

Let me get this straight. Superman is that much of a loner? As though it weren't questionable enough already Waid's talking about villains as favorites, we're told that a guy who was written as having relations with girls like Lana Lang as much as Lois Lane (and even Lori Lemaris makes a great citation) is "lonely"? Wasn't the character of Pete Ross also written in the past as a buddy of Clark Kent's in the Silver Age? And unlike Peter Parker's relations with Jameson in Spidey, Clark was usually on good terms with Perry White in Superman.

There's more questions that could've been asked of Waid, like whether he believes Marvel should restore the Spider-marriage, and DC should fully reverse any bad direction taken since Dan DiDio got his foot in the door, and even earlier than that, but apparently that wasn't the case at Wondercon, though it's hardly a surprise, obviously. There's only so many would-be specialists who regrettably won't show the courage to ask challenging questions for real.

Labels: conventions, crossoverloading, dc comics, Fantastic Four, history, Justice League of America, Justice Society of America, marvel comics, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, Spider-Man, Superman