Heck, there's me trying to be polite and not spell the word out and I get dissed for using an extra *. Oh, f***! Is that better? Then again there's worse things to be criicised for on the Internet.

Joe Z got my point - when creating something like a comic book, an artist or writer can't be looking to the future about his legacy, he/she should only be concerned with doing the best work the can in the here and now, and let history worry about where the chips fall. Marvel and DC are not museums whose job is to preserve the past. It is to make comics and money now and hopefully in the future.

Too bad they are doing such a shitty job at it.  

As to Namor, you demonstrate a rather profound ignorance of the character if you think the guy who turned up in FF4 was substantially different from the Golden Age version.

If people want to write cutting edge, sophisticated storylines that shatter old stereotypes of comics I am all for it. However, create your own fucking characters to do so and leave the icons alone! When animators create something that breaks the mold they make The Simpsons, South Park, or Ren and Stimpy. They don't go to work for Disney and fuck up their money making characters.

Comic book fans are a funny lot. On one hand we scream that we don't want the same old comic book stories but we refuse to leave our childhood favorites when they don't supply us with something different. We want to read Spider-Man but complain when he battles Doc Ock too many times. We expect the comics to be transformed for our enjoyment because we are too lazy to stop collecting certain titles and find new titles that might quench our thirst for something different. In case they haven't noticed for the last forty years there has been an independent market putting out comic books that are filled with off beat superheroes, non- superhero, adult storylines, and some even done that are of high quality.

The selfish fan reading X-Men doesn't want to grow up and away from his Wolverine fix so he demands that Marvel change the character to keep him happy. What Marvel and DC doesn't understand is that those guys are too selfish to even stop collecting if they never catered to their demands. The companies became so scared to lose the comic fans left after the crash they failed to realize the audience that was left were the lifers who would keep on buying if the market was strong or weak. By changing the comics for the outspoken fans they alienated all the fans that didn't whine and complain and were happy. Worse yet they cut off accessability for a new audience to join the ranks of comics collecting. Worst of all a great deal of these outspoken fans took over as creators, editors, and publishers.

You know -- the next time I go to Burger King, I think I will complain to the manager that they don't serve filet mignon and a good gin and tonic!

feh

One of my longest "Voice Crying in the Wilderness" rants has been simply this: when you start to find the stories "boring" and "predictable", when the reaction engendered by the latest issue of CAPTAIN FONEBONE is one of staggering ennui, IT'S TIME TO STOP READING THE #%$#ING COMIC BOOKS!!!

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The amazing thing is that so many of these fans *only* read comics and *only* read superhero comics. I'd given up on recommending novels to a fellow comics fan because I know he won't read them. He wouldn't even read stuff like Cerebus or Optic Nerve. No, it's Batman, X-Men, and Spider-Man for him, which is fine, but if it's your end-all/be-all, of course, you're going to unsatisfied. I like McDonald's on (rare) occasion, but if ate every meal there, then... well we all saw that movie.

Because these fans won't grow or change themselves, they force this genre to grow or change. My favorite bar when I was in my twenties isn't the right fit for me now that I'm in my thirties, but if  they'll just make it quieter, clean it up a bit, and serve some twelve-year-old scotch instead of Pabst, it would be perfect!