Lifted from John Rogers' Kung Fu Monkey...

Comics: Year of the Bummer

I noticed, as the year crept on, an unsettling depression creeping over me on Wednesday afternoons. Now, this was remarkable, as Wednesday is the day I lie to everyone and say I’m writing on my laptop at the coffee shop, instead go to Meltdown Comics on Sunset, pick up the week’s books, and then run to the food court and read comics and eat pizza and weep and purge and weep and purge …

I share too much. The point being, this should be a happy day. Why the hell was I so bummed?

I think it’s because, for some reason, nothing much I read this year was, well, fun. It was the Year of the Bummer. Some of them were well-written bummers. Some of them were the best plot choice. But some of them were just lazy, and dreck.

The return of Books of Magic is unceasingly dour and cryptic. This is actually a different impending rant, so let’s leave it at that.

I’m probably just having a problem with Hellblazer because it’s coming off such an amazing run, and now is sliding back into pariah-Constantine. Rake at the Gates of Hell, people, just stay on that, and the book’ll be fine.

The Flash had a secret identity and then, didn’t, again. (In screenwriting we call that an “up and back”, and what is considered a flaw in movies and television is apparently Comic Writing 101)

The big Bat-crossover, War Games, besides being yet another blow to Gotham’s property values -- seriously, can you even get home insurance in that city? – not only brutally beat to death a young female character I kind of dug, but also relied on the plot device of somebody stealing one of Batman’s contingency plans. Mark Waid did it first and best in the Tower of Babel arc in JLA. Okay, after the first time somebody uses Bats’ own unmatched tactical genius against him, I’m thinking he’s gonna get some better encryption. Maybe a firewall. Because, you know … he’s an unmatched tactical genius. Fool me once, etc. etc.

Speedy has AIDS. ‘nuff said.

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