Why people hate most modern books 3 3

[kav]

1 minute ago, Logan510 said:

The man is 78 years old. I'm going to cut him a little slack.

I enjoy his work.

I love the guy.  But even when he was young, writing Spectre, it was pretty bad.  He's never been a writer.   But I still enjoy Spectre, goofy as it is.  But I was just using Odyssey as an example of great art and really bad story to make a point-not judging him personally for it.  

[Prince Namor]

49 minutes ago, Logan510 said:

Interesting. I've always been of the mind that a great story illustrated terribly is not that good, but great art can carry a bad story and even make it seem better.

After all, it's a visual medium right?

Yep. A LOT of what holds me back from much of today's comics is the artwork - some of the stories are really great ideas, but... the artwork is just so distracting. Yet Geoff Darrow released a Shaolin Cowboy series that had almost no dialogue (The Shaolin Cowboy: Shemp Buffet) and was one pretty gratuitous fight scene spread out over 4 issues. Almost nothing BUT art. Loved every minute of it. 

Took him probably a year to draw, what some boring writer would've described in 15 minutes. That's the whole point to me.

[jcjames]

3 hours ago, kav said:

 

I'm the opposite. Story is numero uno. I would read a good story if it was drawn with stick figures. Conversely, you can have Kneel Atoms drawing, and writing, and the stories are so boring and dumb I cant read em. Even tho the art is fantastic. Just try to read anything Kneel Atoms wrote and drew himself like Batman Odyssey or his Spectre books or his Continuity stuff and see if you still think art is #1.
I'll do a Reductio ad absurdum to drive my point home-let's say you have the best art ever done, but the story is two characters saying 'goo goo' 'ga ga' to each other. Good?
Conversely let's say you have a great story but no art at all, like...a good novel. Good.

Sometimes, if the writing is bad, I still just like to look at the pictures!

But it's hard to read the story without getting poked in the eye with really bad art (coughliefeldcough)

 

[kav]

2 minutes ago, jcjames said:

Sometimes, if the writing is bad, I still just like to look at the pictures!

But it's hard to read the story without getting poked in the eye with really bad art (coughliefeldcough)

 

I realized this when I thought about Frank Robbins drawin Watchmen.  Can ya just picture it????

This would be Rorschach jumpin out that window:
 

Edited February 5, 2019 by kav

[GeeksAreMyPeeps]

On 2/2/2019 at 2:53 PM, Artboy99 said:

I can think of a few reasons.

2. Changes of characters to satisfy social justice warriors. Keep characters the same, I don't want to see a popular character in a new version. Invent a new character instead of ruining the old guard thanks.

5. Superman, Supergirl, Superdog, Supergrandma, SuperTransvestite. Why cant we have originality!

 

2. This is just plain nonsense. Just look at (shared universe) comics history and you'll see it's a string of new versions of popular characters. Even when it's ostensibly the same characters, things are constantly being revamped, and taken as a whole, it doesn't work as a believable story. It's a string of different characters with the same name, as new creators give their spin on the character. As a whole, would it be more believable to tell those stories with new characters? Sure. But they might not sell as well, because it's not a recognized brand, and we're dealing with products from corporations that are all about branding. Want original characters? Try a book from a new company, or something creator-owned.

5. The 50s would like a word with you.

 

 

[Artboy99]

22 minutes ago, GeeksAreMyPeeps said:

 

2. This is just plain nonsense. Just look at (shared universe) comics history and you'll see it's a string of new versions of popular characters. Even when it's ostensibly the same characters, things are constantly being revamped, and taken as a whole, it doesn't work as a believable story. It's a string of different characters with the same name, as new creators give their spin on the character. As a whole, would it be more believable to tell those stories with new characters? Sure. But they might not sell as well, because it's not a recognized brand, and we're dealing with products from corporations that are all about branding. Want original characters? Try a book from a new company, or something creator-owned.

5. The 50s would like a word with you.

 

 

what would the 50's like to chat about?

[kav]

6 minutes ago, Artboy99 said:

what would the 50's like to chat about?

They say you've got some SPLAININ' TO DO!!!

[Lazyboy]

6 hours ago, 500Club said:

As examples, Grant Morrison created a bunch of new characters and concepts for his New X-Men run

Yeah, but that was just a bunch of stuff he thought up before breakfast one day, while he was still half asleep. Morrison giving away ideas is akin to a billionaire giving away pennies.

 

[Cat]

2 hours ago, jcjames said:

Sometimes, if the writing is bad, I still just like to look at the pictures!

But it's hard to read the story without getting poked in the eye with really bad art (coughliefeldcough)

 

I desperately want to disagree with you, but... you're right. I used to be able to enjoy comics that I knew had subpar art, but not anymore. I just don't have the time for that. 

I still can't read stuff I dislike with gorgeous art, though. Not as much as I'd like. I'm a big Dale Eaglesham fan, and I'd love to read the new Shazam just for his gorgeous art, but I can't do it, I dislike the character too much to get past my own prejudice against the franchise. 

[kav]

3 minutes ago, Mecha_Fantastic said:

I desperately want to disagree with you, but... you're right. I used to be able to enjoy comics that I knew had subpar art, but not anymore. I just don't have the time for that. 

I still can't read stuff I dislike with gorgeous art, though. Not as much as I'd like. I'm a big Dale Eaglesham fan, and I'd love to read the new Shazam just for his gorgeous art, but I can't do it, I dislike the character too much to get past my own prejudice against the franchise. 

I'd rather read Kneel Atoms writing Spectre than Watchmen with art by Rob Liefeld!!!

You could shoot your eye out reading book like that!!

Edited February 5, 2019 by kav

[Cat]

Just now, kav said:

I'd rather read Kneel Atoms writing Spectre than Watchmen with art by Rob Liefeld!!!

Good example, as there basically IS Watchmen with art by Liefeld. It's called Judgement Day, and was written by Alan Moore. It explores complex themes and tackles lofty high-concept drama, and is in some ways the closest thing Moore did to a Watchmen sequel (in a higher way, as the core concept is very different, obviously). But the art was awful, and the complicated scenes from the -script just weren't recognisable in the book itself, so it felt somewhat jagged in parts.

No one cares about Judgement Day. This is in spite of the fact it features other artists in large parts too, including some classic names many put on their all-time greats lists. Is the Liefeld stigma that strong? I think so, in this case. I don't think it's the characters themselves. After all, it didn't hurt Watchmen that the main cast were ersatzs of pre-existing characters. 

Thus your point. 

[kav]

1 minute ago, Mecha_Fantastic said:

Good example, as there basically IS Watchmen with art by Liefeld. It's called Judgement Day, and was written by Alan Moore. It explores complex themes and tackles lofty high-concept drama, and is in some ways the closest thing Moore did to a Watchmen sequel (in a higher way, as the core concept is very different, obviously). But the art was awful, and the complicated scenes from the --script just weren't recognisable in the book itself, so it felt somewhat jagged in parts.

No one cares about Judgement Day. This is in spite of the fact it features other artists in large parts too, including some classic names many put on their all-time greats lists. Is the Liefeld stigma that strong? I think so, in this case. I don't think it's the characters themselves. After all, it didn't hurt Watchmen that the main cast were ersatzs of pre-existing characters. 

Thus your point. 

Alan Moore writes very detailed scripts-everything has to be just so-he must have been incredibly frustrated working with Liefeld.  NO I SAID FEET!!! FEET!!!!  AND I NEVER MENTIONED POUCHES WTF!!!!! 

[HeyMoe]

7 hours ago, kav said:

Alan Moore writes very detailed scripts-everything has to be just so-he must have been incredibly frustrated working with Liefeld.  NO I SAID FEET!!! FEET!!!!  AND I NEVER MENTIONED POUCHES WTF!!!!! 

"Alan Moore writes very detailed scripts".
Would like an example of this.

Thanks.

[Skylath]

8 hours ago, kav said:

Alan Moore writes very detailed scripts-everything has to be just so-he must have been incredibly frustrated working with Liefeld.  NO I SAID FEET!!! FEET!!!!  AND I NEVER MENTIONED POUCHES WTF!!!!! 

[Prince Namor]

8 hours ago, Mecha_Fantastic said:

Good example, as there basically IS Watchmen with art by Liefeld. It's called Judgement Day, and was written by Alan Moore. It explores complex themes and tackles lofty high-concept drama, and is in some ways the closest thing Moore did to a Watchmen sequel (in a higher way, as the core concept is very different, obviously). But the art was awful, and the complicated scenes from the --script just weren't recognisable in the book itself, so it felt somewhat jagged in parts.

No one cares about Judgement Day. This is in spite of the fact it features other artists in large parts too, including some classic names many put on their all-time greats lists. Is the Liefeld stigma that strong? I think so, in this case. I don't think it's the characters themselves. After all, it didn't hurt Watchmen that the main cast were ersatzs of pre-existing characters. 

Thus your point. 

3

Yes! Its an interesting note about Judgment Day (no 'e' after the d, for those looking it up)... I actually love this series because of some of those artists - yes, Liefeld's art is HORRIBLE in it, but look at the Gil Kane work! (I believe this was his last professional work...) And I personally thought Stephen Platt was one of the better extreme artists of that period - I wish someone would've figured out to put him on a Conan book somewhere - and then you have Keith Giffen doing Harvey Kurtzman inspired war comic flashbacks! There are other lame 90's artists on the book, too... but the good in it is really cool to see.

Yeah, it's a mess... but it'd make a great coffee table tpb for discussion amongst comic geeks.

[Prince Namor]

1 hour ago, HeyMoe said:

"Alan Moore writes very detailed scripts".
Would like an example of this.

Thanks.

You asked for it!

Pretty sure the artist is Chris Sprouse.

[maraxusofkeld]

18 hours ago, Chuck Gower said:

Really when you look at who Image's line up of great creators are - it's almost ALL former Marvel creators who're now doing their best work. 

What superhero did he create other than Fantomex?

Morrisson then went to DC and through a better shared ownership program, created  an entire Universe of new characters....

Maybe Bendis also got himself a better deal. And talk about a creator of derivative tripe... Bendis is the home run hitter of it, co-creating the Marvel Ultimate Universe. A huge HIT I might add, leading to the idea Marvel might've gotten that readers WANT derivative concepts. 

In the Morrison New X-Men run, he created Xorn, Cassandra Nova, Quinten Quire, the Stephford Cuckoos, Beak, Dust, just to name a few. Marvel has used many of these characters after the fact. 

[F For Fake]

Interesting that the topic has twisted and turned enough to lead us to Judgment Day, of all things. And stranger still to find others (like me) who dug it (Liefeld art notwithstanding)!

I actually loved almost all of Moore's Image work, aside from his terrible Spawn books; his WildCATS run was terrific, as was Supreme, and all of the ancillary titles. In fact, (and I think we've talked about this before) his issue of Wildstorm Spotlight with Mr Majestic is one of the best things he ever wrote, IMO. He managed to give dimension to Rob Liefeld and Jim Lee's ripped off fan fiction characters, which is quite an accomplishment. Need to see if they've collected those stories...

[01TheDude]

Sorry-- I skipped to the end of this thread after skimming a little of it. I would not say I "hate" modern comics. I am indifferent to them. I collect what was available when I was a kid (BA/SA) mostly from a nostalgic viewpoint. Not that I think this is the only valid art or even worth defending as the "best" - it is simply what I know and covet as those same feelings about comics resurface all these years later.

I suppose if the moderns had any work worth checking out-- and I am certain there some works that are outstanding -- eventually I would look into them. The scant few books I have bought from the copper age (mostly to complete some story line runs of my bronze favorites or a particular story that has been adapted to TV like Legion) do show me that the art was starting to look cheaper, sometimes even rushed and the dialogue also seemed less attentive.

My window of collecting is pretty much 1960-1980. Not for hating the new style, format, paper, etc -- as those have changed radically -- but that they don't remind of the comics I knew as a child.

Edited February 5, 2019 by 01TheDude

[jools&jim]

On 2/3/2019 at 5:37 PM, mrc said:

Could someone please tell me where the great artwork in comic books is at  the moment. Anyone?

http://travischarestart.com/#/spacegirl-vol-1/

http://travischarestart.com/#/spacegirl-vol-2/