17 answers on a sunday afternoon

Questions last week, answers now. (Cheers, wikipedia! You life easier for everybody.)

1. I guess the infected in 28 Weeks Later could run around in daylight because the virus had mutated into a new form. Considering it was such an important aspect of the original, it would’ve been nice if somebody could have spent five seconds explaining this. It always bugs me when sequels don’t bother explaining away discrepancies when it’s so easy to do.

2. Groo still rocks my world. In my country, Sergio Aragones is a god and Mark Evanier is a very clever man indeed. And because funny stories about complete stupidity never get tired.

3. I have no excuse for liking Lobo comics, but I do find them genuinely funny.

4. Archie Goodwin had a passionate love for experimentation mixed with strong storytelling and encouraged creators to find their own voice. He was the perfect editor, guiding the overall direction while pushing creators to do their best. How could you not like the man? How could you not mourn his passing? Why isn’t this more common in comic editing?

5. If you think your variants are gonna be worth something one day, I’ve got this lovely bridge to sell you.

6. I have to stop taking stuff so literally.

7. No, willpower is not a fucking emotion. I have tried to get into the current era of Green Lantern and I can see why people like it, but it just does nothing for me. It’s too ponderous and top-heavy, overshadowing the few moments of space glee that do crop up. The Sinestro Corps War was a snore, cookie-cuter aliens with rings chopping each other’s extremities off for page after page after page and while Alan Moore might be overstating the case when he accuses DC of ripping off his concepts and running them into the ground, the Abin Sur tale he did with Kevin O’Neill was an absolute little gem of a short story which absolutely didn’t need any more fleshing out, and seeing that happen in the Secret Origin and Blackest Night storylines just feels old and dull.
Okay, picking on the vague concept that willpower is an emotion is a cheap shot, but Green Lantern is nothing but cheap shots, relying on ‘surprise’ guest stars for narrative drive just isn’t going to cut it.

8. It’s easy to sneer at Bob Harras now, when his time as head of Marvel is mainly remembered for some terrible comics full of over-rendering, gritted teeth and atrocious dialogue. But that’s all too easy with the hypocrisy of hindsight. We all laugh at Liefeld now, but we forget that for a couple of years there, he was exactly what the market wanted and he sold a fucking shitload of comics.
Harras was lucky to be chief at a time of unprecedented superstar artist power and even enabled the whole thing. Sales of Marvel books shot to levels last seen in the 1940s under Harras’ hand and while he took it all too far and it all came to an inevitable crash that left the market flat on its arse, he grew the company beyond Stan Lee’s wildest dreams. Applying the X-formula to the entire Marvel line resulted in some awful, awful comics that sold huge amounts, which was kidna his job.
Then he was gone in 2000 and now he’s the group editor for DC Comics collected editions. I don’t know what that means.

9. IT STILL SCARES THE SHIT OUT OF ME WHEN I THINK ABOUT THAT BIT AT THE END OF BLAIR WITCH. Also the bit where something is hitting the tent.

10. I can only assume Archie wanted a sugar-mummy and who can really blame him? Veronica is hot but mean but hot. Betty is hot and nice and hot. If Ronnie didn’t have the cash, she wouldn’t have got Archie Andrews, because he is the most selfish creature in the entire history of fiction.
Fuck that ginge.

11. I like the fact that the Trinity idea had replaced World’s Finest as the founding stone of DC superhero comics. A three-way relationship is far more interesting.

12. Superhero movies are usually rubbish because they get too hung up on Boring Origin and don’t just get straight to the interesting shit. Who cares where people come from? The more we know about Wolverine, the more boring he gets.
All that said, Miller’s Man Without Fear script would have made a killer movie.

13. The more I think about Grendel, the less I care about Hunter Rose. I came in on the saga somewhere around the end of the War Chikld storyline, so that was always my favourite period. I’d love to see more of Grendel Prime’s adventures. There is something so entertaining in his sheer relentlessness, ruthlessness and cold-boldedness. He’s a star.

14. I don’t know why it took me so long to start watching Samurai Jack and I feel foolish about this discrepancy. It’s got some astonishing storytelling confidence, mixing medative moments with the finest action choreography in cartoons. What’s not to love?

15. Guards at Arkham Asylum must have a cracker of a union.

16. It’s nice to hear that James Robinson has one of those agreements with DC over Jack Knight that meant his story really did end with the climax of his story. His Starman was a frustrating, self-important read a lot of the time, but when it was good, it was fucking spectacular. So when Jack drove off out of the superhero life, that was it, and now he just shows up to look sad and say nothing at tragic funerals.

17. I don’t know. What is it all about?