InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "...i've taken a new position."

queenursula (queenursula) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-05-08 08:36:00

Entry tags:

creator: mark waid, title: irredeemable

Irredeemable #2
Following up from the last post...

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	irenem 2009-05-08 10:27 am UTC (link)
	That is... distressing... but intriguing. I like the mildly-deconstructionist Superman-types--is this new? I haven't seen it before. Now I feel like I should post some scans from The Mighty. (Reply to this) (Thread)

starwolf_oakley
2009-05-08 10:39 am UTC (link)

It's a new character. It is deconstructionist, but Mark Waid says the concept is a superhero becoming a super-villain and why. (Presumably for better reasons than "Lazarus Pit crazy juice.")

Grant Morrison wrote an "afterwords" to the first issue. From that, iseems like the story will be "What if a superhero could hear all the crap people say about him on scans_daily?"

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	irenem 2009-05-08 10:42 am UTC (link)
	I have a feeling they would cry. In other news, I' starting a band called "Lazarus Pit Crazy Juice." We play electro-billy tweecore. (Reply to this) (Parent)

thokstar
2009-05-08 11:28 am UTC (link)

Grant Morrison wrote an "afterwords" to the first issue. From that, iseems like the story will be "What if a superhero could hear all the crap people say about him on scans_daily and had the maturity of a 12 year old?"

Fixed that for you. The real Superman would merely be disappointed with how fake Lois and friends acted, leave, and try to build a new life elsewhere. He wouldn't guilt trip them to death.

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	xdoop 2009-05-08 01:19 pm UTC (link)
	And the Silver Age Superman would teach them all a lesson by ruining their lives. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	thokstar 2009-05-08 01:24 pm UTC (link)
	But in the end the status quo would return since the "Superman" would be "revealed" to be a broken robot who "kidnapped" "Clark Kent". Or an alien double. Or insert gimmick here that doesn't require the Superman stand-in to be a complete idiot. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-05-08 01:38 pm UTC (link)
	Not necessarily; sometimes the explanation was just that he was trying to teach them a lesson. Usually it was a psychological mindgame with Lois whenever she tried discovering his identity or did something else he didn't approve of. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	box_in_the_box 2009-05-08 01:51 pm UTC (link)
	Very true. Even Gail Simone took aim at those, in one of her "You'll All Be Sorry!" columns. As a little boy, it confused me and creeped me out, A LOT, especially when Superman would grin and wink at the reader after he'd basically MIND-FUCKED Lois, as though we readers were supposed to be saying, "Yeah, you SHOW her, Supes! BACK TO THE KITCHEN, BITCH!" (Reply to this) (Parent)

	box_in_the_box 2009-05-08 01:47 pm UTC (link)
	One of the many reasons why I disliked the Silver Age Superman so much that my antipathy toward him caused me to quit ALL comics as a kid, and (aside from TMNT) not return to comics until COLLEGE. Even as an 8-year-old boy, all I could think was, "Wow, this guy is an ASSHOLE." (Reply to this) (Parent)

	aulayan 2009-05-08 04:38 pm UTC (link)
	Given the amount of adult men I meet who have the emotional maturity of a 12 year old... Superman-esque character having it? About a 70% chance. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	batcookies 2009-05-08 02:36 pm UTC (link)
	Their first instinct upon finding out was to go on the air and tell the world. Even keeping in mind they're reporters, that's... SuperSupportingCastDickery. So yeah, not a hell of a lot of sympathy. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	box_in_the_box 2009-05-08 03:14 pm UTC (link)
	I have yet to see a single remotely intelligent character in all of the scans that have been posted. It all reminds me of Paul O'Brien's scathingly funny critical summary of Todd Solondz's films, such as Welcome to the Dollhouse - ie. "Wouldn't it be shit if everything was shit? Why, yes, it would. Next question." (Reply to this) (Parent)

box_in_the_box
2009-05-08 03:27 pm UTC (link)

And actual reporters would want to milk it for all it's worth, by peppering him with all sorts of questions, all at once, and THEN releasing those quotes, bit by bit, to ensure maximum exposure ...

Oh, why the fuck am I even bothering? Waid obviously doesn't know a fucking thing about radio stations, much less journalism in general, so pointing out the flaws in this is like pointing out to a teenage virgin pr0n fic author that the average penis is not 16 inches long.

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psychop_rex
2009-05-09 04:13 am UTC (link)

It read to me more like they were reacting instinctively, not professionally. Remember, if the Plutonian is anything like the actual Superman, his secret ID would have been a topic of discussion for YEARS - he himself makes news every time he appears in public, so learning something this intimate about him is something like going into shock. They'd be going 'He's WHO? Oh holy CRAP, we have to get this out, nownownow before we learn it's a hoax or something, this is NEWS!' I think the bigger issue is that, as his coworkers, they didn't have more respect for his discretion - I think, as reporters, they were fairly in character.
Oh, and incidentally, I worked in the news department of a radio station once, and nothing about this particularly read false to me.

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box_in_the_box
2009-05-09 04:25 am UTC (link)

I was the head of two radio stations - one in Japan, another in Italy (both run by and for Americans) - and I'd expect even non-radio experts to know (as one poster already mentioned) the delay-to-air switch, which our stations insisted upon to safeguard us against things like trainee DJs saying stupid shit on the air. Also, speaking as someone who's actually worked as a journalist since 1997, even a radio station is going to want to run with more details with this, not in the least because, as you should recall from your own radio experience, you can receive serious fines from the FCC for even minor broadcasting infractions, which makes radio vastly less spontaneous than people tend to think. This was not a flash flood or a hurricane warning or any other type of urgent emergency that absolutely needed to be reported immediately. By rushing to report it right away, they HAD to have known that they would guarantee that he would rush off, leaving them with no evidence of their claims other than their own say-so (because IT'S A FUCKING RADIO STATION, so they don't even have CAMERAS), which would shoot their journalist credibility to shit if and when Dan Hartigan simply said, "No, they're lying," and pulled a Silver Age Superman by using his super-powers to trick everyone into thinking that he DOESN'T have super-powers. So, from top to bottom, every single aspect of this scene was 100-percent stupid.

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psychop_rex
2009-05-09 04:59 am UTC (link)

I understand all that - and yes, fine, you have much more experience than me; fair enough - but my point was that they were reacting on instinct, and therefore not being as professional as they might be. Anyway, no, this was not an emergency, but one may assume that, in a world that had such an immensely powerful being in it (and, while I can't confirm this, not having followed this comic except through this community, we haven't seen any particular evidence that there are any other superheroes on this version of Earth), his every action would be of immense interest to most people. It'd be like if the Beatles or Elvis suddenly walked into your radio station - you'd probably want to put some mention of this on the air, right? And neither the Beatles nor Elvis could do half the things that the Plutonian could do. So while I agree that they were not following journalistic procedure as strictly as they might be (or, one could argue, at all), they had a reason for overreacting. Also, at a certain point, there is the logic of the story to consider, which is not necessarily that of real-world logic - the story had to be moved along somehow. (Perhaps on this world the FCC never came into being, or is much weaker, or its restrictions are more like those of several decades earlier, as opposed to those of today - Superman-type stories always tend to be a little retro, anyway.)

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cmdr_zoom
2009-05-08 06:48 pm UTC (link)

Creepy.

It's like watching a sociopath, or an alien, trying to imitate human feelings. And maybe that's the point, if Waid is going for the whole "strange visitor from another planet" schtick.

"But you, I'll save you. I 'love' you, so I'll protect you. You can be my pet human."

IMO, it kind of undercuts any sense of tragedy when the "greatest hero" didn't actually have that far to fall, and was always close to going over the edge.

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	Oh how the mighty have fallen oddpuppets 2009-05-13 06:28 am UTC (link)
	"They would flay your partners and rape your children with hot knives"? Is this bad fan fiction or professional comics writing? The scene just died right there. Everything after was just black comedy. (Reply to this)

	regulus13 2009-07-03 06:26 am UTC (link)
	"They would flay your partners and rape your children with HOT KNIVES." I'm sorry, that just made me laugh like a maniac. I kinda want a poster of that... (Reply to this)