Apparently I’m answering questions again today in between other things.
Redo: do you have any thoughts on the Jazz Butcher Conspiracy? They were a Creation band for a while there.
From what little I’ve heard – and it is very little, I confess – they’re kind of great in the way in which they perfectly encapsulate the Creation aesthetic of the time. There’s a bit of shoegaziness, a bit of the Smiths in terms of Johnny Marr guitar sound and Morrissey-esque phrasing, and a pleasant-but-utterly-undynamic quality. I really should investigate deeper, to be honest.
(Weirdly, they remind me of the contemporaneous That Petrol Emotion, even though they don’t really sound alike? I tend to run all those bands together in my mind. JBC, TPE, Kinky Machine. I suspect I heard them all on the radio at the same time or something and that’s why.)
Any good recommendations for Tumblr blogs to follow?
More seriously, it depends what you’re looking for? That’s so broad, I have no idea how to answer it in a way that’s useful for you. Sorry…?
You do know that Marvel was the first to have black superheroes and black people in their comics, right? And that Nick Fury was white in the comics originally? As a black woman I’m all for more representation, but you have to acknowledge what has already been done and who is responsible for it before complaining. This should read: Why hasn’t a Black Panther movie been made? Let’s push for that.
It took me awhile to realize this is probably in response to the Andrew Wheeler quote about Marvel Studios’ lack of diversity that I tumbl’d ages ago. While I’m fine acknowledging what’s already been done and who’s responsible for it, I’m not sure why that means that Marvel Studios should be let off the hook for having an absolutely appalling record of diversity in their movies. Is the logic meant to be “Well done, the Black Panther means you get a pass for awhile?” That was done almost 50 years ago by a company that, to all intents and purposes, is entirely separate from Marvel Studios.
(Also, for what it’s worth, while I’ll give Marvel credit for having the first mainstream black superhero with the Black Panther, it was neither the first to have black superheroes — that’d be All Negro Comics’ Lion-Man, back in 1947 — nor “black people in their comics,” which is just crazily off-base. Hell, a year before Kirby and Lee created T’Challa, Dell had Lobo, the first U.S. comic with a black male solo lead.)
A Tale of Two Asses: Why Can’t Comics Learn?
Let’s walk through the scenario – A large comic publisher seems to have an opportunity or desire to expand their readership to include more women and thus increase revenue. They issue a cover that shows one of their female characters in a highly sexual pose with a distorted ass.
You may think I am discussing this week’s web explosion over Milo Manara’s variant of the first issue of Spider-Woman. But I could just as well be discussing the 0 issue of Catwoman from two years ago.
The Gentry is representative of the worst of the comics industry. Lord Broken, a demonic house loaded with eyes and composed of haphazardly stacked stories, can clearly stand for a distorted Marvel, “the House of Ideas.” Note that artist Ivan Reis has chosen for each story to be thinner and less stable than the last, perhaps a nod to Marvel’s continued mining and refining of the work of Stan and Jack, producing weaker results with each incarnation—broken visions. Intellectron, a bat-like figure with one eye, is clearly the worst of DC—a single vision dependent on references to Batman—dark and myopic.
Cheryl Lynn just destroys with this quick piece about The Multiversity #1.
Poptimism, etc.
It strikes me as unlikely and wonderful that in a period where my belief in humanity is particularly low thanks to what’s happening elsewhere in the world, a new Grant Morrison comic and a new season of Doctor Who – two things that offer a particularly optimistic brand of escapism – should be released.