This weeks adventures in climbing the cliffs of insanity include a GPS that clearly is part of Skynet, a new X-Men book from Marvel that completely eliminates the "Y" chromosome, and an interesting discussion on that nature of Superman that includes Mark Waid and J. Michael Stracyznski.
But first up, a new all-ages (seven and up) graphic novel, Earthward, from one of my favorite comic writers, Bryan Q. Miller, and artist Marcio Takara.
Miller's Batgirl series from DC is invariably one of the comics I recommend for anyone who wants to get into comics, and his digital-first Smallville Season 11 contains my favorite version of Lois Lane and Clark Kent appearing right now. Takara's credits include Boom! Studios The Incredibles and DC's Blue Beetle.
Miller started as an intern on the Smallville television series before he started writing comics. He said Earthward is a story that's been planned for a long time but not always as a comic. Miller said when he saw Takara's art, he knew it would be perfect and the comic was born. If the Kickstarter campaign is successful, the initial 110-page graphic novel will only be the first of many.
From Earthward's Kickstarter description:
"ANCIENT EARTH" is a FAIRY TALE.
No human alive... no human for at least the last 500 years, has seen the fabled "Earth" in person. It was taken from us, stolen by "THE HIDDEN" - a deadly race from beyond the galaxy who "moved the stars themselves" to hide our home.
Or so... that's how the story goes...
It's the story of a group of kids from ages twenty to six whose parents suddenly disappear from their space-based research facility while the kids are on a standard supply run. The parents, who have been secretly searching for the lost Earth, leave a note: Don't Come Looking For Us.
Kids. They never listen.
Miller answered questions this week about the characters and what he hopes to do with the story, and about why he's so cognizant of younger readers enjoying his work, especially after meeting them in person.
GeekMom: How did you develop each of the kids in the story? How do they play off on each other?
Bryan Q. Miller: The "family" of the Mercury Six really came from a desire to to try and hit as many age-ranges of character as possible.
When you think about it, anything we read or watch (or listen to) is a big Rorschach ink blot - any character has the chance to be a given viewer/reader/listener's audience surrogate. Goonies did this pretty well - Bran and the girls on the high end; Mikey and Data, et. al. on the lower end. And everyone had (in a good way) a very specific, distinct personality and function.
That's the goal for the Mercury Six.
Ben's the eldest (at 20), and bears the burden of responsibility the easiest and most often. Alyssa (17), his sister, is jealous of the responsibility Ben is always given, and is desperate to prove herself to everyone and anyone - but she's also not quite patient enough to learn how to do things right.
Smack (15) is the hustler. He's a little Han Solo who pretends to care about nothing except himself. Cody and Trin (12, twins) are the little know-it-alls who respect and love structure and authority - so they love Ben, and absolutely DESPISE Smack. And then there's little Daniella – everyone looks after little Daniella (6). Though, as the only survivor of a Pirate raid, she tends to be the most capable of taking care of herself.
GM: Is the mystery of the parent's disappearance solved in the graphic novel or will that plotline be continued in the (hopefully) next adventure?
Miller: We find out the why and the how during the course of the this book, but that's only the beginning of the adventure. Hopefully, we'll have the opportunity to create one more of these each year for the next several. If people are willing to read it, I certainly have a plan to tell it.
GM: What's your favorite sequence in the comic, something that you know when readers read it, it will be eye-popping?
Miller: There are certainly sequences I'm excited to see - a bit of adventuring in a Pirate Asteroid, a dash of danger inside of an automated Factory Ship - but I think what Marcio nails the best are our quieter moments with the kids. And anything between little Daniella and Teach (who are our little unabashedly Miyazaki pair) really pops.
GM: This is an all-ages project, like much of your work. Why stories about kids and young adults? Are there some more mature stories you'd like to do as well?
Miller: You know, it's weird. I didn't approach Batgirl as an all-ages thing at first. I was just telling stories in the most accessible way I could. But we still had a few dark bits and pieces on the periphery - specifically the Flood arc, with the techno zombies and whatnot.
At Wondercon in 2010 (I think), I was at my first ever signing, and a little girl, maybe 10, freckles and all, nervously walked over to the table. She asked if I was writing "the Batgirl right now". And then I had this horrible dolly-zoom moment where I realized that THIS little girl was going to be reading the Zombie story in a couple of months (in which there are some especially rough bits inside of Calculator's mindscape). So I kind of freaked and got on the phone with me editor to see how many panels we could soften or blur or change, because there's no way this was the ONLY 10 year old who was reading the book.
So, it's all when and good to write from the heart, and the gut, but I'm also a big believer in being cognizant of who you want reading your stuff, and how you want them reacting to it.
As far as the focus on youth?
It's an age that's rife with indecision and mistakes, which I think makes for interesting situations and character turns. Plus there's a sense of fun that inherently comes across with younger ages - and the Dread Fun is something sorely lacking in current crop of "funny" books.
There's a creator-owned, markedly more mature (though not dark) project that I'm working on with an artist right now that balances everything out a bit. And, just because all that's come out in the last couple of years is (somewhat) all-ages stuff, that doesn't mean that all I write is. A good rule of thumb for any freelancer in film, tv or comics, is that he/she writes roughly five times more than anything you get to read or see. That's not to say I don't strive to keep things as accessible as possible in everything I write. There just may be a few things that creep out over the next couple of years that aren't for the kiddies.
And, even when I say "kiddies", I mean the shared-age audience. Think about that first Star Wars-Empire-Jedi run. Jedi leaned more kid-friendly, but the trilogy is truly all-ages. Kids can watch it, alongside adults, and neither is ignored or pandered to.
It's a goldilocks zone for entertainment that I think is SORELY neglected, across all media.
GM: Television shows are visual and storyboarded. Are the skills needed to be a good television writer easily transferrable to comics? What was the easier part of transitioning to comic work? The hardest part?
Miller: TV teaches one how to write with respect for economy of storytelling and budget. You simply cannot afford to shoot everything you write. The production process on an episode is very akin to whittling down a full page of editorial commentary into one tweet with a hashtag. Refine, refine, refine.
In comics (I've found), the same thing exists, but with page space and panel count taking the place of dollar signs and shooting days. You only have so much proverbial rope to hang yourself with as you tell a story. Do you really NEED that sequence/joke/splash page for the story to still work? Blank page is VERY valuable real estate when writing a comic.
I'd say the hardest part of the whole thing is wrapping your script in a bow and sending it off to your artist to be drawn, but the same thing happens in TV with directors. You have to trust the other professionals involved in the process to carry out the vision and add a little bit of their own, for the good of the end product.
GM: What's your dream project in either television or comics (or prose books, for that matter?)
Miller: This is sticky, because you don't want to jinx anything. But I'm working on one in one of those at this very moment.
GM: Back to Stephanie Brown as Batgirl. When you took over Batgirl, did you know her history in fandom, particularly the girlwonder.org site that was launched after her death? Do you think we'll see her again at some point in a DC comic?
Miller: I knew her history, but was not intimately acquainted with her fervent, rabid, amazing, wonderful fans. Or Cassandra's! [Note: Miller refers to Cassandra Cain, who wore the mantle of Batgirl after Barbara Gordon and before Stephanie Brown. Like Steph, Cassandra is gone from the DC Universe.]
As to her [Steph's] future on the page, I honestly have no idea. I think the bigger question is, if she were to come back, would she be who her fans remember, or re-invented?
GM: In Smallville, Season 11, Lois has has her traditional place in the Superman mythos in this comic, though she's been put on the back burner elsewhere, making your comic one of the few places where Lois fans can find their favorite character. What do you enjoy most about writing her?
Miller: As presented in our show (and now, the comic), Lois is the one person who ALWAYS, without a doubt, would call Clark on his crap.
Sure, Chloe would, too, but she was always a little too close to the whole thing. Lois started in a place of bemused detachment with Clark, and their relationship and bond grew as time went. Over the course of the last few seasons of the show, we literally saw the two of them mature and grow in each other's eyes. They're truly partners by the point we've reached in the comic. Lois is also the grounding element for Clarkie. She's his human tether in his adult life, much as the Kents were in his childhood. She's his Jiminy Cricket. And he loves her for it. And, from her side of things, she sees Clark as man before super. She sees the truth in things. It's what makes her a great journalist, and a valuable person to have on your side.
GM: How much direction have you received from the show's creators about where to take the Smallville characters? Will we be seeing Smallville versions of other previously unseen DC heroes, as we did with Batman and Nightwing?
Miller: I am out here, swimming in the deep end, all by my lonesome.:)
My goal with the book is to not undo anything that was presented in the finale. The show ended the way the higher-ups intended, and I'm going to honor that. Fortunately, we ended on a flash forward, so there's still room for things to happen. Seven years is a long time!
As far as heroes, we'll definitely get chance to meet new heroes and catch up with familiar ones before the season has run its course. And that's about all I can say about that! By the time people read this, we'll probably be almost halfway through our "return of Impulse" story in the comic. And, running parallel to that, we've got a once every few weeks tale, "Effigy", that follows a team-up between John Jones and Batman.
Earthward's Kickstarter campaign went live this morning. A pledge as small as $15 will net you a copy of the print book, with the goodies increasing as the pledge increases, from limited edition prints by Takara to a pencil and ink sketch by Takara of any character from anything beginning at $100.
Superman: Clark Kent or the Man of Steel?
And continuing on the Superman discussion, a fascination interplay happened over on Comic Book Resources Robot 6 blog this week in the comments of a post entitled Quote of the Day: What Makes Superman Unique? Columnist Michael May talks about humanity's seeming mistrust of Superman in the upcoming Man of Steel movie and in Stracyznski's Superman: Earth One that "Superman shouldn’t have to distance himself emotionally from people for their protection and his own. That’s why he wears a colorful costume and has a secret identity. Those things let him revel in the unrestrained use of his powers while still connecting to people as Clark Kent. They let him reach past loneliness to serve his fellow humans without restraint."
This point of view is endorsed by Waid, who wrote Superman: Birthright, a terrific Superman origin tale. Later in the comments, Stracyznski arrives and elaborates on how he views Superman in his story, pointing out that his Superman has only been been a hero for "about a week and a half" and is working his way to become the hero we all know.
As for me? I'm looking forward to the new movie but, to me, Superman is, deep down, always that farmboy who believes in the essential goodness of people so much that others see the essential goodness in him as well.
X-Men Ladies for Marketing Win!
Onto Marvel news, where the X-Men often have problems seeing the essential goodness in people, given how often humanity seems to try and kill them. (In humanity's defense, mutants have tried to kill them as well.)
I haven't read an X-Men comic regularly in a long, long time, since I gave up collecting them in the 1990s. The stories often seemed retreads of similar tales that I enjoyed in the 1980s and the sea of characters were incredibly hard to track. But now I have a series I'm excited about reading for the first time:
Brian Wood and Olivier Coipel's X-Men starring...all women!
No men for the first time ever in an X-men title. Deputing in April, the cast includes Storm, Rogue, Kitty Pryde, Jubilee, Rachel Grey and Psylocke. That's three of my favorite X-Men and two that I really like. Come April, I'll be there at my comic shop for the first issue, especially with Wood–currently revitalizing Princess Leia–on board as the writer. Though some male fans weren't pleased with the lineup. Ah, well.
SKYNET IS REAL! Or Maybe It's Those Evil Alien Machines From Doctor Who!
Last month, the GPS in the rental car sent myself and my companion to the sections of Baltimore most often featured in Homicide: Life on the Street and The Wire instead of to the Sheraton at the Baltimore-Washington Airport. The explanation there was something about addresses being updated and that not being the database. I suppose that sounds logical.
But this week, when I took my eldest into downtown Hartford, a place nearly as bad to drive in as Boston, the GPS in my car decided to send me the wrong way down a one-way street. This was not a fun experience but, luckily, not even the car was injured. The explanation was that Hartford changes the one-way streets near the highway off-ramps between morning and night. Morning, into the city. Afternoon, out of the city. However, this explanation doesn't hold up for the second problem I had going into Hartford. The GPS said to take one exit, failed to mention which lane of the exit, and then instructed me to be in the other lane when it was too late.
That exit has been there for a long time.
I'm exiling the demon device from my car and going back to maps.
And one other parenting note. In my article about This is 40, I stated that sometimes my teenage eldest daughter was right during our many fights/arguments/discussions. She read the article and demanded to know which of the times she was right.
Pfft...like I'm going to tell her.
