The Four Color Media Monitor

Geoff Johns - and Peter Tomasi - continue to tinker and tamper with DC history. In Brightest Day #5-6, Mera lets Aquaman know that she was an assassin sent to our world to kill him. So not only does Mera's origin as a princess whose throne was usurped by the ruthless Leron -whom both Aquaman and Aqualad fought against years before - sound like it's been retconned out, yet more decent storytelling of the Silver Age has been corrupted, and Xebel turned into another variation on the Phantom Zone, for no good reason.

In related news, I'm also quite annoyed by how Johns and Tomasi have turned Arthur Curry into some kind of a greenie-lefty: he's so mad about an oil spill taking place near Atlantis that he decides to shut down the entire operation of the companies in charge, in an apparent nod to the Obama administration's opposition to offshore drilling (this would likely have been written a few months before the BP oil spill, though its debut now is certainly disturbing in how it mirrors what some leftists might think). And by war, greed and corruption, I assume Arthur is alluding to the Bush administration's battle in Iraq. Can we be clear here? Oil is not the problem, it's how you maintain its use and safety that is, and it's quite tiresome how they imply the Bush administration only raided Iraq to exploit the oil systems. If Aquaman made an argument that companies who act negligent with the safety of their oil transportation and development have no business working in the field, that would be acceptable, but turning him into a near anti-capitalist is going pretty low. Now that this story has been told, however, I won't be surprised if Marvel soon follows suit with Prince Namor, and has him sign a pact with Obama opposing offshore drilling in the pages of their comics! The misuse of even the amphibious superheroes is quite galling.

Labels: Aquaman, bad editors, dc comics, dreadful writers, politics, women of dc