The Four Color Media Monitor

Graeme McMillan, still working for Newsarama even if not as much as before, has authored a list of characters whom he thinks are fine for killing off. He first begins by saying:

If the last several months' worth of DC Comics are anything to go by, the death of a superhero's loved ones may be the new death of a superhero, in terms of somewhat odd and worrying trends in storytelling.

But what good is that when he goes on to offer suggestions for whom to terminate next? Besides, it's not just "somewhat". It's very. His suggestions include Carol Ferris, who's been written into a corner by reverting her to Star Sapphire, and even Jimmy Olsen. What's so wrong with them and not with the writing they got? Newsarama's doing a disservice to other people's creations by emphasizing this kind of propaganda.

The article also references how Dr. Arthur Light, whom Brad Meltzer turned into an embarrassment nearly a decade ago, was brought back briefly by Geoff Johns - and turned into a seeming "good guy" - before being wiped out again by Superman's heat vision in the Justice League. I found a topic on the Dixonverse with the panels showing that mind-boggling scene. If they think this is going to appease anybody offended by Identity Crisis, I'd say it won't work for 2 reasons: one, they've thrown away Ralph and Sue Dibny like stale bread, and two, writers like Johns don't offer encouragement with their record. I also learned something I wasn't fully aware of from the time Johns first got into comics introducing Courtney Whitmore as the new Star-Spangled Kid. One guy explains:

Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E.-era Geoff Johns never really did it for me either. The first time we ever meet Courtney she's bitching out her stepfather over his having married her mother and Courtney's (obviously immature, nasty, completely untrue) belief he has forced her to move to a new town.

Johns was a guy who didn't understand how to characterize, how to make his characters sympathetic, even from the get-go. You only get one chance to make a good first impression. And Courtney's first impression - and Geoff Johns' first impression - to me, sucked.

I'm sure he was shocked when the series proved unpopular and was cancelled within a few issues.

I do recall once reading a Beast Boy miniseries he'd co-written from around the same time, that, while it didn't have the unappealing personas Courtney was saddled with in her debut, was nothing to write home about either. It must have been the forced and contrived nostalgia that ultimately bored me (i.e-a daughter of Madame Rouge introduced without any solid evidence she could've born one before), ditto Johns and Ben Raab's method of introducing a new costume for Flamebird. At least having a co-writer take part kept Johns from going overboard. But it still wasn't worth the paper it was printed on.

(I only half agree about getting one chance. If Wolverine could get another, so can other fictional characters. Writers like Johns, however, decidedly not.)

Johns may have been flat as a pancake when he began writing, and with his latest in the Justice League, he continues to make a very poor impression. I can understand now why he did such a horrible job with remaking Captain Marvel.

Labels: dc comics, golden calf of death, Justice League of America, misogyny and racism, moonbat writers, women of dc