Daily Wire guest writer goes too easy on Tom King

Comics artist Matt Battaglia wrote on the Daily Wire about the Lanterns TV show the overrated leftist Tom King worked on, and while Battaglia may express disappointment with the TV program itself (and even that's very soft), he regrettably takes a lenient view of King as a writer himself, making it sound as though King literally has talent, which he doesn't:

HBO’s new television series “Lanterns” is revealing to a broader audience the limits of the superhero genre. The show tries to capture the spirit of the first season of “True Detective” (perfect television) while being shackled to Green Lantern’s expectations. Put those aesthetics on Batman or The Question, and it would work; slap them on a cosmic superhero whose power is fueled by imagination and a magic ring, and they begin to break under the weight of expectation.

The show is dour, but uplifted by a cast whose charisma tends to break what the script asks the viewer to believe and think. Kyle Chandler is obviously magnetic and shakes off any negative connotations some writers wanted to saddle the character with (old, racist, privileged, etc.; roll the clip). John Stewart is played well by Aaron Pierre and is given the reverse problem from Chandler: we are told he’s going to be great at the job, but his actions tend to say otherwise. It’s an odd framing for a story ostensibly about a superhero who comes with lots of baggage and expectations. Nathan Fillion’s Guy Gardner at least feels like he’s playing in the same sandbox his source material requires.

Umm, the politics they're forcing onto the material here wouldn't suit Batman and the Question either, and it's sad Battaglia wants to downplay the whole problem. No matter how good the performances seemingly are, the far-left leanings ruin everything.

This problem of missing expectations and weighing down heroes with such bleak, morally dubious problems and decisions is something of a hallmark of Tom King. Since his rise to prominence in the comics scene, he has been handed the reins to many a superhero property. King is a good writer; his stories are generally well received (except, of course, from his extremely vocal critics who think he single-handedly waged the war in Iraq); it’s just that his stories tend to be ill-suited to the expectations of the superhero genre.

Well isn't this an insult to the intellect. Who gives King's stories a good reception? Only the most loyalist of the critics and leftist audiences. This doesn't make a clear distinction between superhero fare and the indie comics King's written, and if his superhero stories are that bad, why should we think his independent comics are any better? Also, what makes Mr. Battaglia think we actually believe King fought singlehandedly in Iraq? Of course I don't think that's the case, and Battaglia sounds like he's trying to put down King's detractors despite how poor his writing is. Battaglia's downplay continues:

The issue with King’s writing and themes in the TV world is that his styling is finally running up against budget limitations. When paired with artists like Greg Smallwood on “Human Target,” Doc Shaner and Mitch Gerards on “Strange Adventures,” and Mitch Gerards again on “Mister Miracle” (these three being the closest analog tonally to “Lanterns”), the dour writing is buoyed by colorful, exciting visuals, even when the staging can become mundane (see the relatively low dynamics in “Mister Miracle” compared to the Jack Kirby high dynamism source material). Those visuals are entirely absent from “Lanterns”, the suits are drab, the power use is limited, this isn’t the big space opera stuff that is expected from the character.

King tends to mine the hero for guilt and regret, rather than heroics. His take on Adam Strange is a compromised man who ended up in over his head, making sacrifices that he couldn’t handle; His Mister Miracle is suffering from crippling depression and anxiety; Christopher Chance in “Human Target” is dealing with a terminal poisoning and trying to solve his own pending murder (spoilers: his murderer shares a good deal with Hal Jordan’s in “Lanterns”). His DC series “Heroes in Crisis” places all of the superheroes in therapy, and one of them is unable to handle all the pain that they are holding onto, thus creating a murder mystery.

He also leans on female leads who dominate their male counterparts. Mister Miracle and Big Barda at least veer into showing a supportive marriage, whereas Adam Strange’s marriage with Alanna is fraught with lies, similar to Chance’s relationship with Ice, which plays on the classic femme fatale trope.

Sorry, but from the art samples I've seen from King's books, it's uninspired, and telling us it's dour is actually putting it lightly. And if King's take on Human Target has anything similar to what occurs in Lanterns, that's just one more reason to stay far away from his comics. As for ladies dominating their male counterparts, let's be clear. It's not like Barda was ever written literally bossing around Scott Free. If memory serves, she was based partly on Jack Kirby's wife Rosalind, and a way for Kirby to express his love and respect for her.

None of these decisions are bad in and of themselves, and they’re all well done for the choices being made; they just tend to undermine the superhero genre to the point of crumbling. He dealt with many of these themes in his breakout book “Sheriff of Babylon,” which, I think, is a fantastic read dealing with the Iraq War. All the themes King keeps mining in superhero properties were present there, and they fit well. It’s a powerful book that remains relevant. The key difference is that “Sheriff of Babylon” deals with regular people; his other work deals with superhumans and the decision to reduce them to normal, flawed people, pushed to the breaking point and morally compromised to the point where they are indistinguishable from evil. Which may very well be his point – and it’s a point that Alan Moore makes in “Watchmen.” However, with “Watchmen,” Moore is using analogs of other heroes, while King is using the actual characters themselves and all their accumulated baggage. His stories would play so much better unchained from these legacy characters and all their weight.

Sugarcoating even creator-owned comics by folks with left-wing bents is no improvement. There's only so many creator-owned comics that unfortunately are built on divisive politics, and while it may be better if the themes King keeps relying upon were employed in indie fare instead, that still doesn't mean they're palatable even in independents. At least a vital point is made as to what's been common for years now - tinkering and tampering with established characters in ways that does not suit the personas they're usually known for, and certainly doesn't make them look admirable as they were created to be. But to say the heavy-handed trauma themes are "well done" still risks being too easy on the scriptwriters, and that's what's enabled them to all but get away with some of the worst things they've done all these years. We could do without that kind of lenience.

It's a shame the Daily Wire's taking an article from somebody who follows a predictable but still very sad playbook of "diplomacy". If Mr. Battaglia can't deliver a tour de force critique, he also obscures all the worst errors made over the past 20-30 years. That kind of soft approach can't continue.