Comics Journal justifies Miller's defeatism

The Comics Journal recently reviewed Frank Miller's new biography, Push the Wall, and in their typical left-wing fashion, declare his 2011 graphic novel Holy Terror a mistake, which, of course, is what he's also been doing for several years now:

He doesn't shy away from addressing failure. He discusses Robocop 2 and Holy Terror, which was a potentially career-ending nadir to his journey. I agree with Miller's assertion that we learn more from our mistakes than our triumphs. "Never forget: failure is your friend." A more detailed discussion of those failures as well as Miller's aforementioned solo directorial debut on The Spirit would have been welcome. While Robocop 2 and The Spirit seem to be forgotten, backlash from Holy Terror continues to this day, though it has greatly lessened since Miller has publicly disavowed the book and chalks it up to a bad decision made during a low point of his life. "It was a fever." Miller has said in recent interviews promoting this book that he eventually realized that propaganda ranks just below pornography as an art form. Perhaps the accumulated backlash he's undergone explains why Miller is so reserved in this book. He's apparently abandoned the dangerous role of provocateur.

So they're saying he was once just that? I don't know if he was a "provocateur", but I do know there was a time when he seemingly once looked over serious issues, and if he decided since to no longer do that, it's very troubling as it's appalling and defeatist. The reviewer also says:

Even something as heartless and life-negating as American Capitalism doesn’t expect its workers to produce at the top of their abilities past the age of 60. He regrets that he "got really comfortable by the pools and on the barstools of Los Angeles" during his lost Hollywood weekend, but aside from the barstools, maybe that was an astoundingly good use of his time. Looking back now at the vantage point of mid-career I certainly wish I’d spent more of my days poolside. There’s nothing on Earth quite like a Miller Masterwork. Fortunately for him, Miller learned the lesson that he quotes from Bruce Lee: "The process is everything, the outcome is nothing." Another bromide, but a useful one nonetheless.

So they couldn't resist deriding capitalism simultaneously. Well, I guess we couldn't expect much else from such an otherwise dismaying periodical. What's Miller even done to prove he truly respects Will Eisner as a mentor? All I know is that Miller talks too much while helping little. Interesting they say he still receives backlash for writing Holy Terror, because that was the case in Britain when the Thought Bubble convention disinvited him, yet he never seemed to challenge it. The problem, of course, is that he doesn't have the courage to distance himself from his ultra-leftist colleagues, if they're more than willing to throw him under the bus over a GN whose premise they don't agree with. Did it ever occur to the reviewer that he's only furthering the "backlash" when he parrots the claim Holy Terror in itself was inherently wrong? No, what's wrong is if Miller didn't have the courage to explore what the Koran builds on, and I suppose that's why guys like him end up having "liberal guilt". But that's no excuse or substitute for actual failure, which was his apparent disinterest in researching anything vital.

If his Push the Wall biography emphasizes this kind of defeatism the reviewer speaks of, that's decidedly another reason why there's no point in wasting money buying it. Miller's regrettably the kind of leftist who doesn't have what it takes to stand his ground on what stories he writes up, and simultaneously, he doesn't have what it takes to write and illustrate a story building on more optimistic premises. Those are some of his biggest weaknesses, and above all, what was the point of producing a documentary about his career when most of what he's written other than Daredevil is hardly worth it anyway?