Angels in Spaceships! Law and Order: Spider-man style! Praise for Aquaman! In this, our twelfth podcast, the panelists get together to talk writers. We chat about Grant Morrison. We converse about Brian Michael Bendis. We gossip about what make good comic writing. So come and listen. Also, the mysteries of Scip’s laugh revealed!
The question about Scip’s laugh at the end?
I cried I laughed so hard. Seriously, someone had to come check on me. And he heard me from two floors away.
Another great show, guys.
Great show, fellas. I completely agreed with your take(s) on Bendis– I’ve been saying much the same for a while. His plotting is too slow, his use of word balloons has gotten way out of hand— and worst of all, all his characters sound exactly the same.
On that last point, it’s something I’ve noticed on tv shows like The West Wing and Gilmore Girls– where you have this very particular or quirky type of dialogue, everyone ends up speaking exactly the same. Drives me nuts.
Here’s what I think of as a typical Bendis scene: two characters, say for example Spider-Man and Luke Cage, in a room talking. Cage has just came in from outdoors, where it’s raining. The Bendis dialogue would go:
Spider-Man: In from the rain, hunhh?
Cage: Yep, in from the rain.
Spider-Man: So, it’s raining?
Cage: Yep, it’s raining.
Spider-Man: And you’re in from it?
Cage: I’m in from it.
Spider-Man: So, you’re out of the rain?
Cage: Looks that way.
Makes me want to break something.
Finally others who aren’t afraid to point out how much Bendis sucks! I constantly harp about this on my blog, so it’s good to see i’m not the only one. Consider me a new regular listener!
Great show. You asked if the guy who created Orca was the first writer shoved off a book by fan demand because he was just that bad… I’m not sure, but I know that’s definitely what happened with Chuck Austen and his run on X-Men. I don’t know if it was the bizarre emphasis on werewolves, the disintegrator communion wafers or the extra-bad Romeo & Juliet riff with body armor that did it, but people were vehement that he be replaced. So even if he’s not the first, he’s also not unique.
Another lightning round question: If you could give one character a wacky Doiby Dickles-esque Golden Age sidekick, who would it be? And what would the sidekick be like? More heroes need wacky sidekicks.
“More heroes need wacky sidekicks.”
AMEN!