It's not like superhero comics are the only thing out there, either. Dude wants realism, he can go read Clowes, or Tomine, or Pekar, or good big chunks of Crumb, Brown, Los Bros Hernandez...
He's got a point about the superhero genre's Revolving Door of Death, but lack of realism isn't the problem, it's that it removes any emotional stake from characters' deaths. Last night's episode of Arrow tried to get me to give a damn about a major character dying, but I just couldn't do it. First of all, the character in question showed up throughout the episode in flashbacks, so they're not even really gone; second, no matter how many characters say they're "really gone for good and never coming back", I don't believe it. *Maybe* if the character doesn't return by halfway through next season I'll buy that it's a permanent death, but by then it'll be a little too late for me to get upset about it.
Precisely. It's not the lack of realism in comic books, it's the lack of quality writing. It's just plain lazy to kill characters and then hand-wave them back to life. They can't produce any scenario that will properly impact the reader, so they go for, "Let's kill [character] so we can pretend to do something important!"
Someone call a gynecologist, because that guy needs a rekt-al exam.
ReplyDeleteOne of us may be confused. Probably me.
DeleteProctologist.
DeleteIt's not like superhero comics are the only thing out there, either. Dude wants realism, he can go read Clowes, or Tomine, or Pekar, or good big chunks of Crumb, Brown, Los Bros Hernandez...
ReplyDeleteHe's got a point about the superhero genre's Revolving Door of Death, but lack of realism isn't the problem, it's that it removes any emotional stake from characters' deaths. Last night's episode of Arrow tried to get me to give a damn about a major character dying, but I just couldn't do it. First of all, the character in question showed up throughout the episode in flashbacks, so they're not even really gone; second, no matter how many characters say they're "really gone for good and never coming back", I don't believe it. *Maybe* if the character doesn't return by halfway through next season I'll buy that it's a permanent death, but by then it'll be a little too late for me to get upset about it.
Precisely. It's not the lack of realism in comic books, it's the lack of quality writing. It's just plain lazy to kill characters and then hand-wave them back to life. They can't produce any scenario that will properly impact the reader, so they go for, "Let's kill [character] so we can pretend to do something important!"
DeleteDitto. 'Comic book' is not an excuse for crappy writing. (Much less smug grins)
DeleteThough to be honest, it's often difficult to know if that's true.
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