you caught me lingering

Reference: Here (spoilers for Batman and the Outsiders #1).

Dear Chuck Dixon,

I'm not going to comment on most of the issues, because you've constructed some kind of wacky constructed-reality in your head where apparently it's clever to make jokes about oppressed classes of people and try and paint queer folks as special breed of oversensitive precious-pants, and I'm quite comfortable here in actual reality where it obviously makes you an asshole. So I'm going to go with the other question.

What part of 'Batman is the world's greatest detective' do you not understand? Batman, who is obsessed with studying absolutely everyone, in the course of looking at who's going to be on the team, is magically cured of this obsession (and detective-level observation skills, apparently) when it is likely to allow him to tell the difference between a friendship and a relationship? Seriously, are you so fucking incompetent a writer that you have failed to understand such a key aspect of Batman's character? Or are you just projecting your own ignorant baggage onto Batman, which, well, still makes you an incompetent hack who doesn't understand Batman.

You seriously expect us to buy your shite?

no love,
me.

Reference: (from the linked post) "Was this scene calculated to get precisely the reaction it got here? You bet. Did DC run the page it ran in the previews to get a lather on the knee-jerk fans always ready to go to the hate bucket? OH yeah.
Was all of this discussed in advance interrupted with much giggling? Uh huh."

Dear DC,

Uh, did you forget that the point of preview pages wasn't to piss people off but, um, to make people want to buy your shite?
Or are you still, in your financial floundering as an industry, still trying to act as though you're too good for the money of people who expect a little more from you?
Still, feel free to plead with the demographics you're pissing off about how much you'd like us to give certain titles another chance.

me.

So, after spending way too much money on medication (asthma meds for winter + antibiotics and stuff for infected ingrown toenail = lots), I went and made myself feel better with comics and books, the latter purchased with the shiny $150 Borders voucher I got back in April.

Stuff wot I got:
Comics:
* Supernatural Origins #2
* Buffy Season Eight #4
(polrua was also lovely enough to point out the latest Minx title, Re-Gifters, which I couldn't afford this week, but have set aside for my next lot of comics purchasing.)
Books:
bell hooks - Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center
Virginia Woolf - A Room of One's Own / Three Guineas
Merl Storr (ed) - Bisexuality: A Critical Reader
Neil Gaiman - Fragile Things
Patrick Süskind - Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

A nice mix of theory & fiction, I thought. Though I could've done without the sales clerk at Borders looking at me like I have two heads for not actually caring about HP7. *eyeroll*

In other book musing, I'm feeling the urge to re-read José Saramago's The Gospel According to Jesus Christ, which is a beautiful book, written in a style that takes some getting used to, but is capitaving once you're used to it.

Tomorrow was going to be wrestling (TNA PPV at Liam's), but that's moved to next week, so tomorrow will be grocery shopping and curling up with books and knitting. Yup, now that degree is finished, I'm knitting again. Black scarf for me from the stash, and scarves for stephendann and debs7. Due to budget issues, I can't really afford to go yarn shopping for those for another couple of weeks, but Debs, I can go looking at yarn this week and let you know approx how much, and if you want to get some moneydollars to me I can do the buying and get started sooner. I don't mind either way, so it's up to you.

Sweet Lemur on a Unicycle.

In response to the comments thread for this guest colum at GRC, wherein Willow makes a good, minor, point about the fact that one can't subversively read even background comics characters as non-white (without redrawing the comic), the way that one can subversively read background or even foreground characters as queer.

This somehow means that Willow is hatin' on queer folks, but, more importantly, it means that folks have SOMETHING ELSE TO TALK ABOUT IN THE COMMENTS BESIDES RACE. Same old privilege-palooza old.

Bye, G-W forums. I'll be back when folks take their damn fingers out of their ears.

Edit after going back long enough to link the thread to someone: Okay, seriously? I'm fucking done. I'd been teetering for a while, because the forums have been a little male-privilege-tastic of late, but this shit is just enough. It's just not a place I feel comfortable.

He is torturing photographs of Greg Land. That said, I think it's less evil, and more 'for great justice'.

Though it does rather hurt my brain.

So, this evidence of the sheer WTFness of sexist portrayals of women in superhero comics that I posted the other day? Somone did a genderswap. It's utterly glorious. Seriously, I love it.

---

Also, a quote from my textbook for Colonialism and Independence in South-East Asia. With regards to globalisation and popular culture in Japan reflecting Japanese attitudes:
Another example is manga, which has taken the Western comic book and given it a particularly Japanese style, one that often reflects the sexist and patriarchal character of Japanese culture.

Okay, my first objection may not be valid, because I'm not exactly an expert on Japanese history, but was manga actually a case of the Japanese adapting a Western idea of comic books? That's actually a serious question, because I don't know. If it was, fair cop, if not, I think there's a good reason to object to that part of the sentence.
Secondly, um, what the fuck is with a sentence structure that implies that Japanese culture has a sexist and patriarchal character that Western culture lacks? I mean, if you really try, one could consider the idea that that he's talking about a particularly Japanese kind of sexist and patriarchal culture, but I think that's reaching a bit. So, seriously, WTF.
Just to be clear, I'm not saying manga doesn't reflect reflect sexism or partriarchal ideas. I don't read much of it, so I can't really comment with much authority on such a subject. I'm just cranky that a text attempting to foster a considered approach to South-East Asia is so lazy as to slip in something like 'Japan took Western comic books and made them sexist', as though Western comic books aren't sexist, and insinuating that Japan is sexist and patriarchal and Western culture isn't.

My actual response at the time of reading was to laugh until my head hit the desk.

Clinton is interviewed on Faux News and pwns the guy. Transcript here. Chris Wallace (aforementioned guy who got pwned), later reports in a telephone interview that his question was "Did you do enough (to combat terrorism and get Bin Laden)?" Someone apparently fails to recognise the difference between "Did you" and "Why didn't you", as well as failing to realise that, um, we have teh intarwebs. Lying about what you said doesn't actually work as well as you think. Of course, it works better when reporters don't point out your lie. *pokes the reporter with a stick*

Oh, and anyone who still doubts that female comic characters are sexualised in a way male comic characters aren't? Uh, honestly? This is why I will never take you seriously. Also, brown_betty wins the internets for this; remixing Michael Turner's instructions on 'Sex Appeal' (because only women need to be drawn with sex appeal, of course. Come on! DC's not gay, and girls don't read comics!) with Jon Berger's Ways of Seeing

For scribewraith in particular; the tutorial I mentioned on customising Expressive (the new LJ layout style) is here, and there is in fact a community for the style: s2expressive

Last night, after forgetting about it completely until missy reminded me in the morning; I attempted to turn around a day of feeling rather crap and toddled off to the Queensland Orchestra's The Sounds of Sci-Fi. Many many nerds. *grin* Also, many children dressed as Jedi. I was seated next to children, which I was apprehensive about at first, but they were very well behaved and not a problem once I managed to tune out the fidgetting (I know kids fidget; that's not a problem. I just needed a few moments to tune it out.) It was much more theatrical and 'fun' than I'd expected, but there were only a few moments of true lame-ness, and the rest was light and fun.
It was great to see a fair few members of the orchestra get into the spirit of things and get dressed up. We had a few Enterprise crew, a Tom Baker, and The Flash (though there was some contention from the trekkies in front of me as to whether The Flash counts as sci-fi. But that's trekkies for you. :P) All in all, it was a fun night (although the premise of the light 'plot' of the evening of claiming that we don't portray aliens in an overall rather crap fashion is ... well, I've ranted about that before).

Afterwards, I'd considered hanging about in town for a while, but decided I was tired and still feeling a bit generally bleh, so off home to curl up in bed with the most recent Kate Forsyth, whcih I picked up the other day.

This morning I slept until I woke up (as opposed to setting an alarm), and potted about for awhile before finally putting the laundry on. Waiting for the machine to do its thing, I realised just how messy I'd let the house get of late, so off I went on a cleaning spree. The garbage bin outside is filled about 1/3 more than when I started, and I can flit freely between the door and my bed without having to step over things. Hooray!
I'm still working on balancing the fact that I'm a lazy sod with the fact that messiness really really bugs me. In the meantime, the buzz from a freshly-cleaned house is awesome.

Shortly, a trip to the shops, because I need groceries and have fruit and veg cravings. I have a nice cut of lamb thawing for dinner, which I'm thinking of marinating and grill-roasting in the toaster oven. I had some great luck doing that with the pork cut I had the other night. We shall see.

In news of teh intarwebs, Grant Morrison talks to Newsarama about Batman, and comes up with awesome smackdown on Frank Miller. I've no idea what Morrison's like in terms of his actual comic work (comic-geeks on the f-list? I'm curious), but anyone who can lay this kind of smackdown on Miller makes me tingly-happy. (via Bookslut)

GM: ...I'd rather Batman embodied the best that secular humanism has to offer - a sour-faced, sexually-repressed, humorless, uptight, angry, and all-round grim 'n' gritty Batman would be more likely to join the Taliban surely?
NRAMA: Er…
GM: And while we're on that subject...Batman vs. Al Qaeda! ... I'd be so much more impressed if Frank Miller gave up all this graphic novel nonsense, joined the Army and, with a howl of undying hate, rushed headlong onto the front lines with the young soldiers who are actually risking life and limb 'vs' Al Qaeda.

Another thing on the Morrison interview, as I said the boy last night; it's interesting to note that in Morrison's little condensed history of Batman, Robin is not worth mentioning beyond Dick and Jason. No mention of Tim or Steph. Which is perhaps interesting, even acknowledging that we're talking about a paragraph of Bat-history.

Also, a rather fascinating look at the 'traditional marriage' argument, and why it's so hard to swallow. (via Alas, A Blog)

It's not a defensive stance, no matter how it's framed. It's not "please leave my cultural values alone," because nobody is asking them to dissolve their marriages, reorder their families, change their church ceremonies ... They're just asking that other versions be allowed to exist, too, and treated equally. And these folks argue that that mere fact of coexistence will obliterate them...

And now, a snack, then off to grocery-shopping.

1. Have officially finished work now.

2. 6 Bloody Marys (including 2 doubles) in the space of 3 hours makes for a jen who is a wee bit intoxicated.

3. Food makes one be more sober.

4. The DC Comics messageboards are full of whack.

5. My boyfriend is awesome.

6. I want an attack-womb, because gee whiz, I'm not doing much with mine, and having an attack-womb sounds like a much better idea. It could fight crime, even. With my powermove; Cervix-attack.

7. Okay, so I might still be a little pished.

8. I meant to wash my hair this evening, so I could take my bouncy-wavy-hair into the hairdresser tomorrow and go "Okay, this is what my hair looks like dried naturally. Instead of blow-drying my hair straight, how about we find me a cut that will look halfway decent without maintenance I have no time for?" Ah well. I shall have to attempt to convey my sentiment with pesky words and flamboyant gesturing to indicate what my hair normally looks like.

9. Yay! Uni next week!

10. I'm in Sydney next weekend. Neafz0r, I'm assuming your mobile number's still the same (if not, lemme know), I shall msg you when I land, and probably head over to your work, where I shall probably arrive just as you're finishing up. Is that a useful plan? If you've a better idea, lemme know that too. :) Also, le yay! *flails*

11. Sleep now.

A lot of people who know me know that I have had a considerable level of discomfort with the word 'feminist'. What I haven't mentioned recently is that said discomfort has waned considerably in the last year or so. There's still some there, and the reasons for that remaining discomfort are probably another long and as-yet unclarified essay. The reasons I'm considerably more comfortable with applying the term feminist to myself are clearer and perhaps more interesting. ( On Feminism, and why Jen stopped cringing at the F-word. )

So what does all of that have to do with sore spots and my increasing discomfort with popular culture (more specifically, comics and, somewhat tangetally, sci-fi)?

Let's start with comics. Which can basically be summed up as "Why Someone Who Pretty Much Doesn't Read Superhero Comics Is Spending So Much Time at Girl-Wonder.org" ( On Comics, and making it clear than Jen's really not fond of Frank Miller. )... oh, just go to Girl-Wonder.org, already. It's there. And, incidentally, here is another fairly good summation.

But what does that have to do with my sore spots, recently? Well, since G-W.org was officially launched, we've been copping a fair bit of criticism that tends to go along the lines of "Superhero comics are for boys", "Well if you don't like it you don't have to read them", or "Write you're own damn comics if you're so unhappy", among other things, most of which tend to mean "STFU I don't want to think about what you're saying".

But it's not just about comics. Nor is it just about women. It's about all of the storytelling mediums of our culture. Popular culture is a significant chunk of our version and variation of the long storytelling traditions of various cultures. Stories are important to us; they are not the be all and end all, but to cast them off as unimportant is, I believe, to misunderstand a significant part of what it is to be human. They reflect social attitudes and norms; at times they challenge them and critique them. Whilst they don't shape them in the sense that we absorb them like sponges, to imply they have no influence whatsoever is just as ridiculous. At a time when pop culture is so prevalent; so easily accessed, it's ridiculous to not realise the potential of that vicious reinforcement cycle, when there aren't people to not just critique the messages but to change them, and demand that they change.

It's about the fact that varied Others, be they non-men, non-whites, non-heterosexuals, non-humans, or whatever, often actually reinforce the Default (Think token female/black person/gay guy/etc syndrome for the most blatant case this). We are almost always expected to place ourselves in the position of the Default as experiencing the Other. There are expections, of course; but that cliche about exceptions came from somewhere.

And I'm now at the point where I'm really talking about sci-fi more than I'm talking about anything else, so let's cut to the chase. ( On Sci-fi, where Jen thinks aliens are really rather cool and interesting. )

I dont hate comics, or sci-fi. Anyone who thinks that can't have spoken to me for very long, ever. I'm hungry for something I believe the genres are capable of. In the former because it's just so necessary from a broader societal perspective, and the latter because it would just be really really awesome, and I find it absurd that it's just so nonexistent. I have high expectations of them because I believe in them. The next time you go to tell someone they should just look somewhere else if they want something more from a genre? Think about what you are about to say, and really? Just don't. Because if the someone you're talking to is me, I can no longer promise that I will hold my tongue.

So, I watched the first half-ish of Comic Book: The Movie the other night, and one of my first questions was when this was made. When told 2003, I couldn't help but wonder whether Frank Miller watched it and just kind of missed the point entirely. Unless I've got my timing wrong on when Miller decided in his infinite fucking wisdom to turn Batman into Osama-puncher, and he did it before this. I could well do, but I was fairly sure this bright spark decision was more recent than that. And I'm not saying that Miller isn't capable of coming up with stupid, (w)hack shite all on his own, but still.

In other news? For the wrestling fans - This is awesomely awesome. Hat tip to the boy.

For my comic-fandom-inclined friends (Yes sharpest_rose, I'm looking at you *grin*)

Fic prompts* from McSweeny's:

Admirable Activities for Suburban Residents That Sound Wholly Unremarkable When Performed by Superheroes.

By Tim Vanderburg

- - - -

1. Green Lantern eliminating his private mortgage insurance.

2. Batman observing water restrictions by not operating his sprinklers after 10 a.m.

3. Captain America updating his virus software.

4. The Submariner reading the minutes at his neighborhood homeowners-association meeting.

5. The Flash making punch for Vacation Bible School.

6. Iron Man planting seasonal color in hopes of winning Garden of the Month.

7. The Hulk receiving a ribbon for five years of continuous service as a crossing guard.

*Not actually fic prompts, but I think they'd prompt rather amusing fic.

Go! Write Things!

DC Comics has ordered a New York gallery to remove pictures which show Batman and Robin kissing and embracing.

To quote Michael Schaub from Bookslut:
"Because no one had ever, ever made that connection before."

*snicker*

For the Futurama fans on my flist: Someone has done a Flickr photostream of all the screencaps of the Futurama titlescreen taglines from Seasons 1-4. Found here

In comic news; Slave Labor Graphics (of Johnny the Homicidal Maniac and Lenore fame) will be producing four new Disney-based comic series: Haunted Mansion, Wonderland, Tron, and Gargoyles. Details here

Fred Clark over at slacktivist has a well-put comment (despite somewhat of a misinterpretative reference to Godwin's Law) on the tendency for everyone to whinge and moan about Hitler comparisons. To quote Israeli historian Avi Schlaim; "The issue isn't whether or not we are the same as the Nazis, the issue is that we aren't different enough." Fred's full thoughts here.

I know there are people on the flist who'll love this stuff: A gallery of vintage European circus posters, complete with all the vintage things one associates with the circus. Very cool, and here (NB, not in English, but it's fairly easy to make your way around intuitively).

From Dark Horse Comics comes a free webcomic adaptation of HG Wells' The War of The Worlds. (NB: afaik, this product does not contain Tom Cruise. Thankfully.) [ETA: Oops. Forgot the link for this one. here.]

On Sin City:
If the concept itself of Frank Miller co-directing this with Rodriguez wasn't frelling cool enough already?
Interview with Frank Miller about the film I'm sorry, but when you've got actor's like Benicio del Toro and Bruce Willis requesting prosthetics so they can look like the characters Frank drew? That's just awesome. Part 2 of that interview here
Also, Mediamelt over at Film Rotation has put together comic-to-screen comparisons. And, well, DUDE.

In other Comic Film news, Chud.com has a three part interview with Paul Greengrass, the man who has taken on the onerous task of bringing Alan Moore's The Watchmen to life. Pt 1; Pt 2; Pt 3

Also: Joss Whedon has been officially bestowed the task of writing and directing the adaptation of Wonder Woman. The Beat's post is here, and there's a link to a Variety article here. The Variety article requires registration-y subscription things, so I haven't read it, but the links there for anyone who may choose to.

ETA: Also, May sees the release of the illustrated film script for MirrorMask, which includes bits and pieces from Neil, and all of Dave McKean's 1700+ storyboards. Details here

Before I forget to post about this for the nth time:

Comic adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, written by Mike Carey (of Lucifer and Hellblazer fame), with artwork by Glen Fabry (Sandman: Endless Nights and Preacher). Neil consulting. It looks to be rather interesting.

Links here (from a Mike Carey/Lucifer fansite - scroll to the bottm section), here (from Neil's blog - again, scroll to the bottom of the post), and here (again from Neil's blog).

Actually, in the second link in that trio, Neil actually mentions the Neverwhere comic in relation to his general opinion of adaptations. It's really quite a sensible take on it, to me, but I think we all know how forgiving I tend to be of adaptation inaccuracies.