Bear With Me

I've spent three days thinking over this post, and I still haven't figured out where it's really supposed to go, but I can at least be sure where it starts.

'Evil Skeets. I've always loved Skeets and this behavior seems fantastically out of character for him, but DANG is it good comics. I guess that perspective is why I can't be a Cassie Cain fan...' - Scipio, Sept. 13, 2006.

I swear, this isn't another Cassie Cain post, but technically, Scipio could be a fan of Crazy Villain Cassie Cain (if he's saying he enjoys the stories starring that character), but I think I understand his general point: If it makes for a good story, you need to roll with the fact that characters you like aren't always going to be portrayed how you like.

It seems to me that a lot of fans have their own sort of general idea of how a specific character should act, and there's a certain amount of leeway beyond those precise descriptions that won't ruin a story for the reader, but that the leeway only goes so far. How far, may depends on the reader, and probably how much they like character.

For example, some people find Iron Man and Reed Richards' actions and attitudes in Civil War perfectly normal, as they have always perceived them as sort of being aloof jerks (I'm pretty sure someone said something to that effect in the massive comments thread to Jake's post on Civil War #4, or in some other CW#4 related post), whereas I think Chris is pretty dismayed by what's happened to a favorite hero of his.

In my case, I found myself drifting from Spider-Man during the '90s, when he started to get dark, angry, refer to himself in internal monologue as "The Spider", and frequently start screaming about how "he wouldn't let anyone else mess with his life", while beating a lame-o like Shriek with Hulk-like ferocity. Whether that constituted good comics, I leave to you; for me it wasn't. Spidey was too angry, where were the jokes, the sense that his life wasn't all bad? On the plus side, it got me mostly out before the Clone Saga kicked off, so maybe I'm lucky.

I think this post is meant to be a question of how we, as fans, should approach comics. There's a comment in this that made me think that I need to stop worrying about whether a character is portrayed the way I like, and just read the comics and try to appreciate them as they are. I don't know if that's what Dorian was going for, but it's what I started pondering after reading it. And it does tie into Tom's idea of "progressive" comics, where things move forward, and the characters change over time, in that the change might eventually push the character outside of that range that I think is their core, and should I really be getting annoyed when that happens.

I mean, I don't really want to be someone who's trying to force writers to always tell the same kinds of stories, with exactly the same character responses, but I think there needs to be some kind of logical progression, that can actually make sense (which I still don't think the Cassie Cain turn does), as to why a character might be acting in a manner so different from the majority of their past portrayals.

Of course, the dicey part is that what one fan regards as proper behavior is probably dependent on when they started reading comics with that character, or at least enjoying them. I've always kind of had a soft spot for the Wolverine that lead an Uncanny X-Men squad of Dazzler, Rogue, Psylocke, Havok, and Longshot. He was calmer, trying to keep himself under control, so that he could keep these people with no experience working together alive. That happened pretty early in my comic reading days. For someone who's used to the Wolverine who talks smack to Cyclops, and runs around doing whatever he pleases, while his teammates wonder if they can trust him, that might be an abhorrent period to them. Which I suppose, brings us back to the problem at hand. Writers can't please everyone, so should they just please themselves?

In the spirit of being a Marvin Milquetoast middle-roader, I'd say if they can do something that's been established previously as typical character traits, and they can give us some reason for why the character's acting that way - assuming it's a deviation from how they've acted in the immediate past -, then I'd say they can pick the arc of the character's life they like best, and go from there. If they want to build on it in a way that wasn't explored previously, then more power to them. If Character X lost faith in people once and went wandering, maybe the second time they change what they're fighting against, less big-time villains with grandiose plots, more small-time where it's easier to see that you're helping, even if it's one person at a time. The critical factor is, I think it needs to make some sort of sense why it's happening. Which is my problem with the current Cassandra Cain (who just seems too far gone into the killing fields) and Civil War Iron Man. The Iron Man that shows up in Amazing Spider-Man, who recognizes Peter as a valuable asset, and maybe as a friend, and wants to keep him on his side, so he offers gifts, and doesn't pull any punches when pointing out that May and MJ could go to jail for aiding a fugitive if Peter doesn't sign up, I can buy that. Stark's a businessman, he's simply laying out the pros and cons, while simultaneously greasing the skids to get Pete on his side, and playing at Pete's weakness (overwhelming sense of responsibility). I can read that Tony Stark, and while I may not like him manipulating Peter, I can understand what he's doing, and why. The one Millar writes? Not so much. Too brutal.

I don't know. I'm sitting here at the end of this, and I've got no clue where I'm going with it. At the end of the day, I don't know that I can change how I read comics. I don't think I can pick up say, a Teen Titans comic, and see Cassandra Cain trying to kill Robin for no reason that makes much sense to me (beyond "Didio demands it") and say "oh well, it's still a fun read" because I'm too busy being bummed out by what I regard as out of character behavior.