Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Just Too Crazy

Serious blogger's block. I blame my subconscious, which clearly drained my creativity after the dream Monday morning that had simultaneous plots, both involving different members of the cast of Friends (except Ross, because he's a wuss and I hate him), and a funeral visited by characters that look like they came straight out of The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, which culminated in them being called mutants by some midgety purple child.

Yeah. As Tevion said, that wins dream of the year right there. So, sapped of will to blog, let's see what I can pull out here.

Dr. Strange is the closest Marvel got to DC's crazy Silver Age stuff isn't he? While the X-Men, Spider-Man, the Hulk and so on were all dealing with things more or less grounded in the real world and science, Stephen Strange was off in oddly tilted worlds, with weird spheres and wild, sentient manifestations of the universe, where magic - with it's difficult to decipher rules - is in charge. Just bizarre stuff. It doesn't seem as crazy, or played for laughs, as those Jimmy Olsen, Lois Lane, or Legion of Superheroes comics, but it was some seriously weird stuff all the same.

Which may be part of the Good Doctor's problem now. DC, which was more, I'll say fanciful, has gotten more, I'll be kind and say "gritty". Marvel, which at least professed to be more grounded in the real world, seems to be responding by going more real (while not doing a particularly great job of it, I'd say), all of which leaves a fellow whose abilities are somewhat vaguely defined, and doesn't seem bound by a lot of the same rules as the other costumes, a bit out of the loop.

Still, Strange is faring all right at the moment. Being left out of Civil War is probably a plus, and being written well by Brian K. Vaughn is a better fate than Marvel's other resident reality bender - one Wanda Maximoff - got from Mr. Bendis. So maybe there's still a small corner where stuff can just be weird and unpredictable.

2 comments:

Marc Burkhardt said...

Doctor Strange is cool enough to pop up on a Pink Floyd album cover (Saucerful of Secrets, from 68 or 69), but comics fans traditionally don't flock to Stephen's adventures.

Guess magic-based heroes just don't have any appeal in these grim and gritty times. *cough HARRY POTTER cough*

Oh, and as you probably know I still pine for the days when fanciful was an acceptable mood for a super-hero comic. Guess that's what reprints and Gødland are for!!

CalvinPitt said...

fortress: I think we could all use a little more fanciful. Especially Joe Quesada. It might make his heart grow three sizes that very day.