A casual reader’s frustrations with modern comic book writing.
I have four main issues with writers today. They:
1) Use huge events to make sweeping universal changes. 2) Make so many events that events are no longer meaningful and just clutter up what’s canon and what is just one-shot material. 3) Greatly change a very old character. 4) Pass on the mantle of classic characters to newer versions.
1) Huge universal events seem like a necessary evil. For instance, DC has messed with the multiverse so much the idea of something being ‘canon’ almost seems impossible. It is really frustrating to try to understand the history of a character and sort out all the major changes caused by these events. I know these events are good at retconning lots of small mistakes but writers tend to also greatly change classic, old characters.
2) The word event means almost nothing. Everything nowadays is some sort of mini event. Blackest Night was an event. Civil War was an event. Not every four issue series is an event. Writers should not try to place so much gravity on everything that gets published. (if everyone is super, no one is.)
3) Writers seem to be too lazy to create new characters and instead just tear apart older ones. My biggest problem with this is Thor. Making Thor unworthy of Mjolnir is a great story, and has lots of potential. But using that as an excuse for giving Mjolnir to Jane Foster and making her the new Thor is just absurd. If you want to give her powers, give her powers with an origin, don’t just say “Thor is unworthy so Jane is the new Thor I guess.” Make her unique.
4) Spiderman is Peter Parker. Period. He is not Miles Morales. I understand the significance of making a huge title character like Spidey a person of color, a woman, a non-heterosexual, or anything else that deviates from the standard middle class white male trope. But Spiderman is a very old established character! Passing on the mantle to anyone else, regardless of the new person’s background, seems wrong and discredits everything previous writers have done. If you want characters with different traits, make new personas for them. Don’t have them live under the shadow of decades of someone else’s life under that mask.
I don’t buy a lot of comics. I can’t afford to and I don’t even have the space to store them. And maybe I just don’t understand why writers are doing all these things today (if I’m totally wrong please explain! I would love to learn more!), but to a very casual reader like myself, all of these things just appear to be lazy writing and publishers valuing quantity and sales over quality and respect for established characters that will outlive all of use.
Rant over. Sorry for all this negativity, it’s just been on my mind lately but none of my friends are comic book readers so I haven’t been able to talk about this with anyone IRL. :(
