My Iron Man
After working on Astroboy and Wonder Woman, for many years I was “on the list” of writers consulted for every comic-book movie that came down the pike.
When the Iron Man people asked me for a take on their then-aborning project, I took a jaunt to my local comic-book store to look for source material. This was quite a few years ago now, and, as hard as it is to believe, there was almost no Iron Man material in the stores. The only readily-available collection was The Power of Iron Man, an important, ground-breaking story arc that dealt mainly with Tony Stark’s alcoholism.
So I said “All right, whatever you say. Alcoholic superhero. Let’s go.” This is the pitch I came up with:
Tony Stark is an arms manufacturer. He’s a heel and a creep, but somewhere deep inside he’s still human. He brings death and destruction to the world, and it’s beginning to corrode his soul. He turns to alcohol to dull the pain. Caught in the jaws of the capitalist beast, he can only press forward and continue producing death. He has responsibilities to his corporation to keep moving forward, but he’s cracking under the strain and alcohol, he thinks, will hold him together.
His alcoholism progresses to the point where he starts having blackouts. What he doesn’t know is that, when he is blacked out, he becomes Iron Man. Iron Man is, essentially, Tony Stark’s conscience, fighting against the very machine that Tony operates in his non-blacked-out hours. Iron Man works as hard to dismantle Tony’s company as Tony does pressing its agenda. Tony even gets the idea to create War Machine, a “waking Tony” creation designed to fight Iron Man, never realizing that he is, himself, in fact, Iron Man.
So I thought “Well, an alcoholic superhero, I don’t think we can sell that to an audience, but a superhero who is his own supervillain, we haven’t seen that yet.” And I pitched my take to the producer who had sent me The Power of Iron Man and his instant reaction was “Are you crazy? We can’t make a movie about an alcoholic superhero!” And that was the end of that.
(The idea of an alcoholic superhero, of course, didn’t seem so outrageous to the producers of Hancock.)
So they went and made an Iron Man movie without me, and it turned out very well. Tony drinks a lot in the movie, but they never point to it as a “problem,” which I think is the correct approach. The plot coincides with my pitch insofar as it hinges on Tony’s growing realization that he is not making the world a better place by manufacturing ever-more sophisticated weaponry. He doesn’t become schizophrenic, rather, he fights Obidiah Stane, his corporate officer and gets bounced out of his own company. It’s a lot of the same ideas, but more elegantly and organically presented. As far as superhero movies go, it’s pretty sophisticated stuff and a cracking good time. It is both a geek-fest and a good “entry point” movie: it’s filled with Marvel in-jokes but also manages to stake out its own identity. This is all very hard for a hugely-expensive movie to do, which makes Iron Man all the more impressive.
The crowd for the screening I attended was more pumped for this movie than I’ve heard a crowd be pumped for a movie in a long time. They hooted and hollered, shouted and sang as the lights went down. The only thing that got them more excited than Iron Man was the trailer for The Dark Knight which received cheers and a round of applause. Iron Man completely delivered to this crowd, a movie about a gearhead, made by gearheads, for an audience of gearheads. I mean that as a compliment.
I would say to be sure to stay until after the ending credits, but if you’re the sort of Marvel Geek who is rushing out to see the movie today you probably already know that.
The Spider-Man sketch
Spider-Man by Sam, age 3. This was his first-ever representational drawing.
In honor of ![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
urbaniak‘s appearance today at the NYCC (with jacksonpublick , Doc Hammer and my good friend Mr. Steven Rattazzi) I here present the famous “Spider-Man” sketch, which James and I performed a couple of years ago at a similar event at MoCCA.
UPDATE: as one can see, I have finally figured out the “cut” function. Thank you ghostgecko.
The Spider-Man Sketch
Avengers Defeat Galactus!
This was the scene early yesterday morning in Sam’s bedroom, where one of the most fearsome titans in the universe was soundly defeated by the Avengers, aided by members of the X-Men and the Fantastic Four. Ben Grimm stood proudly upon the stomach of the fallen giant and surveyed the scene with a calm wisdom while Iceman, Spider-Man, Logan and Bishop covered the lower half of this seemingly unbeatable foe.
The Hulk stomped out the eyes of the intergalatic plunderer and gave a triumphant roar of “Hulk smash!” while Professor Reed Richards plunged his elastic arm deep within Galactus’s ear to scramble his brains.
Among the fallen was a collection of villains formidable in their own rights, but puny mortals compared to the immense, god-like Galactus. Left to right: Sabretooth, Magneto, Dr. Doom (his gun still clutched in his cold, dead hand), Dr. Octopus and Juggernaut.
Iron Man was unable to participate in the attack on the supervillains, as he was out of scale. He had to be content with providing moral support from the headboard.
Justice League (part I)
The Justice Lords would like a word with you.
My son has turned me into a geek.
I never read comic books as a kid. I think the first comic book I ever read was Watchmen in 1985. I read Dark Knight Returns after Tim Burton’s Batman movie came out. I didn’t start reading comics until Joel Silver asked me to work on the Wonder Woman movie in 1999. Even then, it was all “just research.” It was more fun than reading Dickens (mostly), but I never considered it a pursuit in and of itself.
My son has changed all of that.
He loves superheroes. He can’t get enough of them. When he wakes up, his first thought is about someone he needs to look up on Wikipedia so that he can draw a picture of them. The Marvel splash-panel I posted last week is only one of dozens of superhero drawings that lie scattered in heaps around the house. His walls, floor and shelves are plastered and stacked high with drawings and figurines. (Strangely, every time I’ve tried to interest him in an actual poster showing the same superheroes, he’s never interested; they never “look right” to him.)
Part of it, I know, is related to his interest in dinosaurs, which recently reached its saturation point. That is, like the dinosaur world, the superhero world comprises another world of tiny pieces of information for his rapidly-expanding mind to categorize. In dinosaurs, you have plant-eaters and predators, in superheroes, you have good guys and bad guys. Among plant-eaters you have long-necks and short-necks, among predators you have therapods and oviraptors; among good guys you have metahumans and “regular guys in costumes,” among bad guys you have aliens and robots. And all combinations of the above. (His interest in dinosaurs supplanted his interest in trains, which occupied the first half of his life.)
So a conversation between us will go something like this:
S. Dad, what do you know about Magneto?
D. Magneto can control metal with his mind.
S. Is he a good guy or a bad guy?
D. Magneto is a bad guy.
S. And does he have superpowers or is he a regular guy in a costume?
D. He has superpowers. He can control metal with his mind.
S. Yeah, but he’s not super-strong, and he doesn’t have, like, heat vision or anything.
D. Yeah, but he can control metal with his mind. That’s his super-power.
S. But how did he get like that?
D. He was born like that. He’s a mutant. That’s the difference between X-Men and The Avengers. The X-Men were all born with their powers, the Avengers are all regular people who had accidents.
S. But what about Wolverine?
D. Wolverine is an X-Man.
S. But he’s in the Avengers! And so is Storm!
(one trip to the Marvel Encyclopedia later)
D. Okay, but Wolverine and Storm were in the X-Men first.
S. And is Elektra a good guy or a bad guy?
D. Elektra is kind of like Catwoman. Sometimes she’s a good guy and sometimes she’s a bad guy — it kind of depends on where you happen to be standing at the moment.
And so on.
(Of the many differences between DC and Marvel, one of the most striking, from an “adult trying to explain comic book heroes to a child who can’t read yet” point-of-view anyway, is that the lines of good and bad are drawn much more clearly in the DC universe; in Marvel, characters are zipping back and forth over the line all the time. How do I explain that the Punisher, who slaughters people with guns, is a good guy, while Batman, who despises guns and never kills anyone, is also a good guy? Or for that matter, how do I explain that the Hulk is a good guy, when no one, not even the Hulk, thinks he’s a good guy? And how do I explain how the media in Spider-Man’s world shapes the public’s perception of him, making a good guy look bad?)
Anyway, long story short, there’s this show, Justice League, that a year or so ago just hit my son like a truck.
I can’t explain it. He liked the Bruce Timm Batman show, but it was always a little too scary for him. He liked the Bruce Timm Superman show, but the plots were a little too complex for him (typical conversation: Sam: Who’s that? Dad: That’s Lex Luthor. Sam: Is he the bad guy? Dad: He’s the bad guy. Sam: Then why isn’t Superman fighting him?). But Justice League hit him just right. Something about the family dynamics of the group, Superman and Batman and Flash and Green Lantern and Wonder Woman and Martian Manhunter and Hawkgirl all in the same show, bouncing off each other and having their own adventures, somehow that clicked in his brain in a way that the individual heroes’ shows did not. The complications, which I would have thought would have made the show more difficult to follow, instead gave him more to feast on.
Now then: none of this means that I’ve been watching all these shows with him. Normally, these shows exist as something for Sam to watch while mom and dad get to spend 23 minutes having a conversation or eating dinner. But one night a few weeks ago, I called my wife to dinner and she didn’t come. Ten minutes later she wandered up from the TV room as though in a daze and said “I’m sorry, I got caught up in Justice League.” And I made a sound like Scooby-Doo does when he’s confused, and when after everyone went to bed I stayed up to see what the hell was so interesting about this episode of Justice League.
Check this out: the episode (it’s a two-parter) is called “A Better World.”
The show begins like this: Lex Luthor has somehow become president and is, apparently, about to destroy the world. Superman busts through White House security and confronts him in the Oval Office. Lex sneers at him and says “Go ahead, arrest me, put me in jail, I’ll just get out again, I always do, you’ll never be rid of me, you know that,” and Superman sighs and says “Yeah, you’re right,” and kills him. Just kills him. Just turns on his heat vision and zaps him, right there in the Oval Office. And Luthor falls over in a heap. Because Superman could totally do that, you know. Who would stop him? No one can stop him. Why didn’t he do it a long time ago?
And Superman just stands there over Luthor’s body. There’s no triumph or release, just grim silence. And Wonder Woman comes in and sees the dead body and says “…Oh. (beat) Well, I guess it had to happen at some point.” And the crisis is over, poof, all the world’s problems are solved.
Fade out. Roll titles.
Cut to: two years later, and the Justice League has all new uniforms, a new name (The Justice Lords) and they never leave the Watchtower (that’s their spaceship), because they never have to, because there is no crime. There is no crime because, as we come to find out, the Justice League has lobotomized all the criminals. We visit Arkham Asylum and find Joker and Poison Ivy and Two-Face and everyone else cheerful, model prisoners, milling around the grounds like pleasant, happy zombies. Gotham City is so clean and bright it looks like Metropolis. There’s an incredible scene where Justice Lord Superman is battling Doomsday (whom, aficianados will know, once killed Superman in the comics) and, just as Doomsday is about to go into his “MWAH HA HA” victory laugh, Justice Lord Superman zaps him in the forehead and we watch his brains melt down the sides of his face and Doomsday gets a queer, disconnected, disappointed look in his eyes as he slumps to the ground, still alive but no longer dangerous; somehow, it never occurred to him that Superman possessed the power to lobotomize him.
With no crime to fight, Justice Lord Batman has turned to science and has made an important discovery: he’s stumbled across a parallel dimension, where the normal, regular old Justice League with their colorful costumes and bickering ways are still wasting their time, struggling through a world filled with supervillains. The Justice Lords take pity on the poor old alternate-dimension Justice League (who we realize, in time, are our dimension’s Justice League; that is, the whole first part of the show is taking place in an alternate dimension and the protagonists don’t enter until the beginning of Act II) and, in a gesture of kindness, kidnap them and take them prisoner so that they can clean up the other dimension too. And so Act III has the Justice League taking on the Justice Lords, which, you can imagine, is difficult because they are, in fact, the exact same people, only a teeny bit more ruthless. And on the one hand, you don’t like the Justice Lords because of that ruthlessness, and on the other hand, it’s like — well, how come the Justice League took this long to get their act together? And the tension is unbearable because, as the title suggests, the Justice Lords have truly made their world better, and the Justice League is actually fighting to make it more chaotic and dangerous.
Bizarre enough? It gets better. To solve the problem of the Justice Lord Superman, whom no one can subdue, the Justice League must turn to Lex Luthor, who is still alive in this world, and who has the scientific knowledge to build a super-power-sapping device (“device” being the operative word here). Luthor will zap the Justice Lord Superman so that the good-old Justice League can take back control of our world (or, rather, relinquish control of our world). In exchange for his super-power-sapping device, the Justice League grants Lex a full pardon for all his past crimes and makes him a free man.
In the epilogue, we see a sobered, grateful Lex at a press conference, vowing to give up crime forever and — you knew it had to come — announcing his bid for the presidency. And the cycle begins again.
And I’m sitting in front of the TV with my mouth hanging open. This is a far cry from Superfriends. In the span of a 45-minute superhero cartoon, Bruce Timm and company have just told me more about society, civilization and justice than I ever learned in a season of Law and Order. Sure, Superman could just kill Lex. Of course he could. Why doesn’t he? That would make everything better. All it takes is the will to do so. And that goes for all the Justice League. Why bother negotiating with murderous thugs? Why not just kill them? They obviously have the power to do so. Why put up with giggling psychopaths who have nothing to contribute to society? Why not just kill them? And then, dumb as it sounds, it hit me: that’s why they call it Superman’s “Never Ending Struggle for Truth and Justice.” The whole point of the Justice League (and their real-world counteparts) is not to rid the world of crime, but to be vigilant in the fight against it. And then I was reminded about something regarding God as well. The DC superheroes were always modelled after the Gods, were they not? Well here’s the answer to the great question, Why do the Gods allow evil to exist?
Okay, enough for now. I’ve barely scratched the surface of my thoughts about this show. There’s a three-part episode where, get this, the Justice League goes back in time to World War II, in order to…restore Adolf Hitler to power.
Suffice to say, it’s no longer Sam saying “Hey, let’s watch Justice League!” Instead, it’s him saying “Can I watch Scooby-Doo?” And I’m saying “No, c’mon, let’s watch Justice League!” Now I know who all the characters are and what their backstories are (Did you know Hawkgirl was a detective on her home planet?) and what’s more, I care about them in ways I never have before. And I will get into the reasons for that in Part II.
I leave you for the moment with what is probably my favorite moment in the series, and emblematic of its genius. There’s a robot (AMAZO) who has the ability to imitate the powers of any superhero it sees. If it sees the Flash, it can run at the speed of light, if it sees Green Lantern, it can fashion a magic power ring, etc. It sees Superman, and acquires all his powers, and starts smashing stuff up. Batman, who has no powers to acquire, is the only one capable of fighting it. Thinking fast, he takes a lump of Kryptonite out of his pocket and lobs it at the robot, who collapses like a ragdoll and falls into the river (Batman reasoning that if AMAZO has acquired Superman’s strengths, he might also have acquired his weaknesses).
And Wonder Woman comes out from under a piece of rubble and says “So, what, you just always carry around a piece of Kryptonite with you?” And Batman scowls and mutters “Call it insurance,” and dashes off into the night.
Because he’s seen the “Better World” episode, probably.
Take the Marvel challenge!
My son Sam (5) has quite suddenly made a dramatic shift from DC to Marvel. Interest in Batman and Superman has dropped precipitously, interest in Iron Man and Hulk has increased exponentially. More to the point from a marketing point of view, he has immediately and instinctively assessed Marvel’s presence as a “brand,” and refers to Marvel characters not as “superheroes,” but “Marvel superheroes.” As in, he goes up to other kids at school and asks if they want to “play Marvel superheroes.”
One result is that he has gone from drawing pictures of the Justice League to drawing pictures of, well, everyone in the Marvel universe. All in the same drawing, as though trying to catch up after years of neglect.
Below is one of his latests efforts. Test your Marvel knowledge! How many of these characters can you name?
click on images to enlarge
THE ANSWERS:
Robolizard has done a heroic job with some tough material. The ones he missed are all pretty much the ones I missed too. Luckily I had the artist available to interpret for me.
Here is the complete set:
1. Mr. Fantastic
2. Silver Surfer
3. Spider-Man
4. Ant-Man
5. Nightcrawler
6. Daredevil (complete with endearing backwards 5-year-old double-D)
7. The Hulk
8. Black Panther
9. Iron Man (would be easier to identify if Sam had had access to the correct shade of red)
10. Lightspeed (who is Lightspeed? She is a member of Power Pack, of course, why do you ask? She is identifiable by her rainbow trail that she leaves whenever she zips from place to place.)
11. Rogue (probably the toughest one here. Sam had trouble getting across the idea of the white streak in her hair.)
12. Wolverine
13. Human Torch (Johnny Storm, that is — everyone knows the original Human Torch has no face.)
14. The Thing
15. The Wasp
16. Elektra (I know, I know, she’s topless — how advanced my son is! — but he got her little strappy things right.)
17. She-Hulk.
Congratulations to all our — well, our player!
Deadgirl
A while back, I was up for a gig writing an X-Men spinoff. The gig didn’t happen, but I spent a year researching the X-Men universe anyway.
My favorite tributary of the X-Men river was X-Statix, which managed to have an involving story, evocative characters, biting satire and high-spirited parody all at the same time. And one of the many, many great characters from X-Statix was Deadgirl. Both utterly ridiculous and unexpectedly moving, Deadgirl brought the whole title to a new level.
Now she has her own graphic novel, X-Statix presents Deadgirl, in which she teams up with Dr. Strange to defeat a team of killed-off Marvel characters (including lame-os like Mysterio and Kraven) who keep coming back from hell to wreak havoc on Earth.
Again, the artistic team hits the pitch-perfect balance of silliness, adventure, drama and parody, creating an effect not unlike that of The Venture Bros. In fact, Venture Bros came to mind almost immediately as we are introduced to Dr. Strange, who is found in his study simultaneously conjuring the netherworld and complaining about his hemorroids, all in the ultra-po-faced style of Mike and Laura Allred’s illustrations. I immediately thought of Dr. Orpheus, and another brick in the Venture Bros wall of cultural influences fell into place. It made me wonder if the Deadgirl team had seen the last season of VB and decided to take the idea back to its source.
Anyway, the book’s a hoot.
Xmen: The Last Stand
I dunno, I loved it. Am I crazy?
I know there are many out there who found this movie sadly lacking. I’m not sure what they were expecting.
Maybe all the bad reviews lowered my expectations, but I had a whale of a time. Feel free to tell me why you didn’t like it.
And, just so no one’s hands are tied, SPOILER ALERT.
UPDATE: It seems that a lot of people, not so much here as elsewhere on the internet, hate Brett Ratner. Is there something I’m missing? Did he kill someone’s father? Many people, it seems, went into the movie already hating it because it was Ratner instead of Bryan Singer, as though Singer is some kind of dynamic Francis Coppola-level visionary and Ratner is some kind of soulless Guy Hamilton-level hack. ‘Sup with that?