SFCS -- Strong Female Character Syndrome.

I believe it was Stuart West who told me in private correspondence that he appreciated how many strong female characters I have. I was a little thrown there because it took me a moment to figure out what he was talking about.

In my novels, I have Manana Shushurin, who's a spy that's more James Bond than George Smiley.  She reads, likes music, has a degree from Wittenberg university .... has no social life, and technically, lives with her mother (technically, I say, because she really lives in her office). She also has a secret that's eating a hole in her life.



I also have Maureen McGrail.  She's an Interpol detective, local Dublin cop, relentless, tenacious, and she knows about three martial arts.  She's also pining for a guy who came into her life, swept her off of her feet (just by being himself, really) and disappeared, without showing even a hint of romantic interest in her.



Then there's Wilhelmina Goldberg, who is 4'11", computer nerd, daughter of two esoteric languages nerds. She likes science fiction and fantasy, programs her computer to talk like characters out of Lord of the Rings, and has a subscription to Security magazine.



In context, I should point out that Stuart was using the strong female character comment as a segue into a completely different point, an issue he found in my writing. (Apparently, I shouldn't be putting in bust size as far as describing a female character.  I neglected to tell Stuart that if I knew anything about clothing, I would probably include men's jacket sizes to paint a clearer, more accurate picture of them, too. But I don't know any men who are the sizes I need. Me? OCD?  Nah....)



In any case, the SFC term struck me, and stuck with me.



And then there was this article, entitled I hate Strong Female Characters.  If you read through it, you might find a few points to agree with, and a few problems.



Now, I agree with the author on the initial point.  I also have problems with the SFC label. I really do, because it tends to detract from, oh, the point. In the example they used of Buffy-- she was smart, witty, with outside the box solutions to non-vampire problems (shall we start with the fertilizer bomb in the high school, or the rocket launcher?).  But "Strong" is the only descriptor one can come up with?



In my own work, I spent so much time on developing characters like Manana and Wilhelmina, their quirks and habits and hobbies, that I feel a little awkward if the best description anyone can come up with about them is just "strong."



Though you want my problem with this author?

1)  "I want good complex characters!"



.... And then, let's focus completely on Buffy, because she's the STRONG character.... and ignore Willow, who saves the day repeatedly, but is physically as strong as your average anemic? Faith, who's as physically strong as Buffy, but a broken character? How about Cordelia, who starts out a vacuous California mean girl, and becomes more interesting within the first half of season 1? Anya, who goes through a fairly strange character arc of her own?



And, while they're talking about complex characters, they boiled Buffy down to only "SFC." How about witty? Smart? Creative? The example used in the article was the end point of a two-episode arc exposing just how vulnerable Buffy really is. Yes, she's got superpowers, but she's still a teenager, with all the problems that comes with it, in addition to waging a constant war against everything that came to kill her, swallow the Earth, etc. The author managed to ignore the entire point of a two-part story!



Who demands good complex characters! and then ignores them when s/he gets them?  If this article had said that the "SFC" label shoved a character into a box and left them there, then I could agree to some degree.  But this author seems to be guilty of doing just that.



2) I want a 1:1 ratio of complex characters, male and female! 

The author prattles on about Peggy Carter of Captain America: The First Avenger, complaining that she was unbalanced and cartoonish, making a lot of assumptions.





The author mentions that Peggy Carter shooting Captain America's shield is a temper tantrum that no guy would have gotten away with. Obviously, this person never saw the 100 generic Stupid People Tricks that are on cable, and mostly male.  The author assumed that in firing, Peggy had been too stupid to not be listening to the toymaker Stark prattle on about his cool toys for however long she'd been in his general orbit. The author also assumed that no one in the entire room knew that the shield was bulletproof-- which is kind of like people in Q's lab not knowing to duck on a regular basis.



The author then insists that this "over-the-top" reaction is because she's one of two women with a speaking part, and there be more women on screen to counter stuff like this. (Which is odd, since I counted four -- which included a grandma with a tommy gun, and a SHIELD agent at the end of the film).



My real problem?  First, the author makes these above assumptions and then kvetches that they could have shoe-horned in more women. Why? Just to shoe-horn in more women. So we could have a 1:1 ratio of women in the film. Really?



Hey, maybe we could have put in more cardboard cutouts. Besides, if you really want equality, then Captain America: The First Avenger, was perfectly equal. There were only two complex characters in the whole film.  Tommy Lee Jones was playing....Tommy Lee Jones.... Zola was Mad Scientist #2 ... The Red Skull was Psycho Villain #6 ... Eskine was "Dr. Littleoldmun" from Mel Brooks' High Anxiety. And Stark was very much "Howard Hughes Carbon Copy #1."  Outside of the sidekick Bucky (Plucky Sidekick #9), are any of Captain America's team referred to by name?



In short, Carter and Rodgers were the only two characters of any substance in the film. This isn't a complaint. I'm sure they were plenty deep in character design, but there was little enough of it on the screen. Not to mention-- it's a movie. If you're Peter Jackson, you get nine hours of films for develop all of your character. If you're a Marvel film, you have, at most two hours and thirty minutes.  If you have two well-written and developed characters, you're ahead of the game.  I feel fortunate to have one, some days.



But for the 1:1 ratio this author wants?



Maybe this author would have liked more 2D characters. As she suggest, let's gender swap.... Dr. Zola?  So we can have a weak, simpering little woman be bullied by Tommy Lee Jones? Dr. Erskine? So we can have a little grandmother figure play the martyr?  Hey, we could gender swap Tommy Lee Jones, and have him played by Kathy Bates!  Why not have the Red Skull played by Angelina Jolie?



Now, a reasonable argument I got from Karina Fabian is from the point of view that, there were certainly a heck of a lot more women in the WW2 military than were seen in the film. There were secretaries, WACs, women who transported planes, codebreakers, nurses, etc.  That way, we could have had a lot of women.... but they would have been in the background, and probably would have completely boiled away this author's argument.



3) Women are at the back of the bus...um, movie poster, like Black Widow.



"Strong women are supposed to kick ass and keep their mouth shut." Really?



How about, oh, that Black Widow WAS THE ONLY ONE WHO OUTSMARTED LOKI?  IN THE ENTIRE MOVIE! GAAAHHHH!!!



How about that BLACK WIDOW WAS THE ONLY ONE WHO COULD CLOSE THE PLOT DEVICE DESTROYING NEW YORK?



How about the fact that there were maybe five deep moments in the entire film, and Black Widow was in two of them (The five moments were Stark and Banner in Lab, Stark and Rodgers reconcile, Coulson, interrogating Loki, and Black Widow and Barton, post-brainwashing....six scenes, if you count Black Widow and Bruce Banner in India, giving her half the deep moments in the film).



Oh, hey, how about Sam Jackson? Maybe we should say The Avengers was racist, because he was in the back of the poster?



I'm sorry, but unless you're Iron Man or Thor, you're in the back of this poster.



4) Where's Thor?


Seriously, where's the movie Thor in this discussion?  You know, the movie that was mostly Kat Denning and Natalie Portman handling Chris Hemsworth as he was enduring culture shock? With some occasional exposition from Mr. Skaarsgard? Portman's character, astrophysicist Jane Foster, isn't "strong," in this sense, is she? Because last time I checked, most of my female friends could break her like a toothpick. Foster is instrumental in Thor's change from prick to hero, but is she thrown on the bonfires of the blogger's vanity because she doesn't come with a complete bio and genealogy?



Or does this author consider her merely as a damsel in distress?  Which would be odd, because if you were in the New Mexico town in Thor, you were in distress, up to and including the three beefy supporting characters and the Valkyrie that (quite literally) drop down out of the sky.



Or does this not count, because the end of the movie involves the Warriors Three, Odin, and Loki? Making it three more male characters on screen than women?  Do we count Freya, who tried to stopped three assassins coming to get Odin? Or because she wasn't on screen that often, should we throw her aside?



While not physically strong, I thought Jane Foster was very well written. She was the love interest, sure, but that love motivated both of them to be better.  He was motivated to be a better person, and she was motivated to continue pursuing interstellar/inter-dimensional travel.



Am I wrong? Or, as I asked, does she just not count?



Conclusion: Equality!



As I said at the beginning, I don't like the SFC label.  If you can shove my characters into a nice neat little box, I'm going to be pissy -- either at you for demeaning my characters, or at myself for making them cardboard cutouts.



I would have liked this article more if it were less obvious. It's clearly pushing an agenda -- not about creating good characters, but numerical "equality!" for "equality's" sake. By the end, I felt like I was reading a review of 300 that insisted that there should have been 150 female Spartans at Thermopylae (this is not a joke, I did read one of those).



I honestly couldn't tell you the ratio of my characters if you dared me to.



In A Pius Man, I've got Maureen, Manana and Wilhelmina named above as main characters. Is the ratio 1:1 if I include Giovanni Figlia's wife, the forensic specialist?



Is the ratio no longer 1:1 if I count the three priests in the background?



Is it all right if I have Scott "Mossad" Murphy, who can't shoot, is pale, anemic-looking, and pair him up with the sexy gunslinger Manana?  Does that make him weak, even though he will take gunfire and is a pivotal part of the book?



Does Wilhelmina Goldberg not count if she doesn't shoot anybody, but is a key part to hunting down the bad guys by the end?



At the end of the day, the SFC label is too simple. But so is reducing "equality" to numbers of people on screen and counting lines.  If you're keeping score with 1:1 ratios, exactly what will satisfy you? I have no idea.



Now, if you'll pardon me, I have to go write a scene where Manana has to save Scott. Again.

Avengers, Age Of Ultron ... WTF Was That?

So, that was fun.



Time for my five cents.



Needless to say-- SPOILERS FOR ALL MARVEL FILMS UP TO THIS POINT.



Avengers 2.

WHAT WE KNOW



Ultron is the primary villain of Avengers2. It's really called Avengers: Age of Ultron. So, duh.



We know that Paul Bettany, the voice of JARVIS in Iron Man, is getting his own part as the Vision.  More later.



We know that Pietro and Wanda Maximoff will be in the film.



Dr. Zola, in The Winter Soldier, has an artificial intelligence algorithm that is set to find threats to Hydra, like superheroes, and kill them.



Hydra has the glows tick of destiny from The Avengers.  It has a glowing gem that makes you control people's minds. A mind gem if you will (more on that later).



ADD IT TOGETHER, YOU GET...



Take the AI, stick it into some of Tony Stark's armor, whack it with the mind gem to give it life, and you have a crapstorm ahead called Ultron.



The Maximoff's were seen at the end of Winter Soldier in the clutches of Hydra. Which means that Baron von Strucker and his minions will be part of it. We have another army of darkness ahead.

That was before I saw the trailer.

Now that we've seen The Avengers: Age of Ultron trailer ... now what?



Well, a few things.  To start with, the narration was obviously done by the marvelously malicious James Spader, who is voicing the killer robot Ultron. Blaming Hydra aside, we know a good chunk of stuff.

[More below the break]







WHO IS ULTRON?



For those of you who don't know about Ultron, in the comics, he was created by Hank Pym, aka: Ant-Man, one of the leading minds of the Marvel universe. Because that's what scientists do in comic books. Ultron went bad, and would even create one of his own robot minions, The Vision. While The Vision is not in the trailer, just assume that he's going to be one of the dozens of various and sundry minions crawling all over that old castle.  Why do I assume that? Because, as noted, The Vision has been cast, and he will be played by Paul Bettany, who has been the voice of Tony Stark's AI with an attitude problem, Jarvis, since the first Iron Man film.



In this little bit of Marvel continuity, Ultron will be created by Tony Stark, not Hank Pym (set to have his own movie sometime next year ... maybe).  From what I have seen around the net, Tony Stark will try to "reactivate a program" and it all goes terribly wrong. Since the end of The Winter Soldier showed us elements that show up in Age of Ultron, my friend Jason and I have considered that this program may incorporate elements of the SHIELD / Hydra program that targeted threats to Hydra -- namely superheroes.



Let's face it, does anyone put it past Tony Stark to say "Hey, if I program to identify real threats, like on that Person of Interest show, and create an army of police drones to enforce it, there's no way that this can go wrong!"?



No matter what, we'll have Ultron, the killer robot will have drone minions, and control machines ... like the Hulkbuster Iron Man armor we see the Incredible Hulk fighting in the trailer.



Short version: Ultron will be a pain in the ass to kill.



TRAILER IMAGES.



We see a city in the distance at sunset, then inside its borders are terrified citizens. In another cut is a crowd, seemingly protesting ... Probably Tony Stark, if the above theory is correct.  Though who would be out protesting during Ultron wiping out humanity is a completely different question.



A robotic hand emerges from a molten liquid and flexes, then more screaming people. We encounter our heroes; Captain America walks in slow motion into wreckage, an alert Hawkeye spins around and a backlit Thor stands in front of a smashed cityscape.

Yeah yeah, all very dramatic.



And here's Ultron, mangled but shambling into Avengers Tower, where the heroes -- in plain clothes -- see him, perhaps for the first time.



The next face we see close-up is Robert Downey, Jr. He looks pretty concerned as the bot-who-will-be-Ultron picks up a Stark drone and crushes his head and



... you know what, this bores me. Back to some analysis.



ECHOES FROM THE WINTER SOLDIER (SPOILERS?).

The Scarlet Witch, in costume

If the end of The Winter Soldier is anything to go by, Hydra will be involved for the first act, and it will involve the two young folk shown in Hydra glass cages -- who are Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch, Pietro and Wanda Maximoff.  Pietro just runs very fast. The Scarlet Witch has the power to warp reality ... and is bat-guano insane.



We know the Maximoff twins are going to be in the movie. They're in the trailer.  If they're out and running loose, that means that Hydra is involved, at least in the first act, if not the second and third.



After all, can't you just see it? Act one, Hydra attacks. Tony Stark releases his drone army.  Captain America comes in out of the cold -- and the search for Bucky -- to fight them. Bruce Banner is around, as seen at the end of Iron Man 3, so he shouldn't be too far off.  Black Widow and Hawkeye would come out to play and beat the crap out of Hydra.  And Thor might just be in the neighborhood.

The Twins, the in movie

By the end of Act One, Hydra is replaced with the drone that will become Ultron as a primary threat, and the Maximoff twins are leftover from the Hydra attack to join Ultron. Then we're off to the races.


How they fit in Jarvis as The Vision is a good question, and it can happen at least three different ways. In the comics, it was a natural progression of the AI Henchman that served Ultron. Obviously, if Jarvis has his own body, something else is going on.



Keep in mind, the Scarlet Witch and the Vision were eventually married in the comic books.



Insert your own "sex machine" joke here.



Since Wanda / Witch can warp reality, there was at least one comic book variation where she had an idle thought about a robot falling in love with her, and it grew a personality ... it also became Ultron.  But the less said about that storyline, the better. If they borrow elements of that, and make it the Vision, with Jarvis' programming, that might work


Also, for the ultra creepy-crowd, in the comics, there were a few writers, who created a few moments, where it looked like Pietro and Wanda were a "thing." And one of those writers was Jeph Loeb, who is currently running Marvel's Agents of SHIELD.



...Though I can't help imaging that if Loeb suggested such a thing, or tried to insert his influence anywhere near Age of Ultron, Joss Whedon would personally break Loeb's fingers off and use them as a suppository up Loeb's backside.



Just saying.



It will be interesting to see what happens with the Maximoff twins, as they belong to two different universes. On the one hand, both become members of the Avengers in the comics.  But they're also supposed to be the children of Magneto. They're mutants.  Yeah. That's going to be fun.



If this film ends with a cameo from Ian McKellen, expect laughter in the audience.


THE TRAILER (PART 2)


In the trailer, there is no shortage of wreckage -- destroyed cities, terrorized citizens and authorities fighting something off camera. Every hero we see early on in the trailer shows them walking slowly, looking forlorn and beat down. Bruce Banner is crouched and shuddering, clearly terrified … then stumbling through the snow, presumably post Hulk. A hospital bed wheels down a hall, and there’s a close-up of surgical equipment.

Okay, what does a castle have to do with ANYTHING?

Ultron is an evil robot. Or is he something Tony dug up somewhere?

Ultron, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch appear to exchange a moment in some sort of factory before the droid army swarm a mountain (the same one with the castle, which Iron Man looked up at and Cap stormed into). The heroes, inside an old structure, appear shocked enough to make Thor drop Mjolnir. Tony Stark says, “It's the end of the path I started us on,” to which Black Widow replies, “Nothing lasts forever.”



Yeah, so this is Stark's fault.



And why is Nick Fury back? And who's that bearded fellow with the odd haircut looking really angry/nervous (played by, I think, Andy Serkis, of Gollum fame)?

Hulk Buster Armor. Guess what it's supposed to do.

Scarlet Witch in an office building ... I'm kind of bored now.  Oh look, the not so jolly green giant versus Stark’s Hulkbuster armor.



Insert action cuts with Black Widow dropping out of a Quinjet on a motorcycle.  That looks cool.  Hey, Marvel, can we have the freaking Black Widow movie now, damnit?



.... And then Thor lifts Stark by the throat .. definition all Stark's fault.



Hulk throws a car at the Hulkbuster -- then punches through the car. Yay destruction.  And ... Captain America’s broken shield.



Are we doing the Death of Captain America already? I'd rather not. The Civil War rumors were stupid enough.

Dun dun dun DUNDUN

End with the finished Ultron product. Cue Terminator theme.



The trailer has the UK release date of April, not the US date of May 1.



So, that was fun.



Oh, and in case you haven't noticed, the commercial was having too much fun playing with that Pinocchio "No strings"  song. Which makes me wonder if Whedon wrote the commercial, too.  It would be something he'd pull.



PHASE TWO, THE CONCLUSION



Now, this will be the end of Marvel's second phrase. If you haven't figured it out yet, everything is building up to Avengers 3, where the main adversary will be Thanos, and he will be wielding all six infinity gems.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, they were mentioned in Guardians of the Galaxy as the McGuffin devices for Captain America, Thor 2, GotG, and the first Avengers.



That is actually a good question with Age of Ultron. The last image we had from Cap 2 was that Hydra, led by Baron von Strucker, was in possession of the mind control spear that Loki used in The Avengers.  If the spear is tipped with yet another gem -- the gem of the mind / soul, for example -- not only could it control people's minds, could it also bestow life on an artificial intelligence? We'll see how it goes.



There are many different ways to slice this pie, and I'm sure there are various and sundry things I'm missing. Heck, the only way I can fit the old castle into this film is if it's a Hydra base .... Yes, I could see Act one (as described above) ending with the Avengers being beaten and driven off, and as they research the program Stark used, they have to go to Eastern Europe to investigate.



Why Eastern Europe?  Look at the region the tanks are driving through, the forest that Hawkeye runs through, and tell me that doesn't look like something that could be in Eastern Europe.



How does this fit in with the rest of "The Marvel Plan"?  Identifying the spear as running on an Infinity Gem would add to the chaos.  If the old castle is actually a really old Hydra base ... well, we know how Hydra liked to play with Powers That Should Not Be Touched, so who only knows where this plot could go with reference to the overarching storyline. Also, according to IMDB, Hayley Atwell (Agent Carter in Cap 1) is supposedly in the movie, but that's IMDB, so who knows?



How much of this buildup was there?  [SPOILERS] Well, Iron Man 3 ended with Tony Stark giving up his suit, which would lead to this drone program (subtle as a brick, our Mr. Whedon). Thor 2 might only impact the story because Thor is on Earth. Captain America 2, however, might bring in God-knows-what, from Hydra, to the AI program, to the glow stick of destiny, but it will certainly bring in the Maximoff Twins. [END SPOILERS]



In reference to Avengers 3, seriously, who knows? I'm still trying to figure out why we're getting a movie about Ant-Man and not Miss Marvel, Black Widow, or Hawkeye.  GotG at least made sense in that it better introduced us to Thanos than his brief cameo at the end of The Avengers. Personally, I could have seen a few different movies done instead, and then do GotG in phase 3, but what do I know?



CAPTAIN AMERICA 3 AND THE CIVIL WAR RUMORS



If you know anything about the Civil War premise, you know that it's impossible to make into a movie at this point, and maybe never.  Why? The original Civil War plotline called for dozens if not hundreds of active heroes in the Marvelverse.  The Superhero Registration Act requires heroes to reveal their identities to the government ... and everyone in the film universe knows about Thor, Stark, Captain America, War Machine, and after Winter Soldier, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and maybe Bruce Banner.  Civil War is an impossibility.



This rumor came out of a conflation of two stories. One, Iron Man would be in Captain America 3. Two, Marvel was going to have a comic book callback to Civil War. Conflate both stories, and game over.



Considering that the rest of the Cap 3 story was that "Downy complained that his role was too small, and various drafts delete him from the plot entirely," I suspect it may be more than a cameo.  Also, if Captain America 3 doesn't involve the search for Bucky, than what the hell was the end of The Winter Soldier about?



Anyway, I think I've said enough. I've told you all I know, and some of what I suspect.  Enjoy.

Who would Captain America vote for? An election special

A while ago, someone decided to take a look at the politics of Captain America, something I thoroughly made fun of him for, though the original author at Salon.com found my article, and declared he was completely tongue in cheek. Honest he was.

In the spirit of going completely and utterly over the top, I figure I would take it one step further.  However, I'm going to tell you right now that this is a joke from minute one to minute last.
Batman: 

Bruce Wayne has approximately more money than God, deals in advanced technological research, and while he has been known to contribute to the occasional ecological issues, he's also been known to draw the line at basic, reasonable limits (he won't, say, be in favor of sacrificing lives to save an endangered squirrel or something similarly ridiculous).  Also, can you imagine Batman dealing with an Occupy Gotham movement?

There would be pain, there would be fear, and then, they would run screaming for their mommies.

VOTE GOES TO: I think we've got a Romney voter here

Oliver Queen, aka Green Arrow (DC Universe). 

Why, yes.

I do think I'm Robin Hood

For those of you who don't know Green Arrow, personally, he's sort of like the anti-Batman.  While also from a rich, industrial family, Oliver Queen is Left-Wing. I don't mean Democrat, I mean Left-wing, pseudo-socialist.  Half his conversations with the Justice League involve him screaming "You're all a bunch of fascists!"  I'm not even certain he knows how serious he is about such things.  In any event, it's kinda clear that he'll vote for the most Left-wing politician there is. The only politician like that who will reliably show up on the national stage, including Queen's fictional Starling City, would probably be Barack Obama.

However, since Ollie had been Mayor of Starling City once, he'd probably put himself on the ballot, and promptly vote for himself.

VOTE GOES TO: Either Obama, himself, or the farthest Left-wing candidate.

Captain America (Steve Rodgers)

Because I'm Captain America, damnit.

Pro-Army, pro-gun, pro-Apple pie, Captain America has spent his entire existence dealing with foreign policy issues.  On social issues, Steve would be very 1940s -- abortion was a dangerous, illegal procedure, and any pills like birth control or contraceptives were also illegal, so that entire issue is a nonstarter. Economically, his attitude would probably be very much on the order of, "People get their own jobs, right? Well, a little hard work, everything will be fine." Between those two, I think we've got a one-issue voter.   Given the rate of speed the Benghazi disaster is shaping up, I can't imagine him voting for anyone other than Mitt Romney.

VOTE GOES TO: Romney

Iron Man

This is a tough one. Despite the movies, billionaire industrialist Tony Stark mostly resides in New York City, which makes him a definite shoe-in for a Democratic voter, no matter who the candidate is.  Also, keep in mind that a lot of Wall Street tycoons are supporters to the Democratic party -- John Corzine, Robert Rubin (Goldman Sachs), Citibank, and George Soros (Democrat and Obama's biggest supporter), Brookfield Asset Management, Lehman Brothers (who now work for the Obama Administration).

On the other hand, Tony Stark is a pro-weapon kind of fellow -- let's face it, he's gone a few steps beyond the second amendment, and his father made the nuclear bomb -- and let's look at most of Tony Stark's villains. He fights Soviet Russians, Communist-Chinese, as well as other competitors. In the comic books, Stark was pretty much supposed to be pro-American, right-wing, supports America's wars sort of fellow.

And he made a killing on all those predator drones....

VOTE GOES TO: Either Stark is a Romney voter, or he'll be spending election day at home, drunk.

Superman, aka Clark Kent
Clark Kent is a big city reporter, and over 80% of journalists are Democrat supporters, so it should go Obama.  Kent has also recently given up a job with the Daily Planet because it was bought but someone who kinda resembles Rupert Murdoch -- evil big business, after all.  So, that would be left-leaning.

On the other hand, Clark Kent was raised in Kansas by a rural farming family.  However, as Superman, he once rescinded his American citizenship for five minutes.

VOTE GOES TO: Romney and Obama, depending on who's writing Superman at the time.


Bruce Banner, aka The Incredible Hulk 

Dr. Bruce Banner, fugitive from practically everybody on the planet, he likes the back end of nowhere, and staying as far from military and local authorities as humanly possible.

Enter Obama, who seems to want to cut the military budget and the US involvement in foreign affairs.  And he has anger management issues.

VOTE GOES TO: Obama.

Nick Fury

Another World War II vet, Nick Fury is a spymaster, will defend the planet against enemies foreign and domestic, which will make him both socially conservative and pro-military.

VOTE GOES TO: Whoever Fury has rigged the election for, so, probably Romney.

Daredevil, aka Matthew Murdock

A New York trial lawyer, Daredevil is a natural Obama voter. The ABA backs democrats automatically. Mathew Murdock is also all about community. I could see him as a supporter of Occupy Wall Street, if his super sense of smell didn't cripple him every time he found a client who never showered.



On the other hand, Matt Murdock has always been Catholic.  He's very Catholic ..... then again, he's a bit of a man-whore in the Marvel Universe.

VOTE GOES TO: Obama

[MORE BELOW THE BREAK]

Writer's Rules For Villains

Rules for Antagonists, Villains, etc.





A long while ago, the friend of mine who writes Masks came up with a contest for Rules for Superheroes. It was cute, and genre-specific.



But I always like a smart enemy to go with my protagonists. Preferably, someone who thinks ahead.  So, I have Rules for Antagonists.  Be they killers in murder mysteries, archvillains in comic books, or your basic takeover the world types in science fiction and fantasy, this should be their playbook.





Rule #1: NEVER. TOUCH. THE GIRLFRIEND.  It only pisses them off.



Drazen's Corollary: While abducting the significant other / close relation of your archrival in order to lure him/her into your sinister trap, it will only serve to piss them off.  Your normally docile hero, who tends towards nonlethal force, will seriously consider thrashing you to within an inch of your life, and--if no sidekicks are there to enforce restraint--might go three inches beyond that.



Parker's Corollary on Drazen: If you MUST lure them anywhere, use the standard busload of children chosen at random--it will typically serve to get the required effect, especially with a note to the local media sources and/or police agencies.  Should you do this in a city with a high protagonist population (eg: Marvel's New York), be certain to request the hero of your choice: otherwise you get all of them.





Rule #2. Don't gloat. The amount of time it takes for you to boast, and threaten, and deliver your well-practiced maniacal laughter, someone you overlooked will have unplugged your weapon / unlocked the handcuffs on the prisoners / otherwise screwed up your plans.  Gloat after you've won. (Also: See rule 7)



Fletcher's Corollary: Overlook no one. Seriously, if you're going to take over the world / kill someone / unleash a diabolical scheme, no one is unimportant. Witnesses will provide evidence. Just because it's some nobody in the background asking questions doesn't mean there's no threat—people in the background tend to observe a lot.



Goldfinger's Corollary: Never use the line, "Because you are all about to die anyway, I will tell you all about my evil plan."  This includes all variations on this theme.





Rule #3: Avoid patterns. No matter how comfortable you are with a certain places / style / or MO, repeating it on a constant loop will only serve to have the authorities find you.







Rule #4: Wear gloves during your crimes. If possible, wear a full body suit to prevent fingerprints, hairs, or skin cells from being left behind.



Grissom's Corollary For Killers: This includes keeping souvenirs.







Rule #5: Don't let ideology govern your tactics. Just because your ideology says that your enemy is inferior doesn't make them stupid.



Tarkin's Corollary. Underestimating your enemies will get you killed.



Thrawn's Corollary on Tarkin: Underestimating your allies will also get you killed.





Rule #6: Suicide bombers have never won a war, or even a battle. It only wastes experienced soldiers. Even disposable foot soldiers are not infinite. Minions do not grow on trees.



Zahn's Corollary: Unless you have a cloning unit for disposable foot-soldiers.



Von Doom's (PhD) Corollary on Zahn:  Or you build your own.





Rule #7 (or Rule 2, Expanded): If you have a chance to remove the adversary from the playing field on a permanent basis, do so. Do not lecture them, explain your scheme, or toy with them. Shoot them in the head, and move on.



Stark's Corollary: Also, do not wound them so they can still be useful to you. If they can be useful to you, they can also hurt you.



Ming's Corollary on Stark: Your enemy can be useful to you – dead. Examples are usually better that way.







Rule #8: If you cannot see the hero, worry.



Murphy's Corollary: If you cannot see your adversary, s/he is behind you.







Rule #9: No self destruct mechanisms, unless they are password protected, and require the passwords of at least three of your closest allies.  And confirmed by you. Twice.







Rule #10: Plan ahead.  You have all the time in the world to unleash your deadly plot on the world, or execute your crime.  Take appropriate precautions, and don't assume that everything will go according to plan.  If your plan is perfect, you're missing something.  Murphy is always right.



Palpatine's Corollary: If you are going to invite your enemies to come into range of your ultimate weapon, make sure that it's finished first.







Rule #11: No time travel. You don't have enough aspirin in the world to deal with the headache it will cause.



Doctor's Corollary: Unless you have a blue box.

 



 

Rule #12: Whatever psychological problems you have, make sure that you utilize them well.



Wilson's Corollary: Don't suffer from madness.  Enjoy every minute of it.







Rule #13: When your adversary is incapacitated, on the floor, at your mercy, it is not the time to (a) exercise your creativity in designing Rube Goldberg-esque death traps (b) write your monologue or (c) start gloating.  The answer is (d) shoot them in the head and move on.

Disasters to Marvel At: A Comic Discussion.

While I generally leave anything referring to comic books or superheroes to my esteemed friend and colleague Rebekah Hendershot, author of Masks, I am now stepping in.  The disaster known as Marvel Comics has become a wasteland of jibberish for years now.  Finally, there is a solution at hand.

Dear Disney, you own Marvel now. Have Joe Quesada walk the plank off the roof of 666 5th avenue. You can have Johnny Depp hold the sword that nudges him off, if you like.



Why do I say that? About five years ago, DC Comics started their epic of the week. Marvel, in perfect monkey-see-monkey-do fashion, has tried to keep up. In this effort, the result has been … nothing I can adequately describe using PG-13 language.



Let's see if we can all follow this round of abject stupidity.

Civil War

Marvel's Civil War is more or less where everything starts going sideways for the Marvel. Lets face it, it was a seven-issue arc that interfered in everything else in the Marvel Universe. To little or no purpose. Individual series sold as always, and Marvel should count themselves fortunate that those didn't hemorrhage sales during that period.



Premise: Amateur superheroes chase down badguy. Badguy goes critical, nuking school, and killing hundreds of poor widdle children. Washington issues edict: superheroes are to register with the government, because D.C. doesn't want every other random idiot who acquires superpowers by the luck of the draw to get any ideas about fighting crime and accruing massive property damage.



It's called the Superhero Registration Act (SRA ... not to be confused with the X-Men's Mutant Registration Act, always brought in with with Nazi-like implications, right? Of course not.)



Now, I'm not a great political thinker. Honest I'm not. I've said a few times how I hate politics.  And I mean seriously. The most political experience I've ever had is from watching every episode of The West Wing at least twice. However, when a law such as the SRA becomes a fait accompli, it would have been an easy matter of public superheroes taking up a petition to make a change to the new law.



What change?



Word the amendment to the law as follows: “All superheroes active as of Y date, with a history of successful superheroing, are automatically grandfathered in, under the umbrella of this law.” Or some such wording. I'm not a lawyer, that's the best I can do.



Simple version: “If you're a superhero who actually has experience and doesn't make a habit of wrecking the city, you're in.” Automatically, Captain America and Iron Man should make the list automatically, as well as Luke Cage, the Fantastic Four, all of whom should easily be listed under “They know what they're doing.”  Even Spider-Man had a S.H.I.E.L.D. file (New Avengers, Vol. #1). If it's a matter of protecting humanity from the stupidity of any random moron who gets himself a cape and some flashy powers, then target them accordingly.



Can't you imagine it? They make a Marvel hero, someone who starts operating locally, and S.H.I.E.L.D. comes down, says “Hello, my name is Nick Fury, we're going to bring you in for training, and give you a license, then you can go about your business. Thank you.”



I think that would have been rather cool.



Nope. Instead, they wanted a chance for everyone to talk each other to death. Instead of a classic “My hero can beat up your superhero,” contest (known to science fiction fans as “Who would win in a fight, Spock or Kirk?”), it was a rant. I think Mark Millar and Joe Quesada wanted to make it a political screed of some sort … but I don't even think it works well as that, either. As I've mentioned, I can take “save the whales” if you make it into a good story, but Civil War wasn't.



The sides of Civil War broke down into the camps of “Super-Patriot, Captain America,” fighting … against the government? Versus evil big businessman … Tony Stark?



Did I miss something?



Captain America, who had been created by the military, trained by the military, and all but living his entire life in some form of military structure, is the one fighting the government. And Tony Stark, who doesn't play well with others, who has a history of substance abuse, and has all but said, “Screw you, I don't need anybody,” is the one on the government payroll, leading a war of superheroes, and taking over S.H.I.E.L.D.?



If someone was trying to draw a parallel between Tony Stark and, maybe, Halliburton, I think this qualifies as a fail.



Also, I don't think these others talked to each other as they wrote their separate storylines.



“Front Line,” which was about a drunken newspaper reporter, made it look like Tony Stark was using the war as a method of making money (remember when I said “evil big businessman”?). Then, in Amazing Spider-Man #535, Peter Parker makes a comment to Tony Stark that “You're making a killing, in the stock market,” and you get the sense from Stark that he's too damn busy running a war.



One of the few people who actually tried to make Civil War into a discussion was J. Michael Straczynski, during his run on Amazing Spider-Man. We got to see Tony Stark, up close and personal, as tired, tiring, and all but falling apart, and even confessing that he hated the whole thing, he hadn't slept for weeks, but “The law's the law, damnit.”



At the end of the day, and seven issues of talking at each other, and waging war on the streets of densely populated New York City, wreaking havoc in residential neighborhoods, Captain America essentially concludes, “We're hurting so many people, we have to stop. I'm going to turn myself in to the justice system, and we'll work it out in the courts.”



Really? Work it out in the courts? That couldn't have been the thing to do five minutes after the law kicked in? There are at least two superhero lawyers I am aware of, Daredevil and She-Hulk; no one thought of this the first time through?  What was the point of all that that fighting?  Answer: There was a point?



People who have read Civil War have broken it down for me as “Blah blah blah,” destroy a city block, “Blah blah blah,” clone Thor, “blah blah” destroy Yancy Street. “Blah. Blah.” “Oh my God, we're hurting civilians.”



Then we shoot Captain America with a bullet that makes him unstuck in time.



This last part has nothing at all to do with the events of the rest of the year-long arc, by the way.  (Captain America writer Ed Brubaker had wanted to shoot him for a while, in order to make Buckey Barnes Captain America.  However, the geniuses at Marvel discovered that, when they started Civil War, they didn't have an ending, so the Powers from On High decided to pull the trigger on Brubaker's idea. No pun intended).



And, of course, amidst all of this stupidity, everyone missed an option. Civil War only works if everyone jettisons a third path. Marvel had to make it a matter of “Join the eeeeevvviilll government program” or be a fugitive, or else their "event" had no teeth. In addition to throwing character development out the window, they gave every character a lobotomy … and you thought that was obvious just from the “sudden” revelation that “Oh no, we're hurting innocent people!”



The third option: “Hi, I'm your friendly neighborhood hero. I'm going to retire rather than put up with this idiotic registration. I'm not a superhero anymore. The government's superheroes can handle all of my psychos. Let's see how well they deal with it. Have a nice day. Call me when you're tired of arresting Doctor Octopus for the fifteenth time.”



This third option would probably mean that any hero who tried this route would, undoubtedly, spend their time playing detective, without spandex, for the entire run of Civil War.  We could have watched said title character observe the big government heroes try to do the same job, with villains they've never dealt with before, and not handling it well.  Watch lone hero, without any overt display of powers, outwit the villain and outperforming "The Man".



If you think that wouldn't have been fun to watch, then you've never seen Murder, She Wrote.



But, noooooo, a hero without spandex would jeopardize the comic book run!  We'll ignore that Frank Miller did that for a whole story arc during his time on Daredevil.



Amusing tidbit: despite that the Superheroes Registration Act is almost a direct ripoff of the X-Men Mutant Registration Act, the X-Men were completely neutral in Civil War … funny, considering that this would have been a perfect time for any government official to absorb them into the universe. But Joss Whedon wrote X-men at the time, and you do not mess with Whedon, or he will sic Summer Glau on you.

Back in Black

A shameless tie-in with Spider-Man 3, Back-in-Black was a Spider-Man storyline where it's no more Mr. Nice Spider. During Civil War, Spider-Man unmasked in public. 



Parker then switched sides during Civil War, putting a target on his back.  The Kingpin put a hit out on him; the assassin shot Spider-Man's aunt instead. Then, Peter Parker puts on a cloth version of his black suit as a sign that he was out to go all Jack Bauer on everyone involved in the shooting …



Okay, I'm with them so far.



The scenario takes us with Peter Parker as he works his way up the chain of command, from the assassin to the Kingpin.  Back-in-Black ends with Peter beating the heck out of the Kingpin, with the proviso that “If my Aunt dies, I'm coming back here, and then, I'm going to fire my web shooters down your throat, wait for it to harden, and then literally rip your lungs out. Start praying.”



It was at least entertaining … if and only if you followed J. Michael Straczynski's Amazing Spider-Man arc, or perhaps Peter David's Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man. From what I've seen, everyone else gave Spider-Man whiny emo powers.  Now, I know that some things are popular, but I don't find anything entertaining about Peter Parker as Edward Cullen.

One More Day.

Now, as I noted, Peter Parker had unmasked in public during the civil war storyline. By the end of Civil War, Parker was on the run with his family, and everyone knew his name.



And this was the perfect time to show us a fugitive Parker and family.  Peter reels from the critically injured / death of Aunt May. Peter is hunted by his old friends, and his old enemies, and he can basically have a bounty on his head that anyone can claim, including former criminals.



Although Peter had outed himself during the Civil War storyline, there was little-to-no interaction with people from his old life. There was a brief tussle with J. Jonah Jameson in the rarely-seen or -read Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man run, as well as an issue with two ex-girlfriends, but that was the full extent of any blowback Peter Parker felt from the revelation.



But just consider what Marvel could have done.  Can't you imagine Peter Parker running into all sorts of people after he goes on the lamb?  Each of these people having a whole spectrum of reactions to the revelation of who Spider-Man is?  Or, for those who knew, that he came out in the first place? Old girlfriends. Old enemies. Doctor Octopus saying “Peter, I had you in class. You were beating me up for years? Damnit.”  Or, as a fugitive, on the run with his wife, MJ, asking for aide from his sometimes-fugitive ex-girlfriend Black Cat.  Etc, et al.



No, that would have been creative.



Instead, Marvel settled for a Deal With The Devil. Where Peter makes a deal with Mephistopheles to save his ninety-year-old aunt, at the expense of his marriage.



That giant snapping sound you hear is my credulity breaking.



Why did Marvel decide to end a marriage that has lasted for twenty years?



Because Marvel's editor-in-chief, the brilliant Joe Quesada, decided that he liked Peter Parker better when he was a bachelor. We will ignore that there are about two or three other series where Peter Parker is still single, but why ruin a good story with fact-checking?



Oh, and, conveniently, Parker's wife, Mary Jane, makes a side deal with the devil so that no one knows anything about who Spider-Man really is.



They honestly thought that this was a good idea?



You know something is bad when J. Michael Straczynski, who had written Amazing Spider-Man from 2001 to One More Day, left the series after this, and had expressed a desire to remove his name from One More Day entirely.



Later retcon (retroactive continuity) resulted in a storyline called “One Moment in Time.” 



When I heard about this, I thought “Great, a massive event that will show how history changed because the marriage never happened.” They try to explain why the marriage never happened (Spider-Man KO'ed during a fight the night before the wedding), and how no one remembered he was Spider-Man (Dr. Strange, magic spell, while Peter is aided by everyone hunting him during the Civil War... huh?).



 That was it.  No attempt at anything really innovative, merely an acknowledgment that some of their readers are still suffering from reality-shift whiplash.



 I believe that this sums up my feelings about the whole premise.

World War Hulk

One of the few things Marvel did well during Civil War was to have the Planet Hulk storyline. In order to get the Hulk to stop going on his occasional rampages (and from being a major player in Civil War), Tony Stark and company decide to launch him into outer space. The Hulk landed on an alien world, fought his way up from being a gladiator to being planetary leader, found himself a wife, had a son …



And then the planet was nuked, killing both wife and son, and it looked like Tony Stark and company might have been involved. Hulk comes to Earth to smash puny humans. We discover that one of the Hulk's alien buddies was responsible for killing off the wife and son. Hulk has complications arise in his life.





Overall, WWH was a simple, straightforward smashup. There's not too much to point out, except …



One question: Why was Spider-Man wearing his black suit, fighting the Hulk, alongside other people on Tony Stark's team? Back-in-Black was a storyline that (in comic book time) took place over the course of two days. His aunt was in a hospital in lower Manhattan, which the Hulk was busy trashing. And, oh, yeah, Spider-Man was still a fugitive during that time. I don't mind some temporal overlap, but could someone notice what they're doing in their own scripts?

Secret Invasion

Skrulls, shape-shifting aliens, come to earth, infiltrate all sorts of organizations, wreaks havoc.



Round one, fight!

Dark Reign

After the Skrulls have wreaked their havoc, Tony Stark is deemed ineffectual and thrown out of his position as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. So, they decide to install a new head of S.H.I.E.L.D. …



Norman Osborn.



In case you are not a comic book fan, or have never watched comic book movies, Norman Osborn is better known as the Green Goblin, a super villain that has been the closest that Spider-Man ever had to an enemy that was pure evil. He has been thrown in jail repeatedly, killed repeatedly, and has come back from the dead repeatedly.



And somehow, they put him in charge of S.H.I.E.L.D.?



To be honest, they took Osborn from another government-sanctioned group, the Thunderbolts, who are basically super villains who have been given a pardon if they work for the government. But, still, Hannibal Lecter would be a better director of S.H.I.E.L.D.  I wouldn't go to any of his dinner parties, though ....



Anyway, with Osborne in charge, there was Dark Reign, with Dark Avengers, Dark X-Men, Dark Wolverine (because he was so bright and sunny to start with), and Dark Spider-Man (starring Venom), and Bullseye, Dark Avenger, and the rest of the Dark League of Darkness.



Sorry, they lost me at Norman Osborn, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.



However, this had the makings of something interesting: “The Cabal,” which involved Norman Osborn working with Loki and Doctor Doom. Watch and see who stabs who in the back first. Muahahaha …

Siege

Dark S.H.I.E.L.D. vs. … Asgard?



To start with, the Dark League of Darkness immediately has a falling out, with Norman Osborn alienating Loki and Doctor Doom…



Let us pause here and digest that a moment.



Norman Osborn, whose biggest superpower is that he's a freaking psycho with fancy, high-tech equipment, has managed to piss off a Norse deity and the world's deadliest despot, two super villains in the Marvel universe with egos the size of the galactic core. Osborn even attempts to kill the good Doctor...



And, somehow, Osborn doesn't have a war on his hands with either of them.



In fact, Loki acts as an adviser to Osborn (but secretly driving him crazy … um... crazier?). Norman would like to take over Asgard because it's something that's not nailed down, and not under his direct control. Yes, because being a psychotic megalomaniac means that you kick over a hornets' nest of deities who have been leaving you alone, just because they don't answer to you. Right.



So … Osborn and his Dark League of Darkness take on Asgard, which is currently parked over New Mexico (long story).



Leaving it as the Dark Avengers vs. Asgard. This quickly turns into …



Dark Avengers vs. Everyone Else On The Planet.



In the middle of this story arc, there is a five-page sequence where Osborn goes postal on camera, which makes everyone decide that Norman Osborn is evil …



Wait. No! Really? Whatever gave you that idea? Everybody suddenly remembers: It's Norman Osborn, most evil psychopath in the entire Marvel universe. Lex Luthor looks normal compared to this guy.   What have you people been smoking?!



In writing terms, this is called a deus ex machina, which is usually what a writer does when s/he has written the heroes into a corner and can't get them out by any other means.  It's the writing equivalent of having a villain holding a hero at gunpoint, and having an elephant fall out of the sky and squash him flat.



At the end of the day, Captain America (no longer unstuck in time) is put in charge of the “Fifty State Initiative,” the government's teams of superheroes, formed under the Superhero Registration Act, and the registration act itself is abolished … so, what was the point of Civil War?

Shadowland

Meanwhile, in another part of the universe, the Dark League of Dark Ones extends to … the evil Daredevil.



Daredevil?



Ed Brubaker, who is now known for running Captain America, had been on Daredevil before that. He had shown a civil war within the Hand (ninjas + Yakuza + magic = The Hand), and this war ended with Daredevil taking over at least a part of the Hand, if not the totality.



The next person to write Daredevil decided that now, Daredevil had to be evil.

Daredevil kills longtime enemy Bullseye … superheroes pause and think that something might, just MIGHT, mind you, be wrong with Daredevil.

Of course something is wrong with him. Daredevil is taken over by a demon …



A what now? Quick, someone, call Joss Whedon, we need a Daredevil / Buffy crossover, STAT!



And so, Daredevil has to die, leading to a new comic line: Black Panther, Man without Fear.



Ahem … let us have a thought about this, shall we? One of Marvel's bigger black characters, an African King, is brought to Hell's Kitchen to clean up the mess of a rich white lawyer.



So they made their biggest black characters a janitor.



In Summation...



Civil War: Talk each other to death. Captain America “dies” (but gets better), Peter Parker outs himself (later goes back into the spandex closet). Net result: nothing happens.



Back-in-Black – One More Day: Find Kingpin. Beat up Kingpin.  Make deal with Devil to undo the marriage. Net result: nothing has happened since the eighties.



WWH: Hulk Smash. There is property damage.  Net result: everything that has happened to Hulk for the previous two years didn't happen.



Secret Invasion – Dark Reign – Siege: The Rise and Fall of Norman Osborn, who is replaced by Steve Rodgers. Superhero registration act abolished. Net result: Nothing has happened for five years.



Shadowlands – Daredevil will be reborn, again. Eventually. Net Result: What the Hell was that?



I say again: Disney, Joe Quesada is over there, make him walk the plank.



Now, what does this have to do with A Pius Man? Seriously, John, what are you doing? This is a page for a thriller novel, not a superhero novel, or anything else that tangentially touches on comics.



However, I can comment on bad writing.



I'm serious. Fans of Marvel, can we agree that the net result of their world-shaking, game-changing epic story arcs have resulted in … nothing?  Or, in the case of Spider-Man, at least nothing good?



If you say that “oh, they brought back some characters we thought were dead,” I will refer you to almost every other person who has died in comic books … which adds up to every other superhero in comic books.



I know that it is common practice in most franchises to have few things change until the last possible minute.  How many tv shows will keep a pseudo-romance going for years without a conclusion because to have the leads get together would finish the show?  How many characters should have died, but "you can't risk the franchise"?  Rod Serling referred to it as the Velvet Alley -- a trap where you are ensnared by your own success, and you can't risk changing something lest someone take the success away from you (be it the audience or the Powers that Be in the industry).



But it is now getting stupid.  Marvel has had five years of massive, epic wars, and nothing has happened.



Basics of story telling: you have a beginning, a middle, and an end.  The story order doesn't have to be linear, you can put the end first and the beginning last (not often, but it can work).  At the moment, Marvel is working with an eternal middle that goes nowhere.  The artwork is pretty, they have some cute moments, and look, this fight scene is shiny, but the plotlines resemble endless laps of a hamster on the wheel.



The philosopher Plato had a premise that stated that, out in the world, there is a perfect example of an object, and all other variations of that object are mere shadows of that perfect thing.  There is a perfect chair, a perfect tree, a perfect stick.  If we follow this to a logical conclusion, then out there, somewhere, is the perfect example of a complete and utter moron.



And he is currently running Marvel.  Into the ground.  With pointless fight-fests, Dark-everything, tossing character out the window, and arbitrarily rewriting Marvel history, someone should chat with management.  Possibly with a 2x4.



So, my conclusion is simple: Disney, Quesada, plank.  Assemble those words in the appropriate order.

Next week, we look at an issue at the opposite end of the spectrum: DC comics.



UPDATE (2-14-2011)

Joe Quesada is now "promoted."  We have some thoughts on that, here.