And More Of Why I Hated Iron Man 3

(Reposted from my comic blog, which you should be reading. My feelings a week later have only gotten harsher.)

Some days I am very grateful for the fact that I do an independent webcomic, with no content beyond what I create, no editing beyond what I choose, and no readers beyond a small few devoted and cherished fans. Yesterday was one of those days, because it was the day I finally saw Iron Man 3.

Iron Man 3, directed by Shane Black (replacing Jon Faverau), is not a bad movie. It has the same cast of the previous Iron Man movies (which I really enjoyed, albeit with reservations), and it had a few new characters who were played effectively. It even had some good ideas, such as Tony Stark's anxiety attacks following the events of the Avengers. However, none of those ideas got any space to breathe, and the Hollywood formula smothered the movie so that everything potentially interesting about it was diluted in a stream of explosions and one-liners.

If Iron Man 3 were played as a completely straightforward superhero movie, such as Captain America, it could've excelled at that. But the more thoughtful bits raise important questions and take them absolutely nowhere. Tony's anxiety attacks begin as a serious issue, showing a tortured mind whose view of a rational universe has been shattered in the wake of discovering gods and aliens, and who builds armor after armor in a compulsive attempt to regain his security. This is in the first act; in the second act, Tony's anxiety attacks are just reduced to comic relief as he flips out in front of a little kid, and by the third act, he's completely "overcome" them (as if you can just punch emotional problems into oblivion). 

(NOTE: EXPLICIT SPOILERS FOLLOW)

The intriguing start and piss-poor payoff continues through the rest of the movie. For example, the Mandarin is brought in as a Bin Laden-style terrorist, releasing viral videos of his deeds with messages about America's sins (SUCH AS A REFERENCE TO THE SAND CREEK MASSACRE, as an allegory for the casualties of America's nation-building in Iraq). In the second act, we see that this new interpretation of the Mandarin is just a smokescreen, as he's really just an actor hired by the main villain to distract from his real activities. This is a clever twist that plays on Orientalist fears, but it's ruined by some painfully extended comic relief sequences with actor Mandarin, and then it's completely dropped when the real villain turns out to be just another monologuing jackass, whose speech about the power of anonymity is completely ruined by the fact that he's GIVING A FUCKING SPEECH. What's more, the present-day implications of the genocide against the indigenous Americans are completely dropped, even when there's plenty of appropriate subtext (such as Jim Rhodes/War Machine going on a wild goose chase for the Mandarin while in his new Iron Patriot suit, giving third-world citizens the sight of a red-white-and-blue death machine breaking into their homes and threatening them without warning).

Everything in the movie follows this pattern. The Extremis formula, used in the comics for an interesting exploration of transhumanism (as well as its inventor Maya Hansen, a great example of a once-idealistic scientist corrupted by the military-industrial complex), just serves to make flaming villains here. Tony's compulsive armor-building, a sign of emotional turmoil, turns out to be just the thing needed to save the day in the Obligatory Climax Explosion Orgy. Even the humor scenes fail, because of how scripted they feel. Where Jon Favreau made even the weaker parts of his Iron Man movies entertaining thanks to all the ad-libs, you can tell here that there's a heavier directorial hand, and the situations (such as all the time where Tony fixes his armor with the help of the little kid) show us just how tightly they're sticking to the script and telling us THIS IS FUNNY.

It's all smothered by cliches, robbing it the opportunity to be even an interesting failure. It's not a bad movie, and I don't hold anything against its cast and crew. It's just a mediocre movie clearly ruined by the process of executive meddling, and again, it makes me very grateful I don't have to deal with that shit.

Comic Book Iron Man Vs. Movie Iron Man in the Most One-Sided Fight Ever

(Having a blog devoted to my artist brand didn't work out, so I'm going back to what works; this blog, and writing about things bigger than me)

Overall, the comic version of Iron Man is one of the few superheroes who represents an adult morality, as opposed to an adolescent or even childish one. Tony is a complex man with enough power and influence that everything he does or doesn't do has massive ramifications, and he's fully aware of that fact. His goals are much greater than simply saving the world from villains, so his enemies tend to come across as petty characters despite their destructive capabilities, who are threatened by the fact that Tony can be fiscally successful without Ayn Rand-style opportunism. Even then he's often forced to make hard decisions and do morally ambiguous things, because he's responsible for so many people-- not just in the present, but in the future. Tony Stark's personal problems tend to similarly represent more complex emotional territory than most superheroes, since his fight to lead mankind away from their bad habits towards better choices is represented in his own struggles with addiction (be it alcohol, women, or even just the desire to control everything).

The movie version of Iron Man is less abstract because he's a much simpler and shallower character. He is an overgrown teenager whose activities all stem from what he wants, with the only cases of him actually doing anything altruistic are ultimately self-serving, such as the Stark Expo (which shows no actual inventions, just a vanity project with a lot of sound and fury), or the compulsive armor building (which is just a means of managing his own insecurities with just as much potential for ill as good). Note how all the times Tony actually goes into combat in the movie, it's either a matter of self-defense or vengeance (even in the first movie, he only goes after the terrorists in Yinsen's village). This might be interesting if he were not portrayed as the hero, but instead he's immediately forgiven for his sins because the films demand happy endings. 

If the comic is being rejected, it's being rejected in favor of a sugary Hollywood iteration who can easily overcome his problems to suit the three-act screenplay structure, so that they don't get in the way of the power fantasy that can't hold up to a world of abstractions.

The Ruby Nation Manifesto: All My Blogging Goes Here Now

http://therubynation.blogspot.com

Content will be largely similar, albeit with a bit less bitching, but I wanted to do a daily blog and I wanted to tie it directly into my comic work, so I'm going to write many, many more posts of a shorter nature on there. Please follow me there.

Solestar: Support The Greatest Comic Of 2013!

Go Here To Support Solestar

If there's one comic I'm most excited for in the coming year, it's Solestar. It's currently in the Kickstarter phase, but it deserves your attention and your support.

Writer/creator Siike Donnelly is a friend of mine, who I met first on Facebook and later in person at Golden Apple Comics in Los Angeles. Siike is a survivor of a brain aneurysm, a cerebral eruption that left him severely debilitated. Despite this, he's managed to relearn basic functions that most of us take for granted, such as walking and talking. He's also kept very active in the comics community, having written a few novels, doing a regular Nerd Nation podcast with Gene Hoyle , adopting an adorable stray dog named Echo, and even doing some real-life superheroing.

Usually discussions of people "overcoming" disability are incredibly patronizing, treating the disabled subject as an object of pity, and using the narrative to shame able-bodied/minded people in a way that has the opposite effect (i.e. "this person can't walk but has done so much with their life, therefore you should be able to do even better than this cripple"). They also tend to gloss over the actual challenges of disability by treating them like a super-villain that can be conquered. I'm trying to avoid that here, because I know that Siike struggles on a daily basis, and lives with a lot of pain. His many achievements do not lessen what I know he has to endure, but they do show a man who's become much stronger than most for his hardships. I believe the two defining characteristics of any person are their compassion and their willpower, both of which transcend any physical or cognitive difficulties. Siike has plenty of both.

And Solestar is the culmination of Siike's achievements, a story about a superhero's final days. It's a charity project for the Brain Aneurysm foundation, with all proceeds helping that organization and by extension the people who have suffered that insidious condition. It started as a pitch for a Superman story, but was later reworked into an original character's saga, and came out even stronger for it. And it's got artwork by over 60 people, including yours truly. (Siike gave me a script for a page that was written to my talents, so expect to see a lot of kitties doing kitty things). The artist roster has a wide array of men and women, all of them with unique abilities but each bringing their own voice to the project. There are even some big names in the mix, such as Bill Morrison of Bongo Comics, Sean "Cheeks" Galloway, and Ninja Turtles co-creator Kevin Eastman.

I've read part of the script for this and really want Solestar to be published. Solestar is co-titled "the Naive Project", due to the inherent naiveté of trying to change the world with art and comics. But it's only naive if we let it be naive. Please consider adding some funds to the Kickstarter to bring Siike's story to the entire world.

Here's the link once again.

Possibly the Greatest Image in Internet History

Image by Ian Samson, creator of City of Reality and artist of The Wotch. Commissioned by me, based on Ruby Nation, and worth every single penny.

You're Not Adam Lanza's Mother, You're Just Awful

The entire nation is having difficulties fathoming the events at Sandy Hook Elementary, where a man murdered 27 people (several of whom were little children) with semi-automatic and automatic weapons.  Many are simply speechless, unable to fathom such an insidious act against innocents. Many are very vocal, saying "never again" to a culture who worships guns and makes them so accessible despite all the casualties they facilitate. And, inevitably, some people are using this opportunity to draw attention to themselves. In the case of the so-called "Anarchist Soccer Mom", it's at the expense of her child.

Like too many blogs of mothers who have special needs children, ASM goes on about how hard her life is and how horrible her mentally disabled child is, taking her entire experience and distilling it into a sob story. A critical reader might see two sides to this story, because even if ASM's child is prone to violent outbursts, he's also the victim of a mother who tries to control every aspect of his life down to the color of pants he wears. (She doesn't believe her son belongs in jail, but constant meetings with social workers, an admitted slew of heavy duty medications, and an accelerated school with a heavily restrictive focus are all okay?). However, her position is sympathetic under the circumstances-- or would be, were it not for this line...

"I am sharing this story because I am Adam Lanza’s mother. I am Dylan Klebold’s and Eric Harris’s mother. I am James Holmes’s mother. I am Jared Loughner’s mother. I am Seung-Hui Cho’s mother. And these boys—and their mothers—need help. In the wake of another horrific national tragedy, it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness."

This woman, on a public forum where her real name isn't entirely concealed, compared her child to various mass-murderers who launched pre-meditated plans to murder scores of innocents. Never mind the fact that she admits her son is very personable when he's not in a meltdown state. Or that his worst actions are entirely irrational-- violent kicking and screaming, without the intellectual clarity one would need to successfully aim a firearm. No, her child's pathological defiance makes him the same as the kind of truly evil person who would go through with such a plan.

Her idea of talking about mental illness means stigmatizing everyone who looks like they could be dangerous (whether they are or not), putting them under constant surveillance, and prohibiting them from stepping out of line even slightly-- even if stepping out of line raises a reasonable objection. ASM says she wants God to help us all, especially her son. It seems more likely she wants God to strip her child of his free will, so he cannot object to her-- violently or otherwise. 

It may be easy to talk about guns (getting the small men in power to let go of their large assault weapons being another story), but guns are inanimate objects that can be subject to stringent regulation. Human beings can't be controlled so easily, nor should they. And if you compare your child to a violent killer, you're giving him reasons to actually become a violent killer-- if even his own family won't treat him like a human being.

Fuck you, Anarchist Soccer Mom.

Matt Fraction Iron Man Retrospective: That's It? Hell Yeah It Is

Genre fiction tends not to be the place for subtle, complex emotions. With names like comedy, suspense, drama, and horror, genres in their purest form tend to cater to simpler desires, evoking simple yet visceral emotions if done well. This isn't a bad thing, as that's hard to do in practice and should be lauded when done successfully. However, the best works are the ones that augur more complex feelings, put you in emotional places that are all too real but rarely discussed in our fictional fantasies. This is the difference between, say, anger at a designated foe, and pervasive frustration over a lack of personal progress. A dramatic collapse into addiction followed by a heroic triumph of willpower, versus a realization that those compulsions have just been sublimated into other areas. Or even the difference between a triumphantly happy ending, and an ending where the hero left the world slightly better than he found it-- but only slightly.

Matt Fraction has been doing this with artist Salvador Larroca* on the Invincible Iron Man for four and a half years, taking the character into emotional territories seemingly beyond the scope of the superhero genre. As of October 2012, Fraction finished his tenure on the book with a surprisingly downbeat epilogue. After a penultimate issue of all action, where Iron Man teamed up with pretty much every non-Avenger ally available (and even some enemies) to stop the Mandarin, Tony returned to America after months in his arch-enemy's captivity. What Tony concludes, to his dismay, is that the world hasn't changed much in his absence, still stuck in the past.

Actually, that's not quite true; Tony's friends and colleagues were doing okay without him. Resilient, previously Stark Resilient, became fairly successful without its mega-celebrity founder, using the repuslor technology to make superior consumer goods without a single cent of military funding.Pepper Potts moved on with her life, eventually hooking up with dowdy but reliable Carson Wyche (one of Resilient's star inventors, whose career had previously been ruined by Tony during his decadent and petty pre-Iron Man days) and learning to live without the Rescue armor. The civilian works of Tony Stark continued without him or Iron Man-- his real legacy. But that's not something that Tony can really appreciate, so the only person really stuck in the past is him. Tony's company escaped the Marvel Universe's Nietzche-esque eternal recurrence, and are off doing good if rather dull work by making better, cleaned products that are presumably cheaper. But Tony is stuck in the same cycles of heroes and villains and will never escape them, thanks to the fact that his existence as a Marvel comic character is meant to sell merchandise first.**

The main theme of Fraction's run on Iron Man is the explicit question of wether or not the Iron Man is a good thing. Sure, Tony saves the world as Iron Man, but there are plenty of other superheroes who do that without all of Tony's baggage; who don't sponsor their super-powers with military-industrial blood money, who aren't responsible for thousands of civilian deaths at the hands of Stark weapons, and who aren't so wealthy that they can retreat into their addictions while shirking their responsibilities. Some might even say that Tony's decision to atone for his arms dealing sins as Iron Man served him far more than anyone else, giving him the visceral thrill of being a superhero and catering to his death drive impulses, instead of really cleaning up the Stark-branded messes left on battlefields across the world.

This theme was much easier for Fraction to express at the start of his run, when Tony was the Orwellian ruler of the world as Director of SHIELD. When Tony relapsed into the military-industrial complex full force after the events of Civil War, it was much easier to critique the problems in his imperialistic approach. The first twenty-four issues of the Fraction/Larroca Iron Man fired upon all cylinders, especially during Tony's atonement in World's Most Wanted (which kick-started the Handi-Capable blogging, as some of you may remember). After that it was more uneven, since the Heroic Age led to Tony Stark trying for a more pacifistic approach, which really wasn't condusive to serial superhero comics. (The Stark Resilient arc was particularly egregious, with its first half being entirely set-up for Tony's new company.)

Of course, that may have been the point, because a lot of life-- particularly recovery from addiction-- isn't earth-shattering drama. It's living day-by-day, paying your bills, managing your relationships, and trying to do a little better than you did the previous day. And this doesn't really work for Tony Stark, who risks his life on a daily basis and goes through more women than James Bond. In many ways, Tony still lives an addict's life, even if he's kept himself clean of alcohol; he lives a life of consumption, keeps others at arm's length, is frozen at the emotional maturity of a teenager, and doesn't place any value on his personal safety.*** This isn't really the kind of person you want as a responsible leader for a trusted brand, and when Tony fails, his companies tend to fail with him.

The final chapters, however, did have Tony save the day when nobody else could, by ultimately defeating the Mandarin-- who was quite cleverly played as a twisted mirror of Tony's own conspicuous consumption, a Kim Jong Il-style**** hedonist so obsessed with his self-mythology that he became enslaved by it (what with the rings actually controlling him). Just like in real life, weapons are a necessary evil some times, when you need to defend the just and the innocent. But Iron Man is still a weapon, and tying worship of weapons into the public sphere has grave moral consequences, as Eisenhower (correctly) warned. So this makes the ending, with Tony leaving his company and going off to find new adventures in space, an appropriate if bittersweet conclusion.

One of Tony's final lines to his former employees is "I'll do better next time". So much of fiction deals with character development in very broad strokes, either ignoring it or having characters Learn Lessons and Grow Stronger. Tony isn't a completely different person after all of his experiences in Fraction's stories, nor can one expect him to be. Nor is Resilient poised to dramatically change the world, in the broad "curing cancer and making cars fly" strokes too often shown in science fiction "utopias". They make cleaner cars and cleaner phone batteries. They're helping people live life a little better, and they're offering it to the public in a completely voluntary fashion; you don't choose a Stark phone because of a Dr. Doom-like edict sweeping society, you presumably choose it because it's just a better phone. The world is thus a little better, from this small bit of progress-- which is ultimately the best we can hope for in terms of lasting good. Humans and their societies can't change overnight, nor can they become perfect-- they can just move in the right direction, and that's what Tony's done.

It's a complicated message for a superhero comic, but a very powerful one when fully understood. I'm really going to miss Matt Fraction on Iron Man, and despite some misgivings about certain parts of this story, I have nothing but praise for the sum of those parts.

* Larroca's art deserves special mention, as he became better and better with each issue. His tech is always beautiful and inventive, but his characterizations are also superb; though he's often critiqued for relying too much on photo reference, his art uses such economy of line that those faces get life beyond their original inspiration. I'm going to buy the new Cable and X-Force comic just for his art. And Colossus, of course.
** Which isn't really a bad thing, it just is. This is also why creators who do such brilliant things with the franchise characters deserve special applause.
*** Illustrated beautifully in the .1 issue, where Tony recounts his entire history in the context of an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. If you buy a single issue of Fraction's run, buy Invincible Iron Man 500.1
**** Which is why for a moment I was disappointed that Ben Kingsley was cast as the Mandarin in Iron Man 3, because I would've gone with the Kim Jong Il puppet from Team America World Police :P