Bendis is breaking his hand patting himself on the back for the reaction he's gotten from "thin-skinned" reviewers and journalists.
Here's an example:
The un-ironic way in which thin-skinned reviewers got mad at me for wondering why reviewers are so thin skinned is probably my favorite thing ever
So...in calling for less snark and more thoughtful reviews and hard journalism, he's made broad, uninformed generalizations and focusing most of his effort on jabbing insults at his targets. He gave so little time and effort in composing his thoughts on the matter that he's having to spend a lot of time...criticizing others for not seeming to comprehend what he said. He knew so little about what is actually out there that it wasn't long into his starting the "discussion" that he was presented with a laundry list of examples that satisfied exactly what, in theory, he was looking for (only in theory, because, as previously stated, he's largely looking for long-form, verbal fellatio from reviewers).
When even the creators supposedly calling for deeper stuff from comic book "journalists" are doing so through trading in the same snark that the readership seems to respond to (as evidenced by hits and their own snarky comments that hurt the po' widdle feewings of big time writers), can you seriously expect a productive discourse? Or respect the creator who is essentially saying we should get off the momma jokes because he just got off of yours?
(1. Yes, I know that continuing to talk about this in aggravated fashion feeds what amounts to trolling from him. 2. I know that isn't Bendis in the picture. 3. I like a lot of his work and actually like HIM whenever I see him speak about the medium at conventions, rather than his online antics. 4. I'm sure there are people who know me that have said they like me more when we hang out than they like my online antics.)
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I like your online antics, Kevin :)
ReplyDeleteWhatever happened to Powers? One minute it's one of my favorite books every month, the next it's got an 11 month wait between issues. Now it's off my pull list completely, along with all his other titles (Secret Invasion was the final nail in his Marvel coffin for me).
When I got back in to comics in 2003 or so after a 7 year lay off, I devoured most of Bendis' mainstream stuff...but as Kentendo says, Secret Invasion helped convince me to drop a WHOLE lot of books....
ReplyDeleteI find Bendis' writing almost as painful as the 1970's "each issue might be somebody's first" mentality....the "realistic" pauses, the ban on word balloons (or worse, trite word balloons worse than the "spoken" dialog)...and Secret Invasion was not fun to look at, art wise, and NOTHING happened in the whole series....no, wait, Mockingbird is back.
Heh, thanks, Kentendo.
ReplyDeleteYou both underscore my biggest problems with his rant about this subject:
1. It seems more like he is lamenting the lack of long form criticism that puts his work up on a pedestal. He assumes it doesn't exist because the hits generated from vapid snark have driven it away, rather than his work not rising to that level of late. I read Scarlet #1 & #2 because I knew I'd enjoy it either due to his creative rebound or the schadenfreude of watching someone fail miserably due to believing their own hype. I'd have preferred the rebound, but still got my money's worth.
2. It would appear that the "I don't care how much you're getting paid, do it for the love" isn't supposed to apply to him. In fairness, he's not the whole team on Powers. But for him or a creator he respects a great deal, once you've established that you can get paid for doing something, the amount you get paid should really effect the kind of effort you put into it. Pretty sure that missed delivery dates were chalked up to the better paying work having to take priority, rather than taking the attitude of "we solicited for a date, so our professionalism in meeting that date shouldn't be swayed by how little we make for it".