The Manhattan Projects #9

[superboyprime]

The Manhattan Projects team interrogates the FDR artificial intelligence about his fellow members of the Illuminati.



The Manhattan Projects team kills off the Illuminati.

Comments

[leoboiko]

The more I see this comics, the more I want a realistic/historical one.

[mrstatham]

'I create a new world'.

No, you bastardise a bunch of existing historical figures. By giving them these historical identities, it becomes genuinely insulting; I don't need to see a depiction of JFK whose personal flaws were apparently foisted on him by a secret society when I know full well in real life that JFK was a guy with boatloads of ambition in terms of his politics but was very, very flawed in his personal life. I can't WAIT until Hickman gets to his depiction of Nixon, who I'm sure will be incredibly, farcically over the top and on the nose.

[sadoeuphemist]

I don't know why you're talking this as insulting when it's so obviously fictionalized and not even remotely related to the truth. It's not like anyone will believe that FDR got made into an evil AI and then think less of the actual FDR for it.

Like, how do you feel about stuff like Atomic Robo, where Edison releases Rasputin's ghost on Tesla; or any comic with Hitler in it; or how Vandal Savage was supposedly Genghis Khan; or any of literally thousands of other examples where a historical figure shows up in an obviously fictionalized work.

[mrstatham]

Because it's misappropriating the identities of these people. I just generally dislike the concept of taking established people and basically mutilating their backgrounds and the people they actually were to fit these concepts. Again, if it's 'so obviously fictionalised', why do these particular people need to be invoked? I also just generally dislike Hickman's one-trick-pony act of 'this is how X ACTUALLY happened'.. And I just don't like stuff like this in general. There's too much weight behind the actual stories of these people - the kind of people that were part of the real life Manhattan Project - for me to see them butchered into a standard, dull as dishwater conspiracy plot.

[sadoeuphemist]

So how do you feel about Atomic Robo, etc., etc.? Artists use the identities of famous individuals because exist not just as historical figures, but as icons, figureheads, sets of ideas and mythologies that have crystallized around them. George W. Bush's image can serve as a political and historical figure, or it can be used as a caricature used to mock a set of government and politics that aren't even necessarily directly tied to him.

Likewise, the Cold War can be used as a backdrop to tell stories about man's quest for scientific progress contrasted with government intervention and the possibility of mass death and destruction, without having anything to do with the actual events of the Cold War.

Again, this is like a major thing that is done in practically every medium. All historical figures have incredible weight behind them, do you object to like, Shakespeare's 'historical' plays or the use of historical figures in comics or whatever. Historical accuracy isn't always the important part.

[mrstatham]

Well, I've not read Atomic Robo, so I can't really comment. I also don't really tend toward - at least, not to my knowledge - stuff that does this kind of thing, and perhaps I just haven't dug deep enough into the concept, but I know I just actively dislike the way Hickman's doing this. Hypocritically, I love Ian McKellen's take on Richard III, but.. Well, I'm a human being, and I'm allowed to contradict myself.

When it comes to stuff like the Cold War, though, I actively prefer say, Dr Strangelove, where the concept they're taking potshots at is incredibly clear but they just don't feel the need to invoke actual people. Perhaps what it breaks down to for me, though, is that I just don't think Hickman is doing this particularly well, or that I just wish he'd treat these figures with what I'd consider to be a little more respect.

[darkknightjrk]

I don't know if I personally would call it "insulting," but I do think the whole trend of taking historical figures and turning them into "badass" anti-heroes is starting to really wear out it's welcome, and since that's basically the only thing that The Manhattan Projects has going for it...

[halloweenjack]

I think that it's a function of both how recent the historical figure is and how well they're being used. As far as the former, the figures you cite were born in the nineteenth century or earlier, and simply aren't as well documented as those born in the twentieth or close to it. (Even Hitler's early life, aside from official records and a few photographs, comes down to a combination of guesswork, speculation, and trying to figure out the extent to which anything he says in Mein Kampf is true.) Feynman, von Braun, Oppenheimer and the others are considerably better-documented, often by themselves. If I'd gone to Caltech, I could have attended lectures by Feynman. The use of historical figures who lived within the scope of living memory has to hew to a higher standard; even if considerable liberties are taken with them, there has to be something of their essence if you're really going to use them.

And that's where this series fails. These characters not only don't act like the historical figures that they are named after, they don't even particularly look like them; only Einstein is even recognizable, and that's because literally anyone can draw Einstein. (You draw a jagged line in a semicircle, then draw a shorter jagged straight line underneath it for the mustache. Congratulations, you're a cartoonist.) If you're not even going to take advantage of the copious documentation of the complex and often contradictory personalities and histories of the actual people, then why use their names? Because you'll get a certain number of people who will buy the book because they're so enchanted by the idea of Einstein as some sort of science wizard that they won't even notice that it's not done very well.

[sadoeuphemist]

No, I don't think so, you'll notice that later on I use George W. Bush as an example. Heck, let's get even more current: a story starring Barrack Obama is probably not going to be a account of the historical Obama, the person Obama. He appears on comic book covers to shake the superhero's hand, serving to symbolize the comic's relevance to current events, that the comic book publishers are modern and with it and so on. His actual polices as president are irrelevant to the book. Conversely, he also serves as a boogeyman of elitism, socialism, an illegal immigrant usurper, etc.

Take Steven Weismann's Barrack Hussein Obama, a surrealist account of Obama's life. Obama pretends to be a tree, he talks about the Jonas Brothers and Teen Vogue, he talks to demons and watches Joe Biden shoot lasers out of his eyes. He doesn't act at all like the historical figure Barrack Obama because that's not the point. Because even though he is a living figure whose history is more readily available to us, Obama's main use in fiction is as an icon to symbolize a whole spectrum of American hopes and neuroses and absurdities.

[halloweenjack]

But your description of the stories in which Obama appears says nothing about whether or not they're any good. I can see someone writing a surreal/magic-realistic version of Obama to symbolize how much mythmaking there has been surrounding him on the part of both his admirers and detractors. But that version of the "character" has to compete with all the other versions, not to mention that created by Obama himself in his memoirs, and that's the standard against which they'd be judged. At the very least, they should have something interesting to say regarding their subject. Otherwise it's just sticking familiar names onto generic cartoon characters for the sake of getting a few extra sales.

Nothing that I've seen of this book, nothing at all, has shown that it has the least interesting little bit to say about any of the real-life counterparts. I wouldn't trade any random chapter of Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman for this, or Hickman's entire bibliography, frankly. For a guy who spends an awful lot of time writing about real scientists (between this and his SHIELD book) and fictional ones, he doesn't seem to have much appreciation for what they're really like.

[sadoeuphemist]

And your advocacy for historical fact says nothing about whether the end result is any good or not. I can cram together a bunch of historical facts into a really shitty and confusing biography, a series of dates and facts that goes nowhere. Neither option is inherently any better than the other.

I don't believe historical fact is the standard. That's not how symbolism works. If I use an apple as a symbol of the fall of man, I don't need to compare that to the biological, botanical apple. That would just be dumb.

[halloweenjack]

I'm not sure why you keep returning to the claim that I'm some sort of "advoca[te] for historical fact", when my previous comment makes it quite clear that I'm not. I'm saying that the historical record is part of the body of stories about these people against which future stories can and should be judged. TMP is a shitty story about Feynman, and part of the criteria of judging it so (although not the only one, and maybe not even the most important one) are the other stories about Feynman, many of which are told by Feynman himself. It's not even the best comic book story told about him, or anywhere in the same league.

[sadoeuphemist]

No it's not! People don't judge stories that way! When I read Obama's autobiography, I am not in my head comparing it to Obama's appearance in Spider-man issue whatever. When I read a news story about Obama, I don't immediately judge it against Obama's autobiography, or the Barack the Barbarian comic book, or a skit about Obama on SNL. No one compares stories that way! Because these are all different genres, trying to achieve different things, and there's no reason to compare them just because they're about the same subject.

I compare a news story about Obama to other news stories, which don't necessarily have to be Obama. I compare SNL skits to other parody skits. I compare goofy comic books with other goofy comic books. Your method leads to some sort of insane world where The Cat in the Hat and the musical Cats are somehow in competition for 'best portrayal of felines'.

[halloweenjack]

Again, no, because the Cat in the Hat and the cats in Cats are different characters. And, sorry to contradict your worldview, but I do compare the real Obama against the SNL sketch version (and Fred Armisen's version, in particular, was quite lacking, especially as Obama himself was on the show before he was elected). Other people in this very thread have judged this particular story this way, and in previous threads on the book. Your insistence otherwise, frankly, makes me not want to try to engage you in further discussion(s).

[sadoeuphemist]

No duh that you judge an impressionist against the real thing. I would judge a Feynman impressionist against the real thing too. But you don't judge Fred Armisen's version against Barrack the Barbarian, or Steven Weismann's Obama, or the Obama guest starring in Spider-man, or even the Obama in his autobiography, because even Obama writing in his own words won't have the same verbal tics and mannerisms that Armisen is trying to mimic.

Explain to me what the point is in comparing every version of a character with one another. Why would you want to compare a comic impressionist with a barbarian adventure comic with a surrealist comic with an autobiography, just because Obama happens to be in all of them? Why is history your standard, instead of biology? How is comparing a children's book with a Broadway musical with actual feline behavior any different?

[halloweenjack]

You keep trying to win this argument by throwing up straw men. It's getting fairly ridiculous, and I'm not sure why you're dragging it out unless you're one of these people who thinks that they "win" simply by doing so until the other person gets tired of you and gives up.

This isn't a good book. The shabby way in which it uses real historical figures is one of its many faults.

[sadoeuphemist]

I'm not trying to strawman you, I legitimately can't understand why on earth you feel how you do. Look, in your first post you say that the use of historical figures in recent memory has to hew to a higher standard, because we have more available information about them. Think about it, why on earth are we obligated to hew closer to a person the more information we have? The only logical conclusion is that we are trying to reproduce that person precisely as they are, and that any deviation from that is automatically a flaw. But then later you say you're not an advocate for historic fact, so I don't know what your point is.

Even then, your position doesn't make sense. Sure, there are gaps in the historical record, but you don't need detailed first hand accounts to know that Edison definitely didn't unleash Rasputin's ghost on Tesla, or that Hitler definitely wasn't killed by the Human Torch, or that Genghis Khan definitely wasn't an immortal caveman. These are deliberate and major distortions to historical figures, done purposely and not borne out of ignorance like you suggested. Why are you willing to give them a pass while condemning Hickman?

You said you can't compare the Cat in the Hat to the musical because they're different characters. The real life Feynman is also a different character from the person in Hickman's work! Hickman's Feynman lives in an entirely different universe with entirely different rules of physics with an entirely different set of experiences. The Superman of Earth-One can have team ups and crossovers with the Superman of Earth-Two, because they're two different characters with the same name.

[halloweenjack]

The real life Feynman is also a different character from the person in Hickman's work!

Then why did Hickman name the character "Richard Feynman"?

[sadoeuphemist]

Holy shit, I can't believe you were the one accusing me of arguing disingenuously when you ignore all my points in favor of a snide one-liner.

He named him Richard Feynman because he's telling a goofy sci-fi version of the Manhattan Project+Space Race+Cold War, and populated it with goofy sci-fi versions of all the people involved.

Now, why are we obligated to hew closer to a person the more information we have on them, unless accurate historical reproduction is our goal? And why were you willing to give a pass to my other examples of Edison and Tesla and so on?

[halloweenjack]

You can take this discussion to email if you really want to continue it, but I've already answered these points upthread. Now you're really just trying to get the last word in, and if that's what you're after, go ahead.

[mrosa]

Hickman's smugness is disgusting! What new worlds? Most of his work is based on other people's properties, and TMP is heavily based on existing people and ideas. Not to mention I've yet to seen anything by him that is truly outre by mainstream standards.