Three #2

[arbre_rieur]

'Basically, a story about everything relating to Sparta which is left out of pro-Spartan descriptions. You know, all the things which made Hitler think of Sparta as his model of a racialist state.

'It's an equal and opposite response to the view of Sparta presented by "300."' -- Kieron Gillen







Three Helot slaves have killed their Spartan masters and fled. Now word of this has reached Sparta.







So Kleomenes is ordered to lead the hunt for the three slaves.

Comments

[drmcninja]

Doesn't it kind of miss the point to counter incorrect history with more incorrect history, just in the opposite direction? Wouldn't the best counter be actually accurate portrayals?

[xamda]

But then Kieron Gillen couldn't be insufferably smug about it!

Sparta was a kingdom in the past. They had slaves. Everyone else did to. The people there had very different ideals than people do today. The end.

[grazzt]

Even by the standards of slave-holding cultures, the Spartans were pretty bad. I mean, how many other cultures organized the murder of their slaves, for no reason at all?

[xamda]

Oh, I'm not defending them. They brutally oppressed the helot population because they vastly outnumbered them. This comic, however, suffers from the same things 300 does. You can't fix an overly simplified, super aggressive portrayal of an entire culture with... basically more of the same.

[sadoeuphemist]

Of course you can. This isn't an argument over the historical Spartans - I doubt anyone thinks Miller's 300 was anywhere close to historically accurate. It's an argument over the values represented by the Spartans in our modern culture. Miller says Spartans were badass because they culled the weak and were macho manly men, Gillen says those values are going to leave your culture fucked up.

[shadur]

Look up the ancient honored samurai tradition of Kirisute sometime.

[mrstatham]

I don't see what's 'insufferably smug' about pointing out that 300 was a ridiculously macho, testosterone-ridden mess, and providing a story that's more palatable and undoubtedly more accurate.

Also, just because they're 'in the past', doesn't mean it isn't a story to tell. Slavery was, still is, a huge part of some people's lives. Ideals aren't that different. Miller used the Spartans to tell a dumbass, gung-ho, utterly silly analogy for the War on Terror. Gillen has his own story to tell that doesn't excuse the bullshit they pulled in favour of just presenting them as white knights who paraded off to save the day.

[xamda]

300 was printed in 1998, so I'm not sure it's Millar's take on the War on Terror (We have the insufferable 'Holy Terror' for that!)

I still think it's unfair to judge a two and a half millennia old culture through modern, western eyes.

[mrstatham]

But then the Middle East was a perceived problem at various points prior to 9/11. Al Qaeda just never became a public name until that point.

Also, we use stuff like philosophy, art, culture, strategy and the like from that period, or at least appreciate it, and it drastically influenced western culture. There's no reason that they shouldn't be looked at with particular standards. Otherwise, we should just excuse slavery in America and so on because that's two hundred years old and not modern culture.

[wizardru]

Al Qaeda was a public name after the 1993 bombings...they were just considered a fringe group at that time. Timothy McVeigh made everyone forget about them, though, and homegrown terror was more of a concern for years (see the Michigan Militia, others).

300 is many things, but I don't think Miller intended it as a polemic on the Middle East, so much as his love affair with the story of the 300. There are references to it as far back as The Dark Knight Returns in 1988 and multiple references in Sin City.

No, Frank Miller's truly hateful transformation came after 2001, when his long simmering fear from being mugged in the early 1980s finally found an outlet in hating muslims.

[mrstatham]

I think you're right, but it is generally very difficult for me to disassociate the book from the film, which was made post-9/11, of course, and does feel like some kind of weird analogy. It might just be me, but.. I still think the seeds of whatever the fuck Miller was doing with Holy Terror are very much there in 300. *shrugs* that's all. I know Miller basically had a mad hard-on for the Spartans after seeing one of the older movies (probably about as factually accurate as 300) when he was younger, but still..

[wizardru]

Oh, I think you're right, there. The movie almost certainly had those elements in them and I agree, Miller definitely had those elements floating about in his psyche, perhaps unconsciously, when he wrote some of his previous work. Really, a large problem with Miller's work in general is later knowledge now informs and recontextualizes the older stuff.

In short, knowing Miller is a hateful asshole now changes my perception of his writing and intentions THEN. Which is highly disappointing to me, since I really enjoyed some of his old work when it was the new hotness back in the 1980s. Now it just feels...not good.

[mrstatham]

I definitely agree, as much as I know it's slightly unfair to use my perception of the man now to judge his work from back then.. But maybe I'm not the best judge anyway; I do, after all, actively prefer DKSA to DKR.

[mrosa]

The things we appreciated about that period has been kept alive by us, what we find horrible has been consigned to the dustbin of history. Western culture is against slavery these days, what other evidence do you need that we look at it with particular standards? If we didn't, we'd still be practising it. We just don't obsess over those points we don't want anymore.

[benuben]

But idealising it is okay?

[doodleboy]

Kieron actually does spend alot of time creating a nuanced view of Spartan culture... I'd almost say too much time. As of issue 3 there are two more issues left and we know very little of the three Helots running away.

[q99]

This looks closer to accurate than 300 did.

[kurenai_tenka]

Interesting, thanks for posting!

[shadowpsykie]

hmmm interesting.... the "Boy lovers" comment in the original 300 always... bothered me... i was like "ummm pot? meet kettle"

[damar148]

I love Tyrtaios's suspicious look when questioning the king who is better in bed

[shadowpsykie]

heh i also love how the king avoided the question lol

[mrstatham]

Yeah, but then we couldn't have like, some kind of uncomfortable allegory for the War on Terror going on if there was implications that the Spartans were, god forbid, bisexual in 300. Because that hedonistic bullshit is clearly for the freakish, monstrous Persians and those that would be easily lured rather than, you know, the utterly straight, chiseled, heroic Spartans.

*eye-rolls so freaking hard at Miller and Snyder*

[benuben]

Yeah, what was up with that comment anyway? It doesn't make sense even (hell, ESPECIALLY) if we use the unreliable narrator excuse.

Didn't Miller make a Sin City story about a lesbian avenging her former lover?

[mrstatham]

But lesbians are hot so it's excusable. Being a gay/bisexual man can't possibly be manly. Fact.





I am, of course, entirely not serious and don't mean any insult, since I know how internet tone can be.

[leoboiko]

Mysteriously enough, there's a male gay couple portrayed positively in Sin City: Hell and Back (the Captain and Jerry). And they're manly soldiers and all. Cap gets fridged, but still.

[starwolf_oakley]

There a graphic novel called "Marathon" that also tweaks the nose of the Spartan legend. A character calls the Spartans "brutal apes" if I remember correctly.

[superfangirl1]

Really awesome scans.

[wizardru]

I find it funny that one penalty is to have 'half their moustaches shaved', not because that isn't a penalty (hair style and grooming being a powerful thing in many cultures), but that I think I only see only one character in these scans who actually has a moustache. Lots of beards of different kinds, but no moustaches (other than some stubble).