NoScans: Video: The Killing Joke Movie and The Problem With Comics

[reveen]

So, uh, there's this Youtube guy called hbomberguy...

I don't know how to start threads.

Anyway, this guy did a video on the Killing Joke movie and why it's bad and how Alan Moore inadvertently helped kill comics. I thought it'd be interesting to post for obvious reasons.

"The Killing Joke Movie and The Problem With Comics" (Watch on YouTube)

Though what he does say that I haven't heard anyone say before is how the adaptation ignores a hell of a lot of the stuff that made the Killing Joke feel alive and interesting, and how Liefeldian sparse, nonexistent backgrounds are really fucking shitty for a comic and not just bad art. Background detail can really add a lot to a work.

He talks about this subject in other videos, and it's something I've been noticing in media in general. I recently replayed Chrono Trigger and noticed how the pixel thin strings in Marle's crossbow thwip when she fires it.Or watching a Jackie Chan movie and seeing how there's a clear rythym to the kicks and punches that don't exist in a lot of less awesome American action movies.

TL;DR details are hella important.

Comments

[richardak]

Okay, first of all, was there actually a character named Mrs. Sexdeath? Because that's actually hilarious. I also thought he was kind of unfair by including Dreamslayer in that list. Granted, Dreamslayer, like all the extremists, was a--oh, let's be nice and say homage to a Marvel character, in Dreamslayer's case Dormammu, but he ended up being a great villain for the JLE in his own right. I didn't like that they brought him back, as I felt that that really cheapened Silver Sorceress' self-sacrifice to stop him, but until then, he was a cool villain and featured in some great stories. (If they had also brought Silver Sorceress back on the theory that they were linked such that neither could ever really die as long as the other one was alive in some form, that could have been cool.) He was not just another generic gritty badass.

Anyway, nitpicking out of the way, let me say that I agreed with just about everything he had to say in this video, but let me also defend what he is criticizing. I did not like Liefeld's work in the nineties, or the whole Image style of that period; I recall being the only person in my high school who was into comics who was not into that, but never mind. I would certainly agree that Liefeld's work was at a low level of technical accomplishment, and that it was derivative. That last one I barely regard as a criticism though, since just about all art is derivative (Watchmen is certainly derivative, and if you think that the Killing Joke was the first story ever to explore the idea that there is a thin line separating the mad from the sane, or that the hero can all to easily become like the monster he fights, then have I got a reading list for you). That does not mean that it was worthless. Liefeld's art style managed to convey as sense of dynamism and motion that really did provide a breath of fresh air in a medium that had been static in both senses of the term.

His seemingly endless supply of generic gritty badasses was answering a legitimate and understandable need in the audience. The nineties was the period when the power of the Comics Code Authority finally collapsed; it had been crumbling for some time, but as late as the eighties, it still wielded real influence. That ended, once and for all, in the nineties. It was inevitable that the pendulum would swing far in the other direction. Comics had been kept artificially childlike for too long, so it should hardly be surprised that the adolescent rebellion, when it came, should go to extremes. While it is certainly true that much of what was produced during this period was forgettable, low-quality, follow-the-leader junk, that has been true in every era. The Golden Age of comics? Most of what was made then, including a lot of characters that are now viewed as classics, was forgettable, derivative, low-quality, etc. There was a a reason only a couple of superheroes survived the end of the Golden Age.

It is also true that the Dark Age of comics produced a lot of great work that is remembered fondly to this day. I began with an example that a lot of people misremember: the Justice League International. A lot of people think that this was a countercultural work because it was lighthearted and funny in an age of grim-and-gritty. Not so. The JLI was funny, yes, but it was not light. Quite the contrary: I would submit that it was actually very dark, especially considering that the Justice League is DC's flagship team book and one of the two most prominent team books in superhero comics (the other being, of course, the Avengers). If you don't believe me, go back and read the Breakdowns arc, the original Extremists arc, either of the Grey Man arcs, any of the Despero stories, either death of Wandjina, the Global Guardians arc, or, well, I could go on, but would there be any point? It was funny, but it was not light. I could list other examples besides the Justice League, but the point is that there was a fair amount of great work done in that period, and a huge volume of journeyman-level good work too. Saying that Moore, Miller, et al. ruined comics because some of the imitators they inspired were bad is rather like saying that Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster ruined comics because some of the imitators they inspired were bad. Sorry for the long post.

[locuatico]

Here is my counter-argument to Liefield: Yes. when he started, he was a breath of fresh air. His art was unique and it had a certain... personality.

And while i may laugh at how poorly drawn something like Youngblood #1 was, i admit that was because he was still an amateur and he still needed to refine his craft (I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that the first Captain America Comic can't even compare to Jack Kirby's later work).

HOWEVER, he NEVER refined his craft nor he tried to iron out the flaws in his art. If anything, they only became more overt with time, which is a problem when you are also the guy everyone tries to imitate. So while it allowed for the medium to move from the static stage it was in (altough i would argue it had been moving already before Liefield came ot the picture), it was only to set it in a different static stage filled with nineties tropes.

I can accept that he was popular because his art was unique and it offered a breath of fresh air. But that doesn't make it worthwhile, either.

[richardak]

I have no problem with that. My goal is not to defend Liefeld qua Liefeld. It is true that he never really refined his work. When you become an overnight success and everyone is trying to imitate you, that is often what happens. As for whether his art was worthwhile, he tapped into something that the audience was desperately craving and changed the medium; I think there is something worthwhile in that.

[locuatico]

I disagree. i think other more talented artists were already tapping that which audiences wanted while also giving them what they needed, but his artwork overshadowed them all and the big two even made everyone try to imitate him, thus changing the medium, but not actually pushing it forward in any way (thus, not necessarily making it worthwhile, either).

Early Sandman, for example, already had signs of that which people claimed was so unique in Liefield... except without the flaws AND it was published before Liefield became popular.
What i am trying to say is that Liefield wasn't the force that changed the medium. the change had begun before Liefield, but Liefield was the reason it became what made the nineties so infamous.

[richardak]

Was that why Sandman was such a huge blockbuster hit? With any important artist, you can almost always point to precursors who were doing similar things earlier. From what I recall (which may be altogether wrong), the art in Sandman wasn't doing that, but by all means post some scans.

[locuatico]

In part? yes. The art is an important part of any comic.

Granted, the stuff I am talking is sublte (the over the top toxic masculinity was nowhere to be seen, for starters), but stuff like some of the demons in issue #4 had some of the same design traits that would become common well into the Dark Age and some of the grotesque imagery. Likewise, the more grotesque imagery, while not unheard of before Sandman, was still pretty uncommon when Sandman came out only for that to change with the dark age.

And yes, you can always point to precursors to famous artists. I wasn't implying that the fact there were precursors meant Liefield did not influence the medium. My point is that they were doing it better and liefield's work had a negative effect on what other artists were trying to build.

[domino_blue]

I do agree with some of the thoughts in this video. I will say though I wished he focused on the main topic of the video instead of going on the usual "the 90" killed comics screed. It's so much more complicated that Alan Moore and Frank Miller happened.

and....sigh I still like the Killing Joke, does it have problems? Yeah but so does every story I still find it to be a solid work and without it Barbara Gordon would not such a major character and talking point. I have very complicated feelings about the work.

[locuatico]

SFDebris made a great video explaining how it was a much more complex issue than "Frank Miller and Alan Moore wrote good stories. chaos ensues": http://sfdebris.com/videos/special/comic.php

As a personal nitpick, i HATE the "Comics are dead/dying" when the person is specifically talking about AMERICAN comics. Ignoring for a momento how huge the manga industry is... European comics are a thing and they are not any worse because of the nineties.
Granted, i don't think most people who discuss this are implying or even believe that the entire medium worldwide was ruined because of it, but it is something that bothers me.

[starwolf_oakley]

YOUNGBLOOD: JUDGEMENT DAY does have Alan Moore doing a bit of a retrospective on where superhero comics went after WATCHMEN and DARK KNIGHT RETURNS were published. It isn't quite "My God, what have I done?" But he sees where his work led people.

[mrstatham]

I feel like the guy's getting Darkhawk and Shadowhawk confused. Which.. Irritates me more than it should. I also find the.. Humour a bit grating? Like some of the cuts to a wildly different tone and energy are very Jontron-esque, only Jon typically carries his videos with an energy and demeanour that means the *SUDDEN LOUD MOMENTS* aren't quite as jarring.

I'm at least glad someone else pointed out the issues visually I have with TKJ as an adaptation, in that there isn't.. Nearly enough of Bolland's style or his and Moore's attention to detail in there. Bolland's style just sells the story, be it the grotesqueness of Barbara's treatment, the ugly, horrible pride on Joker's face when Batman arrives at the funfair, and as highlighted, the funhouse mirrors sequence. It's a shame, because Hamill and Conroy are strong contenders for best takes on these characters *ever*, and I felt they were almost wasted here.

Also, oh my fucking God, is Stan Lee sassy in that video. There's something hilariously underhanded and 'fuck you' about "A Liefeld character without shoulderpads is almost naked".

[commodus]

It's so terribly disrespectful when people use terms like "So-and-so killed comics". Because this narrow mined nostalgia, this sense that comics just aren't as good anymore, is so dismissive of the great writers and artists who continue to tell amazing stories - only to be ignored, because some fool wants their childhood back.
I just can't stand it. Enjoy the here and now. Give writers and artists the respect of actually reading their damn stories before proclaiming that an entire artistic medium has been "killed".
Awful.

[tcampbell1000]

At this point, it's more than a little dated and hipsterish to still be saying this stuff about the 1990s. In 1997 or so, it was halfway plausible, if you buy into the highly limited concept of "comics" as "floppy superhero paperbacks," because the market was imploding and attempts to reach new demographics (like g-g-g-GIRLS) ranged from doomed to nonexistent.

But a lot's happened in twenty years. Now it's like those guys who say "music died with Presley on the toilet in '77, man."

[owlbrigade1]

Yeah. Clearly music died when the plane with Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper went down, Presley? That was a copycat hack.

I want to make it clear that was a joke and I actually am agreeing with you, just in case there was anyone who 100% did think that was the day the music died. :P

[laughing_tree]

Thank you, both of you, for articulating better than I ever could why this attitude's always bugged me.

Additionally, some of those examples of writers who were badly imitated are downright weird. Mark Waid? Art SPIEGELMAN? Did I somehow miss the spate of superficial MAUS clones that beset mainstream comicdom?

[lb_lee]

Yeah, I mean, I'm a geek with fondness for some of the self-pub B/Ws of the late 80s through 90s... but let's be real here, indy comics is in an AMAZING time of revival and revolution right now! I love it so much! I know for a FACT that I would NOT have been able to be in the industry back then, and neither would a bunch of my friends, without the convenience of the Internet bringing all us trans people together.

(Seriously. Not even gay newspapers would take us, it seems. Fuckin' DC IMPRINTS took us first! That's just SAD.)

[reveen]

While I agree that the 'killed comics' stuff is pretentious and not at all correct, I will defend it on the basis that that a lot of the practices learned during the 90s have been slow to die. The current obsession of pushing big crossover titles is a somewhat different trend, but there's some overlap due to how many of these crossovers are trying to be all Watchmenish and shit. And while they're not going to kill comics. I don't think it's going to do the industry any favours if it doesn't let up.

We're still seeing echoes of the same practices continue on and on decades later, and if turns out to be a poison, it would have been a slow-acting one.

[doctor_spanky]

"Make comic books great again"

[thatnickguy]

Copy/pasting my post on his channel:

Thing is, Alan Moore or Rob Liefeld didn't kill comics. Image was ridiculously popular in the 90s. They broke the mold on how to sell and promote comics. Certainly, many companies tried doing that dark, edgy storytelling like Watchmen or Dark Knight Returns. Other companies missed the point that what made those stories great was the deep narrative and complex characters. You're right on that point.

But what really killed comics in the 90s was the speculator market. You had Marvel and especially DC putting out these big, shocking events where they'd kill off a major character and replace them with someone else. Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Spider-Man (the Clone Saga), Wonder Woman. These big events would always rocket those titles to the top of best seller's lists.

But then you had speculators looking at all the shiny #1 issues that Image would pump out. They figured the first issue of a comic would be worth something one day. So they wouldn't just buy one, they'd buy SEVERAL copies of the same #1 issue, and then usually promptly ignore the rest of the series. So those series would quickly tank and be canceled, making all those #1s worthless. So companies went out of their way to make those #1s even more special with odd foil-enhanced covers.

I think lumping the entirety of the 90s is unfair, too. The late 90s had a resurgence in brighter, more optimistic superheroes. Grant Morrison's JLA, Kurt Busiek & George Perez's Avengers, Warren Ellis and John Cassady's' excellent Planetary, Mark Waid and Alex Ross' Kingdom Come. They were all published within the late 90s, largely in response to the dark, ultra-violent heroes.

In fact, today, comics are better than ever. Image puts out so many quality books that my wallet begs for mercy (Saga, Elephantmen, Chew, anything by Brubaker & Phillips, I Hate Fairyland, Walking Dead, Sex Criminals). DC & Marvel are still focused on grabbing newspaper headlines with events, but a few of their books are relatively self-contained from all the events (Hawkeye, Ms Marvel, Vision, DC's Young Animal imprint). Readership is nowhere near what it was in the 80s or 90s, but the market is doing better since the crash.

[owlbrigade1]

I think what killed the late 1990s resurgence was 9/11. Or at least the political response to it. Suddenly it was held as proof positive everything good was a lie, hope was false, and only hate and violence could exist in our world so by God it had better be American hate and violence. That was what gave the then fading grimdark its second wind. It has taken fifteen years, but we are slowly getting back to where we were immediately pre-9/11; pop culturally speaking at least.

[thatnickguy]

Yeah, I can definitely agree with that. After 9/11, a lot of people didn't WANT optimism. They wanted heroes that would be willing to take it to the next level. I think that explains why The Ultimates did as well as it did.

Although, you saw a bit of that hyper-realism a little before 9/11. The Authority was HUGE when it first came out, to the point that it completely overshadowed the better book, Planetary.

[mrstatham]

To be fair, The Authority was more about that big, 'widescreen style' approach to stories. Kind of a James Cameron sort of approach; there's intelligence there, for sure, but the visuals and explosions tend to drown things out. I don't know as it was so much hyper-realism as more Hitch using his style to invoke those kinds of movies.

The Ultimates, of course, was Millar attempting to lampshade post-9/11 America and.. Kind-of failing. Yes, he pointed out the Ultimates invaded other countries illegally, and that they were all terrible, damaged people, but.. There was still an international conspiracy against America and a Norse god manipulating things, so it was just.. Kind-of half-hearted.

[thatnickguy]

That's true about Authority. Ellis at least brought more goods to it than Millar's approach.

I think Ultimates had more to it at points. Their first fight with Hulk was treated like a disaster. They had a mourners memorial after, which was similar to 9/11 (and school shootings).

But you're right. Most of it falls flat. With a better writer who could handle more nuances, it'd work better.

[laughing_tree]

I think Kurt Busiek put it best: When he first became a fan, people would read books they didn't personally like but that they acknowledged were high quality. It didn't matter that the book wasn't to their tastes and they didn't actually enjoy it; it's being well-crafted was significant enough alone to warrant being on the pull list. That's how small the industry was, that people could afford to do this. Today, in contrast, there are so many comics being published that, even if you only stick to books you'd genuinely enjoy, you wouldn't have *time* to read them all.

Like you say, it's a better time to be a comics fan than ever before. Objectively. Barring nostalgia blinkers, I don't see how anyone could say otherwise.

[thatnickguy]

I wonder if the people who say comics aren't as good today is they're focusing purely on DC and Marvel like people did "back in the day." Because to me, they're the minority these days when it comes to quality books.

[owlbrigade1]

Yeah, if you focus on DC or Marvel then you are bound to be pessimistic. Marvel's CW:II and DC's Nu52 (although I'll admit there has been some improvement in the last year with the Can't Believe Its Not a Reboot-Rebirth line) they are falling on hard times. I don't have either on my pull list, although DC lasted longer than Marvel, but then when they killed of JL3001 they fell off my list.

Right now the big winner for me is Titan and IDW, although IDW's place is (as my grandmother would say) on a shoogly nail with their Hasbro mandated Revolution Multi-Crossover getting GI Joe stuff all over my giant robots in space. Their Godzilla line up is better, Rage Across Time was fantastic. Weird, but fantastic. If the 2014 movie had been more like IDW's Rage Across Time then there would have been a lot fewer complaints.

[thatnickguy]

I've loved some of the non-franchise stuff IDW published. Darwyn Cooke's Parker books, Locke & Key, Greg Rucka's work (Queen & Country, Stumptown, Whiteout). It just seems like that stuff is far and few between while IDW focuses mostly on brand name spin-off stuff like Ghostbusters and Transformers. Not saying that stuff isn't good; I'm just not particularly interested in it.

[alicemacher]

"Readership is nowhere near what it was in the 80s or 90s, but the market is doing better since the crash."

Also, over the last decade or so, two additional, valuable markets for comics have emerged: mainstream chain bookstores (for hardcover and trade paperback collections and OGNs), and digital media (for the above plus individual issues). Both have enabled mainstream American comics (as well as non-mainstream and/or non-American titles) to attract readers who either don't live anywhere near a comics specialty store, or (rightly or wrongly depending on the store) would rather not set foot in one.

[thatnickguy]

Absolutely. The graphic novel and collected edition market exploded. I've always bought collected editions, so I don't really know when they took off and people "waited for the trade" moreso than before. I know Walking Dead trades do gangbusters compared to them monthlies.

And DEFINITELY the digital market. I don't use it much myself, but it's definitely a factor.

[captainbellman]

As far as I'm concerned, all of the problems of "The Killing Joke" arise from a single factor: the bone-headedness of DC editorial.

Alan Moore's best-remembered stories for the DCU - bar a few exceptions - are all "The Last Days of X" stories. "Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow"; "Abin Sur learns of the Green Lantern Corps' Final Catastrophe"; "Swamp Thing" (in some respects); "Watchmen" - all of these are him meditating on the idea of a superhero growing old and/or dying, up to and including his unpublished plans for a grand epic "Twilight of the Superheroes" story.

Simply put: every plot point in The Killing Joke, from Batman's opening monologue right up to the Joker's closing joke, is screaming out for this to be the last-ever Joker story. The dialogue - e.g., Barbara's "He's taking it to the limit!" line - gels with that meaning; the plot - contrasting the Joker's final, most twisted gag with his twisted origin - also works.

By rights, it ought to have stuck as an Elseworlds in which Batman finally broke his code against killing, feigning laughter so that the Joker would be caught off-guard as he shoved him into the path of an oncoming police car. The narrative silently demonstrates that he is vindicated in doing so: if the Joker is going to this level of nastiness, there's no incarcerating him any more, he needs to be put down. You could even interpret Mr. J's own weary refusal to be helped as a submission to his fate.

But instead, it's Canon with a capital C. So what ought to have been a conclusion becomes a continuation, and we get so many more years of escalating, hyper-sadistic nonsense.

[mrstatham]

This. I don't necessarily agree that the story ends with Batman killing the Joker, but I certainly think it's a 'last story' for both of them. There's just too much in there even without the notion of Batman killing the Joker that just.. Doesn't fit continuity. Even something as small as Batman being found laughing with the Joker in the rain should render his relationship with the GCPD moot; that they couldn't explain it at all when he's questioned by Barbara speaks volumes.

But.. Yeah. Death of the Joker or no, there's a finality to it that continuity just doesn't allow for. I like later Joker stories - I think Snyder's work is fine and a good beginning, middle, end and inevitable rebirth for the character, but.. He'd already killed Jason in-continuity at that time - or would, and yet somehow we needed to pile on more misery, like that wasn't enough to show the sense of increasing darkness and escalation for the character..

[captainbellman]

I mean, it just doesn't make sense to turn such a final story into part of an ongoing saga. Imagine if instead of Watchmen having that ambiguous, uncertain ending where Ozymandias' brokered peace turns out to be tragically temporary anyway and Dr. Manhattan became a benevolent God, they just got grandfathered into main continuity and apparently Jon has instead become a sadistic madman and --- NOW WAIT JUST ONE DARNED MINUTE

[captainbellman]

(I maintain that Batman kills the Joker at the end if only because that actually justifies the title - unless you're taking it in abstract terms to be about the meaningless of existence or whatever, the actual "Killing Joke" is the one which the Joker tells at the end, in that telling it leads to him being killed.)

[reveen]

I think DC pretty much does this because they really want to hitch their cart to these great works, and try to represent Batman itself as being the source of these great works, instead of the result of a great writer who happens to work with Batman.

Like, look at the DVD cover art; it's a "DC Original Movie", likewise they try to canonize stuff like Watchmen to brand it as a DC property instead of an Alan Moore work.

[captainbellman]

Though there again, Moore has personally disavowed any work he's done for "The Big Two" and had them take his name off of it (see also Miracleman being credited to 'the original author').

So - along with their encouraging the (IMHO) libellous image of him as grumpy/angry/unstable - they're probably just leveraging his disgust to their advantage.

[alicemacher]

As many have said, Batman: The Animated Series came closer than any work before or since to a definitive portrayal of the Joker, because it balanced the two most common versions of the character: campy, theatrical, funny prankster; and scary, sociopathic monster.

True, this balance was partly the result of TV content standards: as a daytime show with kids as the initial target demographic, it couldn't depict the Joker killing or permanently maiming anyone. Even so, the creative team didn't go the easy route and make him an ultimately harmless nuisance as he'd been in various media from late Golden Age comics through Superfriends. No, the B:TAS Joker was definitely the "guy you really don't want to mess with unless you're Batman" sort, the "intimidates even other crooks" sort.

At the same time, he still made you laugh in a straightforward, out-loud way. He didn't spout monologues about the cruel meaninglessness and futility of life, as in TKJ and its less literary imitators. He didn't brood around mirthlessly as in Loeb's Hush 2, Azzarello's Joker or Miller's ASBaR. He enjoyed being the Joker. And, as a result, viewers enjoyed him too.

[captainbellman]

The Webcomics Review tumblr recently meditated on portrayals of villainy, pointing out that Mary in 'Dumbing of Age' has a small fan-following despite her bigotry. It's because she's more akin to Wile E Coyote or Peridot than Maleficent or Doctor Octopus; instead of having (and later losing) a significant amount of power, she fails and is mocked constantly, and people sympathise with the failures and the mocked.

(Case in point: I described Mary's arc to someone who'd never read DoA recently, prefacing that she's a religious fundamentalist and transphobic; and yet said friend - a lapsed Catholic lesbian - still gave a sympathetic "awww" to the character being punched in the face and then made to walk past the angry, hate-filled stares of her entire dorm.)

The Joker of BTAS straddles the line; he's intimidating because he has power - a lack of inhibitions - and yet sympathetic because he's always doomed to be incarcerated. We don't love him for killing, but we do love that no matter what, he keeps on giving 110%. (See also: mythological Loki.)

[ozaline]

It was never actually meant to be an elseworld though, that's why Moore had to ask permission to cripple Barbara.

[captainbellman]

I disagree; I think that request was more along the lines of "Isn't this something you'd like to censor?". Moore doesn't really care that much about DC comics continuity, and when he's told that story it's been in the context of "They should have reined me in because it was distasteful and a cheap way of building suspense" rather than "It shouldn't have become part of Batgirl lore".

[ozaline]

Except it's fact?

It's not about whether Alan Moore cared about continuity or not, it's the fact that it was never meant to be an Elseworld.

Just like the Killing Joke movie has a "Last Batgirl Story," there was a Batgirl special, that was meant to be the "Last Batgirl Story," released a week before TKJ to wrap up Barbara's journey.

TKJ never bore the Elseworld logo, and DC knew well in advance what would happen to Barbara.

He didn't have to ask, because he was afraid of stepping on toes (though hey may have been), but because you don't end a characters career without consulting editorial, otherwise they won't publish the book.

If it was meant o be an Elseworld, he would likely have been given free reign.

In Alan Moore's own words--

"I asked DC if they had any problem with me crippling Barbara Gordon - who was Batgirl at the time."

His regret stems from the fact that it was nasty, and cheap (in his own opinion), but the reason he had to ask, is because it would impact other books.

[mizerous]

This sums it up perfectly this should be the climax of the Joker Batman feud.

[hotfoot]

To say that good comics killed comics is like saying that good examples of any medium killed the medium. It's missing the point as much as the copies of better work miss the point of their inspiration.

I get what's being said, that bad attempts to mimic the styles of better creators will damage a medium for a time, but that's the nature of things. Fantasy after Tolkien became more about copying Tolkien than actually creating new and interesting worlds. Fans of Tolkien will be naturally drawn to similar stories, purchase them, and more often than not enjoy them. Every time something is successful, everyone rushes to tap into the new market. World War 2 video games are successful? Suddenly there's a glut on the market. It works like that across literally everything. The companies that pay for these things to get made want sure things for return on investment, because they want to make money. However, because you can't know ahead of time what's going to be popular and what's not, they follow the trends of known successes.

It results in a lot of derivative works, and yeah, a lot of garbage. That's more due to the fact that people attempting to copy what was successful in the original work don't completely understand what made the work successful in the first place. After Star Wars, movies started increasing their special effects budgets, resulting in a slew of movies that were more special effects delivery vehicles than good movies in their own right. While spectacle by itself can be pleasing and make money (re: Michael Bay), it does not result in the long term following that Star Wars or other such movies like it received.

And yeah, the video creator does actually make the point that it wasn't the original works, but the bad attempts to recreate them that were more the issue, so I don't want to make it appear that I'm dumping on the video, it was pretty well done, but the reason it was particularly harmful for comics, in my opinion, goes back even further to Seduction of the Innocent and the establishment of the Comics Code Authority, because that is what created the dearth of mature storytelling in comics. The CCA had been chipped away at by the 70's, and by the 80's it had become largely unenforceable and could even be ignored entirely. Not having a CCA Approved seal on a comic was no longer a death sentence for a book, so comics could once again include sex, death, horrible bloody violence, drug use, and bad guys winning. Once stories involving those things came out and people ate them up because they literally had not existed in comic book form for around thirty years, the comics industry didn't know what to do.

Think of a child, first leaving home, realizing that now they didn't have to follow the rules their parents set. They can drink, have sex, do drugs, skip classes, and nobody could tell them what to do. Imagine that said child had particularly strict parents, and now had a roommate who was already involved in doing all of those things. Like many children first away from home, they overindulged.

Thus came the 90's, the gritty comics, the EXTREME stuff, the barely concealed porn, the not concealed porn, and so on.

Combine that with the capitalist nature of the industry, because it is a capitalist industry (as mentioned above), and you get the full 90's experience. Dozens of comics and characters that were barely different from one another, variant covers, and so on. But here's the thing - a lot of that was driven by the speculator boom, which resulted from comics not being considered important in the past, which resulted in them being thrown out by parents and kids alike. Once comics were known to be something valuable, something important, something hit movies were made from, as cultural touchstones, now they could be seen as collectibles, as valuable. Now nobody would dare throw away a comic book. That Mrs. SexDeath #1 could end up being worth hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of dollars one day.

But it won't, at least not likely within our lifetimes. When people know something could be valuable, they horde it. They keep it safe, in mylar bags with cardboard backings and adhesive strips that won't damage the covers. But those won't become valuable unless virtually everyone else gives up and throws theirs away, burns them, or otherwise destroys them.

Anyway, I'm just ranting and rambling again. It was a pretty decent video, and it does do a good job of showing where the animated feature missed the details from the original story. It's a very good case study of where cashing in can fail to replicate the magic of the original.

[wizardru]

I get that the video's heart is in the right place, I just think it's incredibly reductive. There are a host of things to unpack here.

1) As many point out, those authors did not KILL comics. Not US comics. Not even US Superhero comics just at the big two. In point of fact, comics are arguably better now in terms of quality than in any time in their history. We live in a world where Squirrel Girl, Kamala Khan, Midnighter, Sam Wilson and others exist and thrive.

2) The 90s gave rise to a LOT of good comics. I once compiled a list to illustrate it. YES, we had the rise of Image and the speculator's market. We also had a lot of good comics in a variety of levels of optimism and escapism. For every Youngblood, you had a James Robinson's Starman. For every WildC.A.T.S., you got a Hellboy. Maybe you didn't like "Reign of the Supermen", but I thought it was good comics (if it ran a tad long). Kurt Busiek's Thunderbolts and Avengers were classic comics that would have felt at home in the 1970s...and don't forget that Astro City started back then, too. Jeff Smith's Bone certainly wasn't subject to the XXTREEEMEEE 90s vibe. The list goes on and on. I reject wholely the idea that comics somehow fell down and hole and never crawled out again.

3.I get that the animated adaption has much simpler art. That's the nature of animation. That seems a weak thing to choose to illustrate how flawed the adaption was. I mean, he's not wrong, but that's pretty low on the list of things that the animated adaption got wrong. The two-face thing: much more important (and he's spot on about).

See, I was around for the 80s glut, so the 90s seemed much better by comparison, even at the height of the speculator market. I remember when new comics day was on Friday and how suddenly we went from having a handful of comics companies to a zillion of them, many who were late and only produced about 1-5 issues before disappearing forever, after producing cheap drek with amateurish skills. And I also remember amazing comics rising to the surface, then, too. Comics like Steve Rude's Nexus with it's amazing art or Matt Wagner's Mage, which redefined what color in a comic could be.

I don't think he doesn't have some valid points...he does. I also think he needs to drill down his actual commentary on just the video; I reject his overarching 'comics are terrible and broken and it's the fault of these guys and their work' premise entirely.