Action Comics is out of Action

[Uncle Mxy]

First off, I don't think that comparing Superman's "one true gf" is quite the same as comparing Bond actors, unless you think Superman "one true gf" must behave in some ritualistic way and with same particular affectations that Bond is most noted for.  Apply Bond's character traits to Superman's girl, you'd get "My name is Lane.  Lois Lane.  I like my beef bourguignon shaken, not stirred, Mr. Kentpenny."  I dunno...  seems like a different kind of challenge to me.  The closest I can think of the stereotypical traits for a girlfriend of Superman is screaming "HELP... SUPERMAN!". 

The thing about killing Lori off is that Superman's already had that plot with Lyla Lerrol.  Mermaids are interesting, and turn up enough in pop culture where it doesn't make sense for DC to kill Lori off.  They did 48 stories with Lori as a character before women's lib of the era made putting mermaids on the cover a bit square.  I think writing Lori calls for someone who can write romantic leads, and it's not an accident that the same person who created Lori created Lana. 

[nightwing]

JulianPerez writes:

What I find most interesting about Lori is that even among the people that LIKE her, she's not a favorite. The Timothy Dalton comparison gets more and more apt the more I think about it: even among people that like Dalton, he's never their favorite.

This is categorically false.  There's lots of Bond fans out there who like Dalton best, and defend him with a passion that borders on scary.  You can meet more than you'd ever want to at this site:

http://commanderbond.net/

[Permanus]

JulianPerez writes:

What I find most interesting about Lori is that even among the people that LIKE her, she's not a favorite. The Timothy Dalton comparison gets more and more apt the more I think about it: even among people that like Dalton, he's never their favorite.

This is categorically false.  There's lots of Bond fans out there who like Dalton best, and defend him with a passion that borders on scary.  You can meet more than you'd ever want to at this site:

http://commanderbond.net/

And me! Me too!

[JulianPerez]

This is categorically false.  There's lots of Bond fans out there who like Dalton best,

Fair enough, but my point still stands: as a Superman girlfriend Lori Lemaris is an also-ran, but as a lost, doomed love she has a niche and serves a purpose.

Plus, that bit at the end with the "great poet of the sea that will tell their lost love forever" being a great humpbacked whale was a beautiful detail.

Well, I'm sure your boy Johns will find a way to hack and slash her on-camera soon enough.

This, by the way, is why I prefer your dolphin-safe tuna. 

I wonder what that comic would be called? "Superman's Trip to the Sushi Bar?"

It's really too bad when a beloved character dies...and you have to get the lemon and butter marinade out and have a barbecue! "Hey, Lori would have wanted it this way."

Boy, I sure am glad that Geoff Johns isn't a fat guy, because then the broken-record repetitive diss would be fat jokes. It could be worse, of course; Johns could be Polish.

Anyway, I notice no other element of Johns's skill is under fire. Nobody takes issue with his skill for characterization, nobody contradicts me when I say he has a skill for plots and pacing, or the ability to resuscitate and play straight less popular characters, his utilization of underused elements of the DCU from INFINITY INC to Stanley and his Monster, or his endless litany of deeds in the service of classic comics, from the restoration of Hal Jordan and the GLC to the return of "classic" Hawkman, to the return of Power Girl's Earth-2 origin, to the "elder statesman" JSA characterization that may have singlehandedly justified the existence of "Earth-0," to incredible and cool issues like Wildcat vs. the Injustice Society, issues entirely dedicated to the Flash Rogues, the JSA Thanksgiving party, and someone finally giving an "in-story" explanation for why it is death hasn't been able to stick.

I say without reservation that, if you really look at his record, Johns is the best thing that has happened to the DCU in the past 15 years, and its biggest fan of classic comics. And the Watchmen-style Captain Carrot story was pretty funny too (intentionally).

But hey, screw him. I mean, Johns isn't doing stories about monkeys in capes helping magical elves find lost cookies.

And frankly, Johns's penchant for violence is overrated, especially by people that just won't own up to never having read a Johns comic in their lives (hey, that's you, SuperMonkey!). Things that become true only by repetition are passed back and forth in comics fandom all the time, like "Roy Thomas is a misogynist," or "Don Heck is an artist you don't want anywhere near your book," or "Grant Morrison actually has talent."

The fact is, Johns is absolutely no different - NO DIFFERENT - from the rest of comics writers, and it is only hypocrisy, ignorance and a dishonest double-standard where he is excoriated for violence and Grant Morrison, Kurt Busiek, and Gail Simone get a free pass for it. Remember Ultraman  flash-frying people into corpses with his laser-vision in Busiek's JLA? Remember Gail Simone's VILLAINS UNITED where Hyena was shot iin the head and Dr. Psycho threatened prison wardens Soprano-style? Remember Luthor gangland executing the Parasite in a berserk fury in a prison riot in Grant Morrison's ASS #6?

[JulianPerez]

I just realized too, that Johns has a pretty good memory - and better still, he can translate that into meaningful characterization. An example would be something that I'll admit shamefully, an Earth-2 fan like me had forgotten: Jay and Joan Garrick are unable to have children. But it was Johns that put this together with Jay's membership in the JSA: Jay looks after the younger JSAers as if they were his own children for this very reason.

[Permanus]

It's a little-known fact, but in addition to all his other qualities, Johns is also fully recyclable.

[Great Rao]

I also like the fact that Byrne and Kesel incorporated Aquaman into the Lori Lemaris story. Previously, having two contradictory versions of Atlantis was one of the most thickheaded acts of idiocy ever perpetrated by Weisenger's jealous and arrogant editorial Iron Fist.

I never knew that it was Byrne and Kesel who tied these two different Atlantises together.  I had always thought PAD did that in The Atlantis Chronicles.

I never said Byrne and Kesel merged the story of the two Atlantises together. What I said they did was, they incorporated Aquaman into the Superman/Lori love story. It was in many ways a glorified cameo, but at least it was something.

Julian, I'm a little confused here.  What does "Previously, having two contradictory versions of Atlantis was a thickheaded act of idiocy" mean?  Unless I misread your post, this implies that in the Byrne/Kesel story, the two Atlantises were no longer contradictory.  How is that different from "tieing them together" (which is what I actually wrote, nothing at all about "merging")?

Perhaps this is only semantics, but I'm interested in the history of Atlantis and I'm trying to figure out what actually happened here.  All I had to go on was what you wrote.  My apologies if I misinterpreted it.

Continuing the Geoff Johns debate:

I'm also confused about how whenever anyone complains about the use of excessive gore and violence in Johns' comics, you spend paragraphs talking about what a great writer Geoff Johns is.

So what?  No one is disputing that with you - at least I'm not disputing it.  I think he's a fine writer.  Extremely skilled at his craft.  But that's not what I'm complaining about.  I've read plenty of his comics - enough to know that, yes, he does use an excessive amount of gore and blood - moreso than any other writer amongst those others you list.  I have read enough of his stories to make an accurate prediction that I will probably not enjoy his comics.  And occasionally I will check up on it:  I recently picked up an issue of JSA at the store and started to read it.  Then I put it back on the stands after I was assaulted by yet more gore and violence.  Same goes for Infinite Crisis and its lead-ins.  When IC was over, I was relieved that now I wouldn't have to read such disgusting stuff anymore.  I decided against 52 because I did not want to put myself through that experience again.

Just because someone is a skilled writer, doesn't mean that everyone has to enjoy his stories.  You say Johns is a good writer.  Doesn't mean that I - or anyone else - has to read him.  So what's your point?

I will state that the only exception to my no-Geoff-Johns rule is Action Comics, which I do read and enjoy.  The gore count seems to be lower than in his other work.  But if that changes, then I won't be reading it anymore.

[Kuuga]

And this doesn't change the fact that the primary way Bizarro was written going back to Pasko's seventies issues, was as a mentally retarded, half-scary half-sympathetic monster.

I don't think an element of humor can or should be denied with the character and to do so he really loses something. I would put humor in with the half-scary, half-sympathetic thing.

The issue here though is that given Johns track record it is painfully likely that he will lean more towards just the scary in the most gratuitous way possible and as has become his gimmick he'll go for gore. If he is emphasizing a horror movie zombie slant on the character then this will likely manifest itself the way I predicted in the early going of the thread.

Johns whole thing seems to be take x-Silver Age idea and make it grim and gory. Not to say he never has light in his stories because he does I'll admit that. I don't like his dialog but I have read stuff of his where there is some real heroic spirit going on but then he ultimately ruins it with darkness and gore stunts. Even the story world of DC itself right now is based on that. Take Identity Crisis. (Which I know Johns didn't right but dont try to tell me he doesn't have a hand in the editorial direction of DC and that story wasn't meant to set the tone of things to come). Okay, the Silver Age happened but it happened because b-grade villans like Dr. Light are actually a drooling rapists and sadists who were mind-woogied by the Justice League in a shades of grey clusterfart using Zatanna into being bankrobber types. The equation of this so-called new era of DC seems to be clear. The Silver Age can be around but only if it's bloodier than ever. This is supposed to take us *out* of the Iron Age?

I think in additon to this stuff being vastly unwarranted in a superhero book, it reduces the Bizzaro character to cheap shock value. While there is certainally a old monster movie vibe to the character he is not Dawn of the Dead splatter movie creature.