Utilitarian Review 8/6/16

Upcoming

I managed to sell 50 copies of my ebook on Fecund Horror in my first month. I promised if that happened I’d watch It Follows and write about it…which is what I’m planning to do on Monday. So watch for that over on Patreon (it’ll be free.)

I also need to write another vampire essay this month. Maybe on Let the Right One In?

Also, as a benefit for $10/mo subscribers, I’ve offered to let people commission essays. I’ve only had two folks take me up on it so far; so over the next month or two I’m committed to writing about Mark Millar’s comic Nemesis and the film, Dude, Where’s My Car?
 
Patreon

I posted my essay on Lair of the White Worm and obvious penises for $2/mo subscribers.

I am going to publish a book called Your Favorite Superhero Sucks probably in early September. My son drew an awesome cover for it which $1/month subscribers can see here.
 
Utilitarians Everywhere

At Playboy I wrote about the Suicide Squad and the dream that the people we imprison will love us anyway.

At Quartz I wrote about the virtues of teaching children to curse.

At Splice Today I wrote about

John Ford’s The Last Hurrah, Trump and how you can’t tell the fascism from the democracy.

two great banjo albums by Kaia Kater and Nathan Bowles.

I Am Bart Beaty!

So readers may have noticed that we’ve had quite a number of posts on Bart Beaty’s recent book Comics vs. Art. It’s a good book, but you may well wonder why we’ve (and especially I’ve) decided to spend quite so much time on it.

The answer is simple. Beaty stole all his ideas from me.

Consider.

— In his second chapter, “Defining a Comics Art World,” Beaty argues that comics should be defined in social terms — that is, in terms of a comics world — rather than in formalist terms. I made this argument on HU two years ago.

—Beaty has a lengthy discussion of the way in which art comics has presented Charles Schulz as a depressive genius and avatar of masculine frustration and self-pity in order to establish his high arts bona fides. I made this argument in the Comics Journal more than four years ago.

—Beaty identifies nostalgia as the central endemic feature of comics, and specifically argues that it permeates and defines not just superhero fanzines, but art comics as well. This has been one of the central critical argument of this site. Here’s just one example.

— Beaty spends a whole chapter focusing on Chris Ware’s performance of masculine self-pity, anchored in particular by a look at Chris Ware’s comics about high art. Again, I was making similar arguments, focused on some of the exact same pieces that Beaty discusses, a good while back.

I’m pretty sure I could find other instances too. (This blog has had a lot of discussion of the original art market for comics, for example, which Beaty talks about in some detail.) Reading Comics vs. Art was, therefore, kind of a bizarre experience. On the one hand, I kept turning pages and saying, “ha! I was right all along! See, a real academic says so!” On the other hand, I kept thinking…”Hey! I thought of that first! I even said it in the Comics Journal! Why don’t I get a shout out…or, you know, at least a citation?”

Of course, I’m sure the reason Beaty doesn’t cite me is that he didn’t get the ideas from me. I think most of these ideas (like, the importance of nostalgia in comics) are true — and since they’re true, of course all intelligent independent inquiry will naturally confirm them.

Still, it’s amusing that Beaty can be seen as in some ways enacting the same highbrow/lowbrow performance that is so central to his discussion. Just as Lichtenstein took the work of “lesser” artists and either elevated or stole it, depending on your perspective, so Beaty can be seen (with a little squinting) as taking the work of (ahem) lesser thinkers and elevating them, or swiping them outright. I am Irv Novick!

Again, I’m sure Beaty isn’t actually using my ideas. But it is kind of interesting that in his discussion of comics vs. art, and in his analysis of the critical conversation around these issues, he virtually never discusses the internet at all. The only time he really talks about the web, I think, is when he analyzes the effect ebay has had on the comics back issue market. But other than that, the ballooning online discussion of comics — the discussion that these days shapes the way that most people in the comics world think about comics on a day to day basis — is simply absent. Tom Spurgeon, for example, doesn’t show up in the index — though CR’s appreciation of a broad range of comics is hugely important in shaping the relationship between comics and art, or comics as art. Similarly, Dan Nadel pops up as an anthologist, but his seminal work with Tim Hodler at Comics Comics (leading to their editorship of tcj.com, isn’t mentioned.

Of course, you can’t talk about everything — but, as Beaty would be the first to acknowledge I think, what you choose not to talk about can be as important as what you decide to discuss. Beaty certainly knows about the blogosphere — he wrote regularly for CR for years. So the decision not to talk about the web and its place in comics criticism seems like it has to be a deliberate one. The discussion of comics vs. art is, for Beaty, one that is best approached through established institutions, and writers who have the imprimatur of established institutions, whether those be publishers or the academy — or fanzines, of course, which have longstanding status in comics. The web may shape practices (via ebay), but it doesn’t have anything in particular to say for itself. Or when it does have something to say, the voice Beaty cites is from Salon or the Electronic Book Review or the New York Times, rather than from the comics blogosphere.

The point here isn’t to indict Beaty (whose book I like a lot), but rather to point out the odd disconnect which remains between sholarly discussion of comics and internet discussion of comics. I call this disconnect “bizarre” because it seems to persist despite the fact that scholars (like Beaty) are all over the web. Charles Hatfield and Craig Fischer, for example, are longtime bloggers, and both have written for the Comics Journal (Craig has a column…as does Ken Parille.) There are a couple of specifically academic sites as well, such as the Comics Grid. And for that matter, my own blogging has given me the opportunity to write a book for an academic press. So obviously there is commerce between the two worlds. And yet, at the same time, there remains a cautious distance — such that Bart Beaty can write a whole book essentially about comics criticism without so much as nodding to the place where, at least in terms of sheer bytes, most of that criticism is occurring.

The reason to leave out the internet is fairly obvious; it’s for the most part not especially scholarly. This is a problem if you’re working on a scholarly project, because it’s hard to evaluate importance and worth when there are no credentials, because many people on the web are not speaking in a way that is of help or interest to scholars, and, last but not least, because it brings down the tone.

Tone is particularly interesting, because I think it’s one of the major differences between Beaty’s book and HU, and because that difference turns out to be surprisingly significant. Comics vs. Art is a confrontational book in many ways — but only to a point. Beaty slyly undermines the cult of Chris Ware, or the line between art comics and superhero fandom, or comics’ definitional project. But those jabs are always jabs rather than roundhouses, and they’re always from the scholarly stance of “this is an interesting phenomenon,” rather than from a more polemical vantage. Beaty’s arguments walk up to the line of saying, “people, you are acting like idiots, and you need to cut it out,” — but he never does cross that line. Which is why, when I paraphrase his arguments, adding a really-not-that-much-more-forthright polemical gloss, people tend to engage forcefully in comments — whereas, my sense is, Beaty’s own arguments themselves largely pass unnoticed.

In part this is just an aspect of the internets’ instant response mechanisms, and in part it’s probably because I’m not as credentialed as Beaty so people feel more comfortable (perhaps rightly!) in telling me that I don’t know what I’m talking about. In part, though, I think it’s because Beaty is deliberately working to be low-key. No doubt some will admire him for that, and there’s certainly pleasure to be found in his wicked gift of understatement. At the same time, though, his unwillingness to come out and take stand can make it difficult to figure out exactly why he’s bothering. What does Comics vs. Art hope to accomplish? Why is it worth pushing on the relationship between comics and art? If Beaty had his druthers, how might comics change?

I think Beaty’s answers to those questions would be similar to mine — that is, comics should be less neurotic and status-conscious, less inward-turned, more feminist, more adventurous, and more able to see itself as part of the arts, broadly defined, rather than as a defensive subculture which has to protect its own. Again, I think that’s what Beaty would say, but I don’t really know for sure. Maybe next time out he’ll tell us — whether or not he cites me while doing so.
 

photo
Illustration of Bart Beaty by Martin Tom Dieck from Beaty’s staff page at The University of Calgary.

 
 

Utilitarian Review 11/6/10

On HU

The rest of the week was devoted to a roundtable on Charles Hatfield’s Alternative Comics: An Emerging Literature. Contributors include me, Caroline Small, Ng Suat Tong, HU columnists Matthias Wivel and Derik Badman and guest poster Robert Stanley Martin. Lots of discussion in comments too.

And we’re not done yet! We’re going to focus on other things for a couple of day while Charles Hatfield gathers his thoughts, and then at the end of the week he’s going to do two or three posts in response. So stay tuned, as they say….

Utilitarians Everywhere

At Splice Today I look at fetishizing the teacher in pop music, from Van Halen to Ke$ha to Ina unt Ina.

The truth is that the video isn’t really about lusting after the teacher at all. Instead, it’s about lusting after a childhood in which you lusted after the teacher. The short film is focused on adults imagining how cool they could have been in high school if they had known then what they know now—and, simultaneously, on kids imagining themselves as being adults. The Van Halen band members are portrayed both by the real Van Halen and by a group of kids dressed like the adults. The video unabashedly blends both identities, with the adults sitting right beside their younger selves in class and the kids lip-syncing the lines in the voices of their grown-up doppelgangers. The hot teacher is just an accessory; a convenient stand-in for the real passions, which are between male adults and their younger iterations. The adults want the rebelliousness and goofy energy of youth; the kids want the sexual opportunities and confidence of grown-ups. And both achieve their dream not by sleeping with the teacher, but by rocking out.

Also at Splice Today, I review the first chapter of John Grisham’s new novel.

You can probably see where this is going. No doubt you’ve already intuited not only the existence but also the main character traits of Keith the pastor, who “spent much of his time listening to the delicate problems of others, and offering advice to others” and had therefore “become a wise and astute observer.” Probably you’ve also guessed that Boyette is a bad, bad person (did you figure out he was a sex offender from the fact that he looks at the pastor’s wife’s chest? You did? Bonus points!) If you’re especially perspicacious you may even be able to reconstruct from TV movies past the hollow schlop-schlop of pop theology and pop psychology flopping about like two half-dead fish in a bucket. “It’s human nature. When faced with our own mortality, we think about the afterlife. What about you, Travis? Do you believe in God?”

I have a short review in the Chicago Reader of an enjoyable art show at Columbia College called Post Human/Future Tense.

Another short review of a quite bad book called Cute Eats Cute.

And an essay at Madeloud about musical guest stars on Sesame Street.

Other Links

Bert Stabler has a lovely essay up about The Monstrosity of Christ, by John Milbank and Slavoj Zizek.

Poking around the internet looking for discussions of comics and the gaze, this is what I came up with.

Utilitarian Review 10/16/10

On HU

Matthias Wivel praises both pop and Popeye.

Sean Michael Robinson talks about his experiences making 24-hour comics.

Derik Badman has translated an article by French creator Fabrice Neaud about Aristophane’s Conte Domoniaque.

Ng Suat Tond discusses original art by Jaime Hernandez.

Vom Marlowe reviews Dungeons & Dragons #0.

Caroline Small discusses Frank Kermode, James Sturm, writing and reading.

And I started a thread to talk about what should and should not have been included in the Best American Comics 2010.

Also at HU, we’ve started using Read More cuts. I’m hoping this will make the blog a little easier to navigate. If you have thoughts on the change, please let me know in comments.

Utilitarians Everywhere

At The Chicago Reader I review the Neil Gaiman edited Best American Comics 2010.

Certainly there were loads of Sandman spin-offs. DC has, following Gaiman, shown some interest in fantasy-oriented series—the currently ongoing Fables for example—and independent titles like Gloomcookie and Courtney Crumrin followed a goth-oriented, female-friendly path. But these efforts were marginal. Overall, post-1990s, the mainstream comics industry first drifted and then scampered towards massive, complicated stories mostly of interest to a male, continuity-porn-obsessed fanbase. Gaiman moved on to writing novels (notably, sophisticated fantasies like Neverwhere and Coraline), and the formula he created was largely ignored. Instead of creating goth comics for girls, American companies chose to stick with insular cluelessness and let the Japanese have the female audience. Manga comics, especially those aimed at girls, exploded in popularity here. And that, in case you were wondering, is no doubt why the Twilight comic adaptation isn’t drawn by homegrown artists like Jill Thompson or P. Craig Russell or Ted Naifeh but by Korean illustrator Young Kim, in a manga style.

At his blog, Bert Stabler and I debate Funny Games, I Spit on Your Grave, horror and evil.

Bert: Everyone loves being blamed for their privilege, EXCEPT when it’s by someone who shares (and exceeds)that privilege. Basically, the beauty of Funny Games is that of a vulture feeding in the desert, not a cockfight. It’s not a guilty pleasure that excuses itself with self-awareness– it’s bloodthirsty pornography that reminds you that actors in pornography have actual lives.

At Splice Today I have an essay about Manny Farber and Paul Feyerabend and termites and Galileo. Unfortunately, they kind of chopped off my original ending, making me sound more sincere than I am. This is the original conclusion; imagine it’s there if you click over to read the essay.

Ultimately, Feyerabend concluded that his wish for a new insect view of the world was “just another example of intellectualistic conceit and folly.” Farber, too — in true termite-art fashion — disavowed his essay on termite art. Demanding an end to white elephants is a white elephant way to behave; ultimately termites to stay termites must eat themselves. What they leave behind them is, perhaps, a small space filled with meaning — the not-termite, trumpeting its victory.

At Comixology I write about Quentin Blake’s amazing children’s book, The Story of the Dancing Frog.

The picture of Gertrude picking up the frog is both moving and goofy. Gertrude is half in the water, her facial expression hard to read. The trees form an arch overhead, and her dress is pulled back by the water. It’s a ritual and sensual scene, like a rebirth or a wedding. The frog, on the other hand, is clearly not quite up to the role of Prince — it looks helpless and bizarrely cheerful with its googly eyes and gangly body, no more aware of the affection it’s inspired than an infant. Its obliviousness, though, only makes the moment more poignant. Without knowing it, it is both lost husband and child that never was, a lifeline that cannot possibly bear the weight put upon it.

And finally at Madeloud I have an article about musical guest stars on the 1960s Batman TV show.

Utilitarian Review 10/2/10

On HU

Domingos Isabelinho discussed a critical essay by Bruno Lecigne.

Ng Suat Tong explained why Blacksad is pernicious and derivative.

Richard Cook talked about Marvel Comics published in September 1980 (including…The Death of Phoenix!

I discussed Moto Hagio’s story A Drunken Dream.

In a guest post, architect and cartoonist Aaron Costain talked about the similarities between comics and architectural plans.

And Vom Marlowe sneers at the motion comic Lost Girl and praises Benjamin Lacombe’s book trailer, Il etait une fois.

Utilitarians Everywhere

At Splice Today I reviewed some Chinese black metal and talked about the fuzzy unifying power of hate.

At Madeloud I reviewed the latest Shonen Knife album.

Other Links

Derik Badman has an interesting post about style in comics.

Tucker Stone talks about comics journalism.

This is a great post about make-up and fashion and the confusions straight men are prone to.

And I enjoy being reminded every so often that for all his virtues, Obama is kind of a soulless hack.

Utilitarian Review 8/28/10

TCJ.com Kerfuffle

This week on the TCJ.com mainpage Caroline Small, Ng Suat Tong and I participated in a roundtable on the Best American Comics Criticism anthology edited by Ben Schwartz. Jeet Heer, Brian Doherty, and Ben Schwartz himself also participated. In comments other critics joined in, including Rob Clough, Ken Parille, Robert Stanley Martin, and Kent Worcester. So check it out if you haven’t already.

Oh, and there’s a comment thread on the roundtable here as well which includes a discussion of French language and Japanese comics criticism.

On HU

Domingos Isabelinho discussed Dominique Goblet’s and Nikita Fossoul’s Chronographie.

Kinukitty talked about European fashion magazines, Dave Mustaine, and Makoto Tateno’s Yokan Premonition.

In a guest post, teacher and artist Sean Michael Robinson explained that it’s a good thing for art teachers when students are into anime and manga.

JR Brown wrote an extensive article about the history of the pretty boy in Japanese art.

I reviewed Issue #22 of the Marston/Peter run on Wonder Woman.

Vom Marlowe talked about gender issues in the young adult prose series Percy Jackson and the Olympians.

And a music download of Beatlesesque pop.

Utilitarians Everywhere

Caroline Small is going to be on the Critic’s Roundtable panel at SPX, along with many other illustrious folks. (Via Robot6.)

Critics’ Panel: How We Judge
3:00 | Brookside Conference Room
The accessibility of online publishing alongside traditional media has enabled a diversity of critical voices who are addressing the broad spectrum of comics being published today. A diverse group of critics will discuss the disparate bases for their own critical opinions, and the extent to which they regard different kinds of work in different ways. Join moderator Bill Kartalopoulos for a discussion with Johanna Draper Carlson (Comics Worth Reading), Gary Groth (The Comics Journal), Tim Hodler (Comics Comics), Chris Mautner (Robot 6), Joe McCulloch (Jog the Blog/Comics Comics), Ken Parille (Blog Flume), and Caroline Small (The Hooded Utilitarian).

At the Chicago Reader I review JimCollins’ Bring on the Books for Everybody.

In The Gift of Death, Derrida concludes that literature is an empty, parasitic untheology, constantly seeking forgiveness for its meaninglessness. Ever the tenured radical, he sees this revelation as an affront to the academic establishment. But cultural studies is a more callow establishment than Derrida anticipated, and members like Collins don’t have a problem with emptiness. On the contrary, Collins is “delighted” just to find that literary fiction “forms part of the cultural mixes” that modern cultural consumers “assemble with such gusto to articulate who they are, and what is crucially important to them.” The content of their identities and concerns is utterly beside the point. Are they Nazis? Misogynists? Drooling idiots? As long as they embrace it with gusto, who cares? The point of literature is to make a statement regardless of what’s said. By the same token, Collins is aware that, say, The Oprah Show is witheringly stupid and the movie version of The English Patient is an apologia for imperialism—but he can’t bring himself to take the next step, which would be admitting that some of the detritus of popular culture deserves to be scorned.

On Splice Today I talk about the new film The Last Exorcism in light of the criticism of James Baldwin.

For Baldwin, the bed floating, the fluid spitting, and special-effects gouting, were all part of a willful disavowal. The little girl with the deep voice uttering curses is an innocent possessed by the devil…but Baldwin argues that the upper-middle-class milieu in which she sits and writhes is anything but innocent, and that the movie is therefore an example of (in various senses) bad faith. Baldwin notes that at the end of the film, the “demon-racked little girl murderess kisses the Holy Father, and she remembers nothing.” This convenient amnesia is, for Baldwin, emblematic of America’s penchant for forgetting what they have done, to whom, and for what ends.

At Madeloud I have some recommendations for sexadelic lounge music. Groovy!

Other Links

R. Fiore was inspired by our Popeye roundtable to write a really entertaining appraisal of the Fleischer Popeye cartoons.

Utilitarian Review 5/29/10

Asterios Polyp Roundtable

In the coming week (and a few days) we’re going to have an extended roundtable on David Mazzucchelli’s Asterios Polyp. Besides the usual Utilitarians, columnists Matthias Wivel and Domingos Isabelinho are also planning to weigh in — and we’ll also have guest posts from Derik Badman and Craig Fischer. So please check back!

On HU

I started off the week by explaining why I wasn’t that into Urasawa’s Monster.

Domingos Isabelhino devoted his first monthly column, called “Monthly Stumblings”, to Pierre Duba’s Racines.

Vom Marlowe pointed and laughed at the art in Brave and Bold #33. Several commenters protested, and I did a follow up post speculating on visual tropes in super-hero art.

Richard Cook provided a history of Wonder Woman’s panties in covers.

Caroline Small looked at Barbarella the movie and why it should not be a target for feminist ire.

Suat sneered at Gantz.

And finally Suat expressed some skepticism about the excesses of the market for original comic art.

Oh…also, here’s a download of some semi-schlocky country weepers.

Utilitarian Everywhere

Former Utilitarian and current comics creator Miriam Libicki has been doing some guest blogging over at Jewish Books. You can see her talk about her creative process here.

Columnist Matthias Wivel is over on the tcj.com mainpage talking about the Komiks.dk festival in Copenhagan.

At Splice Today I talk about the best super-hero movie of all time.

Why is it the best superhero movie of all time? If you saw the TV show you know the general outlines. Adam West does not have foam-rubber pecs like his bat-successors, but he does have a cute little paunch which is clearly outlined in his skintight bat-costume, said paunch sitting unashamedly atop his shiny external bat-underwear. It seems Robin has poured a quart of rabid bees down his green short-shorts and is bravely fighting the pain by punching his fist into his palm while imitating a (much) skinnier William Shatner. And, of course, there’s the Batmobile, Bat Repellant Shark Spray, Bat Knockout Gas, and all other kinds of Bat ephemera, each carefully labeled for those who otherwise might confuse the Bat Repellant Whale Spray with the Bat Ladder.

At Madeloud I provide an introduction to black metal.

Whiteface corpsepaint, church burning, ungodly screams, and the odd unpleasant foray into fascism — from the outside, black metal looks fairly foreboding. But while that image isn’t exactly wrong, it is a little misleading. Some black metal performers have really and truly been associated with extreme excesses and ugly ideologies (Varg Vikernes, we are looking at you). But, if you can put that aside, the music is in general quite accessible — in some cases, even pleasant. If you enjoy shoegaze or indie rock or ambience, a lot of black metal will sound like a slightly satanic twist on some familiar tropes. Here are some places to start for those ready to immerse yourself in surprisingly friendly evil.

Also at Madeloud, I review the latest releases from folk black metal horde Blood of the Black Owl and indie folk band The Clogs.

Other Links

This is an adorable illustration of Lovecraft’s Shadow Over Innsmouth.

I enjoyed this part of Kristian Williams’ massive discussion of Oscar Wilde illustrations.

Even though I have no idea what House of M is, this is still a great post about the X-Men by Tim O’Neil.

Feminist Hulk Smash Patriarchy on Twitter!