Is Liberalism killing Comics?

[Ironghost]

As longtime sufferers of Matt Fraction's version of Tony Stark, this article might be good reading.

You pick up a superhero comic book featuring a childhood favorite of yours, hoping to reignite some of that magic you felt way back when and you see that the opening sequence in the comic deals with an oil rig disaster. You immediately and disappointingly know what’s going to be said, either by your childhood favorite or by some other character given credibility within the story. You turn the page, and sure enough, your childhood favorite grumbles about his/her country’s dependency on oil or how inherently dangerous oil drilling is to the environment and how it’s not worth it or simply mutters to him-or-herself briefly about the evils of corporate America. That’s when you put the comic back on the shelf and your local retailer loses a sale. (Sound familiar? Brightest Day #5 contained a similar scenario featuring Aquaman.)

[IMJ]

Fraction's stories aren't even that relevant. I've managed to catch myself up on a few months of the book at this point and man is it awful, poorly paced and uneventful. Some of the covers are incredibly promising with absolutely no payoff on the inside.

[Brian]

I've touched on this topic before but I try to avoid politics on this forum.

However, I think it is a consideration. Tony Stark has always been a difficult character for Marvel writers to work out. I think much of that has to do with their political beliefs. Tony Stark is a patriotic weapons manufacturer. He is a capitalist.

However, it seems that Marvel is never comfortable with that idea. They are constantly taking away his business or having him make bad business decisions or having him stop making weapons. The current arc where he's trying to make a "non-weaponizable" version of his "arc reactor" seems to be a "green energy" dream. The arc reactor is, apparently, a source of clean energy that can power anything. Of course, this entire story goes against everything that Tony Stark has ever done from never creating an arc reactor to never selling Iron Man equipment. Even the idea of a non-weaponizable version of the arc reactor doesn't make sense. Then to make this free to everyone? Why would anyone invest in this? Where's the profit in this?

I think it does have an influence.

[IMJ]

The solution is simple. He's moved away from weapons and is running a company making other things. The story doesn't have to revolve around it on a regular basis, and not every story has to do with Stark stopping someone from stealing an invention. Just touch on it they way that Parker is a photographer. If every story was born of a picture that Peter took, Spider-Man would start to fail as much as... well as much as Iron Man.

[Chaos]

Liberalism? No. Writers who have smoked blown up theirs @$#%'s by editors who then do nothing to correct them when they're wrong or wrote a bad story? Yep.

[Iron Guy]

I don't think liberalism is hurting comics. Bad writing is. Writing Tony as a corporate figure shouldn't be that hard. Yes, he's a capitalist, but, he's also had liberal sensibilities for some years now. The 2 are not much mutually exclusive as some pundits would have you believe. Tony always took great pride in fact that he not only made his money legally, but ethically as well. He was always willing to go the extra mile to make sure his employees were taken care of & that his products were completely safe for the consumer, even if he had to reduce his profit margin to achieve that. You see, he has a sense of Noblese Oblige. That as the landowner, so to speak, he has an obligtion to look after his staff & customers. This is something he would do even if there were no laws calling for it. Layton & others wrote him this way for years with seemingly no effort. It's a shame that so many real world CEO's are morally bankrupt. We could do with alot more '80's-'90's era tony Starks in the world.   

[Metal Head]

This could spiral out of control, and I hate talking politics, but we here at AI are pretty awesome. I will say creator's political beliefs are creeping into movies, TV shows, comics, etc., and 9 times out of 10 it's liberalism.

And the way you describe Tony isn't liberal (good business, looking after his employees, etc.), it's being a good boss. And it's more common than you think. Morally bankrupt CEOs? The few out there are in jail. Try morally bankrupt world leaders.

Here's a fantastic example of Marvel wrestling with Tony being a billionaire, and I've said this a million times here... a writer told me that he was NEVER allowed to mention Tony was wealthy in any way, back around the lates 1990s, early 2000s. I think the editor was Bobbie Chase, and they just slammed any ideas of showing Tony being rich, successful, etc. It was a joke.

heath

ps-And it goes the other way, too; I like my comics, movies and TV shows (and novels, web series, etc.) to be as devoid of personal politics as possible. I just want to be entertained, that's all.

[Metal Head]

I was reading through the (so far pleasant) comments on that post, and THIS sums up EVERYTHING I hate about modern comments, from poster Aris:

"I am a Conservative. I don't notice "Liberal sucker punches". ***I notice Marvel has hired a lot of fanfic writers and rebranded them as architects..and we seem to be ok with that.*** That's much worse than any bad Commie-pinko subtext that MAY be going in comics by a long shot." (Emphasis mine.)

Remember when Wizard was fun in the 90s, even if Image/Spawn/X-Men were on the cover too often, but they still managed to be cool and actually report things? Then, the years leading up to their cancellation, they started getting more and more fanboyish? And pointless? Same thing was happening with comics. Everything is dark, because many of the creators grew up on Moore and Miller, etc., in the mid- to late-80s/early 90s.

heath

[Iron Guy]

I agree that entertainment outlets (like comics) should stay out of politics. I also agree that this isn't the right forum for political debate. It's just that when subjects like this come up I feel compelled to put in my .02 cents. My description of Stark as a good boss may or may not be liberal. But it seems that most CEO's are in a race to the bottom on all costs & would call Stark a bad capitalist who is doomed to failure because he doesn't put profits 1st. And these fine individuals tend to back conservatives. Also unethical behaviour doesn't necessarily equal jail time. 30 years of de-regulation have made things that used to be illegal legal. And you're right, many, maybe most, politicians are corrupt. And this goes for both parties. The problem is our election system requires huge amounts of money to run for state, let alone federal, office. This gives corporations the opportunity to outright buy the politician of their choice. D.C. & all of the state capitals are basically wholly owned subsidiaries of corporate America! Ok, I'm getting off the soap box. I guess this is something we have to agree that we don't agree.   

[Metal Head]

I've seen a lot of rotten people like Madoff, who are big-time liberal supporters, so I wouldn't go so far to say that only corrupt CEOs go for Republicans. It seems equal-opportunity. Bain Capital certainly donated a ton of money in Obama's campaign, and he recently put someone in on his staff, who once worked there. Heck, I worked for a boss who was very liberal, and extremely wealthy, and he paid very little and tried getting some of us to work for free. We turned him down. It doesn't matter, it's all about the personality, not the politics.

[Iron Guy]

Agreed.

[Metal Head]

So at the end of the day, politics seeping into comics is annoying, depending on your POV, but the big thing is just bad writing and art that's not spectacular anymore, it's too modern and realistic. I like the crazy stylings of a Kelley Jones, or a Sam Kieth...

heath