[4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

[Funksaw]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Actually, I hate it because most of the more commonly known Iron Age comics are as unrealistic as the Silver Age comics they are supposedly more realistic than...

 

... just in the opposite direction.

 

Dystopia is equally as fictional a place as Utopia, and for the same reason -- it assumes that human nature breaks 99+% towards a given direction. It's just that its chosen direction is 'down' instead of 'up'.

Dude, have you gotten a load of humanity lately? People really *do* suck that much and we're (at least in the U.S.) living in a dystopia.

[David Blue]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Dude' date=' have you gotten a load of humanity lately? People really *do* suck that much and we're (at least in the U.S.) living in a dystopia.[/quote']

No. Or anyway I fundamentally disagree.

 

One of the many reasons Iron Age feels so unreal to me, so stagy, hollow and artificial, is that the writer or gamemaster has to suppress all real heroes, whether by not letting them appear, or by loading them up with arbitrary flaws that invalidate them, or by making mock of them and usually by killing them.

 

Otherwise the dull, vulgar and morally wretched creatures with official starring status wouldn't be able to stand the competition.

 

I think it would not be hard at all to find a pure-hearted Billy Batson to give the power of Shazam! Peter Parkers walk among us, and Aunt Mays too.

 

A world where the writer/editor/gamemaster/god permits superpowers but not people worthy of them is worse than sordid. It's puny. And it's false.

[Phil]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Rep Dave for that post. Totally agree. Four-color and Iron Age are equally unrealistic as two extremes of the scale. Iron Age (or the more extreme Authority-esque Iron Age) actually go out of their way to ridicule and disempower individuals expressing four-color sentiment. I guess, in a way, four-color does the same in reverse (only they're called bad guys there!).

 

I'd be keen to read a real, solid Iron Age story that genuinely tried to be real. Oh wait, I have. Watchmen. Zenith (from 2000AD - if you can get hold of it, do so. Kinda Iron Age meets Cthulhu ). Still, they're few and far between in this age of computer-game driven goreophiles.

[Guest Worldmaker]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

On the other hand if you mean it in the sence of the Authority or Preacher - these things aren't really comics in the traditional meaning. Rather than being a commentary on the social condition' date=' they actively seek change, pushing their own anti-religious, anti-family, anti-establishment, anti-"insert just about any word here" views. These writers care little for the genre going so far as to mock those who would find value in it. They don't want to tell heroic stories (defining heroic the protagonist has redeeming value as a human and faces conflict which must be overcome), the stories they tell are as far from "comics" and "heroics" as a snuff flick is from a romance. I could go on but why? They suck and have zero redeeming value.[/quote']

 

 

I disagree, because such titles spark debate about the morality/ethics/what have you to be found in comic book storytelling... and anything that sparks intelligent discussion, with people on both sides of the issue having good and well-thought-out points, has at least that going for it in the "redeeming value" column.

 

But... and I say this just to make my own position clear... personally I prefer my heroes to be heroes and not superpowered serial killers with an agenda, regardless of how much that agenda might be seen as benefitting society.

[Hawksmoor]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Coming from a man with Hawksmoor as his handle you would think I *adore* the Iron Age. You would be wrong. I am a staunch Bronzer. The Nineteen 70s and 80s are my cup of tea, where I cut my comic teeth and learned about this wonderful medium.

 

I agree with other posters in that Golden and Iron are the extremes with Silver and Bronze in the middle. I am happiest in that middle and despite my research into crafting a reasonable genre simulation I always drift back to the Heroes are Good, but Complex Heroes are better attitude of the Bronze Age.

 

Hawksmoor

[zornwil]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Rep Dave for that post. Totally agree. Four-color and Iron Age are equally unrealistic as two extremes of the scale. Iron Age (or the more extreme Authority-esque Iron Age) actually go out of their way to ridicule and disempower individuals expressing four-color sentiment. I guess, in a way, four-color does the same in reverse (only they're called bad guys there!).

 

I'd be keen to read a real, solid Iron Age story that genuinely tried to be real. Oh wait, I have. Watchmen. Zenith (from 2000AD - if you can get hold of it, do so. Kinda Iron Age meets Cthulhu ). Still, they're few and far between in this age of computer-game driven goreophiles.

In general I think this speaks to how any sort of sub-genre/period work is almost certainly going to be bad when done to its logical extreme.

 

In general, I do think a lot of Iron Age is simply dressed-up dross made to appeal to young males, which isn't terribly different than preceding eras, just that young males' tastes have changed somewhat and more importantly in general entertainment is more sexual and violent. But as stated earlier, premier works of Iron Age including Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen stand as good examples of the period.

 

I just bought an Authority trade paperback, not sure when I"ll really read it but from browsing it strikes me as what I've heard here before, a sort of Iron-Silver hybrid.

[Kristopher]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

No. Or anyway I fundamentally disagree.

 

One of the many reasons Iron Age feels so unreal to me, so stagy, hollow and artificial, is that the writer or gamemaster has to suppress all real heroes, whether by not letting them appear, or by loading them up with arbitrary flaws that invalidate them, or by making mock of them and usually by killing them.

 

Otherwise the dull, vulgar and morally wretched creatures with official starring status wouldn't be able to stand the competition.

 

I think it would not be hard at all to find a pure-hearted Billy Batson to give the power of Shazam! Peter Parkers walk among us, and Aunt Mays too.

 

A world where the writer/editor/gamemaster/god permits superpowers but not people worthy of them is worse than sordid. It's puny. And it's false.

 

I was going to respond to Funksaw's comment, but it was going to be highly NGD worthy. You did a better job than I would have, especially if I posted right now on my initial reaction. I'll just say that while it should be clear that I'm no jingoistic quasipatriotic America-uber-alles extremist, I am just about sick to death of hipper-than-thou disaffected-hippy RollingStone-style America bashing.

[Myrlyn]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Lord Mhoram really summed up my thoughts on this as well. I want my heroes to be bigger than life, and that includes living up to higher standards. The Iron Age heroes could never successfully deliver lines as wonderful as "With great power, comes great responsibility." It just isn't in the genre's nature.

 

Probably the biggest problem I have with Iron Age comics is how they are slowly writing my old favorite characters in new "gritty" ways that are not consistent with their original four color heroic identities and personalities. I loved the Captain America of old, Spider-Man, and yes, even old big blue himself, Superman, in how they stood for higher standards than the norm. I read Capatin America over the past few years, and I'm not sure I even recognize my old hero anymore. And I'm not even going to get started on the directions the X-men books have found themselves moving in.

 

Overall, the Iron Age heroes aren't heroes in my mind. They may be anti-heroes, serving some kind of code of justice in their own right, but they don't strive for those higher ideals that make some one a real HERO to me.

 

Keith

[zornwil]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

I don't agree that the power-vs-responsibility issue is outside Iron Age's realm. I think both Watchmen and Dark Knight are very specific explorations of those ideas - in the latter we see a responsible Superman perhaps squandering his power but we see an irresponsible Batman perhaps abusing his. And in the end we get the impression they both learned from those experiences. In either case Miller (as does Moore in Watchmen) drives home the point that great power does indeed create a real responsibility.

 

Similarly, with Hellblazer, in its finer moments (don't get me wrong, they've had lots of poorer story arcs) has very much been about how power and responsibility are linked, and that's about as "Iron Age" as one can get as well as somewhat far away from regular superhero stuff.

[OddHat]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

All right' date=' I'd like those that dislike the Iron Age style to post their reasons here. If you are fan of the style this thread is not a personal attack on you or your tastes. It might be best if you avoided it all together if you are senstive which is understandable. I think we all are to some extrent or another. The reason I am posting this is test a theory, one I think will show an important distinction in attitudes being displayed on this board. Again, please, no flaming.[/quote']

 

I like well done stories from both the Iron and "Silver" sides of the genre, as well as Gold and Bronze.

 

Others have mentioned my own reasons for disliking the worst of the Iron Age. To paraphrase Jurt Busiek (sp?), once you've completely deconstructed the Comics Code driven Silver Age stories, what do you have left? What do you want to replace them with? Yes, kid sidekicks, sexless romantic relationships in eternal limbo, pushing the Earth out of orbit with your bare hands and without causing any particular trouble for anyone while doing so, etc, etc, were all kind of silly looked at from a certain point of view. The best of the Iron Age looked at these and other Silver Age tropes and either got rid of them or tried to find some meanng. The worst of the Iron Age induldged in mindless wallowing in gore, sex, and pointless whinging. Rape, torture and drug use were the norm, and the sort of every-day virtue that lets society function at all was unknown. Heroism was nowhere to be found. It was the Angry Teen's view of the world.

 

When GMing and writing in the Supers genre, I try to look at how these heroes would live in the Real World . I don't want the "Every man is a psychopath, every woman a monster" crap that marked Veitch's Brat Pack; I also don't want to tell stories about the Powerpuff Girls protecting Townsville, except maybe once in a while.

 

I do like the Legion of Super Pets. They so rocked.

[RDU Neil]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

I don't agree that the power-vs-responsibility issue is outside Iron Age's realm. I think both Watchmen and Dark Knight are very specific explorations of those ideas - in the latter we see a responsible Superman perhaps squandering his power but we see an irresponsible Batman perhaps abusing his. And in the end we get the impression they both learned from those experiences. In either case Miller (as does Moore in Watchmen) drives home the point that great power does indeed create a real responsibility.

 

Similarly, with Hellblazer, in its finer moments (don't get me wrong, they've had lots of poorer story arcs) has very much been about how power and responsibility are linked, and that's about as "Iron Age" as one can get as well as somewhat far away from regular superhero stuff.

 

This whole "power and responsibility" bit is exactly what I think of as modern comics (Iron Age or not). The point being that Silver Age, and even Bronze Age... didn't challenge the status quo. Everyone going on about heroes choosing the "higher moral ground" and what have you... whereas to me, real questions of power and responsibility are better looked at without some assumption of what the right answer must be. Too much of Silver and Bronze age... even if they asked the question... had a pat answer that protected and upheld the status quo. Challenging the status quo, even if you were right to do so, always led to some kind of failure or tragedy. Protecting the status quo never had a cost that outweighed the reward. There always seemed to be a clear choice, even if it was a melodramatic "hard choice." There really were no hard questions, because the pat answer of the status quo was the inevitable answer.

 

Now... using the Authority as an example... Ellis' original run was interesting, because it was looking at "how much would you sacrifice to do what you felt was right, even if a lot of others didn't like it?" In the end, it cost Jenny her life, even though she was pissed at much of humanity, she never gave up on it. Millar then took it to the excesses of "indulging in power fantasies that are the stuff we should be fighting against." This could have been a good story if it questioned itself... but it never did... always making the villains even more grotesque than the protagonists, so the "heroes" could revel in being mean. This is the worst of Iron Age.

 

Brubaker has now come along, and working with severely damaged goods, is actually trying to ask the hard questions in a complex web of violence and deceit. Whether he can pull off a decent story that really examines this theme... well that remains to be seen.

 

In the end, I prefer my heroes to force me to question my beliefs... to really analyze the concepts of right and wrong... rather than be shills for a pat answer and reinforcing an already established dogma. The good stories don't pick a side, but present a variety of issues and perspectives, and let the reader wrestle with it. This is what Dark Knight did. Is Batman a hero? Probably, but he is also a fascist bully. Is Superman a hero? Probably... but he's also a tool of the establishment.

 

Iron Age... when it is good... deals with these shades of gray... making you uncomfortable by forcing you to realize that there are no pat answers or absolutes. Every good has a flip side of evil, to use such terms. There is always a down side... you can't ignore that... nor can you let it stop you from doing SOMETHING.

 

Bad Iron Age is just as extreme as bad Silver Age... it says it's way is the right/real way... it just chooses to see amoral nihilism as the "right" way... as opposed to Polyanna moralism.

[zornwil]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Hey, Batman's not a fascist bully because...because...I like him. And I hate you, I hate the bands you like! Don't mess with Batman!

 

Seriously, though, Neil, I think you hit the nail on the head, though as far as opinions/desires in reading superhero stuff go, I enjoy "non-questioning" as well as questioning stuff. I may be way off base, but I think that some of the better-but-still-goofy Silver Age stuff may have been as realistic a spin on "what if there were supers" in that there would be a degree to which the fantastic becomes routine and good guys can afford to be complacent merry do-gooders as a super-society can bolster them even though the Silver Age hides the dirt inevtiably underlying it. It's sort of how the '50s in the US, while an intensely paranoid and tense time, actually really did operate in some ways in just as superficially pleasant a way as we also sometimes stereotype it. I'm sure I'm stretching this point beyond the practical breaking limit, but anyway in general I just think that a good and even "realistic" superhero story can be removed from more gravitic concerns and be just as interesting/insightful to me.

[Chuckg]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Dude' date=' have you gotten a load of humanity lately? People really *do* suck that much and we're (at least in the U.S.) living in a dystopia.[/quote']

 

 

You say we live in a dystopia? Here and now? I am mocking you, mock mock mock.

 

One of my grandfathers was made to kneel in a ditch and shot in the back of the neck, along with every other educated and/or government-employed person in his village, as part of a political purge.

 

My mother was born in a slave labor camp.

 

One of my uncles got to do clean-up after they captured the Nazi death camps.

 

Several of my friends have seen, first-hand, the aftermaths of incidents of genocide, ethnic cleansing, mass rape, torture, and deliberate starvation of innocents on a massive scale for political purposes.

 

None of this shit happened in America.

 

All of you people who say that we live in a 'dystopia' now, here, you have obviously never learned from the experiences of anyone who has truly lived in one. But *I* have.

[assault]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

None of this shit happened in America.

 

(Flammable response reluctantly deleted.)

 

Despite all the stuff I didn't write, I dislike "people suck" arguments as well.

 

These arguments are stupid, elitist, and inaccurate. Politically, incidentally, they are deeply conservative, since obviously these stupid people are incapable of running their own lives, and need to be supervised by their betters. This is a variant on the kinds of argument used by authoritarian governments to justify their existence.

 

So people who think people suck, suck.

[Mike W]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

(Flammable response reluctantly deleted.)

 

Despite all the stuff I didn't write, I dislike "people suck" arguments as well.

 

These arguments are stupid, elitist, and inaccurate. Politically, incidentally, they are deeply conservative, since obviously these stupid people are incapable of running their own lives, and need to be supervised by their betters. This is a variant on the kinds of argument used by authoritarian governments to justify their existence.

 

So people who think people suck, suck.

 

Actually, you could just as easily say that "all the people who think other people suck" are liberal, or communist, or socialist - since they feel a need to protect everyone from everyone else and blame other people whenever things don't work out just the way they want. There are plenty of people who have a pessimistic view of humanity in just about every political ideology, not just the conservatives.

[Doug McCrae]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

However' date=' in terms of what I dislike about something like the Authority, it's the gratuity and, to some extent, proxy-hedonism of it. The Authority have great big drunken orgies on a giant space ship because... well, I can only assume its because the writers think that'd be a cool thing to do if they were super hip.[/quote']Bang on the money. You're exactly right.

[Doug McCrae]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Dude' date=' have you gotten a load of humanity lately? People really *do* suck that much and we're (at least in the U.S.) living in a dystopia.[/quote']Oh for fuck's sake.

[megaplayboy]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

To be fair, it's certainly possible to conceive of dystopian states where violence and imprisonment are not the primary forms that oppression takes.

Think "Demolition Man", for example.

I mean, of course things are always better in comparison to something else, but one could extend that logic and say "Dictator X kills Y people a year, and restricts Z liberties, but if we kill him and replace him with Dictator X2, who kills only Y/3 people a year, and only restricts Z liberties half as much, the people will feel as though they're living in a utopian state"

[Wanderer]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

If you mean Iron Age as in the X-"insert title" or Punisher from the 80 & 90s then I don't really have a problem. They tend to be my preferred stories even when they do something like have Collosus kill.

 

On the other hand if you mean it in the sence of the Authority or Preacher - these things aren't really comics in the traditional meaning. Rather than being a commentary on the social condition, they actively seek change, pushing their own anti-religious, anti-family, anti-establishment, anti-"insert just about any word here" views. These writers care little for the genre going so far as to mock those who would find value in it. They don't want to tell heroic stories (defining heroic the protagonist has redeeming value as a human and faces conflict which must be overcome), the stories they tell are as far from "comics" and "heroics" as a snuff flick is from a romance. I could go on but why? They suck and have zero redeeming value.

 

Perhaps Authority and Preacher may be a little extreme, but they are so also by being a deliberate liberation/defiance from the unsufferable and suffocating pro-establishment, pro-religion, pro-family, anti-sexuality, pro-conservative values constant lecture that have been shoved in the unwilling comic reader's throat for decades, via the Comic Code. There are fans that heartily welcome the genre eventually breaking off the CCA chains that have stunted the genre for so long and daring that show that you can be (super)heroic without having to grovel and bootlick before anyone with a badge, U.S. seal or pulpit and be a conservative values poster child for the £$%&% little kids. Iron Age may have been a little extreme in its pendulum swinging, as it typically happens to all revolutions, but it was high time it happened.

[Brandi]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Overall' date=' I KNOW the penciling/inking is better now.[/quote']

 

With one EXTREMELY significant exception.

 

Seriously, has there been any artist of old whose work has been as goddam FUGLY as Rob Liefeld's?

[megaplayboy]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

With one EXTREMELY significant exception.

 

Seriously, has there been any artist of old whose work has been as goddam FUGLY as Rob Liefeld's?

Sal Buscema.

[MikeyMitchell]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

I also don't want to tell stories about the Powerpuff Girls protecting Townsville' date=' except maybe once in a while.[/quote']Hey, Power Puff Girls are way cool... :)I also enjoyed Freakazoid, so what does that tell you?

[Doug McCrae]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Perhaps Authority and Preacher may be a little extreme' date=' but they are so also by being a deliberate liberation/defiance from the unsufferable and suffocating pro-establishment, pro-religion, pro-family, anti-sexuality, pro-conservative values constant lecture that have been shoved in the unwilling comic reader's throat for decades, via the Comic Code. [/quote']It was the Authority and Preacher that broke the Code!!? Not the ground-breaking works of the 70s? Or the mature work in the 80s by Moore, Miller, Pat Mills etc. The Authority and Preacher use the efforts of genuine talents for nothing more than childish scatological shock value.

[Doug McCrae]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

 

Hey' date=' Power Puff Girls are way cool... [/quote']Forget the Authority shit. The Power Puff Girls are the true Iron Age.

[MikeyMitchell]

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?)

Perhaps Authority and Preacher may be a little extreme' date=' but they are so also by being a deliberate liberation/defiance from the unsufferable and suffocating pro-establishment, pro-religion, pro-family, anti-sexuality, pro-conservative values constant lecture that have been shoved in the unwilling comic reader's throat for decades, via the Comic Code. There are fans that heartily welcome the genre eventually breaking off the CCA chains that have stunted the genre for so long and daring that show that you can be (super)heroic without having to grovel and bootlick before anyone with a badge, U.S. seal or pulpit and be a conservative values poster child for the £$%&% little kids. Iron Age may have been a little extreme in its pendulum swinging, as it typically happens to all revolutions, but it was high time it happened.[/quote']I'm a bit curious how one can shove a value down an unwilling person's throat in a book he voluntarily bought and voluntarily read. By definition, if he were unwilling, he wouldn't have bought the book in the first place...And I don't think it's an accurate portrayal to say that Silver Age heroes "grovel" before the police. Spider-Man was often sought after by the police, but didn't meekly turn himself in. If upholding the law means "grovelling" before the courts, then your complaint is valid. OTOH, if you're not upholding the law, you're - by definition - breaking it.There's a right time and a wrong time to challenge the "status quo". Breaking the law and challenging values is valid if it can be objectively shown that the law and/or value is wrong. Otherwise, it's just rebellion for the sake of rebellion. Which explains the Iron Age's popularity with the teenage "I'm mad at the world for no real reason" set.