Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

As you would expect from a medium that has survived decades, comic books have changed with time to adapt to changes in culture.  In Comic Book Nation, Bradford W. Wright describes that history from the birth of comics as a new medium in the 1930s through the 1990s. Though the book was published a decade ago, it still provides a good perspective on where comics are. He mentions the advent of electronic publishing at the close of the book. I think it is fair to say that electronic publishing and distribution has not radically changed comics, though there may be potential for that in recent developments in the business of self-publishing comics electronically.

Bradford is an academic historian. Comic Book Nation is intended to be a cultural history of comics. Of course, Bradford can’t help but cover some the same ground that other writers cover, though this book predates many of the more academic or journalistic books on the subject. Some publishers, creators, and titles are just too important and influential not to mention. Even so, he tries to stick to his purpose and show how the times were reflected in comics.

I think it is fair to say that comics, and popular media generally, reflect cultures more than they influence them. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be popular. This reflection isn’t always simplistic, even in comics. Comics writers and artists, like other producers of popular media, tried to address the concerns and interests of their audiences, sometimes realistically, sometimes idealistically, and sometimes with cynicism.

Of course, it was Superman who sparked the immense popularity of superhero comics, and comics generally. That popularity spawned imitators, as it does today. The early Superman, created by Cleveland high school students Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, was a reformer. He battled gangsters and crooked politicians. He was a New Dealer. Many comics supported New Deal policies to address the Great Depression.

Superheroes made the transition to World War II with ease. Writers had to address why the costumed crusaders weren’t enlisting or bringing the war to a swift end. They must have succeeded, because superhero titles were very popular, even among American soldiers. Comics were pro-war, and many costumed heroes were battling foreign menaces, especially the Nazis, even before America entered the war.

Superhero titles floundered after the war, but other genres did well. Comics generally supported American policies of intervention in smaller nations and containment of Communism. The medium reflected the post-war hopefulness that there could be peace and international cooperation with America leading as a benevolent superpower.

The post-war years had troubles, too. People feared the misuse and spread of nuclear weapons. The Korean War was a doubtful venture that many felt lacked the clear and good purpose of World War II. This applied to Viet Nam, too, where the additional problems of guerilla warfare challenged notions of heroism.

Comic books faced other challenges. The excesses of crime and horror comics brought about industry-operated censorship. Television competed for the time and money of children.

Much of the latter part of the book shows how the comics industry found a way to survive these problems. The 1960s introduced a resurgence of creativity and superheroes, especially the flawed fantasy men of Stan Lee’s Marvel Comics. New models of distribution were introduced in the 1980s. Electronic media has the potential to reinvigorate comics.

Because my adolescence was in the 1980s, I’d like to mention a few things about it. Unlike some comics historians, Bradford spends a fair amount of time on that decade, especially in a book that covers more than 60 years. He provides a pretty good description of how Frank Miller and Alan Moore challenged the superhero model and brought a lot of new interest to it. If anything, Miller and Moore were too influential. A lot of comics are still derivative of their best works.  Imitation of success is common in comics, and too often the imitators do not have the skill or understanding of the masters.

What I’d really like to mention is that Bradford acknowledges John Byrne’s contribution. Byrne was a very popular writer and artist in the 1980s. He did some pretty good stuff, too. He also indulged in excesses that presaged the excesses of the 1990s, but at least he did it with a self-aware wink. Byrne brought fun back to comics. Then as now, I like comics with a good dose of fun.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

Stan Lee by Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Will Eisner by Michael Schumacher

Wright, Bradford W. Comic Book nation: The Transformation of Youth Culture in America. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001.

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Marvel Comics: The Untold Story by Sean Howe

Marvel Comics has a long history in comic books, especially superhero comics. It’s first superheroes, the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner, debuted in 1939 and the company is currently unrolling popular series of films based on a The Avengers, a superhero team that first appeared in comics in 1963.

The extended, interconnected, iterative melodrama of Marvel’s comics is a complicated fictional world. The real-world company has a complicated history, too. It started as a scion of a pulp magazine publisher seeking diversify and is now a part of media powerhouse Walt Disney Company. Sean Howe provides a detailed history of the company in Marvel Comics: The Untold Story.

Howe divides the history of the Marvel into five major ages. He discusses the early history of the company, but Marvel as we know it today could mark its origins in the resurgence of superhero comics of the early 1960s, after a post-World War II slump that all but the most popular titles.

The succeeding ages roughly correspond to the decades. The 1960s marked the birth of modern Marvel. The 1970s were a time of artistic experimentation when comics, especially Marvel, were embraced on college campus and in the counterculture.

In the 1980s, kids who grew up reading Marvel became adults writing the comics. It was also a time when corporate culture began to consume the company—though the priority of making money, executive interference and possibly shady business was something that went back to the days of the pulps. This decade also marked a change in the way comics were sold, shifting from newsstands and grocery-store spinners to specialty shops, which created opportunities and problems for comics publishers.

The 1990s was a period of excess. Comics creators were finally making money (at least some of them were), but old contentions between publishers—especially Marvel—and writers and artists led to the rise of superstars spinning off to publish works to which they would retain the rights. The growth in comics collecting encouraged marketing practice, especially at Marvel, that eventually led to a bust.

Throughout this time, Marvel’s various owners had been attempting to transition the company from a comics publisher to a media company that leveraged its intellectual property in many ways. In the 2000s, Marvel has done that. A criticism often leveled against Marvel today is that the comics are driven by decisions to make the characters marketable in other media, especially movies and toys.

Comics have come a long way since I started reading them as a kid. For one thing, they cost 10 times as much. Howe wraps up with the opinion that Marvels products are better, and in some ways I agree. However, I think comics often uses the words mature and adult when they are simply prurient, and that the improvement in printing quality is not always accompanied by improvements in story or art. I have mixed feelings about the multi-issues stories designed for collection into graphic novels aimed at book retailers, but I think the event-driven mega-crossovers that have become standard for Marvel and DC don’t move me much—I’d rather read a good short story than an overblown novel.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Amazing Fantastic Incredible by Stan Lee, Peter David & Colleen Doran

Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

Kirby by Mark Evanier

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

1939 by David Gelernter

Stan Lee by Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Howe, S. Marvel Comics: The Untold Story. New York: HarperCollins, 2012.

The Phantom Unmasked by Kevin Patrick

The Phantom is a long-running newspaper comic strip that first appeared in the New York Journal in 1936.  He was a pulp-adventure hero who protected his jungle home while fighting piracy and crime around the world. His unique twist, at least visually, was his outfit of tights and trunks, with a domino mask to obscure his features. More than a year before the appearance of Superman, the Phantom was dressing like a superhero.

In parts of the world, people consider the Phantom to be the very first superhero. Though he persists in American newspaper pages, he has not been very popular in the U.S. in comparison to similar characters. In other part so of the world, notably Australia, Sweden and India, he is possibly the most well-known and followed comics characters. How did a middling American adventure comic become so popular overseas? Comics scholar Kevin Patrick wrote a dissertation about it, and has since turned than dissertation into his book, The Phantom Unmasked.

It started with the general popularity of newspaper comic strips in the United States. As the American market became saturated, the features syndicates that distributed comics sought to expand by marketing to foreign publishers. While they faced objections in some markets, they had the advantage of being cheap and plentiful. In addition, the American syndicates worked with local syndicates or publishers to adapt their comics to local tastes and customs. This included The Phantom.

Lee Falk, writer of the strip, conceived of a character who was likely to be popular by taking ideas from popular jungle stories and hero pulps. He noted that he took inspiration form Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan of the Apes (serialize in All-Story magazine) and Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book. The name of the Phantom is suggested by The Shadow, one of the most popular pulp magazines. The Phantom marked his enemies with the stamp of his skull ring, similar to the signet of The Spider, who more often left his mark on a corpse than a living foe. The skull-mark itself may have been inspired by the death’s head ring of Operator 5; though that ring was loaded with an explosive charge.

Patrick traces the spread of The Phantom from the United States to overseas markets, especially Sweden, which would become a center of oversees Phantom media production, India and his homeland of Australia. While he considers the features of the strip that make it popular in these countries, he also explores the marketing and publishing practices of the features syndicates in America and abroad to show how The Phantom was a financial as well as a popular success. The Phantom Unmasked is as much a business history as it is a comics history, though the two have always fit closely together.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

Kirby by Mark Evanier

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

Miss Mizzou by J. B. Winter

Mr. America by Mark Adams

The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore

Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan by Rick Bowers

The Peerless Peer by Philip Jose Farmer

Why Comics? by Hilary Chute

Patrick, Kevin. The Phantom Umasked: America’s First Superhero. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2017.

Dr. Horrible, the Hamlet of Nerds

Okay, comparing Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog to Hamlet, one of the greatest plays in the English language, is the type of hyperbole writers, especially on the Internet, use to draw in a reader.  I presume it worked on you.

There are points of comparison. Both are tragedies. Both feature lead characters giving themselves over to being people they might not really have wanted to become, at least not at the beginning. Both carry a sense of terrifying inevitability.

Having hooked you with Hamlet, I’m going to carry on about Dr. Horrible.  The film plays on concepts of nerdiness, jocks, and what is the potential tragedy of a world in which nerds can’t find a place for themselves (though they seem to be everywhere). It does so in the nerdy context of superhero films and musicals, the mash up of these genres being geeky itself.

About the Film

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog was produced as a serial for the Internet.  The film was written by Joss Whedon, his brothers Zack and Jed, and Maurissa Tancharoen to produce something during the 2007-2008 strike by the Writer’s Guild.  It appeared on the Dr. Horrible Web site in three parts in July 2008 and is now available on DVD.

The familiar star of the film is Neil Patrick Harris, who plays Barney on How I Met Your Mother. I don’t enjoy that show much, but fortunately Harris has found other outlets for his performing talent. It is unfair to say Dr. Horrible launched her career, but I think it helped Felicia Day achieve a new level, especially on the Internet.  She is everywhere now and produces the Geek & Sundry YouTube channel.

Plot Summary

Dr. Horrible (Harris) is an aspiring supervillain.  He is seeking entry into the Evil League of Evil, but his prospects are threatened by superhero Captain Hammer (Nathan Fillion).

The pursuit of supervillainy is complicated by Dr. Horrible’s double-mindedness even more than his nemesis.  As his alter ego Billy, the doctor is smitten with Penny (Day), a girl he meets at the Laundromat.  She meets and begins to date Captain Hammer. Hammer recognizes his enemy and flaunts the affair.

Dr. Horrible retreats from the situation and focuses on the League.  They are not impressed with his recent failures, but he can prove himself by killing someone in one of his capers.  He plans to kill Hammer. Things go wrong when Horrible sees Penny at the event where he plans to exact his revenge and begins to experience a change of heart.  Hammer gains control of Horrible’s death ray, which is overloading. In spite of Horrible’s warning, Hammer uses the weapon, which explodes, causing him pain but no apparent injury. Fragments of the death ray hit the crowd and kill Penny.

In one stroke, Horrible loses his love and gains his dead victim.  He is admitted to the League. He abandons hope and embraces evil.  It’s dark stuff for a musical comedy.

Dr. Horrible: Protagonist, Villain, Nerd

Dr. Horrible is a nerd.  As support of this notion, if it isn’t readily apparent, I turn to the characteristics of nerds identified by Benjamin Nugent in American Nerd.  He suggests that people associated nerds with machine like qualities. Nerds seem machine like in that they

• like working with machines, having interest in technical subjects or complex hobbies, and
• prefer direct, logical, rule-bound communication to indirect, emotional communication.

In his first appearance, Dr. Horrible is recording a vlog entry in his lab. Throughout the film, he talks about his inventions and uses them. He is clearly at home in the realm of technology. Not only that, he identifies himself with science and technology with his costume: long white (lab) coat, long rubber gloves, and goggles.

While comfortable with technology and talking about it, he is uncomfortable with emotional communication. He has trouble expressing his feelings to Penny, and he has trouble reading the signs that she might be attracted to him. In light of this, he is oddly eloquent on his vlog.  In Quiet, Susan Cain noted that introverts often communicate a lot through social media, and rise to leadership in online communities.  They communicate very well when relieved of the pressures and distractions of face-to-face communications. Nerdiness and introversion aren’t synonymous, but I think it strengthens the case for Dr. Horrible’s nerdiness in his preference for technologically mediated communication that is formalized through a script (an unscripted vlog would not be eloquent) and music (with rules for rhythm, pitch, and rhyme).

Captain Hammer: Antagonist, Hero, Jock

Captain Hammer is the antithesis of a nerd: a jock.  I turn again to American Nerd to help make this diagnosis. Nugent notes that the nerd image was at one time associated with immigrant communities that were rising in population and status. Immigrant pursuit of New World opportunities was shaped by their Old World perspective, so they sought upward mobility in artistic and intellectual professions.

The established upper class wanted to both maintain its dominance and distinguish itself from lower classes, especially immigrants. They adopted a preference for athleticism and a suspicion of excessive intellectualism. Book-learning had its place, but a boy who would take his place as active leader in business, political, and military affairs needed to learn how to win. Sporting fields and athletic competitions were seen as the classroom for these skills. Athleticism as associated with a certain class (because such vigorous leisure required time and resources).  This magnified the upper class sense of superiority.

We can see this in reflected Captain Hammer. His superhuman physical superiority seems to be a justification for his overall sense of being superior to others, especially the weaker and physically cowardly Horrible. Even his activities as a do-gooder seem to lack a moral motivation outside a vague noblesse oblige. He seems more interested in establishing and maintaining his status. For instance, his support of Penny’s campaign to end homelessness is motivated by the positive publicity he receives, not by love of his fellow man—he does not perceive value in homeless people.

The Tragedy of Dr. Horrible

Dr. Horrible, then, is a classic conflict between a typical nerd and a typical jock, except they are a supervillain and a superhero in a comic book-style world where such people exist. Where is the tragedy?

We’ve already noted the death of Penny. That is enough to make the film a tragedy, but not necessarily a nerdy one.

The tragedy of the nerd is to be trapped in alienation. Admittedly, nerds seem to be increasingly popular nowadays, but the more traditional image of a nerd is of one alienated from popular society because his machine-like qualities are not valued in a culture that sees emotional display and sensitivity as more worthy and human.

Nerds are not naturally loners, though. They have a long history of building their own communities. Science fiction fandom is a good example. Long before the Internet, sci-fi fans built communities of letter writing and zines around popular magazines. Before long, they began gathering at clubs and conventions. This culture carried over into comic book fandom (for more on this check out Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones). Nugent notes how a similar community of nerds, also readers popular magazines, formed around ham radio, where technological skill and rule-bound communication were prized.

We’ve noted that Dr. Horrible also seeks connection to a community. He specifically identifies his desire to be part of the League.  His quest for world domination is also motivated by a desire to connect with the wider community of humanity. He wants to take over the world not because he hates people, but because he longs for a logical meritocracy that would rid the world of all the trouble cause by emotionalism, celebrity culture, and doublespeak. In his fantasy, he would naturally rise to the top of such a society.

Captain Hammer frustrates these efforts at connection. He reinforces a culture of athleticism and emotional communication that Horrible cannot participate in. When he finds a sympathetic soul who may be able to help him make that connection, Hammer sweeps her away. At last, Horrible wins entry into a community, but the League is evil and inhumane, and can only serve to further dehumanize its members. The cost to Horrible to finally belong is high; he must turn his back on the rest of humanity and give up the hope of ever loving or being loved by another. He is completely alienated, cut off from meaningful and fulfilling connections to others.

The Sequel

A sequel is reported in the works and expected to be released this year.  I would expect most of the major characters to return.

I imagine many fans would like to see Day reprise her role as Penny, though the character died in the first film.  Because this is a superhero movie, there are several ways around this: time travel, cloning, robotic or holographic doubleganger (it’s a word, and it doesn’t need an umlaut), or reanimation (no zombies, please).  Maybe Dr. Horrible will try all of these things, each effort going more wrong than the last. He could be forced to team up with Captain Hammer to fend off an army of time-travel replicated, cyborg zombie Pennies, but I probably wouldn’t watch it because I’m creeped out by the walking dead.

Making Your Connection

You may be nerd seeking connection, too.  I’ve provided a little information below where you can find out about the people behind this film and the books I mentioned. They’re involved in other things and you may find that work interesting. Please do not cyberstalk them.  I don’t want that on my conscience.

Susan Cain

Book: Quiet (review)

Facebook: AuthorSusanCain

Twitter: @susancain

Web site: www.thepowerofintroverts.com

Felicia Day

Facebook: Felicia Day

Google+: +Felicia Day

IMDb: Felicia Day

Twitter: @feliciaday

Web site: feliciaday.com

YouTube: Geek & Sundry

Nathan Fillion

IMDb: Nathan Fillion

Twitter: @NathanFillion

Neil Patrick Harris

IBDB: Neil Patrick Harris

IMDb: Neil Patrick Harris

Twitter: @ActuallyNPH

YouTube: Neil’s Puppet Dreams on Nerdist

Gerard Jones

Book: Men of Tomorrow (review)

ComicBookDB: Gerard Jones

IMDb: Gerard Jones

Red Room: Gerard Jones

Web site: www.gerardjones.com

Benjamin Nugent

Book: American Nerd (review)

Web site: www.benjaminnugent.com, www.americannerdbook.com

Maurissa Tancharoen

IMDb: Maurissa Tancharoen

Jed Whedon

IMDb: Jed Whedon

Twitter: @jedwhedon

Joss Whedon

IMDb: Joss Whedon

Web site: whedonesque.com

Zack Whedon

IMDb: Zack Whedon

Twitter: @ZDubDub

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Interesting Stuff Jan. 13, 2011

A Giant Nib

Dam problems in Massachusetts
-100 major dams need repair, state auditor says
-Audit warns of deteriorating municipal dams

Dr. Who marries Dr. Who or his clone or his daughter or—oh, the paradoxes!
The [Amazingly Comprehensive] History of the Batmobile
Interesting Stuff Dec. 30, 2010
Ft. Leonard Wood recovers from tornado

Life imitates art
-The Phoenix Jones Interview
-'Real Life Superhero' Breaks Up Carjacking In Washington State
-Real Life Super-Hero Phoenix Jones Rescues Man from Carjacking in Seattle
-Real-Life Superhero Walks Streets, Fighting Crime

Lost Earmarks
The President and the E-word
Stan Lee gets his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Subterranean history: Beautiful abandoned NYC subway station

Water getting more expensive
-Orange (CA) water rates could go up 59% over 4 years
-Phoenix officials propose another water-rate hike

The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore

Wonder Woman is one of most popular comic book characters. Because she is about to be featured in a film that will bring Batman and Superman together in epic battle, and is expected to be featured in a film of her own, the Internet is already beginning to buzz with concern over how badly she may be portrayed and hopes that the filmmakers will get her right. She has starred in some great stories, but often the stories about her have disappointed for various reasons. The difficulty of depicting a woman superhero has its roots in sorting out the roles of women in society, something we’re still working on. It is a struggle Wonder Woman was born to fight.

Jill Lepore explores the birth of this female superhero in The Secret History of Wonder Woman. In one of her various comics origins, the demigoddess was formed from the mud of Paradise Island, but Lepore describes how she was formed in the suffrage and feminist movements of the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries, and an unusual family with strong ties to these movements.

Wonder Woman first appeared in print in 1941. When she became the title character of her own comic, her creator came from behind his pseudonym, with some fanfare, and revealed himself as psychologist William Moulton Marston.

Marston’s lifestyle is known now, but it was a closely held secret during his lifetime. For all practical purposes, if not legally, he had two wives. Surprisingly, both women were feminists. They both loved Marston and found in this arrangement a way to live the lives they wanted. They had a pragmatic, flexible feminism that was accepting of the unconventional. I can hardly do it justice in a few words, but Lepore explores the early days of feminism that shaped the arrangement Marston had with these two women.

Marston met Elizabeth Holloway while they were undergraduates, he at Harvard and she at Mount Holyoke. They were both advocates of women’s suffrage. They married in 1915. Marston received a doctorate and Holloway a master’s degree. Holloway claimed to be deeply involved in Marston’s early research. The Marston household became full of writers and editors, and overtime attribution became a matter of convenience or marketing rather than identification of individual authorship.

Olive Byrne met Marston as an undergraduate at Tufts, where she became his research assistant. She quickly became more and moved into the Marston household. Eventually they worked out the arrangement that Holloway would work full-time (over time she had several jobs as an editor) while Byrne raised the children (each had two children with Marston). Byrne eventually felt the need to contribute the finances and in the 1930s wrote for Family Circle as Oliver Richards (Richards from the marriage and widowhood she faked to obscure the parentage of her children). Byrne, like the Marstons she joined, had ties to the feminist and birth control movements. She was the daughter of Ethel Byrne  and her aunt was the more famous Margaret Sanger.

Holloway, Byrne, and even Sanger, were to varying degrees the models for Wonder Woman. She was to be feminist propaganda, and under Marston’s pen she was. One would guess that this would have attracted criticism, but it was not the feminism of Wonder Woman that most stirred up critics.

Bondage was depicted on almost every page of Marston’s comics. In addition, Wonder Woman’s costume was skimpy. Lepore links the bondage in these comics to the use of bondage as a symbol used by suffragists and feminists. Sometimes Marston drew very consciously on images associated with these movements. In addition, the bondage represented notions of domination and submission rooted in Marston’s theories of personality and the relationship between the sexes. Bonds, and the breaking of them, represented the misappropriation of power by men and the power of women to free themselves and take their place as leaders in society. Similarly, Wonder Woman’s bare limbs were emblematic of her athleticism, strength, power and essential equality to make heroes. It’s hard to say that the depiction of Wonder Woman is completely free of sexual undertone, Marston wanted her to be beautiful. Lepore shows the clear link between the symbolism of Wonder Woman and the symbolism  of suffrage and feminism that Marston consciously referenced.

When Marston passed away in 1947, Wonder Woman fell into the hands of writers and editors who did not share his vision. She hasn’t been the same since. After World War II, the feminism she represented was not welcome in the broader culture or by the men who wrote her comics. Even after the second wave of feminism adopted her as an emblem in the 1970s, she’s not been quite at home. Perhaps we’ll have trouble getting Wonder Woman right as long as we have conflict about the roles of women in our culture.

If you’re interested in either comics or feminism, I recommend Lepore’s book. It is thoroughly researched and thoroughly readable.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

Kirby by Mark Evanier

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

Miss Mizzou by J. B. Winter

Reading Comics by Douglas Wolk

Stan Lee by Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon

Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan by Rick Bowers

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Will Eisner by Michael Schumacher

Lepore, Jill. The Secret History of Wonder Woman. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2014.

Interesting Stuff March 18, 2011

Another Real-Life Costumed Hero (or Two) Joins the Fray
-Britain Gets Its Own Kick-Ass: Banker Turns into Superhero The Statesman at Night to Fight Crime
-Britain’s Real Life Superhero The Statesman Battles Evil with the Power of Incredible Facial Hair
-Masked Environmental Vigilante “Super Tri” Put on French City’s Payroll
-Phoenix Jones Protects Seattle

Awesome Artist: Dustin Nguyen
Huckabee Toys with Whitehouse Run
I don’t like everything about Batwoman, but I like the art of J. H. Williams III
Jack Kirby My Little Pony

Jane Russell Passes
-“Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” Beauty Jane Russell Dies at 89
-Jane Russell
-Jane Russell Dies
-Jane Russell, RIP
-In Memoriam: Jane Russell
-Rants and Raves: Jane Russell

Interesting Stuff Feb. 17, 2011

Practice Babies
-Arthur Explores Lives of Practice Babies Once Raised on College Campuses
-Practice Babies: An Outdated Practice Discovered

Waterworks Museum Opens In Boston
Why my wife doesn’t leave me in charge of decorating
Working Conditions Drive Women from Engineering

Investigating Lois Lane by Tim Hanley

Lois Lane is one of the most recognized names among superhero comic book characters even though she is not a superhero. The intrepid reporter made has been around for more than 80 years, and her history is recounted by Tim Hanley in Investigating Lois Lane.

Lois was not in the original Superman stories created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster. As they worked and reworked the character, setting and supporting cast in an attempt to come up with something that would sell, they took inspiration or the girl reporter movies of the time to add a love interest for the man of steel. Several popular movies in the mid-1930s featured smart, tough, fast-talking, blonde female reporters such as Torchy Blane, a character that premiered in 1937’s Smart Blonde.

Schuster’s innovation was to make Lois brunette. He took inspiration from Jolan (Joanne) Kovacs, a high school student in Cleveland who advertised herself for modeling.  Schuster was apparently smitten with her—she was his model Lois, and all his other heroines resembled Lois—and they stayed in touch as she moved around the country pursuing her modeling career. They met up again in New York after World War II. He invited her to a ball—even rented a gown for her. Jerry Siegel was there, too, and she left with him. Siegel left his wife and young son to marry Kovaks.

Not only was Lois a career woman, an unusual thing when she premiered with Superman in 1938, she was also headstrong, cunning, independent and determined to become a top reporter. However, the writers of Lois’ stories were men; the first Lois Lane story written by a woman, Tasmyn O’Flynn, was published in 1982.  Though she remained a working woman, she was often depicted as a damsel in distress or a love-struck cheerleader for Superman.

Depictions of Lois changed over time as the status of women changed in American society. Sometimes she was at the forefront, as she briefly was in the women’s liberation movement during the 1970s. Other time she lagged and reflecting traditional role for women, or Superman and others shamed her unfeminine ambition. Too often she was simply a background player in Superman stories, even though she was more than able to carry a story on her own in the hands of writers who cared.

Such ups and downs will likely be Lois’ fate for a while. We can hope that she get the treatment she deserves with stories that let her shine.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Book of Lies by Brad Meltzer

The Caped Crusade by Glen Weldon

Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

The DC Comics Guide to Writing Comics by Dennis O’Neil

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

Miss Mizzou by J. B. Winter

Reading Comics by Douglas Wolk

Reckless by Chrissie Hynde

The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore

Seduction of the Innocent by Max Allan Collins

Suggestible You by Erik Vance

The Supergirls by Mike Madrid

Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan by Rick Bowers

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Why Comics? by Hilary Chute

Hanley, Tim. Investigating Lois Lane: The Turbulent History of the Daily Planet’s Ace Reporter. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2014.

Amazing Fantastic Incredible by Stan Lee, Peter David & Colleen Doran

When a book is entitled Amazing Fantastic Incredible, Stan Lee must be involved. That is the title of Lee’s graphic novel memoir, co-written with Peter David with art by Colleen Doran, about his long career in comic books.

Lee has a career in comic books going back the Golden Age. He started working in comics soon after they became a popular medium. Few people have had a career in comic books as long as Lee’s, partly because he is still working. No one has been the public face of comic books, or a spokesman and promotor for the medium, as much as Lee.

Because Lee’s career in comics is well known, at least among fans, some of the more interesting parts of the memoir deal with other aspects of his life. He depicts himself as being crazy in love with his wife, Joan, even after decades of marriage. He recalls himself as a lonely kid during the Great Depression, who took refuge in books and the world of his own imagination. He retelling of his army service during World War II, mostly serving as a writer stateside, is mostly humorous.

I suspect Lee’s humor has a lot to do with his popularity. He comes across as self-aggrandizing with a self-deprecating wink.

Even so, Lee’s status as a comics celebrity has sparked criticism in some circles. He was the face of Marvel Comics, and so has taken the heat for the way the publisher treated the artist who worked for him (comics publishers treated artists shabbily for decades). Maybe he could have done more for the artists who worked for him, and maybe he would have been unemployed if he tried. Lee doesn’t get into this matter much, but when he does he shifts the blame to publisher Martin Goodman.

Lee addresses some of his most famous characters and the artists who co-created them. Some might see his recognition of co-creators as a defense against detractors who say he has claimed too much credit. I think the book presents the situation the way Lee would like to remember, and the way he would like others to remember it. I think he genuinely liked and admired many of the people he worked with. Throughout the book, Jack Kirby is depicted as handsome, powerful and dynamic, almost like a superhero, even when there was a rift if their personal and professional relationship.

This is a memoir, not an autobiography. Lee and his collaborators do not attempt to independently confirm memories, though they straightforward about some memories being fuzzy. A few scenes a clearly constructed to present information in a manner more interesting than direct exposition, though they may have had some root in an actual event. Lee’s conversations with his boyhood self are plainly fictional; I thought they tended to be the weakest parts of the book, though they were functional.

Fans of Lee will probably enjoy the book. Someone who wants a brief and easy history of comics, and isn’t too concerned about the lopsidedness that would naturally come with Lee’s perspective, might also like it. Lee would know, he was there.

Stan Lee also wrote Spider-Man with Steve Ditko. Peter David also wrote Writing for Comics with Peter David.

If  you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Comic Book Nation by Bradford W. Wright

The DC Comics Guide to Writing Comics by Dennis O’Neil

Kirby by Mark Evanier

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore

Stan Lee by Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Will Eisner by Michael Schumacher

Lee, Stan, Peter David & Colleen Doran. Amazing Fantastic Incredible: A Marvelous Memoir. New York: Touchstone, 2015.

Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan by Rick Bowers

On February 5, 1946, The Adventures of Superman radio program opened with a new introduction:

Yes, it’s Superman.  Strange visitor from another planet, who came to earth with powers and abilities farbeyond those of mortal men.  Superman, defender of law and order, champion of equal rights, valiant, courageous fighter against the forces of hate and prejudice!

This announced the beginning of the radio Superman’s struggle with post-war social issues, especially a campaign against racial and religious intolerance.  In this adventure, Jimmy Olsen infiltrated the Guardians of America, a fictional stand-in for pro-Nazi groups that were operating in the United States at the time.  This was only the beginning.  Later that year, Adventures would feature a 16-episode story in which Superman took on the Clan of the Fiery Cross, a stand-in for the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).

Behind these fictional stories of Superman were real-life adventures.  The KKK was attempting to launch a new national membership drive, playing on the insecurities people felt after World War II.  There were real infiltrators of the KKK and other organized hatemongers who exposed the workings of these organizations in the media.  Rick Bowers tells the story of these men and the producers of the comic book and radio Superman in Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan.

Superman had been dealing with cultural concerns from his beginning.  When Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Jewish high-school students in Cleveland, created Superman in the 1930s, they pitted him against criminal gangs and crooked politicians.  As Nazi Germany began to rise as an aggressive European power, the hero opposed Nazis at home and abroad.  During the war, he protected the home front.   Though it is not the focus, Bowers describes how Superman has changes with the concerns of the times.

The Klan has roots going back to the Reconstruction era after the Civil War.  It started as a jokey order of former Confederate Army officers in Tennessee who imitated the mystery religion-inspired fraternal orders that were popular at colleges, with mysterious rituals and strange names.  It spawned imitators that secretly gathered in Nashville to organize themselves in 1867.  Former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest was the first Grand Wizard, who lead the Klan in opposition to Reconstruction, including domestic terrorism against blacks and white proponents of racial equality and Reconstruction policies.  The violence of the Klan members, called Ghouls, eroded the organization’s popularity.

William J. Simmons launched a campaign to revive the Klan, taking it national in 1920.  For Simmons it was largely a moneymaking scheme, though he seemed happy to promote intolerance of blacks, Jews, Catholics, immigrants and anyone else who wasn’t a white, male Protestant.  (I’m a white, male Protestant and I find nothing in Protestantism, or Christianity in general, that justifies the intolerance promoted by the Klan.)  Successors led the Klan to political activism in the 1920s, and it became very powerful, but front-line violence and leadership hypocrisy undermined their position.  The post-war membership campaign, led by Samuel Green who was Grand Dragon of the Georgia Realm, was thwarted by law enforcement and equal rights advocates with help of medial like Adventures.

The library helpfully labeled Bowers’ book with a sticker that reads, “TEEN.”  I suppose it is a young adult book, though I think it is within the grasp of many middle school students.  It is an unusual introduction to the history of bigotry in American and the movements that promoted equality, but the tie to a popular superhero might make the subject more appealing to kids in school.  It made me pick up the book, and I’m far passed my school days.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

Maus by Art Spiegelman

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Bowers, Rick.  Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan.  Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2012.

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