Grant Morrison Smites Frank Miller
Newsarama has an excellent Grant Morrison interview (is there any other kind?) up right now. Morrison mostly talks about his approach to Batman, but also finds a few seconds to take a stab at Frank Miller’s upcoming Batman/Al Qaeda graphic novel. I have to admit that I laughed out loud at this paragraph…
And while we’re on that subject…Batman vs. Al Qaeda! It might as well be Bin Laden vs. King Kong! Or how about the sinister Al Qaeda mastermind up against a hungry Hannibal Lecter! For all the good it’s likely to do. Cheering on a fictional character as he beats up fictionalized terrorists seems like a decadent indulgence when real terrorists are killing real people in the real world. I’d be so much more impressed if Frank Miller gave up all this graphic novel nonsense, joined the Army and, with a howl of undying hate, rushed headlong onto the front lines with the young soldiers who are actually risking life and limb ‘vs’ Al Qaeda.
August 25th, 2006 at 9:47 pm
yeah…it’s strange Grant broke the unwritten rule of not bashing other creators. Makes me think maybe there’s something personal between them? As for the book itself, I’ll withhold judgment until it’s actually out. On the one hand, you had Superman fighting the Nazis in WWII, on the other…well, there’s the 9/11 issue of Spider-Man where Dr. Doom was crying.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:09 pm
You know, I’m glad Morrison called bullshit on this douchebag. And honestly, creators should sound off about each other. Not in an egotistical way, just in critique of their artistic choices. I don’t know about you, but those Superman/Captain America v. Hitler comics look beyond campy. They are propaganda, plain and simple and I read Miller say so in an interview. What bugs me is the small minded mentality of reducing Bin Laden or al-Qaeda to a “bad guy”. It’s too easy and dumb. The reality is much more complex than some cape-driven black and white world. If he lived in our universe, Batman would be a fifth column in the US, trying to stop our own criminal government from continuing to commit war crimes in the name of global domination. Bush is Ras al Ghul for real. And Bats would surely understand that it’s our own government’s actions that makes “them” hate us, and not our “freedom”. If Miller had any balls, that’s how he’d write it. I ain’t buying this crap. But I will see “300″. It’s the last good work that came from Miller anyway. And I had no idea Doom cried for 9/11. God, that’s so phoney and exploitative…
September 17th, 2006 at 3:46 pm
A comic showing Batman defeat Osucka is hardly “propaganda”. Its a fictional story. Like ALL of them. Usually comic artists are fawning overthemselves when they address reality by doing things like having a character with AIDS or some simpleton- thinly- veiled political analogy. And I think someone who is hesitant to call Al-Qaeda a bad guy needs his moral compass examined(if he even has one). Are we now so pathetic as a society that we now rush to defend terrorists but don’t hesitate to condemn those who fight them?
Let me get this straight-easy to call Bush a villain but not someone who plotted the death of 3000 people in the name of religion? Exploitive and “propaganda” morelikely mean an artist has dared to express an opinion contrary to yours. If he was doing a cartoon on Bush he would be “brave” and “patriotic” by your own hypocritical mind. Miller is actually being brave by not towing the line like virtually EVERY other comic artist and reader.