Wednesday, September 20, 2017 • Evening Edition • "Hope you survive the experience!"
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Aquaman #7: Why I still read comics (spoilers)
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I read fewer comics than I ever have when I actually consider myself an active reader. I feel little-to-no connection to the majority of the New 52, though I am still reading a handful of books. Aquaman is one of them. This issue is why, despite my frustrations, I stick with this hobby and continue to deal with frustration. Because you never know when you're going to get a book that you truly enjoy for what it is. I have always put my money where my mouth is with this stuff. Going back to the days of the 'Rama's message boards, I had always maintained that you can tell Aquaman stories, interesting Aquaman stories, quite easily. I felt it took only the slightest bit of imagination to use the character well, and the biggest thing the character needed was for the writer to show no weakness with Arthur Curry. You can't make the character incompetent or indecisive or a navel-gazer, constantly whining about his lot in life. I had always felt that if you just played Aquaman straight, just made the character really confident and competent, a writer could do the one thing that is missing from many comics today and from the last few years: You can actually make a reader look at the book, read the book, with a sense of wonder. A sense of scale, of how powerful the ocean could be. Of how competent a character has to be to operate in that environment. As much as I question some other things Johns has done over the years, I have absolutely no questions about Aquaman. I've enjoyed each of the issues at varying degrees and for different reasons, because to my way of thinking, Johns has been at his best with this run by doing the things he does best: Taking a character who, while well-known, doesn't really have a truly defining set of stories or personality characteristics. When Johns has that and is on his game, he absolutely has the skill to start dropping in pieces of "new history" here and there that make sense, make the lead character more interesting, and leads to better stories. So, with that, I make this statement: Aquaman #7 is one of the best books I've read from Johns in many years, likely since the opening arc of the Justice Society relaunch for OYL. Because Black Manta has never really been defined all that well in comics over the years despite nearly everyone knowing the character from cartoons, Johns is able to make him fit into what every superhero needs: A villain who is so freaking dangerous, you don't KNOW that the hero is going to win when they face off. Black Manta is nasty. He's really, really good at what he does. He's....scary. I don't know that Johns writes a scarier character than Black Manta. Johns' first six issues have been planting seeds all along -- I knew that, some of them were obvious. The difference between this and the first installment of Captain Marvel was that I honestly feel, in how I perceive Johns' writing -- and I've read, what, hundreds upon hundreds of his books by now -- is that I truly feel that he is, for whatever reason, invested in this book, this concept. I don't know, but I think Johns enjoys writing this set of characters, perhaps moreso than some of the books/concepts he's been involved with for years. I would encourage anyone who hasn't been reading this book to pick up a copy of Aquaman #7. I'm not pretending this issue is revolutionary -- it isn't. It's the beginning of a "quest arc," where the hero and villain are going to reveal past history as they inevitably wind up in the same place at the same time and have a throwdown to end all throwdowns. But see, that's what Aquaman needs. He just needs storylines that makes sense, do not reinvent the wheel. The character desperately needed to appear in straight-up superhero comic book, with art that is extremely strong and a writer with skill who isn't in a hurry to change everything in order to appear clever. This one's going to be Aquaman vs. Black Manta, at the end of the day, folks. And that's OK. Because with comic books, it's how you get there that matters. It's always been that way for serial characters. It will always be that way. And that's OK. With Aquaman, Johns gets that. This issue is exactly why I continue to read comic books. It was fun to read, fun to look at, fun to wonder what is coming next. I hope that I get a few more of those from anyone/everyone working in the industry today. |
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Great post! |
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Frankly, I've already seen confident and competent Aquaman in previous runs of his solo book, none of which needed the constant, annoying "metacommentary" about non-fans thinking that Aquaman is a useless hero due to Superfriends. |
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I guess he is one of those "when he get it right,he get it right and when he get it wrong he get it wrong" guys. |
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Yep. |
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So what you're saying is that, in an "all story and action" issue, he still managed to fit in a dig. 
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Despite your wishing it so, that's not what happened. |
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Exactly. Punch is, and always will be, better at reviewing single issues than I am. He's dead on with the part I bolded for effect: Johns has done a really, really nice job of pacing this series. Again, I encourage everyone who hasn't been reading it to check it out (Herald, your criticisms are consistent and, for the most part, valid on a lot of things, but I've simply been enjoying this take on Aquaman. No worries, we'll agree again soon...there isn't too much else from DC I'm actually enjoying nowadays, and I don't see that changing soon.) |
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I really liked how Johns wrote/established that Atlantis itself had lots of enemies. That's important when you have a character like Aquaman, who does have some limitations with regard to how closely he is tied to one place. Because of his Atlantean heritage and the fact that his powers are derived from water, Aquaman has to have an Atlantis. You want Atlantis to be strong and vibrant, as a result. You have to make Atlantis feel like a place that existed before Aquaman, has interesting residents who do things when Aquaman is not there. I've always felt that Atlantis has, for the most part, been portrayed fairly poorly. Yes, they have a monarchy. But just like any government, some would support Arthur, some would support another person. Some residents would not care who was in charge. But it's ridiculous to always portray it as "somebody is either scheming for the throne if Aquaman is sitting on it, or the city is irrelevant if Aquaman isn't around." Atlantis needs to have three-dimensional residents. If it does, think of the stories you can tell -- Aquaman is an interesting character to me, but at the same time, there are things that you can enhance that make the overall storytelling experience better with the character. Making Atlantis interesting is one of them. |
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Generally speaking of course. |
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