Grant Morrison on the Death of Comics

[Hurm...]

I thought Batman R.I.P was bloody awful.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

"Geeks" is like the N-word for me.

When geeks use it with each other it's no longer offensive and actually implies a fellowship.

 

[Thebumwhowalks]

It's certainly interesting to finally hear what the falling out with Mark Millar was about.

Because there was a recent interview posted up in the DC boards a couple of months ago, and all he said was that Mark Millar almost made him give up on faith in human nature, without saying what it was all about. So of course, you imagine much worse than what really happened.
What I thought mustve happened, to cause him to say something like that, was that Millar had somehow been doing stuff behind his back, putting the spanners in the works for his film projects by badmouthing him in hollywood or soemthing.

So, I think that initial statement was a bit ott and melodramatic, now we know the reality.

I read somewhere that Mark Millar never gave Alan Grant any credit for giving him a start in the comics industry either, so it's not a personal thing, he just wants to appear like he came out of nowhere fully formed or something.
Still crap of course, and needless, but not as bad as I imagined.

 

[Erzengel]

"Geeks" is like the N-word for me.

When geeks use it with each other it's no longer offensive and actually implies a fellowship.

I walk across the street when I see a geek walking towards me.

 

[Asteroid-Man]

wow, some of those questions were pretty personal.

I think the high price of comics is what's killing them. That's why I stopped collecting anyway.

Same reason I stopped.

Grant Morrison is so insightful. Great read!

 

[the amazing fro]

I don't really buy single issues, mainly trades and GN's. I don't know about the price of singles but the price of TPB's are absolutely extortionate. I saw a deadpool TPB with 4 or 5 issues in it being sold for £20. TWENTY POUND!

 

[Troy_Parker]

Scanned comics on the internet, and as many have said, the high price is the cause.

 

[chamber-music]

I don't really buy single issues, mainly trades and GN's. I don't know about the price of singles but the price of TPB's are absolutely extortionate. I saw a deadpool TPB with 4 or 5 issues in it being sold for £20. TWENTY POUND!

4 or 5 issue TPB for £20 is ridiculous.

 

[the amazing fro]

4 or 5 issue TPB for £20 is ridiculous.

It was at Forbidden Planet which have the most ridiculous prices I have ever seen in a comic shop.

 

[chamber-music]

Yeah I have not brought comics from Forbidden Planet in years.

 

[AlteredEgo]

Has anyone read his book Supergods yet? Is it any good? I was thinking about picking a copy up the other day.

 

[Tron Bonne]

It's pretty good, especially if you have any interest in the superhero, and the origin and ideas behind it. It is also partially autobiographical, though, and....well, let's say Grant Morrison has had some very interesting experiences. A lot of people will probably think he's nuts as a cracker, but it makes for interesting reading.

 

[terry78]

I like some of the dude's work, but some of the stuff he's written I had to step back and say, "are you ****ing kidding me?" I think like everything comics has just hit a slump. They ain't dying. Everything comes full circle.

 

[chamber-music]

Checkout his British Newspaper Metro interview

Why did you want to become a comics writer?

I always wanted to be a writer as a kid but that was based on Enid Blyton books. I liked the Famous Five stuff about middle-class children solving small-scale crime that would probably get them shot or locked in a basement these days. The idea of being a comics writer came later when I realised it was possible.


You say other dimensional aliens visited you when you were in Kathmandu – did it really happen?

It actually happened. It changed my life and it can happen to anyone. I’m sceptical but I started doing magic and occult stuff, and found it actually works – go out and do it yourself and you’ll see. The current scientific view is that these kind of experiences are caused by temporal lobe seizures in the brain, which is more exciting. Rather than being visited by aliens or angels, if we can press a part of our brain that causes religious visions, shouldn’t we be doing it every day?


What advice would you give to people thinking of doing their own voodoo rituals?
I’d keep away from voodoo. The voodoo gods are quite heavy. It’s quite culturally specific because it comes from Haiti. They took African traditions and warped them through their own sensibilities. Playing around with that isn’t the best thing for people who don’t live in those conditions. Those archetypes can be quite savage and scary. The best thing to do is get one of those spell books and try something. The material is available in every bookshop and online.

You taught Robbie Williams some magic rituals, didn’t you?

He got really into magic in 2005 just before his Intensive Care album came out. The artist Frank Quitely and I did some tarot card images for that album but no one picked up on it. I think he was doing some basic spells himself and it was working out quite well for him. I told him to stay away from cults and lunatics and not to believe it, just see what happens.


What have you got lined up in your writing for Superman?

I want to solve some of the problems that have grown up around the character. People now ask: ‘Why the hell would he dress up like that?’ I want to make Superman a more contemporary character. We’ll be changing how he looks, dresses and behaves. He’ll be more like the Superman who appeared in 1938 – more socially active and a champion of the oppressed.


He’s taken his underpants off in the current comics…

With what we’re doing he’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt – a Bruce Springsteen version of Superman, that’s the angle we’re taking. The cape’s still indestructible but the rest is picked up in a shop.


What are you proudest of getting into a comic book?

I’m proud of having Bruce Wayne stumbling through the streets of Gotham high on heroin. When the baddies get hold of Batman and really mess him up, that’s always fun. When I grew up, the comics I loved were by hippies in the late 1960s, which had a big effect on me when I was 12. I’ve always written for an imaginary smart 15-year-old. I’m introducing younger kids to big ideas and to authors and notions. Spanish writer Jorge Luis Borges was in the last Batman story I wrote so I’ve hopefully introduced his work to some new people.


Do some fans take things a bit too far?

There was one guy in the US who was ready to kill everyone in the office when I was working for Marvel. The FBI got involved and locked him up. It was about something in an X-Men comic. I didn’t write it but it drew on stuff I’d created and we’d done something to ruin the purity of his favourite childhood character. I wouldn’t want to tar all fans with that – you get all sorts, from people who write clever analysis to some real nutters.

 

[amazingfantasy15]

I HATE Grant Morrison. Springsteen Superman? Really? The guy is like a shock jockey. He just writes the most nonsensical, ridiculous plots possible for the sake of shock value and if you don't applaud him and say how brilliant he is, he and his defenders question your intelligence and say that you "don't get it." No one wants to be stupid so everyone goes along with the charade of his "brilliance."

I feel much the same way, I keep giving his storylines chances, but always end up disappointed.

I liked his Final Crisis but he spread everything out too thin and didn't elaborate enough on some of the ending stuff. I've read it about 3 or 4 times and I still don't quite get what was happening with "the bleed" and stuff in that final issue.

Final Crisis was absolute crap, actually I shouldn't say that, the first 2-3 issues were pretty good, but the second half of that story was just so hard to follow, maybe I needed to buy the side stories, but a big event like that should be told fully in the main story and it wasn't. It felt like so many pieces of the puzzle were missing.

 

[PWN3R]

Anyway, I don't think comics are dying or close to death. The direct market model is on its last legs, no doubt about that, but in book stores comics (espeically Japanese manga) still sell pretty well and webcomics and web produced comics are becoming frequent and followed. I really just don't see the death of comics, just shifting in different ways. I think comics are like prose and drama, even if they take a different seat in evolution, they will always be around in some fashion.

He pretty much echoes your thoughts, exactly:

And moving on to movies, where it can be more powerful, more effective. The definition of a meme is an idea that wants to replicate, and it's found a better medium through which to replicate, games, movies.

Grant Morrison is a a fascinating human being. If you think he's seriously demented or a genius ahead of his time doesn't matter, he produces stories that people react to. I need to read Supergods.

Also, his Lennon song is pretty crazy:
[YT]xUo_8KOtVOQ[/YT]

 

[Rocketman]

I'm all for abstract ideas and high-art, but Grant Morrison makes me feel like I'm stupid. I feel like I need hallucinogenic supplements to fully appreciate his stuff. I'm not really a fan of his Batman work. RIP was incredibly frustrating and Final Crisis was a total WTF for me. All-Star Superman and WE3 are my favorite things that he's done. Other than that, I think I'll pass. And that's only because I assume there's something wrong with me, not him. Maybe I'll give him another try in 10 years, when I'm older and grumpier and living in a shack with lava lamps and Bob Marley posters everywhere.

I (personally) just feel like comics should be fun and entertaining. I'm all for challenging work that makes you think and requires you to put forth some mental labor... as long as it's done in a semi-coherent way, lol. Maybe I'm just not a Morrison guy. It could really be me.

 

[Tron Bonne]

He pretty much echoes your thoughts, exactly

Well, actually, I think he's talking about the superhero going to a different mediums like movies and video games there. I was mainly just talking about how the medium of comics will still be around, just in different forms and ways than we have now probably.

I'm all for abstract ideas and high-art, but Grant Morrison makes me feel like I'm stupid. I feel like I need hallucinogenic supplements to fully appreciate his stuff. I'm not really a fan of his Batman work. RIP was incredibly frustrating and Final Crisis was a total WTF for me. All-Star Superman and WE3 are my favorite things that he's done. Other than that, I think I'll pass. And that's only because I assume there's something wrong with me, not him. Maybe I'll give him another try in 10 years, when I'm older and grumpier and living in a shack with lava lamps and Bob Marley posters everywhere.

Well, why don't you get some

 

[Rocketman]

Well, why don't you get some

I would, if I wasn't already spending too much money on overpriced comics.

Speaking of which, Marvel's TPBs are so ridiculously expensive. I saw an X-Men book at Barnes and Noble for $35.00 and it literally collected 5 issues. It wasn't even a hardback. It would've taken an hour (or less) to read, for $35. Completely unacceptable.

I don't see why any TPB should ever be more than $15... 20 tops.

 

[Steyin]

Meh, I hate Morrison; I'd even go as far as to say that he is part of the cause, at least for me.

 

[the amazing fro]

Comics aren't really that great value for money. I can spend £3 or £4 on a single issue and then read it in about five minutes and if it's nothing special I'll probably never read it again.

How high are printing prices? They must be bloody expensive to justify this amount of extortion

Anyway back on Morrison I think what I love about him is that he both pays respect to the heart and past of the character and at the same time takes it in very strange and (this is the key here) DIFFERENT directions. The problem with a lot of superhero comics is they are stuck in their own little bubble refusing to change or experiment. Grant isn't afraid of that. He is an acquired taste and some of his books can be a bit of a struggle (I remember having to put down Animal Man Vol 2 after reading it and really think about what the hell just happened). But the amount of innovation that he has done (and still is doing IMO) is extraordinary. There is no-one else really like him still in the industry, thinking outside the box.

 

[Armored Avenger]

People now ask: ‘Why the hell would he dress up like that?’

I have never heard anyone say this about Superman. Whenever someone defends changing his costume as "updating for a modern audience" or "people don't like his current costume" I often wonder if they have actually bothered to get any opinion other than their own on Superman's appearance.
Over the years the only aspect of Superman's costume that I have seen people specifically point out as something ridiculous is the "underwear on the outside". Apart from that nothing else is ever mentioned in a derogatory manner and overall I find that people like his costume - it is iconic.
In the end what it comes down to is the people reading Action Comics are people who like Superman - those who think ‘Why the hell would he dress up like that?’ are not going to be reading a Superman comic anyway, so why pander to them?

 

[the_ultimate_evil]

Yeah I have not brought comics from Forbidden Planet in years.

sadly people like me have no choice. FP is the only comic shop in my town. though i've been going from when the guys who run it ran a small independent shop, so they're good people

 

[Teelie]

I think he's alright. I sadly haven't been into comics in years but every so often I want to start again so some of the more recent controversial stuff I've missed out on but I don't think comics are dying or will die. Like the Atomic Comics thread, I think it's a decline but a decline does not mean death. Who knows what the future will bring but it won't be an end.

He did sound like a decent guy if that comic groupie stuff he said was true.

 

[JewishHobbit]

Final Crisis was absolute crap, actually I shouldn't say that, the first 2-3 issues were pretty good, but the second half of that story was just so hard to follow, maybe I needed to buy the side stories, but a big event like that should be told fully in the main story and it wasn't. It felt like so many pieces of the puzzle were missing.

That's what I meant by too spread out. To understand the story you had to read all seven issues of Final Crisis, both issues of Superman Beyond, two issues of Batman, and Final Crisis: Submit... in the right order... and there's STILL no guarentee that it'll all click. I understand it a little better each time I read it but it's just too far spread and not clear enough in the final issue or two.