The Sinister Shadow Reviewed

Doc Savage: The Sinister Shadow
by Will Murray and Lester Dent, writing as Kenneth Robeson.
copyright 2015, Altus Press

For the last several weeks, I've been reading the e-book version of Doc Savage: The Sinister Shadow, a new pulp novel by Will Murray, in which The Shadow and Doc Savage each battle a mysterious new villain calling himself The Funeral Director, eventually joining forces to defeat him. An afterword to the book explains that early in his career as a pulp writer, Lester Dent, Doc Savage's creator, was asked by editors at Street and Smith, publishers of The Shadow Magazine, to submit some sample chapters and an outline for a Shadow story. Dent's first effort was rejected, but later, the editors asked him to write the very first Doc Savage novel, The Man of Bronze, using the pseudonym Kenneth Robeson. With the permission of the estate of Lester Dent and of Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc., who now own the copyrights to The Shadow, Murray wrote this new novel using portions of Dent's sample chapters and fleshing out and rewriting the outline.

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I'm delighted to see The Shadow back in print with a new adventure. I've been a fan of The Shadow ever since my first introduction to old-time radio in the 1970s and finding reprints of Walter B. Gibson's Shadow novels at my local library at about the same time. On the other hand, I've never been a particularly big fan of Doc Savage, finding him a bit too much of a stuffed shirt and a goody-goody for my taste, but I'm willing to put up with him if it means I get to see The Shadow back in action.

This new novel opens in the 1930s as wealthy men throughout New York City are mysteriously dying of heart attacks. Both Doc Savage and The Shadow, however, suspect that these heart attacks are not natural occurrences and are being caused by some outside agent. It is revealed that many of these men had criminal connections that they wished to keep secret, and were being blackmailed by someone calling himself The Funeral Director.

One of the men being blackmailed, however, is Lamont Cranston, millionaire and sometime alias of The Shadow. Unlike the radio version of Lamont Cranston, who actually was The Shadow, in this novel and in Walter B. Gibson's original pulps, Lamont Cranston was merely one of many aliases and assumed identities used by The Shadow. The real Lamont Cranston goes to see Theodore Marley "Ham" Brooks, a prominent attorney and one of Doc Savage's closest associates, one of his hand-picked "Fabulous Five" personal assistants. Cranston believes that the mysterious personage calling himself The Shadow and making weekly radio broadcasts may actually be The Funeral Director. Brooks suggests that they go to see Doc Savage and present the problem to him, but before they can reach Doc's headquarters, they are kidnapped by minions of The Funeral Director.

This sends both The Shadow and Doc Savage into action--at first on a collision course. Doc suspects that The Shadow and The Funeral Director are one and the same, but the real Shadow has to clear his name and prove to Doc that he is not the villain. Doc also disapproves of The Shadow because The Shadow is willing to use violence, including gunplay, to get the information he wants, while Doc and his associates prefer to use Doc's special "mercy bullets" that contain a nonlethal anesthetic. The Shadow is not above killing criminals, while Doc prefers to rehabilitate them using surgery and a stint at his special "criminal college," a hidden facility in upstate New York.

The Shadow races to find Lamont Cranston, while Doc and his friends Andrew Blodgett "Monk" Mayfair, a brilliant chemist, and Thomas "Long Tom" Roberts, a genius electrical engineer, likewise scramble to locate Ham Brooks. We are told that Doc's other companions, William Harper "Johnny" Littlejohn and John "Renny" Renwick, are out of the country pursuing their own adventures. There are many twists and turns, red herrings, and dead ends, but eventually we learn that The Funeral Director is an old foe of The Shadow, and his aim is to hold Cranston for ransom, thereby drawing The Shadow into a final confrontation. When Cranston's niece Weltha is unable to raise the funds to pay the ransom, The Funeral Director releases Cranston and kidnaps Weltha instead. Eventually, Doc and The Shadow realize they have a common enemy and join forces to defeat the villain. Doc and The Shadow, despite disagreeing over each other's methods, each recognize that the other is ultimately on the side of justice and declare an uneasy truce, if not an alliance.

Author Will Murray displays a thorough knowledge of the mythology and details surrounding both heroes, and the book is loaded with inside references that will make fans of both characters smile and nod in recognition. Three of The Shadow's most famous agents, Cliff Marsland, Harry Vincent, and Clyde Burke all make guest appearances and contribute to the plot at key moments.The author also introduces the eerie and memorable device of having The Funeral Director communicate with both his underlings and intended victims by means of tiny recording machines shaped like coffins.

My one real criticism of the book has to do with its prose style. It's impossible to tell how much was written by Lester Dent himself so long ago, and how much was written by Will Murray a good bit later, but I found the book rife with stilted dialogue, clumsy awkwardly constructed sentences, sentence fragments, and outright grammatical errors that called attention to themselves, slowed down the pace of the story, and took away from my enjoyment. In a pulp style action adventure story, the action should move at breakneck speed, or at least a brisk clip. I don't read a novel with an editor's blue pencil in hand, but gross mistakes in style, usage, and grammar jarred me as a reader and took me out of the story just as huge potholes in the highway can distract you from enjoying a Sunday drive. Will Murray may be a fine storyteller, but he needs a better editor. He's written several new Doc Savage titles for a series called "The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage," but I'd like to see what he can do with a straight Shadow story. Will he write one? Only The Shadow knows!

2014: Looking Ahead

In my previous post, I looked back over the major events of my life in 2013. Now I'd like to look ahead a bit and think about what I'd like to accomplish in the New Year 2014. It's been frequently noted (indeed, I'm sure most of us can see it in our own lives) that most "New Year's Resolutions" fail miserably. As my Facebook friend and fellow blogger William "Billy" Newton observes, based on statistical evidence, human beings tend to make grand, noble-sounding plans to "lose weight," "get in shape," "get organized," or "be a better person," but usually give up in a short time because our goals aren't specific and measurable enough. If your goal isn't specific enough to be measured, how will you know when you've reached it? If you don't know when you've reached your goal, what will motivate you to keep pressing on until you've achieved it?

I myself am notorious for making grand plans, announcing a course of action, and then failing to follow through, usually when I realize it's going to take more work than I figured to reach my goal. Yet at the same time I've been thinking about how the New Year does gives us an opportunity to take stock, start over again with a clean slate, and maybe, just maybe, do things a little differently, and a little better than we did in the past. I'm especially conscious of this, having recently relocated to a new city and a new and better living situation than I've had for many years. I'd like to set out some goals (I hesitate to call them "resolutions" because somehow that seems more formal, grand, and ominous) that I'd like to achieve in the new year. In setting them down here, I realize I'm committing myself to something. I may look back on this post in a year and realize I've failed miserably and embarrassed myself, but on the other hand, writing these goals down and posting them in public may just shame me into keeping them. Here goes.

I have three broad areas of interest in my life right now: broadening and deepening my Catholic faith and my relationship with Jesus Christ; resuming and continuing my genealogical and family history research; and resuming and continuing my creative writing. I have specific goals I'd like to achieve in each of these areas.

As far as my Catholic faith is concerned, I would like to continue attending the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (the Traditional Latin Mass) and learn more about the spirituality behind it until I am as comfortable and familiar with the Traditional or Extraordinary Form as I am with the vernacular or Ordinary Form. I would like to go through the entire calendar year (from this past June when I started to going to EF Masses until next June) and through the entire liturgical year (from Advent to Advent) with the Extraordinary Form. I've said on Facebook that somebody needs to write The Extraordinary Form for Dummies or something like it, and lately, I've even begun to entertain the preposterous idea that I could be that somebody. I would know when the book would reach its intended audience of dummies because I would be the Chief Dummy. I'm not a theologian, liturgist, priest, or religious; I'm just a poor, dumb schmuck in the pews, trying to get to heaven like everybody else. If the book made sense and was helpful to me, maybe it would make sense and be helpful to other people. I've begun making notes and doing preliminary research. I will aim to have a first draft ready by this time next year.

I would also like to learn to pray the Liturgy of the Hours, but this may be too ambitious if I am also writing and doing research. I purchased a breviary and The Divine Office for Dodos by Madeline Pecora Nugent, a guide for learning the Divine Office, by several years ago, but found both the learning process and the guidebook more difficult than expected. Nugent tries so hard to make her writing style cheerful and encouraging that it actually backfires and comes across as annoyingly chirpy and a bit condescending, cheering the reader on as if he is a slightly dimwitted child. Daria Sockey's book, The Everyday Catholic's Guide to the Liturgy of the Hours, has been recommended to me, and I'd like to try it. I will purchase the book this week and see how far I can get with praying the Hours by this time next year.

As far as my genealogical research is concerned, my research has been stalled for over a year and I'd really like to change that. I've been able to establish that my great-great grandfather James E. Leslie (1823-1875) was born in Iredell County, NC,  moved to Lowndes County, AL some time before 1850, set up a blacksmith business, and served in a Confederate cavalry regiment as a blacksmith during the Civil War. However, I don't know where in Iredell County he was born, who his parents were, and when or why he moved to Alabama. I sent e-mail and made a phone call to the Genealogical Society of Iredell County but received no reply whatsoever. I will make contact with the GSIC by the end of this month, and if that fails, I will see what I can find through other channels including the Iredell County Courthouse and the North Carolina Office of Archives and History.

Finally, as far as my creative writing goes, I have no fewer than three unfinished superhero origin stories (which sometimes feel like three versions of the same story) on my hard drive waiting to be completed. My interest in the superhero concept has waxed and waned periodically over the years since I first discovered the HeroMachine website and software, but I'm still intrigued by these characters I've created with it, and it's always bothered me that I haven't yet been able to finish their stories. Maybe this is the year. I will have a completed draft of at least one origin story ready by this time next year.

Superman: 75 Years in 2 Minutes

In honor of Superman's 75th anniversary this year (Action Comics #1 was published in June 1938), here's a nifty little animated short film from Bruce Timm and Zack Snyder chronicling the Man of Steel's journey from comics to TV and film. Timm is the creative mastermind behind recent animated versions of Batman, Superman, and other heroes from the DC pantheon, both on television and in direct-to-DVD releases. Snyder is the director of the recently released Man of Steel movie. Notice how the drawing style changes to reflect Superman's evolution over the decades.

Itz Teh Soopah Frenz!

see more dog and puppy pictures

Catholic Comics Coincidence?

So, earlier this week I decided to splurge because Amazon.com had an absurdly good price on one of my favorite movies: the original 1978 Superman with Christopher Reeve and the 2000 "special edition" with a few minutes of extra footage. The DVDs arrived today, so of course I had to watch them. No sooner do I finish watching the movie and some of the bonus stuff, when I cruise over to The Crescat's blog and find this item:

Kat tags this "Art Behaving Badly" and asks, "Is it a sin to actually covet this?" I dunno, because I'm actually kind of attracted to the thing for the sheer geekiness of it. The more I think about this, the weirder it gets. Cap, Spidey, and Hulk all seem to be listening to Jesus. What is he saying to them? I can't help imagining how church history might have been different if these guys had been around when Christ gave the apostles "The Great Commission," (Mt. 28:19-20):

"Hulk Baptize! In name of Father, Son, Holy Spirit!"

I also wonder if there's similar artwork featuring Jesus and the DC superheroes (A quick search of Google Images reveals there's plenty of Jesus and Superman art, but much of it is even weirder and in more questionable taste than the item above). Just imagine what Jesus might have done with Supes among the Twelve:

"You're going to Confession, Luthor, whether you like it or not!"

Sigh. It's a weird, weird world we live in.

This Just In . . .

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Wondering About Wonder Woman

OK, so apparently I'm the last comics fan in the blogosphere to find out about it, but The Powers That Be at DC Comics have approved a nearly complete revamping of Wonder Woman, including retroactively rewriting her origin story and established continuity (known in the biz as a "retcon") and a major redesign of her costume. The first issue featuring the "new" Wonder Woman went on sale Tuesday, June 29.

In this more or less total overhaul, the Greek gods abruptly alter time and allow Wonder Woman's birthplace, Paradise Island or Themyscira, to be destroyed when Diana is still a child. The infant Diana is smuggled into our everyday world and takes up a new life as a kind of urban vigilante and street fighter. Head writer J. Michael Straczynski, of Babylon 5 fame, is fairly blunt about the reason for the makeover: Sales of Wonder Woman comics are lagging far behind other DC titles, and The Powers That Be hope that WW's new look and story line will perk up interest in the book.

So far, however, the reaction among fans at comics websites I've checked seems to be largely if not overwhelmingly negative. Some like the change in story line, and some like the new costume, but most don't seem to like either one. Chris Sims, host of Chris's Invincible Super Blog, and his pals at ComicsAlliance take readers on a guided tour of Wonder Woman's costume changes through the decades, and most of the panelists give the new look a thumbs down. Here's the Wonder Woman most of us are used to seeing, as drawn by artist Karyn Lewis:

Here, once again, is the "new look" Wonder Woman:

True enough, this redesign addresses some of the complaints fans have had for years about WW's previous costume. The new get-up is certainly more practical for combat and daily wear. For the first time, Wonder Woman has pockets (not to mention pants) for all her superhero gear. However, as other fans have noted, the jacket that's supposed to make her look hip and edgy and boost her street cred just makes her look dated. I had a jacket like that in the early '90s. It was already too small when I bought it, and I quickly outgrew it. I predict Wonder Woman will likewise quickly outgrow this look.

I understand the complaints about WW's old costume. Not to be unpatriotic on Fourth of July weekend or anything, but what's an Amazon princess, a figure from Greek mythology, doing running around in a star-spangled red, white, and blue battle bikini anyway? Yes, her costume could stand to go in a new direction, but I think the look DC chose is precisely the wrong direction.

Therefore, gentle readers, I chose to take Wonder Woman in a completely different direction using the latest version of HeroMachine. I, too, have entered the Wonder Woman makeover derby. Yes, Wonder Woman should be tough, and yes, she should be sexy, but she should also be dignified and regal. She is a princess, after all; a princess from an ancient land of myth, magic, and mystery. I wanted to give her a look that was very clean and simple and neoclassical, something that suggested a toga but still left her ready to fight at a moment's notice. I wanted to portray her on her island home of Themyscira, peaceful by nature but perfectly prepared to kick bad guy trash if the occasion requires. I give you MY version of Wonder Woman:

You'll notice that apart from the red white and blue color scheme, I kept most of her other distinguishing features: jet black hair, silver bracelets, golden belt of Hippolyta, and lasso of truth. I gave her cross-laced sandals because they seemed to fit with the classical, mythological vibe I was going for. I dispensed with the tiara, mainly because HeroMachine 3 doesn't have a tiara at present, and because I always thought the tiara looked a bit silly. (As if the idea of people running around in ridiculous costumes fighting other people in ridiculous costumes isn't silly enough?) A simple circlet might look better. She's a princess but not a beauty pageant winner.

Whaddaya think? Do you (a) love it, (b) like it, (c) hate it, or (d) not really care? Do you think I have a future as a costume designer? Or have I at last snapped and revealed the truly appalling depths of my nerdiness and geekery? Feedback welcome.

Celts, Pagans, and Superheroes, Oh My!

A few entries ago, I told you about my idea for the Celtic League of Superheroes, a team of costumed crime-fighters originating in the Celtic countries and saving the world from various nasties found in Celtic mythology and folklore. It seems I'm not the only one to think of such a thing, because now Pendant Audio. is producing its own original Celtic-themed superhero show, “Genesis Avalon” that has a good many similarities to my Celtic League concept. What's more, in the director's commentary for the first episode, the show's creator, Kathryn Pryde, says she has the first three seasons of the show, 36 episodes, plotted and scripted. After two years, I'm still floundering around with the first draft of my main character's origin story.

I didn't listen to the first few episodes of "Genesis Avalon," first of all, because I didn't want them to influence my development of the Celtic League of Superheroes concept. I reconsidered my decision because I decided I needed to see how others are developing similar material. After all, if you're developing a product, you have to know what the competition is up to. The second reason I chose not to listen to the show, however, was that I feared it would devolve into what was essentially a commercial for neo-paganism and its contemporary incarnations such as Wicca—something that, as an author, a practicing Catholic, and a person of Celtic ancestry, I did not want to happen with my Celtic League concept.

Let me make two things perfectly clear. First, I love Pendant Audio. I listen regularly to many of their shows, especially the "fanfic" type shows based on DC Comics characters, and wouldn't have known about Genesis Avalon at all if I didn't. They are an extremely talented group of people who do a lot of hard work of very high quality solely because they love it.

Second, I realize that there have been elements of mythology, mysticism, magic, and mumbo-jumbo in superhero comics probably ever since Billy Batson learned to say "Shazam!" and become Captain Marvel. That, in and of itself, does not bother me. What bothers me, both as a Celt and a Catholic, is that certain modern neo-pagan occultists have appropriated names and terms from Celtic mythology and folklore (including the word "Celt" itself) to fabricate a modern religion for themselves and to promote that religion and its ideology—a religion and ideology that are directly and deliberately opposed to my Catholic faith.

My original nickname or handle when I first ventured out onto the internet via AOL was MrCelt ("Mr. Celt"). My user profile listed Catholicism as one of my interests. I was told by some grossly misinformed person in a chatroom, "You can't be a Celt and be a Christian." I am wearing a Celtic cross around my neck that says otherwise. Irish, Scottish, and Welsh converts to Christianity brought the gospel to much of the rest of Europe, thank you very much, founding churches, monasteries, and schools that are in existence to this day. I daresay that millions of Celtic Christians in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales today, both Catholic and Protestant, would also disagree with that statement. I resent the fact that the mythology and culture of my ancestral countries is being used to promote an agenda contrary to my faith, which once brought there, took deep root in those ancestral countries.

It's not hard for me to wonder if there's an agenda behind "Genesis Avalon." The pilot episode begins with a prayer to “The Goddess” (to which goddess I’m not sure) and, six episodes in, there have already been numerous direct references to Wicca, and rituals of “The Craft.” The story begins when a young woman finds a mysterious amulet that enables her to become the superhero Avalon, endowed with the powers of the ancient Celtic gods. She invokes these powers by speaking the names of the gods aloud. That in itself wouldn't bother me so much if the protagonist and other characters didn't toss the name of Jesus around as if it were a garden variety interjection, a curse, or an insult. I realize that in real life and in fiction, people can and do say the name of Jesus in vain. Regrettably I've done it myself on more than a few occasions. However, in a work of fiction, when characters speak the names of pagan gods and receive or invoke great power, and then utter the name of Christ with little or no result, you can't help wondering if this betrays the author's bias.

I realize much of what I've just said may sound like so much sour grapes because an author has successfully developed a concept similar to mine, while so far I've failed miserably to develop my own work. The folks behind "Genesis Avalon" may not have any agenda beyond the desire to tell a good story. Judged purely as an action adventure or a work of audio drama, the show isn't bad, and it may be possible to take all the New Age, neo-pagan woo-woo with several grains of salt.

Looking critically at my own work, I worried that it too could be construed as promoting a particular theological agenda, which would be the opposite of what I intended and believed, and that's perhaps one reason that the writing has gone so slowly. I wanted to borrow bits, pieces, and motifs from Celtic mythology and tell cool stories of costumed superheroes slugging it out with evil druids on the streets of Dublin (and other places), not to advocate for a false or fabricated religion. I fretted over this problem with my blog buddy D. G. D. Davidson at Sci-Fi Catholic, and he told me not to worry because, as he astutely pointed out, Christians have been borrowing from pagan mythology to tell stories for centuries.

Will the Celtic League of Superheroes ever be anything more than a vague idea in my head? Should I listen to "Genesis Avalon" or avoid it? I don't know the answers to either one of those questions. But I'll let you know when I find the answers.

"Beware My Power . . ."

In brightest day
Or darkest night
No evil shall escape my sight
Let those who worship evil's might
Beware my power . . . GREEN LANTERN'S LIGHT!

Hey everybody! Happy Mardi Gras! Because nothing says "Mardi Gras" and "Last chance to blow it out before Lent begins" like costumed superheroes, I give you my latest super team: Green Lantern Corps, The New Recruits. Except for John Stewart, I made them up on the spur of the moment last night (Please don't sue me, DC!) As usual, click on the image to see a larger version. Also as usual, I used HeroMachine v. 2.5, HeroMachine v. 3.0, and Paint.NET 3.5.3 to create the images. I like the idea of a band of costumed interplanetary do-gooders, and I like the way the GLC uses just three colors (green, black, and white) to produce nearly endless variations in the Green Lantern costume. Anyway, enjoy, and leave feedback.

Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps, ©DC Comics.

The All-American Family

Once upon a time, in an alternate reality, the superheroine Lady Liberty, the leader of the Liberty Legion, married Freedom Fighter, commander of the Freedom Force. They produced a plethora of patriotic, powered progeny, a sensational series of super siblings. Here's a candid shot of the happy family at home: Mom, Dad, and the kids! Click on the image to see a larger version of it. Please enjoy and feel free to submit feedback.

Images created with HeroMachine v. 3.0, Shakti Warriors, and Paint.NET v. 3.5.3.

Itz Sooper Kitteh!

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More Superheroes

Click here to see a larger version of the image.

I had thousands of requests (well, OK, one) from loyal readers to post more of my superhero creations. I actually created the Celtic League of Superheroes nearly two years ago using Heromachine v. 2.5. (Also available for download here). Version 3 of Heromachine is now in development, but after a weekend's worth of experimentation and fiddling, I decided I didn't like the Version 3 remakes as well as the originals. Don't get me wrong. I think HM 3 will be 31 flavors of awesome when it gets finished, but for these characters and this portrait, I thought the original versions would be better. I used Paint.NET v. 3.5.2 to create the group shot.

As for the characters themselves, they are avatars or champions of the Celtic countries, charged with defending these lands, and indeed the whole world, from the machinations of a sinister, evil wizard, druid, mage type guy and his band of assorted nasties. The concept crosses the standard superhero motifs with bits freely filched and adapted from Celtic mythology, in much the same way that Thor or Wonder Woman comics borrow from Norse or classical Greek myths. My ultimate goal is to create a series of stories about these characters which could be published alone, included as part of a novel, or converted into comic book scripts. A silly pipe dream? Perhaps, but I thought it would be fun to try. Right now, I'd settle for one complete, coherent story instead of the jumble of vague ideas in my head.

Superheroes

Just a little something to show you what I've been up to these days. Here's a quartet of patriotic superheroes, The Liberty Legion: Red Rocket, Whitewater, Blue Eagle, and Lady Liberty (Red, White, and Blue, get it?) I'm also working on writing their origin stories. At any rate, enjoy!

Click on the image to see a larger version. Images created with HeroMachine v. 3.0 and Paint.NET v. 3.5.2.

What The . . .?

Regular readers of this blog (all three of you) know that two of my interests are the Catholic faith and comics. These two things came together in a rather bizarre way when I looked in on Jeff Hebert's Heromachine Blog on Friday and found the following item:



As I commented on Jeff's blog:

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? Bats in the altogether except for his cape and cowl? With his batboys discreetly covered by the undulations of Joker, aka the Serpent in the Garden of Eden? This is not just whacked out comics, folks. This is some SERIOUSLY whacked out theology.

(Darned Episcopalians!) :)

The meaning of this one confounds both Christians and comic book fans. Never let it be said that It's All Straw does not broaden your educational, cultural, and theological horizons, dear readers.

Just for Laughs

OK, enough with the cute pictures of dogs and cats with hilarious captions and the grousing about my medical problems. It's time for this blog to regain the moral and intellectual high ground with . . . superhero parody videos! Yeah, that's it! That's the ticket! I blundered across this yesterday on YouTube and thought it was hilarious.



To be perfectly honest, I always did think Wonder Woman was a little bit on the lame side. Glad somebody else thinks so too.

I Want to See This Movie!

The trouble is, it hasn't been made yet.

As a relative newbie in the world of comics, I gather that a big screen version of the adventures of the Green Lantern is like the holy grail to fans. There are rumors of a Green Lantern project in development, but apparently it hasn't been cast and there isn't yet a final version of the script—in short, it's in "development hell."

I've seen other fan-made GL trailers, but this is by far the best. This effort is from an individual by the name of Jaron Pitts. If you watch the original video on YouTube and click on the "more info" link, he lists dozens of audio and video clips from movies and TV shows that he stitched together (rather expertly, I must say) to make this video. He talks about the development process here. I was blown away by the professional look of this little film. It looks like a real, studio-produced movie trailer. In my humble opinion Nathan Fillion would be an excellent choice to play Hal Jordan/The Green Lantern, but the word is that he probably will not. Until the movie comes out, at least we have this beautiful little dream of what could have been.

Hat tip to Damien Stadler of the HeroMachine Developer's Blog and combox for bringing this to my attention. Thanks, Damien!

The Next Generation of Heroes . . .

is coming.

Jeff Hebert, the creator of HeroMachine v. 2.5, one of the coolest websites and software packages ever, has been hard at work on the next major upgrade to HeroMachine since early in January. HeroMachine v. 3.0 will have a huge number of new features, including a larger color palette, greatly expanded layering capabilities, new accessories for characters, and the ability to mark characters and equipment with patterns, including camouflage, tartan, and metallic. But that's not all. With version 3.0, aspiring artists and creators of superheroes will have the opportunity to select individual body parts for the characters, and have the ability to move, scale, and rotate those body parts and accessories, in effect, customizing the look of each character.

Jeff has set up an "alpha" test version of HM 3 (even earlier in the development process than a beta version) and is actively seeking comments, suggestions for improvement, feedback, and bug reports from users. He's been gradually adding and enabling features and components and hopes to have the site completed by some time this summer. Here's a sample character that I created on the new site, Red Hawk:



This looks like it will be really cool when it gets all done. If you like comic books or superheroes or have dreamed of creating your own characters, head on over. In the immortal words of Mark Shea, "Check thou it out."

Who Watches the Watchmen? Not I

Watchmen / Alan Moore, writer; Dave Gibbons, illustrator /letterer; John Higgins, colorist. New York: DC Comics, © 1986-1987.

I finally found something to rouse me out of my torpor and motivate me to start blogging again. I recently finished reading Alan Moore's graphic novel Watchmen, which, judging from the adulation heaped on it and the hype and ballyhoo surrounding the release of the movie version, is the biggest thing to hit comics since colored ink. Here's a sample of the blurbs on the back cover:

"A work of ruthless psychological realism, it's a landmark in the graphic novel medium," says Time Magazine. They rate it as one of the 100 best novels (not just graphic novels, but novels, period) since 1923. Why 1923, I don't know.

"Watchmen is peerless," says Rolling Stone.

"Remarkable . . . The would-be heroes of Watchmen have staggeringly complex psychological profiles, says the New York Times Book Review.

"A brilliant piece of fiction," says The Village Voice.

"Groundbreaking," says USA Today.

"A masterwork representing the apex of artistry," says Entertainment Weekly.

"The greatest piece of popular fiction ever produced," says Damon Lindelof, the co-creator of Lost.

Most of the reader reviews on Amazon.com are similarly glowing, but a significant number are not. I beg to differ with the majority view and firmly register with the minority.

My opinion? Somewhere between "Meh," and "Yuck," leaning heavily toward the latter. I found Watchmen a grim, joyless, dispiriting work with an atheistic, nihilistic, and pessimistic worldview that deliberately and consistently inverts, subverts, and perverts everything that makes reading superhero comics fun and enjoyable in the first place. The book's title is based on a quotation from the Roman poet Juvenal: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (Who watches the watchmen?) that was used as the epigraph for the Tower Commission's report on the Iran-Contra affair in 1987. Like the Tower Commission, questions about the abuse of power and authority and the nature of good and evil are clearly on Moore's mind here. He uses the conventions of the superhero story to try to make points about larger issues, but I disagree about as profoundly as I possibly can with his point of view and his conclusions.

Nevertheless, I wanted to read the book because about a year ago, as a relative newcomer to the world of comics, I created some superhero characters myself and started trying to create a fictional universe for them to live in. I wanted to see if the kinds of stories I had in mind for these characters would sell, so I set out to do a little unsystematic market research. I wanted to read titles that seemed representative of the market for superhero stories as a whole, and I wanted to read books that were considered essential and highly influential in the comics industry. Watchmen was a name that kept coming up on both counts.

Before reading the book, I knew Watchmen had a reputation for being much grimmer and grittier than the average mainstream superhero comic, and was something of a landmark for having largely introduced this element of darkness and grit into comics as a whole. I knew the journey into the world of Watchmen might not always be fun, but I thought it would at least be interesting and instructive. It was not. I started reading the book before Christmas but gave up about halfway through because I found it so relentlessly bleak and depressing. When I heard about the release of the movie version I decided to dig out the book again and push through to the end before making a final decision about it. I thought perhaps I had misjudged or misunderstood the work. I had not. My initial assessment still stands. I did not enjoy this book and cannot recommend it. I don't get the hype. What makes it so wonderful?

The story begins in 1985 as someone is murdering or otherwise eliminating the members of a defunct and discredited team of masked amateur crime fighters, the Minute Men. The latest victim is Eddie Blake, aka The Comedian, a thug and a rapist every bit as brutal as the criminals he fought against. Another former member of the group, the paranoid and psychotic Walter Kovacs, aka Rorschach, who plainly enjoys intimidating and torturing real or perceived enemies, is conducting his own investigation into The Comedian's death. With the reluctant help of two other former vigilantes, Dan Dreiberg, aka Nite Owl, and Laurie Juspeczyk, aka Silk Spectre, Rorschach follows the conspiracy to its source: Ozymandias, aka Adrian Veidt, another former masked adventurer who has given up crime fighting, become a multimillionaire, and established a reputation as "the smartest man in the world."

Veidt has concluded that simply fighting crime isn't enough. He concocts an insane plan to remake the world in his own image by fabricating the appearance of an alien invasion, destroying half the population of New York City in the process, and forcing humanity to put aside its internal conflicts and unite in the face of the supposed alien threat. Ironically, Veidt's plan works to perfection. Not even the godlike abilities of Dr. Manhattan, the only member of the team with "superpowers" in the traditional comic book sense, can prevent the catastrophe; in fact, Dr. Manhattan refuses to intervene, for his own reasons.

The messages behind the book seem abundantly, almost unmistakably clear to me. Chapter VI, Rorschach's horrific origin story, ends with this declaration by his psychiatrist:

Why do we argue? Life's so fragile, a successful virus clinging to a speck of mud suspended in endless nothing . . . . The horror is this: in the end, it is simply a picture of empty meaningless blackness. We are alone. There is nothing else.

None of the subsequent events of the book do anything to challenge the psychiatrist's pronouncement. The power of God will not save the world because there is no God. If Dr. Manhattan is meant to symbolize God in any way, he will not intervene to save humanity; in fact, he destroys Rorschach for refusing to go along with Veidt's plans and decides to leave Earth forever to visit other "less complicated" galaxies. When Veidt points out that Dr. Manhattan has regained an interest in human life, the doctor replies, "Yes I have. I think perhaps I'll create some," and vanishes.

Moore also seems to imply that conventional heroism will not save humanity because in the end there is no moral difference between the so-called heroes and so-called villains. The Comedian and Rorschach are just as brutal and sadistic as their alleged enemies. The US government recruits The Comedian for all manner of despicable "black ops" missions that the government can later deny. The only "supervillain" we actually see, the former Moloch the Magician, is no longer a master criminal; when Rorschach terrorizes him in order to gain information, Moloch is just a sick old man dying of cancer who wants only to be left alone. Nite Owl, the character most like a conventional superhero, with a genuine desire to do good, is literally and figuratively impotent, both in the sense of being unable to affect the story's outcome and in the sense of being unable to consummate his desire for Silk Spectre--unless he is wearing his Nite Owl costume.

In his essay, A Defence of Penny Dreadfuls, written more than a hundred years ago, G. K. Chesterton argued that popular fiction, ranging from fairy tales to the epic adventures of King Arthur and Robin Hood, and even the "penny dreadfuls," or mass-produced sensational fiction of his time, served two purposes. It fulfilled a basic human longing for stories of heroism and adventure and it taught a basic moral code. Chesterton responded to the so-called intellectual sophisticates of his time who looked down their noses at "penny dreadfuls" even as they looked down their noses at the moral codes contained therein:

And with a hypocrisy so ludicrous as to be almost unparalleled in history, we rate the gutter-boys for their immorality at the very time that we are discussing (with equivocal German professors) whether morality is valid at all. At the very instant that we curse the Penny Dreadful for encouraging thefts upon property, we canvass the proposition that all property is theft. At the very instant we accuse it (quite unjustly) of lubricity and indecency, we are cheerfully reading philosophies which glory in lubricity and indecency. At the very instant that we charge it with encouraging the young to destroy life, we are placidly discussing whether life is worth preserving.

Chesterton argued that in many respects he preferred the simple morality of the "penny dreadful" and the people of the lower classes who read them to the fashionable despair of the intellectual elites:

So long as the coarse and thin texture of mere current popular romance is not touched by a paltry culture it will never he vitally immoral. It is always on the side of life. The poor--the slaves who really stoop under the burden of life-- have often been mad, scatter-brained, and cruel, but never hopeless. That is a class privilege, like cigars. Their drivelling literature will always be a "blood and thunder" literature, as simple as the thunder of heaven and the blood of men.

I would suggest that the pulp novel, the old time radio show, and the Golden Age comic book of the 1930s and '40s were the successors to the "penny dreadfuls" of Chesterton's day. No one could possibly confuse the high-mindedness of Superman or the Shadow's stern warning: "The weed of crime bears bitter fruit! Crime does not pay!" with the nihilism and brutality of Rorschach and The Comedian. When I was a boy, I wanted to be Superman. Some days I still wish I could be. Who would want to be Rorschach?

I would also suggest that in Watchmen, however, we have what Chesterton might have regarded as the worst of both worlds: a work of popular fiction infected with the nihilism and cruelty of the intellectual elites. It's the product of a "paltry culture" indeed, if reviewers think that such a thing qualifies as high art. Watchmen is not "on the side of life;" it is, at its heart, on the side of death. It reeks of hopelessness and despair. It holds that the thunder of heaven is merely thunder and never the voice of heaven; and that men and women never spill their blood for any good purpose, even to save their country, their family, or each other.

Who watches the watchmen? Not I.

Some Curry With Your Kryptonite?

Here's an unintentionally (?) hilarious little clip from an extremely low-budget Superman movie knockoff produced by India's film industry (sometimes referred to as Bollywood). Supes looks to have put on a few pounds, and I'll swear the guy's wearing a false nose. Lucky for us, the person who originally posted this video has helpfully provided English subtitles which add to the hilarity. Hat tip: Saint Superman.

Father Barron on The Dark Knight

Since I'm trying to create some superhero characters of my own, I found this reflection by Father Robert Barron on the superhero concept and its philosophical and theological problems to be quite interesting. He focuses his attention on the recent Batman movie The Dark Knight, but he mentions other popular superheroes in passing and his observations could be applied to just about any superhero character. Father Barron has a real gift for packing a great deal of thought-provoking material into the ten minutes or less allowed by YouTube.