Ahh... the Spike and Faith Comics...

[shadowkat]

[As an aside, I find it highly amusing that I stopped buying/obsessing over X-men comics and lost all interest in them back in 2001, when I got obsessed with Buffy, Spike and the Angel series. Then, in 2007, I'm back to buying comics every month (albeit Buffy not X-men) - because - the Buffy character's stories are being continued by their creators in comic form. This amuses me greatly. The morale? You never can quite break yourself of a weird time/space and money consuming habit/addiction/obsession - you just end up replacing it with another similar one. I can blame Joss Whedon and Brian Lynch for this, but I know full well they are merely the drug pushers, I'm the buyer.]

Bought issue 4, the finale of the Spike: Shadow Puppets mini-series, and issue 7, part II of the four part, Faith story, in Buffy Season Eight comic this afternoon. Took me about an hour and a half to read both.

I loved Spike:Shadow Puppets. It provided me with everything that I wanted from the mini-series. Character exploration, humor, great art, good dialogue, and a sense of the character actually growing and advancing on his journey. Changing. It is admittedly one of my kinks - I need characters to evolve and change in stories, to learn from their mistakes and progress. This gives me hope for the human race and makes me feel better about myself. Stories in which this does not happen, just upset me and who wants that? Life is tough enough without having those things we use to comfort ourselves upset us instead.

Now, I admittedly have an odd sense of humor. Which Brian Lynch apparently shares. It is snarky and a bit self-deprecating in nature. What am I talking about? Ah, here is a bit of dialogue from the latest issue of Spike:Shadow Puppets that made me laugh out loud.

"Official canon is so complicated. So many people with so many opinions!"

LOL!

And -

"Seriously, I'm still feeling puppety. I can't go canon as a puppet. The internet is complaining about me as it is."

"I'm so sure the internet is complaining about something. Get real for a second."

Hee Hee.

And... "Demons love murdering but hate research."

I want icons of those!! Particularly the first one.

The story also worked for me - it explored Spike's envy of Angel, his struggle to define himself (he keeps seeing himself as a lone wolf who doesn't get on with people when it is clear that he is the opposite and does need people), and how others perceive him.

As for the art? I continue to be impressed by Frank Urru - who manages to create characters that do not look alike or dress alike, who have different facial expressions, and are older.
Unlike the Buffy comics - the women in Urru's drawings aren't all one age - we see children, adolescents, elderly women, and their faces are very different. When I read a comic, I look at the art first - it's first and foremost in my mind, then the writing, then the thing as a whole. Lynch and Urru's styles blend beautifully together. The work to me feels almost three dimensional and continues to be in my opinion amongst the best graphic novels I've read and I've read quite a few and a wide variety, including Magna and underground. I draw or have drawn and taken numerous art classes in my lifetime and am picky about art. If I can do it?
I don't think it's that great. If I can't? I'm in awe. Jeanty's? I've drawn stuff like that.
Urru? I couldn't begin to draw like that even in my dreams. Of course it's all very subjective isn't it? What floats my boat more than likely won't float yours. Arguing over it seems to be a waste of time. Yet, being human, we do it anyway. Go figure.

Which brings me to the Buffy Comic. Read this baby first. And....

Well. It was lukewarm.

The good? I am enjoying the exploration of the Faith character and her unresolved feelings towards Giles, Buffy and the gang, which were not explored to my satisfaction in S7 due to the fact that they were busy doing five storylines at once in the space of four or five hours with thirty characters. Also enjoying the exploration of how Faith is not exactly the killer that everyone likes to believe she is. So on the character exploration? It's working for me.

The bad? I don't like the set-up, too cliche for words. I've seen this done in one too many romance novels (not to mention bad fanfics) and to be honest, it is amongst the many reasons I stopped reading romance novels. (By set-up - I mean, the poor girl infliterating the rich English estate, pretending to be a spoiled brat, bonding with the person she is supposed to be decieving (who for reasons that defy logic has not figured out she's a fake), and the only one remotely suspicious is the nasty servant/tutor. If you've read any Harlequin novels - you've read this set-up before. OR at least I have and I know what is going to happen next. Bored already. Come on, you couldn't have come up with a better plot than this? Please.
In short it is not a romance trope that I particularly like at the moment and wish they'd picked another one.

The really bad? The Dawn subplot offends me or rather the humor of it is. I suppose I should be a little clearer about this, shouldn't I? It's not the plot itself, it's the dialogue.

Here - examples:

"And speaking of clothes, have you been wearing the same outfit since you blossomed?"

(Sigh. BLOSSOMED??? Gimme a break. Growing bigger means you blossomed? What about grew?)

"What, did my proportionate stench tip you off? Cause unless Lane Bryant redefines "plus-sixed' in a huffy, it's only gonna get worse."

(Lane Bryant? Ugh. I just watched Without A Trace last night with it's bit about an overweight woman who committed suicide because of how a bunch of boys treated her. This comic is getting on my nerves. All the woman are drawn to be exactly the same size and weight. No one is bigger or smaller in the bust. While the men are different sizes, weights, etc. Then we make cracks about stores catering to women who aren't thin? And think it is funny? Granted I realize that may not have been the intent, but it irked me a bit all the same.)

"You don't understand he was the only guy on campus who treated me like a friend and not a..a walking pair of boobs."

(Uhm, she doesn't seem to have any. I seriously doubt that.)

"Oh sweetie. Don't talk like that. Boys are into you because of your legs. Not those itty-bitty things."

(Honestly, Willow, considering they are exactly the same size as yours, Buffy's, and everyone else not wearing a bustier, how can say you say that? And yet, some idiot letter writer on the letter page seems to think real women look like this? Granted it's better than the super-heroes in most comic books who are stick figures with extended busts and perfect legs and look like Barbie. But...on the other hand, that isn't all comic books. That's just super-hero comics. Pick up Strangers in Paradise? Or say Spike:Shadow Puppets. Or how about a couple of the Marvel ones - some artists do a good job. It varies.

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm getting tired of the lame thricewise sex jokes. Granted they did go over a few people's heads - the one's obsessed with researching mythology.
But, a thricewise was a penis joke. In case you didn't get it - they repeated it here.
See:

"I swear I'll un-embiggen you the second you tell me what incantation your significant other used while you two were being significant together..."

"You're worse than my sister, Willow! Why is everyone so sure this is Kenny's fault?"

"Um, because he's a thricewise?"

Get it? He made her bigger so when his penis expanded to three times its size it wouldn't break her. The big penis, tiny virgin vagina joke...it never goes out of fashion. Am I the only person who collected lame sex jokes in college? Apparently so.

Ugh. This book doesn't make me laugh. It makes me wince. Brian K. Vaughn? Do us all a favor, leave the humor to experts like Brian Lynch. You aren't any good at it.)

I suppose I should analyze the book, but I don't really care that much, nor have the time to be honest. Plus I'm analyzing contracts all week long, bloody tired of analyzing things - want a break from it. The comic was fun. It wasn't that deep. And I'll probably get the next one. Because you know, I like the character exploration and want to see where they go with that bit.

Overall ratings?

Spike:Shadow Puppets: A+
Buffy Season Eight - Faith Issue 7, Part II: C

Comments

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

I don't think that 'thricewise' was any kind of dirty joke, it is a kind of demon (in Joss' first issue of the series it was mentioned by Buffy that she and Giles had both warned Dawn about her boyfriend being a thricewise, but we have still not learned what all this entails besides the giantification thing).

But I agree that BKV's second issue was weaker than his first (I loved his introduction to Faith's arc, and I am willing to over look a weak second issue in the hopes that he really has something to say before he is done).

Brian Lynch's two Spike stories were both drawn by Franco Urro and he'll be drawing Angel: After the Fall too, which I'm thrilled about. I'm expecting big fun. It will be interesting to see how Brian does with a much longer story arc, but of course I know that he has been working on the story w/Joss.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Okay -maybe I explained that bit above the wrong way. Should learn to stop using the penis bit - which isn't as clear.

So, trying again.

If we subtract the bit about a penis growing thricewise, it is still a sex joke. The characters are assuming she grew big having sex with Kenny.

Big. "Knocked up". "You're a woman now that you had sex". "He had a big penis so widened you." "You're a big girl now!""Did you make her grow?"
"Size matters?"

Now re-read the dialogue. What does Willow say? "Blossomed" = what happens to a flower when a bee pollinates it? Blossoms.

See?
******************

I agree on everything else. I'm reading to see what he does with Faith - emotionally. I'm hoping he finds a way of resolving her issues with Buffy and with the others.

Yeah, Frank Urru is slanted to do the art for all of Angel Season 6, yay!
The spoiler panels I've seen really rock. And I lovve the writing. Lynch has become my favorite comic writer. He captures the Spike I fell in love with perfectly and the universe those characters lived in. And his Lorne is fantastic. Plus - when he did the puppets, he included Connor and Cordelia in the bunch, even though Spike barely knew them. This guy knows the series - very well.

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

oh yes, I can definitely see the growing/blossoming/becoming large etc etc.

I wasn't sure the term Thricewise was in reference to that, but of course we shall see when Dawn's story is eventually developed er resolved.

I like Brian K. Vaughan and I like to give him the benefit of the doubt, his ideas were concerning Faith (the Dawn portions are just back to Joss' seasonal story arc) and I'm thinking he has gotten Faith more isolated so that he can give her some room for self-discovery (I hope so). But I agree that Brian Lynch really manages to get the voice/humor/and adventure in fast paced action packed stories which still manage to bring character development. I'm very interested in seeing what he'll do w/Angel and Illyria and anyone else we get in 'After the Fall'.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

The Buffy comics remind me a great deal of female magna comics in style and tone, if not art. The jokes are similar and so is the action. I read quite a few of them in my twenties. Some were made into films, but not many.

Agree with you on Lynch. I love his take on the verse, and really like his sense of humor. I don't know if I'll stick with the Buffy comics or not. I don't find myself looking forward to them in quite the same way as the Lynch comics.

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

I loved your post to aycheb below, because of course that is always the problem, we all look at the comics and see different things. It may hurt my heart that you are thinking of giving up the Buffy comics (or worse: liliaeth's attitude that Joss is the worse thing about his own creation!). But it is clearly ludicrous for me to argue and hope to change your mind. Obviously something either gives you pleasure or it doesn't. For me, I'm more excited about the Buffy comics because I have missed those characters more, and I am looking forward to the different authors' segments with huge anticipation (Jane Espenson! Yay!), but of course that is to take nothing away from Brian Lynch's upcoming 'Angel: After the Fall' which I'm sure will be full of huge fun and surprises (for me the knowledge that Joss had planned up coming stories for Angel & company just makes me anxious to hear what they are).

I'm more forgiving about Georges' artwork, I feel that making consistently good comic book art, keeping the characters separate and recognizable, AND getting in the wide shots and action (which I think Georges does a particularly good job of) is difficult enough without having to worry about meeting every fan's expectations of how the actor image should look. For me, I'm willing to forget the actors and enjoy his vision of the characters. SMG & Nick Brendon can age as much as they like (I always thought that SMG had lied a bit about her age and was starting to look older than her character should look, besides letting her self get WAY more thin than buff little Buffy should get) but Buffy & Xander are still in their early 20s in my comics.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

Yes, I really think what it comes down to is what we look for in art at this point in our lives, what resonates for us. What characters, themes, etc. For example - the last four seasons of Buffy really resonated for me in theme, style, character and story - far more than the firt three did.
Same with Angel - the last two seasons were my favorite - because they resonated. I identified with certain themes and was not offended nor did I notice things that bugged others.

My difficulty with Jeanty's art work is not that his drawings don't look like the actors or haven't aged. Don't mind that so much. It's that the women all look the same to me. Dawn actually looked different in this one, as did Willow. But Faith and Gigi looked a bit too much alike.
Outside of that? I don't really mind his artwork that much. It's a lot better than most of the art I've seen on the Buffy comics, especially that Spike and Dru comic, not to mention some of the art on Spike vs. Dracula.

Part of the reason I'm not into the Buffy comics as much is I think I've lost interest in the some of those characters. Season 7 satisfied me regarding Xander, Willow, Buffy, Dawn, Giles, and Faith's arcs. I knew where they were going and knew who they were. Spike was the only character from the show I needed and desired more information on. I felt his arc was incomplete, they hadn't explored everything to my satisfaction. There was something about that character that resonated with me and I wanted more. I felt the same way about Illyria and Lorne.
So for me, Angel felt more incomplete than Buffy did.

That said, I am curious about where the Buffy characters are going and how and if Whedon plans on resolving old issues amongst them. Such as Buffy's relationship with Faith. Her relationship with Riley, Angel and Spike. And Xander's relationships with Buffy, Willow, Anya and to a degree Giles. There were a couple of loose threads that intrigued me.
Also - am curious to see what Jane Espenson does. And Drew Goddard.
So, I haven't abandoned them yet. I'm just mildly disappointed in them and lowering my expectations for future issues. ;-)

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, I agree about Faith & Gigi: Georges Jeanty had the opportunity to create someone of a very different body type and appearance than Faith, and instead he made someone who looked enough like Faith that I had to keep remembering that Gigi was the one wearing the lame tiara.

But nothing can ever compare to the sheer ugly artwork in that Spike & Dru comic (I had to get rid of that one, I hated looking at it, and I won't be buying the Buffy: Omnibus vol.II because that comic is reprinted in it.)

The 'Tales of the Slayer' comic and 'Tales of the Vampire' series were ones I really loved because they used a number of different artists for different stories, and that really works for me. I love seeing completely different drawing styles representing tales from different places and times.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

LOL! I did the same thing with the Spike and Dru comic (Spike vs. Dracula has some of the same bad artwork by the way). I think I gave my copy of it to talimamma.

And I agree with you on Tales of the Vampire series - it did have some good artists. And very different styles. Reminded me of the some of the kick ass art on the old X-Men cross-overs. Jai Lee who is doing the Gunslinger (Stephen King) series for comics- was one of those artists.
I'm a sucker for hyper-realism, shadow/color template graphic art that looks like it has been painted on the page and flows across it. Urru's is in that style as was Jai Lee and Cassidy (who does Whedon's Astonishing X-Men.)

But Joan Chen's covers rock - they are much better than Tony Harris for Angel After the Fall or even Urru's. In fact I think I may like her paintings almost as well as the great Alex Ross who did Kingdom Come for DC. (Sigh, sorry, am a comic graphic art geek.) Hee. This may explain why Jeanty's art urks me. He looks like he's improving - see issue 6 of the series, then he disappoints me again.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

graphic art that looks like it has been painted on the page and flows across it

That’s interesting. Someone on my friends list was saying that Jeanty draws action sequences as if he were choosing a series of individual frames from a TV show showing the key points of the action. He’s like an editor rather than a cinematographer, which works for me. While vidding I’ve found the process of selecting a small number of key of key images to represent a point came very naturally, I think it’s similar to the way I process movies instinctively. TV editing on shows like Buffy tend to be like that too, they shoot a scene from a number of different angles and distances then put them back together afterwards rather than planning what to shoot in great detail in advance. In comics I also find that fragmented approach works in better sync with the text which is necessarily discontinuous. I think Lynch overwrites anyway but I’ve found it hard to match the eye movement needed for Urro’s visuals with the need to process all the words. But if you read one then the other that wouldn’t be a problem.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Actually, I don't have any problems with the editing style. Doesn't bug me.
What bugs me about Jeanty's art is I can't tell his female characters apart, they look too much alike. Sometimes the only way I can distinquish them is by the clothes they are wearing. Also the dialogue is too similar they sound a like.

Same troubles with some of the male characters. Andrew - I didn't know was Andrew in one of the comics.

Here's how I read comics - I look at the art first. Then I read the words with it. In Urru's I can tell what is going on without dialogue - the art tells the story, I know who the characters are, who is speaking, no problems. With Jeanty's art - I have to read the words to know who is who, often have to read it twice. It's not clear to me.

There are some amazing artists out there who do the editing thing - one is Alex Ross. Who selects specific scenes to paint. Another is Jai Lee.
Then there's Frank Miller - who uses black and white drawings in stark relief. Jeanty is, don't get me wrong, serviceable - his style is pretty good, but from what I've seen he can only draw women to look one way.

My other difficulty with the comic is the coloring - it's faded, not pristine, the colors don't jump off the page. And I admittedly prefer black background as opposed to white. It's personal. I like the feeling of a painting or watercolor - I like the three dimensional look. Something that pulls me inside the page.

Urru's style reminds me of some of the styles I fell in love with while reading X-Men, Jai Lee, and an another Italian artist I forget the name of.
Jeanty's reminds me of the styles that left me cold in the X-Men - Kirby (who was a fan favorite, but I didn't like that much).

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

But Gigi is supposed to look like Faith, they could be sisters! Maybe it comes from having identical twin children but I actually find them very easy to distinguish as drawn. They may have similar colouring and body type but Gigi's expressions and posture are so much more confident and untroubled by self doubt. His Faith is quite withdrawn into herself when not trying to play the demented duchess.

[liliaeth]

Honestly the only thing that worries me about Angel:After the Fall, is that Joss has a hand in it. I don't feel that Joss has any connection to the characters left. There's no nice way to say this, Buffy s8 plain out sucks, the characters are unrecognizable, unlikeable and have little or nothing in common with the characters we last saw in Chosen.

I really worry that if Joss gets any say in the Angel series, we'll get an overload of Illyria. I don't hate Illyria, but she works best in very small doses. And I don't think that Joss gets that since she's his shiny new toy.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

Well I suppose one person’s playful prurience is another’s “Ew smut!” I enjoyed the Willow/Dawn scene and wasn’t offended at all by it. Willow’s slight salaciousness contributed to her cool aunt vibe and I thought it was interesting that Dawn didn’t seem as convinced that it was all about the sex as Willow was. Maybe there’s a difference in the way people read verbal and visual cues because one of the things I don’t like about what I’ve seen of Urro’s art is his tendency to draw women contorting themselves to display to the reader. Being a visual person I respond by imagining trying to pose like that and it feels physically uncomfortable.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

I deleted a post in which I attempted to argue with you and persuade you to see my pov in lieu of the below, mostly because I don't think we should try to change each other's minds on this. We enjoy the comics we enjoy. And that's that. Life is hellish enough without having a heated discussion about things that make you happy.

Yep, how we read things is very different. To such an extent, I sometimes wonder if we are reading or watching or hearing the same things. It fascinates and frustrates me. But what it comes down to? People just don't think, feel, interpret or sense things in the same way, shape, form or style. Heck we don't even seem to agree on the definition of certain words half the time. Look at the disagreements over which version of 'English' is correct. And regarding "offensive" topics? Sigh. People are walking landmines. What offends one person, turns on another. What's that saying? Your button is my kink?

We can't agree on this stuff. But we all think our way, our language, our country, our religion, our morality, our politics, our way of life is the best or only or right way! We judge people who think, feel, act, sense, or do things differently then we do, or offend our sensibilities. Tolerating and understanding another view is REALLY hard, particularly when it is the opposite of our own. I suck at it and fight with myself on it all the time. In this response for example, where I was really tempted to take you to task for what you saw which I frankly don't see. I honestly don't see what made you uncomfortable regarding Urru's art any more than you see what made me uncomfortable in the Buffy comics. We both are looking at each other as if we're nuts. How can you see that?Show me? And we both don't see it.

I sometimes wonder why I bother to argue over it. I know I'm right. I'm convinced of it. But I also know the other person thinks and knows they are right too. So much of life is compromise, isn't it? Compromising a part of ourselves in order to understand another, and hoping they will do the same. Or, in some cases, like a comic book or tv show, the less important stuff? Agreeing to disagree and leaving it at that. ;-)

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. Which I why I tried to keep my comment to two contrasting examples where my personal reaction to the same material differed from yours. Intellectually I can see why you you responded the way you did to the Willow/Dawn scene, I just don't feel it. It's not so much about feeling that my reaction is the correct one but that it is genuine and it should be possible to explain to other people where it comes from. I think that's why I generally try to avoid writing about media I don't like. If I don't care for it I'm probably not paying it enough attention to have much insightful to say. My fundamental problem with Lynch's comics comes from not being a Spike fan as such. I used to think I was because I'd agree more with his defenders than his detractors in discussions of the show but it's become clear that I liked him/found him interesting as a foil for Buffy not for himself.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

As I commented to embers log above, so much of our emotional reactions to art come from what resonates for us. Which characters we identify with and which we don't. Which issues resonate, which don't.

I'm a single working woman living in NYC far from my family except by phone, and can't imagine having children or anything close to the life Buffy and her friends have. Her world is outside my frame of reference.
Spike on the other hand? That character resonates. I get that character.

From what I've read of your journal - it sounds like Buffy resonates more for you. You get her story. It works for you. For many of the reasons that it can't work for me.

This is DEEPLY personal. And how we reacte to things is deeply personal.
I think we all criticize things we don't like - it's natural. You certainly have in both your response and your own post - you may try not to, but I think it is close to impossible to avoid. Part of the reason, I do it, is to understand why I didn't like something. To figure it out for myself while I'm explaining it to someone else.

[wenchsenior.livejournal.com]

I am by no means knowledgable about graphic novel/comic art. Like the saying goes, I know what I like.

And Frank Urru's art in "Asylum" knocked me out. The comic was quite entertaining as well. Looking forward to "Shadow Puppets".