Superhero parodies?

[thorionthei]

Not sure I agree 100% with Steve about this.

IMO 90% of Grant Morrisson's work is superhero parody. Sure he may be the only guy in the world able to pull it off (which i can't think of any others really) but I still don't think it should be a close done deal.

[zuludelta]

Well... it all depends on what you consider to be superhero parody. Steven didn't mention any specific examples in this week's column but I'm assuming that he's probably referring to the likes of Marvel's Nextwave, Keith Giffen's Hero Squared,or even DC/Wildstorm's The Authority and Alan Moore's Top Ten.

He does have a very good point... many of today's superhero comics have become so self-referential and repetitive that they've essentially become parodies of themselves, thus obviating the need for dedicated parody material. Heck, in some respects, The Ultimates is just an extended satirical look at the superhero team concept (I stay for the Bryan Hitch art, though). I think Grant's beef with superhero parodies is that the extant flaws that are found in superhero comics are so obvious that it doesn't really take any stretch of imagination or creativity to point them out.

My problem with this view is that it is quite possible that for a large number of readers, these flaws aren't so obvious. Not everybody is familiar with the tropes of the spandex set, so for these readers, I think superhero parody books serve a larger purpose besides just perpetrating and perpetuating some comic book in-joke, as parody books are wont to do. I remember reading Alan Moore's work on Supreme when I was 13 years old, and while it's obvious to me now that he was riffing on classic Superman, I had no idea at the time that that was the case (I was pretty ignorant of anything DC published back then). It was just good beat 'em up comics to me.

[mattx110]

once characters within the story notice "captain america would look silly if her weren't so awe-inspiring" or "hey, superman looks like an idiot" it takes too much away from what the characters have been made to be through decades of published stories.

stuff like the hip new character saying "move over spandex boyscout" is breaking down the wall too much. i can even take lex luthor calling the JLA "Costumed idiots" but having guest stars in the book just to make fun of them doesn't help but put one book to a higher level of realism than the rest of the books when we know that the next month that "realism" is going to be gone becuase it gets in the way of storytelling.

also, it'd be nice to read a "serious" comic without a minor character named frank miller appearing...

edit: just noticed the dan brereton cover i've never seen before. it's nice.

[badMike]

Just based on Steven's original subject (movie superhero parodies), ya'll had better prepare yourselves for Superhero! out next year, which will be in the same vein as all those awful Scary/Date/Epic Movie "parodies." It's coming from the guy who made The Specials, which I believe was a superhero parody film. (I've never seen it.)

[Krasch]

I have to say I disagree vehemently with at least one point Steven made in his article.

That the CW is a sucker for any pretty face with a script as an explanation for Smallville's longevity.

Bollocks! Were that the case, Birds of Prey (on the same network, the WB at the time) would not have been cancelled before it even finished the first season. It was a very similar concept except that the protagonists were female instead of male.

[NatGertler]

I have to say I disagree vehemently with at least one point Steven made in his article.

That the CW is a sucker for any pretty face with a script as an explanation for Smallville's longevity.Please reread that section of the piece; you're inappropriate applying a phrase outside of a parenthetical remark to a phrase inside the parenthetical.

[thorionthei]

See Nextwave is a good example. As good a writer as Ellis is I didn't think it worked. And the heroes actually weren't wearing costumes. Machine Man in a trenchcoat ala postsuperhero look? No thanks! Give me the purple inspector gadget look! ;)

[thorionthei]

And honestly I think there is a grey area where the superheroes are not capes yet are still superheroes. I think the capes thing is very silver age. Things evolve. Superman? Iconic but he doesn't sell much comics. Batman? The cape is forgiven. :)

It goes along with are comics for kids? JLU and Marvel Adventures: Avengers? Sure! No real continuity. Each issue is self contained, etc.

Are comics for Silver Age kids who are now middle aged adults and want capes? Um. I honestly think we can update superheroes and it can work. We've seen it done already. Ohwell. :)

[NatGertler]

I think the capes thing is very silver age.Naw, capes are basically Golden Age. Few of the significant new Silver Age heroes had a cape. The new Flash, new Green Lantern, Spider-Man, FF, Hulk, Iron Man, X-Men? Not a cape among them. Sure, Thor and Doctor Strange had capes, but they're really exceptions in the period.

[plainbrownwraper]

I've concluded that costumes are essentially a convention particular to comix, a device to tell the characters apart, where a lot of artists draw their faces algorythimacally, and a lantern jaw and Jerry Lee Lewis/Elvis lock of hair aren't enough to focus attention on the main character - they are superfluous, even silly on film, where one is seldom confused over which character is which.

Certain iconic characters, like Batman and Spiderman can get away with it, and it can even be sort of justified as semi-practical, or Superman, who is a less a character than a pure symbol.

The rest only need costumes in comics, and they should lose them in the movies for the most part - I kinda liked Halle Berry's costume in Catwoman, it was more ad-hoc, kinda like Punishers costume (I just finally saw it on TV, and edited for same, to be fair, but I didn't think it was as bad as everybody said - not much of a plot really, the villian is almost an afterthought, but I thought Berry's cat acting was fascinating, I thought she dis a great job with the character - it's just bad luck that Drive-in's have had their day).

It's really just a contextual thing: comix inhabit the subconscious more directly, where pure symbols can be assimilated more easily, and seem less intrusive - they are in their element, so to speak - live images are subject to whole different level of analysis, and the suspension of disbelief bar set much higher. In comix, one can weave in and out between objective reality and pure surrealism without missing a beat - much more difficult in live action movies, and there are only a few actors, like Johnny Depp who can even pull it off (Edward Scissorhands springs to mind) - and even he has his limits

I've noticed the same thing with CG - the closer it is to trying to depict reality, the more noticable the flaws - the over the top CG didn't help Catwoman at all for example, my only real "puh-leeze" moments.

When CG is clearly stylized on the other hand, one is able to simply sit back and enjoy the story without analyzing the images, the Incredibles, etc. The CG in I, Robot was probobly one of the best blends of CG and live action (in close up) I've seen, but again, the robots are not intended to look more than vaguely humanoid - they do however, obey the laws of physics for the most part.

I tend to pay attention to how this is handled in comixhero movies ("Superhero" is a registered tradmark of Marvel inc., I do believe, so it will most likely not crop up in any other, uh, Metahuman tales not directly associated with Marvel inc.) - that is, whether they resist the temptation to try and wow you with the fantastic physical abilities of the hero (i.e., leaning on their CG department) - as comics do by design (dynamics) and convention, and in the process so insult your perceptions of objective reality that they make the characters look more comic than hero, or just tell good stories about characters who happen to have exceptional powers, and have a care about how they choose to depict those.

Particularly tricky, since comix fans have such high, and generally, highly specific expectations.

[plainbrownwraper]

As far as parodies go, they're almost the only kind of Superhero movies I can tolerate - I still get a kick out of Mystery Men, and would rather watch that again than pretty much any other superhero movie made in the last... ever.

I vaguely remember a movie called Superargo vs. Diabolicus that I thought was pretty cool when I was... pretty young - I sincerely doubt if the actual movie could compete with my memory of it, so I wouldn't necessarily be tempted to mistake my jaded perceptions for transcendent insight into the mind of the moviegoing audience in general, just my opinion.

Anybody ever see that movie?

[zuludelta]

See Nextwave is a good example. As good a writer as Ellis is I didn't think it worked.

I really enjoyed looking at Stuart Immonen's art on Nextwave but the superhero satire thing got real tired by the 5th issue or so. We get it Warren... the idea of S.H.I.E.L.D. taken at face value is ridiculous and the Nick Fury archetype is just teeming with contextually loaded psychosexual themes (the cigar, the macho posturing, the phallo-centric obsession with big guns).

The art was great and some of the jokes were genuinely funny, but at the same time, I don't think the parody aspect of the book offered anything interesting or new.

[Charles RB]

It goes along with are comics for kids? JLU and Marvel Adventures: Avengers? Sure! No real continuity. Each issue is self contained, etc.


I found that slightly odd, since Marvel's original success came from selling comics that weren't self-contained and did have continuity to kids.

[sgt pepper]

The original Ben Edlund run of The Tick was all parody and all hilarious, with good stories and a heart.

I think there's room for parody. What's wrong with a little fun (even at our own expense)?

[zuludelta]

I think there's room for parody. What's wrong with a little fun (even at our own expense)?

I don't think Steve was saying that superhero parody is somehow wrong or bad... just that the bulk of what passes for parody these days is uninspired, uncreative, and just not that funny.

[mattx110]

I don't think Steve was saying that superhero parody is somehow wrong or bad... just that the bulk of what passes for parody these days is uninspired, uncreative, and just not that funny.

the scream movies were comedies parodying horror.
john carpenter has only done 1 or 2 films with a straight face through the whole thing.

scary movie is redundant in that it parodied what was essentially a parody. this relies on random references to be funny, not the audacity of the original concept. they're more hour and a half "remember that part in that movie! that was funny" snipets that the screenwriter wanted to include rather than a coherent parody of a subject.
people went to see all those scary movie things and enjoyed them anyway.
but when something high in satirical content, like scrubs or the Specials, or DKR or whatever, has an emotionally weighted plot holding it together, it's a lot more effective as a story.

using the original idea and trying to understand it by breaking down the SoD=parody
intentionally creating characters who rely on humor to cope with life and borderline between breaking down the fourth wall while following a plot derivative of the original genre=umm either parody or satire or whatever, but it's good.
random jokes with no connection to the plot or character development=crap that might be fun to see anyway.

[plainbrownwraper]

Hmmm... did I forget to post yesterday or did it get deleted?

Anyway, I think I said something like parody is kids throwing spitwads at the screen - real comedy is generally based on real insight into the human condition, the absurdity of ordinary life.

Catch 22 is a good example, the movie comes off in some ways as a parody of war movies, but the book it's based on is is pure absurdism - Alan Arkin did more or less specialize in absurdist roles though, it's a recurring theme in many of his movies.

Shaun of the dead also leans more toward the absurdist approach, as a parody, it's hard to tell if it's a parody of zombie flics or a parody of English manners and mores, probobly both, but it somehow manages at the same time to be a much more serious movie than any other zombie flic has ever achieved or even attempted.

Parody is a more American approach, it's mockery, slapstick, an American tradition via Vaudville and Madison Avenue (The Harvard Lampoon crew has carried the torch of parody for decades), although comedies of manners enjoyed a run in the forties, fifties, and sixties, moving into the suburbs, and certain creators like Neil Simon still work the genre now and again.

Absurdism is more akin to the comedy of manners than parody, and has roots going back to at least Shakespeare, and the form is discernable in certain greek plays - it is however, I think, a more distinctly modern variation, and the ultimate motivation of the protaganist merely to survive all the bullshit that happens to him/her, and it often ends up all making some kind of sense in the end. Some of Jim Carrey's stuff has more absurdist themes, Cable Guy for example, though naturally with a heavy dose of Carrey's broad physical comedy thrown in.

Any thoughts on that? It seems to be a distinct category/approach to me, but I could be reinventing the wheel. I'd also have to make the distinction of the Dramady, which is more or less a straight drama with moments of levity, which may or may not include self parody, but which has a certain distinct rythm of it's own.

[Rorysm]

I'd say that the first Scream wasn't so much a parody but an homage and a reinvisioning of sorts. It really revitalized the whole horror industry though. It showed that horror movies could be something more then the stale 80's stuff.

[stealthwise]

Shaun of the dead also leans more toward the absurdist approach, as a parody, it's hard to tell if it's a parody of zombie flics or a parody of English manners and mores, probobly both, but it somehow manages at the same time to be a much more serious movie than any other zombie flic has ever achieved or even attempted.

Parody is a more American approach, it's mockery, slapstick, an American tradition via Vaudville and Madison Avenue (The Harvard Lampoon crew has carried the torch of parody for decades), although comedies of manners enjoyed a run in the forties, fifties, and sixties, moving into the suburbs, and certain creators like Neil Simon still work the genre now and again.


Shaun of the Dead is parody, but it works on the basic principle that you just have the same scenario as most other zombie movies, only have your characters react differently. Planet Terror from Grindhouse is more what you're talking about in terms of the absurdist vein of zombie movies, and it's hilarious.

As for the American approach... I've found that there's a lot of direct parody in British works, and that they seem to have love for irreverence, as evidenced by Nextwave cleaning up at the Eagle Awards. American audiences seem to appreciate satire specifically more than just straight parody, although the success of the Scary Movie type spoofs is a bit scary, as those are usually strung together jokes that have little bearing on the overall story and require more outside knowledge of other movies, rather than the context of the story to get it.

[stealthwise]

I'd say that the first Scream wasn't so much a parody but an homage and a reinvisioning of sorts. It really revitalized the whole horror industry though. It showed that horror movies could be something more then the stale 80's stuff.

I wouldn't think so, I'd say that The Silence of the Lambs and Seven were both much better crafted and much more influential on current horror films than the Scream movies, although Scream did show that teens and young adults are a good way to sell to a young demographic (see the ridiculous casting in the "Rear Window" ripoff that just came out recently).