Two Great Tastes that AREN'T Better Together

[Omar Karindu]

Everyone loves it whent he hot artist and the hot writer, or the acclaimed genius and the acclaimed...uh...artiste team up for a new project. But sometimes it just doesn't work -- the two sorts of brilliance are incompatible, one or the other collaborator is either overawed or underwhelmed by their ostensible partner, or the creators are so overcommitted elsewhere or undercommitted to a project that they jumped on for the paycheck that the work is worse than any of their prior efforts with "lesser" collaborators.

It isn't just writer and artist, of course; it may be penciller and inker, or writer and cowriter, or any number of creative dream teams that turn out to be nightmares. I would ask that we avoid reunions between successful collaborators that lose the original magic and the like.

I'm curious as to how, when, and why this sort of thing seems to happen, and I figured I'd ask around for examples of the supergroup fizzle phenomenon in comics.

I'll toss out three that spring to mind from the world of superhero comics:

Mark Waid, Bryan Hitch, Paul Neary, and Laura Depuy on JLA should have been the best of both worlds, with a star DC writer of fun 60s comics pairing with the brilliant art team that made widescreen comics truly widescreen. Finally the JLA had artists capable of matching the visuals to the Mad Shiny Ideas in terms of scale and vividness.

And then it all fell apart: Hitch started having deadline troubles, Waid seemed bent on stripmining all the suggestions from the previous writer's run rather than developing his own plots, and the art team as a whole was instantly embittered when DC switched up the paper on them and threw off Laura Depuy's coloring as a result. The resulting lack of chemistry among the creators showed rather strongly in the finished product.

Ultimately the art team bailed after one oversized GN and a few spotty and sometimes unfinished (partial fill-in) issues, and what could have been a classic era for the book ended up a third-rate effort to follow both Morrison and The Authority with creators who were largely phoning it in by the end.

Grant Morrison with Gene Ha on The Authority and Jim Lee on W.I.L.D.C.A.T.s was supposed to be the all-superstar, all-brilliant relaunch of the languishing WildStorm properties. Pity not one of the creators could be bothered to tear themselves away from other work to actually produce the comics. The three issues we've gotten to date have been well-illustrated, but glacially-paced, the comics equivalent of vaporware in every way.

It didn't help that Morrison's one issue of the 'Cats seemed rather slapdashedly plotted and scripted, dragging back the most overused villains in the franchise's history and containing a sex scene that was noted for its pretentiousness even by a fair number of self-proclaimed Morrison fans. Worse still, the misfire seems to have contributed to the tanking of the entire WildStorm relaunch, including some less-prominent titles that came out regularly and seemed to be earning good reviews.

Gail Simone and John Byrne on Action Comics was never going to be Watchmen, or even Aztek, but it should have been a stalwart and fun superhero comic. With Simone's star rising and Byrne limited to a pencilling role -- thus precluding complaints about his plotting that had bedeviled his work in recent years -- the team generated a fair degree of excitement from fans after a lackluster period on the title.

Alas, DC allowed the singly-named inker Nelson to simply butcher Byrne's pencils with rather sloppy redrawing. At the same time, the ramp-up to Infinite Crisis meant that the title became an extended crossover with the various lead-in miniseries, including Simone's own baby, Villains United. And finally, to add insult to injury, the editorial policy at the time insisted on creative team rotation, meaning that Simone and Byrne never got out of crossover territory or had time to work with editorial on an art direction for the book.

Nota bene: can we please, please, please not turn his into an ASBAR debate by just not mentioning that book as an example or a counterexample?

[TROUBLEZ]

Jim Lee and Brian Azzarello on Superman

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

Alan Moore and Travis Charest (later Jim Lee) on WildC.A.T.S.

With Charest's art and Moore writing it should have lifted the book above it's Image (and rest of the industry) contemporaries, as the team of Robinson and Charest had only a few issues before.
Instead Charest did only a handful of issues, the book was insanely late, and the plotting a mess.
To make it worse the run started just after a major company crossover, and it had another one wedged in there - both of which made changes to the book's cast/characters - both of which the writer tried to ignore, leading to confusing character moments in a plot driven mess.
Although still lauded by some fans, it's 90's Good (TM) at best.

[dancj]

I really liked Waid's JLA and Alan Moore's Wildcats!

For me...
Frank Miller and Geoff Darrow on Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot.
Grant Morrison and Philip Bond on Kill Your Boyfriend and Vimanarama

[Shellhead]

Chris Claremont and John Byrne back together, on JLA. That was just horrible, one of the worst Justice League arcs ever. To make matters worse, it was also the starting point of the ill-conceived total reboot of Doom Patrol. Forget that both the original Doom Patrol run and the Morrison update were both critically-acclaimed, just wipe that all out for a tepid Byrne reboot starring tedious new characters who upstage the classics every issue. Wtf?

[foxley]

Chris Claremont and John Byrne back together, on JLA. That was just horrible, one of the worst Justice League arcs ever. To make matters worse, it was also the starting point of the ill-conceived total reboot of Doom Patrol. Forget that both the original Doom Patrol run and the Morrison update were both critically-acclaimed, just wipe that all out for a tepid Byrne reboot starring tedious new characters who upstage the classics every issue. Wtf?

It's Byrne. As far as he is concerned a title did not exist before he works on it and ceases to exist once he leaves it. He feels he has no obligation to honour what any creator has done on a title before him, and refuses to accept any change another creator makes to a title after he leaves.

But I agree. That Claremont/Byrne JLA run was awful.

[DubipR]

I'm going to nominate Wonder Woman's pairing of Walt Simonson, Jerry Ordway, and P Craig Russell. Great legendary names, all respected in the field and yet it was utterly bad. I so wanted to enjoy this run but didn't...fell short like 200 yards from the goal posts.

Other "dream pairings" that fizzled out:
Waid and Perez on Brave & the Bold- Ugh..its like pulling teeth trying to read this.
Simonson and Chaykin on Hawkgirl- Another disaster
Terry Moore and Amanda Conner on Birds of Prey- Ok, I'm a friend of Amanda and her art was flawless, but my word did Moore's script just flat out suck?

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

Grant Morrison and Philip Bond on Kill Your Boyfriend and Vimanarama

Totally disagree.
I think the two of them are brilliant together, and I quite enjoyed Vimanarama.
(I haven't read Kill Your Boyfriend)

[Nitz the Bloody]

The biggest example of this that I can think of is Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson on The Boys; brilliant minds teaming up to come up with nothing but puerile jokes and tiresome anti-superhero " commentary ". ( Yes, Ennis, we know you don't like capes, so could you not try to write capes? )

Other examples include Brian Bendis and David Finch on Ultimate X-Men, Orson Scott Card and Andy Kubert on Ultimate Iron Man, Joss Whedon and John Cassaday on Astonishing X-Men. All great writers and artists, but these collaborations gave us mediocrity at best :(

[DubipR]

Other examples include Brian Bendis and David Finch on Ultimate X-Men, Orson Scott Card and Andy Kubert on Ultimate Iron Man, Joss Whedon and John Cassaday on Astonishing X-Men. All great writers and artists, but these collaborations gave us mediocrity at best :(

In complete agreement on all of these, especially Whedon/Cassaday. Seriously great artwork, sup-par storytelling. All bland and banal issues. I personally found it was a waste of Cassaday's artwork on something like this, but Whedon requested him for the project.

[JeffreyWKramer]

Frank Miller and Jim Lee on ALL-STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN.

Though frankly I consider Lee simply good, as opposed to great. Still, the book is a big, dumb, unfunny joke.

[Omar Karindu]

Frank Miller and Jim Lee on ALL-STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN.

Uh-Oh! Looks like somebody decided to ignore the nota bene in the original post:

Nota bene: can we please, please, please not turn his into an ASBAR debate by just not mentioning that book as an example or a counterexample?

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

Brian Bendis, Mark Millar and Andy Kubert on Ultimate Fantastic Four.

The opening arc, the only one they all worked on, was just truly terrible.
Stripped all sense of the fantastic from the book, and basically had characters standing around doing nothing, leading to a rather mundane climax in New York.
Probably fine for a TV pilot, but as comics have an unlimited budget, there really was no excuse.
(Especially as Ellis and Immomen got the next arc and did some great stuff).

[GRANT!]

Kurt Busiek and Carlos Pacheco on Superman.

Busiek can be a fun superhero writer and Pacheco is one of the best artists around and Superman is well Superman. But man those first few issues were pretty damn boring. Didn't help that Pacheco eventually bailed. I stopped reading the book then I heard Simonson drew an issue and gave that a chance. That one sucked too (the 666 issue).

[DoctorDoom]

Great topic...sadly I can only think of one real great taste that goes great together (Instead of not)....skittles and pepsi for Pepsi Summer mix. I've been holding that in.

OK an example...
THose writes who did the Flash tv series and....The flash

[dancj]

Jim Lee and Brian Azzarello on Superman
I just read that and thought it was quite good.
Brian Bendis, Mark Millar and Andy Kubert on Ultimate Fantastic Four.
That's on of my favourite Fantastic Four arcs - though I would nominate the Ellis + Immonen arc that followed for this thread

[BizarroBeachHead]

I'm gunna side with FunkyGreenJerusalem on Ultimate Fantastic Four. Although I don't think that it was terrible, I was disappointed with their "Ultimization" of the characters. There seemed to be lots of needless decompression to make them all angsty teens. Couple that with Adam Kubert and the whole book was nothing more than typical Ultimate fare. I got the impression that neither Mark Millar nor Brian Bendis actually knew what to do with the book, so they just copy and pasted their Ultimate X-Men and Spider-man books and slapped the Utlimate Fantastic Four title on it.

Conversely, I think that Ellis and Immonen were really trying to do something different with the book. Granted, I don't think it was that successful, but in the spirit of the thread, I don't think there was anything wrong with their pairing that made the book uninteresting, but rather it was having to work from the starting point that Ellis, Millar, and Kubert already established.

So, in summation:

Ellis and Immonen, while not producing the best book, still worked well together as a team.

Millar, Bendis, and Kubert reeked of, "It worked on their previous books, it has to work again here, too!" which it didn't.

[ultramandingo]

.......neil gamien and the marvel universe . seemed like a good idea at first but - yick - xpecialy the kirby stuff

[pariah-1972]

Grant Morrison and Andy Kubert on Batman- i don't really mind they brought Damien into continuity since i never read him before
but i was not crazy about them bringing back Silver Age goofyness which i don't feel has ever fit Batman.
and that prose issue got bad reviews from everyone.

[laylamiller]

Kurt Busiek and Carlos Pacheco on Superman.

Busiek can be a fun superhero writer and Pacheco is one of the best artists around and Superman is well Superman. But man those first few issues were pretty damn boring. Didn't help that Pacheco eventually bailed. I stopped reading the book then I heard Simonson drew an issue and gave that a chance. That one sucked too (the 666 issue).

are you insane the busiek and pachaeco superman is great. pachaeco didn't bail, he's drawing a specific arc that just ended with the other arcs are done by different artist's because they demand a different style and to the guy who said brave and the bold isn't any good. wrong. I love this stuff waid's story telling totally makes up for perzes oh so busy artwork

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

Conversely, I think that Ellis and Immonen were really trying to do something different with the book.

Well, Ellis' second arc on the book was far from great, and although Millar did alright during his second stab at it, it's bizarre he ignored the explanations Ellis gave to how their powers worked - it actually struck me as Millar parodying his rep as someone who doesn't read previous writers works on the book his doing - he contradicted things that happened in between the stories he wrote!
(One of which was a much better story than the one's he wrote!)

[stelok]

Everyone loves it whent he hot artist and the hot writer, or the acclaimed genius and the acclaimed...uh...artiste team up for a new project. But sometimes it just doesn't work -- the two sorts of brilliance are incompatible, one or the other collaborator is either overawed or underwhelmed by their ostensible partner, or the creators are so overcommitted elsewhere or undercommitted to a project that they jumped on for the paycheck that the work is worse than any of their prior efforts with "lesser" collaborators.



No wonder manga are more commercially and creatively successful than the American comics! Unlike American comics, Almost all manga are written and drawn by only one individual instead of a team.

Writer & artist teams that don't work:
Chris Claremont & Bill Sienkiewicz on X-Men
Kurt Busiek & Ron Garney on JLA

Penciler & inker teams that don't work:
Mike Deodato & Tom Palmer on Avengers
Dan Jurgens & Bill Sienkiewicz on some comic book title I forgot

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

No wonder manga are more commercially and creatively successful than the American comics! Unlike American comics, Almost all manga are written and drawn by only one individual instead of a team.


I was pretty sure lots of Manga was a team effort - perhaps with a main writer/artist, but helped out by art assistants.

[stealthwise]

I was pretty sure lots of Manga was a team effort - perhaps with a main writer/artist, but helped out by art assistants.

And you would be correct.

I read a Manga for Dummies type book, and it told me so!

[dancj]

Penciler & inker teams that don't work:
Dan Jurgens & Bill Sienkiewicz on some comic book title I forgot
When they worked together on No Man's Land it was just about the only time I've ever liked Dan Jurgens's art.

[TROUBLEZ]

I just read that and thought it was quite good.



Why did you like For Tomorrow? I didn't like it because 1) the art, surprisingly, didn't fit. Superman is a plain looking superhero, and although Jim Lee is very talented, he can't draw dark haired characters all that different looking. And in Superman, variety in facial features is a must.

2) Everything seemed a bit out of character and didn't make that much sense to me. Instead of fighting WW, why didn't Superman just say, "hey, I'm not trying to kill myself, I'm trying to find out the missing people." Then Zod is the power rival to Superman but if he is, what's with the medieval armor (the inverted S symbol was nice though). And why turn the priest into a monster?

[Chris Heide]

Grant Morrison and Mark Silvestri on New X-Men...classic X-Men artist comes back to do an arc with the guy who reinvented the team for the new millennium, and it all ends up a bunch of gobbledy-gook with Silvestri drawing Wolverine of the distant future looking like a twentysomething...

[BizarroBeachHead]

Grant Morrison and Mark Silvestri on New X-Men...classic X-Men artist comes back to do an arc with the guy who reinvented the team for the new millennium, and it all ends up a bunch of gobbledy-gook with Silvestri drawing Wolverine of the distant future looking like a twentysomething...
I think that has a lot to do with Silvestr's astonishingly deteriorated storytelling skills...but yeah, I would agree.

[TROUBLEZ]

Grant Morrison and Mark Silvestri on New X-Men...classic X-Men artist comes back to do an arc with the guy who reinvented the team for the new millennium, and it all ends up a bunch of gobbledy-gook with Silvestri drawing Wolverine of the distant future looking like a twentysomething...

HAHA! I always thought Silvesti did some of the best looking X-Men comics back in the day, especially when it came to Wolverine, but now he does draw him way too young. Oh well. Maybe he was trying to model the new look after Hugh Jackman (claws coming out from between the fingers instead of top of hands) but even Jackman looks older than that.

[mysterycow]

I was disappointed by Darwyn Cooke and Tim Sale on Superman Confidential. Which was a damn shame, as I normally worship anything Darwyn does.

[dancj]

Why did you like For Tomorrow? I didn't like it because 1) the art, surprisingly, didn't fit.
Jim Lee's art does nothing for me, but it doesn't bother me too much either. I thought he was better here than on Hush.
2) Everything seemed a bit out of character
Yeah, but the whole story seemed a bit dream-like to me so I just went along with how people acted. Presumably the story's out of continuity unless they're going to somehow account for Lois disappearing for a year at some point.

Instead of fighting WW, why didn't Superman just say, "hey, I'm not trying to kill myself, I'm trying to find out the missing people."
I think she knew what he was trying to do. The problem was neither of them knew whether it would kill him.
Then Zod is the power rival to Superman but if he is, what's with the medieval armor (the inverted S symbol was nice though). And why turn the priest into a monster?
I never really thought about those things. Some stories are best not being thought about too much!

[Reptisaurus!]

No wonder manga are more commercially and creatively successful than the American comics!

Creatively?

You know what this statement ACTUALLY means, right?

"I am more aware of the diversity of Manga than I am of American Comics.

And I've never heard of, say, Beanworld, Kim Deitch's stuff, Herbie, Paper Rad. and PROBABLY not even some of the more commercial stuff like the MAXX or Kabuki."

Or, I guess you could substitute "Corporate Manga" and "Corporate American Comics" in there and not be too far off.

[stelok]

Creatively?

You know what this statement ACTUALLY means, right?

"I am more aware of the diversity of Manga than I am of American Comics.

And I've never heard of, say, Beanworld, Kim Deitch's stuff, Herbie, Paper Rad. and PROBABLY not even some of the more commercial stuff like the MAXX or Kabuki."

Or, I guess you could substitute "Corporate Manga" and "Corporate American Comics" in there and not be too far off.

Then you haven't known how creative the varieties of manga are unless you've read GTO, Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei, Addicted to Curry, Yakitate Japan, Iron Wok Jan, Oku-sama wa Joshi Kousei, REC, No Bra, etc

How many American comic books have focused on high school teachers like GTO? How many American comic books are there about curry cooking like Addicted to Curry? How many American comic books are there about bread baking like Yakitate Japan? How many American comic books have centered on Chinese cooking like Iron Wok Jan? How many American comic books are there about Japanese voice actresses like REC? How many American comic books have focused on teacher-student relationships like Oku-sama wa Joshi Kousei, Sensei, Ikenai Teacher Iketeru Darling, Onegai Teacher, Suki ? How many American comic books have centered on cross-dressers like No Bra, Ouran Host Club? How many American comic books are there about magical girls like Card Captor Sakura? How many American comic books are there about a pessimistic, suicidal schoolteacher with a high school classroom full of weirdos like in the manga Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei?

[Agent_Torpor]

No wonder manga are more commercially and creatively successful than the American comics! Unlike American comics, Almost all manga are written and drawn by only one individual instead of a team.



What the heck kind of specious argument is this?

[FunkyGreenJerusalem]

How many American comic books have focused on high school teachers like GTO?

Here's the first paragraph from the wiki entry on GTO:
"While peeping up girls' skirts at a local shopping mall, Onizuka meets a girl who agrees to go out on a date with him. Onizuka's attempt to sleep with her fails when her current "boyfriend," her teacher, shows up at the love hotel they are in and asks her to return to him. The teacher is old and unattractive, but this teacher has enough influence over her that she leaps from a second story window and lands in his arms."

Not for me.

Reading on it's about a guy who wants to be the best teacher ever, yet is tempted by school girls.
Not for me.

How many American comic books are there about curry cooking like Addicted to Curry? How many American comic books are there about bread baking like Yakitate Japan? How many American comic books have centered on Chinese cooking like Iron Wok Jan?

Let's put that under the heading of 'cooking', and I ask you... who really wants that?
Not for me.

How many American comic books are there about Japanese voice actresses like REC?

I work with voice artists all the time. Nice people, but I wouldn't read a book about them.

How many American comic books have focused on teacher-student relationships like Oku-sama wa Joshi Kousei,

Why not give the translation - My Wife Is A High Schooler, about a school girl and her physics teacher, and society not accepting their love.

Sensei
About a student in love with her teacher (who isn't keen because the last hih school teacher he dated dumped him)

, Ikenai Teacher Iketeru Darling

Another description?
"Meet Izumi and Tachibana, they're right in the middle of a very hot and heavy romance. Seems normal right? Except Tachibana is teacher at Izumi's all girls highschool. Izumi's calm and cool and is part of the student council. Tachibana is leecherous and always trying to find a way to into Izumi's uniform. See if they can handle their hush-hush relationship and themselves."

Sounds great.

, Onegai Teacher

Given a twist, this is about a school boy marrying, and falling in love with his female alien teacher.

, Suki ?

Girl crushes on teacher, who seems open to her advances.

We really can rank those together right?

How many American comic books have centered on cross-dressers like No Bra, Ouran Host Club?

Every Rob Liefield book with a female star ever?

(one of those is a screwball comedy by the way, not a hard hitting drama).

How many American comic books are there about magical girls like Card Captor Sakura?

Shit loads.

How many American comic books are there about a pessimistic, suicidal schoolteacher with a high school classroom full of weirdos like in the manga Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei?

Nextwave?

Anyway guy, most of what you've listed fall into a couple of genre's, genre's the west, predominantly isn't interested in - books about teachers screwing students aren't going to do well here.

Anyway, your argument is flawed.

How many books in Japan are detailed studies of the fall of Troy like Age Of Bronze?

How many books in Japan are about strange English towns you can't leave like StrangeHaven?

How many books in Japan are as creatively about Magic as Promethea?

How many books in Japan are about a childhood and memory such as Violent Cases?

Etc, Etc.

It's a circular argument.
And

[Reptisaurus!]

Then you haven't known how creative the varieties of manga are unless you've read GTO, Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei, Addicted to Curry, Yakitate Japan, Iron Wok Jan, Oku-sama wa Joshi Kousei, REC, No Bra, etc


Oh, yeah, I absolutely don't. I have a decent idea of what exists in translated Manga, but I also know the more experimental and adult stuff - The Manga equivalents of Love and Rockets or Woodring's Frank - don't make it over here.

But, see, that wasn't my point.

The point is that I DON'T know enough about Manga to evaluate it's overall creative viability when compared to American Comics.

Notice, therefore, that I'm not making any silly sounding judgements about which is more creatively successful.

Hmm. How 'bout that?

[stelok]

How can you call Card Captor Sakura a shit load? Then you're not really an otaku, nor a shoujo fan. That's exactly your problem with manga. Because you wouldn't appreciate the cultural differences in the manga, you're not open-minded enough to appreciate a good story.

Here's the first paragraph from the wiki entry on GTO:
"While peeping up girls' skirts at a local shopping mall, Onizuka meets a girl who agrees to go out on a date with him. Onizuka's attempt to sleep with her fails when her current "boyfriend," her teacher, shows up at the love hotel they are in and asks her to return to him. The teacher is old and unattractive, but this teacher has enough influence over her that she leaps from a second story window and lands in his arms."

Not for me.

Reading on it's about a guy who wants to be the best teacher ever, yet is tempted by school girls.
Not for me.


Then you sir, have absolutely never read the manga at all. Nor do you have any idea why Onizuka has earned the title. That wiki entry you mentioned was only at the start of a 25-volume series. I suggest you read the whole series and you'll find out why Onizuka is truly the greatest teacher in Japan. Onizuka being tempted by high school girls? At first he was but he stopped chasing high school girls, because he decided that was not the path he would take as a real teacher.

Never judge the book by its cover.






Let's put that under the heading of 'cooking', and I ask you... who really wants that?
Not for me.

Then you have no idea how interesting and entertaining Yakitate Japan, Addicted to Curry and Iron Wok Jan can be. While the cooking or baking was the theme of these manga, they also have interesting character development, good stories and well-developed character relationships.

Besides I doubt even Stan Lee, one of the most creative talents in comics would imagine writing a comic about cooking after writing romance comics, war comics, superhero comics, western comics, crime comics, etc.


I work with voice artists all the time. Nice people, but I wouldn't read a book about them.
I'm guessing you've not read REC either.




Why not give the translation - My Wife Is A High Schooler, about a school girl and her physics teacher, and society not accepting their love.

About a student in love with her teacher (who isn't keen because the last hih school teacher he dated dumped him)

Another description?
"Meet Izumi and Tachibana, they're right in the middle of a very hot and heavy romance. Seems normal right? Except Tachibana is teacher at Izumi's all girls highschool. Izumi's calm and cool and is part of the student council. Tachibana is leecherous and always trying to find a way to into Izumi's uniform. See if they can handle their hush-hush relationship and themselves."


Given a twist, this is about a school boy marrying, and falling in love with his female alien teacher.
,

Girl crushes on teacher, who seems open to her advances.

We really can rank those together right?



Do you know how rare it is to find a comic book about a forbidden taboo, while the Westerners already have literature about forbidden taboos such as homosexuality, lesbianism, lolita complex, incest, etc. Ever read the Greek tale of Oedipus?

However older men-younger women relationships are not a big deal especially in literature. They also can be found in even fairy tales. In Disney animated movie of Sleeping Beauty, I dimly recalled seeing the scene where a young non-infant boy Prince Phillip was looking at Princess Aurora, who was just an infant. Philip and Aurora were betrothed although they have a rather wide age difference. Don't forget that Aurora was sixteen years old when she married Prince Philip.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeping_Beauty_%281959_film%29

[stelok]

Oh, yeah, I absolutely don't. I have a decent idea of what exists in translated Manga, but I also know the more experimental and adult stuff - The Manga equivalents of Love and Rockets or Woodring's Frank - don't make it over here.

But, see, that wasn't my point.

The point is that I DON'T know enough about Manga to evaluate it's overall creative viability when compared to American Comics.

Notice, therefore, that I'm not making any silly sounding judgements about which is more creatively successful.

Hmm. How 'bout that?

Hmmm now I understand your point. You're also right that I don't know enough about American comics to evaluate its creative output nor to make such hasty judgments about which is more creatively successful. I admit I have never once read Beanworld, Kim Deitch's stuff, Herbie, Paper Rad. and the MAXX or Kabuki, all of which you mentioned

[dancj]

How can you call Card Captor Sakura a shit load?
He didn't. He said he knew shitloads of comics about magical girls.

Also naming three comics about cooking doesn't help your argument about variety. I've only read the first volume of GTO admitedly so I don't know how it changes, but the first volume squarely falls into the "Grown man lusting after teenagers" genre which seems to be quite popular (and is why I never bothered with the second volume).

It's all a silly argument. Both American and Japanese markets (at least in terms of the Japanese stuff that makes it to America) are largely dominated by a small numbers of genres. Both markets are actually a lot more diverse than that if you look further. Manga probably has the edge purely because comics are so much bigger in Japan, but both have plenty of variety for those who look.