Breaking: Civil War Is Not That Bad

Breaking: Civil War Is Not That Bad

Feb 07

I’ve been reading a lot of the reactions to Civil War online, for months and months now, because I’m just THAT kind of guy–the kind who trolls around the web looking to read about things I’ve read. Compulsively All the goddamned time.

These opinions, these words various have typed, various whom I do not disrespect at all and who in some cases I quite enjoy–these words rub me. They chafe me. They task me, to paraphrase Khan.

I just don’t think it’s that bad. In fact, I’ll jump off this deep end, even if I swim here alone and no one ever notices me flailing about in the dark murky water: I still LIKE Civil War.

In other words, it. Does. Not. Suck.

My sense of the various reactions out there is that they mostly believe the mix of “gritty real Marvel Universe” and “wacky superhero Marvel Universe” is a jarring, unnecessary, unmanageable mix.

They’re wrong.

The Marvel Universe has ALWAYS been a mix of reality and fantasy. It is BUILT upon that notion. As for the “grit,” it may have come in different flavors throughout the past forty years, but it’s always been there. Wasn’t Ben Grimm’s angst over his rocky form in the earliest days of the Fantastic Four a radical departure in tone from what had come before in the world of comics? Weren’t there probably fans who angrily commented in mimeographed fanzines, “Who needs this angst?! I want my superhero comics with NO angst! I want stories that start and end in the same place with bright, uncomplicated characters!”

I bet there were. Those people were nuts too. Fuck them!

So Thor is a clone. Thor is Clor. Reed Richards and Tony Stark have become dickheads. Sue fucked Reed and made him dinner before she ditched his sorry ass.

What’s wrong with these things, really? Are they too silly to take place in a COMIC BOOK, or are they not silly enough? Is it too heavy, or too frivolous? And why can’t it be both again?

Again: The Marvel Universe is both heavy AND frivolous. That’s what makes it different from that other universe. Someone blogged this someplace, and I liked it a lot: The Marvel Universe is a place where we watch how people would act if they suddenly gained super POWERS. The DC Universe is more about how people act when they become super HEROES. (If someone can cite that to a webpage, lemme know–I’d love to toss up a link. That’s some smart shit.)

Civil War is a story about people–weak, foolish, brave, smart, flawed people–who have super powers. They’re not necessarily HEROES. Marvel characters have ALWAYS been this way–they aspire, and sometimes they attain, and sometimes they fail. They don’t fly up in the sky like a bird or a plane and know exactly what to do, then have trouble doing it. They swing up into the sky and aren’t sure what to do, and when they finally figure it out, it still could go way wrong.

That’s Civil War. Are Tony and Reed dicks? Yes. Does it fit with their characters? I think so–bearing in mind that these are ever-advancing characters who are able to change and adapt to situations, it totally works for me. They are being pushed by drastic, scary times into their untenable position, just like the anti-registration heroes. They’re flawed men with super powers making questionable decisions. Whether they will eventually regret them or whether they will continue down the same scary path is yet to be seen.

At the same time, there is an element of Civil War that is as ludicrious as any of the stories from the dawn of the Marvel Age of Comics where two heroes bump into each other, experience some grand misunderstanding, and end up fighting for twelve pages before realizing their mistake and going after the bad guys. Surely, if these fellas sat down and actually TALKED to each other, they could find some common ground. Instead, they dive head-long into silly posturing and battles.

See? Silly stuff with a flimsy backbone of “reality.” That’s Marvel for ya. Excelsior, motherfucker.