Okay, there's the Identity Crisis controversies... the controversy over whoever the villain is (is it Nightwing? Is it Captain Boomerang?) and the controversy over the whole 'supervillains raping family members of superheroes/killing same and superheroes having a rapid response/erasing their memories of superheroic secret identites' plotline. There's Daddy Norman Osborn and the dancing spider-killer twins in Amazing Spider-Man 512. There's the 'Devin Grayson says Nightwing was raped' debate (here's some scans of the pages in question if you're unfamiliar, as I was, with this issue... I only discovered it when I was doing research for a Batman post I did today on my blog) which I suppose might dovetail into the 'Identity Crisis' discussions. There's Bendis on Avengers:Mutilated and New Formula Avengers (will Avengers: Classic be next?) and there's Judd Winick's introduction of an HIV positive character in Green Arrow which is apparently hotly debated... I personally kind of agree with Scott when he says
I think that Winick will do an admirable job on the storyline; that sort of storytelling is his forte. It�s just unfortunate on many levels that this is considered controversial news.But still, it's being treated as one, so I suppose I shall list it.
Any I've missed? I didn't mention Green Lantern: Rebirth because I just did a post about it below... but I could be forgetting any number or simply not aware of them. Of course, comic book companies like controversy in the comics because it gets fans buzzing and generates free press, but I was wondering if possibly we're either seeing too many 'shock' storylines directly attempting to generate these kind of debates in a callous or even cynically manipulative way, and is it also possible that maybe fandom (including myself, writing this) is just a little too easily moved to this kind of thing? Do people see controversy where it really isn't or wouldn't otherwise be?
For myself, I tend to think there's a case by case situation here... I don't think Green Arrow having a character (possibly even a future sidekick) with HIV should be all that controversial by now, but I do find the Nightwing 'was he raped?' storyline/debate very discomfiting on a personal level due to my own life story... that doesn't necessarily mean I think it's worth all the debate I'm seeing on boards (and man, if I never read another discusion of how it's not rape if you're physically capable of lifting your assailant off of you/ are not directly forced or drugged, I'll die a lot happier) but it is a storyline that manages to get past my armor of cynicial 'seen it all' old curmudgeon shell and into some serious thought about the issue. (And this based solely on those scans I found on CBR.) I don't want to mistake 'uncomfortable' with 'controversial', though. I don't find Bendis' take on Avengers all that interesting, myself, but other people do... to my mind, it's certainly not a discomforting storyline, but your mileage may vary on the Avengers killzone.
Anyway, I shall now allow you to discuss among yourself, possibly creating a whole new controversy in the process.
Posted by Matt Rossi at October 16, 2004 3:47 AM