Written World

Why Soranik Natu Should Survive Dating Kyle

2009-11-04T01:35:00.008+01:00

Back when they first introduced Soranik Natu, I was one of the crowd of people begging them not to make her into Kyle's girlfriend. It was right around the time Jade got killed and The Curse was in full height.

Now that they've actually done it, though, I'm finding myself pretty happy with the couple. This took a bit. I was adamantly opposed to this as of the end of Recharge, she was already a hundred times more fun than anyone they'd set Kyle up with and I worried I'd be upset about them killing this one. After the Star Sapphire storyline I was more open to it, but still cautious because we all know what happens to anyone who gets near Kyle's bed. It grew a bit on me when the two approached each other in the aftermath, mainly because Soranik said she'd never been open to love and it looked like it would be a decent story for her. Most female characters are really developed on the side of love and family, and so get neglected with storylines that aren't about relationships. Soranik up until then had been a career-centric character, we'd never seen a boyfriend or a family member. She was established as a hero to be reckoned with already, so this was genuine character growth on her part. Plus, I wasn't expecting it to last.

Now that they've revealed Sinestro is her father, I'm completely in love with this idea. I really do believe it makes her less likely to be casually killed off. Sure, being Alan's daughter didn't save Jade but on this end the father is already so filled with fear and angst and misery that he's a bad guy on a massive cosmic scale. They don't really need to give Sinestro anything else to be freaked out about, Johns is setting him up quite well with the tragic past. Soranik's death would be an even more unnecessary character death than usual on that point.

Of course, Kyle already has enough death and misery in his past and that's never stopped anyone from offing a relative for him.

Still, I think her place in the relationship arc between Kyle and Sinestro is a potentially safe one. She hates her father, but from the position of a person who cherishes life in all forms. As it is Kyle now has a very tense reason to keep Sinestro alive (beyond his usual moral objections), and Sinestro has yet another reason to hate and target Kyle, but new consequences for it. If Soranik were to die and they were to blame each other, that dynamic would be fundamentally less interesting and both characters would lose a dimension of angst.

Beyond being comfortable with Soranik's chances of survival, I have to say she is the first girlfriend of Kyle's that I've actually liked. Part of that is how she was established before she got involved with him. Donna and Jade were both well-established heroes from teambooks before Kyle was even created, but neither were properly rooted anywhere.

Donna had been bounced around from Teen Titans to various identities and power sets and even personality changes when she was pulled into Green Lantern and depowered. She fulfilled a joint girlfriend/mentor role where she was wise, experienced in heroics, and more emotionally mature than Kyle, but she was still insecure and jealous of other women. She also didn't properly belong in Green Lantern so she walked out on him in as soon as someone wanted to pull her. (The "lost all memory of why she loved him" explanation was brilliant, though. I wish he'd whine about that more.) She's considerably more likable as the Ex-Girlfriend who is still friendly but will never likely be involved with him again.

Jade was arguably a Green Lantern character, but not Kyle's sort of Green Lantern. She was one of those Infinity Inc characters that DC didn't know what to do with, so she never really got a proper fit outside of Green Lantern. I don't think she got a proper fit insider of Green Lantern. It always came off as a rather clumsy attempt to mash the Golden Age mystic legacy with the current space-opera version. Don't get me wrong, I like the explanation that the Starheart is the same sort of energy (it may even be a Parallax-style entity), and it comes from outer space so Jenny and Alan are connected, and friendly, but not really a part of the GLC. But the relationship between Kyle and Jade just seemed like an arranged marriage to join the earthbound and spacefaring Green Lantern families together. Every time they got together, I cringed. It seemed inorganic. As a result, I suspect I hated Jade more than she deserved. She just didn't fit the parts of the franchise that appealed to me. She ended up filling the same role as Donna, only a little less competent, a lot less openly jealous and a lot more insecure.

Careerwise, both women were said to be photographers but never seen holding a camera. Both women were professional heroes, but both were depowered. The one that was repowered during the relationship (Jade), was normally shown to be simply not as a good a hero as Kyle was. Not a bad hero, just not as good as Kyle. And since she had the same power set and more experience, one could only conclude that she was either inherently inferior or just wasn't putting in the necessary effort. (I suspect its the latter.) Ultimately, the career didn't matter because their primary role in the book was "love interest" from the moment of introduction, and their primary occupation was "girlfriend/nursemaid."

Soranik is different. She is pretty firmly established as a space-faring Green Lantern character. If Green Lantern Corps were to end next month, it is possible that she would surface as a member of the Global Guardians or a contestant on a reality TV show, but as of the start of this relationship she doesn't have a history of being traded from office to office as writers try to figure out what to do with her. (Neither does Kyle, even though he switches books a lot. He's still in the same franchise.) She's in the franchise that she belongs in, and no other editor or writer will have a claim.

In-story-wise, she fits Kyle's world better than the other two. People argue that in Marz's run Kyle was an earthbound character, but I read that run too. He spends the second storyline lost in space. Every other storyline, he goes to outer space. He spends one-shots in space. In Morrison's JLA, where he most shined as a character, he was on a team based on the moon and a large number of the threats he was called in for were space-based. He has always been a space Green Lantern, even when he was living in New York. He's where he's best suited to be right now, in outer space turning the beauty and weirdness of the universe into something relatable. Yes, Kyle has a very down-to-earth temperament, but that's part of why he and Guy suit the wider universe best. They bring Earth to Oa for us, and their interactions and insights during adventures highlight the humanity in all of these strange alien characters.

Jade was never a good fit for outer space (this may have something to do with her mother being a plant-based villainess), and one of the few good things Winick did was have her realize that and go home. One of the really unsettling things about Jade's death was that it happened in outer space rather than on Earth. That just wasn't her arena, and the fact that she died out there just underscored it. Come to think of it, that may be why I so despise Jade as the primary female Lantern in the DCU. Because she's ultimately an earthly character, and the things I love about Green Lantern aren't even in orbit. She inadvertently sends the message that girls don't really belong there because the only female character obviously doesn't belong in outer space. Katma Tui, Arisia, Brik, Boodika, Soranik Natu, Iolande, even Carol Ferris (she has the same hook Hal does, an Earth pilot who gets hired by aliens) are all preferable because they suit the setting better. I wish I could explain just what it was, maybe its just that all of Jade's legacy ties are earthbound Infinity Inc and JSA matters, or maybe it was that no writer ever took her out to space on her own (she only ever seemed to go when Kyle went), or that she just didn't do well against space-based baddies, but Jade just didn't work in space.

Donna does considerably better in outer space, but she's still a freaking Amazon. I don't care how many times they send the Titans to outer space, or how desperately they tie the Olympians to the Source. It's like Wonder Woman in outer space. It's pretty cool if you write it right, and she can handle it, but ultimately she's just visiting. She's not at home there either.

Soranik is a space alien and a space-faring Green Lantern, and the daughter of a well-established space-alien villain. In temperament she bears a striking resemblance to Bones McCoy. She definitely suits outer space.

Careerwise, Soranik is already established as a Doctor first and everything else second. In speculative fiction, medicine seems to be a safe female niche but that doesn't erase the respectability and importance of Natu's position. She's instantly valuable in every adventure for her professional skill set. She will never be relegated to the background position of "supportive girlfriend" simply because she's dating Kyle. Her job is too damned useful. If she's there and just standing around while he takes charge of the situation, a male character who was not dating Kyle would be there and simply standing around waiting for someone to get hurt so he could be useful. If she breaks up with Kyle so that he can go to his old girlfriend, she'll still be useful to the team because she can do things like deliver a baby in the middle of a battlefield. If in the brainstorming session a writer suggests killing off Soranik, someone can argue that they don't want to kill off the character with all the healing skill and then have to introduce another doctor. (I haven't the slightest idea what happens in brainstorming sessions, but you have to admit that argument couldn't be used to save Jade or Katma.) Hell, if it does get public that they're dating, and Kyle selects Soranik for an important mission there's a very obvious reason for it besides they're sleeping together -- because he wants someone around who can jumpstart his heart more than just figuratively. Just in case, y'know. She's never going to just be the girlfriend, and that's because of something that was set up from her very first appearance over two years before she started dating Kyle Rayner. Something that makes her character unique among Green Lanterns, and valuable beyond just her emotional impact.

Personality-wise, she's a pleasant break from the pattern. Jade and Donna both seemed to have same sunny, friendly attitude. Jade got passive-aggressive and Donna would start snapping at people when under stress. They fought when actually threatened, but tended to be conciliatory otherwise. They would only pull out the arrogance when someone was being a jackass and needed to be put in their place. They were sweet girls with highly developed social skills. They were both more emotionally mature than Kyle, and mentored him in both heroism and love.

Soranik has a short fuse and a surgeon's ego. She's insecure about a lot of things but hides it behind a very harsh demeanor. Her default attitude is arrogance, even though she fights less with the other Lanterns (Guy, Isamot, Iolande) now she still carries a cold arrogance when dealing with them. She softens when treating patients or talking to Kyle. She's confrontational even when there's no threat of violence. She's not a friendly person by nature, and social skill isn't really a priority for her. She's never sweet, even with Kyle. She's never, ever passive about anything.

In emotional maturity, I'd put her maybe at the same level as Kyle, probably a bit behind the curve in some aspects, but a bit ahead of him in others. She strikes me as physically older, and definitely more scholarly which offsets his greater experience in love and heroism. She helps him with a major emotional problem right after they get together, but the way she approaches the problem (his drawings of dead lanterns) is unusual. She's caring but keeps a clinical distance the other women wouldn't have been able to pull off. Jade and Donna's heart to hearts with Kyle always struck me as having a strange half-patronizing/half-pleading tone to them, where the girlfriend would protest that she cares for and loves Kyle but to listen to her because she knows better. Soranik doesn't plead that she loves Kyle, she tells him she cares about him as a way of shifting the debate away from her position as a medical expert who can just dole out orders to that of a friend who wants to understand him but might not necessarily know better. She actually acknowledges that the drawings themselves are a positive step in working through his traumas, which is something I can't see his previous girlfriends having done. (I've no doubt I'll be corrected if I'm wrong in this area.) In the end she offers a solution as a suggestion rather than a prescription, which is a pretty impressive feat for a Doctor.

Kyle's got a very friendly, approachable attitude. As Green Lanterns go he's pretty short on arrogance. He can be sweet, and passive aggressive. He was very much like his last two girlfriends, except he wasn't as mature as they were. Soranik has a completely different personality. She and Kyle share a common set of values, so the differences complement each other rather than clash.

Some of those common values come from just fitting the same part of the DCU. From the first time Kyle fought Parallax, he was tied to the betterment universe above all other things, above self, above family, above even his own species. Jade was always a personal-level hero, who would show up and do her duty during the giant crossover but ultimately be focused on her own loved ones. That's not bad, it's just earthly. Soranik Natu has the same calling Kyle does, for the universe above your own comfort, your own ambitions, your own planet. After the universe itself, Soranik and Kyle share a dedication to the sanctity of life, to the Green Lantern Corps (the people, not the rules or the bosses of the Green Lantern Corps), and to stopping the spread of fear across the universe.

Even before that awesome scene in Green Lantern Corps #41 (though it was nice to see dating Kyle didn't make her suddenly suck), she was considerably better than any girl Rayner's ever dated. Her career cushions her from falling into the "just a girlfriend" trap, her personality makes the relationship more interesting than the previous ones, and her connection to the franchise's major bad guy adds a layer of protection against being casually tossed into a refrigerator. So I have to say I'm pretty happy with what I've seen so far, despite worrying a bit about Kyle's Curse.

Blackest Night

2009-11-02T23:55:00.001+01:00

Note: Please bear in mind when I read these thoughts that I am still two installments (Blackest Night #4 and Green Lantern #47) behind in Blackest Night so if the situation has changed that dramatically, you don't need to spoil it in the comments.

I hate to admit this, but as a Kyle fan Blackest Night has me worried.

Rebirth didn't really worry me because it started with his narration, and he was the first Lantern seen in the miniseries. It turned out to be a pretty damned good portrayal of Kyle, even though it sadly signalled the end of him narrating every appearance he makes. I still miss Kyle's narration a bit. I'm convinced he's still completely neurotic underneath the Model Lantern exterior. Some of the interaction with Guy (He was shocked to actually be respected by Captain Comet and only shows this when talking to Guy; He's overthinking what he saw in the Star Sapphire and only lets Guy know this) supports this, and if you reread Kyle as written by Ron Marz or Grant Morrison without looking at the narration you can see the behavior is the same.

The Sinestro Corps War didn't worry me at all because it started with him getting kidnapped and possessed by Parallax. This was not only living what was arguably his worst fear (after years of being cautioned not to let power go to his head and go bad like Hal, the exact same thing that happens to Hal happens to him), but it was the beginning of a story that was definitely going to end with him freed in some way and returned back to a regular Green Lantern and not some silly creature with near omniscience who can't really do anything effective. I gave Ion a shot, but he's preferrable this way. And since then Tomasi's written of the best Kyle stuff I've seen in a long time.

Blackest Night worries me. I don't think for a second they'll kill Kyle off or even turn him a different color. Hell, I'd lay down money that if every other Green Lantern turns color once during this crossover, Kyle will remain green unless the entire multicolor company turns white at once--in which case he'll go green-white-back to green at the end. I wouldn't be very surprised (but I would be greatly amused) if there was a point where he was actually the Very Last Green Lantern again, after everyone else (including Hal, because there's a good chance he's turning yellow before this thing ends just to give Indigo-1 a headache) has ended up involuntarily switching colors due to all the chaos being thrown around here.

But I'm worried I'm not going to get what I like best out of a Green Lantern crossover here. I'm looking at the storylines in Green Lantern Corps and Blackest Night/Green Lantern, and I see two storylines that aren't going to merge before the climax. The other two? Both Kyle and Hal were set on a collision course from the get-go, because part of the plot was one had to find the other. This one? Hal's gone questing while Kyle defends Oa against the Ex-Girlfriend from Hell (and the other forces of Death and Destruction, but really she's pretty imposing here). Hal's teaming up with other emotionally scarred Silver Age alumni like Carol Ferris and Sinestro in adventure therapy. The climax there is Hal and company getting enough understanding to work together. One that's done, returning to Oa and teaming up with Kyle and Guy will be a formality and part of the resolution. In the other two crossovers, saving one of those two was the climax and everything after that (after Hal's return in Rebirth and Kyle's rescue in SCW) was the formality and part of the resolution.

Really, what I like best about Geoff Johns' Green Lantern crossovers is the Hal and Kyle teamup. We very rarely see these two fight side-by-side apart because that's something saved for special occasions. And it's not the same if its just them in a big battle scene with everyone involved. It's not the same quality of interaction we had in the first two installments of this huge megastory Johns has been writing. As awesome as it is to have Carol back as a major character (and holding her own against Sinestro, and being the wisecracker in the questing party), I'll be a bit disappointed if the mainbook's storyline doesn't merge with Oa's at least in time to get a moment between my two favorites.

From what was once the cutting edge

2009-11-01T23:56:00.001+01:00

Wednesday I got my bundle of comics with Green Lantern Corps #41 in it. It was awesome, and I wanted to blog my reactions but reviews seem rather pointless when the next two chapters of the story come out the day you can do the review. I hate being so far behind. I loved blogging and reading other blogs when I was up to date, but some of the joy is lost in being so far behind. That's why I was never a "wait for the trade" person, because part of the fun in serial storylines is talking with other people about the storyline as the chapters come out.

When it came to comics discussion, I felt like I had to be at the forefront back then. Never was that way with fashion or tech or real life gossip, but I always had to be the first to know which character changed their costume to what and which artist created that monstrosity before anyone else even saw the picture. And if I wasn't the first to see it, by heaven I'd be the first to link the first person who saw it.

That's what made When Fangirls Attack such a good gig for me back when I still had the time. It enabled me to be the one on the cutting edge of the latest major discussion. It was my role. I was the scout who explored the great wide wilderness of the Internet and let the rest of us know what was out there. I took a great deal of joy in it, knowing that people looked at me to know things. I even got resentful at the people who were even just half a step ahead of me when it came to finding links.

It was an extremely pleasant time for me, despite my continual rants. Life happens, though. I found myself no longer able to be in the first wave on the Internet, so I doubled my efforts to be the first to know at the office. I'm now one of the first people the boss asks when he needs to know where a project is. I threw myself into work, and as a result am doing better careerwise than ever before in my life. I might even make Tech this year if I can get into studying.

I don't do things halfway. My writing's almost completely stopped as a result of this focus. Even more sadly, I've drifted away from the people I only connected to because I was part of a community of writers. Everytime I catch up on my RSS feeds I think out it. There's people I used to spend hours talking to on IM or livejournal or blog comments that I only read now. And slowly I trim just a few more people off the reader each month. I've gone from an active participant in a thriving community to a passive participant in a quiet community. And that's not really a bad thing. It's just change.

You always miss the past a bit, especially on long Sunday afternoons when you're catching up on comic books and the lives of old friends.

Happy Halloween

2009-10-31T20:25:00.001+01:00

Happy Halloween
Originally uploaded by Ragnell

About two weeks ago I picked up a pumpkin on impulse, but I didn't get around to carving it until today. A little sloppy, but I don't think this is too bad for someone who hasn't carved a pumpkin since she was 12.

I know, I should've used the Orange emblem, but that seemed a bit ambitious. Maybe next year after I've polished up a bit. I did use a green candle, at least.

Free to Good Home: The Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans

2009-10-15T23:08:00.004+02:00

Remember this?

EQUALITY IS OUT THERE

Even today, some fandoms seem to have a “No Girls Allowed” sign. Created by men and for men, and populated with men who don’t realize that women also dream of telepathic communication, traveling to the stars, dragon-slaying and x-ray vision, it can get stifling for a female fan. Often a search for positive female portrayals is answered by “This is not for you, so go read Harlequinn romance,” “CENSORSHIP!! She’s crying for CENSORSHIP!!” “I know at least two women who like [simpering, annoying female stereotype "character"]” or even “If you are actually a woman, online its hard to tell.”

(At least, that’s how it seems in superhero fandom.)

But there are female-friendly stories out there. There are female-friendly sites and communities. There are female-friendly fans out there. And yes, there are even feminists out there! Which brings us here.

The Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans periodically collects posts from the hazy side-reality where feminist social consciousness meets the outer limits of the imagination. This is to draw attention to lesser known bloggers, to bring individuals of like-minded (or at least, understanding) interests together, and to foster the growth of feminist fan communities.

I used to take great pride in keeping the Feminist SF Carnival going. Not just keeping my friends connected, but also being able to sustain meaningful conversation about such a niche subject as feminist analysis of genre fiction. That's not easy to do.

Unfortunately, over the last couple years I've let it slide as my career's become more and more demanding. Since at least January I've fully intended to ask around for another organizer to take over, but even that's fallen by the wayside. I only really read a select few blogs anymore, so I don't even know if there's been drama and splits in the community. I don't even know if I've been replaced in the meantime or if we're going through an odd period of quiet or if the old gang has simply self-destructed while I wasn't watching. As a result, I've been reticent about offering this up. I used to keep my finger on the pulse of the community--at least the comics portion--and it's very weird to be so disconnected from everyone that I don't know who would be able to do this, and would have the social skills/connections to keep everything together.

But I figure after reading that guy yesterday, and the reaction of disgust he got, and the idiocy responding to that disgust... There'll be enough activity soon for a blog carnival on this subject.

I won't be able to host or organize, though, and I don't want to be the one occupying a slot that can be filled by an active person.

The organizer job involves finding a host, giving the host guidance on running a blog carnival, and promotion promotion promotion. You need to be diplomatic, attentive, passionate, obsessive, and on decent terms with the crew of Feminist SF -- The Blog! because they're associated.

So if someone wants to take this thing and run with it, email me.

Ahem

2009-10-14T20:59:00.002+02:00

Fuck this guy.

ETA: Fuck his friend, too.

Even the Title Screams Hopelessness

2009-09-25T23:42:00.003+02:00

Several of my so-called friends this evening took it upon themselves to remind me that Trina Robbins once wrote Wonder Woman. To be fair, they were thinking of a charming miniseries she helped illustrate, but the first thing that came to my mind upon broaching this best-forgotten subject was a little known one-shot from the 90s entitled Wonder Woman: The Once and Future Story.

If you are interested in viewing Colleen Doran's beautiful depiction of the iconic female superhero, this is the book to purchase. But I would advise you to flip through and view the artwork without actually paying attention to the plot or dialogue, because you greatly risk exposing yourself to a display of feminine powerlessness singularly unsuited to the concept of Wonder Woman.

It's been years since I looked at this miserable pamphlet, but the pertinent details are still clear in my memory. Wonder Woman befriends a female archaeologist (a coworker of Julia's, I think) who is being abused by her husband. Diana's feeble and flailing attempts to understand and improve the situation culminate in the drunken husband holding a gun to his hapless wife's head. Despite Wonder Woman having super-speed, and super-strength, and the Eye of the Huntress, and the ability to communicate with animals, and the ability to force people to see the truth with a nifty golden rope she carries, and a nifty golden rope that can be used to humanely restrain crazy people, and talent in negotiation/social strategy gifted to her by ATHENA AND APHRODITE THEMSELVES; the woman (and I believe her husband) is killed because Diana is too late to prevent the tragedy and too naive to see it coming.

Every once in a while, a well-meaning writer chooses to touch upon serious issues in superhero comics. Now, I'm all for a little real-world awareness raising. But there's a danger, when touching on certain issues, of stripping the superhero of the very thing that draws readers to superheroes--the fantasy that you have power to affect your world. Hell, what makes them heroes is not only that they have direct power over the world and use that power to better it, but that when they come across a situation their powers can't fix they go about fixing it through wit or by seeking help from a hero who can fix it. It is absolutely vital to the story that writers find the fine line between treating the chosen issue too flippantly, and robbing the hero of their heroic appeal.

Different characters are better for this than others. Some characters are just win-some, lose-some heroes so they can be helpless in the situation without losing too much for the reader. Some characters only suit certain situations. Some are so ridiculously powerful in certain realms that being unable to affect certain lives positively is not a huge blow to the hero's appeal. And some characters are Batman, and will be awesome even though no one's life can really be improved in their traditional setting.

And some characters are like Wonder Woman, specifically packaged as an icon for a disenfranchised portion of the population. Custom-made and marketed as someone who teaches little girls that they are important and able to make a difference in the world.

Some issues are personal issues, things the writer can deal with directly. Things where one person's life can be improved but everyone's can't so it's a win-one, lose-the-rest or lose-one but maybe-save-the-next resolution. Some issues (such as ongoing genocides) are so fucking huge that they can only be handled in a metaphor, because it would just suck to have the heroes lose. Some issues are close to home, and some are far away and distorted.

And some issues are like domestic violence against women, immediate and personal and directly tied to the core concept and appeal of a character like Wonder Woman. This issue is specifically a matter of women losing their power to direct their own lives. This is an issue that hits close to home for a large number of women, whether they were directly affected or watched a friend or relative suffer through it. This issue is the very definition of powerlessness for many women.

Of course, any well-meaning writer is going to handle it delicately. A good many writers are inclined to end stories of domestic violence in tragedy, so that they can show how a naive girl learns a lesson, raise awareness, or even just vent some of their own helpless feeling a bit. And a number of writers would probably see any victory, however small, against domestic violence as betraying the seriousness of the issue. I can understand why any writer would hold these positions.

But why any writer would think that the Portrait of Feminine Power and Agency completely unable to help a friend suffering from domestic violence would make a good Wonder Woman story, I don't know.

The "Once and Future Story" is the perfect example of where writers go wrong with serious issues and Wonder Woman stories. The problems facing women in the world are overwhelming and quite depressing, and it seems most natural that a character who was raised free of these problems would be unable to effectively wade through the morass of misogyny she encounters. It probably seems most respectful to these problems that a magical princess from an island out of time is unable to make any true headway with them. But that angle strips Wonder Woman of her power, and turns her from a symbol of hope into just another helpless woman pushed around by a cold world

This nicely illustrated piece of shit grated on my nerves more than any stale Greg Horn cover could, because this kind of plot gives a very specific message to readers. Even if you get wisdom and wit as a gift from the goddesses themselves, you can't resolve a conflict peacefully. Even if you have the help of the gods themselves and all the animals of the forest, you're still getting tripped up by the mundane stuff. Even if you can fly high enough to skim the clouds and run faster than a cheetah, you'll never make any headway where it really matters. Even if you can pick up a Mack truck, throw it at a target two miles away and hit exactly what you aimed for, you can't ever fix things.

That's not the message we're supposed to get from Wonder Woman.

Cry for Justice #3

2009-09-20T22:20:00.002+02:00

I'm quite a bit behind the curve since I went overseas, and I'm only paying slight attention to the rest of the Blogosphere. That's the way my life is now. Even I couldn't miss the Cry for Justice thing, in no small part because Chris was IMing me for my righteous Hal Jordan defense.

I know, in the past couple weeks this subject has been covered ad nauseum and probably better, but I've let it stew too long.

When I first heard the complaints assumed we were witnessing a case of what I like to call "Civil War Syndrome". Basically, the phenomenon where they attempt to do a political argument between a character on the Left and a character on the Right, but really end up with a character behaving sanely and a character behaving insanely. This is because in the past decade American discourse has been skewed so absurdly towards the right on certain issues that people quoting Ronald Reagan's views on torture are considered liberal. I suspect this is because of the different ways in which both the political parties and the media handles Right-wing and Left-wing crazies in the 21st Century. The Democrats disavow and distance, the media ignores the Truthers and the wilder sides of the Anti-War movement. This is to the detriment of the Left because the general public adores the middle of the road, and a little exposure to crazy goes a long way in making your slightly left-of-center view palatable. On the Right, the Republicans embrace and pander, and the media spotlights the Calhoun Club. This is to the detriment of the Right because the reasonable viewpoints that are just slightly right of center are glossed over, and never discussed as the centrists and the leftists can only see the dark cloud of madness devouring the landscape and defend themselves accordingly. And so a proper compromise is never reached.

But that's just me doing my periodic tangent into my Personal Grand Unified Theory of Fiction, the Media and Politics, as required by Paragraph 2(c) subsection 7 of the Universal Blogger's Code.

How does this translate to Civil War and Cry for Justice? Well, the writer of a story looks at an issue in the media and marks down what the conservative character would do and say, and what the liberal character would do and say. This way, the writer can have a big relevant story.

This is my Grand Theory of how we get the behavior of Tony "We can totally circumvent the justice system and still be good guys" Stark in Civil War, and more recently Oliver "Are you sure you wanna do this horrible thing? Okie-dokie, Hal" Queen in Cry for Justice.

When I initially heard of the torture sequence in Cry for Justice, I assumed this was how Robinson placed Hal Fucking Jordan--the guy who was basically the conscience of the Green Lantern Corps up until Emerald Twilight Which Was Recently Proven to Be Not His Fault--in the position of defending the torture of a suspect.

Being quite a fan of the O'Neill/Adams run, I had some expectations about the scene. I pictured Oliver Queen pitching a fit and Hal having a grief-induced breakdown. I expected that Oliver Queen would be proven right in the end when, as Mr. Sims informed me on the dark day this issue was released, the suspect was revealed not to be the person they intended to torture after all.

I was outraged and angry that my favorite character would be put in the position of rolling back on his principles to make such an obvious point as "torture is bad" simply because once again the O'Neill/Adams run had been misunderstood, and Hal was needed to play the conservative character when there were plenty of other characters who would canonically be in favor of beating/scaring information out of a prisoner. Didn't this man understand that there are certain characters that you just don't do that with? I was fired up and ready to rant but stopped myself until I'd had a chance to read the whole cursed issue, even thought I had already completely made up my mind about just how James Robinson had fucked up the character.

Then I read the issue in question. And was shocked into silence.

It appeared, on first and second reading, that Robinson was condoning the use of torture on a suspect. And I'm still not quite sure what to say about that.

I can say that the sequence takes place with three characters acting so far out of character they might be their Crime Syndicate counterparts. Hal Jordan, who has the role of stopping this sort of thing when it occurs in the Green Lantern Corps is observing as Ray Palmer, who is aware of this technique being used to murder one of his dearest friends, is inside what is apparently the head of Prometheus, tap-dancing.

Oliver Queen, who has the role of stopping this sort of thing anytime it happens anywhere, was timidly asking Hal if this qualified as torture. The Real Oliver Queen would be standing between Ray and the Prisoner making comparisons to Hitler, but this person wearing Green Arrow's beard and costume was standing slightly behind Hal was asking ever so quietly if they should consider human rights.

And the torture itself. It was a "clean" torture. You're supposed to read this and think it's not so bad thing. This is not watching them argue about getting their hands dirty with something that gets relegated in drama to the
basements of Nazi criminals. This is something that is designed to say to people "See, this causing pain to other people to get them to talk? That's not bad, that's not really evil. It's not even a risk to his life." Just a little headache. Using the same technique that killed Sue Dibny.

And, even though it turned out to be Clayface rather than Prometheus, the torture worked. The guy spilled his guts and gave them information.

I was angry before I read it because Hal Jordan is what you'd call a "High Road" character. I thought that he was being dragged through the mud to present a conservative foil to a moral rant. But no, this doesn't seem like that at all. This seems like the writer thought it was a perfectly okay way to have them go about. Edgy.

And yeah, this worked for the Shade, but you know what? Not every character is the fucking Shade and they shouldn't be.

Why I Hate Greg Horn

2009-09-15T19:54:00.003+02:00

Thank god he's not doing the covers for Ms. Marvel anymore.

(Dave reminded me.)

Disney wins Marvel, but do women still lose?

2009-08-31T18:17:00.007+02:00

Disney buys Marvel

Of course, the question all over my Twitterfeed is "will this make things better for female fans?" There's some people dreaming of a bright future where X-women marketed side by side with Cinderella and superhero comics aimed for teenaged girls are sold as well as illustrated fairytale classics, but I find myself pessimistic.

Yeah, Disney's good with girls, but a) the word is they acquired Marvel to attract male customers and b) they're the producers of the ultra-feminine Disney Princess line, the long-standing keepers of traditional gender roles. I wouldn't hold out hope that Disney will make Marvel somehow more girl-friendly, when what they want is a boy's club under their banner and they aren't exactly into kickass women themselves.

I suppose there's some hope after the Tinkerbell movie, where Tink was remade based on strength of her name into a complete gadget-geek. The Fairies stuff suggests they're branching out to girls beyond the Princess line, so maybe they'll use some of the superhero characters for that.

At best, we get a court above Judge Joe Q to appeal to when we see something truly heinous. We may even see them pass on the more disgusting ideas for the mainstream titles. But I just don't expect female superheroes to suddenly get better billing and treatment out of this, or that they'll be seen as more than just candy to entice a pubescent male audience.

Aside from the gender-worries, I'm happy for Marvel. Big company, more stable than Marvel on its own. Better resources, more movies and support. Possibly some Uncle Scrooge reprints under the Marvel banner. And a few hours coming up with silly jokes (as well as some inspiring realizations about existing stories.)

Happy Birthday, Jack Kirby

2009-08-28T23:59:00.005+02:00

It's about six to midnight my time, and I know that my readership has dwindled to those who have subscribed and never unsubscribed but I'd be remiss if I allowed the 92d anniversary of Jack Kirby's birth go by without saying something. I'd like to post panels and write essays, but I put it off too much.

So instead, let me just call attention to three things:

24 Hours with Jack Kirby -- Bully's Kirbyathon, currenlty ongoing because the day hasn't slipped away in his timezone yet.

Kirby Facts -- This meme on Twitter.

Stan's Vs. Jack's Sue Storm -- This two-year old livejournal post that I still absolutely love that contrasts Sue Storm as drawn with Sue Storm as written. Judging by her posture and actions, Kirby envisioned the Invisible Woman as a full and valuable member of the team--the kind of kickass woman that little girls in the 60s could admire. I get a strong impression that pictures spoke louder than dialogue and that's why we have the Sue we have today.

Ahem.

2009-07-11T21:37:00.003+02:00

Ryan Reynolds will be Hal Jordan.

That is all.

Oh, and the cat came back. So did Captain America, which you probably already knew but since I'm listing happy thoughts I figured I'd throw that out there.

Kwitter

2009-06-04T22:35:00.002+02:00

Part of the usefulness of Twitter is that I can find out pretty quickly if something has happened to my beloved cat (previously referred to as Knight, Hak, Mordred, That Furry Bastard, Buttbrain, Bucky...etc... Generally whatever strikes me as a fun thing to yell at the beginning of GET OFF MY UNIFORM) through my sister's feed. She catblogs via Twitter, and of course is too impulsive to stop herself from bleeting out that the male cat escaped last night.

This after she urged me to give the cat to her because my mother would assuredly let the little beast slip to his dangerous freedom within the first week. My mother kept saying he'd try to find his way back to Oklahoma when I dropped him off there last summer. Since Ma was being a defeatist I agreed.

I figured he'd be fine since I had him for three years in a tiny apartment and he never once tried to bolt, despite my holding the door open while I paid the pizza guy. Should have known he wouldn't like my sister as much as me.

I'm not mad at her. Yet.

Hunger might set in still. He might come scratching around the screen door soon. I hope he does. He might be okay on his own, but I can't replace him. He's too perfect for me. Friendly, likes to be picked up and carried around, enjoys chasing pacing people, talkative, adventurous, dumb, amusingly clumsy... All the best cat traits.

Anyway, if you're in the Endless Mountains area and you see a big black cat that's wandering around (probably bumping into things) wearing a green collar (it had better still be green) and an expression on his face like Kyle Rayner's first week in outer space, be nice to him. He's a sweetheart.

EDIT: He's back.

2009-05-29T18:56:00.001+02:00

Hopefully that long break has finally cleared out all of the remaining comic book fans in the audience. Now I can finally blog about 17th Century teacup handles like I always wanted.

Don't Panic

2009-04-15T09:02:00.008+02:00

Okay, so I found out on Twitter (via various) last night that Tom Brevoort dropped a fun Captain America image in our laps. A female Bucky.

I'd like to smack the guys who say that Natasha and Sharon are the obvious choices over the head, and not for lack of continuity knowledge. It's an insult. Natasha and Sharon have identities. Damned good ones, at that. Sharon may arguably be the sidekick-girlfriend (which works for her, she's as very cool sidekick/girlfriend and right-hand woman to Nick Fury--they really should've kept her that way in the Ultimate Avengers movie rather than trying to put her personality on Natasha), but she is a well-established as a superspy and a sidekick/girlfriend under the name Agent 13. Black Widow is commonly a partner and love interest, but she's one of the leading female Avenger characters, and of all the supporting cast roles she's had she's never changed identities to suit her boyfriend. Switching to be a female Bucky would be a serious downgrade from their own well-rooted identities.

And nothing that these women have done, and nothing in their plotlines suggests that taking on Bucky's costume would be natural. If Tasha wants to hide her connection to the New Captain America, it's too late. Sharon's emotional connections are to Steve. She may have a lot in common with Bucky, but she's got no reason to emulate him. It could be pulled off--as part of some temporary trick--but the assumption is horrible. It just doesn't fit either woman.

Not to mention they have the Spy vs. Spy theme going on with their current costumes and we've yet to see an artist play with that.

My own first thought on just reading about the picture was that Bucky had a long-lost daughter or granddaughter surface because there is ample opportunity for him to have had children. And grandchildren. (I still fully expect some day he'll run into Rick Jones and ask if his grandmother was a Red Cross volunteer named Katherine Jones who was in London during 1943. It explains nicely why there was a perfect Bucky lookalike around when Steve defrosted.)

Then I saw the picture.

Admittedly, she does look like Natasha (its the red shading), and if Natasha ever had any kids it would have been pre-Widow treatment (I've been informed she's sterile since getting that Russian serum). A writer who wanted a Black Widow/Winter Soldier story would be easily able to fit the affair with Bucky in while she could still have kids, and get a baby or a set of twins out of it. Especially with Tasha's messed up memory. Perfect soap opera/superhero baby setup. They could bring them in at any age they want and do their motherhood story with Tasha without taking her out of action for nine-plus months of storytime.

But it's almost certainly not a new character. It's also certainly not Natasha or Sharon. She's wearing goggles. I adore goggles on a superhero costume, but they are like leather jackets -- a 90s thing. Tasha or Sharon would have been given a more 21st Century look for a new costume. Same with a new character.

It's the Heroes Reborn character (Yes, that's all the poor girl gets on Wikipedia), and I'm really happy about that. I always liked the idea of a female sidekick for Cap, but the art was just too horrible to try out. I've been wanting a chance to read this character without really dreadful art.

I'll be happy as long as she doesn't die horribly. (Yes, I'm looking at you DC and your female Robin stunt.) I sincerely hope this is not just killing an "excess character" off. It's one thing if she's just a ten-page backup story that ends with her retiring from superheroics to have a normal life, it's another if she gets horribly killed off as a way of illustrating the dark nature of the world and brushing that whole Onslaught/Heroes Reborn craziness under the rug. Way too often cleaning house in a franchise involves getting rid of young female derivative characters in really shitty ways.

But that's a really awesome picture, so I intend to be optimistic.

Every once in a while, Sims shows evidence of a working brain.

2009-04-11T23:01:00.004+02:00

Like on IM today...

Chris Sims: So.
Chris Sims: To review.
Chris Sims: Post-Nextwave, Machine Man gets to be a surly, drunken, shape-changing leading man in MARVEL ZOMBIES 3, where he takes on an entire planet of the undead and wins.
Chris Sims: Post-Nextwave, Monica Rambeau gets to be in MARVEL DIVAS, which is described as "Sex in the City in the Marvel Universe."
Chris Sims: No wonder you women are so mad all the time.

The comparison hadn't occurred to me until then. I'd even been willing to write the whole thing off as EiC Foot-in-the-Mouth syndrome, but now I'm all mad Marvel again.

Marvelous thoughts

2009-04-05T22:43:00.010+02:00

Courtesy of Brainfreeze:

If this is timed for July 4th, I might be able to keep my ice cream money.

And if we're reading this promotional stuff right, I hope Bucky goes back to being Winter Soldier rather than some silly new identity. Winter Soldier is actually a pretty good codename, considering the alternatives, and I absolutely adore that character design. Honestly, I wish he'd wear his Winter Soldier outfit and just use the shield more often.

~~~~~

A conversation on Twitter about X-Men merchandise led to the realization that Wolverine is the Lancelot of the X-Men. This probably isn't anything original, but those of you who haven't seen it come up should consider these three points:

-- Lancelot was added in the 12th Century to a mythos that dates back to the 5th Century.
-- Wolverine was added in the 70s to a franchise created in the 60s.

-- Lancelot's romantic plotline includes many women (most named Elaine), but revolves around a mutual attraction with Guinevere, who is married to the King.
-- Wolverine's romantic plotline includes many women, but revolves around a mutual attraction with Jean, who is married to the team leader.

-- Lancelot is a Frenchman in an English court.
-- Wolverine is a Canadian on a US team.

-- Lancelot periodically goes off wandering to avoid being tempted by the Queen. At least once he went crazy and lived in the woods like a wild animal.
-- Wolverine periodically goes off wandering into other people's books. At least once he went feral lived in the woods on the schoolyard grounds like a wild animal.

-- Lancelot is now such a central character that a King Arthur movie or book without Lancelot is almost unthinkable.
-- Wolverine is now such a central character that not only is an X-Men team without Wolverine is almost unthinkable, he has to guest-star in every comic Marvel publishes. Hell, they once did a whole month where everyone just fought Wolverine! He was in the fricking Invaders that month!

I'm certain we can find more if we tried.

~~~~~

And finally, I'm more extensively annoyed at Marvel over on Robot 6. Enjoy.

Sir Gawain: Great Knight, or Greatest Knight? Those are your only choices.

2009-03-30T22:15:00.004+02:00

Today is the "What's your Scott and Jean?" meme day, where participating comic bloggers declare and explain their "Scott and Jean" or rather their "Greek Sacred Cow"--the one story point that they cling to that makes them completely frothing-at-the-mouth insane, and are unable to discuss reasonably.

I have a lot of those. Kyle Rayner is a better Lantern than anyone else; Wally West should be the Flash; Steve Trevor should be the love interest for Wonder Woman; The Kingpin has only 2% body fat (I once stopped the car over this one) to list a few, but those all fall among those that are negotiable. Things that change after a few years or after seeing the right writer manage it.

Really, in all of Geekdom there is only one matter that I will never negotiate on: Sir Gawain.

My first real interest in the King Arthur legend came with the reading of Sir Gawaine and the Ugly Wife (Not the Howard Pyle version. Do not read the Howard Pyle version.) It was followed by seeing a televised presentation of Sir Gawaine and the Green Knight. Preferring short stories to longform novels even as a child, most of my Arthurian research came from hunting for folklore books in the library/on the internet. Mainly I searched for Gawain stories. He was my favorite character, the rightful heir to the throne (as the oldest son of the oldest sister, he had much more legitimacy than Mordred), the paragon of courtesy and gentleness (when written correctly), and often the only one of those fucking stone-aged Roundtable morons who treated women like human beings. He may be seen as a womanizer because he had a different girl in every story (and most of the more interesting women in Arthurian literature are in Gawain adventures), but can you honestly fault the only man in Logres who would solve a dispute over who gets to marry a woman by ACTUALLY ASKING THE GIRL for getting laid a lot? No, that's only natural.

Bundled into this protectiveness are very specific ideas about his mother. See, I always traced Gawain's progressive attitude towards women to the influence of his mother Morgause, King Arthur's more interesting sister. I always like to describe her as the Blanche Devereaux of Camelot. A mature, vibrant woman with an especially active sex life who may be a bit self-absorbed and blinded by passion at times, but is still a warm, good-hearted mother.

Modern writers love to redeem Morgan Le Fay so they can have a "strong woman" but want to keep the witch, so they like to make Morgause the evil one. I fucking hate that. She has so much potential on her own as a female character. Sure there's stories where she slept with her brother and don't get me wrong, I find that horrifyingly disgusting as we're all meant to. But think about it, wouldn't it suck royally to find out that the hot little prince you slept with to cement a treaty was not just a blood relative, but a freaking sibling? Oh, and that you're going to have his kid. I mean, what's with these writers that they can't empathize with a character who made such a huge freaking mistake and need to demonize the character to keep the plot point. Do we really need to make her the wicked witch of the North to keep that part of the story in?

Hell, just leaving that part out (a lot of writers are squeamish on the incest), do we really need to cut off her head in the end for bedding a hot little knight a third of her age twenty to forty fucking years after her husband kicks it? I mean, what's wrong with someone in the Court having a healthy sex life?

I had been reading pre-Malory legends for years when I finally got off my ass and read Le Morte D'Arthur and The Once and Future King. I discovered right away that I really hate Le Morte D'Arthur because Gawain is such a blockhead, because he's shown up as the idiot, because he has to have a freaking enchantment just to explain why he can stand up to Lancelot AFTER spending much of the story getting his ass saved by Lancelot. And honestly, I fucking hate Lancelot and the whole fucking Lancelot/Guinevere story that moviemakers/comicwriters/novelists/etc are so fucking fascinated by that they'll throw considerably more interesting characters in the fucking trash to make time for it. I hate that so muchfiction after this point was based on Malory's story, running the Lancelot loves the Queen story into the ground when they could have been fleshing out characters like Gawain, Perceval, Yvain, Lynnette, Morgause, Eric, Enid, Kay, Bors and so on. (And for the record Perceval gets screwed in this book too because they give his Grail Quest glory to Lancelot's shitty little cipher of a son Galahad. That's Perceval's fucking story, dammit!)

And I will never forgive T.H. White for giving the Green Knight adventure to that little asskisser Gareth and for making "Morgause is the evil witch" (though I concede that The Queen of Air and Darkness is a kickass title) into a motif that everyone who wants to show Morgan as sympathetic likes to use. (Yeah, fuck you too Mists of Avalon!)

My Gawain is not the jerk of the Howard Pyle stories, or the dick of the Tristan cycle, or the blockhead written by Thomas Malory and TH White. My Gawain is the respectful, quiet, handsome man from the Green Knight and the Ugly Wife/Loathly Lady stories, and if your Arthurian story features any other Gawain, I will most likely hate it and call you mean names no matter how skillful and innovative the story may be.

I'm about to lose some money, aren't I?

2009-03-24T22:49:00.003+01:00

So Kalinara and I have a standing bet on Captain America. We're both completely convinced that Steve Rogers will be back very soon. Kalinara figured on a milestone issue. She said they'll either bring him back with issue 50 or they'll renumber Captain America like they did Fantastic Four and Thor on the next big centissual (I know that can't be the right word but I'm using it anyway) and mark the event with resurrection of Steve Rogers. I said that it would coincide with a date or an event rather than an issue number. I expected Steve Rogers to be resurrected on the month of his 70th Anniversary issue, in a special 4th of July or Sept 11th issue, or just before the movie comes out.

CAPTAIN AMERICA #600
Written by ED BRUBAKER with MARK WAID, ROGER STERN & OTHERS
Pencils by BUTCH GUICE, LUKE ROSS, DALE EAGLESHAM & OTHERS
Cover by STEVE EPTING
50/50 Cover by ALEX ROSS
Where were you when Captain America died? It's the anniversary of the day Steve Rogers was killed, a day of reflection and mourning in the Marvel U...a time to look back on the things Steve did and what he stood for... or is this issue actually the beginning of the most wicked plot twist since issue 25? Yeah, actually it's both. Plus, contributions from Cap creators past and present, including a very special essay by Joe Simon, a classic story from Cap's Golden Age, a full gallery of 600 Cap covers, and more anniversary shenanigans than you can shake a shield at!
104 PGS./New and Reprints/Rated T+ ...$4.99

MARVEL SPOTLIGHT: CAPTAIN AMERICA
Written by JOHN RHETT THOMAS
Cover by LUKE ROSS
A milestone 600th issue is worthy of a special issue of SPOTLIGHT no matter what the title. But when it's CAPTAIN AMERICA? We're gonna rock and roll with a SPOTLIGHT that's full of as much red, white and blue shield-slingin' surprises as we can! First up is an exclusive interview with the creative team ushering in this august occasion: Ed Brubaker, Butch Guice and Luke Ross -- three luminaries who have been letting their Cap flags fly! On top of that, we'll have coverage of some of the great Cap artists of all time, including 600th-issue cover artists Steve Epting and Alex Ross. We promise you'll be just as thrilled to read this as we will be to put it together! Remember: Cap's history is America's history! So join the SPOTLIGHT team as we take a look back and to the future with America's most patriotic hero!
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$2.99

CBR News: Marvel Solicitations, June 2009

Yeah, they might as well have just put "The Return of Steve Rogers" in that solicit. There's a chance I can keep my ice cream money in June (maybe if someone from Marvel sees this blogpost and goes "oh shit, the fans are on to us!") but it's so slim it's under five on the BMI scale. This solicit is so obviously for a resurrection event that I'd bet the Steve is back reveal happens in the first few pages and that the end of the book has a completely different cliffhanger (You know, like in issue #25) if Kalinara didn't also figure on Brubaker pulling that again.

I took the long bet mainly because I wanted to watch Bucky squirm in Steve's place for a few extra months but I think I'll get over it. See, I'm starting to love the idea of Steve coming back in the middle of Dark Reign. How else can you can top "Wait.. you guilted/extorted/bribed my traumatized (semi-adopted) baby brother to risk his life doing my job..." but with "Tony... HOW did the Green Goblin end up holding the list of superhero names and addresses, along with all of that tech specifically designed to take out the people NOT on the list..."?

Blogged with the Flock Browser

2009-03-17T21:37:00.002+01:00

New WFA Crew.

ETA: WFA Lives!!

For Sale: One Feminist Linkblog, Slightly Neglected

2009-03-12T23:46:00.001+01:00

When Fangirls Attack: Announcement

Those of you who still follow this linkblog may have noticed a sharp decline in the quality and quantity of posting here on WFA. Anna's always great manga posts are the notable exception, but sadly, she can't carry the weight for all of us.

The truth is that real life got in the way and got in the way hard, and we've come to some unpleasant truths. There's no way we can keep this linkblog going.

We're sentimental types though, and we like to think that WFA serves a purpose in the fan community. We'd like to see it continue and regain some of the relevance it had previously.

That's why I'm posting. We're looking for someone/some people who are interested in taking over WFA.

--Kalinara

Just as Kalinara's school gets really intense, I get transferred from working on aircraft to working on air traffic control systems -- a considerably more demanding job -- in a completely different country. Something had to give, and really it was internet time. I haven't really checked my bloglines since January (I haven't written anything substantial since last year), and I keep up to date through a couple mailing lists and through what I see on Twitter. This is no recipe for keeping track of discourse of any type. So Melissa and I sat down and decided it was time to let the brainbaby go to someone else. We decided to leave ourselves because we knew we'd get picky and bossy as subordinates on any team.

Email me at ragnellthefoul[AT]hotmail[DOT]com if you're up for keeping track of the blogosphere and posting a regular linkdump.

Oh, and don't do it alone. Bring friends, for sanity's sake as well as to spread the work out.

Another reason I shouldn't let this blog go dormant.

2009-02-10T11:29:00.001+01:00

Everytime I let it see too long, the spam bots think I've abandoned and they can just drop tons of links in my comments. Bastards.

I'm not gone for good, dammit. I'm just resting.

And another thing...

2009-02-03T21:51:00.001+01:00

Apologizes for all the slice of life crap lately. You guys have no idea how much it annoys me when all I can come up with to write about is a diary of the day's events. But I need to get back on the damned horse.

If I'm not careful I might end up someone who never blogs.

2009-02-03T21:43:00.003+01:00

I'm trying to keep from falling into month-long periods without writing a word, but life gets in the way. I have fun ideas for blog posts and stories that keep getting put off. This job is much meatier than my last, or I'm just listless right now. My week's been interesting to live through at least.

This morning I woke up and noticed missed messages on my phone. I'd been waiting on a coworker to call and tell me he didn't need me to drive out of my way to pick him up, so I figured that was the message. My conscience wouldn't let me leave his travel to chance, so I called back the number to doublecheck.

A deep voice answered with the name of the Maintenance Chief. I rolled my eyes and told my coworker that was very funny. After the third insistence I realized this was indeed the chief of maintenance who'd tried to call me the other night. He'd wanted me to let him into the building, since I was the building manager. When I hung up and hurried because I actually had to pick up the coworker now, I comforted myself that I wasn't as bad off as that Congresswoman who hung up twice on the President. And I avoided a very embarrassing conversation, because on Sunday I'd closed the car door on my dropped set of keys, bending the master key to the building (and my house key, and my apartment key--which led to waiting in the snow for the landlord to drive up with a new set on a day all of the locksmiths are closed--GOOD TIMES!) and I hadn't gotten around to replacing/bending it back.

In the afternoon I drove two hours and got lost in a hospital only to find that the doctor who referred me to this new office hadn't actually written out any diagnosis notes for the lady I needed to see. My real first session was postponed so that she could track down my doctor, and in the interim I can try yawning.

Prior to that I found myself being sharply reminded by the flight chief that my job title is "technician" and not "file clerk" even though I am responsible for all of the files in the office. I swore I'd never be that woman in the office who does all the clerical work, and here I am doing all the clerical work. Why am I doing all the clerical work? Because the boss needed someone to organize the papers and those idiots I work with wouldn't know organized if they tripped over a sorted and labeled pile of it in the lovecraftian pit of disrepair that we laughingly call a workshop. (To be fair it may indeed be a workshop, but I've yet to see the tables cleared so I have my doubts.) Also, I was the "New Guy" at the time the additional duty involving filing opened up.

This is all a typical day for me right now.

So I've been a bit too tired to write substantially. Instead I've been amusing myself with Twitter. Last night I suggested to Canton that Black Widow--who is in her 70s but still looks to be in her 20s due to funky Russian supersoldier experiments--isn't using epic birth control, but rather is post-menopausal. From there we pounded out a premise for what is either the most awful or most awesome miniseries on the Internet--BLACK WIDOW: HOT FLASH.

We're bad people, yes.

(The title was Canton's idea.)

Tales from the Office...

2009-01-29T00:11:00.003+01:00

All blog jokes aside, I don't consider myself a confrontational person. Certainly not in real life, at least. I've always considered myself meek to a fault, and especially shy in person. I've even kicked myself for being far too much of a pushover. A wallflower, meek and mild. I worry I suck up too much to the boss and I let too many things slide from my coworkers. I've always considered myself in person to be very much the opposite of my online persona.

Last week at work, though, I got a surprise.

I understand completely why I have a reputation for tactlessness at work. I've seen the memos these guys write. Full of extra wording and platitudes around the point and--to quote my coworker who told me my memos were tactless--"buttering up" the other party to get what we want even after the matter has been agreed to over the telephone and the memorandum is merely a formality. "Sir/Ma'am, Due to events entirely beyond our control we no longer have running water in the bathrooms. According to regulations, we need to be able to wash our hands before we eat in order to prevent dying from some horrible disease. If you could find it in your heart to send a plumber, we would be greatful. Help us, Civil Engineering, you're our only hope."

I find that to be an utter waste of time. I also think something like "Please repair the bathroom plumbling at your earliest convenience" is far more polite than necessary and should be sufficient for asking someone to do their fucking job anyway. It also saves ink.

So it was no surprise to me that--after I asked Blunt Boss to brief the office on how to fill out a certain form and had been told by him to brief them myself because they'll listen to me because "women are scary" (I'd responded that my coworkers aren't afraid of me, they just assume I'll burst into tears if they push me too far and he'd insisted that was good enough so there was no getting out of it)--I was gently chided by Diplomatic Boss because "you get more flies with honey than you can with vinegar."

Now anyone who knows how much I fucking hate that turn of phrase will appreciate how nice I was when I disagreed with him. I said I had been nice but promised not to use any profanity next time. He told me i shouldn't start a lesson with "You've been doing it wrong" which made no sense to me, because the whole point of the briefing was they'd all been doing it wrong.

This conversation took place at the end of shift in the middle of the office and led to my statement that I wasn't confrontational. This statement was greeted with laughter.

Naturally, there was a bit more arguing and Diplomatic Boss declared no progress would be made on either side once I'd narrowed my eyes and repeated "...female logic..." in response to a description ("Here is male logic, here is female logic, and WAY over here--") by a coworker. This coworker was the next person to talk to Diplomatic Boss about effective communication.

And for the record, earlier that day that coworker--who had indeed read comics in his life--had been insisting that neither Steve Rogers nor Bruce Wayne would return from the dead so his opinion is suspect.

I did get Diplomatic Boss to concede that I was a pushover about "some things."

All in all, I ended up thrown into a minor identity crisis by the entire incident before the weekend was even underway. I understand that humans have these internal views of ourselves, and its naturally disconcerting to find out just how different others see us than we see ourselves. But that wasn't it entirely. See, I've been keeping this blog for some time as an outlet and I suspect its led to a personality change. But exactly what sort of change, I'm not sure. I chose the nickname Ragnell the Foul on a whim, after a funny description I'd read of Gawain's wife in some Arthurian encyclopedia or another. I wanted to indulge my monstrous side a bit, I wanted to have a chance to be the sort of person who doesn't let shit get flung on her and the name seemed to exemplify that.

And there's an idea in the Wiccan community--a small shadow of an idea that doesn't always surface but its definitely something to be kept in mind when chosing a name (Wiccans often take a "Craft Name" for their religious life)--that we conform to our names. That if you pick the name of a story character you end up living out that story. (Think twice about naming yourself for that tragic hero who lacked self-awareness.) That if you take a description, you end up living up to it. (Be wary of using modifiers such as "sometimes" or "not exactly" in front of virtuous descriptors.) I've noticed it borne out enough online, some people just fit their handles. I've wondered at times if this is putting the cart before the horse--if we just unconsciously choose a good description of ourselves when we choose a name--or if human beings really are such pattern-seeking monsters that we unconsciously mold ourselves to fit the front we put forth. And that little incident at work, and the realization of how much I've changed over the last decade as well as the realization of how differently I see myself compared to how I act has me mulling it over. Did I become Ragnell the Foul somehow, or is it just the real me leaking into my professional life?

And why are the guys I work with so damned sensitive?