Month: April 2003

It used to be nice and simple. I’d click on the bookmark and it would take me right into my AOL folder on the Comics and Animation Forum.

Then AOL “improved” it.

Since then, getting to my AOL folder is the most cumbersome task I undertake in the course of a day. Each step of the way takes four, five, six tries before it works properly. Otherwise I just get a blank screen and have to backtrack and start over.

Perhaps they’ve arranged it this way to “force” me to upgrade. I don’t do well with “forced.” What it might force me to do is dump AOL altogether because it’s getting just that irritating.

PAD

Just to remind everyone there’s an actual book…here’s the Brian Stelfreeze cover for issue #2.

Has anyone been reading this series? What a fun book. I picked up the first three issues at the recommendation of John Ordover, who told me it reads like something I’d’ve written. Considering one of the characters has a superhero identity called “Archetype,” which was a short story of mine that appeared in F&SF several years ago, I’d agree. But that aside, it’s a fun concept: It’s about a nuclear family where the father is a costumed superhero…and the family doesn’t know…and the mother is a vampire hunter…and the family doesn’t know…and the eldest daughter spends time in another dimension as a sword and sorcery princess…and the family doesn’t know…and the youngest son is overseeing an alien invasion of the earth…and the family doesn’t know. And as of issue #3, the storylines start to intersect.

It’s a CrossGen title under the Code 6 imprint.

PAD

I’m recommending to Glenn that, if it isn’t a massively difficult thing to set up, we institute a password procedure for postings. I hope this wouldn’t pose a major inconvenience to folks. There is, of course, the simple alternative of forbidding any follow-up responses, so it’s just me, but I’m not *that* in love with the sound of my own voice (or, y’know, typing.)

The tragic aspect is twofold: That it would be due to the actions of essentially one person, and that it’s *exactly* that sort of inconvenience that the jáçkášš gets his jollies from. Since he’s on AOL, we’re going to explore the possibilities of tracking him down and getting him thrown off the service entirely. Meantime, please bear with us. I want this to remain a forum wherein people can interact rather than just see what I have to say. I was warned that if we allowed feedback, precisely this kind of thing could happen. It’s pathetic to see that it has.

And again, just so there’s no confusion: It’s not actually Brian Bendis causing all this trouble. The gutless creep naturally hides behind someone else while he hides in his parents’ basement causing this stuff.

PAD

Due to a particular loudmouth who can’t take a hint and proceeds to use our website to break a couple of laws, we’ve had to ban him from posting, probably taking a lot of other AOL users with him in the process. If you are one of the folks banned from commenting, we apologize.

Doug Atkinson said exactly what I was thinking.

See, I was thinking to myself, Hunh. Okay. Here’s all these people crabbing (notice I didn’t say “bìŧçhìņg”) about a marketing hook (which, as Kathleen noted, she actually came up with. All I did was suggest it to DC) but that’s all that’s happening. Crabbing. So what else could be offered? “Broad Strokes?” “Lady Killers?” And then I thought, Hey. Wait. So many folks here seem to know so much better what will work and what won’t.

All right: A marketing hook. Five words or less, preferably, to sell the concept of three titles emphasizing female empowerment, at least one of which has a noir-ish tone to it, and all of which have a more risque slant to them in terms of story matter than the average DC book (although not *quite* as risque as Vertigo.) Oh, and it can’t be offensive to any woman anywhere.

Sing out, Louise.

PAD

You know, the entire direction into which the “Marketing Fallen Angel” thread has skewed puts me in mind of “Soul Mates,” one of the two episodes I wrote for “Babylon 5.”

For that episode, I developed a storyline that, to me, made great sense: Delenn, with her newly acquired human characteristics, has a spectacularly bad hair day because she has no cultural clue how to care for her new mane. Ivanova is brought in to help the flummoxed ambassador cope with it, only to find herself speechless at the end when Delenn inquires as to these “odd cramps” she’s started experiencing.

When that episode aired, I got hammered by a number of female fans (and, of course, male fans expressing outrage on behalf of the females) for writing an episode that had two strong women worrying about haircare and periods. Interestingly, when I first arrived on the set of B5 and met Claudia Christian, Claudia told me with genuine enthusiasm, “I was so thrilled when I read this script! Finally, an episode in which we get to act like women!”

I’m sorry. I know it’s annoying to have one’s arguments dismissed as politically correct. But you know what? Women have curves. Men notice them. Some women like that notice. Some don’t. Some are flattered. Some aren’t. To me, the problem stems from the notion that women can *only* be appreciated if sexuality is ignored, as if it’s some part that can be surgically excised and set aside.

It’s a crock. Sexuality is part of everyone. It’s part of the package. Women and men are not the same, and sometimes emphasizing those differences can be fun. And sometimes it’s even fun to act like our genders.

PAD