From: gt1759c@prism.gatech.EDU (Donald Morris)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics.misc
Subject: Re: John Ostrander
Date: 9 Oct 92 03:56:18 GMT
Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology/NE Student

In <BvtBvq.Gqs@news.udel.edu> rschwabe@brahms.udel.edu (Robert Josep Schwabe) writes:

>I am just writing in to ask a simple question, why does it seem that a 
>great deal of projects that John Ostrander writes seem to get canceled.  First
>Manhunter, then Firestorm, Suicide Squad,and now I have heard that he is being
>removed from Hawkworld (this is a rumor).  Personally I like Ostrander's 
>writing the best, he is one of the few people who really puts some grittyness
>into comics.  He really likes to show how things really are.  

Not having read Manhunter or Hawkworld, I can only talk about Firestorm,
Suicide Squid (*cough*), er, Squad, Armageddon Inferno, Legends, Grimjack,
and a bit in the Green Lantern Corps Quarterly #1.

Why do these series get cancelled? Possibly because Mr. Ostrander, with the
exception of Grimjack and GLCQ #1 (which is Grimjack as a GL), really bites
the big one? I'm trying to be fair here, but let's just go down the list...

Firestorm - Johnny O took over here around #53 and proceeded to finish off all
of Gerry Conway's plots. He then wrote Firestorm into Legends. Not a big 
problem, except he apparently NEVER bothered reading any back issues. For
anyone who read Firestorm up to that point, the idea of Martin pulling a gun
on Ron is pretty far fetched. Yet Ostrander did it, and for rather contrived
reasons. The Professor suddenly refuses to fuse, Ron suddenly completely 
disrespects Martin's wishes, etc. ad naseum. From there we go to bad 
characterizations of Doreen, the complete disappearance of Stu and Wendy,
and then the Great Stein Brain Tumor leading to the introduction of angst
in Firestorm's life. The joy. Then we get Annual #5 (the excuse to hype up
Suicide Squad, but otherwise not bad...) and the death of Stein. Ron now
comes down with super-angst, we get Mikhail thrown in with (guess what?) more
angst, and a hopelessly brain dead hero through and following Millenium.
Next, Martin is back, Invasion occurs (Firestorm _still_ being brain dead),
and we enter the great period of Politically Correct Social Relevancy with
Firestorm becoming a (*blech*) Fire Elemental with (you guessed it) even
MORE angst! Yes, he wants to blow up the world - but he can't -, he wants
Firehawk - but he doesn't -, he wants to leave Earth - but he CONVENIENTLY
has instantly lost that ability -, he wants to transmute - but can't -,
and basically just gets to mumble pseudo-metaphysical lines and throw fireballs
at people when he's not kvetching. (Oh, and we get a character from (think
fast) Suicide Squad! to provide lines constantly reiterating when someone
acts like a _real_ hero... The joy.... (And he rewrites Killer Frost's origin).)

Now, even though I'm a die hard Firestorm fan, I can handle this. TO A POINT.
At some point, Ostrander's constant 'grittiness' because about as interesting
as sandpaper for toilet paper. Why? He _reuses_ the same grittiness. Constantly.
So basically, he came onto a comic with a fairly good following, ignored
characterizations (lost fans), reinvented the character (lost some old, gained
some new), reused the same angst causing crap for 15 (or so) issues (lost fans),
totally reinvented the character in a PC manner _including_ redoing the origin
in a way that fit NONE of the past (lost a helluvalota old, gained some new)
and then ran with more angst for a while til people wretched and sales were
so sucky they had to cancel.

As far as Legends and Armageddon: Inferno go, read them together. They're the
SAME DAMN STORY with a couple different twists. Open: Big baddie wants Earth.
Big baddie lives on planet with repressed people and dark lighting. But wait!
Repressed people still have that elusive spark of hope! (I'm serious here,
the same damn writing about Darkseid and Abraxis. I didn't find out until
I picked up Legends in back issues.) Heros fight hardships to stop Evil
One Who Crushes Souls And Makes Bad Popcorn. People given more hope. Joy.

Inferno is almost excusable because its so _laughably_ apparent that they
squished an idea into 4 books that should have been about 12. Or 36 to give John
lots of room to write lines about 'tell yourself you haven't groveled here
with the other terror-dogs' or 'the he only knew that the shining ones were
battling the Dark One' or such lame tripe. Legends, on the other hand, had
plenty of room, _tons_ of crossover issues into other books, and only succeeded
in coming up with a rather lame story idea about fanatic loonies with power
and bad characterizations of most of those involved. Bleagh. In other words,
thing aren't really that way. Or at least if they were, they'd CHANGE once
in a while and not be the same for every person in every damn crosstitle.

Just my $0.04 (inflation). And to be fair, I _liked_ Grimjack. I liked the
GLCQ #1 piece. Hell, I even like parts of Annual #5. It's just that in 
general, I only read the J.O. parts of my collection when I've read the other
stuff and want to finish storylines. But at least he's still ahead of that
_sucky_ "What if Wolverine became Lord of the Vampires During Inferno" drek
that I was suckered into buying.... :)

Donald Morris                         Box 24815 Ga. Tech Station
vapspze@prism.gatech.edu              Atlanta, GA 30332
====================================================================
"Once again I feel, it's time to get down and kneel -
	Time to pray once more, that you'll give me what I came here for."
	Cause & Effect - Another Minute