From: el24+@andrew.cmu.edu (Edward Liu)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics.misc
Subject: Opinions about _The Spectre_
Date: 15 Nov 92 21:01:58 GMT
Organization: Masters student, Information Networking Institute, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Well, after two issues of _The Spectre_, I've come away with very mixed
feelings.  When I heard John Ostrander was going to be doing the series, I've
been looking forward to it, especially since _Suicide Squad_ got axed and I
never really got into _Hawkworld_.

   Very minor spoilers ahead, but I dunno if the ^L will work or not...

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   All of the following is IMHO.  It should also be noted that the only
exposure I've had to the Spectre is from Alan Moore's run on _Swamp Thing_ and
Neil Gaiman's _Books of Magic_.

   Gripes first:

1.  In #1 p.2, the heroine is "Amy Beitermann.  In #2 p. 5, she's "Amy
    Bitterman."  OK, so what's her name?  Granted, this isn't very important,
    nor does it greatly detract from the comic, but it's kind of annoying, and
    surprising from someone of John Ostrander's caliber.

2.  "The Reaver."  Great.  *ANOTHER* serial killer.  Sorry, but after Thomas
    Harris' Hannibal Lecter in the book/film world, Alan Moore's Bogeyman and
    Neil Gaiman's "Cereal Convention" in the comic world, and Jeffrey Dahmer in
    the real world, it seems that every other villian anywhere is a serial
    killer.  This shocks and frightens the hell out of me in the "real" world,
    but I'm just sick of seeing and hearing about them in the "fiction" world.
    I just hope that the Spectre catches him and kills him fast, 'cuz I think
    the serial-killer stereotype is cliched and overused, and I haven't seen
    anything to set the Reaver apart from any other Generic Serial Killer.

3.  Twice, the Spectre has shown concern over entering somebody else's soul,
    saying something like "This is <whoever>'s home ground, and their power may
    be even greater than mine."  Then, one page later, we see that this is
    horse puckey -- after briefly being caught off-guard, the Spectre just
    pounds the bejeezus out of whoever he entered.  It was OK in #1 when he
    enters Snipe, but decidedly *NOT* OK in #2 when he enters the toy mogul.
    I don't mind the idea of the Spectre not being omnipotent, at the very
    least, if the Spectre is going to show concern over entering someone's
    soul, the concern should be really warranted.

4.  "And someday I will know rest..."  The point was OK in #1, but is slowly
    being hammered into us.  It also sounds just too much like Ghost Rider's
    spiel about being the Spirit of Vengeance and his pseudo-introspection that
    Marvel started doing about 6 issues into the series (when I dropped it 'cuz
    I saw the handwriting on the wall).  Personally, I thought the panel in #1,
    p. 11 panel 3 (a pensive, and maybe even sorry Spectre) was more effective
    in communicating the Spectre's unrest and pain better than all of the
    verbal exposition used so far.

   Plusses:

1.  John Ostrander's writing.  Barring the above gripes, this comic is
    definitely one of the better written ones out there.  For some reason, the
    prison scene in #2 p. 12 really disturbed me.  I also thought the first
    conversation between Corrigan and Snipe, and later Corrigan and Amy
    Whatever-her-last-name-is (:-), was very well written.

2.  Tom Mandrake's art.  It fits very, very well.  I thought the knife
    thing in #1 p. 14 was pretty cool.

3.  Tom Mandrake's art and John Ostrander's writing.  The two complement each
    other beautifully.  See the tail of gripe #4 for an example.

   So, after all is said and done, I'll buy at least up to issue 5 or so.  I
just don't want the series to turn into DC's version of _Ghost Rider_, which I
felt had a lot of potential after reading issue 1.  The problem that _Ghost
Rider_ ran into was that all the potential was all ignored in favor of doing
lots of blood and violence with GR spouting either "I am the Spirit of
Vengeance" and "You must pay for the innocent blood you have spilled" in every
panel.

   Discussion?  Also, isn't John Ostrander a subscriber to the COMICS-L mailing
list?  It'd be cooler than cool to talk to him directly about this stuff.

-- Ed
Edward C. Liu		|   " 'Ed, are you hallucinating?'
el24+@andrew.cmu.edu	|     'Huh?  Oh.  Yeah, but not right now."
(E-L, not E-One)	|	-- _Northern Exposure_, Nov 9 1992
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics.misc