Because the stupidity of debate around “whether or not Mark Millar is racist” because of the way he writes characters in HIS FUCKING COMIC BOOK ABOUT SUPERVILLAINS, here is an idiot-proof explanation of Wanted.
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Wanted by Mark Millar and JG Jones is one of my favorite comics of all-time. It’s certainly my favorite piece of everything Millar has ever written. Because it’s about bad guys. And calling any accusations of disgust towards anything throughout the book means that a) you’re missing the fucking point, and b) Millar’s story is far more sophisticated than you gave it credit for. The point of Wanted is ridiculously simple. The idea that the Marvel and DC universe’s villains all joined up and killed all the heroes, rewrote history and now rule the world (our world) is brilliant, but it’s also the surface detail. Wanted is an evisceration of the Heroes Journey. Something every movie fan and nerd has been biologically trained to subconsciously understand. And Wanted shows you how manipulative a device it is, and it can be used against a reader quite easily. There isn’t a single “good” character in Wanted. Not a one. But I care about these characters, simply because I’m presented with the heroes journey. A young man is ripped out of his awful and boring world and shown great things, must make a decision, and soon rules the kingdom.
In the ultimate act of defiance, a populist like Millar has taken Speilberg and Lucas (and everyone else’s) greatest tool and shown the audience how hollow it makes these things. It refelcts that yes, you can just as easily be sold moral ambiguity and hate as good and love.
And there’s some motherfucker action scenes, JG Jones best work ever.
What is the moral of Wanted?
“Fuck You.”
I couldn’t agree more.
13 comments
06/24/2008 at 5:50 pm
David Allison
Heh — I wouldn’t accuse Mark Millar of being a racist because of what his characters say in Wanted (or any other comic), but I do find the handling of race in that book to be problematic in a way that is deliberate but… well, as I was trying to articulate over on Plok’s blog, it just doesn’t come together for me in a meaningful way.
Seems like the narrative jujitsu stuff works better for you than it does for me, which is cool, and which definitely makes sense of the story (inasmuch as needs doing). Like I said in Plok’s comments, though, I find that the more extreme wish-fulfillment works against the heroes journey stuff, preventing it from truly grabbing me/breaking my fucking fanboy neck, etc.
Still, J.G. Jones does fuck rule, and Millar can write an action scene when he wants to, so it’s not like I totally hate the book.
06/24/2008 at 10:49 pm
sean witzke
I always take issue when people use character dialog to call someone racist/sexist, kind of a gut reaction in that part. I’m not saying that he doesn’t mess parts of it up or come short – especially with the first issue where you can tell he didn’t quite have the story down yet. But I don’t have a problem with people not enjoying it, I just have a problem with the knee-jerk “THATS RACIST”/”THATS SEXIST” blogosphere crap. Drawing Vixen as a white character – thats racist. My problem is no one in their right mind would call Mignola a racist for writing Nazis or Ennis for writing the KKK, but I’ve heard this several times as an accepted fact.
06/24/2008 at 11:14 pm
pillock
I actually quite like the book! And I don’t think Millar’s a racist, and I love the evisceration of the Hero’s Journey, but damn it, is it too much to ask that he write something that doesn’t drag in a more generalized social commentary, and then just leave the bloody thing lying there with a “who, me” expression on his face? This is what I say seems nasty to me, and makes me want to give him a smack in the mouth: I mean, he could’ve disembowelled the Hero’s Journey in any setting, but he chose this one, and he played it his way. So I just want to know why he made the moves he did, and don’t want to accept “seemed like a good idea at the time” as a reason. I feel the same way about the second chunk of the Ultimates, there are so many things I want to point at and ask “so what were you trying to do here, specifically?” And if he shrugs, then I push him off the balcony. The man gets by with a lot, because it’s usually not okay (at least, in my mind it isn’t) to insist a writer justify his work — either you like it or you don’t, and that’s the end of the story, and it’s not cool to berate him. But I think Millar presumes on that spirit of reader hospitality a little more than most, so when I saw those Wanted panels again I was thinking “yeah, okay…well, you don’t get to not be asked questions forever, so let’s start — hey, why not? — with the casual displays of pretty harsh racism in Wanted. Was Wesley’s relationship with his boss a deliberate mirroring of the relationship between the Fraternity and the normal people they rule? And if so, why did you think using race was the most effective way to create this effect? I see…that’s very interesting…and was that also what you were trying to highlight with the cholos? Oh, it wasn’t? Do go on…” Like, I want to interview Mark Millar. Or, no: I want Gary Groth to interview him. You know? But I’m guessing that’s never gonna happen, because I’m guessing that’s not really the PR Millar’s looking for…but then if that’s true he loses my sympathy for people calling him a racist, a little bit. Of course then again, if no one’s ever asked him about any of this stuff, then he gets more sympathy from me than he started out with! ‘Cause you gotta at least ask the guy. As you say, I could be missing the whole point, or not giving credit where credit’s due.
Sorry, bit of a rant, there. But I woke up today thinking “oh, I made it sound like I just think Millar’s a racist, well shit.”
06/24/2008 at 11:15 pm
pillock
Whoops, didn’t see you comment, there, Sean.
06/25/2008 at 3:44 am
Johnny Bacardi
But…but…I don’t LIKE being told “fuck you”!
For the most part, I liked Wanted, but the ending was so offputting that it just about ruined it for me.
06/25/2008 at 11:57 am
David Allison
As an argumentative Glaswegian, I don’t mind being told to fuck off, so long as I get to shout back!
That said, I can see why it’s not your bag of biscuits Johnny, though I’m curious as to how much the toxified heroes journey stuff had been working for you up to that point. Pretty well, I would guess, given your general positivity about the body of the book.
Just curious.
Sean, I get what you’re saying, and yeah, some people do seem to have an allergy to reading character dialogue as what it is. Which is dumb, but hey — it’s the Internet, so no surprises.
That aside, I think you’ve nailed why Wanted doesn’t work in David-land — basically, the first couple of issues overplay their hand a little too much to hook me.
Still think there’s room for discussion of the racial angle, though I’m not sure quite how to do so without either getting caught up in a hysterical tangle or simply repeating myself. Gonna have to think on that one. Maybe we could shrink Gary Groth down and beam him into Millar’s brain? He could do a feature, live from the source…
Uh… one last thought for the moment: the movie version of Wanted looks like it’s going to avoid most of the things I found problematic about the comic, and yet… it looks like a slightly too cynical Matrix/Fight Club hyrbid to me.
It might still be fun (motherfucker go boom!!), but still, it’s interesting how relatively tame it looks, if not unexpected.
06/25/2008 at 2:29 pm
David Allison
Blech — I lost all sense of lucidity somewhere towards the end of that comment. My point about the movie was that it looks less troublesome than the comic, but also way more generic.
Also: BOOM!
06/25/2008 at 4:15 pm
sean witzke
Johnny – I got to be honest, I always loved the ending. But then again, I’m a big Sex Pistols fan.
Plok – I might agree with you there, because some of it doesn’t work. But yeah, I do find the whole principle kind of offensive. And Gary Groth – so just be a dick to his face, then? Could we get his non-union Mexican equialent?
David – Pretty much exactly what you said. What bothers me most about the movie is well, this is the follow-up to Daywatch? Is this Bekmambetov’s Hard Target? Is the dodgy superhero action film the new way to break foreign directors on Hollywood’s knee? I’m sure the action stuff will be great, but aside from Morgan Freeman I don’t want to see any of these people in a movie ever again. I’ll probably skip this and see WALL-E.
06/25/2008 at 8:23 pm
Mark Kardwell
Millar’s not a racist. But I do get the sneaking feeling he’s a sectarian. Does that help?
06/26/2008 at 4:40 am
pillock
“And Gary Groth – so just be a dick to his face, then?”
Ha! You read the brutal rope-a-dope interview with McFarlane, I assume? Jesus, that was funny. But I was thinking more of the Sin City-era Frank Miller interview, just as he was finishing up 300: Frank answers his critics, and makes a damn good show of it, too. At the time, it gave me a new perspective on his work, and a more positively-oriented feel for what he was all about as an artist. So: I like Gary, ’cause that was his interview to make informative, or not.
But about the blogospheric knee-jerks: 100% agreed, although I know that doesn’t quite sound upfront of me… after all, I was pissed at that Tigra thing that time, and now I’m saying “what’s with those Wanted scenes anyhow?” Nevertheless, 100% agreed: and I think I may elaborate on that seeming discrepancy in a post, actually. Because I just deleted about two thousand words from this comment on the grounds that it was too many words for a comment.
Probably later tonight!
06/26/2008 at 6:12 am
sean witzke
On Groth – I have the Miller Comics Journal interview book, and at one point he comes out and says he was pissed at Alan Moore and Miller for being too big after the DKR/Watchmen blow-up. He lost my sympathies then.
And I can’t wait to read that post. This is all conversation, anyway. As bad as the comics conversation can get (this recent “Fire Didio” thing being the worst of it), at least we’re all not writing slash fiction.
06/26/2008 at 1:14 pm
pillock
We’re not? Damn. Well, you can break it to Grant Morrison, ’cause I’m sure not gonna…
(Seriously, what do you think is the best Morrison comic ever, outside of SSoV and The Invisibles? My vote’s for Vimanarama…)
On Gary: the most telling thing I know about him, and it was used to great political effect but I bet anything it’s true…Dave Sim said to him “What about Sandman?” And Gary said (according to Dave) “Is Sandman any good?”
And Dave said: “Gary’s out of touch.”
Boom.
Mind you, that exchange was in the context of the High Middle TCJ War Period…oh, I forgot to mention the Wars of the High Middle Period, was that wrong of me? Anyway, Gary apparently was so out of touch that because Sandman was a mainstream comic product he was unable to see any good in it — he just couldn’t “get it”. Corporate bullshit, don’tcha know. Nothing to “get”. Meanwhile we didn’t know Sim would push the envelope of “getting it” to the point of “gaze upon my gorgeous art, and skillful characterizations, but…fear my retarded efforts at prose, and my naked prejudices not even disguised by anything!” Ooof. Where’s the win, here. Jeebus. Okay, we’re voting on who’sa the biggest hypocrite…
06/26/2008 at 1:47 pm
pillock
Gary. He’s the biggest hypocrite.
However: Dave Sim. He may not be the biggest hypocrite, but he’s the goat of this story, because he’s the biggest asshoie. And in a very tough field. “Is ‘Sandman’ any good?” I daresay he doesn’t think so anymore. Won’t read “Judenhass”, however saw a page of Glamourpuss that was UNREAL good, maybe even Toth-worthy. Super-great; the man can really draw.
Incredible talent. Still; I’ll take Gary.