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Post by goldenfist on Feb 12, 2009 10:42:20 GMT -5
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Post by Ignore Me! on Feb 13, 2009 15:18:05 GMT -5
Yeeaarrrrgg! The only thing worse than BENDIS!' writing is BENDIS! talking.
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Post by goldenfist on Feb 13, 2009 15:52:31 GMT -5
Well if you don't like him then don't read anything he writes.
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Post by Ignore Me! on Feb 14, 2009 0:02:24 GMT -5
I try not to, but he has such a major effect on the Marvel Universe it's hard not to. My major interest in comics is Avengers. Until recently it was BENDIS! or nothing. If he would just go away I wouldn't have to complain about him anymore.
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Post by freedomfighter on Feb 14, 2009 15:23:37 GMT -5
Well if you don't like him then don't read anything he writes. If you try to get away from Bendis' current influence on the MU, you're left with mostly ancillary titles. Even though he doesn't write every book, his plotting and influence is felt virtually across the board. Not since early Stan Lee has any single writer had so much to do with every event and every plotline that is occurring in the marvel family of titles over a several year period. So it is a bit difficult to escape the pull of Bendis on the marvel universe...
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Post by goldenfist on Feb 15, 2009 17:24:46 GMT -5
You have to move on, Marvel can't keep repackaging the Avenger s with the big three(I.E. Captain America, Iron Man, Thor)they have to try diffrent things with the Avengers.
You guys make a big deal about Bendis not knowing the Avengers history it's time to stop complaing and accept it or stay stuck in the past and still thinking that Jack Kirby is still alive.
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Post by Tana Nile on Feb 15, 2009 21:06:06 GMT -5
You have to move on, Marvel can't keep repackaging the Avenger s with the big three(I.E. Captain America, Iron Man, Thor)they have to try diffrent things with the Avengers. You guys make a big deal about Bendis not knowing the Avengers history it's time to stop complaing and accept it or stay stuck in the past and still thinking that Jack Kirby is still alive. I think it is less about trying different things with the Avengers than it is doing things many of us simply don't enjoy. And as for not complaining - this forum is for people to express themselves freely. I won't tell you how to think or what to say - please show me the same courtesy.
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Post by freedomfighter on Feb 15, 2009 23:09:28 GMT -5
You have to move on, Marvel can't keep repackaging the Avenger s with the big three(I.E. Captain America, Iron Man, Thor)they have to try diffrent things with the Avengers. You guys make a big deal about Bendis not knowing the Avengers history it's time to stop complaing and accept it or stay stuck in the past and still thinking that Jack Kirby is still alive. Is anyone saying it needs to be the big three? Show me where in this thread someone says that. Bendis wrote Mighty Avengers and many of us didn't love that either and that had several members out of longtime Avengers history. Some of us just don't like his writing style. That's different than living in the past. You do yourself a disservice by arguing a point that no else is making.
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Post by Ignore Me! on Feb 16, 2009 2:44:19 GMT -5
I'm all for new and different members. I could care less if Shell Head, Cap and Thor are in the mix or not. What I do care about is decent writing and IMHO BENDIS! falls waaay short. Here's an example.
Secret Invasion. The line is drawn in the sand. An army of angry heroes ( yes and villians, cause heaven forbid the BENDIS! not shove the Hood down our throats some more ) facing off against the might of the Skrull main force.
Reed Richards : " You killed my family. You're not here to save us. It's all lies. You're here to punish us."
Skrull Queen : "Well, you should have thought of that before you found it funny to turn our brothers into cows."
Huh?! I had to re-read that three or four times to make sure I didn't read it wrong or get it out of context. This sounds like a couple grade school kids yelling on a playground, not the intro to a battle that would decide the fate of mankind.
I just don't get it. Is it because BENDIS! writes like a twelve year old that he's so popular? I dunno. Enjoy him if you do. I'm just some old guy trying to figure out why this man is still getting paid to write and write badly.
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Post by spiderwasp on Feb 16, 2009 22:12:12 GMT -5
I actually prefer a line-up that doesn't contain the big three (Well, maybe Cap but it's certainly not necessary.) I think those characters tend to be less interesting with the group because major developments are more likely to happen in their individual books. For me, a fantastic line-up would be (Pre-Bendis) Vision, Scarlet Witch, Yellowjacket, Wasp, Wonderman, Quicksilver, and Hawkeye. Not only does this not contain the big three but it doesn't even have anyone who has their own book. Switch things around by adding Hercules, Pulsar, Black Panther, Hell-cat, Black Knight, Ms. Marvel and She-Hulk and I'd be in heaven without any need for a big three appearance. I also have no idea where the idea that all of us who don't like Bendis are wanting the Big three came from. I'd love to see some quotes showing where we've been asking for it.
Perhaps that's part of the problem. Certain people just have a knee-jerk reaction to the fact that we don't like what they love and they don't even bother to listen to our reasons. Those of us who bash Bendis normally do it with great detail and back up what there is to not like with examples. If someone can give me some great examples to illustrate why Bendis is a great writer, I'd love to see them. I promise that, although I may disagree with their points and may say so, I won't tell them to stop printing them.
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Post by spiderwasp on Feb 21, 2009 15:55:50 GMT -5
Spiderwasp: "If someone can give me some great examples to illustrate why Bendis is a great writer, I'd love to see them." Three words: "Oh My God" Do you have any idea how much dramatic impact that phrase has?? Bendis utilizes it wisely to deliver the emotion of the moment. And for you critics who think he uses too often... hey, if you kept drawing an ace in hand after hand after hand you'd use it every time... and you KNOW IT. ("the HELL?" came in second on the Bendis-ism list, followed by the disjointed thought-balloons) Dude, I hate to break it to you but Bendis didn't coin the phrase "Oh my God." There have many catchy comic phrases that have caught on, mostly coined by Stan Lee - "Avengers Assemble!", "Flame on", "It's Clobberin' Time", "With great power comes great responsibility", "Nuff said." "Oh my God" isn't anywhere near that category, but if that's what floats your boat, more power to ya. You must just love Chandler's old girlfriend, Janice, on Friends. "Oh my Gawwwd."
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Post by Tana Nile on Feb 22, 2009 13:25:30 GMT -5
Uh.... I think Bill was making a funny, SW.
But I understand, my rational mind gets clouded when I start thinking about Bendis and his 'legacy'...
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Post by thunderstrike78 on Sept 25, 2009 18:09:03 GMT -5
Now, I admittedly have not been around much for the last year or so. I stopped buying comics (for financial reasons) in the middle of Secret Invasion, so I'm a little behind.
That said, I have always been at-once enthusiastic and skeptical about Brian Michael Bendis.
IMHO, his plots are pretty weak. Thin might be a better word. The common complaint, of course, is that his stories are not only "decompressed" but MASSIVELY decompressed. He takes four or five issues to tell a story that could easily be told in a single issue. And the plots themselves are pretty simplistic. The whole arc just before Civil War was embarrasingly simple: super-powerful mutant energy thing attacks town, Avengers arrive, they fight, Avengers win. How many issues did that take, again?
On the other hand, the man has dialogue and characterization DOWN. One thing he does VERY WELL is making larger-than-life characters feel very down-to-earth and real. In that regard, he's not unlike Quentin Tarantino (think of the "Royale with Cheese" conversation in Pulp Fiction). He may not understand several characters' backgrounds leading up to the point where he started writing them, but he does a very good job of making each character act and sound like an individual with a unique background.
Ideally, I think Bendis' strength is in scripting, not plotting. He would be fantastic if someone plotted out his stories beforehand, and then he simply added the dialogue and details afterward.
Just my two cents.
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Post by Ignore Me! on Sept 25, 2009 20:13:06 GMT -5
On the other hand, the man has dialogue and characterization DOWN. One thing he does VERY WELL is making larger-than-life characters feel very down-to-earth and real. In that regard, he's not unlike Quentin Tarantino (think of the "Royale with Cheese" conversation in Pulp Fiction). He may not understand several characters' backgrounds leading up to the point where he started writing them, but he does a very good job of making each character act and sound like an individual with a unique background. Really? Personally I don't find his dialogue any better than his storytelling. I read Spiderman for decades and never heard him utter and Jewish slang. Now Petey's chock full of Oy's and Vey's. Bad dialogue goes hand in hand with his lack of continuty. Just my cent and a half.
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Post by humanbelly on Sept 26, 2009 6:53:45 GMT -5
On the other hand, the man has dialogue and characterization DOWN. One thing he does VERY WELL is making larger-than-life characters feel very down-to-earth and real. In that regard, he's not unlike Quentin Tarantino (think of the "Royale with Cheese" conversation in Pulp Fiction). He may not understand several characters' backgrounds leading up to the point where he started writing them, but he does a very good job of making each character act and sound like an individual with a unique background. Really? Personally I don't find his dialogue any better than his storytelling. I read Spiderman for decades and never heard him utter and Jewish slang. Now Petey's chock full of Oy's and Vey's. Bad dialogue goes hand in hand with his lack of continuty. Just my cent and a half. I think maybe Bendis' talent just falls into a much narrower category-- to the point where it's almost a "trick", in fact. He does have a facility for making the dialog sound naturalistic and conversational. I mentioned at some point that he's like Harold Pinter in this respect, and- like Pinter- seems to consider it the hallmark of his personal genius. But I also think that, in a written medium, it doesn't play well at all a LOT of the time. It's also a serious weakness in books with large casts that are heavy in group scenes (unlike Ultimate Spidey, say), because everyone really does start to sound the same. There's certainly credit due for his recognizing "here's how people talk" and bringing it to life, but he doesn't seem to be able to admit or concede the convention's weaknesses, let alone address them. "Accessibility"-- that's the word I was looking for, Thunderstrike. I was trying to determine the quality of Bendis' writing that was working for you that wasn't really clicking for me. Maybe that's the root of it? 'Cause I think you may have something there. respectfully submitted- HB
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Post by thunderstrike78 on Sept 28, 2009 11:10:41 GMT -5
I think you've got something there, HB.
For me, Bendis reminds me of Aaron Sorkin in a lot of ways. The pitter-patter of dialogue, the cheeky one-liners, the intentional grammatical mistakes (it's been a while since I read any of his stuff, but I seem to remember stutters and mispoken words, just like real human beings talk) that made everyone seem more real to me.
On the other hand, I disagree with his basic understanding of some characters. Captain America, for one, and Spider-Man for another. His understanding of Spider-Man is closer to his understanding of Ultimate Spider-Man; he doesn't seem to recognize that in the mainstream MU, Peter has done a lot of growing up, a lot of maturing, and that he's now a married man (er, whoops! I forgot--THAT's why I stopped reading).
When he's on his A-game, I really do enjoy Bendis' writing, but I also think he's a bit of an arrogant &%$#, and his arrogance oftentimes precludes him from understanding or incorporating past character elements that he doesn't like.
Kurt Busiek, on the other hand, was THE MASTER of incorporating past character elements that he didn't like, and making it all work, to boot. I miss that sometimes. (Probably why I decided to go back and re-read Kurt's run on Avengers and Thunderbolts over the weekend.)
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Post by goldenfist on Oct 1, 2009 23:42:16 GMT -5
Word Balloon: The BENDIS TAPES www.newsarama.com/comics/090925-Bendis-Tapes.htmlPart 1 media.libsyn.com/media/wordballoon/WBbendis0909pt2.mp3Part 2 From Newsarama.com On this edition of the Word Balloon podcast, The Bendis Tapes Fall 2009 part 2 wraps up our marathon talk with writer Brian Michael Bendis, who answers more questions from the Jinxworld Message Board. Here are some tidbits from the Q & A session. More discussion about the transition from Doctor Strange to Doctor Voodoo as the Sorcerror Supreme is within. Daredevil is featured front and center in New Avengers #60. Next year, Bendis teased, he will again work with artist Howard Chaykin. There's a new Ultimate Universe project coming in 2010. You'll hear character discussions about DD, Wilson Fisk, and Norman Osborn. Brian looks back at past events like Avengers Disassembled, and the current Dark Reign . Plus, Bendis discusses some of his favorite meetings with Stan Lee, including his lunch with Lee last month, in which "The Man" asked Brian "How did Norman Osborn get here?" Bendis said, " In preperation of the lunch, Stan read a few of my books, and he came prepared with a specific question and I had better have had the right answer... and I think I did, because I got an got an 'OK Kid.' I had the feeling if I had answered wrong, we probably wouldn't have finished the lunch."
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