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Post by badgermaniac on Oct 29, 2010 17:50:21 GMT -5
Just finished reading (well, eventually skimming) the Vision-Scarlet Witch TPB that covered their solo series and here is my big question: can anyone find anything even remotely redeeming about this series?
Being a fan of both characters (as well as supporting characters like Wonder Man or the Grim Reaper) and knowing that the series had some relevance to modern Avengers lore (birth of the twins), I figured it would be a nice casual read, but I could hardly stand it.
Vision gushing endlessly about his love and feelings-Magneto over for Thanksgiving dinner-Crystal cheating on Quicksilver-going to Mardi Gras-it was just one cringing moment after another.
I don't mind a lot of the corniness of that era, but this was about as bad as you can get.
Just had to vent.
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Post by humanbelly on Oct 30, 2010 8:48:15 GMT -5
Hoo-boy-- I do remember buying those titles when they came out. The first was a 4-issue series, and the second was a 12-issue maxi-series, yes? I know for a fact that I've read them only once- when they first came out- and never returned to them.
Now, I do recall rather liking the first series, due largely to Rick Leonardi's art. But that second run-- oh man. While it may not have been Steve Englehart's best effort, it was certainly a worthwhile attempt to create a large, important arc for two popular characters w/out a title of their own. And, y'know, it might still have worked if the art hadn't been so appallingly AWFUL. I'd never heard of Richard Howell, but his style put me very much in mind of Al Milgrom (unfortunate). . . yet even less capable (more unfortunate). And then Frank Springer's inking was sort of the final axe to the visual story-telling skull, as it were. [I'm pretty sure Frank Springer has a devoted following out there, but I'd never, never, never found his work during the 80's at all acceptable. His pencils in particular were decades behind the artistic times.]
I mean, I kept buying it 'cause I was in that "I've gotta have the complete series no matter what" collecting mindset at the time. But I just kept hating every issue. In retrospect, and assuming that the series was produced in the Marvel Style (writer provides plot & explains scene breakdowns & desired visual elements; artist draws it; writer fills in the script, assumingly inspired by the visuals), Englehart must have been crushed by what he was being given back to work with.
I actually didn't mind having an emotionally effusive Vision-- it had been coming for a long time. But I do have to admit that Crystal's ugly, tawdry dalliance with that neighbor (Fred? Bob?) was cringe-inducing, and the Magneto-at-Thanksgiving thing was flat-out ridiculous.
Hey, good to hear from you again, Badge--
HB
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Post by badgermaniac on Oct 30, 2010 16:52:46 GMT -5
This was only the 12-issue series, so I can't comment on the shorter run.
The art was indeed "meh", but my issue was more with the story itself.
All I can come up with was that it was some attempt to lure a female audience or something. That is my only possible explanation for the soap-operish plot and characterization.
The shame here is that we indeed have two characters who were very deserving of closer examination with a rich pool of potential avenues to explore.
When Toad is the primary villain for about half of the series, it pretty much says it all.
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Post by owene on Oct 30, 2010 17:04:24 GMT -5
I think Richard Howell can definitely draw but has chosen a style that is really out of steps with mainstream super hero comics. The only other places I remember seeing his work at marvel was in silver age Kirby pastiches but it's not even that really, it's more of a golden age newspaper strip influenced style, it looks a lot like Frank Robbins to me.
It really doesn't work on the vision and Scarlet witch and some of the inking makes it even worse.
As unappealing as the art was though the story was even worse.
I haven't read his silver surfer run but everything else Englehart wrote at Marvel during that period suffered from the same faults. It was all terribly overwritten, thought it was making profound points that were 'too deep' for super hero comics (they all come across as incredibly smug to me) but were in fact very obvious and generally lead to sweeping (and usually negative) changes to the personalities of long standing characters every issue and were all intimately interconnected despite none of the stories really resonating at all outside Englehart's head.
Between this series, WCA and FF you end up with about 60 issues that can't have managed to go more than 2 pages at a time without some editorial footnote referring you to some other Englehart book. The crystal infidelity subplot in particular was just bleh but he brought it back in FF.
I can kind of see how you could look at the Vision and Scarlet Witch, see this vast canvas of different, odd, family relationships to countless characters and want to write an epic family saga for the Marvel Universe. It makes sense. But there were if anything too many characters and his ideas for them just weren't at all interesting and didn't have any space to grow organically.
Besides it just led to changes of motivation and yet more continuity that would have to be (and was) ignored the second anyone else wanted to use the countless major characters Englehart involved in it all.
I like a lot of his 70s work but his 80s stuff reads like someone who felt he was too good for the super hero genre but not actually capable of moving beyond the 70s style.
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Post by sharkar on Nov 4, 2010 22:12:55 GMT -5
This was only the 12-issue series, so I can't comment on the shorter run. Badge, if you're interested in reading the first Vision & Scarlet Witch (4 issues), it's also collected in a trade paperback. Like the later series, the theme of family runs through the first series--there are appearances by Simon, Pietro, Crystal, and Magneto. The trade includes the 4 issue series plus (as you can probably tell from the cover) Giant-Size Avengers #4, the wedding of Vizh and Wanda.  All I can come up with was that it was some attempt to lure a female audience or something. That is my only possible explanation for the soap-operish plot and characterization. Englehart had shown a predilection for soap opera elements since his earliest Avengers issues. With the Avengers, he got Wanda and Vizh together pretty quickly (I think too quickly), but once together the main complication was not that Vizh is a synthezoid; no, the couple's main problem was that old soap opera staple, a triangle, consisting of a jealous Wanda, an intrigued Vision, a seductive Mantis...plus an insecure Swordsman. (Now, a plot twist I would have liked to have seen would have been a vengeful Swordsman seducing Wanda; after all, he'd had the hots for her, at least he did in Avengers #20). But I agree this V&SW series was particularly sappy. Off-the-wall characterizations (Magneto miffed because the kids aren't named after him? Simon and Vizh's over-the-top bro-lovefest?Vizh assuring Wanda that his kissing the Enchantress is a good thing, because it proves he is a man?). The only character development I felt was valid was Crystal's. Her willful actions here fit into my image of her as as an exuberant, lusty wild child, a modern-day Madame Bovary. And as I've mentioned elsewhere on these boards I liked Howell's attempt at a
Kirbyesque rendition of her. But most of the other characters just looked odd, especially Pietro (with that chubby face) and Simon. BTW, I read a while ago that Howell drew the real estate salesman Norm--Crystal's paramour--in his own (Howell's) image! There were some throwaway bits in the series I liked, such as Namor mentioning he "fancied" Wanda once (Englehart remembered or knew they were attracted to one another in X-Men #6). Overall, though, I agree with everyone who's posted here that this was a very hard series to get through. And I guess John Byrne felt the same way; seems like this V&SW series was the impetus for his Visionquest arc ( Avengers West Coast), in which Byrne undid much of what was in this series. |
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Post by badgermaniac on Nov 7, 2010 14:43:06 GMT -5
This was only the 12-issue series, so I can't comment on the shorter run. Badge, if you're interested in reading the first Vision & Scarlet Witch (4 issues), it's also collected in a trade paperback. Like the later series, the theme of family runs through the first series--there are appearances by Simon, Pietro, Crystal, and Magneto. The trade includes the 4 issue series plus (as you can probably tell from the cover) Giant-Size Avengers #4, the wedding of Vizh and Wanda. All I can come up with was that it was some attempt to lure a female audience or something. That is my only possible explanation for the soap-operish plot and characterization. Englehart had shown a predilection for soap opera elements since his earliest Avengers issues. With the Avengers, he got Wanda and Vizh together pretty quickly (I think too quickly), but once together the main complication was not that Vizh is a synthezoid; no, the couple's main problem was that old soap opera staple, a triangle, consisting of a jealous Wanda, an intrigued Vision, a seductive Mantis...plus an insecure Swordsman. (Now, a plot twist I would have liked to have seen would have been a vengeful Swordsman seducing Wanda; after all, he'd had the hots for her, at least he did in Avengers #20). But I agree this V&SW series was particularly sappy. Off-the-wall characterizations (Magneto miffed because the kids aren't named after him? Simon and Vizh's over-the-top bro-lovefest?Vizh assuring Wanda that his kissing the Enchantress is a good thing, because it proves he is a man?). The only character development I felt was valid was Crystal's. Her willful actions here fit into my image of her as as an exuberant, lusty wild child, a modern-day Madame Bovary. And as I've mentioned elsewhere on these boards I liked Howell's attempt at a
Kirbyesque rendition of her. But most of the other characters just looked odd, especially Pietro (with that chubby face) and Simon. BTW, I read a while ago that Howell drew the real estate salesman Norm--Crystal's paramour--in his own (Howell's) image! There were some throwaway bits in the series I liked, such as Namor mentioning he "fancied" Wanda once (Englehart remembered or knew they were attracted to one another in X-Men #6). Overall, though, I agree with everyone who's posted here that this was a very hard series to get through. And I guess John Byrne felt the same way; seems like this V&SW series was the impetus for his Visionquest arc ( Avengers West Coast), in which Byrne undid much of what was in this series. I had forgotten the Vision-Mantis stuff was Englehart as well. Good call. |
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Post by ultron69 on Feb 9, 2011 16:05:00 GMT -5
I seem to recall that I liked the 4 issue series reasonably well, but the 12 issue limited series, after a pretty strong first 3 issues, really fell apart for me. Yes, there was a bit too much of the Vision gushing, and #4 hit an all time low for me when Wanda stopped some goons from attacking her by teling them whe was pregnant, and one of them said "no one can hate a pregnant woman". Utterly vomit inducing!
Also, the art was only so-so. I didn't hate it, but I certainly didn't love it, either.
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Post by visionloveswanda on Apr 7, 2011 23:45:01 GMT -5
As a kid I thought the series was okay. Mostly because I had always felt (or maybe fantasied) that the two of them had always wanted to just get away. Like literally get away from a world that accepted neither. But Wanda felt the guilt of her Brotherhood days and Vision felt the guilt of his creation and both felt indebted to the team and its cause. I'm not sure if I was really just projecting that on the characters, but as my two favorites, I loved the fact that their moving to burbs seemed to confirm it. And then the stories happened. Can't add much to the criticisms already addressed. I agree with all of them. But as a fan of both characters I would only offer a defense of the "spirit" of their get away. Of course, its the comics so, it couldn't workout for them. And maybe that is the one thing they got right. Two tortured souls such as they aren't destined to live out life in peace, but to go down fighting, forever lonely and isolated even when battling alongside team mates in the middle of Manhattan.  The brilliant irony of that relationship and what made it seem to work so much for me (an "action-hero romantic"--if there is such a thing) was that the only time they didn't feel alone was when they alone together. VLW |
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Post by ultron69 on Apr 12, 2011 8:09:18 GMT -5
I always liked this couple, maybe because it was an impossible love affair. I'm still a happy ending kind of guy, though.
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Post by visionloveswanda on Apr 12, 2011 15:26:23 GMT -5
I do hear ya Ultron. I was irrationally upset by their long, slow break up, actually stopped reading comics for a looooong time because of it! As I've gotten older, I guess I can see a little more of why the writers went that way (though I make no room for Byrne in the cannon!). But if we have to go with the disassembled reality, I guess my ultimate ending for the pair (or maybe in a "movieverse" version if they ever make movies about them) would be Wanda being stripped of her powers and memories (basically what's already occurred) because she is too much of a threat and Vision checking in on her secretly, maybe manipulating the Transia national lottery so she wins and retires comfortably. Then a final scene where she meets a tall dark stranger in a coffee bar who [*big reveal*] just so happens to turn out to be none other than Victor Shade. He is just there to live out the rest of her life under his secret (to her and everyone else) protection. "And they all lived happily ever after." I don't know. Kinda cornball, but it might work.  --VLW |
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Post by tomspasic on Apr 12, 2011 16:50:28 GMT -5
I will attempt a defense of the series, but have to admit that even at the time I did not think it Englehart's best work.
First, I think that it has to be regarded in context. It was perhaps an organic extension, somewhat experimental, of the "soap-opera" aspects of Marvel's 60's and 70's comics. Whereas normally the emphasis was on action first and soap-opera second, here we get a more 50-50 or even inverted mix.
Stan Lee first mixed in some soap elements to "humanize" heroes, Roy Thomas did a bit more of the same, and Englehart went even further, making the character interactions the main thrust of the Avengers comics. Since each iteration coincided with the successful growth of the company, it probably seemed to make sense to do even more of the same.
In many ways it seemed to be an attempt to fuse marvel's romance comics with it's superhero line, or at least to push superhero comics in a slightly different direction.
Was it successful? No, not entirely. As has been noted, the art did not help. But frankly, it was more to do with the writing. Much of what was interesting about Wanda and the Vision had already been explored adequately in the main Avengers comic, and although the birth of children was a bold step, it wasn't really enough to hang the whole series on.
The themes of family, and parenthood, and what makes some relationships work and other not, were worthy enough. Vision's "gushing" and emoting was a logical development of his humanization, Overall, it's an attempt to write something life-affirming, something dealing with more than just super-heroics, and to move characters he clearly cared about further along their respective journeys.
And I'd rather see comics trying to do that than much of what is in vogue now.
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Post by owene on Apr 12, 2011 18:08:51 GMT -5
Good call on the romance comics, this is a guy who brought back patsy walker of course.
I can see how you could classify his 80s work, especially V+SW as an attempt to show that comics could do more than super heroes. it's an emotionally lead family saga in comics form. An attempt to take a commercial genre and do it via marvel comics. And as such its more ambitious than a lot of 80s marvels and a lot of current marvels.
I dont think well known company owned super heroes is really the place to show that there is more to comics than super heroes but I can understand how a professional writer with bills to pay and editorial green lights would choose to tell his stories in the place that pays.
Given the real opportunities to tell stories about whatever you wanted in 80s creator owned stories (which englehart tried) and the genuinely groundbreaking stuff occurring at the time I think Englehart did want to try and write stuff that covered different ground than super hero stories but ultimately wasn't able to actually come up with a series of his own to tell it and as soon as you are doing that with someone elses characters you are going to come up against an audience and other creators who don't buy your take on the characters.
While I can live with and enjoy the idea of Vision and wanda as parents I dont really think he came up with anything so good that it really added much to either. byrne's rebooting of the vision undid a lot of good work from thomas and englehart and others but none of it was really from the LS or WCA.
The soap opera idea is interesting, a lot of it is interesting, and it's tempting, given the 'evil empire' reputation of 80s marvel, to see any fresh ideas as good. but it wasn't the place for it, he didn't have enough to say, and his style had been superceded.
He did have more to say than most 80s marvel writers and what we wanted to say was less generic. But it wasnt actually good to read and he had so much less to say than countless other writers from the period who werent trying to tell their personal ideas through marvel characters.
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Post by humanbelly on Apr 15, 2011 12:00:44 GMT -5
The "real" Vision is still dead now, right? Still a victim of Wanda's dis-assembled breakdown? Does anyone remember what his status was before that? 'Cause I remember him flying into the battle scene, and thinking to myself--"Hunh. Where the heck has he been lately, anyhow?"
And I'm not caught up on Children's Crusade yet-- but does it look like we're getting a real, functional, stable Wanda back?
Honestly, could there be anything more delightfully, sappily romantic than somehow the two of them getting back together after all of this time and turmoil? The Lucy/Desi reunion that we never got see in reality?
HB
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