Will Comic Books Actually Rot Your Brain?

The short answer? Hardly.

Everyone is essentially from one of two camps: either you feel comic books are trashy tripe filled with simplistic, overly-muscled super heroes that only appeal to children, o r you feel that comic books are an under-rated, untapped creative medium that puts drama, art, and writing into one enthralling package which takes graphics arts to a whole new level. I am of the second camp. I have been reading and collecting comic books since I was 16. Even then I could tell the writers of the day - Chris Claremont, Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Neil Gaiman - were all either using comics as a vehicle for voicing their opinions on social strife or they were pushing the medium into the realm of literature and high art.

In fact, comics saved my life.

At 16, I was small for my age. I was the quintessential 100-pound weakling who was socially-awkward and smarter than most others in my school. This trifecta made me an easy target for bullying. Coupled with the overwhelming black cloud of depression that ran deep in my family, it's no stretch to imagine that I was suicidal at several low points in my life. Then I discovered comic books.

Yes, I've certainly heard of the popular heroes - Spider-Man, Superman, Batman - but it wasn't until I picked up an issue of The Uncanny X-Men where my eyes were truly opened to the power and the beauty of modern comic books. I honestly had not heard of the X-Men in 1986. Chris Claremont's treatment of these particular heroes was fresh and new to me, never having been exposed to comics that went beyond the good vs. bad battle royale. Here was an author who took the fear of mutants in the Marvel Universe and paralleled that with the racism, bigotry, and social unrest of our time. So, being a social outcast myself, I really took to the X-Men and identified with them. They became my friends, my brethren.

I could have a horrible week being cut down by the finest athletes our public school system can produce, but I could always rely upon and look forward to that Saturday when I get to go to my favorite comic shop and pick up the latest treasures of fantasy and science fiction. Yes, they were an escape for me. And one could argue that I wasted a lot of money and a lot of time with this "trash," but ask yourself, "Does the cost of my comic books surpass the cost of my funeral? Does the time spent 'wasting it away' reading comic books outweigh the time spent by my family and friends in mourning for my loss?" No, comic books provided a treasure that far exceeded all the tea in China: they gave me hope.

They also gave me a sense of direction and purpose. Inspired by the hope and excitement comics gave me, I went on to pursue a career in art with the ambition that, one day, I, too, can give some 100 pound weakling the hope he needs to continue on in life and find a way to survive the war zone we call high school. I have not given up that hope. And I grew. Now over six feet tall and close to double my weight at 16, I am still socially awkward. But that's okay. And though I may not be the artist I intended to be, I am becoming the writer I intend to be. And if I can provide that escape, though temporary, for anyone in need of it, I will gladly keep writing until my last breath.

Thank you: Chris Claremont, John Byrne, John Romita Jr., Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Frank Miller, Neil Adams, Barry Windsor-Smith, Jim Shooter, Al Milgrom, Mike Zeck, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Arthur Adams, Brian Bolland, Dick Giordano, and hundreds others in the comic industry who toil away in their passions and ignore the nay-sayers that they work in an industry that churns out nothing but "trashy tripe." Thank you, a million times thank you. You saved my life.

Two weeks and Counting

My first published story will appear in an upcoming anthology at the end of this month. Very excited! The anthology is called, "Gray Matter" and is published by Meizius Publishing.

Do me a favor and check it out and tell me what you thing.

Thanks!

"Scarred" Part One

As promised, this post is the first portion of my short story, "Scarred." You will be able to read the rest when it comes out early July in the anthology, "Grey Matter," published by Meizius Publishing. I hope you enjoy the work. Feedback is definitely encouraged. If you have arrived here from reading the story in Grey Matter, please let me know also. Thanks for looking.

Published!

Mark Twain has been quoted as saying, “Write without pay until someone offers pay. If nobody offers within three years, the candidate may look upon this as a sign that sawing wood is what he was intended for.” While one must consider the socio-economic context of his statement, I believe the general concept to be sound.

Three years? Perhaps in the late 1800's and early 1900's the three year rule could be true. There were not nearly as many markets for writers as there are today, and, a huge venue did not even exist yet, namely the cinematic and television market. So there are much more opportunities for one find a niche or an appropriate home for any marketable composition. After much deliberation and some consultation with some like-minded writers, I've decided ten years. Ten years to write and submit and have something good enough for someone to offer me money for my effort.

Shortly after this decision, I had the fortune of being informed of my acceptance into an upcoming anthology. Published? Yes! Paid? No. And that is perfectly fine. So does this stop the clock and legitimize my standing as a writer? I'm going to say no again, just to fan the fire of my ambition to continue to try harder and thrive for larger achievements. The reason being that contentedness often leads to laziness and lack of effort.

The story is called "Scarred." It is a science fiction tale of a man running from a group of scientists whose experiments has given him psychic powers he is only beginning to understand. It will be published by Meizius Publishing in their upcoming anthology, Grey Matter, Volume Two. Look for an excerpt from the story in a future blog.

What ST:TNG's "The Hunted" Means To Me

As I begin to explore the various facets of using Science Fiction as vehicle to social commentary, an obvious example comes to mind.

• Title: Star Trek: The Next Generation - "The Hunted" Season 3, episode 11
• Medium: Television
• Year made: 1990
• Country of Origin: United States

Synopsis: While the Enterprise-D is reviewing a seemingly idyllic planet's application for Federation membership, an escaped prisoner leads its crew to discover an ugly secret: the government's shameful treatment of its war veterans.

Since this took place slightly before Desert Storm, I'm going to assume this is thinly-veiled attempt to shed light on the plight of many of our surviving veterans of Vietnam. At this time, the Vietnam War ended some 15 years before. This is one of the few episodes on television that I can remember that depicts a Vietnam veteran as intelligent, competent and as a protagonistic character in general. Prior to this episode, veterans in television usually came across as psychos or lunatics, all suffering from severe PTSD. While the character in this Star Trek episode also shows signs of this disorder, it is controlled and is part of his wounded nature, not the main motivation for his actions.

Star Trek is to be congratulated in bringing issues such as these in the forefront of our minds when we watch their episodes. In the my coming blog posts, I will be showing more fine examples of how our favorite Starfleet officers address touchy issues of our day sometimes poignantly, sometimes as a slap in the face.

A Most Powerful Medium

Science Fiction has a bad rap. I bet your English teacher turned their nose up at it. I know mine did. I remember for an 8th grade reading assignment we had to bring in a book that was over 200 pages. I brought in 'BOLO' by Keith Laumer, a sci-fi book about a futuristic tank with AI.

I enthusiastically showed it to to my teacher and she mockingly exclaimed, "BOLO?! Ugh, one of them."And then she gave the book back and dismissed me. And so the first of many dreams of fantasy, adventure and imagination were squashed by someone in educational authority.

But the science fiction genre, and fantasy for that matter, has always been in the unique position to make the most powerful of statements on society without being overtly preachy, which is, quite frankly, boring. No one wants to be a captive audience to blatant political commentary.

But wrap that comment in a fun, exciting and imaginative story, and now you have engaging entertainment with allegorical overtones that may or may not be subtle. Will the audience get the allegory? Who cares! Either way, they are entertained and you get to use your novel, screenplay, or painting as a mouthpiece of what you want to express about life on this spinning ball of mud.

For example, Godzilla was intended to be the personification of Japan's utter horror and helplessness in regards to nuclear annihilation. But they were banned to express how they felt about 'the bomb' that fell some 15-odd years earlier. So they created an allegorical horror in the form of a 200 foot tall monster that destroys a city (well, the model of one, anyway), and now you have an amazing film.

Ironically, J. R. R. Tolkien was quoted as saying he despised allegory, and he never used it in his books. It's funny, because it doesn't take much thought to compare the battle of the Shire vs. the invading Orcs as the struggle our rural facet of society faces against an expanding industrial one.

In short, the purpose of this blog will be to pick a movie or an episode that is taken from the science fiction genre and just say what I feel it is really about. I'm sure it will evolve from there.