I started thinking today about what my twelve-year-old self would think of my life. I’m an academic who reads and writes about things like television and comic books and he would probably be amazed that this is a real job. He also would wonder why I now like asparagus, foreign films, and attending musicals. My point is that my tastes have changed and I think it would be fun from time to time to reflect upon how my twelve-year-old self’s opinion of the things I like. Today I’m going to start with one of my favorite comic books and see what he thinks about it. By the way, it’s important to note that my twelve-year-old self lives in 1984, so he might make a few outdated references.
Kingdom Come-
So this creepy dude gave me a comic book book yesterday and told me I could read it if I wrote about the story. (The comic book is like a hard regular book but it has comic book pages in it. I think this is a great idea because when adults see you they think that you are reading a real book. But you are really fooling them because you are reading a comic book. This way they don’t bug you about all of that RIF- Reading is Fundamental crap and they just leave you alone to read comics.) It’s hard to pass up free comics, so I said yea I would write something about it.
I didn’t like Kingdom Come very much and here’s why. There are three things that every comic book needs and this had none of them. Fighting, women with big boobies, and more fighting. No one wants to read a comic book that people talk in. Have you ever bought a comic book and wished it had more talking in it? No, course you haven’t. Those books that we have to read in school have a lot of talking in them. People read comic book because they want action and fighting. This book had so much talking that when they did fight you felt like it ruined the fighting. Fighting is like pizza and talking is like grapefruit, which would you rather eat and why would you mix the two?
Also, this book had too much about God in it. It made me feel like I was at church. No one wants to hear about church in a comic book. How can I know this and the writer doesn’t? Doesn’t he talk to people? I think he got old and forgot how bad it sucks to sit in the pew at church and pretend that you are listening while your friend makes faces and tries to make you laugh.
One other thing. Why is Wonder Woman not hot in this comic book book? Have you seen Wonder Woman on the TV? My grandpa and I used to watch her show and she was so beautiful. She had a great costume and really great boobies. Why wouldn’t you make her look like that in this comic book book? Everyone would like that better. How do I know this? Because my grandpa is like 80 years old and he thinks Wonder Woman is hot and I think Wonder Woman is hot. So old people and young people would rather have Wonder Woman look good than bad. I think the Kingdom Come artist must be bad, maybe the had to hire someone that worked cheap. They should pay more and get a better artists next time. Someone who understands how to draw Wonder Woman. Maybe also include some pictures where you get to see down her shirt. I think everyone would like that and you would sell more comic book books.
One last thing, why is Superman always whining in this story? He’s Superman. He can do anything he wants. Everyone like him. He has every power he could want. Why is he so mad and sad because Lois Lane died? She was always mean to him anyway. Always trying to trick him into marrying her and telling her that he’s Clark Kent. Shouldn’t Superman by happy that she’s dead, so now she will stop bothering him? Why can’t he go to another Earth and visit the Lois there and then come home when she starts talking too much and he is getting annoyed? He’s Superman. He can do anything he want. Have you seen his Fortress of Solitude? It’s the best place ever. He has every cool thing in existence. I have an Atari 2600 and my cousin Joe has an Intellivision (with the Burger Time cartridge) but Superman has every cool thing ever. I think the writer doesn’t understand who Superman is and mixed him up with Spider-Man. Maybe he works cheap too. DC should pay the writers and artists more so that they can do better work and everyone will be happy. In closing, DC Comics should pay their people more and they would make better comics. I hope the next thing I read has more action, fighting, and beautiful women.
Yes your nephew represents a generation that does not understand anything he perceives as “old” . It is like an analogy of Kingdom Come itself. It is what the book IS about.Give it to him in ten years time and then he will possibly get it. The thing about this book is that it is older readers that get it and that is the point, I think. A reader now can hate this book and in ten years time with some context under his/her belt suddenly the light bulb moment.What he writes makes me what to laugh but then that’s how a 12 year old thinks. No biggie. He’s just too young to grasp the subtleties of subtext and imagery and prose etc.
[...] comic books and coming to vastly different conclusions than I do. The first column can be found here. In today’s posting my twelve-year-old-self reviews all ten volumes of Brian K. [...]