Reply about "New Frontier"

[khaosworks]

This is in reply to acrobatty's post here.

It may not be your cup of tea, and that's fair enough. For me, though, DC: The New Frontier is much more fun since I know the publication history of the DC Universe. The heroes are appearing in the storyline (particularly the new ones, like the Challengers, etc.) in and around the same time they were appearing in the comics. The use of real world history, and the themes of racism and anti-communism as a backdrop is also appealing to me for obvious reasons, as is the use of the B-List characters like King Faraday, the old Suicide Squad, and the Losers, whom I loved as a kid.

Aside from that, Darwyn Cooke's artwork is absolutely gorgeous, of a type I haven't seen regularly in comic books since the days of Frank Robbins, Alex Toth, John Severin, Harvey Kurtzman, those kinds of guys. Contemporary artists with this kind of sensibility would be people like Steve Rude, or Bruce Timm. Not the hyper-realistic kind, not the cartoony anime kind, but simple, clean lines and storytelling that evoke a bygone but no less complex world. The characters in New Frontier are the heroes waiting to happen, but written as very human and very real (with the exception of Jordan not wanting to be "directly" responsible for killing people in the Korean War, but even then he was forced to in the end).

Another part of New Frontier's approach that appeals to me is that it puts the comic book events in the context of real time. For several years now, I've been irritated at the compressed time line that accounts for character non-aging - I find that a completely unnecessary explanation. Nobody ever really gives a shit that James Bond or Remo Williams or Mack Bolan don't age, so why should we really care about comic characters doing the same thing? If I can believe a man can fly, I can certainly suspend it enough to believe that Captain America fought in World War II, was revived in 1965 to join the Avengers, and is still fighting 40 years later even though he looks like he's in his 30s. Ditto, for Superman and Lois Lane to have been married in 1996, or for Tony Stark to have been injured in the Vietnam War. We should worry about the plausibility of the stories within the rules set up by the comic books themselves, not about piddling side details like this. If the fans are really worried... okay, the JSA was hit by temporal radiation, Superman is an alien, the Flash's metabolism lets him stop aging, Tarzan and Jane have access to Kuvuru immortality pills which they also provide to his cousin Doc Savage and his team, blah blah blah. Hope that makes them happy.

Compressed time lines cause more headaches than they solve. For example, since Reagan was in office (and appeared!) when the Suicide Squad was reformed in the midst of the Legends mini-series (real time 1987, comic time about 5 years ago), that means we've had 3 US Presidential elections in the last 5 years. Now that's just plain silly. If placing characters in real time, aging characters normally, letting them die off and be replaced would get rid of this annoying fanboy predilection, I'm all for it.

But enough ranting about that. New Frontier is interesting for reasons other than that. That's not to say it's any good, of course, but it's better than it really should have been, given the thinness of the idea. I usually have a sense for such things - I knew that Miller's The Dark Knight Returns and Moore and Gibbons's Watchmen were going to radically transform the comic book industry, and I knew Gaiman's The Sandman would be a keeper even though other people scoffed with the first issue came out. I also knew that Robinson and Smith's The Golden Age would be amazing, and New Frontier is certainly the thematic sequel to that story. I'm looking at it and my mystery-loving nose is twitching enough to tell me that this series has that je ne sais quoi. It's got "It".

Still, don't take my word for it. I could be wrong. If you don't care for it, of course, you don't. There are flaws in the execution, certainly, but not enough to detract overly from the central story as far as I'm concerned. I'm probably going to pick up the trade paperback when it comes out because I can't afford the individual issues, and this really needs a collected version to get the full impact. But if you want to give it a second go, I'd recommend it. This is a book that takes close reading and some thought beyond the superficial confines of its four-color origins.

Comments

[estoile.livejournal.com]

Fine review!

Not being generally comic-fen (though I'm terribly fond of The Tick -- what's not to love?), I have no particular comment otherwise, but: (a) I would have to agree on the issue of squished time lines (it would seem logical that comic-book physical laws supersede the RL version), and (b) if I were a comics reader, and had the necessary background, I'd be seriously tempted to seek this out.

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

I'd suggest taking a look at the first or second issue and deciding if you want to pick it up, or wait until the collected edition eventually comes out. You don't have to know the background to read the story, but it certainly adds a whole different layer to it. I like to describe New Frontier this way: this is the real, secret history of the DC Universe, the one that the comic books was based on, how real people would have reacted in those same broad situations and events.

It this respect, it's a more successful version of Marvel's Unstable Molecules (2003), which tried to do something similar with the Fantastic Four, which had as it central conceit that the FF were based on real people in a non-superhero world context.

This approach had two problems, ultimately, even though it qualified as a nice try. One, the totally realistic context robbed the reader of any real connection to the comic characters - these were just four people with more or less the same backgrounds and the same names as the FF, that's all. Two, the characters were too unsympathetic, in the end, to care about. In New Frontier, there's more a sense that these are people who are human, but still heroic beyond the average person; and of course the fantastical background helps the excitement level. Unstable Molecules was, in the end, boring, even if it had something to say.

[acrobatty.livejournal.com]

If it is your cup of tea, that's fine too. :)

It's funny, tho. You think it's terrific execution of a thin idea. I love the idea -- the real-time-ness, the publication date usage, the Losers & other minor characters. But I just find it slow and too understated, expecially considering the expense.

Agree about a collected book probably having more impact. It may turn out to be one hell of a saga when it is all put together.

LOVED The Golden Age, btw.

[thebitterguy]

I'm loving it pretty much 100%. Just the way things are done with the icons of the age. It feels right.

And the last panel of Issue #4 was just... Beautiful. I pray (PRAY) this will conclude with the formation of the JLA.

And I prefer Korean War Pacifist Hal Jordan to Drunk Hal Jordan.

p.s. I find your ideas fascinating, and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

Yes, that image - of the simulator flying through the air towards Abin Sur's ship, or in this case the vanished simulator - is so wonderfully iconic. My favorite sequence in "Emerald Dawn" was when Jordan is on his way to the ship and is being bombarded by the ring's explanations on Order in the universe and the Corps' place in that Order. "The ring is the ultimate power joined to the ultimate order. Take the power. Use the power. It is a great honor."