Thursday, January 30, 2014

Meanwhile...

I have an interview with Lucy Knisley regarding her two upcoming travelogues that Fantagraphics is publishing at ComicsAlliance this week, if you'd like to go read it. The books, the first of which I was able to read an early proof of, are travelogues in the style of Knisley's French Milk, but created by the cartoonist after Relish. What amazed me most about An Age of License, however, was learning that Knisley actually writes and draws her travelogues while traveling. Given the difficulty I have in making comics of any kind (even, like, the little 10-panel colored pencils-on-index cards I put online like three times a year now), I'm pretty astounded that she's able to force herself to create such accomplished work under such challenging circumstances.

Art by Robson Rocha and Scott Hanna
And at Robot 6, I have short-ish (for me) reviews of this week's DC annuals, if you'd like to read that piece. These are Batman and Robin, Earth 2, Green Lantern Corps and Worlds' Finest. They all seem fairly well-done, and regular readers/fans of those books will probably want to read them, although only the Batman and Robin one seems worth going out of one's way for, if one doesn't already read Batman and Robin, but is a fan of Batman and/or Robins I and IV (By the way, Peter Tomasi reveals that Dick Grasyon became Robin at age 16 in it, and I believe Dick Grayson's age is one of those Rosetta Stones of DCU continuity with which one can figure out and therefore start to unravel the poor publisher's just-established new timeline).

The Earth 2 book is the origin of the new Batman II, which reveals his surprising secret identity and some other weirdness. As was pointed out to me on Twitter, it explicitly states that Thomas and Martha Wayne were shot in Crime Alley in 1979 which, combined with other temporal clues in the book, means Thomas Wayne was 25 when he was shot by Joe Chill, and thus 17-19 when he had Bruce, depending on whether Bruce was six or eight at the time of his parents' murder. But, Thomas Wayne was already on his residency and about to become a full-fledged doctor some time before he had even met Martha, so Thomas Wayne is essentially the Doogie Howers of Earth-2.

Something I didn't notice (nor, apparently, did editor Mike Cotton, assistant editor Anthony Marques or group editor Eddie Berganza), but a commenter on the Robot 6 did was the surname of the Rex that the dude in the panel above stole Miralco from.

This is the superhero identity of Rex Mason:
Metamorpho, The Element Man, the shape-changing hero who can alter his body's composition to that of any element found in the human body...or in nature, depending on who is writing his adventures and during what part of his fictional career they are set (And who I don't think has been introduced into The New 52-iverse yet, but, if he were, would/should be native to Earth-New 52, not Earth-2).

And this is the superhero identity of Rex Tyler:
Hourman, the chemist who developed an addictive super-drug known as Miralco that gives him super-strength, speed and endurance...but only for one hour a day.

While maybe not glaring (like I said, I didn't even notice while reading and even when quoting it in my review), it's a pretty big error, and one that can't be no-prized around...at least, not if they want to eventually introduce Hourman into the fledling Justice Society in Earth 2 (And why wouldnt they? Hourman is awesome).

3 comments:

SallyP said...

Apparently, if you've seen one Rex, you've seen them all. Or something.

Unknown said...

Not sure how you're figuring Thomas Wayne's ages at various points in his life here.

At the end of the annual, he says he's 65 in 2014. This means he was born in 1948 or '49, depending on the month of his birth. So he was 22 or 23 in 1971, when he was training to be a doctor--still young to be very far along in medical school, but hardly a 17-year-old prodigy. He was 24 or 25 when son Bruce was born in 1973, and 30 or 31 when he was shot in Crime Alley in 1979 (when Bruce was 6).

Don't get me wrong, there are significant problems with the timeline of this story, mostly just how many years pass between events that should happen quite quickly. Bruce is born, which prompts Thomas to break off from Falcone, who sends some thugs after him, who are beaten by Jarvis Pennyworth, prompting Falcone to hire Joe Chill to kill the Waynes--this occurs between '73 and '79--SIX YEARS, for what should surely take a few weeks. Thomas survives the attack and seeks revenge on his assailants in 1994--what on earth was he doing during the intervening FIFTEEN YEARS? And what did he do between then and Bruce's death, besides lurk in the background watching his son?

So, yeah, Thomas Wayne's life doesn't make much sense to me, but not for the reasons you state.

Caleb said...

Ohhhhh....I did the math right, but I started with the wrong number. I thought he stated he was 60, not 65, and did the math from there. I guess the age thing makes much more sense if he was 65 in 2014, which he was.

The stuff you mentioned is pretty confounding too, though. Pretty weird story all around, really.