Bless The V for so many things, but in particular for pointing me to this: Avengers: Disassembled with action figures.

I shouldn’t be surprised, and I shouldn’t let it upset me, but I have to wonder. On what planet, precisely, does a network news program lead with the planned retirement of a late-night talk-show host? On the planet inhabited by The Today Show, apparently.

This would have annoyed me under almost any circumstances, given the fact that there are a million other things going on in the world that should take precedence over this kind of pap. But Jay Leno isn’t even retiring until 2009! That’s five years from now! Who’s even going to care then, much less now?

I’m now seriously expecting Matt Lauer to lead off the morning with, “In the news today, salary disputes rock the set of JAG. More from Ann Curry.”

I was reading the article on CSI in Entertainment Weekly. Things I learned: William Petersen is kind of a tool; Les Moonves likes having his ring kissed; and actors might not make the best writers.

I say that because the recurring theme from all of the actor interviews seemed to be that all that pesky science and crime get in the way of what’s really important – gazing longingly into their characters’ navels. And, while I like CSI and think the cast is just fine, I don’t really want to know any more about their characters than I already do. That’s because the more I learn about this crew off the job, the less I like them and the less I respect them as professionals.

And that tracks back to the writers of the show who routinely portray that kind of personal dimension as a detriment to the characters’ ability to function in the workplace. Grissom conceals his hearing loss, Sarah can’t establish boundaries and has a drinking problem, Warrick gambles, Catherine has a train wreck of a personal life, etc. Sometimes these revelations seem designed solely to give the actors reels to submit to the Emmy nominating committee. It’s a respectability grab that distracts from the gruesome science fair feel. Given the choice between learning about the minutia of evidence and seeing Nick pout – fully clothed, no less – in the locker room, I’ll take the minutia any day.

Seriously, CSI is able to replicate itself so successfully because of the formula, not because of the characters. It’s a character-proof franchise, as David Caruso’s awful Horatio Caine proves week after week on CSI Miami. You can replicate a formula without any trouble, as this show and Law and Order prove yearly.

It got me thinking about other mystery franchises I enjoy. Take Fake, the gay cop manga. It’s CSI’s virtual opposite. The cop content is largely indifferent, serving only to forward the will-they-won’t-they tension between the two protagonists. Criminal investigations in the title are useful in that they prompt revelations about the leads, what they’re capable of, how they feel, their histories. I hope nobody picks it up to satisfy their need for a procedural, because that’s not the point.

I’ve been enjoying Kindaichi Case Files, which is closer to the CSI model. Readers know enough about the protagonist – he’s a so-so student with a gift for investigation – but the mystery mechanics dominate. Nice character moments for the young detectives enhance the stories, but they don’t drive it. On the other hand, as grisly as the crimes can be in KCF, it’s nice to have them leavened with the heroes’ basic decency and sweetness.

In terms of prose fiction, CSI needs look no farther than Patricia Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta novels to see the balance between crime and characters go horribly, horribly wrong. I loved the earlier installments of this series for their fascinating forensic detail, but as they progressed, Cornwell dwelled increasingly on just how dysfunctional her protagonists were. With each new outing, Kay and company seem more paranoid, more self-loathing, and more obnoxious. For me, it wasn’t worth wading through the angst to get to the good bits.

Kathy Reichs seems to manage things better in her Tempe Brennan novels. Brennan is more of an appealing everywoman than Scarpetta; she’s just as gifted professionally, but she’s more aware of her shortcomings, and she has a self-deprecating sense of humor. On the down side, she’s impulsive enough to place herself in dangerous (and totally implausible) situations, and I’d be eternally grateful if Reichs could resist the urge to have Tempe voice moral outrage quite so often. But the forensic anthropology is fascinating, and the cast is a lot more down-to-earth than the Prozac-deprived Cornwell crowd.

The most successful balance between the personal and the procedural, for my money, is DC’s Gotham Central. It functions perfectly well as a crime comic, with an interesting range of cases. As written by Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker, the Gotham freak beat is extraordinarily stressful and dangerous, and it’s only natural that this kind of grind would have personal fallout for the detectives who walk it. The writers keep the character development grounded in the professional context, which works very well. And, as large as the cast is, it’s nice to see them get moments that let readers know what makes the characters tick.

I’m not saying CSI has never successfully inserted character moments into its narrative. Small, illustrative exchanges can be very effective. I’m thinking back to a great exchange between Catherine and a dominatrix where they discovered surprising common ground, shared frustrations, and similar personal philosophies. It was a nice breather of a scene, smartly written and acted, that told us more about Catherine in a few moments than we learn from a dozen bad boyfriends or daddy revelations.

So, in conclusion, I’d suggest that the CSI cast appreciate their show for what it is and save the emoting for their summer vacations. In this case, character bits work best as the seasoning, not the main course.

I don’t normally blog about politics, but I found this to be particularly revolting:

On Thursday the Republican Party owned up to sending mass mailings to residents of Arkansas and West Virginia demonizing homosexuals and predicting liberals would ban the Bible if Democrats won in November.

The campaign literature featured a picture of the Bible with the label “banned” slapped on top of it, and a picture of a man proposing to another man with the caption “allowed.”

It’s so offensive on so many levels… its implicit “gays will take your Bibles” message, its divisiveness, its scapegoating of a segment of the American population, the suggestion that the citizens of West Virginia and Arkansas are so simple and easily frightened that they won’t give a second thought to the illogic of the message, etc., etc., etc… nauseating, hypocritical, insulting garbage.

Must go to the liquor store and buy gin and lottery tickets.

There’s lots of good reading at Christopher Butcher’s comics.212.net.

First, he links to a piece he wrote for ICv2 on the question as to whether the sky is falling on manga. He answers a lot of my questions about how retailers can (and, in my opinion, should) approach manga. As an added bonus, the piece prompts a response from a Barnes and Noble employee, giving me some additional insight. (Matt Maxwell at Highway 62 talked about the ICv2 article that prompted this discussion not too long ago.)

Christopher then asks some interesting questions about comics newsmagazine websites:

Who are they trying to reach with their material, and what are they doing to reach that audience? What is their focus? What are their columnists saying that isn’t being said, their reviewers reviewing that isn’t being reviewed? More importantly, how can we tell what’s noise and what’s static (without Kevin Melrose linking directly to it?).

Ed Cunard, of the Low Road and Comic World News, offers a response. Here’s part of it:

It’s just a matter of constant refocusing and self-examination to get a site to its potential, and that seems to be the thing that plagues most sites. It’s too much about personal feelings and individual goals, and not about just making a nice little corner on the web.

I hope contributors to other sites offer their views, too.

The current season of Survivor seems like a zombie version of itself. Formulaic isn’t necessarily bad, but the pattern here has become painfully obvious.

Young and Pretty gang up against Old and Useful, confident that all will cower in the face of Young and Pretty. Their confidence is immediately revealed to be deeply misplaced. The men, despite repeated losses to the women, maintain unfounded certainty that the women are weaker (coyly reinforced by host Jeff Probst and the production staff), infrequently tossing out a condescending compliment about how “determined” the women are. (Not skilled or strong, just “determined,” like kittens trying to get the laundry hamper open.) Nobody seems to have cultivated any actual survival skills prior to arrival on the island. And the whining… Dread Dormammu, the whining! As I stated previously, contestants, nobody forced you to compete for a million dollars. You applied for the show of your own free will, presumably familiar with its “rigors.” Suck it up.

My favorite gripe thus far was when a contestant compared the experience to prison, like she’d know. I loved this not because it was particularly apt or revealing but because it immediately made me want to see Survivor: Alcatraz. Which tribe will be the first to turn their toothbrushes into shanks? Who will rat out their tribemate to Warden Probst to get a cushy job in the prison library? Will the Young and Pretty crumble in the face of the ruthlessly starchy fare of the prison mess hall? Who will win this week’s reward challenge, 72 hours in solitary?

On to happier viewing, I’m looking forward to tonight’s Joan of Arcadia. If you’d told me that I, as an atheist who considers “uplifting” one of the very meanest things you can call a television program, would love this show as much as I do, I would have given you such an eye-roll. But love it I do, and without shame.

Tonight’s O’Grady is a repeat, or “previously aired episode,” if you prefer, but I’ll probably watch it again all the same. I’m weak that way.

Two of my favorite writers, Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker, talk about one of my favorite comics, Gotham Central, at Newsarama.

This is probably my favorite bit from a really interesting interview, on the subject of shifting from GC‘s style to more mainstream super-hero stories:

Rucka: (Superman editor Eddie Berganza) pointed out one scene to me – a tanker truck exploding. Eddie told me I should have the tanker truck refueling the gas station and blow the whole thing up. He was right – I’d forgotten for a moment that I was writing Superman. My instinct is always to go smaller, and, for lack of a better word, more realistic. So I don’t really have a problem with it in Central. I admit, I’m not great at very, very big – that’s something I have to work hard on doing.
Brubaker: Yeah – it’s like new muscles you have to build. I’m encountering that with The Authority and Captain America. I was halfway through writing my first issue of Captain America when I thought, “Oh, I should probably have Cap doing something other than being interviewed by SHIELD. Maybe an action scene would be good.

I must say, if you’re going to spend a week focusing on one or two comic creators, these two are really good choices. I’ve really enjoyed reading these interviews.

Inspired by Ed Cunard and Shane Bailey, I’m throwing my hat into the “five questions” ring. No subject off limits, though I reserve the right to lie if I suspect an honest answer would make me look stupid or creepy. (Insert “more than usual?” retort here.)

Have at it.

There’s a very interesting interview with Greg Rucka over at Newsarama. Rucka addresses some of the criticisms of his run on Wonder Woman so far and shares his thinking on the character.

I’ve never viewed the pace of the book as a problem. Plenty happens in the average issue, and there’s a fair amount of variety to it all. I do think that Rucka’s central antagonist, Veronica Cale, is dull, and her beef with Diana amounts to jealousy. Rucka disagrees:

“Veronica Cale looks at Diana and sees her as a fraud. Diana is a liar. She thinks that Diana is selling the world a bill of goods. She looks at Wonder Woman and sees a six foot-tow, drop dead gorgeous woman – who flies and bounces bullets off of her bracelets – and her answer is that everyone should just be nice to each other.

“For Veronica, that’s total bullshit. It all comes easy for Diana, but what about the people who have to scratch and tear and bleed and fight and work for everything that they get? What about the people who weren’t molded out of clay and blessed by gods? What about the people who have to work sucky, nine-to-five jobs, workout twice a day, and still can’t get rid of fifteen pounds? People can be just like Diana if they just want to be? For Veronica, that’s just bullshit.”

I don’t recall Veronica articulating it quite that way in the comics, aside from her assertion that Diana is a fraud. And that reference came in context of Veronica remembering her first encounter with Diana — showing up at a party where Diana was the center of attention.

Beyond that, it doesn’t seem like Veronica is paying much attention to what Diana’s message is. It’s never been her suggestion that people can be like her; she just thinks everyone is capable of elevating their own circumstances and improving the lives of people around them. (Veronica, having resorted to blackmail to fund her education, can certainly understand the concept of aggressively upgrading circumstances.)

So, I guess I’m still not buying Veronica as principled opposition, in part because she seems to base her view on a fairly juvenile misunderstanding of what Diana’s about. She seems to have created this image in her mind of Diana as the pretty princess who had it too damned easy, and if that’s not jealousy, I’m not sure what is.

I do like Rucka’s take on mythology, and his great way of summarizing mythical stories:

“The reasoning behind why Athena did what she did was that Poseidon and Medousa were meeting for their liaisons in Athena’s temple, after all of Athena’s clergy had taken vows of celibacy. So Athena’s a little pissed off, because Poseidon is thumbing his nose at her and her clergy while he uses her temple as his personal love shack.”

An interesting read, and another entry in the “writers defend their work” sweepstakes.

Boy, chaos sure makes Earth’s Mightiest talk salty, doesn’t it?

(The following contains spoilers.)

The death in Avengers #502 probably won’t be popular, but it certainly is smart.

If you’re trying to transition the Avengers from What They Are to Something Else, and a body count is part of your formula, Hawkeye is an ideal candidate. With one possible exception, he leads the pack of emblematic Avengers who aren’t the Big Three (Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor). He’s been around for most of the big events, and the bulk of his own big events have been confined to the Avengers titles. Taking him out of play is a decisive way of breaking from the past.

That dramatic function spares Hawkeye’s death from the “shock value” brand (though there are more than enough examples of that kind of passing in evidence, too). It can also support the argument that This Matters. It’s almost, for lack of a better term, ballsy.

I think many fans identified Hawkeye as the gateway character: the average guy who, through persistence, got to hang out with the big guns and be treated as an equal. With the exception of an ill-advised period as Goliath, he relied on skill to hold his own. No serums or mutant genes, no magic hammers or suits of armor, just a guy who worked really hard to be the best with a bow and some arrows. It’s an interesting, atypical example of super-heroic wish fulfillment, at least for Marvel. (DC seems to have more of these types.)

It might also explain why many identify themselves as follows: “I’m not much of an Avengers fan, but I’m a huge Hawkeye fan.” (This is the reason the clerk at the store was so grumpy yesterday, beyond the usual new book madness.) Even though he’s never been able to sustain a solo title, he’s the sentimental favorite.

Of course, he’s the sentimental favorite at least in part because he’s such an effective foil in a team book. Blunt, impulsive, and smart-alecky, he’s great counterpoint to the stalwart (Cap, Thor) and the spooky (Vision, the Scarlet Witch). Taken out of a group setting, he loses that value, and I’d guess that’s why readers who love to see him in a line-up are less enthusiastic when he goes off on his own.

(As a side note, I’m not sure how well the actual death sequence works in #502. The event is consistent with the day’s chaotic (we get it) quality, but the whole thing seems strangely… malnourished. Effective in principle, but less successful in terms of execution.)

So, good for Bendis for coming up with a death that doesn’t seem quite so rote or inconsequential. I’ll be interested to see how he explains the next Big Twist, if it’s what I think it is. With Hawkeye (and Vision, I guess) out of the way, that leaves the Scarlet Witch, pin-up girl for the Old Guard, to address. If Bendis is going in the direction I suspect, I hope he has something smart up his sleeve, because there are any number of ways it could go badly off the rails.

But, that’s something to think about next month.