Worth Reading: DC's Batman: Last Knight on Earth

I usually post short reviews to Amazon; this summer, I thought I'd try some blog posts.

Batman: Last Knight on Earth
https://www.dccomics.com/graphic-novels/batman-last-knight-on-earth-2019/batman-last-knight-on-earth

Billed as "The Last BATMAN Story Ever Told...," Snyder and Capullo's series Batman: Last Knight on Earth (now collected in a hardcover edition) builds on their last arc of the New 52's Batman series.

Batman: Last Knight on Earth positions a new Batman/Bruce Wayne to rise to become a hero in a potential future of the DCU. It is a bleak world (rather like DCeased and Justice League Dark: Apokolips War), but there is a lot of hope in the end (and some intriguing use of the Joker character).

See below for DC's teaser trailer for the series:

IJoCA for Fall/Winter 2017

One more issue to catch up on:

Here are rhe contents for the Fall/Winter 2017 number of IJoCA. Again, the listing is reproduced from the journal's blog at http://ijoca.blogspot.com/2018/03/international-journal-of-comic-art-vol.html.

International Journal of Comic Art Vol. 19, No. 2 Fall/Winter 2017
Editor's Notes
John A. Lent
1

Applying the Lasso of Truth to The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore
Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson
8

Of Politics and Presidents in William Moulton Marston's Wonder Woman
Trina Robbins
46

Saudi Arabia's Role in Advancing Comics
Afra S. Alshiban
51

Re-imagining the Ku Klux Klan in Chinese Media through the 1950s
Patrick Nash
78

The Film Noir's Aesthetics in a Graphic Novel: The Case of Angelus Hostis (2012)
Wladimir Chavez Vaca
97

In the Past the Devil Has Won: Analysis of Seishi Kishimoto's Satan and Savior in 0-Parts Hunter
Robyn Johnson
124

Comics in an Unexpected Place: Mongolia
Dan Erdenebal
148

The History of Gay Male Comics in the United States from Before Stonewall to the 21st Century
Sina Shamsavari
163

Drawing Memories. The "Comics for Identity" Project in Argentina as an Ethical and Aesthetical Challenge
Pablo Turnes
202

Scalpels and Pens:
Tools of Brazilian Surgeon/Cartoonist Ronaldo Cunha Dias
John A. Lent
213

Women in Cartoons -- Liang Baibo and the Visual Representations of Women in Modern Sketch
Martina Caschera
224

By the Power of Lailies: History and Evolution of Women Characters in Bangladeshi Comics
Tahseen Salman Choudhury
253

A Tribute to Trizophrenia: Sport in Jef Mallett's Comic Strip "Frazz"
Jeffrey 0. Segrave
John A. Cosgrove
269

Wang Zimei and Sun Zhijun: Cartoonists Hidden in Chinese History
John A. Lent and Xu Ying
286

Peak TV and Anime: Why It Matters
Northrop Davis
311

Modular, Proportional, Patterning: Representation of Zhang Guangyu's Ornamental Style in His Comics
Hongyan Sun
341

History and Popular Memory. Alternative Chronicle of Mexico City in the Comics of Gabriel Vargas
Laura Nallely Hernandez Nieto
Ivan Facundo Rubinstein
357

Art and Avarice: Tracing Careers in the Indian Comics World
Jeremy Stoll
372

A Turkish Comic Strip: "Abdtilcanbaz"
Tolga Erkan
381

Pang Bangben: "This Old Man Can Do All Kinds of Art"
John A. Lent and Xu Ying
403

Major Lazer: Animation in Electronic Music as a Transmedia Resource
Citlaly Aguilar Campos
415

First Lesson of the Sea, Always Bring a Spare Pencil: Analyzing Navy Culture through Cold War Cartoons
Patrick Shank
428

Sequence Side of Cergam: A Case Study of "Kraman" by Teguh Santosa
Toni Masdiono and lwan Zahar
466

The Printed Word
John A. Lent
475

Book Reviews
John A. Lent
Janis Breckenridge
Mel Gibson
Michael Rhode
483

Exhibition and Media Reviews
Edited by Michael Rhode
493

Thoughts on Wonder Woman: Earth One

Grant Morrison's Wonder Woman: Earth One (2016) offers an interesting new take on the origin of the popular character. The Earth One series is sort of modern version of the Elseworlds imprint and presents contemporary reinterpretations of DCs various heroes.

Wonder Woman: Earth One is a new origin for Wonder Woman best received by mature readers. It pays much homage to past representations of the character of Princess Diana if Themyscria and her legend while also largely updating the figure for today by focusing on the need for the Amazons to concern themselves with Man's World once more. However, there are some issues to be aware of.

First up, purists might take offense that Steve Trevor is now an African American soldier sent specifically in search of Paradise Island by the U. S. military. In Morrison's defense, he is still a good character, and the changes are not much of big deal in an era of race-free casting. Plus, Morrison makes his background a central part of his willingness to help Diana.

Second, and most disturbing, the book relishes in images of violence and (especially) bondage. Morrison seems to include these aspects to link back to Marston's original concepts for the character, but they are very unsettling and push the book into more adult territory.

Finally,  the book also rewrites the myth of Diana's creation, a now frequent occurrence, and (spoiler warning) makes her a mythological test tube baby formed from combining one of Hippolyta's egg with sperm taken from Hercules, the Amazon's oppressor millennia ago.

Further information on the book at http://www.dccomics.com/graphic-novels/wonder-woman-earth-one-2016/wonder-woman-earth-one-vol-1.

Kid-Friendly Origin of the Justice League

DC has begun to extend the Justice League franchise into alternate media, including a new ongoing series of children's books, of which the following is the first. Sadly. its not the best translation from the comics page:

Rosen, Lucy. Justice League: Meet the Justice League. Pictures by Steven E. Gordon. Colors by Eric A. Gordon. I Can Read! 2. New York: Harper-HarperCollins Children’s Books-HarperCollins, 2013. Print. 978-0-06-221002-9

Inspired by the first story of the Justice League of America from The Brave and the Bold No. 28 (February-March 1960), Justice League: Meet the Justice League recounts the formation of the Justice League when Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman—the stars of an earlier series of books in the I Can Read! series—enlist Aquaman, Flash (presumably Barry Allen), Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), and Martian Manhunter to thwart the plans of Starro (a relatively obscure villain from the team’s sixty-plus-year history) for world domination. The art is unexceptional and not truly representative of the characters’ comic book origins, and, at some points, figures appear grossly out of proportion and/or distorted.

Wonder Woman Documentary

A head's up from the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly:

PBS is currently airing a film called Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines. More details at http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/wonder-women/.

Trailer follows:

Watch Coming Soon to Independent Lens: Wonder Women! on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.

Wonder Woman for Kids

Both Stone Arch and Harper's I Can Read series have recently tackled the origin of Wonder Woman. Both do a good job with the story and offer a nice balance of old and new. (Stone Arch also has additional adventures of Wonder Woman; details at http://www.capstonepub.com/product/9781434226518.)

Dahl, Michael. Trial of the Amazons. Illus. Dan Schoening. DC Super Heroes: Wonder Woman. Minneapolis and San Diego: Stone Arch Books-Capstone, 2010. 56 pp. 978-1-4342-2263-3

Retells the origin of Wonder Woman and details how the Amazon princess Diana, by showing “not only bravery and strength, but also […] kindness, fairness, and self-sacrifice,” proved herself worthy of being her people’s emissary in the outside world (43). Her mission, as it has always been, is to aid humanity in its ongoing struggle with the war god Ares and, as Diana vows, “lead the mortals to peace and harmony” (18).

Dahl’s story also includes two nods to older fans of Wonder Woman. First, Diana is prompted, at least in part, to leave her home in order to see a wounded pilot (obviously meant to be Steve Trevor), whose plane has crashed nearby Themyscira, returned safely to his home, and, second, Dahl makes use the Invisible Jet as one of Wonder Woman’s tools to be employed in achieving her goals.

The book concludes with brief histories of Hippolyta, Diana’s mother, and of the Amazons, a glossary, discussion questions, and writing prompts



 

Stein, Erin K. WonderWoman: I Am Wonder Woman. Illus. Rick Farley. I Can Read Level 2. N.p.: Harper-HarperCollinsPublishers, 2010. 32 pp. 978-0-06-188517-4

Stein’s Wonder Woman: I Am Wonder Woman is an account of Wonder Woman’s origins and career as told by the hero herself. Princess Diana of Paradise Island, seeking “to fight for justice,” wins a contest among her Amazon sisters to be the gods’ champion in the world, for, as she explains, “Mankind needed someone to keep the world safe” (9, 6). 

As Wonder Woman, Diana is granted a variety of powers and tools, including the Invisible Jet, to achieve her mission. 

In keeping with popular conceptions of the character, Wonder Woman also describes her life as Diana Prince, her mundane alter ego, and in further homage to the television show, notes how she spins to effect a transformation between her two identities. 

The final pages show Wonder Woman in action and describe her relationship with fellow heroes Superman and Batman.

Justice League New 52

Geoff John's Justice League was the first book of the New 52 and presents a new version of the team's origin for a post 9/11 world.The core of the team is an expected group--Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Hal Jordan's Green Lantern, Barry Allen's Flash, and Aquaman--but Cyborg is added to the roster, perhaps in effort to add diversity to the team, suggesting that the Titans or Young Justice are no longer feeder programs for the League (a curious omission given the popularity of the Young Justice series on The Cartoon Network). As relatively untried figures (the Age of Heroes in the New 52 books began about six years ago), the heroes are all engaging characters and the interactions between the members of the nascent team are interesting and, at times, humorous.

In a story set five years in the past, the series opens with super-powered beings being (rather like the X-Men) hated and feared by the world they are sworn to protect, but the world comes to recognize that (at least) some of these individuals are heroes, when America is suddenly attacked by (essentially) terrorists from Apokolips. Darkseid is the villain of the first arc--recently collected in hardcover as Origin--and is collecting organic matter (i.e. human beings) from across the universe (or, possibly, the multiverse) as an element of an as yet undefined grand scheme, but part of Darkseid's mission is revealed: he seeks to recover his missing (wayward?) daughter (!). The heroes--Cyborg is especially instrumental here--come together to defeat Darkseid and his minions and are recognized as positive forces, an occasion that leads into the series proper. Issue No. 6 concludes with an epilogue that ties into the earlier Flashpoint series and presents both Pandora (a new character to the DCU) and the Phantom Stranger in conflict and referencing a "Third Sinner" (they are the First and Second, as revealed in later stories) and setting the stage for future storylines. Extra material in the collected edition continues this trend of future looking and references the upcoming "Curse of Shazam" storyline.

Ages of Wonder Woman Collection CFP

Still seeking proposals earlier this month:

Collection: The Ages of Wonder Woman
Edited by Joseph J. Darowski
Publisher: McFarland & Company

Please circulate and post widely

The editor of The Ages of Wonder Woman is seeking abstracts for essays which could potentially be included in the upcoming collection. This collection will be a companion volume to The Ages of Superman. The essays should examine the relationships between Wonder Woman comic books and the period of American history when those comics were published. Analysis may demonstrate how the stories found in Wonder Woman comic books (and the creators who produced the comics) embrace, reflect, or critique aspects of their contemporary culture.

Essays should focus on stories from Wonder Woman’s comic book adventures, not media adaptations of the character. Furthermore, essays should look at a single period of comic book history, rather than drawing comparisons between different publication eras. For example, an essay that analyzed Wonder Woman comics from the early 1960s and contextualized them with what was happening in American society would be more likely to be accepted than an essay that contrasted Wonder Woman comic books from the 1940s with Wonder Woman comic books from the 1980s. The completed essays should be 12-15 double-spaced pages.

Some possible topics for essays include, but are not limited to, the following:

William Marston’s Controversial Feminine Ideal; Wonder Woman Joins the Justice Society of America…as Their Secretary?; The World War II American Patriot from Themyscira; From Fearless Worker to Anxious Lover: Wonder Woman’s Transition after World War II; DC Comics’ Response to Wertham’s Allegations; Superwoman: The Evil Wonder Woman from Another Dimension; A Powerless Fashion Boutique Owner: DC Comics Tries to Modernize Wonder Woman; Silver Swan and Dr. Cyber: Wonder Woman’s Enemies Just Want to be Pretty; Superman vs. Wonder Woman: Superpowered Gender Roles in the 1970s; “Gods and Mortals”: Wonder Woman’s Introduction to the Modern World of the Late 1980s; Wonder Woman Versus Storm: The Gender Politics of Inter-Company Crossovers; Politics, Discord, and a Nation Divided in “Paradise Lost”; Alex Ross and Paul Dini’s “Spirit of Truth”: Wonder Woman and Global Concepts of Femininity; Trinity: The Roles of Wonder Woman, Batman, and Superman in the DC Universe; “Rise of the Olympians”: Defense Versus Aggression on the World Stage; The New 52: DC Reimagines Wonder Woman for the Present Day

Abstracts (100-500 words) and CVs should be submitted by April 1, 2012
Please submit via email to Joseph Darowski, darowskij@byui.edu.

Joseph Darowski
Brigham Young University-Idaho
525 S. Center
Rigby Hall 122
Rexburg, ID 83460
Phone: (517) 281-3275
Email: darowskij@byui.edu