Change!

All right, AFB.  If you've set your imaginary browsers to bookmark this blog, then I've got another one for you to bookmark.  Or to at least edit the bookmark for this site to go to that site.  Or whatever.  Do what you want.  Imaginary fans can be so fickle sometimes.

Anyway, I've been thinking that a blog entitled Smitch Loves Movies that lately talks almost exclusively about Wednesday Theology really doesn't jive that well.  So I've been working on correcting that.  With that, I now ask you all to please direct your attention to the official Wednesday Theology blog.

Exciting, isn't it?

If you ever want to peruse previous WedTheo posts, don't worry.  I've already moved them all over to the new site.  I've got your back, AFB.  Just like you've got mine.

But what about this site?  Will it go away?  Well, no.  It will probably revert to it's previous status of never being updated.  But if it is ever updated, hopefully it will talk once again about movies.  And then the title might actually make sense again.

Speaking of movie news, have you heard the recent rumors that after Daniel Craig finishes his run as James Bond, Idris Elba might be considered for the role?  I love that idea!  Likely, the idea of a black 007 would stir some controversy, but who cares about that?  Watch the BBC series Luther and you will likewise be eager to see Elba with a license to kill.

Also, the season finale of Doctor Who is tomorrow!

Okay, now go check out Wednesday Theology.

CFP: On the Scholarship of Religion and Comic Books

I'm taking this straight from A. David Lewis' website.

Call for Papers: On the Scholarship of Religion and Comic Books

Popular Culture Association / American Culture Association

April 11-14, 2012
Boston, MA

Area: Religion & Culture, Comics & Comic Art (joint session)
Moderator: A. David Lewis (Boston University)

Overview:  The last half-dozen years have seen an explosion in U.S. publications addressing the intersection of religion and comics, but little has been said on the body of work taken as a whole. Outside of individual reviews, rarely are these works discussed in terms of their applications, their intertextuality, their audiences, their shortcomings, or the new questions they raise. This panel is to act as a forum addressing either portions of these works, entire books, their shared space, or the next steps to which they may all lead. In addition to the print publications recommended below, this panel also invites reflections on some of the websites and blogs conducting similar work, also listed:

Books: Superheroes: Religion and Popular Culture (2005), Up, Up, and Oy Vey (2006), Our Gods Wear Spandex (2007), Superheroes and Gods: A Comparative Study from Babylonia to Batman (2007), Disguised as Clark Kent (2007), Holy Superheroes! Revised and Expanded Edition (2008), From Krakow to Krypton: Jews and Comic Books (2008), The Jewish Graphic Novel: Critical Approaches (2008), Jews and American Comics (2008), India’s Immortal Comic Books: Gods, Kings, and Other Heroes (2009), Graven Images: Religion in Comic Books and Graphic Novels (2010), Supergods (2011), The Seven Spiritual Laws of the Superhero (2011), Do the Gods Wear Capes? (2011)

Online: ComicAttack.net “Comics Are My Religion” columns, ComicBookBin.com “Religion and Comics” columns, By Rao! Religion and Religion site, Jewish Comics blog, Faith in Four Colors site

Other English-language, U.S. market pieces of scholarship may be considered, but the focus should remain on already-produced analysis, not on works-in-progress nor on the comics themselves. Submissions should be thoughtful reflections on how these pieces function, what opportunities they present, where they may fail, and what has been overlooked.

Abstracts of 100-250 words, a C.V., and brief bio are due by December 1 to ADL at bu dot edu for consideration.

-----------------------

See? I'm not alone in my crazy obsession with this topic!  There are others out there.  You should be afraid.

The First Truth of Batman

Warning: this is going to get rather sentimental.  But it's okay.  It's also going to contain a lot of Batman.

Maybe the most powerful aspect of stories is how we can relate to them.  A story can be absolutely outlandish, absurd and impossible, but still be good, if the reader can connect to it.  It doesn't even have to be a big connection.  Sometimes the smallest correlation between the story and the reader's life can make the biggest impact.

And sometimes that impact doesn't occur until long after we have finished with the story.  Narratives are meant to stick with us.  They linger in the recesses of the mind, ready to pop right back into our recollection whenever needed.  Many times when we first read a story we can find some aspect that reminds us of experiences we've had in life.  Sometimes, though, it is life that reminds us of a story.

This is one of those times.

Sacrilegious Comics

I don’t think there’s a built-in conflict or controversial element between comics and religion. But, like film, it’s a visual medium, and it invites spectacle. Unlike film, though, it’s far less policed and less corporately involved, so more extreme — and, yes, more sacrilegious — works can make it through to the market. Frankly, being sacrilegious isn’t a bad thing in and of itself; there can still be a great and entertaining story there. There can even be a useful message to or between religious communities. It’s when a work sets out to insult or persecute another group when the line must be drawn. Personally, I don’t think either Preacher or Chosen crosses that line.

- A. David Lewis

In the Name of God

They do this in the name of God?
How could they think their God would approve of this?
But how could that same God take my mother and father from me?

- Red Robin #22

by Fabian Nicieza and Freddie Williams II

Made-Up Story, You Idiot!

"People say kids can't understand the difference between fact and fiction, but that's bulls--t," he says. "Kids understand that real crabs don't sing like the ones in The Little Mermaid. But you give an adult fiction, and the adult starts asking really f--king dumb questions like 'How does Superman fly? How do those eyebeams work? Who pumps the Batmobile's tires?' It's a f--king made-up story, you idiot! Nobody pumps the tires!"

- Rolling Stone interview with Grant Morrison

A Poisoned Story

Savoy: So what's special about Jud Suss?
Lizzie: Goebbels turned it inside out. Turned it into its own opposite. Tommy! Tommy where are you?
Savoy: Don't evade the question, lady.
Lizzie: I"m not. It was a novel written by a Jew from a Jewish perspective. It became the most successful anti-Semitic movie of all time. Think about it.
Savoy: I'm thinking. Nothing is happening.
Lizzie: It's a canker. If you torture a story, it turns into a canker. This whole place formed around it--that's how powerful it is.

Lizzie: It--Wilson calls it a canker. It happens when a story gets corrupted or complicated too much. When the energy inside it gets poisoned.
Tom: So this is because of Goebbels? Because of the movie?
Lizzie: It's because of the contradictions. In the novel, Suss sins, but finds salvation through his religion. In the movie, he's just a monster. When enough people had seen the movie--there was a crisis. An imbalance.

 - The Unwritten #11

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

My Deal with Stories

So I was eating at Taco Bell the other day with a member of the AFB (Avid Fan Base).  All right, all right, you got me.  There is no AFB outside of the stories I tell about the AFB.  Well, this is one of those stories about the AFB.  Anyway, while I'm starting to munch on my delicious gordita that came with my $2 Meal Deal, the AFB asks me a question.  And, for simplicity's sake, I'm just going to refer to this one particular member of the imaginary AFB as a personification of the entire AFB.  Wait, how is that simple?  Shh...you're interrupting the story.

The Song of Roland

Tom: It was a long time ago, Savoy. Twelve hundred years or so. The emperor Charlemagne had been campaigning in Spain, which was in Saracen hands. He won a lot of big victories. But on the way home, his rear guard was attacked at Roncevaux Pass and wiped out to a man. Someone wrote a song about it, and it hit the top of the charts. That's why this place was on the map. Not because of the battle, but because someone told the story of the battle.

- The Unwritten #6

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Tom: If it even happened.
Savoy: Wikipedia doesn't lie, Tom.
Tom: The point is, nobody knows. They only know what's in the poem. The Song of Roland. The song was like medieval viral marketing. It spread across Europe, and stirred up anti-Muslim feeling wherever it was sung. French kings led army after army into Spain to make it Chrisitan again. Partly because that song kept the old wounds open and hurting.

- The Unwritten #7

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Tom: Savoy, just listen, okay? There never was any young, heroic Sir Roland. There was a fat, middle-aged baron named Hruodland who got shot off his horse in some stupid border skirmish. The rest is just the usual patriotic bulls--t. Great poetry, but still--bulls--t.

- The Unwritten #9

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

I Heard Only Silence

My Mom was a little religious, my Dad not at all.
So when she was killed--and my Dad was left in a coma--I didn't have a strong foundation of faith to turn to.
By the time my father was killed--then so many of my friends--all I had left to turn to was anger. It was easier than believing in a God who had let that happen.
But anger solved little and when the world was in crisis--
--I prayed.
I heard only silence.
So I confessed my sins...and realized I had none.
How could someone who tried so hard to be good--did so much for so many people--be asked to endure so much?
...God works in mysterious ways...

- Red Robin #22

by Fabian Nicieza and Freddie Williams II

You're a Character in a Book

Tom: Look, you're not real. You can't be.
Frankenstein's Monster: You said the same thing to the cat. It seems a foolish thing to say, in the face of such compelling evidence.
Tom: You're a character in a book. A really old book that nobody reads. You standing there--talking--it's like a bad joke. If you're real, then Br'er Rabbit is real. And Dracula. And the Tooth Fairy.
Frankenstein's Monster: And--Christ, perhaps.
Tom: Yeah. Him, too.

- The Unwritten #7

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Superman, Canon, and Gospels

 
Greetings, AFB!  That's Avid Fan Base, to those of you not in the know.  And if you are a part of the Avid Fan Base, then you absolutely know what I call you because the Avid Fan Base exists totally in my head.  It's all imaginary.  But just because it's imaginary doesn't mean it isn't real.  I mean, here I am, writing about the AFB.  And there you are, reading about the AFB.

Anyway, let's talk about stories about Superman.  And let's talk about stories about Jesus.  And then let's talk about how Superman can teach us to value stories about Jesus that were not written down by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

This may get a tad heretical.  Consider yourself warned.

As True As Any Other

C-3PO: ...Freedom attracts oppressors and power corrupts. But good won over evil and hope was restored. A hope that started with a young boy on a desolate world. There...see? I told you I wasn't very good at telling stories.
Remoh: Is the story true?
C-3PO: As true as any other.

- "Storyteller" in Star Wars Tales #19

by Jason Hall and Paul Lee

Greek Translation

Sarge: Probably, but, I mean, that wasn't even his real name...his name was Joshua...She's all in my face about a Greek translation.
Stacy: His name was Josh Christ?
Sarge: Naw, he was like Josh Lipshitz or something, some Jewish name...Christ just means Messiah...
Stacy: Hmm...how do you know all this, Sergeant Davies?
Sarge: Because I'm a detective, I investigate things.  It's my nature.

- Gotham Central #4

by Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark

Window Into Another Universe

The comics medium is a very specialized area of the Arts, home to many rare and talented blooms and flowering imaginations and it breaks my heart to see so many of our best and brightest bowing down to the same market pressures which drive lowest-common-denominator blockbuster movies and television cop shows. Let's see if we can call time on this trend by demanding and creating big, wild comics which stretch our imaginations. Let's make living breathing, sprawling adventures filled with mind-blowing images of things unseen on Earth. Let's make artefacts that are not faux-games or movies but something other, something so rare and strange it might as well be a window into another universe because that's what it is.

- Grant Morrison

The Only Thing Worth Dying For

Tom: It's--It's a story. It's just a story, man. It's not worth dying for!
Count: Just a story? Tell that to the Greeks who fought at Troy, Tommy.
Tom: Wh-What?
Count: Tell the women burned as witches. The Rosenbergs. Sacco and Vanzetti. Tell the martyrs of all the religions and the millions who fell in all the wars since time began. Stories are the only thing worth dying for!

- The Unwritten # 1

by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Aren't they all?

This is an IMAGINARY STORY...         Aren't they all?

- Superman: Whatever Happened 

to the Man of Tomorrow?

Wednesday Theology. Wait. What?

Okay, okay.  I've been getting asked by a lot of people lately exactly what Wednesday Theology is.  Actually, that's not true at all.  No one's been asking me that.  But sometimes I like to pretend that I have an avid fan base.  And in my imagination, said fan base would be so intrigued by the notion of this Wednesday Theology that they would incessantly ask me about it to the point where I thought it would just be best to talk about it here for the benefit for everyone.  Everyone being, in this case, an imaginary fan base.  Hey, they may be imaginary, but at least they're avid.

Excuse me while I google "avid" to make sure I'm using that right.

Yup, we're golden.

 

Comics, Metafiction, Theology. The Things I Normally Think About

So I finished Grant Morrison's run on Animal Man today.  Did I tell you this already?  Oh well.  I knew it got trippy at the end, but I didn't know just how much.  Especially since it started out so mundane and, well, mostly normal.  It didn't seem like anything to special.  Until the end of the run of 26 issues when it began folding back to things happening in the very first few issues.  The dude had it all planned out.  Or at least tied it all back together.

It was a wonderful piece of meta fiction.  Animal Man eventually begins to realize he is in a comic book, and the last issue is him and Morrison talking about that fact.  Yeah, and it also deals with a lot of the Crisis On Infinite Earth maxi-series in the 80's where DC tried to reconjigger their continuities so it all kinda made sense.  This inevitably led to many old and obscure characters being completely wiped from the existence/history on the in-story continuity of the DC Universe.  Except in Animal Man there's one crazy guy that remembers it all, and his memories start to bring them back to life.

 

Theology? Comic Books? Absolutely!

"I saw into another world and it was worse than this one.  It was like I glimpsed Heaven and...and it wasn't paradise.  It was more like Hell.                                                                                             What if God, or whoever it is, created us to be better than himself?  What if God's reality...Heaven, if you like...what if it's so bad that he had to imagine us to help make his life bearable?"                                                                                                                                                                       - Animal Man #19

Illness

So, I'm sick.

No surprise there.  I get sick all the time.  Well, not all the time, but more frequently than most people.  And then it takes me an unusual time to recover.  My immune system hates me.

So, I've been sick all week.  No fun.  But good news!  I may be on the mend.  And I sincerely hope I'm not jinxing myself by saying that.  I am definitely more alert now and not as incredibly exhausted as I have been all week.  Like, if I had to fight off a bear in self defense....well, I would solidly lose that battle because he would be a bear and I'm just a human.  But my death by bear mauling could be chalked up entirely to that and not because I'm under the weather.

Ok.  That is probably a poor illustration.  The point is I think I'm starting to feel a little bit better.  And every little bit helps.

And I would totally lose in a battle to the death with a bear.

The Continuing Adventures of Angle the Angel

"This is getting stupid!" shouted Pastor.

"Just keep shooting!" Angle hollered back.

Angle was an Angel.  In many languages his name and form of being was not humorous.  In English it was rather humorous.  Angle did not find this fact very humorous at all.

Now, the natural form of an angel is utterly terrifying to most people.  Witnesses to such a sight are immediately overcome with uncontrollable fear, panic, and involuntary bowel movements.  For this reason an angel will spend most of his time visiting Earth in the assumed guise of a human, unless he's heralding a divine decree and needs the audience to unquestionably know just what sort of being is before them.

Angle spent a lot of time on Earth.  But he had never settled on a particular human appearance that he fancied.  He constantly tweaked his form by growing, shrinking, thinning, fattening, and outright changing his entire look on occasion.  Currently his form closely resembled Tom Selleck.  Tom Selleck without a mustache, anyway.  Except Tom Selleck without a mustache doesn't really look anything like Tom Selleck at all.

And this is exactly what Angle looked like.