OH GOD IT BURNS!!! Your Buyer's Guide to Bad Comics

BURN OINTMENT is an appendix series offering recommendations for further reading and general chatter inspired by the main episodes of the OH GOD IT BURNS!!! series. If you're looking for a full length discussion of Dark Knight III: The Master Race, go back and take a listen to our previous episode.

You know, it was only a matter of time before DC got wise to the fact that they didn’t really need Frank Miller to either write, plot, or be in any reasonable way creatively involved with a book for them to still make money off of it. All they needed was his precious, precious name, so just as our great Cheeto in Chief had once licensed his name off to towers, water bottles, and steaks, DC would do the same with old Frankie and pay him for his most valued asset – his name. After all, the company had been grooming its very own Frank Miller in a lab for years, and with the demand for sequels to beloved properties sky high, it was time to unleash Brian Azzarello so they could put that leash on Frank.

Dark Knight III: The Master Race succeeds in being a thoroughly competent follow-up to the original Dark Knight Returns, albeit missing all of the familiar insanity of its predecessors. Adam Kubert is on art doing his best Miller impersonation, and after a few issues (and a few very honest interviews where Miller flat out admitted that he had no involvement with the story), Frankie was even brought on to deliver some honestly stunning artwork and pen the back-up stories.

You’ve seen him at his best. You’ve seen him broken. You’ve seen him angry. But you’ve never seen Frank Miller quite like this before: under adult supervision. So get ready to hit the back-issue bins and snap up the series destined to restore balance to your coveted Longbox of Cursed and Forgotten Comics on this week’s rejuvenating episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!!

BURN OINTMENT is an appendix series offering recommendations for further  reading and general chatter inspired by the main episodes of the OH GOD  IT BURNS!!! series. If you're looking for a full length discussion of Holy Terror, go back and take a listen to our previous  episode.

Welcome back to the oven my crispy cousins for another episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!! Your buyer’s guide to bad comics.

Today on the pod we’re continuing our look at Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns universe with a slight twist: the title we’re covering today is not officially a Batman story. Some might call that cheating, but in order to fully understand why 2011’s Holy Terror has earned a spot on the list you’ll need to know about its very long and very interesting publication history where it was originally developed as a propaganda comic starring – you guessed it – Batman as he works side-by-side with his lover/freaky sex kitten Catwoman to seek revenge on Al-Qaeda following a devastating terror attack on Gotham City. It was to be a spiritual successor to books like Captain America #1, the cover of which depicts Cap knocking Hitler’s jaw off, but because Frank was still in a very dark place following the events of 9/11, it instead became something more vile and hateful, albeit with a very poignant message about how PTSD can infect the lives of the victims in very deep-rooted and incurable ways.

Understandably, DC no longer had any interest in affiliating Batman with this title, and Frank took this to his second home at Dark Horse to publish this as a standalone graphic novel with barely-tweaked costume designs to set them apart from their iconic DC spirit animals.

People love to hate on this book for its blatantly Islamophobic overtones, but those who read this for the story beyond the page will find a tale of redemption for Frank Miller as an artist. Following Dark Knight Strikes Again, it was clear that he had continued to deal with the fallout from the World Trade Center attacks, and that he had been carrying that anger knotted up in his gut for years, just looking for a solid pillow to scream it all out in. Holy Terror is that pillow, and that is why we believe this title deserves a spot in your coveted Longbox of Cursed and Forbidden comics, so listen along as Bruno and I detail the many therapeutic ways this book helped Frankie get his groove back on this week’s meditative episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!!

BURN OINTMENT is an appendix series offering recommendations for further reading and general chatter inspired by the main episodes of the OH GOD IT BURNS!!! series. If you're looking for a full length discussion of Dark Knight Strikes Again, go back and take a listen to our previous episode. 

Hello again my crispy cousins, and welcome back to another episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!! Your Buyer’s Guide to Bad Comics.

Without a doubt Frank Miller wrote two of the most influential comics of all time when he dropped Batman Year One and Dark Knight Returns barely within a year of one another. It was an amazing time, made even more amazing by the fact that in those same years we saw the release of Alan Moore’s Watchmen, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, JM DeMatteis’ Spider-Man: Kraven’s Last Hunt, and oh – what’s this? – oh, yeah, that’s just some other Frank Miller comic called Daredevil Born Again. No biggie.

All of these comics were collectively responsible for legitimizing the medium comics as a genuine literary artform, and I don’t know if you were keeping count, but out of the six stories I mentioned above, our boy Frankie accounted for 50% of them. So when I say that 1986 showcased Frank Miller in his prime, understand that this man was almost single-handedly responsible for changing the industry for the better – and for the worse.

2001’s Dark Knight Strikes Again definitely falls into the worse category, and it does so in what has become one of most psychologically tortured, erratic, and drug fueled journeys into misery ever published. And we owe it all to Osama Bin Laden. If Bane broke the Bat, it was 9/11 that broke the Frank, and for anybody who has dared to endure this book to the last page, it is evident that this series is a masterwork in creative self-destruction, and one that is an absolutely essential addition to your coveted Longbox of Cursed and Forbidden Comics, not only for how it so thoroughly disgraces its predecessor on the surface, but also for how it stands as heart-wrenching metaphor for how the great indominable American spirit was emotionally shattered in the face of such real-world existential evil.

Bruno and I cover all the bases and leave no stone unturned as we agonize over Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Strikes Again on this week’s episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!!

Welcome back to OH GOD IT BURNS!!! Your buyer’s guide to bad comics.

The episode you are about to pipe into your ear holes is a rebroadcast of our first episode in the Miller Time series, which takes a deep dive into the depraved and maniacal world of Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns universe, starting with the beautifully psychotic mess that is All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder. Why a rebroadcast? Because the collector in me goes absolutely nuts when there's a gap in a story, especially one that's as Dan DiDio-sized as the past few episodes. 

While the title of this series makes it seem like we’re in for a world of whimsical fisticuffs and other brazen acts of derring-do, this series pulls an impressive magic act switcheroo and instead feeds us what is essentially a 10-issue manifesto on how Batman is actually a borderline terrorist child abuser with a hard on for hero hating. Also, he says stuff like “whirling dervish” and “why the fuck you feeding the kid cheeseburgers, Alfred! He’s supposed to be hunting rats!”

Seriously guys, there are so so many reasons this series deserves space in your coveted Longbox of Cursed and Forbidden Comics – as does, by extension all other entries in Frankie’s Dark Knight Returns universe - but if I started listing them off here we’d never actually get to the show. So without further ado, I am proud to re-present to you our first episode in Miller Time as we watch the all-star train wreck that is All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder on this week’s episode of OH GOD IT BURNS!!!

Hello again everyone and welcome back to OH GOD IT BURNS!!! - your buyer’s guide to bad comics.

Regular listeners of the pod may remember a few weeks back when I had our first-ever guest Jason on the show to talk about the sudden departure of Dan DiDio from DC comics. What you probably didn’t know is that we actually met to talk about a bad comic that he holds near and dear to his heart. It was my feeble attempt to maintain productivity while Bruno and his lovely girlfriend and Ben Folds enthusiast Lilith were out of town at a food and wine festival. And because Jason had done such an amazing job on that episode I said “what the hell! Let’s go ahead and record your episode anyway,” much to the chagrin of my wife, who is exceptionally loving and understanding – except in situations when I don’t communicate this with her and make her wait an additional 2 hours for the dinner I promised I’d make.

Yeah, I know, I messed up, but you know who didn’t mess up? Jason. This guy’s a beast when it comes to obscure comics knowledge, and since he’s a wee bit older than both Bruno and I, he actually got me reading something that was published before the year 2000, which is something I’ll forever be indebted to him for. And that comic was the six-part Iron Man/War Machine/Force Works crossover titled Hands of the Mandarin! Starring – you guessed it! – everyone’s favorite evil Asian stereotype and longtime Iron Man villain – the Mandarin! And this time, he’s got different hands!

So get ready to add another mighty Marvel mistake to your Longbox of Cursed and Forbidden Comics as we peek back into the times before Tony Stark had his coming out party, and back when it was OK to write a black man like the only exposure you had to African Americans was that one scene from Airplane when the old lady knew how to speak jive. Ya dig, m’man? So listen up, homie, as we party down with Hands of the Mandarin on this week’s episode of…

Having just covered our reactions to the news that Dan Didio had left DC (which you can listen to in the previous episode), we felt that it was necessary to take a short break from Frank Miller’s tragic sequels to the Dark Knight Returns universe, and focus our attention briefly on some of the worst stories to be published under Didio’s watch. Thankfully, we didn’t have to put too much extra work into it, since we had already recorded and handful of unpublished episodes that we decided were too rough to ever see the light of day, but now seem pretty relevant, and among them were 2009’s 7-issue superhero tribute to misery porn, Justice League: Cry for Justice by legendary writer James Robinson, and it’s follow-up Rise of Arsenal by JT Krul.

As we touched on last episode, following fan outcry to DC comics putting the kibosh on Batwoman’s marriage, Dan DiDio took to the forums and responded to fans thusly:

“Heroes shouldn’t have happy personal lives. They are committed to being that person and committed to defending others at the sacrifice of their own personal interests. That’s very important and something we reinforced. It’s wonderful that they try to establish personal lives, but it’s equally important that they set them aside. That is our mandate, that is our edict and that is our stand.”

For my money – and yours – there’s no series that better exemplifies DiDio’s Decree and how horribly it can backfire than Justice League: Cry for Justice. So join Bruno and I as we cry, shout justice, and cry while shouting justice in the series that is destined to stand out as the crown jewel in your longbox of cursed and forbidden comics on this week’s episode of…

OH GOD IT BURNS!!! A Buyer's Guide to Bad Comics.