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Thanks for pointing out that blog by John Austin. I’m pretty shocked and disappointed by his narrow minded approach to writing the Shazam!/Captain Marvel movie. I mean, I’m not saying we should always adhere to the classics or that just because something is old means that it is good, but to flat out say that all old comics suck by virtue of being old, he is coming across more like an annoying child than a professional screenwriter. He makes it even worse by applying it to classic television.

During the character’s hey-day, Captain Marvel was outselling every other character on the market. There are reasons for this and, even if the comics seem irrelevant today, going back to the old Captain Marvel comics should give Austin as sense of the character’s history and the core of what made him so popular. He is obviously willing to do the research by reading comics from the last few years, so I don’t see why it would be so hard for him to spend an afternoon cracking open Showcase: Shazam.

I’ve never been sold on the idea of a Captain Marvel movie and now I’m definitely not looking forward to it. I’ll reconsider my stance if the movie ever actually happens, but I’ll spend the meantime enjoying Captain Marvel stories from all eras.

I agree- Captain Marvel is one of my favorite characters, so the thought of having on the big screen made me smile. Then I read Austin’s reading list- he actually liked the Winick stuff? And CC Beck’s stories and art suck? And most of his readers agree. Sad, just sad.

As he said in the blog, since Cap is unfamiliar to most people, he has the chance to shape the public’s perception of the character. So true, and so sad. But then again, I guess I should have expected too much from the guy who wrote the two “Charlie’s Angels” movies.

The list isn’t great, but what he says under the “Why I’m not including the vintage collections” heading is outright shocking. Referring to collections of older stories like the archives and the recent Showcase book:

“So every time I read one of these, I’m struck with the same realization I encounter trying to watch The Honeymooners or a black-and-white movie: Wow. Old things suck.

Yes, I know that will piss off the vintage comics fans, who insist that the original incarnations are the purest forms of a character. But what you quickly realize is that old-time comic books were awkwardly written, crudely drawn, and bewilderingly inconsistent with their rules. They were making up the art form as they went along, and today’s comic books are better for the accumulated wisdom.”

Truthfully, some of what he says in that second paragraph is true, but that’s only because it applies to any medium. It’s what he says in the first paragraph that makes me lose any hope in this project or, frankly, any project he might be associated with. It’s the bizarre “It’s old so it sucks” mentality that baffles me and makes me doubt a person’s creative abilities.

So the guy hates black and white movies?

BTW it’s John August

Also on the DC Archive front The Captain Marvel books are behind. According to diehard Cap fans the REALLY good stuff hasn’t been collected yet. The original Monster Society of Evil story hasn’t been collected.

I feel that it’s worth mentioning that he feels that Winick wrote Day of Vengeance. Just Sayin’

And I apologize for using feel twice in the same sentence.

I can’t stand Winnick as a writer, generally, and First Thunder wasn’t all that bad.

The Eclipso story wasn’t all that good though.

And the Ordway stuff is good.

Most importantly, in my mind is that he focuses in on the Johns stuff, which is probably the best take of the “Billy in the driver’s seat” version of the character. Which I still think is more interesting and has more possibilities than the alternative.

And even more important is the fact that if he uses Black Adam, we’d probably get the three dimensional version and not the cartoon one.

“I feel that it’s worth mentioning that he feels that Winick wrote Day of Vengeance. Just Sayin’”

He wrote the Superman/Cap vs Eclipso story that was collected in the trade.

All I’m saying is if Retard Cap is in this movie count me out.

“So the guy hates black and white movies?”

Yeah, that kinda floored me too.

The guy is a screenwriter. He writes for the screen. Of course, he writes modestly entertaining pablam for people with short attention spans, but still.
Blah.

This does not give me much hope for this movie.

Wow, that is a bad list.

And I even like a lot of the stories ON the list.

But as a “guideline” to Captain Marvel stories, that is a bad list.

SEAN

Ah, I didn’t know that the trade had that three issue ditty. Nevermind, then.

I found it bizarre that August apparently fails to mention to these nebulous individuals who have never heard of Captain Marvel that he’s the superhero who says “Shazam.”

Isn’t this pretty common cultural knowledge in the U.S.? Who is August hanging out with?

Isn’t this pretty common cultural knowledge in the U.S.? Who is August hanging out with?

Hmmm…. he lives in LA, he’s a screenwriter, and he has shitty taste.

Who is he hanging out with?

My guess is Total Douchebags.

He doesn’t know anything about comics, clearly.

But I dunno that that makes him a BAD choice for a Captain Marvel screenwriter.

And as a screenwriter, I can totally see him bein’ more responsive to new comics. They’re much, much closer to movies in pacing an’ structure. Back in the forties, comics were still, basically, illustrated pulp novels. If you don’t know this and aren’t prepared for it, makes ‘em tough to read.

I was just reading the post, and I noticed that in the next one, he qualifies “Old Things Suck”. Still kind of a strange thing to say, but at least he admits not everything old is worthless. So do whatever you want with that information, I guess.

http://johnaugust.com/archives/2007/on-the-topic-of-old-things-sucking

You can say some good things about old comics - first appearances of characters, fast rate of production, general upbeatness, OK, fine - but overall? As individual works of art, they do suck.

If you’re offended by August’s comments because you used to read those old comics, then okay, you can feel emotionally put out - but that doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t suck. Let’s face it, when we read those old comics, they were much newer comics, and we were six, and we loved the thought of becoming a superhero and knowing a talking tiger. But that was then. And now they suck. I cannot believe that you could give those specific comics to a comics newbie nowadays and expect them to do anything but laugh in your face. In fact, I dare you to try it.

This is the kind of thing Grant Morrison was always banging on about while he was hyping up his X-Men run; there might well be plenty of concepts salvageable from how something was done ages ago, but you steal them and you make something new and shiny with them, and that’s what becomes good. Not the source material. The source material is still crap.

I see August’s blog has a comment from Andy Diggle expressing complete agreement with August’s POV, so it’s not just sucky and evil and untalented Hollywood screenwriters, it’s (obviously sucky and evil and untalented) comics writers who think this, too.

~ Gil

I call bullshit on this argument.
Whether something is old or not has no bearing on its quality. The only factor on quality is whether or not something is Good.
And if a big talking cat is so ridiculous, why did that Narnia film make so much money?
Based of course, on a book that was written in 1949, by the way.
If old things are so cruddy, why is ‘What’s Opera, Doc?’ still awesome, and ‘Loonatix Unleashed’ is a piece of crap?
Why is ‘Citizen Kane’ better than ‘Time Cop’?

Judging ALL old comics by the standards of DC’s Silver Age ‘Green Arrow’ comics is like judging all old movies by the standards of ‘Robot Monster’.

Quality endures. Age is irrelevent.
And a screenwriter who wants to write a script about a character but is too freakin’ lazy to read the seminal works on the character is a hack.

Frankly, August wanting to write a Captain Marvel script based on nothing except Judd Winnick and Jerry Ordway’s version of the character is like someone wanting to write a Dracula Script based only on ‘Blackula’, ‘Dracula: Dead And Loving It’ and that episode of ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’.

But then again, why bother with Bram Stoker’s novel?
It’s old.
And old things suck, apparently.

Johnny Hollywood is full of crap.

Actually Pol, Bram Stoker’s novel does suck. Or at least, the titular character does. It’s kind of his schtick.

I can’t believe I just typed that.

As far as the Shazam thing goes, I haven’t read a significant amount of the Beck stuff from that era like you have, but I have read, for example, a lot of the early Superman, which had a vitality and an energy that the modern comics don’t always have. And then there’s a fuckload of other great comics and movies from the ‘olden days’… so yeah, some old things are pretty damn good.

However, there’s something to be said for the accumulation of technical wisdom that can (ideally) be found only in newer works. I mean, go see ‘300′ and then watch ‘The 300 Spartans’ on DVD, and August’s argument starts to make a lot more sense.

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