It is healthy, I shall come on your site more often, thank.

G'night

I mostly agree with Mark's points. I quit reading Ex Machina after about issue 12, and I've never really missed it. As with Y: The Last Man, the series addresses a lot of hot-button political issues, but never at a very deep or provocative level. To me, BKV seems to be more interested in entertainment than in sophisticated political critique -- which is fine, of course, but it's not to my taste. The only work of his that I've enjoyed without reservations is Runaways.

The post itself, on the other hand, doesn't claim to 'teach' Vaughan anything, but merely offers up a critique of the work in comparison to other works that Mr Andrew enjoyed. Now, some of the critiques seem a bit silly to me (without even having read EM) and it's certainly not the best written piece of criticism ever or anything, but that's where the discussion should lie.

If you're a massive BKV fan, or a massive EM fan, why not just respond in these comments with your own counter-critique to Mark Andrew's points? It seems like you'd probably achieve a lot more, since they're hardly watertight points that can't be argued.

Like you say, you've got "distinctions, fans and worldwide achievments" on your side in favour of EM, so take on the actual critique- rather than the title, and the personality of the poster himself- and you'd probably come out of it pretty well.

“Mr. Plumber, sir, there’s something with my plumbing.”

“Well, how do you know?”

“Because my toilet stinks and it doesn't flush anymore.”

I also like Ex Machina but you haven't actually debated any of Mark Andrew's points. That's quite a silly way to argue, I don't have to be a proffesional debater to notice that.

Go write your own critique before you tell others how to do it.

You completely missed it. Next.

Considering you don’t know anything about MarkAndrew...

Well, you shot yourself on the foot here. Because that's exactly my point. If anyone knows anything about this Mark Andrew character here and a work of his worth mentioning, then all would be well, and he can go on and claim he can teach Vaughan or Morrison or any other writer for that matter. BECAUSE HE'S ALREADY DONE IT.
But no, we get a Mark Andrew NOBODY who claims he can teach a pro how to write. THE NERVE!

...it’s entirely possible that he’s written about seven thousand things worth mentioning.

Then let's ask Mr. Mark Andrew himself, shall we?

Mr. Mark Andrew, name one significant comic book work you did that earns you the right to say you can teach a pro writer how to write his comic.

And please, do not give us the usual arguement that you're a "critic" because that's an entirely different thing.

As previously mentioned, you don't need your plumber's degree to see if there's something wrong with your plumbing:

"Mr. Plumber, sir, there's something with my plumbing."

"Well, how do you know?"

"Mr. Plumber, I know, coz I'm, like, a plumbing critic. I know these things."

"Oh...kay."

"So now, Mr. Plumber, I will teach you what to do. Grab that pipe there, screw it over here..."

"Wait a minute, you're going to teach me? Have you done this before?"

"Um, no. But I can see there's something wrong with it, and that's enough, that gives me the right to teach you what to do, Mr. Plumber sir."

See what I mean?

So then, Mr. Mark Andrew, this challenge:

Name one significant comic book work you did, published, earned disntictions, fans, and worldwide attention that earns you the right to say you will teach the writer of Runaways, Ex Machina, Y the Last Man, or any other pro comic writer to write their comic.

Just one.
Then I will go away.

Now, THAT's Reality Check for you.

What does grok mean?

Understand or conceptualize.

It's kind of a bastard simplification of a word/concept invented by Robert Heinlein in "Stranger in a Strange Land."

And if I don’t grok the character’s morals

What does grok mean?

Reality Check. Ha!

Considering you don't know anything about MarkAndrew, it's entirely possible that he's written about seven thousand things worth mentioning. But that would destroy your strawman argument, wouldn't it?

Nobody likes you. Go away.

perhaps you need an on-going area called Designated Puppy Killer where you can gather all the controversy?

Ha! That actually doesn't sound like a bad idea, and would probably generate copious amounts of traffic as a bonus!

Oh, it doesn't work that way, you say? Fascinating.

Oh yeah, and one last thing. Critiquing something isn’t the same thing as teaching someone something. Get your ego in check dude.

This is a good point, actually - I think some people would have been more accepting of your piece as a piece of subjective, this-is-my-opinion criticism if you hadn’t given it that awful, awful title.

Precisely. Actually, the challenge for him to come up with his own comic work comes from the fact that he says he'll "teach so and so how to write". Really? Have you written anything worth mentioning? You haven't? Write something first, show us your work get published, then we'll see if you have what it takes to "teach so and so how to write his comic".

But whatever; don’t judge a book by its cover, or a post by its title.

How can you NOT judge a post by its title? It's the first thing you see on the main page. It's what draws the readers in. In this case, was the title meant as a cheap-ass gimmick "look at me, im trying to be all against-the-norm-witty type by lambasting a fan-favorite writer" just to draw readers in?

Well, I figured the title was a joke, too- and a funny one, at that- but I’m not so sure now.

It was meant as a joke? Or not a joke? Confusion?
Just shows what a lame writer this Mark Andrew is, he can't even communicate his intent properly.
And you say you'll teach a pro to write. Pft.

Absolutely, you don't need to have written anything to offer up a piece of criticism- and nor do you need to read past Volume 3 of something to suggest that those first three volumes are not good- but to suggest that writing a post with its fair share of grammatical, spelling and format errors and getting a few responses for it makes you a "fair enough writer" to teach a pro how it's done is crazy talk.

Actually, this post would probably attract a lot less criticism if MarkAndrew just told us whether or not he was kidding, wouldn't it?

Also, BKV fans: the only thing I've read of his is his run on Ultimate X-Men, which obviously doesn't entitle me to judge his talent. Is EM better than that run? Like, much, much better? If it is, I'll check it out.

I wouldn't agree with those who say that you need to be a great artist in order to critique art (if only artists could critique, then nobody ever would!); but I do think that by saying "I can teach this established, successful writer how to write properly" you're setting yourself up for a massive fall, and you're almost inviting hostility onto yourself. Particularly when you make some of the typos/grammatical errors that you do (not that there's anything wrong with those under normal circumstances, they don't make you a bad writer - but I think you draw scrutiny on yourself when you say "I know more than the professional!", and you're under pressure to then not make mistakes yourself).

Certainly, Mitchell is not an open book for the reader, indeed, part of the appeal of the series is having his character revealed BY his actions. And taking into account his decisions both personally and politically in the series I feel I do have a good idea of how Mitch is likely to react to a given situation.

What's more, to argue that the pacing is flawed because it does not match the pace of a more established work is pretty specious. It's like saying Seven Samurai isn't a great movie because Citizen Kane manages to cram several decades of story into half on it's running time while SS covers a few weeks in three hours. The story does move, the fact that it doesn't move at a pace you would prefer isn't really a valid criticism.

Lastly, a huge part of the series has been specifically about what causes Mitch to go from superhero to mayor. Each flashback, gives you a little piece of that story. To reveal too much too quickly would kneecap a major aspect of the series. I for one enjoy getting the arc of his transformation piecemeal.

Oh yeah, and one last thing. Critiquing something isn't the same thing as teaching someone something. Get your ego in check dude.

I said that the first 16 issues of Ex Machina compare poorly to the first 16 issues of Sandman in terms of narrative development.

I should've added that you can replace "First Sixteen Issues of Sandman" with "First Sixteen issues of...

100 Bullets

Tales of the Beanworld (There's no real character development here, but the main "character" is really the environment itself, and there's a hell of a lot of revelation where that's concerned.)

Fables
Promethea
Transmetropolitan
Zot!
The Invisibles
Love and Rockets
(Both the Palomar and Locas stories.)
Hard Time
Runaways vol. 1
Astro City
Kim Deitch's Waldo stories.
Lucifer
or DMZ

and the argument still stands.

And I can't think of *ANY* long form but designed to end comic series that had less development at the end of sixteen issues then Ex Machina. (And I'm fairly familiar with most of the DC/Vertigo/Wildstorm and Fantagraphics/Drawn and Quarterly long running series of this type. I haven't read much from Marvel's Epic line, Comico, or Eclipse, though.)

Maybe Bone was less developed sixteen issues in? There were a lot of revelations in the story, but I'm not sure there were any major ones pre-issue 16.