LNH20: The Cat Lady #3

Martin Phipps martinphipps2 at yahoo.com
Sat Apr 28 20:43:21 PDT 2012


On Apr 29, 2:22 am, Scott Eiler <sei... at eilertech.com> wrote:
> On 4/28/2012 8:30 AM, Martin Phipps wrote:
>
> >                      The Cat Lady #3
> >                       The Encounter
> ...
> >    Fortunately, Angelo was their to make the decision easy for him: he
> > walked right up to Rover and raised his paw, his bionic paw, his super
> > strong indestructible bionic paw with razor sharp claws that shone
> > brightly in the noonday sunshine.   Rover took the hint and ran
> > towards his house and barked until his master let him in.  Angelo
> > wanted to follow but his mother stopped him: the other cats were
> > already moving along and they had to follow.
>
> I've said it before, but I'll say it again... This would make a really
> good children's story.  Does RACC have a category which is the opposite
> of "ACRA"?

Thanks... I think.

Just about any story can be a children's story: just take out the sex
and violence, don't use words of more than a couple of syllables, make
sure that there's a visual element (meaning no talking heads) and keep
the length down because children don't want to read War and Peace.

That's why comic books are often considered children's books: the
comics code for years restricted what could appear in them, they are
obviously visual, they are usually only 22-25 pages plus ads and they
are written in such a way (usually) as to be accessible to readers of
all ages.

Thing is, people don't usually take it as a compliment when their
reading material is labeled as "kids stuff".  The comics industry has
tried to be more adult.  This has actually hurt the comics industry
because parents no longer consider comics suitable for kids.  There' a
big question of where the comics industry will get their new readers
from.

I remember reading a Daredevil comic once in which Mr. Hyde stole an
emerald from a museum.  He then dissolved the emerald in acid and
drank the "potion" and became stronger.  This is probably the ultimate
in "Don't try this at home, kids!" specifically "Do not steal emeralds
from museums, dissolve them in acid and drink them!  It won't work and
you will probably die!".  A few issues later Frank Miller started
doing the art and a year after that he was writing and the tone was
quite different: you had ninjas getting stabbed with kitana blades and
dying and dissolving.  Naturally when they did the Daredevil movie
they borrowed from the Miller books: after all, it wasn't going to be
a cartoon!

But when I was a kid, I thought the old Daredevil comics were cool.
Things like Hydra showing up in New York City in tanks and SHIELD
sending forces to stop them and then Daredevil and the Black Widow
having to fight a giant robot.  Yeah, that was cool.  It also had the
Black Widow in a skin tight costume.  I was going through puberty at
the time so that was cool too.

I'm looking forward to the Avengers movie.  It's got the flying tanks,
the giant robot and Black Widow in a skin tight costume.  It's just as
I remember.

So, yeah, thanks. :)

Martin


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