Category Scott Baumgartner

Dec 20 2012

Wonder Woman 15

Alternating Currents: Wonder Woman 15. Drew and ScottToday, Drew and Scott are discussing Wonder Woman 15, originally released December 19th, 2012.

Drew: We’ve said it before, and I’m sure we’ll say it again: comic books are modern mythology. This is an idea Brian Azzarello has devoted Wonder Woman to exploring. I always like when art self-reflects in this way, but Azzarello never does anything so simply. The intersection of ancient mythology and comics mythology has proven to be fertile ground for essays on the nature of myth, but has tied the discussion to the world of fiction. In Wonder Woman 15, Azzarello confronts us with mythologized characters from reality, opening up the whole world of art-imitating-life-imitating-art discussions. It’s a strange, complicated arena of thought, but with Azzarello at the helm, I’m sure it will be a satisfying one. Continue reading →

Dec 18 2012

Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E 15

Alternating Currents: Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. 15, Scott and DrewToday, Scott and Drew are discussing Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E 15, originally released December 12th, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Scott: Perspective is everything in storytelling. Storytellers can have a profound impact on how a story is received based on the information they have access to and how they choose to present that information. Really good storytellers include personal touches that show their passion for the subject, giving emotional weight to the story. I would venture to guess Frankenstein is not this type of storyteller. Frankenstein has fairly simple tastes; he likes killing monsters and not being around people. So how do you elegantly tell a story about a character whose preferred mode of communication is a disinterested grunt? Take the story out of his hands and tell it from a third person point of view, which writer Matt Kindt does to beautiful effect in Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E. 15.

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Dec 11 2012

Detective Comics 15

detective comics 15

Today, Scott and Patrick are discussing Detective Comics 15, originally released December 5th, 2012. This issue is part of the Death of the Family crossover event. Click here for complete DotF coverage.death-divScott: It can be surprisingly easy to convince yourself of something that is obviously not true. I had a crush on a girl in elementary school and then some years later, I retroactively convinced myself that she had been my girlfriend. I don’t know how exactly it happened, but over time I came to believe this to be true, and only when I really stopped to think about it did I have the sad realization that I never had a girlfriend in elementary school at all. I also more recently convinced myself that this story sounded cute, and not at all desperate and creepy, which again may not be totally true. Regardless, I can sympathize with the Clayface arc that dominates Detective Comics 15: discovering that a love you believed in never existed sucks.

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Dec 6 2012

Animal Man 15

Alternating Currents: Animal Man 15, Shelby and Scott ROT

Today, Shelby and Scott are discussing Animal Man 15, originally released December 5th, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Shelby: Last month, Drew talked about Jeff Lemire thwarting our expectations to surprise us in the best way. This month is no different, as he sprinkles some obvious and not-so-obvious surprises throughout the issue. And really, he’s made it easy for us to be surprised; with Rotworld, Lemire has turned the DCU into a place where literally anything can happen. Kill all the heroes and leave the world a rotting shell? Sure! Turn characters we all know into horrifying monsters who want little more than to tear our protagonist limb from limb? Why not! In a universe where all the rules have been broken, even our wildest guesses fall short of the mark.
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Nov 30 2012

The Flash 14

Alternating Currents: Flash 14, Drew and ScottToday, Drew and Scott are discussing the Flash 14, originally released November 28th, 2012.

Drew: I’ve always seen postmodernism as inevitable. As someone who likes art, consuming art about art just makes sense to me. It’s quite easy to take commentary too far — forcing the art to far up its own ass to really be relatable — and while I have a special place in my heart for stories that do that, it’s much more satisfying when they can support a compelling narrative, as well. Brian Buccellato and Francis Manapul nail that type of just-right meta-text time and time again, as Barry grapples with his relationship to his own identity, history, and even time itself. Their pacing and narrative style have remained fluid enough to accommodate all of these ideas, tying them back to Barry’s own experience of the world. Issue 14 continues the recent trend of expanding the scope beyond Barry’s subjectivity, revealing a rewarding complexity to the world he lives in. Continue reading →

Nov 27 2012

Nightwing 14

Alternating Currents: Nightwing 14, Drew and ScottToday, Drew and Scott are discussing Nightwing 14, originally released November 21st 2012.

Drew: As a former sidekick, it’s difficult for Nightwing to define his life without Batman. This is as true outside of the mask as it is behind it — just try to define Dick Grayson without mentioning Bruce Wayne. This makes Dick’s investment in Haly’s Circus (the one part of Dick’s origin story that doesn’t involve Batman) make a lot of sense — it’s his best shot at agency in his life. Dick seems poised to begin a new chapter in his civilian life, yet his costumed life finds him pulled inextricably back towards Batman, as some of Bruce’s oldest foes demand Nightwing’s attention. Continue reading →

Nov 23 2012

Wonder Woman 14

Today, Scott and Taylor are discussing Wonder Woman 14, originally released November 21st, 2012.

Scott: ‘Tis the season for excess. We eat too much, spend too much, we eat too much again and, when things start feeling a little hectic, we tend to think too much. So, as I sit here debating whether to have more stuffing or more mashed potatoes, I can’t help but wonder if Wonder Woman is biting off more than it can chew. Of course, that’s silly; this comic has proven time and time again that it is one of the most clever and well thought-out series around. So the fact that this issue followed four separate storylines in four distant locations shouldn’t worry me, right? But if Wonder Woman is going to turn into the great meal I know it can be, at some point all of these different ingredients are going to have to come together on one plate, so to speak (I don’t know if I’m trying too hard to make this into a Thanksgiving analogy, or not hard enough).

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Nov 19 2012

Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E 14

Today, Patrick and Scott are discussing Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E 14, originally released October 10th, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Patrick: 2003 was supposed to be the year that the Matrix series ruled the world. To follow-up their genre defining 1999 masterpiece, the Wachoskis planned an all-out media blitzkrieg. Over the course of six months, they released two enormous science-fiction action movies, a set of animated shorts that tied directly into those movies and a AAA video game whose narrative wove throughout the movies and the shorts. Naturally, the movies were the flagships of this Matrix armada, so when they weren’t very good, the whole fleet sank. But I played the everloving shit out of that Enter the Matrix video game. It worked because Enter the Matrix had to embrace conventions of a video game directly, instead of stylishly dancing around them (as the films did). It might have seemed strange when Morpheus would tell you to collect three keys to access the next level, but there’s something refreshing about that objective-based narrative — especially considering that the terms of victory in the Matrix movies were becoming ever more grim and convoluted. Frankenstein is the Enter the Matrix of Rotworld: what it lacks in subtlety, it makes up for in clarity of objective.

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Nov 8 2012

Animal Man 14

Alternating Currents: Animal Man 14, Drew and Scott ROTToday, Drew and Scott are discussing Animal Man 14, originally released November 7th, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Drew: Last month, I couldn’t get over how openly writer Jeff Lemire was playing to our expectations in Animal Man. More specifically, he was setting up expectations with the express purpose of implying he was going to meet them at face value — all with an unblinking swagger that was kind of thrilling. Animal Man 14 finds him switching gears to the kinds of thwarted expectations we expect from (good) superhero comics, but that change actually makes the surprises even more surprising. Continue reading →

Nov 2 2012

Swamp Thing Annual 1

Today, Scott and Patrick are discussing Swamp Thing Annual #1, originally released October 31st, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Scott:  This Rotworld stuff can be pretty depressing. I can only take so much of hearing about how everyone everywhere is dead and there’s nothing anyone can do to make things better. So it’s nice that Swamp Thing Annual #1 was able to take a step back and tell a story that, while still wholly depressing in its own right, feels like a breather from the current state of Rotworld despair. Continue reading →