A Mainstream News Piece on Wonder Woman

And here’s the thing: nothing in here bugged me.

There was no biff-bam-pow crap. The book they’re talking about is available now (Okay, I have to check on that because they left it out). It didn’t make any references to geeks or nerds or Simpsons characters.

The story was about Jody Picoult, an accomplished novelist who’ll be writing Wonder Woman. To be honest, it isn’t going to convince me to read the book, but it could certainly nudge some people to go check out what she’s doing, because the article wasn’t saddled with the heaps of negative stereotypes that normally show up in comic book articles.

For an example of what I’m used to reading in newspapers, check out this article, which tells the uninformed that comic books are no longer just for kids. Apparently no one informed the writer that they haven’t been for about two decades.

I look for news stories every day that we can post on here, and obviously I get frustrated by the continual and lazy ghettoization of the medium by the mainstream media. I will admit that things are getting better, but there’s usually still a hint of the idea that people who make or like comics, regardless of how successful or famous they are, are still a bit quirky. This article on Picoult did none of that, and I was happy to see it.

So I guess the other real question here is: is it any good?

Comments

  1. Interesting article but Picoult’s recent Wonder Woman issue was not very good. Picoult spent half the comic making fun of Wonder Woman.

    Wonder Woman’s milkshake is now the Black Canary shake. She can’t figure out how to work a gas pump or a turnstile. Her action figure is discounted because, “She’s never sold as well as Superman & Batman”. Is it any surprise Wonder Woman doesn’t sell? It’s a terribly written and plotted comic book.

  2. i didn’t mind it.

  3. My wife is reading her novel, “The Tenth Circle”, the one that has parts in comic book form, and is really liking it.

  4. Sometimes non-comics people come to comics, and it takes them a little while to find their voice within comics.

    Other times it never happens.

  5. This is a nice contrast with something I read the other night in, I think, Entertainment Weekly. It was a review of her most recent book, and it discussed some of the darker, more twisted things in the novel but said, “Picoult’s next project is decidedly kid-friendly: she’s writing a comic book! Isn’t that adorable?” (I may be editorializing a bit.)

  6. Not a bad article overall. The only thing I saw in there that I would question is that the average age of a comic book reader is 18-19. I would say they were off by at least 10 years or more.

  7. Which article?

  8. So Picoult tried to inject some humor into the title. She has Wonder Woman making fun of a few men in the book. Picoult also worked in some literary references. It was too tempting as a novelist.

    –I guess that’s what the bit about Wonder Woman not knowing what a gas pump was…so called “humor”. Whatever. I’m sure she’s a good novelist, but right now this book is a serious snoozer.

  9. My mistake, I only read the second article. After having read the article about Picoult, the other one is a little bit more jarring.

  10. “But she handled it as if she was one of the guys working on this for years.”

    Is that DiDio having a little fun with that one?

  11. While I can’t really say anything, I really haven’t read much of the actual WW title, I only got on board for Heinberg (and we all know how that went). But… I found the new issue very much like someone baseing it out of the old tv show. Is it just me? or has it always been like this.

    I would find it difficult to believe that Rucka had her spinning out of her civilian clothes and glasses.

  12. “I look for news stories every day that we can post on here, and obviously I get frustrated by the continual and lazy ghettoization of the medium by the mainstream media.”

    Actually, you could just tweak this sentence a little bit to read like this:

    “I get frustrated by the continual and lazy sensationalization of events by the uninformed mainstream media, which rarely bothers to do any decent research or fact checking on almost any topic at all.”

    I think a majority of people would agree with that.

    Why is a website connected to a Lakeside, Florida local news outlet featuring an article by a San Antonio Express-News reporter, about a fairly well known novelist, who also “happens” to be doing the latest issue of Wonder Woman? Are Lakeside residents great fans of Wonder Woman, and do they always turn to San Antonio to find out what’s up in the world of comics? The article is also very glowing about Picoult, the novelist who is now writing her first comic. The reviews on iFanboy are not glowing about the comic. I have learned to trust the people who post here. Maybe San Antonio and Lakeside have some kind of inner source on what’s really up? Do you think they read Picolt’s novels? (yes). Do you think they’ll ever read her Wonder Woman comics? (probably not).

    The really horrifyingly inaccurate article, by contrast, is straight out of the Boston Globe, one of the nation’s major news outlets:
    (On Captain America #25)
    “He’s not being killed in some masterful death trap being set up by Dr. Doom and the Red Skull,” pointed out Bradford Wright, author of “Comic Book Nation,” a cultural history of comic books.”

    If the Boston Globe or other major media outlets are unable to even pick up one little 20 page book with PICTURES to CHECK THEIR FACTS before MAKING HUGE GENERALIZATIONS does anybody here think their reporting on any other news topic (where they don’t have as many pictures to go with the words) is any more reliable? The difference is, a normal company, politician or organization would at least try to make sure the Boston Globe got their facts as accurate as possible if they were going to be quoted liberally in the same article, making the very point of the article. However, Joe Quesada is only too happy to play along, giggly as a school girl to get his name in print in a major news outlet.

    There’s your problem.

  13. I realize I live in the age of the internet, and don’t go to the mainstream media for any kind of decent coverage about anything.

    For Comics? I prefer:
    http://www.talksplode.com
    But people may disagree with me, as is their right…

  14. I have my take on it here.

    Do you think I can get my $3 back from Jody Picoult?

  15. Here’s another story on dear Jody.

    Thanks to Michael for sending it in.

  16. Anyone read Will Pfieffer’s (spelling???) fill-in issue before Picoult came on? Easily the best issue so far, and it got me very interested in Amazons Attack, which I picked up but haven’t read yet.

    All in all I consider all this stuff a nice warm up for Gail Simone, who can do no wrong. Unless, of course, she does do wrong. But she doesn’t. At least not often. I like her. Gail, that is. And Wonder Woman. People draw her pretty.