Comic Book Sabbath

    This piece was originally presented at the Transition 5 conference held at Birkbeck University in London England, October 2014. This conference was one of my favorite things during my PhD. It gave me an excuse to go visit London, talk with other comic researchers, and to work through the unimaginable mass of ideas I was trying to deal with as a PhD student. This paper is part of my Jean Grey/Scarlett Witch cycle. I really came to love these two characters and despise how the comics had done them wrong. So in a lot of ways, these pieces, and most of an eventual dissertation chapter, are basically me exercising and trying on the theory, and pleading to just give these women a break.    Monstrous Feminine: Patriarchal Fear of Female Sexuality It has often been argued that the powers and explosive fights of superhero comics feed into adolescent power fantasies. However, by examining the role of powers, their acquisition, and the role they play in defining and creat...

     This was an early work of fiction from my Masters program and was included in my Master's Thesis in 2008. During the end of my undergrad and into my MA, I had developed a love for writers like Steven Millhauser and stories about old professions. My MA thesis is dominated by stories about ventriloquists, tight rope walkers, and a very early 20th century aesthetic. I recall playing around with a story about a phrenologist that never came to fruition. Anyway. Gregor is a great example of where I was at then. I never really did like the ending. I think I tried three or four different ones and settled finally on one where Gregor never drops into the tank. He is left standing, embarrassed and defeated, as the entire town abandons him. I hated it. The current ending feels better and more in line with where I am as a writer now.   Gregor, the Great Escapist Of course we knew Gregor, The Great Escapist. We knew him as a young boy playing with locks and knots and we ...

This piece was originally presented at the Transitions 4 Conference at Birkbeck University in London England, October 2013. Super Queeroes: The Normalization of Gay and Lesbian Characters in Superhero Comics In the summer of 2012, with the second wave of titles for their New 52 initiative ready to release, DC Comics announced that the Golden Age version of Green Lantern - aka Alan Scott -would be reintroduced as gay. Activist groups such as GLAAD and One Million Mothers (OMM) took up predictable positions on the subject. GLAAD praised writer James Robinson for his “bold decision” while OMM decried what they saw as another attempt by media to portray LGBT+ characters as positive or normal. However, response from die hard comic fans and collectors was less predictable. Posting on message boards and in the comment sections of news stories, more vocal fans wanted to make sure their thoughts were heard. While there were comments and posts praising the narrative choice and vowing to buy mu...