In his concurring opinion in 1989’s Texas v. Johnson, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, “And so great is our commitment to the process that, except in the rare case, we do not pause to express distaste for the result, perhaps for fear of undermining a valued principle that dictates the decision. This is one of those rare cases.”
That case established the right to burn the American flag as one of the freedoms protected by the First Amendment, and while Kennedy had the judicial stones to vote with the 5-4 majority, he heard the footsteps of the mob behind him and wanted to disclaim any bravery in protecting the politically unpopular speech. It was a cowardly opinion, one expressing a sentiment no more complex than “gee, my job with lifetime tenure sure is hard!”
Folks, my job was hard this week. I read too many good books. Don’t you have pity for me?
The Bottom (at the Top)
10. Old Haunts. Writers: Ollie Masters and Rob Williams, Artist: Laurence Campbell, Colorist: Lee Loughridge, Letterer: Sal Cipriano, Publisher: AWA
See, I toyed with leaving this space blank because it was such a tough week, and it’s a little unfair to Old Haunts — in a week more bereft of quality books, it could easily slide into the top half or at least the dadgum middle. Alas, not this week. Conceptually, I liked it, this idea of taking mobsters looking to cash out and slide into retirement and putting a supernatural roadblock in the way of those golden (and bloody) parachutes. But the execution — at least in this #1 — could use a little more in terms of developing these characters. If that was there, there’d be more of an impetus to continue reading the story — and to slot it somewhere other than the bottom of the heap.
We Had Some Issues Here But Just the One
9. The Recount #1. Writer: Jonathan Hedrick, Artist: Gabriel Elias Ibarra Nune, Colorist: Sunil Ghagre, Letterer: Cristian Docolomansk, Publisher: Scout Comics
The real world analogs don’t translate neatly, but I’m going to try anyhow: What if we had the goods on the Donald Trump campaign’s collusion with Russia? What if that prompted the Donald to resign? And what if the Deep State (or Q, I’m not entirely sure in this analogy — I told you it didn’t hang together) wanted the ex-president to pay with his life? And Mike Pence is a tough lady veep who had nothing to do with any of the bad stuff? I don’t think any of that made sense to me, and I both read the book and wrote that, but I hope you’ve got some sense of what we’re working with here: The Recount is clearly influenced by the real world, but I’m not sure it has anything to say about the messy transfer of power we’ve been through — but that’s fine. Not everything needs to be sharp political satire or analysis; Air Force One and Olympus Has Fallen watch just fine as big dumb movies with big dumb presidents. The Recount zips the fuck along as a great actioner, but, like Old Haunts, is thin in the character development. Gimme a pinch. All I’m askin’ for. Promise.
When a Public University President Gets Real Mad About a Tweet
(or the essay in which I imperil my own employment)
Rush Limbaugh died Wednesday.
And I mourn only the cancer cells that died with him.
He was a reprehensible son of a bitch. He espoused racism, misogyny, other assorted bigotry and poisoned the minds and hearts of a generation. Limbaugh was neither smart nor principled; throw a copy of Atlas Shrugged in any college newspaper newsroom, and you’ll hit three people who could grow up to be just like him. There is a direct line — as straight as any other — between Limbaugh, Fox News and Donald John Trump, all institutions that have been incredibly destructive to the fabric of American civic life.
We are better for his death.
So of course we celebrated on Twitter. Not the biggest celebration ever, of course (that comes when the Trump one goes), but a celebration nevertheless. There were memes and hashtags and trending topics galore — the latter of which (Rest in Piss, Rot in Hell and Good Riddance) was a sure signal that Limbaugh was no saint. And yes, they were off color as gallows humor usually is. (My favorite meme suggested that Rush finally decided to do something nice for Black History Month.) But for a man who once said, “Look it, let me put it to you this way: The NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons” — and that was one of the nicer quotes I could find — I think we’re allowed a little bit of joy at this wretched soul’s departure.
(By the way, if you’re one of the liberals who decided to ride in on your clean energy high horse to tone police, go sit in the corner with Michelle Obama and her cloyingly stupid “When they go low, we go high.” Performative moralization is patronizing. And besides, fuck you.)
Rather than celebration, some social media users, like University of Alabama at Birmingham archeology professor Sarah Parcak, had nothing but scorn for Limbaugh. “When a terrible piece of scum who caused immeasurable harm to millions dies, there is no sympathy. Only a desire that they suffered until their last breath,” she said in a tweet now deleted from an account since locked.
It wasn’t Parcak’s first tweet to draw attention. Over the summer, as protesters were trying to bring down an obelisk-style Confederate monument in Birmingham, Alabama (a majority Black city), she tweeted helpful hints based on her background in Egyptology on how to topple the thing. “[N]ever in a million years thought this would come in handy,” she wrote.
Then, she only drew a mild rebuke from the university, a disclaimer that said the tweets weren’t “the opinions of the university” and that campus members “often use social media to express thoughts that do not necessarily reflect the voice of the university.”
But now, Parcak’s Limbaugh tweet brought down the fire from the UAB president himself, Ray Watts.
“UAB is disgusted and extremely troubled that Sarah Parcak would tweet something so unprofessional and blindly inhumane and cruel,” Watts wrote in a buffoonishly strong statement. “Her poor judgment is completely counter to our shared values as an institution that include integrity and respect. She absolutely does not speak for our university, and we are reviewing the matter.”
Ethically, I would focus my “disgust” on the real injustices of the world and not mean tweets about a dead lout, but I’m just a humble visiting assistant professor at UAB and not a guy paid almost $900,000 a year to be the public face of the institution. Guess we just have different priorities.
Legally, we (and by that I mean “me”) have some things we can talk about here. Watts, while this is certainly ill-advised and intemperate, is well within his First Amendment rights here; just as Parcak can tweet, he can spout all the drivel in the world, even if it does represent the official position of the university. Under our framework, leaders and their state-backed institutions can express thoughts and opinions, but — and this is the critical part — those feelings cannot become the basis of reprisals for protected speech. Parcak’s tweet falls under that category of expression because it was “extramural,” meaning it had nothing to do with her job or the university and was therefore outside of her (and, again, my) employer’s right to control. (UAB is only limited here because it is a public institution bound by the terms of the First Amendment. A private university or any other non-government employer is, of course, only limited by the contractual terms of employment when it comes to dismissal and/or sanctions for speech.)
Watts’ statement and its ominous threat to “review the matter” are largely bluster since the university can’t do anything constitutionally. But what I worry about here is the chilling effect this might have on other UAB employees looking to speak out about issues they see as important. Will they think twice before firing off that tweet? They certainly shouldn’t.
Yellowhammer News, the state’s right-wing online “news” outlet, surprisingly argued against Parcak’s dismissal (naturally missing the First Amendment impossibility of such, probably because it was too busy fumbling with its denouncement of “cancel culture,” but whatever) stating, “If UAB keeps this person employed, every professor on that campus should feel free to express themselves without fear of reprisal.”
And that’s the goddamned point. The First Amendment means that state actors and state institutions can’t pick the winners and losers of speech; they cannot — as an immutable rule of American democracy — decide what expression is tolerable for the masses and what is forbidden.
So be disgusted, Dr. Watts. The rest of us can see that tweet for what it is: a final and appropriate farewell to a truly hateful motherfucker.
Really, Not All That Bad
8. Legends of the Dark Knight (2012-15) Vol. 1.
If the first volume of a series I love and cherish can’t get any higher than this, Loyal Content Consumer, you have to understand I’m serious when I say it’s a hard week. (To be honest, it’s here because I’m trying to offset my own predictions and ensure a little fairness for the newer stuff.) But gawshamighty there are some good reads in this book, one that could have easily been even better without the stunt booking of television galaxy brain Damon Lindelof, who does nothing but waste Jeff Lemire’s time and effort. Truly excellent stuff includes B. Clay Moore and Ben Templesmith’s “Crisis in Identity;” Steve Niles, Trevor Hairsine and Antonio Fabela’s “Letters to Batman” and “A Slam Bradley Mystery…” by Joshua Hale Fialkov, Phil Hester, Eric Gapstur and Jim Charalampidis.
7. Nuclear Family #1. Writer: Stephanie Phillips, Artist: Tony Shasteen, Colorist: JD Mettler, Letterer: Troy Peteri, Publisher: AfterShock
I am a big, big, BIG fan of the nuclear apocalyptic/post-apocalyptic genre; Dr. Strangelove, Fail Safe and The Day After are some of my favorite films, and there’s simply something I crave about staring into a hellfire abyss. Nuclear Family is not quite one of those things, though — the bombs are important, and they do fall, sure, but there’s something hinky that comes up in the rubble and ash afterward. While I take my nightmare and destruction a little more straightforwardly, I don’t have anything against the twist/wherever the series appears to be heading. But there’s also not quite enough juice lingering at the end to make me crave #2.
6. Hotell #1. Writer: John Lees, Artist: Dalibor Talajić, Colorist: Lee Loughridge, Letterer: Sal Cipriano, Publisher: AWA
I am in the tank for many things. Mid-shelf bourbon. Brooks Brothers suits. Apple Watches. And anthology series. I mean, my God, out of 10 books this week, three of them are anthologies. Clearly, I have a type. Why do I like them? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s the self-contained stories or the ability to break and remake a series as you go, changing form and tone as circumstances dictate; you don’t get the same freedom in the middle of a Batman arc as you have moving from one story to another in Legends of the Dark Knight. ANYWAY, yes, Hotell #1 was fun and demonically absurd and all manner of fucked up. I would have given Lees and Co. 20 more issues to play with, but, again, I am but a pawn of Big Anthology.
5. Stray Dogs #1. Writer: Tony Fleecs, Artist: Trish Forstner, Colorist: Brad Simpson, Publisher: Image
For a series that Brian Michael Bendis blurbs as “The Secret Life of Pets meets Seven,” there’s not a great deal of peril for our main character Sophie, a sweet little pup who’s been stolen from a murdered owner and placed with a family of dogs who appear — at least at the moment — to be friendly. The spectre of overpromising and underdelivering is mostly negated by the thrillingly subversive art, a reminder of the similarly Disney-fied Dark Fang, a tale of environmental peril starring a findomme vampire that was canceled before its time.
4. Rogue Planet (trade collection). Writer: Cullen Bunn, Artist: Andy MacDonald, Colorist: Nick Filardi, Letterer: Crank!, Publisher: Oni
While I hope I live long enough to tell J.J. Abrams how Star Trek Into Darkness was a miserable failure he should feel personally sorry for, he at least contributed one positive thing to Trek lore with McCoy’s line from the ’09 reboot: “Space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence.” It’s true to the character and pegs that particular flavor of space sci-fi in which every poor sonuvabitch dies some miserably excruciating death, and Rogue Planet, lying directly at the crossroads of Event Horizon and Alien, is that danger and darkness and (eternal) silence. I couldn’t quite get into the story’s more metaphysical elements, but until they make that Event Horizon adaptation, this’ll do nicely.
X Spotlight: Things on ComicsXF You Should Read
- Captain America Smashes The Red Skull’s Mob in Captain America #27 by Jude Jones. That shit sounds familiar, don’t it? I keep meaning to read Coates’ Cap. One day, I suppose.
- Don’t Worry, Be Hoppy. It’s Thor #12! by Zach Rabiroff. You put a pun in the title, and I’ll read that sumbitch. Guarantee it.
- Art and Criticism Intertwine in Vault’s The Picture of Everything Else #2 by Matthew Lazorwitz and Ari Bard. Those guys are allowed to have fun without me? That doesn’t seem legal.
- The Maximoff Family Keeps it Going Full Speed in WandaVision Episode 6 by Mikey Zee and Dan McMahon. Mikey has the most fun with these WandaVision recaps. God bless ’im.
- Advance Review: Vault’s Hollow Heart Details the Relationship between a Man and His Monster by Stephanie Burt. God, this book makes me hurt. And it’s only the beginning.
Almost the Best
3. TMNT: The Last Ronin #2. Story: Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird and Tom Waltz; Script: Waltz and Eastman; Artists: Esau and Issac Escorza, Ben Bishop and Eastman; Colorist: Luis Antonio Delgado with Samuel Plata; Letterer: Shawn Lee; Publisher: IDW
I saw a headline for a review at Some Other Comics Crit Establishment that basically said #2 < #1, and friends, let me tell you, I DISAGREE. STRONGLY. The thrust of the debut is focused on the identity of the last turtle standing (Spoiler: It’s Mikey), but with that out of the way in the followup, there’s a lot more space to let the heaviness of the story breathe — and the book is better for it. April, Mikey, basically whoever is left standing at the end of this generational war against the Foot, they all have the physical and mental scars of decades of fighting, and this series doesn’t shy away from looking at what that pain means. Kevin Eastman’s layouts may be irksome as all hell, but that doesn’t detract from a serious and meaningful story.
2. Haha #2. Writer: W. Maxwell Prince, Artist: Zoe Thorogood, Colorist: Chris O’Halloran, Letterer: Good Old Neon, Publisher: Image
I tell you what, folks — I am a stubborn, prideful bastard. As I set out on this thing seven weeks ago, I promised myself I wouldn’t cover books in this space that I’m already covering somewhere else. “It’s lazy, Will. The X Spot should be about putting in the work,” I observed to myself in the hypothetical discourse in my gray space. “But you hate work,” I replied. The arguments were compelling. This week, I finally came down on the side of me. You can read the full rundown Ari Bard and I gave to Haha #2 here, but two things in particular resonated for me: 1) the tighter narrative connection between these stories as compared to their Ice Cream Man cousins and 2) the sweeping, almost Southern gothic vibe W. Maxwell Prince brought to this issue. I swear, that bastard can write it all.
The Out of ConteXt X: Choice ComicsXF Discord Quotes
- “Sometimes you just have to be a button goblin”
- “it’s because he looks like a sickly victorian boy who grew into a slightly less sickly victorian man”
- “folks does anyone have a link to the oat milk commercial people are mad at i need it”
- “I’m more of a spicy variants man myself”
- “Rich ‘Misunderstands A Joke Panel for a Scoop’ Johnston”
- “Another day, another ‘should I reread HoXPoX?’”
- “The fragile ego of the comics dude”
- “I broke the law in France as well. Also Italy”
- “It’s still wild to think that people born post 2000 are real people to me.”
- “My parents were too busy growing up under communism and I was preoccupied with not existing”
Wanna get in on the madness that is the ComicsXF Discord? Back our Patreon.
Finally, the Big Hoss of the Week
1. Shadow Doctor #1. Writer: Peter Calloway, Artist: Georges Jeanty, Colorist: Juancho!, Letterer: Charles Pritchett, Publisher: AfterShock
The fundamental unfairness of Shadow Doctor — the idea that a skilled Black physician in 1930s Chicago could only find work with the mob on account of racism and prejudice — is so ludicrous that it has to be real, and Peter Calloway handles his grandfather’s story with grace and honesty. But this was the easy chapter, the one where the reader is clearly on the side of the disrespected and earnest Nathaniel Calloway. What happens when, as the writer has promised, we see that Nathaniel was “no saint”? It’s the promise of this book — and the sense that the younger Calloway will continue to navigate this with skill and truthfulness — that makes it so exciting. And the mob. Yeah, that’s pretty interesting, too.
NeXt Time on the X Spot
Future State: Batman/Superman #2, Ice Cream Man #23, Next Batman: Second Son Ch. 1 and seven more … because it’s pronounced “ten.”
Will Nevin loves bourbon and AP style and gets paid to teach one of those things. He is on Twitter far too often.
