Fair point! But he was also E-i-C during a period of some pretty decent books by Marvel. Not that I think he was actually responsible for the contents except in an extremely broad sense, but he does have that in his favor.
Frankly, I'm surprised it's taken this long. I figured something was up when he got freelance writing gigs and then got the collected editions editor job. He wouldn't have been high on my list for either of those, for wildly different reasons.
I have the most morbidly appropriate word verification imaginable for a post about DC Comics : "shedie". I feel like even Blogger is trying to tell us something about mainstream comics.
True, and he did seem to get his act together post Heroes Reborn (sorta) and gave the non-X books a shot in the arm, but unlike Shooter, I think Harras is always gonna have a lot more misses than hits around his neck. I mean, the Clone Saga and putting Byrne on Spider-Man? Woof.
I'd actually heard he'd been working in their collections dept. In fact, people weren't too happy with his duties there because he basically tanked it?
Still, I will be getting into some of Harras' hits here soon as I have just gotten 3 of 5 of the Avengers Assemble hardcovers and I intend to review them for the Prattle.
It's hard to say otherwise, especially when you consider the time periods in question. The Clone Saga, of course, was just a decent storyline idea that got dragged out way too long and ruined the character somewhat. I'd chalk that up more to "bad leadership" than "bad ideas".
Yeah, I am an occasional poster over at this forum and during Harras' tenure, the reputation of the DC collected editions department has plummeted among these folks. Though oddly, the complaints are rarely addressed to Bob Harras. Also oddly, one of the loudest complainers about DC is excited about his hiring for E-i-C. I don't pretend to understand this at all.
Oh wow. That should indeed prove interesting. I was afraid we might be getting hardcovers of Harras run as WRITER, and well, that is too horrible to contemplate.
Well, if "Life of Reilly" is to believed, he had his hands in it quite a lot and directed things in various conflicting directions and really, the fish stinks from the head, so . . .yeah.
Comic fans acting in illogical and contradictory ways? I'm shocked that such a thing could even be possible!
Well, people say good things about his run on Avengers, but when you realize that it was bracketed by Larry Hama's awful run and The Crossing, well . . .damning with faint praise, innit?
I haven't any trouble imagining this, given his alleged track record as editor of the X titles. I'm just saying that the storyline itself would have been a harmless footnote if it had been allowed to play out as planned. Now, well...isn't it telling we don't hear about Harras' deep involvement in comics that people still like?
Well, it has been sagely pointed out that perhaps Harras getting booted upstairs will lead to neither a return to 1998 Marvel nor a better collected editions department. This was greeted by the functional equivalent of fingers in the ears and "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"
...Larry Hama wrote Avengers? Good lord, considering how much he dislikes superheroes, that seems as inappropriate as a Warren Ellis Richie Rich.
If Harras' run gets praise, it must be because it looks better by comparison. I love the Avengers and I could never get into it. My enduring memory is the regular art team (I think it was Steve Epting & Tom Palmer) looked more like Buscema than Liefeld and so editorial decided to give the Avengers matching jackets to make up for it.
Yeah, I think had it just stayed an "Age of Apocalypse" event, it would have worked fine, and might have worked to pop the sales. However, the tail wagged the dog so long that the damage was done.
Denial is a powerful, and very stinky cologne. Mind you, I think Harras actually had some pretty crappy years in his tenure before 1998, in the wake of Heroes Reborn, that he started getting things straight.
Oh yeah! In fact, he introduced RAGE. Remember him?
And an extremely convoluted story featuring an Eternal mind-meld and a whole bunch of alternate Avengers . . .which actually wasn't bad, exactly . . .but worth lionizing? I dunno.
6 comments:
Fair point! But he was also E-i-C during a period of some pretty decent books by Marvel. Not that I think he was actually responsible for the contents except in an extremely broad sense, but he does have that in his favor.
Frankly, I'm surprised it's taken this long. I figured something was up when he got freelance writing gigs and then got the collected editions editor job. He wouldn't have been high on my list for either of those, for wildly different reasons.
I have the most morbidly appropriate word verification imaginable for a post about DC Comics : "shedie". I feel like even Blogger is trying to tell us something about mainstream comics.
True, and he did seem to get his act together post Heroes Reborn (sorta) and gave the non-X books a shot in the arm, but unlike Shooter, I think Harras is always gonna have a lot more misses than hits around his neck. I mean, the Clone Saga and putting Byrne on Spider-Man? Woof.
I'd actually heard he'd been working in their collections dept. In fact, people weren't too happy with his duties there because he basically tanked it?
Still, I will be getting into some of Harras' hits here soon as I have just gotten 3 of 5 of the Avengers Assemble hardcovers and I intend to review them for the Prattle.
It's hard to say otherwise, especially when you consider the time periods in question. The Clone Saga, of course, was just a decent storyline idea that got dragged out way too long and ruined the character somewhat. I'd chalk that up more to "bad leadership" than "bad ideas".
Yeah, I am an occasional poster over at this forum and during Harras' tenure, the reputation of the DC collected editions department has plummeted among these folks. Though oddly, the complaints are rarely addressed to Bob Harras. Also oddly, one of the loudest complainers about DC is excited about his hiring for E-i-C. I don't pretend to understand this at all.
Oh wow. That should indeed prove interesting. I was afraid we might be getting hardcovers of Harras run as WRITER, and well, that is too horrible to contemplate.
Well, if "Life of Reilly" is to believed, he had his hands in it quite a lot and directed things in various conflicting directions and really, the fish stinks from the head, so . . .yeah.
Comic fans acting in illogical and contradictory ways? I'm shocked that such a thing could even be possible!
Well, people say good things about his run on Avengers, but when you realize that it was bracketed by Larry Hama's awful run and The Crossing, well . . .damning with faint praise, innit?
I haven't any trouble imagining this, given his alleged track record as editor of the X titles. I'm just saying that the storyline itself would have been a harmless footnote if it had been allowed to play out as planned. Now, well...isn't it telling we don't hear about Harras' deep involvement in comics that people still like?
Well, it has been sagely pointed out that perhaps Harras getting booted upstairs will lead to neither a return to 1998 Marvel nor a better collected editions department. This was greeted by the functional equivalent of fingers in the ears and "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"
...Larry Hama wrote Avengers? Good lord, considering how much he dislikes superheroes, that seems as inappropriate as a Warren Ellis Richie Rich.
If Harras' run gets praise, it must be because it looks better by comparison. I love the Avengers and I could never get into it. My enduring memory is the regular art team (I think it was Steve Epting & Tom Palmer) looked more like Buscema than Liefeld and so editorial decided to give the Avengers matching jackets to make up for it.
Yeah, I think had it just stayed an "Age of Apocalypse" event, it would have worked fine, and might have worked to pop the sales. However, the tail wagged the dog so long that the damage was done.
Denial is a powerful, and very stinky cologne. Mind you, I think Harras actually had some pretty crappy years in his tenure before 1998, in the wake of Heroes Reborn, that he started getting things straight.
Oh yeah! In fact, he introduced RAGE. Remember him?
And an extremely convoluted story featuring an Eternal mind-meld and a whole bunch of alternate Avengers . . .which actually wasn't bad, exactly . . .but worth lionizing? I dunno.
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