How long have you guys known that Frank Miller's got something in the Bat-oven and haven't bothered telling me?? (also Jim Lee content)

http://www.theouthousers.com/index.php/news/133819-confirmed-frank-miller-had-basically-nothing-to-do-with-dark-knight-iii-story.html?utm_content=buffer6b521&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

So I guess it's more a matter of how Azzarello's writing is, rly

I quite liked the art on DK2 - I don't necessarily equate a broader, cartoonish style with 'laziness', and generally prefer it to the neurotic, overworked fiddlefaddle of a George Perez - but again, I'm not sure it was a style that was appropriate for that particular comic.

So it's basically a Before Watchmen scenario again, except After Dark Knight? (And Miller is writing a fourth book?)

I've put off Azarello since I read a couple of his seriously dreadful Hellblazer issues - has he done anything actually good?

A few people I know rep for his 100 Bullets crime series, but it didn't do much for me. I get the impression that he doesn't actually have much a feel or love for superhero comics, so tends to resort to hardboiled cliche as a way of writing round the genre.

People have said good things about his Wonder Woman run. The best I can personally say about him is that he has very good taste in artistic collaborators and spouses.

I read some the early issues of his Wonder Woman, and it was okay, but it felt more like he was trying to write a Vertigo book (with a heavier and more Sandman style emphasis on the various Greek deities than previous WW writers have had) than a superhero book. Also, he retconned the Amazons (a steady part of WW's supporting cast since the beginning) into man-killers and rapists, which obviously made a lot of feminist fans angry, especially since Gail Simone (the previous long-term WW writer) had done a lot to reclaim those characters after previous missteps, such as the Amazon Attack crossover.

And his Joker miniseries was awful, one of the worst examples of doing a grim & gritty, "mature" take on a character who doesn't really need it. (The Joker is also revealed to be a rapist in that one.)

To be fair, he was following alan moore's lead there

No, he wasn't.

I'm pretty sure the Joker's attack on Barbara Gordon in the Killing Joke is intentionally made to look like rape (right down to the Joker showing "compromising" photos of the assault to Commissioner Gordon, hoping they would make him crack), so I kinda agree with James there. The way the whole scene and it's aftermath is framed, it definitely feels like Moore is saying, "DC won't allow me to make it an actual rape, but I'm going to make it as close to it as possible, so you can read between the lines".

this always turns into a big argument when a female character gets broken, and usually the (always male) creators explicitly deny rape. for instance when black canary lost her canary cry, or the jessica jones/purple man thing- in both those instances the writers explicitly made it canon that those characters had not been raped, in a kind of huffy way like they were mad at people for even thinking it. i understand that to an extent, in that "attack" is a euphemism for "rape" in our culture, but only when a woman is attacked. at the same time i've read some feminist theorists who say that the common sci-fi trope of "mind-rape" is basically indistinguishable from violent rape, and i think there's a good point to be made there too.

Alan Moore is pretty good at indicating when rape is occurring or has occurred in his comics. The Killing Joke doesn't.

Yes, he is pretty good at indicating it, in comics meant for mature readers and published by indie publishers. But do you really think that DC would've allowed him to do a comic where Batgirl is explicitly raped by the Joker, in 1988? And that he didn't already know this when he wrote the story?

I don't think he intended, wanted or attempted to do a comic where Batgirl was raped by the Joker.

i'm sure it's indicated clearly and unambiguously in his 5,000 page script

Great argument, only very slightly undermined by the 128-page script being online.

Well, im sure any woman who was assualted, stripped naked and photographed would not feel at all sexually violated.

This is the point: those things are horrifying enough. There's no need to project the Joker's chalky penis into one's reading of the scene.

Azzarello cleverly just gets right to the rape-cuckolding without faffing about with any of yer fancy psychological torture or songs.

It must be fun to read things and have the ONE TRUE reading and not admit anyone else might have a valid interpretation of anything, ever

It's true, I didn't use any phrases like "I don't think," or give any reasons for my reading of the text, or look up the script and read it after rushomancy cited an imaginary version of it.

I mean, I don't care about and haven't argued with anyone's personal readings of the text; I've only disputed claims as to the author's specific sole intention.

That I accidentally discovered along the way that the author's intention is available in black and white for anyone to consult, and on all available evidence doesn't support other peoples' inferences, was mildly gratifying, but I would have come back and said "hey turns out I was wrong guys, he says 'MAKE SURE WE SEE PHOTOS OF BARBARA WRITHING UNDER THE JOKER'S SCRAWNY FORM, THRASHING LIKE ONE OF ENGLEHART'S AND ROGERS' VENOMOUS FISH, REMOVED FROM THE SAFE HARBOUR OF GOTHAM RESERVOIR. ABSOLUTELY DO NOT COMMIT THE ERROR OF ONLY SHOWING PHOTOS OF HER TAKEN FROM A STANDING DISTANCE BY THE JOKER, THE ONLY PERSON PRESENT IN THE ROOM BY NOW AFTER HIS GOONS HAVE DRAGGED JIM GORDON AWAY. MERELY SEEING HIS DAUGHTER VIOLATED, STRIPPED, CRIPPLED AND POSSIBLY BY NOW DEAD WILL IN NO WAY CAP OFF THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ORDEAL WE HAVE RUN HIM THROUGH OVER THE PREVIOUS PAGES,' fair play to you all."

You're quite odd, aren't you?