I was looking at Douglas Wolk’s essay on Grant Morrison, in which he says, among other things:
“Fortunately, Morrison makes it easier for our own vision of The Invisibles, as readers, to be multiple, too. Return and begin again with what we asked earlier: who’s telling this story? Who’s making it possible to see? The Invisibles is comics, not prose: the creator of its images is, to a significant extent, the person telling the story. But various sections of the series are drawn by roughly 20 artists, and there’s no single “true” or “correct” representation of any character. The climactic storyline is drawn “jam”-style, with everyone taking a few pages, including the one Morrison himself drew. Morrison nonetheless has a prior claim as the image-maker, since he’s the one who directed the images via his own use of language.”
In other words, Wolk argues that the inconsistency/multiplicity of the artwork fits into Morrison’s themes of multiple identity and identity indeterminacy.
Okay…but this ignores a major point. The Invisibles’ artwork sucks. In fact, in virtually every title Morrison’s worked on, the artwork sucks. I know some people like Frank Quitely, and, by contemporary super-hero standards he’s not bad…which is to say, if you’re not grading on a curve, he’s pretty lousy. Moreover (with the possible exception of Arkham Asylum) Morrison hardly ever makes an effort to collaborate with his artists. You don’t get the sense with Morrison (as you do with Alan Moore) that he chooses people he wants to work with based on a particular project. At the end of Animal Man, he noted that he had yet to even communicate with his artist, if I remember correctly. In the recent “Grant Morrison: The Early Years,” when asked if he gives any consideration to his artist, he responds, basically, by saying “no”. “I just write what I feel the need to write and expect my collaborators to be professional enough and creative enough to interpret my stuff to the best of their abilities.” He notes that some artists interpret his ideas better than others…but it never seems to occur to him that he might be inspired by particular artists, or learn something from them in a back and forth creative process. Nor does he think visually in his writing. Where Alan Moore (for better and sometimes worse) experiments with layout and panel transitions and different looks for his comics, Morrison clearly couldn’t care less — which is why so many of the comics he works on are, visually, either boring or desperately cluttered.
Rather than being some sort of pomo strength, I think Morrison’s indifference to art is his signature weakness…and not coincicdentally, a major weakness of super-hero comics in general. Its says a lot about the field that the person who is, in many ways, its most thoughtful and intelligent proponent has no discernable visual aesthetics. I’ve actually read a couple of Grant Morrison’s straight prose stories (in an old series of erotic horror anthologies) and they’re great. It might really have been better if he’d stuck with that, though it pains me to say it. I love Animal Man and Doom Patrol, and have enjoyed Morrison’s other work as well. But, and alas, no matter the care and genius he puts into the writing, even his best efforts look like shit.
Hi Noah!
As you can see, I'm wasting time responding to your blog. I'm not sure I understand what your complaint about the art in these comics is. You call it all "shitty…" Does this mean you personally don't like any of it, or is there something all of the art shares that makes it less palatable than some other comics you're reading or have read. The Phil Jimenez art for Book 2 of the Invisibles (I think that's his name) is (it's true) largely George Perez knockoff, super-"realistic", super-detailed superhero fare, but it's (at least) clear and pleasing to the eye. That is, anatomy, perspective, etc. seem "correct" and the storytelling is clear (that is, one can see what's going on…which isn't always the case elsewhere in the series). I understand if this kind of realistic, super-hero artwork isn't your cup of tea, but I'm not sure it makes it "shitty" in some kind of objective sense. Is this a purely "subjective" judgment, or are you making some kind of empirical claim about the quality of artwork in Morrison…which I think varies. Earlier this week, I read a blog wherein the author (an acquaintance of mine) praises J. H. Williams III's work on Morrison's Batman. I seem to remember you dissing Williams (who worked on Promethea) too, but I kind of like him too. Is there any way to articulate your objections, other than "shitty"? I'm just curious…
I liked _Making Comics_ too, which you pooped on!
While you have a few good points, reading this post makes me wonder how much you've really read of Morrison's work, particularly recently. I would absolutely agree that much of his long-form work (Invisibles, New X-Men, JLA, Doom Patrol) has been hampered by inconsistent and often mediocre art, and that for Wolk to claim this as a benefit of the Invisibles series doesn't really make sense. But to claim that the artwork sucks on "virtually every title Morrison's worked on" or that Morrison doesn't collaborate with his artists is ridiculous.
I think the best counter-example from recent years would be the Seven Soldiers series – each of the eight series (including the bookends) was matched with a great artist who perfectly fit the mood of that comic – from Yanick Paquette's superhero cheesecake on Bulleteer to Frazer Irving's subterranean gloom on Klarion. I can't imagine this as the product of someone who couldn't care less about the art in his comics.
In fact, to quote Morrison from a recent intervew (http://www.newsarama.com/dcnew/7Soldiers/7Soldierswrap_Morrison.html): "All my work starts as sketches in the notepad – I have to have pages of visuals and designs or I can't get started." That hardly sounds like someone who doesn't think visually in his writing.
(As an aside, I don't know much about his working methods regarding collaboration with artists, but to cite Arkham Asylum as an exception to your rule seems odd given the fact that Morrison and Dave McKean had a contentious working relationship and seem to be working at cross-purposes throughout the book.)
Finally, to further refute your point about his artists sucking, here's a modest list: J.G. Jones on "Marvel Boy," Chris Weston on "The Filth," Jae Lee on "Fantastic Four: 1234," Philip Bond on "Kill Your Boyfriend" and "Vimanarama," and Cameron Stewart on "Seaguy." And that's not even mentioning Frank Quitely, whose work with Morrison on WE3 and All-Star Superman is, in my opinion, miles ahead of anything else in the superhero genre today and incredibly innovative, but whom you apparently don't care for. Frankly, if you think these artists suck, I don't think I want to know what artists you like.
Noah:
http://www.newswire.poormojo.org/archives/018030.php
Hugs,
Alan
Jonah V. is right about the 7 soldiers stuff, esp. the great work by the guy on Klarion, Witch Boy.
I think the key aspect of Noah’s argument here is that Morrison seems ambivalent about the visual aesthetic in his books. On this point I would totally agree. While some of the art is “good” (or at least pleasing) and some of the art is “bad” (or at least hard to reconcile with the story) I have never felt that Morrison really engaged another creator on that creator’s own terms.
I would offer as the counter example the late career work of Alan Moore. Starting with WATCHMEN, of course, but also including FROM HELL and even the obscure BIG NUMBERS, you can see that Alan Moore has conceived his story very much with an artistic collaborator in mind. He writes something that draws on the strength of the artist in an intrinsic way. WATCHMEN is reinforced by the clean pop art style that Dave Gibbons offers, especially because Gibbons creates visuals that are careful and very classic looking, while at the same time being far more naturalistic than a classic pop art style might imply; and in FROM HELL Eddie Campbell has consciously torqued his own style to more closely match the art of the illustrated London News that first ran the Ripper stories in the 19th century. In this way, Moore is the true Orson Welles of American comics, understanding the vocabulary in a deeper way than just about anyone else.
Grant Morrison, by contrast, comes across as petulant and disdainful of craft. Not always, of course, but often enough to frustrate me. He rushes his big ideas, his lazy when dealing with his collaborators (or, at least appears to be) and he often leaves his work unfinished. THE INVISIBLES is the key example of this: a breathtaking piece of narrative ambition that I never felt was fully executed. We got fragments, and if you read it during its original run you probably also remember the lags between issues.
For me, Grant Morrison is one of the great disappointments in modern comics.
If I were to level any complain about this post, it would be that the argument itself seems overstated, and the paucity of specific evidence leads the piece into the exact kind of ambivalence toward crafted that Noah hangs around Morrison’s neck.
Of course, this is the same sort of error you can attribute to this comment, and to many of my own blog posts.
-Fritz
http://www.poormojo.org
Right…of course Morrison is no Alan Moore, and his comics runs often dazzle in their early stages and fizzle out as the run concludes. The exception (other than Animal Man) is, oddly, New X-Men, which felt like it was all of a piece, cleverly written and uniformly interesting (not that I can remember any of the details). And…of course Moore shows more interaction and care for his artist-collaborators. Still, not ALL of the art in Morrison's books are "shitty" –and some of it DOES seem peculiarly appropriate for the subject matter (Klarion, Seaguy maybe), so the accusation doesn't quite work in all of its permutations. Maybe Wolk is wrong (probably), but I'm not sure that makes Noah (my brother btw) right. Besides, Noah's critique of the art in Promethea (I think this was just in personal conversation) undercuts the Moore vs. Morrison element of the critique. Part of it is the dislike of "shitty'" art which I'd like to pinpoint more clearly for some unknown reason.
Fucking blogger. I just wrote a long, thoughtful response and it ate it.
In short:
Invisibles sold poorly and therefore got poor artists.
GM almost died a few times while working on the Invisibles, due to illness, hence the lags.
And which other great comic author (besides Alan Moore) has the sort of relationship you want to see with an artist? Maybe Ellis & Templesmith on Fell?
As for Moore, he has a psychotic level of control over the art, to the point where he barely lets the artist have any input at all. Look at the way he scripts.
Hey Noah, listen:
Frank Quitely (“Someone like him”.. yeah, someone indeed…)
Chris Weston
Dave McKean
Philip Bond
Cameron Stewart
J.H. Williams III
J.J. Jones
Steve Yeowell
Phil Jimenez
Frazer Irving
Doug Mahnke
Ryan Sook
Gene Ha
Tommy Lee Edwards
John Paul Leon
Pasqual Ferry
(and another bunch I can’t recall now)
…
Your post only means you’re dumb.
Sorry about it.
Matthias Wieval's blog answers or responds to some of this:
http://www.metabunker.dk/?p=830
Basically, I feel like Morrison's artists vary in competence, but that there is little coordination between story and art even when the drafting is decent (which it often isn't.) Again, Arkham Asylum is the exception. I'm not necessarily a huge fan of the art in that book either, but at least McKean uses layout, coloring, imagery, and drawing style to create a unified look that is deliberately tied into the book's themes. I hadn't realized that he did this despite, rather than because of, Morrison's best efforts…but I can't say I'm surprised either.
I haven't seen everything Morrison's done recently, but the Filth seemed muddy and cluttered in a way that I've come to expect from Morrison's art. So did the issues of Seven Soldiers I saw. (Part of the reason I don't keep up with Morrison religiously is that I find the artwork painful, alas.)
If I were looking for examples of non-shitty pulp art, Eric, I'd probably go first to manga. The control of levels of representation, the sense of page layout, the design, and the drafting in Japan seem to me immeasurably superior to what you find in mainstream comics here. And they're in black and white, so you avoid the unbelievably ugly computer coloring.
Sorry about the paucity of evidence and general half-assedness, Fritz. I generally resent that sort of thing myself, but I kind of thought blogs were supposed to be that way. In other words, I am whole-assedly embracing my blog nature by writing half-assedly. Or something like that.
Mojo: other decent super-hero writer/artist relationships is a good question. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby did good work together; likewise Lee and Ditko (even if Lee's major contribution was just getting out of the way, I'm all for it.) Frank Miller often draws for himself, but even when he doesn't you get the sense that he's an artist and thinks visually. Again, it's hard for me to come up with contemporary examples because I've been so disenchanted with super-hero comics lately (especially the art) that I haven't really kept up….
Matteo, I prefer to think that it just means we have a difference of opinion, for obvious reasons.
hey Noah,
I think All-Star Superman by Morrison and Quitely works perfectly. And at least half the joy is in the art. You should check it out sometime.
And as for Frank Miller, his (coincidentally_ All-Star Batman is a perfect example of art and story that run counter each other and end up making the whole thing much less than the sum of its parts.
I agree that Morrison's work could be stronger if the art was more integrated with the story, but I think it has been steadily improving over the years and while your comments most likely hold true to the Morrison comics you read back when, they might not be as true anymore.
PS Added your blog to my RSS rotation. Don't be surprised if you show up on the newswire.
I'm such an ignoramus when it comes to art, I'm not even sure what you mean by some things, like "drafting" (drawing skill?) and levels of representation…but surely All-Star Superman links art to the story's "themes" and "mood," as did several of the 7 Soldiers titles (although not the crappily drawn Seven Soldiers #0 and #1). All-Star Superman is probably the best thing Morrison's done in mainstream superhero-dom in a while, trumping even New X-Men (I forgot about it since it shows up so infrequently)…and Miller's All-Star Batman is enjoyably bad (drawn by Jim Lee I think)! That is, the writing is so over-the-top, it can be read as parody…which seems to be Miller's standard style actually. It worked better in Dark Knight and Batman Year One though…
Drafting tends to mean representational drawing skill; by "levels of representation" I just meant that in manga they shift from cartoony to realistic and back again very gracefully; something that is rarely done well (or at all) in mainstream western comics.
I'll check out All-Star Superman the next time I get a chance. And I've been meaning to get some of the 7 soldiers trades. I still like Grant Morrison a lot. I just have reservations, is all.
OK Noah, you are very polite and I apologize for the insult 8it is not my normal behaviour) BUT you practically forced me to do it when you spoke about the "shitty" art..
You don'like Quitely ad his storytelling (his best quality imho), it's ok, but I think you will agree that in the list I wrote there are A LOT of great artists.
I agree with you on Doom patrol, Animal Man and JLA, but those are the only ones which can be argued about.
The parallel with Moore doesn't fit because there is a huge difference between Morrison and Moore scripts: almost any good penciller could follow Top Ten panel descriptions and create at least an OK comic (even if Cannon and Ha did an amazing job and brought Top Ten to the Olympus!)… i have read a few pages of The Invisible script and sometimes something is not enough detailed (do you remember Lovecraft unspeakable horrors? Well, jimenes and co. had to draw them even if GM did not describe them quite well).
Even the alchemy between writer and artist is a partial legend: Cassaday is a great artist by himself and his contribution to Planetary is at least equal to Ellis', but I think it was the SUM of their works that brought us this masterwork, not the real interaction between them (thing that, you say, lacks in GM more than in other writers…)
In any case you should read all the other Morrison's comics which are WAAAAY better than JLA (imho his worst work ever)and then consider again your opinion.
Hope I showed you I am not totally a jerk.
Bye.
Hey Matteo. When I said "shitty art" I wasn't necessarily saying "shitty artists," at least not in every case. Morrison's worked with some artists whose work I quite like in other contexts (Jill Thompson, for example.) I think he tends not to bring out the best in them, is all.
I have seen a fair bit of Morrison's later work over the years (X-Men, JLA, Flex Mentallo, the Filth, some of 7 soldiers, etc. etc.) Hopefully I'll get to look at more soon.
I actually thought JLA was pretty entertaining, mostly because Morrison seemed to really not like the heroes. I rather enjoyed that.
Yeowell is a special case; maybe even a unique one. His art on Zenith was a perfect match for the story. Just about everything else he's done (with the possible exception of the excreble Skrull Kill Krewe), with or without Morrison, misses by miles.
Really a pity that the new Zenith compilations are stuck in a warehouse, somewhere in England, pending resolution of rights issues. Truly deserving of a wider audience…
"I actually thought JLA was pretty entertaining, mostly because Morrison seemed to really not like the heroes. I rather enjoyed that."
That's ludicrous, he elevated the JLA to the status of the literal Pantheon of the DC Universe, made Steel, Kyle Rayner and Plastic Man into A-List characters, etc. I have no idea how you could read Morrison's JLA and come off with the idea that he disliked many of the characters.
Have you seen the aniversary edition of Arkham? McKean took a dense, wonderful 64 page OGN by Morrison and turned it into an obtuse 120 page one. It's gorgeous, don't get me wrong, but it is in no way a collaboration.
It also seems silly to say Morrison doesn't care about the visual side of his comics when he started out as a cartoonist (he even did a daily strip at one point), designs many of his characters and supplies thumbnails to at least some of his artists.
That last comment about ARKHAM ASYLUM seems right, even if I haven't seen the new edition he's referring to. The ONLY direct comment regarding his artists I could think of, being a Morrison fan from almost the beginning and so having read a lot of interviews with him, was that he considered ARKHAM a failure because McKean was absolutely the wrong artist for the work (he was probably saying this in retrospect, IIRC) – he had scripted a very tight, programmed story that worked with the conceit of the layout of the asylum being a blueprint of Batman's psyche, including secret passageways and trapdoors and stuff relatable to sublimated drives and obsessions, but NONE of that comes through in the finished work (I can't say myself. I love Morrison but I've only read AYLUM exactly once, when it came out, and never had the urge to revisit except maybe to read the Joker bits again since I like Morrison's reconception of what the Joker is).
As for the other comments – eh, taste in comics art is some of the most subjective taste there is. Case works fine for me on DOOM PATROL although I've accepted that others just don;t like him. I thought the gangly, rangy artwork on ANIMAL MAN was just fine. THE FILTH is beautiful, those KLARION and FRANKENSTEIN issues rocked, Quitely's great…I guess I'm just easy…
But if manga's your standard, then all of the EC artists suck so what's the point of arguing?
The funny thing is that Rachel Pollack's much maligned follow-up run of DOOM PATROL is a perfect exampled of shifting artists completely undermining the ability of a writer to get their story across – until McKeever finally came on board (and then the book was canned), but then I like Ted McKeever's stuff and, again, lot's of people don't.
Manga's not my standard; it's just something that works. I love Berni Wrightson, for example.
cough cough cough
I'll agree that Morrison does generally seem ambivalent or apathetic about the artists on his books, which is unreasonable for a writer of his standing and talent. There are plenty of counterexamples — besides WE3 and Superman, I'd hold up Seven Soldiers, plus Vimanarama and Seaguy — but in general a great deal of his published work is hampered by inconsistent (Invisibles) or unattractive (The Filth) art.
We can't know the degree to which his editors are responsible for both the good and bad choices, though — the New X-Men mess was clearly much bigger than Morrison, and Marvel's corporate culture at the time demanded timeliness at all costs, whereas 2005 DC was willing to delay Seven Soldiers until JHW3 was free, and probably selected most of the artists on that project without much input from Morrison.
Actually, you hit it on the head.
He’s had some great collaborators. Muth, McKean, and Yeowell have all undoubtedly turned in some of their best work for him.
Yeowell also did some of his worst. And you really wonder how stuff like that happens, again and again.
I’m not detracting from the quality of his writing at all. But yeah, his collaborators vary beyond reason — of the big writers, he has the least coherent look.
Maybe it’s because he’s working through the majors, and sometimes you have to make compromises to get the book done.
The inks on Yeowell’s pencils at the end of the first big Invisibles arc — name escapes me — but it’s so puzzling why he let the climax be so completely underdrawn.