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Storming Heaven

Started by 2000AD Online, 21 January, 2002, 11:37:10 AM

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fraston

should point out here that Zenith was superheroes and Cthulu, Storming heaven is super hippies. big difference as far as i can see.

and this one's in colour.

Thread Zero

Ah but the last book of Zenith was in colour!

And Grant Morrison was under the influence of some illegal substance when he wrote it!

Or so Tharg told me.

scott the pedantic one

Thread Zero

Oh stop moaning everyone.

Moan moan moan!

Spread Tharg love to all.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

By the way my name is scojo. Not Scott.

Hee hee.

nathan

You fibber, Scott ;-)

I wasn't moaning, I just didn't understand how something as fresh and exciting as Storming Heaven could be called a "watered-down" version of the greatly over-rated Zenith. I can see now there is a _superficial_ similarity but to say exactly how tenuous the link is  I'd have to reread Zenith and that ain't going to happen!

N

paulvonscott

Some people say why they like stuff, some people say why they don't and a better understanding is ahd by all.  I don't expect any of my views to ever change someones mind.I thought the whole point of forums was the moaning :)  

Oh and don't forget the bitching, and slagging off, that's usually a big part of it too :)

The similarities are just in the concepts Nathan, I read Storming Heaven and it reminded me of the 60's Zenuth stuff, that's all.

And Scojo, how dare you complain about the moaning, your ramblings about the movie have driven me into my local insane asylum.  Mind you there is this guy, with a good idea for a Dredd screenplay...

Just kidding:)

Nurse, can I have the sedative now please!

Trough

Couldn't agree more, Mr PVS.  I thought I was the only one here thinking that Storming Heaven is characterless and uninvolving.

Still not "getting" Frazer Irvine's art, either.  Like with Henry Flint, I think it LOOKS great, but is sometimes hard to follow - which, in my book, does not make good storytelling.

Grump, whinge, whine etc.

Trough, having a bad Monday

JamieB

"What superhero comic isn't about saving the world or destroying it?"

Powers and X-Force, to name two.

*J*

Leigh S

The problem with SH is that too much happens in explanatory boxes and there's too little dialogue and interaction between the characters (besides two episodes of people whining on about where Dr Trips is!).  This is 'tell' not 'show', which makes for a dull comic strip IMO  - it should be the other way around.

Too much exposition and too little plot (bad guys attack good guys).  The Sixties setting should present more interesting scenarios than this - Vietnam, the rise of the counterculture, revolution in the air, the emerging musical superstars (Beatles/Byrds/The Who etc.) who in their own way were very much like superhero teams....  instead we get satanic charlie Manson vs angelic hippy.

The art is tops though.

Matt

Okay, put it another way, what superhero comic isn't about good guys in tights fighting bad guys in tights? I was simply trying to suggest that Stormin Heaven had a familiar feel to it because it operated within the superhero genre and not because it was unoriginal (i.e. based on Zenith)

MATT

Thread Zero

Superman does his own ironing - the mini series - didn't either.

scojo who has all 4 issues of that

2000AD Online

Don`t you mean `constructive criticism`?  Anyway, I did say I liked the art.

2000AD Online

Storming Heaven has oblique drug references, the way the American Air Force is `obliquely` bombing Afghanistan.  SH doesn`t do all those things, it just alludes to them in a pompous way.

yours opinionatedly,


Floyd

O Lucky Stevie!

>The similarities are just in the concepts Nathan, I read Storming Heaven and it reminded me of the 60's Zenuth stuff, that's all.

no doubt because both zenith & storming heaven are referencing the same ken kesey/robert anton wilson source material.

as i've noted elsewhere on this board, grant morrison has explored the same themes in the flex mentallo mini series for vertigo (quite possibly the best super hero comic i have ever read; easily the best thing published in the genre since watchmen) whilst manson is touched upon in his bible john from crisis.

oh, & i actually quite enjoyed balls brothers. the interplay between the two of them was genuinely "brotherish", & wagner's inspired silliness was a breath of fress air amongst the sufeit of superteams which sprang up in the wake of dc's success with the morrison penned jla.

i've wet my knickers!
steven l'enfant terrible
"We'll send all these nasty words to Aunt Jane. Don't you think that would be fun?"

JamieB

It is possible to do original things while notionally remaining within the superhero genre - Powers is effectively a crime procedural with superheroes chucked in, Top 10 is similar if more in-jokey, Planetary has superheroes but reads more like an exploration of the last century's popular culture. Noble Causes is, apparently, going to be a soap opera (a la Eastenders, rather than most modern superhero books, which are effectively soap opera in any case).

The reason people see similarities between SH and Zenith is because there are some - teams of super-hippies (the original Zenith superteam's evolution into Cloud 9), some character names (Dr. Beat / Brother Beat). SH, however, doesn't focus on one hero (as yet) and, of course, has the 60s as its milieu, rather than the 80s.

SH isn't exactly a radical re-invention of the form, but neither is it a rehash of the ideas we saw in Zenith (which, in itself, was a development of GM's work in Zoids*, and continued in things like Animal Man, Doom Patrol and - most obviously - The Invisibles).

* Which, I believe, predates Zenith - feel free to naysay me if I'm wrong.

The one thing about SH which bugs the hell out of me is the inconsistency from prog to prog in character names - Adam Laar has been Lar and (I believe) Lars thus far - which I assume is a cock-up rather than deliberate.

That said, the artwork is gorgeous. And the story itself is, at the very least, an interesting move away from future-oriented SF. Even if you dislike it, you gotta admit, running a new strip of this kind bodes well for the future of 2000AD and Rebellion's time in charge. Well, I think so, anyway.

*J*

turnhill

storming heaven has to be one of the biggest piles of anal crap that has ever made it's way onto the hallowed pages of 2000ad.all this pseudo-60'2 hippy arty wanky shit.i don't understand how 2000ad looked as though it was finally going along the right track only to let this piece of uninspired piss poor garbage in.it reminds me of when 2000ad finally went up it's own arse sometime back in the late 80s when it got "cool" and "alternative" and "arty".fuck that.next,you'll tell us simon bisley and john hickelton are doing the art on some new stories.remember those wankers?splotchy,crappy art
making it impossiblt to follow stories.while the art in storming heaven is passable,the story itself is pure bollocks.pull it now!