Part 2 - Not on the list Uncanny X-Men
His run worked to a formula and he worked and manipulated that to move with the times that his exceptional run covered. He experimented with ideas and character rosters, restlessly playing with that formula, though never really moving too far from it. As a teenager introduced to his work in the mid 80s these comics spoke to me so much and outside Daredevil, these were my favourite of that time.
Yet now, for all that, I can barely read them these days.
I don't really enjoy these comics as an adult at all. Why is that? Well for me they are so of their time and indeed my time then, but they don't hold up to my older eye. I see the formula, can't read past the cracks and the hookey dialogue. I see that crafted formula exposed so clearly and it isn't for me any more. The fact that they were so perfectly crafted for his audience of the time and age they were, means they simply don't translate to me as the reader I am now. There is no room in them to entertain the different reader I have become.
In my entry for Power Pack I talked about how I felt the characters there were honest, they felt real and I trusted them and their place in the story. It truly felt like the characters came first, the story developed from there. With Claremont's X-Men I just don't feel that any more, I don't trust the characters as drivers. The craft and skills behind them shows through, but not in a good way. In the way that makes me see what strings they are trying to pull, what aspect of the audience they are playing to. How they are being used to key into some element of teenage life that will make them appeal to the target audience.
I mean it's done brilliantly, it really works and it worked like billio on me when I was that audience. Now however I feel I see behind the curtain and the characters feel almost cynically built to pull certain emotional triggers. A large part of that is possibly the dialogue as well. I find it almost impenetrable these days. It's almost as bad as Stan Lees, it's hyperbolic and there's just so much of it. But written in a way that feels like it's sculpted to evoke a specific response, rather than feeling natural and evoking that response organically.
Fair to say all dialogue, all story will do this, I just feel with Claremont's work I can now see how he's pulling the strings. As said as well there's just too much of it, so many words, often not saying that much. It feels so written and underlines points which could have better been served by 'show not tell'. I do wonder how good it might have been if John Wagner had been a script editor and just chipped away at things to expose the essence of what was being said, not underline it three or four times.
It's a real shame as one thing Claremont does better than almost any superhero writer is craft combat to do just that. To evoke tension and excitement in very deliberate ways. With his action pieces though he gets away with it much better as he whisks you along at pace, whereas the dialogue drags the character moments back. In the combat sections you genuinely feel our heroes are in danger and the fight is hard and they have to be creative to win the day. Or often not, defeats happened and so the danger in these superhero tussles was palpable. Not so with the character moments where nothing feels earnt, to me at least these days.
I accept I'm very much an outlier on this and folks either see past the cracks that I perceive to glory in the great plotting. Or the stories have such a foundational part in their reading they don't care. OR they see the craft as so good they don't even notice what I perceive as forced characters I don't trust. I mean none of us can ignore the countless dangling plot threads, but they never really mattered, they were part of the fun wondering when some long forgotten idea would spring back to life.
My not liking Claremont's Uncanny run is another case of the reader bringing different desires to the table and therefore getting a different reaction to what they read. I do completely get what folks see in them, but they are just not for me these days. And for me this one is a case of not just thinking these comics are good, just not that good. Rather I just don't get on with them anymore at all, wonderful art aside.
It doesn't matter how important you are if I don't trust you, you're not getting my vote.
His run worked to a formula and he worked and manipulated that to move with the times that his exceptional run covered. He experimented with ideas and character rosters, restlessly playing with that formula, though never really moving too far from it. As a teenager introduced to his work in the mid 80s these comics spoke to me so much and outside Daredevil, these were my favourite of that time.
Yet now, for all that, I can barely read them these days.
I don't really enjoy these comics as an adult at all. Why is that? Well for me they are so of their time and indeed my time then, but they don't hold up to my older eye. I see the formula, can't read past the cracks and the hookey dialogue. I see that crafted formula exposed so clearly and it isn't for me any more. The fact that they were so perfectly crafted for his audience of the time and age they were, means they simply don't translate to me as the reader I am now. There is no room in them to entertain the different reader I have become.
In my entry for Power Pack I talked about how I felt the characters there were honest, they felt real and I trusted them and their place in the story. It truly felt like the characters came first, the story developed from there. With Claremont's X-Men I just don't feel that any more, I don't trust the characters as drivers. The craft and skills behind them shows through, but not in a good way. In the way that makes me see what strings they are trying to pull, what aspect of the audience they are playing to. How they are being used to key into some element of teenage life that will make them appeal to the target audience.
I mean it's done brilliantly, it really works and it worked like billio on me when I was that audience. Now however I feel I see behind the curtain and the characters feel almost cynically built to pull certain emotional triggers. A large part of that is possibly the dialogue as well. I find it almost impenetrable these days. It's almost as bad as Stan Lees, it's hyperbolic and there's just so much of it. But written in a way that feels like it's sculpted to evoke a specific response, rather than feeling natural and evoking that response organically.
Fair to say all dialogue, all story will do this, I just feel with Claremont's work I can now see how he's pulling the strings. As said as well there's just too much of it, so many words, often not saying that much. It feels so written and underlines points which could have better been served by 'show not tell'. I do wonder how good it might have been if John Wagner had been a script editor and just chipped away at things to expose the essence of what was being said, not underline it three or four times.
It's a real shame as one thing Claremont does better than almost any superhero writer is craft combat to do just that. To evoke tension and excitement in very deliberate ways. With his action pieces though he gets away with it much better as he whisks you along at pace, whereas the dialogue drags the character moments back. In the combat sections you genuinely feel our heroes are in danger and the fight is hard and they have to be creative to win the day. Or often not, defeats happened and so the danger in these superhero tussles was palpable. Not so with the character moments where nothing feels earnt, to me at least these days.
I accept I'm very much an outlier on this and folks either see past the cracks that I perceive to glory in the great plotting. Or the stories have such a foundational part in their reading they don't care. OR they see the craft as so good they don't even notice what I perceive as forced characters I don't trust. I mean none of us can ignore the countless dangling plot threads, but they never really mattered, they were part of the fun wondering when some long forgotten idea would spring back to life.
My not liking Claremont's Uncanny run is another case of the reader bringing different desires to the table and therefore getting a different reaction to what they read. I do completely get what folks see in them, but they are just not for me these days. And for me this one is a case of not just thinking these comics are good, just not that good. Rather I just don't get on with them anymore at all, wonderful art aside.
It doesn't matter how important you are if I don't trust you, you're not getting my vote.