Where Were You When Crisis #1 Came Out?

[nxylas]

I vaguely remember picking it up in my local newsagent. It was with the kids' comics, and ISTR the shop owner ticking off a subordinate, saying that it should be on a higher shelf, "because there's language in it".

I preferred Revolver, personally, but not many people agreed with me, or at least not enough to pay money for it.

[karlos]

I recall a customer tearing up a copy of Revolver for dissing Dan Dare.

[2000BC]

I think Angie Mills also did an episode?

She drew at least 2 episodes.  John Hicklenton also drew some episodes of Third World War.  His depiction of the corrupt police chief was disturbing.

[Funt Solo]

it seems to be promoting deadly violence against, well, just people one doesn't get on with. It's more dangerous, in that regard, than the cartoon chaos of Big Dave.

Am a bit surprised by this assertion - surely the story is not meant to be taken at all seriously? Does it really promote vuiolence more than any given 2000AD strip? I've a particular fondness for it, mostly on the grounds that it builds you up from a mildly unlikable protagonist (pretending to be interested in Christianity to get into a girl's pants) to a prpoerly unhinged one (the plumber) to an even more unhinged, and actively nasty, one (the doctor).

And there's a read of the whole thing that's it's just the idle fantasy of a bored/frustrated schoolkid wondering what it might be like to murder people and burn down the Church, which is I reckon something many a 2000AD reader has toyed with in their imagination (where there are no limits, not even to good taste).

I do understand your point - and it's why my original post had the opening caveat of "I had to reevaluate True Faith with a modern lens". When it was first published, there wasn't an organized, violent incel movement.

When the lead character's plan to get closer to the object* of his desires results in a rebuff, because she's misunderstood him, he reacts with highly aggressive vitriol and, later, deadly violence. It doesn't seem to be presented as a tragedy, either. It seems more like it's supposed to be a dark comedy.

Whereas the violence in something like Feral & Foe is at such a far remove from our day to day reality as to render it harmless, True Faith is presented mostly in a contemporary, believable setting (if you especially ignore the hyper-villain and his goons in the third act) - and so is positioned to do more harm.

I'm in no danger of seeing Feral & Foe on the news. Oh, and I live in the US, and I teach at a public school - so the danger of gun violence from ennui-fueled young people is very, very real. When mini-Solo posted a pic of our dog as part of a class activity, another student threatened to shoot it - in writing, and in energetic detail. Hyperbole, you might scoff - but he listed the type of gun and caliber of bullet he would use, and they are both easily available at the local family superstore and may indeed be within reach of the child at his home.

The times, they are a-changing.


*Yes, she's not an object.

[13school]

Weirdly (as I still have every issue of Crisis here somewhere) I barely remember anything about buying or reading Crisis in the first few years. I don't think much of anything in those issues really grabbed my attention* - I must have become a Garth Ennis fan at some stage but neither Troubled Souls nor True Faith won me over.

Knowing me, it was probably A Few Troubles More that won me over. I definitely remember being much more excited about Toxic! when that was announced.

_{*the first time I was really excited about a story in Crisis was The New Adventures of Hitler, though I was looking forward to Skin as well and we all know how that turned out}

[AlexF]

Your context of a US High School definitely paints the likes of True Faith in a much scarier light, I can sure see how you wouldn't want to read/promote it!

I cling to the belief that art can never be truly responsible for encouraging real-life violence, but I can see how it makes it easier for people to think digital violence is OK, or at the very least funny/harmless, which is totally isn't.

The flip side if this is that while I am OK saying that True Life never made someone kill another person, Third World War didn't make people protest/overturn the actions of Mega Corporations or racist police, either...

[Funt Solo]

Interesting, as it segues into a debate around whether actions (whether violent or otherwise) depicted in an artistic medium can cause real-world actions.

This debate is usually around censorship, whether it's of video game violence, or video nasties etc. You'll normally find me on the non-censorship side of that debate. It's interesting - if we were to move the debate onto diet - everyone can be in agreement that certain foodstuffs (for example) aren't good for the long term health of children. It's much more difficult to agree what to do about that - because folk aren't keen on draconian laws around what you are allowed to eat.

The ultimate solution to gun violence in the US is to stop selling guns to people - and that's clear from the data. So, perhaps there's no value in trying to stop artists from depicting realistic, contemporary gun violence - even if we could prove a causal link. If they didn't have a gun - they couldn't use it.

I'm not sure all of this is central to my complaint, though. I don't want to read a story where the protagonist is a murderous misogynist and he's presented as the hero of the piece. I am similarly turned off by Finn because of the sexual politics (fuck 'em and leave 'em, and they all drop their pants willingly despite their prior or latter character depiction) and the environmental politics (oil barons and manual workers at battery farms deserve to be brutally murdered). Or by Greysuit - a sick, serial killer that we're supposed to be rooting for. (Like, in the same way I don't want to drink in a racist pub.)

Moving back to the causal-art debate, for a moment. My wife is an elementary school counselor and has read research that demonstrates that the format of US sitcoms results in conflict between children. It goes like this: there's about 20 minutes of people fighting and being mean to each other, then 5 minutes of morality at the end. The viewer experiences 80% nastiness, and then goes out into the world and reflects that behavior back onto the playground. The 20% morality loses.

Conclusion: I like my fantasy violence firmly rooted in fantasy. I don't mind dark characters, but context is king. If the story is lauding shitheads, it's a turn off.

[JayzusB.Christ]

I recall a customer tearing up a copy of Revolver for dissing Dan Dare.

Kind of understandable, given THAT scene by Grant 'I've never written a rapes scene' Morrison. I have to say I liked Dare though - it's one of the darkest and bleakest strips from an era of dark and bleak comics, and I read it much later on in life, but I found it genuinely gripping and hauntingly poignant.

[AlexF]

If the main underlying principle of all storytelling is 'conflict' (which is maybe debatable but not by the people who make money from writing stories), does this mean that all humans, as inveterate consumers of stories, are driven in life to seek out/expect conflict?

I'm basically wondering if that sitcom-based research, fascinating though it sounds, has fallen into a classic 'correlation is not causation' trap...

Getting wildly off-topic here but one of my favourite depictions of the use/vlaue/power of stories is, of all things, the first Croods movie.

[rogue69]

I remember when Crisis came out & like most people went to get it as it was from 2000AD only to find out that some of the characters in 3WW were loosely based on people I knew from the pub who were friends with Pat Mills' daughter

[AlexF]

In the intro to the Trade, Mills specifically says he talked to his daughter's mates to a) get dialogue tips on how young people talk and b) to ask them what they would do in certain theoretical situations.

This presumably, is his justification for ensuring that all female characters are inclined to sleep with Paul/Finn  /Mills's favourite character...

[nxylas]

In the intro to the Trade, Mills specifically says he talked to his daughter's mates to a) get dialogue tips on how young people talk and b) to ask them what they would do in certain theoretical situations.

This presumably, is his justification for ensuring that all female characters are inclined to sleep with Paul/Finn /Mills's favourite character...

Ugh, yes, the "all Trisha needed was a good seeing-to from Finn" plotline still makes me squirm.

[Dash Decent]

I still have a folder with a sticker from Crisis stuck on it - 'Smile while you die'.

[JayzusB.Christ]

The only Crisis I remember buying, or more specifically my brother buying, had a David Hine story about a kid with worms, a Milo Manara porn reprint, and iirc a Garth Ennis retelling of an urban legend about some teenager trying to replace the neighbour's rabbit he accidentally killed. I quite enjoyed it at the time but in hindsight it was fairly lacking in substance.

[karlos]

I always loved Dare, and I say this as a life-long Dan fan!

That said, I understand why the customer got upset with it.

Anyone remember the True Faith trade paperback coming out?  Didn't it get "banned"?