Wednesday, November 30, 2005


Oh Lordee, the latest review on SpiderFan.org gives my Spidey/Wolverine/Venom story with art from Haward and Stokes and colouring from Offredi…0.5 webs! Yep, that’s half a feckin’ web. 0.5 is what you get for turning up! I’ve no idea if the mark is out of 5 or out of 10. To be honest I’ve never had a high enough rating from the reviewer to actually find out.

The issue (#118) hit the UK newsstands in June. Oh, and there's a little Lady Deathstrike in the story as well. Ok, I can accept the reviewer’s extreme dislike of the story, maybe a little more disturbed by the personal stuff having a go at my writing, characterisation, dialogue, and poor posture at the keyboard (ok, maybe not the last one, not yet). I can maybe even accept his attempts at trying to be funny and superior at the expense of the story but actually coming across as pedantic, tedious, and just a little mean-spirited. But to award half a point to the sterling efforts of Jon Haward, John Stokes, and James Offredi – who delivered art described by others as worthy of being published by Marvel US – is an absolute feckin' disgrace.

As Kenneth Williams once said: ‘Critics are like eunuchs. They’ve seen it a hundred times but can’t do it themselves.’

3 comments:

brenda dallaway said...

Or as Woody Allen says:

Those who can't do, teach
Those who can't teach, teach gym

Khayem said...

I've visited SpiderFan.org many times, though I've tended to skip the reviews. Your post compelled me to go back and have a look. If I didn't know better, I'd think that you'd given "The Editor" a bad review of his self-made Spidey fanzine back when he was a kid and now you're paying the price...!

My first attempt at a small press comic when I was 14 met with a critical slagging in Fantasy Advertiser. "Laughably po-faced" was the best line - even I laughed, once I looked the term up in a dictionary!

It does raise the question of why the reviewer continues to buy the issues you write if he dislikes your writing so much. I similarly bought a comic illustrated by Rob Liefeld once and haven't felt a masochistic need to continually confirm that he's, er, not to my taste.

"A negative judgment gives you more satisfaction than praise, provided it smacks of jealousy."
Jean Baudrillard

Jim Alexander said...

The guy doesn't actually buy the comic, rather someone sends it to him, more's the pity. Maybe the sender should be the one awarded the 0.5. Oh, I dunno, good luck to the guy, although I can't quite see us exchanging Xmas cards.

My final classic Kenneth Williams quote: 'Infamy, infamy, they've all got it infamy!'