Bible Desecration? It's Not Unthinkable.

I've been enjoying Boom Studios' Unthinkable mini-series, written and created by Mark Sable. With its finger on the pulse of our post-9/11 preoccupation with terrorism as entertainment (coming soon on Fox, 24 Season Eight), the book seems ready-made to be optioned by Hollywood. Yet with its real-world setting and distance from superheroes and their mythology, it didn't seem to be a likely candidate to receive commentary on this blog.

But the subject of terror unavoidably brings about the topic of religion, and this is the direction Sable takes us in Unthinkable #3. Set mostly in Israel, the issue explores what an end-of-world terror scenario looks like within the context of the Arab-Jew conflict. However, as ripe as that may be for discussion, it's actually an unrelated panel that sent me rushing to my keyboard eager to nitpick.

As an American intelligence officer interrogates the main characters about the implementation of terrorist plots they may have designed, Sable subjects each to their own ironic form of torture. The lawyer finds his civil rights violated via waterboarding, the computer geek receives electric shock from an XBox 360 power supply, and so on. The character above is the series representative for evangelical Christianity, a Tim LaHaye analogue who predicts the end times in his Left Behind-type novel series. His torture? Having to watch a soldier carelessly tear apart a copy of the Bible.

Based on the fact that the series' featured evangelical is cast as an annoying hypocrite, I assume that Mark Sable isn't acquainted with Christianity as his personal ideology. And in accordance with this, his choice of "torture" for the token Bible-thumper misses the mark. Likely informed by the news stories of Qur'an desecration at Guantanamo Bay, Sable fails to grasp the differences between Christianity and Islam.

Whereas Muslims venerate original language copies of their foundational text, Protestant Christians hold no such sentiments toward any material object. They worship God "in the Spirit," independently from their physical surroundings. Though the truths revealed in scripture are indeed sacred, the pages they are printed on are fundamentally no more to be honored than any other part of creation. Granted, you probably won't find a Christian treating his own Bible in this manner, but witnessing a stranger doing so is unlikely to elicit the melodramatic response seen in this comic.

This is not to deny that Sable conducted his fair share of research on religious matters in writing this issue. That much is apparent from the way he Brian K. Vaughans us by explaining the affinity many evangelicals have for Zionist goals and how it all relates to Raiders of the Lost Ark. The Bible-ripping incident is really a throw-away moment in Unthinkable's grand scheme, but the unreality of it all took me out of the story long enough to make a negative impact on the reading experience.

Wednesday Comics: Nice Try, DC. (Seriously!)

Wednesday Comics hit the shelves last week, and it's not a stretch to suggest that it's likely the most original idea that will come out of the Big Two this year. In an industry seemingly cursed with an endless stream of continuity-glazed crossovers impenetrable to those who weren't baptized into fandom decades ago, such a break from staleness should be welcome. I've recently wondered if my adult self would have ever gotten into comics had I not grown up with Super Powers action figures and the old box of 1960s comics at my grandparents' house. Would the comics of today have been readable enough to do the trick? The truth is that, despite the superhero movie boom, Marvel and DC will have to come up with something fresh to attract new readership before the bubble bursts.

Wednesday Comics is exactly the type of creative thinking that fits the bill. It's an out-of-the-ordinary concept being successfully marketed and gaining attention by the mainstream media. Which is why it pains me to say that it isn't going to work.

Yes, though I applaud the risk that DiDio and company are taking here, I think sales for Wednesday Comics will be relatively low. I don't think it will have broad appeal for non-comics readers, and I also think it lacks the content to make it a smash for those who already pick up the monthlies.

Let's start by looking at the tastes of the public at large when it approaches the fringes of the comics world. Namely, there's the high grosses brought in by superhero movies, but there's also the fact that trade paperbacks and graphic novels do okay among the masses. There's no doubt that people have an interest in superhero fare, but they tend to flock toward the genre when it is presented in a more comprehensive, in-depth format. The most successful movies of late have delved into the origins of their heroes alongside exploring their psychological makeup in a real world context. And trade paperbacks, though they're technically the same things sold in the "floppies," allow for a complete story to be told at once.

The problem with Wednesday Comics, as it pertains to mass appeal, is that it moves in the opposite direction from "regular" comics as do the things above. Each segment of a Wednesday Comics issue gives you (at most) the equivalent of two pages of a standard comic. This means that not only will each individual issue be deficient in story depth, but the series' entire 12-issue run won't be long enough to pack much of a cumulative punch either.

If movies like Iron Man and graphic novels like Watchmen challenge the public's preconceived notions about the simplicity of superheroes, Wednesday Comics reinforces them. By adopting the format and length of a Sunday paper funnies section, the series stands poised to breath new life into the scoffer's argument that comics are still "kids' stuff." The "Biff, Bam, Pow!" jokes I heard outside the IMAX theater where I saw The Dark Knight just a year ago served as a painful reminder that the genre still has a long way to go in some segments of the populace.

For the card-carrying fanboy, I also doubt the ability of Wednesday Comics to attract a significant following. Sure, there will be some who are caught up in the artsiness of it all. But when it comes down to it, clever art experiments are not what fill pull lists on a weekly basis. Even though a star artist can bolster the sales of a popular book, basically there are two elements that can launch a comic to the top of the charts, both story-driven. A top-selling book either promises a significant addition to shared universe continuity (think Secret Invasion) or a standalone tale epic enough to convince readers to step outside the comforts of "canon" (like All Star Superman). Wednesday Comics, unlinked to continuity and not long enough to sustain a robust story, meets neither of these requirements.

Also worth mentioning, though it has been much discussed elsewhere, is the problem posed by Wednesday Comics' price tag. I can't imagine either newbies or lifers happily plopping down $4 for something that looks and feels like a newspaper.

So, it is with a somewhat heavy heart that Infinite Kizes predicts the financial failure of DC's endeavor with Wednesday Comics. Even worse is my fear that it will all amount to a wasted opportunity to bring the joy of comics to the unconverted. I do hope that, if this all plays out as I think it will, DC and Marvel won't shrink back from searching out new, innovative ways to deliver their product.

----------

For an opposing view, check out last week's When World's Collide, by the much smarter and more articulate Timothy Callahan of Comic Book Resources.

The Superman serial from Wednesday Comics can be read each week online at USA Today.