Never Say Never

How is this a cover, who is
editing at Marvel that lets this
slip by. 

A few months ago, I said I had sworn off Grant Morrison.  It seems at the man has his fingers into everything, especially in the DC universe for the past 5-10 years.

My first foray was something that I actually enjoyed for the most part.  All Star Superman.  It just felt fun and light and had absolutely no bearing on continuity.  Then I picked up Batman and Robin and the first two volumes were not bad.  I saw his New X-Men at the library and picked it up and I am not sure what I liked worse, his writing or Frank Quietly's art.  How is it possible that these two also did All Star Superman.  I call shenanigans.  Morrison's goal must have been to completely destroy the x-men franchise.  Usually I see where he is going with his ideas and just think that he fails to execute.  Not with x-men, there was no redeamable factor.  Now this is based soley on volume 1.  I don't expect to read volume 2. 
Because I didn't hate the first two volumes of Batman and Robin, I thought I should pick up volume 3 and here comes Grant Morrison.  Volume three was disjointed and had to be studied to figure out exactly what was going on.  The gaps in that comic are so wide you could write entire TPBs to fill them in.  It is like the man writes a plot outline and then instead of writing the story just adds some dialogue to the outline.  I know some people like the fact that he allows them to fill in the blanks themselves, but I am not one of those people.  When I pay for a comic, I want the writer to have actually written a story.  I will start filling in the blanks when I start getting paid to do so.  On that note, I hate self checkouts.  The checker's pay is already added into the price of your products.  When you use self check out you should save money.  Hey, since Morrison is only writing half the story, shouldn't the comic be half price?
I can't swear the man off though.  He is just too omnipresent in DC comics.  For some reason that I am unable to fathom, he is very popular, but Leifeld was very popular in the 90s, so who knows. 
I also read We3 which was okay with really pretty art and lots of gaps.  Morrison kills a bunny in it though. 

Batman Inc. and The Return of Bruce Wayne

I know I swore off Morrison in my previous post, but I wanted to know if either of these stories are worth checking out.  I mean, the man isn't completely lacking in talent, is he?  He keeps getting hired for these big projects, he has to have done something good.  I liked JLA: One Million, if I recall.  I at least didn't hate it.  I hate to miss a great Bat story just because I don't like the writer.  Either of these count as great?

Batman R.I.P.

Cover of Batman: R.I.P.

Have you ever read a graphic novel, finished, and thought what the heck happened.  I can tell you the last time it happened to me.  It was the final crisis graphic.  It happened again with Batman R.I.P.  Both of these titles were conceived and penned by the infamous Grant Morrison.

The idea behind RIP was fairly good and should have been interesting, but the narrative is severely lacking.  I read somewhere that Morrison isn't a fan of linear story telling.  I can understand that to a degree.  Telling a non linear story can be interesting every once in a while.  Every once in a while is the key.  It gets really old really fast, and isn't cutting edge if you do it every single time out.  Batman RIP is fairly linear, but it didn't help.  Because Morrison likes to jump around so much, it becomes confusing.  With Morrison I have a tendency to change issues, pages, and even panels and having to go back because I thought I missed something.  No, I didn't miss anything, there is just a giant hole in the narrative.

I have to wonder how he sends up his plot outlines to the artist, as the action and the story sometimes doesn't jive and holes in the narrative can usually be explained by the artwork.  I am not sure that the artist even understood what was going on enough to depict it correctly.

I am sure Morrison thought that referencing some ancient Batman story without actually explaining the reference  and making that a central plot point makes him smarter, or at least more knowledgeable about Batman, than me.  Really, I am okay with either of those as long as he doesn't rub my face in it with his comic book story.  Writers shouldn't try to exclude people from their audience, but it seems like that is Morrison's goal.

I am sure that he has written some amazing stuff, but it hasn't been anything I have read from him.  What I have read is so bad, that I don't really care to give him a third chance.  Comics can be smart without being elitist and confusing, ie Sandman. 

Comic Icons post that sums up why I don't like Morrison.

I can't really recommend Batman R.I.P.  I kept reading in false hope of the story eventually making more sense than it did and redeeming itself.  It didn't happen though.  I guess you might like it if you are a Morrison fan.  Everyone else, is probably going to be lost on this one.