Manhattan Projects (spoilers possible) and Some General Thoughts on Hickman
David_D
Posts: 3,884
As of the second issue, I am still digging this, but I feel like the book has the same success, and the same challenge of most of the Hickman I have read so far: The ideas are big and great, but the characters leave me cold.
Anyone else have that same experience?
To be fair, the ideas are strong enough that I am going to continue to buy Manhattan Projects in single issues. And I look forward to Secret when it comes in my next DCBS shipment.
But... there is something about Hickman that seems to continue to leave me a little cold.
As a similar example, I read all of Secret Warriors, and all of S.H.I.E.L.D. so far, and while I found that the concepts, and the intricate, layered systems are excellent, I also couldn't name a single character that stood out to me. There is something, I don't know, impersonal about his writing. Or so it has felt to me so far.
You?
Anyone else have that same experience?
To be fair, the ideas are strong enough that I am going to continue to buy Manhattan Projects in single issues. And I look forward to Secret when it comes in my next DCBS shipment.
But... there is something about Hickman that seems to continue to leave me a little cold.
As a similar example, I read all of Secret Warriors, and all of S.H.I.E.L.D. so far, and while I found that the concepts, and the intricate, layered systems are excellent, I also couldn't name a single character that stood out to me. There is something, I don't know, impersonal about his writing. Or so it has felt to me so far.
You?
Comments
THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS #2 - This will be make or break for me. It will either blow me away and I stay on in monthly or it gets pushed to a trade buy or possibly even a drop altogether. I am looking forward to see how it fares eagerly!
I walked away after reading it right where you are, and was kind of there after I had re-read #1 a few times. I also lost some enthusiasm when I found out this was an ongoing and not a mini-series or set number of issues. Your post made me stop and try to think of just what it is and I think it is how Hickman puts the ideas and concept ahead of the characters, which can work in superhero comics where there is already an attachment and sandbox built that he can then play in... when he doesn't have that to fall back on he makes little to no effort to build it and instead just busts right into story and concept. Garth Ennis is exactly the same for me, literally exactly the same feeling when I read him. I don't have a lot of faith in his endings either, which makes me apprehensive on an ongoing like this as well. I think it is just how you state it, the stories and concepts and layers and writing are perfectly fine, excellent even, but without a reason to care or strong ties to the characters it all just ultimately doesn't matter in books like these.
And I'd like to like his stories.
But for me it's all about character. That's how I get into a story and if the characters aren't alive for me, if they don't grab me and make me care about them, then the story just doesn't stick with me.
I can't remember going from hot to cold so quickly on a new book that I thought I enjoyed initially, ever. I'm sure it is for some people, but not me. Hickman has firmly entered the realm of Ennis and Morrison for me where I can respect them and some of what they've done but I don't care to read it anymore.