Rising Stars is a superhero (or “special” as they’re called in this series) comic book series by J Michael Straczinski, who architected and wrote the majority of babylon 5. The first graphic novel compilation of it was great, though at the end it started to slide a bit. The second compilation continued the slide to the point where I felt it was only marginally better than Gen13 (ie, it started to suck, big time.) He starts to sacrifice entertainment quality for ideology. Audiences have a hard time appreciating your eminently sensible politics when they’re fighting to remain conscious.
Did he not learn the lesson from Ferngully? Ideology does not entertainment make.
The first compilation makes these specials incredibly human. It weaves their superhumanity into the picture of their humanity. The desire for touch, the need to be appreciated, the lust for power, fear leading to anger, all of these were skillfully woven together with deft characterization to produce living breathing “specials”. Individuals’ actions were driven by their character rather than the other way around. And reality intervened into the story in simple, but touching ways. The kid who wanted to be a special so badly that he jumped out in front of a moving car, and paid for it with his life is a perfect example. But he lets reality be dictated not by what we know of the specials, not by their characters, but by cliched plot convience and trite political morals. He doesn’t lead us through their personal tales, or harrowing inner adventures, but instead turns it into a soap opea.
I mean, I’ll read the third in the line, just to give it a chance, but I’m very disappointed.
What issue does the second graphic novel go up to? (I read it by single issue, not TP). They do go more in depth later on.
But I agree with you – a lot of it can be soap operaish in a way that is very unbecoming to JMS.
16
there will be four trade paperbacks each one will contain 8 issues. so, the second tp is issues 9-16.