I'm a bad geek. I'm terrible about blogging. I've long wanted to blog about a million different things on this site but I've always been too lazy to do so. But now is as good a time as any. I might as well start with something bouncing around in my head at the moment.
Honestly I'm pretty knowledgeable about geek things. Having always been a geek I, like my fellow geeks, am one of those guys that the mundanes, or lesser geeks go to for geek knowledge. I don't know everything but I can get by with a great deal more than your average. Having said that something about my own geek-ness has always bothered me: I don't know much about Will Eisner. Or The Spirit for that matter.
Honestly of course I know Will Eisner is a legend in the Comic Book Industry. Having gone to Comic Con since 1993 I'd be stupid not to. I know he created The Spirit. I know he did many award-winning Graphic Novels, like "A Contract With God" and so on. Most obviously, the Comic Book Industries version of the Academy Awards is called "The Eisners" after Will Eisner himself and put on by Comic Con International themselves. I've been to The Eisners. I've seen people receive Eisner awards. I've watched, read and witnessed people into comics (fans and professionals alike) constantly praise Mr. Eisner as a God-Like figure in the Industry. But the truth is I don't know anything more than that.
So when the mundanes or lesser geeks ask me to help fill in the gaps on Eisner or The Spirit, that's all I can offer them. I've never read or even touched the works of Eisner, The Spirit or otherwise. So even long before The Spirit was mentioned as a film. Hell, even long before Eisner himself passed away in 2005, I've been meaning to fill in the gaps myself. I just never got around to it. Honestly, I don't think it's something a simple Wikipedia search could remedy. I believe it's something you have to investigate yourself. So I've always meant to pick up some collected works of the Spirit or any of Eisner's other work but like I said, I've just never gotten around to it. I could have done so at Comic Con 2008 if I really desired but honestly it wasn't on my mind. But you would think with the film coming out, you might see Spirit books themselves just jumping out at you wherever you go. I walked around Comic Con for 4 and a half days this year and I didn't see anything. Who even retains the rights to the character? Like I said I know I could look all this up, but I think it should be jumping out at you. Right? I haven't seen anything. Not at Comic Con. Not even at comic book retailers, Barnes and Noble, Borders, etc. Bad marketing if you ask me. Hell if you know me, my birthday is coming up (that honestly wasn't the intention of this blog) and a Spirit book as a gift might help enlighten me.
So this all brings me to my point: I honestly can't say how I feel about Frank Miller's upcoming adaptation of The Spirit. Honestly everyone's asking me. The first trailer looked awesome. Although, it did look like Sin City, and not the artwork I've seen from The Spirit comics themselves. The second trailer looked cheesy as hell. Is that wrong for the character? Honestly I can't say. I haven't been too impressed with Frank Miller's work as a comic book artist or writer in the last couple of years. Of course I am completely obsessed with his work on Daredevil, Batman, and Sin City to name a few through out the 80's and 90's as cliched as that sounds. I of course know that Miller has always loved the work of Eisner himself and personally knew and worked with his hero. Do I think that Miller would purposely do a disservice to Eisner's beloved character? No. But Miller has only ever directed once before and with all the help of a seasoned pro Robert Rodriguez. So it's possible he might mess it up by inexperience alone. If I knew the character of the Spirit it's possible I might have more knowledge to better mull this one over. For now I can only wonder. I should really go out and investigate. Come this December I don't want to go into the theater without a background on any of this. Plus it will help to make me a better rounded geek in general.
Smell Ya Later,
Matthew "Mattman" Jeffrey
