Word: comically
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...publishers responded to such attacks with a code, guaranteeing in effect that all comics would henceforth be as mild as milk toast. But just as the publishers promised sweetness and light, the '60s began to demand "relevance." What had Superman's crime fighting ever done about civil rights or Viet Nam? Youthful eyes turned to the work of "underground" comic artists like R. Crumb, whose heroes used and acted out words that would have shocked the irremediably respectable man of steel. Even in the swinging '60s, Superman's idea of a really strong expletive was "Great Scott...
...working girl's hat; his successors filled her out a bit, made her almost glamorous; today she wears slacks, bangs and a look of grim determination. From the beginning she has been an object of her creators' male chauvinist sport. When she asks, in one of the very first comic-book installments, to cover the collapse of a crumbling dam, Planet Editor Perry White gruffly insists on sending the less experienced Clark Kent: "It's too important! -- This is no job for a girl!" Lois reacts by tricking the devoted Clark ("Would you do me a favor?" "You know...
Some women profess to regard Lois as a pioneering role model, the only go- getting female reporter. (Older observers can recall that Brenda Starr has been tearing through the comic pages since 1940, and that real-life role models of the period included such famous bylines as Anne O'Hare McCormick, Martha Gellhorn, Dorothy Thompson, Genet, Marguerite Higgins and Dorothy Kilgallen.) As a chauvinist creation, Lois not only bungled most of her assignments and repeatedly double-crossed the faithful Clark, but also subordinated all professional demands to her one romantic obsession. After she parachutes into a flood, she tells...
...latter-day comic-book Lois broke off from Superman in 1982 because their relationship, such as it was, "didn't seem to be working anymore." But they remain friends. After a recent rescue, she offered him some white wine and brie. Lois has won a Pulitzer Prize. And she is dating none other than Lex Luthor, the onetime mad scientist, now transformed into the "most powerful man in Metropolis." This is liberation...
...also her character that causes the picture's problems. Polanski and Co-Writer Gerard Brach start by doing too little with her and end by doing too much. They might have exploited the comic possibilities of her dazy nature a little more, especially as the villains grow overtly menacing in their attempts to reclaim their lost luggage. That, though, is a forgivable flaw. The story, too, is busy with other demands that include, refreshingly, a desire to balance the demand for suspense against the need for plausibility. The principals are never tested by situations that require daring or skills beyond...