John Byrne proves his old stuff wasnt better

In his new column, John Byrne tries to prove his old stuff wasn't better than the greatness he is delivering now.

For some reason, he thinks that different people having different opinions on which of his old stuff is better and when his decline began somehow 'proves' that his old stuff couldn't have been better.

Another bizarre example is how he describes the disconnect between his feelings about Alpha Flight and fans' feelings. He didn't like it, and they loved it, so that proves something.

An artist isn't necessarily his/her own best critic. He's too close to the work and knows his intentions and when he phoned it in, and can't know how others perceive the work itself.

After all of this, he closes with yet another observation about Neal Adams.

He says:

'Neal was not as good as we thought he was.'

Holy cow! After he attacks comics fans for their negative opinions (which is the only point of his column) and how their subjectivity somehow invalidates them, he climbs on the pony and hands out his own absolutes about Neal's work. What hypocrisy!

How can he get away with this?

and the funny part is that people arguing about when his decline began are at least acknowledging that he was *once* an influential creator... If JB wants to say his current stuff is equal to his old stuff, you might as well put it all in the trash...

Neal Adams is of course known for a towering ego, but in the long run his influence on the art and practice of the medium will always be head and shoulders above byrne...

Firstly, I am not tryin to start a flamewar but if you hate John Byrne so much, why do you continually read his articles? They seem to really upset you. Lastly, what do you mean by 'How can he get away with this?' Get away with what? How should he be held responsible?

Perhaps he meant that he was in fact better than we thought? ;O)

No, he meant some of the magic was gone that he remembered when he was just the latest in the throng of Adams imitators in the 70s. That's so subjective; he could look at the books again tommorow and decide they were even better than he ever thought. John writes himself into circles a lot in those articles.

I would have to disagree. I would say they are both equal in terms of influence. When byrne hit the scen in his early days on X-men, he was doing the most detailed stuff anyone not named Perez had ever done in comics. I think his contribution is every bit as important as anyone's. It was after that that many artists emulated him and we suddenly saw super detailed comics. Unfortunately, his pencils have degraded completely over the last 15 years and his stuff is CLEARLY nowhere what it once was. Like many artists, he thoought he was a better writer than artist (Miller, Giffen, etc) and his art suffered.

Or Kirby. Although Kirby's pencils were routinely drained of their detail by less-ambitious inkers.

But, yes, as you say: Byrne was highly influential on an entire generation of comic book artists.

Justin Bacon

... except for a guy named Will Eisner.

Justin Bacon

Well, yes, but Adams' innovation was that the reader couldn't follow it.

Doesn't the Patriot Act pretty much outlaw everything?

Amen. Also note his use of the plural. He's not saying just HE thought Adams wasn't as good, he's saying that EVERYONE agrees with this.