More than Meets the Eye (IDW ongoing comic)

[andersonh1]

That said, this is not "seamless" narrative. Showing the original sequence alongside the sequence that was part of the back-write is not seamless narrative. It is like trying to use an arguement (the back-write) the prove itself.

This arguement makes no sense Dom. Showing the two parts together doesn't make it a seamless narritive? How do you come to that conclusion? You're trying to claim it doesn't work because of a back-write, but that isn't any reason why it can't be seamless, given what we do and don't see between the two scenes. That said, it's only your opinion that it is a back-write in the first place. Because we don't see what happens to Thundercracker in AHM, and Costa literally picks up were that left off, it isn't a back-write.

Yep. It would have to show one thing happen, then the "back write" or retcon would have to show that thing and explain why it wasn't what we thought it was. But we don't have anything overwritten. We have an open-ended situation in AHM #12, and Ongoing #4 picks up where it left off and continues the sequence of events. No overwriting at all.

[Shockwave]

The other funny thing about having shown this to my Mom is that when I asked her if she had seen the same thing in an episode of "All My Children" (which was the soap opera she watched) she admitted that she would expect the character to have survived or to come back later.

[Gomess]

Everyone is technically right. This of course is just how I learned it, but...

A retcon is where you explicitly contradict previous continuity, usually justified through absurd explanations. A backwrite is just where you go back to fill in an open space in the story without *necessarily* contradicting continuity... but probably still in a clunky way which makes the previously open ending less interesting. Your mileage may vary.

But IMO, Thundercracker's survival is a backwrite (and a sigh-worthy piece of drama castration at that), but not a retcon.

(Yes, I've been catching up on RiD too!)

[Sparky Prime]

A backwrite is just where you go back to fill in an open space in the story without *necessarily* contradicting continuity...

That isn't what Dom and JT mean when they call it a "back-write" though. They're claiming that there is no such open space in the story and that Thundercracker certainly died in AHM. So by their logic, anything showing Thundercracker survived would have to be a bit of a retcon. That's why andersonh1 and myself are saying it isn't a back-write, because the scene in AHM is left ambigious in the first place, leaving a clear opening for them to explain Thundercracker did, in fact, survive with out actually contradicting anything.

[Gomess]

Yeah, I know, that's why I said "everyone is technically right". Neither was totally right, in my view.

The main factor here is that Thundercracker was clearly *supposed* to have died, and undoing it- not in as retconny a way as that sounds; many stories have people Miraculously Pull Through- removes most of the emotional weight of that scene for me. Unless, of course, Skywarp and Thundercracker resolve the issue later, but... not gonna hold out hope.

[Sparky Prime]

The main factor here is that Thundercracker was clearly *supposed* to have died,

I don't agree with that. Because of how the scene plays out in AHM, we can't say with any certainty what Thundercrackers fate was clearly supposed to be one way or another. The most we can say is that it is meant to look like he *might* have been killed, while it also still leaves open the possibility he survived.

[Dominic]

The main factor here is that Thundercracker was clearly *supposed* to have died, and undoing it- not in as retconny a way as that sounds; many stories have people Miraculously Pull Through- removes most of the emotional weight of that scene for me. Unless, of course, Skywarp and Thundercracker resolve the issue later, but... not gonna hold out hope.

The line between back-write and retcon blurs considerably, partly depending on "where" you start.

If you start as a reader looking in to or over the story, it is mostly a question of methodology. Does the writer editor simply say "ignore xyz content", or do they provide an on-page reason to ignore said content? Either way, the effect (making the prvious content irrelevant) is the same.

But, if you start "on the page", (which a distressingly high number of people do and seem unable to break away from), then it does matter. The on page reasoning given, (and it *needs* to be given) becomes more important than the real reasoning for the back-written change. And, the existence of the back-written explanatin is self-justifying, because it is seen as depicting an event that already happened (revealing) rather than cancelling out a story that had already been published (revising).


Dom
-notes that comic fans in general seem to have issues with this.

[andersonh1]

In my opinion, a story should be written well enough that what happens in it is clear to the reader, unless the author is deliberately aiming for ambiguity. It shouldn't be necessary to know "what he intended" from his own extra-textual words. Everything we as readers need to understand the story should be right there on the page, with no room for misunderstanding. The fact that it so often isn't clear is a problem with writers and with editorial. THEY know in their head what's supposed to happen, so it's not always apparent when they aren't communicating. It should be. A good editor should catch things like that.

We shouldn't have to argue Thundercracker's fate. If he was intended to be dead of a headshot, that ought to have been made clear, not left to inference. Given the medium we're reading, and how well aware we are of the tricks comics pull, there's no reason for McCarthy or his editors to have leave his fate unclear in any way, except to leave it open for the next writer to fill in the gap and tell us what happened.

We'll be having this same conversation down the road when Rewind reappears. Dom and JT will insist he was dead and we're reading a back-write, while I'll be insisting that I knew it was a good possibility that he'd survive. There's no use railing against comics and saying "it shouldn't be this way". It's too late for that. We know how they work, and we'd better be saavy enough to read them accordingly and not make assumptions. Yeah, we need to see something as definitive as Pipes' death to be certain.

Will anyone be surprised if Pharma turns up again? He fell off a roof and Ratchet got his hands. But we didn't see Pharma die, did we?

[Gomess]

We shouldn't have to argue Thundercracker's fate. If he was intended to be dead of a headshot, that ought to have been made clear, not left to inference. Given the medium we're reading, and how well aware we are of the tricks comics pull, there's no reason for McCarthy or his editors to have leave his fate unclear in any way, except to leave it open for the next writer to fill in the gap and tell us what happened.

No, come on, they could've shown a panel with Thundy's eyes blank and a smoking hole in his head and there was still every chance they'd bring him back to life. Given the medium we're reading.

There's no use railing against comics and saying "it shouldn't be this way". It's too late for that. We know how they work, and we'd better be saavy enough to read them accordingly and not make assumptions.

I cannot enjoy a media text with this attitude. If I think something's crap, I'm not gonna pretend I think otherwise.

Do Dom and I agree on this, or am I going crazy?

[Dominic]

We are mostly agreeing on this. So, something is probably wrong.

No, come on, they could've shown a panel with Thundy's eyes blank and a smoking hole in his head and there was still every chance they'd bring him back to life. Given the medium we're reading.

Exactly.


The irony is that I liked Costa's run on the ongoing "Transformers" series more than anyone on this forum, including what he ended up doing with Thundercracker. And, *I* am calling out the back-write.