Suspension of Disbelief ends

One of my favorite comics-related weblogs, and most underrated weblogs has ended as of the last day of 2007. Loren Collins' Suspension of Disbelief has been there to correct the record and lend advice whenever the creators of our fictional worlds committed major and noticeable errors regarding the real world elements that are included in these fantasy universes. One of my favorite (albeit guest-) posts is this one, which although the image is broken, indicates a moment where George Perez is drawing New York and putting two famous buildings in close visual proximity whereas in real life the two famous landmarks in such geographical disparity that you would have to look in two different directions at once to see both edifices simultaneously. In theory the geography of the Marvel Universe's 616 earth is nearly identical to the real world, that is, the fictional world is a pastiche... and George Perez didn't research the real world skyline before creating the fictional view.

Just as Dr. Scott from Polite Dissent is a doctor correcting medical errors in comic books, Loren Collins used his legal training to correct the legal errors in comic books, actively seeing trials depicted in issues and then criticizing how realistic the trial portions were, as we have little choice but to imagine that many of the legal structures of the comic book universes are the same as the real world, except when explicitly declared otherwise. In which case there is speculation or conjecture as to how the law is different, where the differences are never explicitly stated.

In many instances the mistakes actually detract from the quality of the comic, and distract the reader. It works that way for some lawyers, doctors. For Phil Meadows he cannot merely enjoy a building without deconstructing it in his head and I could not watch Smallville's political election plot lines without getting a sense of nausea. President Luthor did it to me worse.

My buddy Jim MacQuarrie often covers stuff that Loren misses, although his usual mission in the course of the weblog is/was to correct the many archery errors that crop up because pencillers who draw Green Arrow, Hawkeye, or Speedy often mess up royally as to how it actually happens, regardless of the ease of research. Even writers screw it up sometimes. Archery can only work in a certain way to even work, and despite that we can let little things go, some things we would not and should not. MacQuarrie is in a good position to catch that stuff, given that he "is an NAA certified archery instructor. Naturally, his arrows are green." He also did other things, whatever he noticed, and is Christian enough to notice when the Simpsons screwed up Ned Flanders in a Super Bowl episode.

Suspension of Belief was meant to be a group blog, but that never quite worked out. For one thing most of the registered group guys aside from Loren or MacQ posted one or two articles at best. For another I never registered as I intended to, to write about a few of the things I noticed. Hopefully if my short attention span can maintain cohesion I can write about that stuff here on Monitor Duty. (Although sometimes Loren got to it eventually, as he did with the question of whether Jonathan Kent was running for State Senate or US Senate). Another one like that is one that should been done long ago and this particular article should have been proliferated to the far reaches of the internet: Loren's logical and legal dissection of Civil War's Registration Act. As it is it was the lack of relevant topics near the end which led to a lack of regular posting which led to Loren Collins ending the weblog. He will continue the purposes of Suspension of Disbelief over at "the CBR blog, Comics Should Be Good." That is unfortunate, as I do not read that weblog regularly, or anything at Comicbook Resources. I do not intend to. (Well, I will make exception for the work of August deBlieck, Junior and some other stuff as it pops up). I do not read Comics Should Be Good for several reasons, despite the weblog's quality. However in a few months I will make it a point to go back and review all of Loren Collins' work on that blog, to see that disbelief remains effectively suspended.

I hope I can keep my mind straight long enough to affect parallel work here.

Also: us professional comic book readers, sophisticated adults that we are, are well-aware that Suspension of Disbelief is what we engage in so that we can truly enjoy a man who can fly, without saying to ourselves, "wait! a man cannot fly!" That is part of why Superman Returns was awful. It had non-Superman moments that rendered proper disbelief suspension impossible. The weblog I eulogize was so titled because it addressed the bits and pieces that were incorrect from the standard that we view a world, and thus interfered with the Suspension of Disbelief.