A little known Alan Mencken musical called WEIRD ROMANCE. And yes, theatre trivia buffs, that's the guy from Disney's Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin. The show consists of two companion one-acts, which I hesitate to call "ScFi" although it usually gets that label. If you consider The Twilight Zone science fiction, then this is too.
(Um, spoiler alert for anyone who wants to experience this remarkable show cold the first time, it is impossible for me to discuss it without giving away major plot twists.)
Act 1 there is a weird romance indeed for a very sympathetic character, a homeless woman experiencing a glorious Cinderella story, and this love story ends… badly.
Act 2 the title song's reprise begins "I know you got burned the last time, but this will be time anew…" and indeed, we have another romance, involving a scientist who is not terribly sympathetic, especially at the onset. The production I saw, he played the bad guy in Act I, a subtle, subliminal way of stacking the deck against him, but more than that, the man is emotionally constipated. He's cut off from his wife, his colleague, and even the simple joys of his own work. Yet a tender attachment forms when a child appears in the holographic imaging system he is developing. She tells the story of her life in the late 18th or early 19th century, and as the scientists fascination with this woman grows, so does our fascination with him.
The final twist occurs when she is an old woman, clearly about to expire of old age before much longer. We learn that her hologram has aged long past this woman's real lifespan. She died in childbirth shortly after her marriage - after her marriage to this very scientist in a previous life. Devastated by his death he "carried his pain from one life to the next, afraid of getting hurt once more" - and so she came back, to give him a taste of the life they should have had together.
What follows is one of the most powerful, painfully beautiful songs I've ever heard in a theatre, and that includes Sondheim. "Love is worth the chance you take" she sings - and it resonates on the deepest levels because we are THERE with this guy. We cared for that homeless woman in Act I, and the playwrights SCREWED US. Yet we came back for Act 2, and taking the risk again, we got this… this golden moment of light and beauty.
You don't take the risk, you don't get that.
THAT'S how you push buttons the right way and for the right reason.
Now let's turn our attention to the far end of the spectrum. There's a little episode I like to call "Dr. Leslie, Angel of Death" It goes like this: We're going to make some sort of change to our storyverse, and because our readers are primitives and simpletons who fear change, we shall wreck our current storyverse beyond all recognition, delivering up so much pain and disappointment they will accept any change, any change at all, as preferable to this.
That insults your intelligence, folks. But just in case you didn't know that, there's usually a few who will add insult to injury and say it to your face. There was Bru telling you that you don't know what you want in a comic until a Frank Miller comes along to show you. I believe that was the reigning insult for several years until Bill Willingham rewrote the Hippocratic oath from "Do no harm" to "Snuff children to make a point."
How so? How is it possible that I will point to anyone not in Al Quaeda as being worse than Ed Brubaker? Because Willingham's statement was that "We love it when fans hate what we've done." Bru, fucked though is ideas are, is at least framing his sentence to IMPLY that he ultimately wants to give the readers what they want. I don't know that he actually means it, it doesn't seem likely given what he puts on the page. But he is giving lip service to the notion that bringing you pleasure and not pain is the point of the exercise. Willingham is coming right out and saying they're out to hurt you.
Explain to me, please, why anybody goes back and buys these comics after that. He just said, "Harley, come over here, I want to smack you around some 'cause I like the sound your skull makes when it hits the wall. Makes me feel like a man, HAHAHAHA!" They not only squeak "Sure, Mistah J" and walk across the room into the path of his fist, they pay $2.95 for the privilege.
Okay, the disturbing Enabler behavior of certain comic buyers not withstanding, we were talking about Button Pushing.Weird Romance, doing it in service of the story and theme, and ultimately rewarding the trust the audience places in you in placing their imaginations in your hands.
Comic Books, cynically manipulating an audience as a stunt that betrays both story and character, to service an agenda of personal gratification for a writer and/or a marketing maneuver of a franchise holding corporation.
