At 10:27 PM 4/20/02, Jim wrote: >Gautam made a request thusly: > > >>I only read JMS's ASM #36, the 9/11 issue, which was very good, > >>except for the whole Doctor Doom crying thing. > > >I really wanted to read JMS's take on 9/11. Could you tell us > >about it? > >I certainly can! I've been terribly lazy about bagging my books, and it's >sitting somewhere convenient. I've included some quotes, too. I hope >that I give you all a good impression of the story. This was written >shortly after 9/11. Perhaps it will lose something in the light of the >passing of six months; I leave that up to you to decide. > >Page 1: Black page with all white letters: "We interrupt our regularly >scheduled program to bring you the following Special Bulletin" > >Page 2&3: Double spread, ground zero, Spidey holding his head in his >hands, saying "...God..." > >Page 4: Recriminations from people on street, how could superheroes let >this happen?
This, of course, is always the problem with such stories. Superheroes are regularly depicted as stopping far worse fictional disasters, so how could they have let this one happen? Even if the argument could be made that none of them foresaw the first plane hitting (aren't there any good-guy precognitives in the Marvel universe?), howcum no one reacted in time to stop the other three? Frex, why couldn't Superman (wrong universe, I know) get there in time after the first plane hit to catch the others and set them down safely (as he has been depicted doing many times when he saved a plane from crashing after its engines had failed) or held the building up until all the victims were safely out (as he has been depicted doing many times with a building damaged by an earthquake)? And why couldn't he fly over Afghanistan scanning the caves with his super-vision until he located Osama bin Laden and the others behind the plot, then gathered up them up and brought them to justice? Etc., etc. Just one of the problems which occur for the writers when fiction meets reality . . . -- Ronn! :) God bless America, Land that I love! Stand beside her, and guide her Thru the night with a light from above. From the mountains, to the prairies, To the oceans, white with foam� God bless America! My home, sweet home. -- Irving Berlin (1888-1989)
