My Funny/Silly Dwayne McDuffie Story

While watching the news this morning, I caught the back end of a news scroll saying that Dwayne McDuffie had died.  Born in Detroit, the 49-year-old McDuffie wrote comic books for DC Comics and Marvel, where he was also an editor.  McDuffie apparently died Monday following complications from surgery.

He legacy will probably be as one of the founders of Milestone Media, a company which wanted to bring diversity to superhero comics books, especially to introduce more African-American superheroes.  Milestone Comics, an imprint of DC Comics, produced such series as Blood Syndicate, Hardware, and Icon, but the most famous Milestone character is probably Static, which gave birth to the animated series, Static Shock.

McDuffie was also a writer/producer of animated television series and features.  His recent work included Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths and the just-released All-Star Superman.

Yahoo Entertainment News via the Associated Press has this obit.  Comic Book Resources broke the news of McDuffie's death and posted another article with statements from his colleagues and friends.

My story:  Years ago, I saw McDuffie at a Mid-Ohio Con.  I walked through the room where many of the creators had tables, including McDuffie.  We did that head nod to each other a couple of times, but I was too afraid to speak to him.  As someone who wanted to create African-American superhero comic books, he was like a prophet/spiritual leader to me.  He intimidated me.  How ridiculous of me. I wish I had at least said hello to him.

McDuffie was supposed to make an appearance at Golden Apple Comics in Los Angeles this evening.  Now, it will be a memorial.

I Reads You Review: MILESTONE FOREVER #2

MILESTONE FOREVER #2

DC COMICS

WRITER: Dwayne McDuffie

PENCILS/INKS: John Paul Leon (framing sequence)
PENCILS: Denys Cowan, ChrisCross
INKS: Prentis Rollins, Rob Still
LETTERS: Sal Cipriano
COLORS: Snakebite
COVER: Admira
48pp, Color, $5.99

Milestone was an imprint of DC Comics, active in producing comic books from 1993 through 1997. It was the creation of Milestone Media, a collective of African-American comic book creators. Milestone focused on comic books featuring minority characters, specifically African-American superheroes. Several titles appeared under the imprint, including Hardware, Icon, and Blood Syndicate. One of them, Static, was developed into an Emmy Award winning animated series, Static Shock.

After Milestone Media shuttered the imprint, Milestone’s characters mostly disappeared, although some made appearances in various DC Comics series. In the summer of the 2008, Dwayne McDuffie, a Milestone Media co-founder, announced that the Milestone characters would be merged into the DC Universe. That was a business decision, involving legal matters. Published early last year, Milestone Forever dealt with the fictional matters. It was a two-issue miniseries that provided the fictional depiction of Milestone’s universe, the “Dakotaverse,” merging with the DCU.

Milestone Forever focuses on a character named Dharma, the god-like being who initiated the “Big Bang,” the event that gave characters like Static their superpowers. Dharma believes that one of the Dakotaverse stars is the superhero who can save existence, thus, keeping Dharma from doing something dreadful. But which hero is the savior? In Milestone Forever #2, Dharma looks towards Hardware and Static. One is at a crossroads, however, and the other is having an adventure through his future.

As much as I liked the first issue of Milestone Forever, this second issue is a big improvement over the first. The first issue came across as a nostalgic piece of 1980s superhero fight comics, but #2 just seems nostalgic, a sentiment I share. The Hardware story, drawn by the incomparable Denys Cowan, and the Static story, drawn by the underrated ChrisCross, simultaneously celebrates the two characters in a low key way and pines for what was and will likely never again be.

Cowan’s art, great on its own, takes flight thanks to Snakebite’s fiery colors, and the art once again testifies to the potential that the Hardware comic book not only had but reached. Snakebite’s dazzling array of hues make the ChrisCross drawn story a tale that recalls both Static’s four-color foundation and its gritty take on it.

But Dwayne McDuffie must always get his due. He is a thoroughly underrated writer, and here, his magic is not in merging two universes, but rather in affirming that Milestone superhero comic books weren’t a stunt. They were the real fucking deal.

A-

I Reads You Review: MILESTONE FOREVER #1

MILESTONE FOREVER No. 1

DC COMICS

WRITER: Dwayne McDuffie

PENCILS/INKS: John Paul Leon (framing sequence)
PENCILS: Mark D. Bright
INKS: Romeo Tanghal
LETTERS: Sal Cipriano
COLORS: Snakebite
COVER: Admira
48pp, Color, $5.99

Milestone was a comics imprint published through DC Comics’ from 1993 through 1997. The brainchild of Milestone Media, a collective of African-American comic book creators, the imprint produced comic books featuring minority characters, specifically African-American characters and superheroes. The imprint published several titles including Hardware, Icon, and Blood Syndicate. One of them, Static, gave birth to an Emmy Award winning animated series, Static Shock.

Except for sporadic appearances in DC Comics series, Milestone’s characters mostly disappeared. In the summer of the 2008, Milestone Media co-founder Dwayne McDuffie announced that the Milestone characters would be merged into the DC Universe. Milestone’s universe was known as the “Dakotaverse,” named for the fictional Midwestern city, Dakota, where most of the early stories were set. Published earlier this year, Milestone Forever is the event comic book miniseries that chronicled the events leading to that merger.

Milestone Forever #1 stars the core Milestone characters, but opens with a framing sequence focusing on a character named Dharma. He initiated the “Big Bang,” the event gave characters like Static their superpowers. Now, Dharma needs those same superheroes to save the universe. Meanwhile, the Dakotaverse heroes are having their own issues. They are caught in a struggle begun by Holocaust between the old and new versions of the Blood Syndicate.

Thanks to the pencil art of Mark D. Bright, Milestone Forever #1 has a thoroughly 1980s vibe. Bright’s page design often emphasizes large panels, half-splash pages, and sometimes full splash pages – the better to capture superhero combat. The style recalls John Byrne’s art on his short run on the Hulk in the mid-80s and John Romita, Jr.’s art on Cable and Uncanny X-Men in the early 1990s. This is old school superhero comics (in a good way), but with colorist Snakebite’s fiery hues to give the art a modern touch.

I like Milestone, more now than I did in its original incarnation, but I don’t know if Dwayne McDuffie’s script offers anything new that would attract readers who ignored Milestone a decade-and-half ago. For Milestone fans, this is a nice goodbye that looks like the way it used to be.

B+

[This issue has pin-up pages, including a Hardware illustration by J.H. Williams.]

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