Geeks are morons.
American comics suck. Suck suck suck suck suck. Even if the art and the writing are decent for a particular arc, or even if it's great, it still sucks.
Scratch that, a lot of entertainment and speculative/science fiction suck suck suck.
Continuity is a great thing in entertainment. Lost, Battlestar Galactica(2006 reboot) and Star Trek DS9 all benefit from continuity. Growing with characters, living with them through defeats, victories, deaths, and the general struggle through life. The reason why they're singled out over all other examples? They ended, or in Lost's case, ending. Yes, BSG's got a bunch of spinoffs, but they're all backstory. Eventually it ends. On Earth. With Ronald D. Moore kicking you in the heart and soul with the exchange between Six and Baltar.
However, never ending continuity ... can be a huge burden. Talk to a Doctor Who fan, or a Marvel/DC comics fan. Years of cruft, back stories, canon, and contradictions tell us nothing about us. Doctor Who, in the 2005 revival, is exempt from this. Heroes is, too, to a point, for largely the same reason. Doctor Who's revival, has been marked by strong, powerful stories about family, love, regret, and friendship. You give me any particular arc from the new series and there's generally some sort of point there. The John Smith arc, tell us for example, tells us in several episodes, what Spider-man should've done in less than 30 issues. Just because you have power, doesn't mean you should use it. With great power comes great responsibility.
Unfortunately, we're not seeing that in the modern American comics industry. I've written here about this, but I've come to understand the situation far better now. Talk to anyone about Spiderman 3, X-men Origins: Wolverine, or Catwoman(okay, Catwoman's a *BAD* example), and instead of critiquing the story, the message, the plot, the characters or really anything but it's strict adherence to canon. Really, who cares that Deadpool's not the same Deadpool in the comics or that they messed up Gambit? Fanboyism, which is ironic *I* talk about it, is the worst thing for our culture as geeks. We idealize objects inside of the fandom but not understand what's actually going on. To be perfectly honest, I really don't think there's anything compelling to be told about continuing to tell stories about the X-Men. We get it, you're different and fighting persecution from a world that doesn't understand you, or want to. What now? What do we as fans get from continuing this line of canon past this main point? What lessons do we learn from continuities that are old enough to be our parents, or in some cases, like Batman and Superman, our Grandparents(or great grandparents depending on how young you are)? As far as I can tell, nothing. Nothing. A visual medium that gives us an artist's conception of action and scene can either take our imagination away or supplement it. Sometimes words can't tell us about little details that make a scene more real. Given how loud and whiny comic fans get when their precious characters are re-imagined, I would say that we, as a geek culture, just handed it over. Smaller details from finely detailed panels have given way to larger fights over canon and cruft. It's not just comics, but all sorts of fictional media.
Star Wars is another great example of what's wrong here. No one wants to talk about how utterly fucking ridiculous the shit in the Expanded Universe is, in Star Wars terms, but Midichlorians and Jar-jar Binks ruined Episode 1? With the exception of Zahn's Thrawn trilogy, which book arc captures some sort of literary heritage? I'd say all of them do feed the same urge that the endless and often contradictory tales of the Greek and Roman mythos give us, but we're 2000 years separated from that era. We know better. We can put together better fiction and entertainment. Chewie having a moon fall on him draws from the same ridiculous and shallow writing as Bane breaking Batman's back. Actions that happen for no good literary reasons other than to just happen. What good does it do, when there's no real point to be made? Atleast when George Lucas put pen to paper and put together the Podracing scene from Episode 1, he was trying to invite us into a world of excitement and understanding the idea that just because you're a poor slave boy from a backwater planet doesn't mean you can't rise above your station in life and be victorious over your own circumstances. A lesson ripped, admittedly from Ben Hur; but the difference here is, Lucas didn't sit down and write a sequel to Ben Hur. He told us his own story. His own vision of what life could be, what life is, and what life was.
This is not to say that Japanese comics aren't immune to these same criticisms. One Piece is *way* too fucking long, so is Naruto, Doraemon, Bleach, Yuugiou, Meitantei Conan, and god knows how many manga series. The difference here is that while Naruto, Bleach, Doraemon, and Conan can all run forever, the ecosystem is different. Naruto doesn't have to team up with Ichigo and Luffy for a crossover comic extravaganza every year(Jump Ultimate Stars doesn't fucking count guys; it's just a game, and a lousy one at that) for instance. Not only that but not every book that's sitting in comic collection right now is Naruto or Bleach. Utena ended after 5 volumes. Rurouni Kenshin eventually ended. Sailor Moon eventually ended. Hell, for fuck's sake Inu Yasha ended at some point. Not only did these series end, but they left us with something to think about.
For example, Rurouni Kenshin told a story about a man who used to murder for a living, and found remorse and a conscience. That notoriety and fame isn't everything. Taught us something about that time period too; about the struggles and the political intrigue. It wasn't historically accurate, but it told us *something*. About family, about humility, about being stronger, and not acting on it. We're not talking classic literature here, but we are talking about strong well formed literary story telling versus weak story telling. Stories like Twilight versus Harry Potter. Half Life versus Metal Gear Solid.
Half Life versus Metal Gear Solid probably highlights this problem a little better. The story as it goes in the Half Life series, doesn't actually say anything about who Gordon Freeman is, what his struggle is about, who his compatriots are, and why I shouldn't pop Alyx Vance in the god damned head. We're expected to just sympathize with their environment, first the invasion in Half Life 1, and then the subsequent occupation in Half Life 2. In Half Life 1, like 2, the GMan shows up, rescues you, and nothing gets told to you about what's actually going on. At some point in Half Life 2, I identified more with Dr. Breen who opted not to be a complete goddamned slave than I did Dr. Kleiner; I can understand why Breen opted not to eat shit, I'm not given an understanding why Kleiner's living like a hobo.
Contrast this with Metal Gear Solid. Here, we get a glimpse of WHO these characters are. Otacon's a stronger side kick than Alyx Vance is, simply because we know *who* he is. We know what motivates him, we know what shapes his thinking processes. He represents the idea that love(with Sniper Wolf, or Snake, if you're into that) and friendship(with Snake), transcend adverse, tense situations. He also represents innocence betrayed. Which is a continuing motif in his life. Yes, you're beaten over the head with the idea, "War is bad! Nukes suck!" But you're being told something, you're being told to think about the world around you as it is.
Which is the problem. Geeks used to be smart. Really. Really. Really smart. They used to be the ones who could tell us about the world and life around us.
This just isn't the case anymore. We don't want better, nuanced understandings of the world around us. Geeks. Are morons. Reading used to take care of this problem. Reading used to be an escape into a smarter place. But, this just isn't the case anymore. There's nothing magical about the written word that makes us smarter, or gives us a greater appreciation of world around us, or tests our minds. Garbage in, garbage out. We continue to consume crap like Half Life, Halo, X-Men, Batman, Buffy, Angel, Firefly, and god knows what other intellectual trash we in take every day, and are happy about it.