Fire away!

The only thing I ask is that you don't ask more than two questions per post! That sounds fair!

And also be forgiving if I don't answer questions that will directly effect/reveal upcoming storylines!

Here, let me start!

Q: Doe is bother you when you read negative reviews?

A: Well, certainly everyone likes to be loved! And I try to look at reviews and take away what I can from them. Sometimes they are helpful -- and other times, they are just mean crybabies who don't like me, and wouldn't like anything I wrote even if my name were Grant Bendis! LOL!

(It's like when you read FRIENDS reveiws, and the reveiwer says "This season was a bad as all the others. You have to admit that they have never been funny and this year proves that they are as unfunny as ever." I want to say "Dude, you hate FRIENDS. Why are you reviewing it?"

That's how I feel sometimes when I read reviews of my work from people that clearly think I blow. It is kind of pointless...either I agree with them that I am Satan-with-a-keyboard...(which I don't) or I sit back and chuckle.

I just read a review that dismisses ALPHA FLIGHT as "camp" (?!?) and then accuses me of not being campy enough? Um...I don't know, when I think of camp, I think of 60s Batman. I don't see any camp in ALPHA FLIGHT. Am I missing something?

There are also reviews that state "Lobdell is trying to be funny here, but he is not even remotely funny -- on that everyone can agree!" Um...I know there are things that make me laugh when I write them. Does that mean they are funny, or that they are not funny? Some people write to me or I talk to someone in a comic book store and say "That line was so funny!" or "I laughed when Mapleleaf aks 'Who wants to ride some Thunder!" Now, does the INFORMED REVIEWER's declaration that I am not funny, never have been, never will be, world without end, amen, compell me to expain that "No. You are wrong. That line about Thunder was not funny. I too, mistook it for funny, until I read a review that pointed out that I only tried to be funny and failed"?

You can see my problem.


Q: You've read the posts! I LOVE THE ORIGNAL ALPHA FLIGHT! Why don't you just bring them back and make me happy?

A: Um...for several reasons, actually.

One reason is that I hate re-launched books that spend the first issue or two trying to catch the audience up on twenty years of continuity that people have missed. Is this to attract OLD READERS who, by and large, have moved on (right out of the comic book stores if the numbers are to be believed) or to alienate NEW READERS who are essentially paying about three dollars to walk in and sit down during the thrid reel of a movie?

I felt the best way to introduce readers into the world of ALPHA FLIGHT was by letting the CHARACTERS be almost as new to the world of ALPHA FLIGHT as the audience.

I remember reading GIANT SIZED X-MEN #1 and being open mouth shocked by it all! Yes, I wanted my ANGEL and ICEMAN and MARVEL GIRL in their BLACK AND YELLOW COSTUMES (no offense to Neal's lime green mini! Woo hoo!)...but here I was, in the world of the X-MEN (mutants sworn to protect a world that fears and hates them) and I rode along with ORORO and PETER and KURT and JOHN and to a lesser degree WOLVERINE, BANSHEE and SUNFIRE...and I found the whole adventure totally exciting! (And so, apparently, did a lot of other people! LOL!)

I can't help thinking if the internet had been around in 76, legions of fans would be posting "It makes absolutely no sense at all to bring in STORM, a weather goddess from Africa. The X-MEN have always been made up of Americans, it makes no sense that Xavier would travel to Africa to get some blue eyed bubble-head who thinks she's a goddess when all he would have to do is pick up the phone and call SCARLET WITCH and QUICKSILVER or even BEAST who is over at the AVENGERS mansion! Also, NIGHTCRAWLER is blue -- BLUE! No X-MEN has ever been any color other than white! The whole point of the X-MEN is that Xavier is tryint to train mutants who can fit into society. It makes no sense that he would ever try to get someone who is blue to be an X-MEN! The stupidest thing of all, though, has to be WOLVERINE! Is that how bad and dumb comic book writing has gotten since the glory days of Stan Lee -- that PROFESSOR X has to recruit HULK VILLAINS?! Dead God -- even if you ignore the fact that he is about five foot four, and his only power is that he wears gloves with unbreakable knives sewn in, the man had WHISKERS SEWN INTO HIS MASK during his first appearance!!!! For these and many other reasons, it is clear that if the writer has any hope at all of succeeding, he had better get rid of all these stupid lame characters and put CYCLOPS and MARVEL GIRL and BEAST and ICEMAN and ANGEL back tpgether NOW! At this rate, tthere is no way UNCANNY X-MEN will even see issue one hundred!"

See where I am going with this...?

Your pal,
Scotty