History Horrible / Comics

* ''Cry for Justice'', a recent DC miniseries by James Robinson that featured Hal Jordan trying to create a proactive Justice League (because that always ends well). Nicknamed "Gay for Justice" by readers, thanks to some unfortunate lettering styles. The series features gratuitous gore and violence, characters being dismembered, and gross characterization, and everyone constantly shouting "For justice!" Put it this way -- when the author directly and explicitly apologizes to the fans over the quality of the work, ''twice'', BEFORE THE SERIES HAS FINISHED, then you know you're dealing with something AWFUL.
** The worst facet of ''Cry for Justice'' was not the pointless deaths (they're a standby of the comics whether we like it or not) or the wasted talent (we all have off days), but how out of place it feels in the greater DCU. We've just had not one but TWO [[FinalCrisis big]] [[BlackestNight events]] about how traditional superheroic fun sticks it to darkness and edginess; immediately afterward, we have a series where the DarkerAndEdgier dominates the heroes. It's like ''One More Day''. It just... doesn't fit.
*** Robinson seems to have not got the memo that comics have moved on from the DarkerAndEdgier days of his nineties run on ''Starman''. He made a DarkerAndEdgier '''Superman''' arc at the same time, though that one [[strike:isn't quite bad enough for a formal listing.]] [[YouMileageMayVary was actually pretty good.]]

**** Not so much, she ''was'' partially to blame for events that lead to aunt May being shot (along with May herself). Had they not advice Peter to unmask himself during Civil War he wouldn't do that and Kingpin wouldn't send his assasin after them. Sure Peter was the one who made the final decision but Mary Jane felt just that.

*** The style of YourMileageMayVary truly is in the eye of the beholder, as this series was nominated for '''two Eisner Awards''' (one for ''Best Writer'' and one for ''Best Artist''). The problem here is that the story was... alright, were it an {{Elseworlds}} title or about another superteam, but putting it into the main continuity caused severe problems. For one thing, Ray Palmer as the Atom bounced around in peoples' heads to get them to talk. Since this is the way his wife inadvertently caused [[IdentityCrisis Sue Dibney's death]], it is jarring; but it is even more-so when he was portrayed as a relatively unlikeable ass in this work whereas it was a serious plot point in ''Blackest Night'' that Ray was so compassionate for his fellow man that he became an Indigo Lantern Deputy! And the most serious point of contention, the one that {{Linkara}} just can't seem to get over (seriously, it's almost scary), the death of Lian Harper. The one instance where InfantImmortality was averted and was the genesis of the current Arrow Family Metaplot, was the result of ExecutiveMeddling (whether it was Dan Didio or Green Arrow editor Adam Schlagman's call is unknown) which dictated that Lian Harper had to die in the chaos in Star City.

*** Wait, nonconsensual sex ''isn't'' rape? '''[[WallBanger WHAT IS THIS?]]'''
**** [[SarcasmMode Didn't you hear?]] RapeIsOkayWhenItsFemaleOnMale, even more so if the female is the AuthorAvatar of an [[AscendedFanBoy Ascended Fan Girl]] who has an [[PerverseSexualLust unhealthy fixation on the character she's writing]]!

In some cases, they're ''so'' bad that [[CanonDiscontinuity their creators]] ''[[CanonDiscontinuity themselves]]'' [[CanonDiscontinuity refuse to acknowledge them,]] preferring to {{Retcon}} their mistakes out of existence. And that's the ''lucky'' ones.

**** [[SarcasmMode Didn't you hear?]] RapeIsOkayWhenItsFemaleOnMale, even more so if said female is the AuthorAvatar of an [[AscendedFanBoy Ascended Fan Girl]] who has an [[PerverseSexualLust unhealthy fixation on the character she's writting]]!

* Bruce Jones' run of ''Nightwing,'' which followed Grayson's, made her run look like Shakespeare. Nightwing became a male model who slept with his boss, and she just happened to have superpowers. Then Jason Todd showed up and started fighting Dick on a model runway; and then Jason Todd was turned into a ''tentacle monster''....

* How can ''DC Challenge'' not be listed? It was interesting in concept... a 12-issue miniseries in which teams of people who normally did not work together would take turns doing stories which could not prominently feature characters they normally worked on, setting up a cliffhanger ending that the next team would have to solve in the next issue. Unfortunately, this proved to be one of those ideas that sounds better at a party where everyone's brain is at least slightly lubricated by ethanol; it quickly degenerated into a confusing mess. By the end, major plot threads had been completely dropped and no one including the folks at DC themselves was ''quite'' sure what was going on.

*** He also should have asked his old teammate GhostRider how well making deals with Mephisto to save a loved one's life works out...

*** Not any more, he didn't (except he totally did)! Now that we get One Moment In Time, we get the writers desperately trying to make us believe that it was ''all Mary Jane's fault'', as the big reveal of what she whispered to Mephisto constitutes ''her promising to get Peter to go along with the deal'' (which we ''never'' saw any evidence of in the comics leading up to this) in return for his promise to never bother Peter again. What. The. Hell.

*** All of you have made some excellent points, but I'm suprised [[YourMileageMayVary or perhaps not]] that no one mentioned that, for extra kick in the nads fun, Marvel didn't even let the two date after thier marriage was dissolved (even the comic strip, for the all of two months they did OMD, didn't go that far). However, they did do one good thing; since Marvel needs Spidey to suck to be relevant, any new girlfriends he gets will either [[ILetGwenStacyDie die]] or not last very long, so be thankful for small things, I guess.

*

* Bruce Jones's run on the once spectacular ''Checkmate.'' He knew the title was going to be canceled when he took it, and so he felt free to go insane. How bad was this? He took a gritty, realistic spy thriller and made it about a morphing, amnesiac animal man fighting giant porcupines.

** The artist of ''Minimum Security'' (see below) collaborated with another author to make ''As the World Burns'', a graphic novel starring the characters from ''Minimum Security.'' They rant about [[HumansAreBastards how terrible modern society is]]. The graphic novel ends with a speech about how humans should destroy everything and go back to being hunter-gatherers...

* ''[[http://www.kingfeatures.com/features/comics/bfriends/about.htm Between Friends]]'' is best summed up as a LifetimeMovieOfTheWeek in comic strip form, with the Narm sucked out of it. It brings {{Wall Banger}}s by the truckloads whenever it tries to be serious, and nobody [[TheUnfairSex with a Y chromosome]] escapes unscathed (unless they're [[AuthorAppeal Viggo Mortensen]] or a [[EstrogenBrigadeBait reasonable fascimile thereof]]). Of course, since all the allegedly "empowered" women are depicted as hyper-insecure, DoesThisMakeMeLookFat types who both agonize over buying the low-fat double-whipped frappucino and pound back the cheesecake like there's no tomorrow, they don't fare well either.

* ''MinimumSecurity'' is filled to the brim with terrible artwork and [[TheWarOnStraw strawmen representing people the artist disagrees with]] (people who eat meat, vote Republican, drive cars, buy things, wear clothes, etc.). The artist has since sold out, trying more conventional humor and failing at it. You can still read the old strips online.
* ''{{Counterthink}},'' a ridiculous, insane mix of {{PETA}} and Scientology's most paranoid fantasies. Topics include why spending money on drugs, rather than [[AllNaturalSnakeOil herbal placebos]], is bad; "doctors are incompetent, egotistical butchers"; "[[ScienceIsBad technologies are dangerous]]"; and "chemical additives, including Fluoride, are evil."
* [[http://comics.com/the_dinette_set/ The Dinette Set]], which crams many word balloons, captions, sight "gags," and characters into each strip, but ''still'' totally fails to be funny.
* Many consider the political strips of ''MallardFillmore'' a textbook example of PreachingToTheChoir. The problem with that idea is that much of the "choir" (conservatives, especially older ones) don't find the strip funny, either. Those on the opposite side of the political spectrum tend to find the comic blatantly insulting, which is probably the point. Non-political readers just find it bogglingly joke-free. Check any comics board with a newspaper section and note how many posts on [[FanNickname "The Duck"]] contain the phrase "I'm a conservative, but...". As for the comic itself, which would probably be relegated to right-wing websites and newsletters were it not used as a "counter-balance" for ''{{Doonesbury}}'s'' perceived liberal bias - it tends to substitute talk radio talking points for punchlines, it often contains examples of DidNotDoTheResearch, and it frequently repeats the same "joke" over several strips from slightly differing angles. It abusively overuses [[StrawmanPolitical Straw Liberals]], many of whom are in the regular cast. This is made all the sadder because Bruce Tinsley's occasional non-political strips can be genuinely funny and show a flair for observational humor. Unfortunately, those strips make up less than 10% of the strip's output. Discussing ''MallardFillmore'' on TheComicsCurmudgeon is now an automatic banning offense.
* [[http://www.leftersons.com/archives.shtml The Leftersons!]], a political themed comic in the vein of ''MallardFillmore'', is both more {{Anvilicious}} and less funny than its inspiration. The creator of the comic doesn't seem to understand American Liberalism, and so it fails at satire. [[StrawmanPolitical The characters]] have no personality to speak of. The art is unbelievably boring (and many panels, or layouts for entire strips, are [[CutAndPasteComic reused again and again with random background color changes]]). An example of its failure: the son of this StrawmanPolitical family is named Stalin and wears a Darwin-fish shirt, and his hair is done in a random-ass TotallyRadical 1980s punk style, which shows you how up to date the author is. [[http://www.leftersons.com/panel056.shtml Fart jokes, people, fart jokes!]]
** And the wife is named Imelda, because, you know, Imelda Marcos was evil, and therefore...she was a liberal! ...Haha!!!
** Or, just to sum up how batshit insane the author is: [[http://www.leftersons.com/panel556.shtml He thought there was a good joke in here somewhere.]]
* ''{{Marmaduke}}'' is often the center of a great deal of bashing due to its unflinching formula of Marmaduke just acting like a BigFriendlyDog with no variation whatsoever, not to mention its [[PrintLongRunners incredibly long run by the exact same guy]] or its scratchy, butt-ugly art. Really, it's so monotonous and ''dull'' that it makes latter-day ''{{Garfield}}'' look like ''TheFarSide''. Nearly half of the strip's article on TheOtherWiki mentions just how big a ButtMonkey it really is - it mentions not only how many critics have panned it, but also mentions the ''several'' blogs dedicated to ripping it apart. And yet ''this'' is the strip that gets made into a movie?!

* Grant Morrison, just Grant Morrison. The guy might be good writing original characters or the dregs of established characters, but dear lord, do NOT let him near any important established characters. The most egregious, painful examples are Magneto and Batman, he raped their characterization so bad Marvel needed to retcon away everything he did to Magneto as soon as he was out of their door. And who could blame them when he turned Magneto, an holocaust survivor into a junkie sending people into furnaces in the middle of Manhattan. His excuse was that everyone else forgot that Magneto wasn't charming like in the movies, but crazy, so that explained everything. Let's recap HE thought Magneto was crazy and everyone else who saw him differently was wrong. Now he is at DC where Dan Didio's hatred of the bat family has prompted him to give free reign to ([Moronson IncrediblyLamePun])to do everything he wants there, his merits there so far include, promising the final destiny of Batman in rip, only to fail and instead transfer it to Final Crisis, after ripping the whole thing straight from Sherlock Holmes (new villain head of a secret criminal organization? Check. Final confrontation between the detective and said criminal? Check. Falling into the water where their bodies are lost while their closest friend watches? Check. Later resurfacing and revealing his hitherto unknown secret training of some ancient asian technique that helped him survive? Check.) Not to mention all the issues promising something for the next issue and then not even mentioning it, dressing the Batman in rags and giving him the queerest costume since Batman & Robin, his MartyStu Damian who inexplicably gets the Robin mantle while Tim Drake gets booted. And there's Final Crisis, the superyoung team or some shit like that, akin to the bird thing in his xmen run, just a new random, digustingly weird character that he uses to fill the pages instead of focusing on the characters that are actualy important and relevant, not to mention actually popular. The biggest cop to a deus ex machina in comics where basically everything is wished to have a happy ending with the wish granting machine. Dan Didio also qualifies for allowing or encouraging all this, and his hard on for silver age nostalgia that keeps seeping into everything DC, someone should have told him the Silver Age ended for a reason. Really, he is to DC what Quezada was to spiderman, with the difference that the rest of Marvel has been awesome and getting better this whole time whereas DC just keeps getting worst. These are dark times for a DC fan, even worst times for a Bat fan indeed.

->'''''[[ThisIsSparta "THESE! COMICS!]]''''' '''''[+++ [[ThisIsSparta SUCK!!!!"]] +++ ]'''''
-->-- '''Linkara''' from ''AtopTheFourthWall'' after readind JLA: Act of God.

** Among the many problems with this comic is that the author shows a basic lack of understanding regarding the American political system works (i.e. the Republican-controlled House and Senate are apparently powerless to over-ride President Gore's desires) as well as a total lack of consideration for global politics (i.e. no other nation has objections to an Al Queda leader being recognized as legitmate authority by the UN?).
** What is worse, this comic insults its' target audience by implying that conservative Americans would sit by passively while the events of this comic are occuring as they wait for somebody else to save them.

** What's just as bad is that the artist of ''Minimum Security'' collaborated with another author to make ''As the World Burns'', a graphic novel starring the characters from Minimum Security ranting about [[HumansAreBastards how terrible modern society is]] and ends with a speech about how humans should [[WallBanger destroy everything and go back to being hunter-gatherers]].

->'''''[[ThisIsSparta "THESE! COMICS!]]''''' '''''[+++ [[ThisIsSparta SUCK!!!!"]]+++ ]'''''

** The ValiantComics-ImageComics [[IntercontinuityCrossover crossover]] ''DeathMate'' helped lead to the fall of ValiantComics and was one the contributing factors that led to the [[TheGreatComicsCrashOf1996 comics crash]]. The writing was horrible, [[http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/DeathMate.jpg the art]] [[RobLiefeld Liefeldian]], and the concept flawed; and Image released its contributions years late.
* ''{{Transformers}}'' fans disagree on just about everything, [[FanDumb often violently]]. But nobody has managed to find a fan who would dispute listing ''[[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/The_Beast_Within The Beast Within]]'' on this page. The issue of the US comic where Optimus Prime [[WallBanger commits suicide because he accidentally killed some NPCs in a video game]] is also universally loathed.
** His entire mind is put on a [[MagicFloppyDisk floppy disk]] so he can be revived when [[strike:[[MerchandiseDriven the new toy is out]]]] he is needed once more. That's right: ''OPTIMUS PRIME'S ENTIRE MIND FITS ON A FLOPPY DISK!''

** Although there are many terrible elements of ''The Beast Within'', the worst is probably the eponymous Beast. Fans had been speculating on a possible Dinobots combiner and its appearance for years, and when there's finally an official one, it [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070710211127/transformers/images/1/10/Butwhy.gif looks like this]]. Fans were understandably upset with the design for their dream character being so bad it couldn't look worse if it was, to paraphrase Seanbaby, drawn by a retarded child with his helmet filled with bees. Teletraan I has numerous criticisms of it. The most appropriate include:
*** "Yes, this thing is canon. I hate you all."
*** "This is a monument to all your sins."
*** "For years, fans have been coming up with designs for a Dinobot combiner. This is so much worse than any of them. "
*** "He is a mastodon and a Sabre-toothed Tiger short of being a horrible, horrible corruption of the Megazord. "
*** Everything Dreamwave ever put out, apart from The War Within. The first volume relegated the Tansformers to supporting characters in their own damn series, as the writer focused on boring, one dimensional and cliched human characters. He also seemed to think he was writing Xavier and Magneto and not Megatron and Optimus Prime. The plot was banal and idiotic and the art sloppy. But it was Shakespeare compared to volume two and three, in which Brad Mick spent haf his time seeing how many scenes he could rip off from the cartoons and the rest of his time seting up plots that went nowhere.

'''''Important Note''''':Merely being offensive in its subject matter is not enough to justify a work as So Bad It's Horrible. Hard as it is to imagine at times, there is a market for all types of deviancy (no matter how small a niche it is). It has to ''fail to appeal even to that niche'' to qualify as this.

'''''Important Note''''': Merely being offensive to you is not enough to justify a work as So Bad It's Horrible. What is offensive to you personally might not be offensive to others. ''It has to fail to appeal even to that niche'' qualify as this.

'''''Important Note''''': Merely being offensive to you is not enough to justify a work as So Bad It's Horrible. What is offensive to you personally might not be offensive to others. It has to fail to appeal to ANYONE to qualify as this.

* Behind the already bad but copied-enough-that-no-one-cares-anymore RobLiefeld-esque art of the ''Warrior'' mini-series lies unheard-of levels of walls and WallsOfText that contain bad grammar and made-up words used to explain "destrucity", a philosophy of former {{WWE}} wrestler Ultimate Warrior, which makes no sense to anyone in the world except him. If you manage to figure out what is being said, then it makes less sense than UsefulNotes/{{Scientology}}. Oh, and then there was the Christmas special where [[spoiler: Warrior rapes SantaClaus]]. See [[TheSpoonyExperiment Spoony's]] [[http://www.thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/bt/spoonyone/reviews/7238-warrior1 review of it for details.]] (And [[http://www.i-mockery.com/comics/longbox14/default.php see this review, too, for more details than you'll ever need!]])

-->-- '''Linkara''', ''AtopTheFourthWall''

**** [[SarcasmMode Didn't you hear?]] RapeIsOkayWhenItsFemaleOnMale, even more so if said female is the AuthorAvatar of an [[AscendedFanBoy Ascended Fan Girl]] who has an [[PerverseLust unhealthy fixation on the character she's writting]]!

* Decisions that had various heroes who had NEVER BEFORE expressed any strong political opinions being turned into Strawmen for the sake of its IdiotPlot. If they'd stuck to just heroes like Hawkman and Green Arrow it still would have been quite a Wallbanger but it wouldn't have been AS bad. But we got nonsense like Lois Lane becoming the brunnette versin of BlondeRepublicanSexKitten and that's just the tip of the iceberg. God knows who it was meant to appeal to but this Troper hasn't met a single person, liberal or conservative who liked it.

'''''Important Note''''': Merely being offensive in its subject matter is not enough to justify a work as So Bad It's Horrible. What is offensive to you personally might not be offensive to others. It has to fail to appeal to ANYONE to qualify as this.

'''''Important Note''''': Merely being offensive in its subject matter is not enough to justify a work as So Bad It's Horrible. Hard as it is to imagine at times, there is a market for all types of deviancy (no matter how small a niche it is). It has to ''fail to appeal even to that niche'' to qualify as this.