Scalped #35

Jesus, there hasn't been anything here in a month. I keep thinking I should write something and never do it. The next Marathon is in my head, but it's somehow not making the transition to the screen. It's too massive and I haven't been able to sit down with nothing distracting me and writing it. It's about home and not being at home. My version? It's about home home, the United States as home and Allegheny as home.

But, this one is about a single issue of Scalped that goes against what you expect from the pitiless series. Also, Blogger's no longer going to be powering the site, because we're the one percent affected by their changes. Don't worry. We're looking into migrating the content on a different platform. Same URL.

I've never read Scalped before, but I found number 35, a one-shot, to be painful and surprising. The sum of my Scalped knowledge is this: noir set on a Native American reservation. Because this is a noir, crime is organized, and because crime is organized, the FBI is involved. To quote Blacklisted, that ain't real much.

For 35, though, I don't have to know anything about the main characters in the story. It's about an older couple (Mance and Hazel) who love each other who live reasonably close to an Air Force base, within driving distance of the town where the main arc takes place. By the end of the issue, one person dies, there is an explosion and the house is destroyed. But it's not what you think. The first page is the couple walking in the desolate, unforgiving snow, wrapped up in blankets. It's unclear if they're going to make it to the destination and it sets the mood.

Past here are spoilers.

The couple is running out of food and money. Quickly. The man is the first to say that he's going to have to go into town. This is important because what is meant by that is they're picking up food by acknowledging the couple's poverty and inability to survive without help from the government.

They get food. Things are good. Then, the wife, Hazel falls to the ground, her kidney trouble finally catching up to her. Mance puts Hazel in bed, saying he's going into town to get her medicine. She doesn't want to die in the bed, so she goes with him. They go into town again. She gets her medicine and they go back to their house. In the middle of the drive, far enough from town, the car breaks down.

#35 plays on your expectations of Scalped. One person dies. There is a house-destroying explosion. There is no intrigue. Yes, there is compromise and pride in an arithmetic, but not in the noir conceit. There is no femme fatale. There is no evil businessman/mob kingpin, at least not one that's relevant to their story. Yes, there is the casino that is one of the focal points of the main story, which is passed in two panels and used as the difference between the old couple and the rest of the characters in the narrative. The only emotional hurdle or land mine between them is the acknowledgment of their plight, which is dealt with in...a page. They decide they're going to ask for assistance and the scene ends with Hazel and Mance holding each other in bed.

It is because their lifestyle is not one built on glamour or a desire for more wealth. They require each other and that fills their cup. I don't want to be reciting a virtuous poverty/savage story, but instead noting that their life is not caught in the web of deceit, lies and crime that the series is known for. Hell, I don't think a single law is broken in the issue.

It's a heart-warming issue. That's the surprise. Things just keep going wrong and because the characters have the spine to acknowledge the bad things that happen to them and admit they need help (government assistance and Hazel not staying in bed while her husband gets the medicine), things work out. The explosion in house is an Air Force jet crashing into it and the person who died is the pilot. The Air Force covers the cost of their medicine and pays for the rebuilding of their house. It's not happily ever after, they're still older and have health problems, they probably have a construction crew to build them a new house and friends that are invested in seeing them happy.

Above here are spoilers.

Yes, I understand that the issue rewards the idea of a heterosexual monogamous relationship in the key of true love since the teenage years and that's a uniquely Western romantic thing, but it's a rare ray of sunshine in a series that's bleak enough to rival Battlestar Galactica or the Wire.

I hope you buy it.

Black Lanterns and Overkill

My pen name in Overkill was Charles Victor Szasz. It's nuts to type it this many times in an article. Anyway. I submitted this elsewhere and apparently, it didn't take. Here's something about the Question #37.

Go Saints!

I got excited from the first five words: Charles Victor Szasz of Earth.

During a DC Universe-wide event (Something big happens in the fictional universe, to which the monthly series respond and draw upon) Blackest Night, the main artist took some time off and in the place of the main story, 10 cancelled series were brought back for a one-off issue tying into the event.

One of those was the Question, a little known monthly series active in the 80s, starring a C-list hero called the Question. It ran for 36 issues and ended there, influencing most of today's top writers and hadn't been touched since. (The characters were used elsewhere, but not in their own ongoing monthly series.) The series itself was a mix of Mike Royko and Batman, a 200-level philosophy final and Zen Bhudduism that congealed around Charles Victor Szasz, a TV news anchor who went out crusading as the vigilante without a face, the Question, at night.

It ended with him leaving the city because he was too attached to the city and to his lover there to be the Question without emotional pain.

The big event in universe to thank for the one-shot, Blackest Night, is about zombies. Evil zombies feeding off of the emotions for the person, if I had to be specific. In universe, Szasz is dead from lung cancer and his protege, Renee Montoya, is the current Question.

The issue's storyline goes like this: By an incredibly loose definition of a comic book reanimation, Szasz is back as a Black Lantern and it's up to Aristotle Rodor (mentor), Renee and Lady Shiva (kung-fu master, hyper violent) to beat Black Lantern Szasz.

Trouble is, they can't.

Past this point are spoilers, by the way.

The way this is dealt with is what sells me on the book. They don't defeat Black Lantern Szasz in combat. The vision of the Black Lanterns only extends to beings with emotions they can feel. A person who has no emotions will disappear and that's what the group does. They let go of their feelings towards Szasz and Black Lantern Szasz can't see them, so he walks out into the rain.

In short: Szasz had to let go to truly become the Question and his friends had to let go of their feelings for Szasz to survive. If you're aware of the history, it's a callback and if not, it's a unique piece of the larger Blackest Night mystery revealed. This issue, #37, has many different weights on it and shoulders them all. It's one part resolution for the lingering memories of Szasz and one part Blackest Night puzzle piece, set up and done in a way that is reminiscent of the series from years ago.

The issue was done the right way, with the original artist and writer coming back, even titling the issue One More Question. Shame that there's only the one.

Keep On Dancing, Right As the Curtain Is Closing

I wrote this listening to the new Felix Culpa record, available January 24th (also my birthday) from Youth Conspiracy Records. It's pretty long (out of the 66 minutes, they could have cut anywhere from seven to 10 minutes), but it's all an intense ride. I suggest you buy it.

The title comes from the Bane song End With An Ellipsis, a song about the vocalist seeing the end coming for his band, but not wanting to go sadly. Anyway, the meat of this is about S.W.O.R.D., an ongoing from Marvel that just this week made its way to the "buy me" pile, got cancelled. At least it's in good company, though, with Doctor Voodoo, Captain Britain and MI:13 and the Immortal Iron Fist.

S.W.O.R.D. got cancelled at issue #5 (cover left) due to poor sales, which everyone with a functioning brain saw coming. Everyone on the series saw that coming and it was even written as if it would end at issue #5, according to writer Kieron Gillen, (lover of obscure British pop) known also for Phonogram, a comic I enjoy quite a bit.

It's a shame, because it's a neat little spinoff comic focusing on different characters in the Marvel Universe with a tangential relation to established franchises (X-Men). I picked up issue #3 last week and while I found Beast a little bit too whip-smart and it took getting used seeing Beast look more like a horse, I warmed up to it quickly.

Gillen posits two explanations:

1. New ongoings in a shitty economy are extremely risky. (true)

2. The first two issues are ordered before anyone has read the first one so the new series might be on grounds to be cancelled before anyone has the opportunity to buy a single issue. A crazy systemic problem with comics. (true)

Quoted by CBR's Robot 6, Gillen said "It was already on unsteady ground before anyone had even read the thing."

And as soon as I read that, my mind goes to another recent launch: Batwoman. Both are spinoffs of established series (S.W.O.R.D. has X-Men and Batwoman has Batman) but their launches couldn't be more different.

Consider: Batwoman's stories have appeared in Detective Comics, 52 and Final Crisis (52 and Final Crisis being DC events) and the talk only now is coming to her own ongoing. S.W.O.R.D. (created by Joss Whedon during his Astonishing X-Men run in 2004) was thrown into its own ongoing with no lead up or introduction to the characters outside of Secret Invasion, an event from two years ago before the launch of S.W.O.R.D.

The artist on Batwoman is the stupid talented J.H. Williams III, narrowly losing to the guy drawing Blackest Night (46% to 54%) as the artist of the year in a Newsarama poll, but winning the cover of the year with his work on Detective 855 (see right). J.H. also did Promethea with Alan Moore, which also had amazing layouts. Also! Take a look at those colors. Dave Stewart (the colorist) deserves some serious kudos. Suffice to say the art team on S.W.O.R.D. doesn't have that pedigree.

I'm not sure Gillen is in the same league as Rucka, but I buy Gillen's books more frequently than I do Rucka's, so the kangaroo court of my mind has a sizable pro-Gillen bias.

The connection to the X-Men is Beast, which could have been reinforced a little bit more. What's Nightcrawler doing these days? He would fit note-perfect in an ongoing about aliens, earth and alienation. It's Beast, Abagail Brand and "everyone's favorite paper pusher" as the front and center players from the Marvel Universe.

The short version of all this is: based on this criteria, my guess is S.W.O.R.D. just didn't have the editorial backing that Batwoman did. If you want people to buy another new book, then you have to have Things Happen in the book, but also, you have to put your top-tier people on it. The new book needs to be a must-read. S.W.O.R.D. wasn't positioned as a book that's must-read. It's cool if it is read.

I want to come back to Gillen McKelvie's quote: "It was on unsteady ground before anyone had even read the thing." Marvel, I think, didn't take enough steps to compensate for the unsteadiness of the new ground and combine that with the viciousness of a market that's already hurting from an economic collapse and S.W.O.R.D.'s numbers were limited, in this case, from the start.

Of course, that's not to say S.W.O.R.D. was boring. Far from it. The first issue I picked up, ,#3, had a spectacular visual for a cover (see below), Beast being an incorrigible badass, a firebreathing dragon and xenophobia.

You've got a tiny dragon pointing guns with three barrels at you and not just that, but a shotgun and an assault rifle strapped to his back. Awwwww! S.W.O.R.D. will be missed for that reason, for its ability to blend being cute and intelligent. But hey. It's fun and it's got two issues left.

Like Conan, S.W.O.R.D. got screwed, but at least there's a trade in the future. That said, there's a fun feeling to buying the remaining issues of a cult-classic series that's walking dead. You were in before people realized it was so cool, so even if it's gonna end, pick up the issues.

Like many of Mr. Gillen's favorite artists, his work was under-appreciated the first time around and would gain significance only after the band's finished. For his first unique Marvel ongoing, it seems appropriate S.W.O.R.D. ends the same way.

December Wolves: Phonogram

More rough edits on a comic book. Recorded on Christmas morning, so merry Christmas, belatedly. I'm wearing a Crime In Stereo shirt. Expect more updates, a deluge of them, before the 31st.

December Wolves: Yes, Zach, I'm A Prude

I've felt for a while now (40 hours) that White Boys On A Stage (Scumbag Reprise) would be an awesome song title, and since I don't have a band, I'll just use it here eventually. This one's about female characters in comics and what I contribute to if or when I choose to buy them. The title is me acknowledging the obvious.

I want to believe I'm clean on this one, but I'm not so sure.


All of this has been said before, over and over.

There's a new article that's making the rounds on iO9 on the old question of whether comic books have an anti-female agenda. It's got Freudian symbolism and an entirely too-reductive view of major flashpoints of Marvel history, so it's not like they're going for the win here. But that wasn't made me think.

Can female-centered comics sustain a meaningful audience without an assload of corporate backing or fanservice? Answer: No. Then again, can non-core titles survive without an assload of corporate backing and wacky bullshit? Unlikely. (See also: Iron Fist, Steel, Captain Britain, the Question, Catwoman or Luke Cage.) Also: Doesn't the dearth of Wolverine/X-Men titles Marvel puts out pretty much keep the lights on? Answer: Yes, writing books using characters the marketplace is interested in makes money.

Quickly, let's review female-centered comics I might be interested in. (From a major publisher, of course. Independent comics are a whole other cup of tea. I have a vague understanding of two universes. I will travel to others soon.)


I'm not buying Gotham City Sirens because I'm not sure what the fuck is going on with Paul Dini. Dini is not a dumb writer. He knows how to do female characters, as seen on his work in the animated Batman series. I had high hopes but the covers were pretty fanservice tops and I had no idea what was going on. Therefore, I didn't keep reading, which ended up being a good thing. Apparently #5 had Poison Ivy gave a cactus an orgasm and that's when I walk away.

Detective Comics (grandfathered in because of Batwoman) (do you see what I did there?) I buy the day it comes out. I am a good consumer, letting DC know that if they keep Greg Rucka writing a female character that's not bait for kidnapping or LOOK HUGE BOOBS and drawn by one of the most talented and imaginative artists in the medium, it will move units.


There's also Batgirl (right), which features Oracle and has a teenage girl putting on a costume with a bat on it and oh God, is this another high school "how am I going to divide up my time" comic? Maybe, not quite? There's an interesting B story about franchising a superhero name, which might be metacommentary on the universe the characters are set in, so this one seems inconsistent but worth keeping an eye on.





Cinderella I buy day and date. Am good consumer, especially because I talk about it publicly and keep the word of mouth going. I'm not entirely sure what to think about her open-shirted-ness for the first 10 pages. It seems just on the edge of plausible but possibly gratuitous. Then again, this is comics. She's not leaning down to pick something up on a panel, so it's a victory, just not a moral one.




Psylocke. I haven't read it or bought it. The covers are mad fanservice-y (see immediate right) and I feel awkward picking it up. Again, I don't want to support the trend of female characters in a thong or nonsense clothes, but the ongoing should be interesting. Female psychic ninja who'se British dumped into an Asian body. Given that the X-Men started out as an extremely political racial allegory, this title could be developed into some cool post-colonial stories. Put Fraction on it and the possibilities are endless. But it's only been two issues.


Ms. Marvel (getting canceled at issue #50, three issues away.) I'm late to this and I'm not sure if I should feel bad about that, but the Spiderman date issue was fun while not being unintelligent and the characters related to each other believably. Also, she's not fat, she just doesn't look like she has an unsuperheroic eating disorder. Go die.

Wonder Woman, the flagship DC character, should be a no-brainer, but honestly, I don't know where to begin with her. Start at the beginning, douchebag, is one answer, but I have trouble going back to the old drawing style. I'm a fan of color. I like Greg Rucka, so perhaps it would behoove me to pick up his Wonder Woman run and see where it goes.


I already buy two of these books, though. Is that enough? I have a limited amount of money and comics for me are not things I require to live and since I have not yet turned into a profitable enterprise, I'm loath to part with my hard earned money for something that I'm not reasonably sure about. I mean, hell, I still haven't picked up the new Lawrence Arms seven inch yet. But, if I want female ongoings that don't make me exasperated, then one of the best ways is to get into them when they're nascent.

I'm dancing around the question: Ought I to subsidize the books even when their quality hasn't been proven? It feels strange to be saying that explicitly. Look at Immortal Iron Fist. The main character was an Avenger and before that was in Daredevil and was a white dude doing white dude things, punching obviously bad people, getting laid and stopping HYDRA. That didn't last past the number 27, though if you throw in the one shots and Immortal Weapons issues, breaks 35. That comic was proven quality, even when Brubaker/Fraction left it and it got 11 issues.

I have other comics I can spend my money on items that I will actually enjoy, so I can vote with my dollar, but I'm not sure what my vote of no confidence in these series means to those publishers. Does buying Cinderella and Batwoman send a message to publishers that at least one segment of the marketplace will stand a female-fronted superhero book without fanservice being an integral portion of the ongoing, or just that the marketplace will tolerate spinoffs?

Does one person make much of a difference? Word of mouth helps, certainly. Can I reasonably stomach the parts that are meant to create and nurture a fanbase while the writers get their sea legs? Or, are these ongoings doomed to a small run to begin with and we ought to take what we can get? 20,000 people bought Iron Fist and Captain Britain at the end of their runs, so one person, numerically, shouldn't make a difference. That's a cop out, though.

It's a way to avoid saying the things that ought to be said. I'm not going to confuse that with talking shit on publishers, but I will say that if there is an ongoing with a female character I'm interested in (from a major publisher) that doesn't treat me and my pocketbook like a 15 year old kid, I will buy it as reliably, if not more so, as the other comics books I buy regularly.

I don't know if that's a major statement, enlightened self-interest or equal-ist. But it's what I've got and what I, as an attractive target audience (see left) am willing to commit to. And that might be the major statement in this piece.

December Wolves: Thoughts on Detective Comics #859

I said yesterday I was doing 15 posts in December, and here's the first of those 15. I've settled on the name December Wolves for the feature, because wolves roam in packs (there's a number of these updates coming down the pike) and also because one of the composers for d-beat overlords Trap Them, Brian Izzi, was previously in a band called December Wolves.

(Obviously, the Trap Them reference came to my mind first and I realized it was perfect, but probably needed further justification.) Since this is a detail oriented post, there's obvious spoilers, so if you're planning on being surprised by this Detective Comics run, you may want to move along now.




It's the details in Detective Comics #859 that make the issue sing.

This arc focuses on the path of Kate Kane to Batwoman. The first scene is set in West Point, where Kate is acquitting herself well and digging into the surroundings. She's the brigade XO and at the head of her class. She also happens to be kissing girls.

The West Point part showcases Kate's backbone, so you know how this going to end. And you'd be right. She gets kicked out of West Point. But how Rucka takes the reader there is not what you'd expect. I should have noticed it the first ten times I read the issue, but I wasn't focusing on the masthead. It lists another name, aside from the people in DC working on the comic. There's a special consultant on the issue. Daniel Choi.

That name should be vaguely familiar.

It's familiar because he's a discharged Arab linguist and Iraq War combat veteran for, yes, being gay. The masthead reads "Special Thanks to 1LT Daniel Choi (USMA 2003) For His Generous Assistance In Research For This Issue". And when viewed through this lens, the West Point portion comes into focus.

Every person granted a speaking role in West Point is viewed sympathetically. The commanding officer is trying to do Kate a solid. He's offering her an out, by taking her under his protection (by virtue of her exemplary service and his fondness for her parents) and using his fiat to kill the investigation. The other woman is never heard from again. There's no "this is why the poilcy is wrong" scene. There isn't preaching. The closest it comes is the look of disappointment on Kate's face when she does what she has to do.

(Also, I think Lt. Choi just joined the DCU, since the cadet that tells Kate the commanding officer wants to see her has a last name of Choi and Kate refers to him as Dan. I will see if I can get Rucka to confirm this.)

In her reply, she shows the backbone and purpose that will serve her as Batwoman, but also how much she truly believes in the community she's about to be kicked out of unceremoniously. Her reply is that if she said it was a joke or a misunderstanding, she'd be lying and cadets are trained not to do that or allow is to happen around them, so she refuses to say it.

She then goes the step further, saying directly to her superior officer that she's gay. She refuses the offer to hide under her CO's auspices, however well meaning and self-sacrificing it was and quits the service, just before graduation.

She wasn't just measuring up to the Army here, Rucka was showing us her measurements to wear a bat-symbol on her chest. Okay, she has the conviction.

But that only gets her so far, and as her proud father notes, that's not real far.

She is restless and has sex with the woman who would be the Question. (Note to Overkill readers: Mantle-passing is all part of the superhero genre. The previous Question died of lung cancer.)

Most stunning is her transformative experience with Batman. Or, perhaps not so transformative. He simply picks her up after she successfully fends off a mugger, yelling "Don't you know? I'm not a victim. I'm a soldier, god damn it!" What's worth mentioning is that Batman doesn't save her from shit. Bruce simply offers his hand after he surprises her so much that she loses her balance.

He just offers his hand. It's that act of kindness, but not much more. Batman doesn't even set the wheels in motion, he just kicks the machine to get it working. It's not so much an empowerment story via Batman, but just that Batman is a catalyst. That's what makes the story special. Batman didn't train her. There's no taking her under his wing. She's been trained. She knows what to do. She knows how to organize herself and she's doing it herself.

Next, I'll talk about the art, briefly, because it's pretty silly I think, to spend a lot of space describing what's going on when you can just look at it. I'll point a few things out and have that be the end of it.

J.H. Williams' III art leaps off the page, but again, it's the details. The panels on top of the page (below) are of the overarching story, but they're also done as Batman symbols, which is cool. But what takes it from cool to "I never thought of it, that's awesome" is the breaks between panels, starting off in red and ending up in purple, starting straight and veering off course, reacting to to the story it (literally!) delineates.























The rest of the issue is done in a muted, but warm tone which fits the backward looking nature of the run well, but isn't as interesting, since it's set in straight forward panel stuff. It's not as visually compelling. In these pages reproduced here, there's a lot visually going on, but it can immediately be made sense of.

The final touch is this: Batman, when he's shown in the flashback, is done in the modern style. I would say it's a hint at what's to come, but the character's name is Batwoman, so you know what's going to happen.

It's a great single issue not just because all the pieces themselves are good, but when they're put together, the attention to detail, both on the art and story side stand out. True, Rucka could just turn in the narrative equivalent of narrating Mr. Williams' pretty pictures, but Batwoman here is having her character defined as something textured, layered, distinct and very different from Bruce Wayne.

Batman with tits, she is not.

The art's fresh and the writing's fantastic. Last time I checked, this is why people buy comic books.

Eleven Names Strides Boldly Into 2008.

This is me talking about comics with a camera recording it. There should probably be a script. There isn't. I should probably think about lighting. I didn't. I just went out (well, went in) and did. One of the things two writers said was important was having a real deadline and coming back out there swinging next time.

I promise I'll come out swinging next time. Whether there will be a script or not, I don't know. The one on the top has lesser production values, that is to say, I was using a point and shoot camera bought in 2005 to record the video. The one on bottom was done with the video camera in my laptop and thus has much higher quality in terms of visuals. That said, I didn't do as many takes, so it's not as cogently voiced as the first.

There will be more of these in the future. I can't be more specific because I can't see in the future and my physical writing about comics is for the moment, promised elsewhere that insists on things like content exclusivity. The beat goes on. This is just a way to keep that beat going at a faster pace.

It's Shxt Like This That Distances Me From Comics

I know this isn't Marathon #3.

I wanted to write something that wasn't pastepunk stuff and the Marathon pieces take a lot out of me. It's something to knock out the cobwebs and get me off my intellectual butt. This is about...Necrosha. Necrosha is a story about reanimating the dead that got published today that isn't called Blackest Night.


There's a preview page of the Necrosha one-shot in the X-Men universe (from Marvel Comics) which took me out of the world the authors had created and brought me back, kicking and screaming to this one.

It's a shot of Selene, the Black Queen, an X-Men villianess. She's an important member of the Hellfire Club's inner circle and she's a powerful character. She's a 15,000 year old psychic vampire, for heaven's sake. She can grind people to dust with her mind or dominate them to her will. This is a woman with considerable powers and prowess of her own.

She's teaming up with some other death related villains to launch an attack on the X-Men, because she believes she can ascend to godhood for no adequately explored reason, but do villains really need reasons? Answer: No. It's usually better if they don't.

And yet, she's dressed up like an bondage model. That breaks the fiction for me. That pulls me out of the narrative. I don't feel like a reader when I see that. I feel like a target audience. I feel like I'm being titillated, insulted and kept on a leash to make sure I'm paying attention. Take a look at it yourself.

I feel like I'm being reminded that these designs are made to influence buyers. And yes, I know that her costume is based on an older costume, which is just as flattering. But this is 2009. We've learned, right? We don't have dress up the women in those kinds of outfits to get readers to understand the woman is meant to be alluring, destructive and nefarious. It's an image thing. It's her image. It's the image Marvel wants her to have.

The problem is that there's another image and that's Marvel's image of the buyers of which I am one. (That said, all of this could also be said for DC, at random, I could show you Green Lantern Corps #35, but that's tangential.) I recognize that this is an old argument. I recognize I'm profoundly new to this criticism that's been going on for a while now.

It's hard for me to believe that a woman who is 15,000 years old chooses to dress that scantily in on a cold night. I mean, okay, she's a vampire. That requires an abbreviated wardrobe, I grant, but the bondage theme is the straw (or tail) that broke the camel's back.

Maybe I'm just roid-raging. I felt like a kid again and the experience wasn't pleasant. For all the time I've invested in my understanding, all the different perspectives I've tried to wrap my mind around and all the fighting I've done with how I'm supposed to act, pages like this remind me that I'm still just viewed as a person to be insulted with "sultry" women.

I don't believe I'm unique in that I'm college graduate reading comics and am willing to try new universes and characters. Maybe I am. I'm going outside to take a walk and figure out how deeply I feel about this.

It makes me feel powerless and reminds me of the production of comics. The big fear in my mind is that I'm just naive. That of course these comics are aimed at dudes (used colloquially) that define the lowest common denominator. That the patina of storytelling is just that. That I'm putting too much intellectually on something that was never meant to carry it.

Maybe this feeling of being taken advantage of is in my head. I hope it is, but frankly, I never should have left the story in the first place and the fact that even after typing through this, the original problem still remains is the troubling part.