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mygif

Ah, the good old days when Judd Winick was a writer and not a punch line.

Barry Ween was one of those weird books that shouldn’t have worked but it did. This was a series that managed to do a poop joke that was actually funny; “Barry says it will be my major in college”. The main character is unlikable but still sympathetic; Barry is completely aware that he’ll be insane by the time he’s a teenager.

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mygif

His willingness to characterize a 10 year like you say he does might have something to do with his willingness to mess with DC comics characters

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mygif

I agree 100% P&M, Frumpy & Ween are all gold.

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mygif

Some of judd’s Dc work is IMO underrated.

His Green Lantern run was very good. A great and consistent evolution for Kyle Rayner after Ron Marz left the title. As MGK noted in a prior post, Under The Hood is a very enjoyable story arc. And Judd’s Outsiders run was pretty good as well.

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mygif

Early on I think that Winick suffered from trying to make boys talk like teenagers, but as “Ween” went on he got better at giving them their own voices.

I’d like to see more of “Ween”. In fact, I’ve often thought you could make a great TV show out of it, some kind of weird mix of “Buffy”, “Dexter” and some modern sci-fi setting.

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Brian Smith said on November 12th, 2012 at 3:47 am

I may be misremembering “Frumpy,” but in the time I got to read it, it always seemed like Winick struggled with pacing and tried to cram too much into the fourth panel. My stereotypical, exaggerated “Frumpy” would be:
Panel 1, kid: “You feeling OK?”
Panel 2, Frumpy: “Yes…”
Panel 3, Frumpy: “Why do you ask?”
Panel 4, kid: “Because your sleeve’s on fire.” Frumpy: “Why didn’t you SAY something?” Kid: “Because I thought it was a joke!” Frumpy: “My SLEEVE is on FIRE!”
That having been said, I do like the guy, and I can still picture his “Frumpy” style. I’d agree that his run on Green Lantern was very good; the give-and-take in his Green Lantern “Circle of Fire” issue was golden.

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mygif

More Barry, please.

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mygif

Barry Ween was indeed better than much of Winick’s later work. And I’ve read more of him than I care to admit, and his superhero work is often just kind of there even when it’s not bad. What really seems to get a lot of superhero goats is that he’s always adding gay people to comics where no gay people were before and that is just making more work for Johns to kill them off later.

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mygif

I once described Barry Ween as “a blend of Dexter’s Laboratory with Men in Black and written by Quentin Tarantino for kids.”

It’s a great series (track down the uncollected single issues that aren’t in the Oni omnibus edition). The black & white series ended with one of the most poignant scenes EVER in a comic, where Barry realizes how close he came to losing his friends and for the first time ever breaks down in tears.

Powerful, poignant stuff…

…and as funny as shit.

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mygif

I want new Barry Ween soooo bad. The last story especially was not only funny, but was poignant in a way that felt like a two by four between the eyes.

By the way, any love for Juniper Lee? He was the showrunner on it, and I really liked it.

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mygif

@KD: I agree. It’s not that he’s never done any good superhero comics, it’s that his brand has been diluted by being DC’s go-to guy for “this story idea sucks, so we have to sell it hard. Who has a great ear for dialogue? Oh, hey! Judd!” It’s resulted in some rough work with his name on it.

@Murc: Can’t lie, I was thinking of that strip the whole time. 🙂

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mygif

His Green Lantern run is one of my favorites. I think Its much better than anything since Rebirth.

Exiles was a really underrated book too.

Outsiders is where he lost me. It wasn’t a bad book but somewhere along the line I just stopped picking it up.

I read his Batman run (well, the Scarecrow story and Under the Hood anyway) and thought it was mediocre at best.

@JP Cardier: Yeah, Juniper Lee was quite good.

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mygif

Last I heard, Winick was off Batwing and Catwoman, and working on an all-ages project. Really, is “Winick” still a four-letter word? I see a guy who can look like a yutz on cable television, and come away making his own mark, as well as getting the girl of his dreams. Now . . . basing at least four characters on his wife Pam? Different issue.

I liked me some Juniper Lee. Yes, some of it was recycled Barry Ween stories (e.g., the Bigfoot girl), but it had enough originality on it own. Also: Pug with a Scottish accent. Awesome.

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Halloween Jack said on November 26th, 2012 at 11:25 pm

@JP Cardier: As much as I loved Barry Ween, I don’t want new stuff because Winick took the premise, rode it as far as he needed to–into some truly grim territory–and then got off it, walked away and never looked back. Imagine how much better Twin Peaks would be remembered if David Lynch had done the same.

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