Why Rob Liefeld?

                I saw in comic book news that Rob Liefeld is going to start writing Hawk and Dove. If this strikes some of you as untrue, you’re not alone. I couldn’t believe it myself when I read it. So let me say it one more time, and maybe it will sink in—ROB LIEFELD IS GOING TO BE WRITING A COMIC BOOK FOR DC COMICS.

                At this point, I have to wonder why Rob Liefeld is getting any work at all. Marvel and DC have to know about the reputation this guy has. He’s left the flaming wreckage of more comic book titles in his wake than any other writer, penciler and editor I know, and I can’t see any good coming out of Hawk and Dove. Actually, what I expect is that the book will be so delayed that there will be a six-month gap between issue 6 and issue 7, with writing that is only slightly less gripping than watching paint dry. 

                Before we go on, I need to point out that, although this blog post is going to savage Rob Liefeld every way possible, I don’t hate the man himself. He doesn’t strike me as a jerk, and he has taken the time to actually answer some of his naysayers online, which I think is admirable because it would be much easier for Rob to just ignore what people say about him.

                So Rob Liefeld the man is fine by me.  His body of work, though, is a completely different story. I used to like Rob Liefeld when he started doing New Mutants, and I confess that I loved X-Force and wanted to see what Rob Liefeld and Fabian Nicieza were doing each month. I even managed to overlook some of the glaring anatomy problems for a while there, too.

                When Liefeld joined Image, though, my whole view of him changed. Youngblood #1 was godawful. There’s just no getting around it. It didn’t help that a lot of characters seemed to be Marvel heroes with the serial numbers filed off. My brother Andy, when he first saw an ad for Youngblood (to be published by Malibu comics no less!) said that Rob Liefeld had just used elements of characters that he’d drawn in X-Force and shuffled them up a bit. I think Andy was right in hindsight, but he misdiagnosed the problem. The problem wasn’t that Rob was shuffling around old designs, the problem was that he was swiping old concepts and then shuffling around old designs to fit them.

                Then there was the writing, which was atrocious. The only part of Youngblood #1 I remember was the foreign affairs team going into Iraq and taking down Saddam Hussien. Seeing as how this occurred around the time of Operation Desert Storm, it came off as one of the lamest tie-ins ever.

                Even that could have been forgiven, though. So Liefeld’s proportions are way off, he seems to have trouble drawing knees and his sense of continuity from panel to panel can be spotty at best. Who cares? His artwork is dynamic, and it’s fun to look at, at least fun enough to flip through once. And he could have improved as a writer, had he kept the book going. Instead, Youngblood vanished off the face of the earth, and along came other titles that also got delayed after two to three issues. Some titles, Brigade for instance, were delayed after the first issue!

                So far, the picture is kind of grim. It isn’t helped by the fact that there has been no improvement since the 1990s. For instance, Rob Liefeld’s studios got the chance to do Captain America and the Avengers in the Heroes Reborn project. Same writing, admittedly better quality of writing, but still the books got delayed after about three issues, and then Marvel gave them over to Wildstorm studios! What about when the other Image comics booted Rob out and he created two other comic book companies, Maximum and Awesome, which also proceeded to fail?

This brings up another point—Rob Liefeld has a ghastly track record when it comes to being a businessman. The man still owes Alan Moore money for the work that he did with Awesome Studios, for heaven’s sake! Alan Moore, who happens to be arguably the greatest comic book writer alive? What about the reports that he was dipping into the Image comics coffers to pay off some personal debts?

Let’s just take a second to sum up here. Rob Liefeld’s art, while dynamic, is recognized as a joke by most comics fans. His skill as a writer is not exactly awe-inspiring. He has a problem with getting books out on time. He seems to destroy the businesses he helms faster than George W. Bush. Given all that, I want to know what could possibly make an editor say, “Yeah, I think you’ll do a great job on this title!”

                Let’s be fair, maybe Rob Liefeld’s name on a book means better sales. It’s likely. Maybe the sales figures for a Liefeld book are so high that it’s worth keeping him on for two or three issues, even if it means there will be a three-month gap between them. Maybe Rob has a lot of friends in the editorial department. It’s not unheard of for friends to give friends jobs, even if more deserving people are available. Maybe editors are looking for Rob Liefeld to capture that old ‘90s magic, where even the low-selling books would have a run of a hundred thousand copies.

                Whatever the reason, though, the editors have to know what they’re getting, and what they’re getting is a man who has demonstrated far more often than not that he is going to let you down.