Ultimate-ly Wrong

March 23rd, 2006

Filed under: Comics

Look, Carol: I know that you’re a multi-decorated Air Force officer, but I’d hope that you’d realize that USAF Captain’s insignia are silver and not gold (or that at least colorists Ponsor and Mounts, or editor Macchio would). I’m not going to say anything about that weating the gunbelt with the blues you’re wearing because I figure that maybe that’s what the Ultimate USAF wears…

Carol Danvers, Capt. USAF Carol Danvers, Capt. USAFCarol Danvers, Capt. USAF
From Ultimate Extinction #1. Words by Ellis, Pencils by Peterson.

Seriously though, is it too much to ask that the colorist put a little effort into some simple research?

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6 Responses to “ Ultimate-ly Wrong ”

  1. Ragnell
    March 24th, 2006 at 3:39 am

    The tie tab’s all wrong too.

  2. Scott
    March 24th, 2006 at 8:25 am
    Official Comment

    I know it’s very nit-picky, but the little respect given to military uniforms by comic book artists has always bugged me. It doesn’t take any time at all now to find a picture of the correct uniform. I’ll grant that some aspects are fairly obscure (the gun belt, for example) — but the basic uniform shouldn’t be drawn as poorly as it usually is.

    It does make me wonder though, how many people working in the comics industries now have served in the military at some point? Not many in the current generation I bet.

  3. gorjus
    March 24th, 2006 at 9:31 am

    Even if there had been, that doesn’t mean they could draw it. That takes reference, time, and effort. I think Peterson is genearally pretty good on those points, although I hate this new shading/liney/Zipatone thing that’s going on.

    Scott, you should do a series on all the lousy “wheelchairs” that Oracle’s been in over the years. Talk about DwNR (drawn with no reference).

  4. Scott H
    March 24th, 2006 at 2:19 pm

    When artists sometimes can’t be bothered to make sure they’re drawing the right character doing something in an action scene (e.g., Jigsaw instead of Piledriver breaking Spider-Man’s arm in New Avengers), I doubt that details of uniforms take any higher priority.

  5. Dwight Williams
    March 24th, 2006 at 6:50 pm

    One more item to throw into the mix to complicate matters: does Marvel treat the “Ultimate” version of SHIELD as a US service or not? If the former, is it separate from — yet connected to — the Armed Forces as we know them? I seem to recall hearing that this version of Carol Danvers is a member of this version of SHIELD…?

  6. Jon H
    March 26th, 2006 at 1:01 pm

    “It doesn’t take any time at all now to find a picture of the correct uniform.”

    It might take longer for someone who hasn’t been in the military and doesn’t know the jargon. I’d also guess that the precise rank of a character may not be passed on to all the artists - they might just get “air force officer” or similar.

    Hey, maybe in addition to your CBDR, you could put together a reference on military uniform and insignia details - perhaps when showing the uniforms for a certain rank and service, you could provide a list of characters it would apply to.

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