It’s become so commonplace, it’s almost an internet cliché - if a comic book creator of any level of reknown gets a gig reitroducing a old property, especially if it’s a Jack Kirby creation, to the marketplace, John Byrne will be right there to crap all over them. Morrison’s Doom Patrol relaunch, Ennis’ Demon revamp, Bendis and Bagley’s Ultimate Spider-Man, anything Peter David touches - John Byrne has an opinon on them all, even though he proudly proclaims to never have read 90% of what he’s bitching about.

The series du jour is Neil Gaiman’s Eternals relaunch over at Marvel, and the response is…sadly typical. Without having read the first issue of the relaunch, Byrne is already crying foul with his claims of disrespect towards Kirby, dissertations about Gaiman’s lack of understanding of how comics are supposed to be created, and just flat out lying in order to suit his arguments.

Byrne’s response to a poster’s declaration that he found Gaiman’s first issue interesting:

Only “interesting”? But, my God man! This is Gaiman showing us how (in his own words) Kirby “got it wrong”. Surely it must be BRILLIANT!

Never mind that Gaiman never made such a claim, Byrne’s going to stick with this erroneous statement like sticky on rice for the rest of the thread. Hell, as the following comic strip that was published in a recent issue of Entertainment Weekly shows, the idea that Gaiman thinks Kirby’s Eternals is crap couldn’t be further from the truth.

Not that John’s ever allowed actual let facts to get in the way of a good, uninformed rant. He’s also going to make other bullshit-ridden comments as well, such as his examination of Sandman’s sales figures, because everyone knows that units sold is the ultimate measure of quality and talent in the comic book industry:

That depends on how you define “commercial success”. SANDMAN was/is published thru Vertigo, and the expectations over there are a lot lower than in the other DC departments. If SANDMAN had been published as a regular DC book, alongside SUPERMAN and BATMAN, it would not have been seen as quite such a “success”.

(This is, of course, of of the things Vertigo has to offer. Books that might crash and burn elsewhere have the advantage of DC’s deep pockets, as well as lowered expectations. It’s at Vertigo that people really are encourage to “grow roses” and not sweat the more commercial aspects of the business.)

Never mind, of course, that Gaiman’s 75 issue Sandman run may very well be one of the most financially successful comic book series in the history of the medium as far as straight publishing revenues go. Sure, you don’t see Sandman cartoons and action figures littering the aisles of your local Target, but those 75 issues (and various spin-off titles) have been printed and reprinted ad nauseum, and willl continue to be in print for years to come. The upcoming Absolute collections are going to be retailing for over a hundred bucks each, and will likely be DC’s most successful venture in the Absolute line to date.

As far as the rest of Byrne’s argument, Sandman was initially launched as a part of the regular DCU, with the Justice League even making a cameo appearance in the second story arc, which starred longtime JLA villain Dr. Destiny, to boot. It wasn’t until 5-6 years later that the Vertigo label was even created, and even that was initially comprise mainly of DCU titles that transitioned over to the then-new imprint(Animal Man, Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, etc.).

So why give Byrne the time with posts like this? Because, like him or hate him, he still does have an inordinate amount of influence not only on an ever shrinking segment of fandom, but for some reason, editorial at DC and Marvel have yet to write him off completely despite his constant online effigy burnings of their editorial teams and top talent. Most of the time, it’s a pretty childish and petty thing to wish someone out of the comic book industry, but as humorous as it’s been to watch Byrne and his sycophants’ temper tantrums over the years, it’s really just becoming tiresome and an embarassment to the industry as a whole.

Mr. Byrne, I don’t really care if you go away mad - at this point, I’m afraid that that’s just a given. But please, if the industry is really causing you such pain and personal distress, just go away…

Spread the word!