IDW TMNT Micro-series: Karai
Aug. 22nd, 2013 10:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainwatersparkI read it. I have thoughts.
I've always really liked Karai from the 2003 series. She's a fascinating character who dances on the line of anti-hero and villain. She works for the bad guys, but has a sense of honor and tries to treat the turtles decently (well, until Season 4). She's an interesting foil for the turtles, particularly Leo, and Shredder's kindness towards her is basically his only redeeming feature as a villain.
Recent reinterpretations of Karai have been a lot different. I'm not against reinterpreting a character in principle; however, I've always felt that in order to be successful, a reinterpreted character must be as strong as or stronger than the original (talking about strength in terms of characterization). And so far, I don't feel that either 2012 Karai or IDW Karai come close to the 2003 incarnation.
So. IDW Karai. My problem with her is that she seems to be interchangeable with any other Foot henchwoman. She's not Shredder's daughter, but his granddaughter. Why does it matter that she's the blood relative of Shredder? Maybe it has something to do with his resurrection (I didn't read the Secret History of the Foot Clan), but other than that, I'm not sure. Her family ties to the Foot make her seem more of a mafia princess than anything else, but it's far from necessary for her characterization.
And then there's the fact that she's clearly resentful towards the Shredder, who is apparently kind of misogynistic, and she absolutely hates the turtles. So, IDW Karai is stripped of all the qualities that made 2003 Karai a multifaceted character--the father-daughter bond that mirrored the turtles' relationship with Splinter, the position of authority in the Foot Clan that made her a force to be reckoned with, and the frenemy relationship with the turtles that made it hard for them to see her as pure evil. What does IDW Karai have instead? A whole lot of ambition...and not much else.
She's not even all that sympathetic as a character. She doesn't have 2003 Karai's sense of morality or honor; instead, she's pretty bloodthirsty and indirectly caused the death of her own father without much regret. And, as I already mentioned, she completely hates the turtles. Literally, her entire character can be summed up as: ambitious, ruthless, amoral. And that's it. The only way she's sympathetic in the series is because of Shredder's (and now Dark Leo's) mistreatment of her, because of course readers are conditioned to root for the underdog. But if you can't make a character sympathetic without resorting to having other characters beat them up, you're not a good writer.
Don't get me wrong, she's still pretty badass and has a much better character design than her Nick counterpart, but she just comes off as one-note and bland. The fact is, she didn't have to be Karai. She could have been Pimiko, or just some original character, and the series would be none the worse off. This is not to say that all villains need complex personalities and motivations, but if you're going to make them plain vanilla evil, they have to totally own evil; they have to be completely terrifying, the way the Joker from The Dark Knight or Utrom Shredder from 2003 were, or at least competent and annoyingly persistent and obstructive, like Hun. And IDW Karai just isn't like that, which means she's fallen into Villain Hell: not frightening, not annoyingly competent, and not interesting.
There were things that I enjoyed about her micro-series issue: some of the paneling and color work was gorgeous. But as great art can never substitute for good writing in comics, and IDW's Karai just isn't as interesting as previous Karais have been.
I've always really liked Karai from the 2003 series. She's a fascinating character who dances on the line of anti-hero and villain. She works for the bad guys, but has a sense of honor and tries to treat the turtles decently (well, until Season 4). She's an interesting foil for the turtles, particularly Leo, and Shredder's kindness towards her is basically his only redeeming feature as a villain.
Recent reinterpretations of Karai have been a lot different. I'm not against reinterpreting a character in principle; however, I've always felt that in order to be successful, a reinterpreted character must be as strong as or stronger than the original (talking about strength in terms of characterization). And so far, I don't feel that either 2012 Karai or IDW Karai come close to the 2003 incarnation.
So. IDW Karai. My problem with her is that she seems to be interchangeable with any other Foot henchwoman. She's not Shredder's daughter, but his granddaughter. Why does it matter that she's the blood relative of Shredder? Maybe it has something to do with his resurrection (I didn't read the Secret History of the Foot Clan), but other than that, I'm not sure. Her family ties to the Foot make her seem more of a mafia princess than anything else, but it's far from necessary for her characterization.
And then there's the fact that she's clearly resentful towards the Shredder, who is apparently kind of misogynistic, and she absolutely hates the turtles. So, IDW Karai is stripped of all the qualities that made 2003 Karai a multifaceted character--the father-daughter bond that mirrored the turtles' relationship with Splinter, the position of authority in the Foot Clan that made her a force to be reckoned with, and the frenemy relationship with the turtles that made it hard for them to see her as pure evil. What does IDW Karai have instead? A whole lot of ambition...and not much else.
She's not even all that sympathetic as a character. She doesn't have 2003 Karai's sense of morality or honor; instead, she's pretty bloodthirsty and indirectly caused the death of her own father without much regret. And, as I already mentioned, she completely hates the turtles. Literally, her entire character can be summed up as: ambitious, ruthless, amoral. And that's it. The only way she's sympathetic in the series is because of Shredder's (and now Dark Leo's) mistreatment of her, because of course readers are conditioned to root for the underdog. But if you can't make a character sympathetic without resorting to having other characters beat them up, you're not a good writer.
Don't get me wrong, she's still pretty badass and has a much better character design than her Nick counterpart, but she just comes off as one-note and bland. The fact is, she didn't have to be Karai. She could have been Pimiko, or just some original character, and the series would be none the worse off. This is not to say that all villains need complex personalities and motivations, but if you're going to make them plain vanilla evil, they have to totally own evil; they have to be completely terrifying, the way the Joker from The Dark Knight or Utrom Shredder from 2003 were, or at least competent and annoyingly persistent and obstructive, like Hun. And IDW Karai just isn't like that, which means she's fallen into Villain Hell: not frightening, not annoyingly competent, and not interesting.
There were things that I enjoyed about her micro-series issue: some of the paneling and color work was gorgeous. But as great art can never substitute for good writing in comics, and IDW's Karai just isn't as interesting as previous Karais have been.
