Some people were forever broken by the events of September 11, 2001 and, as far as I can tell, almost none of them lost anyone in the attacks or were anywhere near New York when it happened. Yes, Dennis Miller, I'm looking at you.
Mr. Miller has a damn fine graphic sensibility and plunders film noir with the best of them, but as a writer he's no Alan Moore. No matter how innovative his panel work may have been twenty years ago, the dumb, ultra-violent machismo and reactionary politics became too hard to ignore.
(As for Miller's "gritty realism", I'm trying to think of a single real-world problem where the only possible workable solution is for a guy wearing a cape and a mask to kick a whole bunch of bad guys in the face. Nothing's coming to mind.)
Damn, soupytwist, you beat me to it. I was going to say that 9/11 seemed to strike a certain type of white male artist to their core, turning them from merely contrarian yet still entertaining to just straight-up cranky and hateful. Frank Miller, Dennis Miller, and David Mamet are the among the most egregious examples.
I have this vision of Frank Miller, David Mamet, and Dennis Miller on this island retreat where they dress in commando uniforms, get drunk, and talk around a plastic camp fire about all these awesome killer Krav Maga moves they know and how to make nifty survival kits from Altoid tins and how those wimpy liberals will never understand.
(As for Miller's "gritty realism", I'm trying to think of a single real-world problem where the only possible workable solution is for a guy wearing a cape and a mask to kick a whole bunch of bad guys in the face. Nothing's coming to mind.)