Alex Groff
Jul 7, 2005, 12:31 am
<img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/columns/te_logo.gif" align=left width=115 height=100 border=0 alt="Typographical Errors">by Alex Groff
I’m not watching tv anymore—not after the fiasco that was Law and Order. I mean, it was bad enough when it was one show on it’s own—but now it’s become four shows—there’s the original, Special Victims Unit, Criminal Intent and the new one, Trial by Jury. There were even episodes where detectives from SVU showed up in the original series! Then my favorite character left. The creators... they’ve ruined everything I hold dear about police dramas, the justice system, TNT, digital cable…. Even my faith in the human race has been diminished. I quit tv. I'm not watching it anymore, and if anyone talks about tv, you can be certain I'm going to insult their intelligence and critique every aspect of it that I find flawed.
Kind of funny to think about outside of the world of comics, isn’t it?
A lot of people are talking about quitting all DC titles because of Infinite Crisis, or all Batman titles because of War Games, or all Marvel titles because of House of M. Some have talked about giving comics up altogether if these stories aren't what they had hoped for. I understand the logic—I quit reading comics because of Onslaught— but looking back, it seems like such a strange way of thinking, so I had to comment.
2
One of the two key arguments I’ve seen is that, because both Marvel and DC are universes, one cannot read only one title in the universe. After Onslaught, I returned to try Ages of Apocalypse, because Apocalypse was my favorite X-Villain. The story left a bitter taste in my mouth for a dozen reasons—nonsensical plotting, pointless tie-ins, an anti-climatic ending, and the absurd death of Apocalypse… in a separate miniseries, no less—and I quit comics again.
I missed the Counter-X titles, which are now some of my favorite X-related stories. You didn’t have to read the central X books to follow Warren Ellis’ brilliant reinvention of X-Man or his action packed X-Force. Generation X didn’t hit me quite the same way, but Pugh’s art and Wood’s later issues were something excellent. I didn’t realize that until over a year after they were cancelled.
In a shared universe, there are dangers of crossovers and interlocking stories. One key example was Joe Casey and Derec Aucoin’s superlative run on Adventures of Superman, which was interrupted by three or four crossovers (Return to Krypton, Lost Souls, Never Ending Battle and I’m fairly certain there’s another one I’m missing). Instead of collecting those crossovers, I ignored them, and their effect on the main title was actually nonexistent. That is not always the case—X-Force was a fundamentally different team because of X-Cutioner’s Song– but for the most part, you can follow comics without reading their counterparts.
So what, I ask, is the point of dropping Runaways simply because you’re not reading any other Marvel titles? To return to the tv analogy, you can watch any Law and Order series, ignore the others happily, and be no worse off for it. Or, you know, you could just watch Family Guy, which is a much better choice anyway.
3
The other argument I’ve heard is that, because certain readers only pick up Marvel and/or DC, there wouldn’t be anything worth buying. And so I’d like to offer a few recommendations for those who want superheroes and action, but don’t want to put up with a convoluted universe with heavy continuity.
Flare from Heroic Publishing: A revival of a 1980’s superhero, there’s a certain Dazzler feel to the title. Heroic is quickly growing to add Black Enchantress, Psyche and the League of Champions.
Top Shelf is trying out the scifi/police genre with The Surrogates, a miniseries that reminds me of Superman’s Krypton (see World of Krypton, For the Man Who Has Everything or most any story Krypton) with a more modern, realistic feel.
Image is doing a fine job building their line of action/superhero books. Miss The Wasp and Antman? Get the best of both worlds with Mario Gully’s The Ant, a book imagined while he was serving time in prison. Want a little more mutant in your diet? Check out Small Gods, a book that combines cops, robbers, telepathy and a good deal more. Dusty Star mixes scifi with the Wild West, with art by Joe Pruett, whom I remember best from his stint on Cable. Jason Armstrong continues the robot theme with Ferro City, the story of a cop betrayed. Season of the Witch screams Illyana Rasputin, but I could be wrong. Jim Valentino, who is best known for his Shadowhawk series, is working with a small team to create Blacklight, a strange reversal of DC’s Ray series out of the 1990’s. Ray’s a guy with light powers and a cavalier attitude; Lina’s a girl with powers over darkness and a lust for revenge after the death of Kathy. Case Files: Sam & Twitch is a title Bendis wrote before moving to Marvel; it remains a good cop story in the hands of Marc Andreyko. Joe Casey and Tom Scioli work their Jim Kirby-style epic-storytelling magic on Godland, a book that tries to restore the enthusiasm of 1960’s and 1970’s stories to today’s books.Hero Camp is a great miniseries in the same vein as Marvel’s Gravity, only better. Invincible, by Robert Kirkman, has been described as one of the best new superheroes in the past few years and has won a number of awards. Kirkman has done a fair amount of work for Marvel, but Invincible is his baby, mixing the adventures of youth and superpowers in a Spiderman-esque fashion. Jay Faeber, part of the creative team that worked Generation X for a number of years (ah, how I loved the Pooka), writes Noble Causes, the story of a family superhero team that lives together, loves together, and kicks bad guy butt together.
Mark Waid (Fantastic Four) and Marc Silvestri (New X-Men) are publishing Hunter Killer with Top Cow Productions… the creative team alone is worth a look. The Freshman is another take on the superhero as student youth—see Hero Camp, Robin, Invincible and Gravity, to name a few—while City of Heroes reminds me of Busiek’s Astro City, by Troy Hickman, the guy who brought you Common Ground. And I didn’t even mention The Darkness and Witchblade. Want a jumping on point? The Darkness just had a Superman crossover. Fans of Straczynski’s Amazing Spiderman, Fantastic Four and Supreme Power might consider looking at his Rising Stars and Midnight Nation series, both now complete.
Dark Horse offers barbaric action with Conan by Busiek (Astro City, Superman: Secret Identity), gothic horror with Mignola’s (X-Force) work on Hellboy and B.P.R.D.. Meanwhile, Jenkins and Ramos (Spectacular Spiderman) are publishing Revelations, a Da-Vinci Code-style adventure story.
Although the status of their Aftermath superhero line is in question, Devil’s Due publishes the successful G.I. Joe: America’s Elite.
DC’s imprints allow for superhero stories like Tom Strong and Planetary in an out-of-DC-continuity world. Some of DC’s finest work, like The Intimates, The Authority, Ex Machina, Y the Last Man, Fables and Top Ten come from Wildstorm, Vertigo and ABC, all a part of DC the company, but not DC the universe.
Notice that this list ignores most of the horror comics that publishers like Dark Horse and IDW specialize in, as well as slice of life (Drawn & Quarterly), comedy (Oni, NBM), fantasy (Devil’s Due), or graphic novels from the likes of AiT and Top Shelf. And did I even mention back issues? For every poorly written issue of X-Men, there are as many well-written issues from yesteryear, most of them available at cover price or in collected volumes. As you can see, the options truly are endless.
There's a thread here (http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=18865) to find out more about these titles and hear other recommendations.
4
Of course, it’s certainly your choice. More than anything else, I just wanted to offer the options I didn’t know I had in 1997, and to find out why you would consider quitting entirely. Comments are more than welcome.
<center><hr width=75%></center>
Alex groff writes this column. No, you cannot pay him to stop.
<center><hr width=75%></center>
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and are not reflective of Comixfan or its other staff in general. In fact, certain staff members are not adverse to spending good money to have him silenced.
I’m not watching tv anymore—not after the fiasco that was Law and Order. I mean, it was bad enough when it was one show on it’s own—but now it’s become four shows—there’s the original, Special Victims Unit, Criminal Intent and the new one, Trial by Jury. There were even episodes where detectives from SVU showed up in the original series! Then my favorite character left. The creators... they’ve ruined everything I hold dear about police dramas, the justice system, TNT, digital cable…. Even my faith in the human race has been diminished. I quit tv. I'm not watching it anymore, and if anyone talks about tv, you can be certain I'm going to insult their intelligence and critique every aspect of it that I find flawed.
Kind of funny to think about outside of the world of comics, isn’t it?
A lot of people are talking about quitting all DC titles because of Infinite Crisis, or all Batman titles because of War Games, or all Marvel titles because of House of M. Some have talked about giving comics up altogether if these stories aren't what they had hoped for. I understand the logic—I quit reading comics because of Onslaught— but looking back, it seems like such a strange way of thinking, so I had to comment.
2
One of the two key arguments I’ve seen is that, because both Marvel and DC are universes, one cannot read only one title in the universe. After Onslaught, I returned to try Ages of Apocalypse, because Apocalypse was my favorite X-Villain. The story left a bitter taste in my mouth for a dozen reasons—nonsensical plotting, pointless tie-ins, an anti-climatic ending, and the absurd death of Apocalypse… in a separate miniseries, no less—and I quit comics again.
I missed the Counter-X titles, which are now some of my favorite X-related stories. You didn’t have to read the central X books to follow Warren Ellis’ brilliant reinvention of X-Man or his action packed X-Force. Generation X didn’t hit me quite the same way, but Pugh’s art and Wood’s later issues were something excellent. I didn’t realize that until over a year after they were cancelled.
In a shared universe, there are dangers of crossovers and interlocking stories. One key example was Joe Casey and Derec Aucoin’s superlative run on Adventures of Superman, which was interrupted by three or four crossovers (Return to Krypton, Lost Souls, Never Ending Battle and I’m fairly certain there’s another one I’m missing). Instead of collecting those crossovers, I ignored them, and their effect on the main title was actually nonexistent. That is not always the case—X-Force was a fundamentally different team because of X-Cutioner’s Song– but for the most part, you can follow comics without reading their counterparts.
So what, I ask, is the point of dropping Runaways simply because you’re not reading any other Marvel titles? To return to the tv analogy, you can watch any Law and Order series, ignore the others happily, and be no worse off for it. Or, you know, you could just watch Family Guy, which is a much better choice anyway.
3
The other argument I’ve heard is that, because certain readers only pick up Marvel and/or DC, there wouldn’t be anything worth buying. And so I’d like to offer a few recommendations for those who want superheroes and action, but don’t want to put up with a convoluted universe with heavy continuity.
Flare from Heroic Publishing: A revival of a 1980’s superhero, there’s a certain Dazzler feel to the title. Heroic is quickly growing to add Black Enchantress, Psyche and the League of Champions.
Top Shelf is trying out the scifi/police genre with The Surrogates, a miniseries that reminds me of Superman’s Krypton (see World of Krypton, For the Man Who Has Everything or most any story Krypton) with a more modern, realistic feel.
Image is doing a fine job building their line of action/superhero books. Miss The Wasp and Antman? Get the best of both worlds with Mario Gully’s The Ant, a book imagined while he was serving time in prison. Want a little more mutant in your diet? Check out Small Gods, a book that combines cops, robbers, telepathy and a good deal more. Dusty Star mixes scifi with the Wild West, with art by Joe Pruett, whom I remember best from his stint on Cable. Jason Armstrong continues the robot theme with Ferro City, the story of a cop betrayed. Season of the Witch screams Illyana Rasputin, but I could be wrong. Jim Valentino, who is best known for his Shadowhawk series, is working with a small team to create Blacklight, a strange reversal of DC’s Ray series out of the 1990’s. Ray’s a guy with light powers and a cavalier attitude; Lina’s a girl with powers over darkness and a lust for revenge after the death of Kathy. Case Files: Sam & Twitch is a title Bendis wrote before moving to Marvel; it remains a good cop story in the hands of Marc Andreyko. Joe Casey and Tom Scioli work their Jim Kirby-style epic-storytelling magic on Godland, a book that tries to restore the enthusiasm of 1960’s and 1970’s stories to today’s books.Hero Camp is a great miniseries in the same vein as Marvel’s Gravity, only better. Invincible, by Robert Kirkman, has been described as one of the best new superheroes in the past few years and has won a number of awards. Kirkman has done a fair amount of work for Marvel, but Invincible is his baby, mixing the adventures of youth and superpowers in a Spiderman-esque fashion. Jay Faeber, part of the creative team that worked Generation X for a number of years (ah, how I loved the Pooka), writes Noble Causes, the story of a family superhero team that lives together, loves together, and kicks bad guy butt together.
Mark Waid (Fantastic Four) and Marc Silvestri (New X-Men) are publishing Hunter Killer with Top Cow Productions… the creative team alone is worth a look. The Freshman is another take on the superhero as student youth—see Hero Camp, Robin, Invincible and Gravity, to name a few—while City of Heroes reminds me of Busiek’s Astro City, by Troy Hickman, the guy who brought you Common Ground. And I didn’t even mention The Darkness and Witchblade. Want a jumping on point? The Darkness just had a Superman crossover. Fans of Straczynski’s Amazing Spiderman, Fantastic Four and Supreme Power might consider looking at his Rising Stars and Midnight Nation series, both now complete.
Dark Horse offers barbaric action with Conan by Busiek (Astro City, Superman: Secret Identity), gothic horror with Mignola’s (X-Force) work on Hellboy and B.P.R.D.. Meanwhile, Jenkins and Ramos (Spectacular Spiderman) are publishing Revelations, a Da-Vinci Code-style adventure story.
Although the status of their Aftermath superhero line is in question, Devil’s Due publishes the successful G.I. Joe: America’s Elite.
DC’s imprints allow for superhero stories like Tom Strong and Planetary in an out-of-DC-continuity world. Some of DC’s finest work, like The Intimates, The Authority, Ex Machina, Y the Last Man, Fables and Top Ten come from Wildstorm, Vertigo and ABC, all a part of DC the company, but not DC the universe.
Notice that this list ignores most of the horror comics that publishers like Dark Horse and IDW specialize in, as well as slice of life (Drawn & Quarterly), comedy (Oni, NBM), fantasy (Devil’s Due), or graphic novels from the likes of AiT and Top Shelf. And did I even mention back issues? For every poorly written issue of X-Men, there are as many well-written issues from yesteryear, most of them available at cover price or in collected volumes. As you can see, the options truly are endless.
There's a thread here (http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=18865) to find out more about these titles and hear other recommendations.
4
Of course, it’s certainly your choice. More than anything else, I just wanted to offer the options I didn’t know I had in 1997, and to find out why you would consider quitting entirely. Comments are more than welcome.
<center><hr width=75%></center>
Alex groff writes this column. No, you cannot pay him to stop.
<center><hr width=75%></center>
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and are not reflective of Comixfan or its other staff in general. In fact, certain staff members are not adverse to spending good money to have him silenced.