I've been reading TwoMorrows' American Comic Book Chronicles - The 1980s, and seeing a time line all laid out like that put this particular reflection in this 80s comics reader's head...
There can be no doubt that 1986 was a creative game changer for comics, perhaps unlike any year that had come before. The Golden and Silver Ages, while incredibly important and influential, weren't born inside of a single year. But one might say the "Modern Age" kind of was. And that year was 1986.
It's the year Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons produced Watchmen. The year Frank Miller came out with Daredevil: Born Again, Elektra: Assassin AND The Dark Knight Returns. When Art Spiegelman completed the first volume of Maus, becoming the second comic to win a prestigious award usually only given to books. When Marvel beat Oliver Stone to the punch with The 'Nam. And when Harvey Pekar made his first appearance on Late Night with David Letterman. Comics as ART were well on their way.
In the mainstream, it's the first year after Crisis on Infinite Earths has wrapped, and the DCU is rich with new story telling opportunities. John Byrne leaves Marvel for the Distinguished Competition and completely reboots Superman in the Man of Steel mini-series. On the other side of the street, Jim Shooter finally allowed the X-Men to become a brand, with the addition of Classic X-Men, X-Factor, and mutant-driven crossover events like Mutant Massacre. That, and the success of the Punisher mini-series, set the tone for a lot of comics to come.
But even if I respect 1986 for changing the game, I much prefer 1987, which showed what creators DID with their new playground.
At DC, we had Batman Year One (a much better Frank Miller story than DKR, in my opinion), Superman's actual titles starting, George Perez rebooting Wonder Woman, Wally West becoming the Flash, Keith Giffen's comedy Justice League, Denny O'Neil on the Question, and most importantly, John Ostrander on Suicide Squad. That still stands as one of my favorite comic book series OF ALL TIME.
Marvel published a lot of fondly remembered stories as well: Spider-Man's wedding, Kraven's Last Hunt, Armor Wars, Avengers' Under Siege, Captain America becomes the Captain, and Peter David's gray Hulk returns. I'd started reading Marvel books with Uncanny X-Men and took a while to migrate to other books, especially those of solo heroes, but I started sampling more and more that year, at exactly the right time. A time of exciting change, before such things became the formula.
On the independent front, 1987 is when Marshall Law came to Epic, Dark Horse Comics was born (a company that would give me a lot of joy in the early 90s), and Paul Chadwick's Concrete premiered.
So what do you think? '86 or '87? Or perhaps there's a year in comics that's particularly dear to YOU. You're invited to share.
It's the year Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons produced Watchmen. The year Frank Miller came out with Daredevil: Born Again, Elektra: Assassin AND The Dark Knight Returns. When Art Spiegelman completed the first volume of Maus, becoming the second comic to win a prestigious award usually only given to books. When Marvel beat Oliver Stone to the punch with The 'Nam. And when Harvey Pekar made his first appearance on Late Night with David Letterman. Comics as ART were well on their way.
In the mainstream, it's the first year after Crisis on Infinite Earths has wrapped, and the DCU is rich with new story telling opportunities. John Byrne leaves Marvel for the Distinguished Competition and completely reboots Superman in the Man of Steel mini-series. On the other side of the street, Jim Shooter finally allowed the X-Men to become a brand, with the addition of Classic X-Men, X-Factor, and mutant-driven crossover events like Mutant Massacre. That, and the success of the Punisher mini-series, set the tone for a lot of comics to come.
At DC, we had Batman Year One (a much better Frank Miller story than DKR, in my opinion), Superman's actual titles starting, George Perez rebooting Wonder Woman, Wally West becoming the Flash, Keith Giffen's comedy Justice League, Denny O'Neil on the Question, and most importantly, John Ostrander on Suicide Squad. That still stands as one of my favorite comic book series OF ALL TIME.
Marvel published a lot of fondly remembered stories as well: Spider-Man's wedding, Kraven's Last Hunt, Armor Wars, Avengers' Under Siege, Captain America becomes the Captain, and Peter David's gray Hulk returns. I'd started reading Marvel books with Uncanny X-Men and took a while to migrate to other books, especially those of solo heroes, but I started sampling more and more that year, at exactly the right time. A time of exciting change, before such things became the formula.
On the independent front, 1987 is when Marshall Law came to Epic, Dark Horse Comics was born (a company that would give me a lot of joy in the early 90s), and Paul Chadwick's Concrete premiered.
So what do you think? '86 or '87? Or perhaps there's a year in comics that's particularly dear to YOU. You're invited to share.
Comments
Over at Marvel, ironically, the Justice League was in remarkable form by way of Mark Gruenwald's "Squadron Supreme" miniseries. It did deconstruction right, I feel, by showing the heroes still being committed to their ideals (with one or two brief exceptions) and yet making the world a worse place with their grand efforts. May nobody consider it a spoiler that, in the end, the heroes realized they were inadvertently preparing the world for tyranny, and so they quickly and voluntarily abandoned their plans. Why? If you need to ask why, you don't get heroes.
I gotta go with 86, since nobody but me ever gives "Squadron Supreme" its due. Also, 1987 was probably the year Denny O'Neil was giving Alan Moore his three-word go-ahead to wreck Barbara Gordon, in a move I consider as offensive as Captain Marvel's old sidekick Steamboat.
Perhaps we can have the equivalent of a Superboy Punch, where Alan Moore's childhood hero, Herbie, goes through every comic ever written and bops people with his lollipop what deserve it.
(Denny O'Neil did strip Wonder Woman of her powers in the early 1970s, but his intention was to show that supernaturally-bestowed powers don't define a heroine, it's her guts and her skill that count. Only problem was, Denny O'Neil was no Joss Whedon; Denny never really got good at writing a Wonder Woman who was indomitable through and through. But his intentions were respectable.)
But yeah, I like the white pantsuit Wonder Woman in CONCEPT a lot more than in execution too.
Originally, Wonder Woman's powers were all a matter of Amazon training; that's how things rolled on Earth-Two. But Earth-Two Wonder Woman eventually showed the powers of the gods, so I think some divine intervention got retconned in.
I'd also say that however distasteful "The Killing Joke" was regarding Babs (and yeah, she is used purely as a motivator for the men in the comic), we did get Oracle out of it. I still can't decide if rebooting her back to Batgirl is ultimately a good or bad thing...
Which is back in the Convergence event out today. And Oracle is BAD-ASS.
The question is whether the wheelchair is an essential part of the Oracle concept. I think it is; I think part of the Oracle vibe is that you can't keep Barbara Gordon down. I don't like coming to that conclusion -- it means I am wishing ill upon a character who, if Grant Morrison is to be trusted, is a real person somewhere -- but I can't deny that Oracle minus a wheelchair feels like just another generic "mission control" character. (Gordie-Two?)