Brill Building: Ian’s look back

Ian’s look back

It’s no doubt that Dave’s Long Box is one of the best new blogs out there. It’s this post that filled me with memories of my early days of comic book reading. Although I never sampled the delights of Extreme Justice first hand it looks like the prototypical superhero comic of the mid-90’s, from the promise of being “extreme” on down. This was what I had to deal with when I was a kid (I was 12 in 1995) but I will tell you now how I survived this onslaught.

I first started reading comics in the 4th grade because all the other boys at St. Paschal’s Baylon School were reading them. Being the mindless follower I am I soon began begging my Mom for trips to Hi De Ho Comics’ Thousand Oaks store which was located right across the street from my school. When I went through my friends’ collection of Marvel Universe trading cards I knew I had found a collection of wildly interesting concepts that my young brain raised on cartoons and video games could latch on to. At the same time the Ventura County Star profiled a local cartoonist named Jack Kirby. There I found out that people actually created these characters, which was a real revelation.

We were kids who had the overbearing dogma of Catholicism at school and then our parents were in the middle of divorcing at home. Our imaginations were captured by the Marvel heroes of the day: Venom, Ghost Rider, Punisher, Wolverine and good ol’ Spider-Man. We needed “heroes” who were bad-assess to give us an outlet for all the pre-pubescent angst we were feeling.

Finding Image Comics was like finding comic book Mecca for me. Here were comics that had no Comic Code Approval seals, which meant they got bloody and they got bloody often. The guys all had something sharp coming out of them and the girls were built like reject hourglasses. It was everything I could want as a 10-year-old. Soon Spawn, Cyberforce and WildC.A.T.S. became my favorite books. Marvel looked pale in comparison (except the X-Men books) and DC felt like the comic book company for old men (although I did fall into the “Death of Superman” hype). Wizard was some sick Bible for me, keeping me tuned into what was the books worth seeking. I knew what comics had to offer me: tons of violence and sex with nobody asking for ID. It was like I had stumbled upon Heaven.

This habit of mine would go on for a few years with monthly trips to the comic book store keeping me interested. By the time I was 12 Image had stop feeling exciting (I don’t think any of the original artist except Erik Larsen were still doing their own books in 1995). The only book of that time that made a lasting impact on me was The Maxx because it was more about Sam Kieth’s imagination than trying to license your book to be some Hollywood blockbuster (although Maxx did have a pretty good MTV cartoon that I still have on video). I actually found myself wanting something more than just a bunch of chaos on page. Trying to be “extreme” just didn’t impress me anymore. A trip to Universal Citywalk was where I found the collection Fun With Milk & Cheese by Evan Dorkin. These comics looked like nothing else I read. For one, they were funny. Here were two dairy products that acted selfish, rude and destructive across New York City. It was funny as Hell and for a year I would never let this book leave my side. Whether I was at school, family outings or church I would always be able to sneak a peek at Milk and Cheese shouting “Merv Griffin!” while everything around them shattered. I still have this book and it is easily the most worn out book I own.

From there I found myself with some kind of discriminating taste. Watching Marvel get swallowed up by Clone Sagas and Ages of Apocalypses didn’t interest me (this after I bought the first issue of every Age of Apocalypse book mind you). Seeing DC try to be “dark” and “extreme” was simply laughably. It made them look even more like the unhip bunch of losers I knew they were all along. My interest was now held by Dark Horse’s Legend line. Mike Allred’s Madman was my favorite superhero comic (the first Superman comic I bought after the whole “dying” thing was the crossover with Madman) because it looked like a superhero comic should: bright, fun and with a real sense of style. Frank Miller and Geoff Darrow’s Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot was the prettiest looking comic I think I ever saw at that point. I also gave Marvel a shot with Untold Tales of Spider-Man which was cheap (each issue was only 99 cents) but also gave me a good Spider-Man story in one issue, instead of making me buy all the other franchise titles for some stupid crossover. There was also Batman: The Animated Series going on the whole time that captured my interest in a character I never cared of before. It soon became my favorite TV show ever next to The Simpsons. I even sampled the Batman Adventures books and found that DC could put out a good comic when it wanted to.

By the time 1996 rolled around I knew I was going to begin high school in a year. I was already concentrating on playing guitar and soon enough issues of Guitar World replaced issues of Untold Tales of Spider-Man in my room. I figured comics may have pictures of pretty girls in them but if I stuck with music I could actually meet some real girls, which felt like an improvement. I did read Dark Knight Returns that year, though, and it blew my mind. I loved how it was dark and weird but not in the stupid way the old comics I liked were. It wasn’t enough for me to still be the rabid comic book fan I once was but I never totally dropped the hobby. I would buy the occasional Simpson comic or check in with my friends who still read Wizard and were into Spider-Man.

It was reading an article in TIME magazine about Chris Ware that I figured I should start finding comics that were actually as smart as any literature I was reading at the time. Soon, in 2000, I became a Fanatagraphics fanboy and began to find an interest in the whole history of comics. From there I was now a solid comic book fan, even starting a blog about my interest.

Now I’m still interested in works that have a distinct style but also ones that I can devour as a critic and someone who has creative aspirations of my own. I’ve fallen out of love with going to a comic store month after month to follow some narrative. Instead, I want to find something new and challenging every time I purchase something. There are a lot of talents out there like Kevin Huizenga, Corey Lewis, Derek Kirk Kim Jim Rugg and Adrian Tomine that keep me interested along with more established cartoonists that I love like the Hernandez Bros., Chester Brown and Dan Clowes. I think manga titles like Tokyo Tribes, Dead End and whatever Taiyo Matsumoto is doing are giving me entertainment like none I would have found otherwise. I still like the superhero books of Grant Morrison, Mark Waid and a few others but the mainstream world is cyclical. Right now it’s trying to be dark and serious (which usually means money-draining crossovers) like it was when I started reading comics but soon enough we’ll be back to when creators try to be optimistic (if only to congratulate themselves that they’re not “grim and gritty”). It wasn’t too long ago that Grant Morrison’s JLA was DC’s flagship title and Bill Jemas gave Marvel and sense of excitement. I think we’ll see things revert to those kinds of books in a few years. Of course by that time maybe I’ll have no interest in comics anymore and will instead devote myself to a blog about fly-fishing or ping-pong.

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