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Post by dlw66 on Mar 1, 2007 15:59:23 GMT -5
Conversation in the "most consistent title" thread got me thinking (as well as info. garnered from the "how old are our users" thread)... Do you longtime readers have a somewhat defined period where everything (almost) before you view as GREAT and everything after you see with a more critical eye? For example, some of us have noted that we bought comics as children, dropped out around high school age, then got back into it in college/young adulthood. I guess I tend to favor the books published prior to 1980 as my zenith (more or less -- with exceptions of course) and those after 1984 (when I began to collect again) as more hit-and-miss. Anyone know what I'm talking about?
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Post by Black Knight on Mar 1, 2007 16:07:44 GMT -5
To be honest my favorite period was the Midnight Sons era. I loved those comics, and I liked for the most part the avengers and Cap except for the crossing and hero's reborn part. I also, really enjoyed the era with Busiak on the Avengers, and Waid on Captain America.
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Post by thew40 on Mar 1, 2007 16:27:58 GMT -5
Not having quite as much experience as some of you guys, I'd have to say that 1998-1999 was a very consistent time peroid in general. You had Busiek/Perez on Avengers, Kelly/Seagle on X-Men, Morrison/Mackie on JLA, and Earth X was coming out (in '99)
As much as a fire as this is going to light, I'd have to say that I'm really finding comics these days to be very exciting and of high quality -- esspecially Marvel. Never have I wanted to buy so many comics.
Granted, "Disassembled" was a trainwreck, but I feel as though the Marvel Universe is a very exciting time for me. Not everything is perfect, but I can most definetly say that this is a time peroid that I find very great.
[dodges bricks]
~W~
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Post by dlw66 on Mar 1, 2007 20:01:53 GMT -5
Not having quite as much experience as some of you guys, I'd have to say that 1998-1999 was a very consistent time peroid in general. You had Busiek/Perez on Avengers, Kelly/Seagle on X-Men, Morrison/Mackie on JLA, and Earth X was coming out (in '99) As much as a fire as this is going to light, I'd have to say that I'm really finding comics these days to be very exciting and of high quality -- esspecially Marvel. Never have I wanted to buy so many comics. Granted, "Disassembled" was a trainwreck, but I feel as though the Marvel Universe is a very exciting time for me. Not everything is perfect, but I can most definetly say that this is a time peroid that I find very great. [dodges bricks] ~W~ Hands off W, you thugs, or else!! OK -- you guys are getting the hang of what I wanted. I was typing that at the end of my plan hour and the bell rang -- I had to hit send and run outside for my after-school security assignment. If you aren't a teacher, you have no idea... Anyway, yes... You see, when I get out old comics, or more often come across the Sal Buscema or George Perez Avengers, the John Buscema or Perez FF, the Gil Kane, Ross Andru or Keith Pollard Spidey, the Cockrum or Byrne X-Men in tpbs, the DVD-ROMs, etc. -- I just get this warm fuzzy feeling and a stupid grin (don't puke -- I'm serious! ). I have a sense of what my bedroom looked like when I was 8 or 10 or 12, I can smell my friend's basement where we used to trade comics and play with our Megos, I can hear Elton John singing "Rocket Man" or Queen doing "Bohemian Rhapsody" on the AM radio... all of that. Those were my golden years of comics reading -- it was all innocence. Then, after being away, after being exposed to different forms of literature and obtaining a critical eye, after becoming aware that politics mattered -- I looked at comics still with a fun energy, yet in a different light. There were new artists, new writers, new characters, these things called mini- and maxi-series, the Thing had his own book -- it was just all different. And while I got very excited for Dark Knight, and loved the Byrne revamp of Superman and the Perez revamp of Wonder Woman, I didn't care for the West Coast Avengers and the whole Beyonder mess. That magic of "this is going to be cool!!!" was just not always there. For sure, I never really cared for Marvel's monster books or the Western reprints of Kid Colt et al., but the stuff I did buy I lapped up like a dog! Give me another issue of the Secret Society of Super-Villains! But after college it was just different. Yes?
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Post by redstatecap on Mar 2, 2007 1:40:07 GMT -5
I dropped out of comics not long after I went to college, and picked them up again a couple of years ago. Yeah, when we're young we don't know what we do now and we're probably a lot easier to please. I think my age group is somewhat privileged in that a lot of my youth was truly a great era for comics. Sure, I have great memories of reading those books, but they (a lot of them, anyway) were great on their own merits, not just because I was 13 and liked looking at explosions and hot comic chicks. Roy Thomas' Invaders (God, how I love that book!), Avengers #150-200, Gruenwald writing Cap with Dwyer and Lim on art, DeMatteis on Spider-Man...yeah, those were darn good books regardless of whether I was equipped to appreciate them fully at the time.
RSC
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Post by Doctor Bong on Mar 2, 2007 2:50:18 GMT -5
I loved almost everything Gruenwald wrote, although I'm sorry to say I never read (with any degree of consistency, that is..) his Cap; the man had a love for Marvel, it's history & the fans that just plain shone through everything he wrote, as well as an enormous reservoir of sense of humor. I understand what most of you guys are saying... some things never taste or feel the same again once we leave our early years behind... However, I can say I've enjoyed some recent.. well, almost recent stuff as much or almost as much as the things I read back in the day... It seems that there's almost a general concensus here when it comes to Busiek's run... I have no doubt in my mind that it was excellent on its own merits, and yet I wonder: did we perhaps build it up to more than it was because it came right on the heels of Heroes Reborn...? I also enjoyed inmensely David's run on the Hulk and, more recently, Exiles.
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Post by Doctor Bong on Mar 2, 2007 3:11:16 GMT -5
The only 3 periods when I found myself more dissatisfyied than not, are -surprise, surprise...!- : The Crossing, Heroes Reborn & the present time, which for me started with Disasembled... NOT surprinsingly, all 3 periods have coincided with what I have considered terrible mishandlings by Marvel of my, by far, favorite hero, IM: During The Crossing he did terrible things, but at least there was the -small- consolation that he did these things while being controlled by outside forces... but then, after that, he died, only to be replaced by a teenaged alternate version (GAHHH...!!!). In the other universe of Heroes Reborn he was... well, he was a jerk, not to mention that he donned, IMO, the most horrendous suit of armor he has created yet. And, of course, there was the curse Rob Liefield... However, my most unhappy period as a Marvel fan began with Disassembled & the reign of Brian Michael Bendis... During CW IM conducted himself, IMO, as a villian & an evil man, and he didn't, apparently, have the excuse of being manipulated by outside forces.. The fact that he ended up winning the CW is beyond irony for me, as for once I wasn't rooting for him.... And yes, here I've finally come full circle, as the kid which still lives within me absolutely abhorrs that the current Powers that Be at Marvel have given him cause to not want to root for his hero of 30+ years...
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Post by Tana Nile on Mar 2, 2007 12:05:48 GMT -5
Anyway, yes... You see, when I get out old comics, or more often come across the Sal Buscema or George Perez Avengers, the John Buscema or Perez FF, the Gil Kane, Ross Andru or Keith Pollard Spidey, the Cockrum or Byrne X-Men in tpbs, the DVD-ROMs, etc. -- I just get this warm fuzzy feeling and a stupid grin (don't puke -- I'm serious! ). I have a sense of what my bedroom looked like when I was 8 or 10 or 12, I can smell my friend's basement where we used to trade comics and play with our Megos, I can hear Elton John singing "Rocket Man" or Queen doing "Bohemian Rhapsody" on the AM radio... all of that. Those were my golden years of comics reading -- it was all innocence. Doug, I have that same warm fuzzy feeling when I get out my early comics. I think you hit the nail on the head, it is more than just the comics, although the comics were great fun. It's everything else that was going on at the time. For me, I remember me and a friend riding our bikes on Saturdays to the liquor stores and markets to try to find all the different books. Usually after our hunt, we still had some money left, we'd go by the little taco stand and get a taco, then either head back to the park or my house to read. We weren't too discriminating back then, so I might pick up Englehart's Avengers but also something like Marvel Premiere featuring Woodgod or some other awful thing. It didn't matter, at that time everything seemed fresh and exciting to me. But of course that changed as I've gotten older, as I'm sure it has for all of us. Now it's rare where I see a tv show or read a story and I don't feel that I've seen at least elements of the plot elsewhere. I think that's what I miss the most: that sense of pure discovery, of seeing or reading something for the very first time. There's only so many stories to be told I suppose, the key is to dressing them up a little differently. Now when I do come across something that feels fresh, I really savor it.
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Post by redstatecap on Mar 2, 2007 12:36:49 GMT -5
And let's not forget the actual smell of the newsprint. Literally opening a comic and smelling that musty comic smell vividly takes me back to my youth. It's been proven that your sense of smell is a much more powerful trigger of memory than any other sense, even eyesight. That's one reason I'm in no hurry to get the CDROMS.
RSC
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Post by Black Knight on Mar 2, 2007 12:47:27 GMT -5
Man, all of these posts made me think about those early years, with my most vivid memory being a spring afternoon, it was raining really hard, and I was inside rereading the first Hawkeye limited and the WCA limited that had just come out. Ahh those where the days.
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Post by Bored Yesterday on Mar 2, 2007 13:06:00 GMT -5
I remember toting big stacks of comics with me every place I went -- no wonder nothing from what I call "the old collection" survived without being heavily scarred with creases, bends, or tears. They didn't come with bags back then, of course.
But to answer the question, my fandom doesn't go squarely with a timeline. The dark age of the 1990s was tough, and I'm thinking of early and mid-1990s as almost universally bad for comics. That era drove me so far away from comics, that I cam back just in time for Avengers Disassembled. I missed the early stages of the Astro City, the Avengers relaunch by Busiek and Perez, the JLA afore mentioned -- a lot of really good books.
There are a lot of comics being published now that I think I'd enjoy, if I felt it was worth the money. It's not all bad. But I've pretty much given up on buying new comics. There are so many good cheap comics in the back issue bins that I've never read. And as I've said before, as far as I'm concerned, continuity ended at Onslaught, so new developments have no draw for me.
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Post by dlw66 on Mar 5, 2007 14:59:51 GMT -5
And let's not forget the actual smell of the newsprint. Literally opening a comic and smelling that musty comic smell vividly takes me back to my youth. It's been proven that your sense of smell is a much more powerful trigger of memory than any other sense, even eyesight. That's one reason I'm in no hurry to get the CDROMS. RSC The first part of your comment -- I agree with and smile about as I type this. However, your latter comment about being in no hurry to own the ROMs... I now have three of them and am in love with the notion that RIGHT NOW if you asked me about Amazing Spider-Man #whatever, I could, in less than 60 seconds, be heading toward an answer for you. No tape stuck on the cover, no heavy longboxes to move, nothing like that. Just open the tray, close the tray, wait a few seconds and BAM! -- instant Spidey ;D But yes, I do like the newsprint smell
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Post by Doctor Doom on Mar 5, 2007 17:08:53 GMT -5
Cheesy as it sounds, right now. I honestly don't know any other time since I got into comics when they were just as consistently good;
Cap has NEVER had a better run in my time (Though the Waid run was excellent). I have NEVER been anywhere near as interested in Iron Man as I am now. There have been better times for the Avengers- the Busiek run, for example, but that was running concurrently with bad times for other titles whereas I'm excited about "Mighty" and if it's as good as i hope and anticipate, that will balance off. I have likewise very excited about McDuffie's FF- sure, the Waid run was unmatchable but that was concurrently with a bad time for many other titles.
That's jsut some examples, but cheesy as it is I feel like a little kid again for the first time since... I was a kid... when it comes to comics, and that is definitely a good thing.
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Post by Shiryu on Mar 7, 2007 5:14:21 GMT -5
It's a good question, and I can't really find an answer for it. I think Tana explanation is the one that really hightlights it. It's not the comics per se, but it's the memories the comics carry with them. When one is a kid, everything is a wonder, we are not severe analyzers as we become later on. We basically "buy" everything As for the initial question, nothing comes to mind. I think it's because my earliest comic, Mickey Mouse, I still collect to this day with no gaps ( ;D).
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