Brief Comics Commentary

For the most part, I buy comic books when they’re collected into graphic novels–this makes it easier for me to remember what’s going on, is often cheaper than buying individual issues, and means I don’t have to suffer through the eye-searing ads of most monthly books. DC Comics has restarted all its titles (again) so I thought it might be a good time to dip my toe back into superhero books to see if I might want to dive back in.

Nope. I read the first two issues of Action Comics, Animal Man, Batwoman, and Swamp Thing. They felt much like clumsy television pilots, trying to cram a lot of exposition into a small space. And telling with words isn’t what makes the comics medium fun for me. None of these comics made me interested to read further. Instead, I had the urge to go back and read the graphic novel collections of great past arcs of these titles: Animal Man and Swamp Thing by Alan Moore were two of my gateway comics, both Moore and Morrison have done great things with the Superman mythos, and the recent Batwoman collection, Elegy, really engaged me. It’s good I’m not the comic-reading majority, or monthly super books would die, but for now, I’m happy with my status quo, buying a few books in individual issues (iZombie and anything by Ed Brubaker), while getting others as they’re collected (Unwritten and now Sweet Tooth.)

Anyone else out there have any thoughts on DC’s new 52 titles, or individual issues vs. collections?

2 Responses to “Brief Comics Commentary”

  1. Kate Says:

    NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour/Culturetopia podcast had a loooong discussion about them a few weeks ago. It was from (checking on iTunes) . . 10/7. I thought it was a really good discussion–worth downloading.

  2. girldetective Says:

    Heh, Kate one of my I-don’t-go-there things is podcasts. But I might in this case.