Welcome to Comic Book Sage dot Com
6th September 2010
Hi there. I have started this blog to express my opinion in the state of comic books today. One might ask what gives me the right to state anything, and in truth nothing does. That being said, you the reader should know who I am and how this blog came to be.
Let’s start at the beginning, my name is really not important and if in time it does need to be shared I will. Here is a bit of my history. I am 55 years old; I grew up in Queens, NY. I grew up in a time when George Reeves was Superman on WPIX every afternoon. I couldn’t wait to get home from school to see what new adventure Superman would be involved with. Back then all we had was a black and white TV with a rabbit antenna. The reception worked great as far as I could tell, but I always thought that the Superman costume looked like a gray sweat suit. When watching the show there was always too much Clark Kent and never enough Superman. It was still Superman and I could never get enough.
I can still remember the first Superman comic book I ever got. It was Superman number 146 “The Life of Superman”. It was 1961 and I was six years old, my generation was not as smart as the current generations and we started learning to read in 1st grade. My father had taken me out with him to get the Sunday paper, and I pleaded with him how I had to have this Superman book. It would answer all the questions I had about Superman and all his secrets. Of course I could barely read it, but I had to have it. For 10 cents my dad bought it for me. When I got home I raced upstairs and begged my older sister to read it to me. I made her read it 3 times over to make sure I got everything out of those pages.
I was hooked. I would go with my Dad every Sunday to get the paper and more often than not he would buy me a new comic book about every other week. I had to learn to read them because my sister would charge me to read each new book I received. I figured I would go broke pretty fast if I didn’t start reading them myself.
In my time reading comic books was considered as mind rotting as watching TV. My mother finally put her foot down and told my Dad to stop buying me these books. So there it was comic books were banned from the house until 1966 when Batman became a major television star, and I spent my first summer away from home at sleep away camp. My mother, of all people, would send me the daily comic strips from the NY Post and my father would send me care packages of comic books about every three weeks. I was in heaven.
My interest had now gone beyond Superman; it now included Spider-Man, Daredevil, Green Lantern, Fantastic Four, Batman, The Flash, The JLA, The Hulk and Iron Man. I was at camp and in comic book heaven. Everyone at camp had comic books and even paperbacks of past issues of all kinds of characters. Once again I couldn’t get enough and read everything I could get my hands on. This went on for the next 5 years. Every summer when I returned to camp and the stockpile of my friend’s books I read them all and became an encyclopedia of comic book trivia.
Once I entered high school comics again became the forbidden zone and I had to sneak around to read them and, most of the time I had limited time to read them anyway. It wasn’t until I reached college and my junior year when I found comics once again. Now instead of going to the candy store or newspaper stands there were stores dedicated to comic books and all sorts of paraphernalia having to do with comics.
I was on my own and had money to burn. This was for me the golden age of Marvel comics. The new X-Men were in vogue. Superman was still wimpy and Clark Kent was still a non-character. We were on the verge of Star Wars and the Superman movie. This is where my collection started and has yet to end.
So let’s examine why I am doing this. When I visit the book store on Wednesday’s every week I notice the people in the shop are my age or maybe a little younger. I wonder where the real young readers are. I realized what I used to pay 10 cents or even 25 cents are now 3 dollars or even 4 dollars. How are they going to pay for the books that really helped me begin reading? As stories and continuities change under the excuse of bringing newer and younger readers into the fold, who are they kidding? If I was six years old today, and out with my Dad there would be no way I could ever expect him to shell out the 2.99.These days we now only get 22 pages rather than the 36 pages we got for 10 cents. The book is so full of advertisements we get more of them then the real story. We are even subjected to a second story in some books that are so anemic I usually pass right over them.
I am not ignorant to the economics of the times and all things must go up in price. As things do go up though, the quality and continuity must match the value we are paying. Editors and Publishers must be aware what the comic book public wants and expects. It is not just the editors’ thoughts that should drive the direction of books or the newest fad that is in the marketplace, but the history, the continuity and most importantly a good story that needs to drive direction.
It is time for readers to start telling the Editors and Publishers on these books what is right and especially what is wrong with their product. The letters page are always chosen by the people producing the books so how objective can they be? When one pays the price we are now paying for the product uncensored opinions must be heard.
In the coming months I will talk about what I see and what I read in the genre. Who is doing us justice and who is blowing smoke. Just as a preview my next post will be about how Joe Quesada has destroyed the continuity of the Amazing Spider-Man. I will review Amazing Spider-Man issues 338 – 341.
Thanks for taking the time for reading this and if you have any comments or suggestions please post them and let me hear them. If you have ideas you want examined I am all ears.