10 Things I Love: Comics

Despite being over 30, I still love to read comics. I’m not talking the Sunday funnies, I mean tights and capes, superpowers and sidekicks, multi-issue cross title events with alternate collectible covers where major characters die (or become resurrected), heroes and villains switch sides, and the world is changed FOREVER kind of comics.

It’s currently a great time to be a comic book fan, with almost the entire summer blockbuster movie line this year dominated by comic book characters (Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, Hellboy, The Dark Knight) or graphics novels (Wanted, The Spirit). Finally comic book creators and artists are being taken seriously, and the medium is being discovered and rediscovered by fans of all ages.

I think my very first comic book was something lame like Transformers: Headmasters #1. Of course I was all into Transformers (being 8), but it was exceptionally horrible. It would be a few years before the complete obsession set in, and I picked up my first REAL comic book title: The Amazing Spider-Man.

I had joined in the storyline about 10 issues after the first appearance of Venom, with Amazing Spider-Man #321. This was around the time that Todd MacFarlane, of Spawn fame, was drawing Spidey before he was given his own comic a short while later in Spider-Man #1.

Eventually I picked up a comic book that at first I was strangely against reading, which is actually quite funny knowing how much I love the characters now: The Uncanny X-Men. I missed out on my first big comic book collector score by ONE issue: the first appearance of Gambit in Uncanny X-Men #266. Now I can’t get enough of the X-Men titles: X-Factor, New X-Men, Astonishing X-Men (best run so far), X-Force, X-Whatever; I’ll read them all.

There was a good time in my early-to-mid 20s where I was spending about $120 a month on comics (I’ve since calmed down to maybe $20 a month), since I loved them all and couldn’t part with a single title. They ranged from the standard Marvel and DC fare like Spider-Man, X-Men books, Batman and Superman, to the bizarre like Sam Keith’s The Maxx and Johnen Vasquez’s Johnny The Homicidal Maniac. The latter two, although weird and at times extremely violent, are two titles that affected me profoundly.

The Maxx was a series written and drawn by Sam Kieth, who had previous experience on some popular Marvel and DC titles like Marvel Comics Presents drawing Wolverine, and of course the highly prestigious Sandman by Neil Gaiman which he drew the first five issues of.

The story centered in on a homeless man who is convinced he is a superhero by the name of The Maxx, protecting his "jungle queen" who was really his social worker Julie. A serial killer is on the loose by the name of Mr. Gone who begins terrorizing Julie, and The Maxx is doing his best to try to stop him while trying not to get lost in his own inner visions of living in a fictional "Outback". The story has a deep emotional impact on the reader as all of the characters are written extremely realistic, with their own deep seeded emotional baggage and issues on display in every panel.

MTV contacted Keith wanting to turn the first 11 issues of The Maxx into a series for their Oddities program that ran in the mid-90s. Unlike most comic-to-animation transitions in the past, the animation studio opted to turn the comic book into the show, frame-by-frame. Keith’s own drawings came to life on the screen including his often distorted perspectives and oddly-shaped characters. It was amazing.

The first 10 minutes of MTV’s The Maxx

Johnny The Homicidal Maniac is another series that can be a little heavy to read depending on the readers emotional state. Johnen Vasquez created this title about a serial killer named Johnny, and his demented insanity and the pain and torture he inflicts on everyone he encounters, as well as the poor next door neighbor boy, Squee.

While at first it sounds like a horror comic, it’s actually more of a black comedy. Everything from Johnny’s constant political rants laced with irony and social criticism to the non-sequitur filled Happy Noodle Boy comics that Johnny himself "drew."

Unlike The Maxx, JtHM was never turned into a series (thank god, I think it’d be banned in 47 countries), although its creator Johnen Vasquez would be given a chance at another animated series: Invader ZIM. ZIM was one of those cartoons like Ren & Stimpy in that it was shown on a children’s network, but it wasn’t really for kids. Johnen Vasquez’s twisted humor and social commentary was a central theme for the whole show about an alien named ZIM attempting to take over the planet by disguising himself as a child.

Over the years I’ve refined my tastes to only a few books a month. Right now I’m pretty big on the Secret Invasion storyline going on in the Marvel books, in which about a third of all the superheroes have been slowly replaced by their shapeshifting Skrull counterparts, Astonishing X-Men written by Joss Whedon of Buffy the Vampire and Doctor Horrible’s Sing-A-Long-Blog fame, the All-Star Batman series by Jim Lee and Frank Miller, the man who single handedly saved Batman from his campy 60’s image with The Dark Knight Returns in the 80s. Oh, and he also did that little series called Sin City.

Comics have come a long way from the campy stories that first appeared in golden age books. Over time, and especially in the past 10 years, comics have drifted towards more adult storylines and deeper subjects than just the typical good vs evil storylines. Sometimes they make amazing choices like having half the Marvel Universe shapeshifters, sometimes horrible choices like deciding that Peter Parker was never married to Mary Jane, but always captivating and constantly fun to read. I’m excited to see what the next big event is, and I’ll be ready to grab all 5 collectible hologram covers when they come out.