Friday, September 30, 2011

Beautifully Staged

Those of you who are following modern comic books know that the DC Universe has been rebooting, starting storylines from scratch.

I have not been following it at all. First, I have no time to get up to the comic store. Second, I have no desire to even browse the selections. My experience with modern comics presents no charm for me. Nothing against the creators' skills, but rather the editorial dictates.

You don't have to go all the way back to the ancient ages of comics to find some appealing DC books. Below, from 1992, this cover by Matt Wagner is one of my top ten favorite Batman covers of all time, very iconic, beautifully staged and drawn. I bought the comic just for its cover.

If modern DC comics would apply this level of quality to their editorial concepts throughout their books, well, I might just make time to get up to the comic store.

Matt Wagner — Detective Comics # 649 — 1992

3 comments:

Mr Blue Genes said...

Here's my problem with modern comics, Thom - it's all dark colors on shiny paper. Who the hell can read that? All I ever see is the glare from the room lights.

Thomas Haller Buchanan said...

Mr Blue Genes, gimmee that good ol' fashioned non-glare pulp. The smell alone is worth the price of admission—10, 12 OR 15 cents. Even a quarter.

John Matthew Stater said...

Amen. I've been going through some old silver age stuff - covers with word bubbles on them inviting you to delve into the book to find out just how the unbelievable event depicted on the cover could possibly happen - and thinking, as goofy as these are, they do make me want to open the magazine and read it.