November 18, 2005
PLUS, SILVER SURFER HAS THE COOLEST REAL NAME:
10 Comics That Shook The World
(Of comics, anyway) (DOUG HARVEY, 11/18/05, LA Weekly)
With all the hoopla surrounding the opening of the bipartisan Hammer & MOCA museums show “Masters of American Comics,” you’d think comics had never been taken seriously as an art form. The truth is, newspaper comic strips had supporters among the literary intelligentsia from the get-go — George Herriman’s Krazy Kat being singled out for rhapsodic praises by the likes of e.e. cummings and critic Gilbert Seldes as well as receiving the enthusiastic support of the Surrealists and other European avant-gardists. It was comic books — produced and distributed without the imprimatur of the WASP newspaper-publishing establishment — that bore the brunt of elitist disdain, resulting in Dr. Frederic Wertham’s scabrous Seduction of the Innocent, then Senator Kefauver’s 1954 hearings on comics’ causal relationship to juvenile delinquency, and finally the establishment of the self-censoring Comics Code Authority.These days, when Art Spiegelman’s funny-animals-in-Auschwitz graphic novel Maus wins a Pulitzer, and magazines like Gary Groth’s exponentially toney Comics Journal and Todd Hignite’s exquisite Comic Art treat the funnybook medium with seriousness and reverence, it’s unlikely that there will be much controversy over the inclusion of comic-book artists like Harvey Kurtzman and Jack Kirby in “Masters of American Comics.” Still, many who are familiar with the genius of Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts or Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy remain completely unaware of the enormous wealth of innovative visual materials that make up the history of the comic book. Here are 10 landmark comics that expanded the boundaries of what was possible. [...]
Fantastic Four #48
When Marvel took the comics world by a storm in the early ’60s with characters like Spiderman, Thor, the Fantastic Four and the Incredible Hulk, it was negotiating a deceptively bland terrain mined with the recently interred stink bombs of the persecuted Cryptkeeper and his eyeball-injectin’ brethren at EC comics, which had been reduced to a single title — MAD — by anti–First Amendment terrorists. The genius of the Marvel Universe was to embrace the limitations of the Code and pump it full of ironic hyperbole — and to enlist the talents of Jack Kirby, who had already revolutionized comics several times over, inventing both Captain America and the Romance Comic genre with his writing partner Joe Simon. But it was for his 1960s work for Stan Lee at Marvel that Kirby is most recognized, forging almost single-handedly the exaggerated, self-conscious, dynamic model of superheroism that continues to be the standard for both comic books and their lucrative movie and TV spin-offs. Kirby’s art was already impressive, but while churning out pages for Marvel he began taking greater and greater experimental chances, incorporating photocollage, multiple-page spreads, neo-Mannerist anatomical distortions, and an abstract-fetishistic depiction of complex machinery that borders on Outsider Art. While much of his early Marvel work is more beloved, and his greatest personal visionary work was to come when he jumped ship to DC for his never-completed Fourth World tetralogy, it was with this 1966 issue of FF that the gathering momentum of the Marvel Universe exceeded its potential, with the introduction of chromed enigma The Silver Surfer, soliloquy-prone herald for the planet-devouring Galactus. In the year when TV’s Batman brought unprecedented popular attention to comics and pop cultural masterpieces like Pet Sounds, Blow-Up and In Cold Blood (not to mention McLuhan’s Understanding Media) were the norm, the three-issue-long Coming of Galactus more than held its own, cementing comics’ hipness for all eternity.
Posted by Orrin Judd at November 18, 2005 9:09 AM
Another great divide between our great nations.
I just can't get to grips with the concept that comic books can be read by adults.
Posted by: Brit at November 18, 2005 9:43 AMBrit:
I just back into comic books again after a gulf of 20 years. I gave my godson a bunch of my old trade paperbacks ("The Greatest Joker Stories Ever Told" and that sort of thing) and he went nuts for them and I just followed along. They're fun, diverting and not really that expensive.
Orrin:
Why don't you hate comic books? After all the reasons you agree with Joe Liberman on video games and Tipper Gore on rock music are very similar to the reasons you should agree with Dr. Wetham on comic books.
"Another great divide between our great nations."
Judge Dredd would argue otherwise. :)
"I just can't get to grips with the concept that comic books can be read by adults."
Two words: Alan Moore.
There's plenty of excellent stuff being published. Quality's generally a lot higher than the pap at the cinema or on terrestrial TV.
That list is a little lacking though.
No Maus, nothing by Eisner, no Watchmen and no Dark Knight Returns.
Posted by: Ali Choudhury at November 18, 2005 10:47 AM"anti-First Amendment terrorists"
A sure sign of a writer who lives in a fantasy world (or is just really full of himself), and no point in reading further.
Posted by: raoul Ortega at November 18, 2005 11:06 AMOf course, if Stan had allowed Kirby on the Silver Surfer book, he never would have had the name of Norrin Radd. All evidence indicates Kirby intended the Surfer to solely be a product of energy manifested from Galactus. Thus the Surfer really was learning what it meant to be human instead of having amnesia.
I agree with Ali that the list is wrong. Even given personal subjectivity, only about half should even qualify as "shaking the world" which I assume means were issues that either changed the industry or heralded a conceptual breakthrough.
Eisner's Spirit should be on there. So should the issue of Amazing Spider-Man that dealt with drugs that broke the Comics Code. What about one of the comics that actually started the Silver Age, perhaps Showcase #4 that had the Flash. And where's Dave Sim's Cerebus? Or a Jim Steranko SHIELD?
Posted by: Chris Durnell at November 18, 2005 11:07 AMBryan:
Most of the new ones are crap, but the Kirby-Lee era at Marvel produced good work and they're how boys become readers.
Posted by: oj at November 18, 2005 11:30 AMChris:
Green Lantern/Green Arrow.
Send your address and I'll send a book--note that the Silver Surfer's name is a cleverly variation on Orrin Judd?
Posted by: oj at November 18, 2005 11:34 AMDC's Infinite Crisis is shaping up to be really good. Hey, Power Girl's back and what boy doesn't love Power Girl and her amazing Kryptonian cleavage?
By the way, what was the Silver Surfer's real name? It's been many years since I read that one, although I do recall how great it was when Reed Richards jammed the Universal Nullifier in Galactus' big face.
If you haven't seen it before, Mark Evanier's POV site has a good round-up on the history of Jack Kirby, among other comic-related info.
Posted by: John at November 18, 2005 11:46 AMBee-Man! 'Nuff said.
Posted by: carter at November 18, 2005 3:43 PMBrit;
If you think adults in the USA like comic books too much, the Japanese must really freak you out.
Mr. Judd;
It was mostly crap then, too. We only look at the small fraction of them that were good, just as your grandchildren will marvel at all the good comics made now which are currenly lost in the mass of garbage.
Bryan;
Try Google or just read some of the previous comments which have the name.
Posted by: Annoying Old Guy at November 18, 2005 4:05 PMI am liking Infinite Crisis despite being pretty ticked off that they ruined the Giffen\Dematteis Justice League in the process.
That line Batman said to Supes in issue #1 regarding inspiration was quite the zinger.
The Surfer was Norrin Radd.
Posted by: Ali Choudhury at November 18, 2005 4:10 PM"Everyone looks up to you. They listen to you. If you tell them to fight, they'll fight. But they need to be inspired, and let's face it, Superman...the last time you really inspired anyone was when you were dead."
Oh, snap, Batman! One of the things I always enjoyed about Batman is that he's just totally not afraid of Superman. Where I would be all "Yes, sir Mister Superman" Batman just isn't that impressed.
Posted by: Bryan at November 18, 2005 4:48 PMAOG:
To the contrary, most of the obscure ones were their best.
Posted by: oj at November 18, 2005 5:15 PM