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Post by Reptisaurus! on Nov 16, 2015 19:30:47 GMT -5
Well, the results are in and, as much as I agree with them, I am honestly shocked that the '70s overtook the '60s that easily. I truly thought there was more love than that for Marvel's Silver Age. I'm also really surprised we didn't see a single vote for the 1940s nor the 1990s, and yet we did get one for the 1950s (I did not see that coming). I'm actually surprised that the 70s came so far ahead of the 80s. I ove a lot of 70s comics, but I really think the early 80s were much more significant in terms of the evolution of comics and the quality of the work being produced. I agree. But I thought it was a huge backslide at Marvel specifically, as the free-wheeling chaos of the '70s gave way to the much more predictable and less artistically ambitious '80s. The '50s was me, and that was (A) only the first half of the '50s, and (B) the fact (as I see it) that Marvel had it's all time best line-up of artists. I don't think anyone really touched Maneely in his prime for speed and quality - And the genre diversity meant that Stan could put his guys on strips they were good at instead of having Don Heck, Werner Roth, and Ross Andru work against everything they were good at to chur n out endless superheros. |
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Post by Reptisaurus! on Nov 16, 2015 19:37:18 GMT -5
UNLESS you're only a superhero reader. Then I'd agree the quality of Marvel product did improve from the '70s to the '80s. Most of the great '70s books were new titles in new genres, while the superhero books were, in general, stuck in a bit of a pleasant rut.
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Post by Cei-U! on Nov 16, 2015 19:51:19 GMT -5
I did overlook Wolverton in my previous post. Powerhouse Pepper may have been the best humor strip Marvel ever published (though Kurtzman's Hey Look fillers come close).
Cei-U!
I summon the inspired idiocy!
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Post by Reptisaurus! on Nov 16, 2015 20:03:15 GMT -5
I did overlook Wolverton in my previous post. Powerhouse Pepper may have been the best humor strip Marvel ever published (though Kurtzman's Hey Look fillers come close). Cei-U! I summon the inspired idiocy! He did at least one straight superhero strip, too. (Rockman. It was amazing!) |
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Post by Phil Maurice on Nov 16, 2015 21:06:02 GMT -5
I don't think I've ever read a 1940s Marvel comic...  That's surprising. Many were reprinted in titles like Fantasy Masterpieces and Marvel Super-Heroes toward the end of the Silver Age, as well as some of the Giant-Size books in the 70s.
Most are a bit creaky, as Cei-U described. One bright spot for me amongst the later Timelys is Harvey Kurtzman's "Hey Look!"* It was a single page humor strip that he both wrote and drew. It was often very clever and you can see the nascent talent that would later blossom full-blown into MAD.
ETA: *Oops. Should have refreshed the page. I see this has already been mentioned.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2015 21:50:40 GMT -5
I don't think I've ever read a 1940s Marvel comic... That's surprising. Many were reprinted in titles like Fantasy Masterpieces and Marvel Super-Heroes toward the end of the Silver Age, as well as some of the Giant-Size books in the 70s. Ah...don't have any of those FM and MSH reprint books...I do have some of the Giant-Size books though, mostly Spider-Man, Daredevil and a couple others that I bought randomly...and I haven't reopened some of those in several years. |
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Post by tingramretro on Nov 17, 2015 3:03:18 GMT -5
If you read what I actually said, I specified "best superhero work, which would exclude V for Vendetta and From Hell. As for the rest of your list: yes, I do believe Captain Britain is better than Watchmen (which, while great, is overrated) and Promethea (which I never liked much). I don't even remember the other one. I would also strongly dispute that Captain Britain was written in the "then current Marvel style". I was reading a lot of Marvel at the time, and Moore's Captain Britain was unlike anything else they were producing. Oh. I missed that. Although I'd call "V" as a superhero book. Extremely skilled dude in a costume fights evil; Close enough, to my mind. Still don't get the Captain Britain appreciation. I'd call it a "C" on the Alan Moore scale. It reads A LOT like Chris Claremont to me - who would be the cutting edge of Marvel style, I guess. Marvelman I just read for the first time, and that (A) was everything I hate in superhero comics, but (B) was obviously a significant and major development in terms of what you can do with superheros. Captain Britain felt like a step back from what Gerber,Englehart, and Starlin were doing in the '70s... or at least less layered in terms of content and theme. Well, we're obviously never going to agree, I suspect because we have very different perspectives. To me, reading both CB and MM as they came out, they were amazing, it seemed to me that Moore was doing things with those characters that had never before been done with superheroes, at least to that extent. I loved Englehart's Avengers, Starlin's Warlock and Gerber's pretty much everything, but while they were clearly very good writers, they didn't resonate with me the way Moore's stuff did, as a kid growing up in Thatcher's Britain. I certainly can't see any comparison to Claremont in that stuff. I've liked a lot of his stuff, but he's not really in the same league. His characters never spoke like real people, or not any real people I knew. |
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Post by Arthur Gordon Scratch on Nov 17, 2015 8:56:00 GMT -5
While I agree with your asertions and experiences with Moore's take on thtose characters, that doesn't prevent his later work to be even better.I mean, a average Moore book starts at 8 on a traditional 10 scale, and his greater work craves a scale of its own.
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Post by Reptisaurus! on Nov 17, 2015 19:32:32 GMT -5
Oh. I missed that. Although I'd call "V" as a superhero book. Extremely skilled dude in a costume fights evil; Close enough, to my mind. Still don't get the Captain Britain appreciation. I'd call it a "C" on the Alan Moore scale. It reads A LOT like Chris Claremont to me - who would be the cutting edge of Marvel style, I guess. Marvelman I just read for the first time, and that (A) was everything I hate in superhero comics, but (B) was obviously a significant and major development in terms of what you can do with superheros. Captain Britain felt like a step back from what Gerber,Englehart, and Starlin were doing in the '70s... or at least less layered in terms of content and theme. Well, we're obviously never going to agree, I suspect because we have very different perspectives. To me, reading both CB and MM as they came out, they were amazing, it seemed to me that Moore was doing things with those characters that had never before been done with superheroes, at least to that extent. I loved Englehart's Avengers, Starlin's Warlock and Gerber's pretty much everything, but while they were clearly very good writers, they didn't resonate with me the way Moore's stuff did, as a kid growing up in Thatcher's Britain. I certainly can't see any comparison to Claremont in that stuff. I've liked a lot of his stuff, but he's not really in the same league. His characters never spoke like real people, or not any real people I knew. Well, yeah, Moore's a way better writer! I do like Captain Britain a lot - It's just not formally/structurally/design-sense-ually off the scale great like some of Moore's other stuff. I even like the "616" nickname. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 17, 2015 20:00:25 GMT -5
Anyone doing a DC version of this thread?  |
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Nov 17, 2015 20:34:34 GMT -5
Anyone doing a DC version of this thread? Maybe eventually, but I don't expect as hot a debate. |
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Post by tingramretro on Nov 18, 2015 2:26:28 GMT -5
Well, we're obviously never going to agree, I suspect because we have very different perspectives. To me, reading both CB and MM as they came out, they were amazing, it seemed to me that Moore was doing things with those characters that had never before been done with superheroes, at least to that extent. I loved Englehart's Avengers, Starlin's Warlock and Gerber's pretty much everything, but while they were clearly very good writers, they didn't resonate with me the way Moore's stuff did, as a kid growing up in Thatcher's Britain. I certainly can't see any comparison to Claremont in that stuff. I've liked a lot of his stuff, but he's not really in the same league. His characters never spoke like real people, or not any real people I knew. Well, yeah, Moore's a way better writer! I do like Captain Britain a lot - It's just not formally/structurally/design-sense-ually off the scale great like some of Moore's other stuff. I even like the "616" nickname. Actually, while he did use it first, Moore didn't come up with the Earth 616 designation, as I understand it. His predecessor on the strip, Dave Thorpe, picked 616 as a rather obscure joke, since he wasn't that keen on superhero comics. |
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Post by Ozymandias on Nov 18, 2015 3:53:17 GMT -5
Anyone doing a DC version of this thread? Maybe eventually, but I don't expect as hot a debate. Well, most of the later debate has been about Moore, who only worked briefly for Marvel UK. So there's that. |
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Post by MDG on Nov 18, 2015 8:42:43 GMT -5
Maybe eventually, but I don't expect as hot a debate. Well, most of the later debate has been about Moore, who only worked briefly for Marvel UK. So there's that. It could be interesting in that DC had different "fiefdoms" in play during various times, often doing very different things: DC v. All-American in the Golden Age; Weisinger v. Schwartz in the Silver; superheroes v. mystery v. war in the bronze; DC v. Vertigo in the 80s... |
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Post by Warmonger on Nov 18, 2015 11:16:37 GMT -5
Anyone doing a DC version of this thread? I think the 80's would probably rule that one with an iron fist. |
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