Post by rberman on Jul 27, 2020 8:23:24 GMT -5
What issues best exemplify important trends in comic books? Something that sits at the sweet spot of an early example of the trend, an excellent example of the trend, and an influential specimen. Not necessarily every first appearance of a popular character (Wonder Woman, Archie & the gang, Wolverine) or of a particular demographic of character (first black hero, first gay hero), but examples that show larger forces in play.
Comics exist in conversation with the rest of culture, so some important moments may just be important as the first example within a comic book rather than in culture as a whole. Also, the effects of comic books, like other art, often are confined to a particular culture, but there may be certain comic book moments that managed to climb the usual culture walls (America, Europe, Japan, etc.).
Here are some examples I came up with through 1950. Later years will follow.
Famous Funnies (1933) The earliest known “comic book” assembled various previously published comic strips inside a single volume with its own cover, not just the funnies section of a newspaper. Soon its imitators would include original material to meet demand for this convenient form of entertainment. Newspaper strip artists like Hal Foster and Alex Raymond were considered higher on the economic food chain, and comic book adventure stories often imitated them.
Action Comics #1 (1938) Superman, the grand-daddy of super-heroes blended elements of sci-fi, mythology, and crime fiction and set a visual aesthetic of capes and tights that often controls new work even today. At one point his Fawcett competitor Captain Marvel outsold him, but eventually Superman returned to his dominant position. In the 1960s and 1970s, he or his spin-offs (Superboy, Supergirl, etc.) graced half a dozen covers every month. He appeared in radio dramas, TV, cartoons, live-action films, and even a Broadway musical, with comic books often adding interesting elements introduced in these other media. In the 1990s during waning sales, a lengthy plot involved his death and resurrection.
All-Star Comics #3 (1940) Compilation comics with varied stories under one cover were nothing new by then. But the cover showed various superheroes sitting around a single table. They shared the same world! They could team up! The Justice Society met at a hotel, and the world of comics got much larger.
Captain America #1 (March 1941) Comics as propaganda, portraying the United States assaulting Hitler at a time when public support for European intervention was weak. Also an early work by important comic book architects Jack Kirby and Joe Simon. Many war comics would fill the shelves for the next thirty years.
Tintin in America (1945) Belgian writer/artist Herge went the unusual extra step of redrawing his early stories with more detailed “claire ligne” backgrounds over a decade after their original publication. Generations have grown up on the tales of this intrepid boy reporter, and a Steven Spielberg computer-animated film version arrived in 2011.
Young Romance #1 (1947) After superhero comics collapsed following WW2, Kirby and Simon obligingly created the new genre of romance comics, drawing on female-oriented pulp fiction.
Four Color Comics #223 (1949) “Funny animal” stories about anthropomorphic creatures have captivated audiences in a wide variety of media. Carl Barks’ duck stories for Disney have often been singled out as especially successful exemplars. This particular issue features “Lost in the Andes,” in which Donald Duck and his three nephews find square eggs in South America. The large eyes on Disney ducks influenced cartoon drawing in Japan for decades, resulting in large numbers of characters whose eyes filled half or more of their faces.
It Rhymes with Lust (1950) An early example of a longer form comic book story, with a noir story by Arnold Drake and Leslie Waller, and art by Matt Baker and Ray Osrin. This format would later be known as a “graphic novel,” but at the time it was called a “picture novel.”
Comics exist in conversation with the rest of culture, so some important moments may just be important as the first example within a comic book rather than in culture as a whole. Also, the effects of comic books, like other art, often are confined to a particular culture, but there may be certain comic book moments that managed to climb the usual culture walls (America, Europe, Japan, etc.).
Here are some examples I came up with through 1950. Later years will follow.
Famous Funnies (1933) The earliest known “comic book” assembled various previously published comic strips inside a single volume with its own cover, not just the funnies section of a newspaper. Soon its imitators would include original material to meet demand for this convenient form of entertainment. Newspaper strip artists like Hal Foster and Alex Raymond were considered higher on the economic food chain, and comic book adventure stories often imitated them.
Action Comics #1 (1938) Superman, the grand-daddy of super-heroes blended elements of sci-fi, mythology, and crime fiction and set a visual aesthetic of capes and tights that often controls new work even today. At one point his Fawcett competitor Captain Marvel outsold him, but eventually Superman returned to his dominant position. In the 1960s and 1970s, he or his spin-offs (Superboy, Supergirl, etc.) graced half a dozen covers every month. He appeared in radio dramas, TV, cartoons, live-action films, and even a Broadway musical, with comic books often adding interesting elements introduced in these other media. In the 1990s during waning sales, a lengthy plot involved his death and resurrection.
All-Star Comics #3 (1940) Compilation comics with varied stories under one cover were nothing new by then. But the cover showed various superheroes sitting around a single table. They shared the same world! They could team up! The Justice Society met at a hotel, and the world of comics got much larger.
Captain America #1 (March 1941) Comics as propaganda, portraying the United States assaulting Hitler at a time when public support for European intervention was weak. Also an early work by important comic book architects Jack Kirby and Joe Simon. Many war comics would fill the shelves for the next thirty years.
Tintin in America (1945) Belgian writer/artist Herge went the unusual extra step of redrawing his early stories with more detailed “claire ligne” backgrounds over a decade after their original publication. Generations have grown up on the tales of this intrepid boy reporter, and a Steven Spielberg computer-animated film version arrived in 2011.
Young Romance #1 (1947) After superhero comics collapsed following WW2, Kirby and Simon obligingly created the new genre of romance comics, drawing on female-oriented pulp fiction.
Four Color Comics #223 (1949) “Funny animal” stories about anthropomorphic creatures have captivated audiences in a wide variety of media. Carl Barks’ duck stories for Disney have often been singled out as especially successful exemplars. This particular issue features “Lost in the Andes,” in which Donald Duck and his three nephews find square eggs in South America. The large eyes on Disney ducks influenced cartoon drawing in Japan for decades, resulting in large numbers of characters whose eyes filled half or more of their faces.
It Rhymes with Lust (1950) An early example of a longer form comic book story, with a noir story by Arnold Drake and Leslie Waller, and art by Matt Baker and Ray Osrin. This format would later be known as a “graphic novel,” but at the time it was called a “picture novel.”
