I visited the Chicago ComicFest this past weekend - mostly for nostalgia's sake because a comicon in Chicago that doesn't contain either the word "Wizard" or "World" in the title is a rarity. I must admit I do love the atmosphere in a well-stocked, well-packed dealer's room. What can I say? I'm a complete geek at heart.

But as I was walking around checking out the spate of recent popular titles (I hesitate to use the word "hot" because of all the negative speculator baggage that comes with that word), I noticed that many of the series that brought me back to comics over the last few years have either sputtered out or disappeared altogether.

Is the comics mini-renaissance over? I see nothing in the current line-up from the "big two" that truly excites me anymore. And although I've never been a big fan of small press books - mostly for their annoying tendency to wink out of existence without a moment's notice - there didn't seem to be much in the independent realm that really caught my attention.

Here we are with:
- the Ultimate titles getting long in the tooth
- critically lauded titles such as "Preacher," "The Authority," and (my sentimental favorite) "Astro City" ended or cancelled with nothing that I can see on the horizon to take their place (and no, the occasional "Pilgrim" mini-series doesn't really count)
- Alan Moore's America's Best Comics stagnating to the point where really only "Promethea" sees a regular print schedule, where I can't remember the last time a "Top 10" issue came out, and where Alan Moore's future involvement with so-called "mainstream" comics looks precarious at best after his recent snit-fit over the rights to Marvelman/Miracleman
- J. Michael Stracynski (or however he spells his name) sitting on his hands with both "Rising Stars" and "Midnight Nation" (and whose "Amazing Spiderman" run, I'm taking bets won't last a full 12 issues)
- virtually no Vertigo titles worth paying attention to (excepting perhaps "Hellblazer" and that only because of its stubborn longevity as a series)
- "DK2" being lukewarm at best and with "Origin" IMHO being the most horrendous mini-series of recent memory, utterly ill-conceived, poorly plotted, and poorly drawn (especially when you have to read the climactic death sequence at the end of Book II (?) 4 or 5 times just to understand what happened and who killed who)
- Alex Ross half-heartedly churning out covers to those tired "Earth X/Universe X/Paradise X" books, whose concepts were brilliant, but whose execution has been sub-par

Sure, there's still "Powers," "100 Bullets," and a promised Neil Gaiman project later this year. (And friends keep trying to push "JSA" on me.) But - honestly - is that it?

On the plus side, I suppose Marvel's tentpole titles - the Spiderman books and the X-books - are almost readable again. But I really don't see much else that excites me or that looks like it might be remotely intriguing.

Anyone else think the talent boom is over?

I came back into comics after close to a decade out of it. I came back for a few reasons: Origin, DK2 and the Ultimate line in TPBs. Two are going to be ending soon and the other still interests me. I wish I would have waited on Origin as it is now coming to TPB in the summer, but oh well.

Both Origin and DK2 started off well, but they seem to both have lost their focus. Hopefully these last 2 issues for Origin and the final installment of DK2 will reel in what has gone horribly wrong.

I still read reviews every week but I do not buy any comic outside of the 3 I talked about above. I think the Ultimate line is the best thing to come out of Marvel in a long time. A re-imaged version of Spider-Man and X-Men along with ancilliary characters. X-Men is still wildly out of control (it was when I left comics as well), but at least Ultimate X-Men can sit outside of the continuity and tell a good to great story.

There are still great writers out there, I just think they may be spreading themselves too thin by doing too many different books at once.

DK2 is truly a travesty. Miller started off well and went waaaaay off course in the second part. It is sad, but I guess that is what happens to highly-touted series.

Right now I'm only getting 100 Bullets, Hunter, Lucifer, Sam and Twitch and the odd Sandman spinoff. And only the first two are really worthwhile. I didn't even bother with DK2.

More importantly, when I go to the comics shop, the average age of the customer seems to be in his 30s. There are almost no kids or college age people. How could they let their market dwindle to a handful of aging geeks? What do 13-year olds spend their money on instead?

Videogames.

I somewhat agree that this somewhat resurgence(sp?) is coming to an end with a possible death depending on the Spiderman movie(which makes me want to vomit & then laugh at how horrible it looks).

I got back into comic about a year & half ago after a 5 years of never picking up a comic, & I thought I never would again. I found out an old friend of mine had taken over a comic book store near where I use to live so I stopped in & he gave me 2 comics that he promised would have me completely hooked on the genre again. Planetary & The Authority. However I think books like these had a significant role in this somewhat renaissance, & it is for the most part only the impact of books like these that are coming to and end. The Authority is indeed a dead title after March, Planetary might as well be considered the same.

However the big 2 companies I feel are still pumping out exciting titles on all cylinders. I honestly could care less about DK2, I never bought them, only skimmed through them & the art hurts my eyes. Origin I also don't understand why peole feel the need to buy them as soon as it comes out, I'm just waiting for the trade to read it. But both books succeeded in creating hype, which I believe is the only reason both were published.

I truly think Marvel is doing everything they could to keep this resurgence going.

- Grunter you are wrong about JMS's run not lasting on Spiderman, he has closed his Joe's comics label to focus on Spidey, as well as other Marvel books.


- Marvel has Bendis. I am not saying he is as good as, but he may be the Moore/Miller of this generation. Any title he writes becomes a hit, he is now one of a very few writers able to get outside of the media hype(entertainment weekly, Maxim etc.), & this may only get better with the Spider cartoon.

- New X-men is the greatest & most exciting comic perhaps to ever come out of an X title(even getting reviews in an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue),

- I truly believe that one of the biggest titles all year will be the new Captain America series, it will be getting a lot of hype once released & comes out at a great time in America to heavily push this title.

- Also Neil Gaiman will also be working once again for Marvel & he is one of a very few creators that creates enormous buzz.

- And like hime or not, the bottom line is Kevin Smith is one of the best things to happen to comics & now his pull & inluence comes back to Marvel with a Spiderman Mini-series as his next project. He creates enormous sales plus he always gets reviewed in mainstream media.

DC however is lacking.

- They are taking a bold gamble wiht what they are doing with Batman right now & I can't help but feel the only reason they are doing it is for people to keep talking about something DC related once the final part of DK2 comes out.

- The 2 other flagship titles are just a mess. The Superman books took a big hurt from the horrid Our Worlds at War crossover & still has not recovered from that, with the creative teams constantly changing on the books.

- the new team on JLA seems to have no idea what to do with the characters & interest & sales on this once flagship book are fading.

- 100 Bullets is still one of if not the best comic being published but other than that, once Azzerell who only has a couple issues left on Hellblazer leaves that book, will anyone even know about Vertigo any more?

- And now for the time being after one more issue DC loses the Kevin Smith hype & sales machine (althogh he has more work in the future planned for DC than Marvel)

- Wildstorm is pretty much relying on the girls with big boobs genre on keeping them afloat with Witchblade & Tomb Raider, both of which I don't know one person who reads them.

Image is Image, it's not going anywhere but outside of Powers they aren't really doing anything exciting. Silvestri is trying to make a comeback but whether anyone cares about this once early 90s success remains to be seen.

As far as indie publishers go, I have always felt that the only impact they have in a comics renaissance is the fact that comic book geeks can say they read Stray Bullets instead of New X-men b/c they think they are too cool to read a mainstream MArvel book. The bottom line is they may get praise from critics ( & some of my favorite titles are indie books so I'm not knocking them), but a true renaissance in comics depends on the big 2 publishers. And I still think Marvel is going strong.

Here's an interesting interview with Miller from the ONION. I think he makes some good points about the comic industry.

I appologize in advance if this has already made the rounds.

http://www.theonionavclub.com/avclub...ture_3744.html

I'm buying way more comics than I did 5 years ago, at the height of the "Image" style of comics, the Spider-clone debacle, etc. Typically spend $60-$100 a month on comics, TPBs etc. Of course, I'm 30 years old and have been collecting comics since I was 10, so I'm hardly a target market for new readers. Basically they've been predicting the "death" of comics since 1975 or so and it hasn't happened. Comics are a niche market and will continue to be, there'll be great products (Powers, the Spider-Man titles currently, etc.) and crap over-hyped products like DK2. It's all cyclical.

I'm on the other side, I think Spider-Man could be the best comic adaption ever. Yes, the Goblin's suit looks stupid, but the new trailer just blew me away. I was the first one in line against Tobey Maguire getting the role of Peter Parker, but the trailers have shown me that he might have been the best option they could have chosen.

I think Spider-Man will be much better than X-Men (a movie that also had to do away with the old costumes). Spider-Man will make or break all the comic movie adaptions coming up. This movie is over a decade in the making and I sure hope my gut feeling is true.

And you are right about Bendis, but I touched on the fact that writers like him might be stretching themselves too thin. He is very adapt at doing multiple books now, but who is to say that down the line his writing dwindles?

As for Origin, early on all I heard was that there wasn't going to be a TPB or it would come quite a ways down the road. It pissed me off when I found out the TPB was coming in June, but I was already halfway done with the series so I might as well finish it.

Sessa17:

Coincidentally, it was "Planetary," "Authority" and (still my recent favorite) "Astro City" that also got me back into buying comics on a regular basis. But with these titles dying off and with only a handfull of off-kilter mainstream books (if you know what I mean) to take their place, I think I'm probably going to fall back to being a casual comics reader again.

The reason I doubt JMS about his commitment to Spiderman is because he promised up and down that he'd finish "Rising Stars" and "Midnight Nation" before taking on a whole host of other projects. Of course, once I heard that there was a potential movie script in the works for "Rising Stars" and a series of action figures to follow, I knew right away that these series would be about as timely as *cough* "Battlechasers."

You're pretty much right on the money with DC though. I only pick up "100 Bullets," "Hellblazer" and the McGuinness issues of "Superman" these days. Occasionally I'll skim through a Bat-book, but they're no longer on my "must-buy" list.

Anybody have a clue as to when or whether Kurt Busiek will return to "Astro City"? That book alone would get my butt back in the comic stores more frequently. (And could my love of this title be the reason my friends are pushing "JSA" on me? Opinions??)

I tried really hard to get back in after being out for over a decade and I couldn't. Comics are just too expensive to appeal to me anymore. I also had a hard time finding any storylines that really grabbed me. After three months I quit again. Not to say I didn't find some things I liked. Spiderman had a good storyline going at the time and the Kevin Smith Green Arrow thing was interesting. It just wasn't enough to get me back to the comic book store every month. Marvel restarting entire comics and basically wiping away everything that had happened over the decades really pissed me off as well. I have the issue where Aunt May dies, but sure enough she is alive again. I don't like the fact a writer can just decide the last 20 years never happened and start from scratch. Needless to say I'm done with comics.

Hmm, how to approach this...

First off, JMS is closing down his Top Cow comics. He's going exclusive to Marvel. Also, his 12th issue comes out in a couple months, so you're wrong about that.

Next, if you think Vertigo is all washed up you probably haven't been reading the books. Lucifer, Sandman Presents, 100 Bullets, War Stories, etc are some of the highest-acclaimed books out there right now. You also have some fantastic miniseries coming out, such as Kyle Baker's King David.

Also, if you didn't see ANYTHING in the non-mainstream realm that interests you you again haven't been looking. There's something for everybody. No matter what your interests are, there's a great book for you. Not sure what you define as small press, but certainly books from the likes of Oni, Avatar, Chaos, Fantagraphics, Top Shelf, etc. don't blink out of existence.

I also wouldn't say the talent boom is over. In the coming months you'll see some amazing books coming out from the Big Two and others. I've heard of some major things happening during the summer as well.

If you're not familiar with what's out there, I'd suggest picking up a Previews and looking through it, reading what the publishers are offering. That's a great (and cheap) way to find out what's sitting on the shelves. Occasionally you'll find small press books that you wouldn't ordinarily notice, and if your shop doesn't carry them they can special order them for you.

This week my site is running a look at the new issue of Previews, and going page by page checking out the new offerings. You should check it out, you might discover a cool book.

Don't give up on comics quite yet. The industry is growing and some major things are brewing. It's a good time to be a comic reader.

-Brian

The sad fact is that at least 95% of comic books are crap. This is nothing new nor is it solely a comic book phenemenon. The same can be said about modern film, music, and just about any other form of entertainment as well.

I don't think that the recent comics mini-renaissance has come to an end. Maybe the upcoming lineup for Marvel and DC isn't very strong, but there's always great stuff available if you look hard enough. If the only place you're looking is the pages of "Green Lantern", the industry looks abysmal right now. Look to smaller presses (or even lesser known titles by the Big Two), and things look great (from a creative point, at least...not necessarily a financial one). With books such as Chris Ware's "Acme Comic Novelty Library" (collected, in part, in "Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Boy On Earth"), Joe Sacco's "Safe Area Gorazde", Jeff Smith's "Bone", Alex Robinson's "Box Office Poison" (returning soon!) and just about anything by Daniel Clowes, there is still plenty of original...even groundbreaking....work being done today.

Brian Michael Bendis recently stated that now was a great time for comics, as it's the first time in recent memory that writers have had as much control (if not more control) than artists. I couldn't agree more. Although I don't know how long this trend will last, I'm happy just to enjoy the ride for right now.

Creatively, the industry has it's ups and downs. Right now is a pretty high point, in my opinion. Who knows what the next couple of years will bring. Maybe we'll see the return of a huge collector's market that will cause a corresponding decrease in quality once again. But, after a while, this too will fade and be replaced with another group of writers and artists. You've just got to learn to enjoy the highs and search out the few gems during those lows.

jim

This is one of the biggest problems with the industry today. While the average age of comic book fans seems to have increased, the growth and maturity of most books has remained stagnant. So you get an industry that floods the market with books written for the mindset of a 13 year old. Sadly, many of these fans are more than happy to pick up these books, and the industry gets the idea that this is the way to go. There's no progress. Just more big dumb action and soft core porn.

aging geek....
jim

Yeah, there's not much I'm really looking forward to right now. All the good series have dropped in bi-monthly hiatus (or much worse).

Ones I'm still buying (when they come out):

Planetary -- incredible. Just waiting....

Just a Pilgrim -- great miniseries. Second series is just starting. Also a favorite of mine since I won the contest in the first issue and received the script (marked up and everything), and a signed copy of Hitman.

Red Star -- another great story -- when it comes out.

Hellboy -- Never managed to get #2 in the last miniseries. I've finally learned the hard way about waiting for Mignola's TPBs -- he always sticks new stuff in them.

Authority -- may stop buying the individual issues and start picking up the TPBs again, but they're still one of the more interesting books out there.

Punisher -- Ennis is off it, but I'll wait a coupla more issues to see if it stays good.

Negative Exposure -- Interesting Euro import. I'm liking this a lot.

Cowboy Bebop -- different stories from the show. Not bad for the first coupla issues. First manga I've ever bought.

Ministry of Space -- another great one miniseries that Moore has left hanging. It's been at least 4 or 5 months since issue 2.

Bone -- pick up the TPB's from time to time when I have some spare cash.

Liberty Meadows -- great stuff, especially since it'll be all new now.


Miniseries that have been completed/dead series:

War Stories -- really good

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen -- scheduled for another miniseries.

Top Ten -- finished run. Miniseries on Smax scheduled for future.

Astro City -- .......

Tuan Jim

I kinda fell out of comics a few years ago when all of my fave artists started getting bad or became REALLY late with their work. The only things I purchase nowadays are the Hellboy TPBs and I only know about them due to the wonderful Hellboy.com newsletters.

Just wondering, what are the following artists doing now?

Chris Bachalo - His art on Generation X: Age of Apocalypse was some of the most wonderful stuff ever. But after that he started drawing everyone like a pudgy kid and I couldn't stand it.

Aron Weisenfeld - Did he ever do anything after Wolverine/Deathblow?

Dave Johnson - Some wicked backup stories in Wildcats then what?

Travis Charest - After he ended his promising run on Wildcats, I lost track of him.

Does anyone care that Jim Lee will be drawing Detective Comics?

This thread made me a little sad, but I'm part of the "problem" in that my disposable income doesn't go towards many comics these days. There are simply too many other places to spend my money and get more perceived value out of that expenditure.

Any given month, I may pick up 5-10 comics, all depending on who decided to work and put out the comic. I've given up on the mainstays because I can't/won't keep up with continuity that keeps getting re-invented with each new writer/artist team.

I've come to grips with the fact that I'll never get back into comic full-bore like I was 10 years ago. And I'm ok. I used to love going to comic conventions, but I guess I'm jaded, or know that the creators that actually do show up do it not out of love for their craft, but because it's another payday. The business side of the industry depresses me.

The very fact that anyone would cite Kevin Smith as a bright spot in the comics world illustrates aptly why the industry is spiraling downward.

Would you care to explain how in any way Kevin Smith is not a GIGANTIC bright spot for the comic book world, rather than post that with absolutely no explanation[/b]

I'm not a huge fan of his comic book writing, although I have enjoyed Green Arrow so far. But he is one of, if not the best thing going for the industry right now. There are very few creators, you could probably count them on 1 hand that bring amazing buzz & outside of the media attention to comics. Any mainstream comic Smith attaches his name on instantly becomes a best selling book. Brings in thousands of new readers to a title, many of which may stay on that title after he leaves & perhaps even pick up other related books. Again, he is one of a very few creators that can get outside of the media attention ie. Entertaiment weekly, his own website, T.V. interviews etc. So aside from the fact that his writing isn't good enough for you, how is he causing the industry to spiral downward.

Back on topic, contrary to my first post, this year may yet bring some much needed excitement back to the comic book world. By the end of the year we should see Planetery back on track, another League of Extraordinary Gentlemen mini-series, in some form new Authority stories & with Blade & hopefully Spider-Man being successful & the year still being young perhaps some other big surprises.

Kevin Smith's writing is not by any means the best I have read. However, the fact he was writing Green Arrow was enough for me to get the first few issues. Call it curiousity, but anything that brings people into comic is a good thing.

I use to be the same way about guys like Todd McFarland, John Byrne, Peter David, and a few others years ago. I liked their work and would pick up a new series they took over or started just by their name recognition. If Kevin Smith does the same thing I see nothing wrong with it.

I also have to agree that the biggest thing wrong with comics today is the fact they have gotten way too dark and adult oriented. If comics were still written for a 10-15 year old audience I think I would enjoy them more. The increased violence and sexuallity in todays books really doesn't appeal to me. I never minded it so much in some of the independent books, but everyone doing it is a bit much. I can't think of many books I would want my son to read at age seven. When I was seven my mom had subscriptions for me to about 10 different DC and Marvel titles. Granted comics were pretty cheap then. With comics being aimed at a 30 year old audience how will they get new readers? I have run across very few kids reading comics anymore and if they don't get into the hobby as kids I just don't see them getting into as adults. The industry seems to be working pretty hard at putting itself out of business.