What is the most reviled comic book era?

[miraclemet]

In my opinion, the era from 1996-2005 offered a lot of strong comics. It wasn't a creatively rich period such as the Silver Age, but there were a lot of different and fun comics. It's one of my favorite periods as a reader and keeper of comics.

 

 

Heroes Reborn with Marvel kicked off in 1996, that was a definite low point.

 

They 90s (at Marvel, DC, Image and more) were the Artist years... who was drawing the comic was FAR more important who wrote the comic, and as a result we got a lot of hyper art, and not a lot of deep storytellling.Marvel and DC tried to woo back artist talent by giving them too much content ownership and we got style over substance.

 

There were some good things in the 90s, Hellboy ('92 and then his own title in '94) Warren Ellis at Wildstorm wrote The Authority, Busiek came up with AstroCity, and Valliant pushed back for writing as key, but these few high points were drowned out by lots of ...

 

The 2000s furthered that psh back with the Writer becoming more and more important. Writers like Bendis, Brubaker etc got to enjoy the fruits from the seeds sewn at Veritgo which took a major writer focus, Image started to move to this as well with writer-centric titles (writer creator, vs artist creator) like Walking Dead (2001) Y the Last Man (2002) and other titles.

[joe_collector]

The Image stuff was a result of those books, so I would group those books as part of the timeframe I called the IE, even if they aren't Image books.

 

I think people give Image too much credit/blame for the 90's, as both Marvel and Valiant were far more responsible for the "Mass Speculation Age" than Image. Image kind of just rode the wave that Marvel created, and Valiant kept going.

 

I can remember Valiant being THE major player at shows, and everyone was running around like mad trying to locate the latest Valiant book, trading *real* comics for pre-Unity Valiants, and the company made up about 1/2 of most Wizard magazines. There was a real Valiant frenzy out there, which a lot of people forget now that the company is gone.

 

I think Dan has a great story about trading Valiant for SA keys, and people were lining up to be fleeced.

[Ken Aldred]

I can find good reading material in all decades, all Ages, so for me it isn't clear-cut.

[miraclemet]

I can find good reading material in all decades, all Ages, so for me it isn't clear-cut.

 

I understand your point for sure, I too can easily point out some great reads from any era.

 

what spurred me to do the poll was someone's assertion that it was widely agreed that the copper age was the most reviled era of comic books (from an investment standpoint, and maybe from a content standpoint), which surprised me (especially the idea that this was a widely held belief).

[NewWorldOrder]

The Modern era for me started when Ultimate Spider-man #1 came out.

 

'92-99 should be named the era that shan't be named.

 

The Ultimate books were great when they came out. Any idea why the whole concept just fizzled out?

 

The house of ideas ran out of them.

 

House of Ideas was born with the Ultimate line and died with it as well.

[joe_collector]

what spurred me to do the poll was someone's assertion that it was widely agreed that the copper age was the most reviled era of comic books (from an investment standpoint, and maybe from a content standpoint), which surprised me (especially the idea that this was a widely held belief).

 

The problem is that some yahoo started bundling the CA with the "mass speculation/art over story" then-Modern period of 1990-91, which is the anathema of what the Copper Age stood for - i.e. story over art, substance over style, writer is king.

[Prince Namor]

The Modern era for me started when Ultimate Spider-man #1 came out.

 

'92-99 should be named the era that shan't be named.

 

The Ultimate books were great when they came out. Any idea why the whole concept just fizzled out?

 

The house of ideas ran out of them.

 

House of Ideas was born with the Ultimate line and died with it as well.

 

The Ultimate line is a rehash of ideas as much as any other. It didn't create anything 'new', it just redid them. It was better written than the usual Marvel rehash, so people thought of it as great.

Realistically, because it wasn't canon, it gave the writers the freedom to do things they couldn't do in the regular books. That's always going to be better than the stagnant garbage they regularly produce.

[JAM_NYC]

The Modern era for me started when Ultimate Spider-man #1 came out.

 

'92-99 should be named the era that shan't be named.

 

The Ultimate books were great when they came out. Any idea why the whole concept just fizzled out?

Ultimatum drove a bunch of fans away, I think. I was pretty much out of comics by the mid 90's, but I've since gone back and read some of the ultimate stuff. Pretty good reads, for the most part. I was enjoying the relaunch of USM with Miles under the mask, but dropped it when I trimmed my pull list. I wouldn't mind picking up some trades...

[Vikingreed]

The Modern era for me started when Ultimate Spider-man #1 came out.

 

'92-99 should be named the era that shan't be named.

 

The Ultimate books were great when they came out. Any idea why the whole concept just fizzled out?

 

New writers came in, and just couldn't match the previous quality on two of the three flagship titles.

 

Once Millar left the Ultimates, it turned to garbage.

Same with Ult X-Men, in my opinion as well.

 

 

And Ultimatum was just awful....

[Kevin.J]

I guess I feel the same as most everyone else, Post-Copper Age was garbage

[COI]

Give me a break, guys; most GA books are unreadable, and the interior art is often atrocious compared to the covers. The dollar signs in your eyes shiny those panels up.

[Prince Namor]

Give me a break, guys; most GA books are unreadable, and the interior art is often atrocious compared to the covers. The dollar signs in your eyes shiny those panels up.

 

Yeah, I'm surprised that more people didn't choose the GA, because the superhero stuff is really... in it's infancy....

[MisterX]

My first thought was the post-Copper age as well, but actually, quite a few good books had the bulk of their runs during this time period.

 

Bone 1991-2004

Hate 1990-1998

Eightball 1989-200

 

The Sandman 1989-1996

Sandman Mystery Theatre 1993-1999

 

I haven't read the next two, but people seem to like them --

 

Transmetropolitan 1997-2002

Starman 1994-2001

 

And lots of great, early Hellboy stuff, too!

[Prince Namor]

My first thought was the post-Copper age as well, but actually, quite a few good books had the bulk of their runs during this time period.

 

Bone 1991-2004

Hate 1990-1998

Eightball 1989-200

 

The Sandman 1989-1996

Sandman Mystery Theatre 1993-1999

 

I haven't read the next two, but people seem to like them --

 

Transmetropolitan 1997-2002

Starman 1994-2001

 

And lots of great, early Hellboy stuff, too!

 

Preacher, Stray Bullets, 100 Bullets...

[Prince Namor]

Monkeyman and O'Brien

[chrisco37]

The Image stuff was a result of those books, so I would group those books as part of the timeframe I called the IE, even if they aren't Image books.

 

I think people give Image too much credit/blame for the 90's, as both Marvel and Valiant were far more responsible for the "Mass Speculation Age" than Image. Image kind of just rode the wave that Marvel created, and Valiant kept going.

 

I can remember Valiant being THE major player at shows, and everyone was running around like mad trying to locate the latest Valiant book, trading *real* comics for pre-Unity Valiants, and the company made up about 1/2 of most Wizard magazines. There was a real Valiant frenzy out there, which a lot of people forget now that the company is gone.

 

I think Dan has a great story about trading Valiant for SA keys, and people were lining up to be fleeced.

 

I wish I had gotten in on the Valiant stuff. It was a crazy time. I was getting $10 credit each for NM 100's from dealers at one show, which I used to pick up a bunch of BA Spidey's.

[kav]

when liefeld started drawing, that's when the reviling started

[ComicConnoisseur]

The Modern Age, which you strangely refer to as "Post-Copper"?

You replied to me, but I didn't say it.

 

If I made the polls, I would have referred to the ages by their actual ages... and leave the scrap metals at home.

1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s.

+1

It`s time to dump the metals.

 

[Jaydogrules]

Copper and "post copper" should be one selection, ie copper/post copper.

 

-J.

 

are you that desperate to be right about your assertion that copper books are the most reviled comic books of all eras?

 

everyone else has made the point, but I'll second it (third? fourth? 15th it?)

 

This comic book...

 

 

is not the same as this comic...

 

 

 

 

just like this comic

 

is not the same as this comic

 

 

*shudder*

 

Absolutely not , I don't need to be "desperate" about anything that happens on these boards. I just don't think the CA was only 7 years long. Is the OP so "desperate" to prove me wrong that he biased the outcome of the poll by shaving 7-10 years off from what is actually the CA?

 

-J.

[Unca Ben]

Give me a break, guys; most GA books are unreadable, and the interior art is often atrocious compared to the covers. The dollar signs in your eyes shiny those panels up.

 

Yet the golden age gave us many of the top comic book artists of all time.

Eisner, Frazetta, Kirby, Wood, Barks, Krigstein, Kurtzman, Toth, and many, many others.

 

Some of the greatest examples of sequential art and storytelling technique were displayed during the golden age.