How I Learned To Love Comics Yet Again

Over in the first installment of his newly-relaunched column "Grim Tidings," blogosphere bad boy Graeme McMillan closes with this thought:

"But you know what? When you forget about the state of the industry and what everyone else is saying and writing and everything, comics can be pretty good after all."

I'd have to say I agree.  For a while I was pretty heavy into the comic news cycle -- mocking solicits; arguing about the problems of the Direct Market; speculating wildly about upcoming storylines.  Then a couple changes in my life necessitated that I adjust my schedule and regular comics blogging was out.  But that doesn't mean that I've stopped reading comics.  If anything, I may be reading even more comics than I was a year ago when I was in full-on blogging mode.  And what's more, I feel as though I'm enjoying more of the comics that I'm reading.  Now, there could be several reasons for this: 

(1) The comics could actually be better. 

(2) I may have gotten smarter in my preordering, avoiding comics that looked likely to annoy me.  (For example, I passed on DC COUNTDOWN TO INFINITE TITLE LENGTH even though it would have only cost me 50 cents through DCBS.) 

(3) Focusing more on the actual comics and less on the behind-the-scenes of the comics industry may have improved my disposition towards comics. 

(4) Not writing about comics on a regular basis may have dulled my critical faculties to the point where a goofy comic about the "Lil' Avengers" entertains me.  (Yes, dammit, I actually enjoyed the first issue of YOUNG AVENGERS as well, although I'll probably wait until the trade hits the library to read the rest of it.) 

I'm guessing the real answer is somewhere along the lines of "all of the above."  But whatever the reason, it is refreshing to experience those moments where your comic-loving soul feels revitalized.  I felt that way last week when I looked over at the stack of read comics that had been piling up beside my bed and realized that I was batting nearly a thousand:  Almost everything I'd read recently was good.  Planetes ended strongly, with with some very nice bits about the Most Powerful Force in the universe (yeah, it is what you're probably guessing but it worked, surprisingly) and not giving up despite the frequent stupidity and pointlessness of life.  Daisy Kutter was a fun little romp in the Western-with-robots genre, with wonderfully loose art from Kazu Kibuishi.  Scary Godmother: Spooktakular Stories was a silly, surreal, spooktakular (couldn't resist) delight, with lively, playful black-and-white art from the always-great Jill Thompson (really looking forward to the upcoming Dead Boy Detectives manga by Thompson).  Thousand Faces was an engrossing Western horror story with gorgeous art from Marc Malès (my only complaint would be that the story ends abruptly in midstream with no second volume announced yet).  And Epileptic I finished months ago but I keep returning to it to immerse myself in the incredible artwork.  And that's not even counting all the manga (Prince of Tennis, Whistle, Berserk (which I've been enjoying much more than I would have ever guessed based on the first two volumes; I guess all those fans who told me things get more interesting in the "Golden Age" arc were right after all)) I've been checking out from the library.  Yeah, there aren't any superhero comics in that list, but given the overall "grim 'n' gritty" direction both DC and Marvel seem to be moving towards (again), I just haven't been that interested in superhero stories lately.  But that's fine, because as the list above shows, there's plenty of stuff other than superheroes to satisfy my comics cravings.  Besides, I should have plenty of Seven Soldiers comics arriving any time now and after the #0 issue I'm content to ignore what's going on in the "real" DCU and just enjoy what Morrison's doing off in his own corner.

So if you find yourself worn out by all of the crass, cynical events that seem to be dominating the Big Two's output lately, maybe it's time to look beyond the mainstream publishers for your sequential art entertainment needs.  I'm not saying you have to give up superhero comics completely (heck, I'm still enjoying Spider-Man/Human Torch and She-Hulk), but if you're not getting any enjoyment out of the series you've been collecting for years, maybe it's time to try something different for a change.  Who knows?  You may be pleasantly surprised by what you discover.