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Wednesday, January 11, 2017

DC & MARVEL- I’M JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU



When I was a kid I used to get really excited about Marvel Comics and DC Comics. When I’d see their comics on the rack I’d be filled with anticipation pondering what I wanted t buy.


These days I’m just not into them anymore. I haven’t read an article about either company in months or even considered making a blog or video about either company.


While I still love the medium of comic books and the work of all the great artists in the industry I’m not feeling that passion about superheroes at the Big Two anymore. 


Why can’t I get into Marvel and DC’s superheroes anymore? Plain and simple the big two are just a jumbled mess.


With all the reboots over the past two and a half decades nothing makes sense anymore. I don’t know who is who in either company, and I just can’t follow the storylines anymore. In between the Rebirth at DC and the All-New All-Different Marvel, The superheroes I grew up with no longer exist.


I was a fan of superheroes at the big two since I was four years old. But these days I just don’t feel the same way about either company’s catalog of characters. I was upset about the post New 52 DC in 2011 and All-New All-Different Marvel about a year ago, but these days I just don’t care anymore.


They say there are several stages to grieving the loss of a loved one. And in the last seven years I’ve experienced them all seeing all the superheroes who were my childhood friends pass away in every event and reboot.


 Now I think I’m past them when it comes to the superheroes I grew up with in between the pages of newsprint. I’ve been felt all the feelings anyone could have about the changes of DC’s Rebirth and Marvel’s post Secret Wars universes, and even the Archie reboot. And now I just want to move on.


Have I accepted things? I think so. When I went to the New York Comic Con last year I realized I changed. Sure, I enjoyed the show, but I didn’t have that same excitement I had many years ago when I was emotionally attached to DC and Marvel’s characters. Last year they just didn’t light that same spark inside me like they did when I was a kid. My heart wasn’t into them anymore.


I’ve accepted that the Marvel and DC Superheroes I grew up with are gone for good. And my life is going to go on. I’m looking to move ahead these days, not back.


A long time ago in a ghetto far, far, away I wanted to be a comic book writer. And I’ve come to terms with that dream not coming true because now I see something better for myself in the future. While I was writing Spellbound last year, I saw my writing craft take itself to another level. As I was working on that novel, I found myself exploring new writing techniques, and doing things with storylines and character development I was never able to do with any of the ideas I had planned for comic books. I broke past my creative limitations and now I’m looking to push myself further to the next creative level.


I owe a lot to the characters in the catalogs of Marvel and DC. They were my inspiration for many years. Comics were how I learned how to read and how I learned more about writing. However, now that I’ve mourned the passing of my childhood super friends, I’ve decided that the passion I had for comics could be used to pursue other more constructive things like the fantasy stories I write in the Isis series or Young Adult novels like Spellbound.


These days I’m just not into the superheroes at Marvel and DC anymore. I’m just into other things. It’s not Marvel or DC, it’s just me. 



1 comment:

  1. It's okay to say that you kind of grow out or get tired of what comic books offer you. That's pretty much where I am at now. I only really bother with the superhero movies and TV Shows at this point, because the comics are so loaded with continuity-altering gimmicks so often, and they have this bizarre fixation as the publishers with continuity to the point where somehow characters merging together and whatnot. I mean, come on, this is just more complicated than most comic books should be, and it's pretty stupid.

    -John

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