Disclaimers like the one at the start of this video always make me so sad because they make it clear that the video creator has gotten a bunch of insane attacks over some banal, low-stakes opinions on a past video.
Dang.. Really getting "sad" because someone on the internet had an opinion that didn't 100% align with yours and the content creator? "Insane attacks"? Or just unwanted discourse? If you are going to have an online persona, and be an opinionated content creator.. you better be ready to hear some contrary viewpoints. Honestly, I have not ever seen anything that could be remotely described as an "insane attack" in the comments of this channel. When did everyone get so soft that people disagreeing & commenting to their publicly made & self promoted opinions on the internet made you get "so sad".
TBH, it can’t be helped; it’s the internet after all Plus, if he would’ve blamed the “diversity” as the cause of modern comics failing I’m sure an entirely different vocal minority of people would be screaming at him; arguably louder too
I generally break things down like this: Iron Age - 1985/1986 (Crisis, Dark Knight Returns) to 1996 (Marvel bankruptcy, Heroes Reborn) Diamond Age - 1997-2011 (Diamond becomes primary distributor to Flashpoint) Silicon Age - 2011 to present (new 52, Avengers redefines superheroes as movies over comics) One could also argue that Diamond age lasts until 2020 when COVID finally broke Diamond’s monopoly.
My breakdown is the following: -1985-1995: The Copper Age, beginning with Crisis on Infinite Earths until the burst of the speculation bubble. -1995-1999: The Dark Age, beginning with the crash until Marvel Knights, Ultimate Marvel and more experimental books like Milligan's X-Force/X-Statix. -1999-2012: The Modern Age, when what affects to the movies affects to the comics at the time and viceversa, hence the crossovers, continuity rewrites, reboots and some edgy stuff for the sake of it. During that time, The New 52 and Marvel Now happened. -2012-present: The Diverse/Digital Age. Beginning with the launch of Saga at Image and with the MCU already established. That's just me.
I like the names. I don't quite buy 2005 as the cutoff for the modern age. I'd probably go with Ultimate Spider-Man #1, because that was a major written for the trade comic, and that changed the market and how complex stories could be. It became a norm for comics to be available in print (or at least digitally.) It also established a vogue for widescreen/ cinematic storytelling. 2005 also didn't mark any serious new creators. The biggest writers of the era (Bendis, Millar, BKV, Geoff Johns) were already established.
What about this definition: "The modern age is the artist in the driver seat, not the company any more". The end of "house styles", artists had the choice to work at Marvel/DC or self publish with more and more influential comic companies such as Fantagraphics, Dark Horse, Image, etc. Artists got free reign over established comic book series (as Frank Miller with Daredevil). Kirby tried this in 1970 when he created his 4th World Universe, but DC quickly interfered, changing Superman's look and canceling the New Gods.
Comic book discussions post-The Avengers (2012) are relegated to recap videos on TH-cam ("What if the Avengers had irritable bowel syndrome?"), "Top 10 things you should know about" lists on whatever site is the first result when you google a particular character, skimming through the introduction of Wikipedia pages, and old people complaining about changes to characters even though the last comic they've ever read was a Monica's Gang almanac in the 80's
For some reason the second you brought up having to do research to find out what's going on in Swamp Thing continuity, a like parasitic growth of a thought just rapidly expanded and developed in my mind of that one meme of the feller yelling at his golden retriever pissing all over the floor, except in place of him it's Swamp Thing yelling at the dog.
I would say the modern era began with the release of the first Toby McGuire Spiderman movie and the Ultimate Universe. It brought back Marvel into the mainstream and comics seemed to take a big artistic turn that seems very different from anything before. Love the videos!
I resist the idea of defining comic ages by non-comic media. They are significant, for sure, but it should still be the comic event that is used to anchor the age. Otherwise it's not about the comic, but about the culture at large.
@@residentgrigo4701 The term "wide-screen" comics was first used to describe Bryan Hitch's artwork for The Authority which preceded the movies and the first Ultimate comics.
This is what got me seriously into comics as a teenager. Prior to ultimate comics and the spidey movie I was just your typical kid who was aware of and liked super heroes
Very good overview. I mostly agree, but rather than “optional tie-ins” I think it would be best to describe (Big Two) comics as a testbed for ideas to use in the movies. Most of the ideas Marvel experimented with in the 2010s found their way into the films very quickly.
I was getting into comics around 2006-2007. I had a job at a call center and a group of friends who would along w/ me buy a few issues each of each of different stuff and pass them around. The second I wasn't working there anymore I fell off of superhero comics (was around when Secret invasion was starting up). Without my network of reading buddies, there was no way in hell I would keep up with everything coming out and tying into the events. It's too much to keep up with.
I think 2008 could be considered the start of the “Modern” Age with the start of the MCU and the phenomena of movies replacing comics as the primary drivers behind the story continuity of the characters. Seems like the late 90s and 2000s were the industry recovering enough to get to that point.
One while I don't always agree with you I love your insight and views. I may often disagree but it makes me reevaluate my opinion. So let me say something that will make you reevaluate what you've said. Who said you're not a scholar. You may not home a degree in literature, art, business, or comics but you do the research, take the time, and put your work out there in the public door scrutiny. You sir are a scholar and your work is much appreciated and quite frankly I think more people need to go about and reevaluate the aging dates, names and even periods and add sub periods to them. You did that. So thank you for your scholarly work I enjoyed it and thought it was well done
I agree with this conceptually but I would slide the dates around ever so slightly. The Bronze age starting with Alan Moores run on Swamp Thing and TMNT in 84 sounds pretty perfect to me though. I also find this through the original Vertigo comics period to be my personal "golden age".
I think overall you nailed the broader points here, and in that respect I thank you for what you brought up ESPECIALLY in regards to the source material and how little it is brought up (and imo respected) by both “fans” and creators of the shows/films. For both it’s a complete afterthought and who knows what will happen with the now seemingly inevitable crash of the Superhero Movie
As a music fan first and comic fan second, I thank you for piquing my curiosity with your closing line and opening a rabbit hole that seems perfectly tailored to my interests and preferences
The modern era is the only era I was actively a part of the comics community, so it is the only one I have experienced first hand in the moment, but it really feels like it has some of the highest highs, but also the lowest lows. As someone who studied literature for a while in college and really love modernist writing, some of the high concept stuff like Sandman, Miracleman, Swamp Thing, Flex Mantello, Morrison's Doom Patrol, and the like really really speak to me.
If you haven't already you should check out Lucifer (2000), Immortal Hulk (2018), Mister Miracle (2017), and even though I'm sure you've read it I'll say Watchmen because everyone should read it at least once or twice
Love this guy’s videos. I feel like he’s a true fan and treats the subject matter with a lot of respect. Comic books are a special form of literature and to discount them as childish or ignore them for what you get from tv and movies is a disservice to the material. Long live comics ❤
I would argue that when comics started being written in order to more directly appeal to the much larger film audiences would be a good delineation for the modern age.
While TMNT didn't break into the pop culture until the cartoons, it's impact within the comics medium almost immediate. Infinite Crisis may have rebooted DC continuity but was as inconsequential to the the medium as Secret Wars or any other marketing crossover. The reality is Crisis didn't change anything about comics. I would say either Turtles or maybe the Dark Knight were the fundamental crossing over into a new era. I would also contend that the GIJoe series was a major factor in the new era of comics as they were the first comics for most people of the era.
It was the summer before I started High School when Frank Millers Dark Knight Returns was put out. It was the first time (to my knowledge) that a comic book event was discussed in mainstream media. It was the first time I read a NYTimes literary Book review of a graphic novel. It felt like something huge was happening. Honestly, its been downhill ever since!
Great editorial! This is something that I've thought about and researched a bit in my own time and I have my own thoughts/definitions that I'd like to get down if you care to read about them. Like your disclaimer, agree or disagree with anything I say! I'd say the last 30 years should be broken up in three periods: The Dark/Maturing Age (1985-1996/1998), The Revamp/Revival Age (1998-2011/2012), and our current age, The Digital Age (2011 onward). The Dark Age, I mostly define not as a mark of quality or subjective sentiment but more as an attitude and trend. Stories during this time were largely getting darker or taken more seriously (by their writers mostly). More mature themes or elements were being introduced into the medium as it expanded out in the market. Characters were retooled to resemble nothing like how they did only a couple years previously as speculation around certain titles grew higher and higher until that bubble burst. I thought about the end of this marker being Marvel's bankruptcy but what I find consistent with other ages is that it's not marked off by the end of something but the introduction or beginning of something that ushers in a new trend. With the Golden Age, it was the introduction of Superman, with the Silver Age, it's the reintroduction of the Flash, Marvel's resurfacing as a legitimate player in the medium and the general trend of superheroes mixing with science-fiction concepts. With the Bronze Age, it's the expansion of the medium with more genres and creator-driven works like high fantasy (Conan, Elfquest, Marvel and DC's horror and supernatural titles, etc.). And with the mid-80s, you introduce more mature storytelling with things like Watchmen and the Dark Knight Returns as well as wholly independent works like TMNT. So going back to my preferred mark-off point, I say mark it at 1998 with the introduction of Marvel Knights, an imprint that is brought about by Marvel attempting to recuperate from its bankruptcy by revamping their characters in a way that can bring in new readers through a more "back-to-basics" approach as well as bringing in new but established talent from more independent backgrounds or coming from other mediums to do so (Bendis, Quesada, Kevin Smith, Paul Jenkins, etc). This trend of a back-to basics revamp as well as being more conscious of comics as potential for film franchising will quickly dominate the next period. The Revamp/Revival Age is, I think, largely defined by the Big Two, as well as companies like Image, treating their books as proving grounds for expansion into other mediums and a driving trend of digestible, recognizable, back-to-basics approaches to stories and characters, while leaving some room for experimentation and toying with genre conventions. You see books getting revamped or retooled to be easy to jump on through recognizable line-ups (Kurt Busiek's Avengers, Grant Morrison's JLA, Jeff Loeb on Superman, alongside Marvel bringing back cancelled books during their Heroes Return comeback with books like Captain America, Incredible Hulk, Fantastic Four, etc). Marvel will take this even further with the Ultimate Universe imprint as a way to allow newcomers to read modern updates of classic characters that could be easily adapted into potential films. You see more radical attempts at revamps in the pursuit of jumping off points with things like 2001's New X-Men and JMS' run on Spider-Man, as well as Bendis taking over Daredevil and Garth Ennis on Punisher. Meanwhile, companies like Image focus more on diversifying their line-up with more genres. Back to the Big Two, stories were written to be a little more broader, not necessarily sacrificing continuity but with less hang-ups in order to prepare them for larger company-wide shake-ups through more events, which will lead to status-quo shifts for a couple years and then an inevitable revert. These events are categorized as big, epic, cinematic pieces that aren't too dense in their main issues and instead specific details are left to tie-in issues. Also going along with the idea that this era is defined by revivals of classic characters and concepts, nostalgic callbacks and pastiches are popular (Loeb/Sale's Marvel Color series, Infinite Crisis as a sequel to the original Crisis on Infinite Earths, All-Star Superman, Batman R.I.P., Geoff John's Superman, Dan Slott's She-Hulk, etc.), characters that were considered dead or out of action would be brought back in their most iconic state (Hal Jordan, Barry Allen, Supergirl, Brainiac) or retooled to fit modern tastes (Bucky Barnes as an aged-up super soldier, Jason Todd as a revenge-driven antagonist, Robin as a child sidekick and son of Batman, etc.). All this would dominate the 2000s until the plan for franchising would finally take hold in the early 2010s with superhero films fully dominating the cinema landscape especially in 2012 as that summer season was dominated by Marvel, achieving great success with their cinematic universe and Disney's investment after buying the company in 2009 as recognition for their value as an engine for Intellectual Property, paying off with The Avengers and The Amazing Spider-Man, while DC, after rebooting their universe for the New 52 in 2011 in order to have their books line-up better for film franchise potential, cap off their successful Nolan trilogy with the Dark Knight Rises and preparing their own cinematic universe for the following year in 2013 with Man of Steel. The next following era, our current one, is one that's defined by comics going fully mainstream. The Digital Era is still on-going but I'd say defined by full recognition by larger media companies as powerful engines for intellectual property generation and the industry pushing diversification and opportunities for mainstream attention. Now I don't say that second bit as a condemnation, far from it actually. I use diversification to define not just creative-driven efforts for further representation but also diversification of accessibility and media. Manga has now fully crossover into North American markets which allows for greater mainstream attention into the medium from a different cultural lens. Trade paperbacks have become the preferred way to read comics and allows for the medium to expand into different outlets like traditional bookstores. Digital comics such as webcomics have also been embraced as a legitimate expression of the medium. And there is also a greater push for representation of marginalized or specific groups into the traditional superhero genre with characters like Kamala Khan and Miles Morales largely accepted by mainstream audiences thanks in part to appearances in other media like animated shows, films, high profile video games, and live-action adaptations. Comic events have a greater self-awareness for franchise entry potential and capitalize on that front accordingly through synergetic practices of using familiar characters from films and implanting elements that originally came from those films into the comics, to varying degrees of success. More can be written about the many elements of our current era but you get the picture and all I'll say is that there's a lot to like about our current state of comics and a lot to not like. But I think it's far cry to say we're reaching some final endpoint anytime soon, rather more likely we'll just be due for a new era to take hold, probably very soon. Always remember keep reading comics!
Thank you, that was an excellent analysis. I remember I was just a freshman in High School in 1986, and at my local comic specialty shops, you simply never saw girls, only guys. By the early 1990s, this started changing I noticed more graphic arts and fashion design students (many of them women) browsing in comic shops, and the increase in "toys", souvenirs, costumes, VHS/DvD products taking up more space. By early 2000s, forget it, comic shops became tourist traps, with every demographic (gender, age, ethnic, race, preference) seen browsing. Frankly I had long lost interest in the medium as the quality since the mid 1980s had declined to pure trash in my opinion.
I loved what what was said about the relationship that modern age comics have to movie adaptations and totally agree. It seems that for the last decade comic book movies have dominated the conversation around and creation of comics, for better and for worse. Other defining features of the modern age that I personally would add are the accessibility of digital comics (reading comics on a smart device), how social media has shaped comics, and the rise of web comics/social media comics. There are a lot of web comics doing very interesting things with the medium, and a lot of cute newspaper type comics being posted daily by authors on social media. Great video!
Excellent video. I wish we could come up with a better term for the "Bronze Era", but it's hard to think of another name to best describe it. That time frame of 1985-1995 was a very good time for comics.
I forget exactly when I found it but the end of comics in the 90s happened with a specific cover. We had so many gimmick covers. Anything from holo, embossed, foil, and more. Then this one. There was a Marvel comic named Sleepwalker. It had a (October?) issue with a gimmick cover. What was it? Well, it had a cardstock cover with the characters face. And that face? Well it had perforations and punch outs so kne could destroy the comic to have the face of Sleepwalker as a Halloween mask. Yup ... that is about that.
I like these names and timelines. They feel right. Part of me wants to draw a mine around 2011, 12 because that feels like a moment of change in the industry as mainstream super popularity hit with the MCU and everything started to feel like a reaction to that. Either piggybacking off the success or trying to differentiate from it. There was also a second boom of indy comics spear headed by some big names. Saga being the one that comes most readily to mind. Ive also always made jokes about "the leather age" being the post Fox Xmen movies and Ultimates era for a other material term. Ive heard The Adamantium Age be thrown around a lot denoting the rise of the anti hero character and maybe copper age evokes to much similarity to bronze. Or maybe thats the point. 12:25 even as a higher than normal fan, this is where i find myself now, especially with marvel. The success of the MCU has lead to changing the comics to confrom and maintain corporate synergy and its lead to me just having no idea whats going on. DC fares a little better that their titles stand on their own more for better or worse but that might just be limited to their high profile ones.
I also like to think of 2011, 12 as the cutoff. Rise of Aveners movie, Man of Steel, Flash Point going into the New 52, where evey book does renumber at 1, and Secret Wars ending the Ultimate Universe. It's a big year that comes with lots of huge changes.
Much like how the dark age started with a non-comic event (Marvel’s bankruptcy), I would say the modern age started with the first Iron Man movie. Like you had said, there was a massive shift in the industry where comics became vehicles for intellectual property rather than characters. That is a massive change to the face of the comics industry that we still feel today.
Hoh! A late night video? What a welcome surprise. The Copper Age also gave us Abslom Daak! One of, not the most, violent individuals that the Doctor has encountered and befriended (?)
I understand event fatigue. But I love as how you are saying "it was a mess", I am seeing Infinite Crisis, 52, Final Crisis, and Blackest Night. And I am thinking that was good, that was great, that was good, and that was great. I miss my pre-flashpoint DC.
very interesting and well reasoned perspective. the older the era, the more readily the points you can assign them to begin or end. Action Comics #1 in 1938 certainly started the Golden Age, and Showcase #4 in 1956 started the Silver Age. I feel the Death of Gwen Stacey in ASM #121 in 1973 was the end of the Silver Age, the transition to the Bronze Age being more of a maturation than hard line. As for the Modern Era, the framework of eras i've thought of it as Crisis on Infinite Earths as being the closing chapter of the Silver-Bronze Age, and the Dark Age (or Iron Age) starting with the one-two hits of Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns in 1986, and the prevalence of edge-lordy copycats in the years after that. while Marvel's bankruptcy feels like a good demarcation of eras, i feel like it as the harbinger of the end of that Dark era, not the actual breaking point. Around 2000 was when i noticed a shift in more retro tone, continuity fixations, reboots and recontextualizations of older stories, which i've heard others dub the Mercury Age, for harkening back to many Silver Age concepts, and for it's fluidity of continuities. we may have already left that Mercury Age and entered a Celluloid Age, where comics as ancillary to the larger IP management and sourcing for more profitable movies, TV and video games. If 2010s-2020s are the end of one age or the beginnings of another, we won't know for sure until we are towards the end of Sixth Age, whatever its metallurgical designation it may be assigned.
I’d be curious what you consider some of the highlights of the modern age? Are there any comics that rise above that feeling of just being intellectual property? Is there anything that approaches the heights of Alan Moore’s Swamp thing or Sandman? I’ve only been in the comics for about five years but I tend to gravitate to the late 80s and early 90s. Primarily because I like the old school approaches to art before the computer completely took over.
I would add a mention to the rise of variant covers taking such a high percentage of comic sales being a huge shift in comic publishing. Where the cover, and the rarity of said cover, being more important than the actual contents on the issue. Speculators are only interested in the rarity of the variant cover and what grade it can get then in whatever is contained between the front and back covers.
Its a good rundown in a short time. I think people look at a 40 minute video and get intimidated, but a video around 10 minutes will get watched. Good video!
Bronze and Copper Age. Frank Miller and Alan Moore's stories feel like The Bronze Age of Comics still kept going. They are not a part of the edgy Grimdark Era of Comics. And have nothing to do with the edgy comic book era. Rob Liefeld is the one who truly began the Edgy era of Comics. Whose storylines are filled with style but without any substance or awareness. That's a critique to many critics and fans are known for. Frank Miller, Alan Moore, and Neil Gaiman were a part of the Copper Age. Taking influences from Dennis O'Neil, Chris Claremont, Len Wein (RIP), and Neal Adams. The second Bronze Age. Or maybe, a continuation of the Bronze Age of Comics. The Bronze Age truly ended once the Rob Liefeld aesthetic and trend was introduced.
Thank you for this. I think it was wise to define the eras by market and pop culture milestones rather than stylistic shifts in the medium. Seems like a more concrete method. I also appreciate you given a well rounded view of the modern age. I've had people become extremely defensive when I point out what I see as problems in the current era of comics, going so far as to call me a grifter and chicken little. It actually happened enough I started to feel like maybe I was crazy and imagining problems in some near perfect era. Having someone clearly lay out the good and the bad without judgment makes me feel more sure of my own takes. So thanks again.
I think you're spot on. I also think BOTH Superman #75 and Marvel filing for bankruptcy can be the bookend of that era; I don't think it has to be either/or. Excellent work as always! Love your channel :)
Another great video. Jemas, in my opinion, deserves his own age. Whatever you think of the man, he did something completely different. I'd call the current age the Meme age-shallow stories propped up by corporate ownership. The numbers you posted from the 90s are still better than they are now, BTW.
I think people are over-stating the impact of Ultimate Marvel. It did have an impact for its time but it was to a large extent highly astroturfed. Ultimate Spider-Man contrary to belief charted at 15-18 position on Comichron in its first few months. Jemas came up with the idea of pushing Ultimate Spider-Man and Ultimate X-Men into retail stores like Payless and Walmart where the titles sold at a loss but made a splash in mainstream exposure. Even then, the Postal Statements show that Ultimate Spider-Man peaked in its first two years (much of which was inflated) and declined steadily after that. It's ballyhooed feat of outselling Amazing Spider-Man's flagship was basically only true for a brief time and only for issues with Ultimate Venom (sigh). Ultimate Marvel was important in popularizing decompression, Bendis especially, but decompression is adapting manga influences and the real story is the manga influence and dominance of US charts.
Excellent video. At the risk of kicking a beehive, I'd love to hear your take on the way that representational politics have become a sticking point in recent years with the publishers pushing for more diversity in gender/sexuality/race/body types, etc. and different kinds of people having very different reactions to it, almost over and above anything that actually happens in those comics. For me, I almost think of it as a "Progressive/Woke Age of Comics," spurred on by the events of the 2016 election in the United States, but I don't know yet which works (if any) will last the test of time and which will just fizzle out.
Over 3/4 of the post millennial stuff was going woke before 2016 happened. Trump getting elected just exposed them all for the mentally deranged ideologues they always were.
Great video. I agree with everything you had to say except for Infinite Crisis being the starting point of the modern age. There is a lot of reasons to argue for it, but on the flipside Avengers Disassembled fits better. For one, it started the trend of yearly cycles and with Bendis' handling of New Avengers, he showed how to build stories and marketing between the yearly cycles. Most of the events spawned by Avengers Disassembled influenced Feige's movies and all later Marvel and DC events. I think DiDio and Geof Johns were influenced by it in how they approached Infinite Crisis. Finally, Avengers Disassembled made sure previous approaches to event cycles stuck. I wish Infinite Crisis was the one that influenced this trend, but unfortunately it was Avengers Disassembled. All important comics had to drop what they were doing and focus on the event. Now that events are yearly, this is something that has to happen more often making it difficult to follow comic runs. This was thanks to Avengers Disassembled, not Infinite Crisis. Now, the reasons Infinite Crisis should be considered the start of this is the symmetry you mentioned. It also encouraged DC to take the hatchet to its continuity on a regular basis, but this is just a DC thing, Marvel has never destroyed its continuity the way DC does. As annoying as it is, it does give fans several entry points into comics. Finally, DC tends to be more conservative in how often they have events, and don't disrupt comics with tie-ins like Marvel tends to. Honestly, I wish Infinite Crisis was the one to set the industry standard on this one where it produced high quality limited run tie-ins instead of disrupting stories to focus on the event.
I also think method of distribution also has to be talked about when defining ages. Where the books are sold, the rise of trade paperbacks, and obviously dugital distribution.
I'll tell you what brought me back to comics...it is reading digital comics in VR glasses (such as Meta Quest). It's an immersive experience and it matches well with the visuals. The problem is the format difference between a printed comic book page and the image in the goggles. This is also an issue with cell phone comics reading and if I had to make a bet, I would bet on the format being the next big age in comics (as in the layout and art designed to be read on a cell phone).
That all-purpose in-house music drop you deploy at the start of the video that signifies authority and something weighty is hilarious. Wherever you found it, it's an inspired choice. I notice you've used it specifically only when it pertains to something mock serious and pysdo-important. Your tongue's firmly in the cheek of fluent sarcasm. It now has that trigger effect of anticipation as soon as I hear that first Dun-Dun musical cue, I'm already laughing.
I feel there should be something about the rise of manga as a competitor and other source of inspiration and the rise of Image to take the second spot in sales as place that may be points for different comic eras, or sub eras, in the modern age.
I actually became a comic book collector because of Crisis on Infinite Earths. I'd casually read the occasional book for my entire life up until 1985, when I turned 18; but I was curious enough about the story taking place in Crisis to start reading it regularly. That lead to my reading other DC comics on a weekly basis, and I was hooked. I became a hardcore comic book geek for about the next four or five years, though my obsession transitioned into animation and movies by the 1990s. IMy interest in buying and keeping up with comics dwindled as mainstream comics were gutted by the speculator era, giving a huge number of comics I simply wasn't interested in. I stopped reading comic books regularly around the time Alan Moore left mainstream comics...probably not a coincidence...and DC killed Superman and destroyed Green Lantern at the same time. I decided, "This really isn't worth it," and stopped buying comic books regularly. I've followed mainstream comics casually since the 1990s, but the only comics I went out of my way to get were Alan Moore's return to the mainstream with the America's Bet titles and Supreme, and the second and third Mage series. I'm a guy with a lot of nostalgia for the comics of the 1980s, because I was there when it happened. That's what attracted me to this channel, but the intelligent discussions of comics here definitely made me a subscriber here.
This video seems like a updated version of your Holograms and Glow in the Dark Doom video from a couple years ago. Both even have black suit Spider-Man on the thumbnails, which I'm guess was intentional lol. Your look on the Speculator Era was the video got me interested in your channel and I've been watching since.
I would define the recent years like this. From 1986-2011 is the Dark Age as this is when comics were starting to become all dark and gritty. The publication of the Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen is the start of this age. And the start of DC's New 52 ends this era. And from 2011 to today is the modern age. Maybe we'll call it the Copper Ages or the Cinematic Age or the Heroic Age later.
Yeah, I totally get the frustration over the barrier to entry. I've been reading a long time, but I gave up on monthly series a long time ago. Now I wait until the trade paperback of an arc is published, and get that. It's rarely 100% of the story, but it's usually close enough, and has the meatiest part. For the most part, however, I've given up on superhero comics. I'm building up my collections in other areas, like filling in back issues of Conan, Groo and Usagi Yojimbo, or exploring other areas and publishers altogether, like Archaia with Mouse Guard, and fun limited runs like BOOM!'s Coda. And that's in no small part influenced by the fatigue of trying to follow a story line in superhero comics.
I've been a long time follower of both American and European Disney Comics and those have a lot of really clever ideas and fun adventures in them (if you like Donald Duck)
I'd like to hear your thoughts in a video on whether the constant restarting has hindered or helped the big two. Is it easier to jump into a new series like the new Incredible but then get lost figuring out if Immortal comes before Indestructible or Incredible Vol. whatever?
I would date the start of the Copper Age a little bit earlier than Crisis. I would date it to the moment when DC restarted New Teen Titans and Legion of Superheroes as titles for the direct market primarily. That was the beginning of the end of the newstand and one way to think about the Copper Age is as the last age of spinner rack comics: the last period when comics were part of the mass market and capable of attracting new readers. I grew up in a small town an hour from a comic shop and bought all my favorite titles off the spinner rack. The Baxter paper restart of Titans and Legion as titles available only in comic shops was disenchanting for me, since those were my very favorite titles. Even as a 12 year old, I understood the move as the beginning of the end of comics as I'd known them till then: as a ubiquitous entertainment accessible to normies with a wider range of interests, as opposed to a collector's item for an ever-contracting and involuted niche of geeks.
I'd like to think a newer age started around 2011, not just because of the New 52 but it was also the time when the Comic Code Authority lost any and all weight with digital comics and services. Maybe when apps became the go-to means of reading comics as well, especially when sharing on social media became the go to budget friendly means of praising comics. Flawed as that was with how... less said the better. Maybe where crowdfunding comes in as well. I don't know where it ends but I always thought a good name was the Silicon Age of Comics.
Great vid; I love stuff like this. It's somewhat arbitrary, but an interesting thought experiment to try and wrestle a logical solution over. I would shift things up, slightly, starting with 1986 as the beginning of the Modern Era; you have Dark Knight, Watchmen, Batman: Year One, John Byrne's Man of Steel, Perez's Wonder Woman, Daredevil Born Again, Dark Horse launching with Dark Horse Presents, X-Men becoming a franchise of multiple connected books with Mutant Massacre and The Punisher getting his first solo mini-series. This was a time when comics more aggressively attempted to reflect and comment on the real world, hence The Modern Era (even though indies or creator-owned works had been doing it for year prior). From there you could go many ways; The Direct Market Era, The Gimmick Era/Speculator Era, The Post-Speculator/Crash Era and the mostly current Post-Modern Era or Contemporary Era, which are just catch-alls for a period of time that's too close to us to be able to identify a consistent, cohesive through-line of ideological direction that is dominating the comics medium. That's just some alternate ideas; not better or worse than the ones covered in the vid, just different.
I basically look at the previous "modern age" of entertianment; comics, collectibles, video games, movies, anime, etc, as being from the mid 70s up to the mid 2010s. SO basically from roughly 1975-2015. THe late 1970s began to bring the world a plethora of great stories in various mediums: Anime began to get more widespread attention, though it was still not mainstream in the west as it would one day be; cartoons were gaining ever more traction slowly but surely, comics were becoming more nuanced and mature, and film franchises that would span the genres from fantasy, to horror, and sci fi and beyond would start taking off from that point onward. Everything starts slow, but basically once even the "Early days" of console gaming had come and gone, the landscape was strewn with good stuff all around, and much of it all kept getting better over time. SO even in that great time period from the end of the "hipipe days" of the 70s, to the decline of gangsta rap and eerie all encompasing power of souless pop music by the mid 2010s, the middle 1980s to the middle 2000s was to myself and many I have spoken to...the "High Era" of all such things and more. IT more hits all around and great stuff than in any other time period. And since we can look back on the vast majority of written history, its pretty easy to see why is is indeed easy to come to that conclusion. Everything from the NES, the TMTN, the darker Batman comics, other cool and "manly" guy stuff in toys, cartoons, action movies, video games getting better and better year after year, and all the collectibles and pop culture that still holds sway over out hearts to this day...Maybe that was the "modern age". But everything after 2014 ish would then have to be the "post modern" age, aka...The Future. :P BUT WHERES MY HOVERBOARD? T
Thinking in terms of waves, we can mark out Ultimate Spider-Man #1 as a wave origin. This "ultimate marvel wave" not only contains the ultimate comics and their influence and offshoots into the main marvel continuity but also the marvel movies. It was the more grounded approach aiming at a realisim and relatability lost over the course of the 80ties and 90ties that made it possible to make these movies work. This is also a candidate to explain why marvel movies succeeded but DC movies failed. There never was anything that did for DC what Ultimate did for Marvel. And as the movies moved away from this core more and more, they began to fail more, to feel less unified and in this way, they mimic what happened to comics when the cultural force of a wave starts to fade. Compared to this the "event comics" wave is really secondary and it is also much longer, as the patter is really unbroken at least since Crisis/SW. Much more prevalent is the "reboot" wave, driven purely by economic concerns. This has done a lot to radically change the way comics books are created and consumed and is itself an offshoot of the ultimate->movies wave.
While Infinite Crisis was my first thought for the Modern Age demarcation at the video's start, I think ~2011-2012 works much better (especially as I was imagining a single demarcation and not two). Reason being, that was when the New 52 relaunch happened and The Avengers released in theaters. The rise of the MCU, for better or worse, has been the single most noteworthy comic happening in decades after all.
I would call the most recent period the "Cinematic" age due tot he increased influence of films on comics, but that would track it back to the first "Blade" film as its starting point, which doesn't quite mesh up with the rest.
I'm still newish to your channel and i didn't know you were a klf fan 😮😀 got to teach and everything you learn will point to the fact that time is eternal! Hail Eris
This age should be the Iron Age because so many creators (like a blacksmith) are being funded by fans who are allowing creators to create so in a way it is indirect building, and in a way they are both (blacksmiths) creators - though really they (the fans) are really only suplliers they do decide what gets built and so the artist are the builders of their individual works but the fans teh builders of the medium. Its like the fans are building the bookshelves the artist books are on.
I presume you're differentiating "The Copper Age" from what is commonly called the "Grim and Gritty Era", as noted by the omission of The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen. So much has been said about these two that I don't have to say any more, other than to note that *despite their creators' intentions*, they gave birth to several years' worth of "grim and gritty" comics that became stereotypes of the modern era: huge muscles and mammaries, lots of graphic violence, and "crossovers" that were the forerunners of the "event" comics of the modern eras. I would argue the Mutant Massacre was a prime example of this, as its sole purpose was to slaughter a large number of characters and generate sales.
Can you imagine if the Twilight or Harry Potter books were ignored the same way comics are? The fact that the most popular properties on earth are superheroes and yet the source material is only noticed by a minute audience is telling in just how out-of-step the industry is with potential readers.
Way different circumstances. Super Hero movies are not straight forward adaptations and they were in pop culture via TV shows, serials, etc for decades prior
@@nohbuddy1 But shouldn't the fact that the comics are new stories about beloved characters make comics even more enticing than straight adapted material? I guess I just personally don't understand how the correlation between the movies and comics seems so weak. I try to ask some people why they don't try comics and they usually say they don't know the correct entry point. Like on tv serials people start from episode 1 and watch til the series concludes. But of course comic super heroes never conclude, and starting on issue one means reading comics from the golden and silver age that are practically hieroglyphics to modern readers. I think maybe coming out with full stories in nice hardcovers, sold in Wal Marts and stuff, complete with advertising and hype might help. It would make it clear to an audience they are getting a complete story, and that it's the 'hot new product' (not repackaged material from long ago, which most people seem biased against). But who knows really... I guess I just take it a little personally that my favorite medium is ignored in favor of adaptations of the same ideas.
The Superhero Movies and TV Shows are now losing money due to its insistence of going straight to characters and stories from the last 15 years, that failed in the comics, instead of using the source material from its inception!
I'm evolving on the whole era thing. I think the accepted Golden, Silver and Bronze delineations as fine for general references. Beyond this, subdividing the modern age, which may prove inevitable, seems inherently subjective and prone to cause more discussion (debate and argument) than serve as a useful tool. That's a value judgment which is, itself, subjective. For instance, my partner suggested referring to the time since the MCU began as the multimedia age, which comic characters stretched beyond comics and across several media. My counterargument being that comics have long stretched across multiple mediums from Superman and Batman movies in the 40s and Superman again in 50s television to Adam West's Batman as a legitimate cultural phenomenon on par with the Beatles in the 60s and back to Superman again in the late 70s. I treat movie and TV manifestations as separate. Ultimately, the value of a tool is in its usefulness. I'm satisfied to call everything from the publication of TNMT or perhaps Watchmen and The Dark Knight Rises as The Modern Age; and, if anything, to subdivide the present and future consciously. Retroactive labeling being divisive - in my opinion.
To be honest, i am kind of bored of only having what happened in mainstream superhero comics set the “ages of the medium. Like, the mid-80s saw an explosion of self published black and white comics, that’s more important to me than Crisis. The early 90s was the age of Fantagraphics and alternative comics. The mid-90s saw the Vertigo explosion, the mid-late 00s was the golden age of webcomics and so on. Plus, what was happening in Europe? What was happening in Manga? It’s time to rethink the history of comics as a more all-encompassing thing, less US-centered and less superhero-centered.
Less superhero centered certainly. Like the 70s and 80s was the time of Metal Hurlant/Heavy Metal which considering its influence on Alien (via Moebius), Blade Runner (ditto), James Cameron among others, made a far bigger impact than any superhero comic of that time, leaving aside how much superhero comics were influenced by Moebius. The 80s was the time of Spiegelman, Raw, "comics aren't for kids", Watchmen and so on. Manga's growing mainstream influence is by far the biggest story of the late 90s, 2000s, 2010s. I've come across more people who know Junji Ito by name then say Jonathan Hickman or Mark Millar or Grant Morrison.
The urge toward periodization is, both in general history and in specialised histories, most often misguided. A far better approach, in particular to cultural history is one that looks for "waves". A historical wave is a group of events that influence, often imitate and repeat each other showing a wave like profile with a more or less clearly defined starting point, a rising number of incidents that are clearly reactions to or imitations of the wave origin. Waves also generate spilover, variations on the general wave aspects that are fit to spark other waves. If several very big waves start gaining momentum in close temporal proximity, we are tempted to think of "periods" beginning. But the fact that we have several waves explains why starting and end points for periods are so hard to specify. Periods are too simply and unifying a concept to adequately apply to actual history.
Most definitely the Bronze Age ends and everything captured within the mid eighties (I would say from 1984 onwards) towards the late nineties is the Boom Age defined by the boom in creativity and the dizzying highs and eventual fall of the industry. Then what follows with the turn of the century is the Event Age where publishing is geared towards trade paperbacks and big superhero crossover events as cinema becomes the superior medium for superhero mythology while the comics become tedious and convoluted. It's questionable at the moment if the Event Age has actually ended or not, as these eras of comic books seem to clearly pivot around every fifteen years or so. What will define the next era? Will there even be one? Only time can tell.
Its not perfect, but i put the current age as beginning with Astonishing X-Men. I like the neatness of the end of the previous age being the last arc of New X-Men by British Invasion/ Vertigo superstar Grant Morrison and Image founder Marc Silvestri. And the name of that arc "Here Comes Tomorrow" seems apt. Then the modern age begins with Astonishing written by MCU man Joss Wheldon. The innovations of Vertigo and Image had been assimilated by Marvel, and the weird, OTT edges sanded off, leaving comics that feel modern but won't scare off merchandisers and Hollywood people.
Current state of grasping something that resembles a chronology was made complicated on purpose and demands a real effort from any potential customer (thanks to all those regular retcons & reboots). I can understand and even support #1 renumbering when a new creator starts his run but switching titles as often generates only confusion e.g. Thor by Jason Aaron basically forces people to skip the floppies altogether because this marketing tactic is pure insanity. This sabotage proves how shortsighted they really are.
Its interesting and understandable that the perspective used is very much north American Superhero comics. That's the basis of the Golden, Silver, Bronze age definitions and it clearly makes sense to continue using that framework.... or does it. Even allowing for the North American perspective there's a shift towards globalisation of comics needing that framework expanding. So moving beyond superheroes, if for example you'd gone with TNMT 1 as the shift from the Bronze Age, but rather than going with continuation with Copper Age, rather moving into say the Indie Age, we could use Spawn 1 (I'm clutching here and here on with specifics as I've not put any pre-thought into this, so please bear with me on specifics) as say the Image Age - or Big Guns and Pouches Age whatever. Then say Walking Dead 1 for Creator Owned Age and maybe we get to a Crowd Funding Age... I'm not really going with the detail here, just the principle. This still retains the North American bias, makes sense BUT the North American bias was waining even in North American comics so another approach might be to go with say Swamp Thing 19 ending the Bronze Age and starting the Invasion Age - signified by the 'British Invasion' (I'd call it the 2000ad age but then I'd be exposing my biases there!) a period were talent from other markets, not just the UK ... but again 2000ad yah know, most important comic ever and all that.... my biases showing again?... anyway... shifted content across the medium, then maybe a Manga age into a Global age.... where digital access removes all barriers, pretty much.... and that leads to another option. Format / vehicle. The mid eighties start the Trade Paperback Age, leading to the 'Graphic Novel' Age as most high street bookshops and public libraries had 'Graphic Novel' Sections and we then shift to the Digitial Age... Details need work on all of these but my main point is as we shift from defined Golden, Silver and Bronze ages based on superhero comics I think its fine to keep that sequence going while branching out, as the medium has, in definition and scope of the ages. Thus moving beyond that narrow perspective and embrace the development of the medium in numerous different ways, as suits needs. I might well be wrong and or missing the point but hopefully adds to the debate.
i would call comics since the first ironman movie the multi media age or just the movie age. dont really think the term modern age should be used at all a better name would be the current age maybe. some people are calling the rise in crowdfunding comics the iron age so i quite like that term though.
Hello! May I ask you, Strange Brain Parts, which comic you derived the images from for use in the section of the video where you describe the period in which comic book movies took over the cultural conversation between comic book films and its source material. In other words, where do I look to get a copy of that Frank Cho art? Thank you. (Your voice sounded perfectly fine. No deviation from the usual diction or cadence of delivery.)
@@kasrasadrehashemi174 Care to share what made you laugh? Because what I said is factually, correct? Not sure what is funny about it? More sad, than anything else.. Woke ideology pervading comics was the final nail in the coffin for small comic shops and many print comics.
I love this topic you chose. Something I have opinions about. Let me list it out. 1) For me the concept of ages in comics is utterly arbitrary. I wish it were more like music or cinema. Music has terms like "Great American Songbook", Classic Rock, Glam Rock, Arena Rock, Punk Rock, Heavy Metal, Grunge, Hip-Hop, Trap, Rap, Gangsta Rap, Soul, Ska, Reggae. They symbolize both genre and period. Cinema has German Expressionism, Soviet Montage, French New Wave, New Hollywood, Mumblecore, Dogme 95. Instead comics are struck with bizarre metallic ages that are from the literal historical Greek Dark Ages (the original idea of Golden Age was inherently aristocratic). 2) It's also worth mentioning that Golden, Silver, Bronze, Dark Ages came out in the 90s. Nobody in the actual 40s-80s saw comics that way. I also think that while Golden Age makes sense in the way that Golden Age of Hollywood makes sense (i.e. a high that can't be repeated) I don't think that applies to the other ages. The Golden Age was the era of highest comics readership, most diverse choice in genres, with superhero and non-superhero titles having a mainstream audience. That makes sense. But the other ages are more nebulous. 3) I'd divide the eras as Golden Age (until the late 50s), and then I'd say the Post-War Era (from the 1950s to mid-1980s) because Carmine Infantino's Flash very much is about the 1950s futurism as is Green Lantern and the Marvel era. This allows you to fuse the Silver and Bronze Ages together which makes sense since in continuity terms it's the same age for superhero titles. Like Sprang's Batman is in continuity with O'Neil/Adams' Batman and so on. It also terminates perfectly with Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns because both works are so specifically about the Cold War and are in dialogue with the iconography and memory of World War II generation in many ways. The Post-War Era overlaps of course with the end of the Golden Age which for me ends with the collapse of EC Comics and the Wertham backlash. In general terms more inclusive of non-superhero titles makes sense because comics ages are too centered on superhero ages that you forget that even in the so-called Silver Age, the best selling comics of the 1960s were Uncle Scrooge and MAD Magazine more than Superman, leave alone Marvel (which didn't find success in the classic Lee-Kirby era). 4) The 90s is the Speculator era and the Image Revolution is like a music industry term. The Creator Rights era also makes sense since the 1980s was a time of agitation with Kirby's artwork being a major part of it. You can also divide it as Pre-Crash and Post-Crash. The 2000s could be called the 'Ultimate Era" since Ultimate Marvel did capture the zeitgeist in that specific period. I'd argue that this is a time of Manga influence and dominance (Decompression comes from Manga) so it could be called the Global Manga era maybe. The 2010s given that Dog Man by Dav Pilkey and other stuff by Scholastic is making waves ought to be cited as well. As well as Image comics second era with The Walking Dead, and Saga making waves.
I think Golden, Silver, Bronze, Cooper/Iron keeps it simple for the 20th century. Those can have their nicknames like Exploration, Atomic, Progressive, Dark but we have to look at the type of stories that have been published when we define those eras (impact they had, writing style, art quality, public perception quite nicely point to which material was popular). Pursuing trends of a current period we got ActionComics #1 to CCA censorship (aimed at kids 6-13), Showcase #4 to the direct market stores (aimed at kids 8-15), addressing social issues to Crisis/Wars events (aimed at teens 10-17), mature books being created to Hollywood boom (aimed at teens 11-19), industry revival and digital expansion (aimed mainly at 14-23 year old?). We should’ve entered a postmodern era by now, with a shift in content and the industry being less dependant on superhero targeting young adults.
@@ChristopherLono Nicknames make sense I'll admit. But my main point is that eras are conflated or centered around superhero genres. If we mean Ages of Superhero comics okay...but to localize the Golden Age around Superman's first appearance in Action Comics#1 ignores that this was the age where superheroes were one among many genres and often not even the most commercially successful and popular in that time (I mean even among superheroes, in the 1940s, Fawcett's Captain Marvel was outselling Superman). And if you put the end to CCA censorship then it's worth mentioning that CCA censorship came into existence to target EC Comics. The Golden Age makes sense if we mean in terms of highest comics readership, which it was. But it doesn't apply to the so-called "Silver Age" and so on that follows which are all exclusively superhero-centric at the expense of others.
@@ElvingsMusings You're right but I think that invention of the superhero concept was really something unseen (since the ancient myths) and deserves it's recognition. There's no arguing that those books did not have a significant influence.
@@ChristopherLono The did have an influence yes. It's just that I'm not sure if that influence makes sense to discuss in terms of comic books as a whole. In terms of comics as a whole and comics as a medium, superheroes lose in a fair fight to other genres in a competitive market without any thumbs on the scale. Superheroes became big thanks to merchandise and adaptations to other media. Even in this it wasn't exception, Popeye crossed over from comics to cartoons (the famous Superman cartoons where he first flew came from the Max Fleischer studio behind Popeye), as did Little Lulu, with Donald Duck you have the reverse phenomenon of a well-regarded (but largely unexceptional) cartoon series becoming a masterpiece of comics storytelling under the pen of Carl Barks. The focus on superheroes comes at the expense of, the actual comics history a lot of the times.
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Disclaimers like the one at the start of this video always make me so sad because they make it clear that the video creator has gotten a bunch of insane attacks over some banal, low-stakes opinions on a past video.
As they say: opinions are like a-holes, everybody has one. But it's possible to have one and not be one. Which is why I subscribe to this channel.😏
Dang.. Really getting "sad" because someone on the internet had an opinion that didn't 100% align with yours and the content creator? "Insane attacks"? Or just unwanted discourse? If you are going to have an online persona, and be an opinionated content creator.. you better be ready to hear some contrary viewpoints.
Honestly, I have not ever seen anything that could be remotely described as an "insane attack" in the comments of this channel. When did everyone get so soft that people disagreeing & commenting to their publicly made & self promoted opinions on the internet made you get "so sad".
TBH, it can’t be helped; it’s the internet after all
Plus, if he would’ve blamed the “diversity” as the cause of modern comics failing I’m sure an entirely different vocal minority of people would be screaming at him; arguably louder too
I generally break things down like this:
Iron Age - 1985/1986 (Crisis, Dark Knight Returns) to 1996 (Marvel bankruptcy, Heroes Reborn)
Diamond Age - 1997-2011 (Diamond becomes primary distributor to Flashpoint)
Silicon Age - 2011 to present (new 52, Avengers redefines superheroes as movies over comics)
One could also argue that Diamond age lasts until 2020 when COVID finally broke Diamond’s monopoly.
12:12 This is the most accurate statement I have heard about comics and their movies.
My breakdown is the following:
-1985-1995: The Copper Age, beginning with Crisis on Infinite Earths until the burst of the speculation bubble.
-1995-1999: The Dark Age, beginning with the crash until Marvel Knights, Ultimate Marvel and more experimental books like Milligan's X-Force/X-Statix.
-1999-2012: The Modern Age, when what affects to the movies affects to the comics at the time and viceversa, hence the crossovers, continuity rewrites, reboots and some edgy stuff for the sake of it. During that time, The New 52 and Marvel Now happened.
-2012-present: The Diverse/Digital Age. Beginning with the launch of Saga at Image and with the MCU already established.
That's just me.
I like the names. I don't quite buy 2005 as the cutoff for the modern age. I'd probably go with Ultimate Spider-Man #1, because that was a major written for the trade comic, and that changed the market and how complex stories could be. It became a norm for comics to be available in print (or at least digitally.) It also established a vogue for widescreen/ cinematic storytelling.
2005 also didn't mark any serious new creators. The biggest writers of the era (Bendis, Millar, BKV, Geoff Johns) were already established.
What about this definition: "The modern age is the artist in the driver seat, not the company any more". The end of "house styles", artists had the choice to work at Marvel/DC or self publish with more and more influential comic companies such as Fantagraphics, Dark Horse, Image, etc.
Artists got free reign over established comic book series (as Frank Miller with Daredevil).
Kirby tried this in 1970 when he created his 4th World Universe, but DC quickly interfered, changing Superman's look and canceling the New Gods.
Comic book discussions post-The Avengers (2012) are relegated to recap videos on TH-cam ("What if the Avengers had irritable bowel syndrome?"), "Top 10 things you should know about" lists on whatever site is the first result when you google a particular character, skimming through the introduction of Wikipedia pages, and old people complaining about changes to characters even though the last comic they've ever read was a Monica's Gang almanac in the 80's
For some reason the second you brought up having to do research to find out what's going on in Swamp Thing continuity, a like parasitic growth of a thought just rapidly expanded and developed in my mind of that one meme of the feller yelling at his golden retriever pissing all over the floor, except in place of him it's Swamp Thing yelling at the dog.
I would say the modern era began with the release of the first Toby McGuire Spiderman movie and the Ultimate Universe. It brought back Marvel into the mainstream and comics seemed to take a big artistic turn that seems very different from anything before. Love the videos!
Good idea.
Something like this. The cinematic, wide-screen or event era.
I resist the idea of defining comic ages by non-comic media. They are significant, for sure, but it should still be the comic event that is used to anchor the age. Otherwise it's not about the comic, but about the culture at large.
@@residentgrigo4701 The term "wide-screen" comics was first used to describe Bryan Hitch's artwork for The Authority which preceded the movies and the first Ultimate comics.
This is what got me seriously into comics as a teenager. Prior to ultimate comics and the spidey movie I was just your typical kid who was aware of and liked super heroes
Very good overview. I mostly agree, but rather than “optional tie-ins” I think it would be best to describe (Big Two) comics as a testbed for ideas to use in the movies. Most of the ideas Marvel experimented with in the 2010s found their way into the films very quickly.
I was getting into comics around 2006-2007. I had a job at a call center and a group of friends who would along w/ me buy a few issues each of each of different stuff and pass them around. The second I wasn't working there anymore I fell off of superhero comics (was around when Secret invasion was starting up). Without my network of reading buddies, there was no way in hell I would keep up with everything coming out and tying into the events. It's too much to keep up with.
I think 2008 could be considered the start of the “Modern” Age with the start of the MCU and the phenomena of movies replacing comics as the primary drivers behind the story continuity of the characters. Seems like the late 90s and 2000s were the industry recovering enough to get to that point.
One while I don't always agree with you I love your insight and views. I may often disagree but it makes me reevaluate my opinion. So let me say something that will make you reevaluate what you've said. Who said you're not a scholar. You may not home a degree in literature, art, business, or comics but you do the research, take the time, and put your work out there in the public door scrutiny. You sir are a scholar and your work is much appreciated and quite frankly I think more people need to go about and reevaluate the aging dates, names and even periods and add sub periods to them. You did that. So thank you for your scholarly work I enjoyed it and thought it was well done
I agree with this conceptually but I would slide the dates around ever so slightly.
The Bronze age starting with Alan Moores run on Swamp Thing and TMNT in 84 sounds pretty perfect to me though.
I also find this through the original Vertigo comics period to be my personal "golden age".
I think overall you nailed the broader points here, and in that respect I thank you for what you brought up ESPECIALLY in regards to the source material and how little it is brought up (and imo respected) by both “fans” and creators of the shows/films. For both it’s a complete afterthought and who knows what will happen with the now seemingly inevitable crash of the Superhero Movie
As a music fan first and comic fan second, I thank you for piquing my curiosity with your closing line and opening a rabbit hole that seems perfectly tailored to my interests and preferences
The modern era is the only era I was actively a part of the comics community, so it is the only one I have experienced first hand in the moment, but it really feels like it has some of the highest highs, but also the lowest lows. As someone who studied literature for a while in college and really love modernist writing, some of the high concept stuff like Sandman, Miracleman, Swamp Thing, Flex Mantello, Morrison's Doom Patrol, and the like really really speak to me.
If you haven't already you should check out Lucifer (2000), Immortal Hulk (2018), Mister Miracle (2017), and even though I'm sure you've read it I'll say Watchmen because everyone should read it at least once or twice
Love this guy’s videos. I feel like he’s a true fan and treats the subject matter with a lot of respect. Comic books are a special form of literature and to discount them as childish or ignore them for what you get from tv and movies is a disservice to the material. Long live comics ❤
I would argue that when comics started being written in order to more directly appeal to the much larger film audiences would be a good delineation for the modern age.
It would be interesting to get your take on the history of webcomics.
While TMNT didn't break into the pop culture until the cartoons, it's impact within the comics medium almost immediate. Infinite Crisis may have rebooted DC continuity but was as inconsequential to the the medium as Secret Wars or any other marketing crossover. The reality is Crisis didn't change anything about comics. I would say either Turtles or maybe the Dark Knight were the fundamental crossing over into a new era. I would also contend that the GIJoe series was a major factor in the new era of comics as they were the first comics for most people of the era.
It was the summer before I started High School when Frank Millers Dark Knight Returns was put out. It was the first time (to my knowledge) that a comic book event was discussed in mainstream media. It was the first time I read a NYTimes literary Book review of a graphic novel. It felt like something huge was happening. Honestly, its been downhill ever since!
I just go with the follwing: Golden, Silver, Dark (Bronze 69 - 86, Copper 86 - 96), Rennaissance (96 - 11), and Digital (11 - present)
Great editorial! This is something that I've thought about and researched a bit in my own time and I have my own thoughts/definitions that I'd like to get down if you care to read about them. Like your disclaimer, agree or disagree with anything I say!
I'd say the last 30 years should be broken up in three periods: The Dark/Maturing Age (1985-1996/1998), The Revamp/Revival Age (1998-2011/2012), and our current age, The Digital Age (2011 onward).
The Dark Age, I mostly define not as a mark of quality or subjective sentiment but more as an attitude and trend. Stories during this time were largely getting darker or taken more seriously (by their writers mostly). More mature themes or elements were being introduced into the medium as it expanded out in the market. Characters were retooled to resemble nothing like how they did only a couple years previously as speculation around certain titles grew higher and higher until that bubble burst. I thought about the end of this marker being Marvel's bankruptcy but what I find consistent with other ages is that it's not marked off by the end of something but the introduction or beginning of something that ushers in a new trend. With the Golden Age, it was the introduction of Superman, with the Silver Age, it's the reintroduction of the Flash, Marvel's resurfacing as a legitimate player in the medium and the general trend of superheroes mixing with science-fiction concepts. With the Bronze Age, it's the expansion of the medium with more genres and creator-driven works like high fantasy (Conan, Elfquest, Marvel and DC's horror and supernatural titles, etc.). And with the mid-80s, you introduce more mature storytelling with things like Watchmen and the Dark Knight Returns as well as wholly independent works like TMNT. So going back to my preferred mark-off point, I say mark it at 1998 with the introduction of Marvel Knights, an imprint that is brought about by Marvel attempting to recuperate from its bankruptcy by revamping their characters in a way that can bring in new readers through a more "back-to-basics" approach as well as bringing in new but established talent from more independent backgrounds or coming from other mediums to do so (Bendis, Quesada, Kevin Smith, Paul Jenkins, etc). This trend of a back-to basics revamp as well as being more conscious of comics as potential for film franchising will quickly dominate the next period.
The Revamp/Revival Age is, I think, largely defined by the Big Two, as well as companies like Image, treating their books as proving grounds for expansion into other mediums and a driving trend of digestible, recognizable, back-to-basics approaches to stories and characters, while leaving some room for experimentation and toying with genre conventions. You see books getting revamped or retooled to be easy to jump on through recognizable line-ups (Kurt Busiek's Avengers, Grant Morrison's JLA, Jeff Loeb on Superman, alongside Marvel bringing back cancelled books during their Heroes Return comeback with books like Captain America, Incredible Hulk, Fantastic Four, etc). Marvel will take this even further with the Ultimate Universe imprint as a way to allow newcomers to read modern updates of classic characters that could be easily adapted into potential films. You see more radical attempts at revamps in the pursuit of jumping off points with things like 2001's New X-Men and JMS' run on Spider-Man, as well as Bendis taking over Daredevil and Garth Ennis on Punisher. Meanwhile, companies like Image focus more on diversifying their line-up with more genres. Back to the Big Two, stories were written to be a little more broader, not necessarily sacrificing continuity but with less hang-ups in order to prepare them for larger company-wide shake-ups through more events, which will lead to status-quo shifts for a couple years and then an inevitable revert. These events are categorized as big, epic, cinematic pieces that aren't too dense in their main issues and instead specific details are left to tie-in issues. Also going along with the idea that this era is defined by revivals of classic characters and concepts, nostalgic callbacks and pastiches are popular (Loeb/Sale's Marvel Color series, Infinite Crisis as a sequel to the original Crisis on Infinite Earths, All-Star Superman, Batman R.I.P., Geoff John's Superman, Dan Slott's She-Hulk, etc.), characters that were considered dead or out of action would be brought back in their most iconic state (Hal Jordan, Barry Allen, Supergirl, Brainiac) or retooled to fit modern tastes (Bucky Barnes as an aged-up super soldier, Jason Todd as a revenge-driven antagonist, Robin as a child sidekick and son of Batman, etc.). All this would dominate the 2000s until the plan for franchising would finally take hold in the early 2010s with superhero films fully dominating the cinema landscape especially in 2012 as that summer season was dominated by Marvel, achieving great success with their cinematic universe and Disney's investment after buying the company in 2009 as recognition for their value as an engine for Intellectual Property, paying off with The Avengers and The Amazing Spider-Man, while DC, after rebooting their universe for the New 52 in 2011 in order to have their books line-up better for film franchise potential, cap off their successful Nolan trilogy with the Dark Knight Rises and preparing their own cinematic universe for the following year in 2013 with Man of Steel. The next following era, our current one, is one that's defined by comics going fully mainstream.
The Digital Era is still on-going but I'd say defined by full recognition by larger media companies as powerful engines for intellectual property generation and the industry pushing diversification and opportunities for mainstream attention. Now I don't say that second bit as a condemnation, far from it actually. I use diversification to define not just creative-driven efforts for further representation but also diversification of accessibility and media. Manga has now fully crossover into North American markets which allows for greater mainstream attention into the medium from a different cultural lens. Trade paperbacks have become the preferred way to read comics and allows for the medium to expand into different outlets like traditional bookstores. Digital comics such as webcomics have also been embraced as a legitimate expression of the medium. And there is also a greater push for representation of marginalized or specific groups into the traditional superhero genre with characters like Kamala Khan and Miles Morales largely accepted by mainstream audiences thanks in part to appearances in other media like animated shows, films, high profile video games, and live-action adaptations. Comic events have a greater self-awareness for franchise entry potential and capitalize on that front accordingly through synergetic practices of using familiar characters from films and implanting elements that originally came from those films into the comics, to varying degrees of success. More can be written about the many elements of our current era but you get the picture and all I'll say is that there's a lot to like about our current state of comics and a lot to not like. But I think it's far cry to say we're reaching some final endpoint anytime soon, rather more likely we'll just be due for a new era to take hold, probably very soon.
Always remember keep reading comics!
Thank you, that was an excellent analysis. I remember I was just a freshman in High School in 1986, and at my local comic specialty shops, you simply never saw girls, only guys. By the early 1990s, this started changing I noticed more graphic arts and fashion design students (many of them women) browsing in comic shops, and the increase in "toys", souvenirs, costumes, VHS/DvD products taking up more space. By early 2000s, forget it, comic shops became tourist traps, with every demographic (gender, age, ethnic, race, preference) seen browsing. Frankly I had long lost interest in the medium as the quality since the mid 1980s had declined to pure trash in my opinion.
I loved what what was said about the relationship that modern age comics have to movie adaptations and totally agree. It seems that for the last decade comic book movies have dominated the conversation around and creation of comics, for better and for worse. Other defining features of the modern age that I personally would add are the accessibility of digital comics (reading comics on a smart device), how social media has shaped comics, and the rise of web comics/social media comics. There are a lot of web comics doing very interesting things with the medium, and a lot of cute newspaper type comics being posted daily by authors on social media. Great video!
Excellent video. I wish we could come up with a better term for the "Bronze Era", but it's hard to think of another name to best describe it. That time frame of 1985-1995 was a very good time for comics.
I forget exactly when I found it but the end of comics in the 90s happened with a specific cover. We had so many gimmick covers. Anything from holo, embossed, foil, and more. Then this one. There was a Marvel comic named Sleepwalker. It had a (October?) issue with a gimmick cover. What was it? Well, it had a cardstock cover with the characters face. And that face? Well it had perforations and punch outs so kne could destroy the comic to have the face of Sleepwalker as a Halloween mask. Yup ... that is about that.
I like these names and timelines. They feel right. Part of me wants to draw a mine around 2011, 12 because that feels like a moment of change in the industry as mainstream super popularity hit with the MCU and everything started to feel like a reaction to that. Either piggybacking off the success or trying to differentiate from it. There was also a second boom of indy comics spear headed by some big names. Saga being the one that comes most readily to mind. Ive also always made jokes about "the leather age" being the post Fox Xmen movies and Ultimates era for a other material term. Ive heard The Adamantium Age be thrown around a lot denoting the rise of the anti hero character and maybe copper age evokes to much similarity to bronze. Or maybe thats the point.
12:25 even as a higher than normal fan, this is where i find myself now, especially with marvel. The success of the MCU has lead to changing the comics to confrom and maintain corporate synergy and its lead to me just having no idea whats going on.
DC fares a little better that their titles stand on their own more for better or worse but that might just be limited to their high profile ones.
I also like to think of 2011, 12 as the cutoff. Rise of Aveners movie, Man of Steel, Flash Point going into the New 52, where evey book does renumber at 1, and Secret Wars ending the Ultimate Universe. It's a big year that comes with lots of huge changes.
I agree 100% with everything mentioned here. Very insightful (and a bit humorous.)
Much like how the dark age started with a non-comic event (Marvel’s bankruptcy), I would say the modern age started with the first Iron Man movie. Like you had said, there was a massive shift in the industry where comics became vehicles for intellectual property rather than characters. That is a massive change to the face of the comics industry that we still feel today.
I gotta boot the start of The Modern Age back to 2001 when Ultimate Spider-Man Releases and the second Perez Avengers run starts
Hoh! A late night video? What a welcome surprise. The Copper Age also gave us Abslom Daak! One of, not the most, violent individuals that the Doctor has encountered and befriended (?)
I understand event fatigue. But I love as how you are saying "it was a mess", I am seeing Infinite Crisis, 52, Final Crisis, and Blackest Night. And I am thinking that was good, that was great, that was good, and that was great. I miss my pre-flashpoint DC.
very interesting and well reasoned perspective. the older the era, the more readily the points you can assign them to begin or end. Action Comics #1 in 1938 certainly started the Golden Age, and Showcase #4 in 1956 started the Silver Age. I feel the Death of Gwen Stacey in ASM #121 in 1973 was the end of the Silver Age, the transition to the Bronze Age being more of a maturation than hard line.
As for the Modern Era, the framework of eras i've thought of it as Crisis on Infinite Earths as being the closing chapter of the Silver-Bronze Age, and the Dark Age (or Iron Age) starting with the one-two hits of Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns in 1986, and the prevalence of edge-lordy copycats in the years after that. while Marvel's bankruptcy feels like a good demarcation of eras, i feel like it as the harbinger of the end of that Dark era, not the actual breaking point.
Around 2000 was when i noticed a shift in more retro tone, continuity fixations, reboots and recontextualizations of older stories, which i've heard others dub the Mercury Age, for harkening back to many Silver Age concepts, and for it's fluidity of continuities. we may have already left that Mercury Age and entered a Celluloid Age, where comics as ancillary to the larger IP management and sourcing for more profitable movies, TV and video games. If 2010s-2020s are the end of one age or the beginnings of another, we won't know for sure until we are towards the end of Sixth Age, whatever its metallurgical designation it may be assigned.
I’d be curious what you consider some of the highlights of the modern age? Are there any comics that rise above that feeling of just being intellectual property? Is there anything that approaches the heights of Alan Moore’s Swamp thing or Sandman?
I’ve only been in the comics for about five years but I tend to gravitate to the late 80s and early 90s. Primarily because I like the old school approaches to art before the computer completely took over.
Man bro I was supposed to watch this video 4months ago ima subbed you seem chill
I would add a mention to the rise of variant covers taking such a high percentage of comic sales being a huge shift in comic publishing. Where the cover, and the rarity of said cover, being more important than the actual contents on the issue. Speculators are only interested in the rarity of the variant cover and what grade it can get then in whatever is contained between the front and back covers.
Its a good rundown in a short time. I think people look at a 40 minute video and get intimidated, but a video around 10 minutes will get watched. Good video!
I never thought this much about the eras but I like where you drew the lines. It works well.
Bronze and Copper Age. Frank Miller and Alan Moore's stories feel like The Bronze Age of Comics still kept going. They are not a part of the edgy Grimdark Era of Comics. And have nothing to do with the edgy comic book era. Rob Liefeld is the one who truly began the Edgy era of Comics. Whose storylines are filled with style but without any substance or awareness. That's a critique to many critics and fans are known for. Frank Miller, Alan Moore, and Neil Gaiman were a part of the Copper Age. Taking influences from Dennis O'Neil, Chris Claremont, Len Wein (RIP), and Neal Adams. The second Bronze Age. Or maybe, a continuation of the Bronze Age of Comics. The Bronze Age truly ended once the Rob Liefeld aesthetic and trend was introduced.
Man, I love your videos. Every single one.
Thank you for this. I think it was wise to define the eras by market and pop culture milestones rather than stylistic shifts in the medium. Seems like a more concrete method. I also appreciate you given a well rounded view of the modern age. I've had people become extremely defensive when I point out what I see as problems in the current era of comics, going so far as to call me a grifter and chicken little. It actually happened enough I started to feel like maybe I was crazy and imagining problems in some near perfect era. Having someone clearly lay out the good and the bad without judgment makes me feel more sure of my own takes. So thanks again.
Hope you're feeling better. If not, I hope you feel better soon. Thanks for an insightful take on an interesting time.
This might be my favorite video of yours!
I think you're spot on.
I also think BOTH Superman #75 and Marvel filing for bankruptcy can be the bookend of that era; I don't think it has to be either/or.
Excellent work as always! Love your channel :)
Awesome
Great video as always. Thanks for your time and effort.
I'd say the copper age might have started with the British Invasion, Camelot 3000, Moore Swamp things come to mind.
Another great video. Jemas, in my opinion, deserves his own age. Whatever you think of the man, he did something completely different.
I'd call the current age the Meme age-shallow stories propped up by corporate ownership.
The numbers you posted from the 90s are still better than they are now, BTW.
I think people are over-stating the impact of Ultimate Marvel. It did have an impact for its time but it was to a large extent highly astroturfed. Ultimate Spider-Man contrary to belief charted at 15-18 position on Comichron in its first few months. Jemas came up with the idea of pushing Ultimate Spider-Man and Ultimate X-Men into retail stores like Payless and Walmart where the titles sold at a loss but made a splash in mainstream exposure. Even then, the Postal Statements show that Ultimate Spider-Man peaked in its first two years (much of which was inflated) and declined steadily after that. It's ballyhooed feat of outselling Amazing Spider-Man's flagship was basically only true for a brief time and only for issues with Ultimate Venom (sigh). Ultimate Marvel was important in popularizing decompression, Bendis especially, but decompression is adapting manga influences and the real story is the manga influence and dominance of US charts.
Excellent video. At the risk of kicking a beehive, I'd love to hear your take on the way that representational politics have become a sticking point in recent years with the publishers pushing for more diversity in gender/sexuality/race/body types, etc. and different kinds of people having very different reactions to it, almost over and above anything that actually happens in those comics.
For me, I almost think of it as a "Progressive/Woke Age of Comics," spurred on by the events of the 2016 election in the United States, but I don't know yet which works (if any) will last the test of time and which will just fizzle out.
He will not
Over 3/4 of the post millennial stuff was going woke before 2016 happened. Trump getting elected just exposed them all for the mentally deranged ideologues they always were.
@@HailEarendil😂
@@kasrasadrehashemi174 Hey, kiddo! Adults use words to talk, not emojis. When you want to grow up and have a conversation.. I am waiting.
I miss Abby Cadence Sting being the intro sonh
Great video. I agree with everything you had to say except for Infinite Crisis being the starting point of the modern age. There is a lot of reasons to argue for it, but on the flipside Avengers Disassembled fits better. For one, it started the trend of yearly cycles and with Bendis' handling of New Avengers, he showed how to build stories and marketing between the yearly cycles. Most of the events spawned by Avengers Disassembled influenced Feige's movies and all later Marvel and DC events. I think DiDio and Geof Johns were influenced by it in how they approached Infinite Crisis.
Finally, Avengers Disassembled made sure previous approaches to event cycles stuck. I wish Infinite Crisis was the one that influenced this trend, but unfortunately it was Avengers Disassembled. All important comics had to drop what they were doing and focus on the event. Now that events are yearly, this is something that has to happen more often making it difficult to follow comic runs. This was thanks to Avengers Disassembled, not Infinite Crisis.
Now, the reasons Infinite Crisis should be considered the start of this is the symmetry you mentioned. It also encouraged DC to take the hatchet to its continuity on a regular basis, but this is just a DC thing, Marvel has never destroyed its continuity the way DC does. As annoying as it is, it does give fans several entry points into comics. Finally, DC tends to be more conservative in how often they have events, and don't disrupt comics with tie-ins like Marvel tends to. Honestly, I wish Infinite Crisis was the one to set the industry standard on this one where it produced high quality limited run tie-ins instead of disrupting stories to focus on the event.
I would call the first Blade and Spiderman movies demarcation points for the 'Hollywood Age'
Maybe but X Men came out and you still had the 90s Batman movies, even if they weren't received well.
@@nohbuddy1 they were received massively well. Jim Shooter turning Marvel into an early movie house came from Blade and Spiderman though.
I also think method of distribution also has to be talked about when defining ages. Where the books are sold, the rise of trade paperbacks, and obviously dugital distribution.
I'll tell you what brought me back to comics...it is reading digital comics in VR glasses (such as Meta Quest). It's an immersive experience and it matches well with the visuals. The problem is the format difference between a printed comic book page and the image in the goggles. This is also an issue with cell phone comics reading and if I had to make a bet, I would bet on the format being the next big age in comics (as in the layout and art designed to be read on a cell phone).
I’m going with the Modern Age beginning with Final Crisis and, once again, the return of Barry Allen.
That all-purpose in-house music drop you deploy at the start of the video that signifies authority and something weighty is hilarious. Wherever you found it, it's an inspired choice. I notice you've used it specifically only when it pertains to something mock serious and pysdo-important. Your tongue's firmly in the cheek of fluent sarcasm. It now has that trigger effect of anticipation as soon as I hear that first Dun-Dun musical cue, I'm already laughing.
in my opinion....
Strongly agree. Get well.
I feel there should be something about the rise of manga as a competitor and other source of inspiration and the rise of Image to take the second spot in sales as place that may be points for different comic eras, or sub eras, in the modern age.
I actually became a comic book collector because of Crisis on Infinite Earths. I'd casually read the occasional book for my entire life up until 1985, when I turned 18; but I was curious enough about the story taking place in Crisis to start reading it regularly. That lead to my reading other DC comics on a weekly basis, and I was hooked. I became a hardcore comic book geek for about the next four or five years, though my obsession transitioned into animation and movies by the 1990s. IMy interest in buying and keeping up with comics dwindled as mainstream comics were gutted by the speculator era, giving a huge number of comics I simply wasn't interested in. I stopped reading comic books regularly around the time Alan Moore left mainstream comics...probably not a coincidence...and DC killed Superman and destroyed Green Lantern at the same time. I decided, "This really isn't worth it," and stopped buying comic books regularly. I've followed mainstream comics casually since the 1990s, but the only comics I went out of my way to get were Alan Moore's return to the mainstream with the America's Bet titles and Supreme, and the second and third Mage series. I'm a guy with a lot of nostalgia for the comics of the 1980s, because I was there when it happened. That's what attracted me to this channel, but the intelligent discussions of comics here definitely made me a subscriber here.
This video seems like a updated version of your Holograms and Glow in the Dark Doom video from a couple years ago. Both even have black suit Spider-Man on the thumbnails, which I'm guess was intentional lol. Your look on the Speculator Era was the video got me interested in your channel and I've been watching since.
I would define the recent years like this.
From 1986-2011 is the Dark Age as this is when comics were starting to become all dark and gritty. The publication of the Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen is the start of this age. And the start of DC's New 52 ends this era.
And from 2011 to today is the modern age. Maybe we'll call it the Copper Ages or the Cinematic Age or the Heroic Age later.
May I ask where I can find comic sales numbers of that time? I always wanted to research that, but I don't know where to look.
Yeah, I totally get the frustration over the barrier to entry. I've been reading a long time, but I gave up on monthly series a long time ago. Now I wait until the trade paperback of an arc is published, and get that. It's rarely 100% of the story, but it's usually close enough, and has the meatiest part.
For the most part, however, I've given up on superhero comics. I'm building up my collections in other areas, like filling in back issues of Conan, Groo and Usagi Yojimbo, or exploring other areas and publishers altogether, like Archaia with Mouse Guard, and fun limited runs like BOOM!'s Coda.
And that's in no small part influenced by the fatigue of trying to follow a story line in superhero comics.
I've been a long time follower of both American and European Disney Comics and those have a lot of really clever ideas and fun adventures in them (if you like Donald Duck)
Really appreciate your videos
I'd like to hear your thoughts in a video on whether the constant restarting has hindered or helped the big two. Is it easier to jump into a new series like the new Incredible but then get lost figuring out if Immortal comes before Indestructible or Incredible Vol. whatever?
If you’re going with metals Iron Age is probably a more traditional designation.
I would date the start of the Copper Age a little bit earlier than Crisis. I would date it to the moment when DC restarted New Teen Titans and Legion of Superheroes as titles for the direct market primarily. That was the beginning of the end of the newstand and one way to think about the Copper Age is as the last age of spinner rack comics: the last period when comics were part of the mass market and capable of attracting new readers. I grew up in a small town an hour from a comic shop and bought all my favorite titles off the spinner rack. The Baxter paper restart of Titans and Legion as titles available only in comic shops was disenchanting for me, since those were my very favorite titles. Even as a 12 year old, I understood the move as the beginning of the end of comics as I'd known them till then: as a ubiquitous entertainment accessible to normies with a wider range of interests, as opposed to a collector's item for an ever-contracting and involuted niche of geeks.
I'd like to think a newer age started around 2011, not just because of the New 52 but it was also the time when the Comic Code Authority lost any and all weight with digital comics and services. Maybe when apps became the go-to means of reading comics as well, especially when sharing on social media became the go to budget friendly means of praising comics. Flawed as that was with how... less said the better. Maybe where crowdfunding comes in as well. I don't know where it ends but I always thought a good name was the Silicon Age of Comics.
Great vid; I love stuff like this. It's somewhat arbitrary, but an interesting thought experiment to try and wrestle a logical solution over. I would shift things up, slightly, starting with 1986 as the beginning of the Modern Era; you have Dark Knight, Watchmen, Batman: Year One, John Byrne's Man of Steel, Perez's Wonder Woman, Daredevil Born Again, Dark Horse launching with Dark Horse Presents, X-Men becoming a franchise of multiple connected books with Mutant Massacre and The Punisher getting his first solo mini-series. This was a time when comics more aggressively attempted to reflect and comment on the real world, hence The Modern Era (even though indies or creator-owned works had been doing it for year prior). From there you could go many ways; The Direct Market Era, The Gimmick Era/Speculator Era, The Post-Speculator/Crash Era and the mostly current Post-Modern Era or Contemporary Era, which are just catch-alls for a period of time that's too close to us to be able to identify a consistent, cohesive through-line of ideological direction that is dominating the comics medium.
That's just some alternate ideas; not better or worse than the ones covered in the vid, just different.
I basically look at the previous "modern age" of entertianment; comics, collectibles, video games, movies, anime, etc, as being from the mid 70s up to the mid 2010s. SO basically from roughly 1975-2015. THe late 1970s began to bring the world a plethora of great stories in various mediums: Anime began to get more widespread attention, though it was still not mainstream in the west as it would one day be; cartoons were gaining ever more traction slowly but surely, comics were becoming more nuanced and mature, and film franchises that would span the genres from fantasy, to horror, and sci fi and beyond would start taking off from that point onward. Everything starts slow, but basically once even the "Early days" of console gaming had come and gone, the landscape was strewn with good stuff all around, and much of it all kept getting better over time. SO even in that great time period from the end of the "hipipe days" of the 70s, to the decline of gangsta rap and eerie all encompasing power of souless pop music by the mid 2010s, the middle 1980s to the middle 2000s was to myself and many I have spoken to...the "High Era" of all such things and more. IT more hits all around and great stuff than in any other time period. And since we can look back on the vast majority of written history, its pretty easy to see why is is indeed easy to come to that conclusion. Everything from the NES, the TMTN, the darker Batman comics, other cool and "manly" guy stuff in toys, cartoons, action movies, video games getting better and better year after year, and all the collectibles and pop culture that still holds sway over out hearts to this day...Maybe that was the "modern age". But everything after 2014 ish would then have to be the "post modern" age, aka...The Future. :P BUT WHERES MY HOVERBOARD? T
Thinking in terms of waves, we can mark out Ultimate Spider-Man #1 as a wave origin. This "ultimate marvel wave" not only contains the ultimate comics and their influence and offshoots into the main marvel continuity but also the marvel movies. It was the more grounded approach aiming at a realisim and relatability lost over the course of the 80ties and 90ties that made it possible to make these movies work. This is also a candidate to explain why marvel movies succeeded but DC movies failed. There never was anything that did for DC what Ultimate did for Marvel.
And as the movies moved away from this core more and more, they began to fail more, to feel less unified and in this way, they mimic what happened to comics when the cultural force of a wave starts to fade.
Compared to this the "event comics" wave is really secondary and it is also much longer, as the patter is really unbroken at least since Crisis/SW. Much more prevalent is the "reboot" wave, driven purely by economic concerns. This has done a lot to radically change the way comics books are created and consumed and is itself an offshoot of the ultimate->movies wave.
The 90s should be "The Chromium Age." Starting last year, we are in "The Iron Age."
While Infinite Crisis was my first thought for the Modern Age demarcation at the video's start, I think ~2011-2012 works much better (especially as I was imagining a single demarcation and not two). Reason being, that was when the New 52 relaunch happened and The Avengers released in theaters. The rise of the MCU, for better or worse, has been the single most noteworthy comic happening in decades after all.
I would call the most recent period the "Cinematic" age due tot he increased influence of films on comics, but that would track it back to the first "Blade" film as its starting point, which doesn't quite mesh up with the rest.
I'm still newish to your channel and i didn't know you were a klf fan 😮😀 got to teach and everything you learn will point to the fact that time is eternal! Hail Eris
Love Watching Your Videos!😇
This age should be the Iron Age because so many creators (like a blacksmith) are being funded by fans who are allowing creators to create so in a way it is indirect building, and in a way they are both (blacksmiths) creators - though really they (the fans) are really only suplliers they do decide what gets built and so the artist are the builders of their individual works but the fans teh builders of the medium. Its like the fans are building the bookshelves the artist books are on.
I presume you're differentiating "The Copper Age" from what is commonly called the "Grim and Gritty Era", as noted by the omission of The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen. So much has been said about these two that I don't have to say any more, other than to note that *despite their creators' intentions*, they gave birth to several years' worth of "grim and gritty" comics that became stereotypes of the modern era: huge muscles and mammaries, lots of graphic violence, and "crossovers" that were the forerunners of the "event" comics of the modern eras. I would argue the Mutant Massacre was a prime example of this, as its sole purpose was to slaughter a large number of characters and generate sales.
12:12 Guilty as charged!
Can you imagine if the Twilight or Harry Potter books were ignored the same way comics are? The fact that the most popular properties on earth are superheroes and yet the source material is only noticed by a minute audience is telling in just how out-of-step the industry is with potential readers.
Way different circumstances. Super Hero movies are not straight forward adaptations and they were in pop culture via TV shows, serials, etc for decades prior
@@nohbuddy1 But shouldn't the fact that the comics are new stories about beloved characters make comics even more enticing than straight adapted material? I guess I just personally don't understand how the correlation between the movies and comics seems so weak. I try to ask some people why they don't try comics and they usually say they don't know the correct entry point. Like on tv serials people start from episode 1 and watch til the series concludes. But of course comic super heroes never conclude, and starting on issue one means reading comics from the golden and silver age that are practically hieroglyphics to modern readers.
I think maybe coming out with full stories in nice hardcovers, sold in Wal Marts and stuff, complete with advertising and hype might help. It would make it clear to an audience they are getting a complete story, and that it's the 'hot new product' (not repackaged material from long ago, which most people seem biased against). But who knows really... I guess I just take it a little personally that my favorite medium is ignored in favor of adaptations of the same ideas.
The Superhero Movies and TV Shows are now losing money due to its insistence of going straight to characters and stories from the last 15 years, that failed in the comics, instead of using the source material from its inception!
@@bobbugwithoneeyeskingiskin8974😅
Watching that edit from the 90s made for tv Captain America movie to Cap in endgame made me chuckle.
Hope you get well soon.
Comment.
3:43 interesting, most people call it the bronze age
LOL
next tier beyond Justified and Ancient is KLF?
Maybe Lemurians of Justice in Mu-Topia ...
Either or neither they gonna rock you ....
I'm evolving on the whole era thing. I think the accepted Golden, Silver and Bronze delineations as fine for general references. Beyond this, subdividing the modern age, which may prove inevitable, seems inherently subjective and prone to cause more discussion (debate and argument) than serve as a useful tool. That's a value judgment which is, itself, subjective.
For instance, my partner suggested referring to the time since the MCU began as the multimedia age, which comic characters stretched beyond comics and across several media. My counterargument being that comics have long stretched across multiple mediums from Superman and Batman movies in the 40s and Superman again in 50s television to Adam West's Batman as a legitimate cultural phenomenon on par with the Beatles in the 60s and back to Superman again in the late 70s. I treat movie and TV manifestations as separate.
Ultimately, the value of a tool is in its usefulness. I'm satisfied to call everything from the publication of TNMT or perhaps Watchmen and The Dark Knight Rises as The Modern Age; and, if anything, to subdivide the present and future consciously. Retroactive labeling being divisive - in my opinion.
To be honest, i am kind of bored of only having what happened in mainstream superhero comics set the “ages of the medium. Like, the mid-80s saw an explosion of self published black and white comics, that’s more important to me than Crisis. The early 90s was the age of Fantagraphics and alternative comics. The mid-90s saw the Vertigo explosion, the mid-late 00s was the golden age of webcomics and so on. Plus, what was happening in Europe? What was happening in Manga? It’s time to rethink the history of comics as a more all-encompassing thing, less US-centered and less superhero-centered.
Less superhero centered certainly. Like the 70s and 80s was the time of Metal Hurlant/Heavy Metal which considering its influence on Alien (via Moebius), Blade Runner (ditto), James Cameron among others, made a far bigger impact than any superhero comic of that time, leaving aside how much superhero comics were influenced by Moebius. The 80s was the time of Spiegelman, Raw, "comics aren't for kids", Watchmen and so on. Manga's growing mainstream influence is by far the biggest story of the late 90s, 2000s, 2010s. I've come across more people who know Junji Ito by name then say Jonathan Hickman or Mark Millar or Grant Morrison.
The urge toward periodization is, both in general history and in specialised histories, most often misguided. A far better approach, in particular to cultural history is one that looks for "waves". A historical wave is a group of events that influence, often imitate and repeat each other showing a wave like profile with a more or less clearly defined starting point, a rising number of incidents that are clearly reactions to or imitations of the wave origin. Waves also generate spilover, variations on the general wave aspects that are fit to spark other waves. If several very big waves start gaining momentum in close temporal proximity, we are tempted to think of "periods" beginning. But the fact that we have several waves explains why starting and end points for periods are so hard to specify. Periods are too simply and unifying a concept to adequately apply to actual history.
Well, I think that- Oh, wait... 🤯
What about when the art went digital?????
Most definitely the Bronze Age ends and everything captured within the mid eighties (I would say from 1984 onwards) towards the late nineties is the Boom Age defined by the boom in creativity and the dizzying highs and eventual fall of the industry. Then what follows with the turn of the century is the Event Age where publishing is geared towards trade paperbacks and big superhero crossover events as cinema becomes the superior medium for superhero mythology while the comics become tedious and convoluted. It's questionable at the moment if the Event Age has actually ended or not, as these eras of comic books seem to clearly pivot around every fifteen years or so. What will define the next era? Will there even be one? Only time can tell.
And a confident Molecule Man! Which is always sexy
Its not perfect, but i put the current age as beginning with Astonishing X-Men. I like the neatness of the end of the previous age being the last arc of New X-Men by British Invasion/ Vertigo superstar Grant Morrison and Image founder Marc Silvestri. And the name of that arc "Here Comes Tomorrow" seems apt. Then the modern age begins with Astonishing written by MCU man Joss Wheldon. The innovations of Vertigo and Image had been assimilated by Marvel, and the weird, OTT edges sanded off, leaving comics that feel modern but won't scare off merchandisers and Hollywood people.
Who coined the terms "Golden Age" and "Silver Age" anyway?
Current state of grasping something that resembles a chronology was made complicated on purpose and demands a real effort from any potential customer (thanks to all those regular retcons & reboots). I can understand and even support #1 renumbering when a new creator starts his run but switching titles as often generates only confusion e.g. Thor by Jason Aaron basically forces people to skip the floppies altogether because this marketing tactic is pure insanity. This sabotage proves how shortsighted they really are.
Its interesting and understandable that the perspective used is very much north American Superhero comics. That's the basis of the Golden, Silver, Bronze age definitions and it clearly makes sense to continue using that framework.... or does it. Even allowing for the North American perspective there's a shift towards globalisation of comics needing that framework expanding.
So moving beyond superheroes, if for example you'd gone with TNMT 1 as the shift from the Bronze Age, but rather than going with continuation with Copper Age, rather moving into say the Indie Age, we could use Spawn 1 (I'm clutching here and here on with specifics as I've not put any pre-thought into this, so please bear with me on specifics) as say the Image Age - or Big Guns and Pouches Age whatever. Then say Walking Dead 1 for Creator Owned Age and maybe we get to a Crowd Funding Age... I'm not really going with the detail here, just the principle.
This still retains the North American bias, makes sense BUT the North American bias was waining even in North American comics so another approach might be to go with say Swamp Thing 19 ending the Bronze Age and starting the Invasion Age - signified by the 'British Invasion' (I'd call it the 2000ad age but then I'd be exposing my biases there!) a period were talent from other markets, not just the UK ... but again 2000ad yah know, most important comic ever and all that.... my biases showing again?... anyway... shifted content across the medium, then maybe a Manga age into a Global age.... where digital access removes all barriers, pretty much.... and that leads to another option. Format / vehicle.
The mid eighties start the Trade Paperback Age, leading to the 'Graphic Novel' Age as most high street bookshops and public libraries had 'Graphic Novel' Sections and we then shift to the Digitial Age...
Details need work on all of these but my main point is as we shift from defined Golden, Silver and Bronze ages based on superhero comics I think its fine to keep that sequence going while branching out, as the medium has, in definition and scope of the ages. Thus moving beyond that narrow perspective and embrace the development of the medium in numerous different ways, as suits needs.
I might well be wrong and or missing the point but hopefully adds to the debate.
i would call comics since the first ironman movie the multi media age or just the movie age. dont really think the term modern age should be used at all a better name would be the current age maybe. some people are calling the rise in crowdfunding comics the iron age so i quite like that term though.
Maybe Bronze Age instead of copper, metal ref and historical ref
Hello! May I ask you, Strange Brain Parts, which comic you derived the images from for use in the section of the video where you describe the period in which comic book movies took over the cultural conversation between comic book films and its source material. In other words, where do I look to get a copy of that Frank Cho art?
Thank you.
(Your voice sounded perfectly fine. No deviation from the usual diction or cadence of delivery.)
Just did a quick Google check and got lucky. It's Avengers vs. X-Men #0, 2012. Really crisp, clear artwork.
@@SingularityOrbit Thank you very much!
Cho drew the first storyline in Mighty Avengers Vol. 1. Beautiful art.
@@chemorris2875 Thank you
Comic sales are worse now than in the 90s. They are just propped up by false figures. Most companies stopped even printing many books, at all..
😂
@@kasrasadrehashemi174 Care to share what made you laugh? Because what I said is factually, correct? Not sure what is funny about it? More sad, than anything else.. Woke ideology pervading comics was the final nail in the coffin for small comic shops and many print comics.
I love this topic you chose. Something I have opinions about. Let me list it out.
1) For me the concept of ages in comics is utterly arbitrary. I wish it were more like music or cinema. Music has terms like "Great American Songbook", Classic Rock, Glam Rock, Arena Rock, Punk Rock, Heavy Metal, Grunge, Hip-Hop, Trap, Rap, Gangsta Rap, Soul, Ska, Reggae. They symbolize both genre and period. Cinema has German Expressionism, Soviet Montage, French New Wave, New Hollywood, Mumblecore, Dogme 95. Instead comics are struck with bizarre metallic ages that are from the literal historical Greek Dark Ages (the original idea of Golden Age was inherently aristocratic).
2) It's also worth mentioning that Golden, Silver, Bronze, Dark Ages came out in the 90s. Nobody in the actual 40s-80s saw comics that way. I also think that while Golden Age makes sense in the way that Golden Age of Hollywood makes sense (i.e. a high that can't be repeated) I don't think that applies to the other ages. The Golden Age was the era of highest comics readership, most diverse choice in genres, with superhero and non-superhero titles having a mainstream audience. That makes sense. But the other ages are more nebulous.
3) I'd divide the eras as Golden Age (until the late 50s), and then I'd say the Post-War Era (from the 1950s to mid-1980s) because Carmine Infantino's Flash very much is about the 1950s futurism as is Green Lantern and the Marvel era. This allows you to fuse the Silver and Bronze Ages together which makes sense since in continuity terms it's the same age for superhero titles. Like Sprang's Batman is in continuity with O'Neil/Adams' Batman and so on. It also terminates perfectly with Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns because both works are so specifically about the Cold War and are in dialogue with the iconography and memory of World War II generation in many ways. The Post-War Era overlaps of course with the end of the Golden Age which for me ends with the collapse of EC Comics and the Wertham backlash.
In general terms more inclusive of non-superhero titles makes sense because comics ages are too centered on superhero ages that you forget that even in the so-called Silver Age, the best selling comics of the 1960s were Uncle Scrooge and MAD Magazine more than Superman, leave alone Marvel (which didn't find success in the classic Lee-Kirby era).
4) The 90s is the Speculator era and the Image Revolution is like a music industry term. The Creator Rights era also makes sense since the 1980s was a time of agitation with Kirby's artwork being a major part of it. You can also divide it as Pre-Crash and Post-Crash. The 2000s could be called the 'Ultimate Era" since Ultimate Marvel did capture the zeitgeist in that specific period. I'd argue that this is a time of Manga influence and dominance (Decompression comes from Manga) so it could be called the Global Manga era maybe. The 2010s given that Dog Man by Dav Pilkey and other stuff by Scholastic is making waves ought to be cited as well. As well as Image comics second era with The Walking Dead, and Saga making waves.
I think Golden, Silver, Bronze, Cooper/Iron keeps it simple for the 20th century. Those can have their nicknames like Exploration, Atomic, Progressive, Dark but we have to look at the type of stories that have been published when we define those eras (impact they had, writing style, art quality, public perception quite nicely point to which material was popular).
Pursuing trends of a current period we got ActionComics #1 to CCA censorship (aimed at kids 6-13), Showcase #4 to the direct market stores (aimed at kids 8-15), addressing social issues to Crisis/Wars events (aimed at teens 10-17), mature books being created to Hollywood boom (aimed at teens 11-19), industry revival and digital expansion (aimed mainly at 14-23 year old?). We should’ve entered a postmodern era by now, with a shift in content and the industry being less dependant on superhero targeting young adults.
@@ChristopherLono Nicknames make sense I'll admit. But my main point is that eras are conflated or centered around superhero genres.
If we mean Ages of Superhero comics okay...but to localize the Golden Age around Superman's first appearance in Action Comics#1 ignores that this was the age where superheroes were one among many genres and often not even the most commercially successful and popular in that time (I mean even among superheroes, in the 1940s, Fawcett's Captain Marvel was outselling Superman). And if you put the end to CCA censorship then it's worth mentioning that CCA censorship came into existence to target EC Comics. The Golden Age makes sense if we mean in terms of highest comics readership, which it was. But it doesn't apply to the so-called "Silver Age" and so on that follows which are all exclusively superhero-centric at the expense of others.
@@ElvingsMusings You're right but I think that invention of the superhero concept was really something unseen (since the ancient myths) and deserves it's recognition. There's no arguing that those books did not have a significant influence.
@@ChristopherLono The did have an influence yes. It's just that I'm not sure if that influence makes sense to discuss in terms of comic books as a whole. In terms of comics as a whole and comics as a medium, superheroes lose in a fair fight to other genres in a competitive market without any thumbs on the scale. Superheroes became big thanks to merchandise and adaptations to other media. Even in this it wasn't exception, Popeye crossed over from comics to cartoons (the famous Superman cartoons where he first flew came from the Max Fleischer studio behind Popeye), as did Little Lulu, with Donald Duck you have the reverse phenomenon of a well-regarded (but largely unexceptional) cartoon series becoming a masterpiece of comics storytelling under the pen of Carl Barks. The focus on superheroes comes at the expense of, the actual comics history a lot of the times.
Just commenting to help with the algorithm.