Comics Reminiscences

So Brandon asked for some favorite comics articles to put up as a feature on the Comixtreme site.  The brief is to write about something you are passionate about – like a Speak with Sincerity Speech.

So I started thinking back to what I consider my great comics.

I started collecting comics with The Transformers series in about 1985.  These were not classic comics.  I collected them from the Odd Spot spinner rack on the P.R. Main Street.  Allowance money was what was used to purchase them.

When D&M games opened in the late 80s I opened my very first pull file.  I funded my pull file by doing a little bit of labour in the store for Mike.  I collected all the X-Men titles (Uncanny, X-Factor, Excalibur, New Mutants and Wolverine) plus Daredevil.  I choose these series because there were three comics I had randomly purchased years before from these series.

1. Uncanny X-Men #166 by Chris Claremont and Paul Smith.  The first appearance by Lockheed and it had some great Kitty and Wolverine scenes.
2. Uncanny X-Men #159 by Claremont and Bill Siekiewicz.  Nightcrawler defeats Dracula.
3. Daredevil #208 by Harlan Ellison, Arthur Byron Cover and David Mazzucchelli.  A mostly plot-less issue that pits daredevil’s athletics, senses and will against death traps in a house.

While I had read many other comics as youth it was these three issues that prompted the ones I would collect and read.

Those comics had early work by Mark Silvestri, Jim Lee, John Romita Jr and Rob Liefeld.  Artists who were (or still are) some of the premier artists in the field.  My favorite artist was Rob Liefeld.  There was a sense of dynamism and aggressiveness in the art that I really liked.  I hated the Romita Jr. art in Daredevil.  Oddly I’d now rank Romita Jr. first among that group of artists and Liefeld last.  Tastes change (or mature).

I soon bought some additional stuff – The Thanos Quest first, Dr. Strange, Silver Surfer, Alpha Flight, Ghost Rider and Cloak and Dagger.  And soon those artists formed Image and I bought almost all the Image launches.

It is also hard not to think about some of the stuff Dave was collecting in that same era – Spidey, Quasar, Avengers, Hulk, New Warriors, Guardians of the Galaxy and Cap plus some Superman, GL and others.  I read those as closely as my own issues.

I probably don’t have a gushing Comixtreme article in me for any of those early issues.  Thanos Quest and Weapon X  and Uncanny 268 might be the first ones I really loved and could write about.  Or the Longshot mini-series.

Anyway – those were good times.