Friday, October 10, 2014

Good Guys being Good and Bad being Bad

This is sorta of a rant so move along if you don't want to listen to a rant. My sone (5) like Spider Man - for whatever reason. So I was thinking about getting some comics for him and letting him delve into the glorious world of comic book heroes. Spider man is a good choose I should think.

Not so much with many of the others. I have not plumbed the depths of comics in a long time and quit collecting years ago. I quit about the time comics 'grew up.' The content of the stories and several of the story arcs were just too much and nothing I wanted to see in the comic book world I grew with. To wit, themes and back stories concerning alcoholism, gender identification, feminism, politics, drug addiction, and on and on and on just killed the comic for me.

Mot only that, the constant deaths and rebirths were tiring scams by the comic makers to reboot sales, interest and the collectors market. This went really overboard with the special covers, unique covers, silver colors, gold colors, and every year it seemed like a new FIRST ISSUE was released for Superman.

Well, potatoes in your faces I said, and just quit reading comics.

But I still have that childhood love of comics. I enjoy thumbing through old issues (geeze some are 40 years old now).  I can even recall in my minds eye several covers.

Anyway, in perusing comics I was looking for a hero. A hero with no baggage other than "I am a good guy and I want to do good things and I am powerful and can, so will." Then he goes and does good things. Peter Parker appears OK for that but have not read many of the recent comics so do not know the content. Superman is awesome like that. He is just a good guy. Now Captain America is also awesome. Even in the movies he is depicted as a good guy with little or no angsty baggage. He just wanted to do good. I don't know how the comics treat him.

In any respect, I am somewhat leery so will take any suggestions for a hero who is a hero is a hero is a hero.

I want bad guys to be bad because they are bad and good guys who are good because they are good. I want the black and white, the even divide, the clarity and simplicity that a youngster can understand and grasp.

Later, hopefully much later, he can wrestle with all the other crap we, as adults, have or will wrestle with. I want the comic book hero to supply a node (as all role models should) to which he can direct his decision making process.

Ohh comics. Speaking of which, I think I will grab an old Conan. # 58 I think, one of my favorite of all time.



1 comment:

Unknown said...

Yeah, buying comics for kids these days is tough. Most of them are rated Teen-plus. But look for the DC Kids line -- the stories are all one-and-done in an issue, the heroes are clearly the heroes and there's a strong team element in most of them. Teen Titans, Batman: The Brave and the Bold and occasionally Green Lantern are all recommended. dcnationcomics.kidswb.com/
Marvel also has a kids line, but I honestly don't think it's very good -- and I say that as someone who likes Marvel's regular line a whole lot more.

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