Its the age old argument many a child -and adult!- fan has engaged in at one time or another: Which is the better comic book company, Marvel or DC?
Read on, read on…
Big admission: I’ve always been a DC fan. When I was growing up in the early 1970’s, my first major comic book experiences almost all related to DC books. At the time, I was absolutely wowed by the sinister, shadowy artwork of Berni Wrightson and great storytelling of Len Wein in the first ten issues of Swamp Thing. I was also impressed with the Archie Goodwin/Walt Simonson Manhunter stories. Not long afterwards I was equally blown away by the various Neal Adams drawn works, primary of which were his Batman and Green Lantern/Green Arrow series, at that time appearing in various reprint forms.
Don’t get me wrong, I was aware of the Marvel books and many of the creators involved in them. I loved the works of Jack Kirby (who doesn’t…at least now?) and was floored by his Fantastic Four work…but, again, his DC work, which was more current at that time, simply had my attention. I loved, loved, loved Kamandi: The Last Boy on Earth and found The New Gods, and in particular the at times savage Orion, absolutely fascinating.
Lest I sound like a total DC fanatic, let me conclude with this: The initial 38 issues of Spider-Man, the original issues created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, easily remain my all time favorite Marvel works. This is no slight on the many contributions to Marvel Comics of Jack Kirby. As I mentioned before, I loved his Fantastic Four run. It is a very, very close second to the Spider-Man issues for best Marvel work ever. In my humble opinion, of course.
Ok…think I got all that geekiness out of my system now. Back to work! 😉