The Good Ones Left Me

I love fucking comic books. Nerd? Probably, but shit.....I live what a 14 year old dreams life will be. I stay up late and eat all the ice cream (not a big ice cream fan but I'm just making a semblance of comparison) I want. I play video games, and will till the day I die. The only things that have changed are the drinking, smoking, work, college, and lack of the playmate wife.

But I FUCKING LOVE COMICS.

I remember as a kid the first two comics I pick up. One was Transformers and the other Iron Man. Robots to a kid are not unlike a moth to light. But these two comic either enlightened me or totally warped my mind.

In that issue of Transformers, the Autobots were hiding out in some jungle with Optimus's head disconnected from his body hooked to a web of wires serving as some sort of life support system. Seeing a beloved icon from television as a kid in such a helpless situation like that does have a weird sort of effect on you.

Then there was Iron Man. Oh Tony Stark. If my mother (who was fudamentalist christian) knew that the "hero" was an alcoholic entrepreneur who drunkenly donned a suit that has the firepower and cost of an entire squadron of F-15's, she might just have taken offense. But she didn't and I was safe to delve deeper into the rabbit hole.

And deeper I went. I got into the standard superhero fare. There was X-men, and Spiderman, Spawn, and some Batman. And it was good.......until everything got retarded.

This happened around the late nineties and the time that X-men was truly for teenagers. You have to wait something like ten fucking issues before SOMEONE got punched and had to wade through the "Boo hoo.....I'm a mutant and no one understands me." I can't relate to a world where a dude who can make ice on a whim is not invited to a kegger because he is "different". Come on. Would you really turn down a woman with a hot body who doesn't seem to have any great power other than moving shit with her mind and keeping her boobs from popping out because she's a freak? This world is full of shit.

Spawn got boring real quick. A guy who looks like a compost pile for a head can't get over the fact his wife remarried. Batman got his back broken by some 'roid monkey with the good writing not coming much later. Spiderman had it's hit or misses though, but I cut Peter Parker a lot of slack. I can relate to him. Not because of his down on his luck, lovable loser, but because I too think Mary Jane is hot.

I got into Watchmen and was blown away. Then it was Preacher, Transmetropolitan, Lone Wolf and Cub, Hellblazer, and the Authority, but those are now gone. Their stories are wrapped up or a writer finished making a point in a series.

The only ones I keep up with now are Planetary, 100 bullets, and Y: The last man. Naturally, any things else these writers put out, but these are the only ones I really keep up with anymore. If you get a chance check them out........................ but you don't have to take my word for it!

"Butterfly in the sky
I can go twice as high
Take a look
It's in a book......"
-Lost children's show