Independent Comics Are The Way Forward
The two big comic book companies, DC Comics and Marvel Comics, rule the comic book market and have done so for decades. But their reign right now is largely due to inertia and for decades comic boo…
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The independent scene has gotten stronger lately, but it's still a shadow of what it was back in the 80s. In fact, you could argue that Image is no longer technically indie, they're right up there with Marvel and D.C.
But back in the 80s we had Eclipse, Pacific, First, Comico, Eagle, this was before even Dark Horse and Valiant came along.
I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that independent comic creators are spread out over multiple publishing companies and not just a few independent imprints. You have Drawn and Quarterly, Fantagraphics and a whole host of others that publish smaller, indie graphic novels. There are also a lot of traditional book publishers that publish graphic novels now too. There's a lot out there, but it's not under any one umbrella like it was back in the 80s/90s.
I think the old independet comics scene was just different, not better or worse. It'd be great to see more 80s style indie comics made again, but I wouldn't want them to replace what we have now.
Relevant video about the history of Elfquest, which was one of first underground/self published comics to "get big"
I'll check it out. I still need to read Elfquest.
Closest we've got now, I think, are the Ghost Machine books from Image. Those have been a great read so far.
Oh yeah, the Geoff Johns stuff. I didn't know Halo and Hornsby was by them too. I didn't read any of their books yet (I usually wait until a series is done or has a large enough backlog) though they didn't give me 80s indie comic vibes when I saw them.
Mostly Geiger, Rook and Redcoat giving me that vibe.
