Well, I meant in general. I'm not so much talking about "superhero" comics as I am talking about the standard fare nowadays. Ultimate Spider-man, the big crossovers, Superman, etc. There are a lot of superhero books that I still like, as in certain runs of superhero comics, but in general, the tripe that's coming out now. . .it sucks.
I meant more along the lines of you look for the themes and underlying messages then just buying something because it's 'shocking' or 'The Battle of the Century!'.
Oh you misread me.
What I meant was that you can start out reading a lot of superhero fare, and then mature to um, better superhero fare, basically. As you said, you're tired of the crap that Marvel and DC have been feeding us, and the direction you took was to read more Vertigo and ABC.
I think a similar path would be to get sick of the crap that Marvel and DC feeds and pick up 'intelligent superhero-ism' from smaller publishers as well as Image and Dark Horse.
ProjectX2 said:
I think the more things you read, the more defined your tastes become, and you realise that the comics you were reading aren't actually as good as the comics as you should or could be reading.
Sacred&Profane said:
Are my book choices 'maturing?' No. They're simply expanding.
E said:
I disagree. There is a definite difference in maturity between things like Maximum Carnage and Planetary. It's a perfect and correct use of the word.
And yes, I feel like my tastes have definitely matured. Or maybe it's not so much that, but I'm more aware of more "mature" comics than I was before.
I think the reason why these answers differ is because has something to do with
perceived accessibility.
It's not that our tastes are getting 'better' (a concept that is difficult to quantify/qualify) but that we realize that comics can be geared towards personal interests rather than a gut-level sense of hyper cool enjoyment (not that there's anything wrong with that)
Sometimes I get the feeling that this has to do with the fact that comics are perceived as speaking to only one 'conceptual demographic' that enjoys a
limited plurality of surface cool (i.e. giant robots, plus sexy tomb-raiding witch-slaying assassins, lone warrior gunmen with shadowy pasts) rather than being perceived as capable of exciting and arousing different aspects of ourselves.
To cite an individually-specific case, I think is why I like to talk at length about
Fantastic Four and
Star Trek and
Fullmetal Alchemist --- although they appear irreconcilably different and speak to different conceptions of what 'pop culture fun' is, they intersect as philosophical ruminations on the notion of science, progress and other forms of secular humanism.