I am a comic book collector and happy to be one. I might say “proud” if I hadn’t, over a year ago, switched to reading digital as opposed to print comics. I feel a bit robbed of the tactile sensations of the hobby – of the turn of the page, the sneaking look to the panel a page over, the bagging and shorting and stacking and filing. Though I read my comics in a different medium than I used to, I still treat each Wednesday (comic book delivery day to specialty shops around the country) as different from the other days of the week. I subscribe and now, rather than go to the comic store to be handed the books pulled for my “Hold Slot,” I click a button on my iPad and watch them download.
Then I read them.
Rare is the week that I don’t read them all between Wednesdays and some weeks I have, well… let’s just say more comic books in my digital downloads than a grown man should. Comic book legend Will Eisner (creator of The Spirit) is one of the most influential men even to put pencil to drawing board in the pursuit of making comics. So influential was he that the industry awards (think the Oscars or the Emmys or the Grammys) are named The Eisner Awards. He called comic books “sequential art,” perhaps because he became embarrassed by his profession when he had to admit what he did for a living. This is my weekly reaction to the comics I read.
I read 10 comics last week: Batman Eternal #38, Arkham Manor #3, Avengers and X-Men: Axis #9, All New X-Men Annual #1, Batman Annual #3, Daredevil #11, New Avengers #28, Superman #37, Superman/Wonder Woman #14 and Uncanny X-Men #29.
The best comic I read last week was Daredevil #11.
Daredevil scribe Mark Waid is, for my money, one of the top five best writers in comics. Daredevil artist Chris Samnee is, for my money, one of the five best artists in comics. Put them together and Daredevil should be one of the top five best comics in comics.
It is. Consistently, month-after-month, Daredevil is a wonderful read. Waid has made the character fun. He’s revitalized “the Man without Fear” and his supporting cast and has done so by creating exciting plots that feature not only some of the best adversaries from the hero’s rogues gallery (Bullseye and the Purple Man leap to mind) but also some of the best treatments of so-called “real world” issues that one can find in comic books (Waid’s takes on cancer and depression are shockingly moving). He knows Matt Murdock. He knows Marvel Comics’ history. He knows how to write great stories. Everything Waid puts out is worth reading.
And the writer has found a perfect partner in Chris Samnee whose Daredevil in costume somehow looks just like his Matt Murdock out of costume. It’s a pretty cool feat. I cannot think of another artist who manages to capture his lead so perfectly in and out of costume. Daredevil is a great looking book and Samnee’s cartooning style is an excellent compliment the stories Waid is telling.
The writer and artist will leave Daredevil this spring, and that’s a shame. Their departure coincides with the premiere of Netflix’s Daredevil series, a show which promises to be closer in tone to the darker Daredevil stories of the past and, while dark Daredevil stories are all well and good, I will miss this take on the character.
And I will miss Waid and Samnee. Hopefully, they will find another character to take on together.
DC’s Flash, anyone? Waid has a tremendous history with that other red-costumed superhero and Samnee’s style would be an ideal counterpart.
And There Came a Day... 