Wednesday Comics, Thursday Review!DC Comics launched their twelve week experimental run of "Wednesday Comics" yesterday and the large, tabloid-size format (similar to the Sunday color comics supplement in most newspapers), which also hearkens back to the treasury-sized volumes of the 1970’s, is a joy to behold.
It’s apparent that a great deal of thought went into selecting the proper content for this project, which writers & artists would be the best fit, what characters would appeal to the broadest possible audience and which format "might" reel in a weekly readership who’ve grown increasingly bored with other year-long comic events in the wake of "52". It’s no secret that 52’s follow-up, Countdown, and the current Trinity series have each continued to sell; although not at the same level as the earlier fifty-two week crossover series.
There are several nice elements to "Wednesday Comics". First, if this weekly series proves to be successful, then the industry’s conceit of continuing to use the slick paper glossy format on monthly comics doesn’t really hold water. Produced on traditional newsprint, Wednesday Comics is brilliant with color work, and the reader doesn’t have to continually adjust the angle to avoid lighting glare, which obscures and mars the whole reading experience. The ink saturation on the page is absolutely topnotch.
Hey, publishers! The economy is a little depressed at the moment and things out here in the real world will likely continue to rebound ever so slowly. How about trying to save your fans at least a few of their hard-earned sheckles by adopting a more cost effective format that can’t help but improve your own bottom line? Okay, maybe some of the prima donna creators who work for you actually "prefer" the slicker books, since they look "cool". Wrong! You are the operators of businesses that need to reign in costs, in order to protect corporate profits, so here’s an idea. Re-educate those bozos as soon as possible. Like Archie Comics, and DC’s own Looney Tunes & Scooby Doo titles, this is the way to go, and you know what? Stuff like that just looks like a comic book ought to look.
Overall, I enjoyed the entirety of Wednesday Comics creative line-up. There’s Neil Gaiman & Mike Allred on Metamorpho, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez & Kevin Nowlan drawing the Metal Men, Paul Pope soloing on Strange Adventures (which barely missed being my favorite feature in a remarkable group of strips, but Metal Men won out) and Joe Kubert drawing Sgt. Rock. Let’s say that again; Joe Kubert "drawing Sgt. Rock", damn that makes me happy.
Kudos to the all of the creators involved in the series and to DC Comics for thinking outside of the box and attempting yet another way to revive fan interests in a fun format. I can not recommend Wednesday Comics highly enough. Please, please rush out and grab yourself a copy today.
If weekly comics are to continue, folks, this is the way to do them.
3 comments:
Thanks for the feedback, Cash, but methinks you intended this comment for a different post.
Man, finally someone in America gets it. This is how to do comics, respectable format [why shoould only Europeans do them properly, we can too] weekly. All is perfect for a start. I would slowly add more pages [never decrease the size of this beauty!] maybe add some different genres in there slowly like one manga page [not those large eye one, but more realistically drawn eg, Naoki Urasawa], comedy eg, Sergio Aragones etc. western Jonah Hex by Jordi Bernet that would be awesome...
Best thing in comics by DC comics. Love it.
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