War Comics
Crank that soulja boy! I was listening to the radio and that song, just happens to mention some two of my favorite characters: Superman and Robocop. With the marching beat, it made me think, is society finished with war comics? Was the disappearance of war comics a sign of the end of the Golden age or was society’s use for war comics just over. If comics are a reflection of our society, then since we are, in fact still in a time of war, where are the war comics of today? I know there has been some powerful graphic novels concerning the events in Iraq, but there are no serials where say Captain America fights terrorists instead of Nazis. This is the question I pose: Are comics a reflection of society and culture at any given time or are comics an escape from our culture at any given time? I tend to gravitate toward the latter. In the fifties, comics especially for soldier boys created an escape from the horrors or war, all while promoting patriotism. In the seventies, during times of social revolution, the changes in the books of the Silver Age, were an escape from Vietnam and the beginnings of the Cold War. Now today, comics, with nearly every genre with the exception of war, and alas westerns (which we will discuss in a future blog) provide an escape from everything, well, digital. I think the death of war comics in modern comics is merely an indication that society is tired of the battlefront and (I’ll dare say it) flag-waving in general. So crank that–soulja boy.
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