Yes, it's comics the old fashioned way-- at the time avante garde and cutting edge Marvels from the late 60s early 70s stood out because for the first time characters in a comic book universe faced "real life" problems-- Spider-Man needed a part time job to make ends meet-- Iron Man had a drinking problem-- etc etc.
Eventually relevancy gave way to a darker grittier kind of comic book world where it was hard to tell the heroes from the villains.
Kirby didn't bother with any of that-- his characters were one dimensional and spoke in dialogue that a soap opera writer would laugh at-- but it worked and it was entertaining and that's always the goal of storytelling isn't it?
Comics are cyclical-- sales go up and sales go down, and when they go down publishers try new things to bring them back up. To the general public comic books and superheroes are one and the same-- but as long as books like GOODBYE CHUNKY RICE, MAUS and LOVE & ROCKETS are still around the industry will continue to thrive artistically.
Tomorrow: DC Restarts their Universe with a new JLA-- find out what I thought of it.
