Should All Comics be All-Ages?

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
One of the most loaded statements that you can make
about comic books today is comics are for everyone. So
Jason and Diego, I have to follow.

Speaker 2 (00:22):
Up what by asking, Yeah, I'm here. We have a
special guest already. Yeah, here, I am magically appearing.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Yeah, we decided to give the research assistant a microphone.

Speaker 3 (00:30):
Well, I will I will say it makes sense that,
you know us, we're talking about all ages of a
certain medium, and it does make sense for us to
actually bring in somebody that's a little bit younger than
us old people.

Speaker 2 (00:41):
Oh wow, that you brought a child into the podcast.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
Guys, I'll also say, I'm ninety nain Diego when I
were the sees. But so let me boldly ask you.
And we're going to ask Diego first, and we're gonna
make Jason wait for just one single second.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
Won't have much tab nift on show, so you'll go last.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
Why did we stop making mainstream superhero comics for kids?
Kid friendly?

Speaker 2 (01:12):
I am gonna probably blame the eighties. I'm sure we'll
dive more into it, but you could say that for
a lot of things, blame the eighties.

Speaker 4 (01:21):
Yeah, you really like movies, music, a lot of things.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, I have oh political state of.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
Not for real.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
But I think for whatever reason, when comic book creators
had the funny idea of catering to adults rather than children,
I think that started to become the massive decline of
all ages comics for superheroes.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
But yeah, Jason, I mean he's exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
He's absolutely right. I mean there are let's just like,
let's stop all the commenters right now, right because I
know there's a million YouTube comments or whatever they're going
to pop up on this where somebody is going to say,
but this coming, but this coming. Yes, we acknowledge that
all ages comics are still being published and they're out there.
We're just not saying we're talking about the majority, the

(02:07):
mainstream of the corporate, the corporate like big two comic books,
it is the eighties. I mean you could I think
you literally could point you. I think you could point
to two comic books that are the dividing line. And
I think we all know the two comics that I'm
gonna say, it's The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller
and it's Watchmen by Alan Moore. I think I think
you can see that they they put their their line

(02:29):
in the sand and said this fa no father, that
was Patrick Stewart, Star Trek First contact everybody. I already said,
I'm old okay, but you know that Star Trek Shakespeare Clail, Yes,
go listen to a previous episode, but you you know
the real I think we're going to talk about. The
main thing in this episode is was that a good thing?
Was that a bad thing? Who? Who should comic books

(02:51):
be for?

Speaker 1 (02:51):
Like?

Speaker 3 (02:52):
I think that's going to be like the big bottle
of this episode right.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
Exactly that and with such a great summary, I think
it's it's only time to say hello and welcome to
Geek History Lesson. I'm Ashley Victoria Robinson.

Speaker 3 (03:02):
And I'm Jason, and welcome to your Mind University. This
is the podcast where one screenwriter from Kansas and one
comic book writer from Canada talk a little bit about
something from pop culture in a little bit less an
hour or drive it into the ground one of the two.
And we have a very special guest who is that Ashley.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Yesterday, we are joined by the Geek History Lesson research
assistant co hosts of Talking Titans, a writer and Emma
Frost super fan.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
Do you go?

Speaker 1 (03:22):
Anthony new Yeares I do go welcome the man.

Speaker 4 (03:26):
I'm so excited to be here by the fact.

Speaker 3 (03:28):
Are you all ages? We need to know?

Speaker 2 (03:30):
I like to think so. I mean, as most most
fans know, I am a child at heart, so you know,
I think I think it's suitable to be here for
this topic.

Speaker 3 (03:39):
I mean, you are wearing a Harley Quinn T shirt.

Speaker 4 (03:41):
Is that all ages? Oh? That's true.

Speaker 2 (03:43):
I mean it is literally seen from Birds of Prey
where she's sniffing cocaine.

Speaker 4 (03:49):
Ages.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
Some Harley Quinn versions are definitely all ages friendly, I
would say, and we'll get into this a little bit,
but the Batman, the Anemity series version, like that's very
all ages friendly. Harley Quinn is a part of DC Superhero.

Speaker 3 (04:01):
Girls and it's weird.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
Yeah, you know, sales boys. I mean it's everyone. Everyone's
a good girl in that version of the universe. So
I would say, debatedfully, as with most superheroes, but your
Friendly Neighborhood Spider Man and The dog Man movie are
about to come out this week, and they both seem
poised to be the most popular thing in the world.
They are both for all ages.

Speaker 3 (04:23):
We should say, Friend Neighborhood Spider Man is a cartoon,
not a movie.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Your friendly neighborhood. Yeah, yeah, that's the difference. That's your
friendly neighborhood.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
Spider, he's not in my neighborhood. I'll tell you that.

Speaker 1 (04:33):
I think he's in Queens. So we thought this would
be the perfect time to come and wade through why
comics are the way. Yes, exactly, full of love and
joy and respect. But as you know listeners, before we
dive in, Jason and Diego and I all live in
Los Angeles, and recently things have been not great in

(04:57):
Los Angeles, but we are persisting, we are re building,
we are getting back together.

Speaker 3 (05:01):
Soon. Was talking about the LA wildfires. We should just say,
just make sure just in case somebody somebody missed the
newsbody might have missed the news. And if you missed
the news, I don't know why you're coming to the
news for us. I don't know why you're doing that.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
So Jason, don you tell some more about that.

Speaker 3 (05:11):
About the news?

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (05:13):
Okay, Well, usually there is a man or a woman
that says behind a desk and they read from papers,
and if they were reading from papers this week, they
would tell you that hundreds of thousands of people have
lost their homes in LA and people you know, wildlife
has been displaced. I was thank you for looking for
their correct word. And the air quality in LA is

(05:34):
pretty bad, and lots of people have lost their homes
and you know, people are rebuilding. Some people have been
able to come into their homes. It's you know, it's
a it's a situation that we definitely wanted to acknowledge
as we were all three citizens of LA as we are,
so all three says of LA as second checking it's
okay to reveal on the podcast.

Speaker 1 (05:52):
Yeah, and we're just encouraging, yeah, people to keep supporting
and any way that you can. But let's do nonsense now, Well.

Speaker 3 (06:03):
I mean like go go check out there's a lot
of great things that we pune it towards the LA firefighters,
Collis h you know, go help all the gofundmeans you see,
Red Cross is always a great place. There's there's the
LA Times is a great list, go check it out.
Any support is greatly appreciated by the people of Los Angeles,
which we are of.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
Yes, yes, that's almost the function.

Speaker 3 (06:25):
Well, I want to make sure we point people towards something.
It said, just being like yeah, you know, it's go
check it out with Burna's move on.

Speaker 1 (06:33):
Yeah, okay, so let's talk about nonsenses. So there is
a very famous quote that is every comic is someone's first.
This quote is often attributed to Stanley. I use that
phrasing because nobody has cited where or when it was
ever said, but it is attributed to Stanley.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
I thought that I did.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
Extensive research trying to figure out where this came from,
because the Jack Kirby comics will Break Your Heart Kid
is from a specific interview. So it's not that I
don't believe that Stanley said this, but I believe he
said a version of this, and this is what the
pop culture machine has condensed it.

Speaker 3 (07:13):
I'm gonna throw out I think I know exactly where
it is. I cannot give you a specifics. And the
reason why you cannot find specifics is because in the
back of Marvel comics throughout the sixties and the seventies,
there was a letter column that was called Stan's Soapbox
in the back of every Marvel comics, and I believe
that is where this phrase is.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
Coined, or probably like a version of it was repeated.

Speaker 3 (07:34):
It is in the letters page where people would be like, well,
why did you do why did Spider Man do this?
And he's like, well, every kmic is somebody's for his chemic.
You see, yes, Stanley here, so san oh boy, I
was looking for that check from my opinions here from
the after the Life came through. You know the potal
that was opened.

Speaker 4 (07:50):
Up, you know, like old kid comics, and you're just
like here, I come.

Speaker 3 (07:54):
No, no, there was a potal you know from my
Heil dimension it came in. Yeah, yeah, all right, I'll
see that come out of that check in the Mauth.

Speaker 1 (08:01):
Someone's gonna be furious that you imply that Stanley was
in hell.

Speaker 3 (08:04):
I traveled around, you know, sometimes I want to get
a little son from the fires.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
So you're both the creatives and writers. I guess if
Stanley is sticking around, all three of you are creatives.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
You'll be paid for a cameo.

Speaker 1 (08:20):
We did not pay as diego. Will Well tell you.

Speaker 3 (08:24):
I can jul you the digital wallet for the hill coin.
I can tell you.

Speaker 1 (08:29):
Shouldn't it be excelsor excels.

Speaker 3 (08:32):
Copy right, Stanley, give me a check.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
There you go, you can have it. I don't want
I don't want cryptocurrency. Anywhere near me.

Speaker 3 (08:38):
Uh so, yeah, really did make lots of old age comics.
We just said say that absolutely.

Speaker 1 (08:42):
I've had asked you writers, I would like to know
when you hear every comic is someone's first, what does
that mean to you and does that affect when you
think about comic book storytelling.

Speaker 4 (08:52):
In a weird way?

Speaker 2 (08:53):
I always feel like that has something to do with
nostalgia and childhood, because it's just like there's always something
about your first experiences, right, and so with me, it's like,
my first experience with comic books was I want to say,
like thirteen or fourteen. But interestingly, to the topic, it's
like I have an answer. My first ever comic was

(09:13):
actually not one from the Big two. It was Sin
City and that's so Diego.

Speaker 3 (09:20):
Yeah right, yeah.

Speaker 4 (09:21):
And interestingly though too, it's just maybe it's.

Speaker 3 (09:25):
Uh, where did you find it? Where'd you pick it up?

Speaker 4 (09:26):
It was when the movie came out. Oh, okay, it
came out. I was. I was a massive fan of
the movie, and I was.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
Very interesting, really good.

Speaker 4 (09:33):
Yeah, I love that movie. Let's we say about the
second one.

Speaker 3 (09:36):
That's right, that's right, that's correct, but a good time.

Speaker 2 (09:39):
Yeah, and they reprinted all those stories, so I was
so I was reading those and I became really obsessed
with them. And then a year later, Batman Begins came
out and that was like the resurgence for a lot
of Batman stuff was coming on. They were doing DVD
specials for like eighty nine and returns and stuff. So
I like digested all that stuff and was already reading it.
And my first superhero comic was the killing joke that seems.

Speaker 3 (10:03):
Very Diego Tea. Yeah, yeah, right, And you were always
destined to be on this podcast. I think that's what
we're funny.

Speaker 4 (10:09):
Well, yeah, like.

Speaker 3 (10:10):
When yeah cause cancel the second stan Lee appearance, always
bring Diego back? Okay, got it?

Speaker 2 (10:16):
Well, it was funny because when you guys reached out
to me about because there was a few episodes we
were talking about guest spearing on, and this is the
one that kind of stood out to me because there
was a lot I felt like I could offer to
this and and talk about just because of that fact
of I, you know, not to get so personal, but
I always feel like, you know, for me, I grew
up a little too fast, and then it was always
by the content that was provided to me, and it's

(10:38):
funny to me that both, like my non Big two
and Big two were both very adult.

Speaker 4 (10:43):
Yeah, very heavy themed comic books.

Speaker 3 (10:46):
You know, we should make it clear to the listeners.
We should say that Diego grew up on a racetrack.
That's why he grew up too fast.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
Yeah, he is a need for speed.

Speaker 2 (10:54):
I have like one of those like little hats that
you wear and you go to the race track and
you're always betting.

Speaker 1 (10:58):
You know, first in the back of f one at
the first time I met the first.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
Time I met him, he's on a pit crew.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
Yeah, Jason, I would love to know from you. Do
you believe like Stanley that every issue of a comic
book should be new reader friendly? Yes, yes, Oka, cause
I'm gonna I'm gon challenge you and be like, what
are the possible pitfalls if you're writing for the issue
versus writing for the trade. Everyone writes for the trade.

Speaker 3 (11:20):
Well, yeah, see, that's the problem is that we are
now in in and you know a lot of people
give this to Brian Michael Bendis in two thousands and
Ultimate Spider Man, so around the early two thousands like that. There.
That is where you know, comics were serialized before them
because there was no Man's Land. There was there was
there was Nightfall, there was the death, especially the Big Two.
There was death and return of Superman and.

Speaker 1 (11:41):
Batman family, so Superman family as well, so there was
a Superman.

Speaker 3 (11:45):
Yeah. So things were serialized. It was just it was
still it was even in the eighties. They were serialized.
Think about christ Lane and Earth's right, all that.

Speaker 1 (11:55):
We just had smaller arcs like in the in the
Superage we have aquamand death of a Prince. That's the
two as you are.

Speaker 3 (11:59):
The difference I think was is that you didn't have
readers that read comics for forty years or read comics
for thirty years. You would have readers that would read
comics for there was God, there was a I think
Ron Mar's, creator of Kyle Rainer, said this once and

(12:20):
I think he took this from another creator where he
always said that comic books and the originally created were
always meant were just like toys. They were an industry
that was built that every five years you were getting
a brand new audience. Yeah, because kids were growing out
of it, so they would get tired of comic books.

Speaker 1 (12:38):
Are you saying that we all suffer from arrested development.

Speaker 3 (12:40):
Yes, and as a person who does, I fully admit it.
But it's just that we have now changed into a
market to where the only people that are sort of read,
especially talking about the big two, we're talking about Marvel, DC,
the whole audience are people that have been reading comic books.

(13:00):
And there are weird outliers there, right, but the majority
of them, I would say, have been reading the comics
for more than that five years.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
So yeah, more than ten, I would say.

Speaker 3 (13:09):
So I feel like all of the writing, in all
of the creation is now towards that. And so that's
why comics have become super serialized now, when you're expected
to know every single event that has ever happened, Whereas
I think before they wrote them very much like episodic television,
where it was like, well, hey, if you don't know
who this Robin is, no big deal. All you need

(13:29):
to know is that he's Robin and that he's a
good guy. Yeah, that's all you need to know. Like
I mean, like going into sid City, like you had
no clue or even the killing joke, did you have
any clue who Barbara Gordon was. I Besides the old
Batman series, I assume Yeah, right, yeah.

Speaker 2 (13:44):
Because I was a fan of the animated series for sure,
so I was definitely familiar with the characters. But yeah,
in terms of like nuances or what even that meant
from a cultural standpoint of when that book came out
and what like, So like just seeing her get shot
and being crippled, I was like, oh, Like to me,
I didn't understand in the gronder of like that actually
affected continuity in a grand way, and like so like

(14:06):
for me, that was a big drop off point or
drop in point. And then actually when I started seriously
getting into comics and I would see her in a
wheelchair as an Oracle character, I was like it was
it introduced a whole new world of continuity, and like
just like realizing there was more than I was barking
for of like, oh, this single issue is not necessarily
it is a one and done, but it isn't at
the same time, because there's consequences.

Speaker 3 (14:27):
And I love to flip this question around to you actually,
because Diggo brought up a perfect example here of here's
something that people don't think is serialized. It is one
hundred percent serialized. Cheers Mesh, cheers, Oh so good.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
Mid twentieth century television.

Speaker 3 (14:43):
One thing the eighties didn't screw up television. Let's just
say that. Yeah, film and television nailed own eighties. The
eighties might be one of the best eras of television.
I'm just throwing that out there right now. But you know,
diggo said. Batman the anime series, Yeah, that Man the
anime series is serialized because every time the Joker shows up,

(15:04):
they mentioned his previous appearances. It all builds, It builds
to Batman beyond, it builds to just like it's serially,
but Batman the animi series almost feels like you could
watch any episode in any part of that run and
not be lost. So I know that it's your first
experience with Batman.

Speaker 1 (15:20):
Batman sixty six was technically I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it's
because we had the reruns. But yeah, Batman the Animated
Series was like where I got into Batman. I think
it's interesting because my favorite episode of series, Yeah is
what Jason, what's my favorite episode Batman the Animated Series?

Speaker 3 (15:36):
Oh? Boy, I can't because you put me on the spot.
It's the Robin one Robin's record.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
There was a while. There was a while where maybe
in the first couple of years of geek History last,
and we would watch Batman the Amitateries a lot, and
Jason would always be like, what episode do you want
to watch? And I would say Robin's recon And there
was a point where you were like, you cannot say Robin.
I think we'd watch it like three or four times.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
Because whenever I revisit that show, I weirdly fall back
to like three to four episodes either go like to
the Laughing Fish, or that's.

Speaker 1 (16:02):
A great one, Holiday Nights is great to the.

Speaker 3 (16:05):
Episode but most them is one of my favorites the
other one.

Speaker 1 (16:09):
But I think Robin's Reckoning is one of the only
episodes that you actually need to know a little bit
about the common because it has to deal with Dick's
relationship with Ironically enough, but you jumped ahead a little
bit to a point that I had later. Let's do
it right now. Is so, first of all, we want
to agnoloe that we're not saying that like there is
no room for adult comics. There is room for lots

(16:31):
of adult comics. And even in the Silver Age, which
is sort of the era of all you just comics,
we had romance comics and we had adult themed comics,
but we're again, we're just trying to focus mainly on
the Big two.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
We should also check that we were not also saying
that all current comics right now are bad. We're just discussion. Discussion.

Speaker 1 (16:50):
Yeah. Yeah. Many of the best comic books and comic
book television show adaptations are all ages. So I want
to kind of get into that with you guys. Here's
here's a brief list that we put together. Batman, Superman,
Justice League, Teen Titans, and Green Lantern, the animated series
Teen Titans, Go Avengers, Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Man sixty six

(17:11):
Over the Garden Wall, which is an independent story that's
a comic that became a TV show.

Speaker 4 (17:16):
I learned something today.

Speaker 1 (17:17):
I didn't know that I love the static yeah static yeah.
So so yeah, like, if many of the best comics
are all ages, why did we turn away for.

Speaker 3 (17:29):
I don't know. And again, yeah, because these are the stories.

Speaker 1 (17:32):
That we're choosing to adapt.

Speaker 2 (17:33):
I think I think it's public perception, honestly, because I
say more, well, what I think it is is growing
up to be comic book fans, right, it was a
very niche thing, especially like in the nineties, eighties, all
that kind of stuff, Like if you read comic books,
you're like.

Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah, yeah, but y'all got yello.

Speaker 3 (17:50):
Oh I got I got made fun of in the
nineties for reading comic books, I got teased.

Speaker 2 (17:54):
And as time went on, I felt like the key
thing was because they got mature, almost gave like this
permission for society to start tolerating them.

Speaker 4 (18:03):
Yeah, you're right, and.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
I feel like with and I feel like because of that,
and things start falling to the waistside. Like I think,
in its purest pure superhero comics are indulging childhood fantasies,
you know, and you go to the back to the
basics of Captain Marvel, right with Shizam, where it's just
a little boy has.

Speaker 4 (18:22):
A wish fulmiliment, says the magic word. He becomes a
big superhero.

Speaker 1 (18:24):
That you don't think alcoholic. Carol Danvers is wish.

Speaker 4 (18:28):
That's not what I aspired me.

Speaker 2 (18:31):
But I think in that bare essence, there's just something
about that of just wanting to lend yourself to imagine
yourself being Batman or Superman. Because I feel like the
problem is like when you start getting into the weeds
of adult content and making things very mature. Actually, I
wanted to ask you guys this too, was like, because
I know you guys have been very vocal of I.

Speaker 3 (18:51):
Told you I'm not giving you fifty bucks.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
Well then bye, I'm just taking my stuff.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
Good day, everybody.

Speaker 4 (19:02):
I believe I said good day.

Speaker 2 (19:04):
But I did want to ask because I know you
guys have been very vocal and about Batman, and I'm.

Speaker 3 (19:11):
Especially the last couple of years. Yeah, And I'm very curious.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
Do you think it's because of the fact of the
character's been so quote unquote mature that everyone takes this
character so seriously because the points you guys have made
recently about taking like talking about he needs to get therapy,
and would that be a question we would even be
talking about if it was more child friendly, more you know,
like and I feel like that's one of those biggest
issues of like when we start talking about adult things

(19:35):
in the world, realm of comic books, of like serious
themes of like why doesn't Batman just.

Speaker 4 (19:40):
Use all of his beyond air money?

Speaker 3 (19:41):
It's like, Yeah, I'm like, what are we talking? It's
a guy in a costumes of the bat like listeners.
I'm just going to tell you, I'm going to touch
Diego on the shoulder and give him a big, a
big white kiss, because you totally get us. That is
one hundred percent it. It is. It is because at
the end of the day, comics are escapism, right, and

(20:03):
it is this thing of like And Robin was introduced
to be the Reader Cipher back in the thirties, to
be the reader Cipher because they thought Batman was too dark, right,
and they thought were like, kids aren't gonna read Batman.
He's so scary, He's he's scarier than the Shadow. Let's
introduce this kid, Robin because then people bright colors and
bright colors, and he's he's so excited to be there,

(20:23):
and he's and he's a jumping little trappeze artist. And
so that way we could all be like, well, I
could be Robin and then I get to hang out
with Batman.

Speaker 1 (20:28):
And then and Dick Grayson is still to this day
overwhelmingly the most popular character. And then Grant Morrison might
be Peter Parker.

Speaker 3 (20:35):
And then Grant Morrison and his great Batman uber took
that and kind of rote the idea that he was like,
oh yeah, Dick Grayson pulled Batman out of the darkness
and you are right.

Speaker 1 (20:44):
It is this.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
It is this like I'm and and you know, and
I'm fine with the reason why I'm fine with the
Dark Knight Returns is because up to that point in
the eighties, we had had the g golly Like in
the seventies Batman had gotten a little darker. But in
the seventies Batman is very much Shames Bond.

Speaker 1 (21:00):
I think it's hard for us to understand how revolutionary
that was because we've had nothing but reductive copies of.

Speaker 3 (21:05):
That ever since you came out. And I feel like, yes, exactly,
I feel like everybody since The Dark Knight Returns has
just been chasing be like I can be darker than
the Dark Knight return I could be dark. No, I
could be dark. And you're like, where guys, like, literally
twenty years before the Dark Knight Returns, we had Batman
sixty six. Yeah, right, where's our Batman sixty It's a
cycle and we we've all we've done for forty years

(21:26):
now is just been like i'man for like forty years now,
and that's why I'm tired of it.

Speaker 1 (21:32):
Yeah, I have two things I want to I want
to bring up, so so sort of to go back
to like the reader's cycle and bringing in new readers.
When I was working in comics retail at the beginning
of DC Rebirth, I remember a little boy came in
with his mom and he went to whatever look at
the comics, and she came and talked to me, and
she's like, he wants a Batman comic. Can I buy
him the Batman comic? And I was like, you cannot
buy him Tom. I'm sorry, Tom Tom King's batmane. She goes,

(22:00):
why not? And I said, it's called I am suicide,
And I gave I had I to specifically point her
towards a more liked and I say the kid was
maybe six or eight, if he was like small, like
he was young. So I was like, you can't. It's
not a thing where it's like, well, maybe if it's
a mature ten year old he can have. And I
think to Diego's original question, it is interesting because Jason

(22:21):
and I talk a lot about this. In the twenty teens,
we entered this era as a North American society, uh,
which the only countries I've ever lived, and that's what
I'm speaking to. But I think probably all of Western society,
but about American society where we were allowed to go
to therapy. Everybody went to therapy. We all admitted that
we went to therapy. We started throwing my therapist around

(22:44):
like that was a normal thing to say.

Speaker 3 (22:45):
You're better help on podcasts, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (22:47):
It's actually.

Speaker 3 (22:50):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (22:50):
Yeah, men were allowed to tell their friends that they
loved them all over a sudden, and so we brought
a lot of therapy jargon into our regular every day life.
And I think that is both a good thing and
a bad things, as with everything, and I think that's
kind of what has kicked off this idea of like, well, yeah,
Batman should just go to therapy, and like Jason, I

(23:11):
definitely say that, but that is a it's a stupid
day because you're reading Superhero Cop. Of course he's not
just gonna give away his billions, like he's gonna put
on the cowl and punch someone. That's what the media
that you're engaging in. But maybe that just proves that
we need a more subtle type of storytelling, yeah than
just put on the cowl and punch him in the thing.

Speaker 3 (23:31):
Because it's it's the again. I go back to that
escapism and part of the reason about like comics being
all ages. Again, it's like it's a perfect example is
because that six year old should be able to pick
up any issue of a kind of a book called Batman.

Speaker 4 (23:43):
Exactly, and it should.

Speaker 3 (23:44):
But the problem is that for almost thirty years, I
don't well, maybe around two thousand, I say, is where
the break is. Somewhere in there is where like you
really couldn't handle, you couldn't hand even a book called
Superman to a kid. Yeah, like they really made a shit.
They made them very very much for adults, like even
the mainstream books. And again that is like sort of

(24:04):
where the disconnected.

Speaker 1 (24:05):
I mean X Men is also a great example of
that because I think of like Uncanny x Men of
the eighties, which was the competitor for the newteen Titans,
and then I think about like the smash cut to
like Astonishing x Men, where it's the jokes at Emma
Frost about like can you put some clothes on? It's
logan Rippings got out of bed and throwing him across
campus because he's mad.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
Even New x Men is that way too. New x
Men is a very adult book.

Speaker 1 (24:28):
And again you're like, well, but we had this animated
series that brought in this whole new generation of readers,
and then we're ignored. Even something like you brought up Static,
Like Static the comic is a very mature type of storytelling,
but Static the cartoon, which did a lot of visibility
for Milestone characters, is even a younger like you've ciphered

(24:49):
that to an even younger audience, which I think is interesting.

Speaker 3 (24:51):
But here's the difference is that Static partly because of
the era. It was published in the nineteen ninetieses, even though.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
Well it had something to say in those creators something.

Speaker 3 (25:00):
Even though it is dealing with with aids and gang
violence and gun violence and all pregnancy and teen pregnancy,
it's still very much an all ages comic book. You
can hand that to a six year old.

Speaker 2 (25:12):
I think that is something very important to be noted
on because it's like and not to jump ahead about
answering the question or anything about that, like the overall question,
but I do feel strongly that superhero comics specifically should
have an age range where it's accessible to six year olds.
And if we're gonna get mature, you could get as
probably as hard as fifteen to sixteen year old you know, yeah, yeah,
I feel like that's the perfect age limit because it's

(25:33):
the it's the accessibility and like kind of like what
you're guys alluding to of, like you can have mature
themes like yeah, all the animated stuff that we're talking about,
even if you go beyond superhero comics, like you look
at like you know, Last Airbender, you know that kind
of stuff, Like it deals with very heavy, mature themes,
but it's also something that kids can understand.

Speaker 3 (25:51):
It's the presentation. It's the presentation.

Speaker 2 (25:54):
Yes, it's about all it's handled. But for some reason,
we are very hung up on the idea of being
really an adult and maturity and taken so seriously.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
And there is this thing about like and maybe this
is this is because something you know, everybody listens podcast knows.
I'm a huge fan of Star Trek and Star Trek.
A lot of classic Star Trek is about a morality play, right.
It is dealing with sometimes heavy issues, sometimes silly issues,
but the idea is that you're watching this thing and
that you're ending the episode sort of like classic television
that was again what you said perfected in the eighties.

(26:26):
You end the episode sort of with two characters and
there is a lesson and a lot of like Batman.
I know, we're picking on Batman, the Superman, spider Man,
all these things like that. They used to deal with that.
It used to be like you got we look think
about the seventies Roy Harper's drug use, but.

Speaker 1 (26:41):
Think about Wonder Woman started and she was dealing with
world wars and like international strike.

Speaker 3 (26:46):
And those those those issues used to always end with
well and and now we're gonna it's okay, we're gonna
get them the help, and so you you'd end every
issue with sort of like a happy ending. And I
feel again like I'm just gonna pick on Batman because
he's the easy target.

Speaker 1 (27:01):
But I feel like that Man's also a social shorthand
that we have to a lot of who.

Speaker 3 (27:06):
He's Honestly, he's the most popular comic character, let's full stop. Yeah,
so that's the reason why he's gonna be the subject
of this. He's got to be challenged exactly. I feel
like the answer, like the these issues have been like
you know, there's sort of a morality player or somebody
there's no morality play. A lot of times there's no
moral to be learned, and the story is just like
Batman is how hard can I punch this guy's teeth in?

(27:29):
And then the issue ends with Batman being like, how
my hand hurts? Right? Maybe I should get more padding
for my fist hand so I can punch them harder,
instead of the lesson that about Batman being like, maybe
I should stop punching these guys. Maybe that's the lesson
I need to learn.

Speaker 1 (27:45):
Yeah, okay, if you before we move on from our
hands hurting from punching people and we recollect ourselves because
we've all broken our knuckles on this episode. I do
want to let people know that if you want to
hear more about some of the animated shows that we
have been shot out, a great place that you can
do that is by going over to patreon dot com
slash John on how do you spell that?

Speaker 3 (28:04):
Jason j A W I I am.

Speaker 1 (28:06):
Yes. We have a series that Diego and I co
host called Talking Tid where we're going through all the
episode of the og Teen Titans, the animated series, which is, oh,
it's pretty dark, there's dark, it's veryly. We're so close
to one of my least favorite episodes.

Speaker 4 (28:25):
I can't wait for it to be my favorite episode.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
And the people who really broke ground for us. There
is Jason and Jeremy where they did Jason and Jeremy
jowing about Justice League, where they go through Justice League
the animated.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
Series, four seasons of it that show over there.

Speaker 1 (28:39):
Yeah, so there's lots of stuff over there where we
are talking about these shows and these themes that you
can dive into. We also have a great discord where
we are talking. I mean, right now we're talking about
Harley Quinn the animated series, which is not all ages
but has great value. As a result of that. Diego
is also one of the most prominent figures over there,
really holding it down in health and fitness. Try the

(29:01):
channel I never thought we would do, So check that out.
Come join us, Come join us for a bunch of
all ages, all animated talk in there.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
Ad free episodes of GHL. We should just say that
and you get them. Oh yes, yeah, and you get them.
You get them early. Sometimes you get them two weeks early,
sometimes you get them a day early. Just depends on
our schedules.

Speaker 1 (29:18):
Still get them earlier than truly anybody else.

Speaker 3 (29:21):
On Crazy just saying that, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (29:22):
Yeah them, Fire's bin support.

Speaker 3 (29:25):
The part Crazy. So you want some cool bonus stuff.

Speaker 1 (29:26):
Come and check it out. And now we're all going
to armor our fists and armor our heads. We're going
to get our lives together. We're gonna take a quick break,
and they're going to come back and talk more all
ages comics. We are back on geek history lesson, and
we are bravely fixing everything that's wrong with modern comics.
We are sending this episode joined by Dano. Anthony is

(29:47):
talking about should all comics be all ages?

Speaker 3 (29:50):
I'm gonna make a I'm going to say to the
listeners right now, I'm going to stop with the Batman punching.
I punched him in the teeth too many times? Does
he have teeth luff my hands hurt? No, he doesn't.
I'm going to pick spider Man now. I'm gonna pick
on spider Man.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
Great, Yeah, I mean we were fider.

Speaker 3 (30:03):
Man is much darker than he used to be. I'm
just throwing that out there.

Speaker 1 (30:06):
Yeah, but you know what's funny about spidery Man is
I like grown up forties? Said is paramount meter Parker?

Speaker 3 (30:14):
Well, I see that's not what I was referencing to.
But okay, I'll bring it up.

Speaker 4 (30:17):
I might bring up Batman once or twice. We'll see you.

Speaker 1 (30:22):
How conversation here, you're you're allowed to Jason. Jason's ambargoed
a moratorium.

Speaker 4 (30:27):
Keep that man right now?

Speaker 1 (30:28):
Oh man, okay, I would love Actually you brought up
the word gatekeeping. So one of the biggest selling book markets,
like point blank period is middle grade and elementary school
aged readers, so kids ages like six to thirteen. There's
an estimated So the comic book market itself has an

(30:50):
estimated readership of eighty thousand worldwide. I think that's hilariously high.
I think in terms of people who are either Wednesday
Warriors or going in and buying stuff every week, even monthly,
I think the number is actually much.

Speaker 3 (31:03):
Like buying a floppy comic book issue, not a graphic novel. Yeah,
a floppy comic issue, at.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
Least something current to the past month. I think the
number is probably closer to fifty worldwide. That's a tea.

Speaker 3 (31:15):
I would say, you're probably right.

Speaker 1 (31:16):
That is a teeny tiny market. So if you look
at some of the best selling comic book creators right
now in this younger reader space are renas Helgemeyer with
her Uvra DC Kids and newspaper the reprint of newspaper strips,
Calvin and Hobbes and Peanuts, that's wonderful, is so high
if you look at market breakdowns, so I.

Speaker 3 (31:37):
Would Snoopy's never been on a print, Peanuts have never
been on a print, neither fifty and Calvin and Hobbes
has never been on a print and Calvin Hobbs stopped
publishing in like ninety three, nineteen ninety three somewhere in there.

Speaker 4 (31:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Yeah, So why is the direct comic book market not
looking at those models as being legitimate? And why are
we still why are we still like sort of following
the same market.

Speaker 2 (31:58):
I think the answer is still that weird obsession of
being adult. Like yeah, the irony thing, the ironic thing
is comics is such a wonderful gateway for kids to
start reading. Like even for me when I wasn't the
biggest reader, but comic books like I started with like
Garfield actually, if you really want to get to the

(32:18):
order story times, like Garfield actually was my first. Like
I would, I would go to the library all the
time and pick up like collection of those strips and stuff.
But but yeah, it I feel like it's so important
because that's how you get your elongated audiences like, because
that's how you get people invested. But for whatever reason,
and I'm going to bring up Batman again, we're obsessed
with the adult aspect, and.

Speaker 4 (32:38):
It's like, I it's.

Speaker 2 (32:39):
Kind of weirdly juvenile in that weird way, like, you
know what, I don't mean to punch down at what
was it black label?

Speaker 4 (32:46):
The adult stuff.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
It's like, I don't mean to punch down on that
kind of stuff. But I feel like there's a reason
why the general audience laughed at the idea of Batman
having his genitalia yea.

Speaker 4 (32:56):
You know, it's like because.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
There's an absurdist quality of it, because I do feel
like we all kind of understand that comics and these
characters are goofy by nature, right, And I feel like
there's a point where it's a bridge too far of
being adult, where it's like, I'm going to disprove it
by having a naked Batman.

Speaker 1 (33:11):
For the sake of it. I remember Jason I being like,
that's fine if you want to make him naked, but
like the Stewart for a reason, not just to have
made an edge lord and to have done it, and
that feels gatekeeper because you have the you have the
problem with like, Okay, so you're a kid and you
read Garfield and you love Garfield, but maybe you're getting
to be like ten, so you're into girls, guys, everything

(33:32):
in between, whatever it is that you're attracted to, and
then you're starting to hear you're too old for this,
right from maybe your parents, maybe your siblings, may be friends,
maybe people in your life.

Speaker 3 (33:42):
Every I would say every probably human encounters at some
point in their life about something.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
Definitely, Yeah. But I think that happens to comics because
I think we don't see them, like Diego was saying,
as as actual valuable literature. And I think when you
mix that with Gatekeepy, usually men who go, well, how
many Batman comics can have you read? Can you name five?
And then you go, well, can you name five women
who trust you? I think sometimes that's my favorite new refrain.

Speaker 4 (34:10):
I like it.

Speaker 1 (34:11):
I think sometimes the meeting of those two things keep
people from continuing reading comics, even if they read Archie
comics and they loved them as a little kid, or
they read bah Bar or like whatever, all I can
go back to. I'm always going back to, like the
French kids go, but Jason, how old is too old
to read comics.

Speaker 3 (34:30):
None. There is no age that is too old to
read comic books. And I think if you automatically put
that window down and say that they're goofy, then I
think you the problem is with you. Yeah, not with
the medium. Because look, there's lots of stuff in the
world that I'm not a fan of. There's lots of
stuff in the world that I think is silly. There's

(34:50):
lots of stuff in the world that I think is
kind of weird. But you know what, as long as
people aren't punching each other in the teeth about it, Yeah,
why do I care? Yeah, Like, if that makes somebody happy,
I don't care. Like I mean, I'll here all show
my age. You know. The thing that I really don't
understand is my old manage. Old man. Gosh, I don't

(35:10):
understand speed runs video games and watching people do speed runs.
But I know people love that because I look at
that and I'm like, I want to play that video game.
I don't want to watch. But that's you know, but
that's it comes from my childhood where I would just
watch a friend like, you know, hold on to the controller,
never pass it over. So to me, that has no fun.
But like you know, I know lots of adults that

(35:34):
watched those type of things or video game content and
to me, you my brother. But you know, you could
say that about video games too, especially like playing cartoony
Mario video games, which I think a lot of people
would make fun of. And I actually think Mario video
games are some of the best video games ever been made,
and I love playing them. But you could literally be

(35:56):
like you're a little too old for Mario or you're there.

Speaker 1 (35:58):
You'll take Rainbow Road out of my cold.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
But it's it's to me, it's like there is there
is no And I think if you are an adult
and you can't see I read Garfiel when I was
a kid at a lot too, and I read a
lot of Peanuts, and they were at a big gateway
for me to get into comic books as well, and
they were a big gateway for me to read right.
Because it's funny because I find the people that are like, oh,
you're too old, you shouldn't be reading comic books, or

(36:22):
you shouldn't be reading comic strics or Garfield whether that
those are people that just don't read yeah, And I
would say like, you're never too old to read. And
I actually like, I'm gonna if you don't. If you
don't read books with that don't have pictures in them,
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
How do you read this? There's no picture? You're positively
cool to me.

Speaker 3 (36:39):
To me, those are the people that I distrust, you know,
is the non reader.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Here's a really interesting thing about comics that, particularly if
you are either an educator or a parent, I really
like implore you to think about comics teach you how
to read colloquial language, because when you read pros, particularly
pros that's aimed for children, it's usually a bit high
minded in that we're trying to teach them something. We're
trying to expand their vocabulary. We're trying to challenge the

(37:04):
way yourshilole brain thinks. When I was growing up, one
of my cousins is deaf, and so we were around
a lot of deaf and hard of hearing children, and
her mom told me once that she loved giving Archie
comics to deaf kids to learn how to read, because
it's just it's not that it's harder, it's just different
teaching a kid who can't hear how to read than
a kid who can hear, and she said, this teaches
them how to say wow and cool and fun and neat,

(37:27):
which if it's not something that you're receiving, are really
a you are can be like a difficult thing to process.
And so even if you're a child who doesn't have
a disability, that's another form where you're learning colloquial language
and how you process that and how you read it.
And I think that's something that we sort of like
devalue about comics is because it's not like literature. Although

(37:49):
if you look at the London Times thousand and one
Books but to Read Before you Die, there are two
comic books on it. I think there should be more,
but there are two comic books on it, So it
is literature.

Speaker 3 (37:57):
I want to suckle our wagons back around because I
feel like we're we're entering into a different episode.

Speaker 1 (38:02):
That's okay, I have I have a question, unless you
have one.

Speaker 3 (38:05):
Oh, go for it. Yeah, because I want to get
back to like the idea of like of like specifically
like the tone and the tenor of comic books. Yes,
so I'm going to comics cool.

Speaker 4 (38:14):
Garfield's cool, right, right?

Speaker 3 (38:15):
Books and pictures are fine, read more books without pictures.

Speaker 1 (38:19):
I want to ask, are Bronze Age comics responsible for
killing all age comics in Superheroes or is it specifically
Alan Moore and Frank Miller.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
You know, when we were first talking about the idea
of this discussion, my head did initially go to the
Bronze Age, But I do want to point the fingers
specifically at the eighties because I feel like the Bronze
Age was a nice balance of like what I was
talking about earlier, of that you could have something that's
accessible to kids but also have mature themes that's accessible
to them.

Speaker 1 (38:56):
Yeah, because the Bronze Age is definitely atoned across the
and which you say, I made the around the seventies,
that's where the seventies, Yes, yeah.

Speaker 2 (39:04):
And I feel like the wrong lessons were took uh
huh out of that era and then it just went
a complete like we just kept learning the wrong lesson
with each era, where it's like eighties felt like that
was where I defined comic books as literature quote unquot answer,
where like, let's take it more seriously and let's be
very adult about it and this and that, and I

(39:25):
just felt like every era since going forward, we've just
always been learning the wrong thing going forward. So I
guess in an essence, you can trace it back to
the Bronze Age.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
Unfortunately, Jason, I know you love the Bronze Age, so
I know this for you might be a loaded question.
You said earlier, the thing about it being James Bond,
and arguably James Bond goes through this similar evolution where
if you look at like classic James Bond, it is
very especially Roger Moore. You could show that to a
little kid and they'd be just fine. But at Daniel
Craig James Bond, perhaps not. So does the blame deserve

(39:56):
to be at the foot of all the creators of
the Bronze Age?

Speaker 3 (40:00):
No, tell me why, here's the real blame one of them.
I'm not going to say, because every the Internet would
never give me peace. I will tell you off air.
That's fine, okay, it is. It very much has to
deal with the economics of the comic book industry, and
I actually think they're the big villain, but I will

(40:21):
not say them on air. Yeah, so you want to,
you want to hear what it is on air, come
over to the Patriot dot com A big what I
I don't think that the creators have to be are
be blamed at all. I do not think it's the creators.
I do think the creators jumped on the bandwagon a
little bit too much, which which pushed the pedal down
on the gas. Is that correct term? I know, you
grew up on a racetrack a pedal to gas down. Yes,

(40:44):
all right, the creators definitely jumped on it, right, because
you're gonna jump on trends. But honestly, it is the
problem is is it's the bean counters. Because there is
a theory that we have to bring into this that,
like a lot of people haven't even thought about. It
is inflation, because that was even a thing in the eighties.
I know. Look, going into the nineties, comic books cost

(41:07):
about a buck fifty, I think. But then over that
decade comics went from a buck fifty to like two
ninety nine very quickly in like ten years now. I
might be getting the numbers wrong here, but I want
to say, going into the eighties, comic books were about
a dollar, and.

Speaker 1 (41:23):
Over the course I think some were as low as
eighty nine cents.

Speaker 3 (41:26):
Yes, you're a dollar, yeah, And then over the course
of the eighties they got fifty cents. Now you have
to think about that from a little kid who in
the eighties.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
Is what's your allowance? Two dollars? Maybe?

Speaker 3 (41:37):
I mean, I'll tell you my allowance in the mid
to late nineties was I think I got four dollars
a week, and that was only if I did all
my chores.

Speaker 4 (41:48):
And if I did.

Speaker 3 (41:49):
If I didn't do all my chores, I would only
get like I would get like I got it like
a it wasn an amount. It was like a dollar
for every chore or whatever thing like that. So I
had to do all chores to get all four dollars.
So like even then, your think about that for me, right,
Like in the nineties, combooks are a dollar fifty, I
can only get two.

Speaker 1 (42:05):
Yeah, depending on how much tax you're paying, right, maybe
three if you're lucky.

Speaker 3 (42:08):
You know, because they also were kids, like we're not
hardly any kids saves their money. They're spent there. They're
blowing at the second they get to the store, right,
you know, So if I can't get a comic book,
that we come buying what toy or candy or or
knockoff or whatever. So like I honestly think so you know,
like I think kids. I think the start of it
was that kids started getting priced out of comic books,
and so the people that stuck around were the again

(42:30):
like we talked to the arrested development adults.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
Or or yuppies or dinks, right, like don't income, no kids,
like people who had disposable or like young young professionals
who don't have a family and a mortgage.

Speaker 3 (42:42):
And then I think the split happens where you have
adults that have disposable income, you have kids that don't.
So which titles are going to sell more the ones
that appeal to the adults. Yeah, yeah, And then I
think they just pressed on the gas. And then we've
just seen the whole industry flip.

Speaker 1 (42:58):
Wow. Yeah, well you saw comics. How do we how
do we fix it?

Speaker 2 (43:03):
Well know too, because I don't know how much of
a sliver that cuts into it with the economics of
it all. But I know for me, when I first
started reading comics, like I wasn't even doing floppies, what
I would do is I would save my allowance and
I would just buy a trade.

Speaker 1 (43:15):
So would I because you got so much more bang
for your bucket. And that was when you could still
get trades for like nine ninety nine, so you were like,
I can get five or six issues for ten dollars
instead of one that was like two ninety nine.

Speaker 3 (43:27):
And that's so interesting because where I grew up in Kansas,
there were no trades. Well also, you had to you
you just had a news rack of floppies, that's it.

Speaker 1 (43:35):
Yeah, well you have to think, right, the directs. The
direct market didn't start collecting comics really until like the
mid nine mid late nineties.

Speaker 3 (43:45):
Like things like The Killing Joke and I know dark
in returns were like special things as well. Yeah, it
wasn't until like the mid nineties.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
But now everything gets everything that you want and everything
that you are, a business model gets it, and it's
interesting to like we are slowly evolving into this like
manga model. Manga, by the way, also excels at selling
to an on ages audience in a way that Western
comics just simply cannot grasp. But I also want to

(44:12):
bring up the fact that some of the greatest creators
working today, and some of the creators who are writing
some of this incredibly dark stories are people whose favorite
comics are silver age comics. Yeah, like, like here's a
super easy example, and it's not a drag is Jeff John's. Like,
Jeff John's has created an entire company where he's telling

(44:33):
these very dark, very gritty stories and he's one of
the biggest champions of everything from the Silver Age. And
I just think that's super interesting as well that I
think it goes to Diego's point where it's like, well,
what lessons are you learning from? And it's not that
comics should be for everyone.

Speaker 3 (44:47):
Well, the interesting thing both you can you can see
that exact thing what I'm saying about creators stepping on
the gas because Jeff John's awesome dude, awesome writer. You know,
he started out his title was JSA, and it was
it was Stargirl, it was Star Stargirling stripe, right, Star
and Stripe. But then look at like what was then?

Speaker 1 (45:04):
And then a great teen Titans run its two thousand
and six era, and.

Speaker 3 (45:08):
He did look all these really great runs that I
think you could hand to literally anybody. But then as
you notice of the course of his career, what was
the last DC book? Well, ignoring the JSA book that
I I that was barely around and didn't ship, one
of his last DC books was Doomsday.

Speaker 1 (45:24):
I was gonna say Watchman too.

Speaker 3 (45:26):
You can see even in the macrocosm, Yeah, the macrocosm
of his career that he shifts.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
Yeah, you know, that's interesting and it'll be interesting because
we're too close to it right now, but it'll be
interesting in another twenty years to look at other creators
like that and be like, yeah, is that a result
of was it an inevitability as a result of the market,
Because Mark Wade is another great example of that, former
Guess of the Pod, and Mark Wade is still telling

(45:53):
Silver Age stories at d c H and there that
that series is one of the best things that's come
out of the last five year.

Speaker 3 (46:01):
And I would argue that there that I would make
the argument that that is a reason why. And yeah,
he has he has put that flag down. He is
very much his brand. Yeah, he is very much like
this is like he did it. And his Daredevil run
is fantas one of the best Fantastic four runs of
all time, you know, And yes, that World's Finest book
that is currently being published is so good, one of
the best books DC is publishing right now, The Robin

(46:24):
Supergerol Dynamic. I'm obsessed and and you know, It's interesting
because think about it, because you're as a creative, you
are lucky to have a career that lasts thirty years
because it's rare. Right, he is still he's been writing
comics since the nineties. Yeah, and I would say that.

Speaker 1 (46:44):
He was editing comics before that.

Speaker 3 (46:45):
I believed he was. He was editing comics for that,
but I always think about like, his flash run in
the nineties was really like and then he's been working
since then consistently.

Speaker 1 (46:54):
And worked in archie comics, the all ages of all ages, and.

Speaker 3 (46:56):
He's created his own comic book company a couple and
he's also done a dull stuff. Yes, yeah, like on
the side and stuff like that. But it's interesting because
I would argue that that is probably the reason why
he has never stopped working. Like Kurt Musick's the same way. Yeah,
Kirk Music's the same way.

Speaker 1 (47:12):
Kur Music does have some indie books that come up
against being very mature, but you can take most of
his work to an audience of any age.

Speaker 3 (47:22):
Yeah. It's interesting because, yeah, I feel like and maybe
that's because you know, they're they're both a little older,
you know, they come from that, They're they're probably the
favorite era is the Bronze Age. But it is interesting that,
like it just goes to show you that that style
works because it's it's something you like, Diego, you you
nailed it with that point where you're just like oh,
For a lot of people, it's seen as like, no,
I want to be adult. That's kitty stuff. And it's

(47:44):
interesting because like when you look at all the huge
big franchises, all the major franchises like Star Trek and
Star Wars, even Lord of the Rings, they except for
some of the news stuff, I feel like they're falling
off the and I feel like some of their new
stuff falls off the edge because that's where they're trying
to be adult.

Speaker 1 (48:03):
And it's like when you talk about that's the whole
other episode.

Speaker 3 (48:06):
It is. But when you think about the core of
those franchises, they're all ages. They are for everybody.

Speaker 2 (48:13):
And I will cater to your point about escapism that
we're talking about earlier. It's just you know, and not
to get so again personal about things, but with everything
going on, you know, in current events and in la
you know, in the discord, we were asking like how
are you doing? You have something like what are we
doing for the weekend. My response was escapism.

Speaker 4 (48:32):
What did I do?

Speaker 2 (48:32):
I watched Ben Affleck Daredevil because I wanted to see
corny acting from Colin Farrell and half five.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
I am a defender of that movie. That movie is
not as bad as everybody makes it out. Yeah, but
like I love that. I'm sorry, we're gonna devil talk here.
By the way, listeners, if you would like a commentary
track of me and diego Josh over. That's a movie
where I love. I feel like the only direction Colin

(48:58):
Farrell got the penguin by the away. Uh he like, yeah,
I feel the only direction he got that movie that
we're just like, yeah, just go.

Speaker 4 (49:11):
Irish fine whatever like that.

Speaker 2 (49:14):
And like I was reading, you know, the nineties cat
Woman run, which I'm a big fan of.

Speaker 4 (49:19):
I love the Brewbreaker run, but.

Speaker 3 (49:21):
There is just some Jim Ballance run like you know, yeah,
it's like kind of.

Speaker 2 (49:28):
Like actually what you would talk about with Chuck Dixon
in the Romen run. Like there's just something like I
just always grew up with that image of her in
the purple suit and just reading those comics and it's
just yeah, it's cheesecakey for sure. And there's like some inappropriate,
but there's also like a pure escapism where it's just
dumb fun, you.

Speaker 4 (49:45):
Know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (49:45):
It doesn't take the fatal does action stuff exactly.

Speaker 1 (49:49):
You're reading Catwoman a little bit to be like, well,
what was she going to look like?

Speaker 2 (49:56):
But there is something pure about that escapism that I
do feel like just what we're overall alluding with media
that just gets lost, that just gets lost, because I
do feel like that is sort of the mission statement
of what all media should be doing, is just to
have that. Like we could talk about mature things, and
we can have like things that are important to talk about,
but it should be escapism.

Speaker 4 (50:16):
It should be reminded that we're having.

Speaker 3 (50:18):
Yes, And I think that I think that I think
that the whole objective of this episode and the reason
I think we want to talk about this episode is
especially when you think about the Big Two, it feels
like the majority of the books are aimed adult gritty, yeah,
and and like and it's probably it's probably in every
industry right now, Hollywood. It is like you're like, na,
we want we want the variety. Yes, like like there's

(50:41):
plenty of place for the dark Batman book. Sorry I
said it. I know, the Dark Spider Man.

Speaker 1 (50:47):
If you could leave it and not come back, that
would be so great.

Speaker 3 (50:50):
That's fine with me. You know, there's you know, but
but there needs to be that other thing. Yeah, Like
I like, I think, you know, the Robert Pattison Batman
when that came out, you know, and you know, I'm
very mixed on that movie. I think has a great soundtrack,
but I think.

Speaker 1 (51:07):
A lot of things, right, I think it's a lot
of things less right.

Speaker 3 (51:09):
Well, it's enjoyed the first time.

Speaker 1 (51:11):
Yeah, well to me, it looks great.

Speaker 3 (51:13):
Yeah, it does look great and and and the penguin
is the best part.

Speaker 1 (51:17):
Of it, and right, it is amazing in it amazing
le me.

Speaker 3 (51:22):
Award winning the penguin shows part of it. Yeah yeah, yeah,
but you know, I I think when they announced that movie,
I was the most disappointed because I was like, man,
because we just had that amazing Batman Brave in the
Bold cartoon which was all about the silver age and
Batman being very fun and city that show is awesome.

(51:42):
And again I was a person when they announced that,
I was very much like, that looks terrible. And then
I watched it and I was so happy to be
proven wrong. Yeah, you know, and and again we've done
this full circle on Batman sixty six because in the
nineties everybody thought Batman sixty six was stupid and dumb,
and now everybody loves it. Yeah, and I will because
it's good. It's because it's good. But we had to

(52:05):
go through that circle. So like when the Robert Pattison
Batman came out, I very much was like, no, I
want I want Batman the animated series, but I want
fun Batman again, because we had just gone through Chris
Nolan's Batman and Ben Affleck's Batman and again that I
always said this show where I'm like, how much harder
can you grate your teeth?

Speaker 2 (52:22):
Yeah, I do think like when it got to that
point because I was like, I was, I was interested, and.

Speaker 4 (52:29):
I was excited about that movie.

Speaker 2 (52:32):
And when I and you know, and they were saying
like the right things of like oh yeah, we're gonna
be pulling from the comics, we're gonna be doing this.

Speaker 1 (52:37):
And we're gonna just make it out they trot it
out long Halloween to tease us all again exactly.

Speaker 2 (52:41):
And I was like, okay, And then when I watched it,
I just realized I was tired, Like I was just
tired of seeing the same it was the same thing.

Speaker 4 (52:48):
It's the same thing, it's the same.

Speaker 3 (52:50):
Thing, And I think that's I think that's what we're
talking about, where like it's everything. When everything has the
same flavor, it all becomes blam Yeah.

Speaker 2 (52:57):
Because like so again going back to the escapism, My
brother and I last week watched Batman and Robin, and
I know everyone has opinions about it, and I get it,
but I do love how it's gay Batman.

Speaker 3 (53:10):
Basically it's made by those ponds, mister party.

Speaker 2 (53:15):
It's so dumb, but there's again it's about the escapism
and in the variety, like I love that I can
see you, yes, exactly, like you could have a corny, dumb,
toyatic Batman movie that's just like weird. And you know,
I think a better example of it too is like
the first Spider Man movie like that that I feel
like actually gets what Batman and Robin were trying to do.
If it was like legitimately trying to do like a

(53:36):
silver age like fun escapist kind of movie kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (53:39):
But I mean, well, well I'll reveal this. Jason and
I watched Pacific Rim last week, So we're right on
the same best dumb movie ever.

Speaker 3 (53:46):
It's a big dumb movie, but I love it. It's
a fun Every time I watch it, I have a
fun time. Let's let's bring this back. Actually, I don't
know if there's a if we want to you know,
before we head into I assume we have the commercial
messages or yeah, yeah, I can hear stan Lee knocking
on our door. He's coming back in another paycheck.

Speaker 1 (54:00):
So we're gonna We're gonna give Jason and Diego a
brief reprieve to get their lives together and come back
and answer the final question as we wind down this
episode about all ages comics, but come back, because we've
got to figure out who's going to be thrown hands.

Speaker 3 (54:14):
We're gonna solve it, right, come back. We're going to
solve this issue.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Yeah, exactly, we're gonna fix We're gonna comics. If you're
a comic book retailer, come back, We'll fix It's why
I'm here, exactly, both of free podcasts, to think that
we can fix up things. So off Rand and we'll
be back with your answer. Right after this. We are
back on geek History lesson, and I turned to you, Jason,

(54:39):
and I turned to Diego and I asked.

Speaker 3 (54:41):
And I turned to you, and I turned to you, Hi.

Speaker 1 (54:43):
And then someone gets a wet kiss on the map.
And then I boldly ask, do we need more all
ages comics with the with the understanding that we're talking
about mainstream superhero comics, not all or exclusively, but just
more tonally on the shelf. Who's feeling bold? I would

(55:04):
like to go first?

Speaker 3 (55:05):
Absolutely, right, I absolutely the answer or anything, but yes, like
all the points that we made, I mean, it's just it.

Speaker 2 (55:14):
It simply starts when you're a kid. You know, when
you're reading a comic. It's just like, you know, whether
it's funny now to see, oh, you've seen the latest
Batman movie. As a kid, I'm like, that's wild now
to say that going to see the Batman. But but
you know, let's say you saw a superhero movie that
just inspire Okay, m mc you're right, you saw the
latest MCU movie and you're like, I want to know
more about that, and it's your entry way. It's it's

(55:35):
the way you get into comics and you start to
just start falling in love with the medium and the
whole aspect of it and the fact that there's not
really a lot of things to turn to except I
Am suicide or something that's that's devastating, and I do
think it hurts comics in the long run because it's
just that's how you build your fan base, that's how
you keep things being healthy in long run.

Speaker 1 (55:55):
I think it's also it's upsetting when a kid does
get to see something like Teen Titans or Two Titans
Go or Brave in the Bold and they can't turn
around and easily find a one two of that on
the shelf because there are adaptations, there are comic book
adaptations of those stories, but they're usually not kept in
print very long, so that's like an eBay hunt. And yeah,
you know, those kids don't have the patience for them.

Speaker 3 (56:15):
And then you set up the thing. I think we
might have talked about this on another podcast where we
talk about.

Speaker 1 (56:20):
I mean it's been eleven years, so probably.

Speaker 3 (56:23):
We had we had the idea specifically where you brought
up the issue of you know, this kid is like, hey,
I saw the newest Teen Titans movie. Yes, mom, I
want to read more Teen Titans. Yeah. Right, So the
mom is either going to go to a Barnes and Noble,
or she's going to go to a college. She's let's
be honest, she's going to a Barnes and Noble. Oh yeah, right,
she's gonna look at Barnes and Noble and she's going
to see Teen Titans Volume one this. But then there's

(56:46):
a Teen Titans Volume one this. Yeah, Then there's a
Teen Titans Volume one this, then there's a which one
is it? And if she's lucky, she might find a
store employee that'll help her.

Speaker 1 (56:55):
Well, if she's looking for Teen Titans and they go
to the kids section, they will actually probably find the
can Garcia A Gabriel Piccolo box set, which is that's
that's fair.

Speaker 3 (57:03):
That's fair. But but the odds are this, this mom
or dad is going to have a real hard time fight,
and then whatever comic they pick is gonna you know,
because we talked about before where we're like, oh, should
there just be like should they just number right every
Batman and it should just be like just like manga,
it should be like, oh, it's volume, it's it's volume,
you know, and then every once in a while there's

(57:24):
a new one.

Speaker 1 (57:25):
We'll go no, don't even do that attack on Titan
just has twenty seven volumes.

Speaker 3 (57:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (57:29):
Yeah, like if you're into it, you'll and then they
give them every once in a while.

Speaker 3 (57:32):
You got maybe a subtitle, but yes, I think you
have to add a subtitle and you start a volume
something because like I always said, they actually were. I
was like, you wouldn't want to give a little kid
now Batman Golden Ancient Ventures.

Speaker 2 (57:42):
Yeah, I feel like, you know, it's probably divided up
easier with with eras or years, like like you know,
Batman nineteen thirties.

Speaker 1 (57:49):
Yeah, I love that, Like here's Batman nineteen thirty, volume
one to twelve, yeah, or whatever.

Speaker 3 (57:54):
But there aren't that many jumping on points anymore. And
you're and you're and every time we talk about the
every time you put up a gate to keep somebody out,
you're just telling your audience to go away.

Speaker 1 (58:05):
And I think it's just not capitalist, frankly.

Speaker 3 (58:08):
Yeah, And we talked about this a lot, and weirdly,
I don't know why, but weirdly, over the last thirty years,
comic books have put up more gates than they've taken down.
And in an error in an era, and an error,
it is an error of this era that when they
have we just experienced a decade where they've the comic

(58:31):
characters have been the biggest they have ever been and
probably the biggest they will ever be. Yeah, and man,
they let the ball slip by them? Yeah, oh my god,
did they let the ball slop by them?

Speaker 4 (58:41):
Would they?

Speaker 3 (58:41):
Like you could have gained? Because the problem is in
like we talked about this is that I don't know.
I honestly think. I honestly think the you know, the weekday,
the Wednesday Warriors, the people that go every Wednesday pick
up their comic books. I think twenty years it's gone. Yeah,
I'm sorry, I really do, because I just I don't
I don't see you know, I know, a three year old,

(59:02):
you know, I don't see that three year old giving
one damn about comic books. Well what like ten years.

Speaker 1 (59:09):
I know the answer to this, but I'm gonna ask
this for what is the one comic book property that
you have given a book of to the three year old?

Speaker 3 (59:16):
Wonder Woman? And peanuts and peanuts, yeah, we give, yeah,
we get, but like that's like like you know, and
and and we talk about peanuts like that. That's because
like newspapers have become ue cool because newspapers have basically
like been like nobody reads a newspaper anymore. Everybody again,
everybody's reading everything on their phones. And I said this,
you know, on a previous podcast where I was like, man,

(59:36):
I really feel like when online webcomics really a thing,
that's when DC and Marvel should have jumped in, like like.

Speaker 1 (59:47):
Pre web tunes. Yeah, like when Tumblr, when like OMG,
check please was starting this.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
DC or Marvel should have created their own website. Absolutely
that was specifically webcind Well, I don't know if you
remember a DC universe. Uh no, Actually you know there
was a DC Digital initiative way back in the day
in the early two thousands called ZUDA. That's right, because
we know a friend Varus who wrote a comic book
on there, and they they advertised it in comic books.

(01:00:15):
I remember they put the ads in there and stuff
like that. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:00:17):
See. And Marvel also used to have manga imprints that
they like, and they had minx like they let those drop,
which I aways thought was foolish.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):
Yes, and I think the I think the reason why
they didn't work is because none of those imprints. The
reason why I think the audience didn't come over is
because none of the creators that were working on the
mainstream stuff did comic books over there, and then they
didn't do the thing, which I thought was very smart
when they did in web tunes. They didn't. They never
put like a Batman or a Superman. They never had
these Superman zudo comic. Yes. Yeah. The cluses they got

(01:00:47):
was they had all these comics ology digital comic books
for a while and they were great, like Small villl
Season eleven.

Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
Small vill Season eleven is great sober, isn't. Tom Taylor
did Injustice.

Speaker 3 (01:00:58):
Yes, but they hadn't just in us. This was a
digital comics book. It was really good.

Speaker 4 (01:01:02):
They did.

Speaker 3 (01:01:02):
They did a sequel to Batman Beyond, which was really good.

Speaker 1 (01:01:07):
Wrote that great Supergirl TV show time.

Speaker 3 (01:01:09):
There was an era where it was like every like
and it was like half It was only like ninety
nine cents, but it was half. And I scraped a
bunch of them, where like it was like every Monday
you got like ten new pages. Yeah, and it was
like half an issue. But the problem is that they
just printed all of them they like, and they did
it like immediately, so like.

Speaker 1 (01:01:27):
They didn't you should have trade with Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
So everybody so everybody that was like interest in that
they didn't buy the digital comics. They just waited for
the trade. Yeah, and so they killed their whole model.
But like, like I mean, let's be honest, that's where
the future is. It's digital, Like even like for things
like Peanuts, Like like Peanuts will never go away because
they're just gonna put at some point, and they probably have,
but at some point they're just gonna put Peanuts digitally.

Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
Oh, I guarantee they already are. I knew web tuns
was definitely like that scrolling style model was the future.

Speaker 3 (01:01:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:01:56):
When three years ago at San Diego Comic Con, I
was interviewing Dennis cow and he was reading a web
Tunes Yeah comic, and I was like, all right, if
if we've proliferated to creators who started working in like
the eighties, yeah, then then okay, then I guess everybody
reads the.

Speaker 3 (01:02:16):
Yeah. But but but in terms of tone, even when
you think about that, when you think about like the
most popular web comics, right, they're either Romance.

Speaker 1 (01:02:24):
Lauralympus is still even though it's Romans, it's very much
an all you can give to an eight year old.
It would be absolutely fine OMG check please is the
same thing. You can give OMG check please to a
tender anyone about two guys falling in love like it's
a hockey sw Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:02:35):
There was a very famous web comic back in the day.
It was called Breakfast the Champions, Yes, and it was
really popular in the nineties and early two thousands, and
it was about all the serial mascots and like all
lived in a shared universe. It was very funny. And yeah,
it was all eight. It was comedy. It was all ages. Yeah,
it was an all ages comedy. Yeah. Like that's the thing,
is like those the new medium that has popped up,
web comics, it's not really new. It is all ages.

Speaker 1 (01:02:59):
Well in that podcast are new it's yeah, they're not dark.

Speaker 3 (01:03:03):
Yeah there none of them are dark. Yeah, you know.
And it and again it's another one of these things
where you look at these two companies and you're just
basically like what are you doing? Like what how are
you not seeing what the rest of us are saying?
Like I feel like you guys have just put the
blindfold on and it's been like this is fine, Like
you're the this is fine dog.

Speaker 4 (01:03:20):
Oh, I'll take it. Crazy Pills by the way.

Speaker 3 (01:03:24):
I hate that I'm speaking in meme.

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
My favorite version of that meme is that dog surrounded
by a bunch of dead plants and they're like, this
is fine, Everything is fine.

Speaker 3 (01:03:32):
Have we have we have? Have we covered? Like? Are
there any other questions?

Speaker 1 (01:03:35):
I was gonna I was actually gonna throw you and
be like, do you guys have anything else you want
to add to this before I give you? Or what
have we learned today?

Speaker 3 (01:03:40):
Let's go to Diego here as the guest, I mean,
like the listeners have heard us talk this to death,
but I mean, like, Diego, is there anything like of
everything we've talked today that you like think you know,
basically about comments being all ages or anything we've said
that you like you think we're missing or not hitting
him on or.

Speaker 4 (01:03:56):
Yeah, I didn't know.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
I felt like there was a lot that we covered
a lot of grounds that we got to cover because yeah,
it's I think it's just I mean, honestly, I don't
I can't come back to the idea more than just
it's just sad, you know what I mean. I mean,
just everything you're tiking about, it's just like just even
in my own personal experiences that I see kids that
are reading like dog Man comics.

Speaker 3 (01:04:14):
Right because he was huge. It's huge right now, and
it's like episode is because that movie's coming out.

Speaker 2 (01:04:18):
Yeah, and and it makes me think of like when
I was a kid and when Captain Underpants came out,
and I was like, I didn't read that when I
was a kid, but I had a friend in in
elementary school that.

Speaker 3 (01:04:26):
Was obsessed with those books.

Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
And it's just again, it just it comes back to
the idea. It just starts when you're young. And the
fact that that's a market that's just getting more and
more ignored is just it's mind boggling.

Speaker 3 (01:04:38):
If you had Okay, if I put you in charge,
let's say you're in charge of DC Comics tomorrow. Okay,
you have carte blanche. Nobody's gonna stop your Warner Brothers
just like, we really don't care. It just that's pretty much.
So you can do whatever you want. James Gun's not
gonna get in your way. Oh like, yeah, he's fine.
He's that he's making it. Oh yeah, he's gonna leave
you alone. You know he's gonna make Creature Commando season two. Okay,

(01:05:00):
you know what, I hope they.

Speaker 1 (01:05:00):
Do make Creature Comando season two, because at the end
of Creature Comando season one they finally did something interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:05:04):
I think they are. I think they've already green Land.
I would would what what would be some what would
you do? Like? What would you you know?

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):
I I think I would talk about the idea of
what we were talking about earlier or what I mentioned
earlier about setting a hard standard of all ages comics
of making every superhero accessible. And it's like, if we're
going to have our age range from six to sixteen
kind of thing, right.

Speaker 3 (01:05:31):
Because like when?

Speaker 2 (01:05:32):
Because I honestly I feel like the most age appropriate
comic I read when I was first getting into comics,
where it was the killing Joke Inson City.

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
The next thing I read was Hush, which is getting
a great comic for anybody?

Speaker 2 (01:05:43):
Yeah, and that and that's because it's just it's there's
something very like it's Batman and he's being broody and
it's classic Batman's self. But it's also like you get
the cast of characters, everybody's in it, and it's and
it's successible. I didn't really like there was some stuff
I needed to know, but there was, But also it
raised intrigue becase the stuff I didn't know, maybe go
like I want to learn more. Yeah, And I feel
like that should be the mation statement with every character

(01:06:06):
across the line, you know, and it's like starting with
Superman downwards, like just leading of just we got you know,
if you want a place of looking for hope and fun,
this is your you know, your Superman book.

Speaker 4 (01:06:16):
If you want something a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:06:18):
More edgy, but like, you know, fun edgy, you know,
you got Batman over here, you know. And then I
do feel like the biggest emphasis is just making sure
that the younger audience is represented. So you always have
like a teen book, whether it's like Teen Titans or
Young Justice or what have you, just something that's like
not catering to thirty year olds.

Speaker 3 (01:06:35):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, like an actual Teen Titans
book that is like written for actual teens. Yeah exactly, Yeah,
which I think is like was always that, which I
think is like, that's the reason why the X Men
are always like around, like when the X Men are
like hot, it's because they're doing that, like they're leaning
into that. And then and then it's the reason why
in the eighties the New Teen Titans was huge, and

(01:06:58):
it was the two books it was X Men and ten.

Speaker 4 (01:07:00):
Don't think that's an accident.

Speaker 2 (01:07:01):
Yeah, it's just it's something I feel like always just
proves just like what you talked about earlier, just why
you introduced Robin in the beginning, you know what I mean.
It's just there's there is that audience that people crave
for that.

Speaker 1 (01:07:11):
Unless we forget that Spider Man is just a rip
off of Robi Well, he was created to compete with
the audience that Robin was great.

Speaker 3 (01:07:17):
I mean stort of not really, but yeah, I mean,
but you know, I never got the dark Spider Man stuff.
But let's talk about to talk about Spider Man making
a deal with the devil, let's.

Speaker 1 (01:07:28):
Talk about uh and to be fair, this was at an
adult specific imprint. Let's talk about a lecturo and his
feelings for Spider Man.

Speaker 3 (01:07:36):
I don't know. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:07:37):
Is that in Spider Man Max where he hires a
gentleman who looks like Peter Parker, it looks like Spider
Man too. Anyway, it's very dark.

Speaker 3 (01:07:45):
I think you're talking about probably Spider Man.

Speaker 4 (01:07:48):
That's what it is.

Speaker 3 (01:07:49):
A Mark Miller comment, Okay, I was like, I don't
know what you're talking.

Speaker 1 (01:07:52):
But to be very that is a specific and adult imprint,
but that that story lives rent free and.

Speaker 3 (01:07:57):
But there's a lot but you know, Spider Man is
the happy, go lucky character and even look at how
like we've had to be like, well now he's not
married and he had a baby, but a baby got
taken away and now he was a clone cannot.

Speaker 2 (01:08:09):
And I mean, Spider Man's wild when you think about
that too, because you know, that's a character that was
gradually growing up, and yet they want to retain the youthful,
the youthful aspect to him.

Speaker 4 (01:08:18):
But yet he was maturing correctly.

Speaker 2 (01:08:21):
Yeah, healthy grow up kind of thing, and they wanted
to take all that away.

Speaker 1 (01:08:25):
And it's like it's like every time they undo the marriage,
you're like, what are we doing? What are we doing?

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
It's the it's the weirder thing that And I will
say this and maybe this is just me where I
find that as I get older sometimes I think about
how I'm like, you know what I get that this
is sort of a perpetual like reset.

Speaker 1 (01:08:43):
Machine second act.

Speaker 3 (01:08:44):
Yeah, you know, like it is like the Simpsons, like
Bart has never gotten out of the fourth grade.

Speaker 1 (01:08:48):
That's not true. Actually did a episode a couple of
years ago where having Lisa both grew up one whole year.

Speaker 3 (01:08:52):
Oh okay, well they but I bet I bet you
the very next episode they ignored it, which is what
they do. But yeah, because they just ended up so
where he had a birthday and then they immediately ignored it. So,
you know, sometimes to me, I think about like maybe
these two big universes they want to keep their continuities
so and everybody's a continuity continuity. It is the thing
about where I'm like, I don't know, maybe these characters

(01:09:14):
should have aged in real time.

Speaker 1 (01:09:16):
Yeah, so they'd all be dead now.

Speaker 3 (01:09:18):
Well, so we would be on like the second or
third Batman at this point, you know. And it was
a like Zoro, it is a legacy. It is a
mantle that has passed down.

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
And even though it is a fan theory or fan
made when terms of the eras, I do think there
should be some credence to that because I do feel
like there's a lot of things that creatives bring of
what they learned or all this kind of stuff or
flavors and styles, and I do feel like that's when
your resets should be like yeah, because they're like just
start over from the scratch when the new era starts.
I mean, who's to say when that would begin.

Speaker 3 (01:09:47):
Well, it's like we were talking about with the Spider
Man thing, where like, you know, they're they're perpetually like
he got to be a high school teacher, and then they're like, no,
he's he's twenty three and he doesn't have any money
for rent. Yeah, and everybody was kind of like no.
And then night Ween got to a very similar point
where in the mid two thousands they were going to
have him marry Barbara Gordon and then they reset it
immediately and was like, no, he's twenty one and he

(01:10:09):
has no money and he's living in New.

Speaker 1 (01:10:11):
York and you're like, nobody, literally nobody wants this.

Speaker 3 (01:10:13):
Yeah, and everybody was like, just let a married back
girl forgot Sam, you know, I want it. Yeah. It's
like it's like it's interesting because now we're at a
point where, you know, and this might be a good
thing and talk about these these aging in the all ages.
Is that for a long time they didn't want Superman
to be married, right because the idea of this like well,
like a young reader can't empathize with a married character,

(01:10:36):
which is the big thing, yeah, right, right En slander
and when they married off Superman in the nineties a
lot of people, and they've taken it away a couple
of times, but they always bring it back. And so
we've now been like we're at like thirty years almost
of a married Superman. Yeah, and it's now just been
like so much to the point where they made a

(01:10:56):
TV show called Superman and Lois that was about his
married life. Yeah. So like now we've flipped to the
other side of that now where like now there's enough
connuity where people are like, no, no, it's okay, we
can accept that. I know that's kind of a tangential
of our conversation. But we need more all ages comics. Yes,
we need we need the US back. Yes.

Speaker 1 (01:11:16):
What have we learned today? Yeah, we're all very old today.
We've learned that it's fun to punch down on Batman.
Newspaper strips are cool, and you shouldn't bother being an adult.
I also want to add that we do have a
page called recommended Reading. You can find it at geek,
hisstory listen dot com slash recommended Reading, and I am

(01:11:36):
going to include in there a bunch of the stories
that we have talked about today, so that if you
want to get inspired to pick up some of the
best all ages comics that we've screamed our heads off about,
you can do that and then share them with people
of all ages in your life. I also want to tease,
because we did talk a lot about Batman, the Brave
and the Bold. Diego and I on Talking Titans have

(01:11:57):
an upcoming interview with writer me Adams where he waxes
poetic about that show. So come check that out on
the Patreon.

Speaker 3 (01:12:06):
Right, Jason, Yes, I just want to I'm sorry, Ashley,
but we were supposed to do on the social media
shout outs for you on to what we have learned.

Speaker 1 (01:12:13):
Well, what are the social media I've learned?

Speaker 3 (01:12:16):
Well, first of all, we should tell her, we should
tell we should give our wonderful guest, Diego. Let the
listeners know where they can find you online and if
you're working on any cool stuff. I don't no, not.

Speaker 2 (01:12:24):
Currently at the moment, but you can find me on YouTube, Twitter, threads, Facebook, Instagram.
All the social is under the same moniker black Crow
five two one. Yeah, we're fish.

Speaker 1 (01:12:40):
Oh there's a dangling participle for you to go and
discover yourselves, so good.

Speaker 3 (01:12:44):
Check out Talking Titans everbody, Actually, where can they find
GHL online?

Speaker 1 (01:12:48):
You can find us everywhere at Geek History, Lesson, Come
hang On, Threads and Blue Sky it's from there.

Speaker 3 (01:12:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:12:54):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:12:55):
I guess. I guess people are having problems with Threads now.
I guess I don't know if Threads might not be
around for much longer either. I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:13:00):
I think that's kind of why I stopped.

Speaker 2 (01:13:01):
I had that break the socials because I was like,
I didn't know how to promote my socials because I'm
like I had like it's all kind of a weird minefield.

Speaker 3 (01:13:07):
Now. Yeah, I'm at some places at jaw On j
w I N I'm at other places at Jason Jason
dot Inman for the first time at Blue Sky if
you want to come check it out. So there we go.
You know what I've learned today, I've learned that social
medias are on minefield, yes, and that we're all old.
We're old, you know what, because we all thought, we
all agreed with the eighties as the best television era
e ever all time. My back hurts, his back hurts.

Speaker 1 (01:13:30):
So there you go, all right, thank you do I
get to say where I am on social media?

Speaker 3 (01:13:33):
You can where are you on social I am.

Speaker 1 (01:13:35):
On all social media at Ashley V. Robinson are you?

Speaker 3 (01:13:38):
How do you feel about social media being a minefield?
Do you think it's for the all ages?

Speaker 1 (01:13:41):
I know I don't think children should be on social media.
I don't think you should be able to profit off
putting your children on social media if you want to
get really hot.

Speaker 3 (01:13:48):
I don't think children should be able to listen look
at screens until they're forty five.

Speaker 1 (01:13:52):
What a beautiful world that would be.

Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
I know I missed that world. All right, everybody, thank
you so much for listening Geek History lesson. Professor Ashley,
will you please that we thank you for joining us.
Diego by the way, thank you guys for having me.
Professor Ashley, will you please close out the podcast after
that very heartfelt thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:14:08):
Class is now dismissed.

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