by: John Chidley-Hill
Much has been made of the death of print media, with the common thinking being that environmental and financial issues are conspiring to put printed newspapers, magazines, and yes, even comic books out of business.
According to some, paper’s run as the authoritative media for literature is coming to an end, but I disagree. I think that there is no replacing the feel and enjoyment of a book or magazine, and although the price of comic books is rising, they’ll always be cheaper than a computer or internet access.
The web has its benefits though:
A web comic can be put together for a fraction of the cost of an actual comic book, and it can reach an exponentially larger audience.
The wider audience gives online writers and artists more opportunities to find a niche for their work.
Hard work and creativity are the name of the game in the world of internet sequential art, and the crew at Action Age Comics free mummy returns the movie download art school confidential divx are the perfect example of creators who are coming up with fun and original concepts for their web comics.
Their most recent effort is The Chronicles of Solomon Stone: Night Falls on the Cosmordrome, featuring the World’s Greatest Half-Vampire Private Detective.
The creation of Chris Sims, the author of the popular Invincible Super-Blog, Solomon Stone is a breath of fresh air, walking the line between satire and homage.
Solomon Stone stands in stark contrast to the deconstruction and meta-narratives of post-modern classics Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns.
In an effort to emulate that critical and popular success of 1980s post-modernism, the medium became stuck in a “grim’n'gritty” period that produced some terrible comics.
Although it seems like a humorous send-up of many, many sci-fi and fantasy genres, The Chronicles of Solomon Stone
rises above the charred and mangled bodies of sad attempts at post-modernism while delivering the laughs.
Instead of deconstructionism, Sims has created a masterpiece of re-constructionism, smoothly mixing and matching genres.
The art by Matthew Allen Smith is clean and expressive with humorous details included in the lovingly rendered panels.
The colouring style harkens to the four-colour printing of the golden and silver ages of comics. At the same time, obviously, the colouring work has all been done digitally. This is the beauty of Action Age comics: they blend old and new, having fun while they build new mythologies.
It is, in many respects, the opposite of post-modernism.
Action Age Comics is also a great example of the potential of the internet as a testing ground for new ideas and new techniques. Hopefully, this web presence will give these creators an opportunity to break in to mainstream comics.
Last 5 posts by John Hill
- FanExpo Coverage: J. Michael Straczynski - September 3rd, 2009
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- Summertime is Perfect for Retro-Cartoon Watching - August 2nd, 2009
- Sellout Superheroes - August 2nd, 2009
- Archie, Betty, Veronica and the Nature of Comic Book Promotion - June 15th, 2009
