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Superman's Pal
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Member Since: Sat May 17, 2008
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In Reply To
thuggernaut

Member Since: Sat May 17, 2008
Posts: 1,435
Subj: Re: Was Starman the most GenX/90s comic ever?
Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2021 at 01:15:30 pm EDT (Viewed 268 times)
Reply Subj: Was Starman the most GenX/90s comic ever?
Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 at 07:47:36 pm EDT (Viewed 260 times)

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It gets my vote.

Jack Knight is into grunge, flannel, and vintage collectibles, clothes, and stuff. Resentful of his Golden Age father's superhero career.

Jack's non-costume screams cynicism/irony/sarcasm.

Most issues were very navel-gazing contemplative of nostaglia, legacy, and self-doubting issues. Often the same psychodrama of resenting his dad, or thinking about his dead older brother or somesuch.

He does the superhero "gig" for a while till he retires to San Francisco.

Jack gets raped by a woman (producing his son) and bequeathed the Starman legacy to a girl. Feminist bonafides, right there!

Obviously, I'm not a huge fan of the series. But it certainly has its fans and acclaim. And it did lead to the late 90s JSA which WAS quite awesome, IMO.



And yet there was literally a comic across the aisle called "Generation X".

An ethnically diverse cast with a large number of females compared to teams of the past. A tortured boy without a face. A tortured girl who can't speak. An autistic girl. More of that teen angst.

Looking back at the covers, I hated the fonts and stuff they used on the covers in the 90s at Marvel. This was the decade when artists discovered Photoshop or Illustrator and they just went for it. I liked Bachalo's artwork but any time someone else filled in on the title they couldn't make his characters work.