"How do you come back from that?"

Above: Cover to INVINCIBLE #80.

INVINCIBLE #80 came out today. "The best super-hero comic book in the Universe" is just that. Anyway,… enough of my hype.

INVINCIBLE #80 touched upon a couple of things that have been happening in comics.

Mark Grayson picked up some books at Night Flight Comics where he then shared his thoughts about comic book series renumbering back to "#1".

I totally agree with Mark, by the way.

And,… a surprising catastrophic event occured in INVINCIBLE #80, as well.



Above: Invincible meets Gravitator in INVINCIBLE #80.

Lately, Joey B and I have had several conversations in which we discuss how comic book stories are becoming more extreme, more vulgar, and more outrageous. Daredevil becomes the leader of an evil Ninja clan. The Capital Building is blown up by a hammer-wielding gal and her nazi soldiers. Crazy Amazons attack the male population of England. Superman renounces Truth, Justice, and the American way. Crazy stuff like that.

During these conversations, Joey B would state something like: "How do you come back from that?"

And my answer is usually: "You don’t."

I don’t know why many of the large comic book publishes think they have to rely on earth-shattering events to grab a reader’s attention. But, if so, then move foreword with it. If you’re going to take a character down the road of great change (like revealing his secret identity to the world), or if you blow up a landmark, or if you’re going to kill off a character, then move forward with that. Don’t reboot or don’t retcon, just create great stories with great artwork.

Anyway, back to INVINCIBLE #80, which was quite good. I give this issue three and a half out of five NM’s: