Something Happened After I Read Saga and Continued Through Fatale

It’s no secret that I love everything comic related. Growing up I, much like my brother, was a Marvel fan. Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Psylocke, Gambit, and Bucky. It didn’t matter. If it was Marvel, I loved it.

I don’t quite understand the reasons, but DC never really resonated with me the same way. It isn’t as though they didn’t have some really cool characters because they do. Batman, Superman, Green Lantern, Joker, and Wonder Woman are all DC staples that have a huge fan base. It just wasn’t for me.

5 years ago, something happened.

Don’t get me wrong, I still love Marvel and everything about it. I am the first in line when movies are released to the theaters, am subscribed to just about every known podcast, app, and YouTube channel on the planet, and I frequent comic shops more than police visit donut shops.

Fatale

At first, I was a little hesitant. I don’t know too many people that like change. Most won’t even change their living room around, let alone what comic books they’re reading.

I supposed it started one fateful day in a local comic shop while I was living in Edmonton. I went in to pick up my subscription of books that they put aside for me.

X-Men

Avengers

Gambit

Captain America

You know, the usual.

I looked over and saw the most brilliant cover I had ever seen. I poked my head up and asked the clerk if it was any good. Without even flinching, he said, “Yep.”

“Yep.” That’s what I had to go on.

So I took it home and read it, read it and read it again. I must’ve read the book 5 times that night.

For those of you who don’t know, I have a hard-on for Saga and it just so happened that the book that he so highly recommended was “Saga”. This book began my ever changing tastes in comics.

At that exact point, I began exploring other genres of comics outside of superheroes.

I started to read Fatale and was instantly hooked. The suspense, dark art, and narration were something that I had never seen before. Don’t get me wrong. Batman does an impeccable job of creating this atmosphere, but Batman is on a different level. Fatale had grit. The kind that I didn’t know that I wanted.

Non-superhero

From there my infatuation with non-superhero comics grew.

I further looked into Fatale.

I started The Wicked and The Divine.

Shame became a mainstay.

Red Diary was something completely different.

It didn’t matter. Anything unaffiliated with superheroes and I was in.

Aside from the aforementioned, I can’t exactly pinpoint what it is about them. Maybe it is the mature themes, the grim art (which almost always impresses me), and the unpredictable events. Or maybe it is simply that I craved something more from the comics I was reading. These particular comics have a sense of realism and perhaps this is what I crave. You know, things that could actually happen.

Murder mysteries

Reflection

War stories

Political thrillers

I use comics as sort of a downtime from my everyday life. An escape if you will. A way to leave my thoughts behind. Where my imagination is taken into a world that I know nothing about and lead by someone I do not know. If you get a chance, check any one of them out. Don’t blame me if something happens to you too.

I reiterate this doesn’t take anything away from my love of superhero comics. Nothing ever will. I grew up on them. I idolized their characters and wanted to be them. It is more that these have become a way to step into something new and exciting.

Joel

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