Much like Showcase #4 is generally accepted to have officially kicked off the Silver Age, some scholars want to point to a particular narrative as bringing it to a close, such as the story arc where Spider-Man’s girlfriend Gwen Stacy would die in 1973, as Arnold T. Blumberg maintains. Others point to the changes in creators. For instance, Craig Shutt claims that the combination of Jack Kirby’s move to DC and Mort Weisinger’s retirement marks the end. Both of these occurred in 1970. If we are going to use creative changes as the primary lens, the little known Writers’ Strike would be far more qualifying. I assert that the end of the Silver Age occurred when DC lost Gardner Fox, Bill Finger, France Herron, Arnold Drake, John Broome, and Otto Binder in 1968.
DC had to replace their established greats with a new team of creators, and the company was never the same. There were certainly successful comics after this moment, but the torch had effectively been passed to a new generation.
John Broome left DC over a dispute about being paid for reprints around the same time as the Writer’s Strike.
In those days if a story was reprinted, even if was the entire issue, writers were not given any money for the reprint., like Flash 138.
If the writer and artists were the tegular creators for the title thay meant they were paid nothing for that month.
This continued until.Jeanette Kahn became president of DC Comics. She instituted a royalty system.
Our DC library generates income to the writers and artists who worked on these titlrd because of this ( maybe not for much older titles but certainly for comics puplished decades ago.)
Gonna have to take time later to read those @dogwelder9. Wanted to answer back about Flash 128 with the debut of Abra Kadabra. Easily a top 10 Silver Age Flash book. This has it all:
First we get an almost meta narrative on the Silver Age vs the Golden Age. Magic is dead, science having killed it. Kadabra himself looks like a Golden Age villain with the cape and large collar.
Later, we get a nice example of '50s, early 60s SciFi where the author takes a couple of real scientific principles
then builds a crazy completely implausible story around them. Barry getting shot into outer space to tiny planetoid and running his way off is awesome. We also hear again about his ‘aura’ which eventually becomes the Speed Force.
@dogwelder9 Took awhile, but that’s good info. Seems 174 is probably as good a point to end the Silver Age as any but really seems like there was a couple of year transition. I was probably going to anyway, but really think I’ll be reading Flash through until COIE hits.
Finished the first three volumes of Silver Age Flash
Great fun was the Rogues, Elongated Man and the stories with silly covers like turning into.a puppet.
Bad ponts
The motivation of the Rogues are at the most base level pride greed hatred lust.
Flash continuily stops while a Rogue talk to him rather than capturing said Rogue.
The Alien invasion and time travel stories without any Rogue are terrible.
Kid Flash stories sometimes tries to use Hip dialogue which is hard to read. There was one issue with a Beatnik Gang that was awful.
I didn’t see any scene which indicated to me that Iris liked Barry in any way. She does dress way better than Lois Lane though, including evening gowns. And she has an important job.as reporter which is occasionally used in the stories but that should be played up more
It’s funny because the time travel and alien stories are among my favorites just for their sci-fi loopy feel. 100% agree on Kid Flash. I read a few but as stories they are awful. The faux hip talk, the “gangs’ on their go carts, and some junior high fraternity. Kid Flash is much more enjoyable when paired with Flash or Elongated Man. I can’t help think that in trying to appeal to kids with the Kid Flash stories they did the opposite.
It is the nature of this Community that serious hard work on our part is almost always.ignored. @Nathan.Payson has posted about this. That his posts are read by few.
My Road to Trinity and Writing Topics has even less traffic that this site
And people may be reading our stuff and not know what to say. @RobertDeBeero told me that in a post after I did a post. That my posts were good and he looked forward to reading them. He didn’t have anything more to say but agreed with me.and said I said it better than he could. @biff_pow and @TravisMorgan has said similar things about my shorter posts @DeSade-acolyte has responded as well to my longer stuff
Also this is Silvet Age stuff and a lot more people would respond if it was new 52 or Rebirth
I was very glad that @msgtv selected only four issues to review. A lot of other clubs ask for a lot more work on club members. Some seem to change the topic weekly.
I enjoy the club immensely.
I do find it hard to find The Next Event Topic. I think.it was a message to members only. I can’t find it on the Community. And had to bookmark it.
The ratio of readers to posters is pretty high across the forum, or so I’ve been told. So, I think it is being read. Also, the input goes up at mid-month when Vote and Defend goes up.
Hey, brother. Whether your here for a post or for twenty I appreciate you being here. I’m having a ■■■■ load of fun because this makes me think about comics in a different way. Just your suggestion to the Abra Kadabra issue of Flash was worth reading had an impact for me.
I do think there are more lurkers out there than we know. The one thing I have learned is we create digital tattoos with everything we post, be it here, instagram, Twitter, etc.
Even if posts aren’t read much today, that isn’t to say 10 years from now,!it might be read by somebody and make them think in a new way or create a desire to go checkout the Silver Age and fall in love with it. If that happens after I’m gone, that’s “paying it forward”.
I never write for the glory. I write cuz I have something to say. Chances are somebody will read it, and maybe it inspires them. But at the end of the day, these were ideas/thoughts I needed to throw out into the abyss of the universe. Ultimately, I always write for me, in last analysis.
We’ll see if my “Psychology of the Supervillains” club gets green lit by the mods. That dissection of character seems to be really interesting me of late. Will anybody join? Will anybody contribute? I have no idea, but, I think it’s possible some folks will read the thread.
