Are there any DC comics history experts who can help me with this?
I am very confused about something and I need help understanding it.
So I watched two documentaries on the history of comics. Both seem like the best sources for anyone who wants learn about comic books and understand their history. One I watched was “Comic Book Superheroes Unmasked”. It said that Superhero comics didnt have a audience in mind in the beginning, but publishers noticed that their stories were almost exclusively being read by children, so superheroes began changing to reflect that. Which is when Batman changed from a dark, scary creature of the night to a fun lighthearted law abiding do gooder, and Superman went from fighting social injustice to weird crazy stories about parrallel worlds and stuff, and a little later even the Joker would stop killing. ( and the original creators of Superman originally wanted to publish the character as a newspaper strips, which were read by all ages right? )
Then I watched the documentary here on the DC universe app called " Secret Origin, The Story of DC comics". This one says that superheroes and the very first DC comics ( back then called National Periodical Publications ) initially targeted to adolescent boys, and the Marvel superheroes introduced in the 1960s brought them back. This also seems to make sense because Seigel and Shuster were young adults themeselves and the science fiction and detective pulps that inspired Superman and Batman were very popular among teens and young adults also right?
Both documentaries show different aspects of the comic book history and Im just asking for someone to help me understand. But Im confused here and I am only trying to comprehend if one is correct and the other incorrect, or of they are both correct in someway.
Can someone help me understand? I am getting tired of stressing about this now.
Then stop stressing about it. Everything that we could have said to you about the topic has been said. Comic books evolve out of two streams: newspaper funnies, which are typically written with a general audience in mind, and pulp detective stories, which had a reputation for being more adult-oriented and even salacious at times. The adult material from the pulps was mostly toned down once it was translated to comic books, but remnants remained.
The books were popular with younger readers (with about an even split between boys and girls), but they were also popular with G.I.s during the Second World War.
I don’t understand the stress. It was addressed in the previous post about this at length. Also, I’m confused as to why a duplicate post had to be created.
This was answered already.