Wednesday, September 1, 2010

West Coast Avengers



When I was a kid (or teenager), the West Coast Avengers was a comic that I regularly bought, but hated. This was a strange behavior that I had back then. I don't know if it was out of a Marvel fanboy brainwashing or if the problem was that I wanted to buy more comics a month than good ones were produced. Regardless, I bought Englehart and Milgrom's West Coast Avengers month after month hoping that it would get better and it never did.

At Comic Con last July, I was stunned to see my pal Anthony Vukojevich digging these out of quarter bins. Evidently, for him, these comics are transcendently bad and hugely entertaining. On a weird level I can see his point, Wonder Man's horrendous mullet, his costume, Englehart ending every sentence that is not a question with an exclamation point, the horrible art of Al Milgrom somewhat polished by Joe Sinnott, Iron Man's Transformer armor, etc. They are horrible on almost every conceivable level. They are the acme of bad. He's been enjoying the comic so much that he has dedicated a blog to some of his favorite panels. Check it out and maybe you can enjoy it like he can. I still don't have enough distance.

4 comments:

Mike Baehr said...

Oh man, I have a huge run of quarter-bin WC Avengers waiting to be consumed and I have the exact same ambivalent feelings. What glorious junk.

By the way, there's an awesome sentient-cactus horror story in Four Color Fear.

Jon Adams said...

I read WCA too, and can't remember ever enjoying it. I think I enjoyed the excitement associated with a new title when it debuted, but that was probably the high point for me.

Yesterday I saw some early Power Pack issues in a quarter bin and felt like I should save them. They are totally the opposite of WCA. They didn't deserve such a fate.

Robert Goodin said...

A few months ago I picked up the first 8 or so issues of American Flagg! from a quarter box. I had never read them before so I felt like that was a great find. There are good comics to be found if you are willing to go through them. I love coming home with a stack of comics that cost me under 10 bucks. That instinct does conflict with me wanting to reduce the amount of comics I have in my home though.

melvin said...

Hello, this remind me when I was a kid ; but I still read this kind lovely comics.
Melvin