Growing up with Vertigo: British Writers, Dc, and the Maturation of American Comic Books
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CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by ScholarWorks @ UVM GROWING UP WITH VERTIGO: BRITISH WRITERS, DC, AND THE MATURATION OF AMERICAN COMIC BOOKS A Thesis Presented by Derek A. Salisbury to The Faculty of the Graduate College of The University of Vermont In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Master of Arts Specializing in History May, 2013 Accepted by the Faculty of the Graduate College, The University of Vermont, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, specializing in History. Thesis Examination Committee: ______________________________________ Advisor Abigail McGowan, Ph.D ______________________________________ Melanie Gustafson, Ph.D ______________________________________ Chairperson Elizabeth Fenton, Ph.D ______________________________________ Dean, Graduate College Domenico Grasso, Ph.D March 22, 2013 Abstract At just under thirty years the serious academic study of American comic books is relatively young. Over the course of three decades most historians familiar with the medium have recognized that American comics, since becoming a mass-cultural product in 1939, have matured beyond their humble beginnings as a monthly publication for children. However, historians are not yet in agreement as to when the medium became mature. This thesis proposes that the medium’s maturity was cemented between 1985 and 2000, a much later point in time than existing texts postulate. The project involves the analysis of how an American mass medium, in this case the comic book, matured in the last two decades of the twentieth century. The goal is to show the interconnected relationships and factors that facilitated the maturation of the American sequential art, specifically a focus on a group of British writers working at DC Comics and Vertigo, an alternative imprint under the financial control of DC. The project consulted the major works of British comic scriptwriters, Alan Moore, Jamie Delano, Grant Morrison, Peter Milligan, Neil Gaiman, Warren Ellis, and Garth Ennis. These works include Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Shade: the Changing Man, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Animal Man, Sandman, Transmetropolitan, Preacher and several other important works. Following a chronological organization, the work tracks major changes taking place in the American comic book industry in the commercial, corporate, and creative sectors to show the processes through which the medium matured in this time period. This is accomplished by combining textual analysis of the comics with industry specific records and a focus on major cultural shifts in US society and culture. To those I have been fortunate enough to call family and friend, both living and departed, in gratitude and love. ii Acknowledgements Due to their collectability, rarity, and cost (not to mention the sheer volume I consulted during the many months of writing this), acquiring access to several decades worth of American comic books without the aid of libraries and collectors was otherwise impossible. It is with much gratitude that I thank the Library of Congress’ Megan Halsband who not only allowed me access to over seventy years of comics but also actively recommended various titles relevant to my research. She spent several days transporting comic books back and forth from a vault to my small table. Similarly, the staff at Ohio State University’s Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum allowed me access to their vast collection of materials, which without their aid would have been discouragingly difficult to navigate. I would also like to thank the fine staff at the University of Vermont’s Bailey Howe Library who has been fantastic in providing and obtaining research materials not only for this thesis but also for the duration of my enrolment at UVM. Last but not least, I want to acknowledge Amy Alexander, a private collector in Baltimore, who opened up her entire collection of comics (as well as her home) to me for an entire week to sift through hundreds of issues at her kitchen table for six hours a day. My indebtedness extends well beyond the hallowed halls of libraries. Abigail McGowan, my advisor, has been invaluable in the completion of this work. She kept me on task, tirelessly and thoroughly proofed and commented on the narrative, asked difficult but pertinent questions, and provided (much needed) encouragement throughout the entire process. Much thanks also goes to Melanie Gustafson who has provided substantial feedback over the course of the composition of the work and even spent part of her winter vacation reading an extremely rough draft. Without their aid and it is very unlikely that this would have been completed. Finally, I would like to thank many of my fellow grad students who have helped not only in discussing the ideas contained within and proofreading but also for the catharsis of commiseration and demands that I put down the books and leave my apartment on occasion. iii Table of Contents Abstract ..................................................................................................................................... i Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................. iii Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1 ......................................................................................................................... 16 Left in the Gutter: A Brief History of American Comics .......................................................... 17 Chapter 2 ......................................................................................................................... 28 DC’s Changing of the Guard ...................................................................................................... 29 Chapter 3 ......................................................................................................................... 45 The Batman… ............................................................................................................................ 46 … and The Bard ......................................................................................................................... 55 The Exodus of Miller and Moore ............................................................................................... 66 Chapter 4 ......................................................................................................................... 71 “Good evening London... this is the voice of fate...” ................................................................. 74 Politicization in the Panels ......................................................................................................... 85 New Models of Narration ........................................................................................................... 94 Anything but the Same Old Story .............................................................................................. 97 Chapter 5 ....................................................................................................................... 104 The Rise of Vertigo .................................................................................................................. 107 The (brief) Fall of an Industry .................................................................................................. 114 Surviving the Fall ..................................................................................................................... 125 A Preacher and a Journalist Walk into a Bar... ........................................................................ 130 Epilogue/Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 142 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 147 Appendix A .............................................................................................................................. 160 iv Introduction I, like many of the authors discussed in this text, I grew up reading superhero comics and abandoning them at adolescence. When I was twelve (or maybe thirteen) I boxed up hundreds of comics and left them to collect dust in my father’s basement, safely out of sight from the prying judgmental eyes of teenage social circles. They sat more or less undisturbed until I finally sold them to cover the cost of a weekend trip to Philadelphia and my first official tattoo. Over the years I found myself drawn back to the medium by the adamant insistence of friends that I read this or that. Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Transmetropolitan, Sandman, Y the Last Man, DMZ, From Hell, A History of Violence, Road to Perdition, and a host of other comics were loaned or outright purchased for my consumption. I complied and found that these were smart, funny, frightening, nuanced, subversive, philosophical, and, like any good art, disarmingly provocative—hardly the comics I had consumed as a child. In giving up comics at adolescence I had unknowingly removed myself from a profound moment in the medium’s history. The trite storylines of hyper moral lantern- jawed superheroes and one-dimensional anti-heroes so prominent in the comics of my youth had given way to a host of emotionally complex characters, many of which were not superheroes in the traditional sense.