Just when you think the last TASCHEN comics themed book was a heavyweight, and one could not expect a volume any bigger and more exciting, be ready for a surprise. Comic book legends Stan Lee and Steve Ditko in the Silver Age of comics created a large pool of superheroes for Marvel, among them a […]
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Tag: superheroes
Fashion and Masculinities in Popular Culture by Adam Geczy and Vicki Karaminas (2019)
With the advent of modernity, the choices of men and women to shape their own character freely, pick their styles and outfit and maybe even follow a new role model were multiplied. Thanks to travel, tourism, modern means of communication, news and image transfer, no longer only the local role models and heroes were attainable […]
Superhero Thought Experiments: Comic Book Philosophy by C. Gavaler and N. Goldberg (2019)
The main thesis of this book will be of interest to both philosophers and comic book fans, as strange as it may sound at first. In an unusual effort, thought experiments done by philosophers (ancient and recent), and the stories behind many superhero comics are evaluated, and their many similarities revealed. As both groups play […]
The Phantom Unmasked: America’s First Superhero by Kevin Patrick (2017)
The crime fighter/superhero The Phantom, aka “The Ghost Who Walks, Man Who Cannot Die,” appeared first in February 1936 in The New York Journal as a comic strip. Thus predating the arrival of Superman by more than two years; two years in “comic books publishing time” is a long, long while (provided that in the […]
The Marvel Age of Comics 1961–1978 by Roy Thomas (2017)
Marvel Comics of New York, originally founded as Timely Publications in 1939, is one of the most important comic book publishers worldwide. Comic book fans all over the world are grateful for superheros as Captain America or the Sub-Mariner. And particularly for superheros of “a somewhat other kind,” as the mostly troubled, eccentric and characters […]
The Mythology of the Superhero by Andrew R. Bahlmann (2016)
Since by now the superhero has become an intrinsic part of the popular culture in Western civilization, a closer look at the reasons why this has happened makes sense. Although his appearance can be traced down exactly to the early and mid-1930s in the US, his mythological origins go way back. Bahlmann encounters the superhero […]
75 Years of DC Comics. The Art of Modern Mythmaking by Paul Levitz (2017)
Any superhero comic book fan will know about the previous three huge books celebrating the Golden Age, the Silver Age and the Bronze Age of DC Comics. Those three volumes, big as they are, were merely a small part of what the current new edition of 75 Years of DC Comics The Art of Modern […]
The Bronze Age of DC Comics by Paul Levitz (2015)
The third volume of the DC chronicles is out and shows the company’s changing face and politics in the years 1970-1984. As the Golden Age and the Silver Age were focused on the development of DC comics until the year 1970, the current edition is labeled the “Bronze Age“ and demonstrates how the comic artists […]
Bending Steel. Modernity and the American Superhero by Aldo J. Regalado (2015)
By examining interviews, trade magazines and even testimonies, letters, memoirs and other personal data author Regalado seeks direct impact of the superheroes on the real lives of actual people. Or rather, he aims to find out just how “the big forces of American modernity shaped the lives of Americans on an individual level and how […]