Using Comic Books as an Example of How The Internet Changes

Although my comic book reading is semi-detached these days - I'd like to pretend that it is maturity but it is more likely financial considerations - I've followed the last decade of Marvel Comics with vague interest. Like everyone else who grew up with a regular comic habit, I tend to resent any attempt to update my favourite characters (I still have a bizarre crush on Marvel's version of the Valkyrie, who pulled off a clumsy feminist consciousness while wearing a stripperiffic outfit): the speed of change in  the Marvel Universe, however, impresses me even as I recognise it as a sign of panic.

A quick summary: until the late 1990s, the Marvel Universe was relatively static. Despite the odd crossover, the continuity of characters - Spider-Man had women trouble and was hounded by the press, The X-Men fought to save a world that feared them and sold better than anything else, Captain America struggled to hold the values of 'The Greatest Generation' - meant that dropping in and out of reading was easy. Significant changes would eventually be reset, sometimes too quickly, and certain characters evolved, thanks to popularity (Wolverine started the 1970s as an ambiguous Canadian agent,  good in a scrap but volatile, and ended the century as the sort of hero who could kill God).

The last ten years or so, however, have seen constant changes in the status quo. None of them stick for long, culminating in a dramatic crossover story-line that would set up a new status quo, which would culminate in a dramatic crossover... The stock heroes are still knocking about, but some new characters have been invented, risen to prominence and been killed off in the same amount of time it took Jack Kirby and Stan Lee to resolve a single minor plot point in the 1960s.

There has also been an obvious rise in the adult content and themes in comics. Back in the day, heroes would either be killers, and therefore slightly dodgy (viz. Wolverine) or have a frankly fatuous code against killing. When faced with genocidal maniacs, the heroes would defeat them then pontificate about how killing them would make them as bad as the villain.

It is generally accepted that the 1990s introduced the more brutal hero - known as 'The Dark Age,' it saw anti-heroes like The Punisher replace the playground adventures of the likes of The Fantastic Four as the top sellers. Contemporary comics have retained this brutality, and the increasingly ridiculous anatomies of heroines (it's even rumoured that a few artists use porn stars as models for their depictions of female characters). I've been trying to make a collection of comics for my nine year old nephew to read. I can't give him anything printed after about 1986.

Because my reading of comics is now filtered through discussion boards - cheaper and more fun than the actual comics, sadly - the philosophical discussion on the new, darker mentality of the hero can be hilarious. Back in the day, I would defend comics on the grounds that they presented a field guide to ethics. I might still be in the habit of making extravagant claims for art - like that one about how 'going to the theatre is an intrinsically moral act' - but the divorced between the real world and the four colour version is far more pronounced than it used to be. Ironically, the Dark Age was supposed to be the consequence of Alan Moore's attempt in The Watchmen to apply real issues to super-heroics. Instead, there's an uneven grafting of old fashioned moral debate onto images that are all-too-familiar from the news.

That aside, the constant change of the Marvel Universe has seen The Green Goblin become the head of the USA's homeland security, various teams of good guys having throw-downs (Civil War had Captain America get a pasting off his Best Friend Forever Iron Man, Avengers Versus X-Men explains itself), an invasion by an alien civilisation and the destruction of Asgard out of Norse mythology: there's a major shift of emphasis nearly every two years. Each shift causes a major row amongst the fans, who don't always seem to realise that it won't last, and the shifts often mimic the demands being flung about on the message boards.

This revolving door policy of status quo fascinates me because it appears to be responding to the massive and sudden changes in media. Two factors - the emphasis on The Event (each change has a mini-series that announces it), and the instability of the narrative. While I can't be certain that this is the result of the creators reading the on-line arguments and adapting the best suggestions, it does reflect the way that the internet operates.

There's a great South Park episode where the boys try to earn money off YouTube, only to find themselves in a waiting room with previous internet phenomena. In a short scene, South Park parodies the ability of the internet to create stars and drop them. The Laughing Baby was a celebrity, so was that bloke shouting at his dog. Remember them?

The Marvel Event is just like that - a sudden explosion of interest, then replaced by the next Event. As for the instability of the narrative - well, my research into puppetry has found a thousand and one different versions of its history.

This strikes me as a good example of the way in which the internet is changing the way that all media is consumed. It's not about the technology - comics have been very slow to realise that the internet is a very powerful and direct way to distribute - but the way that narratives are shaped. They are in a constant state of flux. It's a reminder of Alan Moore's prediction for the future of information as steam, when the 'heat' of innovation turns knowledge into the fastest moving state of matter.

It's even more interesting when the history of comics suggests a medium that is very slow to adapt to fashion. Much as I love the old 1960s comics of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee, there is little to suggest that their run on The Fantastic Four was responding to the events of the era. During their time on the comic, the USA went from a conservative, Christian nation to a madcap laboratory for alternative lifestyles. Rock'n'roll evolved from Elvis to psychedelia. Mr Fantastic spent the decade squaring off against communists and trying to make his marriage work.  In the 1990s, the X-Men were sporting mullets, a good ten years after they fell out of style.

Quite where this all sits in my broader cultural commentary, I have no idea. Like so many things that occur to me when I am waiting for my invoices to be paid, it is intriguing. Nominally, comics are a popular medium, and express some old fashioned values in a relatively uncritical self-defeating way - the moral that might doesn't make right is usually expressed by punching someone in the chops. But they are not popular in sense of sales - I reckon more people know who came third in X-Factor than the current line up of the X-Men - or even reach: the audience is established and niche.

Niche - that's pretty much like the internet too.