A Picture Tells A Thousand Words

There's a widespread belief that comics are a juvenile artform.

 

That somehow, just because a story is illustrated, it is somehow less deserving of appreciation than if it were told by means of words alone.

 

To which I say - utter nonsense.

 

I've always been an afficionado of comic books, although it took a lengthy hiatus between my early teenage years and my acquiring (as a present from Mrs Wife) Frank Miller's Dark Knight Batman books a couple of years ago.

 

But there are dozens of comics and graphic novels that more than stand their own amongst the great novels of our time.

 

As well as the Miller's Dark Knight books - particularly The Dark Knight Returns, which chronicles the exploits of an aging Batman returning to fight crime after a period of retirement - titles such as Watchmen, Wanted, Sin City, Superman: Red Son, Kick-Ass and the Marvel Civil War epic are all worthy of high praise.

 

Without comics, many of the biggest (which, I concede, doesn't necessarily mean best) movies of the last 50 years would never have seen the light of day.

 

Alan Moore's Watchmen even appears on TIME magazine's list of the 100 greatest novels of all time - an honour I don't expect will ever be bestowed upon Harry Potter or Dan Brown.