HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Banes and I NEEEEEED you to tell us about the traditional comics that influenced you in your early years and pointed you on the road to making comics yourselves.

We're NOT talking webcomics here, but the old printed kind in comic books or newspapers, or gum wrappers or… however else you got your comicbook goodness.
And it is TOTALLY ok to talk about mainstream comics like Batman and Superman if that was your thing or obscure stuff no one ever heard of or weird embarrassing crap like He-Man comics, whatever, it's all good, we wanna know!

So tell us about the comic, describe it if it's obscure, tell us what you like about it and how it infleunced you. Or if it didn't directly influence you that's OK too.
Metion as many as you like!

Just post your submissions in this thread or send recordings to ozoneocean at yahoo dot com.
Due date: Friday the 24th of May!
That's THIS week so be quick!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, first of all… Hi! Long time no post. Looooong… Time…
Here's a short list of comics that changed me:

- The Compleat Moonshadow (John M DeMatteis)
- The Sandman (Neil Gaiman)
- Black Orchid (Neil Gaiman)
- Marvel's Civil War Event
- Joker (Brian Azzarello)
- Blankets (Craig Thompson)
- Bone (Jeff Smith)
- Maus (Art Spiegelman)


And here's why:
The Compleat Moonshadow is, to me, the ultimate story about growing up. Set in a science fiction universe a young boy (called Moonshadow by his crazy-hippie-mom) and his abusive alien friend Ira try to find their place in the universe. What makes Moonshadow such an interesting read is the uncertainty that they'll ever find it. People die, bad things happen. Throughout the journey Moonshadow tries to remain optimistic, he sees the best in people and is often disappointed. Like real life there are clear ups and downs. To me moonshadow has a happy ending, but it all depends on where you stop reading. Moonshadow is a beautifully written story with amazing art that is worth reading.

The Sandman is one of the comic book series that changed the medium. It is the best and everyone should read it again, or be very ashamed for not having read it.

Black Orchid is a superhero comic about the Black Orchid. Several pages into the comic she is shot through her head and subsequently murdered by some criminal element. That's where the story really starts. Another Black Orchid takes her place, similar in everything but without the original Orchid's memories. The reason I liked Black Orchid so much is because in the end there is no big showdown. There isn't a massive brawl. The story (after some violence) ends in a conversation. Throughout the entire story interesting characters like Batman, Lex Luthor and Swamp Thing play small roles. The story is set in the DCU, but does not pretend it is the most important thing in the world. It shows a little glimpse into the normal, day to day, life of most of those characters we love so much, and also reintroduces the Black Orchid. (since she never really got to be the superhero she could have been.)

The civil war event is about a war between two groups of Marvel superheroes. Captain America on one side and Iron Man on the other side. It steals a lot of things from other comics (especially Watchmen), but shows another side to a lot of interesting characters. To me the Civil War event was amazing, mostly because it could have really changed the Marvel Universe.

Joker, by Brian Azzarello, is about the friggin' Joker. ‘Nuff Said.

Blankets is a love story. Like many love stories in the real world it starts out feeling pure, real and everlasting, but the further the story goes, the more it starts to resemble the real world. Besides being about love, Blankets is also about religion. I do not come from a very religious family, but even I have felt the oppressive guilt that comes with Christianity. Blankets shows religion from multiple sides, not passing judgement on those that are religious or not religious. It’s a beautiful story with art that looks very much alive by a writer that clearly cares about everything he writes.

Bone is something I wish I could have written. It's a fantasy story in a serious world with characters that just don't seem to fit in at first. WHich is a good thing, because they are almost more interesting than the rest of the world. Eventually they do and a fantasy epic plays out that has everything a fantasy story needs, and not a lot of things it doesn't. Bone was one of the first comics I bought, after saving up many weeks of pocketmoney.

Maus is an interesting read, but it is only on my list because every list needs a WW2 reference.

The comic that kick started things for me was probably Spawn. It was weird, it was cool it was dark and it was something very new to me. I was probably about 12. That comic paved the way for alot of people in my age group who were getting into comics i think. The old gambit of super heroes were still employed of course. Batman, X-men, stuff like that, but Spawn was something my generation could lay claim to and it felt so bad ass because it was like “Ha! so your super hero got bitten by a spider? well MINE came straight from hell! suck it!”

I know i've said on here before that I've been most influenced by Judge Dredd and Lobo. The quint-essential of bad ass and violent hilarity. And it's true. But Spawn is what really started it for me. for me it cultivated an interest in comics, otherwise i just might not of ever taken notice.

Well for me its 2000AD, Tank Girl, Hellboy and Wormwood Gentleman Corpse.
But if you what to go back to the very begging then it was Sonic the comic! Not the american one I'm talking about the U.K. published one! It turned Sonic the hedgehog into a freedom fighter in a world under tyrannical rule. It was one of the most gripping things to have ever seen as a small boy, written by some of the former editors of 200AD and with some of the sleekest art I had (at that Time) seen. Need less to say its what got me picking up a pencil to try to start drawing my own stories!

Wait a minute, is your name a throw back to “Call me Kenneth”, tom?

I never thought anyone was going to get that!

Probably the earliest influences were comic panels and strips. My dad would usually read me the cartoons in his various magazines, books or newspapers he was reading, hence my somewhat random and strange sense of humor that you can see at The KAMics.
Cartoonists like VIP, Kurtzman and Eldar's Little Annie Fannie, Charles Addams, Charles Schulz amongst many, many others. (How much of their influence is visible I couldn't say.)
I do remember that the earliest attempts at comics I tried making were based on comics like Snuffy Smith and Redeye, for some odd reason.

Thanks for the contributions guys! We did the thing last night and it was grand ^_^