Great Big Comics

Thu, Jul 9, 2009

This week DC publishes the first of their new Wednesday Comics series, a 12-part weekly series which comes in the old tabloid newspaper format, designed to echo the classic paper’s comics section. Although for many comics readers of a certain age (like me) here in the UK I suspect it will remind them of something else – those over-sized kid’s comics of yesteryear like the Beezer and Topper (ah, the 70s and comics as big as the flares in your jeans) which came in the same format for many years and, unlike the Beano or Dandy, generally necessitated lying flat on the floor for a read (preferably in the middle of a room so as to cause maximum inconvenience to passing adults).

DC Wednesday Comics 1 cover

There was always something magical about that format to me as a wee boy, different from all my other comics; so odd to look at one of these new Wednesday Comics (well, Day After Wednesday Comics in the UK as we get the US releases a day later), not having seen a comic in that format for so long; instant hotline to nostalgic memory… The actual comic itself may be short (well, it is designed to be like a pull-out section from a weekend newspaper, with weekly installments) but we were all rather intrigued by it here, it had the staff all peering at it and it certainly boasts some damned fine creative talent, including Mike Allred, Neil Gaiman, Kurt Busiek, Jimmy Palmiotti, Kyle Baker, Adam and Joe Kubert and Dave Gibbons. One to have a look at as you persue this week’s new releases on the comics racks.