When I first left comics back in the late 80's I was mostly reading stuff like like American Flagg, Love & Rockets and such like with a smattering of 'normal' stuff like Teen Titans. I graduated to these comics from the likes of Spider-man and the Flash because my tastes changed as I got older.

Now that I have come back into comics I still have lots of stuff to choose from such as Preacher, Asto City and the Authority etc. I am catered for nicely. As it happens gluttony prevails because most of the stuff I grew out of has become similar in nature to the more adult stuff I like to read. Whoopee do for me, I have dozens and dozens of comics to read should I want to.

The problem with this picture of course is that what is being written for the type of kid I was before I hit 14+ I don't see much around that would entice the 8 year old that I was, to reach out for and start collecting comics today.

I love growth in comics.

My favorite Spiderman are Stan Lee, Roger Stern and Michelinie.

Fantastic Four: Lee Kirby, Roy Thomas, Your own writer/artist run.

X-Men: Claremont with You, Paul Smith and John Romita Jr. Even if I enjoyed Lee/Kirby, Thomas/Adams and Claremont/Cockrum (first run) for me they were only the prologue of the X-men I Ioved and still love. Yet i began to read the X-men with the Arcade arc by you and Chris so I'm biased here.

But what I mean is that I like evolution in comics (when it's well done).

My favorite Robin will always be Dick but when Marv Wolfman and George Perez came with the Nightwing concept in Teen Titans I loved the idea.

One of the reason I loved so much your FF was because the characters were more adult than before. Sue was a woman and a mother, Johny was more mature, Alicia was a real woman and not just the poor fragile girlfdriend of Ben.

I loved Roger Stern Avengers because of adult and clever Janet.

My favorite comics are generaly all-ages, like Iron Man by Michelinie and Layton; but I like when they include mature themes like the Ann Nocenti/John Romita Jr Daredevil.

And I like comics writen for adults like Gaiman's Sandman. What I don't like is when "adult" is understood as free "violence". Violence is acceptable in a comics when it's justified like in Frank Miller's "Born Again" or "Batman: Year One". Not when it's violence for violence, not when it's unjustified.

Good thoughtful post JB and dead on.

I still pull out my silver agers (altho Im now a silver ager myself), put my 7 year old brain in and enjoy those yarns as much as I did the first time around. However altho Ive 'grown', Id rather not seen my charcaters grow - at least Little Orpahan Annie is still little and Blondioe and Dagwood are still married.  Imagine if Blondie had been done as a comic book, they'd be divorced, Dagwood' have a drinking problem (instead of a food one) and Blondie's be running a cat house. Yikes~ thats what I see when I hear about modern comics like the dark ages of DC continuing with drek like Identity Crisis - Sue Dibny murdered - give me a break!  Sorry my hard won $ is gonna go to a SOLO by Mike Alldred or a Simpsons Treehouse of Terror - EC spoof.  

Robin becoming Nightwing is one of the many examples of aging in comics that I do not like.  Unless Dick exists in a vacuum, that means that all of the other original Teen Titans have aged along with him, and so have Batman and his contemporaries.

Like the JB member previously mentioned, I also prefer the "original" Spider-Man to the Ultimate version.  What I mean - and perhaps others who say this mean as well - is that I want to read about the unmarried teenaged wallcrawler in the original title, not in an "alternate" universe.