This weekend, Verde Valley residents who visited the Cottonwood Recreation Center were shocked to discover a bevy of costumed characters — superheroes, antiheroes and supervillains. What was even more of shocker was that two rival universes, Marvel and DC Comics, managed to coexist in the same space without tearing our world apart.
I have already been in contact with my compatriots in the newspaper industry about the story.
Perry White, the editor-in-chief of The Daily Planet in Metropolis, assures me that reporters Clark Kent and Lois Lane were on the scene with photojournalist Jimmy Olson. No word on whether Ms. Lane will get another exclusive with the Son of Krypton, aka Superman, who likely helped keep the peace.
J. Jonah Jameson, editor-in-chief of The Daily Bugle in New York, dispatched photojournalist Peter Parker, who invariably snaps amazing pictures of the elusive Spider-Man wherever he goes, almost as if he has a “spidey sense” to find the web-slinger.
Reporter Vicki Vale from The Gotham Gazette in Gotham City may have had a run-in with the Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder, but the Dark Knight is a mysterious figure, fighting crime from the shadows.
Vale did confirm Gotham City billionaire Bruce Wayne was in the Verde Valley this weekend on yet another philanthropic venture.
Begun in the late 1930s as a form of escapist entertainment, comic books have developed over the years from fringe entertainment to alternative art, to maturing into an integral part of American culture. While direct sale comic books only generate $420 million annually, comic book conventions generate more than $160 million in ticket and retail sales. Comic book crossovers into film and television, however, are the bombshells. The average comic-book-turned-movie shows on 2,700 screens worldwide, generating $38 million on opening weekend and $114 million over its run. The top 100 comic book films have generated $15 billion, most of which was generated in the last few years as these films have become nearly-guaranteed blockbusters.
Like all forms of literature, comic books provide a fictional adventure but can critique and criticize the real world.
The mutants of Marvel’s X-Men are synonymous stand-ins for oppressed minority groups. Mutants first gain their superpowers in their late teens, offering teenage readers a proxy who feels as out of place in the adult world as they do.
The genre-turning Watchmen juggled whether it would be right to terrorize the world against a common enemy in order to save humanity from itself, which was as relevant in the Cold War of 1984 as it is in the War on Terror today.
Characters like Daredevil, Batman, the Punisher and Superman make readers question the fine line between justice and vengeance, doing what’s morally right or what’s legally right and the nature of good and evil, fundamental questions humans have debated since the dawn of civilization.
We hope everyone had a good time at the inaugural Verde Valley Comic Expo and wish organizers the best in years to come.
And J. Jonah Jameson has assured me we’ll have those pictures of Spider-Man as soon as Peter Parker turns them in.
