Comics Talk

Imagination is a beautiful thing. It gives respite from the daily life. I love comic books. One of the reasons I love them because they are stories and they use visual art to convey those stories. I used to read a lot of comics in my childhood and last I saw of comics was when I was in college and had bought a newly launched comic magazine named Comic Jump. Late 2000s and early 2010s were great for comic book industry, as many new comic book companies were formed and new comics were launched. Comic Jump had serialised strips and had good stories, that were also deep. I like deep comics and so I appreciate the works of people like Alan Moore. I also appreciate writers like Frank Miller. Reading comics in childhood was one of my favourite pastimes. Only someone who has owned and read comics can tell how each comics has an individual and distinctive vibe. You read comics and you get immersed in their worlds. I had huge collection of comics in childhood which probably went to the raddiwala later. The surge in comic book companies that this country saw in late 2000s and early 2010s died down as soon as it started, and I think it was due to political reasons and control of media. Still that time gave us a few good comic books and characters. A company called Virgin comics launched characters like The Sadhu and Devi, and probably now are owned by a company called Graphic India. There was Ramayan 3392 AD and Ravanayan, two retellings of Ramayana during the same period, one set in the future and another from the perspective of Ravan. There were two main comic book companies when I was a kid. One Diamond Comics that published characters like Chacha Chaudhary, Billu, Pinki and others by Pran and a few other characters like Fauladi Singh, Agniputra Abhay, Mahabali Shaka and others. Another company was and it is still present is Raj comics which focused mostly on costumed superheroes and churned out great and memorable superhero stories. There were other comics like Manoj comics and Tulsi Comics which had their own set of characters like Havaldar Bahadur and Angara. Raj Comics is still doing well especially after the pandemic when people with nothing to do remembered their childhoods and started sharing PDFs of old comics which were mostly by Pran or Raj Comics. Comic Jump could have done well, I don't know, at least I would have been its regular customer. The company that published it, then named Level 10 Comics now goes by the name of Nihodo Media. The same company had launched a comic book series named Odayan, a story with considerable depth and maturity based in the state of Kerala. I liked Odayan, and I liked the serialised comics in Comic Jump. At present there are still comics ventures alive in this country though they are not really popular. One is Holy Cow Entertainment that has published comics like Aghori and quite a few others. Another is Yali Dream Creations which has published comics like Caravan and has characters like Codename Alpha and Rakshak. There is a comic book company called Indusverse which has launched a bunch of comics and then there is a new addition named Alpha Comics which is from one of the owners of Raj Comics. There is no dearth of indigenous superheroes, though the current generation is into anime and American superheroes. I personally prefer Indian stories, to write and to read. I have seen a trend that Indian comic book creators have gone for working in foreign comics companies, which is understandable as indigenous comics got crushed in this country. It was funny to see one of the comic writers I knew from 2010s and if I remember correctly from an issue of Comic Jump, peddling political propaganda on YouTube and Instagram. It's funny how indigenous creativity and stories have been completely crushed. Though I like foreign comics as well and love superhero movies from Marvel and DC specially when they don't promote woke bullshit, and I love foreign comics as well and Constantine by Alan Moore is one of my favourite characters. I love DC and Marvel, but then one has to agree that not everyone is a Frank Miller or Alan Moore.