LibriumArcana.Games

See, the Made of Wood storyline had made me thinking....

In the modern comic era, superhero stories have become more "adult" and "realistic". That's not necessarily in blood and gore term, though. These days, attempts have been made to make superheroes more believable. Gone the days of 'pow and biff' superheroes like in Batman TV series.

As long as they are not overdoing it, I actually love this trend. There's good and bad apples, though. Dark Knight Returns and Son of the Demon are really excellent, while Ultimate X-Men is a failure (IMO).

I also remember owning three issues of World's Finest where Batman and Superman switched cities (Batman went to Metropolis, while Superman went to Gotham) to stop Luthor and Joker. The events eventually lead to the dark past of an orphanage founded and sponsored by Byron Willie; a former railroad tycoon who built the Gotham-Metropolist railway.

Willie, a twisted person he was, secretly trained the orphan to be criminals until he was eventually arrested. Later on, Willie's protege named Oliver Monks is blackmailed by Joker. Luthor offered to relieve Monks from the blackmail if he agreed to give up the orphanage. It was eventually turned out that Luthor wanted to do what Byron Wille had done; training orphans to become criminals.

Like "Made of Wood", the storyline is far from being perfect. However, the drawing and presentation really enchance the 'dramatic' impression of the story. For example, there ain't many superpower scenes in the story. Another example is less usage of dialogue balloons.

It's not even a graphic novel; it is merely three issues of World's Finest series, but I was quite satisfied with what I read. Like 'Made of Wood', I couldn't help but thinking: if only more superhero comics being made that way....


So what are the excellent, 'dramatic' superhero stories you have read? Share them here!

EDIT: here's a review of the World's Finest issues I read. Just find the keyword 'Oliver Monks' on the page.

Everyone and their uncle is going to say The Watchmen, which is fair, because it along with DKR changed super-hero comics forever.

Other really excellent, excellent works are Brian Michael Bendis's run on Daredevil, Bendis' Powers, and Alias (unrelated to the TV show), which later became the Pulse

I've also heard good things about Keith Busiek's Astro City, but haven't read it myself.

On Ultimate X-Men, and the whole Ultimate universe, it's not supposed to be a 'serious' version of X-Men (or Spider-Man, or Avengers), they're really just re-booting the franchises to make them more simple and accessible to new readers.

X-Men, Spider-Man etc. all have 40+ years of continuity, with all kinds of different writers jumping from book to book and ridiculous plots (people getting killed, off, cloned and returned. Seriously, its happened to almost every character); the idea was to retain the characters and lose the baggage.

That said, I've only read a bit of Ultimate Spider-Man, and even less Ultimate X-Men, but that was Marvel's plan behind it.

Bringing it back to my original point: go read Bendis's Daredevil and Powers.

DC's Kingdom Come was a great one for me. Set in the future where Kansas and much of the midwest is radition posioned and Superman and many of the orginal heros have 'retired' leaveing a wilder generation to wreck havoc on the world.

The story centers about the reemergence of Superman, his and the Justice League's attempts to assert control over a new generation of metahumans who do not wish to follow the old rules.

Wiki

Well, a lot of modern Age Batman comics fit that bill. The whole Contagion/Cataclysm/No Man's Land storyline comes to mind, as does Absolution (all of which ARE available as english-language TPBs), and, to an extent, Knightfall.
And of course there's Murderer/Fugitive.