The "Hero Complex"

http://herocomplex.latimes.com/comics/avengers-dexter-and-more-in-comics-previews/#/77

The LA Times now has a section on entertainment called the "Hero Complex."  This section discusses pop culture trends and analyzes why they are doing well.

The link above is to an article in "Hero Complex" on comic books.  The LA Times released 78 pictures of what they consider "the best and brightest of the comic book world" today.

Looking through the gallery, I found that "the best and brightest" comic books of the day were actually quite unoriginal.  The majority were superhero comic books with such titles as: X Men, Hulk, Spiderman, Avengers, Wolverine, and Thor to name a few.  These seemed to all be telling the same unoriginal story about how a creature with morality and superhuman powers helps better the world.  In addition, many of these comic books use superheroes that are already well known in pop culture because there have already been movies about them.  The only original seeming comics were Hawkeye and Locke + K because they have not been characters in a major Hollywood movie.  However, they still used the superhero genre format.

Slightly more interesting comic books included Django Unchained (the comic book), My Little Pony, and Lebron: King of the Rings.  These did not follow the superhero genre used in many comic books today.  However, a key celebrity figure (Lebron James) or movie or commercial line is used to market the comic book.

I find it sad that we consider these comic books "the best and brightest" comic books of our day.  The comic book industry needs to stop using the superhero genre or commercial media figures to sell their comic books.  I hope that the comic book industry will start making other genres, be more original, and get back to producing the intellectual and artistic comics that it once did.