Eighties comics on the new release shelves

There was a sense of anything could happen in late 80s mainstream comics, after the big hits of Watchmen and Maus and the Dark Knight Returns and so on, anything could come along. Creator-owned work was at a peak, and mainstream comics were making a real quantum leap in quality and craft.

That feeling of innovation and thoughtfulness - for me - has largely faded away over the years, although there will always be pockets of breathtaking creativity in the weird and wonderful medium of periodical comics. And it is deeply reassuring to see some of the old dogs of that era still doing the work.  

Because now there are new Grendel and Concrete comics coming out in the next few months. A Swamp Thing issue from 1988 has just been released, complete with a Johnny DC column and vintage ads for comics that were on sale three decades ago.

(I picked up the Swamp Thing comic for the novelty of it, and enjoyed it more than I thought. I found most of the Veitch run fairly average, but #88 was pretty good in the end. It's so far from controversial though, that it really show what true cowards were at the time - and can still be.)

Obviously the world has moved on, the entire readership and industry has changed. But the pages of Grendel will feature Christine Spar battling evil vampires, and Larry is no doubt doing something dumb in Concrete, so how much has really changed?

I've been a Grendel fan since back in the day, and have all the Concrete that Paul Chadwick ever produced, so I've already got my orders in for the new comics. I doubt they will be able to capture the fire for comics that I had when I first starting reading their adventures so long ago, but I can only hope they spark something new.