12. DC’s Romance Comics
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Originally Aired on: Feb 08, 2009
The whole romance comic genre blows my mind. Think of it, it’s a whole style of comic that is written by men, illustrated by men, for women, about love and relationships. As well, they’re from the past, which makes their plots and conclusions even more inadvertently ridiculous. The absurdity is so much fun! Sometimes, especially at DC, there are excellent and innovative artists and that’s always a treat. I’ve been collecting for 12 years and I literally get an incredible high every time I buy a vintage romance comic. I love the colours, the styles, the hair, the stories, the characters, I love it all. I honestly feel that each comic represents a part of womens history, from a male perspective, in the comic world. It was hard to narrow down my collection, so I focused on a specific publisher, DC comics. Of the two main publishers, Marvel and DC, DC is the less schlocky.
Young Romance #1 (vol. 1): 1947 – 1963 (vol. 2) 1963 – 1975
Published by Crestwood then sold to DC in the 60’s. ‘Young Romance’ was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. The art was a real departure from the bombastic psychedelia of Kirby’s later Marvel superhero art. Extremely dated and totally hilarious the last story, ‘The Plight of the Suspicious Bridegroom’ channels a weird EC vibe.
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