I'm going to make a comic

What good and bad comics should I read before I begin, so I can develop an even better understanding of the genre?

What are your favorite comics?

Eisner

Understanding what genre?
I mean there's a ton of different ones.

I know about a cute comic about a girl with Cupid-like powers to make people fall in love with stuff. I also know about a horror comic about a vengeful ghost from Iraq coming to torture the family of a soldier guy who killed a woman during the war (and the ghost takes the form of a crow woman).

There's mystery comics and gag a day comics and sci-fi comics and dog fucking comics and romance comics and comic adaptations of Dark Crystal sequels/prequels comics and etc.

I honestly haven't read that many comics. I once saw a Batman one where The Joker turned everyone into zombies. I read some issues of Invincible they had at the library. And I saw Blackest Night, which seemed OK. I read this one really dumb Iron Man comic that made tony a blue-armoured alien baby, and another Iron Man comic about this one douchebag that kidnapped a movie maker to make him make a movie about "His greatness" kim jong un style. The filmmaker hid truth in the film so the douchebag blew everything up.

I read a few of the terrible modern marvel ones where Iron Man's a black woman and Thor's an angry surrendering-opponent-striking bitch, but only because some friends were all "Dude, look at this shit!".
Good point. The genre I want to write for is superhero comics. I want to write a superhero comic.

Eisner's work on how to make comics. Then read Tintin, taking note of how the series was before and after the watershed of The Blue Lotus where Herge actually started consistently applying principles Eisner suggested US comic writers and artists should follow, if they are interested in retaining a readership.

>the genre?

You have a fundamental problem there, bub. Try learning the differences between genre and medium first.

Yeah even Superhero genre is still a pretty broad term.
Could mean a story where people sit in colorful costumes and comedy it up (see The Specials movie) or a grimdark story involving realistic consequences for superpowerful actions (see the comics Irredeemable or Watchmen).

Generally superheros do involve fighting crime so that means Action. So it is probably best to make sure you can nail down the visuals of it if you're going that way.

>and Thor's an angry surrendering-opponent-striking bitch

The most hilarious part is that it would have been highly irregular for her to not hit a person who has thrown away her weapon, surrendered and communicated her desire to cooperate.

They even aknowledge that on page, in that issue.

>Yeah even Superhero genre is still a pretty broad term.

There are Marvel/DC ones written by US citizens, there are Marvel/DC ones written by Brits and then there's everything else.

Could I strike a sort of balance between the two? I had an idea where, after a few years of typical hero vs supervillain stuff, one hero decides he needs to change the world.

Most old heroes in their high-concept groups see this guy as a threat, while most newer heroes that deal with darker-coloured grittier stuff like the idea.

Go to university. Study a wide variety of literature, make sure to study the classics going back to Greek literature. If you plan on drawing also study a lot of fine arts, even if you don't you should take some to understand the basic concepts.

Go on to take a masters; if you can find a comic degree a few schools offer that too. Continue to read everything you can find.

And write, write, write.

Ah yes escalation. Probably most common in shonen manga tropes but a good few people do it (hell most people bitch about Steven Universe since it does it but the backs down to slice of life).

Off the top of my head I can't recall a full list that would give you many comparisons.
Most examples I can think of are cause of a change in writer's. Like JLI was mostly campy fun, but JL generation lost and JLI in n52 were more serious.
But these are issues of changing writers more than a choice of escalation.

As for the part about one hero decides the need to change the world. There's a few more recent comparisons for that such as Marvel's Civil War and other events that usually focus on heroes fighting heroes (often described as in-fighting).

Another popular in-fighting story is Kingdom Come.

That concept has already been done, but I'm sure you'll do it differently. To learn what others have done read StormWatch by Ellis, The Authority Vol.1 and Ultimates.

Remind me again how she's worthy to wield the power of Thor?
The problem with Steven Universe's escalation is that the threats they face escalate in the most shallow ways possible, while the heroes don't escalate or grow as people or fighters. Therefore, even with fusion and its "Instantly raise your power level as high as it needs to be" bullshit on the table, every stupid little publicity stunt they use to convince idiots the show might eventually maybe deliver on its promises... every publicity stunt has to be resolved with stupid deus ex machinas, sometimes multiples in a row, so everything can work out as perfectly as possible for the heroes outside of setting up more publicity stunt fandombait to get those idiots to keep watching more seasons of filler, pointless meaningless filler with pointless meaningless characters. Fanboys too blind to see flaws in the show they love will defend these deus ex machinas, because they don't want to admit a shitty little toonboom-trash show lied to them and tricked them. SU is not good, it's never been good, and no matter what speculation-bait it throws at you next week or a hundred weeks from now, it will never get good.

Also, I reckon the Civil War bit would have been better if writers TALKED TO EACH OTHER first, and figured out EXACTLY what registration means. Do you register, unmask, and leave it at that, hoping your street-level thug-punching antics won't get the local not-Kingpin to send goons after your family? Do you get drafted into some superpowered army? Do you only get drafted if your power is really good? Do the strongest villains get drafted Suicide Squad style? Will SHIELD take the friends and family of those screwed-over street-level heroes into protective custody until the A-Listers have finished taking down the whole list of E-Lister street-level villains in an afternoon?

Do you have any idea how vague this question is? That's like saying "I'm going to make a movie. What are some movies I should watch?" You're offering 0 information on what you're even trying to do.

He elaborated more

Thanks! I always hated those "Fuck you, the question in your OP is too vague and I don't want to read the thread before I post!" posts.

I want to make a statement about the old big "Hero groups"(comics and companies) being bad at doing new stuff, while new heroes(comics) don't usually get much attention thanks to the bigger groups pretty much having a monopoly.

In your opinion, how far should I take this?

>Remind me again how she's worthy to wield the power of Thor?

Every single one of them assaults people who surrender. It's standard practice.

>Also, I reckon the Civil War bit would have been better if writers TALKED TO EACH OTHER first, and figured out EXACTLY what registration means.

That would constitute research and editors have a big book'o shit even the CIA agreed they'd never do to anyone's family they will happily pick a random page from and follow the instructions, should they find that one of their writers or artists did that.

Or so I imagine, because everything else makes even less sense.

>Generally superheros do involve fighting crime

Let's be frank - most of the time, they involve fighting other superheros. Crime is not an issue they actually deal with.

Scott Mcloud's Understanding Comics and Making Comics are a good way to show how the medium works and give you a better understanding of it.

That's modern superheros which sort of first happened with OG secret wars and kingdom come.