The top 5 things we could see less of in comic books

Obviously, any list of the things "we could see less of" is often going to be a reflection of personal tastes. But there are a few trends that do tend to get on peoples nerves. These trends may have started off as good things for the comics, but as time has gone by, they've become a bit dated, or have taken their course.

Much like Rob Liefield seemed like a good idea at the time, there are bound to be comic staples today that will be viewed with embarassment tomorrow. So, without further ado, here are five things that may not be as good as they used to be.

5. Manga influences

Manga, at it's base level, is simply Japanese comic books, and as such, are closely related to anime, or Japanese animation. There's nothing wrong with either, as a whole, any more than there is anything wrong with American or European comics, as a whole.

Unfornately, as manga became popular, American comic book artists began to rip it off in increasing amounts. The biggest problem is that there are many styles of manga, but there are generally one style of American rip off. Hopefully you like lots of really big eyes ...

4. Autobiographical graphic novels

Art Spiegelmann's Maus is probably the first autobiographical graphic novel to gain a widespread audience outside of "comix" aficionados such as Speigelmann himself. Despite being praised as one of the best, if not the best, graphic novel ever written, it does illustrate the main problem of a lot of autobiographies in comics form.

Maus is mistaken for many people to be a story about the Holocaust; it's not. It's the story of Spiegelmann telling the story of the Holocaust. Though Spiegelmann is better at this than most, many other comics artists are only self absorbed.

3. Zombies

If someone had a penny for every zombie apocalypse that has stricken the world of fiction in the last couple decades, they'd have more pennies than zombies in the average zombie apocalypse.

I suppose this is partially acceptable in movies and television, where zombies are fairly cheap to produce via makeup. But in comic books, where the artist has the ability to draw, well, just about anything he wants, the reliance on the stumbling undead is just, well, embarassing. Vampires and werewolves, as well, are old hat, but not quite as big a plague.

2. Comic book adaptations

We're not talking about comic movies or video games here. Those can be fun. What we're talking about are video games, movies and, God help us, actual novels turned into graphic novels.

Video game designers are especially prone to this. Gameplay gets in the way of storytelling, so to convince players they actually care about their characters and storyline, a comic book prequel is commissioned. Also popular, in a kind of desperate effort to get comics taken seriously, is the "classic adaptation" of literature, which usually just ends up boring.

1. Realistic superheroes

Never mind that it's an oxymoron (superheroes aren't,  by definition, realistic. They're super. That's why they call them superheroes!), it also frequently leads to superhero comics where the villains seem more heroic than the heroes. At least Norman Osborn is insane!

The mother of all "realistic" superhero books is probably Marvel's Civil War. Though fairly frequently praised in many media outlets, the fans usually find some random guy on the Internet's version better and truer to the characters involved, Black Eyed Peas singing Captain America and all.

Other Top 5s to check out.
Cute fuzzy creatures in comics you don't want to mess with!
Superheroes to fix your car!