I can't decide.

They have the misfortune of being sandwiched between the unparalleled creativity of the 60s and the sheer brilliance of the 80s.

Mostly, they are just bland.

(I'll make exceptions for Chris Claremont and maybe Steve Gerber. Those guys were good)

Don McGregor's work hasn't age too well, eh?

I love the writing of Steve Gerber and Englehart in numerous titles.

I love Wein/Wrightson's Swamp Thing.

I love what Starlin did with Warlock.

I love the way Marvel branched into pulp and horror. Conan was arguably the greatest thing since sliced bread.

I love that Marvel reprinted its monster comics in all those reprint titles of the early 70's.

I loved the oversized Marvel magazines of the "Curtis" era.

I thought 70's Amazing Spider-man was good.

The All-New, All-Different X-Men was a titanic development. I don't see how that can be credited to any decade but the 1970's, because it peaked with Dark Phoenix, a story that wrapped up in 1980.

Now, 1980 was the peak for me, and started some great things. But I have no qualm against the 70's. The downside was just that some of the would-be flagship superhero titles -- FF, Hulk, Thor, etc. -- were stalling and mediocre.

I'm not that familiar with the comics of the 70's.

Not particularly, no, and I believe the same about Doug Moench's work, who was the other writer at Marvel who was doing interesting stuff. I can agree that they were trying to push the boundaries, but I don't believe they were talented enough to push through, like the British writers from the 80s would.

90% of everything is crap.

I think Moench's Moon Knight still works, at least for me.

I can understand Gerber. He struck me as an inherently interesting guy. His Howard the Duck was edgy, clever stuff, with or without the Comic Code. I haven't read his Man-Thing but if I were to read another comic from that era, it would be that.

But I can't understand Englehart, I absolutely despise everything I've read from him.

Also, your face is funny.

Also, the 90s were mostly crap, too.

I haven't read Englehart's Captain America run, but the only standout work I remember from him is that Detective stuff with Marshall Rogers and Terry Austin. I thought he was horrible on Justice League of America.

Some comics were beyond just something for me.

At DC:

Justice League of America really peaked in the 70's.

Superboy and the Legion of Superheroes really took off.

Superman, Action, Flash, Brave & Bold, All-Star Comics, Green Lantern/Green Arrow (Grell), & Super Friends, while not breaking new creative ground, delivered some entertaining super-hero stories. I also think that Ditko's Shade, the Changing Man deserves a second look.

At Marvel:

Avengers, Thor and Howard the Duck stand out for me. I also am impressed with the on-again, off-again runs of Dr. Strange. I know that I'm in the minority, but I also really like Kirby's Captain America and Eternals.

Marshall Rogers was a great artist, I'd give you that.

And as lowly as my opinion of 70s writers is, the artist were pretty darn good.

That one story of Nightwing and Flamebird by Marshall Rogers in Superman Family is beautiful. Probably the best thing he has ever done.

The mid 1970s really were a fun time for me and comics. We had the return of X-Men
over at Marvel, the DC Implosion, the Atlas/Seaboard comics, and E-Man. It was definitely
a return to comics of the Superheroes. And all those giant-sized issues with new material
and classic repeats, and the wonderful oversized $1-$2 Treasury-Sized books.

And I was 12, and I was just really starting to earn my own money with a paper route, and
then as a grocery bag boy, so I was able to buy a lot of it. Some of my happiest days.

Starlin"s Captain Marvel and Warlock were great! Of course the return of the X-Men. Dr. Strange was good. The Avengers did some fun things. I wouldn't say that all the comics were terrible.

Don't forget about Deatlok!

In my defense, I often got them confused (Gerber and Englehart). But his 1970's Captain America really holds up for me lately.

I like them. Adams/O'Neil Batman, Swamp Thing, the revitalization of DC from the bland 60s as a whole. Marvel was not as good as the 60s, but still mostly pretty good. I hate all these threads because I'm remembering all sorts of things from the 70s I did/do like. It makes me feel queasy.

I thought comics hit a rough spot in the early eighties to mid eighties. I remember the prices going up to fifty and then sixty cents and most of the stories seemed to be uninteresting and the art worse. I stopped buying them. In the late seventies to maybe 1980 you had all sorts of interesting things happening and I now remember the "still only 35 cents" on the covers with a lot of love.

Of course I was a little kid then so I might be getting dates wrong. Feel free to correct me. Feel free to scream and yell and slap me across the face.

His 70s work for Marvel is probably his best stuff. I don't like any Englehart that I've read in the 80s (Batman, FF).

This is true. The thing is about comic from the 70s, you have to get by the "talkiness" of them. Almost all of them by both Marvel and DC have lots of captions and word balloons. There is a lot of story in the 17 pages much more than today, so you really have to get used to reading them all over again.