Hey, I've been getting back into Silver Age comics (though I guess I never left), so I figured I'd start a little thread to complement the Bronze Age Comics thread.

First off, I read the 1956 chapter of TwoMorrows' THE AMERICAN COMIC BOOK CHRONICLES: 1950-1959 and was amazed by how many things that year signaled the end of the Golden Age. Obviously, we have the first appearance of Barry Allen which is the main event that signals the changeover, but there were some other big moments -- Simon and Kirby broke up as a team (I guess the "shop" method of working wasn't desired by the remaining publishers, forcing them to become individual freelancers), Quality Comics went under and was sold to DC, Kurtzman leaves MAD and it becomes a black-and-white magazine, and both Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko did their first assignments for Stan Lee as an editor (the last time Jack worked there, Lee was an assistant).

And Alex Raymond died that year. It's another sign of the end of the Golden Age in my book, even though he never worked in superhero comics because he was the most influential comics artist on Golden Age comic book artists, so his passing symbolically heralds the beginning of the end of a comic strip style approach to storytelling and panel layout.

But what inspired me to finally dig into those expensive comics history books was randomly seeing THE DEFEAT OF GREEN LANTERN trade at my comic shop. I flipped through it and was really enjoying the clean, uncluttered approach to storytelling and figure work, so I went home and dug out my GREEN LANTERN CHRONICLES trades. After enjoying about 100 pages of those little 8-page nuggets, I decided to bust out some of the other DC Silver Age books collecting dust in my library starting with THE FLASH and THE DOOM PATROL. Get ready for some random thoughts and observations...

Having read massive chunks of the Silver Age Superman comics, the one thing I really notice about these DC books was that they seemed more "serious" than those books -- Carol was more in love with Green Lantern than Hal Jordan, just like the Superman love triangle, but they never played Carol for the fool like they did with Lois (who seemed to have a "I Love Lucy" quality to her exploits in the Silver Age). There's a lot less whimsy and sitcom style situations -- while some readers likely appreciated that, I do think that playful quality is something that made superhero comics more appealing to general audiences and kids... something that is reinforced everytime I look at the comics my son Elijah enjoys (none of my superhero books, but Dog Man, The Bad Guys, Wimpy Kid, etc.).

The Flash had a touch more of that light humor with Barry always being late for his dates with Iris. The Doom Patrol was a big break from those two in terms of story length, but I had to remind myself how much later it debuted than the Flash and Green Lantern. GL and the Flash were eight-pagers, which felt refreshing -- a complete story can be enjoyed in about five minutes or so. On the other hand, there was a lot less room for subplots and characterization, so they quickly seemed to have a "sameness" about them. I'm reminded of Steven Grant's thoughts on an ESSENTIAL HULK book he read (about... geez, maybe 15-20 years ago now) -- you quickly come to realize these stories were not meant to be read back-to-back-to-back (and definitely not by a middle aged man in the year 2024). That all said, I enjoy these things on their own terms and find many of the "flaws" to make these comics even more attractive to me.

The Doom Patrol always has "novel length" stories like the Marvel books, which does make for more "epic" and satisfying plots -- as the "Marvel" title produced by DC, I wonder if they were imitating Kirby's habit of breaking full-issue stories into three chapters. Bruno Premiani's art is nice and clean and holds up very well next to Gil Kane and Carmine Infantino, leading me to wonder why he didn't do more titles for DC during this time period outside of DP. I see on Wikipedia he left comics in 1971 and died in 1984, so maybe that explains it -- he was too busy on Doom Patrol until 1968 and then left comics soon after. I wonder if it was because he couldn't get assignments or if he was just tired of the business.

But yeah, all three books have very lovely art. Gil Kane's beautiful figure-work is gorgeous and I don't think anyone's ever drawn the human figure in flight better than he has -- to draw the body at all those crazy angles and perspectives is very difficult to do and any artist today would likely need to rely on some sort of 3D model to pill it off. That said, it's quite amusing to see how often Hal Jordan ends up looking like a WASP version of Gil Kane himself. Anyway, let's enjoy some of that beautiful Gil Kane art --

I'm going to list off the DC Silver Age trades (outside of the Superman family) that I know I have so I can dig them up. I might as well post that list here...

Carmine Infantino Batman (HC)
Batman in the Fifties
Batman in the Sixties
Joe Kubert Hawkman (Archives & Showcase)
Joe Kubert Viking Prince (Omnibus)
Adam Strange (Showcase)
Gil Kane Green Lantern (Showcase & various TPBs)
The Flash (Chronicles)
Doom Patrol (TPBs)
Atomic Knights (in Showcase: The Great Disaster)
Teen Titans (Showcase)
Challengers of the Unknown (Omnibus & Showcase)
Steve Ditko Omnibus v 1 & 2
The Creeper by Steve Ditko
Steve Ditko's Charlton Material (Action Heroes Archives)

I think that might be it, but I'm probably forgetting a chunk of something. I think the only thing I really want to get that I don't have is some THE ATOM stuff by Gil Kane.

And hey, this looks great if you're into 60s superhero pop culture!

AmazWAN: https://www.amazon.com/dp/160549125X/?tag=imwan-20

Preview Here: https://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_p ... ts_id=1803

List all the Superman ones too, you bastard.

Looks like I was right about you all along.

Just like I was right about SMALLVILLE.

And streaming.

True.

Man, I am on a ROLL

Almost done with the first GREEN LANTERN CHRONICLES and am surprised to see that GL can make himself invisible. Why doesn't he use this extremely useful ability more often?

Out of respect for Space Ghost.

LOL!

What are the greatest runs of DC's Silver Age in your experience? I'll go ahead and list a bunch in no particular order just to get people's wheels turning...

Curt Swan / Various Superman
Gil Kane / John Broome Green Lantern
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Flash
Bruno Premiani / Robert Kanigher Doom Patrol
Infantino / Broome / Fox "New Look" Batman
Curt Swan / Jim Shooter Legion of Super-Heroes
Jack Kirby / Dave Wood Challengers of the Unknown
Neal Adams / Denny O'Neill Batman
Joe Kubert / Gardner Fox Hawkman
Nick Cardy / Bob Haney Teen Titans
Gil Kane / Gardner Fox The Atom
Gardner Fox / Mike Sekowsky Justice League of America
Neal Adams / Denny O'Neill Green Lantern / Arrow
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Adam Strange
Steve Ditko / Various The Creeper
Joe Kubert / Robert Kanigher Viking Prince

I've been buying a bunch of these new trade-dress books based on the DC Silver Age. They're called DC Finest, and they make for a really good reading edition.

They're similar in make-up to the Marvel Epic Collections, but Marvel insanely puts out Epic Collections in all sorts of order (out of order), whereas DC is treating it as a true introductory Silver Age book.

It's easier for me to answer by artist than series.

Infantino, Swan and Kane drew most of the greatest DC Silver Age books. I probably have everything they did back then.

I liked Sekowaky for the JLA (he drew the best Wonder Woman I've ever seen).

Kurt Schaffenberger (Lois Lane) also deserves some notice, as do Jim Mooney (Supergirl, Dial H) and George Papp (Superboy).

Ditko's DC creations from that era were really just two Creeper stories and one Hawk and Dove before he fell ill, stopped writing/plotting, and they were ruined by Denny O'Neill.

You should add Strange Adventures to your collection (it includes the Atomic Knights stories).

Also add the brief Kane run on Captain Action's book, which is terrific (he drew as well as wrote issues 2 through 5).

Huh, what?
DC has announced 31 books in their DC Finest line, and only 10 of them cover Silver Age material.
I don’t see that as an introduction.

I'm a DC guy, not a Marvel guy, but I will add a word of caution - don't binge these the way you would the Lee / Kirby / Ditko era Marvels. While I love the titles, they are less dense and more primary coloured than Marvel, I think they're easier to overdose on. Having said that, my feedback to your List:

My Personal Top 10 - In Order
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Flash (tie) – It is the Silver Age
Neal Adams / Denny O'Neill Batman (tie) – My vote for second best Best Bat Ever (See below)
Broome / Kubert Sgt Rock – Not Silver, Not Bronze, Not Gold. Priceless
Curt Swan / Jim Shooter Legion of Super-Heroes – 14?!! He was 14??!!
Gil Kane / John Broome Green Lantern – Took a little to find its footing
Curt Swan / Various Superman – the strongest hero ever?
Joe Kubert / Gardner Fox Hawkman – bonus for Murphy, too, but not enough of it Maybe the only one where the GA was consistently as good?
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Adam Strange – as above
Jack Kirby / Dave Wood Challengers of the Unknown – suffers when compared to FF
Neal Adams / Denny O'Neill Green Lantern / Arrow – phenomenal but doesn’t feel silver. By my cut off, it’s mostly bronze (and for others, it all is by definition - April 1970)

The Jim Aparo Aquaman is gorgeous, but the writing is hit and miss
The Teen Titans aren’t in costume for half the run

Not qualifying – I consider them Bronze Age Runs
Englehart / Rogers Detective Run
Wein / Wrightson House of Secrets
The Dillin JLA
Grell and Cockrum’s LSH runs
Everything Ditko
Everything Kirby post Marvel – Kirby on Olsen 133 in August 1970 is my endpoint for the Silver Age

My Dad had a decent amount of Silver Age DC comics in the basement, and, like the Silver Age of
Marvel, I learned to read by paging through them. I loved anything with Batman in it (keep in mind
this included characters like Batwoman and Ace the Bat Hound. I was able to read more of these
when he picked up the Batman from the 30s to the 70s. Some will call this the silly era of Batman,
but I loved them, especially the DC Giants and Annuals that collected even earlier stories.

Action and Superman were pretty good. I don't think I ever liked Superman much in the Bronze Age
or later, but these tales with Bizarro, Lois being a pest, and back up features with Krypto, Supergirl,
and the Legion of Superheroes were all great fun. The Legion and Supergirl stories from Adventure
Comics were also good. I picked up all three Omnibus volumes of the Legion. Great stuff.

Dad never had too many JLA stories (just a few first crossovers that guest starred the JSA). Likewise
he had a smattering of Brave & the Bold issues featuring The Atom, Spectre, and Hawkman. I later
picked up the Viking Prince collection and very much enjoyed it.

Anything else from DC's Silver Age, I saw as repeats in the Bronze Age Giants and Annuals. As a kid,
I was quite fond of The Doom Patrol and Challengers of the Unknown.

I have that series in THE GREAT DISASTER Showcase book --

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1401242901/?tag=imwan-20

I've only read bits and pieces of Silver-Age DC, so it's hard to say what I consider the best. I'd agree with Jason that they don't read as well in large doses as some of the best Marvel stories from the era. I have seen at least a little bit of almost all of DC's features of the day, except for the Sea Devils and Cave Carson. I'm kind of curious about them.

I notice that in that old promotional image Hanzo posted they have Sugar and Spike and the Fox and Crow. Apparently Fox and Crow kept going in DC comics well past the end of their now-obscure run of Columbia animated cartoon shorts.

It's really more Bronze Age, but the late '60s-early '70s Batman stories tend to be some of my Bat-favorites. He was more of a detective in a funny outfit at that time than anything else, and most of the stories were tightly-plotted done-in-ones. And they had great artists. Everybody mentions Neil Adams. I think Irv Novick and Bob Brown deserve some love too. The Batgirl back-ups that ran during that period were intermittently good also.

Kanigher/Kubert Sgt. Rock all the way for me.

I was reading a bit about this -- what do you think led to this series in particular having so much more longevity than the other war titles published by DC and Marvel?

My favorite Silver Age DC runs right now (and I admit I've only read a handful of issues for most of these.. an issue I hope to rectify in the coming year) --

Curt Swan / Various Superman
Curt Swan / Various World's Finest
Gil Kane / John Broome Green Lantern
Curt Swan / Jim Shooter Legion of Super-Heroes
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Flash
Jack Kirby / Dave Wood Challengers of the Unknown
Bruno Premiani / Robert Kanigher Doom Patrol
Joe Kubert / Gardner Fox Hawkman
Infantino / Broome / Fox "New Look" Batman
Joe Kubert / Robert Kanigher Viking Prince

* I realize that the Neal Adams Batman happened later than I thought, so I've removed it from the running.

That said, if you include Steve Ditko's Charlton material (since DC owns it and has reprinted it) --

Curt Swan / Various Superman
Curt Swan / Various World's Finest
Steve Ditko Blue Beetle
Gil Kane / John Broome Green Lantern
Curt Swan / Jim Shooter Legion of Super-Heroes
Steve Ditko Captain Atom
Carmine Infantino / Gardner Fox Flash
Jack Kirby / Dave Wood Challengers of the Unknown
Bruno Premiani / Robert Kanigher Doom Patrol
Joe Kubert / Gardner Fox Hawkman
Infantino / Broome / Fox "New Look" Batman
Joe Kubert / Robert Kanigher Viking Prince