Non “Funny” Funnybooks on the Rise

We’ve been reading comics since around 1961. It is — as we’ve often said — our preferred form of entertainment. In fact, the guy we’ve been buying comics from for most of the past 20 years once told us that something that made us unique among his customers, was that I loved comics. I loved them 50 years ago, 40, 30, 20, and 10 years ago. He wasn’t wrong. I love comics. It has been the one constant over the course of my life.

When I was first introduced to comics, they were comics targeted for kids (Disney, Harvey, others). To be sure, I also read just about every other kind of comicbook I could get my hands on, westerns, war stories, horror, romance, it didn’t matter, so long as they were comics. As a youth, one of my favorite comic titles was Treasure Chest, a series that was published by the Roman Catholic Church and told stories of the saints, as well as other types of stories as well.  (And yes, I also read syndicated comics and editorial cartoons as well.)

Eventually I discovered and wholly embraced superhero comics, however, I never forgot that there were other kinds of comics out there. In fact whenever I’ve discovered non superhero, nontraditional, comics, I’ve attempted to acquire them, which is precisely what I did last year while attending a comicbook con in New Jersey. It was there that I spotted a special Spider-Man Far From Home comic that was issued by (and probably available with) Kellogg’s cereal. After expressing interest in the comics, the table owner showed me three other comics that were issued by the Philadelphia Electric Company issued in 1980, explaining how electricity works.

While as full-on aficionado of Marvel Comics since 1962 I was obviously eager to acquire the Spider-Man comic, but as a lover of the medium itself I also totally wanted the three Philadelphia Electric Company comics as well. Truth to tell, part of the reason that I was so excited to acquire the three comics on electricity, is because my father was an electrical engineer and while I was quite young, spent time explaining to me how electricity worked, in pretty much the same way one of the Philadelphia Electric comics did.

So, to talk about the four comics, first up is the Spidey comic. Issued by Kellogg’s in conjunction with the Far From Home movie, the eight-page comic was written by Sean Ryan and illustrated by J.L. Giles tells a quick tail that is actually totally unconnected from the film itself about how Spidey, while on patrol, comes across an unnamed villain using a hi-tech clove to rob a bank. Unfortunately for the crook, he was mostly unfamiliar with the way the glove worked. Fortunately, as Peter is a science and engineering student in addition to being a superhero, he managed to acquire the glove, disabled it, and turned it over to the cops, who had already arrested the perp. The back cover to the comic was a superhero word search.

Next up are the three Philadelphia Electric comics, all of which are printed on newsprint (the Marvel comic was on high glossy paper), and two of the comics were clearly targeted towards younger readers (featuring anthropomorphic characters), while the third is aimed at more of a young adult audience. Electric Safety from A to Zap! Is a 16 -page comic featuring a cat and a mouse who keep getting shocked by electricity as they kept running afoul of various power chords and outlets. Soon they start talking about energy and how it is generated and transferred. After learning about how electric power makes things work, they eventually learn how not to be zapped by electricity and how to be safe around it.

Learning to use Energy Wisely!  Is also a 16-page, newsprint comic with both human and anthropomorphic characters. The comic starts out with a boy turning on numerous electrical appliances, and then asking his father to read him a story. The story the father read was entitled Pigopolis. It was a story about how a community of pigs learned how to read and build a large city at the edge of a dense forest.

As the pig population grew, they sought to expand their city by extending their city limits by cutting down more and more trees in the forest, and using the cut trees to power steam engines, run their factories, amusement parks, power plants, and heat their homes. Unfortunately, as the pigs expanded their city, they deforested the woods, and displaced the creatures who lived there.

The Pigs continued to grow their city at an accelerated pace while reducing the size of the forest, irrespective of the creatures living there. One day, a young pig wandered through the forest to the far side of it to discover a monstrous creature called a Grok who loved to eat pigs. The young pig then hurriedly returned to the city to tell the others that they needed to preserve the forest to keep it as a barrier between them and the Grok. Learning their lesson the pigs curtailed their unchecked deforestation, and better cared for the environment around themselves.

The third comic from the Philadelphia Electric Company, The Story of Electricity, is once again a 16-page, newsprint comic. As stated, this one is targeted more for an older, young adult audience (think middle or high school). This story starts out where a group of kids are home during a thunderstorm when a tree falls across some power lines and a power crew show up to repair it. The kids approach the repair crew, and one of the crew begins to explain about the power grid, how it works, and more. Eventually the kids are invited to come out to the power plant to learn more about how the power grid works.

The rest of the comic tells some of the background about how electricity was discovered, developed, and put to use. Quite a bit of background it offered up to give a very thorough background and history of the development of electricity and its application and uses in today’s modern-day world. All of this background includes the use of turbines, computers, microchips, and how the grid itself works, turning this comic into a very thorough background on electricity.

Again, we love these types of comics because they expand the base of what comics are and are perceived as, plus they can help make complex information more accessible (and entertaining) to people who could better benefit from that information.