Archie has been the same age for 50 plus years. Having said that, the aging process is one aspect that makes the Harry Potter books so relevant to the major reading audience. The characters get more complex, life gets more difficult, the challenges Harry and his friends meet along the way change them into adults. They move from a world of dimaetrical opposition to a grayer existance. Good and evil are still present of course in the later books, but this evil is far more sinister because in many characters it is a matter of degree and not polar opposites. This gray atmohere is mpst obvious in the conversations between Harry and Dumbledore.
As to comics, In some cases I wish the characters would change over time reflecting the changes in my own life. On the other hand it is also nice for the sake of nostalgia to revisit comics after years and see our old fictional friends just as they were. I guess it depends on what you are looking for.
I don't know, man. Would I want to read about Peter Parker dealing with Spider-Man duties and dealing with a 10-year-old son? I think that would work well for a single storyline for a single character, or maybe a very small, contained universe, but when you consider it for the Marvel or DC universes, it feels totally wrong.
I will say, however, that The Incredibles worked well because the heroes are aging, with kids, with lower back problems, etc. But again, that's a single storyline.
Registered: 02/16/11
Posts: 10260
Loc: Your mom's house.
Originally Posted By: Reno McCoy
I don't know, man. Would I want to read about Peter Parker dealing with Spider-Man duties and dealing with a 10-year-old son? I think that would work well for a single storyline for a single character, or maybe a very small, contained universe, but when you consider it for the Marvel or DC universes, it feels totally wrong.
I will say, however, that The Incredibles worked well because the heroes are aging, with kids, with lower back problems, etc. But again, that's a single storyline.
True - it presents a lot of challenges, and some really boring plot lines. It just came to mind last night as I was reading the Emma Frost run. While I actually liked it, a few things really stuck out, like using a cell phone and other modern amenities.
Since I've been reading X-books with Emma Frost in them since the 80's, it struck me that it was odd to see a cell phone in her origin story, since according to my own personal timeline - her teenage years would have been spent smoking weed in Kelso's van in the 70's. It's not like it ruined the story - it just made me pause to think.
But - everyone's personal character timeline is different - and maybe that is the only way to do it. Even if a company were to take on such a concept, I don't think it could be retconned or anything like that - it'd have to be that way for a character from the beginning for it to have the best effect.
Registered: 07/28/03
Posts: 6272
Loc: THE LOST LAND
Gasoline Alley is a good example of a comic strip where the characters were allowed to age over the years. And it's been a hell of a lot of years too!
I seem to recall that another more recent one, For Better For Worse maybe (?), decided to rewind the clock on the characters and start them out at the same age as when the strip debuted rather than continuing to have them grow old.
Doonesbury characters age too.
Maybe it's more for the serialized strips than the one and done or story arc strips.
#5702145 - 05/21/1209:20 PMRe: Should characters age appropriately and then die off?
[Re: Dr. Balls]
HawkmanHawkman
FACT if I stop posting, trillions and trillions of transistors would be out of work.
Registered: 09/08/06
Posts: 4547
Loc: Vertical
ehhh.....i don't need it. if a creator wants to do it, cool. but i dont care either way. it's REALLY cool in doonesbury, but more so because he's one of the few to do it.
Edited by Hawkman (05/21/1209:21 PM)
_________________________
Raw Books I Need (Eventually):
