by No Single Name

Created on: April 20, 2009   Last Updated: April 21, 2009

Ask the average person on the street about comic books, and the first thing that will pop out of their mouth is likely something along the lines of Batman, Superman, Ironman; kids' stuff, as they are sometimes called. Too often, comics are dismissed by mainstream public as juvenile attempts at escapism, wastes of paper and ink with little more purpose than entertainment.

To put it kindly, these people are ignorant.

In the past decades, comics have proven themselves as not only an art form, but also a powerful and moving variation of storytelling; truly, graphic novels. Though there are plenty of comics that are focused on superheroes and magical creatures, many of these have found purpose and moral: and a blessed number even venture into the realm of "independent," a vast collection that ceases to fit within the standard adventure storyline and instead finds a more comfortable home among transgressive literature.

Not the least of these is Watchmen; perhaps the first truly graphic novel, Watchmen broke ground in the world of comic books with its story of superheroes without powers, struggling to fight a force which may or may not exist. The objectivist, paranoid Rorschach is perhaps the centerpiece character, obsessed with the idea of a conspiracy against masked heroes: he is excessively violent and steadfast in his belief of good and evil, at times contradictory, and completely resolute. "Never compromise," he says, even in the face of death, trying to change the world for the better. Any reader can recognize his resemblance to the protagonist of a transgressive novel, an everyman trying to change society: and save it from itself. Watchmen in itself is a powerful read and of great literary importance, but even more notable, it opened the floodgates for a new wave of transgressive comics.

Teenagers from Mars is a tamer, more realistic comic, and in some ways, quaintly charming: the story follows a teenaged boy writing comics in a time when they are considered to be trash, and his love of an outsider girl he meets and instantly falls for. The pair destroy his workplace and set out to change society with whatever tools at hand, all for the sake of comics: a story of censorship and rebellion, and just as important as any novel.

Perhaps the most transgressive graphic novel to be released in recent times is Jhonen Vasquez's Johnny the Homicidal Maniac. Like a combination of a paranoid Hunter S. Thompson and blood-thirsty Patrick Bateman, Johnny lives in a small house

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