Comics: A Farewell to Garth Ennis’ The Boys

 
There’s nothing like reading a comic for the first time, especially a comic book that has a big impact on your life. When I first opened volume one of The Boys (‘The Name of the Game’), I knew that I had just been thrown onto a roller coaster the likes of which I had never experienced. Characters get holes punched through their chests, legs broken, ripped apart by jet engines, dropped from the sky – any ridiculous maiming or death you can think of probably happens within one of its 90 issues.
 
Since we read comic,s we know a thing or two about superheroes, but even we want to see them with black eyes, broken arms, or even their heads blown off sometimes. Unfortunately as long as they’re cash cows, the big two aren’t going to do that to them, at least not permanently. The Boys dared to go to places that Marvel and DC never will go. This is no more obvious than the initial cancellation of the series when it was with the DC imprint Wildstorm. It was brought back to life at Dynamite and has remained there ever since and of course it took a shot at Batman with its first issue back.
 
I love The Boys because it’s dark. It’s the kind of darkness that you don’t get in very many stories, especially comic books. Sure, the Joker killing an entire police station to get his face back might seem dark, but with the kind of stories that are told in Batman this darkness is quickly forgotten once another equally dark thing happens. The Boys features the kind of darkness that sticks with you throughout each issue. Not every comic can keep plots going that began in the first issue, but when they do it’s clearly plotted to a T with a master at the helm.
 
 
Because of what I do for a living, people always ask me for comic book recommendations and I always point to The Boys. I explain the premise of the comic and more often than not, people are really excited to try it out. The problem though is some people that want to get into comics don’t want that . They want Spider-Man, Superman and Batman. These are great comics, of course, but there are so many others that have borrowed from them and many that are still recycling old stories from the past that it might seem new but it never really is. The Boys still feels fresh to me every time I read it and as long as we have superhero comics it will still be relevant. 
 
The Boys is exciting, it’s thrilling, it’s funny, it’s gruesome, it’s disgusting, it’s a bloodbath. Some of the best times I’ve ever had reading comics came from Garth Ennis’ twisted words with Darick Robertson’s equally repulsive art. I will never forget buying my comics and having to read The Boys in my car in the parking lot before I left because I couldn’t wait to see what happened. Though it’s easily the most adult comic book I’ve read, it made me a kid again. I’ll always love The Boys. It was there for me when I needed something and it has provided me countless hours of entertainment and influence.
 
Thanks for everything Garth and Derrick. Thanks for Butcher, Hughie, MM, The Frenchman, the Female, the Legend, the Homelander, Tek-Knight, The G-Men, and Dakota Bob. It will take a while before I’m used to a month coming and going without a new issue of The Boys, but they’ll always be on my shelf waiting for me to pick them up again.
 

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