Byzantium's Shores: chronicling the misadventures of an overalls-clad hippie

The recent history of Marvel Comics has not been rosy. Hopes are high that better times for Marvel may be in the offing, with the company's fortunes being jumpstarted by the resounding success of the Spiderman movie, the establishment of The X-Men as another cinematic franchise, and other Marvel silver-screen adaptations (The Hulk, The Punisher) in development. There is an interesting article on Slate today about Marvel's future and the pitfalls that may await.

I stopped reading comics on a regular basis about the same time I went to college; when my budget reached a point where a pizza from Domino's was an extravagance, I quickly realized that reading twenty or twenty-five comics titles on a monthly basis was simply out-of-the-question. I've started reading comics again in the last year, albeit in trade-paperback compilations as opposed to the monthlies, and I'm coming to appreciate comics as the most unfairly-castigated medium for storytelling currently in existence. If movies help Marvel to keep comics afloat, then more power to them. (These well-wishes of mine, though, are subject to withdrawal if Marvel should ever attempt a Power Pack movie.)