As a comic book collector,
once in a while something so special to you comes along that you hold
it so close to your heart that when it comes to an end you actually
feel devastated and feel like giving up the hobby as a whole. That
happened the day I found out that Crossgen Comics was going bankrupt
and closing up it's operation. I was Crossgen super-fan #1 and I
credit the company with making me care about comic books again after
about a year and a half of not really giving a hoot. Sadly, after
X-Men went down the tubes in the late 90's and DC canceled one of my
favorite comic book series ever (Sovereign Seven) I was left with
little to purchase every month and relied on buying comic books such
as Amazing Spider-Man, Captain American, and JLA, which were all
books I somewhat liked but wasn't truly enjoying due to the
ramification of the loss of my absolute favorite series. I still
dabbled in Hitman via DC Comics and was enjoying that quite a bit,
and I focused on getting other books like Crimson and Battle Chasers
by Image's Cliffhanger imprint (despite their lateness), but my
“love” for the industry was dimming and something had to be done
otherwise I was about to give up completely.
For months I had been
reading in Wizard Magazine that Marvel was planning to unleash a line
of comics that were going to re-imagine the Marvel Universe. The line
would become known as their “Ultimate” line and I finally had
something to look forward to once those books saw release, but they
were still months and months away. While visiting one of my local
comic book stores I came across 4 books that were clumped together in
a small corner of the store and they all had a #1 on the cover, I
picked them up and flipped through them and decided that I would give
3 out of 4 titles a shot. The 3 books I picked up were Scion #1,
Sigil #1, and Mystic #1, I decided against Meridian #1 because it
looked to be the weakest of the bunch and I didn't have the extra
cash to pick it up (though I did get it later on). The logo on the
front of all 4 books was similar to a ying/yang and later I found out
that all of these characters had this image branded to them and it
would become a mark for “sigil-bearers” within the Crossgen
Universe. Well, when I got home to read these comics I read Mystic
first and really enjoyed the amazing art that this book features as
well as the main character which struck me by surprise as I've never
really read many comics at that time that featured a strong female
lead other than a couple team books. I read Scion next and instantly
fell in love with the “King Arthur” style tale and all the
characters involved, especially the main hero Ethan and his nemesis
Bron. I knew this book would be something special but what I didn't
know is that it would become my absolute favorite series throughout
the next couple of years being rivaled only by Ultimate Spider-Man
and a team book by Crossgen called Crux. I finally got around to
reading Sigil after that and while I felt it was a good book I didn't
really like the artwork and I felt the book was a little to “sci-fi”
for my liking, but I would continue on with the series until it's
end. Actually, about 10-12 issues into the series the book got a new
writer and artist and eventually became one of my favorite books by
the publisher, it just took them a little while and I'm glad I stuck
with them as Sam Rey and Tchulsarud battled throughout the universe
in epic battles.
Some months after the #1's
hit the stands Crossgen announced that more titles were coming and
that the initial 4 titles released have been highly successful. It
wasn't long until The First (a team book with cosmic beings who
watched over the entire universe) hit the stands, followed by Ruse,
Sojourn, and Crux. Crux went on to become my 2nd favorite
title that Crossgen ever published and as the series went on a felt
connected to this book much like I did with Sovereign Seven, my
favorite comic book series that was canceled in 1998. Crux told the
story of a team of Atlantians who went into a hibernation status and
woke up in a future world that had been shattered to it's core. The
lineup was fresh, the stories were fun, and the book featured
countless supporting characters (Danik, Aristophanes, Thraxis) that
helped the book to tell fantastic stories, which had just led me to a
revelation of sorts. The revelation being that many of Crossgen's
books featured supporting characters that were either as cool, or
even cooler than the main characters in their respective books. A few
characters that come to mind aside from the ones I had mentioned
earlier would be Exeter (Scion), Garath (Sojourn), and Roiya (Sigil),
all of which have really made their mark on me at one point and have
been a key reason as to why I purchased these books. Well, soon after
the second wave of titles came there was a slew of books in the third
wave, and it seemed as if Crossgen was just getting started. Comics
within the third wave included Brath, Route 666, Way of the Rat,
Negation, Chimera, Solus, Mark of Charon, and others, but the only ones I
personally cared about out of this bunch was Brath, Negation, and the
Mark of Charon (which was a mini-series).
Soon after the third wave
of books hit it was announced that there was going to be a line of
comics that didn't connect to the “Sigil-verse” and that there
was going to be a whole bunch of new and exciting things going on
with Crossgen. The line of comics would become known as “Code 6”
and Crossgen published a slew of books based upon existing properties
such as Masters of the Universe, and Escape from New York. Some of
the other things Crossgen began doing was publishing comics online
through a strategy called COW (Comic on the Web), and publishing 5x7
digest format trade paperback's they called “Compendia” with a
mix-match of titles within their line for a low price. I personally
didn't care for any of these ventures and aside from Masters of the
Universe I basically ignored Code 6 comics all together and never
purchased any of their digests. Crossgen was one of (if not the
first) comic book publishers to put their titles up on the web for
digital viewing and they were pretty innovative with the Compendia
line of digests, but sometimes being too innovative can come back and
bite you in the ass and that's kind of what happened here with
Crossgen. Things looked to be on the up-swing as they began releasing
normal sized trade paperback's which were being stocked by Barnes &
Noble as well as Borders, but once the retailer began carrying more
and more Marvel and DC TPB's they started sending back their Crossgen
product to the publisher for a refund. This hurt Crossgen and
eventually they began to sink into debt with their creators which saw
many up and leave the company before it's closure.
Despite the turmoil going
on behind the scenes I was highly enjoying all the titles I was
reading by Crossgen and for a solid 3 years they were without a doubt
my favorite publisher on the stands. My friend Kenny (Stelfo64)
bought into the company as I did and started buying titles like
Sigil, Scion, Sojourn, and Crux, he found a comic book store near him
where he was actually able to find the “Primer” sample comic and
the “Crossgenerations” book by the publisher which was sent out
before the #1's hit the stands and he was able to pick them up for me
to help complete my collection. One time I remember fondly was when
Kenny and myself walked into one of our local comic shops I took a
swipe right for the new release rack and spent about a minute
browsing around and when I turned around he had a stack of about 20+
copies of Sigil in his hands. He had started reading Sigil a year or
so before and fell behind and this was his way of catching up. On top
of that we hit up several other comic book stores that day and he
ended up buying a slew of other Crossgen titles, investing heavily
into the publisher and having fun being a comic book fan in the
process. Isn't that what it's all about?
After the collapse of Crossgen I went through a bit of a down time
similar to what happened when DC canceled Sovereign Seven. I was
buying random titles like Batman, Superman, JSA, Amazing Spider-Man,
and a couple of other random titles but I wasn't feeling them nearly
as much as I did the Crossgen books and eventually I sold off my
entire comic book collection which consisted of 9 long boxes and 2
magazine sized boxes full of comics (which I regret doing). About a
year later I decided that I was going to get back into comics but it
was going to strictly be through trade paperback's and that would be
it, but eventually I went back to floppies and spent thousands to get
back a solid amount of what I once had as well as tons and tons of
comics that I've discovered over the past several years. I now have 7
long boxes full of comic books and it's growing rapidly as well as
over 500 TPB's spread across 2 massive bookshelves, but imagine how
many comics I'd have if Crossgen never bit the dust and was still
publishing today. It's funny how I bonded with the company the way
that I did, it was exciting to me and it really felt like home and
that I was a part of something special. To this day I still see
Crossgen fans bring the company up on random forums, and when I do I
stop and smile while I remember the great times I had buying,
reading, and collecting Crossgen titles. It was truly one of the
biggest highlights I've had (or will ever have) as a comic book
collector and I will always cherish those memories until the day I
die.
As
always I want to take the time to thank those who took the time to
read my blog, it's much appreciated. Also, you can always check me
out at www.twitter.com/manga4life as well as TZ and CBR, feel free to
say “hi”.
Take care,
Manga4life
©2012 Cozy Cabin Publishing LLC
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