I'm in agreement about trends being milked to death and stamping out any kind of creative diversity, G-man.

That's why I have so much affection for the 1985-and-prior eras in comics. There was a much wider selection of comics: war, western, romance, science fiction, sword-and-sorcery, humor, funny animals, etc.

Even within the realm of superhero comics, Claremont/Byrne X-MEN was completely different from Englehart Rogers DETECTIVE, Kirby's ETERNALS, Conway/Perez's JLA, Wolfman/Perez NEW TEEN TITANS, McGregor/Russell's AMAZING ADVENTURES/KILLRAVEN, Roger Stern's AMAZING SPIDERMAN or DOCTOR STRANGE, or Michelinie/Romita/Layton's IRON MAN.

And in addition to that diversity even within superhero comics, we also had Grell's WARLORD, STARSLAYER, and JON SABLE FREELANCE, CONAN and SAVAGE SWORD, the EPIC ILLUSTRATED anthology magazine, BIZARRE ADVENTURES, Jonah Hex, CREEPY, EERIE, VAMPIRELLA, HEAVY METAL, CEREBUS at its peak, the Eclipse line, DC's mystery titles, and a lot of other wide-ranging stuff.



Prometheus,the issues I read of the AUTHORITY were 13-16, from 2001, a story by Millar and Quitely.
And like I said, I wasn't impressed by any particular level of depth manifest there. It seemed to me that even while the Authority were killing the bad guys in this storyline, these were characters who took a sadistic pleasure in taking out the bad guys, and there was no standard of justice that the Authority adhered to.
I found the characters to be very unlikeable posturing badasses. Very unheroic.
I found it to be very dark, and lacking any optimism, or even humor. Perhaps you saw some optimism in those issues that I didn't. I'd like to know what in there qualifies as optimism.



It's funny that Dave sees the gratuitous violent side of the AUTHORITY, but still sees it as optimistic.

Myself, on the other hand, I see no optimism, or any other redeeming quality.


For me, this series (what I've read of it) makes V FOR VENDETTA look cheerful!
And at least in Vendetta's case, there was a larger redeeming message, of bringing down an authoritarian state, and of knowing that no matter what Evie was subjected to, she was willing to die without giving up her principles.
Again, I see V FOR VENDETTA, WATCHMEN, Moore's SWAMP THING, and MIRACLEMAN as miles above what AUTHORITY offers.

Again, in my opinion.
And I haven't read the whole series.

I'd like to know what set of issues either of you see as best representing what the authority has to offer.