It’s Time to name the Dark Age -- and let the New Modern Age Begin!

By Barry Dutter

The Modern Age of comics has gone on long enough. I say it's time for a new age in comics.
But what to call the current one -- and how to tell exactly where it began?
Earlier comic ages were easier to identify. The Golden Age obviously began with the publication of Action Comics #1 in 1938. The Silver Age began in1956 with the arrival of the new Flash in Showcase #4.
There is some controversy about the exact beginning of the Bronze Age which came next, but most historians agree it came around 1970. (Certainly the departure of Jack Kirby from Marvel in that year seems like a logical starting point for the era.)
The Copper Age is said to have started in 1984, but I'm not clear what exactly separates comics from the Copper Age with those from the Bronze Age, other than better paper and higher prices.
The story quality of most Copper Age comics was quite low, though the era did produce a handful of titles that are considered high watermarks for the medium: Frank Miller's Daredevil, Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, Dark Knight, Batman Year One and Watchmen.
The Modern Age began in 1991, and again, I'm not clear on the difference between a comic from 1990 and 1991 and why they need to be sectioned off into different categories.
It has been 20 years now since the start of the so-called Modern Age, and that is way too long for one era to have lasted. Any comics fan can see that a comic from 2011 looks nothing like a comic from 1991. There have been huge breakthroughs in printing, graphics, paper quality, etc.
Clearly there needs to be marked a definite end to the Modern Age to differentiate books from the 90s from the ones that are published today. In order to make that happen, first we will have to rename the Modern Age, so as not to appear foolish.
Let's face it, it is next to impossible to define any age as it is happening. It makes sense to me to use "Modern Age" as a temporary name for any current era until that era passes and one is able to look back in hindsight and coin a name that truly defines the era.
In the case of the Modern Age, the name that seems to sum it up best is the "Dark Age." Marvel and DC, the industry leaders, took just about all of their characters (even the once-light-hearted Spider-Man) into darker territory. "Grim and Gritty" became by-woods of the day, inspired by the success of Tim Burton's 1989 movie Batman. The era was dominated by anti-heroes like the Punisher (in three monthly books!), Lobo, and Wolverine.

Marvel introduced harder-edged versions of all their major heroes: Captain America (USAgent) Iron Man (War Machine), Thor (Thunderstrike) and yes, good ol' Spidey (Venom).
Over at DC, Batman was injured and replaced with a darker, grittier hero named Azrael. Superman was killed and replaced by 4 different heroes, two of whom turned out to be super-villains (the Cyborg Superman and the Eradicator). Green Lantern, aka Hal Jordan, went insane and turned into a villain named Parallax.
Even Wonder Woman was replaced by Artemis, a bad-ass Amazon who had a much tougher attitude that our fair Diana.

Image Comics launched in the early 1990s, and it seemed that just about every Image hero had claws like Wolverine or carried guns like the Punisher. Marvel, DC and Image seemed to be in a contest to see who could create the most characters` with the words "Dark," "Blood," and "Death" in their names.
Sales reached an all-time high, but story quality reached an all-time low. Of all the thousands of comics that were published in the 90s, you would be hard-pressed to find any that were any good. Truly the 1990s were a very Dark Age indeed. (To any true comics fan, the waste of paper and talent would almost inspire one to call it the Tragic Age, but that name might be too depressing!)

With the arrival of the 2000s, comics began to change. It's difficult to pinpoint any single event that brought about the change. One might point to the arrival of Joe Quesada as Editor-In-Chief of Marvel in the year 2000. Marvel had grown stale and complacent in the 90s, but Quesada brought with him a willingness to try new things and think outside the box when it came to hiring new creators.
The period from 2000 on has proven to be one of the most experimental in the company's history.
Under Quesada's guidance, bold innovations occurred at Marvel, including the “Origin” of Wolverine -- a story that most thought could never be told. Daring new writers were brought in from the worlds of film, TV and books, which was a welcome change from the 90s Marvel trend of hiring whatever editor who happened to be next door to write your books, in the hopes that he might throw you some writing work as well.

Not everything Marvel has done in the 90s has been successful -- in fact, Quesada himself was responsible for one of the most controversial stories, One More Day, in which Spider-Man makes a deal with Mephisto to save the life of Aunt May. This story was almost universally derided by fans, yet Quesada stands behind his work.
One might not like everything Marvel has done under Quesda's reign, but one certainly must give him credit for taking risks.
In September, 2011, DC won big sales and much acclaim for their relaunch of 52 titles with all-new number ones. Some might see that as the perfect spot to mark the beginning of a new age, just as DC's relaunch of their super-hero line in the mid-1950s marked the dawn of the Silver` Age.

But to call 2011 the start of a new age to means ignore everything has happened over the past ten years. Certainly one must give credit to the great strides that were made by all the major companies to make up for the creative nadir that was the 90s. (I'm sure that in 1993, creating a super-hero named "Grunge" seemed like a good idea, but now it seems hopelessly dated.)
Maybe it's a good idea to just give every decade a new name from now on. If so, what would we call 2000 to 2010? The Recovery Age? The Reconstruction? The Age of Rebirth?
It's hard to find one name that sums up all the elements that defined the medium in the 2000s. It was a decade where many exciting new publishers came up like IDW, DDP and Dynamite Entertainment, offering comics that were in many way superior to the output of Marvel and DC.
Perhaps the biggest trend of the decade was companies creating multiple variant covers for just about every comic, but somehow “The Variant Age” just doesn't quite seem to say it all.
Maybe one could follow Marvel's lead and refer to it as The Heroic Age, but that seems kind of vague. Besides, in an industry dominated by super-heroes, couldn't any age technically be called the Heroic Age?
I don't have all the answers, but I do think something needs to be done soon. Every time I see a comic from after 1991 defined as “Modern Age,” I find myself thinking that it just doesn't feel right to lump 20 years worth of books into one age. It may be too soon to name the decade from 2000-2010, but at the very least, I think it's time the dreadful 90s got firmly labeled and separated from what came after.
Clearly, the answer is right in front of us. There's no point in denying what has been so obvious for so long. I say, let the Dark Age (1991-99) be named!
Be glad that it's over, but let's acknowledge that it existed. Only by defining this era and branding it thus can we be certain not to make the same mistakes again.