Looking Back on a Decade

Back in January of 2003, your humble professor was working as Associate Editor and Newswriter for a little Web site with the unfortunate name “Movie Poop Shoot,” an offshoot of director Kevin Smith’s constantly shifting media empire. One day, while going over the content we had planned for that week, Poop-Shoot Editor-in-Chief Chris Ryall said to me: “Hey, we could use more comics content. Why don’t you do a ‘history-of-comics’ thing for a while?”

Sure, I said. I’ll try it out for a couple of weeks. Might be fun.

So I tried it. It looked a little something like this (click to enlarge):

Screen Shot 2013-01-21 at 1.59.14 PM.jpg

Ten years and 520 columns later, here we are. I’m still here talking comics every Wednesday, rain or shine, busy or bored, good times and bad, and a lot of you out there are still with me. Along the way, this fool’s errand I’ve dedicated myself to has helped me get to quite a few things I never expected, including book deals, a career writing comics, and a nice little store in North Hollywood I’m quite fond of.

If you’ll indulge an old man (at least it feels that way sometimes) a bit of nostalgia, I thought I’d look back at a few of my favorite offerings of the last few years here at the 101. After all, not all of you have been around for the whole decade, I reckon.

I really felt like I might be on to something with this “Comics 101) thing with this column about Walt Kelly’s POGO:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=39

By 2004, I really started embracing the idea of long-form columns, and did something like nine weeks in a row on Batman. This one was my favorite:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=358

It gets harder and harder to do new Christmas columns every year, and I still think my first one was the best:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=57

This may be the piece of writing I’m proudest of in the last 10 years, my tribute to Marvel editor (and more important, my friend) Mark Gruenwald:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=283

I’ve probably gotten more reader response over the years to this column than any other, my dissection of the 1970s TV special LEGENDS OF THE SUPERHEROES:

http://www.comics101.com/archives/comics101/117.php

This one’s a sentimental favorite, which was posted the week my first SPIKE comic hit stands:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=7

To be honest, I can’t really go back and read this one, which I wrote just after the loss of my mother in 2007, but the outpouring of support I got from readers of the site meant the world to me:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=152

I have to include this column about Woody Woodpecker comics, just because I still laugh at the memory of Joe Casey’s sardonic email in response, hassling me for spending so much time on Woody Woodpecker:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=162

I don’t spend that much time talking about my own work here in the column, but I made an exception with this piece by me and Elena Casagrande about our work on ANGEL: A HOLE IN THE WORLD:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=300

I’ve had to write far too many “GONE TOO SOON’ columns about comics professionals who have passed on. This one, about my friend Franco Urru, still hurts:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=430

And this piece, looking back at all my work on ANGEL as the series went to other hands, served as a nice capstone to a big chunk of my career:

http://www.comics101.com/comics101//?mode=project&action=view&project=Comics%20101&chapter=339

As for the future, it’s been evident in recent years that keeping up with the weekly grind here has been tougher, as my freelance writing career has taken off. Still, with your permission, I think I’ll stick with it a while longer. After all, who knows where it might lead?

Scott Tipton is looking forward to 10 more.

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Welcoming the Future, Treasuring the Past.