The classics work for Disney

I’ve really slowed down my comics collecting lately. Finances aren’t tight, but my interest is plummeting in mainstream comics. Sure, I still do buy mainstream comics — I’ve been enjoying Justice League: Generation Lost and even Wolverine: Weapon X lately.
But what’s really killing my interest is just how much comics cost. Most are $3.99 now, and I can’t justify spending that on something that takes 20 minutes at most to read.
Heck, I can buy 2-hours of fun at the video kiosk, and I don’t have to spend time afterwords bagging and filing that movie.
So with this growing reluctance, I’ve turned about 80 percent of my comic-reading to graphic novels I find in discount bins at book stores, comic stores, discounters and a wide variety of general retail stores that have an admittedly spotty record of selling books.
So anyway, I just don’t have all sorts of pithy stuff to say about today’s comics.
Instead, I have a growing fondness for older comics, for odder comics, for orphans that wind up in the discount bins.
One of those recent discount bin recoveries was Disney Comics: The Classics Collection.
By no means is this a great book, or something that’s for a typical comic-book reader.
It has no edge. It isn’t terribly clever.
It’s just straight-forward story telling with pretty decent art.
The book is a collection of Dell Four Color comics that featured Disney characters.
Most of the stories contained here are simply the comic-book versions of an earlier Disney film.
The Bambi story, for example, is a copy of the story from the film … except it doesn’t linger on the little moments of the film. Instead, it just plows ahead with the plot. It’s simple and hits all the key parts. Just what a kid reading it 50 years ago would want.
Along with the true-to-film stories is a great little feature on how Dumbo meets the Seven Dwarfs. Don’t ask how this crossover happens, just sit back and enjoy it. It’s strange, but its fun.
And in each of these stories, there’s top-notch art. Not just regular comic art, but art done in a near-Disney style that makes every character recognizable and every emotion clear.
And I never would have found it if I didn’t dive into the discount bin and give it a chance.
Why don’t you try the same? Just grab something, take it home and crack it open.