Recently, on a long drive, my partner and I were talking about children’s comics—or, rather, the feeling that there is a surprising lack of them. A librarian (who has, incidentally, been retro-cataloging our city library system’s comics and graphic novels), she had been running reports on circulation numbers in recent years, and was surprised at the lack of major comics characters on the list. Sure, Naruto and One Piece have been consistent movers and shakers, as have Garfield, Big Nate, and Raina Talgemeier’s excellent series of Scholastic-published graphic novels.
Marvel Comics
But of the big players—the world’s most famous characters, heroes of the highest-grossing films of all time, and the oldest and best-loved superheroes—there was not a mention. That seems concerning for an industry more and more reliant on an aging fanbase.
A conversation with your local comic shop employees might deepen your concern. It seems—on the surface, at least—that fewer children are coming in, and a look at the weekly releases from the Big Two can clarify why: there are virtually no kid-accessible ongoing titles from the House of Ideas and their Distinguished Competition. Sure, there’s The Batman and Scooby-Doo Mysteries, but all the other major characters are currently entrenched in sober and serious, occasionally momentary continuities, aimed steadily at that 35-year-old target demographic.
Marvel Comics
Marvel Unleashed isn’t an answer to that problem—the book features zero major characters—but it is, perhaps, a step in the right direction. It feels like no child could turn away from what looks like, at surface value, a funny animal comic.
Unleashed isn’t explicitly a kids’ comic, however; this isn’t a brightly lit, pandering, overtly saccharine story. It’s a story that takes itself seriously despite being a comic about some super pets fighting a literal demon. It’s cute, funny, and ultimately heartbreaking, and it’s got Throg and Chewie (i.e. Captain Marvel’s beloved Goose) in it.
Marvel Comics
Because it’s part of the larger Marvel Universe—these are, presumably, canon Earth-616 events—it contributes to what is weird and wonderful about that universe: a world where a ghost dog knows a spider man, where a teleportation dog dates back decades, and where house pets can best the son of Mephisto.
Jesús Hervás and Juan Gideon portray our furry and feathery (and, I guess, ectoplasm-y?) friends in a way that grounds them in that universe: these are animals, not cartoons. A bunch of AIM goons are fully AIM goons, and Kraven the Hunter is still the Kraven the Hunter with a grim and gruesome backstory. Further, Yen Nitro’s colors more closely resemble the dark lushness of modern horror books (Ghost Rider, The Incredible Hulk, and their own run on Alien) than the bright and shiny world of this book’s spiritual successor, 2009’s Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers. This is a kid-friendly book in which pets go to Hell.
That the book is willing to be touching and meaningful is all the better. Writer Kyle Starks introduces an in-universe answer to the question “do all dogs go to heaven?”, and any pet lover will find themselves deeply affected by this, touched and made hopeful in equal measure.
Marvel Comics
Marvel Unleashed doesn’t solve the problem of the dearth of children’s comics, but it presents a model for ongoing attempts in that direction. It’s easy to get into, easy to fall in love with, and recognizably part of a whole. It is, in short, the sort of comic book that could be better marketed to whatever kid wanders into a comic shop (and whatever adult wants to celebrate their pet).
Go recommend it to your local librarians, too.
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