Book Review: Slugfest

The most bruising battle in the superhero world isn't between spandex-clad characters; it's between the publishers themselves. For more than 50 years, Marvel and DC have been locked in an epic war, tirelessly trading punches and trying to do to each other what Batman regularly does to the Joker's face. Slugfest, the first book to tell the history of this epic rivalry into a single, juicy narrative, is the story of the greatest corporate rivalry never told. It is also an alternate history of the superhero, told through the lens of these two publishers.

The competition has spilled over to the even the casual fans, bisecting the world into two opposing tribes. You are either a Marvel or a DC fan, and allegiance is hardly a trivial matter. Perhaps the most telling question one can ask of a superhero fan is, Marvel or DC? The answer often reveals something deeper about personality, and the reason is wrapped up in the history of both companies.

Slugfest: Inside the Epic, 50-year Battle between Marvel and DC by Reed Tucker was published in October 2017 by Da Capo Press, a subsidiary of Hachette Books.

As a kid of the 70's, at the time I discovered super-hero comics I leaned much more heavily into DC. My collecting and reading became a bit more balanced between the two companies in the early 80's when I was moving through high school and then starting college. Today, if its comics, I will willing check it out no matter which company is behind it. Thus, this book was a topic that I could greatly relate.

Of course, having so much history with this creative format, I lot of this story was known to me. What I liked here, though, was how Tucker was able to bring in a lot of the finer details to more fully enhance the base narrative with which I was already familiar. Though a lot of the focus is on DC trying to keep pace with the hot upstart Marvel, it is is certainly a tale of two companies whose history and operations were highly entwined more than much of the public is aware.

Fans of American comics will certainly want to check this one out.