SOURCE: Sabin, Roger. “From Boom to Bust.” In Adult Comics: An Introduction, pp. 96-115. London and New York: Routledge, 1993.

In the following essay, Sabin traces the growth and development of graphic narratives in England and the United States from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, noting factors for the rise and decline in their popularity.

Yet how healthy is the state of this long-awaited New-foundland? Comics have got themselves a good press over the last few years after years of ridicule … but how many are actually worth reading?

(Editorial, Speakeasy fanzine, 1989)¹

The events of 1986-7 burst the dam for adult comics. The period that followed saw a flood of new material orientated at the market opened up by the Big 3, as publishers new and old rushed to cash in. Unfortunately, but perhaps inevitably, the keynotes of the boom were greed, haste and over-production. As a result, very...