The Ballad of Bellum

There's something that really stood out for me as someone in the UK who collected American comics at the end of the 1980s. It's that each new comic you got was a doorway to a world of absolute chaos and gimmickry. I'm not talking about the comic stories themselves, but about the American ads that were suddenly blaring out of the alternate spreads. Topps bubble gum cards. Garbage Pail whatevers. Endless enticements to buy Bayou Billy on the Nintendo Entertainment System. You'd be reading about Batman, knocking gloomily around some Gotham spire, and then you'd turn the page and, WHAMMO, somethin