So what can you get away with in Comics/Graphic Novels?

If you can write it or draw it, you can put it in a graphic novel.

Big corporate publishers may have limits to what they'll print (usually depending on the editor, but sometimes based on some corporate memo), but not all graphic novels are made by big corporate publishers.

 

Depends on the intended audience...there are several "adults only" graphic novels, pretty much "anything goes" there.

 

Not sure what you're into specifically, but you might find this site helpful. Your best bet is to check your local comic store.

 

???

 

The first issue of Marvel's Max line of Alias had the word f^%#ck as its first word.

 

I recall that guy got run outta Florida for his graphic novel that depicted priests sodomizing children. So, you can pretty much get away with anything, just not in Florida.

 

Punisher MAX had the "C" word in it.

You can pretty much do anything in comics you're doing it in an book for adults.

 

League of Extrordinary Gentlemen seems to push the envelope pretty far. Those scenes with Quartermain and Mina were downright pornographic and involved a senior citizen and a young woman

 

Not to mention Alan Moore's pornographic absolute edition of Lost Girls which showed some hardcore sex from characters like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, and others I'm too blitzed to remember. There's tons of gratuitous violence, language and Sex in comics. You must have a pretty sheltered pull list to not already know this. It's gotten to the point were seeing a Teen Titans esque team of superheroes engage in a drunken orgy with prostitutes hoped up on super PCP as seen in The Boys from Dynamite, doesn't even seem the slightest bit.....shocking....to me.

 

If you want violence and swearing MAX Punisher has it all. Cant remember if anyone has ever said c**t in it, but I wouldnt be surprised.

 

ive been reading Y: The Last Man, and that has featured the word c**t in it. as for the 'f-bomb', that **** is just about everywhere.

 

It was part of a darkly funny moment in the "Kitchen Irish" arc.

Yeah, it's darker, has more mature themes, and has a ton of violence and profanity. Basically, when Marvel made the MAX (adult) imprint, they let Garth Ennis do whatever he wanted with the book.

 

Read The Boys by Garth Ennis.

or... anything by Garth Ennis that isn't done by Marvel. (although F**K is in Marvel Max)

Or Lost Girls by Alan Moore.

most Indie titles have some adult content in it. just the big two tend to steer away for it, since they are the mainstream part of the business.

 

There's hundreds, if not thousands, of "mature readers" comics out there which contain everything you specified and more. Comics are a medium, not a genre, so it's like asking "What can you put in a movie?" Anything. You have movies like Toy Story and Stuart Little, and you have movies like Pulp Fiction and Debbie Does Dallas. There's no restriction whatsoever, for movies or comics. Or books or plays or CDs or what have you. The only limitation might be federal obscenity laws, and the choice of specific retailers whether to actually carry the material or not (most comic stores will carry just about everything, though not all have an "adults only" section)

 

Interesting combination of Pulp Fiction and Debbie Does Dallas.

You're right about some titles being hard to find, Lost Girls was nearly impossible to find. I ended up ordering it off eBay.

 

Just an example of R-Rated and X-Rated to illustrate the point. Pulp Fiction could be Preacher or 100 Bullets, and Debbie Does Dallas is anything by Milo Manara

 

MAX is simply Marvel's "Mature Reader" line, which they only created a few years ago. when it first started, Punisher was basically the first character they started publishing under the imprint, so that the stories could be even MORE violent. This is the first volume right here
http://www.amazon.com/Punisher-MAX-...bs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1202112789&sr=8-1

If you're interested in quality comics for older readers that don't have men in tights, look into Vertigo, which is DC's Mature Readers line. Y-The Last Man is published under Vertigo. You can read the first issue of many of their series on this website to check out the books and see which one's you'll like. Preacher, Fables and Transmetropolitan are personal favorites, and definitely read the sample issue of Y. The first issue of Y-The Last Man is a flawless example of how a first issue should be written.
http://www.dccomics.com/sites/vertigo_num1s/

 

Yeah, you want great Mature stuff, go Vertigo. DMZ, Sandman, Hell Blazer, etc, etc, etc.

 

There's also a lot of great mature stuff on indie labels. Oni, in particular, has a lot of really great mature series.

 

Avatar, Image, Dynamite, and of course, Dark Horse.