"Why don’t you just shut up and enjoy them! You know, what comics use to be for before the internet."

This quote comes from a comic book blog’s comments page; and upon reading it, something about it’s passion seemed to really sum things up for me– but first some background. The overall discussion dealt with Marvel comic’s, upcoming "Secret Invasion" storyline that will run through a variety of titles before culminating in an eight issue mini next summer. The basic plot is such: the Skrulls (a big bad alien menace in the Marvel Universe) have used their shape-shifting abilities to apparently replace a number of Marvel heroes with Skrull operatives. Elektra and Black Bolt have already been revealed as skrull imposters, and Marvel has hinted we will discover many more.

What better way to inaugurate a new column than by making a broad, subjective claim about the largest shift in popular culture over the past ten years? This shift partially involves cultural artifacts so almost completely rendered obsolete that we may soon reach a point where a new generation of boob-tubers doubt they ever existed. Like any obsolete media that barely possesses even marginal kitsch or nostalgia factor (I’m looking at you 8-tracks), we’ll soon wonder why we ever put up with them. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m speaking of the television repeat.