I just read that Archie became the last publisher to drop the "Comics Code", presumably rendering it obsolete. The rise of the direct market and the disappearance of comics from mainstream outlets like newsstands and supermarkets pretty much made it irrellevant for the last two decades or so but it's good to see this last vestige of corporate cowardice combined with prudish oppression disappear.
The code was probably the single biggest factor responsible for the retarding the growth of the comics art form for at least two decades and its appearance pretty much conicides with comics beginning their commercial decline (though I have a feeling TV was probably a bigger factor, the same way TV lured away the audiences for radio, plays, movies, newspapers, etc). Hopefully, it will be regarded as a minor stumbling block on comics' maturation as an artform rather than the blight that crippled it in the cradle.




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