How I became a Comic Book Fan
Who and what got me into comics
What’s going on! What’s going on everybody!
It is your favorite comic book writer whose comics you have never read BUT that can change right NOW! All you have to do is click on this link Imagine Nation: Issue 1 and for as little as 5 dollars you get to read my first comic and get some FREE stickers, so check it out, won’t you? One more time just in case you missed it, here is the link:
How I became a Comic Book Fan
Odds are you have been reading comics longer than me and have probably read more comics than me, but I can guarantee I am in the rare 1% of people who have read the MOST comics in the shortest period of time after getting into comics. That’s not me bragging, that’s me trying to make myself feel better about getting into comics so late in life.
By late in life I mean when I was 21, as a kid I read Sonic the Hedgehog comic books because those were the only comics the 7-11 down the street from my house had, and The Simpsons had traumatized me at a very impressionable young age. My fear was comic book guy was the only kind of person running comic book shops and he would laugh me out of his establishment because I couldn’t name a single comic book writer, artist, or colorist. Which was a bummer because down the street from my house was an awesome comic book shop, it didn’t have a name, it just had a bright read neon light outside that said “COMICS” and tinted out black windows with different comic book artwork plastered all over the windows, you couldn’t look through them and see anything inside. For years that store would taunt me in the same parking lot of the Walmart my family would always go to, I was too scared to go in but always wondering what was inside.
My entire childhood the comic book shop taunted me UNTIL I met the first person I had ever known who actually read comics. One of, if not my best friend, nicknamed “Hawk” I could say his real name but it would be pointless because in his entire life I think I have only called him by his real name once. I met Hawk at a high school party which is really funny in retrospect because him nor I were never really invited to high school parties but for some reason we were both invited to this one. Only problem was neither of us had been told that it would be a pool party, so we were the only two kids at this pool party without swimming trunks, we also weren’t cool enough to say “Fuck it” and just go swimming in our boxers. So we stayed on dry land and talked about all things Chapelle show, Conan, and a bunch of other stuff. We hit it off, said goodbye to each other and I legitimately thought I would never see this dude again. Fast forward a couple months later and I am at my bus stop for the start of my sophomore year and who do I see but HAWK! I go right up to him, introduce him to my group of friends, and 13 years later we have both been groomsman at each others weddings and still talk about Conan and comic books pretty much everyday.
That’s a long way (hey I need content!) of saying when Hawk and I started hanging out, I would go over to his house after school, he would have comic books laying around. And it wasn’t Sonic the Hedgehog comics ( no offense to those comics but they were just so dense and filled with some much weird stuff, but not the kind of weird stuff I was into so they never connected with me) it was X-Men, Spider-Man, and Batman. Very few things in my life have had the instant reaction of me in my brain going “This is what I’m into now. Only professional wrestling and comic books have had those type of instant sparks of interest in me, my other passions being sports and movies took a while to connect with me, only because those are always around and you kind of have to find a reason to connect with those mediums as a whole, But comic books and professional wrestling either have to be shown to you by one of your friends/family or you have to just stumble upon it on your own.
So Hawk was my gateway into comics, he let me borrow some of his favorites, I would read them like crazy, and then finally when I was 21 and having a panic attack about having a child so young, my antidote to my anxiety was comic books. I finally was old enough and brave enough to venture into a comic book shop in September 2011 which just so coincidentally was when DC comics was starting the “NEW 52” so I became obsessed with DC comics, Marvel comics, and then the Walking Dead (because it was a show I was watching already and had no idea it was a comic first.)
On Thursday this story continues! I will also share some of my favorite comic book series and my favorite writers/artists!
Thank you to everyone who takes time out of your day to read my ramblings and shout out to Hawk! The secret sauce to my comic book fandom origin story!