When and how did you get into comic books

[kimplix]

There must be at somepoint at a time that you got into the habit of reading/looking at comics and/or collecting them and maybe graphic novels, promos and some others.

 

My story is that I'm a big fan of Sonic (You don't say) and i always wanted to know if there was more to the fan-base than games, art, videos and so much more. I found out about the comics when I was in my primary school. I was at a theater sitting in the clothing room waiting for my class act to be called on. While waiting, I saw a copy of Sonic the Comic #223 on the coffee table. I decided to pick it up and start looking at it. I loved it and I was wondering if there was some others that i could buy and quite frankly, there weren't (obviously) so i just let it flow by and forgotten. Then come the internet. It all started with #200 and for the first moment with the previews, I wanted to buy that issue. But there were a few problems. First off was that It was an American comic, second is that i didn't know any local comic shops near me and third, I didn't have the money at that time. about a few months later at secondary school, I saw in the school library which happened to be a copy of Sonic the comic #8. As always, I started reading it and reading it and before i knew this was the only sonic comic in my school, I saw Where's Sonic. I wanted to borrow it, but someone already was borrowing it and that was the last time i saw any sonic comics. Or so I thought. September arrives, I earn money each month and It's Sonic's 20th anniversary. What do I do with the money? Buy my first ever 2 American sonic comics (#225 & #227). After buying them 2, I decided to buy more and more comics. One year later, The money stopped rolling in and I was in a panic due to the fact that i had to stop buying them. But with the help of my Dad, All the worries vanished and I was in the collecting mode again.

 

But what about my first ever non-sonic comic? Let's just say that it was the best of Bart comic book and then a Batman comic

Edited May 11, 2013 by kimplix

[Abominal SnowTaz]

I didn't start collecting the Sonic Archie series religiously until 2010. Usually, my uncle would give me the comics because he had them at the time, and he knew I liked Sonic. Also during this, I was also collecting Marvel comics, mostly Ghost Rider because it was actually the first comic book I ever read. As of today, my comic collection is growing at an alarmingly large rate. Right now, I'm looking to collect The Mighty Thor and Iron-man books to build on Marvel more.

 

Edit: I also used to read Manga, mostly Naruto, but my interest for Anime/Manga declined over the years. Dragonball Z is still cool as hell though....with fighting games.

Edited May 11, 2013 by Abominal Taz

[Rabid-Noodles]

The first comic series I recall collecting was Sonic the Comic just a few months before it ended when I was about six, then I went onto the Simpson comics abit later and collected them for a few years.

 

I became aware of the American Sonic Comics through Sonic Mega Collection, and assumed they had stopped because I couldn't find them anywhere.

 

Then in 2006 I found both the main series and Sonic X, and just went from there. Luckily it was literally at the start of Ian Flynn's takeover. So I didn't get to see how crap they were before until I bought them thinking they were the same quality.

 

Aside from Sonic, I only really pick up Mega Man nowadays, and Scott Pilgrim when the coloured books come out.

[Crash]

I started with Simpsons Comics back when I was about seven or eight (so 2007 or 8) and I loved them. I then began reading the Beano because my cousin got me into it and I even had a subscription!

 

I didn't get any comics for a while, I just did other things I guess.

 

Fast forward to 2011 and I found some Sonic comics at a comic shop, I already knew about them but I had never seen them before so I got about four or so. After awhile, they stopped selling them so I lost my interests with comic books.

 

Last year, my friend showed me two other comic book shops, they had Sonic so I began reading it again.

 

I'm now an avid Green Lantern and Spider-Man fan.

[Mollfie]

I'm not into comic-comics, like DC, Marvel etc and I don't even read the Sonic comics really, I occasionally flick through them if Jez gets them. But I do enjoy some comics and I've been reading manga since I was a teenager.

 

I read Asterix, Tintin, Garfield, Peanuts and the Beano all the time as a kid. We bought the Beano every week and I got the annuals every Christmas. My dad used to steal them a lot. Our Garfield and Peanuts books belonged to my sisters more than me but I read those a lot growing up. I was more familiar with the Asterix TV show but my parents would buy me the books every so often if I wanted them. Tintin I got in to when we lived in The Philippines because the Belgium lady across the street from us used to let me play in her garden and would lend me her daughters comics (she didn't live with them, she lived in Belgium and visited when she wasn't at university). I also really liked the Tintin cartoons as a kid. When we lived in The Philippines I would also sometimes read Archie comics because there wasn't much else available in the shops where we lived, it was Archie or Peanuts.

 

As a teenager I got into manga through watching anime, then discovering manga. I started out reading Fruits Basket, Death Note and Fushigi Yugi. I only finished reading Death Note out of those three >.>;;;

 

I used to review manga and anime while I was at university because it counted towards my university work (I was studying Creative Writing and we had to do professional writing pieces too for our folders) and I got sent free manga. Some was rubbish but most was pretty good, plus it was free!

 

Nowadays I mostly read webcomics and manga. My favourites being Gunnerkrigg Court, Blue, Habibi, Solanin, DOGS: Bullets and Carnage, Fullmetal Alchemist and One Piece.

[Speederino]

I'm not into comic books as I once was, I'm afraid. Regardless, the first two Spider-Man movies captured my interest and then my brother went and bought this:

 

It contained Amazing Fantasy #15 and issues 1-500 of Amazing Spider-Man. It took me a year or two to read through it all.

[Tori Himemiya]

OH BOI! Where to begin!

Well I was reading through TV Tropes out of boredom and I ran into a certain comic series.

The Sandman was the first comic book series I ever sat down and read through. And I loved every moment of it. From Dream escaping from his glass prison to the Kindly Ones killing everyone in The Dreaming I really loved the story it had. Small details become important later so its important to pay attention to everything and you'll be like "OHHHHHHH!"

But anyways, what really got me really interested in comics in the first place was indeed The Sandman. Early chapters had Dream meeting members of the Justice League, notably Martian Manhunter, and John Constantine from Hellblazer. Batman, Superman, and MM even appear in the last story arc, mostly because its a funeral of an important character. So I started to read other comics and I enjoyed them, though not as much as The Sandman of course. But there's Crow's story of today.

[Old dead account]

Comics are one of those things I had always wanted to get into but never could because my parebts never bought me any. My dad always said that comics are for fat pimplefaced and that I ought to stick to watching the shows on TV (despite the fact that he has a Marvel shirt). And my mom thinks that manga is really just porn in the disguise of a kids comic that teaches you to read backwards. I do however have a bunch of the Legend of Zelda manga comics, and I used to have an old Zelda ALttP And Super Mario comic, which I loved. I never understood how comics are "poison to the brain" either.

[Sonic The Badass]

I grew up with sonic and batman but never got they comics cause I'm cheap, recently I downloaded the latest sonic and batman story arch.

[kimplix]

I became aware of the American Sonic Comics through Sonic Mega Collection, and assumed they had stopped because I couldn't find them anywhere.

You just gave me a mind jog at that moment. I also remember most of the comics being on Sonic Gems Collection. I started to have a browse through them and got me into the comics. And you thought the internet was the provider of me getting into the American comics, think again

[Your Vest Friend]

Aside from Sonic which I got into after being exposed to Google for too long back when the internet was a novelty, I can't say I'm interested in any other comic at all. 

[Chili Dawg]

And my mom thinks that manga is really just porn in the disguise of a kids comic that teaches you to read backwards. 

This is hilarious.

 

As for myself, I don't really actively collect any comic books but I do pick up a few here and there, as well as a lot of graphic novels and collection type stuff. I too read Sanic first.

[Sarah Jane Smith]

I've only gotten into graphic novels recently, thanks to the Walking Dead novels. Not so much into traditional comics; they're kinda boring to me. Currently getting into Donjon/Dungeon, and I'm enjoying "Body World" by Dash Shaw as well. I like interesting stories and artistry.

[Jix Hedgehog]

My brother has always been a huge comic fan.. My dad used to record the old SpiderMan cartoons from the late 70's and that's where it all began. He's the guy to go to for any Marvel related questions. Funny thing is he went to the Comic-Con in Melbourne Australia last year to try to meet Stan Lee but never made it because the line was way too long.. while I've seen Stan Lee several times at Comic-Con San Diego.

 

I used to collect Silver Surfer comics.. my brother insisted on it, but gave that up. When the 90's X-Men cartoon started playing I bought an issue or 2. Never really got into serious collecting until Archie started making the Sonic comic. My bro found a loose copy of issue ¼ that someone took out of the EGM it was bundled with and put it in a newspaper and bought it for me.. I've been collecting ever since (I even have all the Comic Shop News tie-ins) I somehow missed out on issue 0 (but have since purchased).

 

A few years later my bro told me about a Comic shop in the city (called Minotaur in Melbourne) which stocked the comics earlier than the newsagencies (Direct Editions). It blew my mind I was currently on issue 28 or so and the store already had 32.

 

I think the only issues I'm missing are a few of the Free Comic Book day ones (2007) and the Archie Halloween special

[iDEATH]

I started out with STC which I read since issue 101 through to the final issue. I remember fondly darting down to John Menzies every fortnight with my pocket money to buy it

 

When I got to my early teens I discovered A1 comics in Glasgow near where my gran lives and started buying single issues of whatever took my fancy. It didn't last long though and I soon got annoyed with paying so much money for a book that was half adverts. I never buy single issues anymore and only go for trades and graphic novels.

My school library also had a small graphic novel section that mostly had Spawn collections, and a couple batman andspiderman books. It was there however, that I discovered Watchmen and realised how perfect a comic book could be. It was that book that really got me hooked. It's still my fave to this day.

 

I flirted briefly with manga but quickly lost interest.

[Supaidaman]

I'm surprised to see so many people that got into comic books because of Sonic. Well, it makes sense around here though.

 

As for me, I got into comics with Turma da Mônica (Mônica's Gang). Here's a cover of one of the recent ones:

 

I think that I actually started to learn how to read with those comics. Then, I decided to try Marvel Comics. At the time, the 90s Spider-Man and X-Men cartoons were airing here and I was really interested in how were the stories in the comics. Also, my father, together with my uncle, had a subscription of the Marvel comics that were published by Abril at that time so it was really easy for me to get some comics to read.

 

But... it was a weird time at Marvel. I guess the first story I ever read was a Scarlet Spider one and I couldn't undestand shit.

 

"Who the hell is this guy?"

"Why he has spider powers?"

"Clones???"

 

Then Onslaught happened, I couldn't understand it either and my father hated it. So, he stopped reading them.  At the time, the only thing I read was Mônica and then... Dragon Ball happened. A publisher named Conrad started to publish Dragon Ball around here in the early 00s. At first, I thought it was stupid. I mean, it was in black & white and I read it backwards. How could that even work? After some time though, I decided to buy an edition, 25 ( I still have it here. It was published as a half- tanko so it was the second half of volume 12). And I was hooked.

 

After that, I started to buy more and more mangas. At the same time, I started to read some summaries of what happened in the Marvel Universe to know how things were working. When Civil War started here I managed to convince my dad to take a look at it and then he got hooked into the Marvel Universe again (and now the comics were and are being published by Panini at a much better format).

 

Since then, we've bought more and more comics. I love american HQs. I love mangas. And I can't live without them anymore. And that's it.

 

I will try to post a photo of part o my manga collection later for you guys to see. 

Edited May 11, 2013 by ViniciusLC

[iDEATH]

 

But... it was a weird time at Marvel. I guess the first story I ever read was a Scarlet Spider one and I couldn't undestand shit.

 

"Who the hell is this guy?"

"Why he has spider powers?"

"Clones???"

 

 

This is my main problem with superhero comics (I'm not a massive superhero fan, I prefer more personal stories).

 

There's a great quote from Stan Lee when he told Kevin Smith, who was writing daredevil at the time, "Every comic is somebodies first comic". Basically he told Smith that every issue he writes should be enjoyable to long time fans but also accessable to first time readers. Every spiderman comic should be able to convey however briefly, who spiderman is and how he can do the things he can do.

 

too many superhero books don't do this and have such garbled backstories (especially those that have been running for decades) that getting into them is near impossible.

[Trix Master]

Well I got into the comics a little late. When I was scrolling through the bonus stuff on the Sonic mega collection for the gamecube. I thought "oh hey maybe I should go get some comics" but, I did not know of any comic book stores so.

 

Then later when I still had my first DSi with flipnote. I was watching this user's Sonic shorts consisting of the anti-verse characters along with other Sonic characters, and I said "Dang these guys are interesting" and I was into yu-gi-oh at the time to, and the club was at the comic book store and that's where got a Sonic comic. So I'm hoping to catch up with you all on the comic. I also did some research on the comic. I enjoy the anti-verse saga, (yeah because the flipnotes) because well there's a lot of cool stuff going on. But, everything else also has a colorful history too.

[Chaos Incarnate]

I can't remember why, exactly. I may have gotten into them after watching some superhero movies and looking up the comic history of the characters on wikipedia. My interest began to rise, and I started to buy comics consistently from 2009-late 2011. Unfortunately, I haven't bought many comics since then, or read them much for that matter, aside from an occasional library trip or comixology download. Now I only ask for comics on Christmas. I don't live close to many comic stores, and the nearest one just closed down nearly two years ago. Also, they've been getting far too expensive lately. I felt like I would get my money's worth through waiting for the trades, before deciding I had better things to spend my money on. I started to get into much more video game franchises in early 2011, and I just began to lose interest. I only bought dc comics for Batman related books, and I wasn't too fond of some of the creative teams and business decisions Marvel was making. Perhaps I'll return to purchasing comics sometime in the future, but right now, I'm done with them.

[Supaidaman]

This is my main problem with superhero comics (I'm not a massive superhero fan, I prefer more personal stories).

 

There's a great quote from Stan Lee when he told Kevin Smith, who was writing daredevil at the time, "Every comic is somebodies first comic". Basically he told Smith that every issue he writes should be enjoyable to long time fans but also accessable to first time readers. Every spiderman comic should be able to convey however briefly, who spiderman is and how he can do the things he can do.

 

too many superhero books don't do this and have such garbled backstories (especially those that have been running for decades) that getting into them is near impossible.

That is true but in the 90s it was MUCH worse. Seriously, not even the people who were reading the comics could understand what the fuck was going on.

Things are much better nowadays. While most comics don't try to do that at least there are things like the .1 issues or the recent Marvel NOW! thing. The problem is that never really works how it was intended (New 52 comes to mind) and it may alienate both new and old readers in the process.

 

Superhero comics are kind of a niche thing and you must really like them to get into it. I don't really enjoy DC characters, for example, so I don't even try to keep up with Batman (the only DC character that I really like). 

 

Here's a crappy photo of part of my manga collection. I need more space  :/

 

Edited May 12, 2013 by ViniciusLC

[Meow]

As a kid I was never really that into comics. Sure I collected some Sonic issues and a Spiderman issue here and there but it wasn't really something I'd call a love for comics. There was a big period of time where I was in fact not collecting any comics at all. I've always been more of a game guy, specifically the Sonic series in general. Little old me was content wasting loads of artistic potential on just strictly drawing only Sonic fanart all the time that I didn't really need much else other than that and the games, though from time to time I still picked 'em up. Come around late 2009 though and things all kinda changed for me. I started getting involved with doing "comic battles" on the internet. These weren't deviantart run tournaments either but I was on a dedicated 100% all the time comic battle site with no end. For those who don't know what comic battles are they are generally when you make a character, and your opponent makes a character, and you see who can make the better comic. This was my first time really exploring original ideas and the comics medium as a whole really - it was this new 'thing' but a friend of mine was doing it and I wanted to do it too because I wanted to have fun with my friend!

Anyway I got my ass kicked first fight. I lost, the final score being 19 votes for my opponents comic and 4 for mine. For good reason...my artistic ability was absolute shit. It was kinda a huge kick in the pants really, but I had so much fun doing it I wanted to get better and possibly win. Anyway I spent a good amount of time on that site doing some fights before moving on to a different site called EnterVOID where I promptly entered into one of their death tournaments early 2010 (where if your character is killed by you losing a round in the tournament, you can't use that character again on the site). I ended up making it past round 1 because my opponent didn't hand a thing in and then I got slaughtered round 2. Now, despite the fact that I was doing these comic battles I still wasn't really THAT into comics yet. 

 

But from there, I spent the next half the year really improving my game. I had this intense passion - I needed to win. I started winning some fights finally on the first site I was on and then went back to enterVOID in the summer of 2010 for something called the Invitational. It was basically a 'get in free' card for people with either 0 characters or all their characters were dead. I managed to make it past round 1 - and then my computer broke down briefly for round 2. I still manage to turn in though I had to do the majority on paper, getting my computer to run enough to colour it in for the end of that round. Made it to round 3 and squeaked by, my comp being fixed by this point and then finally something just snapped. I went insane and did 16 full coloured, pretty detailed pages in one week. It was nuts, I slept 2 hours each night and also did all my homework and went to college (which I guess I should have mentioned I was doing all that in among this too). I managed to win that match and proceeded on to the fifth and final round - where I beat out the tournament. I felt on top of the world guys, I was so fucking proud of that. That's when I really started to get into comics.

 

I started to read more comics, and through EnterVOID I discovered the likes of James Stokoe's work (Orc Stain, Wonton Soup, and Godzilla: Half Century War), among many others. Kenneth Rocafort (has worked on DC and Top Cow projects) also had a brief stint at that site there too. Chamba (UDON guy, RandomVeus) and many other dudes and dudettes who are now published and working in the industry were there at one point. But a lot of people I started to look up there had comics there first, and I was wowed by that. I got into a lot of different comics I never otherwise would have heard of and found new people to discover. My interest in manga also started to rise, though around the same time as getting into comics is when I was also getting more into certain anime and found creators there to be inspired by too. My collection isn't that huge - but I can say that I have one issue of my own comic in this collection. Because in 2012 I finally launched the first issue of my first project. Unfortunately I didn't sell enough to keep self publishing and there was very little interest from publishers that I pitched to (never heard back). I fell into a huge bout of depression up until recently again and am slowly chipping away at my next series called Bad Dudes Beware which I have a huge amount more faith in due to me be being a lot better at approaching things. It is gonna be rad.

 

Nowadays I am still reading the likes of James Stokoe's work, have a few issues of Deadpool (a series I otherwise don't read) that Sheldon Vella drew (he also did Kill Audio and his comic Supertron is great as well, and again another VOID alumni), got into reading stuff by artists that are their friends too like Brandon Graham. Seriously King City is amazing and the first issue of Multiple Warheads I have by him is great too. My collection is still pretty small overall because I am picky, but I have a small collection of trade paperbacks and manga and art books growing on my shelf. Its a bit crazy for me overall to think about because I was hellbent on making my way into games, which is what I went to school for...not that I would pass up the opportunity to make my own indie game though if I had the knowledge to! I can handle the music/art/design aspects but programming is that next feat...ANYWAY...

 

My name is Charlie and I wanna draw comics.

[Gabz Girl]

Have been reading comics for years, but not many. I used to read my grandparents' old Beano annuals from the 70's and 80's (still do today actually when I'm bored XD) and when I lived in Holland I read quite a bit of Asterix and some Tintin, though I much preferred Asterix because it was so funny. I also liked Suske and Wiske, a Flemish comic. This is one of the albums I read, which is based on an attraction at Dutch theme park the Efteling.

 

 

So yeah, most of the comics I've read are European. There was a point where I used to read manga obsessively though, my favourites being Azumanga Daioh and +Anima.

But now it's American comics! It started with Archie Sonic, since I finally found a comic book store where they stock them (which means I didn't have to download them online >>) and I'm into Adventure Time and My Little Pony too. It's hard to keep up when there's so many comics to read, but whatever. I still like reading them. XD

 

Oh, and webcomics? Not so keen on those, but there are just two that I really enjoy; Lackadaisy and of course Brawl in the Family.

Edited May 12, 2013 by Gabz Girl

[Tani Coyote]

One year around my birthday a comic book shop opened just up the street. My Dad decided we should go there and give it a look, so we did.

 

I immediately got subscribed to Sonic the Hedgehog and the Walking Dead.

 

I wouldn't get around to actually reading the Sonic comic I got until my collection was complete, however. It was issue 183 or so, so I had a long way to go. Fortunately I'd already been amassing the Sonic archives but it would take about a year before I had all Sonic comics under my belt.

 

Working on Sonic the Comic now which is naturally much more difficult to find. Never mind the Royal Mail is the worst service I've ever had to work with.

[Cobalt_Bolt]

I got into comic books in the mid to late 90's when I was in grade school when my dad got a box full of titles from DC, Marvel and a few other publishers that escape my mind for free.  I couldn't understand the story arcs during that time but I just enjoyed looking at the art styles and details.  During the early 2000's I couldn't really keep up with the major stories as I was hooked on other books during that time such as Narnia and Harry Potter.  I picked up three Calvin and Hobbes Treasury books as well as two separate titles such as "Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons" and "Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat". 

 

Around 2005 started to buy the Naruto manga and I picked up Volumes 1-10 for the first arc and 12 as I skipped Volume 11.  I only have Volumes 28-29 of the post-time skip arc as I have little physical room for them in my book shelf and I discovered a way to read manga on the internet that 2005 me could only dream of.  I also have Volumes 1-3 of Essential Spider-man as I am a fan of the web head, Ultimate Spiderman Issue #75, and Marvel Knights Spider-man No. 19.  For the Archie Sonic the Hedgehog I only have one physical issue and that is issue #156 while on Sonic Mega Collection Plus for my PC I have the Sonic the Hedgehog Firsts compilation. 

 

Overall I'd say I am inconsistent in following major story arcs in my various super hero comics while with Calvin and Hobbes I have followed fairly well until Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat.

Edited May 13, 2013 by Cobalt_Bolt

[kimplix]

Have been reading comics for years, but not many. I used to read my grandparents' old Beano annuals from the 70's and 80's (still do today actually when I'm bored XD) and when I lived in Holland I read quite a bit of Asterix and some Tintin, though I much preferred Asterix because it was so funny. I also liked Suske and Wiske, a Flemish comic. This is one of the albums I read, which is based on an attraction at Dutch theme park the Efteling.

 

 

...Anyone noticed that the little robot reminds me a bit like Bemo?

 

Anyway, Just got myself a comic box today. Filled it with my remaining comics and shall post it either later today or tomorrow. Have no idea why I would, just felt like doing so c:

Edited May 13, 2013 by kimplix