Page 33, Vol. I, #14: Free Comic Book Day

What happens when you release two girls in a comic shop?

Normally, Free Comic Book Day isn't worth writing about. While there's a great deal of excitement about it, it's hardly the E3 of comics.

The real reason it's rarely worth writing about is that it's so limited. The comic books available are just hooks to try to get you in, and they're never the important stories. (For example, you didn't find any Civil War titles this year). DC and Marvel will publish a couple special comics for Free Comic Book Day, but they generally will just be the latest hot thing. They're never terribly exciting.

The one exception to that is possibly Keenspot. If you're into having print collections of web comics, and your local store gets Keenspot, then you can probably get a decent book.

In fact, the only thing really worth making a special trip for is the free Clix that Wiz Kids gives out each year (this year is was Logan), and it's not like you'll be getting a Unique. The Stickfa was also neat, actually.

However, this year was a little different. I took my kids.

Elizabeth (nearly 7) and Sarah (just over 5) have recently discovered comics. It used to be that every now and then I'd catch Elizabeth looking at the Sunday comics, but that was it. But then I started packing my books up. A box that wasn't sealed on top contained a few books that have been important works lately: It's a Mystery, Charlie Brown, There's Treasure Everywhere, Hound of the Far Side and Garfield at Large. Ok, yeah, I'm not sure why I still have that last one. I mean, I got it when I was 8, so I can just blame immature taste, but….

Anyway, while mother dearest has pronounced that the Far Side too mature for them (she claims they won't understand, but I think she's worried about nightmares of zombie chickens) (And, it's a good thing that Billy and the Boingers Bootleg wasn't in the same box), the other three have become popular reading (several fights have been broken up over them, which is how we measure popularity at my house).

The Calvin and Hobbes book is obviously the one I'm most pleased with, though I have mixed feelings (I'm not sure how you read a comic strip aloud, and I am constantly asked to read it to them). However, they love it. They take the books to bed with them, they read them and laugh and laugh.

Victory for me!

So, Saturday, I loaded my two eldest into the minivan and drove on down to Nova comics. And we returned with prizes.

Last year on Free Comic Book Day, as a tie-in to Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Dark Horse gave away a free comic book about an adventure Obi-Wan and Anakin shared during the clone wars. I ended up with 2 copies even though I wasn't that impressed (The line art was ok, but there was far too much anime-influenced, exaggerated expressions on the face… and the story was kind of … weak). I bring this up because it was again available this year.

The girls are huge Star Wars fans. Elizabeth has a Barbie-sized Leia doll, that is the prize of all prizes. So, naturally, when shown the table of free comics, they both grabbed that issue. Even though I told them that I would give them my copies, they wanted their own. They wouldn't touch the Donald Duck comic.

Actually, I can understand that. I never thought that Disney did particularly good comics. They should stick with animation.

So they both got the same comic. That we already had copies of. On the one hand, it's disappointing that my children are so caught up in a property that they just grab what they recognize (because, y'know, I've never bought a comic based on which hero was on the cover). On the other, it's exciting on many levels that they're reading anything at all. And that they will read and re-read a comic book is awesome for me. I can share something I love with them, and hopefully they'll grow up, if not loving comics, at least not disparaging them.

I guess Free Comic Book Day this year was a success. I got a Clix (and a Superman/Batman that was actually more interesting than I expected it to be), and my kids started their comic collections. Bring on another.

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Written by SaintEhlers on May 09th, 2006