Sequential

09May08

Ah, another meme.  This time, it’s comic book related.  I’m following Dave’s addition to the proceedings.  

1. What was the first comic you remember reading?

I always remember comics being around.  All varieties.  I was a voracious reader and I loved illustration.  So there were milk crates of comics in my young life.  I remember hand-me-downs from cousins.  Titles like Swamp Thing and Batman.  I flipped through these and marveled at the splash pages.  I probably drew on several of them.  But the first comics that I really read, the first obsession I had in a lifetime of passing fancies and fixations was most likely Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures.  

I remember buying new issues at farmers’ markets.  My favorite issues were a two part collection of character profiles filled with statistics and biographical summaries.  These books resonated for me because each installment delivered a new mutation, some bizarre new character to meet.  So, really, I’ve been obsessed with characters from the beginning.  This issue (which I remember quite vividly) came out less than a month after my fifth birthday.    

2. What was the first comic that made you realize that you might be in this for the long haul?

At some point in the early ’90s I fell away from comics and new obsessions took hold. I got into prose books and started reading Goosebumps.  I formed a club and tried writing a newsletter.  I tricked our fourth grade teacher into reading us things like Monster Blood II and Welcome to Horrorland during our regularly scheduled quiet reading period.  Pogs landed that same year.  I probably still read comics during this time, but without a comic shop within the distance of a casual bike ride, I was unable to keep up with single issues.  It really wasn’t a matter of being cool or not.  I read epic fantasy novels through freshman year of high school.  Hell, I wrote some.  I watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer as well as wrestling (as was the fashion during 7th and 8th grade).  No, I wasn’t ashamed of comics.  They just weren’t readily available.  So I was limited to noteworthy trade paperback collections.  I’d buy maybe two or three a year.  

Then came the purchase of an iPod and the arrival of superhero movies.  This lead me to iFanboy, the comic book discussion site and official podcast.  After a couple months of scouring the episode archives and taking in the week-to-week commentary of modern books, I stopped by a comic shop and picked up 14 books.  That was in January of 2007.  I’ve been buying weekly books ever since.  

So what book got its claws in and hasn’t let go?  It must have been an early issue of Geoff Johns’ Justice Society of America.

   

3. If you had to make a snap decision to take one comic or one comic run to a desert island, what would it be? Don’t think too hard!

I could say any number of things here.  Tintin by Herge, because it reminds me of childhood vacations and a much simpler time in my life.  I could say Hellboy because the art is so ridiculously good.  Or JSA, because it’s literally reduced me to tears on occasion.  Watchmen because it’s so dense and I haven’t even finished the thing yet.  But it’s impossible to find one book to represent a whole lifetime of reading.  We’ll just ache for the rest of it.  Who wants to be bitter about something once loved?    

But here’s my official answer.  I’m going to take Scott McCloud’s Making Comics and a pile of sketch pads.  I’m going to ignore the fact that I haven’t drawn seriously for about 5 years now.  And I’m going to spend the rest of my sun-drenched days reclining against a palm tree, heels in the surf, dreaming.  Escaping.    

When you don’t want to run out of something, all you need to do is realize you can make more of it.  

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