Free Comic Day!

turkeywrap writes "Today is Free Comic Day! Go to your local comic store, pick up some free comics, and support the comic industry. Check and see if there are any special signings or events at a store near you." Ack! I'm in Warren at Penguicon this weekend, and nowhere near my precious comic store! I guess I'll have to pay for my comics ;)

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This is why comic books are important

[starvingartist12]

This is why comic books are important

"I'd never actually seen a comic in person before that, and though even then I knew they were lame, I was fascinated by the kind of stories that used both pictures and words."
...
"Truth is, I was a slow student initially, because we were always going from town to town, and the curriculum varied tremendously across locations. (I was also near-sighted, something my father didn't want to admit, so I didn't get glasses until late Junior High School.) So in a very real way, comics taught me how to read, taught me a love of language, and storytelling, and most of all, an appreciation for heroes, for chivalry and bravery and a refusal to surrender."
...
"In addition to the elements just noted, I learned my sense of morality, my sense of right and wrong, from comics. That may sound stupid and naive, but it's true, and that understanding is what propels me to this day."
...
"And there was never any question in his mind about doing the right thing. You just do it. And that, to me, became very important to my moral development. I still tend to see things in black-and-white terms, and if I come into a situation where the only way to keep my job is to do something I don't agree with on principle, I'll quit. It's cost me any number of jobs over the years, but I can't do otherwise. Wouldn't be right.

My family, of course, didn't see it that way at the time, and when my grades slipped, my father blamed it on comics, and as I sat there, he took all the comics that I'd so carefully stored and protected, kept in pristine condition, all my number one issues of X-Men and Spider-Man and the rest ... and tore them in half, one after another, until they were all gone. It still makes me angry. But the other thing about comics is that this was where I first began to appreciate the process of storytelling. I was kind of oblivious at first to the idea of writers, but over time I gradually began to figure it out, that somebody sat down and wrote down these words. And I was entranced by that."

Just who was this person? It's none other than J. Michael Straczynski, writer and creator of Babylon 5, Crusade and Jeremiah (He's currently enjoying getting a chance at writing Amazing Spider-Man for Marvel) =)