Geekgasm: Free Comic Book Day

Every year on the first Saturday of May the world of comics hosts an awesome event where they give out loads of free comics. Today is that day so that’s what this post is all about!

Being a British comic fan is hard. Whilst I can’t really say I know what it’s like to buy comics in America, I think I have a decent idea based on TV, movies and the internet. I imagine that’s it’s relatively easy. It’s not the same here though. Independent comic shops are few and far between. In fact I’ve never even seen one here. There is fortunately a brand of shops called Forbidden Planet which is a fantastic. The nearest shop though is a twenty minute train ride away when I’m at uni and an hours bus journey when I’m at home. Fortunately you can have your comics delivered but by the time they’ve been shipped over and then posted to me, it’s usually nearly a week since they’ve been released in the US, which is pretty frustrating.

Last year’s Free Comic Book Day was what started my interest in comics. I had sort of been interested before but didn’t really know where to start. Last year’s DC offering gave a preview of their summer event, Flashpoint, which I read. And that led to a reboot of all the DC Comics meaning they all started from #1 again. For a new reader this was brilliant for me and got me hooked. As time has gone by I’ve tried various other comics too and got into some of them and have purchased a few graphic novels to bring me up to speed. Today was a rare visit to the comic shop to collect the freebies and get very excited by them. I’ve found that the comics you end up with are pretty much a random selection.  I shall now take you through the ones I ended up with, which appears to be more of a kids selection, and let you know what I think of them!

Top Shelf Kids Club

That sounds like an odd name considering I would usually imagine the term “top shelf” to talk about adult magazines! This is clearly one for the kids as it has simplistic drawings and text. There’s various short stories in it and some of them don’t even have any words to them. It’s mostly pretty dull stuff but I did quite enjoy “Pirate Penguin Vs. Ninja Chicken”. It’s a ridiculous title for a ridiculous comic which seems quite funny. I don’t think I’ll be buying the book of it though! Not for me but the kids probably loved this one.

Capstone: The Incredible Blockhead/Zinc Alloy

Another kids one really but much more enjoyable. Both stories are about geeky schoolboys who have become superheroes. They are both quite silly and pretty funny but they are unfortunately just previews of upcoming graphic novels. It’s a fun read of a comic though, I really liked it. And the art style is pretty awesome too.

Paperctz: The Smurfs/ Disney Fairies

Clearly the Disney Fairies thing featuring Tinkerbell is never going to be for me. Although out of all the female Disney characters, Tinkerbell is definitely the hottest. Although you’d have to be a fairy to fully appreciate her. You have to love The Smurfs though and this is by the original Smurfs artist Peyo. It’s a great little story but I do find it rather frustrating that the word “smurf” is used to replace pretty much every verb, it’s infuriating. There’s also random snippets from a graphic novel called “Dance Class” which seems ok but is definitely another for the girls. “Ernest and Rebecca” looks really girly but it’s about a girl befriending a “germ” who helps her cope with her parents on the verge of separating, which is a big issue to tackle in a kid’s story but it seems to have been done well.

DC Comics: Superman Family Adventures/Green Lantern: The Animated Series/Young Justice

This is the kid’s DC comic book. Superman Family Adventure goes for cartoony over realism and is actually great fun. The Green Lantern bit sets up the Cartoon Network series, explaining how a Red Lantern came good. And a very short Young Justice comic sees Green Arrow and Artemis foil a robbery as Batman and Robin thwart a kidnapping. In those short pages I actually got quite excited by the idea of the Young Justice comic. It basically has a kid version of Aquaman, Green Arrow, The Flash, Superman and using Robin for Batman as well as some girl called Miss Martian. It sounds kind of fun so I might actually investigate this further. That’s what Free Comic Book Day is all about.

DC Comics: The New 52

Definitely the highlight. This year DC have not just previewed upcoming comics but created a special story just for Free Comic Book Day. It focuses on Pandora, the mysterious woman who appeared briefly in Flashpoint, was hidden in all the #1 issues and has made a brief appearance in Justice League. It turns out Pandora is indeed the Pandora off of Pandora’s box and she manages to find the box once more. Then there’s a flash forward in time when the Justice League are battling a whole load of enemies with the caption “Coming Next Year… Trinity War”. And that page folds out so it’s massive, which is brilliant. Quite what all this means I don’t know. A massive event in summer 2013 I assume that involves a big war. It’s hard to tell who’s fighting who but interestingly the Green Arrow is there and so is a Green Lantern who is fighting against the Justice League. There’s no sign of Hal Jordan anywhere. I eagerly await this “Trinity War” event!

Well that was interesting. I’m not really sure why I ended up with a kid’s selection but I’m a massive kid so I still enjoyed it! I am kind of disappointed I didn’t get any of the Marvel offerings. What my comic store has is pretty limited though so I should be grateful!