There’s really something to be said for educational comics.

Not genuinely educational ones (perish the thought), but ones that guide the inexperienced reader through the labyrinth of nuttiness that was the golden and silver ages of DC comics. 

Batman: The Brave and the Bold, is a comic aimed at kids, just like many comics were during the forties through the seventies.  This makes it a particularly good place to unearth all of those silly, funny, and imaginative characters that populated the comics world back when the medium was light-hearted, episodic, and frankly ridiculous.

The series also serves as a guide for those of us who are new to comics, and looking for something other than wikipedia to introduce us to older characters.  Each team-up is a fun, fast way to learn about some ancient character from a source that doesn’t expect any knowledge of the reader.  So you get an explanation of each character’s backstory, motivation, and abilities.

It’s a fun way to catch up on tone and continuity of long-lost characters, and I recommend it to anyone who isn’t willing to page through forty years worth of comics to find out what they might have missed in the old days.

I believe I was the very last person in the world to discover hulu, but when I did, I was very pleased to see that the first few seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer were on it.

“Fantastic,” I thought.  “I can put them up on my computer when I have to clean up, or fold clothes, or  just whenever I feel like seeing some of my favorite episodes again.” Read the rest of this entry �

There’s nothing quite like the feeling of being right.  Oh, the smugness.  Oh, the false sense of righteousness.

I have said, repeatedly, that Superman/Batman is a great comic.

And in issue #61, I was proven right, yet again.  Fantastic art by Francis Manapul, a well-written story by Michael Green and Mike Johnson, a ton of in-jokes, a surprising yet logical conclusion, and on top of all that?

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When you ask a certain type of person what kind of comics they like; well, first they’ll correct you.  They will say ‘graphic novels.’  And then they will tell you that they don’t have one specific interest, they just like high-quality graphic novels.

While I can admire a search for the best quality products of a medium that you like, I’ve always felt a certain contemptuous pity for those people.  Really?  Just ‘high-quality’?  Just ‘good’?  Just ‘insightful’?  These people are either liars, or are the stunted, gnarled, embittered kind of jerks who will tell you that they only listen to classical music and NPR.  Sure, their taste is unquestionable and their likes and dislikes as pure as the driven snow, but – really?  They have no guilty pleasures?  No specific areas of interest?  No morbid curiosity?  No nostalgic favorites or fannish loves or goofy objects of affection?  It just seems so flavorless and bland.

And I can say this because I without a doubt know that those people, when I tell them I like the Batsquad and the Arrows and have an irrational prejudice against Marvel, pity me just as much.

As well they might.  I’m a character-based-fan.  That?  Is like attending a Rolling Stones concert, making it backstage, and spending the whole time talking about your favorite member of the Monkees.

There are many humiliations to being a character-based-fan.  Start out with the fact that, prestige-wise, you are the lowest rung of the ladder (and considering you’re already into comics, that’s a really low ladder to begin with).  Add to that that artist-based-fans can flit to one book or another, ignoring all plot and dialogue and rhapsodizing about a page layout, and writer-based-fans can camp out for a story-arc or two before moving on.  A character-based fan is pretty much stuck in a book forever.  We’re like those frogs who get put in cold water, and then don’t jump out when it’s heated up, boiling ourselves to death.  But at least the frogs go quietly.  Character-based-fans are the ones at Cons, arguing with a panel of uncomfortable comics-professionals about how our character would never do that, while the audience hisses at us.

We’re the idiots who get into ‘who would win in a fight’ arguments and talk about the logistics of what Batman can carry around in his utility belt, and complain about how terrible a comic is while they’re buying it.

Still better than yakking about the artistic merits of Lost Girls, though.

Well, it’s finally happened.  I’ve finally bought Booster Gold.

Sure, many of my friends told me that it was well-written, fun, heartfelt, not too burdened with mega-continuity, and featured a lot of creative adventures.  It was, in short, exactly the book I said I wanted to be reading.  Except I wasn’t reading it.  Because this is something that you should know about me.

I hate and fear change.

Yes, you can take that into account any time I make another grumpy-old-lady ‘what are comics these days coming to,’ entry.

I got into Batman because I saw it as a child, and then my reading habits slowly expanded, usually whenever Batman teamed up with another character.  Picture me as one of those neolithic hunter-gatherer groups, the ones that tended to move whenever the sea level dropped and new land was exposed.  I’m slowly traveling through the comics world, moving whenever a book’s profits drop, exposing some previously undiscovered link with Batman that causes a team-up.  I wandered over the isthumus of Batman to the new Blue Beetle series, and when it was cancelled and became a back-up for Booster Gold, (and this issue of Booster has a Batman appearance that I am sure is no coincidence), I followed it to this series.

Which involves time-travel, saving Batman from never existing, showboating, a smart-mouth sidekick, and an idiot savant with a mentor called ‘Rip Hunter.’  Ah, yes.  This is a comic.

And this is the best time to be a comic fan.  The honeymoon period.  When you don’t worry about artists, writers, or continuity.  You have a character you love, a story you’re interested in, and a nice little stock of back-issues to wade around in.  Life is good.

A lot is made of how, in comics, readers can/will/are supposed to identify with certain characters.

I’ve talked a lot about how, when I was a kid watching Batman: The Animated Series, Batgirl was my favorite character.  A girl, running around, having adventures, kicking ass, taking names and sassing Robin was just about the coolest thing little Esther had ever seen.  And while I can’t deny that I feel a certain personal investment in Barbara Gordon, exulting in her triumphs and enduring her failures, I don’t think that’s the same as identifying with her.  Most of the characters in the Batverse are too perfect to identify with.

Identification also depends a great deal on the reader as well as the character.  When you were a kid you might feel a kinship with a fictional child, but when you’re an adult, often you look at the same character and think, “What a brat.”

Have you ever felt a strong connection between yourself and a comics character?  And if so, does the connection endure, or has it faded?

Futurama is getting renewed. 

Twenty-six episodes. 

Next year.

If only Bea Arthur were still around to voice the Femputer.

Chances are many of the readers here have worked a retail job at least once.

Of course, every job has its little annoyances but one of the perils of retail work, especially retail work in a field that certain groups of people are enthusiasts of, is having to spend long periods of time in conversation with people who take an interest in the things you’re selling.  Sometimes this interest is mild and tempered by a person’s natural social skills.  Sometimes it is passionate, and is not tempered by so much as a wrist watch that will allow people to see when closing time is.

All this discussion of mutual interests, theirs social and yours professional, will lead a lot of people to conclude that you are enjoying their company, or even that you are their friend.  Often the actual case is that you will get fired if you tell them to leave.

Having mostly had retail jobs in fields of heart-stopping dullness, I didn’t often have to put up with that kind of thing.  When I did, the relationship could range from mildly interesting to excruciating.  I vowed that I would never do that kind of thing to a helpless emloyee.

Guess how much time I spent at my local comic book store today!  Guess how much time I spent yesterday.

Some of you out there must have had jobs in comics in the past, and most of those jobs must have included dealing with people like, well, me.  Did it make you nuts?  Were you interested?  Pet peeves?

Those of you who haven’t been behind a counter; feel free to confess your sins, share your insecurities, or just talk below.  After all, if I get sick of you, I can just close the window.

Once again – a cut up top for Red Robin #1 spoilers.

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The thirteenth episode of Dollhouse is going to be aired at Comic-Con 2009.

Below are two images from the episode:

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