Free Comic Book Day 2016

Not many of you may have heard of this event but for the last fifteen years, the North American comic book industry has hosted a Free Comic Book Day to help bring new readers into independent comic book stores.

When I was growing up, I was never interested in comic books, to be honest, I didn’t even know they existed! I loved Marvel and DC favorites like X-Men, Batman, Fantastic Four and Spider-Man but never thought about where these stories originally came from. It wasn’t until I got older that I understood where these amazing characters came from, the wonderful universe of comics.

At this point I still wasn’t interested in comics but I loved them for the characters that they brought to television and film. I felt as if because I was so many years behind in the series I wouldn’t fully understand the story as there’s so many different variants and storylines for each character.

I briefly read The Walking Dead comics as I had heard how different they were to the television programme and as I loved the programme I thought I would try out the comics. I read a few but there wasn’t anything there that really tied me to them, nothing that grabbed my attention to make me want to read more.

Before this year, it was a while since I had watched a DC/Marvel film, as there was so many different films I just never had the time to watch them. Especially as they all linked to one another some how. It wasn’t until I saw a trailer for Deadpool that I was like yes, I need to watch that when it comes out, this was the first movie that I felt like this so I just had to find someone to go with.

After speaking to my best friend, who never heard of Deadpool before but fell in love instantly after watching the trailer, we decided that we needed to watch Deadpool. I fell in love with not only Deadpool but the actor who played him Ryan Reynolds. This fueled my love for the character and now I am addicted to anything Deadpool. Which lead me to buy my first comic book!

Since then I have non stop been buying Deadpool comics, trying to read the series from the beginning as I am a very chronological person. I have got Deadpool & The Mercs for Money, Hawkeye vs Deadpool (because why not!), Deadpool’s Secret Secret Wars (Captain America is in there) and finally Deadpool & Cable, only because Deadpool 2 (it’s happening!) is supposedly about Cable.

The last time I was in my local independent comic book shop, Final Frontier Plymouth, he told me about Free Comic Book Day, an event that I didn’t even know existed! After reading up on it, I decided I needed to go and see what free comic books they had to offer. I’m glad I did as there was a wide range of comics for everyone! Even something like Strawberry Shortcake for the little ones.

Flickering through the choices, at first I felt I wouldn’t pick up any comics as there wasn’t anything that took my fancy. After looking behind other comics and waiting a while I came across Assassin’s Creed and Captain America. I grabbed these before anyone else could as the store had a limited supply of each comic. For a free comic they are definitely worth the non price!

There is a lot more advertising in them but what do you expect from a free comic, there are still the same quality so you don’t need to worry about cheap paper. As I picked them up in my work lunch hour I wasn’t able to fully experience the day. My particular store was putting out different comics at different times so everyone would have a chance at grabbing some.

There were comics for everyone, from family favourites like Pokemon, Pink Panther and SpongeBob SquarePants to blockbuster hits like the Avengers and Suicide Squad. When I’ve previously visited Final Frontier, it’s never been busy! Only one staff member working and it’s a very chilled environment, this day was different though. There were four staff members around to help everyone with their enquiries.

I will definitely be going to Free Comic Book Day 2017! It was a great day but I have learnt that you need to keep your day free so you can keep popping in to check out all the comics. Do some research before to see exactly what comics are being offered so you know what you need to look out for and grab!