Recommended comics reading for one's girlfriend - 2004-06-13 6:50 AM
For the last six months I've been going out with a girl I met during my last year in college. It's not a serious relationship yet (our get-togethers have been sporadic due to her college schedule and the fact that she lives almost an hour away from me), so we're still in that "getting to know each other" phase. One thing that we have in common is that she grew up with the old '80s fantasy cartoons and classic superhero movies, and she's got something of an interest in the genre.
Which leads me to the problem of which I'm about to discuss.
Back in May, my brother and I were planning to go to the Motor City Comic Con, and I invited this girl to come along with us. She couldn't be there due to a friend of her having a concert that weekend, but we got to talking about comic books and the like, and I mentioned that the Hellboy movie was based on the Seed of Destruction miniseries. Her first response to that was, "What's a miniseries?"
You see, she's never read a comic book before.
It had to be one of the most awkward explanations I've ever had to give someone. I mean, we can throw comics jargon around here like it's nothing, but to someone who's never read comics and has no idea what any of it means, it must sound like total gobbledygook. I can only imagine it was like that for her when I first brought it up. So I tried to explain what it was I was talking about, and she finally expressed an interest in giving comics a whirl. "I imagine it's like reading a play, just with pictures," she said. So I decided to try to put together a list of comics that I could recommend to her. Unfortunately, it ended up being tough because...
1. A lot of stories rely on the reader being familiar with everything that preceeded them. Anything that depends on knowing a lot of backstory/past history had to be avoided, because I don't want to overwhelm her. This ruled out a lot of mainstream superhero stuff, obviously.
2. She's not big on graphic violence, so anything with that kind of content had to be avoided, too. This ruled out From Hell, Empire, and 300, among others.
3. Really complex and involved stories would probably turn her off. She's new to all of this, after all, and I don't want to direct her to the more complicated stuff until she's had a chance to get used to the medium. I think I need to stick to stuff she'll be able to latch onto first time out. so Watchmen, Akira, Alan Moore's Supreme, and other such stuff is going to have to wait for now. (I'm torn on Sandman, though, because she's an English major like me and would probably get all the literary references.)
4. I want to recommend to her a large range of stuff, not having one predominant genre or other. So I'm trying to keep a limit on how many superhero stories I can recommend (and the newbie-friendly necessity has already curtailed how many I could suggest, anyway) and aiming to include other genres.
I have an incomplete list of comics she might enjoy, but I think I might be missing something. I'll post up what I have, and if you guys can think of anything to add to it, please let me know. I could really use some help here.
Which leads me to the problem of which I'm about to discuss.
Back in May, my brother and I were planning to go to the Motor City Comic Con, and I invited this girl to come along with us. She couldn't be there due to a friend of her having a concert that weekend, but we got to talking about comic books and the like, and I mentioned that the Hellboy movie was based on the Seed of Destruction miniseries. Her first response to that was, "What's a miniseries?"
You see, she's never read a comic book before.
It had to be one of the most awkward explanations I've ever had to give someone. I mean, we can throw comics jargon around here like it's nothing, but to someone who's never read comics and has no idea what any of it means, it must sound like total gobbledygook. I can only imagine it was like that for her when I first brought it up. So I tried to explain what it was I was talking about, and she finally expressed an interest in giving comics a whirl. "I imagine it's like reading a play, just with pictures," she said. So I decided to try to put together a list of comics that I could recommend to her. Unfortunately, it ended up being tough because...
1. A lot of stories rely on the reader being familiar with everything that preceeded them. Anything that depends on knowing a lot of backstory/past history had to be avoided, because I don't want to overwhelm her. This ruled out a lot of mainstream superhero stuff, obviously.
2. She's not big on graphic violence, so anything with that kind of content had to be avoided, too. This ruled out From Hell, Empire, and 300, among others.
3. Really complex and involved stories would probably turn her off. She's new to all of this, after all, and I don't want to direct her to the more complicated stuff until she's had a chance to get used to the medium. I think I need to stick to stuff she'll be able to latch onto first time out. so Watchmen, Akira, Alan Moore's Supreme, and other such stuff is going to have to wait for now. (I'm torn on Sandman, though, because she's an English major like me and would probably get all the literary references.)
4. I want to recommend to her a large range of stuff, not having one predominant genre or other. So I'm trying to keep a limit on how many superhero stories I can recommend (and the newbie-friendly necessity has already curtailed how many I could suggest, anyway) and aiming to include other genres.
I have an incomplete list of comics she might enjoy, but I think I might be missing something. I'll post up what I have, and if you guys can think of anything to add to it, please let me know. I could really use some help here.