Comics are Novels too!/ Free Comic book day

I have often tried to get my peers into comic books and graphic novels but comics have been nudged to the side for long enough. I am going to give comics the attention the deserve! Comic books are an interesting way to comprehend social issues, it helps with visualization, challange you just as much as "normal" novels do, they allow you to have a deeper understanding of our favorite heroes that surpass what is shown in the movies, and we get more time with the heroes we know and love so they are just fun to read.

Some people have told me "I don't want to read comics because I want to be challanged." But there is nothing that can hinder a comic from being challenging. Characters can use a higher vocabulary and you can speak with different methods of syntax and diction. But what really makes a story challenging is how thought is provoked in the reader. I don't think we read harder books to say, "hey look at all the big words I can find" if that was the case I'd plop a dictionary in your hands and condescendingly say, "have fun!"

Another argument I hear is, "they are too short" But keep this in mind. The first Harry Potter book is 200 pages long give or take. But the whole saga is at least 1000. Let's say the average comic is about 20 pages. They usually get released about twice a month (40 pages a month) and the first Superman issue was released in June of 1938. Since we are drawing to a close with May, this is where I say: close enough. Now that was 76 years ago. If we calculated 76 times 12 months and the bimonthly comic schedule we would get (ladies and gentlemen get out your calculators) on average 1,824 pages. FOR ONE CHARACTER. DC and Marvel (and the smaller comic makers) have hundreds of characters so you have an abundance of variety.

There is a good chance you are probably thinking, "that's awesome but I don't know where to start." But one of the easiest way of starting is going to Half Price Books and spending 1-2 dollars. If you get confused about a reference to a character just look them up on Wikipedia. But if your not sure if you want to spend money just yet, the first Saturday of May is Free Comic Book Day (that rhymes if you say it aloud.) But there is a video in the post explaining what it is.

In conclusion: my friend once asked me if I wanted to learn how to play the Pokemon trading card game (which I also suggest but that's aside the point) and I said I'd give it a shot. And if we are all willing to try the comic books and the trading card games and the skydiving and the spelunking and the video games and what else. We have to at least be able to give it a shot.