I grew up thinking that comic books were written for 12 year old boys and that all comic books had impossibly muscled men mixed with ridiculously dressed and oddly proportioned women. Then I met Paul and he confused me. He seemed to be (relatively) mature, and I knew from our conversations that he appreciated true literature and knew what great writing was. Yet he had boxes and piles of comic books lying around his place. I wondered how someone so intelligent could love comics. Basically, I figured it was his way of holding onto his childhood, because we all know that comic books can't be well written, right?


WRONG!


Paul has opened my eyes to a whole new world of writers and stories. It was a struggle at first, I was extremely resistant. I was sure that I would open it and see story attmepts with nothing but blood and violence and never see a plot. Don’t get me wrong, I am sure there is plenty of this still out there in the comic world, but it's not ALL this way.


Here are some of my new favorites:


Gus Beezer comics by Gail Simone- This was just made to be kind of like a short, but if you liked Calvin and Hobbes you would love these! Gus is a little boy with a fascination with superheroes, and a penchant for trouble. His story crosses the top of the page, and then a story that Gus Beezer wrote himself (reminiscent of Spaceman Spiff) crosses the bottom of the page.


Birds of Prey-I have not read this whole series, but Gail Simone started writing it at issue 55 and after reading Gus Beezer I wanted to read anything by her that I could get my hands on. Birds of Prey has intelligent, funny, human writing in a superhero world. The women in this do wear clothing that a normal woman would bounce out of, but hey, maybe superhero boobs don't jiggle. Who am I to judge?


True Story: Swear to God - This is a true life romance. The writer of this comic book fell in love with a woman and moved halfway across the world to be with her. This comic is a tribute to their love, and is very well written.


Fallen Angel - This is not a comic that I thought I would enjoy. It comes to close to the extreme violence category, even has a mature audiences warning label on it. But this comic is a wonderfully well written story of a tortured woman who tries to rid herself of her torment by helping(sometimes) others. At first, it is hard to tell if she is the "good guy", but as more and more of her story unfolds you begin to realize who she is.


PS238 - Very possibly one of my new favorite things of all time! This book is cute, sweet, hilarious, and moving. It is about a school for "metaprodigy" children of superheroes. It eventually turns towards the one normal child. His parents are superheroes and are convinced that SOMEDAY his abilities will show so they put him in this school full of superhero kids.


Apparently all you have to do is put love, kids, or strong women in a book and I love it.