I used to have a bit of a comic book problem.

Back in the mid-to-late 90s, I lived in Los Angeles about a mile away from an absolutely amazing comics shop run by a pair of guys who were very good at talking me into trying new series and checking out old ones that I’d missed.  At the same time, I was going on a bit of a nostalgia kick for the comics I’d read as a kid.

The end result was that, by the time I moved OUT of Los Angeles, I owned about 7,000 comics, all neatly cataloged in a database, all sealed away in protective bags and boxes and the like.

I kept collecting for a year or two, but not with quite the same fervor.  This was a period where DC was actually doing me a favor by canceling titles that I had read and enjoyed and I wasn’t picking up new things because I didn’t have the same pair of pushers talking me in to trying new things.

After that, my interest kind of waned.  I’d pick up the occasional graphic novel from Barnes and Nobel, but that was about it.  I stopped doing THAT after I bought into the Infinite Crisis hype, read it and realized that DC had gone screaming off the deep end in an effort to be, I dunno, gritty or something.

Then I hit a point where I needed to move again, this time for school, realized that moving 7,000 comics represented a startling amount of both space and weight, and started purging the heck out of them.  The first batch, carefully screened to make sure that they were all-ages appropriate, went to Goodwill.  Subsequent batches have gone to comics shops or into recycling bins.

Yes, recycling bins.  When I was a small child and buying comics that cost 40 cents each, the local comic shop had a standard buyback for any comic book: They would give you a nickel each in case or ten cents in credit.  Now that I am a grown man and comic books cost $3.00 each, they still offer the same nickel each or ten cents in credit.  I’d rather get nothing and put the paper back into circulation.  But I digress.

I still have a single plastic storage bin full of comics that I haven’t been able to replace with digital versions.  Some of these I may never be able to replace, but it’s still a lot less to move the next time.

Anyway, I have written an awful lot of words here about how I have completely kicked the comics bug, which makes the following just a little vexing:

I was browsing a forum thread about the latest Bat-movie and someone posted the following page, taken completely out of context, and I thought it was brilliant – it was actually FUNNY, which is something that I don’t take for granted from comics any more, and  I may just have to track down wherever this came from and read the rest of it.

Seriously, there’s just something about the faces in this.  Must read more.