FCBD IS NEAR:
Not sure what the letters FCBD stand for? It’s simple, it stands for Free Comic Book Day. I’ve talked about the day lots of times before in my blogs.
www.shakefire.com/blogs/lee-roberts/2010/04/30/free-comic-book-day-is-here-and-who-are-the-artists-that-i-like
The day is getting closer and closer, 57 days away as of today Friday March 9 2012. It might seem like it’s still far enough away that I shouldn’t be talking about it but I want to start early to get people more aware of this glorious day where we get some free comic books and if you’re lucky some other swag. So here are just a few of the titles that will be coming out on FCBD.
Avengers Age of Ultron Point One
DC Comics New 52 #1 Special Edition
Peanuts Adventure Time Flipbook
Star Wars/Serenity (now for the Fanboys of these 2 are not meeting it’s a half in half book where Star Wars is one story in half the book and flip the book over/around and Serenity will be the other half, 2 separate stories, guess that would have been easier to say)
Zombie Kid
Buffy the Guild
DC Nation Superman Family Flipbook
There’s a lot more titles that are being given away on FCBD, these are just some of the titles that has caught my attention that are the big ones. By the time that it’s about 2 weeks out from the day itself there will be a whole lot more titles added to the list. Also when the day gets closer I’ll talk some more about it and give some guidelines as to how to handle yourself on FCBD but until then this just serves as a appetizer to wet you fanboy sides.
Oh here’s the link to the site to get more info and a newsletter.
www.freecomicbookday.com/Home/1/1/27/992
COUNTDOWN TO BEING 50 YEARS OLD:
No not me, Spider-Man! That’s right the year of 2012 marks the milestone of my favorite character turning 50 years old. It was August 1962 when the great Stan Lee and Steve Ditko introduced the world to the Amazing Spider-Man in the comic title Amazing Fantasy #15. With that in mind I’m going to do one moment in Spiderman history as the month of August slowly (yet quickly) approaches to honor and remind everyone why Spidey is such a cool character.
In this blog the first will be the first appearance of Spidey in Amazing Fantasy #15. Without this issue there would be no Spider-Man, no web shooters, no Parker luck, no MJ, no Gwen (even though there is no Gwen now), and so much more. Other than it being the first appearance of the wall crawler what else makes this issue so good? Well, first off this was the first issue of the re-titling from Amazing Adult Fantasy to just Amazing Fantasy. Though it was Steve Ditko that did all the artwork on the inside of the issue it was Jack Kirby that Stan Lee had pencil the cover for Amazing Fantasy and Steve Ditko inked it. This was also the last (kind of) issue for the title. In 1962 the Amazing Fantasy title was canceled with issue #15, lucky for the world and me that the appearance of Spider-Man was done because it was thought that nothing else could be lost considering it was the end of the title anyways. So for 33 years the title had stayed at only 15 issues but in 1995 Amazing Fantasy was 3 more issues (which I’m not going to go into because this is about issue #15).
Some other notable facts about this issue, it was the first appearance of Aunt May Parker, first and really only true appearance of living Uncle Ben, first for Flash Thompson and Liz Allen, and it’s the first showing of the web shooters. We get to see that Spidey was going to use his powers like any typical teenager would, especially one who has always been made fun of for being weak, as well as one that was poor, he used the powers he got to become a famous wrestler. Though we all know the story, because of the fame and money he wanted it allowed the burglar to kill Uncle Ben and set Peter/Spider-Man on his destiny to becoming the best superhero in the Marvel Universe.
CHARACTER OF THE WEEK #11:
Beta Ray Bill is this weeks cool character. I’ve always liked this character and he’s been underused in my opinion because up until 1983 with issue #337 of Thor there had never been any other character to pick up the hammer Mjlonir. There used to be written on the hammer inscription saying that anyone who was worthy of the hammer would be able to lift it and get the power of Thor. Guess what, Beta Ray Bill, this monstrous looking alien with the horse skull looking face was the first to ever life Mjlonir to get the power of Thor and technically becoming Beta Ray Thor. What makes this character so cool is that he was the first character to ever lift Thors hammer and not only lift it but Odin had Bill fight Thor to the death to settle who had the rights to claim Mjlonir and the power of Thor. In that fight Bill stood toe to toe with Thor where in the end both warriors where knocked out but Bill came to first, saving Thor from a death by lava because to Bill Thor was too honorable and worthy a warrior that he deserved better than death. Odin did what I still consider amazing for a character, he bestowed on Beta Ray Bill his own hammer, Stormbreaker, a hammer that is equal to Mjlonir, and grants Bill the power of Thor. By the way, I still have my four issues of Thor #337-340 that are the first appearance of Beta Ray Bill.
