I read an article today that made me really angry. It’s an article about comic books, and how they should have more readers, and how they’re these wonderful things full of imagination and great story. And then the author ruins it by being a complete jerk about it. The article’s title is “Buy A F***ing Comic Book”, and it’s about as friendly as you’d expect. I originally started writing this as a comment on the article itself, but then decided to just turn it into a full blow article of my own, so here we are.

For the most part, it’s a really good, smart article that says great stuff about comic books. I even forgot the article’s title while reading it, until I got to this part at the end:

“But, you know what? F*** that. This is all your fault, not theirs. Comic books do all the heavily lifting. Artists, writers, editors, letterers, inkers, colorists, publishers, all of them working their asses off to produce amazing works of art and you expect them to beg for your attention? No. No more. Stop your b****ing about Hollywood’s endless remakes and television’s s***ty Fall schedule. Stop wondering all where the creative, intelligent creators have gone.”

You don’t get to say this. People don’t read comic books because comic books don’t get advertised. Sure, there are adaptations and people know they’re based on comics, but these adaptations don’t actually make people read more comics, at least not in significant numbers. There are TV commercials for a new Batman toy, or a new Batman movie, or a new Batman TV show. Batman merchandise is readily available in major store chains like Old Navy and Hot Topic for the customer to see, hitting a wide range of demographics. But there are no TV commercials for Batman comic books. And outside of Barnes and Noble, I can’t think of a big chain store that carries them. (I’m talking about individual issues, not the collected editions.)

This isn’t the old days of news stands and grocery store checkout lines, where comics are everywhere and cheap. Comics are a niche market, with a product that’s pretty expensive for what it gives you. I can go on iTunes and buy the latest episode of Arrow in HD for $2.99. An episode of Arrow is over 40 minutes long, and took many, many man hours from writers, actors, directors, crew, editors, and more all to make it happen. That’s 40 minutes of uninvolved entertainment that I can just sit back and enjoy for a low price. I can also buy the latest issue of Green Arrow for $2.99. That’s about 10-15 minutes of entertainment that depends on the rate I personally can consume it. That’s as low as potentially ¼ of the escapism time for the same price. At the same time, I could not buy Arrow, and just watch it when it comes on. Highly advertised, the producers go out of their way to make sure I know about it, and it’s there. If I have a TV, I get that for free, 40 minutes of entertainment every single week, not 10-15 minutes I have to pay for monthly.

We live in a world that’s over saturated with entertainment options. I can spend hours watching funny videos on YouTube, or hop on Netflix and marathon a whole TV show, or start up a video game and the next thing I know it’s sundown. Comic books demand that I keep up to date with them on my own, with very little help, and go out of my way to hunt them down. In terms of awareness, there is very little. Comic books are a thing that exists, and the media likes to pretend they care about them once in a while so they can rile people up (“Longtime American icon who you’re only just now hearing about, Ms. Marvel, is a Muslim!”) because the media is terrible. Everything else is given to the consumer. I can turn on TV and get TV. I go on YouTube and get related videos. If somebody makes a movie I’m going to like, they make damn sure I’m aware of it. And everyone sees it. And everyone talks about it, so the few people that don’t see it hear about it very quickly. I’ve never listened to Miley Cyrus’s “Wrecking Ball” and have no intention to, but I damn sure know about it. I know the imagery, I know at least one lyric, I know the cultural context, because even as somebody who goes out of their way to evade the mainstream news, so many people talk about it and so many pictures of it exist that I can’t ignore it. The producers of popular content make their content available and they make it known, and they make sure people want to consume it, so everybody talks about it.

But when people are talking about comics, it’s mostly awkward nerds like me or demanding jerks like the writer of this article, and that turns them off to it. I’ve heard countless stories of people who have walked into comic book shops and made to feel like they weren’t welcome because they didn’t pass the employees’ (or worse, the owner’s) made-up standards for who is worthy to read comics. And even though geek is chic and all that garbage, there’s still this stigma about people who read comics.

So no, the burden is not on the consumer to go out of their way to try and get into comics when comics make it really hard for them compared to everything else. It’s all a big competition, and comics aren’t playing the game right. Now I realize that a lot of independent publishers can’t really advertise their stuff, but DC and Marvel could easily make a TV commercial or two advertising their books, and that alone would get more people into the comic book stores, rather than these flash in the pan press releases about a major iconic character that go away after a day or two.

Comic books have an image problem. The little attention they get is usually bad attention. And to top it off, it’s a very insular community, full of problems like sexism and a generally exclusionary nature on the behalf of both industry professionals and fans alike that drives people away. Even an actual published professional like Noelle Stevenson still faces discrimination on the consumer level from people who frankly have no business being in customer service, just because she’s a woman. And then there’s no positive image help coming from the major companies themselves. They’re content to stay locked away in their own little world, pandering to the same niche they always have, and while they do show improvement, what progress they do make goes very, VERY slowly.

For now, it’s up to us comic book readers to get more people to read. And you’re not gonna do it like this. You’re not gonna make people want to read comic books by berating them, and telling them to go fuck themselves, and yelling about how it’s all their fault that your precious comics aren’t bigger than Jesus. You want to get people to read comics? Get yourself and be nice about it. Because for all that wonderful stuff you’ve said about the medium, your yelling at people about it just ruins it. You want to get people interested in comics? Here’s how I like to do it:

Question: Who saw the Guardians of the Galaxy trailer?

How fun does that look? Are you gonna go see it? Just like I saw Iron Man, and Thor, and Captain America, and the Avengers, and all that good stuff. Marvel makes some really great movies. I’ve never read a Guardians of the Galaxy comic myself, but this movie definitely makes me interested. It looks like fun.

But you know, if you like stuff like this, you should check out an actual comic book sometime. I know, comics are kind of confusing and hard to get into, but really, it’s as simple as picking up something and going. Don’t let big numbers fool you. Not every issue #28 requires you to read all 27 previous issues. Lots of them are in new stories, or it’ll just feel like coming in halfway through a TV episode.

But why should you read comics? Well, for every cool comic book movie or TV show there is, the original comic books were kind of testing grounds for these cool stories. Sure, Hollywood takes its creative liberties, but they still borrow from the original comics, which have the stories that make it into the movies and so much more. For example, do you like the X-Men? Did you grow up watching X-Men cartoons or movies and really enjoy them? Do you ever want to see more with those characters? There are a lot of options. Really, there’s something for everybody as far as X-Men goes. You just have to pick your flavor. Maybe you just like Wolverine being a badass. There are two different series for that: Wolverine and Savage Wolverine. Maybe you want to start with just Wolverine. It’s just started with issue #1 very recently, so it’s the easiest to just get in on the ground floor with.

Maybe you like cool espionage stuff, but with the addition of superpowered mutants. For you, there’s X-Force.

Maybe you’re sick of comics being a boys club and wanna see the ladies do all of the ass-kicking. The current X-Men series features an all-female cast.

Or maybe you’re like me and enjoy fun, light-hearted adventure, in which case you should totally check out Amazing X-Men.

That’s not even all of the X-Men comics out there, but there’s that much diversity among one franchise from one company! There really is a comic for everybody. Do you like the cartoon Adventure Time? There’s a great all-ages comic of it!

Maybe you like fun quirky comedy, but with a dark, twisted sense of humor? Harley Quinn is definitely for you.

Maybe you like monsters, magic, and mythology? In that case, you could check out Wonder Woman or Thor: God of Thunder. And if you’re not into superheroes, there’s even a book about the Krampus from Image Comics just titled Krampus! It’s really good.

Maybe you like ghosts and horror? Well there’s lots of options from the major publishers, but the great thing about comic books is that there are also small independent creators just putting out the stories they love. I really like the Comixology-exclusive horror comic Tara Normal. I just wish it had an actual release schedule instead of the creator only being able to put it out when he has the time to make it, because it’s really good.

Maybe you want something that speaks to you as a sexual being. Lots of comic fans think that Sex Criminals is the bee’s knees.

And this is all just stuff currently being released right now. There’s tons of great old stuff out there. Do you like foul-mouthed, semi-anarchic, intelligently-written humor that you would never want grandma to see? Transmetropolitan is calling for you.

Maybe you want something grounded in reality, a piece of history, something that calls back to the old days of noir and some good old-fashioned crime drama? I think you’d like Jew Gangster.

My point is this: Comics are a wonderland of imagination, a fantastic medium where there’s something for everybody. Whether you just want to see Batman do Batman things (and believe me, there are a LOT of books where Batman does Batman things) or you want something human, something meaningful and artistic and well-written, there are a ton of options. It’s not always easy to get into, I’ll admit that. But it’s well worth it. And for every one person who tries getting in your way or tries judging you, there’s somebody really nice and really cool who’s willing to help you get in there and find something you’ll love. Don’t be afraid to look, and even more importantly, don’t be afraid to ask.

Comic books are for everybody, no matter what their image says. Somewhere in all of those pages, pictures, and words, there’s a gem that you’ll appreciate more than anybody else. You just gotta dig in.