What’s the big deal on comic books?

Comics lets us be "kids" again. My daughter and I would read "Elf Quest" together. "When I divorced, I took what was "important to me: Two suitcases of clothes, my bicycle and my small stack of comics. Now I enjoy them with my Grandchildren and Great Granchildren. I have been called many derogatory names in my life, but as a retired military pilot, "geek, nerd, or loser" was not one of them.

Diamond Comics was one of the world’s largest comic book in 2009, graphic book and merchandise distributors, sent out about 80 million comic books and 15 million graphic novels to shops.

It’s not just geeky, teenage boys reading the comics. Buyers include include teenage girls, university students and professionals in their 40s, comic book shop owners and industry experts say.

Many people, including Mike Van Houten, started reading comic books as children. Van Houten, who has owned Oxford Comic Books in Atlanta, Georgia, for 30 years, still remembers the first comics he purchased.

"I started collecting comic books when I was a little kid, maybe 12 years old. I went into an old-timey drug store — it still had a counter that had a malt shop –and back in the back it had a rack of comics," he said. "I remember buying three comics, all Marvel. "Fantastic Four," "Captain America," and "Spiderman," and I fell in love with them."

But comic books weren’t always designed to attract children’s allowance dollars. American comics started out in the 1930s as a successful way to sell newspapers, said Mike Richardson, CEO of Dark Horse Comics.

"The Sunday paper was literally wrapped in funnies to get peoplp to buy that newspaper as opposed to the competition," he said. "The comic strips were so fashionable that two salesmen had the idea to repackage them."

After the accomplishment of Action Comics No.1, which was the first appearance of Superman — and a failed comic strip, Richardson pointed out — a flood of copycat superhero comic books appeared.

"For a lot of years comics were taken as children’s entertainment," Richardson said. "But we’ve seen the graying of the comic book audience. Because we have an older clientele, the subject topic has matured. There was a poll done recently that said comic readers are more likely to be in their mid 20s than 12 or younger."

In Japan, people have enjoyed comics since the time of Emperor Meji. These days, it is not uncommon to see businessmen, grandmothers and school kids all reading comic books on subways and trains.

Yoshimura Kazuma, the chief researcher of the Manga Museum in Kyoto, Japan, said the cartoon form is appealing since it offers a "more unique expression than a movie or a novel."

The "transformation, exaggeration and omissions" that the images in comics make convey information on multiple levels, and is similar to the way Chinese writing is ideographic script, he said.

The equal of a comic book in Japan is called "manga." Manga is a mainstay of
Japanese publishing, taking the form of magazines or even small paperback books. These printed cartoons follow a similar structure to American comic books, but have evolved to appeal to Japanese sensibilities and include a wide variety of topics. Manga can encompass just about any genre: science fiction, horror, fantasy, comedy, action, sports, fashion, geared toward young women or men, and even graphic and adult content in some cases.

"It’s like Cheers in here," said Bell of his shop. "It’s some place people can come to and hang out and chat about their favorite comics. Things they can’t get to at home or at work," he said. "The community is rising. A lot of people don’t like to admit they like comics."

I think the top engineers and scientists may have been inspired when they read comic books as children. Then they grew up and are making contributions to the real world. If you’re still reading comic books as an adult, the odds are that you’re not contributing much.