What got you into comic books in the first place?

[DonovanMore]

I have been a comic geek since I was very very young, maybe as early as 3 or 4 years old. I was introduced to Spider-man on the PBS show the Electric Company. I remember making my Mom read Spider-man comics to me as bedtime stories. Somewhere ( I am desperately searching for it) I even have a photograph of me as a small child sitting on Spider-man's lap at a toy store grand opening.

[Cam63]

The '60s Batman and the '50s Superman TV shows.

[Mylazycat]

Amazing Spider-Man. The look of the costume, those villians, the sopa opera element, the drama. It was all so exciting to me as a kid. Then came Batman, Flash, Hulk, JLA, ect.

[Basque]

It's weird for me.

I had an interest in comic books when I was a kid, but for a number of reason wasn't really able to get heavily into them. Mostly, my parents couldn't afford it. But also I lived in a rural area with no access to a comic book store, and also a French-speaking area where super-hero comics weren't as popular as "bandes dessinées" like Tintin or Astérix.

So as a kid, other than those French albums, I only read a few random Spider-Man, Thor and Captain America comics. Like totally random single issues right in the middle of longer storylines, so that none of it really made much sense to me. They all ended with "to be continued" and I never found out what happened next.

Then I grew up and forgot about comics. Had a few brushes with "graphic novels" and indie comics during my 20s. And then one day, for no apparent reason, now in my early 30s, I decided to go to a book store and pick up a copy of Watchmen. I read it and love it and it made me want to read more DC books. I started getting trades and then eventually started getting single issues, and now I'm hooked.

As far as I can tell, there was NOTHING to trigger this sudden interest in the medium. It came out of nowhere. I guess some co-workers were into super-hero comic books and I heard them talk about them, so maybe that's where the idea came from. But it was pretty random and I'm amazed at how quickly I got sucked into it.

[Teal_Lantern]

I started reading manga and than grew an interest towards Superheroes, mainly due to JLU and Batman Begins. Eventually, I found a shop, started reading Marvel, than DC, and now want to read any comic that's good from any publisher.

[AndrewCrossett]

I was a casual comics reader as a kid in the 70's... a grab bag of stuff from horror/weird to Disney to superhero... but I never really followed anything, and in my early teens I sold my whole collection at a garage sale and never bought another comic until around ten years ago.

It was "Transmetropolitan" that hooked me. I used to go past the comics wall at the store where I went to buy D&D gaming stuff. One of the Transmet covers caught my eye (#22), so I bought it, and shortly after I went and got the first TPB.

From there I branched into the other Vertigo stuff, and on to lots of other titles... though "Birds of Prey" was the only superhero title I read until pretty recently. I mostly preferred (and still do) the indie stuff... Dark Horse, Oni, Image. I also made a list of recommended graphic novels and started working through them.

One of my friends/co-workers was a comics artist, and we made plans to try and create a graphic novel for me to write and him to draw. It never happened, although we got most of an issue finished. (I still have one of the pages framed on my cubicle wall.)

Now I have far, far more comics and TPB's and graphic novels that I have room for.

[Gaelforce]

As a girl, I could never find any role models for me to look up to (60s/70s). All the women were these dainty princesses or damsels in distress, and I was a tomboy who wanted adventure.

I saw Wonder Woman on the cover of her comic book (as well as on the cover of JLA doing the same thing the *men* were doing!) and I was hooked. Here was a woman proving that a girl could be just as tough and as strong as the guys.

It's why I love the original Star Wars so much - first time I ever saw a woman grab a gun and shoot back

[Dream]

I watched B:TAS, 90's Spider-man, and X-men: TAS. I loved the Phantom film. And one day I bought a random lot of comics at a swap-meet. It included issues of Amazing Spider-man and Spider-man during Maximum Carnage, Mark Waid's Flash including the Return of Barry Allen, JLI, Superboy, Classic X-men, Silver Surfer, various Bat-books, Superman, West Coast Avengers, Green Lantern, and Justice League when Nuklon, Yazz, and Metamorpho were on the team. I read these over and over for a couple of years, but I didn't start buying a monthly until Ultimate Spider-man.

[AndrewG]

I used to spend a lot of time up in Montreal when I was younger for the summer and winter (25 years ago). My grandparents didn't have cable so we were limited to 2 television channels in English one of which was always news or sports so I read a lot. Started pulling comics off the spinner racks: Superman, Batman, Spider-Man.

A couple years later I found myself really enjoying the Spider-Man and Star Wars comics and going to the local grocery store or newstand to pick them up regularly until I discovered the joy that was a comic store. Haven't stopped reading since

It was after I started reading that I took notice of the cartoons and stuff

[scout1279]

I loved superheroes pretty much since I was a toddler. Spider-Man on the Electric Company, which I don't even remember watching now, was huge for me. So, it was definitely TV that got me into superheroes.

It was my brother that got me into comics though. He always had tons of them lying around, and one day I was annoying him, I was about 10, and he just said, "You like Spider-Man, right? Read this." I fell in love with superhero comics and have been hooked ever since.

My brother's did really solve the annoying kid sister problem though, as after that he had to deal with me constantly stealing his comics and asking endless questions about the characters.