Diving into New Fandoms

...because my life is not already filled to the max with my current fandoms.

Well, perhaps not the MAX, but I am part of quite a few fandoms and now it is time for me to jump into one that I have avoided specifically for the past three years and when I think about it, probably most of my life. What fandom is this you say? The fandom of...comic books.

At this point, it only makes sense that I attempt to join the world of comic books properly. When I was younger (9 to 12ish, I think), I would watch the cartoon versions of Spiderman, X-men, and Batman all the time. In fact, when I discovered that Spiderman and X-men were available on Netflix, I was a bit too excited for a 22 year old. I've always enjoyed the super hero movies that I watched. And finally, my best friend from college is a big comic book fan.

I'm surprised that I lasted this long.

But, there were a few things holding me back. When you take a look at the comic book world, there is just so much in it. Even if it gets narrowed down to one specific brand or one superhero, there's years of comic books and hundreds of story lines. Where should I start? What are considered the "original" story lines that people always claim that a certain adaptation did "the right way?"

So I asked my friend about a month ago, what should I do to get into comic books and how do I find the "original" stories?

Apparently, there is no way to get the supposed original stories via a comic book because so few people have even touched those comic books, much less read them. At least, this is what she told me (actually I think she may have used the words "privileged to have touched them"). So I said goodbye to reading those original stories via an physical comic book. Instead, she told me to just pick up some comic books and start reading from there. There's so many story lines and there have been countless reboots that you just need to start somewhere.

With that in mind, I went to a flea market and bought 20 comic books that had superheros that I liked or if they had cool looking covers, because sometimes I like pretty things. That was about two weeks ago and I have yet to actually start any. I'm not quite sure what I am waiting for. I've only read Watchmen recently, so that it could be my first jump into comics but I haven't done anything from there.

At some point, I'm just going to jump into it all, which is something that I sometimes have a hard time doing. I want to find the correct way to start something or the path to follow, but that's not how things always work out. You just have to jump in and hope to figure things out along the way. Not just with fandoms or hobbies, but with everything. The fear, or at least the "holding back," won't be helpful. You might as well look like an idiot for a little while instead of not experiencing something at all.

I may blog along the way of my adventures as a first time comic book reader, but most likely it will just be a lot of tweeting instead.

Also, update on my 30 book challenge, I am failing miserably. Apparently, it takes me about 1.5 to 2 days to get through a book. I decided to tweak it a bit. It's now 26 books in 30 (ish) days. The 'ish' being an extra 5 days, give or take. It's still a lot of books in a short amount of time and that was the whole point.