Free Comic Book Day 2023

 Clearly I haven’t blogged about comics in some time. Well.

A few weeks back it was once again Free Comic Book Day! I happened to be traveling this year, so I didn’t visit a comic book store that day, but the following Thursday I did, after I got back home. I headed to South Tampa Comics, which opened just down the street from me last year (I’ve bought many graphic novels from them, and you can find many reviews at Goodreads from the results). Since I was already planning to Midtown the bulk of my catch-up, and couldn’t expect to find any of the FCBD comics at the store (typically they’re only available that Saturday, and Sunday after it), I didn’t expect to pick up any of this year’s releases there, but it turns out I could, and some from last year’s Trick or Read (another free comics promotion geared toward kids). In years past at another local shop, they’d have selections from prior years and other such events, so that was nice. And of course I took advantage of Midtown, too, and that box arrived on Tuesday.

So here’s what I got!

• Best of the Mighty Marvel Backlist (Marvel) 
• Animal Castle Volume Two (Ablaze)
• Uncanny Avengers (Marvel)
• The Best Comic Ever!! (2000 AD)
• Choujin X (Viz)
• Clark & Lex/Fann Club: Batman Club (DC)
• Conan the Barbarian (Titan)
• Crimebuster  (Comic House)
• Dawn of DC Primer (DC)
• Dawn of DC: Knight Terrors Special Edition (DC) This is DC’s latest publishing event, like Future State, Convergence, and Flashpoint before it taking over the publishing slate for a few months.
• Dog Man and the League of Misfits (Scholastic)
• The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers (Fantagraphics)
• Fishflies (Image) New from Jeff Lemire.
• Girl Taking Over (DC)
• I Am Stan Lee (Ten Speed Press)
• Marvel Voices (Marvel)
• Mexikid: A Graphic Memoir (Dial Books)
• Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur (Marvel) Trick or Read
• Ranger Academy (Boom!) As in Power Rangers.
• The Sacrificers (Image) New from Rick Remender.
• Shadowman: Darque Legacy (Valiant) Valiant has undergone tons of publishing turmoil in recent years, and releases very few comics these days, so it’s just nice to see them still in the game.
• Smurfs 65th Anniversary (Papercutz) They’re not just from the ‘80s cartoon!
• The Amazing Spider-Man (Marvel) Trick or Read reprint featuring Queen Goblin.
• Spider-Man/Venom (Marvel)
• Star Trek (IDW) Featuring a crossover event called “Day of Blood.”
• Star Wars: Doctor Aphra (Marvel) Trick or Read
• Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures (Dark Horse) IDW and Dark Horse have gotten to publish young readers comics in the current Marvel age.
• Strange Academy (Marvel) Trick or Read
• The Umbrella Academy (Dark Horse)
• We Are Legends Special Edition (DC)

At Midtown I also ordered a few backlog FCBD offerings (which were no longer free):

Carriers (Red 5) From last year. Red 5 used to be the publisher of Atomic Robo, and dependably released a new Robo comic every FCBD, but Robo went to IDW and then online. I wanted to pick this up last year since it included a preview of Bëorn from Ben Bender, who’s in my Twitter feed. Bender’s art is very reminiscent of Bill Watterson.

We Are Humanoids Featuring The Incal (Humanoids) This is from 2020, the FCBD that played out in stages throughout the summer of that year. I didn’t participate that year, making it the first FCBD I missed completely since discovering the event at Newbury Comics in Burlington, MA in 2005 (the event itself began several years earlier).

Now of course typically a comic book store will limit the number of free comics you can pick up, so if you have your eyes on multiple releases you have to hit multiple stores (which I’ve done), unless you’re Zimmies that one year and passed out huge bags with all the comics. Or order from Midtown. I like to support the local shops (besides South Tampa Comics there are two other stores close by that I visited on past FCBDs). I bought comics from Midtown and at South Tampa while scooping up the freebies. Spent too much. Not just saying that! What I really missed this year was experiencing the line! Typically FCBD will draw people who don’t normally go to a comic book store (which is the whole point), and you get to listen to whatever it is they talk about while you wait. I always like this experience. Of course, Marvel tends to release a movie that weekend, too (this year was the third Guardians of the Galaxy, in which animals were digitally harmed). It’s a whole thing! My brother-in-law had no idea about it! So maybe next year…