Newsgroup: it.fan.tv.buffy
Titolo: How to Get Your Girlfriend Into Comics

:-)))
http://www.buffy.nu/article.php3?id_article=5802
Was it Al Bundy or a bumper sticker that said  Women - you can t live with
them you can t make them read comics?  Maybe it was neither. We all know
how complex women can be. At times they can even be downright difficult,
when it comes to things that are unfamiliar. Most women are a little
adverse to the realm of comic books because of the stigma attached to it by
stereotypes like the Comic Book Guy in the Simpsons, but I am here to help
you, should your choose to accept your mission. Granted, my introduction to
comics is a little hard to believe, but I swear on the Necronomicon, it s
all true. Growing up in Chicago, the only people I knew that read comic
books were girls. I didn t know a single guy who would go near the stuff,
so I thought it was a girl thing until after I graduated college. I m
living proof the rumors are all true- women do, in fact, read comic books
and some of us even work on them.
Neil Gaiman, in his Eisner Awards speech last year, put it best:  We are,
right now, this minute, in a golden age. There are, quite simply, more good
comics available to be read than there ever have been before. More classic
books, more good books of recent vintage.  Keep this in mind when looking
back at previous attempts to woo the fairer sex into our little subculture.
Some women are just going to be stubborn about the whole thing and I
obviously cannot make any guarantees, but if there was ever a point in
recent history to try, now is the time. You and I both know that comics are
so worth the rest of the world reading, but some people just don t take to
it the way others do and I can t pinpoint exactly why, but we can try.
More women have started getting interested in comic books since 1997 than
at any previous point in this art form s short history. Because of this,
the last seven years have provided us with even more opportunities to make
this valiant effort to show them what they have been missing all these
years. Why 1997 you ask? Good, you re paying attention.
In 1997, a young blond woman, instead of being chased down and bitten by a
vampire, turned around and slew him. Joss Whedon s  Buffy the Vampire
Slayer  premiered on television despite being based on a movie that had a
less than enthusiastic popularity. Joss created Buffy because he thought it
would be more fun to watch a girl kick a demon s butt than to watch her be
a meal. The female audience started to pay attention and the numbers grew.
Fans of the show started picking up the comic book versions and attending
conventions - while they were there, they started to notice that there were
other things that also interested them. I didn t start watching the show
until the second season, but I fell hard for the style and characters. Now,
I will follow Whedon to the edges of space, hoping he will protect us from
the Reavers. If that last sentence makes no sense, I insist that you go
rent/buy the Firefly series immediately. You are missing out on one of the
best shows that ever was on television, but I ll continue on that rant at
another time.
In the beginning of 1998, two stoners who previously just hung out on film
in front of a Quick Stop appeared on the pages of a comic book by Oni
Press. Some of the fans of Kevin Smith followed him into the realm of
comics with his first book  Jay & Silent Bob In: Walt Flanagan s Dog.  Even
more surprising, some of them were women. One of the reasons most give for
liking Kevin Smith is that his dialogue sounds more like how people really
talk. I actually was won over with Kevin after reading the credits from
Clerks. He just seemed to be more like a guy I would have grown up with as
opposed to the larger than life filmmakers like George Lucas. I can
personally attest to this as a valid way to come to comics, since this was
the first comic I ever read. I then picked up  Daredevil  and realized that
there were references that I didn t understand. I made friends with a guy
who had a whole box of them and started reading. From there I followed
crossover characters into their own comics and then met more people who
introduced me to other comics. Just like Kevin thanked Walt for introducing
him to Batman, I must thank Matt for doing the same.
The third (and sadly the last) major influence happened in 2000 when a
director who didn t read comics tried directing an adaptation of a popular
comic book called  X-Men.  There was a burst of women coming out of the
woodwork for two main reasons. There were women with super powers holding
their own and these newly converted female fans  interest was peaked by
this good looking yet misunderstood Wolverine creature. This movie also
opened the floodgates of having more comic book movies made than ever
before. We got the good (Hellboy) with the bad (Punisher). It was simply
amazing how the trend started and comic book characters were the thing to
do. It was about time that Marvel stood up to DC in the film department.
Now DC just needs to learn that nipples on the Batsuit is a huge neon sign
that maybe the director isn t the best choice. Heaven only knows if the
Watchmen movie will ever come to pass, let alone be any good. Unless maybe
if Peter Jackson tried...hmmm...Rorschach goodness...sorry... where was I?)
Now that I ve laid the background info down for you, let s move on to your
particular lady fair. The first thing you need to do is a little
investigative reporting. Make some notes about her current reading and
viewing habits, as well as the styles and types of things that she likes
both in literature and art. Don t lose heart if you realize she only reads
romance novels and watches reality television, we can work with that. If
she isn t a big reader at all, it will be a bit more of an effort. Some
women will be a bit more open to it than others. The ones who lean more
that way got swept up with Buffy or X-Men by now.
It s not going to be an overnight change to her running out to buy a Wonder
Woman outfit. It all depends on the woman. Will Eisner, an icon in the
comic book industry and the father of the graphic novel, is married to a
wonderful woman named Ann who was asked a few years ago on a panel when she
read  The Spirit  for the first time.  The Spirit  was Will Eisner s most
notable work, which he had been writing since before he met her after World
War II. She sat and thought about it for a moment and said,  It was about
two years ago, I believe.  The Eisners are from an entirely different
generation, though, so don t lose all hope. The other women on this panel
of creator s wives all seem to be interested in comics if not working by
their side. There is a great book called,  I Have to Live with This Guy  by
Blake Bell. Not required reading, but you might want to check it out. It is
all stories from the wives  perspectives of their comic book creating
husbands. Excuse me, but you didn t hear a thing I just said after Wonder
Woman outfit, did you? Fine, think about it for a moment and then when
you re ready continue reading.
Much like drugs, certain comics work better than others to get people
hooked on. I m sure your first instinct is to hand her your favorite arc or
graphic novel, but it s not going to go over well if you hand her  Kingdom
Come  or, god forbid,  Watchmen  right off the bat.  Kingdom Come  is
phenomenal, but if you don t know who Captain Marvel is well, it s a little
hard to follow and  Watchmen , while considered by some to be one of the
greatest graphic novels ever written, is a bit thick and cumbersome to get
through, not to mention a bit gory in spots. One of my friends is still
pissed at me for just relaying Rorschach s origin story to her over dinner.
My bad. You can t start her off the hard stuff until you ve gotten her
hooked on some  gateway  comics. Now, you may have her read something that
you are morally opposed to like an Ultimate series or a book you think is
just mediocre at best. It s for the greater good, I assure you. The more
people that read comics, the better the world will be. So, suck it up now
and prepare yourself to possible pick her up something unpleasant like a
movie adaptation comic *shudders.*
As most anyone will tell you, it is important to know your audience. So,
before I start recommending which comic books you should hand her, you need
to find out which of the following categories she falls into as to why she
doesn t read comics: she s not interested in super heroes, there are no
stories written for women, there are no stories written by women, comics
are for kids, that type of artwork doesn t interest her, it s too much of a
commitment to keep track of an on-going storyline, it s too technical based
like science-fiction, it s part of a sub-culture that she doesn t want any
part of, she prefers to read  real  books or her ex-boyfriend/brother tried
to get her to read them and she hated it. If the last one is why she
doesn t then, well, you re screwed.
Now, put your Daily Bugle or Daily Planet hat on and go do some
investigative reporting. Come back next week and I ll show you which books
you can use to persuade her to read, depending on the information you
gathered. You re still thinking about the Wonder Woman outfit aren t you? 
Jolan Tru
-- 
Filippo "Hytok" Simone - L'oracolo sampdoriano di Sunnydale
La Casa degli Elfi 
http://members.xoom.virgilio.it/hyterdeflok/
Commissione Voyager 
http://www.voyageritalia.com/
http://www.ussexcalibur.it/

 
http://www.buffy.nu/article.php3?id_article=5802
mah, bella minc*iata...
vagamente misogino e fissato coi supereroi