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<\/a><\/p>\nI look forward to seeing parents take their kids to HCF tomorrow.\u00a0 Things have changed substantially since I was a kid begging my mom to take me in search of comics.\u00a0 Back in that day comic books were considered the fare for the young, the weak-minded, and the emotionally stunted.\u00a0 All the cool kids played football and found a way to get beers for a night of underage drinking.\u00a0 Reading comics was more of an underground activity that one hid, or at least down-played, if one knew what was good for one.\u00a0 The idea of things fantastic as a reasonable pursuit either as a hobby or as a vocation was frowned upon.<\/p>\n
Somehow Halloween broke this otherwise inflexible rule.\u00a0 One day a year where the all things fantastic were in bounds and people indulged in dress-up fantasies.\u00a0 This was allowed but not much more.<\/p>\n
Over the years, I\u2019ve seen comics wax and wane but little had prepared me for the growth of the Free Comic Book Day<\/a> in the spring that started in 2002.\u00a0 Suddenly, not only were comics tolerated or acceptable, they were main stream.\u00a0 Parents, people my age, were raising their kids on comics as accepted art form and not as a poor substitute for adult fare.<\/p>\n The pinnacle of this total transformation was reached in 2012 when comics came full circle with the creation of Halloween ComicFest by Diamond Distributors.\u00a0 Comics had somehow grown, matured, and returned to its \u2018roots\u2019 in a respectable fashion.\u00a0 Quite a story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"