I feel like I took the route most people did. I feel for the X-Men franchise. I had an oblique relationship with the fandom until 1997 when Uncanny X-Men #350 was published. The words "oh snap" don't properly explain what went down in my pysche at age ten.  Previously, I had fallen for Gambit. I think it was something about the trickster with a past, but with the issue of his trial, I was sold. I stayed away from DC things because I thought they were a little White Hat v. Black Hat.

I was yard sale-ing with my mom one summer about this time, and we came across of a yard sale of a guy who was probably about the age I am now (early twenties). He just had a yard filled with comics that he was selling for like a quarter each. I didn't really know where to turn, so I didn't make the killer I could have today, but I decided I was never going to be that guy. In my head, his significant other had decided it was time to become adults and settle or something so the comics and what not had to go. Therefore, I take my action figures out of their boxes and let my comics become just a little less than mint condition. It's unlikely that A). I could permanently settle with someone who can't embrace the dorkiness of B). anyone would really want my crap, but it is my passive-aggressive way of protecting my horde of things.

Like most teenagers, I eventually found The Crow, and like most teenagers, I thought it was the most brilliant thing ever! Or maybe it was just that I had the expendable income to snatch up all the marketing that I could at comic shops and cons (I will admit, I was a little bitter when years later I saw things of that nature in Hot Topic. I was over my fixation, but still, I kind of thought something of the special was being taken away).

About six years ago, I fell in with a group that was filled with manga and anime freaks. I tried to get into it, but it never worked out so well. Yet about that same time, I found that there was a lot more than Marvel and DC (to some extent). I happened across Strangers in Paradise, Kabuki, and the titles of Vertigo. Neil Gaiman and his Sandman titles were probably the first wave quickly followed by the likes of Hellblazer, Preacher, and Transmetropolitan. I also about shit myself when I found out that my childhood Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were a shade different in their original incarnation. Since then I have been filling up nooks and crannies of my living spaces with these "profound" and "adult" titles while wondering while the X-Men just aren't the same (it was like I took my eyes away from the titles for one second, and then I came back and it was ... less than I had remembered).

I am also a huge sucker for action figures, and my roommates are constantly poking fun at me about it.