Beginner's Guide to Comics

Table of Contents

1. Basic Glossary
2. Comic Eras
3. Mentor/Mentee Guidelines

Basic Glossary

• Issue: One single comic. Ex: Nightwing (2016) #1. Huntress (1989) #4. Often issues are part of bigger comic lines/runs, though they don't have to be.
• Floppy: A single physical issue of a comic.
• Trade/TPB (Trade Paperback): A physical collected volume of many comic issues, released for people who maybe don't want to buy each individual floppy issue of a comic. Often more accessible.
• Run: A run of a comic is the consecutive issues of a comic line written by the same author. Ex: Mark Waid's Flash run, or Simone Gail's Birds of Prey run. They didn't write the entire comic, but they wrote dozens of consecutive issues.
• Limited/Mini: Any comic line that is ended at issue 6 or 12 on purpose. The comic covers may tell you which issue it is on out of how many total issues there will be -- this is different than a comic that was intended to go for longer, but was cancelled at issue 15 due to lack of sales or some other reason.
• Elseworld: A comic or other media released by DC or another comic company that is not compliant to the main storyline. The Batman Who Laughs, for example, is not canon compliant to the actual Batman run being released at the time. It exists hypothetically, on a different world. An Elseworld. This is why the animated movies, TV shows, etc contain different versions of the characters.

What are all these different periods of time people keep throwing around?

• Well, first off, this Tumblr post here does a pretty good job at explaining them, but I'll rehash:
• Golden, Silver, Bronze Age: Breaks up early comics into chunks of time. Golden is 1938-1956; Silver is 1956-1970; Bronze is 1970-1985. Each age is generally marked by a tone shift in the comics and subject matter in them, but I don't know too much about this.
• Pre-crisis: Refers to before the Crisis on Infinite Earths event, which occurred in 1985. This Crisis majorly changed a lot of plot points, backstories, and some personalities. Not all Crises do this, but the big ones do. Crisis on Infinite Earths also starts us off with what is referred to as the Modern Age of comics.
• Post-crisis: I feel as if this may be obvious. Where pre-crisis refers to comics released before Crisis on Infinite Earths, post-crisis refers to any comics published after. This technically doesn't cover all comics to present--most people, when they say "post-crisis" have an implied "pre-Flashpoint" resting right after. See further down the list.
• Modern Age: Refers to any comics published after 1985. When most people on Tumblr post about DC comics, they are almost certainly posting about Modern Age comics, unless they clarify that they're posting about a specific earlier era.
• Zero Hour: This was in 1994 and was much less of a hard reboot than some other Crises/events, but did retcon some things and reboot specific areas of comics, though not the whole thing.
• Flashpoint: Okay, so this is a Flash event published in 2011ish that was another timeline-resetting, backstory-changing, HUGE comic book shift the likes of which hadn't been seen since Crisis on Infinite Earths. Because of that, "pre-Flashpoint" is another common term that refers to any comic books released before 2011.
• New 52 (Nu52/N52): This is the age of comics that was started by Flashpoint, and implied in the "post-Flashpoint" statement. New 52 stretched from 2011-2015, which is not a lot of years, because this reboot sucked so bad that even DC comics couldn't pretend it didn't. New 52 is almost universally hated, though I have met people who enjoy a good comic line or two from this era. It's not ALL bad, but the changes it made are significant enough that almost every character was completely altered, and a lot of people didn't like that. Additionally, since the CW shows had started taking off around this time, New 52 introduced a whole lot of new characters to the comics that were taken from the TV shows, which comics fans also hated.
• Rebirth: Last one -- Rebirth was the 2015-2016 event that lasted until the 2020 era where they did a couple soft reboots back to back. I've kind of lost track at this point. Rebirth tried to erase a whole lot of the damage New 52 had done, which they did with some moderate success. While some people hate post Rebirth comics, it's less universally hated than New 52, and a lot of the comic lines coming out right now are beloved by a lot of fans. They're trying to heal. It's sort of working. Anyway, this has been your crash course.

Mentor/Mentee Guidelines

When you are matched please adhere to the recommended guidelines below - this is to ensure a good relationship and to help drive the purpose of the mentorship program without getting lost along the way.

1. Build rapport with each other, be friendly and understanding but professional until a bond has been made, not everyone is comfortable with swearing, or very personal stories etc. Talk about your relationships to comics and find out where your experiences are with comics! This will let mentors know how much guidance may be necessary if someone is a newbie vs someone who has been around the block a few times!


2. Get the hard stuff out of the way first.
   
   Mentors remember, when you are matched with a mentee it is because you have professed that you are knowledgeable about something they are interested in, talk to your mentee and ask them if they have any comic questions that confuse them and answer them. There is an FAQ listed in the server full of a glossary of terms that may prove helpful to any newbie (do they know the difference between a series and a run? What about the main reboots?)
   
   Find out how your mentee likes information provided to them. Do they appreciate infodumping or would they prefer a list or a link to a reading guide?
   
   Discover what your mentee's comic reading level is and how much reading they are willing to do, this is important so you know how much is going to be too much. Upper thresholds are important to discover and test, but don’t push and overwhelm a newbie.
   
   Discuss if your mentee has any themes that are an absolute hard ‘no’ for them and be open about if the comics they are interested in has any of these themes, and what an alternative would be to promote happy reading (another series entirely or just skipping the issues that the theme in question comes up). Always leave the reading decision up to your mentee - do not make up their mind for them.
   
   In addition to finding out the themes that are intolerable to your mentee, find the ones they are genuinely interested in and work with that depending on their interests and willingness to maybe consider comics they have never heard of. Remember, leave the decision for them to read up to them.
   
   Suggest comics based on what they have told you they are interested in (Green Lantern but only Guy Gardner, Wonder Woman but not sexist, Pre-Crisis Superman only etc) unless they have expressed willingness to expand to other comics they have never thought of.


3. Keep things as simple as possible within reason, it is VERY inadvisable to hand a newbie mentee a reading list that is 100s or 1000s of issues long, instead focus on starting points or runs that might be easy for them to break into unless they have voiced that they are okay with being handed large reading lists and just need a “start” and someone to answer questions.


4. Remember that this is to help your mentee get into reading comics or find a direction, not to sell your favorite runs or comics. Unless your favorite comics hit the points that they are interested in, try to stay away from pitching comics that they otherwise have not voiced an interest in or whose favorite themes do not showcase. Yes, we all know Impulse 1995 is probably the best comic series DC made but if they are not interested in Bart at all do not suggest Bart comics.


5. Do not discourage reading, leave the decision for mentees to read up to them and leave personal bias out of conversations as much as possible unless your mentee is asking for your honest personal opinion.
   
   Examples of discouraging reading might look like; “I know you’re interested in Jonathan Samuel Kent, so don’t read anything past his age-up it sucks, trust me! Everyone who likes him hates him once he’s aged up!” 🚫 Do NOT do this.
   
   “A lot of people don’t like Jon’s age-up because they feel his character has totally changed and they feel like we lost years of development with him. His comics are very different from when he was a kid, too. But I think with everything you’ve told me about what you like, you might actually like them--or you might not.” This would be a better way to approach controversial issues in series.
   
   Additionally, please keep character biases out of conversations as much as possible. If a mentee has expressed a desire to read comics about Tim Drake, please do not bash Bruce Wayne or discourage comics where he might show up.


6. Shipping - this is not the point of the comic mentorship program, we would strongly suggest mentors and mentees to avoid getting into potential shipping debates or getting offended by someone else’s ship by avoiding the topic entirely until a good bond has been made first. Remember, the server is of a “ship and let ship” mindset to mitigate hostility. If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all and be professional.


7. IF a mentor or a mentee is uncomfortable with their assigned partner for any reason PLEASE reach out to one of the Mods ASAP so you may be reassigned to someone else and we can do more digging to make sure the next match is better. Please be prepared to answer specifics as to WHY the match was not working out. Mods are doing their best to make good matches but sometimes a mistake might be made and sometimes people just don’t click. It is impossible for the mods to know everything about every person that applies.


8. Mentees - please come into this with sincerity and a willingness to communicate, listen and to read, your mentors are your guideline but they cannot read these comics for you, that is up to you to do ultimately.


9. Mentees - please avoid ‘unicorn hunting’ for comics. What this means is giving your mentor a list of requirements with a long checklist of items that may be extremely difficult for them to find, or impossible. If your mentor says what you’re looking for doesn’t exist in any significant amount outside of fanfiction please be open for alternative comics or compromises.
   
   An example of ‘unicorn hunting’ might be wanting to get into Batman comics but you only want wholesome scenarios, but also high-stakes drama, no gun violence, Bruce not being manipulative, no mentions of Arkham Asylum or mental illness and Tim and Dick are brothers and it’s also based on BTAS but it’s not the BTAS comics.


10. Harassment, baiting, trolling, intentionally antagonizing, or attacking your mentor, mentee or other members of the program is strictly prohibited. For ANY reason. Instead of resorting to hostile behavior, which also includes “callout posts”, block the offending person, and reach out to a mod for reporting and a solution. Remember, mods cannot solve a problem they are unaware of. If anyone is discovered to be partaking in any of the above, even on other servers or websites, they will be banned immediately.


11. Know when to ask for help - we’re a big community! Sometimes your mentee might have a question you do not have the answer to - reach out! It is impossible to know everything.