COLUMN: Middle Georgia Comic Convention returns to Macon Saturday

People love comic books and spend more than $7 billion on graphic novels and related items worldwide each year.

Though industry reports show even the greatest superheroes took a sales hit during the worst of COVID-19, they’re bouncing back big time as good superheroes should. The pandemic took its toll on Superman, Spider-Man, The Avengers and even Batman who some reports call the biggest seller of all time.

Saturday, you can see famous and not-so-famous heroes’ and villains’ comics, their figures and other paraphernalia as well as comic-related items like fantasy role-playing games, artwork, posters, hand-made specialty items like game dice and more at the Middle Georgia Comic Convention at Holiday Inn Macon North, 3953 River Place Dr.

Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and admission for adults is just $5. Kids 12 and under get in free.

The convention is locally hosted by Macon’s Fanboy Collectibles and Comics store, located at 5854 Columbus Road. Online they’re at facebook.com/fanboycollectiblescomics where you can find links to the convention event page.

Fanboy is one of those businesses that opened just months before COVID-19 shut everything down but managed to power through – it without the help of superpowers but through the love for comics of owners Michael and Monique Huffman.

“We had been talking to friends who did conventions as pandemic regulations started easing up and they put the bug in our head for doing one here,” Monique Huffman said. “We planned our first one in January 2021 and had a good response. So good, in fact, we planned another for June that year then another for January ’22. Now this one is our fourth.”

Monique Huffman said every convention has grown with young and old showing up. Some are comic fanatics, some are just getting into comics, some loved comics as a kid and are picking the hobby back up or wanting to see if they can get their hands back on an old favorite issue or character and then others aren’t that into comics but come to see what’s up or just get out and about for something different entertainment-wise.

“Families come with kids and I really love that,” Monique Huffman said. “We’re very family-friendly and that’s one reason we have no charge for 12 and under. That’s also the age a lot of kids start getting interested in reading and comics. We’re all about promoting literacy, that’s one of my favorite aspects of all this. Getting a kid to read is one of the best things you can do because once they enjoy stories and reading it can take them anywhere.”

Literacy? Comics? Really?

Go to the show and ask adults where their love for reading came from. OK, that may be skewed, but consider popular authors who grew to love storytelling from comics or who have written comics. That would easily include Stephen King, James Patterson, National Book Award-winning non-fiction writer Ta-Nehisi Coates and multi-award-winning Doris Lessing who was commissioned to write comics in a literary style. Many of science fiction’s best-known early authors, like Ray Bradbury, can be included, too.

People like comics and, even with the dip, they’re a $7 billion-plus industry worldwide.

Think the U.S. tops the comic-buying list?

No, it’s Japan. And even in the U.S., Asia’s anime and Manga-style comics have helped the industry not only stay afloat but zoom forward. And worth mentioning is that across the board, graphic novels – comics that are more “book” than traditional magazine-ish comic books – are leading the way in sales growth.

And think comics are just for boys and they’re who are creating the boom?

Wrong again.

There’s been a surge in girls/women comic readers. Just a half-dozen years ago, the website www.graphicpolicy.com did surveys of people on Facebook who had comic books as a “like” in their profile. Yes, a lot of comics-related surveys are less than scientific but reports came back with women at 42.86% of those “liking” comics.

Add to that other reports show women make up almost a third of comic book writers.

Hence the growing popularity of the Huffman’s type of store, their convention and the other conventions they sometimes travel to sell at — and the multitude of vendors who’ll be at their Macon show.

“We’re still a small show but we’re growing,” Monique Huffman said. “Our dozen or so vendors sell everything from vintage comics to toys to vintage collectibles to movie posters and more. We even have someone who sells Japanese import items — but even with all that, we’re looking at expanding to a larger venue to do more things and more of the things people are asking us to do.

“We hope to be able to bring in guests, notables in the comic world, before much longer and we hope to add costume and cosplay competitions as well.”

Contact writer Michael W. Pannell at mwpannell@gmail.com.

This story was originally published June 10, 2022 at 7:00 AM.