SOMETHING FOR NOTHING

It's going to be a big weekend for comics, for two important reasons. First of all, there's the release of the X-MEN movie sequel - more on which later. Secondly, and by no coincidence, it's the second annual Free Comic Book Day on Saturday.

The stated aim of Free Comic Book Day is to bring brand spanking new readers in to comic stores and to bring back old readers who have 'grown out of comics'. You know the ones; the people who nowadays only ever read cereal boxes and TV guides, and possibly children's books about wizards.

Last year the event was timed to coincide with SPIDER-MAN, and a lot of stores capitalised with their own special promotions, such as signings, competitions and free pizza. Clearly it was a success, or they wouldn't be doing it again. That doesn't necessarily mean that it brought in extra customers for the whole year, though. It may just be that comic stores have discovered their own special Christmas, where they can artificially boost their takings for one day and put a little extra spending money aside for the summer holidays.

Of course, if you're reading this, you probably read comics already. You know where your nearest comic store is, and chances are, your local comic store already knows you. Thankfully, there's a secondary effect of Free Comic Book Day, which is that it can help broaden the horizons of readers stuck in a rut. Freebies aren't just for newbies; there's freebies there for you.

So what should you look out for, if you want to try something new? Well, a lot of the free comics seem to be aimed at an all-ages audience, and of course, all-ages books don't necessarily appeal to all ages. In fact, whether the PG-13 rated X-MEN 2 will actually encourage a lot of children into stores remains to be seen, but the smarter stores presumably won't be counting on the movie to do all the publicity.

So, for that get-them-while-they're-young audience, there's BATMAN ADVENTURES, LEAVE IT TO CHANCE, COURTNEY CRUMRIN, DONALD DUCK ADVENTURES and PEANUTBUTTER & JEREMY, to name but five. And, I'll be honest, you wouldn't go far wrong picking up any of them. They've all earned loyal followings for good reason, especially Carl Barks' legendary work on DONALD DUCK.

Marvel's contribution last year was ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #1, so no prizes for guessing that this year's offering is the already oft-reprinted ULTIMATE X-MEN #1. It's sort-of-all-ages, despite writer Mark Millar's protestations. Teenage boys wrestling with their homoerotic fascination with Wolverine will love it. They'll also probably love the AVATAR GRAPHIC NOVEL SAMPLER, of course, which promises stories by Alan Moore and Warren Ellis, and probably some breasts.

Perhaps the most useful freebies to look out for will be the samplers, including the Avatar book, plus Alternative Comics' bravely named ALTERNATIVE COMICS #1, Slave Labor Graphics' SLAVE LABOR STORIES, and Dark Horse's ROCKET COMICS: IGNITE.

Between them, these books should give you a pretty good idea of the stuff to look out for in the future, and to introduce you to something new that might just be to your tastes. So, if you've always wondered what the big deal is with guys like James Kochalka, David Lasky, Gabriel Bell and Dean Haspiel, pick up ALTERNATIVE COMICS #1 and get yourself an education. SLAVE LABOR STORIES will introduce you to the works of other much-lauded and terribly trendy names, like Andi Watson, Jhonen Vasquez and Evan Dorkin. As for IGNITE, that offers a preview of Dark Horse's new Rocket Comics imprint, so it offers a first chance to find out if those books have hooks (and might save you some money if they don't).

A mention should also go to the deftly named CHRISTA SHERMOT'S 100% GUARANTEED HOW-TO MANUAL FOR GETTING ANYONE TO READ COMIC BOOKS, a copy of which dropped onto my welcome mat just the other day. I can't speak to the guarantee, but it's made by the team behind the excellent family drama-come-crime drama FADE FROM BLUE, and it cunningly cannibalises scenes from that book to illustrate its lessons. It's certainly the most inventive offering in this year's event, and I hope it has the desired effect, both in terms of bringing in new readers to comics, and in selling a few more people on FADE FROM BLUE itself.

So basically what I'm saying is, you should take a big bag. You're bound to find something you'll like, and you're bound to know someone who'll like the stuff you don't.

For more information on Free Comic Book Day - including in-store appearances - visit the official site. The best stores to visit appear to include The Comics Revolution in Chicago (where Brian Azzarello and Jill Thompson will be appearing), Atomic Comics in Mesa, Arizona (Mike Kunkel, Jim Mahfood and many more), Heroes Aren't Hard To Find in Charlotte, North Carolina (Paul Smith and the Gaijin Studios team, including Adam Hughes and Brian Stelfreeze) and, of course, the near-legendary Jim Hanley's Universe in New York (Dean Haspiel, Stuart Moore and a host of others, including those lovely FADE FROM BLUE boys).

Ninth Art's very own Rob Vollmar, of Eisner-nominated CASTAWAYS fame, will be flitting between the two Atomik Pop stores in Oklahoma with POP GUN WAR's Farel Dalrymple. And if you're lucky enough to live in San Diego, you can find Batton Lash, John Romita Jr and Eric Shanower at Comics 'n' Stuff - but then, if you're lucky enough to live in San Diego, you're probably pretty jaded about this kind of thing.

SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE

Whether you're still wrestling with your erotic fascination with Wolverine, or you've moved on to an erotic fascination with a leatherclad Kelly Hu, there's a fair chance you'll be one of millions queuing to see X-MEN 2 this weekend, in the biggest ever simultaneous worldwide opening of a movie.

For fanboys of the comics, fanboys of the first movie, and fanboys of big loud action movies in general, this film has been hotly anticipated. From a business point of view, though, it's probably not very significant - unless you stand to profit personally, of course.

Though this is the year of the comic book movie, Hollywood has put most of the big tests behind it. BLADE proved that BATMAN & ROBIN hadn't killed the market. X-MEN proved there was money to be made from superheroes. SPIDER-MAN proved conclusively that X-MEN wasn't a fluke, and DAREDEVIL put to rest fears that only iconic characters could open strong. GHOST WORLD established that it needn't all be about superheroes, and ROAD TO PERDITION convinced audiences that it wasn't just about kids. Oh, and BULLETPROOF MONK proved that the market could withstand the occasional turkey.

The only test left is whether audiences are going to burn out, and as I've said before, I don't see that happening any time soon. It certainly doesn't seem likely that audience enthusiasm will be tested by the hotly anticipated X-MEN 2. In fact, the only test riding on X-MEN 2 is whether it's any good.

I can happily report that it passes that test. Indeed, just by the standards of a summer blockbuster it excels in terms of humour, action and spectacle. But, let's be honest, I'm mainly talking to the geeks here, and I know what you want to hear, geek to geek, so let me make it plain: X-MEN 2 is a fanboy dream. X-MEN 2 satisfies. While the first film was fun in spite of its flaws, this one pulls off perfect fanboy thrills with nary a hiccup.

It doesn't just look great, it looks familiar and right. Director Bryan Singer has done at least as good a job as Sam Raimi or Tim Burton in creating a comic book universe on screen. Hugh Jackman seemed like the perfect Wolverine before, but now he's raised the game to cigar-chomping, claw-popping perfection. Not all the characters get a fair share of screen time, but Singer does a surprisingly good job of juggling the ensemble cast, and what we see of the various characters is generally note perfect. Ian McKellen's performance in particular is sublime - as you'd probably expect - but Brian Cox as new villain William Stryker gives him a run for his money, and the surprise scene stealers of the piece are the ex-catwalk girls, Famke Janssen and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos. Even Halle Berry's Storm isn't a total embarrassment.

Oh, and for me, the scant few glimpses of Colossus in the film were real geek nirvana.

It's often been stated that the first movie was really just set-up - a trailer for the second. Even Singer has said as much. What the second movie demonstrates, though, is that it's a bigger gamble than that. X-MEN 2 leaves the audience in no doubt that it's just as much a stepping stone in the greater journey as the original. This isn't just two parts of a trilogy, but the first installments of a potentially open-ended franchise in the fashion of James Bond.

LORD OF THE RINGS, HARRY POTTER and the two MATRIX sequels have paved the way for a new approach to moviegoing, where the audience doesn't always expect to get the whole story, and doesn't feel cheated if not everything is resolved. The X-MEN movies are proving to be one of the first franchises to test the waters of this new attitude, and it's doing so without the benefit of an established roadmap like the ones provided by JK Rowling or the Wachowski brothers.

The concept of the 'ongoing' series in comic form has fallen out of favour with many readers and critics, but if it can succeed with a wider moviegoing audience, it may suggest that the problem in comics doesn't lie from the format, but with the execution.

One final word of advice; if you do go see X-MEN 2 this weekend, don't go and see it with comic fans. They'll just talk all the way through.

Andrew Wheeler is a London-based entertainment journalist.

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