Free Comic Book Day preview: Ten comics you should grab

Free Comic Book Day preview: Ten comics you should grab

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Mark your calendars -- tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day!

For the uninitiated, Free Comic Book Day (or FCBD) is one of the greatest holidays of the year, when comic-book publishers create exclusive material to give away at comics shops nationwide.

You should plan to visit your local shop sometime Saturday and check to see if any events are happening in your area.

A few simple rules for FCBD:

1. Arrive early. Don't believe the myth that comic-book fans wake up at 2 p.m. On FCBD, all sorts of folks descend on shops to get the best exclusives available. Be one of them.

2. Plan to hit more than one location. Some shops will limit how many free comics you can take (and this is a bummer). Others won't carry the free books you're looking for. If your town has more than one comics shop, plan to visit them all.

3. Bring the kids! More so than ever, this year's crop of free comics features really amazing material for kids. For extra enjoyment on FCBD, bring a small person and watch his/her eyes light up.

Fortunately, I've seen all of this year's free books. Below are my 10 favorites that will be offered tomorrow. (Note that I don't include the most popular ones -- Marvel and DC -- but you should grab those if you're down with superheroes.)

Also note that you can preview several of these on FCBD's website.

10. Disney's Darkwing Duck (Kaboom!) -- It had me from title of this issue, The Duck Knight Returns. Ha! Here's a kid-appropriate tale that's a fun read for all ages, especially when they throw in pop-culture references like "Starducks" coffee.

9. Baltimore and Criminal Macabre (Dark Horse) -- The publisher pulls out the big guns with Mike Mignola and Steve Niles for these horror comics -- and I'm glad they do, because they certainly fulfill a niche in this family-friendly year. Read Baltimore first, especially if you dig a vampire story.

8. Spontaneous: Issue One (Oni Press) -- I was mesmerized by this new series, which delves into the mystery of spontaneous combustion. Can a young, independent reporter and her newfound sidekick figure out the reason behind a wave of bizarre fires? Recommended for older readers and adults.

7. Rated Free for Everyone! (Oni Press) -- Oni has something for everyone this year, including this kids' book with two stories: One about a girl whose drawings come alive; and another about a kid who develops powers based on what he eats (I love that one, and the full book arrives in stores this fall).

6. Inspector Gadget (Viper Comics) -- Just seeing Gadget on the cover makes me giddy. Remember Penny? And Brain? And Dr. Claw? They're all here, as is a cute bonus story about young antihero Johnny Test. Nostalgic fun for the whole family.

5. The Mis-Adventures of Adam West/Walter Koenig's Things to Come (Bluewater Comics) -- Yes, there's a new comic about actor Adam West. The first few pages show an aging West being told things like, "Your hero days are over." And then ... well, it's pretty amusing. Grab it.

4. Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse (Fantagraphics) -- This is sort of what FCBD is about, isn't it? Fantagraphics presents Floyd Gottfredson's amazing old Mickey strips from 1935 that are still entertaining today. Perfect for all ages, and a promo for the publisher's upcoming collection of vintage Mickey strips.

3. Bongo Comics Free-For All -- You can't go wrong with Simpsons comics, especially when Comic Book Guy on the cover. These books are always so funny, incredibly detailed and odd that they're a must-read for me.

2. Mouse Guard/The Dark Crystal (Archaia) -- Hands down, this is the best art you'll get on FCBD. Mouse Guard is David Petersen's long-running saga of tiny rodent warriors in a menacing world full of giant snakes and crabs. The Dark Crystal comic is cool, too, though geez, I don't think I've seen the movie in at least 20 years.

1. Super Dinosaur (Image) -- My favorite of the bunch. Written by Robert Kirkman (The Walking Dead, Invincible), this kids' comic tells the origin of Super Dinosaur, a talking, modern-day T-Rex whose best friend is a hip young boy. It's smart, it's witty and an image of SD playing basketball is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time.

Have a fun Free Comic Book Day, and feel free to tell me all about it!

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Reports suggest studios should be afraid, very afraid (of Netflix)

Reports suggest studios should be afraid, very afraid (of Netflix)

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By Tim Mullaney, Special for USA TODAY

A couple of new reports this week suggest that Netflix's effect on Hollywood will be an even scarier movie than the moguls thought.

Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney says Netflix's U.S. customer base will double to 50 million by 2013, and the company is beginning to grow even faster elsewhere. That's what's happening in Canada, Netflix's first market outside the U.S. In less than a year, it has signed up 8% of Canadian households - a task it took five years to complete in the U.S. Netflix will likely be in two to three more nations by year-end 2012, Mahaney wrote. By Citi's calculations, expanding to 20 countries in Europe and Latin America will add 43 million households if Netflix matches the percentage of households it serves in the U.S. now.

That changes the balance of power in the running tug-of-war between studios and Netflix over what movies Netflix is allowed to stream, and what it should pay for them. Time Warner, especially, has resisted letting Netflix stream movies from Warner Bros. and original shows produced by its HBO unit. It is trying to protect both the studio and the $15 a month or so people pay for HBO with tactics such as the launch of its own HBO Go streaming service and today's acquisition of Flixster, which offers free streaming for about 1,200 movies and an array of TV shows.

Mahaney had been a skeptic on Netflix's $231 a share stock but gave in and recommended buying it on Monday, saying swapping DVDs that are expensive for Netflix to buy and ship for cheaper, easier movie streaming should take Netflix shares to $300.

A second report this week comes from Digital Entertainment Group, saying that sales of DVDs fell 20% in the first quarter to $2.1 billion, further crippling a revenue stream studios have counted on.

For consumers, the result of the studio-Netflix tussle is likely to be even more movies available for streaming. The question is whether a Netflix with 50 million or even 90 million users will be able to get content sooner, without waiting for movies to cycle through exclusive windows for DVD sales and pay-per-view, damaging the studios' other markets even more.

Netflix wants to make nice, Chief Executive Reed Hastings said on a conference call last week. "As we get a larger subscriber base it becomes easier to write big checks,'' he said. "It's very respectful, I would say, across the board.''
That's a little too nice. One detail deep in Netflix's first-quarter financial report tells the real story. The company spent $142 million more this year than last to license content for streaming. The drop in DVD sales DEG reported was about $500 million - before any Netflix-inspired cancellations of movie channels or people who decide to wait and Netflix last month's release rather than spring for pay-per-view. Do the math.

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