Free Comics

___________________________________________________________________________ A few months ago, I brainstormed about how Halloween mini-comics being offered by Diamond could be used in a variety of ways to promote comics and have some fun!   (Read that again... there are...

I read (almost) every Free Comic Book Day title, and let you know what's the best!

With only 3 days remaining till this year's Free Comic Book Day, here's a peek at a few of the freebies coming to you!

What's better than getting free candy on Halloween? Free comics! I offer some crazy ideas for retailers and lovers of comics, using Halloween as the inciting incident to tell a great story about marketing comics!

A hardcover comic book! Which costs more like a comic, but looks more like a book! And the first one is free!

Following in the footsteps of Sergio Aragones and Darwyn Cooke, Jim Lee will provide the art for next year's commemorative Free Comic Book Day t-shirt, with an homage to the JLA and Jose Luis Garcia Lopez. The shirt will be on sale in comic shops on April 11, in advance of Free Comic Book Day on May 5, but can be preordered via the January Previews.

We already gave you the Gold Sponsor books, but here's the entire Free Comic Book Day 2012 lineup, including everything from kids books to Gilbert Hernandez. More information on all titles available at the FCBD site.

Here's what you'll be getting gratis next May 5th -- you'll note it's a mostly family friendly line-up of tested characters -- and Marvel is, not surprisingly, sending out am Avengers book and DC is sticking with The New 52.

Free Comic Book Day founder Joe Field looks back on this year's event (no permalinks) with some numbers:

So, this tenth Free Comic Book Day, I looked back at the first FCBD and consider it was a seminal day in the history of comics. I consider it a pivotal day, as three different aspects of comics converged into a synchronicity which continues to affect and drive the comics industry. Those three aspects: mass-market retailing among specialty comics shops, graphic novels, and comics movies. As with most historical events, there are multiple events which foreshadowed and pioneered the moments and movements which coalesced the weekend of May 3, 2002.

By all accounts, it was one of the biggest Free Comic Book Days yet, with most stores reporting "sell-outs" early on and crowds and -- importantly -- SALES that rivaled their biggest days ever. It was also a media event as over 200 news stories show.

Free Comic Book Day is Saturday, May 7th, 2011! And there are very likely some comics-related festivities happening in your area, or at the very least some free comic books. There are way too many happenings to cover here. Diamond has a master list of events, including interviews by Darwyn Cooke and Humberto Ramos and the FCBD site has a monster list of signings organized alphabetically by state!