jdeitch25

I know I'll catch some flak for this, but I began reading comics around this time, and I really loved the Batman Knightfall stuff.  Not the crap with Azrael and the armored Batman, but the original arc where Bane broke everyone out of Arkham and basically broke Bruce mentally is stil, to me, a pretty interesting character study as to what it takes to push someone like Batman to the edge and over...even if it was event-driven.

Great article, Conor, it's an interesting moment for a lifelong comic fan. 

I don't remember the name of my first shop, but I remember that it was across the street from Smiley's pizza in Brooklyn, a brick corner building with a smiley face painted on the side.  My dad and I always got pizza there after baseball games in Prospect Park.  I remember being between 5-7 (because that was the time we moved from Brooklyn) and loving everything Ninja Turtles.  So, when that store put a giant poster of the TMNT in the window, I had to check it out.  I walked in, and at that age didn't notice what I was surrounded by, but instead found myself in the kids' section with all the Saturday morning cartoon adaptations.  There it was, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1: all my favorite characters in four color glory. 

A few weeks later, I returned to the shop and made the discovery that changed my life.  I saw a new issue of Ninja Turtles, but something was off.  On the cover, all four of the turtles wore red bandanas.  Inside there was no color, only pen and ink.  I picked it up out of curiosity. It was the "Old Man River" arc from Eastman and Laird's Mirage series.  In it, the foursome contend with a giant mutating leech that bit Mikey or Raphael (I believe), which causes him to regress to his original Turtle form.  It remains one of the best arcs I have ever read, and it opened my eyes to the incredible world of comics.  Thanks for the nostalgia, Conor.