#comictok

[screaming-out-into-the-void]

Comics were a lot more fun when it was just me reading them in my room, blissfully unaware of all the discourse. Now every video on comictok seems to be engineered to ragebait me.

I stopped reading regular books because I fell into booktube/goodreads toxic productivity hell where everyone was claiming to read 300 books/year, posting rant reviews, dnfs & tbrs, overconsuming books, complaining about authors and other creators, starting drama, being fake intellectuals etc etc. My AuDHD ass could not keep up with what was “expected” of a reader so instead i just got burnt out. Reading was no longer fun and just felt like a competition/chore.

Now comics are starting to feel just as stressful because of spaces like comictok. It’s time for me to go back to my roots and leave the comic book online space

[evilwickedme]

Do you have recs for people to follow for comictok? Preferably ones that focus on the batfamily, Spider-people, or Daredevil

for sure!!! I decided not to include people who are mainly editors/cosplayers, but if you did want that let me know and I'll compile another list

anyway these are most of my favorite comictokers whether or not they're specifically about these subjects, feel free to check them out either way and see how you feel

so firstly and obviously if you're not following thepandaredd and nikhilclayton are you even on comictok? I'm honestly always pleasantly surprised by how UN-dudebro-y they are and thepandaredd is like a solid 40% of how I got into batfam in the first place. nikhilclayton does batfam and spiderman but I mostly associate him with x-men

then we've got myself, obviously! my username on tiktok is gailpirl and any character I talk about here gets talked about there. right now my smallville obsession is literally everywhere but obviously peter parker, spider gwen, deadpool, batfam, etc, plus whatever comic I just read all get some content made on them

then we have @stackthedeck my dear beloved mutual, who has the same username on tiktok, and whose content is mostly spider-people with a decent amount of daredevil and the occasional foray into other characters

for dc I recommend literallyloislane, theactorbat, nightwingser, kennenbabbles (another mutual!), mia.likes.bats (yet another mutual!!), sandmanlibrary, and for the flash specifically, theflashmuseum, their content is fucking great I don't care about flashfam until their videos show up on my fyp and then I suddenly don't care about anything else

ayaanshahlikesyou makes content on both marvel and dc; I mosty see his young justice content on my fyp but he likes blue beetle and kamala khan as well

speaking of kamala khan, h3yd4v3 talks about a lot of marvel content but mainly focuses on ms marvel; also notfranklinsherald is f4 focused but occasionally talks about northstar and aquaman too

also @emptyjunior has a lot of really fun skits for batfam, team red/spiderman, xmen, and captain america, among others

anyway yeah these are my favorites that aren't specifically only edits or cosplay enjoy!!!

[screaming-out-into-the-void]

Why are we recommending Watchmen to someone who JUST started reading comics? Watchmen is a much better read if you are someone who is deep into superhero comics, not when you’re just starting out. Why are we recommending The Dark Knight Returns to someone who has never read a DC comic before. TDKR is supposed to be an edgy (male power fantasy) deconstruction. You can’t deconstruct something that hasn’t been constructed yet. A new Batman fan should be reading classic Batman stories and getting to know the character, not having this edgy nonsense ruin Batman for them before they can even start.

I get that people probably do this because they’re scared people will dismiss comics as little kid stuff, so they rush to recommend the “grittiest, most grounded, realistic and grown up” comics. But this is totally the wrong move. It’s like once upon a time a bunch of 30 yo men decided that these are the top tier comics of all time, glazed them to hell, then all these young people who are just now coming into the fandom picked up on this sentiment and spread it further. I get it, the comic book fandom can be pretty intimidating. For a lot of young women it is their first male dominated fandom (which feels super different to a female dominated fandom). There is a ton of comics to read and lore to learn, and it takes years and years. It’s also not always clear where one should start. People who have been into comics for a long time seem like they know what they’re talking about, and young women are prone to take older men’s word as gospel. So when some millennial man on your FYP says that TDKR is peak and that you gotta read it, it’s so easy to believe him. We have to do better guys.

This trend hurts my heart because I see everyone all over my FYP recommend the same five books. And I can see personal comic book taste die before my eyes. Everyone is reading the exact same things, everyone’s bookshelves look the same, everyone has the same favourite writer and artist, everyone has the same opinions about everything, it’s like we are being told what to think and like. We need to go back to people organically finding the characters that they vibe with, picking up runs that they have never heard of before, finding their favourite stories all on their own. Nowadays people won’t even do their own research or make their own reading guides, they just follow a pre-approved tiktok rec reading list.

[screaming-out-into-the-void]

I was at the comic book store and omg it just hit me how OVERWHELMING it can be. I want to read everything all at once but i CAN’T. I could read my entire life and not finish it all. What im most stressed about rn is that i have a HUGE tbr list that ive curated for my own tastes, and i keep buying comics faster than i can read them (scarcity marketing you know) and at the same time comics are blowing up on tiktok and im bombarded with “read this its so peak” recs and i feel like im not keeping up with all the other comic fans and falling behind bc I cant just pick up a random comic if im not in the right mindset for that character and also i feel like im being pulled in a million directions there are so many stories and so many characters, like deadpool, spiderman, daredevil, moon knight, cap, bucky, avengers, x men, cyclops, wolverine, batman, superman, green lantern, flash, green arrow, wonder woman, justice league, tim drake, red hood, nightwing, damian wayne, teen titans and if you wanna properly get into ALL these characters omg that is so many comics to buy and read

[qutibahalfarouqitheclonetrooper]

I still dislike comictok!

Vor.

[screaming-out-into-the-void]

People are always going on and on about the horrors of going to the comic book store as a woman and encountering rude employees, incels that hit on you, insufferable male nerds that mansplain and make you name 10 characters, etc. But I have literally never had that experience at any of my local comic shops? Or anywhere else for that matter. All comic book fans I’ve ever met have been nothing but nice and excited to chat about superheroes with me. Everyone is just normal. WHERE are y’all shopping??

I would actually love to hear some of these comic book store horror stories, but whenever I ask around or try to find some, all I see is people doing skits and making fun of these supposed incel geeks, no actual personal experiences. So is this something that actually happens, or is it like a relic of a stereotype from the 90s that people still bring up for some reason?

[blackriphunter]

God I wish superhero properties didn’t explode into the mainstream like they did bc now I got niggas treating every issue like powerscaling ammo and it’s so exhausting… it’s always “canon” “no diff” “peak” it feels like a boys club, just testosterone and “my dad can beat up your dad in a fight”