It was late June, 1990. My family was moving from Long Island to Colorado, and we were driving those two thousand miles their two kids, ages 14 and 8. I was the eight-year-old. On the way out of my hometown, on our way to my new hometown, we stopped for some effects at a convenience store. I didn't have much in the way of an attention span, and this was before my parents knew about Gameboy, so I would always have plenty of things to entertain me. I would have drawing pads, card games, ninja turtle toys, and travel games to play with my sister. Despite all this, I was still bored. So my mom sent me into the store with my dad and told him to buy me something. He took me over to the comic book rack and told me to pick out a few books. There were monsters on the cover of this and it drew me in. I love monsters.
I didn't really know what was going on in this comic because I didn't know any of the characters and I'd never read a comic before. I remember just being really fascinated by it. After that I just started collecting X-Men comics. I started drawing from them and my artwork started looking alot like Jim Lee's. I would doodle all over the letters I would send to my grandmother back in NY and it would be pictures of Cyclops firing optic blasts in the margins.
If only we would have moved 2 months later. I would have picked up #266 instead. You know. The comic that introduced Gambit. That one's worth way more than the other ones. It would have probably gotten destroyed or lost, though.
It's really funny to look back at these books now. It's like looking at an old photo album from when I was a kid. What really sucks about it is that I don't know what happened to any of the comics I owned.
If I could go back in time, I would first go back to the late 90's and tell my wife's grandfather not to sell his Apple stock, then I would go back to 1990 and tell myself to keep my comics safe.
What a great coincidence we have in our comic book history!
ReplyDeleteThis issue was also the first one I bought as a collector, having previously known X-Men before. And this specific comic is remarkably hard on newcomers because most of the well known X-Men faces are gone or have disappeared while in Australia. I remember thinking "Forge? Who the fuck is this guy?". Two months later I started college, and the addiction only got stronger. Ah good times!!!
(was Portacio who drew that sexy female villain who tried to kill Storm and Remy in the issues following this one? She was hot, I forgot her name!)
I don't remember. I have these issues, but I don't want to dig them out and get my paper-deteriorating finger oils on that gem. There is a trade that has the 4-issue Gambit mini and Uncanny #266. I should get it just for the reading value.
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