Free Comic Book Day is this weekend, so here's all the free comics you can grab (2024)

FAQs

How to get comics for Free Comic Book Day? ›

How do I find stores participating in Free Comic Book Day? Check with your local comics store or bookstore. Even some libraries participate. Not every location will offer FCBD books, but the FCBD site has a shop locator you can use.

Though the exact number of free comics you can pick up will depend on your comic book shop's individual policy, it's likely that you'll be restricted to just a few. There may also be further restrictions according to the comics' categorisation — you might be allowed two Silver comics and one Gold, for example.

What's the difference between the Gold and Silver sponsor books? Good question! The Gold and Silver tiers reflect the availability of those titles at participating comic shops. Gold sponsor titles will be available at every participating comic shop.

Every year, on the first Saturday in May, the industry comes together to give away free comics and encourage both curious, first-time comic book readers and seasoned comic book fans to flock to the best place in the comic book community: local comic shops.

Publishers subsidize the production of the give-away comic books and retailers pay a reduced price for the books that they order.

However ... Free Comic Book Day comics are given away for free at participating comic book stores, and are not typically considered to be valuable collectibles. However, some of these issues have become sought after by collectors and fans, with a few rare issues being sold for pretty high prices.

While many comic books appreciate in value, not all of them do. Before investing in comic books, it's important to do your research and learn which comic books are valuable and which are not.

What comic books are worth money? Comics that have the most collectible value are those published between 1938 and 1979. Typically within that time frame, superhero comics hold the most value, with first appearance or origin issues being the most sought after.

More than that, though, age is just a general indicator of a price range. Older comics tend to be more valuable on average, but that's because it's the era when comics were in short supply, even fewer have survived to now, and many of the most popular characters today were introduced.

Some publishers including Dell, Western, and Classics Illustrated, never used it. Its code, commonly called "the Comics Code", lasted until the early 21st century.

What ended the Silver Age of comics? ›

End and aftermath

Historian Will Jacobs suggests the Silver Age ended in April 1970 when the man who had started it, Julius Schwartz, handed over Green Lantern—starring one of the first revived heroes of the era—to the new-guard team of Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams in response to reduced sales.

Every week, tens of thousands of unsold comics and magazines are returned from shops to retailers, who send them to be pulped, it's been revealed. Instead of this destruction, one national waste and recycling company suggests that they are redistributed at cost to hospitals and charities where they can be enjoyed.

Each year, you are invited to discover new comics and pick up free issues from a wide variety of series and publishers. Free Comic Book Day traditionally takes place on the first Saturday of May.

Legally, yes, but especially illegally, as a proliferation of sites offering pirated comic books have made virtually any series you can think of naught but a Google search away from instant access.

If you're a fan of comic strips but don't want to buy a newspaper, or have a favorite that isn't carried by your local paper, GoComics is the site for you. Over 200 comic strips are updated with each day's installment for you to browse. If you've seen it in a newspaper, it's probably here.

The color of the FCBD banner on the front cover of the book will indicate the book's age rating! Green for All Ages Blue for Teen Red for Mature.