To advertise here, please contact Marty@villagerpublications.com London comic stores are a vital part of the city’s economy, culture, and collective imagination. It was future comic talents such as Bryan Lee O’Malley who frequented these London landmarks before going on to make comics history of their own – in his case, as the creator of Scott Pilgrim. Another Bid Time Return partner, Bruno Andreacchi, went on to establish B.A.’s Comics, now located on Hamilton Road. And it was former Bid Time employee Mike Robinson who set up Heroes, which was taken over by Brahm Wiseman in 2000. Opened in 2003, Neo Tokyo is London’s “only dedicated anime specialty store,” says owner Rob Chamberlain. The store also sells manga, which are the Japanese book-sized comics that are meant to be read from right to left. “Established in 1992, Worlds Away brought together nerds and geeks alike,” CTV London reported in a tribute when owner Brad Ashton-Haiste passed in 2020. The store was located at 666 Dundas Street East. Smet ran the Comic Collector on Dundas Street East until 1987. “New comics were poorly distributed at the time,” he explained of his retail origins in an essay in the academic journal Canadian Literature. He has since made headlines donating more than 10,000 comics to Western University. That store closed under different ownership in 2017. Gord Mood was one of the original partners at Bid Time Return on Queen Street. He opened L.A. Mood Comics & Games in 1997 with his wife and business partner, Carol Vandenberg. It had two different locations downtown until it moved to 100 Kellogg Lane in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. His secret to success? “A store can’t be just a store anymore, it has to be a cultural hothouse,” says Mood. A brief history of comic stores in the East End by Dan Brown There’s a long history of comic stores in London, including major representation in the city’s east end. Stores located east of Adelaide today or in the past include L.A. Mood Comics & Games, Neo Tokyo, B.A.’s Comics and Nostalgia, Worlds Away and the Comic Book Collector. The last on this list was the city’s very first direct-market comic retailer, and one of the first of its kind in Canada. The Comic Book Collector was owned by Eddy Smet and began business in 1979. Such specialty stores, which comic fans take for granted today, were a big step forward: Before then, the kids – and it was mostly children – who loved superheroes had to buy comics from such publishers as Marvel, DC, Charlton and Gold Key off-spinner racks like the one in the Drawing Card, a stationery store that was located in Sherwood Forest Mall. Apart from comics, these much-loved shops sell graphic novels, toys, T-shirts, posters, games and other superhero-themed items. They also take part in special events like Free Comic Book Day and serve as the unofficial headquarters for the Forest City’s comic fans. In addition, they sponsor gatherings like Forest City Comicon and London Comic Con. Stores in other parts of London, and from the past, include Heroes in the Core, Bid Time Return, and Endless Adventure. There are also local stores that sell comics as part of their business, like Forest City Coins, and City Lights. In its day, Multimag was another place London kids got their superhero fix.
And even if the comics industry has had its ups and downs, superheroes have never been more popular. Just look at the box-office records being broken by the most recent comic adaptation, Deadpool and Wolverine. Dan Brown is a local journalist who has covered pop culture in London and beyond since 1992.
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Old East Villager September/October 2024 • Page 3
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