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After spending the morning finishing the latest Max Finder script, I went on a little blog stroll.

I started here and from there went to here to here to here. And that’s where I discovered Erika Moen’s great comic: i like girls.

It’s a simple, poignant, smart and very funny comic. The story behind it is explained in this Sequential Tart interview:

ST: Last year you came out with the comic I Like Girls which told the story about your first girlfriend, written to your mother. I’ve always wondered, is this what you used to come out to your mom? Or did you prep her first?

EM: The script for that came out of my “Memoir and Autobiography” class I took freshman year at Pitzer College when I was very first making these gay realizations. I wrote it as if I were going to give it to her, but I wasn’t ready to at all. So that was in … December-ish? Winter-ish 2002? I didn’t come out to her until that summer, and when I did it was talking to her face. This is the exact dialogue:

Me: Mom … I’ve got something to tell you, you’re not going to like it.
Mom: (cooking something, not looking up) mmhmm?
Me: I’m gay.
Mom: No you’re not.

After that there was lots of crying and, y’know, breakin’ her heart and all that. But things have gotten a lot better in the years since I told her. She really wants to be supportive, but homosexuality is fundamentally wrong to her. She’s made it clear from day one that she loves me no matter what and doesn’t want to lose me; however, she absolutely does not support homosexuality.

After reading Moen’s comics, I was once again reminded of the power that this genre has to convey intelligent, complex ideas beyond capes and superpowers.

Sometimes, when I’m feeling especially self-indulgent, I like to think that Max Finder might be a kid’s first introduction to comics and that they’ll be a comic fan for years to come. Well, you know, it could happen.