The Secret Back Rooms of the Comicshop

It is happening. My shrine to nerdiness and part-time place of employment, (on and off) for roughly twenty years is moving. The Comicshop is a Vancouver institution. We were there first, and according to reader polls in the Georgia Straight, we do it best. My intention here is not to go on and on about the place, nor to tell it's history. Instead I thought I might "pull back the four-colour curtain" for you all. We have been at 4th and Arbutus for over thirty years. Crap accumulates. It is a big, barn-like retail slot with lots of backrooms and hidden nooks. I took these pictures about a month ago, just before all the hubbub began. By now, all this stuff has been "cleaned" out of existence or left behind. Here I will try to share some of the day to day pop-culture oddness and coolness that lurked behind the scenes at the old place. If you click on the pictures you can zoom in pretty close.


The door to the office is framed by an deflated mylar Spider-Man balloon, and two signed t-shirts, one from Todd McFarlane and the other from Sergio Aragones.


There are decades worth of sticky things and hangers affixed to the office door. The motorbike stuff ties in with my boss's last name, which he shares with Norton motorbikes.


Slurpee cups, novelty bubble-bath containers, and miscellaneous brick-a-brack have been sitting on the windowsill for years.


This is part of an old pinball machine that the boss found in an alley at 24th and Main St. back in 1974. He has had it since he opened the first Comicshop that year. It sat on the office windowsill for 31 years. It is now mine. :)


Here is some oddness from the (somewhat home-made) office wall. There is a fantasy pinup by Frank Brunner . I'm not sure who did the Daffy Duck cell, but it has a Tex Avery / Bob Clampett look to it.


Various certificates and a cool plastic Uncle Scrooge, festooned with some god's-eye charm.


I love this patently unsafe-looking Mickey Mouse crib toy. I suspect lead paint, applied in a 1968 Chinese sweat shop. It also has the look of a toy that was designed long before anyone thought of the term "choking hazard".


The coffee counter has a huge poster of Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman. It is a bus shelter transparency from "Batman Returns", which was kinda crappy except for Michelle Pfeiffer. I guess it's been there since 1992.




Over the years; cool old comics have fallen apart and left wonderful, detached covers in their wake. There are several spots behind the scenes where the old things were just tacked up with the staple gun, for colour.


This Holly Hobby wall plaque has been collecting dust on the circuit box for as long and anyone can remember. It reads:
"He doesn't find contentment who seeks the wealth of kings, for the greatest happiness of all is found in little things." Sweet...


Bart has been guarding the receiving door for about twenty years.


The furnace had a dire warning affixed to it. I am proud to say that I never touched.



The other side of the furnace is adorned with groovy 1970's comics industry stickers and an armadillo fridge magnet from San Antonio, Texas.


Old magazines and antique fruit boxes were stuck in a corner.


Old Disney records, a "pose-able" Batman wall hanging, and sexy go-go girl paperbacks clutter up the overstock area.


This isn't in a hidden area, but I include it because it is so cool. I risked my life a decade ago to hang these cut-outs up on the wall. Anyone who can name all the characters gets an authentic Stan Lee no-prize. Note the unique and precious Uncle Scrooge stained glass window. No, it is not for sale. Ever.


This is also not hidden. This hand-made car display, with unlikely characters mix, used to be in the window at the old (long closed) Comicshop branch in Neslon, BC. I first saw it there in 1982, while on a school band trip. It found it's way home and has been on the wall ever since. I will never understand why Batman would let Goofy drive...


Please forgive the quality of this picture. It was a hard one to get. If you stand on the (tippy and spinny) chair and look down from above the fluorescent light fixture above the upstairs till, you will find dusty old airplane models and a Gundam action figure. Perhaps they were left there by ghosts.


A framed Vancouver Province page from 1983, when the boss made the cover.


So long, 2089 W. 4th Ave. The neighbourhood outgrew the Comicshop, so I guess we'll just have to start piling up interesting things at the new location down the street, at 3518 West 4th. Excelsior.