I’ve been fascinated by the credits pages of comics for longer than I can remember, and the all important “Writer” title is the one I have aspired to.

Fortunately for you, dear readers, this eventually shifted to the comics critique and ‘reporting’ steadfastly disappointing you here each and every week!

Writing is hard. Scripting is hard. You guessed it, making comics is hard work. Drawing comics is probably much harder than it looks.

As much as I thought my dogeared copy of How To Draw Comics The Marvel Way (1978) by Stan Lee and John Buscema would have me at the drawing board for 8 hours a day like an Extreme Studios understudy, that was not my path in life either.

I’m always up for a good challenge, though.

Upon urging from my colleague Matt Dursin (an actual published comics writer!) I have audited The Rise of Superheroes and Their Impact On Pop Culture MOOC with Stan Lee’s and Michael Uslan course of study.

In preparation, I dusted off 2001’s The DC Comics Guide to Writing Comics by industry giant, and writer of my favorite Batman tales, Dennis (Denny) O’Neil.

[READ MORE AT FORCES OF GEEK]