David Lillard, a comic book & science fiction collector, creator and dealer, read Steve Bennett's column on The Big Bang Theory (see "Confessions of a Comic Book Guy--The Brotherhood of Broken Toys") and had this to say.

From the start, I *really* liked this television program.  I was afraid it wouldn't last long; fearing the general public would not find enough interesting about it, to keep it in production.

In high school, I wanted to be a theoretical physicist, but got sidetracked into computers… then into comics, SF and conventions.  I associate MOST with Sheldon; mostly because I never had the [envious] sex life of Leonard.  In computers, I have worked along side of REAL people like Raj and Wolowicz.  And I have become acquainted with women like Penny, along the way.

I *wish* I'd earned the wages that the fictional shop-owner claims.  Seems like every time I was about to break-even and start showing a profit on a store, someone would open a store down the street (or 4 doors down, in one case), or, in the case of my last one, the economy took a DIVE, that I didn't have the resources to weather.

VERY rarely has a good-looking woman EVER come in to ANY of my stores.  In part, I believe, because there really wasn't much being published for them. Now, there are several items coming out for--AND BY--females.  A *definite* improvement!

The biggest problem, that *I* see facing shop-owners, today, is the digital publishing.  It won't be long before the majority of our tech-savy comics customers bypass us.  Who wants to maintain 1000's of comics in their home, when the can be EASILY maintained AND accessed via smart-phone, computer, tablet or the cloud.  I know that I don't! (But, I am stuck with them)

Just some comments from an old-timer.

The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.