SpringfieldNewsSun.com

Huck Finn and Frodo Baggins. Even Dracula and Frankenstein.

No matter what happens to those characters (and lots more), it seems we never forget their existence on the printed page.

But Superman, Batman and Spider-Man?

They're movies, cartoons, Fruit Roll-Ups and Underoos.

They've become everything but characters that grace page after page month after month.

That's especially true here in Springfield, where the last real comic book shop closed when George Clooney was still technically Batman.

Scott Riley hopes to change that.

"We missed out on an entire generation of comic collectors by not having a comic shop," Riley said. "Young kids in this town don't even know what comics are, unless their dad collects."

Riley will open Main Street Comics and Games in an East Main strip mall next month.

"There are a lot of comics fans in town," he said, "with no place to hang out."

To save you the shock, Captain America died and Hal Jordan came back as the Green Lantern while you were away.

Aquaman, though, still can't sustain a monthly comic book.

OK, OK, it's not that Springfield has been without a comic shop that long (just this side of a decade).

It was just the worst possible time to be without one, that's all.

In that time, comics became cool thanks to an ongoing run of big-budget (and mostly pretty good) superhero movies.

But comic books also became virtually impossible to find locally.

When Stan Lee came to town in 2006 to speak at Kuss Auditorium on behalf of the public library, I didn't have the guts to tell him he was in a town where that month's issue of "The Amazing Spider-Man" was absolutely nowhere to be found.

He might've left for a cooler town.

Riley will open his store at 2031 E. Main St. (around the corner from the Save-A-Lot) on March 2, just four days before the mother of all comics movies, "Watchmen," comes out.

"Opening a comic shop has been an idea of mine for years and years," said Riley, 37.

A 1989 graduate of South High, Riley isn't just a fanboy fulfilling a dream.

A longtime Cassano's manager, he at least has experience running stuff.

"It's everybody's dream to work for themselves," he said. "I've been running businesses for people for half my life."

Still, Riley isn't giving up his main job just yet. He'll continue to manage the Cassano's around the corner.

But Riley, whose love of comics goes back to issue 50 of "Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth" — "I stole it from my uncle" — saw a business opportunity the size of Galactus staring him down.

"There was a niche in town," he said, "that needed filled."

And besides, there's still hope for a guy wanting to sell comic books in 2009.

For all the movies and more, most of us still think of Thor at least as only a comic book character — not, you know, an ancient Germanic deity.

Contact this reporter at (937) 328-0352 or amcginn@coxohio.com.