Deman shares his journey with comics, visual semiotics, Orientalism, and margins of alternative comics. Along the way, Deman discusses Scott McCloud, comics in the 1990s and its seeking of legitimacy, pornography and sexuality in comics, Sam Kieth's Maxx, Aline Kominsky Crumb's It Ain't Me Babe, Chris Claremont, Harley Quinn Vol. 3, #8--as well as the Canadian Society for the Study of Comics, his blog, and his "The Claremont Run" big data research lab. "The big 3 (Maus, Persepolis, Fun Home) grows from a contextual history of insecurity in comics studies as a field."