Frankie B. Five Years Later

Antonio P. Cuneo
Aug 22, 2017 · 6 min read
Frankie.

When I was 18 I met a bunch of guys from the internet where the only thing we had in common was that we lived in the Tri-state Area and that we liked comic books. I was a freshman in college and I didn’t know where I fit into the world. (I still don’t, but that’s another story for another time.) I had only been reading comics for two to three years so I was still relatively new to the whole thing. All I knew was that I wanted to talk about the comics I read with other people that read those comics. None of my friends in real life read comics, and those same friends still don’t so I was searching for an outlet for all these thoughts I had about the books I read. This was before the creation of Twitter and Facebook and all the other social media that is crazy popular now, all the way back in the year 2004.

Late one night during college I couldn’t sleep. (Story of my life, guess what I’m not doing because I’m writing this right now.) I started doing some googling about the different comics I was reading. One in particular was Ultimate Spider-Man by Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley. I looked up Bendis and found his website which had a message board. This message board was for Bendis and his comics but it would become something so much more. I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.

So I spent the rest of the night reading all these different threads (discussions) going on. Laughing, nodding in agreement, and bursting out in anger with disagreement. You know, internet things. I lurked for a long time, always reading but never posting. It wasn’t that I was intimidated by anyone I just thought the community flowed so well that I didn’t think it needed me to add anything to it. So I just enjoyed the ride and read along, becoming obsessed with it, spending most of my time reading it when I didn’t have class or work to do. So much so that some of these screen names became legendary to me. I don’t know if it was the high post count or the popularity of their threads or how much attention each post got or maybe the fact that they actually got to interact with Brian Michael Bendis. To me it was the coolest fucking thing ever.

Eventually the appeal of the community became too much and I wanted to be a part of it. I figured it was worth the risk to see if I would get accepted or fall completely on my face. Who the fuck wanted the opinion of an 18 year old? What did he have to offer the world? Nothing, I thought, but fuck it, I joined anyway. Let me tell you right here and now, that to this day I couldn’t have called how this message board would change my life and that I would make lifelong friends. I think about this every now and then and it still amazes me how this one writer brought this community together and that it’s brought me so much joy. I’m very thankful for it because I don’t know what I’d be without it.

The reason I write all this more than ten years later is for a number of reasons. First, it was truly a wonderful place for discussion. That place shaped me, my interests in film and television and reading books and comics and thinking differently. The vast amount of different people that I’ve met, hung out with, got drunk with, got high with, smoked cigarettes with, went to cons with, visited in other states, attended weddings, gone to the movies with, gone out to eat, met their families, laughed, cried, hugged, been there for each other. It’s incredible to me that that place has gave me all that. Some of these people are some of my best friends. I’ve had two of the most memorable laughs in my life with my friends 4thman and MikeD! Screen names on a fucking message board.

If you’re from the board, hi I’m THWIP!

Second reason I write this is because of TheGetHighKnight, but I knew him as Frank. Frankie B. FBR III. I was 18 when I met Frank. Frank was without a doubt the coolest person I’ve ever met. There’s no question. You looked at him and your first thought was, man that guy looks cool and he doesn’t even look like he’s trying. And I don’t think he was. The coolest thing about being cool is saying that you aren’t cool. Because if you say you are, you’re trying to convince someone of something you might not believe. Frank was cool. He always wore a black Mets hat and he had squared black frames and he painted and liked the Beastie Boys and Chinese Democracy by Guns and Roses and Ghostbusters and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Star Wars and The Walking Dead and The Punisher and toys and RC Racers and movies and he fucking loved smoking weed. His ringtone was The Imperial March! He made quite the impression on a kid who didn’t know what the fuck to think of the world. He taught me that it was okay to love the things you like and not give a fuck what anybody else thought. That was their problem, not mine. He was there for me for one of the hardest nights of my life in dealing with the death of someone I admired. He sent me drawings he did because it didn’t cost him anything and he knew how much I loved his work. I couldn’t afford to commission a piece from him so he was kind to me. He had a wonderful spirit. He loved life and he loved the board and he loved comics and he loved hanging out with all of us. Any time we all met at a bar, the initial group would yell a ‘HEY!’ whenever someone showed up, I think Frankie always got the biggest one, because we loved him and because he was always holding.

Frank died 5 years ago. Cancer. Fuck cancer. A group of us went to his funeral on Staten Island. We met up in Manhattan and took the ferry. We drank on the ferry and admittedly got a little tipsy. We were in mourning. Frank had a tough battle. When we found out we hadn’t seen him in a long time. We chalked it up to schedule conflicts and life. We didn’t know he had cancer. He didn’t tell anyone except his family. I wish I could remember the last time we saw each other or at least I wish we could have said goodbye to him. I think about him a lot. He was a good person and a good friend to a fucking kid he didn’t know when he didn’t have to be. But that was Frank. He’d give you the shirt off his back if you needed it.

This was just supposed to be a short memorial to Frank on the anniversary of his death, but he’s been on my mind lately. It happens every once in awhile especially now and with his birthday next month. I miss him a lot. Every time I see something Star Wars related I think of Frank and how he would have liked Kylo Ren or wonder what he thought about Rogue One.

We still talk about him all the time. Every time the guys from the board get together we raise a glass in his honor, wishing him the best, wishing he was still with us.

RIP FBR III

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