“This is about discovery”: New comic and game store H&H Evanston opens on Central Street

When you enter H&H Evanston, the new comic book and game store on Central Street, a portal into your imagination opens.

“This is about discovery,” said owner Drew Beckman. “This is about being part of a community. Even if it’s just your family around a table.”

Beckman and Vern Wiley, the store manager, recently moved the store they operated for 4 years in Wilmette, Heroines & Heroes, to the newly renovated space at 2026 Central Street. It is now H&H Evanston short. The unofficial opening took place on August 9th.

In July, while boxes were still being unpacked and shelves were being emptied, the two men sometimes talked excitedly to each other, like wide-eyed children in a candy store.

Of course, sweet treats are not their specialty: they spoil the audience with picture pages, fantasy worlds and games, but also with tutorials and competitions.

Defying the stereotypes of comic book stores

While H&H Evanston offers the latest Deadpool and other serialized novels, it’s not a typical comic book store of the past – not like the ones Wiley’s mother took him to but never went in. He jokes that in those stores, “Comic Book Guy,” the character from The Simpsons, “was actually a shining example of a guy I would have met as a kid.”

As the former owner of the Comix Gallery in Wilmette, Wiley knows this guy, but he doesn’t come across as sarcastic or grumpy in the slightest.

Beckman added: “If you grew up in the ’70s or even the ’80s, if you wanted to go to a comic book store, you always had to go to a hole in the wall. It was dingy, dirty, it smelled.”