Get Your Hot Takes: Hoopla is the Best Digital Comics App
A new recurring column debuts with a (possibly?) spicy take from an increasingly competitive part of comics.
Welcome to Get Your Hot Takes, 10 a new recurring column that will be the home to random comic thoughts and observations I have that could arguably be considered a hot take. Will they be that sizzling in reality? Probably not. I’m not a hot take kind of guy. But they’ll be in the vicinity for me, and this is where you’ll find them.
What if I told you that there’s an app out there that contains a practically unlimited number of single-issue comics, graphic novels, and manga?
That it’s available in several of the largest English-speaking countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand?
And that all it costs you is the time it takes to get — and eventually renew — a card from your local library?
That sounds pretty great, right? Almost too good to be true, even. But let me tell you, folks: It’s real, and it’s spectacular. So, what’s this wonder app called?
You probably know it already. It’s hoopla, 11 a, for a lack of better words, streaming platform powered by your library card. It doesn’t just hold comics and graphic novels and manga either. It features books, audiobooks, movies, TV shows, and music as well, extending that “practically unlimited” concept from earlier into the domain of “functionally infinite.”
And during a time of great change in the digital comics environment, with new players arriving and previous ones technically existing even though they’re often real weird about it, hoopla’s still there, as it has been since 2012. And it continues to be what it has always been, in my opinion: the best digital comics app available right now. 12
My love affair with hoopla began when it did for many, I’m guessing. There I was, a boy, sitting at home, bored and scared during the pandemic. And there it was, an app, loaded with everything I needed to resolve at least one of those problems, just waiting for me to renew my library card. I did, a decision that has since made hoopla a staple of my comic reading habits. 13
In fact, if you’ve noticed greater rigor in my end of the year reading habits of late, much of that is thanks to hoopla. It’s the backbone of The SKTCHD AWRDS, and I suspect its involvement will only grow in my new, more economically restrained reality. But the big question is, why do I think it’s the best digital comics app going today?
Well, I have my reasons, and I’m going to share the biggest ones today.
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Said in the way a vendor would shout, “GET YOUR HOT DOGS” at a baseball game.↩
Its name is stylized with all the letters being lower cased. I’m not being weird!↩
One could make a nuanced argument that hoopla operates in a much different space than its peers in the digital comic scene. That’s true. It’s also true that such nuance defeats the hot take nature of this column, so I am reducing it to a footnote.↩
I also watch movies on there, ranging from good ones like Train to Busan and Quiz Show to some far more questionable choices. I want to say The Meg was involved at one point.↩
Although they’re considering reducing that number.↩
At least for me.↩
The former one is mystifying but I suspect I’m not its target market.↩
Another app connected to libraries that works more like a traditional library with limits on material and a hold system, but it often has far more books and audiobooks to choose from (although fewer comics in my experience).↩
Hidden in the Teen Zone, an area designated for teenagers. I have been caught sneaking into this area before by my wife, who points out that I am not actually a teenager. I might be in my heart, though!↩
Said in the way a vendor would shout, “GET YOUR HOT DOGS” at a baseball game.↩
Its name is stylized with all the letters being lower cased. I’m not being weird!↩
One could make a nuanced argument that hoopla operates in a much different space than its peers in the digital comic scene. That’s true. It’s also true that such nuance defeats the hot take nature of this column, so I am reducing it to a footnote.↩
I also watch movies on there, ranging from good ones like Train to Busan and Quiz Show to some far more questionable choices. I want to say The Meg was involved at one point.↩