This project is an analytical history of the discourse of media panics that have affected comics-like forms in the mid- to late-1800s, comic books in the mid-1900s, and comics media in 1990s and the contemporary moment. The study of these media panics shapes a theory of nerd culture in general and comics culture specifically in order to better understand the delicate and foundational dialectic that sustains a consumer identity that is paradoxical in its indulgence in and animosity towards popular culture. With its historical formation in mind, this project explores the formation of geek chic as a consumer identity that, in many ways, troubles and even threatens the status quo of nerd culture.