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The Kiss bassist and lifelong comics fan reveals his deep roots in fandom — publishing fanzines as a teenager in Queens alongside a young Marv Wolfman, his encyclopedic knowledge of comics minutiae (he once rattled off DAK's complete scripting credits on first meeting), and his love of the Kirby-Ditko-Lee pre-superhero fantasy stories. Discusses how comics and rock'n'roll are both "folk art" that reflect their times, his subconscious borrowing from Harryhausen animation for his stage movements, and his brief career as a sixth-grade teacher who assigned Spider-Man as homework. Mentions wanting to play the Thing if CBS's Fantastic Four movie gets made.

Gelb reconnects with Simmons after discovering that the KISS co-founder had written columns in his 1960s fanzine Men of Mystery under the pseudonym Gene Klein. Simmons recalls his 1958 arrival from Israel, learning English through DC and Marvel comics, his intense fandom for Kirby, Ditko, and Gil Kane, and his own fanzine publishing. He discusses how comic-book archetypes directly influenced KISS's visual identity, the Marvel KISS comic (with Stan Lee present for a blood-in-the-ink promotional stunt), his failed attempt to play Jon Sable on television, and current projects including the Delta Tenn TV pilot and his record label Simmons Records.

A reprint of an unpublished college paper written by Simmons under his birth name Gene Klein, arguing that comics should be used as classroom teaching aids across subjects such as English, sociology, and science. The paper draws on McLuhan's media theory and Simmons's own experience learning English through comics as an Israeli immigrant.