Brill Building: July 2004

Comic-Con Fan Report part 7

Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,
6.

Right, this it. Simpsons and Sin City and that’ll be the end of this Comic-Con business. I will post an appendix to all of this, though, but that’s not essential. Looking around I see there are a lot of great post-Con reports. The thing is those people have enough sense to keep it to one post. Me, well, mine have to come with an appendix! Ah well, people enjoy reading them and I enjoy writing them (most of the time) so who cares? On with the goofiness:

Sat.

Daniel and I had a train to catch at 4:00 p.m., so this is really half a day. Granted, it’s half a day with three of the biggest panels of the con, none having to do with comics. Saturday, more than other day of the Con, is movie/TV/etc. day. As long as they still give me plenty of comics stuff, I don’t mind. I was just there to soak up the geek goodness.

We got to the Simpsons panel early. Seems the preview/panel of the new J.J. Abrams series Lost was getting started. With nothing better to do, we decided to sit down. They showed the first hour of the two-hour pilot. Pretty decent show about a bunch of airplane passengers stranded on a (supposedly) desert island. One of the airplane passengers happens to be played by Lord of the Rings actor Dominic Monaghan. Hearing half the audience scream with delight whenever he appeared on screen or when he came on stage for the panel, I knew this was the closest thing I will ever get to a Backstreet Boys concert. Pretty much all the questions were directed towards him. He admitted he couldn’t answer much because of a bit o’ the hangover, but he tried any way, the poor sod. I thought it was cool that former Batman: The Animated Series writer Paul Dini was there as one of the show’s writers, but he didn’t get to so much because he was never in LOTR. The poor fool.

After all the Lost fun it was time to get better seats up front for the upcoming Simpsons panel. The show started off with clips from last season on the big screens. Then we got to see something special, very special. They played a French detergent commercial starring Our Favorite Family. At the end of the commercial (featuring voice work by French actors who did amazingly good impressions of the real Simpsons cast) we get to see young Bart Simpson doing a full frontal nudity scene for a good few seconds. Bart’s penis is very small, just so you all know.

Creators Matt Groening, Executive Producer Al Jean and a few writers and other crew members trotted out on stage to hearty applause. Bongo Comics big-wig Bill Morrison did an ok job of moderating, but this presentation was dominated by audiences from the questions. And most of them were bloody terrible. One question was someone asking for more appearances by Rich Uncle Skeleton and Dinner Dog. The producers told us that the return of Dinner Dog was no high priority. The mention of said Dinner Dog would become a running joke throughout the show. Another question came from someone who was supposedly a big fan of Gabbo. If he was such a big fan, why did he complain that we have only scene this character once? Doesn’t he know of the Great Gabbo’s appearance at that Indian Casino?

All these questions and more were made bearable by writer Matt Selman. This man’s fanboy baiting puts the likes of us comics-bloggers to shame. It is one thing to dismantle some Newsarama poster’s poorly made argument from the safety of one’s computer; it’s a whole other thing to call out some Comic Book Guy stand-in right in front of many thousands of people. The venom this man had for any fan’s who complained how thing aren’t the same as they were during 1992 is truly inspiring to us all. The fact that he wrote one of my favorite recent episodes of the show, the Run Lola Run-inspired Trilogy of Error, makes me like him even more.

Other news such as Springfield legalizing gay marriages and the subsequent coming out of a character were revealed. I even heard that piece of trivia being reported on CNN. Yes, come to the San Diego Comic-Con, where the real news is made! I’m more looking forward to the guest appearance by Gary Busey on the show. He’ll be narrating an educational video entitled So You’ve Gotten a Restraining Order.

The panel ended with a clip from last season of The Simpsons, Comic Book Guy and Edna Krabappel attending a comic book convention. This was a big hit for the crowd, and was to fun watch with a ton of fellow nerds.

Time for the Sin City panel. We decided to get there early as well. We did and we got in line. Not just any line, mind you. This was the biggest line in the world. It went from Hall H, the farthest right portion of the convention floor, to outside the convention center. By outside the convention center I mean it went to the grass and almost to the building right next to the convention center that was under construction. Every fifth person that came outside was heard to exclaim “wow, look at the size of that line!” That was funny the first two times and excruciating the last ten.

Still, it was all worth it when we got to finally sit down and hear director Robert Rodriguez tell us about the creation of the film adaptation of Sin City. He basically didn’t want the comics to become a film; he wanted the film to become like the comics. That’s why he drafted Frank Miller to co-direct the film. Rodriguez introduced Miller and the crows went wild. Miller and Rodriguez talked about Miller’s apprehension to movie making based on his experiences with the Robocop franchise. Rodriguez eventually melted that cold, cold heart of Miller’s with a short film he did in Austin based on the story The Customer is Always Right. Miller liked it so much that it would become the first scene of the movie. The movie is an anthology of stories from various Sin City books, the longest featuring the character Marv (Newsarama has a pretty good rundown of the show).

Rodriguez and Miller let the film speak for itself by showing us some clips of the film. The first was the test of the film that was previously talked about. This and other clips they showed were basically the panels of the comic moving. They even cut the actual panels of the film into the clips, although I hope that doesn’t make it into the final film as it’s distracting more than anything else. The film is over-the-top with the violence, sex, dialogue, everything. Just like Miller’s work the film looks like it has no time for subtlety. I don’t know how the movie audience as a whole will react to the film (although big fans of Kill Bill will probably like it, the fact that Quentin Tarantino directs a scene doesn’t hurt) but fans will get a huge kick out of this piece of work. I think it’s fantastic to see a wonderful artist like Miller get his work out on such a large level.

After the clip show Rodriguez introduced the lovely ladies of the film, but Daniel and I had to split. The 785 to Santa Barbra and intermediate stations was calling us and we had to answer. After all, we had gone too long without a home-cooked meal.

I want to thank you, San Diego. I was born in the city some 21 years ago, and just a few weeks ago I was reborn. If I had any doubts of being a nerd before, this crushed them forever. Not to worry, though, as I now know that there are many, many, many, many, many, many, many more like me. And a lot of them smell awful when you get real close to them.

Permanent Link: 11:28 PM | 0 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 6 (barely)

Part 5 (and you can work backwards from there)

Yesterday and today has been busy as Hell (with emphasis on the word “Hell”) for me with family stuff. I usually try to post daily, but I had to skip a day, as well as miss out on a really good eBay auction. I’m afraid this post isn’t even much in the way of compensation for a missed day as it is pretty short. I promise you folks, Saturday is next and it’s a real good one what with The Simpsons panel and Sin City. I’ve even got an odds ‘n’ sods piece to finish it all off. So here we go with what some call “The Oscars of comics.”

Eisners

Award shows, well, they aren’t for me. While I know the people behind it only want to honor great works in comics of the last year (at least that’s what I hope the awards are about) I just can’t hang with the idea of creating some type of competition for any art form. Still, this is the comics awards show so I thought I would enjoy it a little more. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case.

In fairness, it wasn’t entirely the fault of the show and its directors. After being cooped inside the Convention Center for 12 hours straight and living only off of hot dogs and bottled water, my oh so sensitive body was giving out. I still managed to get in two hours of the ceremony in and some of it is pretty entertaining and/or interesting.

For where the fan seats were I got a pretty good seat. Only a little to the speaker’s right of the podium and in the second row. Of course if you’re a fan of elbow space, and I am, this seat turned out to be not so hot. Since many fans going to the Eisners and other events at the Con have bags and what-not with them I wish they would put a little space between seats. Oh, what the Hell am I complaining about?

Jackie Estrada had a few nice words about the history of the Con before introducing the night’s keynote speaker, Michael Chabon. I enjoy Chabon’s stuff alright, so I wanted to hear what he had to say. His speech was about how, now that the comics audience is mostly adults, there should be comic books out there for the kids. I think he made some good points especially on how if you want to get kids reading comics, perhaps there should be more comics starring kids and not just as sidekicks. He made it clear that he didn’t think that the kids of today will automatically think comics are “corny” or “out of touch.” He knows it is a powerful enough medium to entice readers of all ages. I think Chabon has something of a case although while Chabon mostly talked about the content of comics, I would place most of the blame on comics losing kids on greedy publishers and lazy retailers. In fact we see in manga a whole new world of comics that isn’t under the thumb of Marvel or DC (at least not yet) nor usually bought by kids in comic book stores. Every generation has its own memories of comics for them to wax nostalgic on in their future years. For the baby boomers it’s Schwartz-era DC and Lee-era Marvel. For my generation it’s the Image explosions of the early-90s. I don’t doubt in the future we will hear young adults say to one another “hey, do remember reading Love Hina?”

Hmmm, that was more analysis than reporting wasn’t it? Sorry about that, folks.

After Chabon’s speech Will Eisner himself spoke a few words. He, along with everyone else it seems, has an opinion on the large New York Times piece about graphic novels that ran recently. Seems Eisner didn’t have much use of the article’s inference that cartoonists come from a strange and dysfunctional background. Later Walt Simonson, along with his wife Louise, would present. Simonson added to Eisner’s dissent when he talked about how his friends Howard Chaykin described him as “the Andy Hardy of comics.”

The ceremony plodded along. And along. And along. And aloooong. As my body got sicker from today’s endurance test of poor ventilation systems my mind started to get weary of so many, well, award show stuff! Still, I thanked myself for staying put when I heard the greatest acceptance speech to any award there has ever been.

The wonderful and talented Chipp Kidd received his award for his work on the Alex Ross art book. He made a little joke than thanked a few people. Then he said, in complete and utter seriousness, this:

”I want to share with you something I overheard today. I thought it was so amazing and so profound. I overheard somebody exclaimed on the floor ‘if you like zombies, and you like Jesus, you’ll love Zombie Jesus.’ Thank you.”

Chipp Kidd, I love you. I love your designs for so many great books. I love your enthusiasm for comics. And with that speech I just plain love you. You are the man.

I knew the show wasn’t going to get much better than that. After that speech it was all over for me. My body was going to give out, and the fact that I had filled it with a few Heinekens might not have helped. I caught the Pink Line back to my little inn and promptly gobbled down some Pepto-Bismol and fell asleep, dreaming about the wonders that Saturday will hold.

Won’t you join us for them?

Permanent Link: 11:19 PM | 0 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 5

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

I’m I up to five already? I guess so.

Before I start with the memoirs I want to tell you about an e-mail I got. I received an e-mail from Gary Sassamn, Director of Programming of the San Diego Comic-Con saying how much he enjoys my reports (I thanked him for putting on a great Con). Tom Collins (yes, that’s his real name) said he’s enjoyed the reports as well and is jealous of all the fun I had. If HaloScan didn’t erase all the Blogger comments you’d already know this. I even got link to by Mark Evanier (and the man I’m convinced is his little brother Mike Sterling). I’m not saying this to feed my ego; I just want to thank those individuals and all the others who have been enjoying my reports. I sometimes feel like I’m writing in a vacuum and this feedback makes me feel really good about what I do. I thank you all.

Also, according to Milo George, my squirrel name is Lord or Lady Nibbles his Nuts II. My only question is…how did they know? Alright, back to our regular scheduled programs:

More of Fri.

After three straight panels it was time for one last trip to that exhibit floor. The Kirby panel got out at a little before 4:00 p.m. and the Hernandez Bros were signing at the Fantagraphics table right at 4:00. Tony Millionaire was still doing some signing so I decided to get the latest Maakies collection autographed by him. This marked the fourth time I made my way to an appearance of this great artist. I thanked him for an e-mail he sent me recently thanking me for saying nice things about his Star Wars Tales story on The Comics Journal message board. We exchanged pleasantries and I’ve got another great collection of his strip with a sketch of Drinky Crow in it. Peter Bagge was also there but he was packing up. I love Hate and a lot of other stuff by him (I think I might be the only person who bought all six issues of Sweatshop) but I’d feel about bothering him for a signature and a sketch while he’s making his way out. I’m looking forward to his book that was announced at the Dark Horse panel.

By this time Jaime Hernandez showed. I mentioned that we shop at the same comic book store, which he thought was cool. We both agreed how lucky we were to have a store to shop at that had such a great back stock. I gave him Love & Rockets #11 to sign and he flipped through it. Seems this was the first time he’d seen the book in print. He even asked me if it was ok if he looked through it. Of course! It’s quite a feeling to hand one of the greatest cartoonist their latest work hot off the presses. I told him I’m really looking forward to the Locas book, he said he is too.

I moved over to the right to get a signing and a sketch from Jaime’s brother Gilbert. I mentioned that I was at the Vertigo panel and I’m looking forward to Sloth. He was nice enough to pull out some pages of the book that have been all but lettered. I noticed that a page had lemons raining down from the sky. When I asked him about them he said “The Godfather had oranges, I have lemons.” Beto also had a mini and a videotape companion that he was selling. I picked both, no questions asked (well, that’s not true, I asked how much). The mini, titled The Naked Cosmos, is Beto doing a superhero story as only he can. Imagine if 60’s Marvel didn’t have to deal with the Comics Code Authority and you’ll start to get the idea. I haven’t seen the video yet but when I do (and when I figure out how to get vidcaps on this site) I’ll post a review of both the mini and the tape.

After that coolness I went over to the Dark Horse book. They were in a tie with Fantagraphics for best signings at a booth. Will Eisner, Frank Miller, Howard Chaykin, Michael Chabon, Mike Mignola, Kurt Busiek, Joe Casey, Stan Sakai, Dean Haspeil and more were there. Unfortunately my schedule prevented me from showing up to any of those. Ladies and gentleman, no matter if you’re on the floor or going to panels, the name of the game is plan it out.

I did end up walking behind Patton Oswalt and Brian Posehn. I didn’t want to bother them or anything, but it was cool to see that they were there. Man, I need to pick up that Oswalt CD.

6:00 p.m. rolled around and it was time for Spothlight on Aaron McGruder, the cartoonist behind Boondocks. The room was pretty well attended, second to only the Kirby panel for most populated comics-related panel I went to. McGruder was up on the stage all by his lonesome talking about his career. He started talking about how he was first inspired by the early-90’s Image and Milestone comic lines, no doubt the only cartoonist you can find in the newspaper comics page who can say that. When he attended the ChicagoCon and Milestone co-founder Mike Davis (who later made his way to the panel himself) made a speech about being persistent in the comics biz, McGruder knew what he had to do to get his name out. Eventually he got his stuff to Universal Press Syndicate and he’s been with them ever since.

McGruder shared a funny anecdote about his first time meeting with UPS head. McGruder described him as a “white man so white, you feel good that there’s a guy that white around. I mean, he looked like Santa Claus.” McGruder expected to be asked to change something but the only input he got was “I think there should be more angry black children in your comic.” Ever since then, McGruder said, he’s gotten along just fine with UPS.

Now, there was rumor that got posted on Newsarama that a fight broke out on the panel. There probably wasn’t. At the very least, if there was a fight it was diffused pretty quickly and didn’t disrupt anything because nobody else in the room, certainly not our speaker, noticed anything. There was, though, one questioner who sounded pretty confrontational towards McGruder, although the fact that he was all the way in the back and had to raise his voice to be heard probably contributed to that. Still, he tried to paint McGruder as a hypocrite for working for, as the questioner put it, “whitey” while criticizing Colin Powell and Condaleeza Rice for the same thing. McGruder clarified his position by saying he didn’t criticized those two for working for a rich white man; he criticized them for working for a man who started an illegal war. Overall, this was a room filled with liberal college kids who just absorbed and applauded pretty much every word McGruder said, myself included.

McGruder said that an animated pilot for Boondocks has already been made and is directed by comic book artist and another Milestone co-founder, Denys Cowan. We can expect that next year. A computer animation 3-D movie is also in the works, but that won’t be out for a long time.

Overall, this might be my favorite panel I went to at the Con. McGruder is such a smart and engaging speaker; if you have the chance to see him lecture I encourage you to check it out. Absolutely wonderful.

I decided to give the Eisners their own post, so that’ll be up soon. After that we’ve got Saturday with the Simpsons and Sin City panels. Then I’m done and we’ll be back to more Brill Building goodness. Until then, have a good night, folks

Permanent Link: 11:38 PM | 0 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 4

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Hey, I get HaloScan to work on my blog. They came up with some automatic install wizard so I just had to click a "next" button a few times. I didn't know it would erase any of the comments I did get, which sucks. Still, when every door closes another one opens. I hope you take advantage of the new and easier comments section.

Anyway, more Fan Report. I plan to do a few today. In this one I’ll go over the Marv Wolfman: From Idea to Script and The Jack Kirby Tribute panel.

The first thing I remember of the Wolfman panel is what I heard making my way there. I noticed a few of the costume people expressing regret about coming to this gigantic event in their elaborate outfits. The heat was getting to everybody there, but I think those in costumes felt it the most. Still, I was glad to see people sticking to their guns (or lightsabers in some cases) and still being in their costumes. Hell I think people should talk in the voices of their characters. Example:

“Yes, you in the pirate costume, do you have a question Pia Guerra?”

“Arrr. Do ye know when will be seeing more of Yorrick’s land-lubbin’ mother in thar book?”

I got to the Wolfman panel which (as Wolfman pointed out in the beginning) was pretty well attended seeing how the Warner Bros. showcase of Batman Begins and Constantine. Wolfman is a shy, quiet guy and he apologized ahead of time if he wasn’t being that good an orator. While he had to check his notes a bit early on, I think he did a fine job of explaining how a story can become more than just good but something the viewer or reader will really remember and appreciate. He did this in a humorous way of deconstructing films everybody knows like Star Wars: A New Hope, Star Trek: Wrath of Khan, Raiders of the Last Ark as well as going over his own work in Spider-Man, Tomb of Dracula and New Teen Titans.

He talked about why theme in a story is important because a good story has to be about something. He applied Star Wars’s theme of a young man finding his role in life to different settings to illustrate this. The great thing I got out of this presentation was how Wolfman said if you deviate from the norm you can still be a success. He gave Wrath of Khan as an example. A Syd Field type of instructor would tell you that you need to have Kirk and Khan meet face to face. But that never happens, does it? For once I finally got to go to a writing class that wasn’t about certain formulas designed to make you a good writer (in reality, a mediocre one) but one that asks the students to apply critical thinking to their favorite works so they’ll know what they want to write. I hope a lot of people got something out of this panel.

Up next was the Kirby panel. I got a seat pretty close to the front for this one, which was very well attended. Mark Evanier hosted Steve Rude, Paul Ryan, Dave Gibbons, Walt Simonson and Mike Royer for this panel. Things got started with an appreciation of Kirby’s family and friends. They even gave out plaques to honor those who have been friends of the Kirby family. Evanier got started with the hosting duties soon after that. You can tell he used to write for variety shows because he doesn’t mind slipping in the occasionally corny joke with a delivery that tells you he knows it’s corny. He's pretty funny, I liked his line about Julie Schwatz being re-incanated as the old guy in the Six Flags commercial (hey, they are both WB properties). For anyone of you that has ever met Mike I’d say that Evanier actually reminded me of an older version of him.

The panel talked about the first Kirby book they’ve read. When Simonson gave a vague description of an Atlas monster book someone in the crowd was immediately able to identify it as Journey Into Mystery #72. These were people who knew their Kirby.

Due to the presence of Mike Royer the panel talked about inking Kirby (on the dais Royer, Gibbons and Rude have had the honor of inking The King). Royer talked about what it was like inking an artist where every line was so perfect in where it needed to be. The panel also spoke highly of Joe Sinnot.

Someone in the audience brought up a recent issue of Fantastic Four where God was revealed to be Kirby himself. Evanier said that while Kirby knew that the creators who did put him in their work as tribute meant only respect; he was worried about a big company like Marvel owning his likeness. Gibbons talked about on his recent run on Captain America and how he gave Kirby a bit cameo. Evanier quoted Roz Kirby when she saw a Kirby cameo in a book, “there’s another tribute we’ll never see any money out of.”

Ryan, Rude and Simonson talked about the times they've worked on Kirby characters. Rude said he drew Kirby characters the way Kirby drew them becuase that's he feels that's the way they should look. Simonson had a slightly different view. He said when he was working on Thor he decided to take the Kirby influence he strongly felt and use that to come up with his own work. He said it was as if he's standing on Kirby and Lee's shoulders. Ryan mentioned how Kirby's humanism was just as important to him as his dynamism. Ryan talked about when he was working on Fantastic Four he tried to heed how Kirby would apply the same level of craft to the man on the street as he would to, say, the Human Torch or the Thing.

Also mentioned were some reprints DC and Marvel have coming out. Besides the Marvel Visionaries book coming out I mentioned in posts before, DC is going to start reprinting Kamandi. I don't remember if they said whether it would be in Archives format or in trade paperback like the Fourth World stuff, but either way we’ll get some Last Boy on Earth comics.

Later on in the day I’ll talk about hitting the convention floor one last time as well as the Aaron McGruder panel. Then the Eisners, which made me glad that I live in a world with beer. See you then.

Permanent Link: 11:10 AM | 0 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 3

Part 1

Part 2

Fri.

This won’t be all of Friday. I’ll just do the a little bit of the day, as a lot happened.

This was panel day for me. While I went to two panels on Thursday, I went to twice that number on Friday plus I went to the Eisners. The first panel I went to was the only news one I attended. It was Vertigo: Breaking Boundaries and it started at 10:30 a.m. This meant getting to the Con as soon as doors opened at 10:00. We did, and the accomplishment of our goal led me to one odd observation.

There is nothing quite like seeing the absolute blob of people that is Con goers waiting to get in. Our shuttle had to travel the entire length of the convention center to get to its stop. That meant that any passenger looking out the right side window got to see wave after wave after wave of anxious fans. Pretty soon you can’t make out any noticeable differences, not even with the costume people. You just sit there and witness the enormous flesh-gathering.

I made it to the Vertigo thing with time to spare, although you wouldn’t notice that by the way I was stressing out getting there. Karen Berger, who reminded me of a really nice high school guidance counselor, introduced the large group of people on stage. Every popular Vertigo ongoing book was represented by at least one member of the creative team. There was trouble getting the lights to dim to start the slide show. Of course, as soon as that problem was fixed Berger had a conversation with someone working under her that went something like this:

“Alright, can we start the slides now?”

“Actually, we’re looking for the slides.”

“You mean, you don’t have the slides here?”

Still, Berger kept everything cool and calm. To stall time Dave Gibbons talked about his upcoming original graphic novel The Originals. “It’s going to take me as much time to talk to you about it as did for me to do it the way things are going,” Gibbons observed.

Eventually, though, the slides were retrieved and all the big news was announced. You can read all about them on other sites so I’ll just talk about what being in the room was like. Everybody was getting excited about the new stuff and what’s happening with the old stuff. Then the film Constantine was brought up. You could feel the mood in the room turn more than a bit dour as Berger explained the film. When she mentioned Keanu Reeves’ name a person sitting behind me let out the softest, shortest “boo” I think I ever heard. Berger even said that Reeves does a good job as Constantine, which another person decided to snort rather loudly at. I felt that was a bit rude, this was a woman who was bringing that person several books a month that I’m assuming that person enjoys. At least give her her say. “The important thing is that this is the first Vertigo movie,” Berger said. That got the crowd back together and everyone leapt into applause.

Colleen Doran, who will be doing the art on a book Warren Ellis is writing called Stealth Tribes, offered some advice. “If you’re going to use yourself as a model in a story Warren’s writing read the ending first,” Doran said. “Else you will have to draw yourself doing some freaky stuff.” The book is about body modification and people spending a lot of time online. If Ellis wasn’t going to write a story like that, who would?

An audience member identifying himself was “a rabid Bush-hater” got a round of applause from the crowd, certainly from me. He asked if any of the creators were worried about bringing politics into their books. Berger put it best, “if we were scared of what people though of our stuff, we would have been gone a long time ago.”

One last thing about Vertigo and it’s important. I don’t usually act like any type of comics-activist, but here I will make an exception. When Seaguy was brought up Berger said that Grant Morrison and Cam Stewart would like to do more with the character. They said they would publish more of the book only if they got some real positive response. Right now they feel they’ve got about half-and-half going. I appeal to you to go to DC and e-mail them (the link is right there where I send you) and tell them you want more Seaguy. C’mon, you know you want it.

Looking at that big block of text I think should end here. I’ve still get plenty more to talk about, I just worry that this will go on for so long that people will tire of hearing about Comic-Con before I even get to my final post on the subject. Still, I don’t want to drown the good folks on the internet in reading, so I’m trying to keep the posts smaller. I’ll have more on Friday up tomorrow. See you then.

Permanent Link: 11:19 PM | 1 comments

Catwoman Review

I’ll get to the actual Comic-Con fan report soon, but first let me say a few words about a movie I just saw, Catwoman. Like most people I did not like this film. My main complaint is that the directing was just awful. So much of the time it looked like some hyper-active ad for Pepsi that I was just turned off by the whole film. I didn’t want to get into the excitement of the Catwoman character if that meant I had to sit through another eyeball-torturing fight scene. Hell, not even the fight scenes were given that type of treatment. A basketball game between Benjamin Bratt and Halle Berry was given the look of Nike’s latest campaign. As for the movie’s romance itself, Bratt had more romantic chemistry when he was playing opposite Jerry Orbach. The scenes between those two were a snooze-fest, although to be fair so were most other scenes in the film.

The actual Catwoman stuff featured Berry, Sharon Stone and the guy who was in the Matrix sequels giving the scenery some deep bite marks. Hamming it up may be fun for the actors, but all I could think of was that a campy take on the Catwoman character was done before and done better by Eartha Kitt. It didn’t help that the film thought it could turn the campy stuff on and off like a faucet (first Berry is licking Bratt’s face and than she’s crying in the interrogation room with him? What the fuck!?). Having a goofy time works in low-budget, fun movies. It doesn’t work in a big budget movie, at least not for me. When I see a group of creators being flip and trivial with millions of dollars all I can think of is better ways for that money to be spent (what can I say, I was raised by a Jewish Scotsman, worrying about money is in my blood).

As for that costume, I would have preferred if they stuck with the first one she used. It may have been nothing more but a leather get-up one could find on Melrose Ave. with a simple mask no doubt held to the face with spirit gum, but it was simple and effective. Instead we got some terrible S&M outfit with a lot of skin showing and a goofy looking mask. It might be easy to masturbate to, but no so hot when it comes to crime fighting.

I would recommend this movie if you enjoy the feeling of being bored and dizzy at the same time, other than that just Tivo some of the old Batman shows off of TV Land.

Permanent Link: 9:08 PM | 2 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 2

Part 1

More of Thurs.

Daniel and I met up at the Freaks and Geeks panel early. We decided to take our seats in room 6AB right then while the current panel, one on putting together DVDs, was wrapping up. That panel was basically movie and TV geeks shooting the shit about DVDs on a grander scale, which was fun. It was there that I first witnessed a certain phenomenon. If you mention Firefly, as one of the DVD producers on the dais did, you will invariably get loud applause for your comment. It’s not only a sci-fi show after all. It’s a sci-fi show created by Joss Whedon. It’s a sci-fi show that was cancelled before its time. It’s a sci-fi show that became so popular on DVD that a movie is now in the works, making the fans of the series the true victors over know-nothing TV execs. It is perfectly tailored to many of the crowd attending the Con.

The F&G panel got started with co-creator/writer/director Paul Fieg introducing the last episode of the show, Discos & Dragons. The show was great stuff as is to be expected from this show. The recurring mentions of Dungeons & Dragons and appearances by Mystery Science Theater 3000 alumni Joel Hodgson and Trace Beaulieu got extra laughs from the large crowd attending this panel. After the episode finished Paul Fieg came back on stage to introduce the rest of the panel. All of the “geeks” were there, John Francis Daley, Samm Levine and Matrin Starr (whose Bill Haverchuck might be one of my favorite TV characters ever). Joining them was Steve Bannos, writer and actor on the show, and Natasha Melnick who played Nick’s rebound girlfriend Cindy. This was all audience Q&A with all the questions asked by fans to be smart and articulate. I would soon find out this was not the case for all of the Con’s programming. Fieg originally dominated the answers, but soon the rest of the panel chimed in. Among the topics discussed were why the show was cancelled in the first place, if there will be an Undeclared DVD set (there will be), what the panel members are up to now and how autobiographical was the show. Fieg is a smart and witty guy who gave us an unflinching glimpse in how a major network can screw up a good thing, but he never sounded bitter. The “geeks” of the panel made a few good jokes as well. When Fieg mentioned that Levine was the youngest member of The Friars Club, Levine said it was “only so they can harvest my organs.” This was a really fun and informative panel, one which I’m glad I attended. The F&G crew did a signing at the autograph center right after the panel, but I couldn’t make that. No, I had a writing panel to attend to.

I took down my notes that would end up here in between the panels and waited outside room 1B (a lot of the Con felt like a new semester starting up at school and the rooms were where all my classes were). I overheard two teen fans discussing X-Men comics and their disdain for Grant Morrison’s run on the book that was equaled only by their approval of the new “Reload” their favorite franchise has received.

“Have you ever met someone who actually liked the Grant Morrison X-Men? I bet they’re all like ‘I like the X-Men expect for that weird part in the 80’s where it made no sense.’”

“Huh, yeah.”

They then went back to admiring Uncacnny X-Men #444.

Later, from the same fans:

“I bet it’s real easy to write comic books.”

The panel DC: The Write Stuff (the names didn’t get any better, folks) had a line-up I was very interested in seeing. It featured Dan Jolley (who looks like Jason Lee, but unlike Jason Lee doesn’t have a demeanor that I find 100% annoying), Paul Jenkins, Andy Diggle (who looks like a British Dave Foley), Bill Willingham, Howard Chaykin, Jimmy Palmiotti and Peter Tomasi. The panel was pure audience Q&A and the questions here hardly stimulating. Luckily the panel featured three very quick wits in Chaykin, Palmiotti and Jenkins. When the lights suddenly went out during the panel (only for a second) Chaykin was quick to quip “ladies and gentlemen, a new superhero…Lady Brownout!” All the creators spoke about their books and the ideas behind them, as well as their experiences writing in the comics industry. A point driven home was how important perseverance is. Writing experience, even if it isn’t writing in comics, is important just so you’ll improve in your craft. Another point brought up was fan reaction on the internet. Willingham had the best line of the night when he said “when I started on Robin I was told two things: fix this book and don’t change anything. And that wasn’t even from two different fans.” Willingham’s cell also went off during the panel, which was funny because his ring was simply the sound of a horse neighing. Also, the writers would like editors to know (and some on the panel are/were editors) that writers need certain hours in the day to write and they can’t be interrupted. Jenkins told the audience that, after all, there was a reason why he spent so much time on the golf course. Finally, if you’re going to ask a creator about his or her career, at least get your facts straight. Don’t ask Howard Chaykin that, since he started with independents, how hard was the adjustment working for DC in the late-80’s. He just might bop you in the head with a copy of Detective Comics #441!

I will end my Thurs. report with this observation. The Con involves a lot of walking. Lots and lots and lots and lots. The thing is, when you realize that you’ve been eating at Denny’s for four days straight, you don’t really mind all that exercise. Just remember, wear a lighter backpack.

Next on my Friday report: Vertigo reveals new projects and revels in uncomfortable audience sentiment about the Constantine film, Marv Wolfman is teacher for the day, I pal around with Tony Millonaire and the Hernandez Bros., Jack Kirby is honored and I attend the best panel of the Con. Be here tomorrow (or thereabouts). Until then I say good night, folks!

Permanent Link: 8:34 PM | 0 comments

Comic-Con Fan Report part 1

Hello, I just got back from the SDCC. I left at around 3:00 p.m. today in the middle of the Sin City panel after they've shown clips of the film. It was awesome, but I'll get to that later. I want to describe to you what two and a half days of Comic-Con was like for one comic fan just there to soak up the pop culture goodness. This will go on for a few installments, but I'll try to keep it up interesting and not go over stuff that Newsarama and Heidi MacDonald's The Beat have already written about it.

So, let us start:

Weds.

After a four-hour plus train ride from Moorpark, CA to San Diego and a half-hour walk to our inn, neither my friend Daniel nor I were interested in preview night. We just got to where we were staying and decided to rest up for the next few days. We learned at the front desk that every room is filled with Comic-Con attendees. To think that I was staying in an inn where everybody conceivably knew who Joe Quesada was left my mind in a particularly boggled state.

Also, San Diego has Seinfeld on after The Simpsons at 11:30. I felt this was a vast improvement over the Los Angeles Fox station, which gives us The Drew Carey show after Simpsons.

Thurs.

Since our inn was only two minutes driving distance from the San Diego Convention Center we figured we could just walk there. All I can say is, I didn’t think carrying a backpack filled with big thick trade paperbacks and graphic novels (I ended up getting a total of 0% signed) would be a problem. After all, it was only a short walk. Well, it wasn’t so short when we end up getting lost while the summer sun was just coming out. Many probably thought registration was a hassle, but after adding an extra twenty minutes to our travels getting our badges felt like a rest. After all, I was able to lay this big heavy back pack down for a few minutes. Oh, but if only took advantage of the luxury that is luggage check.

We finally got in and witnessed the disturbing splendor that is thousands and thousands of people who have at least one obsession or another with some trivial pop culture phenomenon.

Daniel and I decided to split up and meet up again at the Freaks and Geeks panel. That wasn’t until 4:30 p.m. and we got on the convention floor at around 11:00 a.m. This gave us plenty of time to kill visiting all the various booths out there. I’ll share some quick observations now:

• Heavy backpack hurts me
• Staying in DC’s booth for too long will make one’s head explode, it really feels like media overload. I never want to hear the Cartoon Network at such a high volume again.
• Heavy backpack hurts me
• Fantagraphics had a nice, simple booth set up. It was well stocked with all their latest titles, the exception being when I asked about what Ho Che Anderson stuff they had. They told me they had nothing there, but gave me their latest catalog along with a coupon that gave me free shipping and handling. Dirk Deppey was there and proved to be a very kind, helpful gentleman. He also always had a flattoped cap on which, when combined with his facial hair and pony-tail, made him look like a cool, hippie train conductor. When I asked if they had my pre-ordered package of Eighhtball #23, Luba #8 and Love and Rockets #11 they gave me my package right away. They didn’t have L&R #11 just yet, but Eric Reynolds signed off on a sheet of paper that I’ll get the book when I come by the booth on Fri. Very cool.
• It’s cool when a creator has their own simple little booth. Steve Rude (assisted by his wife) and Kyle Baker were there to see the fans face-to-face and do a quick signing on the latest books they had. No hassle, no big lines, just comics business done fast and clean.
• For the love of all that is good and holy in this world have a water bottle with you!! Oh, and drink from it from time to time.
• Heavy backpack hurts me.
• After wandering aimlessly seeing a lot people hock a lot of, err, below-average material, I decided I had to simply sit and down and enjoy the books I bought. I gave my body a rest. I also did a little people watching. That was something. For example, I no longer have to wonder what Darth Maul would look like if he was a teenage girl. Also, a full blown Spider-Man costume might look odd but at lest it isn’t as sad as just some guy with a Spider-Man mask on his head and T-shirt and jeans on otherwise. It seems, over all, many people went for extravagance over efficiency. I guess you’ve got to dedicate your life towards something.
• I went to the small press tables and stocked up on stuff I’ll probably only get the chance to buy at Comic-Con. A lot of fun stuff and fun people selling it. I’ll review some of this stuff soon.

Oh, and my heavy backpack was somewhat painful. I’ll get to the F&G panel tomorrow, but I do want to share an image with you that fascinated me to no end. Among a few guests dressed up in full Jedi regalia, there was one guy who paid extreme detail to his costume; it was an impressive show of craft. He was also so large he had to ride a Rascal. I don’t want to make fat jokes because they are too easy, but this man summed up a lot of my feeling about this Con. He obviously spent so much time on his Star Wars costume yet very little time, if any, to keep his weight down so his knee caps wouldn’t be crushed by the weight of his upper body. I was reminded of this gentleman, who couldn’t have been older than his mid-30’s, when I stood in the largest line in the world to see the Sin City panel or when I spent $100+ in fifteen minutes at the Milehighcomics.com booth. In the end, this man just might be the spirit of the Con, for good or for ill.

Tomorrow, the Freaks and Geeks panel, a DC writers panel featuring Howard Chaykin, Bill Willingham, Andy Diggle and others. Until then I say good night, folks!

Permanent Link: 11:13 PM | 0 comments

It means "whale vagina"

I'm off to San Diego today for the comic-con. I plan to keep a journal there and I'll report back here if any thing interesting happens. Also, I got my Comic Book Legal Defense Fund membership card today. Won't you sign up and help a good bunch of people?

Permanent Link: 8:56 AM | 1 comments

And I thought I wasn't going to write in this thing for a week...

Tim O'Neill counters Dorian's essay on Identity Crisis. I think they both make good points, but I must respond to two things in O'Neill's post.

First, there was a Spider-Man book that dealt with child molesting. It was some educational book (Scott Shaw! profiled it, but since Comic Book Resources' search engine doesn't work I can't find it) and it had a flashback to Peter Parker's life where a babysitter played a little too rough. I don't think that was quite what Tim was going for, but I thought it worth mentioning.

Second, I have to agree with Dorian, I can't see kids being enticed to buy this book becuase of the cover. Off all the people on the cover of the book, Flash would be the only one reconizable to kids becuase of the Justice League cartoon. A Hawkman character did appear on the season finale, but he was a bad guy and it was only that episode. Zantanna appeared in the Batman: Animated Series, but those episodes aren't rerun enough for kids today to know them. Also, kids who read comics, for the most part, don't read DCU titles. In another post Dorian goes over what kids (and others) buy. I shop at Dorian's store and can vounch that he certianly knows what he's talking about. The only DCU book that gets a mention in the "kids" part is Catwoman, but she's not on the cover of this book.

It's not impossible a kid could come across the rape scene in IC, but it's not impossible that a kid could come across the same (or worse) in another comic or movie or TV show or whatever. It's a fact of life that a parent is someday going to have to explain something to the kid that he or she shouldn't have seen at that age. It happens all the time and most kids end up fine. They may not end up loyal DC readers, but these days that's pretty unlikely to happen anyway.

Permanent Link: 6:06 AM | 0 comments

The sloganator

I'm packing and preparing for San Diego so I don't have time to do much for this site. In fact, this will probably be the only thing I post this week. I was going to post the cover for Marvel's Clueless tie-in, but I don't know how to edit the size of images in Blogger.

I will give you this, though. It hasn't got much to do with comics but it's very funny.

Permanent Link: 12:00 PM | 0 comments

That great BLACK superhero!

Great old TV ad for Mego action figure line. You can download the video by clicking on the Captain America action figure.

The people who wrote the copy for the ad didn't do a lot of research on these superheroes. They got Mr. Fantastic's powers very wrong. Still, I love how the announcer describes The Falcon. Oh those silly 70's.

Permanent Link: 2:51 PM | 0 comments

Look out, Alan Moore's pissed!

Well, the world of the internet and comics seems to be all about the events in the DC mini-series Identity Crisis. Now I haven’t read the issue. Unlike some people who haven’t read the issue, I’m not going to start praising it or slamming it. I’m just going to share a thought that went through my head.

Alan Moore has got to be pissed.

Not at the content of IC per se, but (as Alan David Doane pointed out here) when he put that Marvel Douche ad in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen DC had the issue pulped. When he wanted to do a story about L. Ron Hubbard in Tomorrow Stories that was flat-out rejected (the story ended up in a Top Shelf anthology). Meltzer puts sex and violence into the DC Universe, and the cover for issue #2 is the main piece of promotional art for the San Diego Comic-Con! It’s even appearing on buses in San Diego.

Or maybe Moore’s not even surprised by this point. He’s been in this industry long enough after all.

Oh, and just one more thing related to the Green Lantern/Jack Black thing. In a thread on his message board discussing the film (which probably won't get made) John Byrne reveals that he writes letters to TV Guide when they reference the Adam West Batman show. That’s funny in itself, but even funnier if you’re familiar with the stand-up of Paul F. Tompkins.

Well, let's hope this post works. Blogger's been driving me crazy for two days now.

Permanent Link: 12:25 PM | 0 comments

Damn you internet!

Is any one else having trouble using Blogger and Netscape? I try
updating my blog but the browser crashes every time. When I get
back on and see that my blog has been updated the html for links and
stuff isn't working. I've tried using Mozilla as well, but that
didn't help

Also, trying to put HaloScan on this blog is confusing too. I'm losing my mind over here.

Permanent Link: 8:56 AM | 0 comments

Tenacious Green

Remember when Rich Johnston posted about the (slim) chance of a Green Lantern movie starring Jack Black? I wrote about, Mike wrote about it (causing a bit of controversy in his comments section). But that seemed about it.

Until now. At the risk of doing Graeme MacMillan’s job, this CBR thread delivers the Fanboy Rampage one would expect from even the slightest hint of such a movie. I try to be the voice of reason (I even give a shout-out to Mike’s Sinestro idea) but to no avail. Of course, you didn’t think there would be just one thread about what is the most important issue facing us today, did you?

It’s stuff like this that makes me love comics. It always brings a smile (probably more likely an evil grin) to my face when I see stuff like this.

Permanent Link: 8:06 AM | 3 comments

Every superhero is in the book! Every one!!!

Steven Grant talks about the creation of the Marvel mini-series Contest of Champions in his latest column for CBR. Dorain, Mike and I pulled the series out of the back issue bins and gave it the once over a year ago. Most notably it might have one of the silliest panels in Marvel history (and that’s saying something) where the members of Alpha Flight all engage in the most awkward conversation ever so readers can find out the names of all the characters. One would think that just putting caption with the characters’ names on the page would work, but no, so often common sense seems to be the big loser in the making of comic books. The book really doesn’t get much better from there; pretty much every one of the characters' actions seemed contrived. There’s good reason why many of the international characters created for Contest are rarely seen again, although I do remember Sabra appearing in an issue of Peter David’s Incredible Hulk.

Grant’s column is a fascinating read about the creation of Contest, perhaps because it’s such a great example of corporate comics’ clusterfuckery. The book was meant to tie into the Winter Olympics, but when the United States decided to boycott the 1980 Olympics that tie-in was kaput. When Marvel needed a mini-series, and from the looks of it that meant any mini-series, those Olympics tie-ins were re-worked into Contest. The story just gets more complicated from there. Still, Grant says he gets copies of the book to sign all the time. I guess if it brings a smile to some people’s faces, well, maybe it’s not all bad. And hey, it opened the door to Contest of Champions II!

Hmmm, Grant has wrote about Contest of Champions, he's named the Hardy Boys books he wrote on his message board...is it only a matter of time until we find out the story of his work on Blip! magazine?

And on that note I will wish you all a very happy afternoon and rest of the day.

Permanent Link: 12:19 PM | 2 comments

Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, Marijuana, Comics and Alcohol

Hey, new comics came today. Good for them. I picked up three new ones. Let’s see what they do for me (there could be spoilers here):

She-Hulk: The only Marvel book I’m buying delivers the goods. The miniscule prison is a fun idea that writer Dan Slott makes a darn fine superhero comic out of. The prison outbreak was done well, I was genuinely interested. I liked how the law-firm decided to fight the idea of the prison with their “right to height” plan. Paul Pelletier does a good job with the artwork, specifically with all the different supervillains. Slott’s got an arc on JLA coming up. With that news and the fact that Busiek and Garney are going to be on it, that book might be good again.

Challengers of the Unknown: More Chaykin goodness. The man’s known for coming up with complex plots, and while this won’t go down as complex as other works by him it’s good to see a comic that packs in this much story in one issue nowadays. Also, I think it’s clear I’ve been reading too many Wildstorm books when I see a character born on January 1st, 1901 and say to myself “now that’s really going to be important.”

DC Comics Presents: Mystery in Space: The Maggin/Willaims story is great, I love the artwork from one of the best current artists out there. It’s the Morrison/Ordway story that I love, though. Grant crafts a great story in the comics page that touched on current events concerning the media and wartime. All the while he gives us another story paying tribute to Julie Schwartz and the great comics of the 1960s. “Two Worlds” indeed. Grant pays loving tribute to Schwartz and his work by celebrating what DC's characters were (and in the hands of writers like Morrison still are). They're heroes that are all about science and imagination. Their stories and their visual aesthetic dazzle their readers' minds. Probably the most important thing that Grant does is at the end makes the case for what these comic's place in the 1960’s was. Morrison proves in the space of 12 pages while he is one of the greatest writers comics has ever seen.

I’ve already done the dance with DC’s October solicitations, so let’s look at what someone with really no interest in Marvel looks for in Marvel’s solicitations for the same month. Only three things pique my interest. She-Hulk, as usual. Marvel Visionaries: Jack Kirby Vol. 1 is a must buy, there’s simply too much good stuff going into that book. To top it off I’ll get Essential Tomb of Dracula Vol. 3 which completes the series and also reprints the Tomb of Dracula magazine. I’m a simple man; if you want to make me happy just give me Gene Colan drawing pretty much anything (and I’ve got the issues of the Doug Moench Spectre series to prove it!).

I hope you all have a goodnight, folks. Thanks for reading!

EDIT: Oh yeah, and Eightball #23 came out. I already pre-ordered it at the Fantagraphics table at SDCC, so I'll pick it up next week. I've already given Kim Thompson my word I'll be there to buy it and other books, and that is bond no man dare break.

Permanent Link: 9:51 PM | 0 comments

Bill Cosby Says: If You Can't Send You, Send Money

This might not be the first and probably won't be the only place you see this, but I'd feel terrible if I didn't say anything.

Jeff Mason's Alternative Comics is facing finacial problems due in part to a distributor that went bankrupt. Mason gives us great comics by the likes of Sam Henderson, James Kochalka, Dean Haspiel, Jeff Neufeld, Nick Bertozzi and many others. The Internet world has had great success saving copmpanies like Top Shelf and Fantagraphics and I know we can save Alternative as well.

Pick up Alternative Comics products at your store or buy them from Alternative's offical online store Mars Import. You'd be saving other people's job by reading comics, how easy is that?

Permanent Link: 10:17 AM | 0 comments

I believe in a sense of duty. And as a comic blogger, I have duty to get all pundit-like on the DC comic solicitations. So, here we go:

DCU

Monolith is one of those books I feel bad for not buying. It seems good and I don’t want it to be cancelled, but the hell if I can pick up another on-going series. Still, if you can pick up this series, go for it.

While the Grant Morrison fanatic in me will probably pick up the Arkham Asylum Anniversary Edition I’ll probably wait. I already have the first edition and to be honest, it’s not the best work of either Morrison or Dave McKean. Also, since when is the 15th anniversary something special?

Solo could be a good book depending on who’s doing it. I like all the artists they have so far, but the comics world isn’t too kind to anthology series. Tim Sale is great, so I’ll pick this up.

Vertigo

I only have scattered issues of Sandman Mystery Theatre, so it’s cool to see that DC is coming out with a new trade as well as reprinting the first one. I loved those photo covers. What the hell does Gavin Wilson do these days?

I hope DC does more digest sized books like they’re doing for My Faith In Frankie. Not necessarily because I think they can crash the manga market, I’m just a cheap guy who likes spending less than ten bucks for a trade.

Not only is Jock producing some of the best covers out there for The Losers, but he is probably the only artist doing great covers that also does the interior art. God bless that man.

Wildstorm

New Astro City? I’m there, even if it is a Who’s Who type of thing. This is probably one of my favorite series of all time. It was the first book I read as a kid that made me see superheroes in a different way (this was before I found Watchmen and stuff like that). Kurt Busiek’s interview in Comics Journal changed the way I look at writing fiction, too. Yeah, I have to get this. I might check out his JLA, but I don't like his non-creator-owned work as much. I didn't even read JLA/Avengers, let's hope it's collected in a trade that isn't $75.

Ed Brubaker on The Authority might be good. I’m of the opinion that only the Warren Ellis issues were any good, but I love Brubaker’s stuff so I’ll give this a shot.

And I’ll still be buying Y the Last Man, Sleeper, Ex Machina, Challengers of the Unknown and We3. Because that’s what I dig, man.

Permanent Link: 4:20 PM | 0 comments

How 'bout the power to kill a yak from 200 yards away...with mind bullets!

I’m writing this as I’m barley awake. Believe me, you can tell.

Rich Johnston posts that movie producers want to make a film of Green Lantern starring Jack Black (eighth item down). Now, I can see why there are many anal comic book fans who would hate this (Black is meant to portray the Kyle Rayner Lantern). In fact, there’s a whole group, H.E.A.T, which is dedicated to being anal about the Green Lantern character. But here’s the thing: This movie probably isn’t going to be made. It’s a yellow light on a rumor column. But if this film is made, would that be a bad thing?

I don’t think so, at least not on its face. I think Black is very funny, and if it is a good film that’s all that matters. Many fans believe that there is only one right way to write a character and any deviation from this idea only tarnishes the character. Some even go as far to say that it disrespects the original characters’ creators. To that particular argument I would say fans should save those harsh words for the publishers and fan press who treat older creators like they don’t exist. To the larger issue I would say fans (and editors) should relax. Let creators enjoy and take advantage of the fact that these are fictional characters. The only point to creating fiction is to create good stories.

I love Superman and I would have to say one of my favorite Superman stories is Kurtzman and Wood’s Superduperman. Not only is it a fantastic parody, it reaches a truth about the superhero genre that only a piece of comedy would. Alan Moore and Frank Miller have said that the Superduperman was a big influence in their works in superhero deconstruction. Miller has said that the classic Mad Magazine piece was an influence on The Dark Knight Strikes Again, a great piece of comedy that also served as a tribute to the Silver Age DC (and at times Sept. 11). Many fans whined about the piece, but many just ended up looking humorless, and when it comes to men and women punching each other ridiculous outfits one must never look humorless.

Well look at that. I started with a Rich Johnston post and ended up with an aimless essay, one that decried mindless fandom and mentioned DKSA no less. I truly am a comics blogger, huh?

Permanent Link: 1:37 AM | 2 comments

Proof I have too much time on my hands

This pic (via Kevin Melrose) made me thinking that some of the best cartoonists of the alternative comix field would make a great action/adventure team. Yes, just think about:

Seth: He’s the history buff. We go to him when we need tactical info on an enemy’s faults and weaknesses.

Chester: The ladies man. He’s all action on the field or in your fields.

”Scoop” Sacco: The world traveler. He knows every place we end up like the back of his skull-crushing hand.

Adrian: We call him “The Kid.” What he lacks in experience he makes up for with a brash sense of style.

And in the middle that’s me, The Spiegel Man. I’m the leader of this rag-tag group of mercenaries. If you have a problem, if no one else can help and if you can find us, maybe you can hire, The Sequential-A Team

Permanent Link: 11:18 PM | 0 comments

Summer Plans

Ah, San Diego. Specifically the San Diego Comic-Con. I’ll be there, won’t you? I’m only going to be there for two days, Friday and Saturday, and I would like to share some of the panels I’m looking forward to:

Friday

10:30-12:00 VERTIGO: Breaking Boundaries: I likes me the Vertigo. The chance to see what they have coming up sounds nice. Andy Diggle and Jock will be there, they do a book called The Losers that’s so good more people should be buying it.

1:00-2:00 Marv Wolfman: From Idea to Script: Wolfman’s a writer I’ve always enjoyed, in fact I just picked up the second Essential Tomb of Dracula volume. I’ve always had ideas for stories, be they in comics or any other medium, and how can I say no to a workshop taught by this man?

2:30-4:00 The Jack Kirby Tribute Panel: On the tenth anniversary of The King’s passing a wonderful gathering of talent will be there for this panel. Besides host-master extraordinaire Mark Evanier there’s Dave Gibbons, Walt Simonson and Steve Rude. It should be good to hear those masters of the comics page talk about the master.

6:00-7:00 Spotlight on Aaron McGruder: I like Boondocks a lot, even if I think the quality has gone down in the past year or so. I like the sound of him doing an original graphic novel with Kyle Baker, so that should be good. There will also be talk about the animated adaptation of the strip. I’m a bit worried the political views of the strip will be neutered for home-viewing, but we’ll see.

Saturday

11:30-1:00 The Simpsons: As I was watching the 4th season DVDs I realized how big an influence this show was on my whole life. I’ve been watching it since I was a little kid. When I was going to a Catholic grade school the episode Homer the Heretic blew my mind. Matt Groening we’ll be there, along with Executive Producer Al Jean (who also did The Critic, which I loved) and Bill Odenkirk. I think Bill will have some pretty important opinions on this year’s presidential race. His brother, after all, is the Presidents of Beers.

3:00-4:30 DC Comics: Taking It to the Limit: I wish it didn’t have that stupid subtitle to it. This is mandatory for the DC-nut I am. It will be cool to see what Howard Chaykin, Brian Azzarello and Jimmy Palmiotti will have to say. Also, after seeing his interview in the Batman: The Animated Series DVD box set, Dan DiDio looks like a 1920’s strong man. That is so awesome.

5:30-7:00 Cartoon Network: Adult Swim: If I was ten years old now, Adult Swim’s shows would probably be more of a revelation than The Simpsons. MC Chris will be at the panel, maybe if we’re lucky we can get him to bust some rhymes for us. And if we’re really lucky we’ll find out what Evan Dorkin’s Adult Swim show will be (I wish Eltingville was picked up).

So, there ya go. That’s what I’ll be doing along with getting books signed and sketched from some of my favorite creators. Hope to see ya there, folks!

Permanent Link: 11:14 AM | 0 comments

To Be Young, Not-So-Dumb and Reading Superman pt. 2

In my last post I go over why I enjoyed Joe Casey’s run on Adventures of Superman and #623 in particular. It was sort of a rebuttal to Tom Spurgeon’s short review in the latest Comics Journal. I want to go further into the idea of how comics put out today and in the early 90’s aren’t as inaccessible to kids as some might think.

I’ve always taken the more mature (although I feel that might not be the best word to use) way of telling superhero stories for granted. The first comic I bought with my own money, and what comic reader can forget theirs, was X-Men #1 vol.2. It was the variant cover that had Jean Grey on it. I was eight years old. Ever since then I was reading books from Image, Marvel and DC. By this point most of the books by these companies featured a type of storytelling that was probably darker and more serious in tone than the books we have now. The first Superman story that I read was the Death, World Without and Reign of Superman stories. While these books might seem too complicated or even inappropriate for kids, the fact is my friends and I loved them.

All the superhero stories I read from that era shared something with the superhero comics of 40 and 50 years ago. My favorite books at the time (and I’m really embarrassing myself here) Cyberforce, Gen 13, WildC.A.T.S., X-Men and Batman all had enough characters with strange powers and abilities to ignite my young imagination. It’s true, though, that the stories being told in those books were more convoluted and tackled some serious issues sometimes (although looking back at the way they tackled them you can see my hesitation in calling these books “mature”). Still, I was a young kid who loved comics and, as I’ve previously went over, my just as young mind took the images on the page and turned them into stories that I felt at the time were quality stuff. Also, the fact that these stories were more violent and sexy than the comics I knew my Dad read at my age made me like them even more. I knew I shouldn’t be reading them, and that added to the appeal.

Granted that was just one person and a few friends’ taste in comics then, although I have met other comic readers around my age who still look back on their days of reading “dark” or “grim and gritty” comics with more nostalgia than I do.

When Spurgeon says that a new or young reader might find this story unsatisfactory, I can’t speak for an adult who might already have his or her fully-formed idea of what a comic should read like that. I will say that the superhero comics put out now harkens back to the Silver Age of superheroes much more than the books I was captivated by as a kid. Writers like Casey as well as Mark Waid, Kurt Busiek, Grant Morrison and Jeph Loeb have all brought back the wonder they felt reading comics in the 60’s into their own stories. Even so, the stories aren’t done like the eight-page installments one would find in an issue of Action Comics. They realize that most readers today, of any age, would see new stories done that way as too much of a gimmick. Adventures of Superman #623 is one of the better comics that take Silver Age fun and adventure and presents in a much more modern type of storytelling. Give this comic to a 100 kids and you might get 200 different reactions, no doubt some of them probably would be bored by it, but I know from my experience as a young comic book reader that some kids would be captivated by the adventures presented here as well as appreciate the fact that the comic doesn’t talk down to them and isn’t afraid to deal with what being a Superman means in a smart way.

I feel many comics and other forms of entertainment specifically designed for children are adults thinking they know what kids want. Kids, who are always smarter than adults give them credit for, can see through this and know when someone is being phony. Most superhero books I see on the stands I would have no trouble giving to a child of ten or older, with the exception of Marvel’s MAX books of course. The quality of the book and the child’s reaction will vary from book to book, but I think many kids would enjoy reading superheroes stories that at times are done in a smarter way than the most of the superhero movies put out today. Unfortunately many adults fail to recognize this.

Permanent Link: 8:25 PM | 1 comments

To Be Young, Dumb and Reading Superman pt. 1

Why does the concept of the Generation Gap (or more than one sometimes) seem to pop-up in comics a lot? I think I may be looking into things too much sometimes, but I do feel, as a man of 21, just plain bewildered by some of the opinions of comic readers older than me. Then I remind myself not too get to arrogant and actually listen to what someone older and probably wiser than myself has to say. They are, after all, viewing the medium with a different mind set than I am.

I was inspired to write this post while reading Tom Spurgeon’s review of Adventures of Superman #623 by Joe Casey and Derec Aucoin. As a fan of Casey’s run I picked this issue out of the back issue bin (I had only really discovered Casey’s Superman work after he was done with the book) the same day I bought Comics Journal #261, the magazine in which Spurgeon’s review takes place in.

I read the Adventures #623, the story is called Bittersweet, first. Superman takes Lois Lane around the world telling her of his past adventures, as well as discussing what it means for him to be Superman. The stories all have a Silver Age feel to them. One story I know appeared in an actual Silver Age Superman book, Secret of the Phantom Quarterback, because it is one of the Julie Schwartz tribute books DC is putting out. I don’t know if any of the others first appeared as actual stories of Silver Age. Lois and Supes land in Germany to briefly talk about Nietzsche, although they never get too deep into the subject (Supes has to save a Chilean town from a volcano suddenly). Near the end of their globe-spanning discussion Supes tells Lois that while he may inspire others to be better and more heroic; he is in fact inspired by mere mortals’ deeds of heroism. A few of the pages have bottom panels featuring fire fighters, doctors and emergency medical service people simply doing there jobs. The book ends with Supes dropping his wife off at their building. She tells her husband the talk was “illuminating.”

I really enjoyed this issue. It’s Casey putting everything he loves about Superman in one single issue. Casey feels about Superman much the way I do, in the fact that his heroism is meant to be inspiring and his adventures are meant to be imaginative. It’s a shame the era of the Superman books were plagues by many inter-book company crossovers (the story Our Worlds at War crosses over to two trade paperbacks). The later books in Casey’s run are some of the best Post-Crisis Superman stories I have read, in particular the modern Superman meeting the Golden Age Supes.

Spurgeon starts his review of Adventures #623 with some history. He writes about the reinvention the superhero genre has gone through, making the point that many superhero properties are currently just fodder for movies and other forms of entertainment. Here I believe him and I can agree that we won’t see much quality work if this is the mindset editors keep foisting on their creators. Spurgeon sees a contrast in the Silver Age stories mentioned here and how they were actually presented for the first time in the original books. He says to himself “My comics were a lot more fun 40 and 50 years ago when I didn’t have all this talking-head marriage shit to deal with.” This is definitely a valid point to make. No matter how valid it is, though, it is one that would never occur to me had I not read this review of the book. He also makes the point is that the issue is too “slow going for anyone young or new to comics.” Here I must disagree. Unfortunately, though, I don’t want to bog you readers down with too much text. I will have my rebuttal to Spurgeon’s review tomorrow. I will talk about my first comic book reading experiences and how I feel sometimes we don’t see how well some kids can get into today’s modern superhero stories. Until then I will bid you a good night and thanks for reading!

Permanent Link: 9:49 PM | 2 comments

Great Kirby News

From This Is Pop (second item down):

Tom Brevoort reveals that Marvel is coming out with a hardcover Jack Kirby: Visionaries book. What is in this book, you ask? Well, let's take a look:

"Mercury in the 20th Century" - RED RAVEN COMICS #1 - 8 pages Kirby's first work for Marvel

"The Vision" - MARVEL MYSTERY COMICS #13 - 8 pages
Kirby's first character creation for Marvel

"Meet Captain America' - CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS #1 - 8 pages
First Captain America story

"UFO the Lightning Man" - YELLOW CLAW #3 - 5 pages
Kirby writes and draws this strip in the '50s

"I Defied Pildorr, the Plunderer from Outer Space!" - STRANGE TALES #94 - 7 pages
Story from the monster era. First time Jack is inked by Joe Sinnott

"I Am the Amazing Dr. Droom!" - AMAZING ADVENTURES #1 - 6 pages
Origin of Stan and Jack's first super heroic character of the '60s

"Beware the Rawhide Kid!" - RAWHIDE KID #17 - 7 pages
1st revamped Rawhide Kid story, the beginnings of the Marvel style

"The Origin of the Hulk" - HULK #3 - 3 pages

"Spidey Tackles the Torch" - AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #8 - 6 pages

"Captain America Joins the Avengers!" - AVENGERS #4 - 23 pages

"The Fangs of the Fox" - SGT. FURY #6 - 23 pages

"The Coming of Galactus" - FANTASTIC FOUR #48-50 - 60 pages

"This Man, This Monster" - FANTASTIC FOUR #51 - 20 pages

"The People Breeders" - THOR #134-135 - 32 pages

"To Become an Immortal" - THOR #136 - 16 pages

"This Is A Plot?" - FANTASTIC FOUR ANNUAL #5 - 3 pages

"The Inhumans!" -AMAZING ADVENTURES v.2 #1-2 - 20 pages

"America Will Die!" - CAPTAIN AMERICA #200 - 17 pages

"The Fourth Host" - ETERNALS #7 - 17 pages

"What If the Original Marvel Bullpen Was the Fantastic Four?" - WHAT IF #11 - 34 pages

The fact that this is a $30 hardcover makes me hope this is oversized. I love the Essential books because they give you a lot of comics for a good price, but how great would The Galactus Saga be in oversize full-color? Hopefully this will be out soon.

Permanent Link: 9:11 PM | 0 comments

Comics: The Four-Color Menace!

Remember when John Podhoretz bashed comics and caused controversy for about, say, a day? Well, another bit of sniping at comics by a conservative fell under the radar...until now.

It seems Townhall.com columnist Michelle Malkin isn't too happy about schools teaching the poetry of Tupac Shakur in their schools. She offers this remark:

Frances Arena, manager of curriculum and professional development of the Worcester Public Schools, told me this week that Shakur's book will remain on the list for the foreseeable future because it "heightens awareness of character education" and, more importantly, because it's "popular with the kids."

If that's the standard, why not just drop the pretense of academic instruction and assign them comic books and romance novels?

Probably because comics and romance novels aren't popular with kids.

Permanent Link: 4:01 PM | 0 comments

By the Hoary Hosts of Hogarth!

Besides the Ditko/Lee Spider-Man stories I love, I also love Dr. Strange by the same creative team. Here I think Johnny Ryan creates a tribute to those stories that brings the warmth of nostalgia to any old Marvel fan's heart.

Permanent Link: 8:23 AM | 0 comments

Happy Birthday To Me

Reid, my man in NY, has his report from MoCCA. He has pics of all the sketches he got. You see those "Happy Birthday Ian" sketches from Evan Dorkin and Dean Haspiel? Yep, those are pretty sweet birthday gifts for me.

The other sketches are nice, even with the lack of Ian-realted content.

Permanent Link: 8:02 AM | 1 comments

And yes, I do think Spidey cries when he masturbates

My favorite Marvel comics might be the Lee/Ditko Amazing Spider-Man stories. The issues of 1-38, what makes upEssential Spider-Man volumes one and two, never fail to entertain me. The thing is I probably like them for the wrong reason.

There are two reasons why those are pretty much the only issues of Spider-Man I enjoy, even though the later issues with John Romita and Gil Kane feature fantastic artwork. One is spotting for the struggle between Ditko and Lee bubbling up into the content of the book. The back up story in the first Spider-Man annual is Ditko bickering about a story Lee just gave him. Even though the tone of the story is “we’re just kidding folks, we at Marvel are one big happy family” we know that really wasn’t the case. With the later issues I try to figure out the story Ditko was trying to tell with his pictures without Lee’s captions and dialogues thrown in. This might be the reason why the only other Spider-Man book I have enjoyed is Peter Bagge’s The Megalomaniacal Spider-Man, a book that imagines what the world of Spider-Man would be like if Ditko had stayed on (Bagge’s work has also touched on the next subject I will talk about). Granted, I feel a bit of a ghoul almost cackling at the personal problems of the two men who were doing Spider-Man at the time, but the artist (or other readers for that matter) can never tell or control how a reader interprets the work. It keeps me returning to the books, for whatever that’s worth.

The other reason why I like those issues of Spider-Man is one that survives past Ditko’s departure and into the movie franchise which sparked my interest into writing this post. We all know that Spidey differed from other superheroes at the time by having to deal with personal problems all the time. In the second movie Peter Parker, along with having to deal with Doc Ock, has trouble paying the rent; the girl he likes is marrying another man and his best friend hates him. This creates a kind of soap opera/superheroics dynamic which seems to be found in most superhero comics today. That isn’t good enough for me though, I love the fact that Parker comes off as a guilty Catholic boy. It certainly makes Spidey easier for me to relate to!

As far as I know, Parker’s religion has never been established. His guilt is, though. It’s, as we all know by now, about how he let the hood that would end up killing his uncle escape. It is guilt that is taken to an extreme level, no doubt because Marvel wants their best cash cow (along with the X-Men) going. That guilt, along with Uncle Ben’s wisdom of “with great power comes great responsibility,” seems to inform everything Spidey does. Perhaps that is why my favorite Spidey stories are the ones where his guilt gets to him so hard he becomes a pathetic mess. A storyline lifted from the early Spider-Man stories and put in the second movie is Spidey losing his superpowers due to lack of confidence (or something like that). Since the famed web-shooters of Spidey’s are organic in the film, the sexual connotations of this conundrum can not be missed. It’s a metaphor that says Parker’s nights of swinging through the city are substitute for a really satisfying sex-life. His time spent out of that skin tight suit is his attempt at penance for such actions. Plenary Indulgence for Saturday night, Catholic Guilt Sunday morning.

Of course, no Spider-Man story is going to come close to the works of Joe Matt or Ivan Brunetti (I was warned by Mike that Schizo was so painful to read that I should only take it in small doses. Imagine my horror when I found out that Brunetti’s life seemed to mirror my own in many, many, many, many ways), but when I’m feeling to cynical too be captured by Lee’s hyperbolic text, the Last Temptation of Parker (Scorsese can not be beat when it comes to portraying Catholic Guilt on film) is certainly something appealing enough to roll around in my noggin.

Permanent Link: 7:56 AM | 0 comments

She-Hulk #4

Here’s the thing about me, when it comes to superheroes I’m a DC guy. Most Marvel books do not interest me. I hate the way they keep pushing Bendis and Millar (I liked their earlier work a little but they’re now two creators that don’t interest me, probably an averse reaction from the Marvel hype machine). I loved Morrison’s New X-Men and liked Milligan and Allred’s X-Force before it changed its name and the quality went straight to Hell. When I see Marvel introduce a slew of new titles featuring characters I don’t give a damn about I feel a bit ill. Well those feelings haven’t quite changed, but there is now one exception. She-Hulk just might be the only Marvel ongoing that I pick up. Probably because it’s got something that few superhero books do and even fewer do right.

When I noticed that Dorian recommended this book and it was getting good reviews elsewhere here on the net, I thought it might be worth a shot. Well, it was definitely worth that particular shot.

The best word to describe this book is “witty”. Writer Dan Slott (who I’ve only known from Ren and Stimpy books I read as a kid) has come up with an interesting story that

a) Fits one single issue that any new reader (i.e. me) can pick up and enjoy

b) Actually re-captures the humor of a Stan Lee written Spider-Man (he’s the guest star on this book)

c) Isn’t afraid to see superheroes as ridiculous characters that can be fun

That’s pretty rare to see in a superhero book, by Marvel or DC, these days. Praise for Mr. Slott for going against the stream and not doing another Marvel book “written for the trade” and telling it’s story very…very…very…sloooooowly.

Juan Bobillo gave us some great art in the Agent X issues written by Evan Dorkin. I liked his stuff then and I like it here on She-Hulk. It’s cartoony (which is perfect for this book) and is really good at getting across action and humor.

A preview of the next issue can be found here. It’s a two-part story, but that’s ok with me. It looks like I’m sticking with this book. Paul Pelltier (whose worked I loved on the latter Waid and Augustyn Flash issues) is the new artist.

For what it’s worth, I say pick up She-Hulk #4, which should be on the stands right now.

Permanent Link: 6:58 PM | 1 comments