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Thursday, April 20, 2006
Happy Birthday George Takei!
I have been swamped with work but I'm certainly not going to pass up the chance to give well wishes to actor and poltical actvist George Takei. He was one of the most visible Asian-American actors in the '60s as Sulu on Star Trek, part of the ground breaking multi-ethnic cast of the show. He's ran for Los Angeles City Council, been an aid to L.A. mayor Tom Bradley and now fights for equality for the LGBT community. All that and one of the richest voices in Hollywood.
Some of Sulu's greatest hits:
The Naked Time on The Original Series: This episode's title may have multiple meanings as its most memorable moment is Sulu showing off some topless fencing.
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock: In one of the most exciting sequences in franchise history Kirk and his crew have to steal their own ship, the USS Enterprise! Sulu kicks some ass to do what needs to be done. Don't call him shorty!
Flashback on Star Trek: Voyager: Meet Captain Sulu of the USS Excelsior!
Memory-Alpha's articles on Hikaru Sulu and George Takei.
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Thursday, April 13, 2006
Three things
Matt Zoller Seitz’s Sopranos blogging is essential reading but his take on Lost based on last week’s show really impressed me (I’m always a week behind on the show, so this post might read funny if you’ve already scene last night’s installment). He writes:
But the longer I watch this series, the more convinced I am that the action-adventure elements -- the big setpieces, the plot revelations, hell, the whole master narrative -- are its least interesting and maybe least durable aspects. What hooks me is the "Twilight Zone" sci-fi-as-morality-play vibe, the sense that this island is not exactly real and not exactly a fantasy or dream, but is instead a dramatic tabula rasa for the characters, a place where metaphors become tangible, real enough to see and touch and even converse with; basically an immense psychic theater-in-the-round.
Exactly. I was waiting for someone to put into words the appeal of the show for me, especially when I was constantly reading viewers of the show gripe about an “aimless plot” and how weak the ending will surely be. Lost isn’t a novel with a set number of pages or a film with an exact running time. With this new era of television, where dramas like Lost but also The Sopranos, The Wire and Deadwood prove to be genuinely intelligent and engaging works, we must re-adjust how we evaluate genre entertainment now that some of the best of it is being produced for a less finite medium. Lost may last three seasons or it might last eleven. We can’t have our expectations be based around the build up to a twist ending with all the events leading up to it in a tight structure.
Telling stories in television allow writers and producers to be much freer with the pace of the story and how wide-ranging they choose it to be. We can concentrate on many different characters and plot elements that would make a novel or film seem too top-heavy. That’s why I find it exciting when revelations and character development on Lost open up more questions than they provide answers. Otherwise we would have one interpretation of what the island and all the tests the characters go though to be. I prefer to think of the show as being about a place in-between life and death where characters decide what kind of people they will truly be, either individualists who look out for themselves or collectivist who depend on the cooperation and input of others to build towards a better life for everyone (that’s an oversimplification, for one it is never just one or the other, but for the purposes of this argument I hope it will do). Is that what the island actually is? I don’t know and don’t much care. I’m more interested in getting the characters into situations where their philosophies butt heads with each other, as Locke (brilliant choice for a name!) and Jack do every week, or where their idea of reality is challenged, as was Hurley’s last week. I find that far more satisfying than trying to decode the symbols that appeared after the counter’s countdown or trying to figure out what those infamous series of numbers can mean.
All that being said I do hope that the mysterious “him” that the fake Henry Gale spoke about is to be played by Kyle MacLachlan.
At this point, between the sales of their books and the press coverage they receive, it is fair to say that Alan Moore, Frank Miller and Neil Gaiman are as known and as powerful as most of the well known authors writing prose today. There is one name that is absent from that list, a writer whose work I find more satisfying than all three of those men. The name is Grant Morrison. You and I are very familiar with his work. You might even agree with me that his work doesn’t suffer from the cold calculations of Moore’s, the un-ironic worship of the macho ideal in Miller’s or the affectations of Gaiman’s. But do the readers of the New York Times Book Review know? Do the people stocking the shelves of Barnes & Nobles know? I don’t think so.
I believe that the main problem is that Morrison doesn’t have that one book that, presented in a nice hardcover edition and with hosannas galore printed on the back cover, can define his whole career. Morrison chooses to write long series like The Invisibles or Doom Patrol (only know getting a proper trade paperback program!) to showcase all his talents (his reasons probably have to do with some of the ideas in the above item). Moore’s Swamp Thing work is collected across six trades but for the casual fan who just wants to read a few graphic novels a year they can go into a bookstore and come out with Watchmen or V for Vendetta and see what all the fuss is about. The closest Morrison seems to have to one special book is Arkham Asylum with Dave McKean, recently given a special 15th anniversary re-release, but that is hardly his best work and certainly not very representative of why Morrison is so good.
I hoped the trades of WE3, Seaguy and Vimanarama would change the situation but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Here were wholly original stories with consistent, not to mention wonderful, art teams that provided all the optimism, intelligence and skill the best of Morrison’s work has to offer. Unfortunately the sales of the book in single issues weren’t spectacular and Vertigo/DC didn’t give the trades any special attention. All this while Gaiman and Andy Kubert’s 1602, good but not as good as WE3, got plenty of attention in the press and at literary events.
Perhaps we’ll see an Absolute Edition for Animal Man or the Seven Soldiers series? Will All-Star Superman in its collected form do the trick? We’ll see. I just want the world to know of one of the greatest minds to have written comics.
Who is the next Stan Lee? I say Dan DiDio, Graeme says Larry Young and then Chris Arrant says Warren Ellis is the new Man. I’m coming around to Chris’s point to be honest. As far as being creators I think Lee and Ellis both define a certain era of comic book writing. DiDio is an editor and while Larry is a good writer he isn’t an innovator like Ellis is. I also like the idea of the new Stan Lee as not promoting a company but promoting a lone creator, himself, and with many different apparitions on the internet. Information was more centralized in Lee’s heyday and Ellis’s presence(s) reflects the fractured and anarchistic way people learn and interact about everything, including comics and their creators.
It’s kind of a weird debate though, to compare people to Stan Lee. It’s a bit ghastly as well, considering The Man is still alive. But I wrote about it anyway and you read it. Here is your reward for doing so:
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Tuesday, April 11, 2006
The Battle for Bludhaven #1
This is a bizarre comic, but it's a type of bizarreness you don't see in superhero comics anymore. I'm almost glad to see it back. The book arrives in stores tomorrow.
The book is decidedly retro in feel. Dan Jurgens art reminds me of the house look you will find in the Marvel Essential collections that reprint books from the '70s and '80s. The anatomy and action is all done is a sturdy manner and flows in a decent manner, with no real stylistic flights of fancy to get in the way of the storytelling. The main visual influence on the book seems to be the study of thousands upon thousands of pages by John Buscema.
Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray's script completes the book's Nixon-era aesthetic. Superheroic action and allusions to current events sit uncomfortably with each other throughout the story. A giant monster named Chemo turns the city of Bludhaven unlivable due to radioactivity, reflecting many post-9/11 fears about “dirty bombs.” The citizens of Bludhaven are living in government shanty towns unable to get back to their homes, a situation similar to many New Orleans citizens. By the time we get to talk of “insurgents” Palmiotti and Gray’s strive to be relevant looks a bit overblown and clumsy.
What is weird is that the book is also trying to read like an old-school superhero comic. Characters announce themselves proudly with funny names all the time. A character who dresses like a sexy Statue of Liberty corrects one of the Teen Titans that her team name is no longer “Force of July” but rather “Freedom’s Ring.” They even have a member named Silent Majority, even though he talks. On one page three government foot soldiers contemplate how disastrous the world seems to have gotten. You’ve probably heard people in real life speak similarly about how pessimistic they feel about the future after they’ve finished a newspaper. Except in real life those people aren’t confronted by the colorful Nuclear Legion whose follow-up tag line is “And you’re about to become a little piece of ash.” Like many older superhero books all the dialogue and emotions seem to be on one setting: overload. All this in the middle of a proxy for hurricane ravaged New Orleans.
The book reminds me of the attempts to be relevant by writers like Stan Lee, Steve Englehart and Denny O’Neil. The overly-dramatic way of writing superhero comics was still in full force so you ended up with this. The modern day equivalent would be in this book where one of the characters shouts “All Hell is breaking loose! Where are the costumes?” I think the character was meant to be asking “where are the superheroes?” but it sounds like she was in charge of a chaotic acting company.
I can’t say this comic is really “good,” at least not in the way a comic like All Star Superman is. But it stuck with me long after I had read it, which is more than I can say for most of the superhero comics today. It has a weird texture to it that some may find embarrassing but I’m intrigued by. Keep in mind I’m the kind of guy who likes the Captain America books where a black power leader is revealed to be The Red Skull.
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Monday, April 10, 2006
APE Reactions, overall edition
The strength and weakness of APE is that it is a convention that appreciates the small things in life. While the stories from conventions such as San Diego Comic-Con, WonderCon and especially the New York Comic-Con are these growing crowds, many people remarked that APE felt less busy than last year. I really noticed this at the panels I went to. On Sunday I attended two interesting artist spotlights with very small crowds for both of them. If Raina Talgameier’s family wasn’t there the audience would barely reach double digits. Alex Robinson and Edward Champion had a thought-provoking and revealing discussion about Tricked and Box Office Poison. I was thankful to hear Champion will post the discussion as a podcast because it would be a shame if only fifteen people heard what these two talked about.
I can’t get too worried about programming attendance at APE, though. No matter what specific reason someone attended the show and what they ended doing and not doing, they most likely walked away with seeing and hopefully reading something they’ve never seen before. What’s more it was probably something they never would have seen or read if they didn’t take some time out of their weekend to get to the Concourse in San Francisco. I had a real positive feeling about comics the entire time I was there because so many tables were filled with artists at the most optimistic point of their careers. Hundreds of tables had comics placed upon them that were made solely because these people chose the comics medium, without any responsibilities to a publisher or an editor. I’ll grant you that more than a few of these comics could have used a good editor but no matter the surface quality of these self-published comics there’s still the appealing notion of the passion and sacrifice that went into them.
The first person I saw at the con was Comic Relief’s Rory Root. He told me that the old saying for APE was that as soon as you walked in you saw all your friends. That’s how it felt for me at times. People that I saw every Wednesday buying new comics or even people I knew from school and didn’t even know were into comics were manning tables and selling books with all their hopes up. It was a nice flipside to the usual social atmosphere of conventions, where you have to immediately start shaking hands and make connections with people you probably only knew through the internet, if that. I still had to be as much as a comics professional as a comics fan at the con, something I don’t mind at all, but it was nice that the welcoming spirit of APE brought another dimension to meeting up with exhibitors.
The tables in the middle of the floor may have been for name publishers and established talent but that welcoming feel of APE still shone through. It was great talking to Jeffery Brown and Rene French at the Top Shelf both for a while, especially when they were more than pleased to show off their Wolverine action figures (Which apparently come with a billion points of articulation). It’s a treat to talk to Brown about comics, he’s got a real great sense of both his own work and the medium. I got to thank Eric Reynolds for all his fine service he’s been doing for Fantagraphics fans. He really sells those books in a way that’s not pushy, just complimentary to the already great work the company regularly publishes. Chris Pitzer at AdHouse is a great conversationlist as well. Talking to him about some of our mutually favorite cartoonists, Kevin Huizenga and Sammy Harkham, amongst others, was fun. Coming back to the AdHouse table and getting Process Recess signed by James Jean was even more fun. The little sketch was he did inside the book was done in less than two minutes and for me, a total stranger as far as he’s concerned. Yet it’s still completely beautiful.
After most cons I feel almost broken because of the stress but after APE I felt more excited about comics than I’ve felt in a long while. I saw a lot of the medium’s possibilities and appeal that I tend to forget about when I’m in the middle of tracking down stories or making those valued connections. I was glad I could take a breather, attend a con purely because I wanted to and just soak up what was happening. It was certainly worth it.
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Saturday, April 08, 2006
APE memories, Saturday edition
Brett Warnock makes a mean margarita. Believe me, I had about four. They made me feel good, just like the comics he publish does (well, maybe not >just like).
A friend of mine pointed out the prevalence of fetus-themed comics this year. What can I say; when you need something cuter than a baby you just have to go younger.
Conventions are a great way to have a ten minute conversation with someone you like and probably won't see again for a year. Every person I spoke to is a Hell lot smarter about comics than I am so I made sure to spend these precious moments listening. That is, when I'm not giving people compliments. The life of an artist is lonely and they need to hear this stuff.
I think the big appeal, for me at least, when it comes to Corey Lewis's comics is that he seems more like someone who should sing for a well-hyped British indie band than a cartoonist. But gosh darn it he makes comics instead of giving Peter Doherty a run for his money and for that we should all be thankful.
Being recognized for this blog, as I was when I met Serene and Dylan from Successless, is an experience that combines joy with terror. I feel I should thank them and then offer a million apologies.
The big discussion amongst friends was the proper use of the word "fetching,” mostly whether the word could be used ironically or not. I could tell you what major upcoming graphic novel inspired this debate but then I would be in trouble. Not with the publisher, more in terms of my guilt and conscience.
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Friday, April 07, 2006
APE-ologies
So much is going on becuase of APE that it's too big for just one post. Also, I have a shorter memory than animals I have eaten.
Not only is Isotope throwing their Top Shelf Happy Hour (seen in BB's last post) but they're also announcing the winner of the The Fourth Annual Isotope Award for Excellence in Mini-Comics. Past winners include Rob "1000 Steps to World Domination" Osbourne and Josh "Skyscrapers of the Midwest" Cotten. Who will win this years prize. Will it be you? Find out at the APE AFTERMATH April 8th at the Isotope.
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Thursday, April 06, 2006
APE Days, APE Nights
Perhaps you've heard of this little shindig, happening at The Concourse in SF this Saturday and Sunday. You can get in really cheap, I believe it is $10 for both days, and find enough indie comics to beat the (unsigned, hip local) band. But don’t think the show ends at The Concourse! There's plenty to do around town as the Bay Area goes APE crazy.
Friday gives us APE$#!T (pronounced "ape-shit") where 11 Bay Area cartoonists like Jesse Reklaw and Justin Hall show their work. Hall will also be moderator at the Queer Cartoonists Panel at APE.
Saturday is the start of the con-madness. After a day of walking around the convention you'll want a drink so you'll at least feel like you've got a grip on your sanity. That's where Brett Warnock of Top Shelf and The Isotope come in. The Top Shelf Happy Hour is 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on the 8th with Warnock, publisher and bartender extraordinaire, serving up drinks. Sip from a nice cool margarita while you find out what it feels like to be a publisher Alan Moore doesn't hate.
Also on Saturday is the MOME/Giant Robot APE after party. That's from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. You can compare your relationship problems to Jeffery Brown, whom I'm sure isn't in any way sick of talking about that subject.
What's happening on Sunday? Nothing, San Francisco is a Christian city and we're all in church that day. You might have heard different but you heard wrong. I mean, why do you think one of our favorite drag acts is called Peaches Christ?
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Wednesday, April 05, 2006
This blog's on shuffle mode
After writing "The Rise of Comics Piracy" for The Comics Journal issue #269 I've been interested in seeing how publisher deal with their copyrighted content and the anarchistic nature of the internet. I suspect some publisher will come up with the somewhat-discussed "iTunes model" but we're all still waiting. Until then there have been some interesting developments, the latest one being AiT/Planet Lar posting an entire 104 page graphic novel for free. You can download Continuity by Jason McNamara and Tony Talbert from the publisher’s website. We'll see if this pays off for Larry Young and his company.
I don't think this move is meant to battle any piracy, although that might be a happy side-effect. Larry's always been about getting the word out about his book and in this case he'll go as far as put the entire book in reader's hands, or at least their hard drive. Graeme ponders that perhaps this strategy was taken because the complicated plots is "not as simple a sell as the high concept books like Astronauts in Trouble or even Demo." If that's the case perhaps other independent publishers with "heady" material will take Larry's lead. I suppose we'll find out if it's a path worth taking when the book arrives in June.
I must say I wasn't expecting this! I love Criterion's edition of F for Fake but Mr. Arkadin (titled Confidential Report in some markets) is probably Orson Welles's most difficult film and the hardest to like. Perhaps that makes it the best candidate for the deluxe DVD treatment. The film really shows the wear of Welles's low-budget and on-the-fly filmmaking. The dubbing in the film is particularly distracting. Get past those problems and you'll find a film that is of interest to fans of Welles or film noir. Arkadin is the cynical, ugly twin of Citizen Kane. The critique of powerful men and where their power comes from is far angrier and to the point. Welles's performance as Gregory Arkadin is one of his best roles. Welles's tendency to go over the top benefits the overall film's grotesque nature. Even with the low-budget Welles gives us the audience some amazing scenes. There's a scene where Welles and Patricia Medina are in a cabin's room. The room seems to be expanding and shrinking at the same time, reflecting Medina's drunken state right before she meets her fate. One of the best thing's Welles has ever filmed.
Perhaps we'll see Criterion come up with a DVD for The Trial now?
Have you checked out the new Comic Foundry? Cable television star Tim Leong has come up with a pretty interesting package that feels like Blender or Rolling Stone, but for comics. I must admit my association with the magazine and plug my article The Best Comic Ever. I suppose on one level it’s about comics but it’s really about moving away and leaving friends behind and turning favorite activities into fond memories. Mike helped out with the article, although he probably just found out about this now.
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Sunday, April 02, 2006
Jimnder Gaffizen
I might have restained my fan tendencies last night with Patton Oswalt, Sarah Sivlerman and other funny people but I can say that I did interact with one star: Jesse Thorn, America's Radio Sweetheart. He hosts The Sound of Young America out of Santa Cruz. The show is always worth listening to for comedy fans but the latest podcast is a real treat. What would you say to an interview with Jim Gaffigan? What would you say to an interview with John Lee and Vernon Chatman, the creators of Wonder Showzen? How about the two interviews back-to-back? Enough questions for you? Go and listen and have a rollicking good time. Rollicking, I say!
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Night of a Thousand Scowls
Hmmm, post a picture of Patton Oswalt or Sarah Silverman? Which will get people to notice this post more?
April Fool's Day for 2006 saw me volunteer at 826's comedy show. Jimmy Kimmel, Tom Rhodes, Al Madrigal, some local guy who was funny 50% of the time, Sarah Silverman and Patton Oswalt all came out to raise money for the writing program by making people chortle and guffaw.
My job ended up being giving out programs to people as they walked in. Without me how would the audience know how many times Patton Oswalt had done Conan O'Brien's show or that Jimmy Kimmel is the executive producer of The Andy Milonkas Show? Also there was an envelope to donate even more money to our charitable organization. It was kind of like church (the show was held on Church Street) but instead of a priest blabbing about God you had Sarah Silverman talking about the similarities of Black youth and old Jewish people ("they love track suits...all their friends are dying (audience groans). They're not all funny people, sometimes they're serious!").
Seeing Silverman was awesome because I had enjoyed her work for so long but had only known her through TV prances. Live she really delivers, especially when a whole audience seemed to be in love her from the start. Seeing a multiracial audience laugh at an attractive Jewess tell off-color jokes about race and sex filled me with happiness, but that's probably because I'm crazy.
I had seen Al Midgral before when Tom and I saw Mitch Hedberg and Stephen Lynch. Midgral was the MC. He's someone who should be much more famous than he is. He's got a storytelling style, somewhere between David Sedaris and David Cross. One of the best things about seeing comedians in SF is that when they talk about living here they name actual locations and routes. I had seen Madrgial talk about going to French school as a boy, but did you know he took the N-Judah? I take that train to Amoeba where Golden Gate Park kids offer me weed! Now I feel like I've known Madrigal my whole life (see, told I was crazy). Also, Patton Oswalt's "shoot whitey/stab whitey" living location was the Lower Haight. Think about that next time you go to The Toronado to drink one of their 78,000 beers.
Oswalt was funniest than anytime I had seen him before. Inspired by Larry the Cable Guy the Health Inspector he was trying to market some catch phrases that he would sprinkle through the act. "Put the Puppy in the Bucket" was a crowd favorite. Oswalt has also eclipsed his Robert Evans bit with his take on Death Bed: The Bed That Eats. He breaks down the movie making process with this absurd film, made in 1977 but never released until it came out on DVD in 2003. Try to see Oswalt live just in hopes that he'll do this bit.
Now here's the weird part. Before the show all us volunteers had to drop our coats, backpacks and whatever in this room in the book (this show took place in a huge middle school). After the show I go to get my backpack so I can leave with out realizing I forgot my belongings a half-hour or hour after I left, which is what I usually do. So I go to the room in the back and here a voice that was familiar. It was Sarah Silverman's. I'm looking all over this room for my backpack and I realize that I walked into the "green room" where all the talent is. Jimmy Kimmel and Patton Oswalt are talking about cult films on DVD and I'm just thinking to myself "where's my backpack?" I saw other people's backpacks but not mine. Then it hit my slow-moving mind that maybe the room where us lowly volunteers put out stuff was not the same room where they put the people they flew up from L.A. I go the room that's next fucking door and get my backpack and go. I also congratulated myself on not being a starfucker when in the green room, which is something I'm always worried about being brought up in the Los Angeles area. Why should I let a close encounter with some of America’s funniest people stop me from reminding myself how absent-minded I am?
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