Palmotti talks Countdown

Can we handle another weekly comic? Countdown writer Jimmy Palmotti tells us why this will be the series to watch over the summer. Plus – the excitement from Free Comic Book Day has just settled, but we’ve got the behind-the-scenes action as we debrief some of of the nation’s better retailers on just what happened in their stores. All this and your weekly comic & DVD wish list, news on the girl who will end up in The Hulk’s hands – and a little ditty from the Blondie who isn’t married to Dagwood!

The 37th Big ComicMix Broadcast is in the air! Press The Button… or Jimmy Olsen dies!

Transcript

Www.ComicMix.com Imagine me and you. I can just imagine. Imagine all the people. Imagine that. I can't imagine anything that's better. Can you imagine how many copies of Amazing Fantasy 15, all nice and slabbed, you could buy with $148 million? Well, we survived the weekend. Let's put the pieces together now. Hi, it's Mike Raub with the first broadcast of the week and free comic book day. We're going to look at that and see just exactly what happened in the stores over the weekend.

Some big news, including the debut of Countdown, a little something from the blondey who isn't sleeping with Dagwood, and a lot more all on May 8th, 2007. Marvel has announced that Liv Tyler will play Betty Ross in the new Incredible Hulk movie scheduled for next summer. You know already that Edward Norton is going to play the Hulk. Remember that Wolverine animated series they talked about a couple of years ago while it's finally going to come out from the people that first serve tunes. The Wolverine series, which hasn't really been titled yet, is scheduled to come out within a year or so. It'll be 26 30-minute episodes appearing on U.S. television.

World War Hulk has been the big seller at Marvel this week. Incredible Hulk number 106, oddly enough if you're a history fan, you know what that issue number means, has been the first big sellout. Right now Marvel does not plan to return for a variant or a second printing of that issue. U.S. anime fans are going to be able to digitally download the Japanese anime series Death Note beginning this month because of a deal between Viz Media and Direct to Drive. The first episode of the English subtitle version of the series debuts this week. By the way Death Note is not for young kids. It's based on the manga series of the same name. Ring of Honor Wrestling along with the guys at G-Funk Sports and Entertainment have a new programming and distribution deal for pay-per-view and video on demand wrestling cards.

Wrestling fans on the east coast know that Ring of Honor has been around with some great shows for a long time. Their very first event, Respect is Earn, will be taped on May 12th in New York City and will premiere on video on demand. After seven seasons of the WB and the CW, it's goodbye to the Gilmore Girls. The season finale airs 8 p.m. on May 15th. There have been discussions about a limited run series next year, but no decision has been made. American Eagle Outfitters are sponsoring something called It's a Mall World. It's an original series of comedies about three minutes in length. That will be produced for the web, but the very first episode is going to premiere on cable during MTV's real world broadcast on the 1st of August. It's also interesting because that very first one is directed by Milo Ventimiglia, you know him as Peter Petrelli from Heroes.

All in all, the episodes will be produced throughout the fall and will be available from American Eagle Outfitters on their website as well. Well, when you have to make the decision about seeing Spider-Man 3 a couple more times or buying some comics this week, if we run down the list, maybe that'll make it easier for you. Here's what's in the stores coming up in a couple of days. Star Wars Dark Times number three from Dark Horse, of course. Secret number four, the last of that miniseries and Star Wars Legacy number 11 from Dark Horse. Over to D.C. and this is a week where countdown begins. Well, we just got over 52, so now what do we do? Another weekly comic? That's not the case, says one of the writers, Jimmy Palmiati.

Yeah, it's another weekly comic, but that's a good thing. Not a bad thing because people seem to love 52 and what we've done is taken what 52 has done and we just kind of we're trying to show up. We're trying to take it to the next levels. Now, there's at least a year's worth of story to tell here. So how fast are things going to move? A lot of stuff that happens right away in the series. It's one of those books that we do have like we hit a lot of major story points every month, you know, so it doesn't just float out there with a bunch of characters randomly running around. Over the next couple weeks, we'll check back with Jimmy and get you all involved in what is going to be the big event for D.C. over the next few months. Also on the racks from them this week, DMZ number 19, Friday the 13th number six, Gen 13 number eight, Green Arrow number 74 and Green Lantern Corps number 12, Grifter Midnighter number three, Jack of Fables number 10, JLA classified 38 and Mystery in Space number eight, the last of that limited series.

Nightwing hits number 132, Outsiders number 147 is this week as well as Tales of the Unexpected number eight, the last of that limited series. And Why the Last Man number 56 as well as the Why the Last Man trade paperback volume nine, Motherland. From Devil's Dew this week, the hack slash sketch cover is available if you got a smart retailer to deal with. And over to Image where you can get the Frank Frazetta's Death Theater limited cover number one. Again, certain retailers should have that. Also from Image, Battle Pope number 14, Blood Nation number four, Bomb Queen three number three, the new printing of Dymo five number two and Invincible number 41.

Also the first look at Madame Mirage and Noble Causes number 29. With a Marvel stamp on it this week, you get Amazing Spider Girl number eight, Amazing Spider-Man number 540, which should be appropriate. Annihilation saga this week begins as well as Black Panther number 27, Blade number nine. Two more Civil War trade paperbacks, Civil War frontline book number two and Civil War Peter Parker Spider-Man. Also the trade paperback of the first of the Criminal issues. Good series. You may want to catch up in one form by grabbing the trade paperback.

The Essential Fantastic Four number six is out this week to add to your shelf. In addition, Ghost Rider number 11, Hulk and Power Pack number three, Immortal Iron Fist number five, Marvel Zombies Dead Days, New Avengers number 30, New X-Men number 38. Second issue of Nova, Punish Award Journal number seven, Spider-Man Fantastic Four number two and Thunderbolts number 114 this week as well as another one of the variants of that series. Ultimate Power number five and Wolverine Origins number 14. Some heavy reading from our friends of two morrows this week, a whole bunch of good stuff including the comics gone ape soft cover.

You're going to like this trade paperback. It's filled with articles and stories about all those great ape stories that appeared in the comics over the 50s and 60s. There's also the Jack Kirby Collector number 48, Alter Ego from our buddy Roy Thomas number 68, Rough Stuff number one, a new printing of that and right now number 15. If you get a chance to sit down and watch some DVDs this week, you get some good new choices including music and lyrics with you Grant and Drew Barrymore. Catch and release that Jennifer Garner film with Kevin Smith, obviously paying back a debt somehow.

Because I said so, Diane Keaton and the girls and some special editions of some classics including a special of Donnie Brasco, one of Mrs. Doubtfire, Big and one of my personal favorites. You know, it almost comes down to being a Tom Hanks week, huh? There's also another special edition of Dirty Dancing which means if we add one more, there's going to be no room for Baby in the Corner anyway. Also from TV this week, season five of The Waltons and season one of Kegny and Lacey. ComicMix. ComicMix.com.

For year number six, comic stores all around the country and the world came together for free Comic Book Day. Comic retailers were offered not for free, but for a small cost, a menu of comics from DC, Marvel Image, and most of the major small publishers and a lot of very interesting independents as well. They were encouraged to give these away and do promotions to show the world the variety offered in the comics industry in 2007. We set up a network of stores all around the country who were in contact with us throughout the day on Saturday and that included Jerry at Midtown Comics in New York, Shannon at Comicopia in Boston, Ken at Drawn to Comics in Phoenix, Arizona, Brandon at Austin Books and Comics in Austin, Texas, Sheldon Drum at Heroes Aren't Hard to Find in Charlotte, North Carolina, Pat at the Graham Cracker stores in Chicago, and Ryan at the Golden Apple Comics store in Los Angeles.

Right off the bat, our first question is what was the response from the customers? And Pat at Graham Crackers in Chicago had a lot waiting for him when he got to the store that morning. At Austin Books and Comics, Brandon found that the excitement lasted pretty much the whole day. It is spring time though, a lot of other events are going on so what was it like in a city such as Boston where Shannon found she had a little competition. How was the crowd there? Pretty good. We're in Kenmore Square though so we have a lot of people going to the Red Sox game.

Excitement continued all the way out to the West Coast at Golden Apple Comics. We asked Ryan what the crowd was like there. It's overwhelming. We have a phenomenal response for free comic book day this year. We have a lot of great signings with great creators like Mike Maniola. We had a lot of stuff donated from a lot of the movie studios. We have free Fantastic Four stuff to give away. We have Silver Surfer and 11 foot Silver Surfer out in front of our store. This year the menu of comics that were offered to retailers was wide indeed. Things from DC and Marvel of course, Image, Family Guy, Simpsons, Comics for Big People, Comics for Little People. Out of Phoenix customers grabbed the books they were most familiar with.

I've seen a lot of people go for Simpsons and Family Guy and we've also seen a lot of people pick up the Lone Ranger, Battle Star Galactica. In Boston Shannon said her customers went for the independence. Always Ally. Ally always is a big, big seller. Some of the independent ones are doing really good like Hunter's Moon. In Chicago customers were looking for titles from the big two. The mainstream books always seem to go this fast. The Justice League and the Spider-Man books from DC and Marvel respectively were the first ones to go.

And we actually wound up running out of Oney's Whiteout as well. Brandon out in Austin told us there was a lot of buzz on a certain image-free comic. Astounding Wolfman by Robert Kirkman from Image Comics has been a really popular choice. Spider-Man's swing shift comic, Unseen Peanuts from Fanographics. They're all going pretty well. Not everybody handled the day the same way. At Midtown Comics customers had a chance to get a little of everything.

We prepackage all the books and everybody gets one of everything. So it's not like they just pick and choose what they want. We have two types of packages. One are for children, one are age appropriate. Another package for adults that has everything in it. People who got here early actually got every single book out there. With all those fans in the stores we had to ask exactly what else they were buying. In Boston, the new comics were hot.

Buffy for sure. Everybody's really excited. Season 8 of Buffy is in comic book form right now. So everybody's on that. Dark Tower is another really big world war Hulk. It was Planet Hulk. It is now World War Hulk. It's huge right now. Having a creator on hand in Chicago provided for some interesting sales there. Well, we had Robert Kirkman doing an in-store signing today.

So we moved a ton of his merchandise and really high-end stuff too. The Invincible, Splitcase, hardcover editions. We sold multiple of those. Walking Dead hardcovers. Invincible t-shirts. I mean a lot of stuff that had to do with him specifically went well. And in Charlotte, Sheldon Drum said pretty much everything was going out the door. Well, we sold statues, tons of trades. We're selling everything.

We'd like to take a minute to thank all the stores all around the country who participated in Free Comic Book Day again this year. As Jerry at Midtown pointed out, for a really good business person, it was a no-brainer. We want to get the word out there. We want to expand readership. And to us it's an investment in marketing. We're going to revisit our panel of retailers one more time in a couple of days, but this time it's going to be about a different topic. Spider-Man 3. We've seen the reviews by all the important people in the newspapers, the magazines and on television.

But how about the comic fans? What do they think? And where better to find them than in a comic store? We'll do that again here on Thursday on the ComicMix broadcast. ComicMix. ComicMix timeline. May 8th, 1981. Amazing Spider-Man 2.16 is something we shelled out our quarters for this week in 1981 along with Daredevil number 170. The very first issue of the second series of Green Lantern came from DC as well as the best of DC Digest had a nice collection of Batman villain stories.

Adventure Comics was still rolling with number 483, which had dial H for hero. And we spent a couple of bucks on Marvel Treasury number 28, which had that second Superman-Spider-Man appearance. In the news, the house approved a budget of almost $700 billion for the fiscal year 1982. Only four Teamster members attended the funeral for former boss Frank Fitzsimmons, and any young man celebrated his 53rd wedding anniversary. In the movies, there was music stars on the screen. Ringo was in Caveman. Dolly Part was in 9-5. And Neil was in the Jazz Singer.

A forgettable night on TV, that's for sure. Dukes of Hazzard, an episode of Harper Valley PTA. And one from Battle of the Network Stars is pretty much all you found on the networks. Your problem, you better off turning the tube off, turning the radio on and hoping to catch Deborah Harry and Blondie. ! Alright, back as you would know in a couple of days, we'll talk about heroes, we'll see what the comic fans had to think about Spider-Man after a few days in the theaters,

and on the weekend we premiere our Secrets Behind the Comics feature. You're gonna love that. Comments, of course, well we actually would like to know what you do love. Let us know on the website, that's real easy to do. Alright, as direct at podcastatcomicmix.com, and don't forget our ComicMix video broadcasts all on the site waiting for you right now. Talk to you in a couple of days. Bye! Thanks for watching!