Author: Glenn Hauman

On sale today: ‘Jon Sable Freelance: Ashes of Eden’ #4!

For those who came in
late: Jon Sable has been
hired by a businessman to deliver both a rare, valuable diamond and a beautiful
yet troublesome woman from Africa to New York City. He’s done that, he’s back
home, and he’s reconnected with old friends and flames.

Last issue, Jon
attended Prinsloo’s party for the Maguffin Diamond and, wouldn’t you know it,
everyone’s favorite thief Maggie the Cat was hanging out. While Jon and Maggie
were back at her hotel getting … you know, reacquainted … someone stole the rock.

Compelled to return
to the scene of the crime, Jon is ambushed on his way to keep his date at the
annual Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting ceremony… and things promise to go much worse for him.

Mike Grell on story and art, John Workman on letters, yours truly on colors and Mike Gold waving a baton.

On sale today: ‘GrimJack: The Manx Cat’ #6!

GrimJack is in a race to
save Blacjac and Bob from the Manx Cat. The problem is… everyone who falls
asleep becomes an unwilling Night Terrorist in the Manx Cat’s army! Bullets,
blood, bikes, bombastic babes… and the St. John Knives! What more can you want
in a stunning conclusion? Creators John Ostrander and Timothy Truman on script
and art.

What will the future of magazines on tablets look like?

Everybody’s waiting for the tablet computer to see what it could do to the comics industry. Thanks to Time and Sports Illustrated, we have a potential preview:

Boy, wouldn’t it be great if DC Comics were published by Time Warner?

No?

Wouldn’t it be nice to think that DC was thinking about this stuff, at least?

More in this New York Times article.

Disney/Marvel official, and Disney’s getting Stan Lee as well. Now what about the freelancers?

It’s official. Marvel Entertainment stockholders approved the company’s merger with Disney at a special meeting held last Thursday, December 31, 2009.  Under the agreement, which is valued at an estimated $4.3 billion, Marvel becomes a wholly-owned subsidiary of Disney.

But in addition to acquiring Marvel, Disney also furthered its existing relationship with Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment (Purveyors of Wonder) by taking a 10% equity stake in POW! for $2.5 million.  Disney entered into a first look deal with POW! in 2007, and under the new deal includes enhanced rights to the creative output of POW! and certain exclusive consulting services.

The only hitch? Over the weekend, I was talking with a freelancer who was complaining about a recent job he did for a Disney subsidiary which still hadn’t paid him after many months, even after signing multi-page forms and four contracts, for what basically amounted to a lettering job.

One wonders what it’s going to be like for all the freelancers at Marvel who will suddenly find themselves thrust into Disney’s mammoth accounting system for dealing with outside vendors. If anybody has any experiences with the new regime, let us know.

‘Captain America’: The Movie!

No, not the new one coming out in a few years– the 1990 one.

Starring Matt Salinger as Steve Rogers, we bring you this film as a reminder of how comic book movies used to be.

(Hat tip: David Gallaher.)

Happy New Year!

It’s been a heck of a ride, hasn’t it?

Congratulations, we’re living in the future now.

(Incidentally, now that the old year is officially past, we’ll start doing those end-of-year/end-of-decade wrap ups, because we weren’t going to jump the gun. We have to have some rules around here, don’t we?)

So enjoy, have a happy, and don’t forget to watch 2010 on TCM later tonight.

And now it’s Sir Peter Jackson too…

It really is the year of the nerd, isn’t it?

Peter Jackson, the director of the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the executive producer of District 9, as well as the upcoming Mortal
Engines,

The Adventures of Tintin, and The Hobbit, has been made a Knight Companion of New Zealand, which entitles him to the honorific “Sir”.

The award was given in recognition of Jackson’s efforts in jumpstarting the New Zealand film industry as well as for his artistic achievements.

Patrick Stewart to be knighted

patrick-2520stewart-8178651 Now when the crew of the Enterprise addresses him as Sir, they can really mean it.

Patrick Stewart is on the list of people to be knighted by H.R.M. Queen Elizabeth II this New Year’s Day, and in the U.K. will henceforth be known as Sir Patrick.

Stewart is known to comics fans for, among other things, playing Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men movies and Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation. He is also a fan of comics, having contributed an introduction to a Transmetropolitan collection, optioned the film rights, and having made his desire known to play the role of Spider Jerusalem in any screen adaptation of the property.

He is also a noted Shakespearean actor, having been a long-time member of the Royal Shakespeare Company and most recently performing as Cladius opposite David Tennant’s Hamlet.