The Mix : What are people talking about today?

DC’s January Pulp Solicitations

  • News
  • October 18, 2010


DOC SAVAGE #10
Written by IVAN BRANDON
Art by PHIL WINSLADE
Cover by J.G. JONES
It was the war that changed everything and brought Clark Savage, Jr., and Ronan McKenna together. But the things those men had to do as soldiers would one day tear them apart! Don’t miss this thrilling flashback to the history of the First Wave universe; a story that sets the scene for the deadly conclusion of Doc’s adventure in the Middle East!
On sale JANUARY 12 * 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

FIRST WAVE #6
Written by BRIAN AZZARELLO
Art by RAGS MORALES & RICK BRYANT
Cover by J.G. JONES
1:10 Variant cover by JIM LEE
This is it – the cataclysmic conclusion of the miniseries that launched the FIRST WAVE universe! Every life on Earth is threatened by Anton Colossi’s mad ambition. But The Spirit is at death’s door, The Batman is near his breaking point, and Doc Savage is at the mercy of a mad scientist! The stakes couldn’t be higher – and in FIRST WAVE, anything can happen!
Retailers please note: This issue will ship with two covers. Please see the Previews Order Form for more information.
On sale JANUARY 26 * 6 of 6 * 40 pg, FC, $3.99 US

nagranowrimo-6393652

National Graphic Novel Writing Month, Day 17: Fools! I shall tell you my evil plot!

  • News
  • October 18, 2010

nagranowrimo-4606808The month’s half over and amazingly, I have yet to reference former Valiant Comics editor Teresa Nielsen Hayden‘s lecture on “The Evil Overlord Devises a Plot“. This must be remedied immediately because, even though you are probably deep in your story, you may have hit a few snags along the way. Her own plot advice says “steal from the best” and so I’m going to steal from her. Take it away, Teresa:

<

p class=”large”>Start with some principles:

  • A plot doesn’t have to be new. It just has to be new to the reader.
  • In fact, it doesn’t even have to be new to the reader. It just
    has to get past him. (It helps if the story’s moving fast and there’s
    lots of other interesting stuff going on.)
  • A plot device that’s been used a thousand times may be a
    cliche, but it’s also a trick that works. That’s why it keeps getting
    used.
  • Several half-baked ideas can often be combined into one fully-cooked one.
  • If you have one plot presented three ways, you have three
    plots. If you have three plots presented one way, you have one plot. (I
    stole this principle from Jim Macdonald’s lecture on how to really
    generate plots, which is much better than my lecture on stupid plot
    tricks.)
  • Steal from the best.

Looked at from this angle, the Internet’s various lovingly-compiled
cliche lists are a treasury of useful plot devices. The instructions that
follow are one way to use them.

  1. Below, you’ll find a comprehensive collection of the various Evil
    Overlord lists    . Don’t go there yet. First, using whatever method pleases
    you, generate five random numbers that fall within the following ranges:
  1. 1-230
  2. 1-150
  3. 1-130
  4. 1-123
  5. 1-94
  1. Now go to the Evil Overlord lists, which I’ve divided into five
    categories. Take your five random numbers and match them up to the
    appropriate entries in the lists:
  1. Lead Characters (Bad)
  2. Lead Characters (Good)
  3. Auxiliary Characters (Bad)
  4. Auxiliary Characters (Good)
  5. Further Evil

You now have five juicy cliches.

You’re going to make a plot
out of them. You’ll find it’s fairly easy to make a silly one, but
it’s not all that much harder to turn them into a decent one. You’ve got a
lot of potential story to work with.

  1. You’re not done yet. Before you start writing, roll one die. Take
    whatever number comes up, and generate that many random numbers which fall
    between 1 and 141. Now go to Murphy’s Laws of Combat, which follow the
    Evil Overlord lists, and find the laws that match your numbers. These are
    plot twists. Use them as needed. If your story absolutely requires that
    Gareth go from point A to point B and drop off a package at the Post
    Office along the way, but you’re finding that part dreary, tossing in
    modifiers like “Every man has a scheme that will not work” or “If your
    attack is going really well, it’s an ambush” will suggest ways to liven it
    up.

Alternately, you can go here and have them
all generated for you.

  1. You’re allowed to throw out one cliche, but only if you’re
    convinced you know another comparably lurid thing that should be
    happening there instead. You’re also allowed to use the cliches
    straight or reversed. Say you’ve drawn A-34, “I will not turn into a
    snake. It never helps.” You can have a character turn into a snake and
    find it doesn’t help, or do it and find it very useful indeed, or decline
    to do something so obviously useless and do something else instead. That’s
    fine. Just get in there and make the story start happening.

  2. You may be tempted to throw out awkward-seeming list picks and go for
    more obviously writer-friendly cliches. That’s your choice; but try the
    awkward set first. It’s figuring out how to make them work together that
    produces interesting and unexpected story lines.

  3. If you’re trying to write science fiction, it may be useful at
    this point to pull the same stunt using the mighty and compendious SF
    cliches list at http://users4.50megs.com/enphilistor/cliche.htm. For a
    perfectly shameless mixture, you can also toss in a few cliches from the
    “Things We Learned at the Movies” list—but only if you use them in
    reverse.

Me again. And since this is comics, we would be remiss if we didn’t include these comic cliche lists:

http://www.comicsalliance.com/2009/11/03/roasting-old-chestnuts-our-favorite-comic-book-cliches/

http://www.jonathancrossfield.com/blog/2008/03/comic-scriptwriting-superhero.html

http://forums.comicbookresources.com/archive/index.php/t-50446.html

And if you have a few hours to burn, you can go through the lists at TV Tropes. But be very careful– you only have two weeks left to finish writing your graphic novel, and if you go there, you can easily spend two months. You’ve been warned.

Remember: you can follow all the NaGraNoWriMo posts here!

Happy 20th Birthday, IMDB!

  • News
  • October 18, 2010

Did you know that Dougray Scott was cast to play Wolverine, in the summer blockbuster X-Men? He had to leave the project because of his work on Mission: Impossible II. Did you know that in Batman: Forever, strings can be seen on the helicopter after it explodes against the “Lady Liberty” statue? Did you know that Simon Weisse, prop-maker of Hellboy, was an uncredited model maker for Inglorious Basterds!?

Of course you did! And it’s all thanks to the Internet Movie Database, IMDb.com… which turned 20 today, October 17th, 2010.

Nerds, cinemaphiles, and popular comicbook/pop culture bloggers have been turning to this amazing source of sometimes useless, sometimes shocking, always acutely specific database of movies and television information now for two whole decades. Just ask yourself, where would you be without it? How many bar fights did you prevent by using your iPhone to assure your comrades that Wil Wheaton did win the 2002 Melbourne Underground Film Festival’s award for Best Actor for his performance in Jane White Is Sick & Twisted? How much money did you win in that local trivia contest because you knew that the imcomparable John Hoyt played Sire Domra in the episode Baltar’s Escape in the 1979 Battlestar Galactica? And how would you ever have wooed your eventual wife, if you didn’t amaze her by knowing that there was a video camera inside Ludo’s right horn that fed to an external video monitor inside it’s own stomach, assisting the puppeteer perform in Labyrinth? Suffice to say, the unbridled girth of information available to the populace thanks to the IMBd has allowed all of us to become living wikipedias of information!

Speaking of wikipedia…how about a little history, shall we? The IMDb was born from a pair of lists generated in early 1989 by participants in the Usenet newsgroup
rec.arts.movies. In each case, a single maintainer recorded items
emailed by newsgroup readers, and posted updated versions of his/her list
from time to time. The founding ideas of the database began with a
posting titled “Those Eyes”, on the subject of actresses with beautiful
eyes. Hank Driskill began to collect a list of attractive actresses and
what movies they had appeared in, and as the size of the repeated
posting grew far beyond a normal newsgroup article, it soon became known
simply as “THE LIST”.

The other project, started by Chuck Musciano, was briefly called the less capitalized
“Movie Ratings List” and soon became the “Movie Ratings Report”.
Musciano simply asked readers to rate movies on a scale of one to ten,
and reported on the votes. He soon began posting “ballots” with lists of
movies for people to rate, so his list also grew quickly.

In 1990, Col Needham collated the two lists and produced a “Combined LIST & Movie Ratings Report”. Needham soon started a (male) “Actors List”, while Dave Knight began a “Directors List”, and Andy Krieg took over THE LIST, which would later be renamed the “Actress List”.
Both this and the Actors List had been restricted to people who were
still alive and working, but retired people began to be added, and
Needham also started what was then (but did not remain) a separate “Dead
Actors/Actresses List”. The goal now was to make the lists as inclusive
as the maintainers could manage. In late 1990, the lists included
almost 10,000 movies and television series. On October 17, 1990, Needham
posted a collection of Unix shell scripts which could be used to search the four lists, and the database that would become the IMDb was born.

In celebration of it’s 20 year history, IMBd is hosting plenty of party games. By party games, we mean video clips (today’s features funnyman Will Ferrell alongside his director/writer in crime, Adam McKay), retrospectives, and tons of stuff to keep your thumbs  a’scrollin’. Head over to their Anniversary Page to do what we all do on IMDb… waste a ton of time learning factoids we’ll never need… but can’t stop quoting.

PULP SIGNING AND ALL PULP WAS THERE!

  • News
  • October 18, 2010

The Broadway Mall bookstore of Denver, Colorado played host on Sunday,  Oct. 17th to Laura Givens, pulp/sci-fi cover artist turned writer/editor and she and several of her colleagues greeted the public and signed copies of SIX GUNS FROM HELL.

Seated left to write are David Boop, Carol Hightshoe, Laura Givens, Jennifer Campbell-Hicks & David B. Riley.  The book was published by Science Fiction Trails Publishing. The signing attracted a nice crowd of friends, family and fans and a really fun time was had by all in attendance.

Laura Givens is a popular, well known cover artist who will be featured in a full length ALL PULP interview later this week.
For All Pulp – Ron Fortier

Review: ‘The Tudors Season 4’

  • Uncategorized
  • October 17, 2010

Imagine if you will that we’re all living in the time of King Henry V. His court would be the A list, their comings and goings the subject of gossip at every tavern and pub in England. They were the celebrities of their day, at a time when England was still a small power, finding their voice and charting their destiny.

For four years, Michael Hirst has been delivering a taste of what it might have been like in the Showtime series, The Tudors
. Now, the fourth and final year, covering the final two wives and his death, has been collected on a four disc set released from CBS Home Entertainment.

The show’s success was attributable to the lush visuals, from the costuming to the locations. John Rhys Meyers was a lusty, virile king, craving a dynasty and constantly thwarted. He was a man of voracious appetites, far beyond food, but history denied him greatness. The first season covered his unhappy first marriage to his dead brother’s wife, Catherine, and his true love, Anne Boleyn, challenging the Pope for his freedom. In the end, he broke from the Church, established the Church of England and found himself challenged at every turn.

Hirst took liberties with characters, characterizations, and sequence of events so don’t use this for your homework, but for a sense of what the time was like and players, this is darn good entertainment. The seasons rolled through his loves and losses, with some of the wives coming to life and others barely sketched out. The fourth season suffers a bit from compressing so much into a mere ten episodes.

His quest for a male heir led him to Katherine Howard then the unhappy final wife, Katherine Parr. Age and illness (the dreaded gout) robbed him of his strength and appeal, letting the upper class maneuver for favor or power.

We open in 1540, thirty years into Henry’s reign and he remains strong as he gets to know his fifth and youngest wife, Katherine, a mere 17 years old. While Henry and Katherine are cordial, Thomas Culpepper covets Katherine while currying favor with the king, a subplot that plays out in the early episodes. Henry also gets a chance to realize what he may have missed during an encounter with wife number four, Anne of Cleves, who compares more favorably than does young Katherine. While Katherine and Culpepper play, Henry and Anne clandestinely reunite. It’s certainly good to be the king.

His rages are legendary and Meyers handles the explosive emotions quite well, especially when Katherine’s affair and sordid past come to light. Also, his rocky relationships with his daughters comes to the fore at mid-season as he restores Princesses Elizabeth and Mary to the line of succession. At the same time, politics and religion clash as the Reformation is weakened when Henry takes the Catholics’ side in matters of state.

We rush through his final wife, Katherine Parr, who is closer in age to the now ailing Henry. Clearly, Hirst could not end the series without covering all six legendary wives but one wishes for more  We also get a truncated war with France before illness finally claims the king. Nicely done was a final dream sequence as the dear departed former wives (Maria Doyle Kennedy, Annabelle Wallis and Natalie Dormer) all appear and have final words for their husband.

The show looks wonderful on disc but one wishes the same attention to detail in extras from the first three sets was given to this final set. Instead, there are no extras of any sort but a collection of sampler episodes from Showtime’s other series. A sad way to take our leave of Tudor England but the show is well worth a look.

Ferguson reviews Mitchum in ‘The Wrath of God’ during THE LONG MATINEE

  • News
  • October 17, 2010
THE LONG MATINEE -Movie Reviews by Derrick Ferguson
twog1-1603848
THE WRATH OF GOD

1972
MGM

Produced by William S. Gilmore
Directed by Ralph Nelson
Screenplay by Ralph Nelson and James Graham
Based on a novel by James Graham

Back in the 60’s and 70’s there was a sub-genre of the western that had these elements: a group of American outlaws/mercenaries/rogues would find themselves in Mexico or South America at the turn of the century and get involved in what amounted to a suicide mission that circumstances forced them to accept. There’s usually a huge amount of money waiting for them at the end of the mission but during the course of the adventure the outlaws would find their long buried sense of justice and honor awakened and they would abandon the money to take up the cause of the downtrodden and oppressed peasantry. This is pretty much the plot of movies such as “The Wild Bunch” “The Professionals” “Duck, You Sucker” and “Vera Cruz” but I’ve never seen this plot worked in such a goofy and flat out off the wall manner as we see in THE WRATH OF GOD.

Emmett Keogh (Ken Hutchinson) is a wildass Irishman stuck in South America during the 1920’s. He’s blackmailed into driving a truck north by Jennings (Victor Buono) who tells him it’s a load of whiskey that will fetch a helluva price in the United States that is suffering under Prohibition. Since Jennings was the guy who arraigned for his passport to be stolen, Emmett has no choice to agree. Along the way he meets Father Oliver Van Horn (Robert Mitchum) who is one of the strangest priests that Emmett has ever met since Father Van Horn drinks liquor like it’s lemonade, swears like a Kansas City pimp and totes a huge black valise carrying a Thompson sub-machine gun. It’s a weapon that Father Van Horn knows as well as a monkey knows his coconuts which he demonstrates when Emmett and Father Van Horn have to rescue an Indian girl named Chela (Paula Pritchett) from being gang raped by the soldiers of Colonel Santilla (John Colicos) The two men are forced to go on the run with the girl in tow but they’re caught by Colonel Santilla’s troops and Emmett discovers that the truck actually carries guns meant for the rebels. Jennings has also been captured by Santilla and the three men are made an offer they can’t refuse: in return for their lives they have to agree to kill De La Plata (Frank Langella) a local rebel warlord who is causing Santilla a great deal of trouble.

Posing as mining engineers, Jennings and Emmett infiltrate De La Plata’s fortress-like hacienda while Van Horn takes up residence in the village church, which has been desecrated. It turns out that De Le Plata hates priests and personally killed the last one himself. Del La Plata’s mother (Rita Hayworth) begs her son not to kill this priest and De La Plata agrees not to since Van Horn saves his mother’s life when the local mine caves in. You see, the mine is filled with gold and De La Plata has terrorized the villagers into digging it out for him. But the mine is horribly unsafe and he needs the expertise of mining engineers to get it out. Of course, the three outlaws have to kill De La Plata before he figures out that Jennings and Emmett know as much about mining as I do about Chinese arithmetic. The situation is complicated by Emmett’s relationship with Chela who has fallen in love with him and Van Horn’s increasing desire to live up to the trust the villagers have in him as a priest. And while the outlaws have no loyalty to Santilla, they also see that living under De La Plata’s rule isn’t any day at the beach either. So they make a decision. And that’s when the story really takes off as Father Van Horn begins to conscript the villagers to stand up for themselves against De La Plata, Chela marries Emmett and Jennings makes plans to break outta Dodge and save his own ass.

You see? I told you it was goofy. What makes THE WRATH OF GOD so much fun to watch is that you never know where this damn movie is going to take you or what’s going to happen next. There’s a plot twist every five minutes and just when you think you know what’s going to happen, it doesn’t. There are a lot of really funny one-liners thrown back and forth between the three leading men and from the amount of humor in the story you might think halfway through it that it’s a spoof of the genre. I mean, this is a movie that has Victor Buono as an action hero, for cryin’ out loud. We’re talking about a guy who’s best known role was probably as the King Tut villain on the “Batman” TV show. In this movie he has a great scene where he drives a car like a battering ram into the barricaded gates of De La Plata’s fortress while firing a Thompson sub-machine and then he jumps out to take on the chief henchman with his sword cane. And he’s totally convincing during his fight scenes of which he has several. And he has a bunch of great one liners, such as “We’re going to get along famously” which is used in this movie the same way “I have a bad feeling about this” was used in “Star Wars”

I’ve never seen Ken Hutchinson in a movie before and have no idea who he is but he’s immensely likeable as the wily Emmett who seems to tumble in and out of adventures as easily as you or I eat fried chicken. A lot of the humor in the movie comes from him as he’s constantly thrown into situations where he’s clearly way in over his head but he manages to come through with luck and sheer dogged determination that even Dirk Pitt might admire. And as for Robert Mitchum…well, he’s flat out terrific in this. For much of the movie we’re never sure what the deal with Father Van Horn is.  Not only does he carry an arsenal of machine guns and grenades in that big black valise of his but he also has $50,000 dollars that he hints he got by robbing banks. He has a great scene where he tells the villagers that he’s going to hold an all night service in the church where he performs weddings, baptizes babies and hears confessions where it made clear that he knows the rituals of The Catholic Church inside and out but he also indulges in decidedly un-priestly activities like sleeping with whores, drinking whiskey like water and cussing like crazy. He also carries a Bible that has a concealed gun inside and his cross hides a six-inch blade. Nobody in the movie really knows if this guy is actually one really badass priest or a really eccentric badass who likes to pretend he’s a priest until he spills the beans near the end of the movie.

Robert Mitchum is one of those old type movie stars I love because he looks like a man who actually looks like he’s tough enough to kick your ass with just a look, unlike a lot of the current crop of movie stars who are just too damn pretty to look like they’re as tough as the characters they’re portraying on screen. Robert Mitchum comes from the crop of actors I like to call ‘Old School Tough’. I’m talking about guys like Lee Marvin, Robert Ryan, William Holden, Ernest Borgnine and Steve McQueen. You know what I’m talking about. Whenever he’s on screen in this movie you just can’t take your eyes off him, as you want to know just like the other characters what the real deal with him is.

There are a lot of great action sequences in this movie, especially when the three outlaws finally take on De La Plata’s army in a ferocious shootout in front of the church and the final showdown at the fortress. In between we’ve got a whole series of double-crosses, fistfights, staredowns and showdowns that will make your head giddy. Trust me, this isn’t a boring movie. In fact, despite having been made back in 1972, THE WRATH OF GOD seemed to me a lot more of how current action/adventure are made with it’s healthy mix of violent action, comedy and eccentric characters which is why I think it makes enjoyable watching today.

So should you see THE WRATH OF GOD? Hell yes. If you’re a big Robert Mitchum fan it’s worth seeing just for him alone as obviously he’s having a great time with his role and the material. Victor Buono and Ken Hutchinson also turn in great performances as well. Frank Langella has a wonderful time with his role as a bad guy and his scene in the church where he confronts Robert Mitchum and tells him why he hates priests and God is an example of just plain good solid acting from both of them that goes a long way to establishing both of their characters and sets up the conflict between them nicely. THE WRATH OF GOD works as a really good cinematic pulp adventure that should be enjoyed for what it is: a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon with the snacks and beverages of your choice. If you get Turner Classic Movies on your satellite/cable provider you can wait for it to show up there but if you’re a dedicated pulp or Robert Mitchum fan, spring for the rental fee and give it a try. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. I know I wasn’t.

Rated: PG
111 Minutes

jonny-rench-4235516

Jonny Rench, 1982-2010

  • Uncategorized
  • October 17, 2010

jonny-rench-4235516Bleeding Cool reports that Jonny Rench, comics colorist best known for his recent work for DC and Wildstorm, from Batman, Human Target, Midnighter, The Programme and Red Menace, has passed away from a heart attack at the age of 28.

His last work appears to be in the now disturbingly titled Welcome To Tranquility: One Foot In The Grave.

You can see more of his work at his blog.

Our condolences to his family and friends.

Marvel Television Surrounds ABC-TV!

  • Uncategorized
  • October 17, 2010

When Disney bought Marvel, the movie rights to the majority of their big-name properties were tied up. They still are. But now that writer Jeph Loeb is head
of Marvel television, he’s been pitching a bunch of properties to ABC-TV, which, of course, is owned by Disney. You might have heard that The Incredible Hulk is in development – which is not the same as being green-lighted. That’s kind of remarkable as Mark Ruffalo, movie’s third Bruce Banner, has been signed to do three Avengers movies as well several Hulks.

But that doesn’t mean they can’t do television at the same time. I think Ed Norton’s chance at going green again is only slightly better than Bill Bixby’s, but Ed’s extremely talented and, hell, I don’t have to work with him.

There’s two more Marvel properties on the short list: Cloak and Dagger, which is presently sans comic book, and The Punisher, who is three movies shy of being a star. Maybe the small screen is a warmer environment.

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Heroes for Hire is being kicked around;
this show would focus on Luke Cage; I don’t know if Iron Fist would be in it.
But “Heroes” IS plural. His comic book wife, Jessica Jones, is on the list with
her own show. It can’t be called Alias, so they’ve titled it Alter-Ego. This should not be confused with Roy Thomas’s character of the same name, nor his monthly fanzine of the same name.

Jack Kirby’s The Eternals is being considered. Even with CGI I don’t see this being as strong in live action as it would be in traditional animation, but I doubt ABC has the guts to do that. Stepping out of the pages of Marvel’s recent mega-crossover, The Hood is on the list. I guess ABC needs a nice family-oriented show starring a ruthless villain. Everybody’s favorite private eyes, Colleen Wing and Misty Knight, are on the list under the title Daughters of the Dragon. If they can cast the right sexy babes, this one is a shoo-in. Not so much the other two on the list.

ABC is looking at Ka-Zar. I don’t know if the teevee world is ready for the return of Tarzan, but my guess is that if it is, it would be looking for a show called “Tarzan.” Finally, there’s Agents of Atlas. Marvel just cancelled this title, which pisses me off because I love it. Is the world ready for a talking gorilla, a guy from Uranus, and a female Sub-Mariner? Well, this is an election year.

Mind you, even though ABC and Marvel are both owned by Disney, the network is not obligated to pick up any of these shows and most certainly will not pick them all up. But it would be kind of fun if they picked up a couple so they can do Marvel-style crossovers.

PULP ARTIST’S WEEKEND-Interview with LANCE STAR artist James Burns!!AND CHECK OUT HIS GALLERY!

  • News
  • October 17, 2010


AP: Tell us a little about yourself and your pulp interests.
JB: When I was a kid I owned all 80-some Doc Savage paperbacks. I lived and breathed Kenneth Robeson.
 AP: What does pulp mean to you?
JB: Adventure stories, told in a direct, no nonsense fashion, or possibly something having to do with the timber industry…
AP: Your entry into creating comic books is rather unique compared to most. Tell us about the personal story that launched your comic book career.

JB: It’s both a scary, as well as a redemptive tale, and one actually told in my first comic Book. I had always loved comics, and had always wanted to create a comic, but I was one of those folks who talked about it a lot, but when I sat down to actually make one, I found I didn’t really have a story to tell.Then in 2002 I had a serious problem with my eyes, a detached retina, which necessitated having surgery on both of my eyes, a scary prospect for a visual artist. Needless to say, I recovered, but at last I had a story to tell, and at age 45 I drew my first comic, Detached, about the experience. AP: Let’s talk Grumbles. How did your long running weekly comic strip come about, how long has it been appearing, and where folks can find it.

JB: Grumbles has been running in Atlanta’s Sunday Paper for over six years now. I first pitched it when I heard they were starting an alt-newsweekly in town, and they were nice enough to accept it. I had a guaranteed 9 weeks of strips that they’d buy. I’m now working on week 314.I wish I were more of a self-promoter, so I could get it into more publications, but I’m happy that someone pays me to draw on a weekly basis. It also serves as an outlet for my anger at what I consider to be the stupid or cruel or selfish behavior of my fellow man, and expressing that angst on a weekly basis keeps my head from exploding.All of the weekly strips are available in an archive at http://jamesburnsdesign.com/comics/grumbles/, and I also sell physical compilations of each year’s strips at comic shows, and on Indyplanet.com.

AP: You handled the art on Lance Star: Sky Ranger’s leap from pulp anthology to comic book. How did that come about?


JB: Atlanta has a vital and energetic community of comics creators, and there are frequent chances for them to get together and work on projects together. That’s how working on this comic came about, from talking with Lance Star’s creator Bobby Nash, and as a result of networking at comic shows.It was a lot of fun to work on, especially as this was the first script I’ve drawn that I hadn’t written myself. What a fun character! Who doesn’t like to draw Nazis being punched out, or fantastic air battles?

AP: You were the creator, editor, and publisher of Real Magicalism. Tell us a bit about the book and the title. Are there plans for more Real Magicalism volumes?

JB: Well, the title comes from the literary term for a dreamlike narrative style, called magical realism where you can’t really tell what’s real and what’s part of the dream. I twisted the title around to both pay homage to that genre, as well as to indicate that these stories in the anthology also contained a twist, a slant. I’m very proud of that volume, and learned a lot about pulling an anthology together. It’s quality is due to the wonderful work with which I managed to surround my own work with, which in the end made my stuff look that much better. I cannot thank the contributors enough.Yes, I’d like to do another volume when I get enough of my own work collected to start the ball rolling again.

AP: Who are some of your artistic/creative influences?

JB: I love the classic, old-school storytellers; Kirby, Wally Wood, Wil Eisner… They all share 2 characteristics – the ability to tell a story really well, and they’re all amazing visual artists.They’re something to aspire to.There may be some illustrators out there who have perfect technique, their draftsmanship might be considered superior to these folks, but in terms of pure storytelling, they’re unparalleled.

AP: What does James Burns do when he’s not making comic books?

JB: For the last 25 years I’ve created motion graphics for a living; that means things like title animations for video, cable, television, and the web. For the last year I’ve also been teaching what I know at the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), here at their Atlanta campus.On the personal side, I’ve been married to the beautiful and talented Rebecca Burns, author, editor, and writer, for over 21 years.We have a beautiful 18-year-old daughter who’s just starting college. I’m a very lucky man.

AP: Where can readers find learn more about you and your work?


JB: My main website is http://jamesburnsdesign.com, from which you can find out about all aspects of my professional life, and http://jamesburnsdesign.com/comics/ to find out about my comics work.


AP: Any upcoming projects you would like to mention?


JB: Grumble Year 6 should be out before the end of the year, and I’ll also have translated versions of a couple of my strips in the Italian magazine Mamma! My plan is to take Europe by storm, and become famous over there like Jerry Lewis is in France.

AP: Are there any upcoming convention appearances or signings coming up where fans can meet you?

JB:  I tend to stick at home and not travel far afield, which means I’ll be at any Atlanta area convention that will have me. The end of the year looks busy for me, with a trip to Germany and some much-needed back surgery (perhaps I’ll get a new comic out of it… “Slipped!”) , I probably won’t be at any show until Wes Tilander’s next Atlanta Comic Convention, on Superbowl Sunday.

AP: You have served as a writer, artist, colorist, letterer, editor, and publisher. Are there any creative areas you’ve not been worked in that you would like to try your hand at doing?

JB: I think it would be fun to do a children’s book, or perhaps a novel. I’ve always envied writers. Especially comic book writers. They’re allowed to write something like “… at that moment every soul on the planet stood up, put on a crushed velvet tuxedo, slicked back their hair, and brandishing an authentic katana sword, joined the battle…” and then some poor comic artist would be expected to draw that. What a scam!


AP: And finally, what advice would you give to anyone wanting to work in comics and/or art?

JB: Talk is cheap. Lot’s of people say they want to do comic books, but all they ever produce is fan art or single illustrations.If you really want to create comic books, just sit down and start doing it. Don’t wait to get a publisher, don’t wait to get a deal, just buckle down and start learning the craft of storytelling by actually putting pen to paper and by doing it.

Movie Review: ‘RED’

red-bw-online-banner1-6275640For those of you who haven’t read the three-issue comic book miniseries Red, by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner, don’t worry. The movie version is to the comic book as [[[Blade Runner]]] was to Philip K. Dick’s novel [[[Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?]]] That is, Red takes the comic book’s basic concept—a retired CIA assassin, Frank Moses, finds himself under attack and comes out of retirement to deal with the problem—and then spins it off in a new direction. In this movie’s case, that direction is a fast, fun film with a fantastic cast, great action, great lines, and more than a little bit of humor.

Let’s start with the cast. You’ve got Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, and Helen Mirren. That’s a fantastic lineup all by itself. But then throw in Mary Louise Parker, Karl Urban, Brian Cox, and Richard Dreyfuss, and this movie could be about pretty much anything and it would still be fun. Hell, I’d watch that group doing an improv of strangers meeting in a supermarket checkout line!

But don’t worry about the plot. It’s there. Oh, is it there. And it all works. It’s straightforward enough to follow without a problem, but has plenty of depth to keep you interested. There aren’t any of those cinematic asides Hollywood is so fond of these days, either—I think there’s all of one flashback, and it’s short and to the point.

There’s also a lot of humor to this movie. Plenty of laugh-out-loud moments, especially with Willis and Mirren’s droll delivery, Freeman’s cheerful amiability, and Malkovich’s off-kilter antics. If anything, Malkovich steals the show, but only barely. This isn’t a group you can steal much attention from.

red1-4414641There’s a lot of violence, of course. But no real gore. No nudity either, and not much profanity. Plus the light tone and the romantic element offsets all the talk about killing and killers. The film’s rated PG-13 and I think that’s fair.

One of the best things about this movie is that you can tell everyone had a great time making it. Willis is definitely on as the calm, cool, slightly amused Frank Moses. Malkovich is perfect as the addled but still deadly Marvin. Parker is delightful as the confused but sweet Sarah. Mirren is wonderful as the wickedly serene Victoria, Freeman is endearing as the easy-going but utterly competent Joe, Urban is excellent as the focused and competent Cooper, and Cox is charming as the smooth-talking Ivan. And watch for a cameo by screen legend Ernest Borgnine.

Red is definitely a movie well worth seeing. If you’re anything like me, you’ll walk away grinning—and with a new appreciation for postcards from cities around the world.

Categories

Archives

Everything you need to make great comics!

comicmix-pro-300x69-2

Nucleus X

Bookshop Zaks