The Mix : What are people talking about today?

Heath Ledger’s Oscar-Winning Performance?

Whenever the subject of The Dark Knight comes up, everyone seems to be asking the same question (when they’re not talking about the film’s viral marketing, that is): Do you think Heath Ledger will receive an Oscar post-humously?

Over at Cinematical, they’ve started a discussion thread on exactly that subject, and the resulting comments have been interesting, to say the least. Reader response is all over the spectrum, but I thought commenter "techstar25" summed up the debate pretty darn well:

Last year the Academy recognized the work of two brilliant actors playing two of the most heinous villains ever put to film (Javier Bardem and Daniel Day-Lewis). There is now clearly a baseline with which Ledger’s Joker will be compared. How does "Joker" stack up against "Anton Chigurh" and "Daniel Plainview"? We’ll see, but at least now we know that the barriers have been broken and the voters will take a second look at "the bad guy".

This subject has certainly been the topic of conversation at many a ComicMix meeting, but I’d like to throw it out there for discussion among our readers. Is Ledger a lock to take home an Academy Award, or is the entire discussion premature with the film’s July 18 release still months away?

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ComicMix Radio: Shake-Ups On TV – We Need A Hero!

cmixradio-200-4020296The fall lineups for the major networks continue to be revealed and you may  not be happy at where a few of our favorites landed. To ease the pain, we poke Heroes‘ star Milo Ventimigila to find out what he picked up at his local comic shop, plus:

— Iron Man buzz hits the comic racks with two sellouts

— You can see Indiana Jones early – if you fly to Cannes

— BSG‘s Number Six meets Spidey!

Stop looking at the goofy TV stars and press the button!

 

 

  And remember, you can always subscribe to ComicMix Radio podcasts via badgeitunes61x15dark-7593382 or RSS!

Happy Birthday: Garry Leach

  • Uncategorized
  • May 15, 2008

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Born in 1957, Garry Leach studied Graphic Design at St. Martin’s School of Art. His first work in comics was on 2000 A.D., but he quickly became known for his art on the series The VCs.

In 1981, Leach joined Quality Communications as art director. He was also the first artist on Alan Moore’s revival of Marvelman (better known in the U.S. as Miracleman). Leach and Moore then created Warpsmith. In 1988 Leach and Dave Elliot set up Atomeka Press—the first title was the anthology AI, which included another Moore/Leach Warpsmith story.

Leach left comics briefly in the mid-’90s after Atomeka closed but returned to ink Hitman a few years later. He also drew the first issue of Warren Ellis’ Global Frequency and contributed more work to 2000 A.D.

In 2004, Leach and Elliot restarted Atomeka Press.

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Interview: Tim Seeley on ‘Hack/Slash’ and Suicide Girls Crossovers

  • Uncategorized
  • May 15, 2008

ctonymark-com-3Writer and artist Tim Seely has come along way from reading, drawing and dreaming about comics as a kid in his parent’s basement in Wisconsin. Over the years, he’s managed to write and/or draw some of the most popular cult-favorite comics in publishing, including Kore, G.I. Joe, G.I. Joe vs. Transformers, Forgotten Realms: The Dark Elf Trilogy and most recently, a comic based on the Holloween movie franchise.

He’s also the creator of the hugely popular and successful comic book series Hack/Slash, which is currently being produced as a feature film by Rogue Pictures and expected to be released later this year. Recently, ComicMix sat down with the prolific artist and writer to get all the latest details on Hack/Slash the comic, the movie adaptation and his latest project with the Suicide Girls.

COMICMIX: Hey Tim, thanks for taking the time to talk with me.

TIM SEELEY: Sure, no problem at all.

CMix: You’re the staff artist for Devil’s Due Publishing, but your most well-known work, Hack/Slash, is a creator-owned project?

TS: It is creator-owned, yeah.

CMix: How did you come up with the idea for it?

TS: My girlfriend always gets embarrassed that I tell this story at all, but I was sick for a couple of days with the flu or something so, and it was right around Halloween. I’d just lay in bed for three or four days, and all I did was watch horror movies, like every station, they all run marathons, you know?

So I’m just sitting there and I’m on cold medicine and I start noting patterns in these horror movies. I took a bath because I’m feeling all crappy, and all of a sudden, it gelled in my head, and I jumped out of the tub and ran over, dripping-ass-naked in my house, and I wrote down this kind of outline for the comic.

There’s a girl that goes from slasher movie to slasher movie.  It’s a whole meta-idea or whatever, so then I started to build Hack/Slash from there. I just wanted to do something that didn’t have the flavor of what most comics have, something more like, B-movie, kind of totally creative, not so serious, something more like Psychotronic Movie Guide, like gonzo silly, but make it really important that the characters

There is a lot of characterization, and it was going to be about two characters and about their relationship. So, I kind of combined what I like about bad movies and what I like about good movies, and just got rid of all the other stuff.

CMix: Now, in addition to the comic, there’s also the Hack/Slash film in production as well… How’s that going?

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The Single Greatest Comic Book of All Time?

Chris’ Invincible Super-Blog continues to be one of my favorite comic blogs on the InterWebs, as it never fails to crack me up while also turning me on to some comics that might not have otherwise been on my radar. Yesterday’s celebration of his one-year anniversary with the new ISB site was no exception.

In order to commemorate a full year with the "new" ISB, Chris revisits his assessment of "The Single Greatest Comic Book Of All Time" — which happens to be November 1988’s Batman #425, featuring a Jim Starlin story and Mark Bright pencils.

According to Chris, a single page featuring Batman’s creative use of a car battery changed the course of his entire life:

That’s it. That’s the moment. That’s where the ISB was born, although it wouldn’t actually show up for another seventeen years. You can draw a line straight to the comics I read today and everything makes sense: The way Batman casually looks around for something to use, the delight he takes in “getting improvisational,” the thug’s reaction and the grin Batman’s got in the shadow, the way the guy just crumples. You don’t hear a whole lot about Mark Bright, but man. That is a beautiful page.

Much like Chris Ullrich‘s post a while back, directing you to a list of comics that "hooked" popular creators, it’s always interesting (to me, at least) to find out what issues were the "first" for various readers.

Mine? Marvel Team-Up #129, featuring Spider-Man and Vision vs. The Mad Thinker’s Robots. They smash evil versions of Albert Einstein, Mark Twain and, I believe, Abraham Lincoln. Vision questions his own humanity – or lack thereof – and there’s a big robot with a club for a fist. Ed Hannigan’s cover remains one of my favorites to this very day.

When Superheroes Get Old

Geriatric superheroes appear to be all the rage these days, as a number of sites are linking to Italian artist Donald Soffritti’s illustrations of Superman, Spider-Man and a variety of other super-types in their Golden Years. Soffritti’s work is great, and I can’t help but giggle every time I look at his take on DC speedster The Flash.

(And please, for everyone’s sake, don’t tell DC/Warner Bros. about this stuff.)

(via ComicNerd.com)

 

Along the same lines, BoingBoing points us to a similar piece that fast-forwards the age of popular cartoon characters, including Popeye, Felix the Cat and Dennis the Menace (my personal favorite).

 

Disney Invades Iraq? by John Ostrander

You may already know about this story – it surfaced in late April elsewhere. I found out about it thanks to This Is True, a weekly newsletter and website run by Randy Cassingham and one of my fave e-mails of the week each week.

Here’s the story, in case you missed it. An American entrepreneur has looked at the mess in Iraq and decided that what Baghdad needs is an entertainment park. Llewellyn Werner, chairman of C3, which The Times of London online says is “a Los Angeles-based holding company for private equity firms” is putting 500 million dollars – a cool half billion – into the Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience outside but near the American “Green Zone.” It will comprise fifty acres and, in addition to the former Baghdad Zoo, will include a skateboard park, rides, a concert theater, and a museum.

The Baghdad Zoo itself now has only 35 animals out of about 700 it had originally. The rest were lost to the war – starved to death, stolen, and killed so they could be eaten by Baghdad citizens who were afraid there was going to be no food.

Quoting the Times:

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Gene Colan’s Health Issues Prompt Industry Fundraising Efforts

colan_batman_cover-3861728While Warner Bros./DC is actively shutting down fundraisers, the friends and family of artist Gene Colan are continuing to put the word out about their need for donations to help with the cost of Colan’s medical bills due to dangerous liver problems.

Dirk Deppey over at Journalista has made it the top story for the entire week and like many other sites, provided a link to auctions of Colan’s original art that his family has posted. He’s also offered up an alternate strategy for getting much-needed money into the right hands:

Do as I did, and make a direct donation via Paypal, where the Colans are registered as genecolan@optonline.net — just log into your account, hit the “send money” button, and insert said email address and the amount you wish to donate into the appropriate boxes. Oh, and you might want to mention the word “donation” prominently in the comments box, so the Colans don’t have to sort through a bunch of listings to find the eBay payments.

Tom Spurgeon also offered up a host of links and information about Colan, his predicament and how you can help, while ComicMix pal Mark Evanier posted a long message about Colan on his website:

I don’t know what else to write here. It just seems appropriate to send a whole lotta love the Colans’ way this morning. I hope the dire reports on his health will prove to be overstated. I hope we’ll have Gene around for many more years. I hope — and of this, I am the surest — that Gene is well aware how many fans he has and how, whenever he goes, he’s leaving behind an incredible body of work that will be praised and studied and appreciated by comic book fans who aren’t even born yet. I just think we oughta postpone losing a guy like that as long as possible.

A message from Colan’s wife Adrienne can also be read here. (more…)

DC/Warner Bros. Shut Down Childhood Cancer Fundraiser

superdrunk-9327448BoingBoing recently put the spotlight on Warner Bros. decision to shut down a series of original art auctions on eBay benefitting a childhood cancer charity. Apparently, many of the pieces of art in the auction (which the organizer had requested of his contacts in the comics community and they were more than happy to provide) depicted DC characters such as Batman and Superman.

From organizer Thomas Denton’s blog, Say It Backwards:

I just got notice that two of the Superman related auctions have been removed from the site and the rest are probably next. I don’t know what to do now. I have to start canceling auctions and issuing refunds. That means all the fees and such I’m now responsible for which is money i just don’t have, and I have no idea if I’m still obligated to the middleman ebay uses for their charity auctions.

…

I am heartbroken. I am really sorry to any one this is any trouble for. Legally, I was in the wrong. I used their intellectual property without their permission. I’m not going to play the victim on that front. I swear I just wanted to do something good.

Denton offered some further thoughts on the whole kerfuffle in a later post, as well as notice that he would probably be shutting down his site — which had been a vocal supporter of all things Superman and DC over the years — once the dust had settled.

(more…)

Superheroes, the Richard Mullins Way

Our pals over at Fanboy.com recently posted some really great work from artist Richard Mullins featuring Batman, Robin and a few other familiar characters. I’d love to have any one of these pieces hanging in my office, to be honest.

Since I’m probably the last person you want to consult when it comes to describing art (I’m more of a "I know it when I see it" sort of guy), I’ll let Fanboy.com’s Michael Pinto handle the synopsis:

What I like about his work is that in addition to be inspired by pop art subjects, his style of painting and bold use of vivid colors reminds me a great deal of the Fauvism of Henri Matisse.

Yeah, I agree. I think he summed it up there.

(Psst Between you and I, I had no idea what "fauvism" was before I read this.)

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