The Rome News Tribune (via JK Parkin at Newsarama) reports that the Gordon Lee case has been postponed yet again. Judge Larry Salmon, who is presiding over the case, is sick. A new start date for the trial has not been set.

Any minute now, Galactus will just show up and interrupt the hearing.

First, the consumer report: LoserPalooza is a treasury-sized collection, which means it’s larger and more expensive than the usual run of comic-strip collections, and also that it collects strips from two previous smaller collections. In this case, LoserPalooza has the comics from Say Cheezy and Scrum Bums. LoserPalooza does have the Sunday strips in color, though, so it’s not entirely twice-baked beans. (It’s also rarely clear whether a strip is being reprinted in its entirety to begin with, or if all of the strips from the smaller collections make it into the Treasuries; specifically, it’s not clear in this case.)

Get Fuzzy is one of the most successful new strips of the past decade, and possibly the most successful strip launch since Dilbert in 1989. (The competition includes strips like Pickles, Baby Blues, and Adam @ Home, which aren’t as edgy as Get Fuzzy and so are probably in more papers daily. On the other hand, Get Fuzzy seems to be one of the most successful comics when it comes to selling reprint collections, so it’s hard to tell which strip actually makes the most money or has the most readers.) In any case, it’s still fairly young, for a daily newspaper strip, and it’s grown to a lot of papers pretty quickly.

As the characters note in a storyline mid-way through this book, Get Fuzzy could be seen as a Bizarro-world version of Garfield. A man of indeterminate age (Rob Wilco) lives with a cat (Bucky) and a dog (Satchel), and funny stuff ensues. Except, in Get Fuzzy, we don’t identify with the cat – Bucky is clearly insane (as all cats are). Satchel is lovable but dim, also like most dogs. And Rob isn’t quite as much of a loser as Jon Arbuckle. Well, he is a vegan rugby fan who hasn’t had a date in years, does something unspecified involving crunching numbers, and roots for the Red Sox – so maybe I should say that he’s a more realistic loser than Jon is. Get Fuzzy doesn’t have the ground-into-the-turf running jokes Garfield does – and I hope it won’t, even if it runs for thirty years – but it’s vastly younger than Garfield is, and hasn’t had time to get stale.

(more…)

Via the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund: The eyes of the comics, publishing, and Free Expression communities are focused on Rome, GA as the trial of Gordon Lee begins this morning.

Mr. Lee will stand trial for two misdemeanor counts of distributing harmful to minors material, and faces penalties of up to a year and prison and $1,000 in fines for each count if convicted. Lee’s day in court comes after nearly three years of legal proceedings arising from the Halloween 2004 distribution of Alternative Comics #2, a Free Comic Book Day sampler which featured an excerpt from the critically acclaimed graphic novel The Salon that depicted Pablo Picasso in the nude, and was allegedly handed to a minor. The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund has spent $80,000 on Lee’s defense since taking the case in early 2005, and anticipates this week’s trial to cost another $20,000.

Lee’s case is also being closely watched by the mainstream media for its implications on Free Expression. In the past week, stories have appeared on NPR’s Morning Edition, CourtTV, and New York Magazine, joining profiles from venues including The New York Times, The Book Standard, and Publishers Weekly.

"This case has broad consequences for all retailers of First Amendment protected material," says CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein. "If Gordon is found guilty, it would establish a precedent that makes the seller of any book, magazine, or film depicting non-sexual nudity vulnerable to a similar prosecution in the State of Georgia." He adds, " We’re confident that Gordon is not guilty of the charges he’s accused of, and that the work in question comes nowhere near the threshold the law requires to deem a work harmful to minors."

"It’s appalling that these charges were brought in the first place," Brownstein says. "It’s outrageous that it’s taken nearly three years, a complete change of facts by the prosecution midstream, and tens of thousands of dollars for Gordon to get his day in court. Now that we’re here, we have every confidence in our legal team of Alan Begner, Cory Begner, and Paul Cadle to wage the best defense on Gordon’s behalf. We couldn’t have done it without the overwhelming support of the comics community, whose contributions have ensured that we are able to fight back."

For a detailed summary of the case and its developments, please see Gordon Lee: The Road to Trial

To make a tax-deductible contribution to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, please visit their donations page.

Via Warren Ellis and Newsarama: Mike Wieringo, the artist well known for drawing Flash, Robin, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Sensational Spider-Man, Adventures of Superman, Fantastic Four, and the co-creator of Tellos and Impulse, suffered a fatal heart attack on Sunday.

Everybody in the comics industry is shocked and saddened at his sudden passing, including collaborators Peter David and Todd Dezago.

We’ll post more details about services and the like as we get them.

UPDATE 8:57 PM EDT: More kind words from Mark Waid and Karl Kesel.