The Mix : What are people talking about today?

Letterman NYCC quiz

  • Uncategorized
  • February 28, 2007

The CBS Late Show with David Letterman took a look last night at the New York Comic Con, offering the following bit:

Said Letterman, "We got some footage of the event. We then compiled this quiz. Some of my favorites:

(Heavy guy thumbing through comic books)

"Just an hour into the convention, this man has already gotten his hands on:

A) Superman #1

B) Green Lantern #3

C) Cheeseburger #6

(Character in giant head)

"The character on the right:

A) is from a Japanese cartoon

B) will soon be in his own movie

C) has been stumbling blindly through the city since the Thanksgiving Parade

(Girl in fluffy dress and orange wig):

"Looking at this scene, we’re reminded that:

A) all fantasy realms are welcome here

B) the convention is a great place to meet friends

C) it’s been a tough month for Britney Spears

(Alien with claws):

"You may remember this creature from:

A) "Lord of the Rings"

B) "Pan’s Labyrinth"

C) Your local Taco Bell"

Letterman’s competitor, Stephen Colbert, was a guest of the NYCC.

Scott Shaw! salutes black history

  • Uncategorized
  • February 28, 2007

all-neg-2220204One of the highlights of the Black Panel at NYCC was when Denys Cowan started mentioning all the pioneers deserving of wider recognition.  Scott Shaw! celebrates Black History Month on his Oddball Comics website with a title from 1947 called All-Negro Comics entirely produced by black cartoonists/ The page also includes a discussion of other comics of the time created for black audiences. 

A fascinating read, including lots of clickable articles and illustrations.  (No Michael Davis, I don’t believe "Negro Kitty" is among the characters, so you still own that idea…)

Enough to make you gag

  • News
  • February 28, 2007

cartoons01-8510605Hey New Yorkers!  Not doing anything tomorrow night, and frustrated because you can’t draw or sell gag cartoons?  Yeah, you know who you are.  Funny thing, Media Bistro at 494 Broadway has just the solution — a 3-hour intensive course (starting at 6:30 PM) on How to Draw and Sell Gag Cartoons, taught by John Donohue, whose cartoons have appeared in The New Yorker, Barron’s, Thompson’s Medical Economics, and other spots. 

If for no other reason, you should go to find out how and why editors are still purchasing tired 1950s stereotypes of henpecked husbands pursued by purse-wielding wives .

aie-1989654

Ain’t It Cool comics awards

  • News
  • February 28, 2007

aie-1989654

The Ain’t It Cool News site has just come out with an  "AICN Comics" presentation of its third annual @$$ie Awards, featuring your host Crucifer (the @$$keeper?), above.  Categories include Best Single Moment/Single Issue, Best Cover Artist, Best Miniseries/Special/One-Shot, Best Comic Book Character, Best Artist/Art Team, Best Writer, Best Publisher, and Best Ongoing Comic Book Series.  Mercifully, only the intro is done in comic book form.

Future tech wishlists

  • News
  • February 28, 2007

Auntie Beeb covers the story of "a wide-ranging survey produced by the South Korean government to find out what consumers will want from future technologies." The survey also features long-range predictions gleaned from interviews carried out with about 3,500 of the country’s technology experts, including online smell-o-vision within a decade, a two-month duration for mobile phone batteries before they’ll need recharging, and routine robot surgery (that’s by robots, not on them) by 2018.

Heck with all that, where’s my personal jetpack?  I’ve been waiting since 1975!

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UPDATE – Arnold Drake hospitalized

  • Uncategorized
  • February 28, 2007

Via Newsarama via Tom Spurgeon: "According to an e-mail disseminated by Ken Gale, the writer Arnold Drake was found collapsed in his home and is currently in intensive care at Cabrini Hospital." Drake is the creator of Deadman and Doom Patrol and wrote what is regarded as the first American grapic novel — with artist Matt Baker — back in 1949.

Send cards, letters and art to Arnold Drake, Cabrini Medical Center, 227 E. 19th St., New York, NY 10003.

UPDATE: Reports at 2:30 PM EST indicate Arnold is improving and should be moved out of the ICU within the next 24 hours.

Trek-ulation begins

  • Uncategorized
  • February 28, 2007

trek-8141492Paramount has announced the next Star Trek movie (number XI, for those of you counting Roman-style) will premiere on Christmas Day 2008, no doubt delighting many Jewish Trekkers, as going to the movies on December 25 is almost as popular among Jews as going out for Chinese food.

Eleven is  being helmed by fan favorite director J.J. Abrams (Lost, Alias, etc.) and speculation has already started as to what actors will be chosen to play younger versions of James Kirk, Mr. Spock and so forth, since the screenplay from M:I 3 writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci is said to follow those familiar characters during their Starfleet Academy years and into their first space mission.  If Abrams & co. are smart, they’ll go with unknowns.  If they’re smarter they’ll hold and publicize open auditions.

Meanwhile, Saw IV director Darren Lynn Bousman is said to be remaking Scanners, scripted by another fan favorite and sometimes comic writer, David Goyer.  That should be coming out right around the same time.

bengurion-9615795

More Green Lantern geopolitics

  • News
  • February 28, 2007

bengurion-9615795We bring you this from Kung-Fu Monkey John Rogers: "In researching [Blue Beetle] #14, I discovered that the Guardians of the Universe, the dudes who run the Green Lanterns — their appearance is based on Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. That means, in the DCU, the Jews just don’t control the media, they control the UNIVERSE."

Oh, I can hear the keyboards clattering away as people start rewriting their own versions of the GL Theory of Geopolitics, claiming that the Israeli flag is blue just like the Guardians’ skin, and Israel stands only because of its willpower and… hmm.

This makes the Zamarons some shiksa goddesses, nu?

The female gaze

  • News
  • February 28, 2007

elayne200-4891347Tomorrow marks the start of Women’s History Month (with March 8 being International Women’s Day), so it’s probably a good time to mention that I’m one of those double-x chromosome types. That fact automatically puts me, along with the majority of the population, in the category of non-default, of Other.

Which always confused me; how can a majority not automatically be considered the default? Well, it’s a matter of historical societal power, isn’t it? Take South Africa under apartheid; the white rulers there were certainly the minority, outnumbered 4 to 1, yet they were the Default among South African citizens, and the blacks they oppressed were the Other. The accepted wisdom was that they needed to be Other, in order for the Default to remain in power. (The fact that the minority oppressors had weapons as well certainly helped reinforce that.) The Default controls the culture, most especially cultural thought.

A lot of people today have no notion of how revolutionary a step it was for feminism to succeed in getting gender neutrality language accepted in this culture a mere 30 or so years ago. Before that, you never heard “he or she” — the default was “he” and that was that, the majority population devalued to the point of invisibility in terms of anything of significance or importance. Heck, it’s been less than a century since we were first allowed to cast a vote in most of the United States!

But you’ll be getting enough of those historical factoids during the month to come. What I want to discuss is something else.

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