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| Bobby Nash and Sean Taylor with their 2013 Pulp Ark Awards. |
For the first time since the Pulp Ark Award winners were announced, Ruby Files co-creators Bobby Nash and Sean Taylor got to hold their Pulp Ark Award for Best New Pulp Character: Rick Ruby at the Free Comic Book day event at galactic Quest Comics in Buford, GA.
Congratulations to Bobby and Sean.
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| Bobby’s award: Best Author |
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| Rick Ruby’s creators. |
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| Best New Pulp Character: Rick Ruby |
A prominent website associated with Macmillan Publishing showcases Pro Se Production’s latest blockbuster anthology! This week, “Drums of the Ogbanje” by Mel Odom is a feature expert on www.criminalelement.com. The tale is a zombie pirate adventure from the anthology Black Pulp, edited by Tommy Hancock, Gary Phillips, and Morgan Minor.
Black Pulp is a collection of stories featuring characters of African origin, or descent, in stories that run the gamut of genre fiction. A concept developed by noted crime novelist Gary Phillips, Black Pulp brings bestselling authors Walter Mosley and Joe R. Lansdale, Gary Phillips, Charles R. Saunders, Derrick Ferguson, D. Alan Lewis, Christopher Chambers, Mel Odom, Kimberly Richardson, Ron Fortier, Michael A. Gonzales, Gar Anthony Haywood, and Tommy Hancock together to craft adventure tales, mysteries, and more, all with black characters at the forefront.
http://www.criminalelement.com/stories/2013/04/black-pulp-drums-of-the-ogbanje-mel-odom-zombies-pirates
Criminal Element is a community website featuring daily content for fans of the crime and mystery genres in all of their forms.
The site features original short stories and excerpts from upcoming crime and mystery novels along with daily blog articles.
Gail Simone is at once challenging, provocative and blisteringly funny in her writing. One moment she’s introducing new transgendered characters to the mainstream DCU, and the next she’s announcing on the electric-type Twitter that her next project will feature an all-quokka cast.
As well as her triumphant (and briefly interrupted) run on Batgirl, Gail has introduced a new Superhero…perhaps “team” isn’t the right term. The title describes it best; The Movement. Too easily waved off as a play on the Occupy folks, The Movement is also equal parts urban watchdog group, police oversight committee and street gang, with a bit of Anonymous and Teen Titans thrown in.
It’s set in new fictional DC town Coral City, a town high in crime and police corruption. As a pair of dirty cops offer to let a pair of young people go if the female offers them a free show, they are quickly surrounded by members of The Movement, clad in masks (which had BETTER be getting handed out at cons this summer, thank you very much) and cell phones, recording and disseminating the cops’ indecent proposal.
The part of town known as “The Tweens” is under the protection of The Movement, which seems to have both powered and non-powered members. Incursions by the police, even the precinct’s honest captain, are not welcome, and are met with force. The Movement has the might to
There’s the hint of a theme first touched on by Mark Waid in his last (and sadly underappreciated) take on Legion of Superheroes, in which the Legion was more of a youth movement than simply a superhero team. As here, they represent the idea that since they are not being watched over by anyone, they will watch over themselves. The Movement has organization and the power to make sure their part of town is not threatened from without, and protected from those within.
Freddie Williams’ art has a very loose line, , far better suited for a more character-oriented book like this. The panel layout is very interesting, often a large splash image hiding under numerous smaller panels – the storytelling is dense, and fast-paced. It’s a unique look, very well used in this very unique book.
This is far from standard DC fare, and Gail fills it with very interesting characters, about whom you immediately want to know more. I expect the tale of how these people got their powers, and how they found each other, will all entertain and interest readers for some time. Being a unusual title, I’m hoping it finds an audience, maybe even one outside of the normal clientele of comic shops.
Every convention we attend, the same cadence occurs several times over.
“Sir! Miss! Can I tell you about our comic book?”
“Sure.”
“Awesome. It’s called the Samurnauts. It’s about a team of Samurai Astronauts, led by an immortal kung fu monkey, fighting zombie cyborg pirates in space!”
“Jeez! What were you on when you created that!?”
“…pie.”
And with that comes a wink and a nod from our potential customer. You see, they think we’re being coy. Here’s the kicker though – we’re not lying.
I make no qualms about why I make comic books. I am absolutely still a kid at my core. When I go to Wal-Mart or Target for sundries? I always walk through the toy aisle – and not for my son. My DVR is chock full of cartoons. Better than that? Matt and Kyle, my Unshaven Cohorts, are one in the same. When we Unshaven Lads take our show on the road, we fill literally hours of time discussing the minutiae of superheroes. We dissect the books we read, TV shows we watch, and of course… map out our own little corner of the great-and-powerful world of sequential fiction.
It really comes as no surprise to me why then we end up with a pitch as we do with the Samurnauts. It literally all started out at a Bakers Square – as most all of our creative jaunts do – just brainstorming. On one fateful occasion we came to discuss how we’d create the most marketable creation known to man. We pulled together the common threads of those cartoons and comics we loved so much growing up. The sage warrior/mentor of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The color-coordinated weapon-driven team action adventure of the Power Rangers. And the villains? Well, we just piled on as many adjectives as we could until we felt we had something. And we laughed. Because to us, this was just a joke. A flight of fancy so that we could make a fake ad to take up space in the next issue, that would become a huge in-joke to our growing fan-base.
And then, after tackling horror, and R-rated super heroics… with a third issue to complete our first series in front of us… we came back to that shared pie-experience, and faux advertisement. The Samurnauts was simply too good to pass up. Not because we felt like parodying commercial crassness (like TMNT and the Power Rangers), but because we’d literally thrown our own nerd-gauntlet in front of ourselves. Our brainstorming produced a pitch so insane, that to not do it justice would be a sign that maybe we shouldn’t be making comics in the first place. And then folks? We did what we Unshavenauts do best. We created a world, and treated it with reverence.
We make comics because we can’t stop building worlds. It’s not enough to declare we have a kung fu monkey. We have to know that he practices Hou Quan. We have to vet out that his hou gun is formed from the cosmically irradiated metal of his shuttle craft. We have to know that he was launched as Albert V, the fifth monkey to be shot in space, secretly, in April of 1950. And yes, we even have to know that the worm hole he travelled through carried with it the chronal energies that made him intelligent and immortal. I make comics because it’s those insane details that make our comic worth reading. Beyond the hilarious pitch that sells it… our comic takes itself seriously. It’s really perhaps the only way we can say with a straight face that we needed only a few slices of pie to give birth to something so crazy.
And it’s that respect we pay, in building a universe from a silly set of adjectives, that earns us our keep on the convention floor. When your pitch is as insane as the Samurnauts, the customer-in-waiting could quickly determine if our zeal is merely style over substance. Upon flipping the book open and seeing fully painted pages opposite completely digitally drawn portions, it’s clear that our tongues may be firmly in cheek… but our hearts are on our sleeves. Just as those cartoons and comics of our youth took themselves seriously, we too employ the power of not forcing the wink on the audience. When they see that we start with the tropes – the lantern jawed leader, or the bad boy with a heart of gold – we don’t shy away from giving them a little depth to boot. And when they see that we’re willing to not only have a kung fu monkey on the cover, but we have a real back story, and a generation-spanning tale to tell? Well it’s clear that we owe Bakers Square a debt of gratitude.
My intent here is not to necessarily shill my product to you. You’ll note I’m not even mentioning Unshaven Comics’ website has a store where you can purchase the Samurnauts: Curse of the Dreadnuts #1. You’ll relish the fact that I’ve no need to mention we’ll be in Fort Wayne, Indiana on May 11th, or Detroit, Michigan on May 17th hawking our wares. At the beginning of this lil’ column, my only intent was to give you a glimpse inside the madness that is my collective mind with my bearded cohorts. Amidst the literally thousands of pitches we will hurl on convention floors this coming year… now you’ll appreciate it when we meet that knowing nod with a smirk of self-confidence.
“What were you on when you created that!?”
We’re on the best drug of all; a big toke of youth, and a friendship of 20 years.
SUNDAY: John Ostrander
MONDAY: Mindy Newell
One of the most enjoyable successful stories on TV this season has been NBC’s GRIMM. Despite a Friday night time slot, the show has grown to the point where the network has rewarded it with another full season in 2013-14. Star David Giuntoli talks about what it feels like to be on top and how it all has worked. Plus what books are flying out of the book stores these days, who will be The Black Panther on the big screen and how Charlie McCarthy is getting a biopic.
Take us ANYWHERE! The Point Radio App is now in the iTunes App store – and it’s FREE! Just search under “pop culture The Point”. The Point Radio – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or on any other mobile device with the Tune In Radio app – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.
Thomas Deja’s Nocturne Travel Agency launches a new podcast. In episode 1 of The Nocturne Travel Agency Podcast, Deja talks with author Richard Lee Byers about his self-published super-hero prose anthology series The Imposter. It’s an hour of discussion about pulp, heroes, licensed properties and the creative process.
History happens every day. Every day changes the world.
Not every day gets written down in history books. Not every day is part of that pop quiz second period.
Usually, the battles get written down. We measure time in wars. The more death, the more important.
And yet, that’s not all there is to history. There are births and marriages and medical advances that allow women to give birth without dying from infections. There are music and art and dance. There are comic books and television shows and movies.
When I was a young history major in college (back when there was waaaay less history), some of the more interesting discussions we had were about how one defined history at all. It is a study of the past, of course, but what kind of study?
The field is enormous, of course, and allows all kinds of views. The one that most interests me is the question of how people lived their lives in other times and other places.
I like the stories.
This week, on AMC’s award-winning Mad Men, the story centered around an historical event that I actually remember, the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I was in high school at the time, my freshman year at boarding school in Connecticut, and mostly what I remember is feeling horrified (MLK inspired my early pacifism) and frustrated, because there was no way to find out what was going on up on that mountain.
The Mad Men cast had lots of reactions. Some were upset, some were scared for themselves, friends and family. Some were annoyed that events upstaged their plans. Some were awkward around the (very) few black people they knew. I believe all the reactions were authentic recreations of what people in that particular demographic niche felt at the time, although I’m not sure the proportions are correct. Still, it is history the way I like to see it, happening to people in real time.
There are lots of parallel stories in comics. The most famous is probably our own Denny O’Neil’s run on Green Lantern/Green Arrow, written about the real world, using super-heroes to articulate some of the different points of view in the day’s arguments. Another of my personal favorites is this story, in which Superman trusts President Kennedy with his secret identity. I read that comic when I was ten years old, and President Kennedy had just been shot.
It’s hard to imagine a story like this today, when things are so hyper-partisan. Looking at it now, I have an understanding of how different our national discourse was 50 years ago.
Another little bit of history that happened this week is the return of All My Children, now on the Internet (and also One Life to Live, but I don’t watch that). I don’t know how anyone can keep historical records in Pine Valley, when time doesn’t seem to move in a straight line. Apparently, five years have passed since we last saw our cast, but some characters are the same age, while some are a decade older. Just a few episodes in, and it’s thrilling how much I don’t care.
And the great philosopher, Howard Chaykin said, “Continuity is for geeks.”
SATURDAY: Marc Alan Fishman
SUNDAY: John Ostrander
This weekend, the race to box office supremacy begins! Mike Faber, Mike Gordon, award-winning author Bobby Nash, Box Office Buzz scribe Ashley Bergner, and 7th Row Center podcaster Alex Autrey survey the highs and lows of the upcoming summer movie season. However, Alex’s magic movie 8-ball cannot help him in The Geek Seat! Plus, Tara Lynne returns to the station to tell tales of the Ice & Fire Con this past weekend. All this, and the usual Rants, Raves, Khan Report, and Shout Outs! Plus, Bobby gives a report from the Pulp Ark Convention.
Join us for yet another episode of The Earth Station One Podcast we like to call: 2013 Summer Movie Preview at www.esopodcast.com
Direct link: http://erthstationone.wordpress.com/2013/05/02/earth-station-one-episode-161-2013-summer-movie-preview/
We’re getting to convention season, and it seems like there’s a demand for finding out how to get the sort of… proportions that superhero costumes can require. In other words, how can a woman with normal breasts look like she was drawn by J. Scott Campbell?
We’re happy to help. Go take a look at this cosplay cleavage tutorial, and with the help of bras, wires, and socks, you too can be spathic.*
Good Riddance
By Cynthia Copeland
224 pages, $17.95, AbramsComicArts
For years, Cynthia Copeland has been mining her personal experiences to produce books about families and things families can do together. As a result, she has been recommended by Oprah and others and has carved out a nice little career with her prose and illustrations. She brings a friendly, kind sense of humor to her work making these great to read books. Now, though, she brings her personal experiences to a new work that is intimate and clear-eyed.
Subtitled An Illustrated Memoir of Divorce, Copeland traces her marriage and divorce from TJ while raising a family in New Hampshire. In 2001, Copeland discovered her husband had been having an affair and was in a loveless marriage after eighteen years. Looking back, she realized she thought the younger TJ was exotic and interesting, insecure about her own qualities so latched on to him for fear of never finding the right guy.
TJ, though, is far from ideal. He’s not exactly ambitious and seems to coast through life, perfectly content with a level of thriftiness most of us would call cheap. He’s an attentive father to their three children but avoids the hard issues, including how to discuss the end of the marriage and dissolution of the family. She insists he leaves so he goes to live in his office rather than spring for rent. In time, though, he gets a place of his own and Copeland begins to fret the kids will love it with their devil-may-care dad more than being at home with the “rules”.
The novel follows that first year and is nicely broken into seasonal chapters which include a pause for how the family reacts to the horrors of 9/11. But life goes on and the separation becomes formal and the kids don’t abandon her. Instead, she works on her books, works out and gets into great shape, and relies on her network of female friends for the emotional support not forthcoming from her parents. TJ, meantime, meanders from woman to woman, never exactly growing up but never shirking his responsibilities to the kids, who periodically have to force him to pay attention.
Copeland finally samples the dating pool with the usually expected humorous results and even tries to reconnect with a high school friend only to learn that you really shouldn’t try to go home again. Instead, she eventually finds a second family with Will, and his three sons. The final section of the book all-too-briefly deals with the whirlwind marriage and blending of families that culminates with his insisting they sell her home where he would never feel like he belonged. Instead, they buy land and build a place the new couple can truly call their own.
The book nicely traces the fears, joys, pain, and sorrow that comes with divorce and massive, rapid changes to one’s life. The artwork is clear and simple, conveying emotion with just a few lines. She mixes word balloons and captions well, ensuring each page is clear to read. Copeland produces the work in two color, choosing an appropriate shade of blue to represent the emotional state was she in during this period of her life.
For whatever reason, some of the best graphic material released these days is in the form of memoir as we discover people’s real lives can at times be far more interesting to read about than the hyper-fantasies that have crowded the shelves. Works such as Copeland’s deserve your attention even if you aren’t married or divorced, because the human experience can be entertaining and moving.
Columns / Glenn Hauman / News
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