Category: News

Happy 80th birthday, Don Heck!

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

Don Heck. Today would have been his 80th birthday.

I first met Don twenty-seven years ago at his house in Centereach. He and my dad frequented the same bar, the Emerald Pub. My dad knew I was a fan of his on The Flash, and thought I should meet him, and finagled an invite.

It was the first time I’d ever seen a comic artist’s studio– and to this day, the best analogy is the scene in the movie where the young boy visits the wizard’s cave and sees the dimly-lit wonders, or the hacker’s technical sanctum and all the neat knick-knacks, you know the scene.

It was magic.

And like any good magician, he gave a gift to the audience– the page to the right, from The Flash #292, was one of them.

Don still hasn’t gotten the appreciation he deserves– for creating Iron Man, Hawkeye, and the Black Widow; for his runs on Avengers, Wonder Woman, Batgirl, and Justice League of America; for hundreds of stories without a single costume in them– but there are those of us who still remember.

Thanks for the magic, Don. Happy birthday.

‘Wonder Woman’ Writer Michael Jelenic Talks Animation

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

Writer Michael Jelenic makes the leap from animated television to feature-length films with his script for Wonder Woman, the next entry in the popular series of DC Universe animated original PG-13 films. Warner Premiere, DC Comics and Warner Bros. Animation are set to release the all-new film on March 3, 2009, distributed by Warner Home Video. The film will also be available OnDemand and Pay-Per-View as well as available for download day and date, March 3, 2009.

Jelenic has crafted a script that offers complementary balances of action and comedy, contemporary society and Greek mythology, and the social pratfalls of both men and women. It is an origin story and a stand-alone adventure, resulting in an entertaining approach to the first-ever Wonder Woman full-length film. Jelenic and renowned comics writer Gail Simone have "story by" credits on the movie.

Jelenic is well-known for his work at Warner Bros. Animation, providing the clever words to series like The Batman, Legion of Super Heroes and the newest Dark Knight animated series, Batman: The Brave and the Bold.

Jelenic stepped away from his laptop to be both brave and bold in answering a few questions about the thoughts behind the words and story of Wonder Woman, the challenges of pleasing every fan, and the un-coolness of working in the comics realm. (more…)

Welcome to the blogosphere, Mark Waid — hope you survive the experience!*

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

Somehow I forgot to note that Mark Waid, writer extraordinaire and editor in chief of BOOM! Studios, started blogging a month ago over at Kung Fu Monkey while John Rogers takes the break afforded him from Blue Beetle to exec producing Leverage over at TNT, which is a hoot and a half. He’s been talking about the writing process for comics, and how it differs from novels and screenplays, and it’s well worth your time.

However, I have to point out something he wrote in his first post:

Remember, though, I’m new at this form of communication, so be gentle with m–

Ow.

Goddamn it, somebody already threw something.

And John refuses to let me put up the chicken wire.

and then this week:

I worry that I’ve apparently not yet said much worth arguing over. How does anyone post two thousand words about anything on the internet and not get flamed by someone?

Mark obviously is new to blogtopia (yes! Skippy coined that phrase!) and hence is not aware of all internet traditions, but one does not welcome someone to blogging with flames and brickbats. No, we welcome them by finding embarassing items from past jobs and posting them– like this piece from the DC Comics office bulletin board of twenty years ago:

Of course, you have to be careful with sort of thing, because Mark could still have a copy of my Thunderbolt proposal from back then. (I’ve seen his collection. The man saves everything.) So we’ll keep the escalation low. But if anybody has copies of Kits 1 and 2, let me know.

  • Yes, I know I owe Chris Claremont a nickel for the headline. Good thing ah’m invulnerable when ah’m blasting.

MyToons.com Collaborates with Google for Launch of MyToons Live

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

MyToons.com, the first and only online animation community to offer HD animation, announced on December 18 the launch of MyToons Live; MyToons.com’s latest collaboration with Google, utilizing the power of Google Earth technology. MyToons.com has built its reputation on connecting animators and fans around the world, and MyToons Live graphically represents their activity on a real-time global map.

“MyToons.com thrives on connecting animators, creatives, and fans – the global animation population – bringing them all together under one virtual roof to share ideas, information, and knowledge,” says Paul Ford, president and co-founder of MyToons.com. “MyToons Live serves as a visual representation of this global collaboration, inspiring artists everywhere and emphasizing their possibilities and the breadth of their worldwide networking capabilities.”

MyToons Live is a free download available on the MyToons.com homepage. Visitors are invited to download Google Earth and install the MyToons Live application, enabling them to gain a worldview of active animators and animation fans currently connected to MyToons.com.

For further information on viewing the global animation population, please visit MyToons.com.

About MyToons.com

MyToons.com is the world’s premier online animation and art community. Launched in spring of 2007, MyToons.com provides global content creators with a free platform to share their original animations, artwork, and games with animators, enthusiasts and fans worldwide.

Combining high-quality standard and high definition (HD) video file streaming with best-in-class social networking for animators, MyToons.com showcases the greatest variety of independent and studio animation anywhere. Dedicated to "everything animated,” MyToons.com allows artists to share their techniques, discuss their thoughts and ideas, and explore their commonalities in a robust visual environment. The website can be explored at MyToons.com.

Donald E. Westlake, 1933-2008

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

We’ve just received word that Donald E. Westlake passed away yesterday.

Donald is probably best known to comics fans as the author (under the psuedonym Richard Stark) of the Parker novels that Darwyn Cooke is adapting and bringing to IDW Publishing later this year. But that’s the barest fraction of his output. Over a career that lasted decades, he was a four-time Edgar Award winner in four different categories. In 1993, the Mystery Writers of America named Westlake a Grand Master, their highest honor.

His novels were turned into twenty-one different movies, including Payback and The Hot Rock (featuring his famous character John Dortmunder) and wrote screenplays on his own, most notably for The Grifters, where he was nominated for an Academy Award, The Stepfather, and a treatment for the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies.

He will be missed.

Here’s a promo image from the upcoming Cooke series:

Popeye gets discharged in Europe

  • News
  • January 2, 2009

Mark Evanier reminds us that Popeye falls into the public domain today in Europe under an EU law that restricts the rights of authors to 70 years after their death. Elzie "E. C." Segar, the Illinois artist who created Popeye, Olive Oyl, brother Castor Oyl and Bluto, died in 1938. So if you’re in Old Blighty and feel the urge to print t-shirts or write that story of Popeye the Sailor Man and his lusty sea life with Bluto, rum, sodomy, and the lash– now’s your chance.

Just don’t let us know about it here in America, as King Features Syndicate still holds the copyright and trademark here and plan on vigorously enforcing it.

D.J. Caruso Continues to Talk ‘Y the Last Man’

  • News
  • January 1, 2009

Eagle Eye director D.J. Caruso, promoting the film’s DVD release, said of his next project, Y the Last Man,  “I think it’s one of those that the source material is fantastic stuff, it’s great, but it’s a tough one to lick into getting into a screenplay. I’ve tried to feel like it’s a trilogy of movies and I think everyone sort of agrees, but at the same time, just getting the first movie right and getting the right beats and knowing what to put in, it’s been really tough. You have great minds like David Goyer and you’ve got Carl Ellsworth and you’ve got Brian K. Vaughn, and I’m working with them to just kind of crack it and get it down. And we’re almost there. I know it’s a slow process, but I think eventually we’ll get it. We’re going to get it and we’ll get it right, but we had a pretty good breakthrough a couple weeks ago in the final act, and hopefully we’ll get there.”

On the concept that the ten volume series, which concluded earlier this year from Vertigo, being turned into a trilogy, he told Coming Soon, “I don’t think the movie so much will be left open-ended, it’s just a matter of, if you’re familiar with the source material, there’s so much great stuff and he meets so many great characters but it’s over the course of a long period of time. When you’re telling the story—yes, the fanboys and all the people who love it will go and see it—but if you’re just seeing the movie from a filmgoers’ perspective and you’re not familiar with the source material, you have to make sure you make the movie that they understand and they love, too. Like I said, it’s been more difficult than I thought but we’re getting close."

While he hopes to make this his next project, Caruso floated the notion that he may film something else if the screenplay gets delayed.

 

It’s a new year, and you know what that means…

  • News
  • January 1, 2009

…now we can start really compiling the best of the year lists. Dammit, you just don’t do that until you have a full year done. It’s like buying gifts for Jewish kids that haven’t been born yet.

We’ll be posting lists in the next few days, and soliciting your opinions for even more lists, but I’ll kick it off with some of my favorite posts from ComicMix in the past year…

What about you? What were your favorite pieces of ours?

 

All-New ‘Black Panther Saga’ For Free on Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited

  • News
  • January 1, 2009

Following the events of Secret Invasion, darkness has fallen upon the Marvel Universe, and the great Nation of Wakanda will never be the same again.  When his Majesty, the King of Wakanda, T’Challa, the Black Panther, falls in the line of duty, a new Black Panther must rise—but who is she?

Before Black Panther #1 hits stores this February, learn the character’s history in Black Panther Saga, a free feature available at Marvel’s digital comics website.
 

Year-end window closing wrap up, part 1

  • News
  • January 1, 2009

This is my first step towards fulfilling my new-year resolution: to post items of interest in a timely fashion. (There are two assumptions there: that I can post anything in a timely fashion, and that this is interesting, but bear with me.) If I close these windows, my browser will run faster and new posts will go up faster. That’s the theory, if that doesn’t work, I’m getting a new computer and declaring email bankruptcy.

* In the strictest sense, this probably counts as a comic strip. And now the song will be stuck in your head.

* If you’ve recently become unemployed, here’s what you’ve been missing– part Dilbert, part Kafka, part symbolic self-immolation.

* How comics can save us from scientific ignorance.

* Will Elder, remembered by the New York TImes Magazine.

* "I usually dream up a dozen or so profoundly stupid ‘high concepts’ for stories every day." — Brian K. Vaughan, interviewed in Esquire. Explains why J.J. Abrams hired him for Lost, I suppose. (Via io9.)

* Star Wars: A Musical Journey. Run, Luke, run.

* Baby, if you’ve ever wondered… wondered if there ever really was a WKRP in Cincinatti… there is now, but it’s a TV station.

* We hate to burst bubbles, but there’s no way the Lone Ranger melted silver over a campfire to make bullets. (And we mean silver the element, not the horse. That’s just disgusting.) This also means that any medieval werewolf stories are in trouble too…

 

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