As predicted, I had a swell time at the Baltimore Comic-Con. Lots of friends, lots of fans, and lots of attention from the best convention crew I’ve ever seen. The editorial we had a few fun experiences we’d like to share.

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I bopped around the show carrying a cane. I don’t really need it, but since I was on my feet in a crowd for a couple days I thought bringing it would be a good idea. Besides, at any comics convention I can never tell when I might need to bash some head-slapping backpack donkey. Several people asked about my unconcealed weapon, including cosmic comics superstar Jim Starlin.

I told Jim I blew out my back in his hometown of Detroit. He sympathized and then one-upped me. He screwed up his back in South Africa, at a funeral, at which he was a pallbearer. When a breeze wafted by, the pallbearer in front of him lost his yarmulke and left his responsibility to go fetch. The weight of the coffin shifted over to Jim, and that screwed up his back. O.K. Jim wins.

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At 88, living legend Stan Lee gets more attention from women than a 1960s movie spy. At least three-quarters of the men at the show were jealous, including those who were happily married. And including me. I was particularly amused at his lustful glowering at my daughter.

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Most of the folks who dress up in costume at these shows are, at the very least, entertaining to watch. Some are sexy, others are cute, many are adorable. But for the life of me I just don’t know who the buff middle-aged guy dressed in nothing but a loin cloth was supposed to be, other than a buff middle-aged guy dressed in nothing but a loin cloth.

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Mark Wheatley took me to a place purposed (by comics fanboy and teevee star Guy Fieri) to have some of the best pit beef in the nation. It’s a wonderful shack called Chap’s and it’s next to a strip club on Pulaski Highway. Both Mark and Guy are right. The place kills. This wasn’t the highlight of the convention for me, but it made my Top 10 list.

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Mike Grell introduced me to his former assistant on [[[The Warlord]]], a woman who used to be married to the brother of Brother Grell’s ex-wife. Beverly Derouin was extraordinarily pleasant, particularly after Mike explained the etymology of their relationship. That’s really cool. Particularly in an environment that can be a bit overwhelming.

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Timothy Truman and his son Ben were hawking their upcoming series Hawken. If it is half as fantastic as the t-shirt they were selling (and I should have purchased, damnit), this series will be absolutely fantastic. As well it should be, given its high pedigree.

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I got a chance to tell Dean Haspiel how much I enjoyed [[[Cuba ­– My Revolution]]], one of my favorite projects of the year. It was written by Inverna Lockpez, and if you haven’t read it yet, you’re making a very, very serious mistake. It’s the best graphic novel I’ve read since Stagger Lee. Outside of those I’ve edited, of course.

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The drive from Connecticut to Baltimore takes about four hours, which is how long it took for us to drive down last Friday. The drive back took eight and one-half hours, virtually all of which were spent on the New Jersey Turnpike. That road hasn’t been the same since Simon and Garfunkel broke up.

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As always, I want to thank Marc Nathan and his unbelievably professional crew for putting on another great show, to Mark and Carol Wheatley for putting my daughter Adriane Nash and me up – as well as putting up with me – and to the aforementioned Ms. Nash for her assistance and companionship during the show and for sharing with me my proudest moment in my comics career.

I’ll be at the Baltimore Comic-Con next year. You should be, too.

(ComicMix editor-in-chief Mike Gold annoys the masses with his Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind rock’n’blues radio show, which streams four times a week on www.getthepointradio.com and is also available on demand at that very same venue. He also pens a very political column at Michael Davis World – http://mdwp.malibulist.com/ — where he joins ComicMix columnists Martha Thomases and Michael Davis.)

THURSDAY: Dennis O’Neil

Hugh Jackman’s fall action film Real Steel has unveiled a new featurette, exploring the world of these rock’em sock’em robots avatars. The film opens October 7 and stars Jackman alongside Dakota Goyo, Evangeline Lilly, Anthony Mackie, and Kevin Durand. The movie was directed by Shawn Levy, better known for his Night at the Museum films, who claims to have thrived on the challenge of doing something new and different.

The DreamWorks release comes from a story by Dan Gilroy and Jeremy Leven and a script by John Gatins but the real source material is the wonderful Richard Matheson’s short story “Steel”.

Here’s the official synopsis:

A gritty, white-knuckle, action ride set in the near-future where the sport of boxing has gone high-tech, “Real Steel” stars Hugh Jackman as Charlie Kenton, a washed-up fighter who lost his chance at a title when 2000-pound, 8-foot-tall steel robots took over the ring. Now nothing but a small-time promoter, Charlie earns just enough money piecing together low-end bots from scrap metal to get from one underground boxing venue to the next. When Charlie hits rock bottom, he reluctantly teams up with his estranged son Max (Dakota Goyo) to build and train a championship contender. As the stakes in the brutal, no-holds-barred arena are raised, Charlie and Max, against all odds, get one last shot at a comeback.

Everything’s Okay: My Journey to Building a Joyous Life After Surviving Childhood Cancer
by Alesia Ellen Shute
80 pages

If you’re lucky, you won’t get this book because you need it.

Don’t get me wrong.  It’s really good.  Maybe even great.  You should hunt it down.  But it’s about something very scary – childhood cancer – and it doesn’t pull any punches, emotional or physical.

Alesia Shute was diagnosed with colon cancer when she was 7 years old.  She went through years of surgeries, hospital stays, discomfort (which is the polite way to describe pain) and tests.  Lots and lots of tests.  She also grew up, fought with her siblings, fought with her parents, dated, fell in love, fell out of love, fell in love some more, got married, and had a child.  Oh, and she got cancer again after she found out she was pregnant.

Several years ago, she wrote a book about her experiences, which she self-published.  With the money raised she raised, she started a non-profit organization, which raises funds for the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (which she affectionately calls CHoP), her alma mater.

This fall, to coincide with Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, Round Table Comics is publishing a graphic novel adaptation of her book, which is available at Hudson Newstands and through Amazon at the link above.  All proceeds will be donated to CHoP.

When I first heard about this project, I thought, in my condescending way, that it was for children, a way for parents to talk to their sick child (or her siblings) about cancer.  I was wrong.  This book is too intense to give to a young child.  While neither bloody nor gory,  Nathan Lueth’s artwork conveys Alesia’s pain and fear, and the loneliness she feels because she’s so different from other kids.  It is, however, a great way for parents and other concerned adults to know what a child with cancer is going through.

There is none of the sentimentality that so often accompanies stories about cancer survivors.  Instead, there are real emotions (not just the noble ones) that reinforce Alesia’s humanity, and make her experiences believably real.

As I write this, Diamond is not distributing this book.  Perhaps if enough of us ask our local comic shops, they might reconsider.

This weekend I watched the movie [[[Paul]]] on BluRay. It seemed so lame to me when it first came out. When I saw the previews I decided I’d avoid it like Stevie Wonder avoids driving. I only rented it because it’s one of the few movies that I have not seen On Demand and I get so many free rentals movies from Blockbuster I feel that I’m wasting my money if I don’t rent something. I’m about to give up my Blockbuster membership for NetFlix just as soon as I remember that’s what I want to do.

Anywho, I took [[[Paul]]], [[[True Grit]]] (I really wanted to see that in the theaters but I’m just so damn busy) and [[[Rango]]] home to my massive flat screen.

Hey. I’m a man and size matters.

Well, size matters if it’s big. If not then, not so much, at least that what guys with little flat screens tell themselves and by little flat screens I mean penis.

True Grit was GREAT. Rango was not. I’ll leave it at that. On the other hand, Paul was really good. I enjoyed it and realized I’d made the same mistake with this film as I’d made with [[[The Iron Giant]]] and Galaxy Quest. The previews and marketing were so freakin bad on those movies I just stayed away.

In Paul, Comic-Con was a nice little backstory. Yes, it was centered on nerds but what are you going to do? The movie started at Comic-Con, ended at Comic-Con and was referred to many times during the film.

I watched Paul Saturday night. Sunday, the day of this writing, I was flipping channels and stopped when I saw the face of my friend David Glanzer. David is the head of marketing and publicly for Comic-Con and was a guest judge of a show called Cupcake Wars.

I try to never say never but I’m pretty damn sure if I did not see David I would have never watched a show called Cupcake Wars. That show has as much appeal to me as a show called Towel Wars or can goods conflict or The Peanut Butter Lick Off. You know I could see watching the Peanut Butter show if there were hot women contestants. The more I think of it I would watch that show and now the show sounds like a good idea!

(The Peanut Butter Lick Off. trademark & copyright Michael Davis 2011. All Rights Reserved.)

But I digress (sorry Peter). I was talking about David. Not Peter David. I watched the entire show not caring rather or not who won (who the fish cares?) but rater I watched marveling at the genius of David and Comic-Con. Clearly, appearing on that show as a guest judge in his capacity as the head of marketing and publicly for Comic-Con is a fantastic way to market to people who may have no clue what Comic-Con is.

Then it hit me— has Comic-Con jumped the shark?

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For some, age defines you. You are either young or old. For others, age is a number and you remain your youthful, exuberant self.  Then there are the ageless wonders, among them actress Janet Waldo. Generations of people have grown up with Janet’s work even though her name may not be a familiar one. The 87 year old actress sounds as vibrant as she did when she first wowed audiences on radio with Meet Corliss Archer.

Today, she is best known as Judy Jetson or Penelope Pitstop, but she has portrayed countless characters of all ages in a rich career that includes stage, screen, television and tons of animation. After high school in Seattle, Waldo, a distant relative of Ralph Waldo Emerson, was performing in local theater when she won an award presented to her by fellow alum Bing Crosby, who was accompanied by a latent scout. She left for Los Angeles where she appeared in several films before beginning her radio career.

She did numerous roles in comedies and dramas before CBS cast her in Meet Corliss Archer, a teenage sitcom series designed to compete with A Date with Judy. She played the part from 1943 until it ended its radio run in 1956. By then she was married and turned down the part for television in order to raise Lucy and Jonathan with her playwright husband Robert Edwin Lee (Inherit the Wind).

When Waldo resumed her career, she wound up doing some television work, such as the recurring character Emmy Lou on The Ozzie & Harriet Show, commercials and the then-new field of television animation. She was cast as teenage Judy Jetson in Hanna-Barbera’s The Jetsons and has voiced the character exclusively ever since (the one exception being having her recorded voice replaced by pop star Tiffany for the 1990 movie).

During the 1960s, Waldo could be heard on all three networks and in multiple roles from Granny Sweet and Anastasia on Secret Squirrel to Penelope Pitstop (first seen in Wacky Races), and of course, Judy. (more…)

Just a quick little column this week, guys, just a collection of my thoughts. Some about comics, some not. Call it a walk into Mindy’s brain. And don’t forget to duck.

• Spent three hours today at the New Jersey Division of Motor Vehicles renewing my license. Last time I renewed it, I was in and out in 20 minutes. Why did it take so long? Two words: Walking Beachball.  (Actually I was going to say Fat Fuck, but I didn’t want to offend anybody.) That’s right, I’m talking about New Jersey’s Governor Chris Christie. For a while at the DMV I occupied myself looking at the latest IKEA catalogue. Then I started talking to some of the nice people who work there. (Now that’s a job in hell! Compared to working at the DMV, Buffy’s stint at the Doublemeat Palace was being the Queen of England.) One of the first things Christie did when he took office was to cut the budget of the DMV, meaning layoffs and location closings and cutting the days and hours the DMV is open and absolutely no updates in computer software. I also talked to some of the nice people who were also waiting at the DMV. Apparently nobody voted for him. In fact, nobody I know voted for him. Even my friends who are Republicans. So how did the Walking Beachball become governor? I don’t know.

• I really hated Season 8 of Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Dark Horse by way of Joss Whedon). Hated. Loathed. I mean, I’m not a big fan of comic adaptations of television and movies to begin with, but this one really sucked. The artwork sucked. The story sucked. The ending sucked. And I put Season 9 on my list at my local comics shop. Fuck it. I’m a Buffy junkie.

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