Tagged: comics

Heroic Gloom, by Dennis O’Neil

  • News
  • August 26, 2008

Tuesday, August 26: 146 days.

They continue to dwindle down, the days, but maybe not fast enough. If Dennis Kucinich is right in a New York Times interview, Georgie just might launch an attack on Iran sometime between now and the election because…well, we don’t want to switch leadership in the middle of a military crisis and we have to be tough on terrorism, et cetera. And lest we think that this is lefty paranoia from a vegan who is, after all, a friend of Shirley MacLaine’s, just look at the last eight years…

But enough gloom on this fine pre-autumn day, at least enough political gloom. Let’s switch to some nice television gloom. This is not a good week for Okay, I’m gonna bust in here. In case we haven’t met before, I’m Randy Hyper, a fictional character that dweeb O’Neil made up ‘cause he hasn’t got the cojones to tell you about the stuff he’s doing that he wants you to know about. (And if there’s a bigger loser in comics, don’t tell me ‘cause I don’t feel like crying.) Anyway…what el dweebo wants me to tell you is that he’s again teaching a course in writing comics and graphic novels at New York University, beginning next month, September 24, and running until December 3 on Wednesdays from 6:20 till 8:40. Course number is X32.9372. Phone is 212-998-7171. I can tell that he’s looking forward to this gig ‘cause last semester’s group were what he might call “cool” which just goes to prove that even he isn’t wrong all the time. Now back to our regularly scheduled blather. so if you like sports, this is your week. The last gasp of the Olympics, preseason football, the big tennis matches, plus the usual baseball action – lots to keep you sports fans amused. As for the rest of us…not wonderful.

And if you’re a Lois Lane – a superhero lover – the season beyond this week isn’t awfully promising, either. As far as I can tell, there are no new superdoers on the television schedule and one of last year’s, the revamped Bionic Woman, won’t be returning. This despite the fact that the summer movie schedule was pretty superhero-intensive and two of the entries do for this kind of fantasy-melodrama what the films of John Ford, Howard Hawks and maybe John Huston did for westerns: mature them. No longer are the cape-and-tights crowd fit only to provide the airiest of light entertainment; they now have a claim on art, of maybe even Art.

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Interview: Elizabeth Genco of ‘Comic Book Tattoo’ and ‘Blue’

  • News
  • August 25, 2008

cbt_coverjasonlevesque-3160861The past few months have brought a swell of attention to indie comics writer Elizabeth Genco, who scored a coup by having a story included in the Tori Amos Comic Book Tattoo collection from Image Comics, and then her graphic novel Blue — a modernization of the Bluebeard legend — sold well in part thanks to a plug from Brian Wood.

Genco took the time out of her busy schedule to chat with ComicMix about her music-infused projects and what it was like to work with an idol in Amos.

ComicMix: Let’s talk about the Tori Amos project first, since it’s the book of the moment. How did you get connected to that gig? Were you a fan of Amos previously?

Elizabeth Genco: I’ve been a fan of Tori’s for almost 15 years. Both she and her music have been hugely influential, especially in my creative life. Tori is very smart about how to create a creative career while staying true to your vision, and I learn from her. Of course, like many of her fans, her music has helped me through some dark times.

As for how I got involved, a few years ago, editor Rantz Hoseley and I got acquainted via Warren Ellis’ old board, The Enginge; he and I have been pals ever since. When he extended the invitation, I jumped onboard immediately.

CMix: How did you approach the assignment? Comics is such a visual medium, it’s not that common to hear creators be inspired by sound.

EG: I want to say that I’m not inspired by sound so much as I am by words — that is, lyrics. But the interesting thing about lyrics, of course, is that they take on a completely different meaning when you add the music. I would even go as far to say that 99 percent of the time, song lyrics are incomplete without the music. (Music is a huge influence on me, and I’ve aspired to be professional musician at several points in my life, especially when I was very young. So I’ve thought about this a lot, actually.)

Music inspires my writing quite often, and the process is usually the same. A line will capture my attention, and I’ll start noodling — following the thread, seeing where it goes. In this case, I decidedon the song and then went looking for that line.

As for the song itself ("Here. In My Head"), well, I spent all this time going through Tori’s catalog trying to find the right one before going, "Duh!" It’s been my favorite Tori song for years, so it wasthe obvious choice.

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Paul Levitz on Comics, DC and the State of the Industry

  • News
  • August 24, 2008

dclogo-00-5982662During San Diego Comic-Con, ICv2 conducted a fairly comprehensive interview with DC president/publisher Paul Levitz to chat about the state of the comics industry and the recent past, present and potential future. The interview was broken down into three parts, and each of them has some worthwhile questions and answers from DC’s head honcho.

From Part One, some frame of reference for the decision-making process when it comes to which characters/titles to put the spotlight on:

Some people think that Watchmen is a risky movie for presenting comics to a broad audience because it’s so dark. What are your thoughts on that?

The great successes are always the things that you can’t prove in advance will work or will not work. You get a Superman because it’s a departure from what was there before. There were ancestors of him in the creative process, but it represented a leap forward. And the same reason that my predecessors were nervous about putting him on the cover of every issue of Action Comics for the first few until they got the sales figures in, were the things that in part created the potential for him to be the breakaway at this time. I don’t think there’s a lot of mid-ground for Watchmen. I think it will either be very successful or it will be a passionate cult favorite. Everything we’re seeing so far indicates to me that we have a good shot at it being a breakaway.

From Part Two, an interesting observation of the economic status of what DC believes to be the typical comics buyer:

Do you predict any differences in how sales in the different channels will respond to the economic conditions?

The comic shop owners are still more vulnerable to the high intensity-high value customer. Luckily a high proportion of our customers are in industries that have been doing relatively well—high technology kinds of things tends to pop up fairly frequently in the descriptions of jobs in our field, so hopefully that’ll be sustaining. The bookstore side of the world, I think, is just vulnerable to all of the challenges that book publishing is having now. Even if the graphic novels are a very bright spot in their world, and they seem to be, book publishing is not having an easy time right now.

From Part Three, some insight regarding DC’s plans for webcomics and their Zuda program:

The screen is a powerful method of delivery for a younger generation and it’s going to be part of our business one way or another, hopefully in a very complementary fashion. I think we start doing print stuff on Zuda in early ‘09 in the current schedule. And that will be an interesting test to see how that translates over.

 

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What’s “Watchmen” About?

watchmen-cover-00-5610748Over at The Comics Reporter, Tom Spurgeon has asked readers to let him know how they would answer the question, "What’s Watchmen about?" It’s a nice feature, as I believe Watchmen to be one of those projects that has been held in high regard by comics fans for so long that it’s difficult to think outside of our comics fishbowl and explain why it’s such an important story to someone with little knowledge of the industry.

Here’s the answer I gave Tom, which I came up with pretty quickly due to having been asked that same question by someone yesterday:

Watchmen examines the relationship between superheroes and society and the ways in which this relationship changes over time given a variety of real-world factors. What would happen when the shine wears off and things like politics, economics, racism and the knowledge of one’s own abilities far and beyond that of everyone else come to the surface? The story examines all of this by way of a noir-style murder mystery in which one of the former "superheroes" investigates the mysterious death of a former member of the superteam "The Watchmen."

That was my three-sentence answer that skips over so much of what makes Watchmen great to comics fans, but is most likely to hook newcomers to the comics scene. In this case, it seemed to work, as the person I told this to called me up an hour later to say he’d watched the trailer again and now definitely wants to see the film.

You can read more responses over at The Comics Reporter, but feel free to add your own to the comment thread here or email Spurgeon (via the link provided in his post) in order to have your answer added to the feature.

Paul Pope on Toys and “THB”

  • News
  • August 22, 2008

batman-year-100-1-00-2678935Over at the L.A. Times’ geek culture blog Hero Complex, T.J. Kosinski talks to celebrated creator Paul Pope (Batman: Year 100, 100%) about the upcoming re-release of his fan-favorite series THB, as well as what he sees as the "new canvases for comics."

According to Pope, the upcoming reprint of THB (due out in 2009) will feature quite a bit of new material — almost half the project, in fact.

Talking about clothing design, upcoming iPod artwork, and the possibilities of designer wallpaper was all very interesting, but what grabbed my attention most was the future of "THB," Pope’s independent comic begun in 1995. The futuristic series featured the exploits of a teenage girl, HR Watson, and her super-powered bodyguard, THB. That collection due next year will be half reprints and half unseen material.

While I was on the edge of my seat, Pope leaned back in his chair and opened up about "THB," referring to it as “his baby.” “I’ve been working on it this whole time,” Pope explained. In fact, he’s accumulated so much new material that the complete collection of THB will total four volumes.

Pope also spoke to Kosinski about joining the growing pool of creators who have turning their attention to the vinyl toy market. His "Masked Karimbah" figure was one of the major hits of San Diego Comic-Con, and Pope seems to be hitching his future success to both the collectible vinyl scene and his designer line of DKNY Jeans clothes hitting shelves next month. 

Christopher Reeve Still Soars, by Alan Kistler

  • News
  • August 22, 2008

It’s been a rough week and I needed something to make me feel good about the world.christopher-reeve-american-flag-1179568

This past monday was the last day this year they were doing the Bryant Park movie. For you non-New Yorkers, HBO has sponsored movie screenings every Monday evening for the past 16 years during the summer, projecting films on a large screen at the edge of the Bryant Park. People gather with blankets and picnic baskets for when the lawn opens at 5 PM, and within 10 minutes there is an audience of well over 1000 people, all waiting for sunset when the movie begins.

This last week, it was Superman: The Movie (the director’s cut, specifically) with Christopher Reeve, Marlon Brando, Margot Kidder and Gene Hackman. I needed this and so I got a couple friends together to join me in the park. Some of us, myself included, were born after this film came out in theaters. Lucky for us, though, we still had the opportunity to see Superman: The Movie in something approaching that big-screen environment this week — because I’m quite certain that you haven’t truly experienced this film unless you see it on a massive widescreen surrounded by an enormous crowd. You can literally feel the electricity in the air that surges from a nearby person becoming a new fan.

When the "S"-shield blazed across the screen and the John Williams theme soared from the speakers, over 1000 people roared and cheered and applauded. When Clark Kent donned the costume for the first time, again, the entire park was filled with cheers and screams and shouts of "YEAH, CLARK!" It was like the moment in a sports game when your team makes an incredible play and you feel the joy of everyone around you. We laughed at Hackman’s sarcasm, we sighed at Lois and Clark’s flight over the clouds, and again, cheered our hearts out when Superman saved the day in the end and said "We’re all on the same team." (more…)

Manga Friday: Lawless, Winged, and Unconfined

  • News
  • August 22, 2008

Poking through the stack of manga to be reviewed, earlier this week, I noticed several books featuring characters with wings of one kind or another. Quick to sense a theme, I dragged them together, and here they are:

Koi Cupid, Vol. 1
By Mia Ikumi
Broccoli, April 2008, $9.99

Koi Cupid is an all-ages series about cherubs-in-training – yes, cute little girls in white outfits, running around making people fall in love. It’s not quite as kawaii (cute, often cloyingly so) as it could be, though, so I came to think of Koi Cupid as actually fairly restrained.

(Of course, that’s by manga standards – recalibrate your cuteness detectors from American settings, or you’ll be instantly deafened by the alarm.)

Anyway, the story focuses on three cupids-in-training: Ai, the cheerful one; Koi, the shy one; and Ren, the way-ahead-of-the-others one. They’re taught by a full cupid named Rin, who is deferring her own promotion to Guardian Angel to continue to mentor them. Kou actually is a guardian angel who pops in for added firepower now and then; Sister Yuuri is a winged, talking cat who supervises the cupid training program, and Lizette is a sneaky demon who tries to foil their work, but whom Ai wants to be friends with. (more…)

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Skrull-icide in “Secret Invasion”

  • News
  • August 22, 2008

secret-invasion-5-00-8968406Over at Metabunker, Matthis Wivel has posted an interesting analysis of the "only good skrull is a dead skrull" theme in Marvel Comics’ Secret Invasion event. When presented with the rampant slaughter currently going on in Marvel’s latest big event, Wivel wonders what ever happened to the whole "heroes don’t kill" standard of yesterday’s comics.

I’m not going to be all holier-than-thou about this — I know that the audience for these comics is largely adult geeks such as myself, and that a little killing won’t hurt our sensibilities much. But still, it’s gotta be some kind of landmark that the biggest superhero event this year so callously ignores what was once a central principle of the genre. And kind of auspicious too, that a series that at least superficially carries pretensions of political allegory most likely unintentionally lends to its heroes a borderline fascist groupthink outlook on their enemies.

And beyond all that, what is the big problem with the skrulls, anyways? I mean, Embrace Change sounds like a pretty nice guy… er, skrull.

(via Tom Spurgeon)

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Behind the Scenes With “Stan’s Soapbox”

  • News
  • August 21, 2008

stansoapbox-00-6645624Just about a week ago, it was announced that the ol’ "Stan’s Soapbox" columns that ran in Marvel Comics from 1967 to 1980 will be collected in an upcoming paperback published by (and benefiting) The Hero Initiative, the very worthwhile organization that is also the "first-ever federally chartered not-for- profit corporation dedicated strictly to helping comic book creators in need."

In true form, Stan "The Man" had this to say about the collection:

"Wow! What a kick it is for me to see all my old Soapbox columns printed in one great volume!," said Stan Lee. "Reading them now is like taking a trip back through the history of Marvel in those great ol’ days when the fans and I would rap about how our batty Bullpen was exploding with new heroes, new villains and more far-out, fun-filled, fantastic new ideas than you could shake a radioactive spider at! And, best of all, every Stan’s Soapbox book sold means more money for the great Hero Initiative cause. No wonder I’m so proud of this book and the cause that it serves! Heck, I might even buy two copies!"

While the 144-page collection is scheduled for a November 2008 release and sporting a $14.99 price tag, as well as commentary from Marvel luminaries like Joe Quesada, Kevin Feige and Roy Thomas, there’s one thing the collection won’t include: the original typed copy straight from the desk of Marvel’s Main Man himself. Lucky for us, former Marvel Comics Assistant Editor Scott Edelman recently posted a scan of one of those aforementioned drafts — as well as some thoughts on how he ended up with them.

One of my duties as an Assistant Editor at Marvel Comics in the mid-’70s was to write all of the text for each Bullpen Bulletins page except for Stan’s Soapbox. (Thanks for the opportunity to channel my childhood idol, Len!)

Which meant that Stan would hand me a yellow sheet of paper each month on which he had typed out his musings, complete with edits in the form of crossed-out clauses and handwritten additions. I’d hand both his text and mine (for the rest of the page) to a different Stan, Stanley Aaron, the typesetter who would make it all look pretty so it could then be pasted up for print.

Even without the drafts, the Stan’s Soapbox collection looks like a great opportunity to get all sorts of nostalgic about comics days gone by. I’ve posted the full press release after the jump, with more information about the project. (Oh, and we’re told that’s not the final cover art.)

(via The Beat)

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Bryan Lee O’Malley and Hope Larson on “Bear Creek Apartments”

  • News
  • August 21, 2008

bearcreek-00-2002423Celebrated comics couple Bryan Lee O’Malley (Scott Pilgrim) and Hope Larson (Chiggers) returned the focus of their considerable talents to the webcomics pool this week with Bear Creek Apartments, a new, original collaboration between the two creators. They announced the project this week on their website, radiomaru.com, and the comic was subsequently flooded with traffic — forcing O’Malley to break it down from a single page to a series of linked pages.

For the art geeks, the pair also provided the following details about their tools of the trade for Bear Creek:

The art is done with pen, watercolor, crayon, and some CG elements (mostly lighting effects). The lettering was done with ComiCraft’s "Monologous" font.

You can see the full comic now at the link I’ve provided above, but be sure to read it through to the end. There’s a twist there that caught me by surprise… so you’ll want to beat the spoilers, too.

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