2009 March
Hang in there, please!
Hang in there, please!
Everyone get their San Diego Comic Con hotel room this morning?
At one point this morning, I had a hotel room — a double at the Westin Gaslamp. I entered my credit card information, then checked the little boxes saying I was ok with the cancellation policy. Then I waited for about 15 minutes while it tried to confirm my reservation, then I received a screen telling me there was some sort of data error and my reservation was NOT saved.
Now I’m in line again, I guess, as the above screen keeps loading and reloading. Maybe this is a good year to simply take a hiatus from the con.
Update: 10:52 a.m. Pacific, and I was finally able to get back in. And I was able to pull up the chart that shows what’s still available, which is very slim indeed. If you were planning on getting something within walking distance of the convention center, forget it.
- March 19, 2009 @ 10:19 AM by JK Parkin
She’s come a long way, baby, since her wrestling days
Songbird
Much like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has transitioned from the wrestling ring to the silver screen, Marvel’s former female grappler, Screaming Mimi, has done pretty well for herself since ditching the squared circle and becoming Songbird, the former heart and soul of the Thunderbolts. And while her tenure with that group may be over, it doesn’t look like she’s fading into oblivion … in fact, she’s the latest playable character announced for Activision’s Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2 game. Concept artist Dave Phillips talks about designing the character for the game:
Songbird was one of the easier characters to concept since we already liked her design a lot and decided that we really didn’t want to change all that much. We had lots of great reference material but ultimately it was Marko Djurdjevic’s cover art from the Thunderbolts (series #111-121) that really resonated with us. We felt that his overall art style and costume designs perfectly suited the look we were going for – A kind of gritty realism with more subdued colors and a great attention to detail. The covers are very beautifully painted and we wanted some of that illustrative quality to come through in our models as well. Additionally, we liked how Marko gave Songbird a harder look rather than being just another pretty face: her expressions are tense and serious. Of course, we still wanted to make Songbird attractive, but we tried to choose a likeness that conveyed her underlying emotions in a more believable manner.
- March 19, 2009 @ 09:53 AM by JK Parkin
The most awesome image you’ll see today
Greg Ruth's contribution to MicroVisions
Irene Gallo, art director of Tor Books, posts this amazing illustration, contributed by Greg Ruth (Freaks of the Heartland, The Matrix) for the annual MicroVisions auction. Proceeds benefit the Society of Illustrators student scholarship fund.
- March 19, 2009 @ 09:25 AM by Kevin Melrose
Robot reviews: Miss Don’t Touch Me
Miss Don’t Touch Me
by Hubert & Kerascoet
NBM, 96 pages, $14.95.
Miss Don’t Touch Me is a fairly conventional sex/murder mystery thriller from France, which is interesting (at least from my perspective) since it’s rendered in an art style that owes quite a bit to Joann Sfar, Dupuy & Bebarian and what I’ll tentatively call the “new wave” of cartoonists that eschewed traditional genres (sci-fi, noir, etc.) in favor of more “personal” and experimental work.
But while the comic may use a modern style to tell a familiar story, that doesn’t make it any way rote or dull. In fact, it’s a pretty engaging, entertaining thriller that while it may not necessarily surprise, delights nevertheless.
- March 19, 2009 @ 09:00 AM by Chris Mautner
This weekend, it’s Webcomics Weekend
Webcomics Weekend
The Boston Phoenix has a brief preview of the first New England Webcomics Weekend, the March 20-22 gathering that’s expected to bring more than 700 webcomics cartoonists and fans to Easthampton, Mass.
Initially planned as a small event, the weekend has, in the words of the alt-weekly, “snowballed into a sort of webcomics Woodstock.”
The gathering kicks off informally tomorrow at 8 p.m. with a pub crawl, which includes a couple of all-ages locations, before shifting into convention mode Saturday morning with registration, panels, live-drawing events, tabletop gaming, a charity auction, gallery show and more. The schedule can be found here.
Guests include Steven Cloud, Danielle Corsetto, Rob DenBleyker, Lar deSouza, Rene Engstrom, Meredith Gran, Brad Guigar, Scott Kurtz, Ryan North, Ryan Sohmer, Spike, R. Stevens, Kris Straub and Kris Wilson.
- March 19, 2009 @ 08:21 AM by Kevin Melrose
Supernatural TV show promotes Wildstorm’s Supernatural comics
Supernatural
Last year Wildstorm published a couple of comics based on the CW TV show Supernatural, and now it sounds like life is imitating art … or art is imitating art, actually. The April 2 episode of the show revolves around the Winchester boys discovering a series of comics about their lives and the demons they hunt, which sends them looking for the creator.
BuddyTV shares a description of the episode: “Sam and Dean are shocked to discover a series of comic books titled ‘Supernatural’ that accurately detail their lives as demon hunters. They track down the writer, Carver Edlund, who explains he has visions of the brothers that he then turns into comic books. Chuck reveals that Lilith is coming and she has a plan for Sam.”
The title of the episode is “The Monster at the End of This Book,” a reference to the classic children’s title of the same name. Clever.
- March 19, 2009 @ 08:06 AM by JK Parkin
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Teen Titans #71
Creators | Citing “the vague and oft-used ‘creative differences’,” writer Sean McKeever has announced he’s leaving DC Comics’ Teen Titans with May’s Issue 71. He will, however, write the title’s Ravager back-up story that debuts in June. [The Comic Bloc Forums, Newsarama]
Sales charts | Watchmen slides three spots to No. 5 in its 35th week on USA Today’s list of the Top 150 bestselling books. And while volumes 40, 39 and 38 of Masashi Kishimoto’s Naruto drop to Nos. 51, 71 and 84, respectively, Vol. 41 climbs eight places to the 55th spot.
And the sixth volume of Matsuri Hino’sVampire Knight debuts at No. 126. [USA Today]
Retailers | Matt Price files a brief report as the direct-market trade organization ComicsPRO kicks off its annual meeting in Memphis, Tenn. [Nerdage]
Manga | “Poor Knight,” by Taiwanese artist Huang Chun-chan, has won the grand prize in Kodansha’s third annual Morning International Manga Competition. [Anime News Network]
Creators | Matthew Badham posts the full transcript from his interview with writer Andy Diggle, which appeared in the February issue of Judge Dredd Magazine. [Citizen Badham, via Forbidden Planet International's blog]
Publishing | Tucker Stone delves into DC Comics’ “After Watchmen, What Next?” campaign. [comiXology]
Comics | Mike Romo offers some suggestions for what to recommend after Watchmen. [iFanboy]
Retailers | Chris Pitzer pays a visit to Comic Envy in Asheville, N.C. [AdHouse Books Blog]
Comics | Conor Kilpatrick rattles off his list of “The Top 5 Underused/Misused DC Characters.” [iFanboy]
- March 19, 2009 @ 07:13 AM by Kevin Melrose
The race is on, and it looks like heartache
The Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889
If you’re planning to attend Comic-Con International, you likely need no reminder. But just in case: Hotel reservations open today at 9 a.m. PDT, noon EDT, via Travel Planners.
The Comic-Con website cautions: “Hotels do not allot enough rooms to meet the demand of everyone who wants to attend Comic-Con International. Rooms do fill up within the first few hours so you may want to book a room directly with the hotel of your choice now.” So … yeah.
The list of hotels can be found here.
As we noted on Monday, four-day passes to the con already have sold out. And Saturday is at 39 percent, with four months still to go. Today’s not going to be pretty. Expect the Twitter accounts of comics folks to be littered with profanities — well, more than usual — beginning in about three hours.
- March 19, 2009 @ 06:01 AM by Kevin Melrose
Late to the party: MOMEntum
Fantagraphics promotions director and MOME anthology editor Eric Reynolds was in Minneapolis last week for the opening of the MOMEntum art show, which, as you may have guessed, features art work from the anthology. Reynolds helped curate the show, and he also gave a lecture about the history of the work and comics in general, which Sarah Morean of The Daily Cross Hatch has transcribed for your reading pleasure:
When I first started reading comics and cartooning it seemed like it wasn’t that hard to get published through anthologies, zines, etc. In 2004 when I first started to conceive of MOME in my head, and with Gary Groth at Fantagraphics, one of the reasons we started thinking about it is because there are virtually no regular comic anthologies on the market. Graphic novels were booming, but there wasn’t a place you could send a short script when you finished it, and anticipate having it published in a few months. You pretty much had to self-publish or web-publish. The best anthologies that were out there in 2004 were probably Kramer’s Ergot and also NON by Jordan Crane. They came out very infrequently though, maybe once every couple of years, while simultaneously pushing the boundary on what comics could be. But they weren’t the kind of thing you could send a strip in with the hopes of being published.
Reynolds also has a photo diary of his trip and the exhibit, which, if the picture above is to be believed, involves talking baby tour guides. Mome contributor Tom Kaczynski has an additional Flickr set worth checking out too. No baby tour guides there though.
This show is on display at the MCAD Concourse Gallery now through April 19th
- March 19, 2009 @ 05:00 AM by Chris Mautner
More on Wolverine as masterpiece
van Gogh-inspired Wolverine by Laura Martin; and Warhol-inspired Wolverine by Morry Hollowell
The Washington Post unveils six more variant covers from Marvel’s Wolverine Art Appreciation Month, featuring images of the hirsute mutant inspired by the work of famous artists. The gallery can be viewed here.
- March 18, 2009 @ 05:47 PM by Kevin Melrose
Gorillas Riding Dinosaurs: The Abominable Charles Christopher
The Abominable Charles Christopher
Written and Illustrated by Karl Kerschl
The Abominable Charles Christopher
If you only know Karl Kerschl from Superman comics and Teen Titans: Year One you likely love him, but you’re missing his best work. The Abominable Charles Christopher, Kerschl’s weekly web comic, is a poorly kept secret, but I still don’t see it talked about enough. Certainly not as much as it deserves.
At first look, ACC is about a sweet, but dim sasquatch-like creature. We don’t know his name at first, and maybe he doesn’t even have one, but he’s eventually called Charles Christopher and the name sticks. We don’t really know why he’s called that, but the one who gives him that name is a mysterious being whose motives we don’t yet understand. Maybe there’s nothing behind the name. Maybe it’s of vast importance.
You see, trouble is coming to the forest and it’s going to be up to Charles Christopher to stop it. Why? We don’t yet know that either. Will he be up to the task? It’s hard to see how he will.
- March 18, 2009 @ 03:19 PM by Michael May
I’m Larry Young, and I love comics.
I love comics so much, I have to make my own.
In the summer of 1973, our family moved from Dallas, Texas to rural Vermont. To say that it was a culture shock would be understating the situation. In public school in Texas, for example, we had etiquette lessons; the correct way to answer the phone, the respectful way to address your elders, that sort of thing.
The first day of school in Vermont, however, both my sister and I ended up at the principal’s office for being extremely sarcastic to our teachers. Our crime? In answer to a direct question, I had said, “No, sir” to my teacher, and my sister had said “Yes, ma’am” to hers.
We got in trouble for that.
Anyway.
- March 18, 2009 @ 02:08 PM by Larry Young
Talking Comics with Tim: Warren & Gary Pleece
Montague Terrace
Warren and Gary Pleece have always been brothers, but at one time, they were also creative collaborators–back in the 1980s and 1990s with Velocity. This past Friday marked a resumption of their collaboration to a certain extent, when Warren launched the new webcomic, Montague Terrace, at ACT-I-VATE. The new project (which Gary will be involved in as his schedule permits) is summed up as “Unsuccessful megalomaniacs, brain frazzled ex-pop stars, Special Ops pensioners, haunted children, writers, fighters, nervous magicians and magic bunnies. 1930s detectives, fake pet psychics, hounded inventors, randy postmen, landlocked seamen, diabolical architects and secret societies. And all under one roof…” Warren and Gary made me feel like a pop culture idiot–considering the wealth of topics they referenced in this email interview. But I was overjoyed to enter territory I knew, when Gary mentioned the Monkees’ 1968 film, Head. Tears nearly welled up in my eyes when he mentioned it (for the love of God, this film [with the likes of "Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, Teri Garr ... Annette Funicello, Frank Zappa and Sonny Liston"] cries out either for the Criterion folks or the gang at Cinematic Titanic…). My thanks to Warren and Gary for a fine time.
Tim O’Shea: The last time the two of you collaborated was in the late 1980s/early 1990s–what sparked the decision for you two to collaborate again?
Warren Pleece: Montague Terrace actually showcased in the last edition of Velocity, no. 6 way back in ’96 as a place we could develop countless characters, stories and interlink them into some grand scheme. As was usually the case, the ideas were there, but the means and time to carry it off was another matter. I got more work for DC, Gary did his thing, we both started families etc. and like so many other ideas the whole thing became relegated to the cardboard boxes of our minds and Velocity 6 became the last edition we did.
- March 18, 2009 @ 01:17 PM by Tim O'Shea
Asian-American creators share their Secret Identities
A group of Asian-American comics creators have come together to create Secret Identities, a super hero anthology with comics by Greg Pak, Cliff Chiang, Kazu Kibuishi, Dustin Nguyen, Billy Tan and many more. Above you can check out a trailer for a story by Gene Yang and Sonny Liew, which Yang says is “sort of a riff on that old Green Hornet TV show.”
- March 18, 2009 @ 12:22 PM by JK Parkin
Expect a lot of ‘Venus girdle’ jokes
Wonder Woman is going to hit you
If my review of the new Wonder Woman DVD didn’t float your battleship (so to speak), let it be duly noted that critic Noah Berlatsky will be liveblogging his reactions to the film starting at 7:30 tonight, Central time. Should make for a fun evening.
- March 18, 2009 @ 12:00 PM by Chris Mautner