2010 July
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Legal
Legal | The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund joined a coalition of booksellers and other organizations in a federal lawsuit filed on Tuesday to challenge an expansion of Massachusetts’ obscenity law to include distribution via the Internet of material “harmful to minors.”
The new law, which went into effect on Monday, is intended to close a loophole that led the state Supreme Court to overturn the conviction of a man accused of sending sexually explicit instant messages to someone he thought was a 13-year-old girl. Following the February ruling, the state Legislature swiftly to add IMs, text messages, email and other electronic communications to the existing obscenity law.
But the coalition, which includes the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts and the Association of American Publishers, argues that the law is too broad, and “bans constitutionally protected speech on the Internet for topics including contraception and pregnancy, sexual health, literature, and art.” Under the statute, violators can be fined $10,000 or sentenced up to five years in prison, or both, which the group asserts will cause “a chilling effect” or online booksellers. [The Associated Press, CBLDF press release]
- July 14, 2010 @ 08:30 AM by Kevin Melrose
Food or Comics? | This week’s comics on a budget
Chew #12
Welcome once again to Food or Comics? Every week your friendly neighborhood Robot 6 crew details what comics we’d buy at our friendly neighborhood comic shop if we had $15 to spend, if we had $30 to spend and if we had extra money to spend on what we’re calling a “Splurge” item. So join Brigid Alverson, Chris Mautner, Kevin Melrose and myself as we run down what we’d buy, and check out Diamond’s release list for this week to play along.
Kevin Melrose
If I had $15 to spend, I’d buy …
Chew #12 ($2.99)
John Layman and Rob Guillory’s delightfully quirky series about a police detective turned FDA agent who gets psychic impressions from whatever he eats continues with the return of Poyo, the killer cock. (Image)
The Sixth Gun #1 ($3.99)
The Sixth Gun #2 ($3.99)
The Free Comic Book Day edition of the first issue of Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt’s new supernatural Western was the big hit of this year’s event — and with good reason: It sold readers on what promises to be a thrilling yarn about the bloody quest for a cursed gun in an Old West markedly different from the one shown in our history books. (Oni Press)
- July 13, 2010 @ 09:15 PM by JK Parkin
Anthony Bourdain remembers Harvey Pekar
Anthony Bourdain with Harvey Pekar
Among the many tributes to Harvey Pekar that have begun to appear online and in print, this one by chef and author Anthony Bourdain stands out. That’s in large part because Bourdain’s remembrance centers on a 2007 episode of his Travel Channel series No Reservations that brought him to a wintry Cleveland, where the irascible Pekar served as a guide and narrator.
Watching that episode, it was obvious a handful of ingredients — Bourdain, comic book-style illustrations and, most importantly, Pekar in his element — had combined to create something special. So it’s nice to see that, three years and almost 60 episodes later, “Cleveland” remains Bourdain’s favorite.
“That show was unique among over a hundred others in that everything — absolutely everything — went perfectly and exactly as planned,” he wrote today on his blog. “Unlike every other episode, pretty much everything had been ‘written’ (or at least planned out) in advance: the look, the American Splendor graphics, destinations, subjects and content. In the middle of a blizzard in the dead of winter, we got exactly what we were looking for. We wanted American Splendor and that’s what we got.”
It’s a lovely tribute that moves beyond an episode of a food and travel show, with Bourdain trying to capture what drew so many to Pekar and his work: “A few great artists come to ‘own’ their territory. As Joseph Mitchell once owned New York and Zola owned Paris, Harvey Pekar owned not just Cleveland but all those places in the American Heartland where people wake up every day, go to work, do the best they can — and in spite of the vast and overwhelming forces that conspire to disappoint them — go on, try as best as possible to do right by the people around them, to attain that most difficult of ideals: to be ‘good’ people.”
You can watch a teaser for the Pekar episode after the break.
- July 13, 2010 @ 02:34 PM by Kevin Melrose
The Middle Ground #12: Gets It Together
There comes a point when you realize that something has gone from being popular to whatever that next level is. That point may be when you end up having multiple conversations with strangers about Scott Pilgrim for no immediately apparent reason other than the fact that they’re excited about either the movie or the final book.
Okay, admittedly, one of those conversations was with someone who worked in my local comic book store, but only one! Imagine my surprise when, as a socially-awkward sub-hermit type, random people that I am buying cupcakes from or whatever recognize my t-shirt and ask if I’m a fan of the books and then go on to share that they’re big fans of Kim Pine, for example (although that really happened, which still kind of blows my mind). I mean, if it was Batman, then that’d be something else; he’s one of the most immediately recognizable pop-culture icons of the last hundred years, after all. But it was Scott Pilgrim. I feel like this is some kind of breakthrough that I can’t quite wrap my head around.
- July 13, 2010 @ 02:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
Attention entrepreneurs!
CO2 Comics is a very new company; they just celebrated their first anniversary with some crazy talk about moving from web to print publishing. But the owners, Gerry Giovinco and Bill Cucinotta, have been around the block a few times; they were once the co-publishers of Comico Comics, from which CO2 draws some of its material. So to celebrate CO2′s first anniversary, they are taking a little trip down memory lane. Giovinco kicks it off with a look at the Thing costume he created, which was apparently a big hit in the summer of ’79, but even better is this week’s look at their inspirations for starting the company, which includes full text of some cool old comics articles and all six pages of >How To Start A Comic Book Empire. So go, read, set your time machine to 1978, and get ready to conquer the world.
- July 13, 2010 @ 01:00 PM by Brigid Alverson
Klein and Willingham team for new art print
F The Enchanted Letter
Letterer Todd Klein has teamed up with Fables writer Bill Willingham for the latter’s sixth art print featuring a letter of the alphabet. “F The Enchanted Letter” features a poem written by Willingham stocked to the hilt with F-words–sorry, not that F-word–but words like fantasy, fairyland, fleece and, of course, fable.
Klein provides more details on how the print was created here and here. It goes on sale July 16, and you can find the first five prints he worked on with Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Mark Buckingham, Alex Ross and J.H. Williams III for sale here.
- July 13, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by JK Parkin
The Black Lanterns return in October
“What is October’s RETURN OF THE BLACK LANTERNS?” asks DC’s The Source blog, and frankly, your guess is as good as ours. All we’ve got to go on is the accompanying David Finch image, featuring undead Black Lantern versions of Aquaman, Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Martian Manhunter, Firestorm, and Deadman — six of the twelve characters who were granted full-fledged resurrections by the White Light at the end of Blackest Night and who are currently the protagonists of Brightest Day. Halloween’s as good an excuse as any to let their black light shine again…
- July 13, 2010 @ 11:30 AM by Sean T. Collins
Marvel’s Atlas ending with issue #5
Sounds like the little series that could finally couldn’t. In an interview with Comics Alliance’s Chris Sims, writer Jeff Parker has revealed that Atlas, the very recently relaunched series starring a motley crew of 1950s superheroes from the Marvel/Atlas/Timely stable, will end with #5 — largely at Parker’s own discretion. “I’m killing ‘Atlas’ at issue 5….But at least it was me who went out back and shot Lenny while he looked for bunnies, not Marvel,” Parker said.
According to Parker, the series’ first issues sales, in the 20K range, put it on the potential chopping block right away. “Atlas has actually always sold better than a lot of books that get to go on much longer- a good bit of DC’s line. But the Marvel danger zone is 20k more or less, and since books tend to trend downward, that always sets off alarms,” he told Sims. Parker notes that Marvel editorial suggested he “tie the book into another crossover mini-event” to keep it going, but having done that several times in the past with everything from Dark Reign to the X-Men to the Avengers to Hercules, he didn’t feel like going back to the well once again.
Parker’s optimistic about the future for some of the Atlas team: Venus will be appearing in Hercules’ God Squad, while Gorilla Man — who’s the subject of the bulk of Sims’ “interview” — is the star of his own miniseries. But collectively, Jimmy Woo’s team has seen its last stand-alone adventure.
Honestly? I really applaud Marvel for working as hard as they did to ensure the Agents of Atlas stuck around as long as they have. A team of largely forgotten pulp-ish superhero-esque characters from Marvel’s most fallow period as a publisher, tonally reconceived as sort of Marvel’s answer to the B.P.R.D., was always gonna be a tough sell. But Marvel clearly believed in the concept, in Parker, and in the rock-solid line-up of artists he assembled for the team over the years. By my count, the Agents starred in the Agents of Atlas miniseries, which received an impressive collection stuffed with back-up material and reprints from the team members’ golden years; came back a couple years later to launch an ongoing series by the same name; were the beneficiaries of a Dark Reign tie-in; made cameos in Thunderbolts and Deadpool Team-Up; saw their main series cancelled only to co-star in crossover miniseries with the X-Men and the Avengers; briefly shifted over to back-up strips in an Incredible Hercules storyline that culminated in the title character’s semi-death; generated spin-off minis starring team members Marvel Boy and Gorilla Man; and got relaunched yet again as Atlas with the dawn of “The Heroic Age,” the promotional images for which prominently featured Gorilla Man. As always, I think we need to look long and hard at a publishing and retailing model that works relentlessly to pump up the top sellers but can’t sustain a book that even its biggest publisher so clearly believes in, but that said, Marvel and Parker showed a sticktuitiveness here that’s nothing but praiseworthy.
- July 13, 2010 @ 11:00 AM by Sean T. Collins
Wanted producer teams with Palmiotti, Young and Walmart on new comic line
Kickstart Comics
Jason Netter, producer of the Wanted film and the Painkiller Jane TV show, is starting his own comic book company.
Variety reports that Kickstart Comics, an imprint of Netter’s film and TV company Kickstart Entertainment, will be overseen by prolific writer/artist Jimmy Palmiotti and AiT/PlanetLar owner Larry Young. The Hollywood trade also said the company has already entered into distribution pact with several major retailers, including Walmart, to produce at least 24 new books over a year. The initial plan is to release four books a month for six months starting this fall.
“This is a way to introduce comic books to a broader audience,” Netter told the trade.
Read the full story over at Variety for more. As they say, this one is developing …
Update: I asked Young about the announcement, and he responded: “At AiT, we’ve worked with Jason at Kickstart for many years. Loved shooting the NOBODY pilot for ABC Family up in Vancouver with him, and we have very similar sensibilities when it comes to graphic novels, so I’m really looking forward to helping the Kickstart team bring a mainstream entertainment experience to comics.”
And from Palmiotti: “I have been working with Jason and Samantha for years since they sold Painkiller Jane to sci-fi and have been writing books for them as well like Back to Brooklyn, and Random Acts of Violence. They asked me to freelance edit some books for them and help them along the way and its been great ever since. I am still writing for them, as well, they are out selling my properties like The Pro and Ballerina and we have enjoyed a great working relationship together.”
Update 2: Here’s the company’s website, which features preview art for upcoming books like Bombhead by B. Clay Moore and Kevin Mellon; Mirror, Mirror by Joshua Williamson and Lee Moder; and Hero Complex by Adam Freeman, Marc Bernardin and Javi Fernandez.
- July 13, 2010 @ 10:15 AM by JK Parkin
Amanda Conner’s new cover for the Two-Step collection
Two-Step
On his blog, writer Warren Ellis reveals an impressive new cover that Amanda Conner and colorist Paul Mounts created for the trade paperback collection of Two-Step, which is finally being collected this November. The comic was published in 2003 by WildStorm, under their Cliffhanger imprint, I believe, and was written by Ellis and draw by Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti.
“You know how this project started? I’d worked with Amanda before — on a Vampirella thing, just because I wanted to write something for Amanda, because she’s brilliant,” Ellis wrote on his blog. “And a couple of years later I got an email from Jimmy that read, I swear: ‘Wanna write something for Amanda and I? We both think you don’t suck.’”
- July 13, 2010 @ 10:00 AM by JK Parkin
AdHouse adds houses
The three faces of AdDistro
Some cool comics just got a lot easier to get your hands on. Chris Pitzer of AdHouse Books — the stalwart and stunningly designed publishing imprint behind the likes of Jim Rugg & Brian Maruca’s Afrodisiac, Josh Cotter’s Skyscrapers of the Midwest and Driven by Lemons, James Jean’s Process Recess art books, and Pulphope: The Art of Paul Pope — today announced the creation of AdDistro, a new distribution effort that will make comics from small publishers and self-publishers available for purchase through AdHouse proper. The first three additions to the roster are London-based Nobrow Press, Canada’s Koyama Press, and creator Malachi Ward. Pitzer’s got quite an eye for quality, so if you’ve enjoyed AdHouse offerings in the past, I’m sure these newcomers are well worth a look. Might I suggest starting with Michael DeForge’s excellent, award-winning Lose series from Koyama?
- July 13, 2010 @ 09:30 AM by Sean T. Collins
Ex-Sonic writer claims rights to his stories, character
Julie-Su, one of the characters claimed by Penders
Here’s an odd little story that has been brewing over the past couple of days: Ken Penders, who wrote the Sonic the Hedgehog series for Archie Comics for over a decade, is claiming he owns the rights to the stories he wrote and the side characters he created. Not surprisingly, Archie Comics is disputing the claim.
A few days ago, Penders posted this claim on his website:
As of April 21, 2010, the U.S. Copyright Office finally began certifying my copyright claims (which I initially filed beginning back in January 2009) on every single story I ever wrote, penciled or both for Archie Comics. As a result, I am now officially recognized by the U.S. Government as the owner of every single SONIC and KNUCKLES story I ever created (well, almost every one right now, but it will be “all” shortly, as soon as the Copyright Office finishes with the last few claims. But I digress…).
What does this mean?
That means anyone seeking to use my characters, concepts and stories that were published in the pages of SONIC THE HEDGEHOG, various SONIC 48-page specials, various issues of SONIC SUPER SPECIALS, the PRINCESS SALLY mini-series, the SONIC’S FRIENDLY NEMESIS KNUCKLES mini-series, KNUCKLES THE DARK LEGION and the KNUCKLES THE ECHIDNA series, must first contact me for permission and to make arrangements for the use of this material.
- July 13, 2010 @ 09:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Chew, Vol. 2: International Flavor
Publishing | The direct market saw a 21-percent jump in graphic novel sales in June, reversing the category’s dismal trend. ICv2.com notes that’s the best year-over-year comparison since June 2008. Periodical sales, meanwhile, remained virtually unchanged, inching up just 1 percent from June 2009.
DC’s Arkham Asylum: Madness, by Sam Kieth, led the graphic novel list with modest sales of about 7,400. The No. 2 title, the second volume of John Layman and Rob Guillory’s Chew, actually experienced an increase in sales in its second month on the chart. The periodicals list was topped by the first issue of Marvel’s relaunched New Avengers — one of four Avengers titles in the Top 10 — with about 129,000 copies. John Jackson Miller has additional analysis. [ICv2.com]
- July 13, 2010 @ 08:00 AM by Kevin Melrose
David Finch, Grant Morrison launch Batman: The Dark Knight
from Batman: The Dark Knight #1
Following in the Bat-footsteps of Tony Daniel and J.H. Williams III, artist David Finch is slated to go from simply drawing the adventures of the Caped Crusader to writing and drawing them. CBR and The Source are revealing that following a Grant Morrison-scripted, Finch-illustrated October one-shot called Batman: The Return, Finch will be serving as a writer-artist auteur for Batman: The Dark Knight, a new monthly series.
Favorably citing the Denny O’Neil/Neal Adams run on the character, Finch — a longtime, vocal Batman super-fan — says his new series will feature “demonology, dark arts,” and “a darker path where he’ll be stretched to his physical and psychological limits.” Given the furrowed-brow, gritted-teeth intensity of Finch’s shadowy art, that all seems appropriate enough. Personally, I’m wondering if and when Frank Quitely, Cameron Stewart, and/or Frazer Irving will get their own turns at Bat…
- July 13, 2010 @ 07:26 AM by Sean T. Collins
