2010 September
Talking Comics with Tim | Paul Levitz
Legion of Super-Heroes 5
Paul Levitz‘s return to the Legion universe has been under way for the past several months (writing the character’s early days in Adventure Comics and the regular ongoing stories in Legion of Super-Heroes). With a gamut of issues already out I thought it would be a great time to discuss his work. Plus I got an opportunity to find out what it was like to be a student of Frank McCourt, as well as how a journalism class during that era helped strengthen his writing ability. My thanks to Levitz for indulging my questions and DC’s Alex Segura for his assistance in facilitating the interview. This Wednesday, September 22, will see the release of Legion of Super-Heroes 5.
Tim O’Shea: Before our Legion discussion, I would be remiss if I did not ask about being taught English at Stuyvesant High School by Frank McCourt (as mentioned at this Midtown Comics Times Square signing in May 2010). What were some of the major lessons you took from his instruction? Did you stay in touch with McCourt after high school–did he know how successful you became as a writer?
Paul Levitz: McCourt was teaching English, not yet officially Creative Writing, when I was his student. Vivid memories include the range of literature he opened our eyes to—Achebe and Mishima, the examples that still stick with me, and their very different world views and life experiences. He was very encouraging to me about my interests in comics, and my fanzine publishing, which was great. We stayed lightly in touch—I recall sending him the trade of Great Darkness when it first came out, and an email note back—and saw each other several times after he became an author. The best moment was a fund raising dinner for Stuy’s 100th, at which he presented me with an award (predominantly for my work on the 100th Anniversary book about Stuy). The other lesson, from a distance in time, is the power a good teacher has—looking at the long list of writers who came through his classes over the years, and our attachment to him. It’s one of the reasons I’m starting to teach now.
- September 20, 2010 @ 07:15 PM by Tim O'Shea
Obama, Palin head to Riverdale for hotly contested student council race
Archie #616
Only in Riverdale would President Barack Obama and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin share a shake at the local soda shop. Above is the cover to December’s Archie #616, which guest stars both politicians in a story about student government campaigns that “spiral out of control at Riverdale High!” It’s Archie vs. Reggie throwing mud at each other in the political arena, as Obama and Palin are pulled into the fray.
The story continues in Archie #617, the cover for which can be found after the jump.
- September 20, 2010 @ 03:46 PM by JK Parkin
Facebook campaign wants to see Stan Lee on Saturday Night Live
Stan Lee
He’s appeared in countless movies, cartoons and video games, so why not? Fans of Stan Lee have started a campaign on Facebook to get the comic book icon onto Saturday Night Live.
“Stan Lee has been known to make many scene stealing cameos, appearing in both movies & TV shows, yet there is one show & one cameo he has yet to tackle, Saturday Night Live. Imagine Stan “The Man” Lee appearing on SNL, think of the possibilities,” reads the description on the page. A similar campaign worked for actress Betty White last season.
Although Lee’s appearances on the silver screen are typically small cameos in Marvel’s films, I’m betting he’d do a better job than Steve Forbes, M.C. Hammer and Nancy Kerrigan, all of whom have hosted in the past.
- September 20, 2010 @ 02:00 PM by JK Parkin
Open house: A visit to the birthplace of Superman
Christopher Irving, the writing half of the Graphic NYC blog, paid a visit to Cleveland recently, and he couldn’t resist a visit to the home of Superman creator Jerry Siegel. He ended up chatting with owner Jefferson Gray, who had no clue, when he bought the house in 1983, of its historic significance. Three years later, Gray got a letter from the city, which planned to designate the house as a landmark, and ever since then, Superman has been a big part of his life. Gray gave Irving a tour of the house, including the attic where Siegel and pal Joe Shuster dreamed up the Man of Steel, now filled with a tantalizing array of Superman memorabilia. While he may be one of the few favored with a tour, Irving is not the only pilgrim. “People come by, leave letters and things on the porch,” Gray told hm. “People come from all over—It’s a joy.”
- September 20, 2010 @ 01:00 PM by Brigid Alverson
Marvel and Graphic.ly, part 1: Marvel’s digital initiatives
Another week, another digital platform: Marvel announced last week that it will make its comics available on Graphic.ly. It has been almost three years since Marvel launched its first digital initiative, the subscription-based Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited. Since then it has also made its content available through a few different iPhone/iPad applications, including a Marvel-branded one created by comiXology. Like the Marvel app (and unlike Marvel DCU), Graphic.ly allows readers to download comics and keep them; what makes it unique is its social networking aspect, which lets readers post comments about the comic directly on the pages.
I checked in with Marvel’s Ira Rubenstein, executive vice president of the global digital media group, to see how all Marvel’s digital initiatives are going and how Graphic.ly fits into the mix.
Do you anticipate releasing comics on the same day and date on Graphic.ly and in print, either regularly or occasionally?
We have done it with a few of our books, and I can’t speak for future plans but I think we will continue to experiment. Graphic.ly is just another outlet, and we believe in as wide distribution of our content as possible. The big news for Graphic.ly is this is the first time we are on a PC in a sell-through model.
- September 20, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by Brigid Alverson
Take a sneak peek at Chloe Sullivan’s Action Comics debut
Chloe Sullivan in Action Comics
TV Guide has the first official look at Smallville‘s Chloe Sullivan from her long-delayed DC Universe debut in Action Comics #893, which goes on sale on Sept. 29.
The popular supporting character, played by actress Allison Mack, was created specifically for the television series, and introduced in the 2001 pilot. She was set to be integrated into DC’s comic-book continuity in 2008 but those plans fell apart. However, the publisher at last announced in July at Comic-Con International that Chloe will have a recurring role in the Jimmy Olsen co-feature by Nick Spencer and R.B. Silva that kicks off with this month’s Action Comics.
Spencer, who’s best known for his Image Comics series Existence 3.0 and Morning Glories, tells TV Guide he had to make some changes to the character’s history to enable her to fit into the established DC timeline.
“It’s a pretty different continuity, which I think has always been the challenging part of bringing Chloe into the DC Comics Universe,” he says. “She’s never existed in the comics before, so in order to make a part of Clark’s life when he was a teenager in Smallville, you’d have to do it somewhat retroactively, and it would age Chloe as a character a lot, since Superman is well past that part of his life in the books.”
- September 20, 2010 @ 11:00 AM by Kevin Melrose
WWE Heroes returns for second mini in November
WWE Heroes: Timequake - Undertaker
Titan, holder of the World Wrestling Entertainment comics license, today announced WWE Heroes: Timequake – Undertaker, the follow-up to their first WWE Heroes mini-series.
The new two-issue series, which kicks off in November, features the Undertaker and Rey Mysterio fighting zombies in Mexico. Like the previous miniseries, it’s written by Keith Champagne, who is joined by Tom Nguyen on art.
A short press release and the book’s second cover can be found after the jump.
- September 20, 2010 @ 10:00 AM by JK Parkin
Matt Fraction wins first-ever PEN USA Literary Award for Graphic Literature
Matt Fraction and friend
That’s the Award-Winning Iron Man to you, pal: Invincible Iron Man, Uncanny X-Men, Casanova and Thor scribe Matt Fraction has won the 2010 PEN USA Literary Award for Graphic Literature. The award, given for the very first time this year, is part of a slate awarded annually by the California-based PEN Center USA, the West Coast branch of the prestigious writers’ organization and free-speech advocacy group International PEN. Fraction received the award, according to PEN USA’s press release, “for his outstanding body of work.”
The PEN USA Literary Awards also cover fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, research nonfiction, children’s/young adult literature, journalism, translation, drama, screenplay and teleplay, as well as granting The University of California Press Exceptional First Book Award. Each winner receives a prize of $1,000.
To give you some idea of the company Fraction’s keeping, past winners include Woody Allen, Rudolfo Anaya, Paul Thomas Anderson, Ray Bradbury, T.C. Boyle, Sandra Cisneros, George Clooney, Cameron Crowe, Ariel & Will Durant, Carrie Fisher, Betty Friedan, Matt Groening, Vaclav Havel, Charlie Kaufman, Barbara Kingsolver, Maxine Hong Kingston, Ursula K. Le Guin, Dan Savage, Neil Simon, Oliver Stone, Michael Tolkin, Gus Van Sant, Gore Vidal, Alice Walker, Billy Wilder, and Steven Zaillian.
(via Fraction’s Twitter)
- September 20, 2010 @ 09:00 AM by Sean T. Collins
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes [Updated]
TouchSmart 310
Digital comics | Hewlett Packard’s newly announced TouchSmart 310 — it’s an all-in-one touchscreen desktop PC with a starting price of $699.99 — will give users access to more than 8,000 Marvel comics, thanks to a deal between HP and Disney: “TouchSmart users will now be able to buy and download special versions of classic comics, and then literally thumb through them with on-screen controls. More than 8,000 Marvel titles are available, which HP says is the most extensive digital collection ever offered from any content partner.” [PCMag.com, TG Daily]
UPDATE: Marvel has issued a clarification, as well as an official press release: “HP TouchSmart Apps Center will offer streaming access to over 8,000 digital comics from Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited. None of these digital comics will be downloadable.”
Legal | The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund has filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging the Supreme Court to affirm a lower court’s ruling that a California law banning the sale or rental of violent video games to minor is unconstitutional. [press release, Game Rant]
- September 20, 2010 @ 07:55 AM by Kevin Melrose
What Are You Reading?
Thor: The Mighty Avenger #4
Welcome to What Are You Reading?, where we give a great big hug to all the comics, graphic novels and what have you we’ve been reading lately.
Our special guest this week is Ben Morse, assistant editor of Marvel.com and one of the several contributors to the Cool Kids Table blog. He’s also written a few stories for Marvel as well.
To see what Ben and the Robot 6 crew have been reading recently, hit the link …
- September 19, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by JK Parkin
Morrison opens fire on My Chemical Romance in new video
Grant Morrison
My Chemical Romance, the band fronted by Umbrella Academy writer Gerard Way, has posted a video teaser for their new album on their website. The clip features fast cars, loud music, pirate radio, gun play and a silver-faced Grant Morrison as, apparently, the villain.
Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys comes out later this year. Watch the full clip after the jump.
- September 18, 2010 @ 09:30 AM by JK Parkin
The Fifth Color | Mr. Brevoort, Tear Down These Prices!
How Many of These Will You Have to Read?
Robot 6′s Charismatic Mr. Collins assisted Marvel Editor Tom Brevoort in asking a particular question back on Monday to our assembled Robot readers. After hearing a lot of frazzled fans at this year’s Baltimore Comic-Con, Mr. Brevoort wants to know what readers think of event books. Enough news and views have happened in the week, but this question is super important and cannot be ignored by Yours Truly.
Event books are a touchy subject. One one hand, they sell a lot of comics based on the sturm und drang of their stories; on the other hand, they ruin a sense of stability for the reader. Some of them have been truly game-changing events, and others have been World War Hulk. Now, you can dress up an event book in the uniform of a particular character and call them more ‘localized’ events like Curse of the Mutants and Shadowland, but people picking them up off the shelves and taking them to the sales counter know what they really are: an event book, just like all the others have been.
I would like to thank Mr. Brevoort for being brave enough to unleash such a subject into the wilds of the internet. We of the internets are an opinionated and passionate bunch who will tell you exactly what we think (sometimes to our own detriment). Event books are the holofoil covers of our time, just another way to promote a book and perpetuate interest, and it’s cool that a Real Live Editor(tm) might really want to know how much interest they’re perpetuating. I hope he reads each and every one of our readers wonderful comments; I know I’ll be certainly going over a lot of the stuff they originally said over here but in the end, it’s all going to come down to one answer.
This answer will make both long-time readers happy, interest new readers and generate sales in the long term for our House of Ideas. It will slice, dice and also make Julian fries. The answer is HERE, my friends! Not a dream, not an imaginary hoax, the real true answer to the event book question is live and in person and right below that continue reading link! It’s there! Get yours today!
- September 17, 2010 @ 04:00 PM by Carla Hoffman
Denton, Hendricks, LaPaglia cast in animated All-Star Superman DVD
Absolute All-Star Superman
James Denton (Desperate Housewives), Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) and Anthony LaPaglia (Without a Trace, Happy Feet) have been cast as the voices of Superman, Lois Lane and Lex Luthor in the upcoming All-Star Superman original animated movie. Warner Bros. announced the direct-to-DVD project in San Diego this past summer.
Bruce Timm is executive producing, and Sam Liu, who directed Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, will direct this one as well. Dwayne McDuffie, who wrote Crisis on Two Earths, Justice League Unlimited and many other animated programs (not to mention comics) wrote the script.
The DVD will be released next spring.
- September 17, 2010 @ 01:30 PM by JK Parkin
Craig Thompson finishes Habibi, starts to tinker
Craig Thompson rearranges some words in Habibi
Craig Thompson posted this week that he has finished his graphic novel Habibi, which at almost 700 pages will certainly be called “epic” by many reviewers. (That’s an easy call.) But he still has a lot of final touches to take care of, like the edit above, where he fixes the unclear reading order of some bits of text. While we wait for the finished product, you can see more scraps and edits at his blog.
- September 17, 2010 @ 01:00 PM by Brigid Alverson
Lulu awards cause puzzlement, consternation
Von Allan's The Road to God Knows
Friends of Lulu, the all-volunteer organization founded to “promote and encourage female readership and participation in the comic book industry,” has certainly had its troubles this year, but it looked like president Valerie D’Orazio had things back on track with an interim Board of Directors and the opening of voting for the Friends of Lulu awards. (Full disclosure: I was a judge for last year’s FoL awards and was asked to cast a tie-breaker vote for this year’s nominees, although I did not do so.)
The nominations raised some eyebrows, however, because male creator Von Allan was nominated for the Kim Yale Newcomer Award. D’Orazio defended the nomination, stating that there is nothing in the rules that disqualifies men, although at The Beat, Heidi MacDonald unearthed some evidence to the contrary. It gets weirder, actually, if you look at the full list: Marla Levesque, a character in Allan’s The Road to God Knows, was nominated for Best Female Character, the book was nominated for Lulu of the Year, and his assistant was nominated for the Woman of Distinction category. To sum up: Von Allan or a direct connection was nominated for four of the seven Lulu awards. and his assistant was nominated in a category that also includes Peggy Burns and Francoise Mouly. Edit: Boswell is actually the editor of the book, so I’m withdrawing my objection to that.
- September 17, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by Brigid Alverson