2011 May
Darryl Cunningham’s tale of the man with murderers’ eyes
Darryl Cunningham has posted a fascinating new comic at his site, Murderer’s Eyes, the (apparently true) tale of a man with many strange delusions—among other things, he believes he was kidnapped by mass murderers and that their eyes had been transplanted into his head. As fascinating as this man’s many delusions are—and I urge you to read the short comic just for that—Cunningham’s explanation for why he doesn’t belong in a mental institution is equally interesting. This story is destined for the second volume of Cunningham’s Psychiatric Tales, the first volume of which was just published this spring, but grab the chance and read it now.
- May 10, 2011 @ 11:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
This Friday is Dialogue Free Comics Day
Calamities of Nature, one of last year's dialogue-free (but not word-free) comics
This may sound like a contradiction, but constraints often lead to greater creativity—the challenge of working within a set of boundaries can get an artist’s imagination working overtime. Webcomic artist Noel Curry started Dialogue Free Comics Day last year for pretty much that reason. As he explains in this year’s post:
Too often, when writing my webcomics (Milton’s Life and DJ Bogtrotter), I forget that this is primarily a visual artform and so to emphasise that, I’ve set myself the challenge of posting a dialogue free comic on that day and I’d like you to join me.
On this coming Friday—yes, Friday the 13th—Curry invites creators to make a special effort to make comics without conversations. They don’t have to be word-free—text can pop up in the form of sound effects or signs, for instance—and looking over last year’s comics, it’s striking how often the creators do rely on words to get the story across. Curry will post or link to all this year’s entries at his blog, and they should make interesting reading.
- May 10, 2011 @ 10:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Ouch! Upper Deck chops up vintage comics to make trading cards [UPDATED]
In a move that most likely is causing comics collectors almost physical pain, the trading-card company Upper Deck is cutting out panels from old, rare Marvel comics to make trading cards for their Marvel Beginnings series.
The cards are made from actual panels of vintage comics such as Amazing Spider-Man #2. The Marvel Ultimate Collection Panel Focus insert cards, as they are called, will be the rarest cards in the set, at one per case. The series also includes sketch and autograph cards by a raft of creators, including Stan Lee, Mark Waid, Kurt Busiek, and Brian Michael Bendis; these will occur with a frequency of one per box.
The question is whether it would be worth some entrepreneur’s while to buy up all the cards, pull out the panel focus cards, and piece together their own Frankenstein-like copy of Amazing Spider-Man #2. Probably not, but it’s fun to think about.
UPDATE: ICv2 has the list of comics used.
- May 10, 2011 @ 09:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | Spider-Man musical returns Thursday; Noveck lands at Syfy Films
Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark
Broadway | The $70-million musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark will emerge Thursday from its three-week hiatus a vastly changed production, featuring five additional flying sequences, expanded roles for Aunt May, Uncle Ben and Mary Jane, a scaled back (and transformed) Arachne, new songs and a lighter tone. “There is still a ton of emotional complexity in the musical, and some of that original darkness,” says playwright and comics writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, who was hired to help rework the script. “But we all also wanted a show that would honor the rich legacy and history of the Spider-Man story: the high school love story, the pretty girl next door, the science geek who is coping with new powers.” The new opening night is set for June 14. [The New York Times]
Publishing | Gregory Noveck, former senior vice president-creative affairs at DC Entertainment, has been hired as senior vice president of production for Syfy Films, a joint venture of Syfy and Universal. Noveck, who oversaw DC’s film and television ventures, left the company in August amid a massive restructuring. [Heat Vision]
- May 10, 2011 @ 06:55 AM by Kevin Melrose
Talking Comics with Tim | Roger Stern
Panels for Primates
Late last week, Panels for Primates editor Troy Wilson (who I interviewed at my pop culture blog in 2010) gave me a heads-up that this Wednesday’s installment of the “charity anthology for the Primate Rescue Center, featuring an eclectic mix of primate stories by both well-known and up-and-coming creators” was going to be written by industry veteran Roger Stern with art by Canadian animator Caleb Hystad. With the installment fast approaching, I begged Stern for a brief email interview about his new story. Normally, if I had more time, I would love to do an in-depth, career-spanning interview, but time was of the essence. Rest assured, Stern is open to the idea of doing a longer interview down the road, so that will happen eventually, but for now, here we go. My thanks to Stern for his time and to Wilson for the tip. [Update: Stern and Hystad's story is now online. Enjoy.]
Tim O’Shea: Your story is titled: “All Monkeys are Primates, But Not All Primates are Monkeys!”. First off, how did you become involved in the Panels for Primates project. How did you arrive upon telling this particular tale?
Roger Stern: It all started when I received an email from Troy Wilson (the author of Perfect Man), asking if I would contribute a four-page strip to an anthology of monkey comics — with all of the proceeds going to a worthy animal-related charity.
The idea really tickled me. The more I thought about it, the more ideas came to mind. And that eventually led to the creation of Morty Monkey, the star of our little four-pager. In fact, the hard part was restricting myself to four pages. I could probably have written a whole book about Morty.
- May 9, 2011 @ 04:00 PM by Tim O'Shea
Dr. Tiny Cat! Thank God you’re here!
Inspired by the I Can Has Cheesburger meme, cartoonist Jessica Hickman (Space Quint) has occasionally been posting a series of Dr. Tiny Cat comics like this one:
Others in the series feature Dr. Tiny Cat pulling an all-nighter, catching a nap between rounds, and attending a lecture. That last one’s my favorite, but they’re all hilariously cute. I hope there’s more coming.
- May 9, 2011 @ 03:00 PM by Michael May
Where the Marvel Heroes live
No trip to Hollywood is complete without buying a map to the stars’ homes. Now you can do the same thing for New York City superheroes in the Marvel Universe. Only – thanks to Dorkly – the map is free. They tell you where to find your favorite heroes’ hangouts, but the best part is that they also have photos of the real life buildings that inspired the fictional ones and/or reside at their addresses.
- May 9, 2011 @ 02:00 PM by Michael May
What was sundered and undone shall be whole; the jam made one
Brent Schoonover (Horrorwood, Astronaut Dad, Vincent Price Presents) has posted some art jam pieces that he contributed to, including this one for The Dark Crystal (Schoonover drew Aughra). Others in the link are tributes to The Infinity Gauntlet, Stan Winston, and Stephen King. The pieces were all commissioned by Matthew Reed, who shares these and some Star Wars-themed ones at his Comic Art Fans site where you can also see the names of the other artists involved.
- May 9, 2011 @ 01:00 PM by Michael May
Icarus on Robot 6 pg 19
Icarus is a comic by Ryan Cody and is serialized here on Robot 6, with new pages every Monday, Wednesday & Friday. Comments welcome.
Ryan Cody is the creator, artist, writer, & colorist of ICARUS, a bi-monthly super-powered adventure/espionage book published through Super 75 Comics. Ryan’s past projects include illustrating the graphic novel VILLAINS for Viper
Comics as well as contributing to the Eisner-Award winning anthology, Popgun Vol.3, from Image comics. ICARUS #1 is currently available as both a .99 digital download and in print. For more information or to order a print copy of ICARUS, please visit www.super75comics.com
- May 9, 2011 @ 12:00 PM by Ryan Cody
The Fifth Color | Raise a hammer to Thor
Okay, we’re going to try a little something different today. When I left the house to go to the midnight showing of Thor Thursday night, I could barely believe I was really going to a movie theater that was going to show me a million dollar movie by Kenneth Branaugh about a guy who hits things with a hammer. Thor isn’t a character so well known to the public, and I have heard from a few people that not only did they not know who he was, but disliked him as part of the Avengers when they were younger, or had read comics in some mysterious era where Thor was not awesome. Still, despite mild obscurity as a comic character, here was his feature film. Imagine what you felt like the night before you saw Iron Man back in 2008 and you get an idea of the butterflies in my stomach: the very thought that someone aside from the Big Names of comic book culture could get a full feature film with quality actors and effects…. well, it was something to marvel over.
And despite knowing this day was coming — seeing screen shots, clips, trailers, merchandise for days, an interactive SHIELD website that told me about Acuras — some part of me still stood in awe of a real live Thor movie. I knew that, barring tremendous incident, I was going to like this movie. That I would leave the theater in that “It’s 2am and I have seen the best movie ever!” afterglow and I would also sit down and write the most unobjective review of my lifetime. So I sat right down and wrote myself some questions, things that I wondered about before going to see the movie that I would later be able to answer in that post-Thorgasmic haze of midnight showings, fan audiences and Shakespearean delivery.
Below are my past self’s questions to my future self written for The Fifth Color in the present. I wasn’t worried about whether the movie was going to be “good” (it is) or if I would like it (I did) or if it would change my life forever (probably need to see it in 3D). I didn’t want spoilers, so I didn’t ask about the particulars of the movie’s plot. I just wanted to know what the future was going to look like.
SPOILERS for the Thor movie after the jump!
- May 9, 2011 @ 11:00 AM by Carla Hoffman
Don’t cut yourself on Jim Lee’s Lady Gaga dress design
Once upon a time, pop music sensation Lady Gaga wore a dress made out of meat. With her new album coming out May 23, New York Magazine asked 20 fashion designers and artists “to try to top said meat dress” and submit designs of the pop star. Above is Jim Lee’s very 1990s Image design, and you can also see dresses by Tim Hensley, Molly Crabapple, Ariel Schrag, Mike Keefe, Vanessa Davis and many more.
- May 9, 2011 @ 10:30 AM by JK Parkin
James Stokoe scares up a Troll Hunter poster
Magnolia Pictures has unveiled a poster created by cartoonist James Stokoe (Orc Stain, Wonton Soup) for Troll Hunter, the darkly funny Norwegian film about a group of students that discovers the government has been hiding the existence of trolls for years. For more information about the documentary-style movie, check out Spinoff Online’s recent interview with writer-director André Øvredal.
Available On Demand now, Troll Hunter opens in theaters on June 10.
- May 9, 2011 @ 10:00 AM by Kevin Melrose
Kindle update: More disappearing manga
Delivery Cupid: No longer delivered wirelessly to your Kindle
Last week we reported that Amazon had removed several yaoi manga from the Kindle Store on the grounds that it did not meet their content guidelines. I spoke to Fred Lui of Digital Manga Publishing, the publisher of the deleted manga, and he said that Amazon didn’t give any more specific reason than that, although he did note that there seemed to be a new guy who was being “overzealous.”
The Kindle Store still offers plenty of yaoi manga, including some fairly steamy titles, so Amazon doesn’t seem to be deleting all the yaoi by any means. However, Animate U.S.A., a Japanese publisher that publishes yaoi manga exclusively on the Kindle, reports that Amazon has removed some of their books as well. I e-mailed them last week to ask about this, and this is the reply I got:
As you may know, some titles are already removed by Amazon without any specific reasons.
We just know that the titles contain content that is in violation of their content guidelines.
The e-mail did not include specifics, but I looked through their press releases and came up with three titles that Animate announced but that are not currently available in the Kindle Store: vol. 1 of Mister Mistress (vol. 2 is still available, and both can be bought used in print through Amazon), Delivery Cupid, and Pet in Love, a Pet on Duty side story (Pet on Duty is still available). I have e-mailed Animate to confirm that these titles were removed by Amazon and not by the publisher.
While the deleted Digital titles are still available via the Nook and Digital’s own eManga website, Animate U.S.A. publishes only to the Kindle, so these titles are no longer available digitally.
A side note: In the earlier post, we mentioned several non-yaoi graphic novels that seemed to be at about the same level of explicitness as the ones deleted; one of these, Christmas Creampie, is no longer available in the Kindle Store.
- May 9, 2011 @ 09:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
TCAF | Doug Wright Awards, Sequential zine, more confiscated comics
Too hot for Toronto?
Another Toronto Comic Arts Festival has come and gone, leaving in its wake a lot of broke-but-smiling comics fans, a couple of artists with a new cause celebre, and some interesting reading.
As we reported on Friday, Canadian customs seized all five copies of the Black Eye comics anthology that creator Tom Neely was trying to bring to TCAF. The news was originally reported by Ryan Standfest, editor and publisher of Rotland Press + Comic Works, at The Comics Journal, and Ryan adds in comments that Blaise Larmee’s Young Lions was also seized from Sparkplug publisher Dylan Williams. (For those who are curious about what’s too hot for Canada, here is a preview.) Standfest posted his reaction to the Black Eye confiscation at the Rotland blog; I’m sure there will be more to say about this soon.
The winners of the Doug Wright Awards were announced on Saturday night: Pascal Girard’s Bigfoot won the award for Best Book, Alex Fellows won the Best Emerging Talent award for Spain and Morocco, and the Pigskin Peters Award, given to non-traditional and avant-garde comics, went to Michael DeForge’s Spotting Deer.
Meanwhile, the folks at the Canadian comcs news blog Sequential have posted a special TCAF edition of Sequential Pulp, which you can download as a PDF or read via Issu, with lots of good stuff, including interviews with Jillian Tamaki and Mark Laliberte, books reviews by Tom Spurgeon, Salgood Sam, and others, and pages and pages of original comics. It’s all free, so go, browse.
- May 9, 2011 @ 08:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | Gaiman fee feud continues; Carlos Trillo passes away
Neil Gaiman
Politics | The controversy in Minnesota continues over Neil Gaiman’s speaking fee, with a state House Republican committee chairman now recommending a $45,000 cut to the Twin Cites’ regional library system budget to make up for the Legacy Fund money paid to the author and comics writer in May 2010. “I simply subtracted out $45,000 — just making a point,” Rep. Dean Urdahl said. Gaiman responded that the move “seems like a sad way to make a point.” He talks at length with CityPages about the controversy. [Star-Tribune]
Passings | Prolific Argentine comics writer Carlos Trillo, co-creator of CyberSix, passed away over the weekend while on vacation in London. He was 68. Trillo, whose career spanned five decades, collaborated with such artists as Eduardo Risso, Jordi Bernet, Juan Bobillo, Carlos Meglia and Domingo Roberto Mandrafina. [TN.com, via The Beat]
Retailing | Peter Panepinto turns a Free Comic Book Day preview into one of those perennial articles about the potential effects of superhero movies on comic-book sales. [Carroll County Times]
- May 9, 2011 @ 06:55 AM by Kevin Melrose