Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #103 | How did I get here?
Looking through the previews of Archie’s New Crusaders revival the other day, I had this odd reaction that took me a while to work through. My first impulse was a sense of … dissatisfaction, perhaps, that it looked too “cartoony” and aimed toward kids, which was immediately followed by its own backlash as I remembered, oh, that’s right: that’s what they’re supposed to be.
- May 15, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #102 | Back to school (age)
Here’s just one of my strange internal contradictions that I can’t explain: Even though I was raised on comics – Asterix was a series that I re-read with such regularity that there was a time when the pre-teen me could’ve easily rattled off plot points from multiple books before going on to tell you what book they were from, what puns were used in characters names in that same book and what (if any) continuity plot points were included in said book that would affect another book in the series – the subject of “all ages” comics is something that I am woefully under-educated in. Luckily, that’s about to change and it’s all down to one book.
- May 8, 2012 @ 04:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #101 | Second verse, same as the first?
And in today’s response to the question “Can’t you ever just be happy about something?” the answer seems to be “Apparently not.” After all, I can think of many reasons why I should be more upbeat about the return of Devil’s Due Publishing — not least of which is the promise to pay creators monies owed from the last incarnation of the company — but, to be honest, the best I can muster is a mix of apathy and cynicism. Where’s the joy?
- May 1, 2012 @ 04:30 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #100 | The Show That Should Never End
This weekend brings with it not only the promise of better weather – You should see the grim, grey skies outside my window as I type these words – but the annual wonder that is the Stumptown Comics Fest here in Portland, which is pretty much the one comic convention that I can’t bring myself to miss anymore.
Continue Reading »
- April 24, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #99 | Wunga Wunga Wunga Wunga
I admit; if you’d told me that my favorite comic of last week would’ve ended up being The Bionic Woman #1, I’m not sure that I would’ve believed you. That that’s the case, however, feels like the beginnings of a lesson about making this kind of book – and this kind of first issue – work for you in a way that I wouldn’t have expected.
- April 17, 2012 @ 03:33 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #98 | Comparisons, beware!
One of the easiest ways to sell someone on a new thing is to compare it to something else that they’re familiar with; it’s no coincidence that high concepts are generally described as “It’s [Title X] meets [Title Y]” so often, because even if you can’t explain the complexity or appeal of something to someone who’s never experienced it, that kind of shorthand is nonetheless successful at conjuring some kind of idea of what’s going on. The problem with doing this, though…? Well, sometimes the comparison examples aren’t serving the purpose as well as you may originally think. Continue Reading »
- April 10, 2012 @ 02:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #97 | How Buffy got her groove back
There were, let’s face it, numerous warning signs about Buffy: The Vampire Slayer Season Nine, not least of all the way that Season Eight had turned out. But adding a second ongoing book to the line? Joss Whedon only writing the first issue instead of the first arc, because of his commitments to Marvel’s The Avengers? There was, it seemed, little possibility that the series could regain the support or excitement it had at the launch of Season Eight. And then, to quote Jarvis Cocker, something changed. Continue Reading »
- April 3, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #96 | Here was where the money lay, classic art has had its day
I’ve never quite understood whether or not the whole notion of “artcomix” is meant to be an identifier, an insult, both or something else altogether.
That isn’t to say that comics can’t be art, because – well, come on, the idea that they can’t is just ridiculous. “Artcomix” as a thing, though, it makes me wrinkle my nose in distrust and wonder why we can’t just say “comics” for everything and get on with it. It’s not like there’s really a genre of comics called “Stupidcomix” and one called “Worthycomixthatyoushouldprobablyreadbutyou’llneverquitegetaroundtobecausecomeonreallysometimeslifeseemstooshort”; “art” isn’t even a genre, as such (Although there are, I guess, “art (house) movies,” but that, too, feels like too lazy a shorthand). It’s a thing in and of itself. Any genre can be (or have, or inspire) art, it’s not something that exists off to the side and stays to itself.
- March 27, 2012 @ 04:30 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #95 | Grud on a Greenie!
Here’s the thing: Considering how much that I love 2000AD and Judge Dredd, you’d think I’d be much more excited than I am about IDW Publishing’s announcement at WonderCon that they have the American rights for Dredd material. Sadly, I have enough of a memory to know that this might just lead to more fan heartbreak.
- March 20, 2012 @ 03:30 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #94 | Memory loss
Oddly — actually, thinking about it, perhaps not so oddly — one of the more pleasant types of columns to write (and one of the more popular to post, it seems) are the mea culpa ones. You know, where I say “I thought [Project X] wasn’t up to much, and then it turned out to be awesome!” Well, this is one of those, kind of … but instead of it being “I was just downright wrong,” it’s a little more complicated than that.
There was something about Dark Horse Presents that left me vaguely uncertain when it returned recently; maybe it was the price point, or perhaps the first issue itself, which seems more filled with creators of yesteryear than the original incarnation of the title, but I remember being oddly suspicious of the book, as if it has done something wrong in disappointing me. The problem wasn’t just that I had fond memories of the original Dark Horse Presents, which I remember finding in occasional bursts at small comic cons and marts in Glasgow, looking through long boxes of titles that I’d never heard of before, but that earlier revivals of the title had only set the bar even higher for what a Dark Horse Presents should mean.
- March 13, 2012 @ 04:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #93 | Dinner Party Conversation
It was, of course, that moment when talking to strangers that I dread, when said stranger finds out that I write about comic books for a living, and says “Do they still make those?” in a way that’s both entirely genuine and unsnarky and somehow more upsetting and offensive than if it had been the snarkiest, snippiest comment possible (I sometimes wonder what they’d do if I answered “No, I write about a dead art form that finished because you gave up on Super Friends all those years ago,” but then I remember that with the pop cultural landscape being what it is in these post-modern times, that that could theoretically be possible). After explaining that, yes, it’s a living and – in many ways – thriving medium, I got the inevitable follow-up question, which also happens to be the one I always enjoy answering: “So what would you recommend?” Continue Reading »
- March 6, 2012 @ 04:30 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #92 | What’s The Buzz, Tell Me What’s The Happenin’
Whether by plan or happenstance, it looks like 2012 is likely to turn into the year when Image Comics is more relevant to the comic industry than it’s been since it was first founded 20 years ago. The publisher isn’t just at the center of multiple conversations about the future of the industry as it stands today, it’s on the “right side” of the argument in so many (if not all) of them. Continue Reading »
- February 28, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #91 | Second time around
The unexpected thing about catching up on the output of the original Valiant line wasn’t that it made me more optimistic and enthusiastic about the upcoming relaunch of X-O Manowar and the entire Valiant Universe; part of me had been expecting that reaction based on the pedigree of those involved with the relaunch, if nothing else. What was a surprise, though, was that reading early issues of books like X-O and Harbinger made me think about the benefits of revivals and characters outlasting their original creators. Continue Reading »
- February 21, 2012 @ 05:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #90 | On the unreliability of memory and Wikipedia
One of the interesting things about the fact that Marvel and DC dominate comic book history – with a parallel stream for “alternative comics,” which is so vague as to include Robert Crumb, Chris Ware, Dan Clowes, Eddie Campbell and Marjane Satrapi, depending on who’s doing the defining at the time – is that everything else seems up for grabs. This past week, I found myself relying on the internet to find out about some of the 1990s publishers that have since gone the way of the fondly-remembered dodo, and the malleability of certain areas of history was brought home very, very clearly indeed.
- February 14, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan
The Middle Ground #89 | Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Comics, as everyone is fond of saying as they quote Jack Kirby, will break your heart. It’s true; you don’t have to look far to find something truly depressing about the industry – not the medium, never the medium, which is as fine as any and better than many – that just makes you want to shake your head in mild despair, whether its creators having little control over their work or receiving little to no reward from their publishers even as their creations appear in much-hyped movie trailers filling up the internet conversations. But what truly broke my heart recently was looking at the sales figures of indie books in the Diamond sales chart. Continue Reading »
- February 7, 2012 @ 03:00 PM by Graeme McMillan