editorial cartoons
Comics A.M. | Man discovers $12,000 Spider-Man comic in attic
Amazing Fantasy #15
Comics | While going through a box in his attic, a Grange Park, Illinois, man discovered a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15, the first appearance of Spider-Man, that he had bought as a kid. While other copies of the comic have fetched as much as $1.2 million, Chimera’s Comics is selling it for $12,000 due to its condition. [LaGrange Patch]
Comics | Brian Truitt profiles Marvel’s Fantastic Four, talking to Mark Waid, Tom Brevoort and Tom DeFalco about the long-running comic. [USA Today]
Publishing | Janna Morishima, formerly of Scholastic and Diamond Comic Distributors, has joined Papercutz as its first marketing director. [Papercutz]
- November 29, 2011 @ 06:55 AM by JK Parkin
Editorial cartoonist loses job following plagiarism allegations
It’s one thing to steal an idea and transform it into something new; lots of creators have stood on the shoulders of others. It’s another thing to copy something and make it into something worse.
The Daily Cartoonist has been hot on the tail of David Simpson, an editorial cartoonist for Oklahoma’s Urban Tulsa Weekly. The story started last week when blogger Alan Gardner noted similarities between one of Simpson’s cartoons and an old cartoon by the late Jeff MacNelly. They weren’t just similar concepts; Gardner overlaid the cartoons and they line up pretty well. He told the Poynter Institute’s Bob Andelman that it looked like Simpson didn’t photocopy the older cartoon but redrew it, down to the small details. The main difference between them was not visual but conceptual, as Schlock Mercenary creator Howard Tayler points out in comments to Gardner’s post:
- November 2, 2011 @ 07:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Cartoonists respond to London riots
The other day, Graeme McMillan asked why there are no news comics about the riots in the UK—he thinks that the immediacy of comics is exactly what is needed to fully convey a situation like this.
David Ziggy Greene’s comic What the F*** Just Happened? is a report from the scene, not a dispatch from the thick of the riots but a stroll through the aftermath. The comic includes a piercing insight into what the riots were all about, at least in one one shop in one neighborhood. On the other hand, Tom Humberstone accompanies his image of Londoners rebuilding with a blog post that argues that there are no simple answers to why the riots happened. Sally Jane Thompson also posts an illustration inspired by the riots, this one much more abstract in its concept than the other two.
Martin Rowson responds with an editorial cartoon.
(First two links via The Forbidden Planet blog.)
- August 15, 2011 @ 09:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Robot Reviews | Willie & Joe Back Home and Will Eisner’s PS Magazine
Willie & Joe: Back Home
Willie & Joe: Back Home
by Bill Mauldin
Fantagraphics, 288 pages, $29.99
PS Magazine: The Best of Preventive Maintenance Monthly
by Will Eisner; Selected and with an overview by Eddie Campbell
Abrams, 272 pages, $21.95
There can arguably be no finer example of how to completely sabotage a successful career than what cartoonist Bill Mauldin did upon returning back to the United States at the close of World War II. The youngest person (he was 23) to win the Pulitzer Prize at that time, his gag cartoons, featuring dirty, worn-down, battle-hardened, embittered soldiers (most notably the pair known as Willie & Joe), which ran in Stars and Stripes and later in national newspapers, allowed soldiers to vicariously let off steam — someone out there knew what they were going through — and gave the citizens back home a look at the war that few media outlets at the time provided.
- August 12, 2011 @ 01:00 PM by Chris Mautner
Comics A.M. | Mike Keefe wins Pulitzer; BOOM! loses Classic Disney titles?
From Mike Keefe's portfolio
Awards | Denver Post editorial cartoonist Mike Keefe has won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning “for his widely ranging cartoons that employ a loose, expressive style to send strong, witty messages.” Keefe, who joined the Post in 1975, had previously served in the Marines and taught math in college. “I am gobsmacked,” the 64-year-old cartoonist says. “In recent years, the Pulitzer has gone to much younger folks who are newer in the business. I’ve always done pretty classical editorial cartooning. I thought my day had passed.” Comic Riffs has Keefe’s award-winning portfolio. [Denver Post]
Publishing | On the heels of successive announcements that Marvel will publish comics based on Disney’s Pixar and Muppets properties, licenses previously held by BOOM! Studios, comes word that BOOM! has stopped soliciting Classic Disney series like Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse, Uncle Scrooge and Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories. However, Diamond’s Previews catalog for July contains listings for the publisher’s titles based on such Disney Afternoon properties as Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers, Darkwing Duck and DuckTales. [ICv2.com]
- April 19, 2011 @ 06:55 AM by Kevin Melrose
Tom Tomorrow to launch new political cartoon section for progressive powerhouse Daily Kos
They’re two Left tastes that’ll taste Left together: This Modern World cartoonist Tom Tomorrow and progressive pundit and activist Markos Moulitsas Zúniga have announced that Tomorrow is leaving his slot at the online magazine Salon to become the first-ever Comics Editor for Moulitsas’s popular liberal blog and political community, Daily Kos. Tomorrow’s final Salon comic ran today.
- March 29, 2011 @ 01:41 PM by Sean T. Collins
Comics A.M. | Borders nears Chapter 11; Diamond’s secret shopper results
Borders
Retailing | The financially troubled Borders Group reportedly could file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as soon as today or Tuesday, setting the stage to close about 200 of its 674 Borders and Waldenbooks stores and eliminate thousands of jobs. [The Wall Street Journal]
Retailing | Diamond Comic Distributors revealed that 98 percent of the more than 500 direct market stores visited by secret shoppers during the first month of day-early delivery were found to be in compliance with the program’s street-date requirements. According to Diamond, of the 10 stores discovered to be in violation of the agreement, one was reported by another retailer while the others were discovered by secret shoppers. [ICv2.com]
- February 14, 2011 @ 08:20 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | Two plead guilty to selling fake Comic-Con badges
Comic-Con International
Legal | Two Los Angeles men accused of selling counterfeit passes to this year’s Comic-Con International have pleaded guilty to theft and were placed on probation for three years. Farhad Lame and Navid Vatankhahan, both 24, were each ordered to pay a $750 fine, complete 10 days of community service and pay restitution to the victims.
Prosecutors say the two photocopied Comic-Con badges and sold them on Craigslist to people looking for last-minute memberships. They were arrested in July after two of their victims attempted to enter the convention using the counterfeit badges, which the women bought for $120 each. [The San Diego Union-Tribune]
Technology | Tech blog Chip Chick names DC Entertainment President Diane Nelson as one of its “Top 13 Women Who Impacted Technology in 2010.” [Chip Chick]
- December 28, 2010 @ 06:42 AM by Kevin Melrose
Grab a pawful of early and rare Bill Watterson art
Bill Watterson: The College Years
Face it, tiger-lovers — you just hit the jackpot: Check out this terrific gallery of early and rare art by Calvin & Hobbes cartoonist Bill Watterson. Included are pieces from the Kenyon College yearbook and student newspaper, covers from the political-cartooning journal Target, Watterson’s own editorial cartoons from the Cincinnatti Post, illustrations for an essay in The Comics Journal, self-portraits, a collection of Calvin & Hobbes sketches, and much more. The site design indicates that this is about a million Internet years old and thus many of you may have seen it before, but I sure haven’t, and it’s great way to see whole new side of Watterson — and a demonstration that his chops were ample even at a tender age.
(via Andrew Sullivan and Gavon Laessig)
- December 7, 2010 @ 02:30 PM by Sean T. Collins
Comics A.M. | The graphic novel market, and webcomic economics
Diamond Book Distributors
Publishing | Calvin Reid interviews Kuo-Yu Liang, vice president of sales and marketing at Diamond Book Distributors, about the state of graphic novel sales, the international market, manga and more: “I think we are entering the golden age of selling graphic novels. The demographics and the audience are both broadening. We are lucky that the core readers have stuck with us through the recession. We are finding new readers crossing over from literary, commercial, speculative and genre fiction. Non-fiction graphic novels are doing well. We’re getting more kids and parents (I’ll talk more about that later). I also think the growth of internet shopping has changed the game, because now it is easier than ever to find what you like to read, and get recommendation from fellow readers. The key is still good books. Without them, we don’t have an industry.” [Publishers Weekly]
Publishing | Heidi MacDonald spotlights BOOM! Studios, with a focus on the publisher’s marketing efforts. “The secret to our success to go to the thing that other people haven’t done; it isn’t to go head to head against people, or trying to take their market share away or trying to duplicate their editorial style,” says co-founder Ross Richie. “We’ve had to invent a space in the market place to exist. ” [Publishers Weekly]
- November 24, 2010 @ 07:41 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | Another One Piece sales record, another cartoonist layoff
One Piece, Vol. 6
Publishing | The 60th volume of Eiichiro Oda’s popular pirate manga One Piece sold more than 2 million copies in its first four days of release. It’s the first book to move more than 2 million copies in its first week of sales since the Japanese market survey company Oricon began reporting its charts in 2008. As we reported last week, this volume’s 3.4 million-copy first printing set a record, and propelled the series past the 200 million-copy mark. [Anime News Network]
Editorial cartoons | Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Matt Davies has been laid off by the Gannett-owned Journal News in White Plains, N.Y. [Comic Riffs]
Publishing | Abrams has made three comics-related promotions: Susan Van Metre to senior vice president and publisher, overseeing all comic arts books as well as Abrams Books for Young Readers and Amulet Books; Charles Kochman to editorial director of Abrams ComicArts; and Chad W. Beckerman to creative director, overseeing design for all comic arts books as well as Abrams Books for Young Readers and Amulet Books. [Abrams]
- November 11, 2010 @ 08:39 AM by Kevin Melrose
Move over chromium: Check out the googly-eyes-enhanced cover for the new anti-Michele Bachmann comic
it beats a replica of Aunt May's tombstone
Finally, a cover gimmick that Real Americans can get behind. That eye-catching image above is of the cover to False Witness! The Michele Bachmann Story #4. Written by Bill Prendergast with art by Kevin Cannon, Danno Klanowski, Lupi McGinty, and James Powell, it’s the latest in a series of satirical takedowns of the Minnesota Republican Congressperson, mostly using her own outlandish quotes as ammo. This issue focuses on her religious views, and as such it features the disembodied head of Jesus Christ floating around like the Wizard of Oz with actual plastic googly eyes pasted on top. God Bless America!
The issue retails for $4 and can be purchased at BiasedLiberalMedia.com, but be warned: Only the first 500 copies will be googly-eye-enhanced. (Via Talking Points Memo, who have an extensive review.)
- October 18, 2010 @ 10:00 AM by Sean T. Collins
Straight talk for cartoonists from Daryl Cagle
Daryl Cagle
Editorial cartoonists seem to be going the way of buggy-whip makers; the past few years have brought a litany of layoffs and, at least from the outside, it looks like staff cartoonists are becoming a thing of the past.
Cartoonist Daryl Cagle posted some surprisingly frank advice for editorial cartoonists on his blog this week. Depending on how you look at it, this is shrewd business advice or an enticement to dumb down and sell out.
Some of this is good nuts-and-bolts advice for freelancers: Think of what your editors want (not what you want to draw), plan ahead for holiday and seasonal cartoons, sell your archived cartoons on a per-use basis, and avoid local papers — there’s no money in that market. Learn to draw — words alone can’t carry a cartoon.
But it is also rather disturbing. Let’s return to that first point, about pleasing editors:
- September 30, 2010 @ 12:30 PM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Piracy
Legal | A bill introduced this week in the U.S. Senate would allow the Justice Department to seek court orders against piracy websites located anywhere in the world. The bipartisan legislation, called the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, would permit the government to seek an injunction ordering a U.S. domain registrar or registry to stop resolving an infringing site’s domain names. That means a visitor attempting to access a targeted piracy site would instead get an error message. Domains outside of U.S. control could be blocked by Internet service providers upon a court order. [Threat Level, ICv2.com]
Business | Time Warner has extended the contract of Warner Bros. Chairman and CEO Barry Meyer through December 2013 as part of a management restructuring that sees WB President and COO Alan Horn shifting from his current position into a consultancy role in six months. And in a move that may look vaguely familiar to watchers of DC Entertainment, Warner Bros. executives Jeff Robinov, Bruce Rosenblum and Kevin Tsujihara will share as part of a new Office of the President that will report directly to Meyer beginning in April. DC Entertainment President Diane Nelson reports to Robinov, currently president of Warner Bros. Picture Group; it’s unknown whether that will change in the new structure. [The Hollywood Reporter]
- September 23, 2010 @ 08:23 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
The Thing
Publishing | Marvel reportedly has issued a round of Digital Millennium Copyright Act notices to Google in an effort targeting Blogger sites that serve as clearinghouses for links to pirated comics. (Blogger was purchased by Google in 2003.) One such blog, Comics Invasion, already has been shut down. [Bleeding Cool]
Passings | Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Paul Conrad passed away Saturday of natural causes. He was 86. The winner of three Pulitzers, an achievement matched by just two other cartoonists in the post-World War II era, Conrad worked for the Los Angeles Times for nearly 30 years, and earned a place on President Nixon’s infamous “enemies list.” [Los Angeles Times, Comic Riffs]
- September 7, 2010 @ 09:08 AM by Kevin Melrose