Avengers Assemble

Saturday at the New York Comic Con brought news for the Avengers, Superman, Legendary Comics and … Disney’s Prep & Landing? Here’s a round-up of announcements from the show today.

• With a big, blockbuster Avengers movie scheduled for next May, Marvel announced a new ongoing series, Avengers Assemble, by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Mark Bagley. The book will launch next March and will feature most of the Avengers featured in the movie — Iron Man, Captain America, Black Widow, Hawkeye and the Hulk. The first arc will feature the villainous group the Zodiac.

• Speaking of that big, blockbuster Avengers movie, fans were treated to new footage from it featuring Bruce Banner and the Black Widow. Tom Hiddleston spoke to CBR about his work on the film.

• Marvel also announced that writer Rick Remender and artist Gabriel Hardman will take over Secret Avengers with issue #21.1, adding new members and pitting them against a new Masters of Evil.

• At the Cup O’ Joe panel today, Marvel also announced a Disney/Marvel crossover — Prep & Landing: Mansion: Impossible. It features the elves from the Disney television special who prepare homes for the arrival of Santa Claus every Christmas eve — only this time they’re trying to break into Avengers Mansion to get it ready for Santa. Written by director Kevin Deters and drawn by story artist Joe Mateo, the story will run in the back of the Marvel Adventures books as well as Avengers #19 in November.

• Marvel CCO Joe Quesada also announced that Marvel will publish a comic based on the Showtime television show Dexter. Novelist Jeff Lindsay will bring the popular character to comics with an all-new ongoing series with new stories set in the world of the Dexter novels

• During their All Access: Superman panel, DC Comics plans to release a second Superman: Earth One graphic novel next fall, by writer J. Michael Straczynski and artist Shane Davis. They showed off the book’s cover, and Davis revealed the Parasite will appear in it.

• It was confirmed that Keith Giffen and Dan Jurgens will take over Superman from George Perez beginning with issue #7.

• DC’s CCO Geoff Johns and artist Gary Frank have been tapped for “The Curse of Shazam,” a back-up story that will appear in Justice League starting with issue #5.

• Fans were treated to the first episode of Warner Bros. upcoming Green Lantern animated series. The first scene is available to view online.

• Jeph Loeb and Simone Bianchi will bring back Sabretooth, the character they decapitated some years back.

• Harold Parrineau will voice Blade in the upcoming Blade Anime from Marvel.

• Top Cow announced that David Hine will take over as writer of The Darkness, and a second volume of his comic with Shaky Kane, Bulletproof Coffin, is in the works.

Dragon Age

• Dark Horse Comics, who already have the license for Bioware’s Mass Effect video game, will publish digital comics based on the video game series Dragon Age. The comics will feature characters from the first and second game — Isabela, Alistair and Varric. (As a huge Dragon Age fan, I can’t help but wonder, which Alistair will appear in the comics? I have three different saved games on my Playstation 3 — one where Alistair became king, one where he became a drunk and one where the new queen of Ferelden had him killed. It’s likely not the third Alistair).

• Famed creator Mike Kaluta is working on a “big, meaty graphic novel” based on the John Milton poem Paradise Lost. Legendary Comics will publish it.

• Legendary will also publish a collection of Paul Pope’s The One Trick Rip-Off, an early work first published by Dark Horse.

• Viz Media will replace its Shonen Jump magazine with a weekly digital magazine called Weekly Shonen Jump Alpha.

• Steve Jackson Game will introduce a card game based on Image’s Skullkickers.

• Lucasfilm debuted a poster for the upcoming film Red Tails, drawn by Joe Kubert.

• And finally, ABC showed a sneak preview of their hey-isn’t-that-kinda-like-Fables TV show Once Upon a Time. A fan asked about the similarities between Once Upon a Time, Fables and NBC’s Grimm. “I haven’t seen what the movies are doing and I haven’t read those scripts,” said creator Edward Kitsis. “For us, this is our interpretation of this world. Fairy tales have become a genre the way science fiction is a genre, and I am always up for watching someone in a spaceship heading somewhere on a mission, and this is our version of that.”

An ominous-looking postcard from Marvel arrived today at the Comic Book Resources offices teasing “It’s coming.” What It might be is anyone’s guess, but the note on the back from Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso promises we’ll find out more Oct. 15 at the “Cup O’ Joe” panel at New York Comic-Con.

Comic Book Resources will, of course, be covering the entire four-day convention, which kicks off Oct. 13 at the Jacob Javits Center. Marvel also encourages those who can’t attend to catch the announcement live at 5 p.m. ET Oct. 15 at Marvel.com/itscoming. “Because trust me,” Alonso writes, “you won’t want to miss this.”

Legal

Legal | Prosecutors in Macomb County, Michigan, rested their case Friday in the second trial of Michael George, a former retailer and convention organizer accused of the 1990 murder of his first wife Barbara in the back room of their Clinton Township comic store. The judge this morning will hear a defense motion for a directed verdict, seeking dismissal due to lack of evidence, before testimony resumes.

George, now 51, was arrested in August 2007, after a detective reopened the cold case, and convicted seven months later of first-degree murder and insurance fraud, among other counts, and sentenced to life in prison. However, the judge later set aside the verdict, citing prosecutorial misconduct — George’s mug shot was shown to the jury — and the release of new evidence that could lead the jury to believe another person was responsible for the murder. His retrial began Sept. 14, and should conclude this week. Prosecutors contend that George staged the killing to look like a robbery so he could collect money from an insurance policy and a shared estate, and start over with another woman. George insists he was asleep at the time of the shooting, and that his wife was the victim of a robbery gone wrong. [Daily Tribune]

Publishing | Chip Mosher, marketing and sales director for BOOM! Studios, left the publisher on Friday after four years. Marketing coordinator Emily McGuiness will take over his duties. [BOOM! Studios]

Publishing | Papercutz has acquired the license for the Three Stooges, allowing the company to reprint classic comics and adapt the 2012 Farrelly brothers movie. [ICv2.com]

Three #2

Awards | Prism Comics awarded its 2011 Queer Press Grant to veteran cartoonist and publisher Robert Kirby for his anthology Three. “I’m slightly overwhelmed, humbly grateful and excited, and full of renewed energy for proceeding with Three — which is now more than ever my magic number,” Kirby wrote on his blog. [Prism Comics]

Awards | Katie Longua has won the 2011 Isotope Award for Excellence in Mini-Comics, presented over the weekend by San Francisco’s Isotope: The Comic Book Lounge. Previous winners include Joshua M. Cotter, Danica Novgorodoff, Will Dinski, Max Riffner and Daniel Merlin Goodbrey. [Twitter]

Awards | The entries have been posted for the 2011 SPACE Prize, which will be presented April 21, 2012, at SPACE 2012 in Columbus, Ohio. [SPACE Prize]

Publishing | Geek Out looks at recent moves at Archie Comics, primarily the introduction of gay character Kevin Keller. [CNN.com]

Emma #1

Publishing | Geek Out also stumbles across comic-book adaptations of classic, and contemporary, novels, and seeks out artists Janet Lee and R. Sikoryak, and writer Nancy Butler. [CNN.com]

Creators | The New York Times spotlights the Sunday routine of Joe Quesada: “I am pretty much working all the time. I don’t have a set schedule, per se — it’s just a matter of what comes across my e-mail first. I’ll be reading an animation script, working on an animatic for one of our shows, or drawing covers for our books. I have an iPad that’s set to ping whenever I get an e-mail from work. On weekends, there’s very little pinging, so it’s a good time to sit and draw. I listen to music when I draw — a majority of it is the Beatles.” [The New York Times]

Creators | Dave Gibbons discusses the state of the comics industry, digital comics, and the long shadow of Watchmen. [The Huffington Post UK]

Grant Morrison

Creators | A profile of Grant Morrison is pegged to his Action Comics relaunch and an announced adaptation of his forthcoming graphic novel Dominion: Dinosaur vs. Aliens. [Daily Record]

Creators | J.H. Williams III is profiled by his local newspaper, which focuses, of course, on the newly launched Batwoman. [Merced Sun-Star]

Creators | Mike Carey talks about creating the story for the X-Men: Destiny video game, and touches upon his tenure on Vertigo’s Hellblazer. [God Is a Geek]

Comics | Darryl Ayo explains Frank Miller’s Holy Terror this way: It’s cartooning, using the full power of the medium and eschewing an “adult” subtlety: “What makes Frank Miller special isn’t that he’s a great writer (he’s not) or that he’s an expert draftsman (he is, though) … what makes Miller special is that he can make things look heavy and light at the same time. That he can have ‘Batman’ vault through the great expanse of the hazy, scratchy page and land roughly, awkwardly and gracefully at the same time.” [Comix Cube]

Craft | Kevin Czap admires the way that both James Kochalka and Ron Rege Jr. compose their comics with the whole page in mind, ensuring that all the elements are perfectly balanced. [Comix Cube]

Atomic Comics' Chandler, Arizona, location

Atomic Comics, the nationally known Arizona retail chain, abruptly closed all four locations on Sunday, shocking staff, customers and industry figures alike. Although the closing of the stores in Mesa, Phoenix, Chandler and Paradise Valley was initially announced last night by multiple employees and creators, owner Michael Malve confirmed the news this morning in an installment of his weekly newsletter titled “My Final Report.”

“As some of you may have already heard, after 25 years of running a successful business, sadly and much to my dismay, I have shut the doors of Atomic Comics,” Malve wrote. “The villain in this tragedy is the economy. I had hoped to be the superhero and triumph over the recession, but sadly the economic downturn of the past 5 years has proven to be unsustainable.”

In the newsletter, which can be read below, Malve revealed he’s filed for bankruptcy, and that he and his family are losing their home, ” as we had secured it against our leases which we obviously have to break.”

“I know there are many people out there facing very similar situations in these difficult times and now I can definitely empathize with them,” he continued. “I have always been and will forever be an extremely optimistic person and will look at this situation as an adventure. I have very high hopes for the next chapter of my life.”

Well regarded nationally for its in-store signings, innovative marketing and sheer size — it was believed to be among Diamond Comic Distributors’ largest accounts — Atomic gained international exposure last year when its name and logo were featured prominently in Kick-Ass, the film adaptation of the comic by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. The chain began in 1988, when Malve opened Bubba’s Comic Store in Phoenix. A year later he moved to Mesa, renaming the business Atomic Comics.

Malve, a major supporter of The Hero Initiative, sent a weekly newsletter to colleagues, creators and publishers, breaking down sales at his four stores. Although Malve was forthright in the emails, grumbling about the state of the market, there apparently were few indications that he was on the brink of closing until he commented in his Aug. 17 report that, “I don’t know how I am going to afford September at this point.”

The news triggered immediate reactions from the likes of Jim Lee, Joe Quesada — “The best retailer I’ve ever met closed his doors” — Brian Michael Bendis, Warren Ellis, Kevin Smith and Dan Slott.

However, it also led some to try to pinpoint a cause, and to sound the alarm. Controversial retailer Larry Doherty chimed in, “If Mike Malve has fallen we could ALL be doomed. His genius in retail is the high water mark,” later adding, “Print runs are REALLY low. Publishers that market digital to the SAME customer base just put Atomic Comics out of business.” Retailer and promoter Jimmy Jay replied, “if Atomic has fallen, it didn’t happen overnight. [...] Digital didn’t kill Atomic, that is simplification.”

But then Rob Liefeld weighed in, writing, “Atomic Comics is a cautionary tale of hype over commerce. [...] Hate that this will turn into a blight on the comics industry when it is isolated to a specific chain, not all encompassing. [...] Once again, terrible news about Atomic Comics. Confident the AZ. Comic scene will recover and Malve will rise again.”

Note: The article has been edited to reflect the content of Malve’s newsletter.

Read the full text of Malve’s “Final Report” below:

My Final Report

As some of you may have already heard, after 25 years of running a successful business, sadly and much to my dismay, I have shut the doors of Atomic Comics. The villain in this tragedy is the economy. I had hoped to be the superhero and triumph over the recession, but sadly the economic downturn of the past 5 years has proven to be unsustainable.

For over 20 years I ran a successful and debt free business, provided jobs for up to 60 employees at a time, with some working for me for 16 plus years!  I saw profits of up to 5 million during our best years. My wife recently bought me a copy of the book, “ONWARD” by Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks. I could really identify with some of the problems Starbucks had faced. Some similarities were that during the best of times, Atomic Comics, like Starbucks, expanded into high profile locations, but when the economy went sour, low sales could not support the higher rent at these high visibility locations. The leases at these particular stores which had originally provided the consumers with greater visibility and more foot traffic to our wonderful world of comic books, the higher overhead proved to be too much for Atomic as we faced declining sales.

As Atomic was seeing such success, we opened our headquarters which housed our shipping and receiving department, home base for our web store and worldwide mail order operation. We closed the headquarters down in May of 2010. I think the catalyst for Atomics’ downfall, as some of you may remember, occurred in October of 2006, just as the recession was beginning,  when a 16 year old uninsured driver, drover her car through the window of our Mesa Superstore, our largest and greatest revenue producer. This in turn caused a flood as the water main had been hit. This caused such severe damage and loss that we had to shut down for over 5 months. The damages were so severe we lost close to a million dollars in product. The loss of revenue due to being closed all those months as we headed into retail’s busiest season was astronomical. What really stood out to me was how many of Atomics’ customers were lost as we rebuilt the store. It seemed as if half our customers never returned. The great mystery to me is what exactly happened to all those missing customers. I can only speculate that once you take away the habit of weekly buying-it is hard to jump back into it. Since there was not another comic shop in the immediate area, I can only assume customers found other means to obtain their comics, maybe they started driving great distances to hit up other stores, some possibly went the way of the internet and are now ordering their books online or perhaps even downloading their books illegally, or maybe even some stopped collecting comics altogether.

I have some great memories of my regular customers, seeing these people week in and week out. Some for as many as 25 years of not missing a beat as they picked up their books. Bringing the new readers into comics by doing various promotions and events was something I enjoyed a great deal and will truly miss. Hopefully the customers and fans I cultivated will find new a new place to call home and get their geek on. To all my fellow comic book retailers out there, I truly hope you do not succumb to the same fate, can see this recession thru, and continue to be successful and flourish. I will be here rooting for you!  With DC’s September release of the #1’s, Marvel’s makeover of key books and continual growth, and other publishers working hard with some amazing new and exciting content, there is hope on the horizon for the direct market! I have enjoyed sharing thoughts and ideas with all these other retailers. Much love and appreciation to you all.

I have been blessed since day one to be surrounded by so many incredible people. There is no way that Atomic would have lasted all these years without everyone’s effort and support. To all of my employees past and present, friends in the industry, and business contacts I have made over the years, I plan on staying in touch. If I made a list of all the many people who have helped and supported me over the years the list would be lengthy beyond belief! So I’ll keep it short. At Atomic I would like to thank Bill Mitchell, Dale Worthington, Julian Moraga, and Mike Ueber. I have had hundreds of great employees over the years that went above and beyond as they dedicated themselves to making Atomic Comics a very special place. Someone who has given me an incredible amount of support is Ryan Liebowitz from Golden Apple Comics. He and his family have bent over backwards providing me with ideas and words of encouragement to keep me going. Ironically, Ryan’s father, Bill Liebowitz was my good friend and mentor when I opened my first store 25 years ago. I would like to thank and give credit to Joe Quesada, Mark Waid, and Jim McLaughlin for inspiring me to write this weekly report over a decade ago. It was conceived at Megacon as we hung out talking about the industry. I had already been writing a very informal monthly report just checking in on sales with the guys at Wizard magazine, but I don’t believe anyone was receiving true and accurate sales numbers until this weekly report began. I had wanted to portray a candid-no holds barred account of what was and what wasn’t selling. Lastly, I want to give a shout out and thank everyone in the comic and entertainment industry for their continued support over the years.

Making the decision to file bankruptcy was very difficult and painful. I have had a very wide range of emotions.  My family and I are headed into uncharted waters which is very scary for my wife and I as well as our children. We are losing our home as we had secured it against our leases which we obviously have to break. I know there are many people out there facing very similar situations in these difficult times and now I can definitely empathize with them. I have always been and will forever be an extremely optimistic person and will look at this situation as an adventure. I have very high hopes for the next chapter of my life. I have the support of my wonderful wife, Andrea, my kids, Alexandra & Jack, many loving family members, and lots of great friends. My passion in life, second of course to my family, is the comic book industry, of which I hope to remain a part of in the years to come. I don’t plan on giving any public interviews and would like mine and my family’s privacy respected so we can work on rebuilding our lives.

Sincerely

Mike Malve

Atomic Comics name and logo in "Kick-Ass"

Atomic Comics name and logo in "Kick-Ass"

Update: Jhonen Vasquez shares his thoughts in our comments section: “Atomic was the first big signing I ever did, and the first I had done outside of California when I was first starting out. From the very moment I met the guy, Mike treated me not like the malformed horror most people see me as, but like a friend and a huge supporter of my work. Loved signing at Atomic then and for years on and I wish Mike and everyone from Atomic well.”

View from the cheap seats ...

I won’t have as much to say about the last day of D23 as I did about Friday or Saturday. We were late getting started Sunday morning, which meant I was late to the big Cup ‘o Joe presentation, Marvels’ first foray into the D23 world (except for the five minutes or so they had at the end of the movie presentation on Saturday, of course). We went to the arena when we arrived and headed for the cheap seats; during Saturday’s big movie bonanza, the place was packed to the rafters, but there were only a few people up on level three when we arrived. The sections beneath us seemed to be pretty full, though. Marvel Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada was wrapping up his presentation and getting ready to take questions as we sat down.

And I gotta say, the question were actually pretty lively. They included:

–It started with a question about the possibility of more Broadway musicals after Spider-Man:Turn Off the Dark, to which Quesada responded there weren’t any plans right now.
–Another person asked why Marvel didn’t have a booth at D23, which brought applause from the audience. Quesada said as the creative guy he honestly didn’t know, but pointed out this was their first time to attend the show and maybe they’d have one next time.
–The next question was about reboots, and Quesada said they don’t do hard reboots — their characters still have the same histories. He then explained how the Ultimate Universe is a separate, alternate universe that’s only been around for 10 years. I’ve had these kinds of conversations with non-comic reading friends who keep seeing news stories about DC reboots and Miles Morales, so I could feel his pain.
–Will Marvel ever have a presence at any Disney parks? Quesada said there have been talks, but couldn’t elaborate.
–Another fan said he loved Howard the Duck, and wanted to know if Marvel had more plans for him, and if we’d find out he’s related to Donald. Quesada chuckled and mentioned the legal troubles between Marvel and Disney over Howard before Quesada was CEO. He also pointed out that the 25th anniversary of the Howard the Duck movie was coming up. No mention of Fearsome Four, though.
–Several fans asked about the possibility of Marvel doing Disney comics now that BOOM!’s Disney line was coming to an end. One fan (the same one who thanked Quesada for his work on Booster Gold) suggested that if Marvel did a Darkwing Duck comic, they should hire the creative team of Ian Brill and James Silvani, who work on the comic for BOOM! Studios. Quesada said where these licenses go is really up to Disney, pointing out they’ve done a few comics with them.
–Another fan asked if Marvel would be doing any stories that reference the “end of the world” coming in 2012, per the Mayan Calendar. Quesada said the world ends in Marvel comics every week.
–Is a Deadpool movie in the works? Quesada said that’s in FOX’s hands, but said Ryan Reynolds makes a better Deadpool than a Green Lantern.

After that we made another round on the floor, hit a few booths to buy stuff (lines! lines! lines! at all the shops!), and ended up spending some time just sitting in the D23 lounge they had for members upstairs. We were tired, it had the low light thing going, so we almost went to sleep. They also had free cookies!

And that was pretty much it. There was a Star Tours panel we thought about attending, but we were kinda conned out by then, so we headed back to our hotel to pack up and get ready for the trip home.

Robert Crumb

Creators | Robert Crumb has decided not to attend Graphic 2011, an arts festival scheduled for Aug. 20-21 at the Sydney Opera House in Australia. Crumb told The Australian he withdrew from his headline appearance because of an article in the Australian newspaper The Telegraph that called him “a self-confessed sex pervert.”

“It’s a very, very disappointing situation,” Graphic co-curator Jordan Verzar wrote on the show’s Facebook page. “There were a legion of people eagerly anticipating his visit and the Graphic team and Sydney Opera House had been working for months to pull together the shows he was involved with and to supply an enjoyable first visit to Australia for him. I sincerely doubt that he will ever make it to Australia now. It’s a very sad day, but I’m still excited and looking forward to the rest of the great shows happening at Graphic next weekend.” [The Australian]

Retailers | Birmingham, England comics shop Nostalgia and Comics was damaged during the riots of the past few days; no one was injured, but the windows were broken. [The Forbidden Planet blog]

Comic strips | For Better or For Worse creator Lynn Johnston has posted her entire foreword for Fantagraphics’ The Complete Peanuts (1981-1982) on her site. [For Better or For Worse, via Flog]

Creators | Batman annotator David Uzumeri interviews Grant Morrison about, well, Batman, as well as Action Comics, Multiversity and more. [ComicsAlliance]

"Saga," from Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

Creators | Nathan Wilson interviews Fiona Staples, one of the creators who was name-checked a lot during last week’s women-in-DC-comics discussions. Don’t get your hopes up, though: Staples would rather be drawing horror comics. “You’re limited by a lot of things when dealing with superheroes. There are constraints from the fans, the publishers, and the companies who own the characters. There are the decades of history that bind the characters. It’s possible to be innovative with them, but it’s a struggle.” [Graphic Novel Reporter]

Creators | In a pair of interviews, J.H. Williams III discusses his career and the long-anticipated debut of Batwoman: “I’ve always handled female characters, dating back to my time as co-creator on Chase, then Promethea, and then Desolation Jones, to show how strong they are.  I’m not interested in drawing sexy vixens, but rather realistic women.  I find this much more attractive and beautiful.  This allows them to be fully formed characters, and not just fantasy objects.  It allows you to get involved with them.” [ComicsBlog, Multiversity]

Creators | We all know about musicians who make comics; Josh Flanagan takes a look at comics creators who make music, from Scott Pilgrim creator Bryan Lee O’Malley to Joe Quesada (seen filling in on guitar with Kirby Krackle). Rock on! [iFanboy]

Crawl to Me #1

Creators | Alex Dueben talks with Alan Robert about Crawl to Me, his new horror miniseries from IDW Publishing. [Suicide Girls]

Creators | Steve Bennett takes a look back at Carleton Waugh and his comic strip Hank, the story of a serviceman returning to civilian life after World War II: “Hank had also lost a leg in the war and he just one of a number of wounded servicemen being targeted by a group of leftover isolationists to ferment discontent and spread racist, anti-Semitic propaganda. The politics were extremely progressive and according to Waugh the strip was ‘a deliberate attempt to work in the field of social usefulness’.” From an artistic point of view, Waugh did some interesting experimentation with lettering, but alas, most of the strips have disappeared. [Super I.T.C.H.]

Commentary | Call this “Caleb reads the comments so you don’t have to”: Robot 6 contributor J. Caleb Mozzocco provides a quick roundup, with links, at the big comics controversies of the past week or so, in case you were too busy living your own life to follow them closely. [Every Day Is Like Wednesday]

Reviews | Rob Clough reviews Jason’s Isle of 100,000 Graves. [The Comics Journal]

Reviews | Richard Bruton dives into the latest Alan Moore opus, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen—Century 1969. [The Forbidden Planet blog]

Craft | Gerry Giovinco meditates on how hard it actually was to draw a straight line (let alone a curved one) before we had computers to do it for us. [CO2 Comics]

D23 Expo

Although a lot of folks are focused on Comic-Con International and the roll out of the panel schedule this week, Disney’s D23 Expo announced their “arena schedule” for their next event, scheduled for Aug. 19-21 in Anaheim.

I attended the first D23 event two years ago, and the arena presentation were by far the highlight of the weekend. They were announcement-filled, star-studded affairs with all sorts of Disney flair. For instance, the presentation by Walt Disney Studios included appearances by John Travolta, Nicholas Cage, Robert Zemeckis, Tim Burton, the Muppets and Johnny Depp dressed as Jack Sparrow, as they announced the latest Pirates of the Caribbean movie. And during the Disney Parks presentation, Darth Vader and a load of stormtroopers came out to announce the Star Tours upgrade.

The first D23 Expo was held right after Disney had announced they were buying Marvel, so the House of Ideas didn’t have a presence. But what a difference two years makes, as Marvel CCO Joe Quesada will host a session on Marvel on Sunday, and Kevin Feige, president of production for Marvel Studios, will join the movie presentation on Saturday. Does that mean we’ll get to see all the Avengers come out on stage in their costumes? One can only hope.

You can find the complete arena schedule after the jump.

*****

Friday, August 19, 2011

11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. 2011 Disney Legends Ceremony – Hosted by Tom Bergeron. Honorees Regis Philbin; Jim Henson; Disney Princesses Jodi Benson, Paige O’Hara, Lea Salonga, Linda Larkin and Anika Noni Rose; Bo Boyd; Jack and Bonita Wrather; Guy Williams and Ray Watson will be inducted as Disney Legends for their contribution to the creative legacy of The Walt Disney Company in a special presentation exclusively for D23 Expo guests.

3:30 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. Walt Disney Parks and Resorts – Join Tom Staggs, Chairman of Walt Disney Parks & Resorts, as he gives D23 guests a special behind-the-scenes glimpse into some of the exciting projects currently underway at Disney’s parks and resorts around the world.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. The Walt Disney Studios – A fascinating behind-the-scenes glimpse at the exciting roster of projects on the horizon at The Walt Disney Studios. From exclusive video clips and live performances to filmmaker discussions and star appearances, this session will be hosted by Rich Ross, Chairman, The Walt Disney Studios; Sean Bailey, President of Production, The Walt Disney Studios; John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer, Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios; and Kevin Feige, President of Production, Marvel Studios.

6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. The Lion King 3D Exclusive D23 Screening – Disney fans will have access to an exclusive advance screening of The Lion King in Disney Digital 3D(tm), ahead of the film’s highly anticipated theatrical and home entertainment releases. “The Circle of Life” takes on a new dimension as Simba, Mufasa, Nala, Timon and Pumbaa grace the screen once again, this time in breathtaking 3D.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. Marvel Comics – An exclusive and unprecedented experience that will take you through the evolution of Marvel from its first comic book in 1939 to its current position as one of the most important creative forces in the world. During this presentation, which will include interactive Q&A segments, you will not
only get an inside glimpse of the history of Marvel and its iconic Super Heroes but also discover why Marvel truly is the House of Ideas. This session will be hosted by Joe Quesada, Marvel’s Chief Creative Officer and one of the most respected and sought after writers and artists in the entertainment industry.

2:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. Disney Channel – Fans are invited to experience the excitement of a spectacular live performance, featuring stars of Disney Channel’s hit series Shake It Up. From meeting the cast of television’s first dance-driven sitcom and learning moves from a Disney Channel dance master to a special panel, autograph session and more, this unforgettable experience awaits Disney fans of all ages.

Action Comics #1

A ruling by a federal magistrate judge could open the door for Warner Bros. to gain access to confidential documents the studio insists support its claims against the attorney representing the heirs of creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in their fight for the rights to Superman.

Variety reports that U.S. Magistrate Judge Ralph Zarefsky ruled Wednesday that the documents, stolen from the office of attorney Marc Toberoff and delivered anonymously to Warner Bros. in December 2008, were not protected by attorney-client privilege. However, he postponed a final ruling until Toberoff and his attorneys can seek a decision from U.S. District Judge Judge Otis Wright.

At the time of the theft, a judge ruled that the documents were privileged, and ordered the studio to turn them over to a court officer within 24 hours. However, an attached seven-page cover letter called the “Superman-Marc Toberoff Timeline” was not privileged, and became the basis for Warner Bros.’ 2010 lawsuit against the attorney. The complaint alleges that Toberoff “orchestrated a web of collusive agreements” with the Siegel and Shuster heirs, leading them to reject “mutually beneficial” longtime deals with DC Comics and seek to recapture the Superman copyright. In addition, the studio claims Toberoff schemed to secure for himself “a majority and controlling financial stake” in the Superman rights.

Just last month Zarefsky rejected the studio’s argument that the documents, which purportedly contain a formula for how the two estates and Toberoff would divide the Superman assets, violate the U.S. Copyright Act and, therefore, cannot be isolated from discovery. But this week he determined that Toberoff actually waived privilege when he turned over the documents last year in response to a grand jury subpoena issued after Toberoff met with the U.S. Attorney’s office to discuss an investigation of the theft.

The decision is only the latest twist in Warner Bros.’ increasingly bitter legal battle to hold onto Superman following a 2008 ruling that Siegel’s widow Joanne Siegel and daughter Laura Siegel Larson had successfully recaptured half of the original copyright to the Man of Steel under the provisions of the 1976 Copyright Act. The window will open in 2013 for Shuster’s estate to do the same.

He just looks so ominous...

It’s been awhile, but did the hair rise up on the back of your neck as of late? Did a cold wind blow through you? Even before I caught the news of the major editorial change at ol’ Marvel HQ, something didn’t feel …right.

And it’s not Axel Alonso. I’m actually stupendously happy that we have such an awesome new EIC; not only do a bunch of cool writers constantly refer to him as the man who got them their first writing gig at the House of Ideas, but the way he balances this new talent with the old brings out the best stories in each of them. He’s a really great editor and, with his name in the indicia, you know you’re going to get a quality story.

Not to mention he has been just about the only Marvel envoy at the West Coast WonderCon for the past few years and is fervent in his desire to keep the X-Men in San Fransisco, so he’s got this California girl’s support.

No, it was something else about the announcement that got me a little spooked. That “Chief Creative Officer” part. The fact that Joe Quesada isn’t so much stepping down from his position as stepping up. Chief Creative Officer makes me think of rank. I mean, a Chief Petty Officer is one thing, a but a Chief Creative Officer? From the same guy who got ‘creative’ with Spider-Man’s marriage?

Oh yeah, there’s that chill. Yikes.

Joe Quesada has already been Chief Creative Guy for awhile (I hate using the word ‘officer’ for people who aren’t policemen or in the military; I keep thinking Quesada’s serving aboard the Enterprise). Remember his grand design to put certain genies back in bottles? He’s accomplished them to various levels of success.

I’m going to say it again, so some of you might want to cover your ears: making Spider-Man a bachelor was a good idea. I know, it’s like nails on a chalkboard, mostly because of the execution. While separating him and Mary Jane and readjusting Peter Parker’s life might have given the character a fresh start and brought some media attention for the big switch toward the classic life of Spider-Man, it was done so catastrophically that all a lot of people will take from it and any other following Spider-Man tale is “Mephisto BAD!”

Quesada wanted to permanently fix just how many mutants were walking around; decreasing the mutant population also has a good centering quality to it.  You can get mutants back to their ‘hated/feared’ status when they don’t inhabit a small country and writers stop slapping on a host of mutant characters during their tenures for a chance at immortality. This mandate sort of rolled around quickly under Bendis’ care and in a kind of hasty fashion, Wanda said “No More Mutants” and thus, it’s so. Mostly. For a little while. Hate and fear aren’t around so much right now, as Hope and her new generation are starting to form a new basis for mutant evolution and the X-Men are teaming up with Spider-Man and becoming more integrated with the rest of the Marvel heroes. San Fransisco practically welcomed them in, and that’s not very hate or fear at all. While they don’t have a lobbyist working for Genoshan rights anymore, they are no longer a disenfranchised minority, even after all the Scarlet Witch had done (and she herself had gone through, but that’s for another story).

There have been many ideas like these examples that, while interesting and solid in their inception (making Marvel comics edgier via Civil War, putting Kevin Smith on Daredevil: the Target, etc.), they just never came out right when released into the wild. It’s almost like Quesada needed… I don’t know, an editor to oversee him? Hey! I know a great editor, let’s get Axel Alonso on the phone!

So in a way, this new Chief Creative Guy job might be the best position for Joe Quesada. It’ll allow him to keep track of genies and find larger arcs to turn the Marvel Universe on (please see the upcoming Fear Itself), all the while getting him out of the directorial execution so other people can do the dirty work. Perfect, right?

Let me tell you the ways I can think of off the top of my head that this all could go terribly, horribly wrong.

Isn’t it weird how we, as readers, love a good car crash? Saving comic title campaigns don’t get half as much attention as “I Hate Mephisto and Everyone Associated with Spider-Man should die die die” rants and forum posts. Trust me, some of you in the comments section here will be driven to express your disillusionment and how much you don’t read Marvel anymore because of price, a change of tone on characters and other points of contention with the House of Ideas. With Quesada as Editor-in-Chief, he has held a firm party line on the choices that Marvel has made; instead of bending in the gale force winds of reader complaint, Quesada has remained firm to the point of coming across as aggressive to opposition. This has done the company a remarkable amount of good and now we all enjoy a Marvel Comics that is not on the edge of bankruptcy. But with so many new ventures, from Animation to Movies to Television, we need a strong diplomat rather than a staunch defender. It all comes down to making sure that the movies are similar to the TV shows to the comics and the cartoons, that the creative content of Marvel Entertainment is secure between movies being made. This is something you’re going to have to make the best creative decisions with and sometimes that means knowing when to hold the line and when to take a step back.

In 2008, I asked Quesada himself about the lack of Hulk-titled comics that actually featured the Hulk when the Incredible Hulk movie came out. That month, there were something like two comics that came out and the main title was featuring the Red Hulk. I was told that Quesada would never dictate to his writers what they should write or where they should take characters based on what their movies were doing at the time. Yeah, this happened out loud in front of witnesses, so let that sink in a bit. He would never force his writers to hold to the public opinion of where a character was going due to other media. Very brave statement that he would never hold back writing creativity just to fit in with a business model, but now being the Chief Creative Guy, that’s what he’s going to have to do. He’s going to be in charge of keeping Marvel Entertainment a unified product. When you see Iron Man in movies or in comics, you should have a clear sense of who he is and what he can do.

How do I know this? Because it’s what Geoff Johns is doing over at the Distinguished Competition, and it’s probably the biggest challenge facing Quesada’s new job. Johns wrote a quick explanation for the DCU Source blog when he became their Chief Creative Guy and said that he was tasked to “take our comic book world, embrace it (as I do) and use it to lead the creative charge on bringing it all to film, toys, television, video games, animation and beyond.” On an experience level, Johns can’t be topped; his resume includes TV writing, comics world building and his early days of working in film. He’s an actual Chief Creative Guy because he’s so creative and helps translate this vision into a variety of media. Joe Quesada in comparison (and yes, people are going to compare them; please see above statement about fandom’s contrariness) is an actual Officer; he’ll be putting the finishing touches on Marvel’s film and animation divisions, not to mention helping to create Marvel Television from the ground up. He’s the business guy who knows the most about the product they’re promoting. It’s like still being EiC in some way, just on steroids. I have no idea when Joe Quesada is going to sleep.

No matter what you think of his regime changes, Joe Quesada helped pilot one of the biggest turnarounds in comic book history. Marvel was bankrupt when he first started working for them and now they are not. Trade paperbacks are now infinitely more common than they were ten years ago and the characters and company is on the map and at the top. Being Editor in Chief is hard because people will always judge the King harshly. It’s easy to pick on the guy in charge. Returning to a penciling position might have refreshed him, given him some time to put down the burdens of leadership down and reminded him why he loved comics in the first place. I mean, look at Jim Lee.

But instead of taking a break, Joe Quesada took on one of the most difficult new titles and promised to lead the House of Ideas into the next field of discovery. Love him or not, the man has cajones.

Wow — between Erik Larsen and Eric Stephenson, it sure seems like Axel Alonso pissed in Image Comics’ Wheaties at some point!

Hey, it wouldn’t be a Robot 6 post without a “let’s you and him fight” angle. But now that that’s out of my system, there’s a lot one could say, pro and con, about Axel Alonso’s promotion to editor-in-chief of Marvel. Actually, the level of surprise with which the news was greeted says something all by itself. True, he’s never been the public figure that his predecessor Joe Quesada and colleague Tom Brevoort (who, again, has long said he didn’t want the EIC job) have been, so in that regard he’s an unknown quantity to readers and fans. To creators and editors, however, everything I’ve heard indicates that his reputation is sterling, dating back to his involvement in Vertigo — he’s well-liked personally and well-respected professionally (unless you’re Darwyn Cooke).

Personal anecdotal evidence is routinely the least reliable kind, but I myself can tell you that he was friendly and attentive to me during my earliest years of having a professional interest in comics, way before I had even the minuscule amount of recognition I have today and thus when it was totally unnecessary for him to be so. I’ve heard from many other people that that approachability remains in place today. Moreover, it’s worth pointing out that like the similarly respected Quesada, Alonso has roots in creator-driven and creator-owned comics, something that surely goes a long way when you might otherwise be seen as simply the head suit in a major corporation.

And despite the increased prominence of franchise-wide crossovers for the X-Men under his reign, Alonso seems to me to remain the torchbearer for Nu-Marvel, the era when off-the-beaten-path creators were essentially given carte blanche to take the company’s characters and run with them. Certainly that’s been the raison d’etre of the Alonso-spearheaded MAX line, which has become for contemporary crime novelists what Law & Order was for working New York actors. Of Marvel’s major editors, he seems the least concerned with traditional superheroics — which approach, after all, revived the fortunes of the company in the early ’00s to the point where they went from Chapter 11 bankruptcy to multibillion-dollar Disney acquisition in ten years. For readers who hanker for that freewheeling feeling again in this the age of linewide events that point nearly every book in the same direction at the behest of a relatively small cadre of editors and creators, Alonso seems like your best bet.

On the other hand, Larsen is basically right about the low-key state of the X-Men under Alonso, even if he’s probably way too harsh in his assessment and certainly too narrow-minded in terms of whom he’s blaming. The X-Men still sell, after all, and important issues regularly crack the Top 10, even if they no longer dominate it as a whole. But yes, since the departure of Joss Whedon — and arguably before that, when it became clear Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men was an adjunct to the line rather than its flagship; and arguably before that, when Grant Morrison’s abrupt departure left the line and its then-flagship New X-Men floundering — the X-Men, which had been the dominant property in North American comics for around 25 years, assumed second-banana status to the Avengers in Marvel’s line-up. Now, correlation does not imply causality, and there are any number of possible reasons I could suggest for why that happened that either predate or simply have nothing to do with Alonso’s role as editor: a desire on the part of the company to push the characters to whom they retained the movie rights; an unrelated drive to shore up what had long been a weak point of the line; the individual interests of the creators and editors at the company at the time; the innate resonance of the Avengers’ quasi-military set-up and quasi-terrorist antagonists with the country’s mood for the past decade, versus the X-Men’s less zeitgeisty status as outcasts and outsiders; Wolverine’s spread into the Avengers franchise and the X-books’ subsequent lack of a unique claim to the company’s biggest character; the X-Men’s near-total lack of involvement in the company’s event comics (although that in turn invites the question of whose decision that was); and on and on and on. But whatever the reason, and despite the presence of acclaimed writers like Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction in the Uncanny X-Men driver’s seat, little that has happened on Alonso’s watch has changed the X-Men’s status as the Superman to the Avengers’ Batman, leaving how he’ll handle the whole line and its bestselling Avengers franchise something of a question mark.

Similarly, it’s Tom Brevoort who’s been at the center of the storm when it comes to planning and executing the company’s major events: Avengers Disassembled, New Avengers, House of M, Civil War, The Death of Captain America, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign and Siege all originated in his shop. Alonso’s crossovers have been X-specific and thus tell us less about how he’d oversee one of the big ones, although with Fear Itself just a few months away, we’ll soon find out. And speaking of Brevoort, Alonso isn’t half as outspoken as his counterpart, nor is he anywhere near as frequent a presence on the Internet or as the star attraction of comic-con panels. With fan outreach and carnival-barker hype just as much a part of the EIC gig as figuring out who’s secretly a Skrull or who gets to kill the Sentry, Alonso’s strengths and weaknesses in those departments are also largely unknown.

Meanwhile, useful though it has been as a means to field-test talent and push the boundaries of where Marvel’s properties can go in terms of raw content, Alonso’s MAX line — with the exception of Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Gaydos’s wonderful Alias and Garth Ennis’s bible-black Punisher run, both now years behind us (please note: We would also have accepted U.S. War Machine) — has never produced an evergreen hit of the lasting acclaim or staying power of the big Vertigo titles, including many Alonso himself was involved with. Now, you can convincingly argue that MAX was never intended to do work that way: It doesn’t have the creator-owned capacity of Vertigo, just for starters, and for a long time now it’s been a miniseries-based line rather than an ongoing-series one. But regardless of whether you view the line as a failure or a success that simply has modest goals, it too doesn’t tell you much about how Alonso would govern the whole Marvel line.

To a certain extent, we can glean how Marvel thinks Marvel might fare under an Alonso administration by noting the credits they saw fit to mention in the press release announcing his promotion. There’s the X-Men and the MAX line, which stand to reason as they were his most recent gigs. There’s an (almost — don’t forget the Princess Di debacle) unqualified creative success in the form of Peter Milligan and Mike Allred’s X-Statix, one of the great Nu-Marvel books. And there’s that Marvelized issue of ESPN Magazine, because hey, a head honcho has to be all about synergy these days. But there’s also Rawhide Kid, the much-maligned Ron Zimmerman Western that gained notoriety more for the simple fact of its protagonist’s sexual orientation (and the somewhat less than decorous methods by which it was depicted — Brokeback Mountain this ain’t) than for its quality as a work of art. And there’s Amazing Spider-Man during J. Michael Straczynski’s tenure on the title, a period in which the sales were generally strong but the stories, I think it’s safe to say, were more talked-about than beloved: the retconning of a magical element into Spidey’s previously science-fictional origin; the revelation of a sexual relationship between the Green Goblin and young Peter Parker’s late love interest Gwen Stacy, complete with hushed-up pregnancy; a persistent emphasis on mystical elements in storylines like “The Other” in ways that seemed discordant with the character as he’d come to be known; and of course the hugely divisive “One More Day” arc in which Spider-Man literally made a deal with the devil to save his octogenarian aunt at the expense of his marriage. It can be argued that Alonso’s creativity-encouraging willingness let his creators follow their bliss went a bit too far during JMS’s run on the company’s most iconic character (even if, as rumor has it, there were contractual reasons behind the hands-off approach).

So where does that leave us? Well, in a position not all that dissimilar from where we were when Marvel tapped one of the two outside contractors who ran its comparatively edgy Marvel Knights sub-imprint to take over the whole megillah in 2000. If I recall correctly, Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti’s Knights line had produced a high-profile hit in Daredevil, a pair of cult favorites in Black Panther and Inhumans, and a pretty major misfire in that Punisher thing where he hunted demons. Sure, Quesada also had a history as a publisher thanks to his and Palmiotti’s Event Comics, but that sword cut both ways: Unlike Alonso, a fixture in Marvel’s halls for a decade, Quesada was a true outsider to the company and its culture. With that as your starting point, Marvel’s subsequent trajectory under Quesada, from anything-goes home of Morrison, Milligan, Millar, Bendis et al to blockbuster event-comic juggernaut to vital creative center of a multimedia conglomerate, was all but impossible to predict.

But hey, let’s give predictions a shot anyway. My guess it that you’ll see Alonso use his rapport with the creative community to continue what by all accounts is a stellar creator-relations regime at the publisher. You’ll see his innate sensibilities and eye for a certain variety of talent made manifest in a climate where creators who like their superheroics with a hard edge continue to feel at home. You’ll see some Alonso-esque high concepts a la “X-Men vs. vampires” or “Hit-Monkey” lobbed at the wall to see if they stick. I would guess you’ll see more opportunities for writers to work with big-name characters relatively free of line-wide directives — perhaps through renewed emphasis on the Marvel Knights or Astonishing labels, perhaps even in certain hands-off titles within the core franchises. (Here’s hoping!) How will he fare with Marvel’s main moneymakers, aka events and Avengers? That’s tougher to say, but keep in mind that story summits and creative committees have long been the driving force behind these things, even if individual writers or editors eventually take point. Everyone may have shifted up a rung on the ladder on the editorial end, but the players are basically all the same. If anything, the presence of an EIC who isn’t also being pulled in multiple directions by simultaneous CCO duties as was Quesada over the past year or so will likely improve the focus and morale of the publishing wing all by itself — that’s not a reflection on Quesada, who goes out with a lot of good will on his side and whom I frankly respect a great deal, but it could be a welcome shot in the arm after a year of punishing sales declines, lackluster responses to big initiatives, and fan enthusiasm at a low enough ebb that Tom Brevoort talks repeatedly and publicly about needing to get people excited again. And that’s one thing you can say for sure about naming Axel Alonso the new editor-in-chief: It’s gotten people excited.

Marvel.com: What is your proudest achievement as far as what Marvel has accomplished under your reign?

Joe Quesada: I’ll give you the long answer to your short question. When I was reintroduced to reading comics around 25-26, I remember the first comics I read were [The Dark Knight Returns] and Watchmen. I’m a big believer in role modeling, setting goals for yourself and shooting for those goals, shooting for the moon. So when I broke into comics, the goal became not only did I want to be a writer, not only did I want to be an artist, but someday I wanted to do something as great as Dark Knight or Watchmen—that was the goal. I think a lot of creators have that when they start; they find that one book and say, “someday I want to create something that’s just like that.” That’s the path I tried to follow.

Now nobody, myself included, has ever really had that kind of story that has redefined the genre like those two books. But when I look back at my 10 years at Marvel and everything we’ve accomplished, from Chapter 11 [bankruptcy] to now where we’re part of the Disney family; now that we’re a movie studio, a television studio, and animation studio; we’ve got all these things going on—when I look back on that, I look back on that as my Watchmen. That’s what I hope I’ve left behind as a good thing. It wasn’t a book, but it was certainly a period of time for me that I will remember very, very fondly.

–Outgoing Marvel Editor-in-Chief and reigning Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada gives Marvel.com’s Ryan “Agent M” Penagos what strikes me as an extremely revealing answer to the question of his legacy. Everything I’ve ever heard from Marvel creators and employees led me to conclude long ago that Quesada’s great strength as EIC (and a few of his weaknesses as well) stemmed from the fact that he is an artist first and foremost; seems like he still thought in those terms even when far from the drawing table.

Tom Brevoort

Not to be outdone by his former fellow Senior VP – Executive Editor and (Cup o’ Joe: Marvel T&A partner) Axel Alonso, outspoken editor Tom Brevoort has been named Senior Vice President of Publishing by Marvel. Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada broke the news via Twitter while also congratulating Alonso for his ascension to the Editor-in-Chief position held by Quesada until today. Marvel tells CBR that further details about both promotions are forthcoming.

With his (imho) admirably candid Internet presence across a variety of platforms, Brevoort has emerged as Marvel editorial’s de facto voice, often to the tune of reader controversy. This has always struck me as a reversal from the “Nu-Marvel” days of the early 2000s, prior to Brevoort’s involvement in the publisher’s new Avengers and event-driven era, when the editor was viewed by many fans as a traditionalist counterpoint to/bulwark against Quesada, Alonso and then-President Bill Jemas.

In related news, can comic book publishers please take a brief break from industry-rocking publishing and personnel news for a little bit? I’m getting tired, and falling way behind on my stories.

Huge news from the House of Ideas: Axel Alonso has been promoted to Editor-in-Chief of Marvel Entertainment. Previously serving as Senior VP – Executive Editor alongside Tom Brevoort and overseeing the X-Men and MAX lines among other projects, Alonso will now oversee all of Marvel Publishing’s day-to-day aspects and report to Publisher and President Dan Buckley. Alonso replaces Joe Quesada, who shifts to full-time focus on Marvel’s multimedia initiatives in publishing, digital, film and television alike within his existing role as Chief Creative Officer.

This marks the end of Quesada’s transformative ten-year tenure as Editor-in-Chief, the longest such reign of anyone in the company’s history save Stan Lee and one that saw the publisher emerge from the shadow of bankruptcy to once again become the dominant player in the North American direct market for comics. Alonso played an integral role in the Quesada regime since 2000, with his experience at Vertigo coming into play as Marvel took major creative and personnel risks during what was known as the “Nu-Marvel” era. Marvel’s press release on the matter touts such controversial projects as X-Statix and The Rawhide Kid as major credits from Alonso’s resume right alongside runs editing Amazing Spider-Man and X-Men, so it seems that Marvel higher-ups value Alonso’s frequently unconventional approach to superheroics.

CBR News Editor Kiel Phegley has the full press release and further analysis.

Thor: The Mighty Avenger #4

“Sorry about the TMA cancellation, folks. For the record, I don’t make those decisions. That said, it’s a great [comic] and may be back again someday.”

– Joe Quesada, editor-in-chief and chief creative officer of Marvel,
on the cancellation of the critically acclaimed, yet low-selling, Thor: The Mighty Avenger

Greg Pelkofski and Joe Quesada

If Greg Pelkofski have anything to say about it, he’ll be making comics for years to come. Hoping to get some advice on how to do that, the 21-year-old fan and aspiring comics editor paid $536.51 to have lunch with Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada as a part of one of the Hero Initiative’s fund-raising efforts.

“Almost immediately, Joe began asking me questions about myself and I was able to explain my desire to be a comic book editor,” he wrote. “With an attentive ear, he patiently listened to me speak of my college studies and my experience as an intern at AARP. He explained how tough it is to actually break into comics, especially in today’s job market, but he also told of how rewarding the work is. We discussed editorial work in comics and what a typical day at Marvel is like, and I found myself wanting to work there now more than ever.”

Head over to the organization’s blog for a guest post by Pelkofski about the experience.

– Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada, splitting the Internet in half with his explanation of how
“One Moment in Time” has removed from continuity the controversial events of “One More Day”

It probably should: Wonder Woman #606′s variant-cover homage to Leonardo da Vinci’s “Vitruvian Man” by Alex Garner is also just a bit similar to artist (and Marvel Editor in Chief) Joe Quesada’s promotional image for the J. Michael Straczynski Spider-Opus The Other. Why, that kind of playful tweak of the competition is almost…Marvelesque, isn’t it? I for one am hoping that this means that Leather-Jacket Wonder Woman will shoot spikes out of her arms and eat a dude’s face.

(via Marc-Oliver Frisch)

Joe Quesada, by Alex Maleev

The Mighty Marvel Podcast marks its 100th episode with an interview with Joe Quesada, who was named editor-in-chief of Marvel 10 years ago this week. Quesada, who in June was promoted to chief creative officer of Marvel Entertainment, reflects on his time overseeing the Marvel Knights imprint, his role in the creative of the Ultimate Universe and more.

To help commemorate the anniversary, Alex Maleev created an illustration depicting Quesada as puppet master — no, not that one — of the Marvel Universe. See the full image after the break, and read more about Quesada’s tenure at Marvel.com.

Joe Quesada, by Alex Maleev

Comic-Con International

Saturday at Comic-Con International in San Diego, once upon a time, was “big movie day” at the con … back before every day became big movie day at the con. Still, today somewhat lived up to its reputation for being eventful, as the Avengers assembled on stage, Green Lantern movie footage was shown and one poor fan was stabbed in the eye while attending programming in Hall H, where several of the big movie panels took place. The victim was taken to UCSD Medical Center, while his attacker was taken away by police after attendees detained him.

In happier news, here’s what was announced on the comics front:

• Marvel Editor-in-Chief and Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada confirmed that Marvel is “gonna be doing some CrossGen stuff.” CrossGen, which published numerous titles like Sojourn, Way of the Rat, Abadazad and Meridian starting 1998, went bankrupt in 2004. Disney bought their assets that same year.

Their titles covered many different genres, from fantasy to horror to detective stories. “I think with the CrossGen stuff you’re going to see us attempt a little more genre publishing, which I think is much-needed in our imprint,” Quesada said. No word yet on what properties they plan to bring back.

• Kurt Busiek announced that American Gothic, the urban fantasy comic announced at last year’s WildStorm panel, will now be called Witchlands. The series will be drawn by Connor Willumson. Busiek is also working on an Arrowsmith novel titled Arrowsmith: Far from the Fields We Know, which will include illustrations by Carlos Pacheco.

• Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness are working on a new Marvel project called Avengers 3 featuring Captain America, Thor and Iron Man.

• DC Comics announced that Chloe Sullivan from the TV show Smallville will appear in the Jimmy Olsen co-feature that will run in Action Comics. They also announced a new title called Weird Worlds, starring Aaron Lopresti’s Garbage Man and other characters. “Monster books, they’ve become horror books in the last 15 years, but I want to get back to monsters as superheroes,” Lopresti said of the character.

• Christos Gage and Darick Robertson are teaming up on an as-yet-unrevealed WildStorm comic.

• Fantagraphics announced today that they’ve obtained the rights from Disney to publish the complete Mickey Mouse comic strips by Floyd Gottfredson.

• Tokyopop, Yen Press and Drawn & Quarterly have all announced that they’ve picked up new manga licenses. Tokyopop has picked up Koge-Donbo’s Naki Shōjo no Tame no Pavane (Pavane for a Dead Girl) and Ghost Face, by Min-Woo Hyung. D&Q will publish two Shigeru Mizuki manga, Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths and NonNonBā. Yen will publish Otoyome-Gatari, Highschool of the Dead, Aron’s Absurd Armada, Betrayal Knows My Name, and another arc of Higurashi When They Cry.

• John Byrne’s Next Men are returning in new stories from IDW this December.

• Marvel confirmed, finally, that the Atlas team of Jeff Parker and Gabriel Hardman are taking over the Hulk.

• IDW will publish a four-issue Rocketeer anthology by various creators, including Mike Allred, Kurt Busiek, John Cassaday, Darwyn Cooke, Michael Golden, Gene Ha, Michael Kaluta, Garry Leach, Bruce Timm and Bill Willingham, with covers by Alex Ross.

• IDW will also publish the Ultimate Alex Raymond Collection: The Definitive Flash Gordon and Jungle Jim.

• Joe Kelly will team again with J. M. Ken Nimura, the artist on I Kill Giants, for an Image Comics project called Immortal Sergeant.

• All nine issues of Joe Madureira’s Battle Chasers will be collected in an oversized hardback in November.

Movie, television and video games

Avengers cast

• Fans who weathered a long day of movie panels, not to mention the horrible stabbing I mentioned earlier, ended the day in Hall H with the Marvel Studios panel, where directors and cast from Thor, Captain America and the Avengers gathered on stage to discuss the upcoming films.

• Sony released an extended trailer for the upcoming DC Universe Online game, which has to be seen to be believed. I played the game yesterday, and will have a longer report on what I thought, but I played as Nightwing, and boy did Dick Grayson get the beatdown of a lifetime. I’m pretty sure the Joker and Harlequin I was fighting were ringers.

• Ultimate Spider-Man writer Brian Michael Bendis will help produce and write the aptly named Ultimate Spider-Man animated series.

• A new CGI animated Green Lantern series is coming to Cartoon Network.

• Top Cow Productions announced a Witchblade video game.

• Ameratsu, the spirit dog main character from the video game Okami, and Thor have joined the cast of Marvel vs. Capcom 3.

• The video teaser shown during the Walking Dead TV panel this weekend can be found online.

• Footage has been released from The Goon animated movie.

• Today brought several unveilings, from the Green Lantern movie logo and the Avengers movie logo to the Destroyer armor from next summer’s Thor movie and the first photo from the upcoming Cowboys & Aliens movie.

CrossGen Comics

During this afternoon’s “Cup O’ Joe” panel at Comic-Con International, Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada teased the audience with an image of CrossGen’s original “Sigil” logo and the date “2011.”

The obvious implication was, of course, that the CrossGen comics properties, purchased in 2004 by Marvel’s new parent Disney, will be making a return next year. The question is, however, in what form.

“We’re gonna be doing some CrossGen stuff,” Quesada confirmed to CBR TV. He said that although Marvel does have a plan for the properties, “we’re not really prepared to talk much about it right now.”

“But we have started to work on some concepts based on the old CrossGen concepts, trying to strengthen them up, and eventually bring them to Marvel,” he said.

“It just offers us a wider variety of stories to tell than just the normal Marvel Universe kind of stories,” Quesada added later. “I think with the CrossGen stuff you’re going to see us attempt a little more genre publishing, which I think is much-needed in our imprint.”

Founded in 1998 by Florida entrepreneur Mark Alessi, CrossGen featured a line of titles in a variety of genres with a shared universe, or “Sigilverse,” with characters broadly linked by the Sigils they received. The first wave of comics launched in 2000 with the space opera Sigil,  the fantasies Meridian, Mystic and Scion, and the “untold tales” anthology CrossGen Chronicles. Later additions included the Victorian detective series Ruse, the contemporary horror Route 666, the pirate adventure El Cazador, the fantasy Sojourn and the wuxia comedy Way of the Rat.

CrossGen was unique among comics publishers at the time, with creators initially working as full-time employees out of its Tampa offices. Alessi brought together a mix of industry veterans — Mark Waid, Barbara Kesel, Ron Marz, Chuck Dixon, Butch Guice and Brandon Peterson, among them — and then-relative unknowns, such as Greg Land, Mike Perkins and Tony Bedard.

With a solid talent roster, high production values, even higher ambitions, and a variety of genres and titles with (potentially) broad audience appeal, CrossGen seemed poised to give major comics publishers a run for their money. However, by mid-2003 reports emerged that the company had fallen behind on payments to freelancers, exposing a shaky financial plan that apparently was undermined by massive returns from Barnes & Noble and Borders.

CrossGen filed for bankruptcy in 2004. Later that same year, Disney bought the company’s assets for $1 million, with designs on Abadazad, the children’s fantasy book by J.M. DeMatteis and Mike Ploog. Disney released three subsequent volumes, but canceled the fourth. With the exception of a handful of licensed reprint collections from Checker Books, no other former CrossGen titles have been published.

Below, see video of the “Sigil” teaser shown at the panel.