some of AdHouse/AdDistro's recent releases

A hearty and heartfelt congratulations to publisher Chris Pitzer on the ninth anniversary of the formation of his fine line of comics, AdHouse Books (and more recently its distribution wing, AdDistro). Pitzer is marking the occasion by telling the stories behind nine of the company’s releases, and the result is a mix insight into the kinds of challenges any small-press comics publisher must face, and the qualities that make this particular small-press comics publisher such a valuable one.

With an output ranging from high-end art books like Paul Pope’s Pulphope and James Jean’s Process Recess to thoughtful graphic novels like Josh Cotter’s Skyscrapers of the Midwest and Adam Hines’s Duncan the Wonder Dog, it’s tough to say exactly what “an AdHouse book” will be like, but with Pitzer’s attention to design and reproduction behind every one, you generally can count on it being gorgeous. And as the stories told by Pitzer about books like Pulpatoon Pilgrimage, Skyscrapers, Duncan and so on indicate, the chances are also good that he’s gone to bat for a largely unknown and unpublished talent. That’s an admirable thing for a publisher to do once, let alone over and over again for nearly a decade.

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.”

Saga

Three down, one to go … here’s a list of the major comics-related announcements made at Comic-Con International in San Diego on Saturday:

• A number of new projects were announced or promoted at Image’s Creator-Owned Comics panel, not the least of which is the return of Brian K. Vaughan to comic books. Vaughan will write a book called Saga, which is co-created and drawn by Fiona Staples. Vaughan told CBR that the book is “an epic drama chronicling the life and times of one young family fighting to survive a never-ending war. 100 percent creator-owned. Ongoing. Monthly. Fiona and I are banking issues now.”

• Image also announced that Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman is collaborating with Charlie Adlard on a new series of graphic novels called Album. The books will be released roughly 18 months apart, 60 pages long, with different themes each year, with the first being Passenger. It’s co-published with Delcourt in France and will be available simultaneously in English and France.

• Jonathan Hickman and Nicky Pitarra will team up for The Manhattan Projects at Image. Hickman is also doing a book called Secret with artist Ryan Godenheim.

• Joe Keatinge and Frank Cho are teaming for a new comic called Brutal. The book stars Stone, a mysterious super-assassin who kills superheroes.

• Jonathan Ross and Tommy Lee Edwards will team up again for Golden Age, an ongoing comic about retired superheroes. Matthew Vaughn is attached to a film version adapting the first six issues. Ross is also working on a “reverse Superman” project called Home Life, about an Earth baby sent to another planet.

• Howard Chaykin’s Black Kiss will return to comics with a new miniseries at Image.

• Fantagraphics announced two major archival collections, the complete Zap Comics and the EC Comics Library.

Cable

• Marvel announced the return of Cable by Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness. “Those of you that are longtime X-Men fans – who I have tremendous respect for – when I first started at Marvel back when they were on paper was Cable,” Loeb said at the Cup O’ Joe panel. “He is a character that I love, and like all of you was absolutely shocked and terrified when he went down in Messiah CompleX and the Second Coming storyline.”

• Marvel also announced that their “Point One” issues in November will be stand-alone entry points, but will also set the stage for the next major crossover event next year.

• At the Vertigo: Fables panel, Bill Willingham announced a new Fables spinoff, Fairest. The creative team for the first arc, which will feature Sleeping Beauty, will be Willingham and artist Phil Jimenez.

• Justice League writer Geoff Johns revealed that the League’s mystery lady is Lady Luck.

• The protest against DC’s upcoming relaunch drew very few actual protestors. ComicsAlliance reports only a dozen or so protestors, mostly dressed as the Joker and Harlequin, showed up.

• Legendary Comics announced two projects, a new edition of Paul Pope’s Pulp Hope and a new series by Matt Wagner, The Tower Chronicles.

• Marvel is developing a live-action Mockingbird television series for ABC Family.

• Top Cow chief Marc Silvestri teased a possible Darkness origin story movie.

• The Amazing Spider-Man‘s Rhys Ifans, who plays Dr. Curt Connors, was issued a citation backstage after some sort of incident. Police said it was a “non-custodial misdemeanor arrest.” The movie’s star, Andrew Garfield, popped up at the microphone in the crowd dressed in a store-bought Spider-Man costume.

• Twentieth Century Fox is developing an animated feature based on the Mutts comic strip by Patrick McDonnell.

• Capcom confirmed the characters that were accidentally leaked on one of their servers will indeed be playable characters on the upcoming Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 game. On the Marvel side, the list includes Iron Fist, Ghost Rider, Dr. Strange, Nova, Hawkeye and Rocket Raccoon. On the Capcom side, it includes Strider, Firebrand, Vergil, Frank West, Nemesis and Phoenix Wright.

• Speaking of Marvel vs. Capcom, Udon announced they will create a “book of design and production artwork, as well as all new art pieces” based on the game. They also announced artbooks for the Sengoku Basara game franchise, the Valkyria Chronicles 2 game, and Persona designer Shigenori Soejima. Udon will also publish a two-volume manga for Sengoku Basara.

The Tower Chronicles

Legendary Comics announced at its panel this afternoon at Comic-Con International that it will publish new projects from Paul Pope and Matt Wagner.

Set for release this holiday season, PulpHope is a more than 200-page retrospective of Pope’s career, featuring many pieces that haven’t been seen before. A previous edition was published in 2007 by AdHouse Books.

The Tower Chronicles, developed by Wagner with Legendary CEO Thomas Tull, is a supernatural action-adventure about a bounty hunter with a hidden past who, backed by a team of high-tech mercenaries, protects civilians from the things that go bump in the night.

“We are thrilled to be working with Pope and Wagner on these upcoming projects for Legendary Comics,” Editor-in-Chief Bob Schreck said in a statement. “Just as our film division works with the best-in-class talent and filmmakers to produce content for the fandom demographic, so too will Legendary Comics move forward on our mandate to publish works from the best in A the industry.”

Legendary also will release Frank Miller’s Holy Terror in September.

Update: The Hollywood Reporter reports that Simon Bisley will provide artwork for the Tower Chronicles. They also provide additional details on the PulpHope book, calling it “a revamped version of the artist’s out-of-print art book titled PulpHope, stripping away 100 pages and throwing in 100 new ones incorporating work Pope has done in the music, toy and clothing spheres, as well as other material.”

“I remember how it felt to be a kid in school and have no money but a passion for art so Beguiling always prices out some inexpensive art,” Pope tweeted, complete with a smiley-face emoticon. Even if you’re only just looking, this stuff’ll put a smile on your face, too. But if you are in the buying mood, better hurry, as it looks like stuff’s going fast.

Creating the illusion of movement is one of the main goals of comics art.  It’s what sequence is there for.  That said, it’s not the hardest thing to do when the movement in question is that of human figures or familiar machines.  Dynamic posing and composition work quite nicely much of the time, even when it isn’t quite certain where the movement is being directed, or how.  Comics have a library of stock gestures and shot transitions for artists to pull from in order to sell their action.  Creating a sense of real life on the page is one thing, but to simply put some jump in the pictures, two words — “copy Kirby” — are often all that’s needed.

However, that’s only true as long as the artist is dealing with easily recognizable forms.  Abstract comics have become a more and more significant part of the dialogue surrounding the art form over the past few years, and artists in that section of the medium are faced with a different set of challenges.  How does one animate pure shape or color or linework, how can these things be convincingly brought to life?  It’s not a question with a solid answer yet.  There’s no How To Draw Comics The Marvel Way for abstraction, no solid set of rules cartoonists can turn to to string their non-figurative drawings into sequences that work as comics, accumulations of images that build power and function as more than the sum of their parts.  I think it’s probable that one day some artist is going to come along and lay down a broad, workable grammar for abstract comics the way Kirby did for action or Ernie Bushmiller did for gags, but until then abstract comics are shots in the dark, unarmed forays into unknown territory.

The page above isn’t strictly abstract — there’s an easily parsed figurative meaning to it, a hand chalking shapes onto paper — but it deals with one of the main problems of abstract comics in a stylish and effective manner nonetheless.  How do you put motion, the illusion of life, into pure lines that carry no meaning beyond their own existence?  “Draw like Paul Pope” isn’t the worst starting point.  The Pope line, fluid and expressive, messy and elegant in equal measure, is one of the liveliest in comics.  Even when the line is bent to figurative drawing, it feels charged, like it’s waiting to be set free.  Here, it is, and it moves with a life and logic of its own.  Perhaps Pope’s greatest gift as an artist is his ability to communicate gesture with his line, to show readers the details of the path of his brush across the page with variations in thickness or wobbles in texture.  That’s what’s being put on display in this sequence, the ebb and flow of ink as it relates to the trail being blazed, and like any depiction of forceful movement in comics, the reader can’t help but be drawn into following it over the panel borders, watching the progression from beginning through to end.

Pope’s framing is also key to the sense of life here.  The standard eight-panel grid layout’s broad, low panels call up the shape of a movie screen, priming readers to see motion cutting across them.  Pope plays with the panels borders almost imperceptibly, moving the central vertical axis of the page from right to left, creating a rhythmic wobble in the layout that mirrors the slicing curves of the line.  By cutting in and out on the hand, making it now bigger, now smaller, now completely invisible, creates more movement, the sense of a camera unable to fix its rapid subject in place.  The line is the one constant, its source a mere happenstance.  It is what we watch.

The abstract trails and shapes Pope cuts across the page are themselves a major part of the loose, snapping kineticism this sequence carries: left with nothing but the line itself, no recognizable textures or outlines being formed, the movement we see when we move from panel to panel is assigned to the line itself.  It’s the most engaging constant on the page: the background remains the same, and though the hand twists and strains, its contortions are pinned to human anatomy.  It has nothing on the pure expression in the whip-dance of the black trail searing across the page.  This sequence qualifies as abstract because it manages to make the abstraction more arresting than the figurative, cutting the strings that tether our eyes to the figurative but still leaving them dangling on the page.

It’s a beautiful thing, a kind of “drawn metafiction”, if you will.  We are made fully aware that this comic is made up of medium on paper, a physical object in real space created by the movements of an outside agency.  What’s so wonderful about it is that it denies the idea that that movement, that agency, is in the past, the means to an end.  This page is not a cold, dead sheet of paper with its shapes and lines long since inked and printed.  Whenever we look at it the lines begin to draw themselves again, and the motion on it forces us to watch it create itself once more.

Strange Adventures #1

Vertigo has released the cover and more details on Strange Adventures, the science fiction anthology they plan to publish in May.

The cover, above, is by Paul Pope, and as previously reported, the first issue will include a chapter of Spaceman by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso, which will get its own series from Vertigo in the fall. Other contributors include Jeff Lemire, Ross Campbell, Kevin Colden, Peter Milligan, Paul Cornell, Denys Cowan and many others. You can find the complete table of contents after the jump.

Table of Contents:

“All The Pretty Ponies”
Writer Lauren Beukes
Artist Inaki Miranda

“The White Room”
Writer Talia Hershewe
Artist Juan Bobillo

“Case 21”
Writer Selwyn Hinds
Artist Denys Cowan

“Postmodern Prometheus”
Writer and Artist Kevin Colden

“Ultra The Multi-Alien”
Writer and Artist Jeff Lemire

“Refuse”
Writer and Artist Ross Campbell

“Partners”
Writer Peter Milligan
Artist Sylvain Savoia

“A ‘True Tale’ From Saucer Country”
Writer Paul Cornell
Artist Goran Sudzuka

“Spaceman”
Writer Brian Azzarello
Artist Eduardo Risso

So it comes with particular delight to not only receive news that the artist is doing a new fine art print for CBLDF, but that he did a process video showing how it was made as well as talking about why he’s doing it for CBLDF. Here’s the video:

The print is available if you buy a $500 or $1000 membership with the CBLDF. The video was directed and shot by Shahriar Shadab, with music by Sons of the West.

Dark Horse Presents cover by Paul Pope

Dark Horse catches a tiger by the tail with a “special ultra-rare” variant cover by Paul Pope for the upcoming Dark Horse Presents reboot. Retailers will receive one copy with the variant cover for every 20 copies they order, which no doubt means they’ll be fetching a high price from your local retailer. Personally I’d love to see it released as a print.

Battling Boy

Here’s a nice pre-Christmas treat … First Second has started “leaking” some of the artwork for Paul Pope’s long-awaited Battling Boy project on their blog. Check’em out here and here. Those of you with long memories may remember that Pope told us earlier this year that Battling Boy will come out in 2011, and hopefully these teasers mean it will be sooner rather than later.

Check out the full schedule in the BCGF press release after the jump.

BROOKLYN COMICS AND GRAPHICS FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES PROGRAMMING SCHEDULE

The Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival announces a full slate of programming events featuring comics luminaries including Lynda Barry, Charles Burns, Anders Nilsen, Brian Chippendale, Mark Alan Stamaty, Renée French, and many more as part of the one day Festival taking place on Saturday, December 4, 2010 at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church in Williamsburg, Brooklyn (full schedule below). The Festival is especially pleased to announce New Yorker Art Editor, RAW co-editor, and TOON Books Editorial Director Françoise Mouly as a special guest, who will join Kramers Ergot Editor Sammy Harkham for a conversation about the art of editing. Festival programming is curated and principally moderated by Programming Director Bill Kartalopoulos.

In addition to the day’s programming, the Festival is pleased to announce a suite of satellite events taking place over five days, including a very special program of rare comics-related film curated by Mark Newgarden screening on Sunday, December 5 at the Knitting Factory and exhibit openings at Secret Project Robot on Friday, December 3 and the Adam Baumgold Gallery on Tuesday, December 7.

Admission to the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival and all associated events is free and open to the public.

BROOKLYN COMICS AND GRAPHICS FESTIVAL PROGRAMMING EVENTS

Downstairs at Our Lady of Mount Carmel | 275 North 8th Street, Brooklyn

All panels moderated by Bill Kartalopoulos unless otherwise indicated

1:00 | LYNDA BARRY AND CHARLES BURNS IN CONVERSATION

Lynda Barry drew the syndicated weekly comic strip Ernie Pook’s Comeek for more than two decades, and has authored books including Cruddy, One Hundred Demons, What It Is, and this year’s Picture This. Charles Burns is the author of acclaimed graphic novel Black Hole and the recent full color book X’ed Out. Join us for this conversation between two extraordinary artists who also share a personal history as former classmates.

2:00 | THE ART OF EDITING

In 1980, Françoise Mouly co-founded, with Art Spiegelman, the ground-breaking comics anthology RAW. She is also the Art Editor of The New Yorker and the Editorial Director of the TOON Books line of children’s comics. Sammy Harkham is the editor of the Kramers Ergot series, which has articulated a new aesthetic for comics – and comics anthologies – with each monumental volume. Harkham and Mouly will discuss the pleasures and problems of editing.

3:00 | TAKING INVENTORY: THE STORY OF THINGS

In their most conventionally narrative form, comics develop a storyboard-like continuity from panel to panel. But how isolated can a panel be? Renée French, James McShane, Jungyeon Roh and Leanne Shapton will discuss the ways in which they construct or suggest narratives by assembling images of objects and moments that retain their individual integrity.

4:00 | IRWIN HASEN: WHEN COMIC BOOKS WERE NEW

Comic books came into their own with the success of Superman’s 1938 debut. By 1940, Irwin Hasen was working in this new field, drawing early comics featuring Green Lantern and Wildcat before co-creating the comic strip Dondi and, recently, the 2009 graphic novel Loverboy. Evan Dorkin and Paul Pope will join moderator Dan Nadel for a special conversation with an artist who has been working in comics for seventy years.

5:00 | ANDERS NILSEN Q+A

Anders Nilsen’s fine line, radical graphic experimentation, and humane philosophical investigations distinguish him as one of the most notable cartoonists of his generation. This winter sees the conclusion of his series Big Questions, an epic epistemological adventure featuring several cartoon birds (some of them dead) and one disoriented fighter pilot. Anders will discuss his art and career in this spotlight conversation.

6:00 | HOW NANCY IS: THE SEMIOTICS OF THE GAG

Ernie Bushmiller’s iconic comic strip Nancy has been described as “a mini-algebra equation masquerading as a comic strip” drawn by “a moron on an acid trip.” Bill Griffith (Zippy the Pinhead), Mark Newgarden (How To Read Nancy), and Johnny Ryan (Angry Youth Comix) will discuss the unshakeable appeal of Nancy and the essence of gag humor in their comics.

7:00 | CHAOS AND PATTERN

Artwork that is dense with compositional detail, line, pattern and texture encourages a lingering, wandering eye. How does this kind of drawing work in comics? Brian Chippendale, Jordan Crane, Keith Jones and Mark Alan Stamaty will consider the relationship between densely made drawing and the propulsive concerns of visual narrative.

SATELLITE EVENTS AND EXHIBITS

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3

“Nazi Knife” Exhibit Opening

Location: Secret Project Robot | 210 Kent Ave, Brooklyn

Time: 8:00 – 10:00 pm

A collection of images curated by the French collective Nazi Knife, whose eponymous anthology has become a post-millennial clearing house for the psyche-grotesque and other non-narrative drawing in the transgressive post-punk French tradition. Artists include: C.F., Mat Brinkman, Hendrik Hegray, Jonas Delaborde, Andy Bolus, Leon Sadler, Massimiliano Bomba, Stephane Prigent.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 5

The Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival presents:

Cartoonists and Comics On Camera, 1916-1962

Location: The Knitting Factory | 361 Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn

Time: 3:00 – 5:00 pm

A once-in-a-lifetime presentation of rare footage featuring 20th century comics greats and some unusual animated adaptations of their work, curated by Mark Newgarden. See Rube Goldberg, Otto Soglow, Chester Gould, Frank King, Harold Grey, Hal Foster (and many more) at the drawing board! See Jefferson “Gags And Gals” Machamer act! See a drawing lesson from Fred C. Cooper! Plus Krazy Kat, Al Capp, Jacky’s Diary and many more surprises! And join us afterwards for drinks at the Knitting Factory’s front-room bar.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7

“Renée French: Drawings” Exhibit Opening

Location: Adam Baumgold Gallery | 60 East 66th Street, NY, NY

Time: 7:00 pm

Adam Baumgold Gallery presents a selection of Renée French’s exquisite graphite-on-paper drawings from 2007 to the present. Included here are sequences from her acclaimed new graphic novel, H Day, as well as a series of metaphorical “portraits” — uncanny visages made up of microscopic details.

The Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival is an ongoing project by Desert Island, PictureBox and Bill Kartalopoulos. More information about the Festival is available online at www.comicsandgraphicsfest.com.

Screengrab from the upcoming documentary 'Soul Trading' about the Thee Hypnotics (Director Phil Staines, Cinematographer Andrew Foster)

Paul Pope is comics’ closest equivalent to a rock star.

It’s a reputation he’s garnered by both his comics works and his personality — and by the fact he’s an active DJ. He now splits his time between New York City and Europe, the latter of which is the first to see some of his anthology work. Last weekend, Pope and AdHouse Books stealth-released a new issue of his seminal series THB at Baltimore Comic-Con, with extra copies now available on AdHouse’s website. The unique nature of this release was due in no small part to Pope being off the shelves of American comic book stores for years while he completes the graphic novel Battling Boy for First Second.

Just moments after riding back from Baltimore, I spoke with Pope about the new THB, as well as Battling Boy and a creation of his even more rare than the new THB.

Chris Arrant: Let’s start with an easy one, Paul – what’s on the drawing board today?

Sequence excerpt from the story 'Masked Karimbah' in 'THB: Comics From Mars #2'

Paul Pope: Battling Boy. Right now it’s a lot of inking. We’re at the point where First Second is preparing their 2011 marketing and Battling Boy (or “BB” as we call him internally) is a big part of that. So my editor Mark Siegel and I are getting a lot of pressure from higher-up to get this thing done ASAP. Without compromising quality, you know. I tend to pencil about 24 pages and ink those while penciling the next big batch, overlapping like that. I’m treating the various scenes as “issues” or “chapters” within the book. Hilary Sycamore’s studio is coloring with my art direction, and the coloring is looking really great– much brighter and flatter than Batman: Year 100, which required a gritty, urban, slightly toxic tone. Battling Boy‘s coloring is more like Hayao Miyazaki’s films Totoro and Porco Rosso.

Arrant: Last week, you let loose with a new THB – the second in a new volume. Why’d you choose to have this be a Baltimore exclusive?

Pope: It’s been really hard to go from years of periodical publishing — where you have an ongoing dialogue with readers regarding the work in progress — to suddenly working on a massive graphic novel like Battling Boy, where you do pages you want to share but nobody can see the work for literally years. I’ve missed publishing comics. So I wanted to get a one-shot out, drop it like a stealth single. [AdHouse Publisher] Chris Pitzer and I cooked up the idea and decided to keep it a secret, just launch it without any word. It was his idea to make a companion to the last Comics From Mars — so this is a second one-shot containing THB Universe comics set on Mars. It turned out nicely, I think. Chris’s cover design idea is really visually striking.

Panel excerpt from the story 'Action' from 'THB: Comics From Mars #2' (AdHouse)

Arrant: Is this con close to your heart?

Pope: I love the Baltimore con. Mark Nathan, Brad Tree and the others gear this show more toward the creators and the fans, so there’s a refreshing lack of big-media booth culture with all the movie stars and disgraced ex-governors and all these other media people and things who have sweet F.A. to do with comics. A lot of my friends in the business make it to this show, and it’s small enough you actually get some quality time with people you don’t get to see often enough. Also, it’s close to AdHouse’s HQ and in a sense is a home-team game for Chris Pitzer and AdHouse.

Arrant: This one reads to me as very fluid, with you working pretty fast – not rushing – but not letting ideas sit for too long in your head. I see a lot of ephemera like David Bowie, Tom & Jerry, and Kirby comics seeping in here … so can you tell us about putting this together?

Pope: I haven’t had the time to work on too much besides Battling Boy for some time now. The last nine or 10 months — since wrapping “Strange Adventures” for DC’s Wednesday Comics anthology — have just been a whirlwind. But I have managed to complete a short stack of THB-related short stories, a few of which were done for my French publisher, Dargaud, for their newsstand magazine Pilote. Chris and I looked at what we had already completed, and of the 50 or so “available” THB Universe pages, we edited the contents down to a solid 24 pages– it’s a single, stand-alone comic. This one has leans toward humor — my sort of absurdist humor — and action.

Panel excerpt from the story '1977' in 'THB: Comics from Mars #2' (AdHouse Books)

Arrant: While longtime comics fans like you and I have been reading for years, there are a lot of people just coming into it – or just coming back.

Pope: I’m starting to notice a considerably younger reader now, people in their teens and early college-age. For a longtime, the audience seemed to be my own age group and older Silver Age readers who are into black-and-white comics. Now it seems to be widening.

Arrant: How would you describe THB for someone who’s fresh into comics?

Pope: It’s a science fiction action-adventure story. THB is a loose handful of separate science fiction stories, all interweaving, all set in the same cities and deserts on a colonized Mars in the future. At the heart of it, it’s a coming-of-age story about a teenage girl whose father builds incredible robots. The absent father is in trouble with the law and the daughter has to figure out what that’s all about. It has elements of the science fiction I grew up loving — Frank Herbert’s Dune, Star Wars, John Carter of Mars, things like that.

Arrant: Jeff Newelt mentioned you were doing more rock ‘n’ roll art; I loved those gig posters you did a while back. Is this kind of work what he’s referring to?

Pope: I’ve done a few tour posters and magazine illos for the likes of Nick Cave, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, JSBX, Heavy Trash, White Stripes … I have been involved in the upcoming documentary about Thee Hypnotics, one of my all-time-favorite bands, I did some art for that. I’m really into jazz lately, though — abstract music.

Panel excerpt from 'Battling Boy' (AdHouse)

Arrant: I can’t hold back any more – I need to know more about Battling Boy. How’s that project coming for you? It seems like it’s gestated for a while, and with all the movie interest and a big publisher already signed on, has that helped or hindered things?

Pope: It’s been inscruitable, really. Not sure what to compare it to. The film and the book are both on separate tracks and both need to hit within the same timeframe, the book first then the film. I’ve been involved with both, which has slowed things down on the book but also benefitted the story structure for the book, since I’ve been involved pretty intimately on the film script and concept art for the film. We aren’t at greenlight yet and can’t say much about it now, but getting there, we have a lot of support from the studio and the producers and there is work going on toward a feature film.

Arrant: A friend told me they saw you DJ a party and you had a video you put together for it. Where can a guy out in the middle of nowhere like me see that video edit you put together?

Pope: Gotta make it to one of my DJ sets! It plays as a “lightshow” or a “showreel” during the live set and doesn’t live online anyplace. I like the idea of creating something that isn’t available to torrent or download or anything, it’s strictly a component of a live event. Too often now, people can get anything online and they miss out on the sense of wondering about something without really knowing what it is. I miss that and wanted in my own little way to bring that back.

For more on Paul Pope, visit his website, blog and Twitter feed.

From Paul Pope's "Battling Boy"

Artist Paul Pope and colorist Nathan Schreiber have released what I think is our first look at color pages from Battling Boy, Pope’s highly anticipated — and much-delayed — graphic novel from First Second Books.

Announced in 2007, Battling Boy centers on the son of a god (or perhaps superhero) who’s sent down from the top of a mountain by his father to rid the continent-sized city of Monstropolis of the monsters that plague it. This is the fabled comic with “horrible, Grimm’s fairytale, Beowulf-ish monsters” and 50-page fight scenes.

It was suggested back in March that Battling Boy initially could be serialized online, presumably as part of First Second’s TBC/To Be Continued initiative. However, no additional information has been released.

Abbey Road by Paul Pope

Come together, right now, over the author of Batman Year 100: Yesterday Paul Pope posted a sketch of the iconic cover of the Beatles’ swan song Abbey Road. It kinda makes me want to see bearded, white-suited John Lennon have sexy science-fiction adventures, but then again, I usually do.

"Bizarro," by Dan Piraro

Bizarro creator Dan Piraro won the 2010 Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year, presented over the weekend by the National Cartoonists Society. He beat out fellow nominees Stephan Pastis (Pearls Before Swine) and Richard Thompson (Cul de Sac).

The organization also 13 divisional awards in categories ranging from feature animation to book illustration to comic books. Paul Pope won the latter for “Strange Adventures,” his Adam Strange strip serialized in DC’s Wednesday Comics, while David Mazzucchelli took home the graphic novels award for his critically acclaimed Asterios Polyp.

The full list of divisional winners can be found after the break:

• Television animation: Seth McFarlane — Family Guy
• Feature animation: Ronnie del Carmen, storyboard artist — Up
• Newspaper illustration: Tom Richmond
• Gag cartoons: Glenn McCoy
• Greeting cards: Debbie Tomassi
• Newspaper comic strips: Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman — Zits
• Newspaper panel cartoons: Hilary Price — Rhymes with Orange
• Magazine feature/magazine illustration — Ray Alma
• Book illustration: Dave Whamond — My Think-A-Ma-Jink
• Editorial cartoons: John Sherffius
• Advertising illustration: Steve Brodner
• Comic books: Paul Pope — “Strange Adventures” (Wednesday Comics)
• Graphic novels: David Mazzucchelli — Asterios Polyp

Paul Pope's original cover for Solo #3

In advance of Paul Pope’s appearance this weekend at the Stumptown Comics Fest in Portland, Oregon, Mike Russell sits down with the cartoonist for a wide-ranging interview that touches upon, among other topics, his pursuit of a “world comic,” working for Japanese publisher Kodansha, Psychenaut — the experimental sci-fi mash-up film and the comic — and his First Second Books project Battling Boy, which boasts sprawling, 50-page fight scenes.

“They go on forever,” Pope says. “That’s from manga. One of my favorite books is Egawa Tatsuya’s Tokyo University Story — and he would have long sequences where basically nothing would be happening except a guy in a bicycle riding along, or two guys playing Ping-Pong. And that’s just so cool to me — not because it’s jerking off on paper, but because it feels real. It’s that fugue state you get into when you’re doing something — when you’re playing chess or drinking coffee in the morning trying to wake up. … To me, the magic of comics — and art — is trying to say something real about life in an artificial medium. To re-create life, or to sub-create it, to use Tolkien’s term.”

AICN dubs the lengthy Q&A “a must-read interview”; it’s definitely that. Go read it.

Battling Boy

Paul Pope’s eagerly anticipated, but much-delayed, graphic novel Battling Boy may see life online before it’s released in print.

The cartoonist revealed the information this afternoon on Twitter. “Battling Boy: can’t say final details yet but it looks very likely it will be online before in print,” Pope wrote. “I’m glad for that.” He quickly deleted the post, but not before it had been commented on, and passed along, by several readers.

Presumably Battling Boy would be serialized as part of First Second Books‘ new TBC/To Be Continued initiative that already boasts Mark Siegel’s Sailor Twain, or, the Mermaid in the Hudson, Amir and Khalil’s Zahra’s Paradise, and Derek Kirk Kim’s Tune. All three comics later will be released in print.

Announced in 2007, Battling Boy centers on the son of a god (or perhaps superhero) who’s sent down from the top of a mountain by his father to rid the continent-sized city of Monstropolis of the monsters that plague it.

“These are horrible, Grimm’s fairytale, Beowulf-ish monsters, awful things,” Pope wrote in 2008. “Child-stealers. Plus some of the vampires and mummies and wolfmen we remember from the old black and white Hollywood horror films.” He’s also teased a 50-page fight scene, the benefit of not having page restrictions.

Paramount Pictures optioned the film rights in November 2008.

Jurassic Park #1, by Frank Miller

Two months after Frank Miller tweeted “I just drew a really cool dinosaur,” everything finally falls into place with IDW Publishing’s announcement of Jurassic Park: Redemption, a new ongoing series by IDW Senior Editor Bob Schreck and artist Nate Van Dyke.

June’s Issue 1 will feature covers by Frank Miller and Tom Yeates, with subsequent covers in the initial five-issue arc by Yeates with variants by Arthur Adams (#2), Paul Pope (#3), Bernie Wrightson (#4) and Bill Stout (#5). What’s more, IDW will be giving away posters at WonderCon featuring Miller’s cover art.

The series is set 13 years after the events of the first Jurassic Park film, as John Hammond’s now-adult granddaughter Lex Murphy works with the United Nations to keep people off of Isla Nublar and Isla Sorna, while her brother Tim tries to redeem their grandfather’s name.

In addition to the new series, IDW has secured the rights to reprint the Topps Jurassic Park comics from the 1990s in a trade paperback.

Jeff Parker

Lava Men!

I’m excited by a NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL from Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover that is coming out from Top Shelf this year, that I don’t think I can name because they haven’t formally announced it yet. But really, those two names and a full length work should be all you need to hear to know I’m right.

What I’m most excited about that I’m involved with comes out in just a few weeks, it’s AVENGERS VS. ATLAS from Marvel, where I think my collaborators Gabriel Hardman, Elizabeth Breitweiser and I have really gelled. Even if you’ve never read an Agents of Atlas story, I bet you’ll enjoy seeing the original lineup of The Avengers back on the scene.

Or you’ll at least want in for the LAVA MEN.

Jeff Parker writes a whole bunch of great comics for Marvel, including all the Agents of Atlas projects and Thunderbolts. He also helped us out last year with our Robot Love posts at Valentine’s, in a post titled I ♥ learning from comics. Tim O’Shea also interviewed him about Underground earlier this year, along with artist Steve Lieber.

Paul Pope

First of all, I am excited about turning in Battling Boy, my next major graphic novel, to be published in 2011 by First Second Books. Battling Boy has been years in the works. I have a lot of faith in this project. There is a bunch of stuff related to the potential film which I would like to discuss–but can’t as of now. Same goes for the book. I have spent most of 2009 engaged in the film and book productions of this story. But the book is coming regardless of whether or not a film is made, and I am putting a lot of love into it. I hope the readers really get into it.

I am proud to say that Wednesday Comics will be collected as a large oversized book in May 2010. My 12-page “Adam Strange” strip– a tribute to heroes of yesterday like Flash Gordon and Cap’n Easy– is featured in this DC Comics special HC edition.

As far as American comics go, I am probably most excited about Sam Hiti’s new project, Death Day. He is a top cartoonist, and his latest project is full of force and menace.

I am really curious to see the Kick Ass film and the Scott Pilgrim film. I wish the creative teams on these films the best of all possible successes.

I am excited to see new work from Dustin Harbin and Kate Beaton. These are two talents I feel deserve as many new readers in 2010 as they can get, both are excellent and both have their best days ahead of them.

Paul Pope is the creator of many great comics, from 100% to THB. He has a blog that we like to link to a lot. I believe Battling Boy was also the most-named project for 2010 by the folks I contacted for this post.

Matt Kindt

Revolver

I’m really looking forward to the new series by Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt from Oni called The Sixth Gun. It looks to be a crazy horror/western and I’ve had the unique privilege to see some of Hurtt’s art for the first few issues and it’s some of his best work. I’ve never seen a writer/artist team work as well together as they do together and gives me hope that writers and artists maybe can work to make something greater than the sum of the parts. Here’s a link.

As for a project I’m excited about — I’m looking forward to my first Vertigo graphic novel “Revolver” coming out this summer. Here’s a link for that.

Matt Kindt is the creator of Super Spy and 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man, which Tim talked to him about earlier this year. We also ran one of his stories from Super Spy: The Lost Dossiers earlier today.

Evan Dorkin

I’m looking forward to IDW’s King Aroo collection, their continuation of the Dick Tracy and Little Orphan Annie series, the long-delayed fourth volume of Walt and Skeezix from Drawn and Quarterly, Melvin Monster vol 2 and Thirteen Going on Eighteen from D&Q’s John Stanley Library, DHC’s new Harvey reprints and their Trump collection, new Yotsuba volumes from Yen Press, new Blackjack volumes from Vertical, anything by Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez, a number of recently announced Fantagraphics reprint projects (a Toth collection, the pre-code horror collection, the Jack Cole collection, the Dick Briefer Frankenstein book, etc), as well as Popeye vol 5, Captain Easy vol 1 and Prince Valiant vol 2. Anything DC reprints of Jack Kirby’s that I don’t have. Mostly, work by dead people.

Since you asked about our own projects, I’m anxiously awaiting the Beasts of Burden hardcover collection Dark Horse will be publishing. It will collect all the material Jill Thompson and I have done on the series to date, going back to the first short story from 2003 and finishing up with the recent limited series. Other than that I’ve got some Bart Simpson comics I wrote and drew coming out next year from Bongo, I’m writing two comics for Dark Horse which should be pretty nifty if all goes well, and I’m hoping to get something of mine finished up for SLG to publish next year. Not holding my breath on that, though.

I’m also hoping things will work out so we can manage to attend TCAF next year.

Evan Dorkin shares information on his comics, like Beasts of Burden, and Milk & Cheese, over on his livejournal. He spoke with Tim O’Shea about the former back in July in an interview Tim still raves about.

C. Tyler

Most excited about in the world of comics:

San Diego Con, July 2010. I’ll be there as a guest. Last time I was there: 1988.

Most excited about personal:

Book II of my trilogy. “You’ll Never Know: Collateral Damage” is due out Fall 2010.

Earlier this year Tim O’Shea spoke with C. Tyler about the first book in that trilogy. She may have had the best opening line of the year in one of his interviews.

Dustin Harbin

Elephant Adventures by Dustin Harbin

COMIC-WISE, WHAT ARE YOU MOST EXCITED ABOUT FOR 2010?

Oh man. I have to say, I’m still kinda starstruck over all the stuff that came out in 2009, much of which is still on my to-read pile. As I’m finishing up Tardi’s YOU ARE THERE I’ve got FOOTNOTES FROM GAZA and ALEC: THE YEARS HAVE PANTS piled up on my table. How can you top a year with all this plus ASTERIOS POLYP? Oh wait you asked about 2010–

The very first thing that comes to mind is my fervent hope that the third volume of MOURNING STAR comes out. I’m at the point where I anticipate new Mourning Star volumes with the same sweaty zeal as POPEYE; it’s monstrously exciting to see genre comics being done in a fresh way by a young creator–the idea that something can be well-written and funny and adventurous and dramatic all at the same time is sorta rare in American comics, if you think about it. I’m glad that manga is finally starting to rub off on American creators in a deeper way than just drawing everyone to seem vaguely catlike.

Also: DEATH DAY, by Sam Hiti, currently being serialized on his site in massive chunks will see its first book collection in 2010, which will almost certainly be near the top of a ton of end-of-year lists in a year’s time. So amazing, Sam Hiti is easily the MOST undersung cartoonist working today. OH! And speaking of Sam, his stylistic antecedent Paul Pope is finally releasing BATTLING BOY this year I think, ZOMG. I’ve seen some of these pages, and they’re pretty face-melting. This is like a kids’ book you wouldn’t necessarily want your parents to know you were reading, full of monsters and violence and gods and all the stuff that’s usually bled out of this sort of thing.

In my own world, in 2010 I’ll be starting a long cartoon memoir project called THE DHARBINS, which I’ll be serializing on my site. I’m still working out the somewhat surprisingly complicated plot–surprising mainly because my life isn’t particularly complicated, and it originally happened very much in order–but in the meantime I’ve been trying to flex my cartoon muscles with a bunch of one-off and short-series cartoon exercises, which I’ll be collecting this year in my first color special.

I’m also one of the organizers of the yearly Heroes Convention, which of course I’m professionally very excited for, this year maybe more than ever–besides a ridiculous profusion of guests like Ben Templesmith, Brian Bolland, and Guy Davis, this year Indie Island will be swollen to the gills, including a bunch of first time guests from the webcomics world, including Kate Beaton, Ryan North, and Christopher Hastings. It’s going to be like Tron in Indie Island this year for sure.

In addition to all the cool stuff Dustin mentioned above, he also spoke with our Tim O’Shea this year for Talking Comics with Tim. Twice.

C.B. Cebulski

Personally, I’m excited about the release of How to Break into Comics the Marvel Way in March, which has been a long time coming! I think they’re going to be great comics that offer wonderful insight into how Marvel works and what we’re looking for from up-and-coming comic creators who want to work for us. Plus, it will feature original stories by some of the world’s best and brightest new artists who were the finalists of ChesterQuest, my international talent search.

Overall, with the world getting increasingly smaller thanks to the Internet, I’m looking forward to seeing more and more new writers and artists making their debut in any of the growing number of ways comics are released in this day and age. There are so many new voices just waiting to break out in 2010 and I can’t wait to discover their work!

C.B. Cebulski works for Marvel as a new talent scout and has written a fair share of comics himself, like X-Infernus, Loners and Wonderlost. You can follow him on his blog and on Twitter, where he’s been known to offer advice to aspiring creators.

Faith Erin Hicks

Brain Camp

In 2010, I’m most looking forward to continuing down the rabbit hole that is Naoki Urasawa’s comics. Pluto will be ending in March, I think, and 20th Century Boys will continue on for many more twisty volumes. I find Urasawa’s comics thrilling in a way no other comics are … and by now all my friends are completely sick of me breaking into conversation to talk about how freaking awesome he is. I’m contemplating starting some kind of support group. For some reason he hits my storytelling sweet spot at this moment in time, just like Jeff Smith did with Bone when I was a teenager. I’m thrilled I have many more Urasawa comics to read… blessings upon the Japanese comic making machine that forces him to churn out 1200 pages a year! I feel terrible for the guy’s wrist, but you can never have enough Urasawa. I’m also looking forward to seeing what else Viz Signature publishes, as I’ve very much enjoyed Children of the Sea, Solanin, What a Wonderful World! and Ooku, all published by them.

As for something of my own that I’m looking forward to in 2010, my first graphic novel with First Second Books comes out in the fall. It’s a middle grade horror/comedy/coming of age graphic novel called Brain Camp, written by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan with me on art duties. I’d never before drawn someone else’s script, which was both challenging and rewarding. I saw my artwork improve a lot over the course of the book, which was encouraging… although I’m still nervous to see what the reaction will be. Like me, nice comic reviewer people, like me!

I’m also planning to finish up drawing my second book for First Second in June, which I both wrote and drew. It’s called Friends With Boys. It’s a semi-but-not-really autobiographical story about a homeschooled girl entering public high school, and her gang of large hairy manly brothers. I’m just finishing up Christmas break with my family, and every year my brothers seem to get larger, hairier and manlier… I think they’re part Sasquatch. Anyway, I’m really thrilled that First Second is publishing this book, and I hope people will like it. Here’s a drawing of the main character, Maggie.

I’m also hoping that SLG Publishing, who published two other graphic novels by me, Zombies Calling and The War at Ellsmere, will be able to publish my long running webcomic Ice… provided I finish the sucker and all the stars align. Fingers crossed that the Small Press Comic Gods will be kind to us in 2010, and we’ll be able to make that happen. Hey comic folk, buy a book by an indie publisher today, they do awesome stuff!

I’m excited for 2010. It seems like over the ’00s we saw an amazing diversity of new comics being published, both online and offline, and I got to read them all and be a part of that. I sound like a total sap, but there’s a richness to the comics world now that I really love… I feel like I can find comics written FOR me, which is amazing. I hadn’t really felt that in the 90s, when I was a kid interested in comics and not sure what to read. I can’t wait to see what the ’10s bring us. GO COMICS! (Imagine me throwing up a couple of pom-poms here.)

Faith Erin Hicks is the creator of Zombies Calling and The War at Ellsmere, both available from SLG, in addition to the new projects she mentions above. She helped us out back in February with a post titled “I ♥ Anticipating Comics.” Follow her on livejournal.

Randy Lander

I’m excited for a lot of comics-related things next year, but the big ones are actually probably the movies. I wasn’t huge into Kick-Ass the comic, but those trailers for the movie are a blast, and I’m especially excited to see Iron Man 2, given how great the first one is and how slick that first trailer looks.

I’m also excited for STAPLE! 2010, the independent media show that I’ve been helping to put together (and co-sponsoring) for several years. This year our guests of honor include Guy Davis, who is one of my top five favorite artists of all time, plus Andy Runton (Owly) and Chris Schweizer (Crogan’s Vengeance) and a huge selection of other creators as well. It’s always a good time, and seems to be getting bigger and better this year, and I can’t wait until it’s March and time for the big show again.

Happy New Year!

Randy Lander is the owner of Rogues Gallery Comics & Games, which you should visit if you’re ever in Round Rock, Texas. He can also recommend some good places to get Tex Mex in the area.

Graeme McMillan

I’ve managed to somehow lose touch with a lot of the weekly comings-and-goings of superhero comics in 2009, but I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t curious about seeing the new “Heroic Age” status quo of the Marvel Universe and post-Blackest Night DC Universe, if only to cynically see how long this latest version of bright, positive, optimistic superhero status quos will last. Being a sucker for DC books, I’m also looking forward to both the conclusion (conclusion-ish?) of the long-running Superman plots from the last couple of years with the “War Of The Supermen” crossover, and Grant Morrison going bat-guano crazy with The Return of Bruce Wayne, but both come with a very quiet, very small print “Oh Please Do Not Suck I Want To Like You So Bad” trailing along behind. Can I say that I’m genuinely excited about Girl Comics without the internet jumping up and down? Never mind my misgivings about the title and the whole “2010, Marvel Remembers Women Exist!” branding; ignore the gender of the creators involved and, man: That’s one of the most talent-filled anthologies around.

What I’m maybe most looking forward to are new books from people whose work I’ve come to love recently: Scott Pilgrim 6, obviously (And the movie, too), but also James Stokoe’s Orc book at Image, and the unseen King City second half by Brandon Graham. Hope Larson’s Mercury has me very excited, as does the rumored possibly maybe new possibility of new Casanova. Is Paul Pope’s Battling Boy coming out this year, as well? If so, then I’ll be first in line for that and then some. I’ve read the first issue of Joe The Barbarian, and it’s got a lot of potential – Morrison’s script is a little rough, but it’s a stunning looking book; Vertigo’s made a quiet comeback over the last couple of years, I think, and between Joe The Barbarian and Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba’s Daytripper, they’re coming out with some great stuff that not enough people are paying attention to.

Really, though, I’m looking forward to things that I don’t know anything about: Something that’ll knock my socks off without me seeing it coming. Come on, 2010. As Pat Benatar once said, hit me with your best shot.

Graeme writes about comics and other things over at io9.com, and recently contributed to our What are you reading? feature. And of course he used to blog with us back when we were at Blog@Newsarama, so he’ll always be family.

His comics ain't so bad either

Brian Michael Bendis! At least according to Samuel Rules of Are You a Serious Comic Book Reader? In a post stuffed with evidentiary linkage, Sammy proclaims “No one used Twitter better in 2009 than Bendis,” citing the Siege writer’s honesty and humor, as well as the “little insights into his life” he provided. “I used to talk a lot of trash on him,” Sammy recalls — “Upon discovering his Twitter, however, I started to understand him as a person, and then kinda wanted to hang out with him.”

Which got me thinking: Who would I proclaim comics’ Twitter-er…Twit…uh, Tweeter of the year?

Would I stick with Bendis, for his informative Q&A alone?

What about Matt Fraction, for his performance-art masterpiece Hobo Darkseid?

Michael Kupperman, for a consistently hilarious feed that’s like reading Tales Designed to Thrizzle in pictureless 140-character snippets?

Paul Pope, for his philosophical musings?

Kate Beaton and Dustin Harbin, the dynamic duo of Tweeting webcartoonists?

Ryan “Agent M” Penagos, for having more followers than the rest of the comics industry combined?

But then I remembered the one man whose Twitter account impacted my life, or at least the blogging side of it, more than anyone else. For my money, no one tops the ever-interesting, refreshingly candid Tom Brevoort. Why, just the other day he took to his feed to breathe a sigh of relief about Captain America: Reborn finishing before The Flash: Rebirth as he predicted, size up his chances regarding Siege finishing before Blackest Night, criticize Rebirth artist Ethan Van Sciver for drawing convention commissions while his book is delayed, and defend Reborn artist Bryan Hitch from accusations of habitual lateness. Can you imagine if everyone in comics were that forthright? I can, and it looks like heaven from here. Tweetin’ Tom Brevoort, we salute you!