san diego comic con
SDCC ’12 | MAC Cosmetics to launch Archie’s Girls makeup line
After partnering last year with DC Comics for a collection of Wonder Woman makeup — Themyscira mascara! Obey Me nail polish! — MAC Cosmetics is heading to Riverdale.
Archie Comics announced today that it’s teaming with the cosmetics giant to launch a line in spring 2013 called MAC Archie’s Girls that will “celebrate the iconic looks of Betty and Veronica.” Although fans will have to wait a while to get their hands on the products, MAC will be promoting the line Wednesday and Thursday in San Diego with an event at its Gaslamp Quarter store featuring Archie cartoonist Dan Parent. Apparently, you’ll be able to get a Betty- or Veronica-style makeover, and a sketch from Parent.
SDCC ’12 | Exclusive first look at six new Love and Rockets 30th anniversary T-shirts
Love and Rockets is celebrating its 30th anniversary at Comic-Con International in San Diego, and to help fans mark the occasion in style, Fantagraphics partnered with Graphitti Designs to offer six new T-shirts featuring characters created by the legendary Hernandez Brothers. The shirts, which cost $18.99 each, can be found at the Fantagraphics booth (#1718-1722).
But wait, there’s more — Fantagraphics and the Hernandez Brothers also will debut three new books at the show. First up is the newest work by Gilbert and Jaime, Love & Rockets New Stories #5, featuring Gilbert’s return to Palomar and Jaime’s much-anticipated follow-up to “The Love Bunglers” (from #4). Also debuting is God and Science: Return of the Ti-Girls, Jaime’s superhero epic combining material from Love and Rockets: New Stories #1 and #2 plus 30 all-new pages. Comic-Con also hails the release of Gilbert’s children-focused graphic novel,The Adventures of Venus, which we recently previewed on Robot 6. You can also expect a Love and Rockets-related announcement Saturday at the “30th Anniversary of Love and Rockets” panel.
Check out the shirts and the full press release below.
Second Walking Dead Compendium due in stores Oct. 3
A second Walking Dead Compendium will arrive just in time for Halloween and, of course, the next season of AMC’s The Walking Dead TV series. The massive volume, collecting issues #49-96 of the Walking Dead comic book, arrives Oct. 3 and retails for $59.99.
Robert Kirkman told USA Today it’s his favorite format for the comic. “It’s just such a big, huge book that really offers a lot of bang for your buck,” he said. “The idea of having Volume 1 and 2 sitting next to each other on a reinforced shelf really excites me.”
Like its predecessor, it collects eight trade paperbacks into one 1,068-page volume. It also sports a similar cover to the first volume, featuring the main characters at the top and “zombiefied” mirror images of them below.
Check out the full cover by Charlie Adlard and Cliff Rathburn after the jump.
SDCC ’12 | Sunday programming schedule announced
Comic-Con
2012′s Comic-Con International wraps up on Sunday with its traditional focus on kids. Kid-friendly properties like LEGO Ninjago, video game characters Sonic and Mega Man, SpongeBob SquarePants, Carton Network’s Ben 10 and Level Up!, and many more are represented, along with creators like Raina Telgemeier, Art Baltazar and Franco, Shane Houghton and others who know a thing or two about creating great kids’ comics.
Comic publishers get their final chance to talk up their lines, as Marvel, DC Comics, Image, Archie, IDW Publishing and more are represented. The schedule also includes spotlight panels for Jason Shiga, Angelo Torres, Tom Yeates and Alison Bechdel.
Here are some of the comics-related highlights below; visit the Comic-Con website to see the complete schedule.
Nominees named for 2012 Russ Manning Promising Newcomer Award
Comic-Con International has announced the nominees for this year’s Russ Manning Promising Newcomer Award. They are:
- Craig Cermak, artist of Voltron, Year One (published by Dynamite Entertainment)
- Martin Cóccolo, artist of Helldorado (published by APE Entertainment)
- Tyler Crook, artist of Petrograd (published by Oni Press) and B.P.R.D. (published by Dark Horse)
- Teagan Gavet, penciler of Norgard: Across Thin Ice (Published by Sofawolf)
- Dave Wachter, artist of Night of 1,000 Wolves and That Hellbound Train (published by IDW Publishing)
The award is named for Russ Manning, the prolific artist who worked on Tarzan and Star Wars, and created the classic comic series Magnus, Robot Fighter. Started in 1982 as a joint presentation of Comic-Con International and the West Coast Comics Club, this award honors a comics artist who, early in his or her career, shows a superior knowledge and ability in the art of creating comics. Previous winners of the award include Dave Stevens, the first winner in 1982, as well as Art Adams, Jeff Smith, Gene Ha, Jerome Opeña, Steve Rude, David Petersen, R. Kikuo Johnson, Marian Churchland and Nate Simpson, who won last year.
The winner will be announced July 13 during the Eisner Awards ceremony at Comic-Con International in San Diego.
Tr!ckster offers the chance to have Steve Niles co-write your comic
Tr!ckster, the creator-focused event that took place offsite last year during Comic-Con International, is planning a return to San Diego. Putting on an event like Tr!ckster takes money, of course, so the creators involved have turned to Indiegogo to raise the $35,000 they need.
Indiegogo works a lot like Kickstarter: You contribute money toward a particular project and get back some kind of reward based on how much you pledged. The Tr!ckster folks are offering some fairly unique incentives that stem from the creator-centric ideas behind the event itself. These include opportunities to brainstorm, get feedback from, and even co-create with, the likes of B. Clay Moore, Doug TenNapel and Steve Niles. For instance, for $300, you can choose a cocktail hour/working session with Ivan Brandon and Eric Canete, who will help you brainstorm and offer feedback over booze. And for $750, Niles will actually co-write a 22-page comic with you. If you’re serious about becoming a comic book creator and have the money to spend, this is a pretty great opportunity. And if you aren’t interested in the creator incentives, they’re also offering things like Tr!ckster T-shirts and a Mike Mignola print.
Tr!ckster 2012 will be held July 11-13 at Wine Steals/Proper, a paired restaurant/pub on J Street in San Diego.
Mattel reveals Tiny Titans, Death San Diego exclusives
Tiny Titans
The operative word for Mattel’s San Diego exclusives this year would be “cute,” if the three DC Comics items they posted on their MattyCollector site today are any indication. As you can see above, they’ll be offering a set of Tiny Titans collectible figures with a display base. And if that’s not enough of a cute overload for you, click below to see the Death figure and the Polly Pocket Comics Villains set, featuring a trio of Bat villains, labeled “A” for “Adorable.”
They also announced some Masters of the Universe and Ghostbusters exclusives as well, so click on over if you want to check those out.
Comics A.M. | Stan Lee talks comics and The Stan Lee Story
Stan Lee
Creators | Ahead of the premiere of the documentary With Great Power: The Stan Lee Story, the 89-year-old Lee discusses the big-screen success of his co-creations, the fairy-tale appeal of superheroes, his favorite character (he doesn’t have one), and a time when he was embarrassed to admit he wrote comic books: “Oh well, in the beginning, comics were the lowest rung on the cultural totem pole. I’d go to a party and people would say ‘What do you do?’ ‘Um, uh, I’m a writer’ and I’d try to walk away. And the guy would follow. ‘What do you write?’ ‘Oh, er, stories for kids.’ Well finally he’d pin me down and I’d say, ‘Okay, I write comic books’ — and boy, he couldn’t get away fast enough. Now, though, I walk into a party and someone sees me and they say, ‘Sorry, excuse me a minute, President Obama, I have to go over and say hello to Stan Lee.’ Well, okay. Slight exaggeration on my part.” [The Star-Ledger]
Conventions | The Calgary Sun previews this weekend’s Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo. [Calgary Sun]
Conventions | Jimmy Jay wonders whether Comic-Con International in San Diego could expand to two weekends, like the Coachella Music Fest. [ComicConMen]
Comics A.M. | Chris Roberson speaks on his split with DC Comics
Chris Roberson
Creators | iZombie writer Chris Roberson discusses his recent public announcement that he would no longer accept work from DC Comics and his subsequent dismissal from his last writing job for the publisher. “Well, this has been building over the last few months, and mostly had to do with what I saw DC and Time Warner doing in regards to creator relations. I think the first thing — you have to understand that when I first started working for DC in 2008, the Siegels had just recaptured half of the copyright for Action Comics #1 and I felt very good about that. That seemed like a very positive step. And then over the course of the last few months there has been the counter-suit against the Siegels’ lawyer, Marc Toberoff, and I was less sanguine about that, and starting to get a little itchy about it, and then there were just a few general things about the way that it seemed that DC regards creators now that are working for them — and I can talk about that more in detail — but the real kind of proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back was the announcement at the beginning of February of Before Watchmen, which I just thought was unconscionable. And so I had already signed a contract by that point to do six more issues of iZombie, of which three of them had been turned in, and so I just made the decision to go ahead and turn in the remaining three, not wanting to jeopardize the livelihood of my collaborators Mike and Laura Allred. But once I turned in the last one, even though I had other work lined up, I would have to at least — if only for my own peace of mind — let people know that I wasn’t happy with it.” [The Comics Journal]
Nominations open for the Russ Manning Promising Newcomer Award
Comic-Con International announced today that submissions are being accepted for the 31st annual Russ Manning Promising Newcomer Award, which will be presented in July during the Eisners ceremony at the San Diego Comic-Con. The award was named after Russ Manning, the prolific artist who worked on Tarzan and Star Wars, and created the classic comic series Magnus, Robot Fighter.
Started in 1982 as a joint presentation of Comic-Con International and the West Coast Comics Club, this award honors a comics artist who, early in his or her career, shows a superior knowledge and ability in the art of creating comics. Previous winners of the award include Dave Stevens, the first winner in 1982, as well as Art Adams, Jeff Smith, Gene Ha, Jerome Opeña, Steve Rude, David Petersen, R. Kikuo Johnson, Marian Churchland and Nate Simpson, who won last year.
Below is the criteria for the award that was sent out by CCI:
Comics A.M. | Comic-Con ‘getting a handle on’ badge process
Comic-Con International
Conventions | Comic-Con International spokesman David Glanzer addresses problems with the badge-buying process: “After the two aborted events last year, we learned that each person had a multitude of browsers open. That’s going to create a bottleneck no matter what you do. Were there issues? Are we trying to work on them? Yes, we are. I think people’s anger is understandable, when all they’re trying to do is pay someone for a badge to attend an event and they can’t do that. We do test after test, and lo and behold something will happen. But (selling out in) an hour 20 minutes shows us we’re getting a handle on it.” [U-T San Diego]
Comic strips | Darren Bell talks about having Trayvon Martin, the Florida teenager who was killed by a neighborhood watch member, appear in his comic strip Candorville: ” I decided to incorporate him into Candorville as soon as I saw one of my Facebook ‘friends’ post a photo of Trayvon [that turned out to not be this Trayvon], flipping off his webcam. Even if that had been the real Trayvon Martin, it wouldn’t have mattered. … What this told me was people were starting to dehumanize Trayvon, so they could rationalize what happened and insulate their own belief about ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws, about race, about concealed carry laws, etc., from any fallout.” [Comic Riffs]
Comics A.M. | Comic-Con hotel reservations open Thursday
Comic-Con International
Conventions | The hotel reservation system for Comic-Con International in San Diego will open Thursday at 9 a.m. PT, as the yearly mad dash for discounted hotel rates begins. CCI has posted a list of hotels, and if you’re willing to stay in Mission Valley, you can book a room early. The process will be the same as last year — select up to 20 hotels where you’d be willing to stay, and you’ll get a confirmation email no later than April 1. You can leave your April Fool’s jokes in the comments below. Also of note this year, shuttles to and from hotels will run 24 hours a day during the show, beginning at 5 a.m. Thursday. [CCI]
Editorial cartoons | Michael Cavna rounds up nine editorial cartoons commenting on the killing of Florida teenager Tryavon Martin. [The Washington Post]
Comics A.M. | Not-guilty pleas in death of elderly comic collector
Legal
Legal | Rico Venditti and six other alleged members of a stolen-goods ring pleaded not guilty Tuesday to federal murder and racketeering charges following a revised grand jury indictment in the July 2010 home invasion of an elderly comics collector. The victim, 78-year-old Homer Marciniak of Medina, New York, died of a heart attack a few hours after being tied up and assaulted during the robbery, which prosecutors claim was set up by Venditti and two others. [The Associated Press]
Conventions | A preview of the first Image Expo, which kicks off Friday in Oakland, California, does double duty as a profile of Image Comics. [Contra Costa Times]
Conventions | Bruce Lidl looks at the potential “Comic-Con tax” that could hit attendees as a result of the expansion of the San Diego Convention Center. [The Beat]
Pre-registration opens for Comic-Con International
Comic-Con International has opened pre-registration for those hoping to attend the July 12-15 convention. That’s right, pre-registration.
Seeking to ease the online process for purchasing badges, organizers this year are requiring prospective attendees to sign up for a free Comic-Con Member ID that they will use to log into the system once registration actually opens.
Having a Member ID doesn’t ensure your entry into Comic-Con; anyone with a valid and unique email address can get one. However, everyone — attendee, volunteer, professional or press — who intends to purchase or apply for a convention badge must first have a Member ID.
More information can be found on the Comic-Con website. You can sign up for a Member ID here; the video below will walk you through the process.
Comics A.M. | Comic-Con co-founder Richard Alf passes away
Richard Alf
Passings | Richard Alf, who as a teenager fronted the money for the first three years of San Diego’s Golden State Comic-Con, the annual event that later became Comic-Con International, passed away Wednesday from pancreatic cancer. He was 59. Alf, who co-chaired the first convention in 1970 and became chairman the following year, later opened Comic Kingdom in North Slope, a business he sold by the end of the decade. [U-T San Diego, Mark Evanier]
Conventions | iFanboy, San Francisco’s Isotope Comics and Grant Morrison are teaming up for MorrisonCon, which will feature “A once in a lifetime opportunity to see Grant Morrison and 9 hand picked comic creator superstars, all together for one weekend, one time only.” They’ve released few details so far, but the website says it’ll occur next fall. [MorrisonCon]
Awards | Comic-Con International is now accepting submissions for the 2012 Eisner Awards, which will be presented in San Diego in July. The deadline for submitting materials for consideration is March 6. [CCI]