George Lucas is partnering with Nerdist Industries for “Course of the Force,” a 136-mile lightsaber relay beginning July 7 in Santa Monica and ending July 11 at Comic-Con International in San Diego to raise money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. It will be officially announced tonight on NBC’s Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.

The brainchild of Nerdist’s Peter Levin and Chris Hardwick, Variety reports the Star Wars-themed event will feature 500 participants walking or running quarter-mile legs, passing a Lucasfilm-produced “Course of the Force” lightsaber rather than the traditional torch or baton. Octagon and Machinima are co-producing the relay.

Participants are encouraged to come dressed in their best Star Wars or pop culture-themed running gear — Drew Carey and Jim Gaffigan have already committed to wearing costumes — for a chance to win prizes along the route. The conclusion of the relay in San Diego in the hours before Comic-Con’s Preview Night will be marked by a party and live podcast at the Balboa Theater.

All proceeds, generated through sponsorships, will benefit the Make-A-Wish Foundation. For more information, or to register for the relay, visit the “Course of the Force” website.

Lightsaber Run to Debut Leading up to San Diego Comic-Con International
Course of the Force run/walk from Santa Monica to San Diego will benefit the Make-A-Wish Foundation

SAN FRANCISCO (FEB. 9, 2012) – Star WarsTM fans will have a chance to channel their Force of good-will while raising a lightsaber, an elegant symbol of hope, in an epic journey worthy of the Jedi Knights.

Lucasfilm Ltd., Nerdist Industries, Octagon and Machinima have teamed up to present Course of the Force, an Olympic-style lightsaber relay held July 7-11, where participants will make a journey from Santa Monica to San Diego while benefiting a worthy cause. At quarter-mile markers (much less than 12 parsecs), participants will hand off the official Course of the Force lightsaber to the next runner as they begin their leg of the journey. Course of the Force will take place in the days leading up to the annual San Diego Comic-Con International, July 12-15.

On top of creating an event for Star Wars enthusiasts to celebrate and embrace their love of the Saga, Course of the Force will benefit the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Fans will have the opportunity to participate in the historic lightsaber relay through various promotions and online calls to action.

Participants in the relay are encouraged to come decked out in their best Star Wars or pop culture-themed running gear, not only to look good but also to win prizes. Ancient Jedi Masters carried within backpacks are not required.

“The Course of the Force lightsaber run is a great cause that combines fitness with helping others, principles that aspiring Jedi Knights can embrace. We have long supported the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and this is a great opportunity to raise funds and awareness while letting Star Wars fans celebrate their favorite saga,” said Kayleen Walters, Sr. Director of Marketing for Lucasfilm.

Giving the event a true fan’s touch, Nerdist Industries’ founder Chris Hardwick and co-hosts will follow the action from the Course of the Force lead vehicle each day, broadcasting live to the Nerdist platform, including its YouTube channel, youtube.com/nerdist. Machinima, the dominant video entertainment network for gamers around the world, will provide extensive coverage and promotion of the event through its multi-channel video network.

As the Course makes its stops along the iconic California coast, Star Wars-themed parties, contests and live Nerdist shows will cap off each day for fans to enjoy. Participants will receive a customized Hasbro Star Wars Ultimate FX lightsaber, along with other gifts celebrating the Force and Comic-Con.

“We aim to build on the excitement leading up to San Diego Comic-Con International, to raise awareness for the wonderful Make-A-Wish Foundation and to ensure that Course of the Force becomes an evergreen part of the pop culture lexicon,” said Nerdist Industries’ principal and Course of the Force creator and executive director Peter Levin. “Partnering with Lucasfilm, Octagon and Machinima creates a trilogy of cachet, profile and execution expertise. As a wise green man might say, ‘succeed we will, for a good cause’.”

Check out Diamond’s release list or ComicList, and tell us what you’re getting in our comments field.

John Romita's The Amazing Spider-man: Artist's Edition

Graeme McMillan

Congratulations, Dark Horse: You pretty much own my first $15 for the week, with Dark Horse Presents #8 ($7.99) and Star Wars: Dawn of The Jedi #0 ($3.50) both being my go-to new releases for the week. DHP has the new Brian Wood/Kristian Donaldson series The Massive launching, as well as more Beasts of Burden by Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson and new Skeleton Key by Andi Watson, which is a pretty spectacular line-up, and the new Star Wars book coincides with the latest flare up of my irregular longing to check up on that whole universe’s goings-on. Apparently, I’m keeping it local this week, who knew?

If I had $30, I’d add Action Comics #6 (DC Comics, $3.99) and OMAC #6 (DC Comics, $2.99) to that pile — I’m particularly treasuring the latter before it goes away, although I have to admit that the time-jumping nature of these Action fill-ins has gotten me more excited than I should ‘fess up to — as well as a couple of Ed Brubaker books, Winter Soldier #1 (Marvel, $2.99) and Fatale #2 (Image Comics, $3.50). I wasn’t bowled over by Fatale‘s debut, but it intrigued me enough to want to give it another go, while the noir + super spy sales pitch for the new Marvel series pretty much guarantees my checking the first issue out at the very least.

When it comes to splurging, there is nothing I would buy – were I rich enough — more quickly than IDW’s John Romita Sr. Amazing Spider-Man Artist Edition HC ($100), because … well, it’s classic Romita as the pages originally looked on his drawing board. How anyone can resist that (other than the price point), I don’t know.

Action! Mystery! Thrills!

Chris Mautner

There’s not much I’m interested in at the $15 level this week, so I’ll likely keep it to the issue #63 of The Boys.

If I had $30, I’d put that issue of The Boys back on the shelf and pick up Action! Mystery! Thrills!, a colorful collection of comic book covers from the Golden Age edited by Greg Sadowski. It’s not as insightful as some of Sadowski’s other books like Supermen!, but it’s still a clever pop-candy tour through comics’ yesteryear.

Almost defining the term splurge this week is the Madman 20th Anniversary Monster, a $100 tribute to Mike Allred’s creation featuring new work by folks like Kyle Baker, Peter Milligan, Peter Bagge, Dave Cooper, Dean Haspiel, Paul Pope, Craig Thompson and many more. And a new Madman story from Allred. I doubt in reality I have the cash to justify this sort of purchase, but hey, I’m splurging, right?

Cross Game, Volume 6

Brigid Alverson

If I had $15, all but a penny of it would go to one book, vol. 6 of Cross Game ($14.99). Viz is releasing this baseball/drama series in delicious, double-sized volumes and the sweet story and easy-to-digest artwork make it one of my favorites.

If I had $30, I’d mix it up a bit with a stack of floppies: Ice Age: Iced In ($3.99), a lighthearted, all-ages comic from KaBoom; Sergio Aragones Funnies #7 ($3.50), because someone was just commenting on how funny Aragones is; Terry Moore’s Rachel Rising #5 ($3.99); and with what I have left, I’ll try out Dynamite’s Lone Ranger #2 ($3.99), which looks kind of cool. That’s a little over budget, but maybe I’ll get a deal on one of these.

Usually the splurge category is where I go for thick, colorful books of classic comics, and while that fourth volume of Dark Horse’s Archie Archives is calling out to me, this looks like a Fantagraphics week, with two compilations that span opposite ends of the love spectrum: Young Romance: The Best of Simon & Kirby’s Romance Comics ($29.99), and The Life and Death of Fritz the Cat ($19.99). That’s a whole lotta reading for $50.

Magic: The Gathering #1

Michael May

If I had $15, I’d start with a series I’m following that has a new issue this week, Fear Itself: The Fearless #8 ($2.99) and then I’d add some new things I want to try. I’ve said before that Winter Soldier #1 ($2.99) is the closest thing we’re going to get to a Black Widow series for a while, so — while that’s sad — I’ll take it. I’m also cautiously curious about Image’s nasty-sounding Alpha Girl #1 ($2.99) and Zenescope’s Jurassic Strike Force 5 #1 ($2.99). I don’t have a lot of confidence in Zenescope’s brand, but dino-soldiers from space need looking into.

If I had $30, I’d add some more expensive comics to that pile, starting with Betrayal of the Planet of the Apes #4 ($3.99). I’m also looking forward to seeing if IDW can do the same thing with Magic: The Gathering #1 ($3.99) that they did with their Dungeons & Dragons comics (ie make it really good). Then I’d circle back to the Boom rack for Ice Age: Iced In ($3.99) – because my son loves those movies and will love that comic – and check out Dynamite’s John Carter/Gullivar Jones mash-up, Warriors of Mars #1 ($3.99).

If I’m able to splurge, I’m always interested in the new Dark Horse Presents ($7.99), but especially when it has new BPRD and Beasts of Burden stories. And since that’s not a huge splurge, I’d also grab the Xombi collection ($14.99), which coincidentally comes out the same day as Static Shock #6.

Hello and welcome to Shelf Porn, where fans show us their collections. Today’s submission comes from Victor Liew in Edmonton, Alberta Canada.

If you’d like to see your collection right here on Robot 6, just send me a write-up and some jpgs, and we’ll make it happen!

Now let’s hear from Victor.

*****

I began officially collecting comic books with Alpha Flight 1 by John Byrne, which led to his Fantastic Four run, which led to Uncanny X-Men, which led to New Teen Titans, and so on. So far, I’ve managed to confine my hobby to one basement room in the house. The highlights include a complete run of Miracleman 1-24 and to date I am three issues away from completing the 300-issue run of Cerebus – unfortunately I require 1, 3, and 4 which are pretty difficult to find at an affordable price.

Although my comics are in long boxes, I keep my graphic novels, hardcovers, trade paperbacks, and collectibles on shelves. Most of the Star Wars toys are original to my childhood. Luckily I was not one of those kids whose parents threw out their toys. I managed to keep mine in pretty good shape for the most part. Other items I was able to reacquire as I got older, got a job and actually had some cash to buy.

The shelf with the Lone Wolf and Cub/Samurai Executioner/Path of the Assasin manga digests also holds most of my Star Wars swag. On the top shelf is a Dark Knight promotional vacuform (although it’s a little beat up) plus the LP for the original Star Wars record album.

The manga spin rack that holds the Archie digests was retrieved from a “dumpster dive” from a local comic shop that threw it out. It was perfectly fine so I pulled it out of the garbage, threw it in my car and drove off before too many people noticed what I was doing.

I went on an Absolute edition binge, much to the detriment of my wallet. The Battlestar Galactica Viper on the shelf is an original toy from 1979 . I also have a Cylon raider on the adjacent shelf. In both cases, they shoot out small red missiles but this was changed due to safety concerns as kids were getting nailed in the eyes with the missiles. Later versions of the viper and raider had missiles but they did not detach from the ships.

The room has original artwork from Steve Rolston on Queen and Country, a Darick Robertson head sketch of Billy Butcher from The Boys, and a Steve McNiven Nemesis sketch. The Batman Earth One print was signed by Gary Frank at Fan Expo in Toronto 2010.

Hope you like what you see. I love looking at other collector rooms so hopefully my room is worthy of inclusion. Happy New Year!

Byron Mosley explains how to defeat a Force-user in this comic strip called “The Lando Effect.” You can probably guess the final panel, but that makes it no less funny to see. Actually, Mosley has a lot of funny strips on his site, so you should plan to spend some time there.

(via Geeks Are Sexy)

Hello and welcome to Shelf Porn! It’s been awhile since we had someone’s shelves to feature, and what a great way to end 2011 by posting someone’s collection.

Today’s shelves come to us from, simply, “The Dork,” who blogs regularly over at The Dork Review. “This is a collection of my stuff (minus the Yoda stuff; which is my wife’s) that I have been collecting since I was a kid,” he told me via email. He had previously posted it on his own site, and you can see that post right here.

If you would like to contribute some shelves, it’s easy — just send pictures and a brief description to jkparkin@yahoo.com.

And now, onto the shelves!

*****

Green Lantern vol. 3 #19

Last week’s post discussed a couple of interrelated topics which I thought deserved a little more attention. One comes out of the idea that there can be a “Superman done right,” and the other deals with the development of a concept over time. Both of these are central to any fan of modern corporately-owned superhero comics, and in fact they inform much of our debates. However, they raise some thorny questions.

First off, the notion of “[character] done right” necessarily implies that the character can be “done wrong.” This is nothing new. Many fans might even say that the “wrong” examples far outnumber the “right” ones. For me, though, the problem comes when the “right” examples vary from the original conception of the character.

We can find examples of this in the various Green Lanterns. Writer John Broome, artist Gil Kane, and editor Julius Schwartz revitalized GL by making him an honest, fearless test pilot; but after a decade of straightforward adventures, Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams turned that on its ear. O’Neil and Adams also created Hal’s new deputy, John Stewart, a passionate architect dedicated to social justice. Nevertheless, for his role on the “Justice League” animated series, John became a hard-edged ex-Marine. This portrayal found its way into the comics, where it superseded John’s original (and somewhat lower-key) background.

Hal’s first backup, Guy Gardner, may have gotten the biggest makeover. Created by Broome and Kane for 1968′s Green Lantern #59, Guy was the one-off star of a story which revealed that he could easily have been top dog in Sector 2814. As you probably know, O’Neil and Adams introduced John after putting Guy out of commission a few pages earlier. Several years later, after a brief stint with a power ring, Guy was left comatose, until writer Steve Englehart and artist Joe Staton revived him in time for Crisis On Infinite Earths. That cataclysm gave Englehart and Staton the opening to make Guy something of a renegade — not quite as bad as Sinestro, but not the most friendly to Hal, John, or their peers. Furthermore, once Guy joined the Justice League, writers Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis amped up his boorish qualities. Today, all of that has been swirled around and blended into a fairly nuanced personality, but it’s hard to say whether any of it goes back specifically to the brief glimpse readers got in 1968.

Indeed, all three Lanterns trace their roots back to the Golden Age’s Alan Scott, created by Bill Finger and Martin Nodell. Alan literally looks nothing like his descendants: blond with a red, green, and purple costume and a magic ring and battery which didn’t come from the planet Oa. (Well, not directly, and not at first.) So do we judge how faithful Hal, John, and Guy are to Alan? Can we?

It depends on how we view the character of “Green Lantern,” and it brings me to the second prong of today’s post. Although none of us superhero fans are getting any younger, I suspect there are few of us who remember Alan as the only GL. Heck, I wonder how many of us remember a time before Guy or John. It’s not a stretch to suppose that the vast majority of superhero-comics readers see “Green Lantern” as one of DC’s legacies, albeit one which allows (if not encourages) multiple Lanterns to coexist. Put another way, “Green Lantern” isn’t a single character, it’s an idea — hero with magic ring — which runs through decades’ worth of stories and several individual characters. Accordingly, we judge how faithful those characters are to the abstract idea, not necessarily the creators’ intent. Again, we do this in large part because that’s what we know. That’s all we have known. We can try to put ourselves in the place of a reader from the ‘40s, ‘50s, ‘60s, whenever, but by and large that’s not our true perspective.

I was reminded of this over the weekend when talking about Star Wars, and specifically how to introduce various younger family members to the Galaxy Far, Far Away. To me, it came down to a couple of factors: the “padawan’s” age, and whether she was interested in the films as one coherent story. Basically, I figured that if a kid didn’t know about a certain big spoiler, she might as well start with Episode I and go all the way through to VI. However, I know that won’t apply in most cases; so generally, I’d start with the 1977 original (as amended, unless one doesn’t mind VHS) before going back to The Phantom Menace. Sure, you have to watch Episode IV twice, but what’s wrong with that?

The larger point, though, is that Star Wars has developed from a single game-changing blockbuster to a familiar, almost constant presence in pop culture. Like many of you, I can remember a world without Star Wars, and therefore I can remember what it was like in the beginning. When I was 8, the only way to see Star Wars was in the theater, and we had to wait a year (uphill, both ways, in the snow) for the first toys. By contrast, today’s adolescents can watch the movies (or the “Clone Wars” cartoons) on the DVD players in their parents’ cars while on their way to Target for the latest action figures and weaponry.

Wow, that sure sounds like Grandpa Simpson, huh? (Speaking of constant presences in pop culture….) I can flip it around just as easily, because those Green Lantern Archives and Showcase Presents are full of stories from before I was born. Fandom has a certain “unearned” quality which is almost unavoidable in such cases, for the simple fact that these longstanding works have become ubiquitous. It was a big deal in 1991 when Timothy Zahn’s Heir to the Empire and Tom Veitch and Cam Kennedy’s Dark Empire came out, because Return of the Jedi was eight years in the past and Marvel’s SW comic had been gone for five. Still, what does it matter in the greater scheme of things if Zahn’s novel or the Dark Horse comic were a new fan’s first glimpse at the GFFA? What if today’s fans got hooked first by Phantom Menace or this season’s “Clone Wars?” Without new converts, fandom dies, and the best the old-timers can hope for is that the newbies at least appreciate their roots.

Even so, sometimes those roots are hopelessly tangled. We can’t ignore the shoddy treatment many creators have endured after being cut out of their characters’ successes — but at the same time, we tend only to know these characters in their current forms, in some cases far removed from their first appearances. As a kid, I recognized Superman as drawn by Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson, and Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster’s stories were artifacts of the distant past. Today, I buy Superman comics because of my enduring affection for the character, although that affection comes from having discovered a version of him decades in the making. Regardless, I remain grateful to Siegel and Shuster for their creation, and I want their legacies treated properly.

Thus, I am still trying to work out how to balance my fannish desires with those moral imperatives. Some things, like the Siegel and Shuster estates’ legal rights, aren’t for me to determine. I can control my comics-buying habits, but for various reasons (including this column) I don’t see me boycotting DC anytime soon. Instead, I try to give credit where it’s due while never losing sight of my pastimes’ beginnings. Whether I was there at the start or came in late, I’m one of their historians, and that’s what comes with the job.

Judge Bao and the Jade Phoenix

It’s time once again for our monthly trip through Previews looking for cool, new comics. As usual, we’re focusing on graphic novels, collected volumes and first issues so that I don’t have to come up with a new way to say, “ Wonder Woman is still awesome!” every month. And I’ll continue letting Tom and Carla do the heavy lifting in regards to DC and Marvel’s solicitations.

Also, please feel free to play along in the comments. Tell me what I missed that you’re looking forward to or – if you’re a comics creator – mention your own stuff.

Archaia

Judge Bao and the Jade Phoenix - A detective story set in ancient China. Plus: cool name.

Avatar

Dicks #1 – Garth Ennis and John McCrea’s humor makes my top hat explode and my monocle fly off my face, but I remember this being pretty popular back in the day and I imagine that it’s new presentation in color and leading into a new storyline could make it popular again.

Bongo

Ralph Wiggum Comics #1 – This, on the other hand, is exactly my kind of funny. Kind of like 30 Days of Night, I’m astonished no one’s thought of it before. Too bad it’s just a one-shot, but hearing that Sergio Aragones is one of the contributors makes me want to poke myself with my Viking helmet to see if I’m dreaming.

Terror on the Planet of the Apes #1

Boom!

Terror on the Planet of the Apes #1 – Boom continues its domination of the Planet of the Apes by reprinting classic stories from Marvel’s time with the concept. Between Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Boom’s other PotA comics, I’ve been itching to read these stories.

Adventure Time #1 – As much a welcome no-brainer as Ralph Wiggums Comics. Oh, man. Now I want a crossover!

Dark Horse

Conan the Barbarian #1 – Not only does this have Brian Wood and Becky Cloonan; it also features one of my favorite Conan characters, Bêlit the pirate queen.

BPRD Hell on Earth: The Long Death #1 – The Mignola-verse is managing to come out with some kind of first issue or collected volume just about every month now. That’s amazing. In this mini-series, the team returns to the spooky woods from New World.

Star Wars: Dawn of the Jedi #1 – If this had come out fifteen years ago when I was still voraciously devouring all the Star Wars EU history I could get my hands on, I would’ve been dancing like a Twi’lek slave girl over finally getting the story of how the Jedi came to be. It’s one of the few events in Star Wars history that haven’t yet been explored.

Dark Horse Presents #9 – Featuring Tarzan, Lobster Johnson, and the world’s largest pirate ship. Not in the same story, unfortunately, but still pretty cool.

DC Universe Presents #6

DC

DC Universe Presents #6 – The Challengers of the Unknown take over the title with a beautiful, fantastic cover by Ryan Sook.

Legends of the Dark Knight: Jim Aparo - This isn’t even out yet and I’m already impatient for Volume 2.

Northlanders, Volume 6: Thor’s Daughter - I’ve been looking forward to finally trying out Northlanders with this volume. Telling the story of the Siege of Paris through the eyes of a Viking woman is a great hook.

Dynamite

Warriors of Mars #1 – Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter stories couldn’t be more different in tone from Edwin Lester Arnold’s goofy Lieutenant Gullivar Jones: His Vacation, but the similarities in concepts (Southern soldiers transported to Mars where they fall in love with princesses) has had fans and writers making connections between them for decades, including Alan Moore in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Now Dynamite’s taking a turn with Carter’s princess (or her people, anyway) kidnapping Gullivar’s.

First Second

Friends With Boys - I’m all for three things: First Second publications, Faith Erin Hicks comics, and stories about people learning to communicate with people unlike themselves. No, wait: four things. Ghost stories.

The Big Town

Fantagraphics

The Big Town - Charles Schulz’ son wrote this novel (the last in his jazz-age trilogy) about the end of the Roaring Twenties and “the role of business, crime, morality, and love in our lives.” It’s not comics, but it sounds ambitious and transporting.

Humanoids

Celestial Bibendum – New York is now on the Seine and there’s a lonely seal named Diego living in it. That’s weird enough that I’d like to know more.

IDW

Road Rage #1 – You might think that the short story “Trucks” was Stephen King’s ultimate homage to the Richard Matheson novella Duel. After all, “Trucks” was collected in Night Shift and King himself directed the movie adaptation of it, Maximum Overdrive featuring Emilio Estevez, AC/DC, and a giant Green Goblin mask. What you might not know is that King also collaborated with his son Joe Hill on a biker-gang novella called Throttle that’s more directly inspired by Duel (which you probably remember was also adapted to film as Stephen Spielberg’s first feature-length project). IDW is now adapting both Duel and Throttle to comics with this four-issue mini-series.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Volume 1: Change is Constant – The first issues of the new, ongoing series are collected.

Jack Avarice is the Courier - I love the way IDW released this mini-series: weekly over the course of a single month, then the entire collection the month after that. I’d love to know how it sold for them, but for me as a consumer, that’s a perfect system.

Thief of Thieves

Image

Thief of Thieves #1 – Some new guys named Robert Kirkman and Nick Spencer team up to write one of those crime comics the kids love these days.

Glory #23 – Rob Liefeld’s Extreme relaunch continues to impress me with the talent it’s choosing. In this case, Joe Keatinge (Popgun) and Ross Campbell (Shadoweyes) offer a very different take on the Wonder Woman archetype.

King City - Brandon Graham’s masterwork is finally collected.

Marvel

Winter Soldier #1 – The closest thing we’re going to get to a Black Widow comic right now.

Ka-Zar by Mark Waid and Andy Kubert, Volume 2 - Ka-Zar vs. Thanos. ‘Nuff said.

Metropolitan

Journalism - A collection of short comics by cartoonist/war-reporter Joe Sacco.

Moonstone

The Lone Ranger: Vendetta - The concealed cowpoke and Tonto investigate a serial killer with possible connections to the Ranger’s dead nemesis, Butch Cavendish.

Rohan at the Louvre (French edition)

NBM

Rohan at the Louvre - A newly famous mangaka meddles with a cursed painting deep in the bowels of the famous museum. This will not end well.

Oni

Sixth Gun, Volume 3 – Trade-waiters have reason to whoop it up now that the next installment of the awesome Weird Western is on its way.

Courtney Crumrin, Volume 1: The Night Things Special Edition – The comic that put Ted Naifeh on so many radars gets color and a hardcover.

SLG

Malleus Maleficarum: A Guide to Catching Witches - Everyone’s favorite Inquisitorial treatise on How to Hunt and Torture Pagans, the Homeless, and Other People You Don’t Like is adapted to comics.

Top Shelf

Harvey Pekar’s Cleveland – One of the last projects Pekar worked on before his death is also – according to Alan Moore’s intro – “one of [his] very greatest works.”

That’s it for me. What are you looking forward to?

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Dark Horse Comics has announced two flip books for next year’s Free Comic Book Day, scheduled for May 5, featuring four of their licensed titles — The Guild, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Wars and Serenity.

The first comic will feature a Buffy the Vampire Slayer tale that sees the title character finding it hard to take a vacation from “all things that go bump in the night,” paired with a Guild tale which features the group of gamers heading to the beach. The second title features a Han Solo and Chewbacca tale where the two have a falling out over one of their customers, paired with a Serenity tale.

You can find additional art after the jump.

*****

Star Wars

The Guild

]]> http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2011/11/dark-horse-announces-two-free-comic-book-day-flipbooks-for-2012/feed/ 4 http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2011/11/previews-what-looks-good-for-january/ http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2011/11/previews-what-looks-good-for-january/#comments Sat, 12 Nov 2011 00:00:56 +0000 Michael May http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/?p=96655

Explorer: The Mystery Boxes

It’s time once again for our monthly trip through Previews looking for cool, new comics. As usual, we’re focusing on graphic novels, collected volumes and first issues so that I don’t have to come up with a new way to say, “ Mouse Guard is still awesome!” every month. And I’ll continue letting Tom and Carla do the heavy lifting in regards to DC and Marvel’s solicitations.

Also, please feel free to play along in the comments. Tell me what I missed that you’re looking forward to or – if you’re a comics creator – mention your own stuff.

Amulet

Explorer: The Mystery Boxes - With the Flight anthologies done, the all-ages version, Flight Explorer has morphed into this. I expect it to be as lovely as its predecessors and especially like the Mystery Box theme.

Archie

Jinx – J Torres and Rick Burchett’s graphic novel aimed at tween girls.

Kevin Keller, Volume 1 and Kevin Keller #1 – Archie collects the first appearances and mini-series of their major, gay character and also launches his ongoing series.

Ardden

Flash Gordon: Vengeance of Ming – The third volume in Ardden’s Flash Gordon series.

Ferals

Avatar

Ferals #1 – David Lapham writes werewolves.

Atmospherics, Color Edition – Warren Ellis and Ken Meyer’s re-mastered and newly painted story about a woman who’s either a disturbed witness to a UFO attack or a heroin-using serial killer.

Bongo

Simpsons Illustrated #1 – Bongo launches a Best Of series collecting material from various Simpsons titles.

Boom!

Steed and Mrs. Peel #1 – Reprinting Grant Morrison and Ian Gibson’s 1990 Eclipse Comics story of the other Avengers.

Peanuts #1 – Kicking off the regular, monthly series with new stories as well as reprints of Schulz’s Sunday strips.

Campfire

Jungle Book - Campfire’s artwork can often be perfunctory, but I like the whimsy of Amit Tayal’s cover for this one.

Cartoon Books

Bone: Quest for the Spark, Book 2 – The second installment in Tom Sniegoski’s series of novels set in Jeff Smith’s world (with illustrations by Smith himself).

Lobster Johnson: The Burning Hand

Dark Horse

Lobster Johnson: The Burning Hand #1 – Mike Mignola’s pulp hero returns for a five-issue mini-series.

The Monstermen and Other Scary Stories - I love Gary Gianni’s linework anyway, but I especially dug his Corpus Monstrum/Monstermen stories that appeared for a while as back-up features in Hellboy comics. This volume features Gianni’s tuxedo-wearing, medieval knight fighting zombie cowboys, squid pirates, abominable snowmen, and mustachioed skulls.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic – War #1 – I’m pretty much done with the Star Wars Expanded Universe, but if you’re not or are curious about it, Dark Horse is billing this as a major jump-on point to the part that covers the ancient period of the Star Wars galaxy.

Compleat Terminal City - All fourteen issues of Dean Motter and Michael Lark’s retro-scifi/noir series.

Mighty Samson: Judgment - Probably as close as we’re going to get to a Thundarr the Barbarian comic.

King Conan: The Phoenix on the Sword #1 – This four-issue mini-series adapts Robert E Howard’s first Conan story.

Dark Horse Presents #8 – Features a BPRD eulogy for Hellboy and a new Tarzan story.

DC

Justice League #5 – Looks like the team’s finally together.

Frankenstein vs. OMAC

Frankenstein: Agent of SHADE #5 and OMAC #5 – As a faithful reader of Jeff Lemire’s Frankenstein, I”m actually kind of excited that this will give me some motivation to check out OMAC, which I’m hearing good things about.

Xombi - The biggest casualty (for me, anyway) of the New 52 gets its collection.

Drawn and Quarterly

Goliath - The David and Goliath story told from Goliath’s viewpoint through the filter of corporate bureaucracy and presented in a lovely, minimalist style.

Dynamite

The Lone Ranger #1 – I tried Dynamite’s first Lone Ranger series, was disappointed that it wanted to stretch the familiar origin story into a multi-issue arc, and immediately dropped it. Assuming that won’t be the case this time – and noticing that it’s written by Ande Parks, whose writing I’ve enjoyed very much on other things – I’m up for another try.

First Second

Olympians, Volume 4: Hades, Lord of the Dead – The latest in George O’Connor’s wonderfully exciting and insightful review of the the most important characters from Greek mythology. Hades has always been a favorite of mine, so I’m especially looking forward to this one.

Silence of Our Friends - “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Edmund Burke is supposed to have originated that quote, but it was driven home for me by Vicente Amorim’s 2008 film, Good about good Germans who were too afraid of the Nazis to assist their Jewish neighbors in WWII. But even that gave me some comfortable, historical and geographical distance from the people and events it was talking about. I expect that Silence of Our Friends, about the civil rights movement in the ’60s, will hit even closer to home.

The Sincerest Form of Parody

Fantagraphics

The Sincerest Form of Parody: The Best 1950s MAD-Inspired Satirical Comics - I can’t decided if I’m more interested in the historical context of what folks were parodying in the ’50s or just looking at some cool Jack Davis and Kirby art that I’ve never seen before.

Hermes

The Phantom: The Complete Sundays, Volume 1: 1939-1943 – I like daily strips too, but Sunday comics are the best.

Humanoids

Whispers in the Walls – Guillermo del Toro’s co-writer from The Devil’s Backbone goes solo on this tale of horror at a Czechoslovakian children’s hospital in the late ’40s.

IDW

Infestation 2 #1 – Since I’m not a zombie fan, I passed up the first Infestation even while I was loving the idea of connecting all those weird, incongruous universes. This time around it’s Lovecraftian demons, which is not only a more appealing concept to me personally; it also makes a lot of sense from a dimension-crossing standpoint. That something exists tying 30 Days of Night and Dungeons and Dragons together with Transformers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles gives me all the joy I’ll ever need.

Danger Girl: The Danger-Sized Treasury Edition - I’ve been wanting to check out Danger Girl for a while now. This collects the first three stories to get me started.

Danger Girl: Revolver

Danger Girl: Revolver #1 – And here’s the new story.

Womanthology: Heroic - The controversial Kickstarter sensation comes to life.

Doctor Who #13 – Occasionally I have to break my rule about only mentioning new series. Josh Fialkov’s taking over Doctor Who for four issues to put the Doctor in 1941 Casablanca is one of those occasions. It starts here.

Steve Canyon, Volume 1: 1947-1948 - I read these stories when Checker published them and was eager for more. Unfortunately, Checker quit, but now Milton Caniff’s globe-trotting pilot is at IDW in a great-looking hardcover.

Image

Fatale #1 – Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ supernatural noir comic has everyone’s mouths watering, including mine. I’d buy it for the “Beauty” cover alone, though the “Beast” one looks cool too.

Prophet #21 – Two of my favorite artists, Brandon Graham and Simon Roy are collaborating on this, with a cover by Marian Churchland. That’s the exact opposite team of whatever I expected from a continuation of a Rob Liefeld book. Seriously: good on Liefeld. I’m also impressed that he’s not just starting the numbering over again with #1. Seems like that would be the obvious thing, especially with the book going in such a new direction, creatively, but it’s because it’s surprising and counter-intuitive that I like it. And it’s not even like he’s cashing in on a milestone issue-number. If my calculations are correct, he’s counting two mini-series (one, ten-issues; the other, nine), a one-shot, and an annual to get to 21. If this is what we can expect from the new Extreme, and apparently it is, my interest is piqued.

Whispers #1 – I find the Luna Brothers interesting enough that a new, supernatural thriller by one of them gets a check-out.

The Intrepids

The Intrepids, Volume 1 - Teens vs mad scientists (and a cyborg bear).

Marvel

Scarlet Spider #1 – The latest spin-off for the Spider-Man franchise.

Amazing Spider-Man #677 and Daredevil #8 – I like a couple of things about this crossover. First, like DC’s Frankenstein/OMAC one, it’s pretty unobtrusive. Second, Mark Waid’s writing both parts of it.

Alpha Flight #8 – SOB! I’ll miss you, Alpha Flight!

Wolverine and X-Men Alpha and Omega #1 – I’d usually feel ungenerous towards a mini-series spin-off of a comic that’s only four issues old, but Brian Wood is writing it and that bears looking into.

X-Men Legacy #260.1 – Christos Gage takes over from Mike Carey. I’m sad to see Carey go, but intrigued to see what Gage has planned. I hear good things about his Avengers Academy.

Daredevil by Mark Waid, Volume 1 - Waid and Paolo Rivera’s critically acclaimed run for trade-waiters.

Moonstone

The Big Book of Kolchak: The Night Stalker – Collects the first seven, long-out-of-print Moonstone Kolchak stories.

Oni

Possessions, Volume 3: Better House Trap - Sadly, it’s only recently that Ray Fawkes’ name has been on my radar. Now that it is, I want to check out his slapstick series about a possessed little girl trying to escape the loving, nurturing environment of the haunted house that traps her.

Wasteland

Wasteland #33 – Oni is celebrating Antony Johnston’s post-apocalyptic series’ going monthly with a $1 kick-off issue. I’ve fallen extremely behind in reading it, but it was one of my favorite comics at the time I decided to trade-wait it.

The Avalon Chronicles, Volume 1: Once in a Blue Moon – I’m a sucker for stories about young people who get transported to magical worlds where they discover things about themselves. Especially ones as nicely drawn as this one.

Papercutz

Monster Mess - Lewis Trondheim’s story of two kids who discover their ability to bring monsters to life (and have them fight each other) just by drawing them.

Putnam

Fangbone! Third-Grade Barbarian, Volumes 1 and 2 - It’s a cute enough concept, but Michael Rex’s art and Fangbone’s deadly serious expression on the covers are what sells it.

Russ Cochran

Sunday Funnies #1 – This is kind of brilliant. I’ll just let the publisher describe it:  ” A monthly, 32-page, full-size comic section containing historic Sunday pages from as far back as 1895, and including favorites such as Gasoline Alley, Little Nemo, Krazy Kat, and many other classic Sunday pages that you’ve probably never seen before. Each issue … will be a full-size 22″x16″ comic section, containing full page Sunday comics in full color. These pages are coming from the archives of Ohio State University, which, thanks to Bill Blackbeard, has the largest and most comprehensive collection of Sunday comics in existence. The retail price will be $10 and I will be selling subscriptions, 12 monthly issues for $100.” Should go well next to Wednesday Comics collections.

Bettie Page in Danger

SHH

Bettie Page in Danger #1 – Even more brilliant. A fumetti using real Bettie Page photos to tell a story about the pin-up queen’s career fighting zombies, mad scientists, and other naked ladies.

SLG

Sparko – This sounds a little like Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere with the Thames replacing London’s Underground. I don’t mean to make that sound like a bad thing. Coming from SLG and including a murder mystery, goth goblins, and a pickpocket named Belle, I trust that it’s not.

Tor

Girl Genius Omnibus, Volume 1: Agatha Awakens – The Hugo-winning, steampunk webcomic gets the deluxe hardcover treatment.

And that’s it for me. What did I miss?

Jaxxon ain't no rodent

Back in the 1970s Marvel Comics was saved by a little film called Star Wars, according to Jim Shooter. As Marvel’s editor-in-chief at the time notes, Marvel’s adaptation of the film “sold and sold and sold” no matter what format they released it in.

And after Marvel adapted the film into six-issue series, they continued to tell tales set in the Star Wars universe. Issue #7 sported a cover promising new stories about Han Solo and Chewbacca, as the duo appeared in a “Seven Samurai” style tale with a whole bunch of new characters, including a big green rabbit named Jaxxon. While Jaxxon only appeared in a handful of Star Wars comics at the time, he made enough of an impression to achieve a sort of cult status with some folks. IGN ranked him as #97 in their top 100 Stars Wars characters, while Bully the stuffed little bull advocated that they should have replaced Jar Jar Binks with Jaxxon in the prequel films. And he even appeared in a webcomic at TheForce.net.

And now the Bugs Bunny tribute character is up for the ultimate form of recognition, as Hasbro and Star Wars Insider magazine are holding a “Fans’ Choice Poll” where fans can vote on which action figure Hasbro will make next. Jaxxon is going up against some other “expanded universe” characters and the expected “Hey, weren’t they on the screen for five seconds? Make a figure!” characters from the films.

The polls close Dec. 1, so head over there and show your support for the rodent, er, rabbit.

The Dare Detectives: The Snow Pea Plot

It’s time once again for our monthly trip through Previews looking for cool, new comics. As usual, we’re focusing on graphic novels, collected volumes, and first issues so that I don’t have to come up with a new way to say, “ Life with Archie is still awesome!” every month. And I’ll continue letting Tom and Carla do the heavy lifting in regards to DC and Marvel’s solicitations.

Also, please feel free to play along in the comments. Tell me what I missed that you’re looking forward to or – if you’re a comics creator – mention your own stuff.

Ape

Richie Rich Gems Winter Special - In addition to their modern-look Richie Rich, Ape has also re-introducied the classic version in both new and reprinted adventures. I missed the solicit for Richie Rich Gems #44 last month (which picked up where the Harvey series left off in 1982), but the series continues with not only the Winter Special, but #45 as well.

Arcana

Dragons vs Dinosaurs - I haven’t had great luck with Arcana’s books in the past, but c’mon. The title alone…

Hero Happy Hour: On the Rocks - This, on the other hand, is no risk at all. I’m a big fan of Dan Taylor and Chris Fason’s superhero bar stories and this is an all-new, 80-page adventure. Not reprints; not even a printed version of the webcomic. It’s all-new and I need it.

Archaia

The Dare Detectives: The Snow Pea Plot Collected Edition – Archaia prepares for their publishing Ben Caldwell’s Dare Detectives: The Kula Kola Caper by re-publishing the first story that was originally put out by Dark Horse.

Andie and the Alien

Archie

Archie #637 – The first installment of the “Archie Meets Kiss” story. Not quite as odd as Archie’s meeting the Punisher, but gettin’ close.

Bliss On Tap

Andie and the Alien - An alternate-history story in which an alien prevented Europeans from colonizing North America and how that affected WWII. That’s a harrowing premise and I’m eager to see how Philip and Brian Phillipson and Alex Niño (the team behind God the Dyslexic Dog) tackle it.

Boom!

Outcast #1 – Undead (but not Zombie) Conan. I can get behind that.

Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas - And my nine-year-old can get behind this. Just realized it’s written by Caleb Monroe too and that bodes well. I really liked his stuff on Hunter’s Fortune.

Dark Horse

The Strain #1 – Pandemic stories are too scary for me and zombies make me yawn, but this might just hit the sweet spot between the two.

Hellboy, Volume 12: The Storm and the Fury – The Death of Hellboy for trade-waiters.

Star Wars: Agent of the Empire – Iron Eclipse #1 – I don’t remember the last time I was interested in a Star Wars comic, but I’ve always supported the notion of using big, popular settings like that and Star Trek for other genres. James Bond in the Star Wars galaxy sounds kind of awesome just so long as it doesn’t turn into the same Empire vs. Rebels story I’ve already seen too many times.

Ningen's Nightmares

Star Wars Omnibus: A Long Time Ago, Volume 5 - Wrapping up the reprints of Marvel’s 107-issue Star Wars series. I have fond memories of a lot of those comics and have been waiting to read them all back-to-back.

Dark Horse Presents #7 – Another excellent lineup of talent from Neal Adams and Howard Chaykin to Mike Mignola and Eduardo Barreto.

Empowered: Deluxe Edition - Collecting the first three volumes (and some extra material) of the critically-acclaimed superhero spoof.

Ningen’s Nightmares - A warrior-monk fights bounty hunters, a witch, and her demon-samurai with art that reminds me a little of Mike Oeming’s.

DC

Batman Incorporated: Leviathan Strikes #1 – Grant Morrison continues his popular, pre-New 52 Batman Incorporated story in this one-shot.

Ray #1 – Justin Gray, Jimmy Palmiotti, and Jamal Igle bring out the New 52′s Ray and make him fight giant monsters.

Catwoman, Volume 1 - Collecting the first issues of Ed Brubaker and Darwyn Cooke’s much-loved time with the character.

Resurrection Man, Volume 1 - This was a fantastic series and deserving of a collection. It raises the question though: why isn’t there a New 52 Aztek comic?

Dynamite

Lord of the Jungle #1 – It’s been too damn long since we had a Tarzan comic. I just wish they didn’t feel the need to retell the origin story again.

Romeo and Juliet: The War

Voltron #1 – On the other hand, since I know nothing about Voltron (except that it’s about a giant robot, which is really all I need to know), I can do with a re-telling of the origin story on this one. So, yes, I’m a hypocrite.

1821

Romeo and Juliet: The War - Stan Lee turns my least-favorite Shakespeare play into a sci-fi fantasy with cyborgs and genetically enhanced humans. So torn.

Fantagraphics

Young Romance: The Best of Simon and Kirby’s 1940s – 1950s Romance Comics – Not only am I extremely curious from an historical standpoint, but damn it, sometimes you just wanna read about kissing.

Flannery O’Connor Cartoons - Growing up in the South like I did, Flannery O’Connor’s short stories were required reading. I had no idea she made comics too.

First Second

Mush! Sled Dogs with Issues - Sled dog soap opera! That’s so crazy it just might work.

Hermes

The Phantom: The Complete Series – The King Years – I really can’t seem to get enough Phantom.

The Hero Initiative

Justice League of America 100 Project - Great artists drawing great characters for an even greater cause.

Madman: 20th Anniversary Monster!

Humanoids

Before the Incal: Classic Collection – One of these days I’m going to get around to finally reading Alejandro Jodorowsky and Moebius’ The Incal and when I do, I’m going to include this prequel.

Muse – Terry Dodson draws the story of a beautiful (it’s Dodson; how could she not be?) governess to a mysterious family.

IDW

Memorial #1 – Magic shops are great settings for stories, but I rarely read one that lives up to my hopes for it. Maybe this one about an amnesiac girl (another favorite concept of mine, Starfire notwithstanding) will do the trick.

Magic: The Gathering #1 – I still get a little angry over the concept of a game where the advantage goes to the person most willing to spend a bunch of money on it (yeah, I’m looking at you too, baseball), but the art on the Magic cards did a great job of suggesting a cohesive world, even if I didn’t understand anything about it as I was playing. I’m hoping that this series can flesh out that suggestion while also telling a good story.

Curious Cases of Sherlock Holmes – I’m a big fan of Gary Reed and Guy Davis’ alternate universe Holmes in Honour Among Punks, so I’m pretty excited by the prospect of Reed’s doing a comics anthology of the “real” Holmes teaming up with and/or fighting Dr. Jekyll, the Phantom of the Opera, Oscar Wilde, and Toulouse Lautrec.

Image

Madman: 20th Anniversary Monster! - Madman’s already cool. He doesn’t need Peter Bagge, Kyle Baker, Peter Milligan, Darwyn  Cooke, Dean Haspiel, Los Bros Hernandez, Erik Larsen, David Mack, Mike Oeming, Paul Pope, Eric Powell, Frank Quitely, Steven T Seagle, Jeff Smith, Craig Thompson, Matt Wagner, and others to make him cooler. But he’s got them anyway.

Polly and the Pirates, Volume 2: Mystery of the Dragonfish

Last Battle - Dan Brereton does the art on this Rome vs barbarians one-shot.

Marvel

Defenders #1 – I wish this had Green She-Hulk in it instead of Red (and also that it had Valkyrie and maybe Hellcat), but it’s still a revival that’s past due.

X-Club #1 – The X-Men’s Science Team was always a cool idea and deserves a shot at its own series, but I’m kind of scratching my head over why Beast isn’t in this. Apparently it’s Second-Guess Marvel Team Lineups day.

Moonstone

Captain Action: The Complete Adventures – Including both Fabian Nicieza and Steven Grant’s runs on the series. Over 400 pages for less than $30. I’ll take that Action. (Sorry.)

NBM

Inner Sanctum – I don’t think I’ve ever listened to a single episode of Inner Sanctum, but I always get a thrill of recognition when I hear the title thanks to Bill Cosby’s name-dropping it in his “Chicken Heart” story. Anyway, if you’re going to do a horror anthology, you could do much, much worse than have it inspired by Inner Sanctum and completely created by Ernie Colón.

Oni

Polly and the Pirates, Volume 2: Mystery of the Dragonfish – Have I only been waiting six years for this? Feels like sixty. Volume 1 was wonderful and I can’t fault Ted Naifeh for only writing this one when he got someone as awesome as Robbi Rodriguez to take his place on the art. The preview pages look amazing.

Spontaneous – The mini-series that combines Spontaneous Human Combustion with conspiracy theory gets its collection.

Th3rd World

The Intrepid Escapegoat – Guys, it’s a paranormal-investigating escape artist who’s a goat. You’re welcome.

Titan

The Complete Flash Gordon Library, Volume 1: On the Planet Mongo – I’m still not sure I understand the difference between this volume and IDW’s (except that IDW’s also includes Alex Raymond’s Jungle Jim comics), but I’m mentioning it just in case there is a difference that I don’t figure out until later. Seriously though: if someone knows, please explain it to me.

That’s it for me. What did I miss?

Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark

Broadway | Reeve Carney, who plays Peter Parker and Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, has extended his contract with the musical through May. Carney’s original contract was set to expire in November. “I can’t imagine a more wonderful, harder-working company than my mates on Broadway, and I look forward to being with them until shooting begins, and again as soon as we’ve wrapped,” he said. [Wall Street Journal]

Creators | The works of cartoonists Frode Överli, Lise Myhre, Christopher Nielsen and Jason are being featured on postage stamps in Norway, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the first comic book to be published in the country, The Katzenjammer Kids. [cats without dogs]

Creators | Firebreather creator and former Wonder Woman writer Phil Hester is profiled in conjunction with a visit to Limited Edition Comics and Collectibles in Cedar Falls, Iowa. [WCF Courier.com]

Creators | Jamaica Dyer discusses her webcomic Weird Fishes, her inspirations and her imaginary friends. [Innsmouth Free Press]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 9: Freefall #1

Creators | The Vampire Diaries writer Andrew Chambliss discusses his work on the new Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Nine comic, where he’s enjoying writing the character Spike: “So far, Spike lands at the top of my list of favorite characters to write. I think that’s for several reasons. One, he’s British and it’s just plain old fun to write with those cadences and syntax. Two, he’s a bad boy, which I am decidedly not, so it’s fun to step out of my persona and into his. And three, he and Buffy have been through so much together that there’s so much rich emotional history to draw from when I’m sitting down to write a Spike scene. I was a big fan of Buffy and Spike’s journey together in the later seasons of Buffy so it’s fun to be able to call back to some of those storylines.” [Hero Complex]

Creators | Robot 6 contributor Sean T. Collins interviews up-and-coming comics artist L. Nichols. [The Comics Journal]

Comics | io9 recounts how “Star Wars saved the comic book industry” back in the 1970s. [io9]

Manga | Kristy Valenti has eight reasons why you should read — or re-read — Moyoco Anno’s manga Flowers and Bees, a subversive take on the beauty industry featuring a teenage boy’s quest for bodily perfection. [comiXology]

My Faith in Frankie

Comics | Shaenon Garrity, who loves to rehabilitate forgotten comics, lists her five favorite Vertigo comics that you probably don’t even know exist. [comiXology]

Digital | Alex Zalben argues that same-day digital comics “must be released at 12:01 a.m. ET online.” Which would mean digital comics would come out in most of the United States on Tuesdays. [MTV Geek]

Design | Daniel BT describes panel and layout glitches that drive him crazy, such as a line that interrupts a panel and looks like a border — even though it’s not. [Sunday Comics Debt]

Exhibits | Michael Cavna looks at some of the artwork on display at the Library of Congress exhibit Timely and Timeless, which features artwork from comic strips, magazines, graphic novels and more. [Comic Riffs]

Elf World

Hello and welcome to What Are You Reading? Today our special guest is Fantagraphics’ Marketing Director Mike Baehr, who runs their indispensable company blog, Flog!, among other duties.

To see what Mike and the Robot 6 crew have been reading, click below.

*****

Tim O’Shea

Thunderbolts

Thunderbolts 162: Holy crap, Jeff Parker. How long have you been holding onto to the Giant-Sized Man-Thing card? Best Thunderbolts moment in a long time. In the increased publishing schedule dynamic, I do not think I will ever see a more jarring shift than when the story shifts from Valentine De Landro to Matthew Southworth.

Supergirl 67: Really ashamed that we do not get to read more of Kelly Sue DeConnick’s Supergirl. But good lord, Chriscross’ penchant for drawing ugly-as-hell bone structured faces almost killed any enjoyment I had in this story. It astounds me how such an accomplished and talented artist utterly fails to make any effort to consistently draw character’s faces the same way. Extra points to DeConnick for ending the issue on a note that would have been a mild series gamechanger (a secret revealed) had the series continued beyond this point.

Venom 6: OK this whole Spider Island event. Am I the only person that sings Spider Island to the melody of that 1970s rock classic by Jay Ferguson, Thunder Island, whenever I see the phrase? I have one question was it writer Rick Remender or artist Tom Fowler who decided to have the Venom symbiote bond with a dog? Visually a great bit. There’s always a fun horror-vibe whenever the issues are drawn by Fowler.

Gladstone’s School for World Conquerors 4: The issue opens with a great battle scene (with beautifully vibrant colors by Carlos Carrasco), leading to, of all things, a study group session? (This series is like 1960s X-Men comics, but on acid, which is a good thing for me [the comic, not the acid, that is]). But what makes this issue a must buy for me is writer Mark Andrew Smith and artist Armand Villavert’s dead-on riff on Scott McCloud’s storytelling approach in Understanding Comics (special thanks to my friend Dugan Trodglen for pointing this out to me). An aside, the issue is dedicated to Scott McCloud (“one of the greatest teachers in comics”).

Power Girl 27: Matthew Sturges tells a 60-second story. With Power Girl’s speed, of course, there’s a lot to cram in that 60 seconds. But honestly, it must be hard to understand all that she says in that 60 seconds, because she says a lot. Matthew Sturges, another writer who writes females well. Curious to see where he’ll end up in the new DCU.

Cloak & Dagger: Spider Island 1: This actually came out last week, but my pal Dugan convinced me to pick it up this week. Glad I did. Writer Nick Spencer and artist Emma Rios clearly are taking a swing at an ongoing series with this miniseries. So far, the Spider Island connection is fairly mo’s second dular, they could have just as easily plugged in a Fear Itself moment and run the same story. I am not complaining, as the dual (Cloak & Dagger) narration that Spencer employs is really effective. Much of the first issue is a rehash of where the characters have been before, but the life recap actually served to draw me into the tale. I look forward to seeing what issue 3 brings. I’m really impressed with how much more confident and effective that Rios’ art has gotten since the Strange miniseries (with Mark Waid) from a year or so back.

Hulk 39: So my good pal (and I must add, damn fine writer) Carla Hoffman does not feel the love for Red Hulk (as documented in this week’s always must read Fifth Color) that I so clearly possess. This issue perfectly exemplifies why I find Parker and artist Gabriel Hardman’s Hulk to be a great exploration of Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross. Despite the fact that he cannot currently change back to his human form, Red Hulk is very much defined by the human that Ross is. No one else creates as cinematic-like and dynamic layouts as Hardman. The flashback to Ross’ childhood in this issue is some of the most compelling storytelling I’ve read in months. I want a whole damn arc with Thaddeus and his childhood pals. Hoffman, please read this issue.

Daredevil 2: In this issue, writer Mark Waid subtextually reveals that he wants to marry Captain America’s shield. But seriously, I think spending time as BOOM’s big editorial honcho gave Waid a chance to sit back and look at the dynamics of the Marvel universe (something he obviously had mulled prior to BOOM admittedly) and is allowing that inform his approach to this book. Dating back to the days of Waid’s second run on Captain America, I have clearly appreciated his basic concept of seeing Marvel heroes and their weapons as props to be explored (remember when Cap lost his shield for that run?). As issue 2 opens, Daredevil quickly gains control of Cap’s shield and Cap snags DD’s billy club. To see the way the two tacticians wield the weapons is a storytelling treat, particularly given artist Paolo Rivera’s complete commitment to the scenes. DD uses Cap’s shield as an urban boogieboard, for Pete’s sake. When Waid has DD say: “That thing (the shield) is beautifully balanced, by the way. It’s like touching a Stradivarious. High point of my evening.” I giggled in delight like my 10 year old self. In two issues this creative team has given me the DD I have not seen since the days of Karl Kesel’s short run (#353-357, 359-364 [thanks very much manwithoutfear.com])–a fun to read comic. Added bonus, editor Steve Wacker runs a letter column with letters from the 1960s issues.

Tom Bondurant

2001: A Space Odyssey

Finally, the magic of eBay has delivered unto me Jack Kirby’s Monolith-sized adaptation of 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the combination of Kubrick, Clarke, and the King was pretty engaging. I had read some of the regular-series 2001, and of course I have seen the movie (and read the books) many times over, but this felt much more like ’70s Cosmic Kirby — much more in the spirit of The Eternals, say — than a straightforward adaptation. In fact, Kirby’s dynamism is diametrically opposite Kubrick’s cool, meditative style. Thus, the Dawn Of Man scenes are beefed up with insight into Moon-Watcher’s thoughts and feelings. Dr. Floyd and his colleagues get a little more attention. The Star-Gate sequence is translated into a series of breathtaking double-page spreads. Kirby does a pretty faithful version of the famous bone-to-satellite jump-cut, but he modifies the look of the Pan Am clipper to more closely resemble the (then-experimental) Space Shuttle orbiter. Ironically, the characters who suffer the most are Bowman and Poole, both of whom come across fairly generic. In a way, this was in keeping with Kirby’s plans for the regular series, in which a procession of ordinary humans were transformed by the power of the Monolith. Still, Kirby’s 2001 and Clarke/Kubrick’s 2001 share the same basic cautions about humanity’s development, and in the end that’s what matters.

I’ve also been catching up on John Ostrander and Jan Duursema’s Star Wars Legacy series, having bought a couple of paperbacks from the emptying shelves at the local Border’s. So far I’m through volume 3, and I like it pretty well. Cade Skywalker does have a somewhat predictable “you can’t make me” attitude, although I guess that’s one way of following in his ancestors’ whiny ways. Also, I can’t quite get past his relentlessly-coiffed appearance, which threatens to be more monsters-of-rock than a Star Wars character should be. Overall, though, it’s a good next-generation take on the Galaxy Far, Far Away, and it stands alone well enough that the occasional ties to the movies are just a bonus.

There’s something of an unfinished aesthetic to the first few years of “New Look” Batman stories (reprinted in color in Dynamic Duo Archives Vols. 1 and 2, and in the black-and-white Showcase Presents Batman Vol. 1). Mostly this is due to the relative lack of Carmine Infantino pencils. The Bob Kane studio (including Sheldon Moldoff) still drew the bulk of the stories, with Infantino only on covers and pencilling every other issue of Detective. (Inker Joe Giella gave everything a consistent feel.)

Among the memorable stories so far are November 1964′s “Zero Hour For Earth!” (Batman #167) and “Hunters of the Elephants’ Graveyard!” (Detective #333), and “Partners In Plunder!” from February 1965′s Batman #169. “Zero Hour” was written by Bill Finger, with pencils credited to Bob Kane, and features Batman and Robin on a globetrotting mission to stop the nefarious organization known as Hydra. (Yes, this predated Marvel’s Hydra by a couple of years, but the Bat-office might already have taken a shot at Marvel a few months earlier, when a megalomaniacal mutant threatened the world in “The Man Who Quit The Human Race!”) Anyway, “Zero Hour” is the kind of story that the hairy-chested love god of the ’70s would have found familiar; although Kane/Moldoff’s Batman was hardly hairy-chested. “Hunters” was written by Gardner Fox and pencilled by Infantino, and it is probably the last word on Batman vs. a herd of rampaging pachyderms. Specifically, it’s very effective at setting up the elephants as noble creatures, and then turning them into a giant mass of stampeding trouble. Most clever of this bunch is “Partners In Plunder,” written by Ed “France” Herron and pencilled by Moldoff, which finds the Penguin deciding simply to create random chaos with trick umbrellas, and then basing his future capers on Batman’s subsequent speculation. It’s a neat idea which plays perfectly off of the “Batman is never fooled” trope, and in fact it ends with the Penguin in prison and Batman never realizing he’s been duped.

Finally, I enjoyed the Batman and Wonder Woman ’90s Retro-Active specials, mostly because the creative teams of Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle and William Messner-Loebs & Lee Moder produced stories which didn’t miss any beats from their earlier work. The Wonder Woman story especially made me wonder why DC wouldn’t turn to Messner-Loebs and Moder more often. Sure, it was a quiet, character-oriented piece about Wonder Woman bonding with a group of mallrat girls, but the reprint was the start of Messner-Loebs’ outer-space saga, and that was plenty action-oriented. If anything lasting comes out of the Retro-Active experiment, I really do hope it involves more work for Messner-Loebs, who clearly still has the chops to handle these characters.

Brigid Alverson

21

I have started reading Wilifred Santiago’s “21″: The Story of Roberto Clemente several times, but I always wandered off: This time I pulled it off my stack and read it most of the way through. I love Santiago’s style and his depiction of Clemente’s childhood in Puerto Rico, but the story is hard to follow for a number of reasons. One is the huge cast of characters, who simply appear and start having conversations as if they had known each other forever, with no background on who they are. The story also moves around in
time in a confusing way, especially in the beginning, and seems to skip important events‹how did Clemente go from being voted 8th in the Most Valuable Player poll to having Roberto Clemente Day at Three Rivers Stadium ten years later? Still, Santiago really captures the feeling of listening to a ball game on a hot summer day, and his story is rich and complex, if flawed. I’m glad I read it.

Also on the stack this week was an advance copy of The Last Dragon, a gorgeous fantasy graphic novel written by YA author Jane Yolen (Foiled) and illustrated by Rebecca Guay, who is probably best known as one of the illustrators of the card game Magic: The Gathering. Guay’s style is a throwback to the Golden Age of children’s books, reminiscent of Maxfield Parrish and Arthur Rackham in its combination of pseudo-classical styling and luminous color. I usually find books like this boring, but Yolen pairs up a smart young woman with a blowhard Fabio look-alike to accomplish the central task of the story, killing a dragon that has been terrorizing a small village. It’s a fairy-tale type story that manages to feel fresh despite its traditional setting and tropes. It’s due out in early September, and it’s definitely something to watch for.

Finally, I picked up Doctor Who Volume II: The Ripper on a whim and I really enjoyed it. The book collects four of IDW’s Doctor Who comics featuring the Eleventh Doctor. In the first story, Rory uses a cell phone in the Tardis and as a result all his (and Amy’s) spam and social-networking contacts come to life. It’s very well done, and some of the anthropomorphized spam made me laugh out loud. The second story comprises three arcs of the comic and it’s a Doctor Who take on Jack the Ripper. You really don’t have to be familiar with the television program to enjoy these stories‹I have been away from Doctor Who since the 1970s, and I still could follow them. In fact, it
worked the other way for me: I started watching the show with my daughter and I actually knew who the characters are. Incidentally, all the stories are available via IDW’s digital app, for less than the cost of the trade paperback, and if you have an iPad, the two bucks you spend on that first story will be the best money you spend all week.

Mike Baehr

My to-read pile contains about 12 feet of graphic novels and comics right now, with about half of that being Fantagraphics stuff — we’re literally putting out books faster than I can read them. I’ll try not to be too much of a shill for my employers, but what kind of Marketing Director would I be if I didn’t love what we put out?

I just finished plowing through my stash of minicomics from the Stumptown Comics Fest. Elf World from Family Style is a fun anthology series of fantasy stories by independent and small-press artists, and the first 2 issues of the 2nd volume have the nicest production values I’ve seen in minicomics, with gorgeous letterpress covers illustrated by Sammy Harkham and Daria Tessler. Salad Days by Minty Lewis is another standout — no one depicts awkward conversations and the minor humiliations of life quite like her, and all with a cast of talking fruit, which gives it a sense of absurdity but somehow heightens my empathy for the characters at the same time. Too Dark to See by Julia Gfrörer is chilling for the way it depicts how the damage that we do to ourselves and each other is far greater than any supernatural threat. And after one issue I’ve completely fallen in wuv with Ed Luce’s adorable and hilarious Wuvable Oaf (soon to be seen in Fantagraphics’ forthcoming queer comics anthology No Straight Lines), which stars a big hairy metal-and-Morrissey-loving gay dude and his friends, plus a bunch of kitties. I definitely need to pick up the rest of that series.

The Box Man

At Comic-Con last month I finally picked up a copy of The Box Man by Imiri Sakabashira, published by our “Distinguished Qompetition.” It’s like a mashup of a Jim Woodring Frank story, Hans Rickheit’s The Squirrel Machine, and a Mat Brinkman comic (with maybe a dash of Brian Ralph) as the protagonist and his animal companion journey through an incredibly detailed detritus-strewn urban underbelly on a mysterious mission, encountering various forms of peril and bizarre debauchery along the way. It’s part maximum weirdness, part straight-up thrilling action, all depicted with breathtaking skill. I’m surprised I didn’t hear more about this book when it first came out.

My current favorite ongoing webcomic is Steven Weissman’s Barack Hussein Obama, which I have the privilege of posting on the Fantagraphics website every week. Steven’s work has undergone a really interesting transformation over the last few years, and he really cuts loose with this sketchbook strip, mashing up old-fashioned gag humor, Lovecraftian horror, bizarre nonsequiturs and absurd interpersonal drama. It’s a combination that could only come from Steven and it makes for a dizzying and thrilling reading experience. I also enjoy seeing the remastered reruns each week at What Things Do (the best webcomics site out there bar none), and I’m excited that we’ll be putting out a book collection of the strip next year.

There’s a ton of recent and upcoming Fantagraphics books that I’m chomping at the bit to read (Prison Pit 3, Michael Kupperman’s Mark Twain book, Gahan Wilson’s Nuts, Willie & Joe: Back Home, The Man Who Grew His Beard) but one that leaped to the top of the pile was the new 4th issue of the Hernandez Brothers’ Love and Rockets: New Stories. I actually first read this as a printout a few weeks ago but it’s been hard to stop picking it back up now that I have a bound copy. Pretty much everyone who’s read it has said that it moved them to tears, and I’m no exception. Jaime’s stories in the issue are some of the most emotionally powerful fiction I’ve ever read — as devastating as “Browntown” was in the last issue, Jaime takes it to the next level here. Brace yourself because Jaime takes you on a rollercoaster ride. So many “oh my god” and “holy crap” moments. And Gilbert is absolutely at the top of his game here too. The metafictional world he’s been building over the last few years is super-fascinating to me, and the new directions he pushes himself within that world are exhilarating.

To continue in shill mode for just a bit longer, another thing I just read is the Fantagraphics Spring/Summer 2012 distributors catalog, with all of our books slated for April-August of next year, which we just sent off to the printer. People tell me all the time that we put out too many good books, all I can do is agree and say HOO-EE, that’s not about to change anytime soon!

Star Wars art by JH Williams III

LucasFilm and Abrams Books have teamed up for Star Wars Art: Comics, a collection of artwork from “the entire history of Star Wars comics publishing,” from the first Star Wars adaptations published in 1977 by Marvel to the present day.

According to the press release, the artwork has been “hand-selected and curated” by George Lucas and will feature interior pages and fully painted covers from artists such as Al Williamson, Howard Chaykin, Adam Hughes, Bill Sienkiewicz, Dave Dorman, and many more. It will also feature newly commissioned art by 20 creators, including John Cassady, Sam Kieth, Mike Mignola, Paul Pope, Frank Quitely, Jim Steranko and, as seen above, J.H. Williams III.

“I wanted something that was a new character of my creation,” the artist wrote on his blog. “I had been told that George was a longtime comics fan. So I also wanted to go for this classic giant monster versus hero idea, like stuff you might see in old [Jack] Kirby comics, but here it needed to be a mechanical weapon that looked like a creature, giving a sense of story beyond fighting a giant monster. This gives more weight for the snippet of a bigger unseen plot idea. And the scene had to have a strong design sense to it, so it could have a signature look that could be identified with my sensibilities, but still felt like Star Wars when you look at it.”

This is the second book in Abrams’ Star Wars Art series; the first one, subtitled Visions, was released last year. Star Wars Art: Comics has an introduction by Virginia Mecklenburg, a foreword by Dennis O’Neil, and a preface by Douglas Wolk. It features a cover by Dave Dorman and is due in October.

In case you missed it in the rush of SDCC news, Dark Horse is now releasing Star Wars comics on its digital app, and they are posting Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic #1 and Star Wars: The Clone Wars #1 for free to celebrate.

New free comics on comiXology include (links are to the comics on their web reader): Batman: Gotham Knights #1, Impulse #1, Robin #1, Titanium Rain #1, and a bunch of previews. And there’s the third chapter of the Rise of the Planet of the Apes prequel from BOOM! Studios—the whole thing is free, so you might as well go back and get the earlier chapters as well.

Free comics on Graphicly include Carpe Chaos: Rising Up #1, The Devil Died Different #1, and a preview of Eye Witness, which “combines a Biblical adaptation, with a modern day action-thriller.”

Here’s another SDCC announcement you might have missed: Square Enix, publisher of such fine manga as Black Butler, Fullmetal Alchemist, Higurashi When They Cry, and Soul Eater, is offering one free volume 1 through August 10. The details are here.

If you’re in the mood for some Deep Thoughts, Wiley is offering the book Superheroes: The Best of Philosophy and Pop Culture as a free e-book on a number of different platforms, including iTunes, Nook, and Kindle.

Finally, here are a couple of SDCC manga deals that will be running out soon: Viz is taking 40% off its volume 1s to celebrate the rollout of its web app, and Yen Press is offering volume 1s of its manga, including Yotsuba&!, Maximum Ride, and Highschool of the Dead, on its iOS apps for $2.99

The Massive

Friday was a busy day in San Diego, with a full slate of announcements capped by the Eisner Awards in the evening.

• Image Comics will resurrect the classic television show MacGyver as a five-issue miniseries written by MacGyver creator Lee David Zlotoff and Doctor Who writer Tony Lee, and illustrated by Becky Cloonan.

• Brian Wood’s newest project was announced — The Massive, about environmentalists who survive the last environmental collapse. The comic will start its run in Dark Horse Presents #8 in January.

• Vertigo Executive Editor Karen Berger confirmed that Scalped will end with issue #60.

• Marvel teased the return of the Scarlet Spider.

• DC Comics released more interior art for several of their “New 52″ titles, including Aquaman, Mister Terrific and more.

Rascal Raccoon's Raging Revenge

• Oni Press announced a new book by Robot Chicken writer Brendan Hay and artist Justin Wagner called Rascal Raccoon’s Raging Revenge.

• Dark Horse’s Star Wars comics are being added to their digital app.

• Aspen Comics announced several new projects, including volume two of Shrugged; a new volume of Fathom: Kiani; Dead Man’s Run, a brand new series written by Greg Pak with art by Tony Parker; and Homecoming, a new project from Aspen designed by Michael Turner.

• Viz Media announced three new manga licenses: A Devil and Her Love Song, a romance; The Earl and the Fairy, a fantasy; and Fluffy, Fluffy Cinnamoroll, which is based on a cute mascot dog from Hello Kitty parent company Sanrio.

• Yen Press also had three manga licenses to announce: Durara!!, Kore wa Zombie desu ka? and Olimpos, as well as an iPhone/iPod Touch app that will sync with their iPad app. And yes, they are working on an Android version.

• Joshua Hale Fialkov and Rahsan Ekedal, who collaborated on Echoes, have another comic in the works for Top Cow’s Pilot Season, titled The Test. Writer Alan McElroy also talked to CBR about his Pilot Season entry, Anonymous.

• First Comics officially announced their return in San Diego and shared that their YA/submissions editor, Susannah Carson, is taking submissions.

• James O’Barr’s The Crow is returning at IDW, as is Popeye.

• IDW also announced another Artist’s Edition, this one featuring Will Eisner’s The Spirit.

• Abrams will publish The Art of Daniel Clowes: Modern Cartoonist in the spring of 2012.

• Syfy will adapt Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt’s The Sixth Gun comic into a television show.

• AMC debuted a new trailer for the second season of The Walking Dead, which will premiere Oct. 16.

• Neil Gaiman will produce a movie based on Roman Dirge’s Lenore.

• A live-action Voltron feature film is in the works.

• Today’s strange-but-true announcement: Capcomm announced a Hello Kitty x Street Fighter crossover that will produce a line of merchandise bearing images of Kitty in various Street Fighter costumes.

• Conan O’Brien “crashed” Comic-Con to debut a new trailer starring his alter-ego, The Flaming C.

• Justice League action figures based on Jim Lee’s “New 52″ designs will debut next year.

Dark Horse announced at the Dark Horse/Star Wars panel today that it is adding Star Wars comics to its the Dark Horse digital store. Over 50 titles are available right now, including Star Wars: Crimson Empire, Marvel’s adaptation of Episode IV: A New Hope, The Clone Wars, Knights of the Old Republic, Legacy: War, Knight Errant, The Old Republic, Jedi: The Dark Side, and Darth Vader and the Lost Command. Dark Horse will continue to add both new and backlist Star Wars titles to their digital store weekly. The price point for single-issue comics is $1.99, but there are some bargains: KOTOR #1 and Clone Wars #1 are free, and Crimson Empire #1, Knight Errant #1, and The Old Republic #1 are priced at 99 cents. And it looks like the store is offering a discount on bundles of these comics, as it does with others, with a six-issue arc of Star Wars: Legacy, for example, priced at $8.99 instead of $11.99.

Mimoco, makers of designer USB flash drives featuring characters from Star Wars, DC Comics and other areas of pop culture, announced today several new characters for their Star Wars and Hello Kitty lines.

Joining the Star Wars line are Lando Calrissian, Han Solo with a Carbonite carrying case, Princes Leia disguised as bounty hunter Boushh and a reissue of Boba Fett. They join Bossk, Mimoco’s SDCC exclsuive. Check out the complete details in the press release after the jump, as well as more images.

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Hello Kitty

SAN DIEGO COMIC CON 2011: MIMOCO BOOSTS STORAGE CAPACITIES UP TO 64GB AND RELEASES STAR WARS™ MIMOBOT® SERIES 7 AND HELLO KITTY® BLOTZ™ MIMOBOT® USB DRIVE COLLECTIONS
New characters include Han Solo with a Carbonite carrying case, a reissue of Boba Fett, and a Hello Kitty Loves Animals mystery box BLOTz MIMOBOT assortment, all featuring free gifts with purchase.

(San Diego – July 20, 2011) – At the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con, Mimoco (www.mimoco.com), creator of the MIMOBOT® line of designer USB flash drives, unveiled new editions of its popular Star Wars™ and Hello Kitty® collections, along with increased storage capacities across its entire flash drive product line. Previously only available in up to 16GB capacities, Mimoco now offers 32GB and 64GB versions throughout their character-based MIMOBOT flash drive assortment. Mimoco is offering exclusive limited edition products, gifts with purchase, and celebrity signings at their Comic-Con booths, #4936 in the Toy Growers Cultyard, and #2913M in the Star Wars Pavilion. All MIMOBOT® drives come pre-loaded with exclusive series-based content like wallpapers, screensavers, soundbytes and more.

The new Star Wars MIMOBOT Series 7 features a product offering based on many iconic characters from Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi. Leading off is Han Solo MIMOBOT with Carbonite carrying case, a keychain accessory that encases Han Solo in a sculpted plastic protective block re-imagining a new use for the famous frozen intergalactic smuggler. For the first time in MIMOBOT form is Lando Calrissian, Solo’s redeemed friend who aids in his rescue and pilots the Millennium Falcon helping to destroy the Death Star. Billy Dee Williams, famous for starring as Lando, will join Mimoco for an autograph session at the Star Wars Pavilion (#2913M) on Friday at 12:00pm – 1:30pm to promote the new series. Also joining in the fight against the Galactic Empire is Princess Leia MIMOBOT, disguised as the bounty hunter Boushh, ready to save the one she loves from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt. Lastly, the fan-favorite Boba Fett has been reissued in Return of the Jedi styling, updated with a new battle-scarred suit and more intimidating scowl. These new additions join previously announced SDCC exclusive Trandoshan bounty-hunter Bossk. Each Star Wars Series 7 MIMOBOT purchased at Comic-Con comes with a free poster.

Hello Kitty Loves Animals BLOTz™ is a collection of 11 colorful Hello Kitty MIMOBOT USB flash drives presented in a blind box assortment. Each mystery box contains one surprise MIMOBOT flash drive featuring Hello Kitty dressed up as one of her favorite animals including Panda, Raccoon, Seal, Tiger, Bear, Fox, Penguin, Leopard, and more. Two of the drives, the endangered Giant Panda and White Tiger MIMOBOT designs, are extra rare and serve as chase variants. The Hello Kitty Loves Animals BLOTz collection will also be available in case-packs of nine units, packaged without any repeats, guaranteed. Those purchasing a full case of Hello Kitty Loves Animals BLOTz will also receive a free Hello Kitty Loves Animals ringer t-shirt, while supplies last. Available in 2GB capacity, the Hello Kitty Loves Animals BLOTz, like all MIMOBOT drives, are Mac and Windows compatible and come preloaded with original content.

“At our seventh consecutive exhibition at Comic-Con, we are working harder than ever to bring excitement to our awesome fans with celebrity signings, multiple exclusives, new releases, and fun gifts with purchase,” said Evan Blaustein, CEO of Mimoco. ”Packed with super-passionate pop-culture buffs, there is no better venue than Comic-Con to launch our new 2011 products.”

Mimoco is offering other previously announced Comic-Con MIMOBOT exclusives for purchase at their booths. Batman: Arkham City’s menacing Harley Quinn x MIMOBOT will be released in an edition of 800 units and is supported by an autograph signing by Tara Strong, voice of Harley Quinn in Arkham City, on Friday at 3:30pm – 5pm at Mimoco’s Cultyard booth (#4936). Also joining the MIMOBOT collection is a collaboration featuring Cosmic Debris’ heroine, Emily the Strange, which kicks off with a 500 unit People Are Strange Emily the Strange design. Rob Reger, Emily the Strange creator, will be on hand signing at Mimoco’s Cultyard booth (#4936) at 1p – 2p on Saturday. Each exclusive MIMOBOT purchased at the show will be accompanied by a free limited edition 11×17 poster that each celebrity signer will autograph on site. Other new MIMOBOT collections that are being showcased at Comic-Con include the just-released Transformers Optimus Prime and Megatron MIMOBOT devices, along with Green Lantern, Batman, tokidoki, and Mimoco’s own Core Series characters.

Han Solo

Lando

Boba Fett

Bossk

Skullkickers

The San Diego Comic-Con runs kicks off with a preview night on July 20, then runs July 21-24. If you are a comics creator or publisher, and you’re planning to bring something new to the con — a sketchbook, a print, a graphic novel debut, anything! — then we want to hear from you. Drop me an email and let me know if you’ll have something cool on hand that attendees should know about. Feel free to send any artwork as well.

This time around we have panties from Pantheon (seriously), more Mimoco, word of an announcement by Dark Horse, plans for Viz and Arcana, several Hasbro exclusives and more. So let’s get to it …

Skullkickers creators Jim Zubkavich and Edwin Huang will be at the Image Comics booth #2729, selling hardcovers of the first volume of Skullkickers with an SDCC-exclusive cover. You can find more details here.

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by Craig Thompson

Pantheon Books will be at booth #1515, giving away MetaMaus buttons and … panties? They’ll also have the above poster by Craig Thompson, which he’ll be signing at the booth:

Pantheon Books will be at this year’s San Diego ComicCon (July 20-24), and we would love to see you there. We will be at Booth #1515.

We have two Pantheon authors joining us at ComicCon this year: Craig Thompson/HABIBI (onsale 9/20) and Chip Kidd/BAT MANGA!. Both will be appearing at our booth and on author panels.

Also, just a note that this year marks the 25th anniversary of Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer-Prize winning Maus, and in the fall Pantheon is publishing Spiegelman’s METAMAUS (onsale 10/4), a studied look at the genesis of Maus, accompanied by a DVD with never-before-seen panels, a home movie, and other objects relating to the original publication of Spiegelman’s groundbreaking original comic book. We will have METAMAUS buttons on hand for giveaway throughout the convention.

Finally, next spring, Pantheon’s sister imprint Schocken Books is publishing its first ever graphic novel: UNTERZAKHN (onsale 3/20/2012) by Leela Corman, a mesmerizing, heartbreaking story of immigrant life on New York’s Lower East Side at the turn of the 20th century. In anticipation of this exciting release, we will be giving away women’s panties at the Pantheon booth, since, as some of you may know, the word “unterzakhn” is Yiddish for “underthings.”

Unterzakhn

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Previously I highlighted the Harley Quinn USB flash drive that Mimoco will have at the show. They’ve released more details about their plans, which also include SDCC-exclusive Flash Drives featuring Bossk, the reptilian bounty hunter from The Empire Strikes Back, and Emily the Strange:

They’ll also be hosting Emily the Strange creator Rob Reger, Harley Quinn voice actress Tara Strong and Billy Dee Williams, aka Lando Calrissian, at various times during the show. You can find all the details here.

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Viz sent out information on their booth activities, which include:

VIZ Media’s Booth (#2813) will be a hub of continual activity on the main show floor. The VIZ MANGA APP is the latest technological innovation for digital manga comics for the Apple iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. Fans that drop by the booth and show the App installed on their Apple device will receive a special free tchotchkie as a ‘thank you’ from VIZ Media while supplies last.

Video game fans will also want to be sure to check out playable demos for Namco Bandai’s NARUTO SHIPPUDEN: ULTIMATE NINJA STORM GENERATIONS, which will be released in Spring 2012, and NIS America’s new BLEACH: SOUL RESSURRECCIÓN, launching in August 2011.

Sunday July 24th is Kid’s Day at the VIZ Media booth. Young and older fans alike are invited to pose for pictures with Kon from BLEACH, NARUTO (Classic Version), Edamame from MAMESHIBA, and more. Visitors can also attend screenings of Episode 1 of the new VOLTRON FORCE anime series and stay for special free VIZ Kids samplers and product giveaways.

Don’t miss other exclusive VIZ Media product giveaways during special times throughout the show (attendees should check the booth for a daily schedule). There will be free NARUTO ninja headbands and whisker tattoos, as well as MAMESHIBA headbands and the ever-popular VIZ Media convention tote bag. This year the tote commemorates VIZ Media’s 25th Anniversary. Don’t miss the chance to score this special convention exclusive!

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Dark Horse, meanwhile, is promoting an announcement that will be made at 7:30 p.m. on Preview Night, July 20::

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Arcana has two new books they’ll have at the show:

SideShows

Kade Art Book. Limited to 250 copies, Arcana’s seminal character, Kade, created by owner Sean Patrick O’Reilly is celebrated in style in a limited edition art book. Featuring an original cover by Tim Bradstreet (HELLRAISER, IRON MAN: THE RAPTURE) and including brand new artwork from talented artists such as Tim Seeley (HACK/SLASH), Brent Schoonover (HORRORWOOD), Greg Horn (THOR GOES HOLLYWOOD), Kevin Mellon (GEARHEAD), Ashley Wood (MYSTERY SOCIETY), Liam Sharp (GOD KILLERS), Ben Templesmith (30 DAYS OF NIGHT), Greg Titus (VAMPIRE HUNTRESS), and Whilce Portacio (UNCANNY X-MEN, WETWORKS). Don’t miss out on this limited title and your chance to see some of the industry’s top talent’s take on Kade, Arcana’s enigmatic warrior.

Sean Patrick O’Reilly says of the art book, “Kade is Arcana’s first comic and graphic novel, and we now have seven graphic novels in the library for the series. This comic book artbook looks back at some of the great talents that have worked on the series, and also showcases some never before seen artwork. Just some of the artists are Tim Bradstreet, Greg Horn, Bob Hall, Whilce Portacio and many of the talented artist at Cadence Comics.”

SideShows Launch Edition. Written by Erik Hendrix with art from
Michael David Nelsen, SideShows is an action-packed story of crime and powers set in 1950′s Las Vegas. It makes its debut at SDCC this year in an extremely limited “launch edition” of 100 copies. In addition to the story, it contains some behind the scenes of the concept as well as pin-ups from some amazing artists.

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And finally, Hasbro will have a whole bunch of exclusive toys for sale at the show, from Marvel, Transformers, G.I. Joe and Star Wars. Check them out:

X-Men #1

What is it about comics fans (any type of fan, really, but let’s focus on comics fans) that makes us want to see the details of every little thing that happened ever? We know that Bruce Wayne was inspired to become a crimefighter when he saw his parents gunned down in an alley, but what about the gunman? He’s gotta have a story too and I want to read it. The X-Men are already a team when we first meet them in X-Men #1, so how did they form? There has to be a story there as well; someone get on that. And so the publishers and storytellers oblige us.

It’s not just gaps in comic book history that we want filled in. Movies also have back-stories and comics are the go-to medium for showing us Abby the vampire’s adventures with her “father” pre-Let Me In or filling in details of how Romulan Eric Bana went back in time to create Nu Trek. Why are we so interested in seeing this stuff when we’ve already seen how it plays out?

You don’t have to answer that. I think I know. For me, it goes back to my childhood introduction to comics as a casual reader and an experience that I’ve heard shared by countless comics fans. It comes up a lot when we talk about the necessity (or lack thereof) of jump-on points for new readers. Fans of my generation didn’t need jump-on points to get interested in superhero comics and we often argue that neither do new readers today. Part of the fun of Marvel and DC comics was being thrown into the deep end of these universes that felt so real. And the reason they felt real was because of all the history that was referred to not only by the characters, but also by the editors themselves in all those little caption boxes telling us to check out Avengers #53 or whatever if we wanted to see what Hawkeye’s talking about.

Avengers #53

That immersive experience hooked us and we didn’t actually need to go back and find a copy of Avengers #53 to enhance anything. The story we were currently reading told us enough to understand what we needed to know. But we sure as hell fantasized about one day owning a copy of Avengers #53 and reading that story for ourselves. For a lot of fans, reading older comics isn’t just about consuming classic stories by legendary storytellers; it’s also about filling in those historical gaps and finally witnessing for ourselves events that previously we’d only been told about second-hand.

The thing is though: it never ends. I pulled Avengers #53 out of my butt as an example, but let’s go with it. Looking it up on Comics.org, it’s about Magneto’s manipulating the Avengers into fighting the X-Men for him. That’s going to lead to some questions about the X-Men, but if you want them answered first-hand, you’ll have to go to their book to learn more. Except that current X-Men comics are only going to send you digging into X-Men back-issues for the “complete” story and even if you go all the way back to the very first X-Men comic ever made…you still don’t see how the team came together.

Any fictional world worth exploring is going to have back-story. My question is: are we ever really satisfied by having it laid out for us in detail? Is my enjoyment of Batman enhanced by knowing all about Joe Chill? Has any prequel comic ever turned the movie it supported into a better experience? Maybe they have for you. If so, I’d love to hear about it in the comments. But for me, I’ve only ever been disappointed at seeing events play out that I’ve already imagined much more coolly in my head. Exhibit A: the Clone Wars.

Star Wars: Episode 1 - Queen Amidala

Observing another movie franchise, I was concerned when I heard about plans to make an Alien prequel. Rob Bricken at Topless Robot summarized my feeling really well:

“Let me tell you what this movie will be – an alien stalking that first spaceship [that they discovered in Alien], or, basically, a remake of the original Alien except everybody dies and it’ll saddled with an incredibly lame origin story that makes the whole franchise less interesting. No thank you, Ridley. Why don’t you just go ahead and work on a prequel to your Monopoly film instead. Tell us how Uncle Moneybags met the dog and thimble.”

Or, as Filmdrunk put it, “You know what are super cool? Sharks. You know what’s not that interesting? The story of how sharks were created.”

Fortunately, the direct-prequel idea for Alien ultimately was trashed, mostly because Damon Lindelof got involved. What actually got me thinking about all of this were some comments he made about prequels on The Kevin Pollack Chat Show.

Planet of the Apes #2

“I’ve always felt that really good prequels should be original movies. And the sequels to those prequels should not be the movie which already exists because, with all due respect to anyone who makes a prequel, but why would you ruin the greatest twist in the history of cinema – ‘Luke, I am your father’ – by showing me three movies which basically spoil that surprise. You can do movies which take place before Star Wars, but I don’t need to see the story of the Skywalker clan. Show me something else which I can’t guess the possible outcome of. There is no suspense in inevitability. So a true prequel should essentially proceed the events of the original film, but be about something entirely different, feature different characters , have an entirely different theme, although it takes place in that same world.”

I tend to agree. It’s not that I don’t care to see stories anymore that are set in earlier time periods. Marvels is a great example of this done correctly. It reflects events from Marvel’s history without being about them. And from the movie prequel arena, BOOM!’s current Planet of the Apes comic succeeds by covering events not directly referred to by the films or leading into any of them. It’s exciting because it’s its own thing. It doesn’t rely on my affection for another story and that makes all the difference in the world. I don’t want to keep going over missing details from stories I’ve already enjoyed. I want to experience new ideas and new characters that will get my imagination firing, not digest someone else’s version of a story that I’ve already imagined as awesome as it can be.

What about you though? Do you enjoy prequels and hole-filling stories in general? Do you only like certain ones? What are the greats?