Fanboy Rampage!!!

The Comic of 2004:

As everyone and their nephew knows, the comics blogosphere is just like the original Legion of Super-Heroes: we all have our exciting codenames, our colorful costumes, and we all hang out in a massive, upside-down rocket that's half in the ground for some mysterious reason that's never quite explained. Oh, and Ed Cunard has a protoplasmic shapechanging telepathic pet. Thus, it will come as no surprise when I tell you that Matt (Highway 62) Maxwell and I were to be found escaping a torrential downpour the other day by discussing the world of comics. During the enjoyable conversation I made the suggestion that, really, there's only one possible choice for the coveted title of Comic Of The Year, and that is Identity Crisis. As I'm sure you can imagine, the very notion made a flush of outrage appear on the cheeks of my esteemed colleague, and I realised that an explanation was in order, and quickly!

"Please understand, I'm not meaning that in the sense that it was the best comic of the year, simply that it seemed to be the most important one in terms of - if you will - the industry as a whole. Or, at least, the mainstream direct market. Identity Crisis," I said in hushed tones, "was a comic that sold shitloads based not upon the quality of the work, nor the popularity of the creators - for, before this, how many people really even knew who Brad Meltzer or Rags Morales were? - but, instead, purely because of the hype. DC told everyone that it was an 'important' book, and we all fell for it. Months before it came out, people were buzzing about who was going to be killed, and who it was that would kill them. Message boards were filled with breathless threads and guesses. And then, when the book finally appeared, message boards and blogs were talking about it again, wrapping themselves up in knots about whether it was misogyny or bad writing that was behind what happened to Sue Dibny. Why, even Alan David Doane, a man never given to hyperbole or outrage, became obsessed with the word 'assrape', a curious affliction he bears to this day! The outrage about the comic became as all pervasive as the rumor-mongering and excitement for it. Somehow, suddenly, Identity Crisis became the book everyone was talking about and had an opinion about, and that's the reason that everyone bought it. The actual book itself didn't even really seem to matter, in the end."

Mr. Maxwell took a gulp of his beverage, and nodded, sagely.

"It's almost as if it's a metaphor for what the direct market itself had become in 2004," he said. And then we moved on to other subjects, including whether "metaphor" had been used correctly in that last sentence.

The Comics I Liked Best This Year:

Rock'N'Roll (Ursula was a lot of fun, but there was something wonderful about this, also from Fabio and Gabriel, along with Bruno D'Angelo and Kako.)
Or Else (Thanks to Shawn Hoke sending me a copy of Kevin Huizenga's Supermonster zine, I ended up in love with his work just in time for Drawn and Quarterly picking him up and releasing the first issue of this.)
DC: The New Frontier (A love letter not just to the DC characters, but the era they were created in, this was easily the most beautiful, most fun, superhero comic released this year for me.)
Tales From Fish Camp (Yes, I know, it's not actually a comic. But AiT/Planet Lar are a comic publisher, and this was accidentally listed as a graphic novel at Amazon, so it's enough of an excuse to put it here and tell you how much I loved this short collection of stories that's more like a friend telling you about her fucked-up summer than anything else.)
Birth of A Nation (Kyle Baker, Aaron McGruder and Reginald Hudlin doing a political satire taking its starting point from the Florida electorial problems in 2000? Who could resist? Apart from Augie, of course.)
Carnet De Voyage (Again, not really a comic. But I think it's Craig Thompson's best work, with a lightness of touch and willingness to admit/confront the "I am so angst-ridden and I HURT" tendency that ended up ruining Blankets for me. Yes, I wasn't the biggest fan of Blankets. I'm sorry.)

That's not even a top 10, is it? In that case, I should probably mention Ex Machina, American Elf, Gotham Central, and We3, which brings it to ten unless my math is off. Still, to everyone who reads this: Happy 2005, when it comes. Now go and do something more fun than reading a blog.

As we speed towards the end of the year, Newsarama has both a letter from Charles Brownstein, Executive Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, looking back at the last twelve months and a request for charity donations to help with Tsunami relief operations.

Heidi does such a good wrap-up of the year that I feel too scared to attempt one, now. Go read.

Pascul Ferry talks about his amazing work on Adam Strange:

"After drawing Superman, [editor] Eddie [Berganza] asked me what I wanted to do next. I had no doubts: Adam Strange. This is the opportunity for me to develop weird stuff, create new designs for old sci-fi DC worlds, and space robots. It's also a chance to be a part of something that has a clear start and finish in just eight issues without any crossovers. [I anticipated] the opportunity to use a new style and technique with my own ink and specially grey illuminations on the pages... After doing superheroes for almost ten years, I didn't have any clear idea about [an art style or technique for the series... I just had one premise: be myself. I wanted to take care of the details of the design, the outfits, the backgrounds, and try to create great action sequences. No referential tributes or anything like that - just to be Pascal Ferry for good or bad."

Millarworld responds to the Warren Ellis mailing quoted here yesterday:

"Warren knows many genre models, goth dominatrix's and S & M muses and the like, it seems. He's always linking to them around here. They have pretty big audiences for their websites. If there were a website that combined models such as these and others with comics, it'd be really popular. Imagine it; Warren Ellis and friends create webcomics for a site. Get a group of models to do shoots as the characters in scenery from the comics. It's getting comics out to the models' audience, and it's getting the models out to horny comic geeks who may not have heard of them before. And we've all got a website that gives us proper superhero genre near-porn. Have a members' section you need to subscribe to for the really interesting stuff, and the site's making money, which can be put into publishing comics or advertising in mainstream medium or whatever. Have a message board that builds up a community for this site, add in some free samples from fans' bands or something to get them out there more, plus advertise for new creators for the webcomics and models to act/star as the characters, and you've got a nifty community that's breaching people of various interests while keeping the creativity going. Budda-bing, budda-boom, budda-bango."

"F@ck the internet, personally. It's great when people are already here, but how do you get someone to go to randomcomicwebsite.com? Everyone needs to get their head out of the internet and focus on actual advertisment in print publications (and no, Wizard does not count), radio ads, tv ads, whatever... Isn't it illegial, or at least, immoral, for a company to not advertise their products? Trade magazines don't count, I'm talking real, actual publications. Time, Entertainment Weekly, Spin, Q, Rolling Stone, etc..."

"I imagine mainstream advertisement is a huge gamble at this point. They're not making the money to risk it and are at a comfortable equilibrium so neither company wants to take the plunge. To be effective I'd think you'd need multiple ads and that's going to raise the cost significantly. You'd be paying more to advertise a book than you're paying to the creators and printers combined. The best bet is to continue to promote that comics aren't for kids and continue to get more magazines to do the promotion for you. Alternatively, if they are gonna spend the money, I don't think a one page ad in a magazine is worth it. If you really want to draw a new reader you need to put a couple page preview in, something they can sink their teeth into and will be compelled enough to go to a store and buy. Just like novels that put a chapter preview in a magazine."

"One major drawback with advertising in national mainstream magazines is, once you've enticed potential new readers, they don't know where to find the product. If I'm interested in a new book, chances are I can pick it up at a any mall bookstore like Waldenbooks, or even Wal-Mart if it's a popular item. Same with the latest rock CD, which I can find in a mall music store like Coconuts, or in a chain like Target. If I see an ad for Ellis' Apparat books, and I live in Smalltown, USA, where do I go to buy them? If all the publishers put pressure on Diamond to arrange a better distribution system, reinstating return policies in some cases to encourage growth of new markets, and actually getting ALL comics into department stores and major chains, then mainstream print advertising would make more sense."

Neil Kleid talks to Chris Arrant about his upcoming graphic novel, Brownsville:

"I've always been fascinated by the criminal world before the 1950s and I've always wanted to tell a gangster story. I suppose, like Allie, I've been drawn to the patter, the life and was looking for a way to get involved. Thing is, I wasn't interested in creating a 'fake mob' like you see in so many gangster stories in comics... I wanted my world to be set in the actual history of the Mafia. I wanted my characters to sit in the same room as Lucky Luciano and all the rest. That's one of the things I dug about Road to Perdition. It's one of the things that bothered me about Judd Winick's Caper... So I did a bit of research and discovered that there were all of these little hoodlums out there that all contributed to the larger story of the Mafia - and more importantly to me as an Orthodox Jew, the Jewish Mob. I'm from Detroit where you keep hearing about The Purple Gang and had never really read up about the Jewish Mafia. I knew all the Italian players, and a good deal of the Irish. But apart from Lan! ksy and Bugsy? Zip.

"So I dug a little and found out about Reles and Pittsburgh Phil and Gangy Cohen and Mendy Weiss and so on. Did you see Band of Brothers? It's the story of the individual soldiers of Easy Company from D-Day until V-E Day and it lets us see that these heroes, these men who gave their lives for us, had personalities and individual hopes and dreams. I suppose my story could be subtitled 'Band of Bag Guys', because that's essentially what it does - shines a light on the personalities, hopes and fears of these nameless hoods you see standing in the shadows of movies like The Godfather and Once Upon A Time In America."

Marvel does something interesting; world stunned. Newsarama has the story:

"While Mark Paniccia has been at Marvel since October... this is the official notification of him joining Marvel as a Senior Editor. Already on Paniccia's slate is the new Amazing Fantasy series, which will showcase new characters to the Marvel Universe. What's also of note in the following release is that Marvel is planning on using Paniccia's expertiese in recruiting new talent - during his time at Tokyopop, Paniccia oversaw the bulk of the publisher's Rising Stars of Manga contests, as well as anthology compliations. Also of perhaps more interesting note is the indication that Paniccia will 'spearhead original graphic novel development.' The move, if it does indeed bear fruit, will mark the return of Marvel to the production of original graphic novels, something it ceased producing in the early '90s. Time and time again, when asked, if a return to OGNs was in Marvel's future, Editor in Chief Joe Quesada had expressed a desire to return to OGNs, but they were not, at the time, a financial possibility for Marvel to produce. Of course, something that also could cause a raised eyebrow is Publisher Dan Buckley's praise of manga as part of the larger comics industry. Are original, digest-sized Marvel OGNs on the horizon?"

From Warren Ellis's Bad Signal mailing list:

"My particular Gordian Knot for 2005: how to improve promotional impact on the net without going back to running a message board.

"There's a clear gap in comics message-board culture for something like the old WEF, but I can't face going back to all that. I could do it the way Mark Millar does, having it reflect the relentless cheerful populism of his current incarnation without actually having an active hand in it, but I can't see the point of that. I'll be releasing PDFs and other viral preview material through warrenellis.com, but that site still isn't gelling right for me -- it needs something, and I can't put my finger on what. DPH averages about 8000 humans a day, but I never feel entirely comfortable using it for promotion.

"If you take that whole New Economy-wonk mantra that 'markets are conversations,' then you tend to assume there's a corollary that conversations are markets. Which can sometimes bring you to the old saw about trees falling in the forest and no-one to hear them. There's a ton of work sold only in the direct market that no-one seems to talk about. There's a core comics audience that knows little or nothing of webcomics despite the likes of Justine Shaw getting nominated for Eisner Awards. Image Central are fighting an uphill battle just trying to get people to understand what they're doing. Dirk Deppey's trying to reinvent the Comics Journal and no-one outside the already-extant audience seems to know about it.

"There's a bunch of stuff happening that doesn't make it into the current popular comics message-board conversation -- and here's how that applies to me. I work in commercial comics, but a whole chunk of my output (taken as a whole, not just the last year) is what I think of as 'bridge' work -- adult-oriented fiction in genre, standing between the literary mainstream and the commercial mainstream. This may be arrant bullshit, but it's how I often think of it. And if no-one's talking about that kind of work, there's not necessarily a market perceived for it. I do okay, but then, I've been doing it for a while. I could do better, but so could we all. But I can't do it in a vacuum. Poor old B Clay Moore, possibly less aware of the broader sphere of things, thinks he IS working in a vacuum, writing adult-oriented genre work like THE EXPATRIATE. Y and FABLES are doing fine at Vertigo, but Vertigo as a whole feels quiet these days. Does that mean there's nothing to talk about? Or that we just can't hear the conversations? The circle of comics blogs are mostly pretty low-traffic affairs, and often pretty mainstream in intent. I'd also hesitate to call them conversations, call-and-response, commenting systems and trackbacks aside -- though obviously there's space to argue against that.

"Maybe it just comes down to buzz.

"Thinking out loud, obviously.

"Back to holiday time."

[Edited to include the entire email]

The Bendis Board has more disaster relief charity efforts in the works:

"As I'm sure most of you know by now, there is a dire need for disaster relief and donations to help with the almost impossible job of picking up the pieces after the huge tsunami hit this past weekend. I know with the christmas season just passing a lot of us are tapped financially. Others want to help, but don't know where or how. So I and Ronin as a whole are getting an anthology put together to help with the disaster fund. Every cent generated from the sale of this book will be donated to the American Red Cross to help with disaster relief. Throughout the entire life cycle of this book, no matter if it's still selling copies five years from now. All of it will be sent to the ARC. If you're a writer, we've got artists on hand to draw your story. Artists if you want to work on a story, or donate a pin up, then by all means speak up. We're looking for a fast turn around on this so we can get this baby printed up and get the cash flow started. We'll be soliciting this to Diamond through Ronin ourselves so we can forgo the whole courting process we're currently going through with the ACTOR charity anthology book. I urge any and all of you to contact me either by responding to this post, pm or send me an email to nlarimer@gmail.com [...] Anything you wish to donate. Short comic story, prose story, poem, pin up, or a full story written and drawn. Even if it's something you've had lying about for years collecting dust. We're taking them all."

(Also, more here.)

Steven Grant on exclusive contracts:

"Traditionally, companies went after talent who'd shown sales muscle, or, as mentioned above, had a reputation for getting attention regardless of overall sales (companies like attention). The array of talents offered exclusive deals lately, though, has been... well, baffling, particularly at Marvel. I'm not saying any of the talents involved don't deserve contracts - they're all talented guys, even if most as unrecognized by the market and rarely mentioned by the press - it's just hard to figure out what Marvel gets from it, aside from a guaranteed pool of warm bodies to make sure books come out on time."

Brian K. Vaughan updates people on scheduling issues of his books:

"First of all, I take deadlines incredibly seriously. I've been writing comics for almost nine years now (believe it or not), and I've never once kept an artist waiting for pages. I LOVE monthly serialized comics, and I know how much it blows to have to wait for the next chapter of whatever it is you're mainlining. My series all have pretty great track records, but a few different things beyond my control seem to hit a few books simultaneously."

Y: The Last Man, Ultimate X-Men and Wha... Huh?! are all running late, for various reasons, the Ultimate X-Men reasoning being the strangest ("Marvel decided to hold off on releasing [the first issue Vaughan has done with new artist Stuart Immonen] until January 5 just to give us a little extra promotional boost, and let everyone know that one consistent team will be working on UXM for the next twelve months. I know that sounds like bullshit, but I swear it's true, and I think there are retailers here who can confirm that our first issue has been finished for ages." Because it's impossible to have a twelve month run that starts in December?).

The Ultimates hardcover is out of print already. Millarworld react:

"I do not, in any way, understand Marvel's printing policy on tpbs. Now, I'm sure this will quickly go back to a new printing, but with what is probably Marvel's most successful title, and Volume 2 just out, why would they not go directly back to a new printing when the first one is almost gone? It's that the whole purpose of tpbs...to always be in print?"

"[Marvel] want to see what the demand for this is currently. I assume the current back orders they feel may not represent accurate demand from retailers/fans so they want to be sure if they print say 10,000 to cover current reorders that the actual demand is not closer to 20,000 causeing them to have to go right back to press....again and so soon [...] Not being familiar with Marvel policy all I can say for certain is that if you want to make the most money on product.. you want to go back to press as FEW times as possible. It's just good business, if they have to make you wait to ensure they aren't losing huge amounts of cash it's in their best interest and our own if we want their books to keep coming."

"Actually, The Ultimates HC vol 1 only sold : 4,728 copies in october (ICV2 figures)"

"Marvel's TPB/HC program seriously sucks. Number one, they underprint their books. In recent memory, two titles, 'Thor Vikings' and 'FF Unstable Molecules' went out of print almost immediately upon release, and still haven't been reprinted a year later. Now, look in the Marvel backlist section of the Previews Customer Order Form. Almost nothing but broken runs. I don't think they can even keep all four 'Alias' TPBs in print at the same time. There's always at least one that's unavailable. Vols. 1 and 3 of Frank Miller's DD Visionaries line are unavailable. The first Milligan/Allred X-Force TPB has been out of print for ages now. Half of Morrison's New X-Men run is also unavailable. It's ridiculous... wouldn't all of these broken runs end up actually hurting sales? And what's with Marvel not going immediately back to press on books until retailers have placed 'backorders?' Isn't that a generally bad policy for the retailer, to have to place orders and tie up capital for expensive books that might never ship?"

The Bendis Board are organizing a charity auction to raise money for Red Cross relief workers dealing with the aftermath of the Asian disaster at the weekend. Go here to bid on original Mike Oeming Powers artwork, with more lots apparently coming soon. Presumably, any creators wanting to donate something to be auctioned can contact Travis Howard, who appears to be organising the auction (details here).

(Oh, and everyone? Don't snark about this. Kind of obvious, I know, but somehow I just knew that someone was readying a FMK joke...)

The Hollywood Reporter on one reason why Marvel may feel lonely soon:

"Pixar Animation Studios' 'The Incredibles' has all the earmarks of a comic book movie: It features superstrong Mr. Incredible, superflexible Elastigirl, superfast Dash and the forcefield-wielding Violet. A family of superheroes, they all face off against supervillains and pal around with superfriends. But 'The Incredibles,' created by animator Brad Bird, is not based on a comic book. It represents a new wave of movies that derive their inspiration from comic book conventions but create universes that have never existed in a comic book imprint... 'People are now creating their own heroes,' said Paramount executive vp production Brian Witten, who is overseeing the development of an adaptation of the Marvel Comic 'Deathlok.' Witten also oversaw the comic book movie 'Spawn' while at New Line and was comic impresario Rob Liefeld's producing partner at Extreme Studios. 'You don't necessarily need a comic as your source material anymore.'"

(Thanks, Laurenn.)

DC's Teen Titans artist jumps ship:

"Marvel Comics is honored to announce that fan-favorite penciller Mike McKone has accepted a two year exclusive contract! ...The artist’s 'fantastic flair' for costumed superheroics will serve him more than well for his first new Marvel assignment. 'I’m going to draw my favorite comic book in the whole wide world,' beamed McKone. 'I’m going to be drawing the Fantastic Four!'"

Millarworld discuss cool, style and substance in comics:

"I like a certain amount of cool in everything, not just comics. But when comics pull that cool factor and I think 'Wow. Cool.', that's more awesome than anything. Style vs. substance? Doesn't mean shit to me. Do I like it or not? That's all it comes down to."

"Cool is out, or has at least changed it's stripes. Leftist social and culturally critical points of view are considered an element of a 'liberal establishment' and kids split, some are anti globalist - they read stuff like the Authority. Others turn right wing, pro=republican and pro-military -they enjoy the Ultimates. (The adroit Mark Millar gets benefits from both audiences.) The 9-11 attack takes place and patriotism is back in, Capt. America becomes unapologetically American again. And the anti globalist anarchists, are turned into symbols for Big Govt liberalism, one of the right wings favorite whipping horses. DC's revision of their long standing archetypes, a process pushed forward by Miller's Batman of the Eighties, takes on a bit of a retro feel on the one hand, while borrowing currents from the counter culture where it suits the situation..."

"The comics industry in general suffers from a large amount of self loathing these days. It disgusts me to be honest. Putting this in high school terms. We're the nerd that's OH so gratful to be getting a hand job from a cheerleader. The cheerleader doesn't really care and is just doing it so we'll do her homework. Comics are the nerd. Hollywood is the cheerleader."

Ron Marz talks about his recent run on Green Lantern, and in particular, the return of the villain that helped coin the phrase "women in refrigerators" in the first place:

"You know, everybody's up in arms talking about 'violence toward women' in comics, as if somehow violence toward men is perfectly fine. The point with [murdered girlfriend of Green Lantern Kyle Rayner, and first woman in refrigerator] Alex was that Major Force was a sadistic son of a bitch, and that was the first time Kyle was confronted with real evil, not to mention personal loss. With Kyle's mother, the point was that it's the same sick bastard perpetrating the same crime. And in a larger context, it was about making Kyle deal with what he's been able to do as Green Lantern. If the same thing happens to someone else he loves, what's he accomplished? It was about making him decide if this job is worth it."

Over at Newsarama, Chris Arrant talks to J. Michael Straczynski about his plans for Fantastic Four:

"Oh, and to the net-heads out there who are on this 'Oh, Joe’s going to do a story where Sue tells Reed that Franklin’s really Namor’s kid', understand: I’ve written 200 TV scripts and about 100 comics scripts, and the one thing I never do is repeat myself. So y’all may be stuck on that, but I’m not. So there."

Rich Johnston asks if Bendis may be cursed in terms of DC:

"Remember the 'Batman/Daredevil' crossover kerfuffle that Brian Bendis went public with, appealing to Paul Levitz' better nature? And his subsequent apology for the problems it caused DC, and the fact that he damned the project the moment he started speaking? There does seem to be some further history between Paul and Brian here. I understand that Brian Bendis was the chosen writer for the upcoming "Flash" movie, but Paul Levitz personally intervened and got him ejected from the project - replacing Bendis with David Goyer. All because of Bendis' close association with Joe Quesada. And it's not just Bendis Paul seems to have a problem with. Bendis' friends can also go under the knife. Such as Michael Avon Oeming finding his Batman comic project cancelled for similar reasons."

Can't wait to see the Bendis Board reactions.

Paul O'Brien provides The X-Axis review of 2004:

"In December 2003, I sat down to write the X-Axis year in review, worked out how many X-books had been published that year, and nearly had a fit. Largely, this was because I was trying to work out when I would ever find time to write a column of that length. Eventually I ploughed through it anyway, and produced an eighteen-part epic, the longest X-Axis column I've ever written. This year, if I was giving every ongoing title its own page, we'd be up to something like part 25. This is ridiculous. I take a degree of comfort from the fact that many of the new launches have failed, with sales swandiving gracefully into oblivion from day one. I can only hope that the essential point - that there are too many of the damn things, and that the X-Men brand has been diluted into meaninglessness - will finally penetrate Marvel's thick skulls, although god knows I'm not optimistic... The biggest issue facing the X-books at the moment is that there are just too damned many of them. With that in mind, I'll be approaching every title with two simple questions in mind - questions which, sadly, Marvel rarely seem to ask themselves. First, was there any point in publishing this book in the first place? Second, should it be axed?"

As ever with O'Brien's work, but especially with his X-Axis reviews, it's well worth reading.

John Byrne explains it all! The origin of the word fanboy:

"'Fanboy' was, in fact, coined as a prejorative -- a term created to separate the fans (people who enjoyed comics for all the positive reasons) from the anal-retentives and other such whiners who used to be a small part of the audience."

The date of creation of the term "Marvel Zombie":

"The phrase was coined in the early 1980s, in a strip called 'True Fan Adventures' that used to run in CBG. And, as noted, it was coined as a prejorative."

The origin of his bad rep:

"Those stories began almost the exact moment I left UNCANNY X-MEN. There were many fans who felt utterly betrayed by my departure from that title, and I
was roundly excoriated for leaving. Since many of those fans worked in comic shops, where they had, essentially, captive audiences for their rants, it did
not take long for the 'Bad Byrne' stories to catch on -- to become, in fact, a way of proving how 'cool' one was, by telling of how 'Bad Byrne' had commited some atrocity (preferably involving small children) before their disbelieving eyes. No one has been able to produce a verifiable 'Bad Byrne story that did not have all kinds of ameliorating factors, but the people who tell these tales are not inclined to let their issues be clouded by facts."

Millarworld looks ahead to the next big thing:

"The major trend in comic book these days is to get the best artists and writers money can buy, and make sure the largest amount of people will get the book that will remain forever on the backlist so they can sell copies for the next ten years. It's what DC is doing with Superman/ Batman, JLA Classified and Superman these days, it's what they will do next year with Superman & Robin by JIM LEE and Superman by Morrison & Quitely. Marvel did it a few years back with the ULTIMATE line, but they failed to have constant, outstanding and regular creative team. It's what they did with Ultimate Spidey & The Ultimates, where every single issue has been written and drawn by the same team, but with the two others, something need to be fixed. We know Ultimate Fantastic 4 will have a A-list creative team next year after too many creative changes in the past 12 months. It's going to be fixed on Ultimate Xmen with 12 issues in a row by the same creative team. But what's next for 2006?"

"Ultimate FF has not had too many creative team shifts. It's had one. So far the title has only had two artists, and 2.5 writers. The only one that hasn't really been completely consistently good has been Ultimate X-Men, but thats less to do with the team and more to do with the stories just not being as interesting ...Which I guess is the creative teams fault. Okay."

"Geez, I'd have said that, relative to what's been the norm for Marvel over the years, the Ultimate Universe has been a model of consistency: USM is on track to go to issue 100 (or beyond?) with no changes or fill-ins, Ultimates is going on two volumes with no changes, UFF has had one change that happened at the end of an arc, and even UXM, while it's had changes, has avoided the abrupt fill-in issues that plagued NXM."

Jae Lee signs exclusively to Marvel. DC, apparently, isn't happy:

"I wanted to finish [Lee's Batman mini-series, Jekyll and Hyde]. In fact, my Marvel contract allows me to finish it, but DC was unhappy with the progress I had made on Batman when it was announced I was working for Marvel again... Freelancing is a tough business because you constantly have to line up work months ahead of time based on estimates of when you think you'll be done with something. If something happens in your life that slows your progress down, it screws everything up. When it's for the same company, it's usually not a big deal. When it's two different companies, it sucks."

Newsarama returns, refreshed from its Christmas break, full of stories. For one, Chris Arrant talks to Becky Cloonan and Brian Wood about what a year of Demo means to them:

"[Reception to the series has] been really great. Sounds a little cliché, but its been so much better than we expected. We, meaning AIT, Becky, and I, all sorta went out on a limb with this series, and didn't really know exactly what sort of reaction to expect. On a personal level, I've never written anything like DEMO before. I didn't think I had the ability to touch so many people on such a personal level. The emails we've received have been astounding."

You know, all I was doing was catching up with some last-minute Christmas things, but now I'm all verklempt after reading Chris's post and the comments thread attached. I'm practically unable to be snarky about Marvel's about-face about Mark Millar and Greg Land (no longer on Thor next year, they're taking over Ultimate Fantastic Four as of #19 instead, according to Newsarama. Millar explained "I'm a lot more interested in the FF than Thor. This idea that started with Neil and was embellished by JMS and eventually plotted out by me is really nice, but it could be done anytime. I walked out of The Incredibles thinking it was the best FF story I'd ever stumbled across and it's nice to be able to utilize the flood of ideas that came to me for the FF in the taxi home. Details of the first arc will be made available the second week in January. This requires some big co-ordination on the part of Marvel and the other writers so we can't release details yet. But in terms of a stunt it's probably the biggest and most ambitious thing the Ultimate Universe has attempted so far. This will be the most fast-paced and idea-heavy book in the Marvel line as of May. Just the way the FF should be."), and linking to Comic Book Resources's new column "Calling Manga Island" now seems like just a nice thing to do instead of an opportunity for some cheap shot. I can't even point out that, with Mark Millar offline until after the New Year but Brian Michael Bendis anouncing that the Bendis Board will be fully open for business over the next few days, then the Bendis Board is probably the best place to go to be mean about Millar and hope that he won't see it. Instead, I'll offer up this special Yuletide link and take my leave. To those who celebrate Christmas, may all your Christmases be white, and to those who don't, have a nice weekend anyway. I'm sure I'll be grumpy again by Monday.

Grim Tidings Indeed...

I just wanted to take the opportunity of Graeme's seeming disappearance to thank him for endlessly suffering through the various message boards, news sites, and other assorted tough-guy-postings-from-their-parents-basements for all of our collective amusements this year. Graeme's work here at Fanboy Rampage is a constant reminder that while the Bendis, Millarworld, and Newsarama message-boards are "nice" places to visit (or view from the Peanut Gallery, perhaps), I sure as fuck wouldn't want to live there.

Thanks Graeme, Happy Holidays.

- Christopher Butcher

To put you even more in that elusive holiday mood, look at pictures from Slave Labor Graphics holiday party and marvel at the choice of songs ("She Said She Said" being one of my favourite songs ever). Dan Vado looks like he is, as the kids say "rocking the house" in that first pic.

Talk@Newsarama posters look at the bright side of things:

"Thank you Crossgen for going under. That way I get to see all those wonderful writers and artists from Crossgen work for DC and Marvel on MY favorite characters. 2004 was good and 2005 looks to be even better."

"Yeah, it's kind of cool seeing all the CrossGen names taking over some big name comics.But I honestly would rather have CrossGen be viable. The comics industry could use some fresh new characters and stories. These guys are bringing their ideas and talents to established characters, which is great for us fans, but I can't help thinking there was potential there at CrossGen for something exciting to attract new fans. Either way, I'll take them! There has truly been some great stuff created by them, and as you have pointed out -- more to come in 2005!"

"Cross gen was a great attempt at some really great comics... and they succeed for the better part of 3 years..that final year is the harsh one... but for those first 3 years Cross Gen was an amazing company that signed amazing creators and did some spectacular work. Nice job being snotty though...."

Marvel unveil a somewhat confused press release about Marvel Next. What is Marvel Next, you ask?

"Not a new line or imprint, Marvel Next is a collection of titles that will spotlight young characters in fresh and exciting ways."

So, wait, it's a collection of titles getting rolled out over a four month period that's getting its own branding and section in Previews, being collectively hyped in a press release instead of individually, and given promotion with quotes like Dan Buckley's "Marvel Next is a way for us to promote these teen focused stories to their core readership. When you see the Next tag, you’ll know you’re getting some solid teenage hero adventures," but it's not a new line or imprint? Why not? What's the difference between this and, for example, Tsunami? Or Marvel Age? Or Marvel Adventures? Or MAX?

Elsewhere in the release, poor Young Avengers gets hyped up again:

"The series that may well be considered the flagship Marvel Next book, as well as garnering a great deal of interest since it was announced, is YOUNG AVENGERS. 'We believe the Young Avengers characters could each carry a book by themselves. They’re that cool!' Quesada remarks. 'I think YOUNG AVENGERS is up for a long and heavy-hitting ride.'"

Am I the only person who feels sorry for Allan Heinberg for having to live up to all the hype that's being launched at the book? It's being continually painted as the coolest book that Marvel will be publishing, groundbreaking, etc., so much so that if it just turns out to be a good book, people will look at it as a letdown...

JP Dorigo offers up a list of Christmas presents for those that you love:

"Mom: Mom likes stories about girls that are badass since she’s a wimp. I’d recommend giving her Birds of Prey. Black Canary and Huntress make great role models for mothers everywhere. Then maybe the next time someone cuts her in line at the supermarket she’ll kick their ass in the cereal isle. Dad: Dad’s a pervert and likes women with big breasts. Don’t worry about picking a book with too much of a plot. As a matter of fact, the less dialogue the better. I recommend Danger Girl, Lady Death, or Codename: Knockout."

Superhero Hype has scans of the Wizard art previews for All-Star Superman and All-Star Batman, for those of us too cheap to buy Wizard.

At Newsarama.com: Mark Millar talks Wolverine:

"The X-Man who Wolverine [kills] in issue #25 has is probably one of the most high profile X-Men of the last ten years. He's enormously well-known and I'm amazed Marvel let me away with this. Obviously, they weren't going to let me kill Daredevil or the Hulk or whomever, but I was surprised when they said I could kill this character. It actually works really well. It's a real comic-book moment and I just saw the art last week and had to pinch myself. Wolverine driving his claws through this character was quite a sight. To be continued..."

Marvel try to catch up with DC's announcements: J. Michael Straczynski confirmed as Fantastic Four writer after Mark Waid leaves, and the "Formerly Known As The Justice League" creative team do a 4-issue Defenders series. Giffen on Defenders:

"When circumstances lined up that made it prudent for us to go to Marvel, I called [assistant editor] Andy Schmidt and we talked and I mentioned Defenders and we'd be interested... From then on Andy took the ball and ran with it. That the book exists is as much due to his diligence and pitching it and pitching it and keeping it in people's faces as our desire to want to do it."

(On Giffen's relationship with DC, by the way: "There's a lot of people out there trying to make a case for me being pissed off at DC and hating 'Identity Crisis,' and being broken hearted about Sue Dibny... Hey, reality check, Sue Dibny, she's not even real. No, I'm not angry over 'Identity Crisis' or anything that went on it. Do I have issues with DC? I have issues with everybody! No there are no hard feelings and as a matter of fact I read 'Identity Crisis.' It's a good read and I understand why they're doing it. I get it. I really get it.")

JMS on his relationship with Marvel, and whether his FF run will be affected by the FF movie due next year: "The thing about Marvel is that they understand something about me that most of the people I've worked for don't: I'm a workhorse that functions best without a saddle. Just let me go my own way, and I'll be fine. Micro-manage me, and everything dries up. I don't like to play the 'Oh, I'm an arteest' card because that is all too often an excuse for bad behavior, but I know what I'm doing, and I'm eccentric, and if I'm forced to become a square peg in a square hole, I know my own mind well enough to know that whatever the source of the small voice in my head that tells stories, it goes to sleep after a while. I need to have a fair measure of creative freedom, with the assumption that I will always do my best to service the character I'm handling."

Matt Brady has the final piece of the Superman puzzle - the new creative team on Action Comics:

"A writer who’s just as surprised as you to be reading her name here, a penciller who’s making a return to a series he hasn’t worked on regularly in 17 years, and an inker known for telling some of the most…colorful stories in the industry. In other words: Gail (Birds of Prey) Simone, John Byrne, and Nelson DeCastro."

Gail gives a tease as to what she's going to be supplying:

"We’re still putting a lot of this together, but if all goes well, we’ll be seeing some really very cool, very fresh new villains, including at least one that both literally and figuratively wants to rip Kal’s heart out... We’ll see some guests from the past, and quite possibly, the future. We’re going to see why Lois completely kicks ass, and why Jimmy is one of the coolest supporting characters in comics. And that’s just for openers. It’s going to be a blast."

And, just to give Rich Johnston an ego boost, he did call this one on Monday (LITG's updated, by the way, with confirmation of JD Finn's identity, and whether Jeph Loeb is leaving DC for Marvel).

Matthew Clark reveals his next project after he leaves Adventures of Superman:

"Artist Matthew Clark has alerted THE PULSE to news of his next project after Adventures of Superman. Clark is working on an arc of JLA Classified written by Peter Milligan. Clark couldn't reveal much more about the project, because he hasn't even begun to draw the story yet. He promised more details for us soon. Clark told THE PULSE he found out about the art assignment change shortly after we did our interview, but wasn't supposed to talk about the new assignment yet."

Mark Millar speaks out about Grant Morrison's revelation (in his Newsarama interview today) that the end of Red Son was his idea:

"Back in the 90s when I used to hang around with Morrison we used to throw stuff around on the phone every day. I had the last two pages of Red Son sitting blank and I knew the baby was getting sent somewhere (the previous ten pages having been inspired by Steranko's brilliant Superman 400 endpiece) and I just couldn't nail where the baby should go. I hadn't read Astro City, but Morrison suggested ripping off Kurt's idea for The Samaritan where the Superman character isn't blasted through space, but gets blasted back in time. We used to bounce ideas like this around all the time back in those days, hence my kitten-getting-fried ending to JLA Earth 2, etc, etc."

I love the mention of the kitten-getting-fried joke. It's like some kind of defensive "Yeah, he came up with the ending that everyone said that they liked. So? So? I came up with a lame joke that was near the end of one of his books! So THERE!" He continues to comment on All-Star Superman in general, not letting his bitterness get in the way or making odd passive-aggressive comments about Morrison's most recent work at all:

"I'm surprised some people think Vince will be an odd fit on the art because his art really reminds me of a kind of super-enhanced Murphy Anderson and should suit Superman better than any Superman title artist of the last fifteen years. I'm hoping the story is more late eighties/ early nineties Morrison than Seaguy, New X-Men, etc. Brotherhood of Dada: Good. Chubby the Tuna: Bad. A dinosaur-man villain and the Abominable Snowman worries me slightly, but I have high hopes given that he always makes an extra effort when working with Quitely and we should hopefully get a return to Flex-style form. The X-Men issues they did together were the best things Morrison has done since maybe 1997 or so so here's hoping."

Lunchtime update: Mark Millar clarifies his earlier comment about Grant Morrison:

"No, what I said was that NXM was Morrison's LEAST interesting work (tied with Seaguy) and doesn't compare with his excellent stuff like first year and a half on JLA, Animal Man, Doom Patrol, etc. But the issues that worked for me were the Quitely ones. I think having Quitely as an artist just makes him try harder. That was my point and why I'm more interested in Superman than anything he's done for a few years."

All snark aside, go read this at Chris Galdieri's blog and do as he says. Thank you.

Steven Grant looks back, quickly, at 2004:

"Mainly what 2004 saw the most of was No Direction. Except for manga. Not that there weren't any good books. There were. Most floundered in the low-to-cancelled range, and I can't think of one that achieved anything resembling critical mass. (Though doubtless many readers will, missing the point, regale me with lists of their favorites and provide convenient rationales for why obscurity is either a necessary byproduct of greatness or a badge of honor.) Perhaps the single true bright spot was the market resurrection of Dark Horse on the heels of the HELLBOY movie and the CONAN revival, and the most interesting development of 2004 was the return to the 'star' system. Comics companies cycle through this every so often, as the pendulum swings from them deciding the characters should be presented as more important than the talent creating their stories to them deciding, generally after years of insisting it's not the case, that Big Name Talent is the best way to attract readers and give the impression their company is hotter than the competition's. Marketing, marketing, all is marketing."

Like the Queen, Mark Millar offers a traditional Christmas message:

"This is just a quick thank you to everyone foolish enough to have supported me over these last twelve months. What's interesting is that, for the first time in my career, I'm really pleased with everything published between a January and a December. Such is the nature of this job that there's always SOMETHING a bit crap or not as good as you'd hoped out at any given time, but this is the first year I haven't winced at least five times as I open my comp box. Our Superman: Red Son trade, Wanted, Chosen, Spider-Man, The Unfunnies, Wolverine, the end of Ultimates and the beginning of Ultimates 2 are all books I'm really proud of and may one day actually read (I've never yet read any of my stuff once it's beyond the black and white lettered stage). Of course, the main reason these books look good is down to Hitchy, JRJR, Terry and Rachel, JG, Anthony, Peter, Frank The Wank Cho, Dave Johnson and young Kilian. I've been lucky to work with some of the best artists in the industry these last three years, but this is definitely the strongest line-up so far. I genuinely love these guys and am more excited than anyone else when I see their new pages downloading."

He also offers a list of upcoming projects, and thanks to the Millarworld mods.

Newsarama also has Joe Quesada's new Christmas song, as well as Joe talking about the inspiration behind it:

"The Christmas songs are always a hoot to do because I’ve tried to write each one with a bit of a different flavor while still trying to keep the accessible and topical... With this year, I knew six months ago that I was going to write about alternate covers. the melody didn't hit me until three weeks ago when I was bone dry and thought that I may have to call it a day."

Newsarama.com talks to Grant Morrison about All-Star Superman:

"I don't think we need to 'make' Superman relevant. We just have to tell stories which resonate with human experience. The best Superman stories are fables about love, pride, shame, fear, death, friendship etc. We can all relate to those big issues. Superman stories should represent huge, basic human dramas and human emotions, played out on a larger than life canvas... I'm still not sure about 'realistic' comics. Sales are always crap when comics get 'realistic' and sales are particularly crap right now, considering the wide-ranging public acceptance of superhero stories in other media. So Frank and I are keeping modern sensibilities in mind while trying to make sure that each of our stories addresses some basic human fear or need in a big, colorful, comic book way. We hope to produce a collection of science fiction folk tales with Superman at the heart of them. I like to think of these stories as 'relevant' to the human condition although not necessarily relevant to the current headlines, if you see what I mean. The All Star Superman is intended to appeal to a wide audience of diverse people for a long time, like the Greek myths."

He talks about his plans, and big geek that I am, they sound just what I'd wanted all along:

"The first issue 'Faster…' starts with Superman attempting to rescue the first manned spaced mission to the sun! An overdose of solar radiation triggers a fatal chain reaction in his cell structure, P.R.O.J.E.C.T. specialists race to create a new Superman and...well, you'll have to wait and see. The Fortress appears in issue #2, stuffed with a ton of new toys and gets haunted by the bandaged ghost of the Unknown Superman of 4500 AD. The Kandorians finally get out of that bottle. Superman gets a new power. Clark Kent winds up sharing a prison cell with Lex Luthor in issue #5. The Bizarro Cube Earth invades our world in an epic 2-part adventure (no 'decompression' here!) and we're recasting the Bizarros as a frightening, unstoppable zombie-plague style menace. Bizarro Jor-El and the Bizarro JLA turn up in the second part of that story too. What else? We meet Earth's replacement Superman and Clark Kent takes on a new superhero identity...Ten of the 12 issues are complete short stories in 22 pages, so lots of stuff happens. And it all links together as a maxi-arc or whatever they call them these days, entitled 'The 12 Labors of Superman'."

Oh, big updated Silver Age madness joy!

Millarworld spoils another Wizard exclusive:

"Its official according to the new Wizard Mark Millar is on the New Thor with Greg Land and JMS is the new writer on Fantastic Four. Also Mark Waid and Mike Wierengo are going to be on a new Spiderman Book. Lots of great stuff revealed in this Wizard."

Also, later in the thread:

"Waid and Wieringo are on all new spider title. No mention of artist on Fantastic Four that i could see, and the guy whos writing black panther [Reginald Hudlin] is taking over marvel knights spiderman at least for an arc."

You have to wonder if Wizard is going to send another email out...

Update: The Bendis Board has more on the New Thor:

"The new Thor title is based on a pitch by Neil Gaiman, spun by J. Michael Straczynski and will finally be penned and drawn by Mark Millar and Greg Land respectively...Pieces of Asgard as powerful artifacts fall to Earth after Ragnarok, an aevil corporation collects these artifacts, building a base in Iowa around Mjolnir, an immovable hammer for the new guys out there...At the site a group of teens gather the rest of the artifacts as Iowa becomes ground zero for their transformation into Thor, Loki and the rest of the gods of Asgard."

Yes, it really does sound bad, doesn't it? It took three writers to come up with "teenagers get magical artifacts that turn them into superheroes"? It's practically Dial T for Thor, for the love of God. The same thread has a minor spoiler for Spider-Man and the Avengers, I guess.

DC Collected Editions editor Bob Greenberger on next year's art book, Batman: Cover to Cover:

"Imagine sorting through 500+ first round covers and winnowing it down to about 275 covers, organized by a variety of subject headings. Then try and find loose copies of 275 comics spanning 65 years. Now think about creating a list of 20+ people to write short pieces about their favorite cover. And then contacting them, getting their picks and getting them paid. That is the merest tip of the enormous amount of time and effort I, along with several of my colleagues, expended to make this book happen. To anyone in the publishing world, the idea that we got started on this in earnest in August and are sending it to the printer in Hong Kong on Friday, would seem ludicrous."

Todd McFarlane Productions, Inc issues a press release about the Chapter 11:

"Todd McFarlane Productions, Inc., producer of comic books, filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code to continue regular operations, because of various situations including the aftermath of a $15 million verdict handed down last July by a St. Louis jury in a lawsuit by retired hockey player Tony Twist over the use of the name of a fictional mobster character. The filing does not involve and will have no impact on McFarlane Toys, one of the nation’s largest toy action figure manufacturers, or any of the other companies in which Todd McFarlane is an officer... Todd McFarlane Productions has defended its use of the name Tony Twist on First Amendment grounds and intends to press that claim on appeal. Todd McFarlane Productions has received extraordinary support for that position from many of the nation’s leading authors and entertainment figures, including Harry Shearer from The Simpsons, Michael Crichton, creator of the television series ER, and Larry David, co-creator of Seinfeld, all of whom filed a “friend of the court” brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the free speech defense in an earlier proceeding in the case."

For some reason, I would almost pay money to see Larry David in court, defending Todd McFarlane.

The post-Azzarello/Lee Superman creative team is announced:

"Following up on yesterday’s news of Adventures of Superman getting a new penciller in the person of Karl Kerscl in May, Superman gets a full creative team turnover, with Mark (Smallville) Verheiden coming on board as writer, with Ed (Birds of Prey) Benes joining the book as penciller. For Verheiden, the Superman run, which begins with May’s #217 marks a return to an ongoing comics gig in almost a decade. Don’t worry too much about his chops though, as alluded to above, Verheiden comes to Superman after working as a co-executive producer on the WB’s Smallville television series, telling the story of a young Clark Kent, growing up and coming to terms with his powers and his destiny... 'Especially after working on Smallville, I think there are ways to ‘re-imagine’ our sense of Superman without necessarily turning the character upside-down,' Verheiden said. 'For starters, I want to bring back the feeling of awe the character should generate when he does his ‘super’ thing on Earth. Sometimes Kal-el feels too much like mankind's pal and not the astounding, otherworldly, incredibly powerful being he truly is. However, that doesn't necessarily mean making him aloof or apart from humanity. It's pretty clear that Superman desperately wants to be part of human-kind, otherwise he wouldn't have married Lois or continued to stick around in the face of endless adversaries. So my series is going to explore his fascinating relationship with ‘us,’ a relationship that is going to be sorely tested by a variety of situations and villains'."

When not busy sending emails to Newsarama, Wizard update their website with Alex Ross sketches and commentary about his upcoming JLA miniseries, "Justice" (a word which will always be linked with animatronic Louis Armstrongs dispensing the death penalty in my mind. Thanks, Chris Morris). Why, look at how seriously Ross takes Gorilla Grodd:

"Here you have a simian who has a much more powerful mind than any of these other characters... Grodd can actually press his mind upon other physical beings. He can manipulate people. Now that’s an excellent ability that can be taken to a further level, and that’s what’s being explored in our story."

Just sometimes, don't you wish that Ross would just go "Come on, it's a telepathic gorilla. That's just fucking cool"?

Matt Fraction and Joe Casey talk Europe and comics:

"Going to Europe was like actually visiting Bizarro World-- Me am crazy legitimate medium for thoughtful expression on human condition! Me am also affordable! In Japan, Tezuka began making work for more than kids way early. I dunno so much about Europe, other than Tintin was never just for kids. Maybe over here, the most adult work we got out of the early days was the EC books and they were choked in the crib. Then the Batman TV show made comics and camp synonymous and a million lazy journalists go out of their way to remind us of it... Then again, you know, 90% of everything hasn't exactly been written for adults, you know?"

Jim Lee and Brian Azzarello - taking it to the fans, man:

"Starting this month and continuing every month til the end of our [Superman] arc—For Tomorrow, writer Brian Azzarello and I will be conducting interviews with randomly chosen fans about the controversial arc and the story as it unfolds. To launch the first of these interviews, we selected two fans off the Superman message boards—one, Kilgore Trout who has been critical of the run so far and Moira who has enjoyed it."

The full interview can be found here; a small bit of interest included therein is this line from Lee: "Brian and I have at least 2 batman stories lined up, and one related to the Superman mythos as well which is all i can say--it will be wacky tho’". I wonder if one of those 2 Batman stories will be All-Star Batman and Robin?

Over at the Geoff Johns forum, it's all about the rights:

"Wow! marvel threatened to sue me!, I got an email today... from the director of Marvel copyrights, complaining I had a PDF which violated marvel comics Copyright of the FF. I checked my files and found the item in question was a assue of a decades old crossover between the Xmen and FF, with Doom capturing Kitty Pride. The book value on this is nominal. It was never collected in trade, and to my knowledge has never been reprinted. It's a throwaway crossover and Marvel threatened to sue me for having it on my PC. Needless to say, Im annoyed. Their copyright department read the file title, and assumed it was the current mini-series, like I want to read that mindless drivel. This was a years bygone tale which cannot currently be found, and for having it on my PC they threatened legal action. This annoyed me greatly. Make mine Marvel? My @$$."

"What I want to know it, how did they find out about it. I highly doubt marvel is scanning peoples computers. More likely I would guess, you had it linked on the 'interweb' somewhere, and probably posted about it in a forum, not unlike this one. Your argument of 'causing harm' holds no water. If something is illegal, it's illegal, regardless of direct personal harm to the copyright holder."

"Appearantly, My Napster clone had PDF's listed as shared files. I've since corrected that and deleted the files. The fact that Marvel would THREATEN LEGAL ACTION over a 30 year old back issue worth maybe 2.50 reeks of petyness. However, with the Current Mini out, one might assume that they could re-release the old one with it in TPB form. In which case I would appologize."

"In order: My Napster clone - okay, right there....ILLEGAL. Do you not get that this is the kind of behavior that caused Napster to GET shut down??? 30 year old back issue worth maybe 2.50 reeks of petyness - I see, so a Beatles album is okay to download illegally because it's old? The copyrights are still in effect. You're in violation. However, with the Current Mini out, one might assume that they could re-release the old one with it in TPB form. In which case I would appologize. - You SHOULD anyway. You're in the wrong. Absolutely. Whether or not a book is new, old, popular or not is totally besides the point. It's theirs. You downloaded it. You did not pay for it. You stole from them. You probably left it in a place where others could download it. They did. You allowed THEM to steal from Marvel."

Also included: Emails from the guy's IP address, as well as from Marvel themselves. It's a legal and moral quagmire, I tells ya.

Interesting fallout from recent Wizard leaks at Newsarama:

"Dear Sirs:

"It has come to our attention that a Member of your Message Board has been and is publicly displaying, reproducing and distributing copyrighted material (the 'Material') owned by us, Wizard Entertainment, Inc, on your website [http://www.newsarama.com/forums/showthread.phpthreadid=23772].

"We hereby demand that you immediately remove and destroy all copies of the Material from your website and, furthermore, cease and desist from any and all present or future unlawful display, reproduction, distribution and/or any other infringement of any rights in the Material.

"This letter shall serve as notice that you are infringing upon our rights in the Material pursuant to the Copyright Act of 1976 (the 'Act'). As set forth in § 106 of the Act, we have the exclusive right as owner of the copyright to the Material to, amongst other things, reproduce, display, and/or distribute the Material publicly or otherwise. Therefore, your use of the Material is in violation of § 106 of the Act."

The Joe Quesada board asks how Marvel should respond to news of DC's All Star line:

"With DC announcing their new 'All-Star' line, kicking off with Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely on Superman and Jim Lee with an as-yet-unnamed artist on Batman and Robin, how can Marvel answer that kind of a challenge in their own premiere line? My suggestions (some of which are already in progress): Bryan Singer (and company) with John Cassaday on Ultimate X-men. Cassaday will be done with Astonishing as of issue #12, so I say keep him drawing the mutants with the man who brought them to the big screen. And if Cassaday can't do it for some reason, then give Mike Deodato, Jr. the job. I think he's ready for the big time after his stint on Amazing Spider-man. Orson Scott Card and Andy Kubert on Ultimate Iron Man. Keep Warren Ellis on Ultimate FF for at least another year with Adam Kubert. An Ultimate Hulk vs. Ultimate X-men mini by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch (to follow their run on Ultimates Vol. 2). JMS and Steve McNiven on Ultimates Vol. 3. And keep Bendis and Bagley on Ultimate Spidey (obviously)."

"Marvel's creed used to be 'the best writers and artists on the best books'. That just doesn't seem to be happening. Consolidate and bring the talent in to what's left."

"marvel should relaunch the marvel universe line [...] we need spitfire and the troubleshooters"

Newsarama offers a hint of this year's Christmas song by Joe Quesada (and, if you scroll down through the comments, there are links to the last couple of years' songs as well), called "Alternate Cover":

"Here’s a holiday story, a cautionary tale
About a night when love couldn’t prevail
The Christmas tree was lit so bright
Stacked high with gifts, it was quite a sight

With each I opened I grew so low
I held my breath there was one more to go
That’s when I left my girl standing by the tree
‘Cause when I opened that last box I didn’t receive my

Gold inlayed, leather bound, chromium, foil enhanced
Holographic, U.V. plastic, pencil sketch, photographed
One in ten, nine point nine, personally autographed, Alternate Cover"

Do you get the joke? Because Joe hates alternate covers, you see, and Marvel only floods the market with them and uses them as speculator bait because if they didn't, then they'd only have ten of the top 20 books each month and not fifteen! So he's being sarcastic! Oh, that Joe.

Someone at Millarworld has a sneak copy of this month's Wizard, and spoils the "major" DC announcement:

"I got the latest issue of Wizard today, 2 days early..., and there is an article about DC's ALL STAR line which is being compared to the Marvel Ultimate line. It looks like they are gonna start off with Superman & Batman. The Morrison/Quitely Superman story is going to be done in All-Star Superman and the long awaited return of Jim Lee to Batman will be in this All-Sytar line with the writer yet to be announced. According to DC, these books define what All-Stars is all about: giving only the best creators in the business access to the biggest characters in the DCU - and then watching the titles fly off the rack. Sounds really interesting I cant wait to see Jim Lee back on Batman for another arc."

Neil Gaiman on how the Todd McFarlane Chapter 11 affects the Spawn ruling:

"My understanding is that it doesn't affect me, as the court judgement on the copyright violations was against both TMP (the company which Todd has declared bankruptcy on) and Todd personally. Now that Todd's appeal process is over (and lost) we're still waiting for the final accounting to figure out how much Todd owes, and for the judgment to then be made final."

Greg Rucka talks Adventures of Superman, letting slip two things: One, he's staying on the book while Brian Azzarello and Chuck Austen depart theirs, and two, he's getting a new artist in the form of Karl Kerschl. Huzzah! He also talks plot:

"My terms when they gave me the job was that I had stuff I wanted to do and stories that I wanted to tell, and now, DC Countdown is going to lead into a bunch of other stuff over the summer, and I’m one of the three writers on Countdown, and Superman is one of the three icons of the DCU. So, here we get at least some consistency and continuity in terms of what we are trying to build, coming out of the Countdown book. That’s a big part of it... In [January’s] #636, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman have their first big meeting since the events of Identity Crisis... Those who are not up to speed on what happened during Identity Crisis, meaning the characters who weren’t aware of all the sordid secrets, find them out. It leads to what will be the start of a huge fracture between the three pillars of the DCU. You’re going to see the beginnings of a breakdown. We’re not doing anything new – there’s a reason other writers have told these kind of stories before, because it is possibly the most core, relevant story of the DC Universe, which is: when Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman aren’t getting along, bad things happen. This is the start of them not getting along. And the rest of that sentence... well, it’s coming."

Paul O'Brien takes a look back at the year:

"It's the end of the year, the time when all columnists take a moment to pause and reflect on the last twelve months. And for Article 10, that means a look back on the highlights of the year in comics. Unfortunately, there weren't any.

"Well, that's that done. And now some music."

There are many reasons why I love Evan Dorkin. The following is just one:

"I heard from a source affiliated with DC that one reason my Metal Men series was canned was because the scripts were deemed 'too goofy' by a power-that-be. That's right. 'Too goofy'. The Metal Men. If that's true, I guess I should've had Platinum get raped and killed by Chemo while she was going to have Tin's clockwork baby. Or maybe someone should've read my pitch more closely before they approved it. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm still pretty sore about the whole thing."

Rich Johnston is in fine form today, with rumours about DC Countdown, and the identity of Chuck Austen's replacement on Action Comics:

"'Who is JD Finn?' The new announced writer for 'Action Comics' taking over from Chuck Austen. The name appears to be a pseudonym... and can be read as 'jaded fan.' Some have speculated this could be Chuck finishing his stories under another name, Writer X style, to stymie fan expectations. However, I'm also hearing another version. That JD Finn is actually John Byrne, telling monthly Superman stories again. But I've had that definitely stamped on from afar. Not true. May well have come about because it's mixed up with the rumour John Byrne will be artist on Action Comics with Gail Simone writing in the near future."

As reported everywhere, Todd McFarlane Productions has filed for bankruptcy. Newsarama has an indepth look at what this actually means. Green Lantern: Rebirth artist Ethan Van Sciver leads the Millarworld reaction:

"[McFarlane] "Profitted" by using the name Tony Twist? HOW? Who bought SPAWN because one of the characters was named Tony Twist? And even if they did, or if Todd's use of that name hurt the actual guy named Twist, 15 million dollars? F*cking lawyers!!! Despicable."

Other comments from the board are along similar lines:

"I couldn't agree more on this one. I was one of the most avid Spawn fans up until issue 100 and I sure as hell wasn't buying the book because some hockey guy from st. louis had a character that was named after him in it. I've always disliked our 'sue-happy' society, but this man was already making millions. If anything, Todd named people in his books out of homage, not spite. Complete and total bullsh!t."

"I'm not a huge McFarlane fan but this makes me sick to my stomach. This is the most B.S thing i think i've ever heard of. Our legal system SUCKS...and Tony Twist has got to be the biggest piece of festering crap to have ever lived for sueing McFarlane in the first place. There is no reason why a hard working ,honest , successful business man should have to pay someone like twist for a small (very small) infringment on his name. Major failure here... the system has failed somewhere down the line. I hope Twist dies."

On the Image board, the reaction is more or less the same:

"This is crap Todd McFarlane did not do any thing wrong. He came up with a brand new name Twistelli. Writers do this stuff all the time. Alot of writers even use people in there family. They take the middle and last name. Now if Todd McFarlane used Tony Twist then I can see his point. But its not the same name."

"No one who knows anything about the Spawn comics or this character could award this clown Twist anything. It seems Todd is paying for being a sucessful businessman. Hopefully it is possible for Todd to have kept his comic line apart from his other business so Twist can't get his thieving paws onto anything. But I hope this does not mean the end of Spawn. Todd has been out of comics for a long time and I hope this somehow spurs him to return to Image as an artist/writer with a new book so his fans can buy his work again."

Well-known McFarlane commentator Peter David offers his opinion:

"So people have been e-mailing me (yes, my e-mail is functioning properly once more) asking me if I'm 'happy' about the news that Todd McFarlane has filed for bankruptcy. The answer is, no, of course not, for two reasons. First, I take no pleasure in the misfortune of others, even if they've done me dirt. And second, I don't think of this as anything other than a canny accounting dodge so that Todd can get out of the debts he owes to people that he's done dirt to. Tony Twist, to whom he lost two court battles for naming a murderous thug after him; Neil Gaiman, to whom he made countless promises that he then broke; various artists including my past collaborator, Angel Medina, to whom he owes thousands. Depending upon how it plays out, all these people he's screwed over may wind up getting pennies on the dollar, while Todd winds up 'reorganizing' and eventually going back to business as usual without having to properly compensate these guys. Guys who (with the exception of Twist) made only one mistake: Trusting Todd McFarlane. Granted, I'm not an accountant or a lawyer. So if someone with an accounting or law degree would care to explain that I'm wrong, I would love to hear it. I would very much like to be wrong on this and think that guys like Neil and Angel will be able to get what's due them."

Brian Hibbs on Marvel's No Overprint policy:

"The problem of course is that it shifted the burden of inventory-management from those most able to afford it (the publisher) to those least able to do so (the retailer), and it limits the supply of a given work to the confidence and capitalization of the retailer. That’s two big humps to get over. Retailer confidence is why books like She-Hulk or Runaways tend to launch so low – on the March ’05 order form there are seventy comic books (and seventeen new TP releases) coming from Marvel. It is really hard for an individual book to stand out of the pack in that kind of swell of product (especially when you think about the eighty-three comics and twenty-six books coming from DC in that same month!) It is made harder when 11 of those 70 comics are issue #1."

Frank Cho talks about his now-less-tittilating-for-the-fanboys book, Shanna The She-Devil:

"I’ve been working on and off for about two years... There are many reasons why it took such long time. The main reason is [that] I often rewrite pages that I’ve drawn. There [are] some pages that I’ve redrawn as many as five times and recently due to the rating change, I had to go back, redraw and cover up certain pages... Axel Alonso was a big fan of mine. He got in touch with me and asked me to work on Shanna. Sexy women in skimpy outfit fighting dinos in the jungle. It was a perfect fit for me. I’ve always been a fan of jungle tales when man is pitted against nature. It’s my fondness for these types of stories that this Shanna adventure was born. That, and I get to draw dinosaurs tearing people up."

David Goyer jumps movie franchises:

"Writer, director, and now producer David Goyer isn’t giving up Hollywood versions of superheroes anytime soon. According to variety, the writer/director of Blade: Trinity and writer of Batman Begins will next write, produce, and direct a feature film version of DC’s Flash for Warner Brothers... Goyer is quoted in the trade as saying: ''Flash' is my favorite of the properties. I think the character of the Flash, who moves faster than the speed of light, opens itself up to rich cinematic and story ideas.'"

Johanna's having an Owly contest. Go and enter and win a copy.

Newsarama interviews a brand new comic store owner, about what it takes to open a store:

"[The person who approved the business loan] was pretty skeptical about it at first. But when we gave him the business plan, he was very impressed. We detailed out exactly what we were planning to do, what types of products we were going to have, who we were going to market toward, why we chose this location, and projected sales for a couple years -- which was very hard. But the business plan convinced him it was a real business. Actually, he told me later he wants to check out the store because he used to read the Punisher. So the banker may end up being a customer!"

Millarworld considers Chuck Austen leaving Action Comics:

"Didn't take too long, doesn't really suprise me given the major negative reaction to the run."

"Honestly, I think it was the right time for Chuck to leave. He started off good. . .the first few issues were just what he said he was going to do--nothing but action! But then, the old 'soap opera' Austen came creeping back. . .and I guess DC decided to take him off the book before it got worse. . .like X-Men worse. They didn't even wait to let him write the Gog/Doomsday issues (which includes an anniversary issue)--that's how quickly they wanted to avoid The Adventures of The Creeper and his pal Jimmy Olsen... Does anyone know what work [announced replacement writer] J.D. Finn has done previously? Never heard of him."

"JD Finn is probably the Superman editors."

Frank Quitely signs an exclusive contract with DC for 2 years:

"I've been offered an exclusive on a number of occasions in the past, but I've always been more interested in keeping my options open, but this time it looks like being on an exclusive is actually going to suit me... Dan [DiDio] has been very flexible with the way he's worked out a deal for me that works for all of us -financially, creatively and schedule-wise. I had a great time working at Marvel, but when I wanted to do a creator-owned project Vertigo was the best place to go. I got the opportunity to paint the Destiny story for [Neil] Gaiman's Sandman: Endless Nights book, and then Karen [Berger] was great to work with on We3, and now I'm gearing up for a DC company-owned character - it's as simple as that. Well, that and the fact that DC have been great to deal with since I went back there."

As for those Superman rumours:

"I'll probably do bits and pieces of other things as well from time to time, covers, for example, but there's something very specific that this is all set up for... As for scheduling, the first and second issues of We3, which was scheduled as being bi-monthly, came out on time, I think, and this third one is nearly done, which means it'll be coming out mid-January, which I think is nearly a month late. The scheduling problems with We3 arose from me having a really serious sciatica problem, but fortunately I’m over that now. The schedule won't be any more relaxed under the exclusive, but I hope to have a decent sized head-start so hopefully there won't be any deadline problems."

This may distort the dimensions of the blog something awful, but it's worth it. Courtesy of the wonderful Darwyn Cooke, the cover to DC: The New Frontier volume 1 trade paperback.



Nice, isn't it?

(Thanks to Darwyn, and to Chris for image hosting.)

Is it wrong of me to think that Marvel's press releases about their own characters should be accurate? Let's look at the start of the press release about Ultimate Iron Man, shall we?:

"Iron Man, the crusading super hero first introduced by Marvel in The Avengers series, will receive his own book in the Marvel 'Ultimate' universe this January as Marvel Comics launches Ultimate Iron Man."

Wasn't Iron Man around before The Avengers?

The Joe Quesada board has an anonymous letter to Marvel:

"Dear Marvel,
It seems as though Secret War is now coming out every five months. WTF?
Sincerely,
Anonymous"

Others try to answer the question of exactly what, if you will, the "fuck":

"i think they realized no one cares anymore..."

"easier on the wallet."

"I was waiting for the trade, now I hope the social security system won't be bankrupt by the time it comes out."

Chuck Austen is off Action Comics. Does that mean he's not doing any work at The Big Two anymore?

Hey, great! Another new publisher: Alias. Company boss Mike Miller explains:

"Right now I want to lay the seeds of a company that will hopefully some day rival the Big Two. Obviously a lofty goal, and I’m realistic about what an Everest that is to climb. But a people without vision will perish, so I aim to aim high. Of course, that means starting low. We want to build a foundation on solid rock. We want to ensure that we produce an ever-growing line of quality products that meet deadlines and complete their stories. We’ve even gone so far as to ensure that reality in our contracts with our individual creators and studios. Hopefully, we will be able to garner enough of an audience for our company as a whole out of the various studios we are publishing, that we can build upon that foundation year after year."

You know what I love? That publishers start out not wanting to publish good work, but wanting to become the next Marvel or DC. Now that's getting your priorities straight.

I am both somewhat stunned and amused. Definitions for the word "Millarworld" at Urban Dictionary:

"A shrine to the egotism and self-publicising arrogance of one of the most overrated comics writers of the current era... The moderators place their own whims and decisions above any sort of reasonable chat... and worst of all most of the posters put up with their shit just so that they too can some day be part of the elite 'in-crowd'... The elite in-crowd are anything but. Not the WEF."

"Simply not as cool as it thinks it is. Often has so-called 'drink-ups' where they gte pissed and act like they're so cutting edge on the boards because of it; as if they discovered getting really drunk. Sorry, Millarworld : about ten thousand students got there first."

People are named and shamed, and all I can say is that Mark Peyton, Andy Shaw and Frank d'Agostino, at some point all of you apparently pissed off someone in Ottawa.

(Thanks, Luke)

Ryan Higgins (also on my list of Great Figures of The Comics Internet) posts the retailer release from Marvel about the renaming of Marvel Age:

"In April, Marvel Age comics will become MARVEL ADVENTURES comics. There will be a formal announcement of this in January, but I wanted retailers to hear it here first. This change is a result of the success of the Marvel Age line across all markets, and the positive reaction that we have received from comic shop retailers. Recent focus groups (with readers 8-12 and parents) showed us that we have an opportunity to attract even more new readers to the industry by creating a brand that would clearly describe this line of all age comics. Marvel Adventures was the favorite choice by far."

(The release ends, in a burst of Mighty Marvel Self-Knowledge, "The hype begins in January. Believe it!")

Millarworld reacts appropriately:

"Those comics were so sucessfull that they choose to change the name? Yep, that's logical."

"When it was Marvel Age, I didn't give it a second thought; but now that it's Marvel Adventures, I'm going to subscribe to every issue of every series. AND pick up the trades a month later. In fact, I'll get two copies of each. Slick move, Marvel marketing department. Man, Marvel Adventures: Maggott is gonna rock!"

"About damn time."

Broken Frontier hosts an Image roundtable (well, of sorts), with B. Clay Moore, Jason Rand, Raven Gregory and Mike Bullock talking about the publisher. Rand on the "family" of Image:

"Image is a very diverse publisher and because of all these different creators all bringing their own unique visions there, you're not always going to like everything they publish, though I’d like to know how that differs a lot from other publishers. Equally, you're not going to get along with everyone there, but there's a certain camaraderie between Image creators - we've all 'made it' with our own babies at a very competitive publisher. It isn't easy to get the nod from the big I, so I have to feel there's a certain respect between everyone there. For me personally, I'd been hanging around the Image forums for a couple of years before Small Gods came out. I'd already become friends with people like Arvid and Eric of Rex Mundi, Clay and Steven of Hawaiian Dick, Azad of Sammy and more. Arvid even gave me some tips on the first draft of Small Gods #1 before [editor] Kris got her hands on it. So I felt very welcomed when we were accepted at Image. Now I try to extend the same courtesy those guys gave me to other new Image creators and those creators who are still trying to get in."

Kandora's C. Edward Sellner is still defending the new publisher at ICv2:

"First and foremost, we are working well ahead of schedule, so that we have some grace time built in. I've already written scripts for issues 3 of each of my titles, and mine are the later releases, meaning #1s will be released in May and June. Art is well underway for #2 of each, etc. Second, our artists are experienced Asian comic artists, mostly from Korea, and they are very used to working on titles with far more pages per month than U.S. comics. So this deadline for them is not as unrealistic as some might think. We are also using a good team approach, in terms of digital work, 3-D modeling, background artists and coloring teams to expedite production. The point being, we should be able to produce an issue in a good chunk less than a month.

"We recognize the value of on-time shipping and have a strong commitment to hitting every mark we set as far as release dates! Of course, like all things there may come a day that something serious happens and we miss one, but when that day comes, we will do our best to make it up to our fans, and our retailers and ensure, that that is considered a very unusual fluke to a normally good, timely system."

It's the comics rivalry you didn't know existed:

"Geoff Johns vs Brian Michale Bendis [...] Who do you think is the better writer? Theyre basically each companie's equivilant of each other. I preferr Geoff Johns, he was what made me start liking DC more than Marvel. Im starting to think now DC puts out better books"

"They're not really too similar. Only thing they really have in common is that they both write 28128748634 books."

"ding ding ding [...] they got nothing on alan moore"

"johns... when i recommend any dc book to someone, he is the person writing it! flash... johns... green lantern... johns... teen titans... johns... jsa... johns. and, once again for emphasis, the flahs is the best book out today. if i were to recommend a marvel title to someone, bendis might write one of the top 5, but i would first say supreme power."

"Geoff Johns all the way (especially when writing DC or Marvel superheroes - Bendis' indie and creator owned stuff is better but still not up to Johns standard IMO)"

Somewhere, ADD's head is exploding.

The Joe Quesada board want to bring back Alpha Flight. No, really:

"Both the second volume and this current volume of Alpha Flight were missing something important to keep sales going well and longtime fans from dropping the books.....what was it? It was Alpha Flight, of course. Why are the original team members missing, ignored, sent away into limbo, etc...everytime an Alpha Flight series is revived? Both new series(volume two and three) featured an almost entirely new cast of characters and mysteries galore, developed the new characters very slowly and both series had sales that dropped quite quickly, which ended in them being cancelled. Northstar is a great character, who is wasted teaching X-brats....Aurora has been shipped to some post Weapon X limbo, scads of other AF characters are also in limbo or just plain missing. many of the original team and some old favorites(Guardian, Vindicator, Shaman, Snowbird and Puck) were sent into outer space in issue six of this most recent series(the only issue they've truly appeared in, so far). Are writers afraid of using these characters or not creative enough to make them work? Why does Marvel have to alienate older fans of Alpha Flight each time they relaunch the book? When will we have an Alpha Flight series with Alpha Flight actually in it? Please bring them back to where they belong."

"Im with you guys on this one. Alpha Flight could work if done properly. I won't hold my breath as current Marvel seem to be convinced they can always do better than what came before. They did so well that I am a huge Alpha fan yet even I couldn't bring myself to pick up the last series past issue 2. If the hardcore fans won't even pick up the book who the *** is going to care about it. If Marvel do relaunche Alpha flight i think they shoudl go read JSA or Teen Titans first to understand how this kind of comic should be done."

"Alpha Flight has definietly been lacking in Alpha Flight appearances. You can't even get an Alpha Flight cameo in most of the new volumes. Sad that such a popular team, once a top 10 seller, has been shuffled into an abyss only to be supplanted by new less interesting teams. Unfortunately this just reduces the chance the real Alpha Flight will ever get a book again. Volume 1 eneded largely due to the fact that the originals were gone. Volume 2 and 3 never had the originals, so it's no surprise they failed. But there's more to it than that even. Marvel didn't even offer subscriptions to volume 3. Couldn't get it even if you wanted it! I can't tell you how many people I heard say they went to the comic store, but it was sold out. That wasn't the case in my neck of the woods, but it was in other areas. I've also seen some pretty deep discounts on subscriptions to X-title and Spider Titles in the past year, somewhere around 50%. I guess that helped their numbers, so they could stay on top of the Top 100 list. Alpha could've used this kind of help to at least spark some interest. I also recall seeing Fantastic Four, Daredevil, and Avengers comics for less that $1 on the newsstand. Something like that could've helped spark an interest or at least get some new readers to give it a try. And it's not just Alpha Flight that needs this kind of help. How many failed series have we seen over the past 5 years?"

Millarworld reacts to the Wizard solicit that seems to confirm that Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely will be working on Superman next year:

"Holy crap."

"Jesus. Swore to heaven and hell I'd never get caught buying a Superman comic. I guess I'm a liar."

"I'll believe it when I have the comic in my hands, personally brought round by Morrison and Quietly, and they buy me presents out of the money they have been payed by DC to produce said comic. Until then, I'm still heart-broken from the last time this was rumoured but never actually worked out..."

"THis might be the greatest news in comics industry since... EVER!!!"

The Art of Greg Horn sells out:

"Horn has become a fan favorite for his cover work for Marvel Comics, and that side of the artist is amply represented in the book. But THE ART OF GREG HORN showcases Horn's diversity, as well, covering his work in four different industries: comics, video games, magazines, and advertising... Fans should check with their local shops for current availability on THE ART OF GREG HORN. The hardcover book is printed in full color and retails for $39.95."

In related news, sales of Kleenex rose last week amongst nervous young men in Wolverine t-shirts.

Courtesy of Millarworld: Marvel Previews for March 2005. Of interest:

* Ultimate Iron Man launches, as leaked today: "Brace yourself for the most imaginative, groundbreaking comic of 2005," says the solicit, but somehow I'm unconvinced. But, hey! There's a 50/50 foil variant!

* The Marvel Age line gets relaunched as Marvel Adventures.

* Nine issues of "Age of Apocalypse!" In one month! GREAT! It's a one-shot "celebrating" the decade-old X-Crossover, plus a handbook to the characters, plus five issues of a new miniseries, and two issues of Exiles. Why? Because they can.

* Dan Slott continues to entertain. From the solicit to Spider-Man/Human Torch #3: "Two teenagers hanging out in the garage, building a car from scratch. Sounds like your typical male-bonding experience, right? Well, not when they’re putting together a SPIDER-MOBILE! For the love of all that’s holy--get off the streets! Heck, stay off the WALLS too! ‘Cause, as SPIDEY & THE TORCH are about to discover, 'With great horsepower, comes great… torque?!'"

* Marvel obviously knows something that no-one else does. New Avengers is described as "The number one book in the country!"

* Look, a new reprint series: "Celebrating 65 years of titanic tomes from the House of Ideas, MARVEL MILESTONES makes its triumphant return to the comics scene! The first issue of this new monthly series features key reprints of your favorite Avengers; Iron Man, Ant Man and Captain America. Just in time for ULTIMATE IRON MAN #1 comes a true tale of suspense! Iron Man lives in TALES OF SUSPENSE #39! Plus: the first appearances of Ant-Man from TALES TO ASTONISH #27 and Captain America from CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS #1!" 48 pages for $3.99 isn't too bad.

* There's a new Wolverine mini, Soultaker, which is almost worth it for this solicit: "Do you like Ninjas? Do you like zombies? Do you like Wolverine? Would you like to see Wolverine fight ninjas and zombies? THIS IS THE BOOK FOR YOU!!!"

But of even more interest than the Marvel solicits, there's also the complete solicits for March, which contain a seeming confirmation many didn't think they'd see:

"WIZARD #162 IS OUR SUPER MEGA-COMICS SPECTACULAR! BETTER THAN ULTIMATE SUPERMAN FROM DC! Artist Frank Quitely (New X-Men) and writer Grant Morrison (JLA) join forces for their highest profile project to date. Hear from the new creative team that will take Superman to new heights in an exclusive Wizard Q&A interview."

You heard it here... um... third.

Allan Heinberg makes his attempt to win the coveted "How many times can you say 'Avengers' in the response to one question" award:

"The Marvel Universe is already so vast, how do you introduce NEW characters and have anyone care about them? How do you get readers to invest their time and hard-earned cash in characters (and in a writer) they've never heard of before? With Young Avengers, the answer for me was: the Avengers. The audience is already deeply invested in the Avengers, and so am I. So, the Avengers themselves -- their history, their uncertain future, and their legacy -- are at the center of Young Avengers. That's why this book isn't New Warriors. Young Avengers is a book about what it means to be an AVENGER. And if readers are invested in the Avengers, I hope they'll be invested in these kids' relationships to the Avengers."

Judd Winnick talks DC Countdown and tries to see if he can find some way to link the book to Identity Crisis in the subconscious of readers:

"There are certain story elements that come right out of 'Identity Crisis,' but also I'd say that creatively, the creative spirit of 'Identity Crisis' lives on through this... Many of the turns and sort of character based bent that you got with 'Identity Crisis' and the sort of writing that Geoff, Greg and myself have always leaned towards, we've now been allowed to embrace fuller. We're allowed to write stories which are for keeps... When we were discussing 'Identity Crisis' way back when, the whole concept behind 'Identity Crisis' was taking all these classic characters and also not-so-classic characters that people may not be familiar with and the point is that the strength is in the story itself. It won't be about you having to have followed the DCU for decades and someone will turn the page and a character will pop-up that you've never heard of that's supposed to have resonance, but doesn't because you don't know who it is. We're not doing that. We're writing the story from the perspective that anybody, anybody can pick up this story even coming cold to the DCU and find it riveting. It's all character based. You have large iconic characters and you have rather small ones."

Joe Casey and Matt Fraction bemoan the lack of fun superhero comics these days:

"There's a lot I'm not reading, so I might be missing something. I thought 'New Frontier' was great, except that it was so Not Fun that it kinda strangled the point of those characters. Beautiful to look at, though, and when it worked it was great but... ooph, yeah, too serious. I appear to be in the minority there, however. Morrison coming back to 'JLA' and the DCU holds some kind of promise, but I'm afraid that he'll just be read by the same people that read his 'JLA' run back in the day. Fingers crossed, I guess. 'Ultimate Spider-Man' for a good long while had that kind of manic whimsy that was truer to the character than any other run in recent memory. Aside from the whole, uh, meganerdic origins of the Ultimate line, Bendis really understands why people love the character. I liked Warren's 'Iron Man' and Ed's 'Captain America,' but neither of those were what I'd call innocent fun. Um. I'm kinda striking out here, aren't I? Maybe it's a fallow period. Maybe people were asking themselves the same question in 1989?"

I'm alone in thinking that, when paired with a good artist (that is, not Michael Turner or Pat Lee), Superman/Batman is un-selfconscious dumb fun and all the better for it, aren't I?

Millarworld polls its posters for their Best of 2004. Nothing really to quote because it's mostly votes as opposed to commentary, although it's nice to see Ed Brubaker's name appear so often for best writer of the year. My favourite part of the thread is this exchange:

"Are all the people who said they were going to boycott DC because of the Batman/Daredevil thing still doing so? Did they even do it to start off with?"

"For the most part, yes. I went ahead and picked up IDENTITY CRISIS #1-4 in an eBay auction because the total was $2.00, as well as GREEN LANTERN: REBIRTH #1 and AUTHORITY: REVOLUTION #1 for 75 cents from DCB in addition to the new PLANETARY, to see what was going on and for the sake of cheap reading. But that's been it."

I love that logic. "Yes, I'm boycotting DC. Apart from all those DC comics I bought."

So, after last week's shitstorm, I decided to give Alysha McK, Bendis Board Moderator, what she wanted ("I have a novel idea...how about you worry about yourselves instead of us? We're doing just fine over on the Bendis board by ourselves.") and give the Board a break for awhile. The Christmas spirit, and all that. After reading this thread, however, I kind of regret that decision... In actual Bendis news, mind you, Michael Lark is announced as the new regular artist on The Pulse.

Comic Book Galaxy hosts a fascinating End-Of-Year round table of creators, critics and publishers that is worth checking out. See Jim Rugg (amongst others, it's actually a very good discussion) talk sense:

"The return of [variants and other sales gimmicks] designed to capitalize on speculator mentality is the sad expression of two over-sized dinosaurs that have lost touch with the market. Slapping variant covers on their shit books is the equivalent of putting air-fresheners in port-o-johns. Marvel and DC (especially Marvel) remind me of those older-middle-aged men who try so hard to be 'hip' but just come off as old and pathetic. It could be entertaining if they had a shred of self-awareness and a sense-of-humor, but they don’t and it’s like watching a very boring train wreck. The saddest part is that the retailers who can’t deal with reality and maybe aren’t the most savvy business men will be the ones that pay the price for Marvel’s inability to successfully publish quality comics instead of repeating 10 year old tricks that nearly sunk the market the last time."

Liam Sharp (remember him?) announces the launch of another new publisher:

"Today, at 200pm GMT, we launch our new publishing company's dedicated site www.mamtor.com [...] Drop by later if you get the chance as this is shaping up to be a pretty big deal. What's great about this is it's entirely creator driven, and we give the opportunity for new talent that can't find a place in the mainstreem to work along side, and sometimes with, industry pros. Think Warrior meets Heavy Metal meets meets Epic via IDW and you won't be far wrong. Neadless to say I've been busy as hell putting this baby together, and Diamond US will be distributing it and promoting it (along with Newsarama, CBR, Dynamic Forces, Comicon, Comics International, etc.) for it's launch at the Bristol Comic Expo in May next year. We're open to submissions - written and artistic - but we're not trying to go into competition with the mainstreem. This is strictly for more niche and underground, science fiction, horror or fantasy type work. We're looking for the next Corben, Moebius, Bilal, Sienkewickz, etc, not the next Superman or XMen team."

Update: Newsarama has an interview with Sharp, who gives a line-up of creative talent working with Mam Tor, including Chris Weston, Ashley Wood and Mike Kaluta.

Adam Warren talks Livewires at Newsarama:

"This miniseries introduces the Livewires in the action-heavy midst of one 'high-tech sabotage' mission, then fleshes out and defines the characters while taking them further through their high-speed paces. This all leads up to a long, climactic (and ill-fated) raid on a very large, very dangerous, and very familiar secret-program target over the final three issues of the six-part miniseries. All told via a spicy mix of seriously kinetic action, skewed character delineation, intense SF ultra-tech fetishism, and a fair bit of humor overlaying some rather distressing creepiness… especially by the story’s end, when mechanized violence, high-tech brutality, backstory twists, and nasty surprises aplenty are flying fast and furious."

Andrew Arnold at Time.com looks at the year ahead in upcoming releases:

"With an eye towards a last minute entry in the 'Softball Journalism of the Year' award, I contacted various publishers and asked them for a preview of their 2005 list (with a limit of five), including a one-sentence description. Release dates are given when they were provided. Edited for brevity and hyperbole, these listings do not constitute endorsement by TIME.comix."

It's kind of sad to see that, while other companies have some major works in there (DC has The Quitter by Harvey Pekar and Seven Soldiers by Grant Morrison, Alternative has new James Kochalka, Pantheon has Ice Haven by Dan Clowes), Marvel's picks are Black Panther, Young Avengers, House of M, Astonishing X-Men (tagline: "The smash series of '04 continues with the 'Dangerous' story arc in '05!") and Ultimate Iron Man. Or maybe that's just me.

Sci-Fi novelist Orson Scott Card comes to comics to write Ultimate Iron Man:

"Finally paying off on a hint dropped by Publisher Dan Buckley at WizardWorld Dallas, it was inadvertently announced by Time.com that novelist Orson Scott Card will be the writer on next year’s Ultimate Iron Man six issue miniseries, joining artist Andy Kubert... The move by Marvel makes Card the lastest in a series of novelists who have moved to comics for a project or an extended stay, a list which includes Greg Rucka, Brad Meltzer, Kevin Anderson, Michael Moorcock, Mat Johnson, Gary Phillips, Richard Morgan, and others."

Spot the difference. The cover to Ed Brubaker and Sean Philips' Black Sails, from IDW, announced in September:



The cover to Kieron Dwyer and Rick Remender's Sea of Red, from Image, announced today.

Click here, because CBR sneakily don't allow hotlinking of images.

Pirate epics with colour-based names and Chip Kidd-esque covers (it's that horizontal break) where the top half has a pirate ship and the lower half a scene of swashbucklin' horror based around scary head(s). It's the new Zombie/Pirates the last time around/Rock and Roll, apparently.

Great Figures of The Comics Internet, part 1: Paul O'Brien. He reads X-Men books so that you don't have to, and then tells you about them in such a manner as to be more entertaining than the books themselves. Consider, dear readers, this section of his review of X4:

"I can only assume that somebody in Marvel's marketing department thought it would be a wonderful idea to have an X-Men/Fantastic Four trade paperback ready to go in time for next year's FF film. What a shame it doesn't seem to have occurred to anyone that it should include a story. This has all the hallmarks of a comic produced via the Commissioning Editor's Syllogism: (1) We must publish an X-Men/Fantastic Four miniseries. (2) This is an X-Men/ Fantastic Four miniseries. (3) Therefore we must publish it."

Does that not tell you all you need to know about said book? Exactly. Paul O'Brien, friends. Worship him.

New DC solicits! New DC solicits! And not just for March, either, but more of that later. But for March, here are some highlights:

* Lex Luthor: Man of Steel launches, finally: "Long considered one of DC's most vile villains, MAN OF STEEL reveals why Luthor chooses to be the proverbial thorn in Superman's side — simply put, to save humanity from an untrusted alien being."

* Gotham Central takes a roadtrip: "Montoya and Allen must pursue the origins of an abandoned lab in Gotham...even if the trail leads them to Keystone City, home of The Flash!" I'm such a DC geek, it's pathetic.

* Seven Soldiers gets going: Shining Knight launches: "Though twilight and red ruin falls on Camelot, the Knights of the Broken Table stand ready to battle the forces of the Beyond. Little do they realize that the only one within their spent and bloodied ranks who can save what remains of their world is 16-year-old Sir Justin, a teenaged warrior who, with his winged horse Victory, finds himself thrust into the maddening world of the 21st century to save the future of all mankind! And the best place to start the battle? Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, of course!" Missing the word "who" in there, perhaps? Guardian also gets started: "After the accidental shooting of a child that resulted in his handing over his badge, ex-cop Jim Harper tries to get his life in gear by applying for the job of The Guardian after spending more than a year dealing with personal demons. But Jim quickly learns to be careful what he wishes for, as the new Guardian finds himself in a pitched battle with Subway Pirates! Will he survive the ride of his life through the unknown subterranean world of New York?"

* I love the Plastic Man solicit: "An all-new issue spotlighting your favorite hero who can stretch into any shape imaginable! And don't forget a guest appearance by his dull-witted but endearing partner! Plus: humor!"

* Green Lantern: Rebirth concludes. Look who's apparently not dead, and on the cover.

* That Countdown solicit in full:

"Three of the most acclaimed and popular writers in comics — Geoff Johns (TEEN TITANS, JSA), Greg Rucka (ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN, WONDER WOMAN) and Judd Winick (BATMAN, OUTSIDERS) — join an all-star roster of artists for DC COUNTDOWN, an 80-page Spectacular with the incredibly low cover price of $1.00!

"Artists Rags Morales (IDENTITY CRISIS), Ed Benes (BIRDS OF PREY), Ivan Reis (ACTION COMICS), Phil Jimenez (WONDER WOMAN, New X-Men), and Jesus Saiz (MANHUNTER) each pencil chapters of a story that follows a member of the JLA through a mystery that touches on nearly every character in the DCU!

"Topped with a cover pencilled by Jim Lee (SUPERMAN, BATMAN) and painted by Alex Ross (KINGDOM COME, JLA: LIBERTY AND JUSTICE), DC COUNTDOWN is an essential project that features nearly every major character operating in the DC Universe. It's a project that will resonate for months to come and is a perfect jumping-on point for readers who've been wondering where the people who helped deliver IDENTITY CRISIS could possibly be going next. You won't want to miss it! And the clock is ticking..."

I'm telling you - Things will get crap, and then everything will be magically fixed by the end of Crisis 2.

* Superman reaches the end of the Azzarello and Lee era, while making the book sound more interesting than it seemed at the time: "Throughout the harrowing 'For Tomorrow,' by the acclaimed creative team of Brian Azzarello, Jim Lee and Scott Williams, Superman has faced his share of obstacles, from Wonder Woman to Equus to a living Mt. Rushmore!"

A living Mt. Rushmore?

* Vertigo is kind of dull, but the kids might dig Phil Jiminez's new series, Otherworld.

* The third Sleeper trade, A Crooked Line, appears.

Meanwhile, two special Batman projects are advance solicited, presumably to tie in with movie interest. May has a collection of 250 of the best Batman covers ever called Batman: Cover To Cover: "Commentary on personal favorites is provided by Batman Begins director Christopher Nolan, TV's first Batman Adam West, the voice of the Joker Mark Hamill, as well as comic book creators Neil Gaiman, Alex Ross, Brad Meltzer, Mark Waid, Jeph Loeb, Brian Bolland, Paul Levitz, Sheldon Moldoff, Jim Lee, Jim Aparo, Neal Adams, Jerry Robinson and many more!" DC really decide to take my money with April's special Batbook: "One of the most important and critically acclaimed Batman adventures ever — written by Frank Miller (BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS) with art by David Mazzuchelli (Daredevil) — returns as a deluxe hardcover designed by Chip Kidd. In addition to telling the entire dramatic story of Batman's first year fighting crime, this collection includes new introductions by Miller and Mazzucchelli, loads of reproductions of original pencils, promotional art, unseen Mazzucchelli Batman art, Richmond Lewis's color samples, script pages and other surprises. This will be the must-have hardcover of the season!" Batman: Year One Deluxe Edition? You had me at "unseen Mazzucchelli Batman art". Or maybe "reproductions of original pencils." But Richmond Lewis's color samples? Damn you!

Millarworld's discussion about Kevin Smith and Brian Michael Bendis making up quickly gets derailed:

"I'm more concerned with the disrespect he's shown the entire comics community by not finishing his work than I am about anything he's said."

"Who, Smith? How has he disrespected anybody by not finishing his work?"

"You see nothing wrong with selling people the begining of a story with a reasonable expectation of conclusion and then never finishing it? I guess some people will defend anything."

"I would say it's unprofessional of Smith to not finish his work, but not 'disrespectful'. Kevin Smith doesn't owe me any respect. I could even argue he doesn't even owe me the ending to his story, since I didn't pay for it."

"I agree 100%. And on the flip side, you could also argue that perhaps Smith is actually showing professionalism by not hacking out a subpar story just to fulfill his contractual obligation or meet a monthly deadline. I'd rather wait for a good, well thought out and executed story than get a rushed one."

"He's consistently let down fans, despite his two-year contract to Marvel which has resulted in no published work. He has his priorities. The fans ain't it."

"I knew someone who was a university teacher once, and this bratty kid was complaining, and said 'I pay your paycheck!' So she took out a nickel, gave it to the kid, and said 'that's the portion of my paycheck you pay. Now shut up, and I don't ever want to hear you again.' Why do you feel like you deserve something, like you have it coming to you? Smoking too much spandex?"

Larry Young pops in to offer up some acommon sense story, where the moral is also a plug. Which is an art, really: "Honestly, if having stuff come out when you say they will is a sign of respect at all, it's a sign of self-respect. We do it so I know our business partners can rely on the dollars they make from selling our books. Sooner or later retailers understand that they make more money from books that come out than from books that don't. That's why all our books are in-print and available, ready for when somebody thinks, say, 'Hey, that's right! I just read Warren Ellis' name in that Smith/Bendis thread! I always DID mean to pick up SWITCHBLADE HONEY.' And BOOM! Never more than two weeks away from your retailer to sell to you. Slow and steady wins the race."

Sequential Tart takes a look at Slave Labor Graphics this month, with a collection of SLG creators talking about the company, and a short article about the publisher that some had written off as a goth imprint:

"'I would call us eclectic,' says SLG Publishing Editor-in-Chief Jennifer de Guzman. 'I can't deny that the Goth titles are a big part of our line, but if you look at all of our titles ... there's a lot more there. You hear that, people? There's a lot more!'"

Newsarama have a preview page of Identity Crisis #7. Yes, that's right. Preview page:

"Citing concerns of not wanting to give anything away, and that even page 2 of Identity Crisis #7 is too sensitive to be shown prior to the book’s release, DC Comics has released a one page preview of the issue to Newsarama."

For some reason, I find the description of page 2 as "too sensitive" very funny.

Kevin Maguire on the identity of DC Countdown's mystery Batman-cradled possible-corpse:

"Keith Giffen,Marc DeMatties, and I did an interview with Wizard this week and the interviewer asked us what we thought about the fact that Dan DiDeo told them,on the record, that Blue Beetle would be the most important figure in the DC universe this year. We told them we had no idea about that,which we didn't. Looking at that cover [to Previews], it looks to me like they're killing him off. If that's the case, I'll be really, REALLY ticked off. First Sue Dibney, then Blue Beetle? DC, are you trying to tell us something?"

Risking the wrath of shite Scottish popsters Del Amitri, Newsarama posters look at the idea of "nothing happens" being a valid criticism:

"I've seen the 'nothing happens' comment as an instant bash to enough comics. It's synonymous with 'this comic sucked.' It's everywhere, and I've used it at times too. But is it a cop-out? Is it a throwaway comment that we use because we can't think of anything else to say or identify why we as fans dislike a book? The reason I want to know is that in the recent Iron Man #1 nothing happens. The plot is pretty much, 'Tony gets out of bed and is interviewed for a documentary.' But the comic is a damn good and interesting read. Should I just ignore the 'nothing happens' comments from here on out?"

"I don't like that argument. SOMETHING always happens. Whether its fast paced and action-filled or not is another case. I LOVE Bendis' Daredevil.. I think its my favorite ever, even better than Miller's.. and nothing ever happens."

"sometimes nothing DOES happen. bendis did an entire issue of USM that was the exact same thing as the previous issue, just from goblins POV. i'm sure it's nice in a TPB or something, but as someone who only gets my USM fix once a month (well, ok, now it's a bit more) that pissed me off. i don't wanna spend 2.25 and NOT have the story advance at all."

"The phrase is a truncated form of 'nothing of importance happened.' Seeing the POV of Green Goblin might have been interesting, but if it didn't further the plot or reveal details that were expounded upon later, sorry bud, 'nothing happened'. It's like saying a movie 'sucks'. You're not literally saying it's drawing air in, you're saying you didn't like the movie."

"Nothing Happens is a perfectly fine complaint. It's just that some writers are guilty of the Nothing Happens crime more often than others and their fans get all defensive about it, so they try to undercut the complaint by proclaiming it invalid and a copout. Sorry, but as Loeb said about a Bendis written Batman, who wants to read a story where Batman just sits in his cave for the entire issue and talks. Month after Month! (Until the 6th issue in the arc when amazingly, he suddenly can stomped Bullseye's - I mean the Joker's - ass with no problem at all.) That Nothing Happens Syndrome was one of the things that helpped drive away scores of Hulk readers during Bruce Jones run. Let's see where New Avengers is in a year."

Andrew Wheeler on the year in comics at Ninth Art:

"It's a year when the hopes of years past proved unfounded. The bookstore market hasn't changed the face of the industry. Hollywood's love affair with superheroes hasn't translated to new readers. Whether the manga bubble is set to burst or not, the success of manga hasn't rubbed off on anyone else. Marvel has turned its back on the bold experiments of the Jemas years. Even the internet is yet to make an appreciable difference to the market, other than allowing people to download comics without paying for them. There was a hope that people would read comics if only they were exposed to them, but comics are in bookstores now, the are making money, and publishers are producing intelligent books that receive mainstream press attention, and it still isn't making a difference. Maybe that's why Marvel fell back on the bad habit of raping and pillaging its readers. That huge market of casual readers isn't there, which means the comic industry really is just a cottage industry serving a dwindling market."

Sam Hiti sells out, I find another Christmas goodie to give to my niece and nephews:

"On Newstands December 14th, 2004 Nickelodeon Magazine presents the Series of Unfortunate Events Official movie magazine. It features a 38-page comics adaptation of the blockuster film starring Jim Carrey, based on a the NY Times bestselling novels of the same name. The comic adaptation is illustrated by Sam Hiti, the 29-year-old artist, who made a splash this summer with the debut of his Xeric Award winning graphic novel, 'End Times/Tiempos Finales.' ...Sam was able to bring his own dynamic visual sensibility to the world of Lemony Snicket, creating a balance between what has come before and his own distinct take on the characters and settings... Larger mysteries lurk in the magazine's pages. In the spirit of the book series, there are crypic messages, puzzles, and secret codes. Take for instance the seemingly innocent bonus comic drawn by Jay Stephens (Jet Cat) that is 'written' by Dr. Gustav Sebald, a noted expert in cryptography (that’s secret codes to you and me)."

The John Byrne board talk about their favourite subject:

"Besides Jack Kirby, I think [Byrne is] the most prolific creator around right now and those 'Young Guns' should take a good long look at what [he has] accomplished."

"Kirby-Byrne Parallels [...] Let's see. Both made their names pencilling for Marvel. Both left the FF to revitalize DC. The future? A return to Captain America? Devil Dinosaur? I'm really looking forward to BOTD."

"Truer words were never spoken (or typed, in this case). Jack Kirby alone was responsible for creating a universe of characters (like The Eternals, Machine Man, The New Gods, Etrigan the Demon to name only a few), plus collaborated with others to create veritable comic book icons (such as the Fantastic Four, Thor and The Hulk). John has done pretty much the same thing with the body of work that he's produced. And he's seemingly not afraid to tackle various forms of subject matter. Attention to detail is also extremely important with regards to character sizing, consistency, etc. John's work exemplifies that, and he should be commended."

Byrne himself agrees, unsurprisingly:

"Thanks! My career has shown some interesting (and unexpected) parallels to Kirby's, albeit on a somewhat less spectacular scale. (I didn't help create the whole Marvel Universe, after all!) Right now I seem to be passing thru something akin to the 'Jack the Hack' period of the 70s -- which means, I suppose, I should anticipate being 'discovered' by a new generation of artists who will somewhat sycophantically elevate me to levels as just unrealistic as the depths to which the previous generation sought to condemn me! Fun, ain't it?"

I know what you're thinking - "What if I could pretend to be a Marvel Comics character... on my cell phone?" Luckily, that no longer has to be a dream:

"MFORMA Group, Inc. and leading global entertainment licensing company Marvel Enterprises, Inc. (NYSE: MVL) signed a licensing agreement that will bring Marvel's catalog of world famous entertainment brands to mobile phone users throughout the world. This landmark agreement was announced today by Daniel Kranzler, MFORMA CEO, and Tim Rothwell and Bruno Maglione, presidents, respectively, of Marvel Worldwide Consumer Products and Marvel International. The agreement calls for MFORMA to publish an extensive portfolio of mobile entertainment products based on many of Marvel's iconic characters as they appear in movies, television, video games and comic books which will be available in all domestic and international territories, except for Japan. As part of the agreement, MFORMA will co-publish selected Marvel-based mobile games with Activision, one of the world's leading video game publishers. Activision brings a rich heritage of developing, publishing, and marketing blockbuster video games based on popular brands, including Marvel's major properties. The MFORMA/Marvel multi-year global product plan identifies mobile entertainment applications of every kind and represents one of the most far-reaching publishing programs seen in the mobile industry."

The Erik Larsen board is polling to find out "Who do you consider the genuinely nicest person in comics?":

"Jeff Smith, creator of Bone. There's no one who ever existed who could be as nice as him."

"I always saw Oeming as pretty ordinary in the morals department, but it may be me."

"I met Sam Kieth -- I'd have to vote for him. What a genius too.. and the same year I met Art Thibert -- we blew out his tires in the parking lot."

Currently in the lead is Walt Simonson, but you still have time to go and pick your favourite...

Millarworld are concerned with what you're buying:

"Given the choide what would you get and the advantages of HC and TP. Disadvantages [...] Thks"

"I almost always prefer paperback. They're cheaper. I have a few hardcovers, most of which were gifts. The only reason I'd buy a HC is if absolutly couldn't wait for the TPB, if it were on sale for cheap, or if I didn't think there would ever be a paperback version (The Frank Book, Palomar, Locas, Charles Burns Library, etc.)"

"TP hands down. They're cheaper, as everyone has said, they line up with everything else in the bookshelf, but most of all they're light. You can easily read a typical Marvel 6-issue book lying in bed or curled up like a pretzel or hanging upside down or whatever. Plus when you have to move house the movers will be grateful. I'd buy a hardcover as a coffeetable book, like maybe full of pin-ups, but not to read."

"Generally, HCs because I'm a dirty, dirty collector. Plus, they usually have nice extras, and if you get them signed by the creators, they always do something extra for you, like a nice sketch or something."

"If the HC comes out months or even years before the softcover, like the HUSH HCs & FOR TOMORROW HCs, then I'll usually get the HCs and I usually end up buying the TPs in the long run as well."

Robert Kirkman talks about the understanding of the characters that got him the gig of writing Fantastic Four: Foes:

"A hero is only as good as his villains and the Fantastic Four are the greatest superheroes in the world... They have the most colorful and diverse rogues gallery in comics. Batman has a bunch of psycho dudes, Spider-Man has a bunch of psycho animal dudes, and the FF have villains of almost every possible kind. [...The series features] pretty much everyone but Doctor Doom and Galactus... I'd have liked to use Doctor Doom, of course but he's you know, dead. Also, I think he would have overpowered the other villains as far as presence goes. If you take out Galactus and Doom the rest of the villains are on a pretty even level so I think the series works much better without those two. Besides, Galactus hasn't been cool since they got rid of the big 'G' on his chest and the bare legs. He's just a shadow of his former self and I don't want to perpetuate that. He deserves better."

Evan Dorkin updates his schedule:

"I'm working on a two-page pitch for Mad, finishing up stuff for the delayed Biff Bam Pow, we have the Bill and Ted material in our laps for finally putting the book/editorial together for volume 1, I've accepted a gig drawing a comics page for Maxim U.K. (which may turn out to be a regular gig if all goes well), and I'm talking with some folks about some gag writing on a property tie-in type of book. And I'v started working on my damned Adult Swim script again, finally. Everything's going painfully slow as we wrangle with our work schedule while hitting various doctor's offices, shopping for baby stuff, cleaning, painting the bedroom and assembling oddly-named Ikea furniture for the kid-to-be."

Sadness: New Dorkin for Maxim only in UK. Happiness: It'll probably turn up in a future Dork.

Kandora's C. Edward Sellner continues to explain why Kandora's price point isn't necessarily going to kill the publisher straight out of the gate:

"See, we did think about this... a lot. We looked at a number of options and wrestled with all of them, including some very similar to this challenge. So, I'm not saying 22-pages at $2.25 is bad; it's just one way to go, we chose another way that we see as just as valid. Here's what we see. Even for 22-pages of story at $2.25, your reader is paying 9.7 cents per page. On our books, readers will be getting 32-pages of story at $3.50, which is 9.1 cents per page. To me, though granted I'm not a financial wizard, that is a value. To say it's not is going to be hard to counter. Whether it's the most appropriate value, or the best strategy, well, you can always find some that disagree.

"As someone who has been a lifelong fan of comics, I would jump at the prospect of monthly books with almost a third more story! I'm the kind that always targeted the giant-sized annuals, or double-sized issues, because I wanted more story and I saw those as a plus. I know you retailers take a chance every time a book comes out; every dime you spend to buy the book is a risk. I think we are doing our part to show our commitment. Producing books like this takes time and energy, and commitment. The production quality is top notch and the printing will be as well. All that is also monetary investment, so I certainly don't see us as lacking in that. But hopefully we can meet in the middle. I know we want to support retailers out there, knowing you all are our bread and butter. I believe we're going in a good direction and I hope that that will show through very quickly and very completely. Maybe if nothing else, some creative promotions can come together to help ensure people know the books exist, so they will ask for them to be reserved."

B. Clay Moore thinks about design in superhero comics:

"First, a given: Stale storytelling, regurgitated art, and a refusal to push forward into brave new directions is strangling mainstream comics... I'm sitting in the art section of the bookstore, and there's this book next to me called 'SONIC: Visuals for Music.' And I just flipped through it... Makes me wonder...Is it that hard to raise the level of graphic design in comic books...content, covers and ads? There's some wicked shit in this book. But then I think....the existing comic readership may not take well to hip, catchy graphic design, and no one else will see it, so is there a point? As a creator, I'm starting to edge stuff beyond the standard boundaries...I think the Expatriate (my new Image book) will show that to some degree. I tend to think I'm virtually alone out there, though. Marvel and DC books are heavily edited, so unless a guy like Mack, who already has his own visual language comes in, nothing will really move forward or change. And most Image creators tend to lean on the same language as Marvel and DC books. Not to keep waving the Image flag, but we're the only 'mainstream' publisher that has a chance to really impact the look and feel of genre comics... By moving away from traditional design. There's no editor to tell artists 'NO' at Image. I specify genre comics, because plenty of people are trying to push the envelope with indy books. And too many guys who move over to Image to do their 'own thing' are hidebound by the old ways they've had hammered home by the Big Two, so they don't ever stretch their wings. Then again, as the marketing guy at Image, I'm not sure it'll help... But it's a point I'll start making to people. Remember...Image struck gold at one point because it sparkled like a new toy under the Christmas tree. But toys eventually get left out in the rain, and when that happens it's time to put something new under the tree...."

Clay: Steal the official Image checkbook and hire Rian Hughes to do covers for your books. And Julian House. And Glenn Leyburn. Or, for local people, Popgun, Claudia Fung and Chen Design.

Yes, I'm a design geek. I'm sorry.

Josh Middleton on his first DC project, First Thunder:

"In my first meeting with the ever-energetic Dan Didio at the DC offices we discussed the type of project I was aiming to work on, and my number one request was that it be something more fantastic than what I had been doing, something more magical. I really wanted a chance to draw something bigger than life... Dan [DiDio] really seemed to understand what I was grasping for creatively and I think the mention of 'magical' was key in bringing Shazam to the table... Dan mentioned that it was also one of his goals to bring some magic back to the DC universe as a lot of that aspect had been stripped away over recent years, and Shazam really seemed to embody all of that. Nothing was decided at that first meeting, but of the things we talked about, Shazam struck me as having real potential. All of the characters and stories Dan mentioned were exciting in their own way, but I was certain of the feel I was after; I needed to draw something magical, but still an ass-kicking, bigger-than-life adventure, and perhaps most importantly, it had to remain intimate and character driven. It wasn't long before I got a call from Judd Winick to talk about this story he'd been wanting to tell for a very long time, and as it happens it was very magically kick-ass indeed."

So, let's try something a little less likely to get people pissed off. Andy Runton's all-ages series of books, Owly, for example. Who could get pissed off with Owly? Andy Runton explains the series at Newsarama:

"Well when something is as personal as Owly there is even more personal stuff in there that people really don’t see. Then the reader can see themselves as Owly on a lot of different levels. But Owly is about a little owl that lives in this world. He’s a bit too nice for the world he is. He’s a little lonely because of who he is. Other animals are a little afraid of him but he’s trying his best to make new friends to make the world a better place... Originally I wanted to do a regular comic with it or a kid’s book but I’m not a writer. So the writing I could tell was missing something so I just left it off and let it work that way. It seemed to work out a little bit as things progressive. As things got more complex I needed a language to fill in the blanks so it just evolved like that."

"I have saved comics. Bow down. I am Paramount Leader now. People are always complaining that comics advertising is ineffectual at best. I have solved this. Why are you looking at me like that? Do you WANT comics to fade away like a gin-scented fart in a rehab ward? Of course you don't. I have the answer. I have all the answers."

The most recent issue of Mark Millar's Spider-Man offers up a retcon of the entire status quo of Spider-Man's villains (and, if you take it to the conclusion implied, all villains in the Marvel Universe). Millarworld's reaction is, well, interesting:

"The 'massive sweeping retcon' seems to be all the rage these days in superhero comics. Bendis, Meltzer, JMS, and now Millar are all presenting one. Bendis' golden age story so far is great, IC is great but a bit cheap, I'm pretty grossed out by Sins Past, but Mark has knocked it out of the park with this one. Peter's relationship with all his enemies has just been swiftly turned on its head. Very very clever way to completely change the franchise dynamic without changing the actual story being told about a nerd turned hero due to a radioactive spider. Heh."

"I´m not so fond of this trend. This is in part what John Byrne did wrong in Spider-Man: Chapter one, IMO, why does it all have to make so much sense? Why no randomness? And does *** have to be behind everthing?"

"If you arrive at the comic shop every wednesday to pick up your new books. If you've preordered them to make sure they'll be there. If these books feature the same characters in many of the exact same situations over and over again. If you have repeated this ritual at least 30 times or have read over 100 such periodicals. Then you KNOW why we'd want a retcon to tie the past together. You KNOW why we don't want randomness in our stories but instead fascistic order with a soft, humane sheen. There is no more satisfying element in a utopian mainstream superhero comic than that which unifies disparate continuity elements! 'Peter's life is all tied together and coherent? Hmmmmmmm, maybe mine could be too.....'

"Interesting to note here the metatextual stuff happening with [the mastermind that I'm not going to spoil here for anyone who cares about this stuff] essentially standing in as a subsitute for Lee and Ditko. We often read these stories because the creators have given them so much coherence. We now have the exact same paradigm within the paradigm we've been experiencing for some time now. Does this double or exponentially jack up the intensity of our clockwork orgasms? What does it say to use Spidey's arch-enemy as a substitute for the authors of his most beloved stories? Is it a critique of the superhero paradigm? Is it simply a fun gesture that endorses by implication?"

Shawn Hoke makes my day by going through Previews:

"Stormbreaker: the Saga of Beta Ray Bill #2 (Page 38): Why the hell has Thor turned into a donkey and why is he crying? Again, rhetorical question, I don't want to know. Wait, I do want to know; this is just too weird. Someone clue me in here... X-Men Phoenix: Endsong #3 (Page 59): This is a touching cover with Wolverine about to kiss a dead woman. Another Greg Land cover, and the 50th Marvel cover in this book to feature Wolverine... On the cover of Outsiders #21 (Page 77), Batman and Nightwing are arguing about something. This is also an 'Identity Crisis' follow-up issue. Don't miss it, I know I won't."

Shawn also mentions that I loved Supermonster by Kevin Huizenga, which again reminds me that I keep forgetting to pick up Or Else. To any comic store person who happens to see me in their store: Please remind me. You'll be able to recognise me by the thinning hair, glasses and loathing of everyone buying The Art of Greg Horn.

Phil Hester talks about The Athiest, his new Image series:

"'The Atheist' is my cipher to do strange storylines... He's basically my tool to do whacked-out sci-fi/horror stuff. This was basically caused by me watching too much 'Dr. Who' as a kid. I want this character to deal with strange menaces like Dr. Who did, but to be less ridiculous... I pretty much started this idea up when I was working on the 'Wretch.' The good thing about the Wretch was, you could come up with any type of whacked-out character for the Wretch, but the Wretch was actually mute, so he was limited... I had some creepy ideas, but they needed a proper antagonist. I also like writing an unsympathetic main character -- it's interesting to me."

The Joe Quesada board think about the important things:

"Would you bear with lower paper quality ...if titles like She-Hulk and Alpha Flight stuck around because of it, and Marvel took more chances with new series'? For me, I really don't understand the fetish for glossy paper. Not only does the ink blotch and run on the paper often, the paper that's used on Vertigo issues isn't significantly worse at all. If you want pristine white paper, buy the TPBs, you know? With cheaper printing costs, I'm fairly certain that Marvel would be able to keep around lower sellers as long as they presented some profit."

"I personally don't want a lower-grade paper on any of my comics. The cheapo newsprint hurts the art, bottom-line and doesn't preserve nearly as well. I buy several DC books every month and I'm astounded at how they can keep printing the gorgeous Ed Benes art on Birds of Prey every month on such cheap-@ss paper."

"In my opinion, the big Two should look at the feasibility of what DC tried quite a few years ago... An expensive, nice paper stock version of their comics for the direct market, and reprints roughly a year behind on newsprint for the newsstand. Yes, I remember that Marvel did this in the mid 90's, but I have no idea how successful/not successful this was."

As if Raven Gregory and the Bendis board couldn't get any better. Well, worse, but you know what I mean:

"The Sexiest comic fan girls of all time. Nothing inappropriate fellas. But ladies...show us (any cute pics) whatcha got."

Nothing inappropriate, fellas. Apart from, well, maybe the idea of the thread itself. Sadly, by the third page of the thread, the pictures start appearing, as does the fanboy drooling:

"Lovely and talented! We are very, very lucky indeed."

"If I wasn't married...I'd be asking to marry both you and your cousin in some state where that's legal"

"If you were any more beautiful, we could start charging people just to look at your pics... we'd make a fortune..."

New Avengers #1 sells out. The best part of the press release:

"Internet comic book message boards have been buzzing over the introduction of the new all-star Avengers team. Fan Terry Anderson of Lexington, Kentucky was excited by the debut. 'I really like the artwork here and the story is intriguing,' he posted. 'This new direction was a good opening for me to break into with the Avengers. I'm curious how the new team will operate. And I do like the inclusion of Spidey. He and Cap both are more about heart than their powers. I think it is a good nucleus for a team.'"

Somewhere, "Fan Terry Anderson" is feeling very happy with himself.

Newsarama have fairly comprehensive spoilers for the last issue of Identity Crisis that I'm not going to go into here (but I'm sure someone's going to mention the identity of the killer on the comments thread, so be warned those who don't want to know), but the reaction is just what I think everyone expected...:

"If that is true, the it is LAME-O and Brad Metzer really did pull a Loeb...."

"If this turns out to be the ending...then IDC will be the biggest letdown of the year. How does this change the DCU in anyway? God, I mean...Who gives a shit? This pisses me off...there's no way Meltzer would pull something like this."

"In all seriousness, this sounds like kind of a lackluster conclusion. But I dont' know enough about [the person who killed Sue Dibny] to know if this fits."

ICv2 presents a point-counterpoint discussion about new-Crossgen Kandora Publishing's launch titles. It all starts, as these things do, with one retailer complaining:

"Kandora Publishing has announced that its first book, Barbarrosa and the Lost Corsairs, will retail for $3.50. I will not be ordering this book -- quality is not an issue. The lost and lamented books of CrossGen were terrific for the most part and didn't sell well overall, even with hyperactive publisher marketing and in-store retailer support. CrossGen made a multitude of mistakes. Among them were (1) the publication of too many titles, especially after an initial promise that the company would not over-expand, (2) the break up and diversification of what was promised to be a cohesive universe, and (3) most importantly, a cover price for new books of $2.95 in an already glutted marketplace... Kandora Publishing is now attempting to enter the comics market at a time when Marvel and DC are constantly introducing new series (if not new characters) in an effort to maintain their stranglehold on market share. Yesterday was new comics day (December 1st). On Wednesday, I had 10 people give back the 25 cent issue of Hunter Killer. A new book with both a popular writer and a popular artist on board, yet 10 people didn't want to try the book even for one measly quarter. What chance does a publisher have when it offers four new books at a price of $3.50 each?"

Kandora writer C. Edward Sellner responds:

"Kandora does not plan on making the same mistakes that led to CrossGen's downfall. That being said, I think sometimes we forget the positive once we get hit with the negative. CrossGen did have its successes, and everything I have read is that if they had not had such overhead to support their in-house system, and expanded too much too fast, they would have continued for a long time as a thriving publisher... I know a huge part of our intention is trying to offer much more story, for a cheaper per page cost than any other publisher on the market, all to give the average fan a more enjoyable read and to help them feel they got more than their money's worth. We've tried to do that in the best way we could develop to offer a fair price, be able to cover our costs, and make enough profit to validate moving on. We want this to succeed, not just for our company, but to show that genre books, non-super-hero books, whatever, HAVE a real chance in this market. All of us on our end are making some sacrifices to make this work, pitching in and trying to do something good for the market as well as hopefully launch a successful company that will pay off in the long run."

The retailer responds to the response:

"If Kandora wants to make a positive splash in the marketplace, then it should consider releasing the first year of their four initial titles at $2.25 each (equivalent to Marvel and DC's lowest priced mainline books), with no change in content, page count, etc., etc. If they do so, I will order 10 or more shelf copies of each in an effort to hook the lost CrossGen fans; otherwise, I will only order those copies that are preordered by my reservists and take no more risk than the publisher is willing to. To be sure, Kandora is not responsible for the marketplace as it exists. Even so, Kandora needs to maximize its ability to make an impression and compete in that marketplace. Yes, Mr. Sellner, not ordering any shelf copies of a book guarantees its failure. But when so many books from established publishers sell below expectations, with known characters and storylines to boot, I will no longer risk my hard-earned dollars on new titles that I feel are overpriced."

Mark Millar gets interviewed at Pop Culture Shock, and as usual, it's best if you don't pay too much attention:

"I love Superman more than any other work of fiction in movies or comics and I haven't been able to enjoy the books in fifteen years. No disrespect to the guys involved, because some of them are very good, but the Superman stories just don't work. They're approaching the character with a Marvel head and completely missing the point. Do Superman right and it would be the biggest comic in the world."

Of course, saying that you haven't enjoyed the Superman books in fifteen years or that doing a Superman book right and it would be the biggest comic in the world would have more weight if you didn't say this later in the same interview:

"Five titles doing it very right are Ex Machina, Planetary, Superman-Batman, Iron Man and Superman: Birthright."

Ah, Superman: Birthright, the biggest comic in the world. But you have to wonder why two out of those five are books that Mark hasn't been able to enjoy for fifteen years, don't you? Not to mention be interested in the fact that four of them are DC books... Of course, you can also have fun with Google, when it comes to Millar not liking any Superman books since 1989. Mark Millar talking about the current Superman comics in 2003: "However, I do try to pick these up because I think the three guys they have on these books are great and probably producing the best material we've seen since John Byrne. I miss Jeph Loeb's Superman because he's pretty much the best American writer in the business at the moment." Other fun quotes:

"Ultimates 2 is probably the most political book on the stands right now. Likewise, Red Son was a very obvious comment on pre-emptive strikes and hyper-powered countries taking over the world. If anything, I think the indie books shy away from this stuff and focus on the individual more than the socio-political... I honestly think the mainstream is much more political and much more interesting than the indie scene at the moment."

"Vertigo is a ghetto now. A hit at Vertigo is selling 18-25K and I just don't want to focus on such a small readership. Your hands are also tied in the sense that it's still owned by a big company and I could never have done a book like Chosen there."

"I call this The Club. There are only ten great artists at any one time and I've worked with so many bad guys that now I only fuck within The Club. Fuck outside The Club and these artists don't want to know you, but they all want in on the action when they see you with a pretty little Bryan Hitch or a tasty Quitely. It's like that episode of Seinfeld where George figures out that dating an attractive women is a way to attract OTHER attractive women."

If Mark Millar didn't exist, we'd have to invent him.

The Comics Journal board: "If you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao, you ain't gonna make it with anyone anyhow. Maybe.":

"do comics have the ability to reach the masses and effect people by appealing to thier sense of rebellion?or are we just here for funnies and erotica? all this spandex and t&a is making me irritable.fantasy is what people want but what is needed is reality or spirituality or some other damn fool thing."

"'Reaching the masses' should be the ideal goal of all artists. That doesn't mean compromising work, but it also means you should never design works for niche audiences. You do what you already want to do, you give it the chance to be seen by as many as possible, and if it has to be in a niche it will find his own. I find this whole concept that comics are ghettoized to increasingly seem more like a vestigial inferiority complex on the part of creators than a reflection of reality. Though at one time it was indeed the latter, nowadays the only thing blocking comics as mass communication is the mistaken belief by creators that they have to save in some way what already exists in the industry rather than just going ahead with their work and letting the chips fall where they may. Screw the 'industry.' Creators have always been better to it than it's been to them. Maybe the old one needs to die and another be born. I mean, when it comes right down to it, with the web, if your work being seen is your main goal, nothing really stops you."

"Yeah, fuck the Free Market. I vote that we all should live in a commune and share one really good comic book, and I say that comic book should be 'Omaha the Cat Dancer #4.' Of course, under Communism, one of the members of the commune will be required to wait on a long line for hours in the snow outside Fat Jack's Comicrypt to purchase 'Omaha #4' for our collective; I would volunteer for this duty, except that I am too busy studying the writings of Comrade Lenin."

The Geoff Johns board have been paying attention to the DC in Demand page in DC's books...:

"Read Deadshot and was reading the coming attraction page in the back. I noticed the 'ticker' acroos the top that does the 1 month till, 2 months till... The I see it, 3 months till DC Countdown. DC Countdown?? This would correspond being solicited in Previews after the big announcement in Wizard. Not a crisis in name, but a countdown. A countdown to what I may ask, Geoff?? Hmm??"

"I was going to post about that yesterday, I searched for DC countdown online, and just got info on Washington DCs New Years events."

"Glad to see other people noticed this. I was just about to post about it. Certainly allows creators to deny the existence of a new Crisis - it isn't called Crisis!"

The Bendis board hits new topicality highs:

"JMS ASM 9/11 [...] Just curious: Am I the only one who found that issue of ASM to border on hack writing? The first few pages were good, but then they are all on with Doom and Magneto crying and several full-page spreads that got so far over the top it became preachy. Overblown salutes to things like this get into Bruckheimer territory and don't do the tragedy justice. The whole thing came off as forced. They should have had a few of their oldest heroes...FF, SPider-Man, Original X-Men, Cap, and Daredevil...Standing among a crown mourning at the site, and offered it as a poster, full proceeds going to releif. It would have been much more meaningful than the melodrama we got."

"cut them a little bit of slack. it was done very quickly and right on the heels on 9-11. so all that emotion and fear was still really fresh. even more than it is today. no one really knew where the country was going at the time. but yeah, maybe Dr. Doom was crying because somebody else knocked down those buildings before he did."

"As soon as Dr. Doom, Kingpin, and Magneto cried and helped out with the relief effort, I stopped caring about anything else in the issue. That was hack writing at its worst. Not because the villains wouldn't have cared, but because that's not how they would have reacted. I can fully see Magneto being outraged by the events of 9/11. But he wouldn't have acted like a little girly-man about it. This is Magneto. He ould have flown over to Afghanistan, pulled Bin Ladin out of his cave, brought him to Ground Zero, and proceeded to torture him to death so the whole would could see. At this point, he would do the same to every member of Al Qaeda he could find. Then, he would clear the debris at the WTC site, and start rebuilding the towers from the ruins using his Magnetic powers. He would then issue a stern warning to humanity to stop killing each other, or the next terrorist attack will come from the Brotherhood, and go back to Genosha. If Dr. Doom was outraged, his actions would be along the same line. So, yes, it was hack writing, and it's too bad because the rest of the book was pretty powerful stuff."

Raven Gregory, creator of Image's The Gift joins the conversation:

"I will say this once and I will never say it again (and if you buy THE GIFT then please know I still love you but) every person who talked shit about this issue, and the anal misconceptions of Dr. Doom crying, or blah, blah bullshit is missing the fucking point of touching on one of our worst and bravest moments in history. You are all fucking trolls and need a swift kick in the ass for not letting the comic rise above the bullshit who's in whose Avengers, or whatever lame ass continuity issue is up for grabs for the week. Please remove your heads from the ass that is being a troll and thank JMS for being brave enough to bring something like that in front of the public eye and doing it with class. Rant over. Raven still loves you."

Following on from the (now closed) "Red State/Blue State" discussion, Millarworld considers comic book readership polling:

"I've heard that some publishers put questionaires in random copies of issues. It only applies to people buying whatever book (or books) you put it in though, so information is limited to only those whom buy your stuff. Also since querstionaires require a response, they tend to be biased towards less causal buyers. (Although they tend to be quite a large group) Along with assessing demographical information, information should also be asked for about preferences, and even about other publishers works. Determining the breakdown of where sales are located should be really easy. Just keep track of where the retailers are located and what they tend to order. In fact retailer surveys in general should allow a publisher to glean lots of useful data. It's only when it applies to the consumers instead of the customers that it becomes difficult because the number of consumers is so large."

"I'm sure Marvel and DC do retailer surveys and even workshops. But there is the problem of what shops order and what consumers want. For example a shop might not order any of a particular comic so the consumer has no outlet to purchase the product. The value of consumer information would be to try to tailor the product to specific groups of consumers and maybe more importantly tailor marketing on those consumers. I suppose it comes down to what the big companies want from the direct market - Do they want to grow it or just try to maintain it at its current levels."

"I can't believe Marvel or DC don't do polling/ demographic surveys. Especially DC with the Time-Warner monolith behind it- might have saved them the misery behind the Doom Patrol 're-vamp.'"

Newsarama tries to resist temptation:

"Here is a crazy request...or perhaps we can call it a wish. We all know that someone on the board will get a copy of [Identity Crisis #7] before next Wednesday. Do you think we could post only spoiler-free reviews until at least the day it's released? I know that we have the argument that 'If you don't want it spoiled then don't look,' but some of us can't handle the temptation AND I think it'd be cool to have everyone come on here after reading the issue and immediately getting their shock...or lack thereof from reading the issue instead of reading someones synopsis. So what do you think? Can we do it?"

"Hear, hear! I absolutely agree! We need to treat Identity Crisis #7 like it's a red-headed Irish stepchild living on the street begging for whiskey but we ain't giving it any! (or something like that) Seriously, everybody, don't spoil it if your shop gets an advance copy of #7 tomorrow. Otherwise, I'll have to take a hiatus until I've read it. And this place would become way too cool if I'm gone."

"I'm probably going to begin my hiatus from Newsarama tomorrow. I don't want to hold an eternal grudge against anyone who spoils the ending to this great story."

DC's official website breaks the story that Gail Simone has signed on for two more exclusive years at DC:

"There are a ton of great reasons to work for DC: the characters, the management, footrubs from Greg Rucka, Dan DiDio's fabulous slumber parties, the editors, and the attention to quality and detail all spring to mind... Seriously, I think DC's commitment to the readers is unequalled. They have management you can believe in, exceptional editors like Joan Hilty, Mike Carlin and Stephen Wacker, and a proven commitment to excellence."

It's a sad day when Archie steal tricks from Marvel, but look who's enjoying the renaming/renumbering trend now:

"Due to the popular demand of Archie Comics' fans everywhere, we're shining the spotlight on Riverdale brighter than ever before. Starting in March 2005, LAUGH DIGEST becomes TALES FROM RIVERDALE DIGEST. TALES FROM RIVERDALE DIGEST will continue all of your favorite fun from LAUGH DIGEST, with all of your favorite characters. Of course Archie, Betty, Jughead and Veronica will be there every month, as well as headlining their own monthly digests."

Peter David sets the record straight about the Hulk:

"So a writer who shall go nameless (because, y'know, why afford him or her the publicity) announced on a radio program that my run on HULK will absolutely end after the current six issues to make way for a 'new creative team.' I've spoken with Tom Brevoort because this was news to me. Tom had previously been contacted by other netfolks and had been judicious in his answers because it was news to him as well and he wanted to do just what I was doing: Check with his higher ups to see if it was true. Long story short: Absolutely nothing has changed from what I told you months ago. I'm on the series for six issues. We're going to see what the numbers are like. We're going to see how all parties feel about my staying on board after that."

Because I like naming the nameless, the writer mentioned above was Mark Millar, who listed Hulk as one of three series getting new creative teams soon, with the other two being Fantastic Four and Thor. Millar is rumored to be handling Thor, with Fantastic Four having been linked to JMS.

Augie writes a column just for people like me, who like Greg Rucka's work for the most part (Not a big fan of his Superman, but that's just me) but have never picked up Queen and Country...:

"The Pipeline Guide to QUEEN AND COUNTRY is a project that began in September. With Greg Rucka's novel about to hit the streets, I wanted to refresh my memory of the series and catch up on the issues I hadn't read yet. That involved reading through seven hardcover collections and, by the time I finished those, three individual issues. The write-ups are lengthy, and the final set of reviews came close to 6000 words. You'll see the first four volumes reviewed here this week, and the final three (plus assorted single issues since then) in next week's column."

Gawdblessya, Augie. Of course, now I have lots more trades to buy, so damn you as well.

Matt Fraction and Joe Casey talk about the anthology comic:

"Maybe the reality of ongoing anthologies is that there's not enough creative talent out there to make it a worthwhile, continued purchase for people. You know the score... for every great short in an anthology, there are tons of crappy ones. Keeping the quality level high is a big deal on normal, monthly comics. Keeping it up on an anthology is ten times more difficult. Yeah, I know it's not rocket science... but I suppose I can sympathize with any overworked editor that can barely keep a single creative team on point. The prospect of keeping several creative teams doing great work, month-in, month-out would send some guys out onto the ledge...! What went wrong is generally what happens when anything goes wrong. Plain and simple apathy."

They mention Action Comics Weekly, bringing back happy memories of wondering what was going on in the Black Canary serial when I was a nipper...

The Joe Quesada board asks "Why does Marvel put out bad books, (or anyone else, for that matter)?":

"Since I had some credit at a local comic shop, I decided to pick up all Marvel's 616 continuity new releases for this week. As you'd expect, there's books I liked and books I didn't. But then, there's a couple books I can't imagine ANYONE liking. Heck, I can't imagine why Marvel went to press with them! Take Sabertooth #4, for example. Peeee-ewwww! What the heck were Warren Simons, Axel Alonso and Joe Quesada thinking let this thing through? What was the point to this?"

"In the case of books like that, there are several possibilties; 1) Editorial interference that totally screwed things up. 2) Editorial incompetence; ie; not being able to spot bad work. 3) Cronyism; turning a blind eye to bad work because it's your buddy. 4) Realizing too late that you've got a stinker, but putting it out anyway to recoup some of the costs. There are probably other variations on these, but these the most commonly cited reasons for such boondoggles."

"But on the over hand it could be; (5) Its a good book, but not for everyone"

"OK, name the reader that DC's 'New Guardians' was for. I'd like to meet him."

John Byrne! He tells it like it is! Some examples, from a thread that started off as being about Warren Ellis and the frequency of Planetary:

"Get this into your tiny brain: trade paperbacks are not the 'future' of this industry. They are another industry entirely, as movies are to TV. And, like movies, they are going to become increasingly dependent upon new material as the prima donnas who work in comics these days increasingly demonstrate themselves incapable of producing their product on schedule -- even schedules which, as in this instance, they have set themselves! Go on -- continue congratulating these unprofessional elitists for their failures. Pretty soon there will be nothing but trades -- and then, without reprint material to fill them up, those will start coming out later and later and later."

"How about if we just think of it this way: PEOPLE WHO MISS DEADLINES ARE LAZY, ARROGANT, UNPROFESSIONAL C*CKS*CKERS WHO ARE IN NO SMALL WAY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATH OF THE INDUSTRY. AND THE 'FANS' WHO SUPPORT THEM ARE BRAINDEAD ELITIST MORONS."

"We're not talking here about those nutball retailers who expect to make $10,000 off some 'hot' book, then only make $9,000 and whine that they have lost money. We are talking about retailers (and companies) who have been promised $10,000 and then only make $9,000 because the product was not delivered. Some 'fans' are stupid enough to accept this. 10 books a year instead of 12 is what they have come to think of as 'normal' -- they will even join in the chants of the braindead elitists who insist late books are better than books that ship on time. The whole 'growing roses' malarkey. I wonder -- if M***** and DC decided to switch to a 10-book per year schedule for all their titles, and then started cutting the number of pages in those books (to make it easier for the prima donnas to produce the work they promised to produce) would this be accepted, too? 'Last month, this 22 page book was $2.50. This month, same book is 20 pages for $2.50. Next month it will be 16 pages for $2.50. But, boy! will they ever be great pages!' A ______ and his _______ are soon ________."

The Bendis board vote on the worst comics of 2004. Again:

"Biggest Disappointment: Amazing Spider-Man - Sins Past. It started off with so much promise, with the potential to be a Spidey classic, the first couple issues were cool, but the issue where we found out what went down between Gwen and you know who and how it happened, just left a bad taste in my mouth."

"i bet it left a bad taste in gwen' s mouth"

"For everyone voting for worst mini, surely you haven't forgotten X-Force."

"X-Force sucks, but it doesn't reach the levels of sucktitude that X-Men the End reaches."

Millarworld discusses Warren Ellis's theory of politics and comics (which can be read at the start of the thread linked, but can be summed up with this quote: "A few weeks ago, I threw out the playful notion that original comics don't actually sell in the Red states of America -- that the political borderlines there are also cultural borderlines. Just as there are isolated political Blue islands in Red America, there are also island comics stores, to be certain -- but that the audiences for progressive comics are largely contained in the coasts and those few Blue states in the north. The broader sweep of Jesusland is a dead zone, to massively generalise."):

"Well, the data may be slightly skewed. 7 of the 10 most populous states are Blue (California and New York, the top 2 markets, among them) and, the Blue states are richer than their Red counterparts. It's still an interesting theory to read though. I'd like to see a follow up on it. There may be more to this."

"The problem is much deeper than 'Conservatives like Superman to punch Luthor and that's it' and goes back to the culture of these areas as a whole and the lack of any sort of emphasis on artistic expression. Greenville and Columbia are not places known for their museums, art expos, or conventions but look a few hours south and you have Atlanta -- the new mecca for musical expression. I think were there level playing fields in all the states you wouldn't see anything like this because good comics are good comics and people are going to like them irregardless. But the sad truth is related more to the entire spectrum of these places socialization than just red-states liking their comics traditional -- they just don't know about anything else and thereby implying that perhaps to increase readership these publishers should promote the merits of their experimental works in these untapped markets MORESO than the established 'liberal' areas."

"WE'RE TALKING ABOUT COMIC BOOKS; BUFF MEN AND WOMEN IN TIGHTS BEATING UP OTHER PEOPLE IN TIGHTS. I IMAGINE THE BLUE ELITISTS AT THE NEW YORK TIMES WILL HAVE QUITE THE LAUGH WHILE CONSIDERING THE HIGHER INTELLECT OF THE BLUE COMIC BOOK READER OPPOSED TO THE RED COMIC BOOK READER."

You know what I love about Newsarama? The way they don't get bogged down with Marvel vs. DC threads all the time:

"Much has been made of late about how much better DC is with continuity than Marvel has been the past few years. I do not agree that DC has been so great in the continuity area, citing examples such as 4 different Supergirls running around in 2 years time, rebooting and relaunching Legion of Super-Heroes AGAIN, rebooting and relaunching Doom Patrol AGAIN, changing the JLA and Teen Titans to match their TV counterparts, and Birthright which changed Superman's origin AGAIN. I brought this up in another thread but instead of hijacking that one I feel this merits it's own discussion. I'd love to hear examples of both Marvel and DC doing good and bad jobs with continuity, and which company you feel is doing the better job."

"I don't feel like I can compare the two. While Crisis on Infinite Earths gives me a migraine, this whole dissassembled thing has me cross-eyed. Both are FUBAR."

"Having read comics for 30 years, I thought I had a pretty good handle on continuity at both companies up until about Zero Hour and Heroes Reborn. At that point, I pretty much gave up and just learned to enjoy the stories. If writers and editors use and respect continuity, it's a great reward for us longtime fans. If not, I just don't worry about it — there are bigger problems in the world. I look at it like this — with parallel worlds, alternate timelines and reality-warping characters and situations clearly established in both the DC and Marvel universes, there can be no 'fixed' continuity. In the real world the continuity glitches are to blamed on lax editorial decisions at both companies, but for story purposes it's not hard to assume that through the actions and machinations of The Beyonder, Monitor, Franklin Richards, Parallax, Scarlet Witch, Time Master, Kang and all the rest over the years, the timelines are probably pretty well screwed for better or worse in both universes. Or maybe every time little Franklin has a nightmare, Iron Man gets a retcon."

In this post, a sampling of the wit and wisdom of one Mr. Nick Locking.

On Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's We3:

WE3 is so shit-hot I have a world championship level erection just thinking about it.

On John Byrne's tendency to overdo exposition, even on comic books that he himself has drawn:

OH NO, MY FLATMATE HAS PUSHED ME TOWARDS A PIECE OF SHIT COMIC! I'M ACCIDENTALLY READING IT AND MAKING A TERRIFIED FACE, AND HAVE SHIT MY PANTS!

On Mark Millar's WANTED:

I dunno, WANTED is fairly fun even if RAPE Millar's RAPE usual RAPE themes RAPE do show up a bit. Sorry, did I say themes plural?

On Batman's sexual orientation:

Obviously Batman is the World's Greatest Gay, if he chooses to be. However, the only people capable of satisfying The Batman's Bat-Lust are Talia Al Ghul and Catwoman, because they are both DIRTY FUCKING BITCHES. Batman has never touched any Robin because that would be kiddie-fiddling and The Dark Knight is assuredly not a kiddie-fiddler, and also because he is practically the father of all three Robins so it would be incest too and The World's Greatest Detective does not shit where The World's Greatest Detective eats. No men Batman knows are sufficiently filthy lovers to satisfy his needs.

On the behind-the-scenes process that resulted in the Amalgam character Dark Claw:

I love the cavemen-banging-rocks-together creativity that went into Dark Claw.

"How can... UG! Wolverine good! Batman good! UG! We... GRAAGHH!"
"Make... BATMAN WOLVERINE!"
"NO! Then we... have two Wolverine!"
"Make WOLVERINE BATMAN!"
"GRAAAGGH! YOU STUPID! THEN WE HAVE TWO BATMAN!"
"uughhh..."
"Graarggh..."
"We..."
"Make Batman... LITTLE like Wolverine!"
"GRAAAAGGH!"

On the plot for an imagined BATMAN/PROMETHEA crossover:

Batman learns of a strange new superhero. He doesn't like her, because she's blatantly too powerful for his liking, so immediately he starts working on ways to take her down SHOULD IT BECOME NECESSARY. He talks to Felix Faust, a bunch of other dudes, and acquires an arsenal of magic items (which he dislikes, but accepts using). He tells Promethea that he can fuck her up hardcore in about ten seconds flat, which she takes exception to, and promptly leaves him tied in knots and hanging from a tree (in accordance with the laws of dramatic tension). Then, he learns of this apocalypse thing. Batman then says "I don't fucking THINK so", grabs Robin and Batgirl, and launches a full-on magical assault on Misty Magic Land, which is dissolved and trapped inside some sort of magical macguffin. Then, Promethea's power gone, he breaks her arms and sends her to Arkham. Then he retreats to the cornice of a building, and stares the entire city down for a couple of hours.

JOB DONE.

On his idea for a new Batman series:

ULTIMATE BATMAN: JUST IMAGINE KNIGHTFALL IF IT DIDN'T TOTALLY FUCKING SUCK.

On why JLA: ROCK OF AGES is a better comic than PEDRO AND ME:

Number of times Batman saves the day in ROCK OF AGES: about four or five.
Number of times Batman saves the day in PEDRO AND ME: NONE.

Gay characters in ROCK OF AGES: GREEN FUCKING LANTERN and GREEN FUCKING ARROW II.
Gay characters in PEDRO AND ME: Some guy off an MTV reality show.

How they kill Darkseid in ROCK OF AGES: Green Arrow II fires The Atom through his forcefield, riding a photon fired by a flash arrow.
How they kill Darkseid in PEDRO AND ME: THEY DON'T EVEN KILL HIM!

On whether or not Batman has figured out a cure for cancer in the DCU:

Batman's probably cured it already but has worked out that since criminals get more cancer than regular people it isn't sensible to release it onto the market.

(Why is it whenever Locking starts to discuss Batman's greatness I feel as though I'm back in my Medieval Philosophy class being subjected to arguments about the perfect nature of God?)

Much, much more side-splitting takes on comics (and other subjects as well) over at The V Forum.

Dark Horse get excited about geekdollars in March:

"Dark Horse has announced its comic and graphic novel releases for March, leading into the premiere of the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith film in May. Its Episode III adaptation trade paperback will street April 2nd, with art by Doug Wheatley. Cover price will be $12.95. On the same date, Dark Horse will release Star Wars: Visionaries, a $17.95, 136-page, 7" x 10" trade paperback with end flaps. Visionaries is a collection of short comic stories by the Episode III concept artists and designers, including Iain McCaig, Warren Fu, Derek Thompson, and more. These talented creators have been given free rein to explore the furthest reaches of the Star Wars universe. This is the first time that comic stories have been written and drawn by the Star Wars concept artists."

Paul O'Brien on Marvel's marketing of Reginald Hudlin as a moviemaker:

"This is what happens when writers from a different medium turn up in comics - we are breathlessly reminded that this person is a real novelist, or a real writer from a proper medium like TV or cinema. The veiled implication is that somebody who has written films, TV or novels must be fantastic. Because as we all know, the standard of writing in every other medium is unflaggingly high. And up to a point, people seem to buy into it. So, for example, Joss Whedon, Kevin Smith and J Michael Straczynski have been successfully marketed as big name authors in the context of the comics market. Viewed from a mainstream perspective, they're really creators with cult followings, but the mere fact of being writers who had achieved some degree of success elsewhere seems to lend instant credibility."

The Bendis board isn't too fond of X-23, the new Marvel "hit sensation":

"Did anyone else catch Joe Q's little editiorial in New Avengers #1 (it was either this or Ultimates 2 #1--they both came out same day) about how Marvel wants to develop the character from NYX into a frontrunner for the company due to overwhelming positive response to her? This is the girl that has two claws in each hand and a claw in each foot. In what form is this response in and where can I view it? 'Cause I just don't see her as an A-lister and really, really don't want to start seeing her on every other X-cover they release. Wolverine I can understand, but X-23?"

"I will drop any book I see that useless fucking waste of space appearing in. And I mean X-23. Not Joe Q. Although it's a close race as to who is more annoying."

"I don't know whether to laugh or cry."

"A goth Wolverine girl? Yea, that's going to be huge with the fanboys."

Newsarama reports: "It has been learned that comics legend Bob Haney died on Thanksgiving Day, November 25th. He was 78 years old. Haney died at a nursing/hospice facility in El Cajon, CA where he was hospitalized following a stroke that had robbed him of his ability to speak or recognize people. Complications from the stroke were the cause of his death."

Mark Evanier writes about Haney:

"He worked for DC until the mid-eighties, occasionally clashing with younger editors and struggling to produce material they considered fresh and contemporary. When work dried up, he turned his attention to other forms of writing, including the authorship of a book on another of his passions, carpentry. His last few years, he resided in San Felipe in Baja, Mexico and occasionally ventured North to appear at one of the Comic-Con Internationals in San Diego. We never knew if he was coming, for he was difficult to reach down in Mexico, but when he showed up, he was a welcome and valuable addition to our panels. One visit a few years back led to him writing a new story of old Teen Titans for DC, though it has yet to be published. I hope someday it is, as I always enjoyed his writing, especially on The Unknown Soldier and Metamorpho. DC ought to reprint the early issues of Metamorpho, one of the freshest, liveliest comics that came out of the company in the sixties."

Reginald Hudlin talks Black Panther:

"It’s sort of a fun, convoluted process. I was working with a storyboard artist named Paul Power who in addition to doing storyboards in Hollywood is also very well connected to the comic book community. He knows I’m a comic book fan and one day he asked me what I thought about John Romita, Jr. I thought he’s a great artist and I love his work. So Paul picked up his cell phone and called John Romita, Jr. and put us on the phone together. Then a few months later I actually met John out at the San Diego Comic Con and we hit it off right away. He is just a really great guy in addition to being an amazing artist. In another storyboard session I was talking about how much I loved Neal Adams so Paul Powers picked up the phone and called Neal Adams. So he put me on the phone with Neal which was exciting because he’s always been a hero of mine from his work on The Spectre, Batman, and all that classic Silver Age stuff. So when I was in New York I visited Neal in his studio and I got to meet him. Neal was taken by my enthusiasm in comics and said, 'You should be working in comics!' Neal then called Joe Quesada! So the next day I sat down and had a meeting with Joe. Joe brought [Marvel editor] Axel Alonso into the meeting so when I started pontificating about what comics needs to do and how I saw the future of comics, they actually agreed with a lot of what I was saying. Axel and I then started a friendship and over the course of several months we stayed in touch. One day I was in New York again and I had a lunch with Axel and he goes, 'I can’t believe you’re here, this is perfect timing. We’re reviving the Black Panther and you’re the guy who has to write the book.' I stated to tell him 'No, no, no I don’t have time for that' and by the end of the lunch I was hard at work."

Millarworld remember a comic once hyped up by Bill Jemas as a book that "may be Marvel's most important teen book since Amazing Fantasy #15. Think about it. Think about who we are and what we do.":

"What The Hell is Up With Trouble? Is that the birth of Peter Parker? Are May and Ben the parents? Or is May and Ritchie the parents? What's goin on there? ...I know, I know, lame. But it's actually a topic elsewhere."

"And why was the TPB cancelled ? Low order ? Epic's second death ?"

"It's best for everyone if you imagine Trouble never happened."

"The thing is that "Trouble" was set in the Ultimate universe, most people didn´t got that [...] In the last issue they meet and old man called Bucky who was CAptain America´s photographer in WW"

"[No, it's not in Ultimates continuity because] for one, the ages don't correspond. for another, Millar stated that it wasnt in any continuity, and that was the point of the bucky appearance"

"What they said at the time was that it COULD be in 616 continuity, but reaction to the seriesd would determine whether it would become canon. I'm guessing it did not..."

US Customs seizes Stripburger:

"Citing that material contained therein constituted 'clearly piratical copies' of registered and recorded copyrights, a shipment of comics bound for Top Shelf has been seized by US Customs in Charleston, SC. The books in question are copies of the Stripburger anthology containing the stories 'Richie Bush' by Peter Kuper, and 'Moj Stub' ('My Pole') by Bojan Redzic. Top Shelf has asked the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund to look in to the matter, and as a result, the CBLDF has retained counsel to challenge the seizures."

Newsarama posters' reactions?:

"Geez, this kinda crap literally makes me sick to my stomach. If this thing has anything to do with the politics of the book(the Bush parody), then it's even worse.
This isn't even like a lawsuit for copyright infringement, it's all the US Customs doing. You'd think the friggin' US CUSTOMS would have bigger fish to fry. Ugghhh.... sick to my stomach."

"You know, it's most likely somebody tipped off Customs to the content of that book. (And before the paranoid among you start screaming 'Bush Administration! Bush Administration!), it's most likely the Schulz Estate protecting their copyrights on the characters. Good for them! Too many 'satirists' just jerk people's chains in the name of being 'in-you-face' and 'out there.' Frankly, I could do without the image of Snoopy taking a leak on a lightpole. I hope the whole friggin' shipment gets pulped."

Mark Waid talks about his upcoming Legion of Super-Heroes revamp:

"I don't know if we've found the 'perfect' balance, but on the whole, I'd say that Barry and I always by trying to remember that the more real these individual teenagers seem, the wider the range that gives us... In other words, they're not simplistic and one-dimensional enough to be an 'Archie Legion,' [a derogatory term used by some to describe Waid's reboot efforts in 1993] but neither are any of them (well, okay, maybe Ultra Boy) intense and brooding enough to where they're unpleasantly dark. It's a tough tightrope to walk, I admit--the struggle with the first issue in particular came in making the team accomplished and likeable while at the same time not perfect and perfectly meshing... The Legion's never more boring than when they're attacking a problem as an 18-member groupmind, and we're working very hard to maintain the awareness among readers that these guys are radically different from one another in culture, in belief, in upbringing. Barry and I can both say that we're not as interested at first in having a Sun-Eater show up as we are watching the Legionnaires deal with smaller, more personal threats. That said, we're headed towards interstellar war on a cosmic scale, and soon, so it's not like we're not willing to turn up the heat."

Is it so wrong of me to think that this could be great? It's super-powered teenaged soap opera! In space! With stupidly named characters! What more so you want from your superhero books? I am completely nerdy in my anticipation of this.

Mark Brooks is the latest Marvel exclusive. Which would probably come as more of a surprise if I could think of any non-Marvel work that he's done.

Newsarama looks on the bright side:

"Enough with this bullshit 'marvel sucks' threads [...] Enoough with the 'I hate' Title Y. We can spend a million years complaining about what we hate (and we probably will). So, what do you LIKE about comics? Must be something, or you wouldn't be here (unless you just come here to bitch and complain constantly)-- So, what do you LIKE?"

"It's the best medium in the world! I love the stories and imagination that goes into them, the art and writing the competition between publishers which makes them strive to make comics even better. the fact the Punisher is the best it's ever been ever in the history of the character."

"Long running characters a person can enjoy for a LIFETIME. They smell nice. Escape from a not so fantastic world. 'real comics' (not TPBs) are very scanner-friendly and allow one to make beautiful wallpaper images at any resolution within reason even from comparably tiny panels."

"60% of what I read these days (maybe more) are DC titles. Too many titles to list here (but Geoff Johns is clearly at the pinnacle of his work these days). Actions speak louder than words. What do I NOT hate about Marvel these days? Um... er... okay, here's one! I am buying more X-titles than I used to these days. Yeah, it's very retro 90s in X-World right now, but I'm likin' it. The X-titles are more fun lately."

Sometimes, you have to just wonder what these people were thinking:

"Okay, we have judges, so I think we're ready. Here it is, the official Bendis Board Best Catch Contest. Here's how it works:

"1) Single men post pictures of yourself and a caption of no more than 500 words that explains why you are a good catch. Each member may post only one entry. Women, I'm sorry, but there was just too little interest shown; if enough women change their minds, we'll do a female version of this. NOTE: Single is defined by the entrant, but must mean in some way 'available,' therefore excluding all married men.

"2) These pictures will judged by our panel of judges, who are: Neophyte, Taki Soma, Carrie Lavon [...] These three will look over all entries, talk among themselves and determine which SIX contestants will move on to the next round.

"3) The final round will be set up as a POLL, in which all members will have the right to vote. Final contestants will be asked to post a SECOND picture and another 500 words describing why they are a BETTER catch than the other five finalists.

"4) The winner will receive a special prize that is most likely nothing, but might be a mobile home. Let the carnage begin."

Raising that bar, one lonely little creepy fanboy moment at a time.

Millarworld asks "New Avengers or Ultimates 2?, Which did you prefer, and why?":

"While I thought both were decent books with gorgeous art, I would give the edge to New Avengers #1, because I thought it had a brisker pace and a more intriguing setup. Both stories are off to good starts, but I'll probably wait for the trade to see how Ultimates 2 pans out, whereas I'm going to pull New Avengers for the duration of this first story."

"I liked The Ultimates better. Altough Captain America dislikes piercings. Grrr. The Avengers read more like it should be The Champions or something, and eveything was so damn convenient, like Tetris blocks falling into place. Besides, you know that everybody will come out on top. The art was typical Finch. Some love it, some say meh. Meh for me. The Ultimates was a blast, quick paced, action-packed, one of the best artists in the biz, one of the best writers in the biz. Great story, great art, what more can you ask for? (despite the piercings thing. grr) Millar is the best at packing the stories wth little details, like the total geek-out between Banner and Pym, 'boys and their toys', and the story seemed more, i dunno, organic that Bendis' Avengers."

"I very much enjoyed New Avengers. But, let's be honest, its just another Marvel fanfic when all is said and done and knowing that that has a slight but noticeable impact on my reading experience and reaction. In 10 years nobody's going to be reading this (and I love Bendis, think he's about as good as it gets) but the Ultimates is an achievment. It will be with us for some time. It is the Sistine Chapel of Nu Marvel. No expense has been spared, time, talent, money, production values, this is IT. This is probably about the only time Marvel's ever chosen quality over a quick and consistent buck and it shows. This whole little 2000-2005 rennaiisance in mainstream superhero work...culminates with these two volumes (provided volume two holds up the quality of course) and knowing THAT makes for an untouchable reading experience. Both were great books this week, however only one was an IMPORTANT book."

Sean Philips answers 5 Questions at Newsarama:

"My style usually changes because of the demands of the story, but also I can't help but be continually influenced by everything I see, be it in comics or film or fine art. I'd hate to get to a point where I thought I'd learnt everything I needed to to make comics, and my work just stagnated. Nowadays, change is more gradual, but hopefully it will always be forthcoming. Most every morning it feels like I've forgotten how to draw overnight and will have to fake it again another day."

Michael Lark talks about leaving DC and signing with Marvel:

"[M]y attitude towards [Gotham] Central hasn't changed. I still think it's the best comic in the mainstream market today. But there just aren't a lot of people buying the book, and that put DC in a difficult position. We'd been discussing that for about a year, since I'd renewed my contract with them last November. They wanted me to stay on the book forever, I wanted to stay on the book forever, Ed, Greg, and Stefano wanted me to stay on the book forever. But the folks at DC felt they needed to make some changes in some areas, and long story short we all realized that I couldn't stay on the book. No one was happy about it, but it had to be done. Once I'd decided that I'd have to leave the book, I was free to explore other possibilities. Some were at DC, some were at Marvel, and some were with other publishers. But when all the options were weighed - creatively and financially - Marvel was clearly the way for me to go at this point in my career."

You know what? He sounds as happy - are you ready for this? - as a Lark! David "Never very happy" Lark, to be specific.

Found via Millarworld: fun with Lego. Includes Lego Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison and Alan Moore!

Announced at the Bendis board, but not at any of the news sites yet: Michael Lark exclusive at Marvel ("Michael Lark is, well, happy as a lark" says the press release) as is colorist Morry Hollowell.

Brian Michael Bendis announces what's going to happen with Powers vol. 2 issue 12, which will also be the 50th issue of the book overall:

"POWERS 12/ 50 will be double sized. it will have a regular story written by me and drawn by mike. starting a new story arc. it will feuture a back up written by oeming and drawn by me in torso/ jinx noir style. ( so kiss those hopes for pulse going monthly this year ) an all new exclusive retrospctive interview by our very own ernie pcs. a totally obnoxious letter column. two covers. one by oeming, one by me. no variant incentives. buy which ever you want. thank you for your help. this is for you guys. but you still have to buy it."

The fans are happy:

"wow bendis! your awesomeness awes me"

"Sounds fucking awesome...I would never usually, but for my favorite comic, I'll definitely buy two!"

"I'm so happy I'm dancing! Ok, in my mind. That's the only place I'm good at it anyway."

Slave Labor Graphics have a Christmas tree. For some reason, that makes me oddly happy:

"We really are about peace on earth and good will toward men here at SLG. Really. In that spirit, the Supreme Commander sponsored a tree for San Jose's Christmas in the Park doo-dah. Last Friday, the whole Vado family decorated the tree with SLG toys and ornaments that Michelle crafted. If you're a local loco, you can go see the SLG tree in the Plaza de Cesar Chavez on Market Street between San Carlos and San Fernando. If you're not so lucky as to live in or near the vibrant and beautiful city of San Jose (yeeeahhhh.), or if you're just another Californian sent into a shivering panic by the below-50-degrees-in-the-daytime-what-the-hell? weather you can go take a look at the pictures of the tree here."

Larry Young - Like Santa, but with a spacesuit instead of buttons made of coal (Or was that another of those things that my parents told me that no-one else was told? Scroll to the December 1st entry, anyway):

"It's that time of year, again, and everyone asks me what I want for the holidays. While I appreciate the sentiment, all I want for the holidays is for you to buy AiT/Planet Lar books and give them to your friends. Here at AiT/Planet Lar, our motto is 'Making Comics Better.' So if your mom needs a new garden hose or your dad is wanting an ink cartridge for his Parker Duofold International, you should probably get them one of those for a gift. But if the folks on your gift-list are readers, we have just the thing for holiday treats."

Thank God Newsarama are arguing about something important:

"I think most fans can agree that Marvel has oversaturated the market with Wolverine. He's a guest star in everyone's book, his own book and a member of the Avengers and X-Men. He's got offshoots (X23, Sabretooth) and spinoffs (Weapon X). They obviously think he's their best or at least most marketable commodity. Maybe he is. Why doesn't Marvel go ahead and take the big step and change their comics division's name to Wolverine Comics, under Marvel Enterprises. Really. That way Wolverine's name is upfront on every book and they won't really have to deny it."

"Yeah and DC should be called Batman and for another imprint Superman. God needless Marvel bashing what double standards some people have around here. And all you doubters are wrong about New Avengers sucking so choke on that Marvel bashers."

"the point is batman doesn't appear in 10 books.... wolverine does.... Superman doesn't appear in 10 books.... and of course Superman and Batman are still much more recognisable than wolverine by the majority of people in this country... and as a percentage superman and/Batman don't appear in as many comics as wolverine does per month..."

"Which 10 books is Wolverine in December? name ALL TEN"

"Ultimate Nightmare #5, Astonishing X-Men #8, Ultimate X-Men #54, X-Men/Fantastic Four, X-Men 165, Wolverine #23, Gambit #5, New Avengers #1, Uncanny #453, What If Magneto Had Formed X-Men [...] Those are just ones I know of."

"January Wolverine appearances. X-23 #1 (and 2 I assume, but we'll just count 1 for now.), Ultimate X-Men, Ultimate Spider-Man, Wolverine obviously, New Avengers, New Thunderbolts #4, New Invaders #6, Uncanny X-Men? (don't read this so I'm not sure if he's in it), X-Men #166, Astonishing X-Men, X-Men/Fantastic Four, Mystique #23 (he's on the cover anyway) [...] And X-Men Phoenix Endsong if he's in that too. I'm not sure. So that's 11 comics for sure in January, not including X-23 #2, Uncanny and Phoenix Endsong. 14 total if you include those."

"People need to quit their bitching. There is a double standard, and thats the bottom line. It just seems like people are bitching for the sake of bitching. Because its cool to bash Marvel. Wolverine has ALWAYS been overexposed. ALWAYS. But people loved him in the 90's. Now that the trend of Marvel bashing is at full steam, its cool to pick out the biggest thing and use it to bash... But its ok. I don't like Wolverine appearing in all these books, but that doesn't mean I have to bitch about it."

"i hate the dc bias man, it'd like watching fox news."

Mark Millar got locked out of his own message board. Really, it was only a matter of time:

"I'm locked out. It's like I lost my keys. I tried re-registering this morning and typing my code in, etc, but it just isn't happening? Is it because I've been having an affair with THESE boards [the Bendis board]?!?!?!"

The MW mods appear to explain:

"Mark, we had a huge database glitch. Accounts are set to be approved by administrator, that's why the re-registering wasn't inmediate. Edit: under which username did you try to re-register? Couldn't find any millar in the member list."

"The board voted and decided we could no longer risk you with any power. The board itself was scared that you would detonate it."

"What part of 'stick to the cover story' did you fail to understand?"

Thank God! Jesse Baker reaches the Joe Quesada board:

"Note to Joe Quesada, you made another big ass mistake. New Avengers #1 was kaka on a stick and combined with the unredeemable, stinking "How in the name of the unholy inferno that is *** could Marvel publish this utterly unredeemable garbage" waste of paper prove without a shadow of a doubt that you have essentially killed, rape, and skinned the corpse of the Avengers franchise for NO GOOD REASON WHATSOEVER....

"Seriously, you should have just told Bendis that if he wanted to write a team book with his personal lot of bottom-feeders (Cause Cage, Sentry, and freaking Jessica Drew are more well known that Scarlet Witch, Hawkeye, Vision) that you'd launch him an all new title or at the very least give him the 'Champions' name for said book and let the Avengers remain beyond your out of touch with reality and the needs of your readership grasph Joe. The fact remains, letting Bendis MURDER Vision, Ant Man, and Hawkeye and turn Wanda into a murderer (and not to mention FORGETTING to include a key plot point regarding Agatha not being a victim of Wanda's murder spree and forcing Tom Brevoort to scramble and cover his ass in that respect) was irresponsible and a stab in the eye to long-time Marvel fans that have put up with your other actions as Editor-In-Chief and of Brian Bendis being treated like a prize pig who can do no wrong and who everyone else is forced to ape his hack writing style that involves dragging out stories for 6-8 issues. And not to mention that Bendis's big story ideas; recycling the collective works of freaking John Byrne's Avengers run.

"If you want someone to bastardize John Byrne Joey, break down and bring Byrne back. Sure Byrne and Bendis are both worthless hacks, but at least Byrne, in his own deluded out of touch with reality way, CARES about the Avengers (which Bendis DOESN'T, and lied HIS BUTT off about being a huge ass fan of the Avengers before destroying the book, skinning the corpse, and dressing up his 'Secret Wars the Series' ongoing with the Avengers dead skin like he was freaking Leatherface).

"I'm done. I'm not buying ANY MORE of Bendis's fly-attracting defecations on what was once one of Marvel's top titles. And as for you Joe Quesada, you've lost ANY sympathy I might have had for you as EIC. You are a pathetic EIC, making your predecessor Bob Harras look like Mary Sunshine. And given that Bob Harras set the standard for Marvel Editors in Chiefs giving Marvel readers the old butt-ramming when it came to ruining their favorite titles, that says a lot...."

Obviously, the rest of the board doesn't quite know what to make of this:

"haha tell em why youre mad son! youre my new favorite poster/personal hero."

"Hooray for you! Now, tell me about your father."

"This is not newsarama Jesse, Posting under the influence of stupidity is not a good way to start"

Ed Brubaker talks about The Man Who Laughs at Newsarama:

"It's no secret that when this was originally contracted, Steve Dillon was the announced artist. And this was a story I came up with because it was going to be Steve's one time drawing Batman, most likely, and I wanted it to be something really special and significant, if that was going to be the case. So, I looked through all the reference I could find, and realized that this was a story that was never told, at least not since 1940. So I thought, in the post-Year One world, how could there be a cooler story than that first Joker/Batman meeting? ... As a writer, it's certainly a bit freeing to do an early years story like this, because you don't have to deal with all the extra characters and continuity. It feels fresher. And in Batman's case, this era was simpler -- him and Gordon and Alfred, and that was it. His mission was his whole life, and we get to see him learning how to be more effective here, and realizing that his world is changing - that his job is going to be a lot bigger than he imagined it would be."

The Joe Quesada board members post three things that everyone should know about comic books:

"1. There are a lot good comics out there that are not published by Marvel or DC.
2. There are lot of good comics out there that are not about superheroes.
3. You are most likely to find the comics you enjoy by following creators you like."

"1.- Comic books are the most faithful and inmediate mirror of the modern society.
2.- Comic books are literature, art and graphic design.
3.- Comic books are not for everyone. It requires a special sensibility to enjoy of them."

"1) Continuity is what makes comics great
2) Having good art doesn't make it a good comic (Google: Image Comics)
3) Batman is the greatest fictional character ever created. Just learn to accept it and live with it"

"1. DOCTOR
2. FREAKIN'
3. DOOM"

Newsarama reports on John Byrne's panel at Mid-Ohio con in a report that seems oddly biased ("John Byrne’s Q and A was both informative and entertaining, with the creator answering every question honestly and with as much passion as he puts into his work." Maybe this was written by a Byrne board regular?). It seems as if he didn't hold back, though:

"Never being one to shy away from controversy, Byrne went on to diagnose the biggest problem with the comic industry as an influx of prima donnas who can’t get past their own egos and get their work done on time."

You have to hope that the irony of John Byrne complaining about comic book prima donnas wasn't lost on the crowd present, don't you? Especially when you consider his response to whether he'd work for Marvel again: "I didn’t leave Marvel, Marvel left me and I presume that Marvel will come back someday."

Call me cynical, but this just seems like a company that'll be dead within two years:

"With the unfortunate demise of CrossGen, there was an opening for a publisher to create genre stories and an audience that was looking for them... Kandora wants to fill that need. And in doing so, we guarantee high-quality full color art, compelling stories, more pages on a monthly basis than any other publisher and all at a reasonable cover price. I think we’ll have something that everyone will want to read and I hope that the package will be attractive enough for readers to try."

Kandora launches with a "pirate fantasy tale that begins on the high seas of Earth during the Middle Ages but winds up on a strange world in which the waterways are filled with giant, dangerous sea monsters" called Barbarossa and The Lost Corsairs, launching in March, with a new title each month afterwards until June. Each title will be monthly, 32 pages of story, for $3.50. There's no mention of doing anything with trades, or outside of the direct market...

Man, when those Avengers disassemble, the fallout goes on forever, doesn't it...?:

"Working at Sprint for ten years and getting involved in an investigation into a flagrant ethics violation reinforced rules about corporate life that I already knew: Never criticize your superiors, unless you want to seek protection as a whistleblower. The criticism goes against the all-important corporate hierarchy and will cause the superiors to dislike you. That dislike will manifest itself in the future, in obvious and less-obvious ways. Given the involvement of Quesada and Buckley in the 'Avengers Disassembled' project and the hyping of it, disavowal of the published result may be undoable, simply because of the egos involved.

"Then there's the 'House of M' crossover planned for May (WIZARD #158). Marvel naturally sees that as a summer moneymaker; there would be pressure to do the crossover with Wanda as the reality-altering mutant threat, no matter how badly 'Avengers Disassembled' failed. To me, that's a potentially sorry example of marketing plans trumping artistic standards. If [Editor Tom] Brevoort could silence fan criticism with a few sentences pointing out how wonderfully the plot elements mesh and how readers are missing all-important details, there's no reason for him not to write those sentences, especially since, during his silence, Bendis has been acting like a gutter mouth in mounting an incoherent defense. Brevoort could render the public a service simply by getting Bendis to shut up.

"I obviously don't think Bendis should be writing NEW AVENGERS; given the continuity problems with 'Avengers Disassembled' and AVENGERS FINALE, I don't think Brevoort should be editing Marvel Heroes titles either. That opinion is based on their performance, nothing else--except for the reliance on a massive retcon as the central idea. People might not consider retconning a close cousin to plagiarism and/or unethical behavior, as I do, but the sheer scale of the retconning, and the *unnecessity* of the retconning to accomplish the goal of ending AVENGERS is a combination I find *extremely* offensive and is a major motivator in continuing to criticize 'Avengers Disassembled.' People who rely on such miserably uncreative devices for stories don't deserve, IMO, to be called creators or to be paid for foisting their stories on unwary consumers."

Millarworld looks for the "Ins and Outs of 2004". Of particular craziness:

"In - Millarworld [...] Out - CBS, NYT"

Best response?

"This french toast is delicious."

Newsarama tells you who is "hep" to hate:

"Chuck Austein? I've neve rbeen a fan of him, but i never read alot of his issues either, and apperiently everyone hates him. What makes him so shitty? I remember reading in Wizard he was pretty high up a few years ago from all his work. Now hes n00b?"

"uh oh. abandon all hope ye who enter here."

"Hey, hey hey!! We've been done with Ausin for a while now! Its over to Bendis bashing now! Austin is so out."

Heidi reports that Irwin Donenfeld, former publisher at DC, is dead.

The Bendis board asks the hard questions, gets sidetracked:

"ok, so i wanna know, who is the most over-rated hack in the comics industry? give me your feelings on this matter fellow fanboys!"

"KURT BUSIEK. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING REMARKABLE ABOUT ANYTHING HE WRITES. I DON'T KNOW WHAT 'FAVORS' HE DOING TO GET ALL THE BOOKS HE GETS, BUT MAN HE SUCKS ASS."

"Do you need to use all caps? Is that your 'thing'? It is a little annoying."

"YOUR ANNOYED BY THE FACT THAT MY CAP LOCK BUTTON IS ON. SOME PEOPLE ARE REALLY HIGH STRUNG. IF THAT IS ALL IT TAKES TO STRESS YOU OUT, I'D SUGGEST THAT YOU SEEK HELP."

Will Pfeiffer and Pete Woods take over Catwoman, come March. Pfeiffer explains his take on the book:

"The tone will be similar [to Ed Brubaker's run], at least for the time being... I think Catwoman works the best as an adventure book with some film noir touches thrown in here and there. As an over-the-top super-hero book, it's not really playing to its strengths. Selina and the characters she hangs around with - except for the guy in the bat suit - are more down-to-Earth and, for lack of a better term, normal, than the rest of the DC Universe. In some ways, I want to continue the tone I used in HERO - people trying to live normal lives in a very abnormal place. Naturally, there will be all sorts of reasons Selina can't/won't live a 'normal' life - otherwise, the book would get a little tedious: 'Page one, panel one: Selina sits in her cubicle at her data processing job, trying to remember if she put a cover sheet on her TPS report. Page one, panel two: Selina makes a cup of coffee...' Much, but not all, of the supporting cast will be sticking around. Selina's connection to Gotham's East End - and to people like Holly in particular - are a big part of what defines her as a character for me. Removing those elements from her life would change things pretty drastically, and for no good reason. That's not saying I won't be turning her entire life upside down now and then..."

Ahhh, Blogger returns. Let's use it while it's still working, shall we?

Frank Tieri does the "I won, you ungrateful bastards, I won" dance as Weapon X gets a reprieve:

"You know, when I first started this whole campaign to save the book, there were plenty of “geniuses” out there more than willing to offer their ever-so valuable opinions – the gist of it being this was all just a grand waste of my time. And of course, as is often the case in this business, it was proven that those people never know what the #$%& they’re talking about. In fact, part of the reason for this interview is to laugh in their collective faces. Ready? BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…. God, I enjoyed that."