I Stand Corrected: Here is the San Diego Comic-Con COMICS News

I wrote on the site's Twitter account last night:

LongandShortbox LongandShortbox.com

The #comics news from #SDCC this year was more like a lack of news. Non-news? Nobody's talking much. ~ @JonGorga

13 hours ago

I stand by the third sentiment, i.e. nobody's talking about any of San Diego's announcements. And a great deal of the announcements that were made really were about video games, movies, and television adapted from comics, and had very little to do with Comics. The only thing I hear about again and again is DC's (@DC_NATION) complete loss of the opportunity to salve fears over their relaunching of 52 series at the end of this month, which Josh (@IamJoshKopin) and I have already spoken a great deal about here, here, here, here, and here.

Marvel (@Marvel), Image (@imagecomics), and IDW (@IDWPublishing) were the only companies with new COMICS news at the San Diego Comic-Con this year.

The few small announcements:

+ Brian K. Vaughan is returning to monthly comics with his first series at Image, called "Saga".

[via CosmicBookNews.com]

+ IDW is bringing back the character The Crow in a new series and complementing it with a series of reprint collections.

[via @Robot6]

+ Marvel and J. Michael Straczynski (@straczynski) will finally be completing "The Twelve" after a hiatus of roughly two years. Some covers are already drawn by the awesome Paolo Rivera (@PaoloMRivera)! This is a long, long time coming.

[via @iFanboy]

+ Josh already posted on the site about Marvel's "Avengers: Origins" series of one-shots giving us new takes on several characters' inceptions here.

Thorough description from Marvel here.

[via @Marvel.com]

+ Marvel has also given us a run-down of their "Fear Itself" aftermath series: "The Fearless", "Battle Scars", and "Shattered Heroes". Superhero characters dealing with death and loss in the wake of the war-like events of "Fear Itself".

"Battle Scars" especially sounds pretty exciting to me because it's being written by "The Sixth Gun" co-creator Cullen Bunn (@cullenbunn)!

[via @Marvel.com]

+ But the most exciting? Marvel intends to counter DC's wildly successful "Earth One" series of graphic novels with a line of GNs called "Season One"!

I covered, in detail, the stages of development and release for "Superman: Earth One" and I will do my best to offer comparable coverage to Marvel.

"Spider-Man: Season One" [preliminary art from which is to the left] will also be written by Cullen Bunn (@cullenbunn). This man is going places. Hell, I'd almost go so far as to say he's arrived.

Surprisingly, unlike DC's original graphic novel line, these stories will attempt to 'play nice' with established continuity. The goal being a shelf-full of fully-fleshed-out book-length comics that lead-into the comic-books on Marvel's New This Week racks. Ambitious. Impossible? Pointless? We'll see.

More original graphic novels giving the characters I love 'feature-length' sequential art stories makes me very happy so, no matter the continuity, I'm looking forward to giving these comics a read.

[via @iFanboy]

And DC had... no news other than the release of some of the costume designs for a few of the relaunching/re-booting characters. This lends credence to the rumor bouncing around that DC rushed to announce their big plans because Rich Johnston (@richjohnston) of BleedingCool.com was going to beat them to their own story. That's the game folks. But if it's true that the company making the boldest move in comics in a decade is playing catch-up? Heaven help us all.

~ @JonGorga

P.S. ~ Side note: It appears Jeph Loeb and the new MARVEL TV division I announced the creation of back in July of 2o1o does still exist and has actually been hard at work on pushing through some new stuff. At least enough to merit a panel talking about it at the big show as iFanboy posted here. Jessica Jones getting her own live-action TV show? And a new live-action Hulk? Cool.

"Brunette reading a comic on the L train - m4w" - Craiglist NYC

Found in Craigslist's Missed Connections this past week:

"As the title says: you were a short haired brunette (with glasses!) reading a comic on the L train heading to Brooklyn on Wednesday. We both got on at 8th ave, and I sat next to you, with the pole in between us. You were reading some DC Comics. I think I've seen you before on the shuttle bus, but I'm not sure.

I got off at Myrtle-Wyckoff, you remained on the train.

I was the short haired hispanic guy in a grey shirt/black tie with a bookbag. I fell asleep a couple of times on that ride, I remember apologizing because I think I bumped into you.

If you remember and are interested, I'd like to take you out for a drink sometime.

- V"

Wednesday. New comic-book day. The week Comic-Con is happening out in San Diego? A day of passion.

I had two house-guests recently. Both are good, clean, comics-reading folk; one from Portland, OR the other from the Boston, MA area. I told them that, truly, the thing that I love most about New York City, and the main reason I never intend to return to the Boston area, is that there's comics culture in the fabric of the society itself here. It's more than just conversation about comics in a populace with a larger percentage of comics-readers, it's an energy and feeling, a zeitgeist, that's created by all that conversation and partially by the comics stores every ten blocks in Midtown Manhattan, but mainly by the history in this great city.

Will Eisner. Jack Kirby. Stan Lee. Harvey Kurtzman. They all grew up here. Eisner in the South Bronx. Kirby in the Lower East Side. Kurtzman in Brooklyn. Lee in Washington Heights. This is where Marvel Comics was once Timely Comics and DC Comics was once National Periodicals and where they both still hold offices today. Comics culture and history is thick on the sidewalks of New York City.


I was just talking with comics writer and sometime artist Brendan McGinley (@brendanmcginley) Tuesday night at the bar in the People's Improv Theater (@thePIT). The weekly Comic Book Club show (@comicbooklive) was long over and we were talking about the neighborhoods of New York. I mentioned that I used to live in Washington Heights and he mentioned that he used to date a girl living there. We both experienced the neighborhood's change. I see it even more clearly after moving away a year ago and coming back to visit. Starbucks. Vegetarian cafes. Fancy restaurants. But it used to be the home of Smilin' Stan!

(There's an experience all by itself. Imagine realizing you'd been living in the neighborhood that birthed your childhood hero on your last week before moving out.)

Brendan said there's a high school that churned out comics guy after comics guy in the Thirties. DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx just happened to be in a thickly Jewish neighborhood at the height of the depression when imaginations seem to have been on overdrive. Lee, Eisner, Batman's co-creators Bob Kane and Bill Finger, and the co-creator of "Casper: The Friendly Ghost" Seymour Reit are among its graduates. [Read a bit more about that here.]

I suspect the only other place that feels this way at all is Cleveland. The birthplace of Superman's creators Siegel and Shuster as well as the home of the late great underground autobiographical comics writer Harvey Pekar. The two trailblazing, trend-setting pillars of the two main expressions of the medium in America from one Mid-Western city.

Josh and I both grew-up in suburban environments, what an old girlfriend of mine used to call the land of 'white bread' people. We didn't grow up with this and it's almost intoxicating to me. A tiny bit like being in a comics convention going on in secret all around you at all times. Sit down in a park, you might strike up a conversation with someone about Craig Thompson's "Blankets". Get on the subway, you could sit down next to someone reading the latest issue of "Wolverine". Drop by some small cafe in Brooklyn and you will find comics from local indie creators amid the free pile of small-press newspapers and magazines.

It's easy to get spoiled by it. But it does make me less jealous of the people who went to San Diego last week. I'll take New York over California any day of the year.

~ @JonGorga


P.S. ~
I covered a very cool event last year about comics that capture this adopted home of mine and the write-up is here.

These Avengers Origins One Shots Are Pretty Silly

Something like half the characters featured are dead or otherwise wrapped up in some serious continuity bullshit and none of them except Thor are in the movie; what's going on here? Still, this cover for the Vision one is pretty cool and the one for Ant Man & Wasp is alright. I wish Marvel would tell us who did them, though. Also, does Villains for Hire mean they are canceling Heroes for Hire? because I hope not. (via Rich)

The Symbol Becomes Her

"SIGIL" v2 #1 from CrossGen (a [newly acquired] imprint of Marvel Comics)

The weekly sea of the new comics rack had a very few covers that jumped out at me three weeks ago. Really only one grabbed my attention: a gorgeous fully-painted illustration by Jelena Durdjevic [at right] displaying a woman with striking red hair mysteriously focused away from her face and cleavage (a road not too often taken in American mainstream comic-books and thus very welcome). The woman’s face is obscured by the logo from the series’ original run, spruced-up a bit by the new publisher’s in-house production team.

The comic is “SIGIL” #1, a continuation of a comic-book printed between 2000 and 2003 by CrossGen Entertainment. It appears to have been a science-fiction title then, and it’s… an interesting mix now. Usually when one reviews something in a series, it’s bad form to admit some unfamiliarity with the history of the material being reviewed. I am new to this series. But then, so is the publisher. Marvel announced plans to re-activate the property among the other CrossGen titles last year. Turns out: Disney has owned the rights for years, Marvel is now an official arm of Disney, rights are shared, ergo Marvel may print CrossGen comics. It was one of the announcements of San Diego Comic-Con 2010.

Comics companies buying up old properties after their original publishing house have gone to the great beyond and adding these characters to their repertoire is a long-standing tradition in American comics industry. DC bought the characters from Fawcett Comics in 1980 (many, many years after a protracted court case in which DC sued Fawcett claiming their Captain Marvel was too similar to Superman), the entire small universe of characters at Charlton Comics became theirs to play with in 1985 (on whom the “Watchmen” characters are based), WildStorm Productions became an imprint of DC Comics in 1999 and its properties were declared an informal part of DC’s fictional universe last year (making one of the more sad but expected news items of last year: the end of WildStorm), and, most recently in 2008-2010, Milestone Media, whose comics were always distributed by DC, are now also published exclusively by them.

The previous year, the big news of San Diego Comic-Con 2009 was Marvel’s purchasing of the rights to the character Miracleman/Marvelman, a property so tied-up in litigation new stories haven’t been told with the character since the late Eighties. That instance was only the second time, to this writer’s knowledge, Marvel Entertainment has engaged in this practice. The first being Malibu Graphics in 1994, reportedly purchased not so much for their characters as for their digital coloring department. Disney’s money now runs through their veins and makes them capable of such things just as Warner Brothers money does for DC. It’s all about jockeying for new material with minimal effort and hoping to grab established fanbases combined with a corporate big-fish-eat-small-fish mentality.

But enough history; on to the comic itself. I have to first say: “SIGIL“ #1 is not the best thing I’ve read so far this year. But it also has many fine elements to recommend it.

New writer of “SIGIL”, Mike Carey gives us a story that works as an introduction for new readers (such as myself) but also seems to continue the story from the original run. Our main character Samantha Rey, knows nothing about the unusual magic happenings that bring her to a pirate ship in the year 1695 because she is too young to remember the events that will happen in her future. The one negative thing I am forced to say about the narrative is that it really lacks subtlety. However, Sam’s dialogue is shockingly naturalistic! She sounds like people I know. Read some of this dialogue:
Leonard Kirk’s pencil art shows strong storytelling choices, though with some uneven draftsmanship. Some very fine page layouts serve the story well. [See above again.] The draftsmanship issues might be the fault of the inker Ed Tadeo. (Comics in America are most often produced with two artists: a penciler who create shapes with a pencil, whose lines are then layered-over by an inker to create emphasis and depth.) No way to tell without process materials or inside-information.

Seriously though? This comic was FUN. Hard to do these days it seems. The issue ends on a great cliffhanger… in two ways. (1) The reader is left not knowing how Sam will survive this epic sea-battle aboard the El Cazador in 1695. Evil pirates, old friends of a future version of herself that she certainly don’t know. The ending splash revealing the villain of the piece descending on them from the sky is just marvelous. And (2) we the readers also can’t know if “SIGIL”, or all the other CrossGen properties that have been sitting in limbo for almost a decade, will survive this recession publishing market!

Only time will tell.

~@JonGorga

2o1o in a Shortbox: The Best of the Year

The Oscars were last night, so here's the best comics I read last year. Pretty simple.

The deal is: To qualify, a work must be comics and must have become publicly available in its entirety, in English, and for the first time, either in print or on the web, between 1/1/1o and 12/31/1o. The selections are presented by category, but not in any ascending or descending order.

BEST GRAPHIC NOVELS
"Superman: Earth One"
written by J. Michael Straczynski(@straczynski); drawn by Shane Davis
Like a Hollywood action movie, the first of the "Earth One" graphic novels delivered on action, excitement, and most importantly: gravitas. A 'superhero in the real-world' story for the first half and a classic, smart, grandiose superhero/supervillain battle for the second half with strong character work throughout.

"To Teach: The Journey, in Comics"
drawn by Ryan Alexander-Tanner (@ohyesverynice); adapted from a prose-book by Bill Ayers(@BillAyers)
A documentary-comic, Alexander-Tanner deftly cartoon-ed his way through Ayers' theories about education to clear, informative, humorous, and, occasionally, thrilling effect! Truly it is a work that any aspiring teacher should read. Quite a few healthy life lessons in general are spelled out on its pages.

"Ghostopolis"
written and drawn by Doug TenNapel (@TenNapel)
If "Earth One" is the 'action flick' and "To Teach" the 'documentary,' this is the 'animated movie'. A fully-realized world of familiar archetypal Halloween characters used and combined in unexpected ways, portrayed with fine cartooning and lush coloring. Some pages are laugh-out-loud funny (although some jokes are childish 'potty' humor), while other pages are truly moving. The words AND the pictures are moving, both in concert and separately. (I don't play the numbers game, I list no 'number 1' graphic novel here, but if I did...)


BEST GRAPHIC NOVELLAS (under 100 pages)
"Serenity: The Shepherd's Tale"
written by Zack Whedon(@ZDubDub); drawn by Chris Samnee(@ChrisSamnee)
Truly beautiful and truly unique is this 'life flashing before his eyes' sketch of the television/film/comics character Shepherd Book. The overlapping phrases and motifs that run through the life of the main character serve as bullet-points by which the reader is allowed to drop into further and further back stages of Derrial Book's life.

"Pterodactyl Hunters in the Gilded City"
written and drawn by Brendan Leach (@iknowashortcut)
Sharp drawing and even sharper writing makes this strange comic an exciting and engrossing reading experience. Brotherhood and the passing from one era into another are its themes, the ink-lines combined with ink-washes make for a glowing, bleary, period-accurate feeling. Not to be over-looked is the awesome faux-newspaper-front-page that makes the comic's cover.

"Falling for Lionheart"
written and drawn by Ilias Kyriazis (@IliasKyriazis)
The 'indie- film' comic for the year. (Okay, that analogy's done with now, I promise) Emotional, but with action, sex, and humor; alternative lifestyles are presented as well as mainstream ones; comics is depicted as a medium capable of expressing emotion within the narrative, "Falling for Lionheart" is among the finest graphic novellas I have ever read. And furthermore, it uses different visual art styles to VERY smart narrative effect.

"Portrait of the Cartoonist as a Woman" on NarrativeMagazine.com

written and drawn by Liza Donnelly (@lizadonnelly)

Human and honest, like the best memoir comics are, these 32 pages speak volumes about childhood, womanhood, body issues, sexism, motherhood, and creative energy. The inherent sweetness of the small moments ("I was launched as a cartoonist. ... And most importantly, I made my mother laugh.") support a sense of life and narrative.

BEST MINI-SERIES
"Bullseye: Perfect Game" #1 and #2
written by Charlie Huston(@CharlieHuston); drawn by Shawn Martinbrough
This clever short series tells of murder on the baseball diamond. A certain supervillain-assassin masquerading as a home-town baseball player to carry out a hit. A big baseball fan solves the murder and narrates the story to the reader while walking around an apartment. Only at the last page, does the POV shift and we see that the baseball fan has been talking to a certain superhero.

"Phantom: Unmasked" #1 and #2
written by Martin Powell; drawn by Hannibal King
Again, this series' strength lay in a unique POV: the sultry, intelligent, hard-as-nails, lady private investigator Laughton Brice hired to find The Phantom, through which we see 'The Ghost Who Walks' anew! (The character of The Phantom has been around since 1936.) The Ghost Who Walks never even makes a clear physical appearance until more than halfway through the first issue, only shadows and stories. And, to boot, the courageous choice a character makes in the second issue tops it off nicely.

Seriously, these are both worth checking out and only two issues-long. Ask your retailer for where you might find them. I have little doubt most American retailers didn't sell many of these two series AT ALL.

(LATE ADDITION)

BEST STORY-ARC IN AN ONGOING SERIES

"Metal" from "Northlanders" #30, #31, #32, #33, and #34

written by Brian Wood(@brianwood); drawn by Riccardo Burchielli

One of the best stories of any medium was told last year in Brian Wood's series "Northlanders". Cross-cultural viking-era action/romance. Unique, smart, and cool.

BEST INDIVIDUAL ISSUES (either from a mini or ongoing series)
"41" from "Daytripper" #4
written and drawn by Fabio Moon(@fabiomoon) and Gabriel Bá(@Gabriel_Ba)
A tremendously emotionally affecting chapter in the haunting life of Bras, the main character of the series by those talented brother comicsmiths: Moon and Bá. The loss of a father, the birth of a son, and the moment in life at which a precarious level of security-like adulthood is attained... then swept away like all the others.

"M.I.A." Parts 1, 2, and 4 from "DMZ" #51, #52, and #54
written by Brian Wood(@brianwood); drawn by Riccardo Burchielli
Matty Roth, the main character of Wood's long-running futuristic love-letter to NYC, makes some achingly hard decisions to regain his lost honor. LOOK at that cover on the last issue of the arc!

"Collective Punishment" one of five: "five hours under fire" from "DMZ" #55
written by Brian Wood(@brianwood); drawn by Andrea Mutti

A shocking, smart, compact story about the horrors of war, both the ones perpetrated on human bodies and those perpetrated on human minds.

"Collective Punishment" four of five: "A Decade on the Wall" from "DMZ" #58

written by Brian Wood(@brianwood); drawn by Danijel Zezelj
A harrowing and beautiful issue narrated by the first "DMZ" character I ever encountered: the graffiti artist known as Decade Later. After imprisonment, during which he wasn't allowed to draw, this man creates a graffiti autobiography in the ruins of a New York City art gallery. Incredible.

"Electric Ant" #1 and #3
adapted from a Philip K. Dick prose novel by David Mack(@davidmackkabuki); drawn by Pascal Alixe
Crazy mind-altering sex between a self-aware organic-robot and a human... or is she? Visually stunning color and shape choices are made to represent Dick's psychedelic verbiage. Very cool.

"The Sixth Gun" #1, #2, #3, and #6
written by Cullen Bunn(@cullenbunn); drawn by Brian Hurtt
Fun, striking, exciting, funny, and unique all describe this new ongoing series. The most wonderful sound effects melt into the artwork in wonderful ways. The scope is huge, while the human-scale dangers never feel lost. The first arc's conclusion in issue #6 is perhaps the best: mostly double-page spread layouts.

"Never Say Die" from "The Shield" #10
written by Eric S. Trautmann(@mercuryeric); drawn by Marco Rudy
The surprise delight of my year. I received this issue in a pile of free comics. The superhero concept at the core of this series (American soldier is gifted with abilities by the government to better serve) is a very, very old one to which nothing new is brought here, but the characterization seems more genuine than most. The winning element is Rudy's storytelling panel layouts, which are the best I have seen since those of the supremely talented Steve Rude or J. H. Williams III.

"the brave and the bold." from "Superman/Batman" #76

written by Judd Winick; drawn by Marco Rudy

In fact, I shouldn't have been surprised by Rudy's skills as he had already shown me what he can do. More wonderful page compositions here. Judd Winick brings emotional gravitas to Superman's reaction to Bruce Wayne's death. It was also a wonderful compliment to this Batman issue...

"Batman's Last Case" from "Batman" #702
written by Grant Morrison; drawn by Tony Daniel
Despite the fact that this issue makes no sense without the context of a mini-series from two years ago ("Final Crisis") it does an excellent job of gifting that mini-series retroactively with more sense. Most specifically and remarkably it explains Batman's actions and makes them emotionally powerful: "I survived an encounter with something bigger than me".

"Grounded" Part One from "Superman" #701
written by J. Michael Straczynski(@straczynski); drawn by Eddy Barrows
Any story in which Superman is put into realistic morally complicated situations is usually interesting. Stories in which Superman is put into realistic morally complicated situations and finds a way to triumph are usually going to get me. A single issue that does that over-and-over again was guaranteed to win me over.

"Night Gods" from "The Brave and the Bold" #32
written by J. Michael Straczynski(@straczynski); drawn by Jesus Saiz
This Cthulu-inspired, genuinely scary comic, stars Etrigon the Demon and... Aquaman. Aquaman does a series of bad-ass things and Straczynski put in the effort to write all of Etrigon's dialogue in rhyming verse. All good things.

"Ladies' Night" from "The Brave and the Bold" #33

written by J. Michael Straczynski(@straczynski); drawn by Cliff Chiang(@cliffchiang)
A return to the moment-in-time just before a young heroine's defining tragedy laid out in sharp relief. Just beautiful.

"A Batman's Work is Never Done!" from "Batman: The Brave and the Bold" #17
credited as written by Sholly Fisch; drawn by Robert W. Pope
Kids' comic: Batman has a busy week. Calls his friends. Hijinks ensue.

BEST SHORTS (under 22 pages)
"Comic-Converts" on Jillian Tamaki's Sketch Blog

written and drawn by Jillian Tamaki (@dirtbagg)

It's a diary entry, a comics news report, a food review, a showcasing of friendly faces, and an ethnographic statement all at once. The mix of geek/indie, human/inhuman, private/public elements in this comic about SDCC really shows how much a comics convention can be and how much a comic can show.

"Culture POP" #14 "The Aerialist" on ACT-I-VATE.com

reportage and photography by Seth Kushner (@sethkushner)

The way Kushner laid-out photographs here to bring the reader through a narrative while maintaining the beauty of the photographs themselves is nothing short of remarkable.

"Acidopolous" number one

written and drawn by Nathan Bulmer (@natemorebikes)

A fun, trippy little mini-comic. Reality melts into a world of cartoony horror for one acid-tripping punk rocker. The first chunk can be read here.

BEST STRIPS (one page each)
"Angel" in OVERFLOW Magazine #6, Summer 2o1o; and on ACT-I-VATE .com here!
written and drawn by Dean Haspiel
Hapiel's work always feels RIGHT to me, but rarely so much as when the main figure of this double-page comic falls-- no SLAMS-- into the ground and the textbox reads: "I'll miss you." A pseudo-Kirby, action-representation of emotion in line and color, this may be his best work to date. (Again, I don't make this a numbers game. But if I did...)

"Flying Restrictions 1" and "Flying Restrictions 3" (The Adventures of The Man Who Can Only Fly When He's Sad) on cowbirdsinlove.com

written and drawn by Sanjay Kulkarni (@cowbirdsinlove)

I especially like 3 because it is positive and beautiful in its resolution, but 1 serves as excellent set-up. 2 left me cold by comparison. Doesn't really need to be there.

"The Tell-Tale Beat" on XKCD.com
written and drawn by Randall Munroe

A hilarious piece that reminds us that yes Randall Munroe can, in fact, draw.

"Porn For Women" on XKCD.com
written and drawn by Randall Munroe

Honesty = excellence. And, in this case, hilarity.

"Spirit" on XKCD.com

written and drawn by Randall Munroe

Oh god! I can imagine few things as simultaneously funny and horrifyingly sad. Except maybe the next webcomic:

"SuperMutant Magic Academy: Wufflefluff" on Jillian Tamaki's Sketch Blog

written and drawn by Jillian Tamaki (@dirtbagg)

Creepy, sad, but so true.

"SuperMutant Magic Academy: Pickles" on Jillian Tamaki's Sketch Blog

written and drawn by Jillian Tamaki (@dirtbagg)

Funny but also sort of sad, and feels right to me somehow.

"Domestic Men of Mystery" on JillianTamaki.com

written and drawn by Jillian Tamaki (@dirtbagg)

Father's Day, indie-webcomics style. This one is really beautiful and sad and happy and I can imagine few better ways to go out for 2o1o.

~ @JonGorga

P.S. ~

Comics that very well might have made it had I bought/read them in entirety:

"The Playwright"

"Jonah Hex: No Way Back"

"Revolver"

"Smile"
"Stigmata" (in translation)

"Artichoke Tales"

"Return of the Dapper Men"

"Special Exits"

(Truly, this one is in need of more attention. Amazing.)

"Market Day"

"Foiled"

The market for graphic novels either swung wide, wide open this past year, or I just never noticed the volume already coming out. They also take a lot longer to read...

I Hate It When This Happens

Solicited by Marvel earlier today:

CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIGHTING AVENGER #1
Written by BRIAN CLEVINGER
Pencils by GURIHIRU
Covers by GURIHIRU & BARRY KITSON
Captain America’s Day One!
He’s got the strength. He’s got the training. But has he got what it takes? A ragtag Special Forces unit takes Captain America on his first mission of World War II. Their orders? Don’t get him killed! But when the low-profile assignment draws the attention of Baron Strucker, the future Red Skull and half the Nazi army, it’ll be a crash course in super heroics for Marvel’s first Avenger!
48 PGS. /One-Shot/Rated A …$3.99

Y'all may or may not remember, but way back during SDCC '10, in July, this was announced as an ongoing, to premiere in January. I wondered where it was, and now I know: it's a one shot, coming out in April. My feeling at the time was that it was going to be a similar quality as the sadly canceled Thor: The Mighty Avenger and my feeling now is that the cancellation of that book probably has something to do with the minimizing of this one. It's too bad, too- I still love Gurihiru's design for Captain America.

Spider-Man's Brand New Day: Three Years Too Much?

This Christmas would be the three year anniversary of the blackest, hardest piece of coal Spider-Man fans ever found in their stockings. Many of our readers may not know what the big hullabaloo is around the just completed period of Spider-Man comics called "Brand New Day". So here is a quick rundown:

On December 28th of 2oo7 "Amazing Spider-Man" took a strange turn with "Amazing Spider-Man" #545, an issue concluding a story called "One More Day" which has become one of the most widely disliked of the decade. Spider-Man and Mary Jane's marriage of 1987 was deleted. No, not annulled. The Pope was not involved. No, it was not a divorce. There were no legal proceedings. The marriage and, without explanation, the death of supporting character Harry Osborn, the destruction of the Parker home in Queens, and Spider-Man's "Civil War" unmasking were simply deleted, either from the characters' memory, history, or both. Or were they?

Long-time fans (among whom I count myself) felt understandably confused and somewhat betrayed. The truth is long-term serial fiction requires house-cleaning from time to time. I always try to think: 'Just show me in your story that you put serious thought into how your story works even if it is just a device to change an old story and/or set-up a new one.' It appeared as if the mastermind of this story, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada (@JoeQuesada), hadn't done that. The details of the situation are complicated and don't particularly make anyone involved look good. But what followed over the next two years, depending on your point-of-view, was either a masterfully-laid slow-burn reveal of what "Brand New Day" always really was: a new Spider-Man status quo or a massively convoluted backpedaling away from an attempt at giving Spider-Man a remaking. There is a difference between the two, more on that later. First, quick as I can, a run-down of the little clarifications that came down the path during "Brand New Day":

Stephen Wacker (@StephenWacker) was made the new "ASM" editor and the first issue taking place in the new status quo (the new continuity) (or whatever it is) was "Amazing Spider-Man" #546. The dialogue in the issue made it clear that six months had passed since the last public sighting of Spider-Man. Strange, but it opened many doors. It was revealed in "Amazing Spider-Man" #569 that Peter could remember a time when at least some people did know his secret identity as the superhero Spider-Man. It was 'ret-conned' through flashback and explanations in "Amazing Spider-Man" #581 that Harry Osborn had never, in fact, died at all. In the same issue we learned that the Parker house had been rebuilt as a good-will present from Harry upon his return from hiding. (Note that, although strange, these changes are organic.) In "Amazing Spider-Man" #591 it was revealed that Spider-Man had succeeded in creating a 'global mindwipe' of the knowledge of his secret identity. "Amazing Spider-Man" #601 revealed that Mary Jane remembers that Peter Parker is Spider-Man.

Why does that all matter? It means that there is still a single story thread, as convoluted as it may be. A status change as opposed to a re-boot. It seems that Marvel (E.i.C. Quesada, Spider-Man editor Stephen Wacker, and the multiple rotating "ASM" writers) after giving the string of this nearly 50-year ongoing story a swift snap, then applied band-aids, electrical tape, gum and elbow grease to reconnect it. Who really knows whether or not this was the plan all along. I have very little inside information to go on. It worked well-enough compared to the catastrophe it could have been. For me, it was like a murder mystery where the victim was continuity and instead of 'Who killed it?' the question was 'How dead is it really?'

So a lot of the B.S. has been explained. Mind you, they are still goddamn stuck on the marriage never having occurred. Which is... well, bullshit. Sorry Marvel Entertainment. Sorry to Joe Quesada and Stephen Wacker and every writer and artist, colorist, and letterer who's worked on "The Amazing Spider-Man" from "One More Day" to the present, but regardless of the quality you bring to everything around it, it just doesn't stand because it doesn't make sense.

And at first the whole thing was not only tactless but didn't make up for it with real quality. The early "Brand New Day" stories were fairly mediocre. Mind you, those first creators were in a damned-if-they-do-and-damned-if-they-don't situation in regard to... everything. There was a tone of experimentation. Things got better in fits and starts and eventually the 'Web-Heads,' as the rotating creative teams were nicknamed, turned out some fantastic stories. Some of the better Spider-Man stories of the decade. And that is the real tragedy here, that as a commenter my opinions about the quality of these stories is only a small part of an editorial about them.

Let's talk about a few of those stories: "Unscheduled Stop" from "the Amazing Spider-Man" #578-#579. The Shocker is hired as a hitman and we meet J. Jonah Jameson's father! This delightful story brought me tentatively back on-board. "Red-Headed Stranger" from #601-#605. Chilling one-moment, hilarious the next. "Grim Hunt" from #634-#637. Badass. "The Last Stand of the Rhino" from #617 & #625 The Rhino finds his humanity, goes straight, starts a family, gets screwed, becomes a criminal again. "Keemia's Castle" from #615-#616. Heart-breaking, both. Those were just my favorites.

We did, unquestionably, get some great stories out of the "Brand New Day" period.

Finally, the story "One Moment in Time" (ostensibly a direct sequel to "One More Day" and essentially bookending the "Brand New" era) in issues #638 to #641 finally handled the secret identity problem, the 'global mindwipe' and did so in an emotionally satisfying, if convoluted, way. However, it also showed through flashback an almost-entirely alternate version of the story from the 1987 "The Amazing Spider-Man Annual" #21 wherein Peter Parker and Mary Jane got hitched. Is that wrong? No, I suppose it's not. But it's a rather unpleasant experience. Mephisto (read: the Devil) 'bought' their marriage from reality in exchange for Aunt May's continued health in "Amazing" #545, the end of "One More Day". And apparently that's the way things are going to stay. Marvel Entertainment just won't let that one go.

In the latter quarter of last year this ad began running in Marvel's comics:
That in addition to the covers (especially of issue #639, above) they released? False hopes were all Marvel gave us. Intentional little tricks to drive sales or innocently honest presentations of the story? Just because Mary Jane is in a wedding dress, it doesn't have to be a story of reunion, apparently. Who knows?

At San Diego Comic-Con in July it was announced that the tag-team style writing would be dropped, Dan Slott (@DanSlott) would be the new solo writer and that "Brand New Day" will end with a story titled "Origin of the Species" in issues #642-#646 with a single coda issue (#647) which will serve as a bridge to "Big Time", slated to arrive this Wednesday November 10th in "Amazing" #648. With "Origin of the Species", "Brand New Day" goes out as it went in: exciting, but confusing and just above average.

I felt that the Long and Shortbox Of It! should have something definitive on the record about this strange period of Spider-Man history as it passes, but "Brand New Day" makes little sense to me as a marketing idea or as a story element. If it is supposed to be a quality part of the ongoing story of Spider-Man that works in and of itself why does it need to take such pains to create a situation that doesn't naturally follow from the previous story? If it is a story existing purely to create a more 'marketable' Spider-Man, why make "The Amazing Spider-Man" less unique and more like the single teenage Spider-Man as seen in "Marvel Adventures Spider-Man", "Ultimate Spider-Man" and the Spider-Man films? Is a married Spider-Man really unrecognizable? Brand strengthening or character diluting? I don't have easy answers.

What will be the legacy of Spider-Man's "Brand New Day"? Well in one sense that stands to be seen in the choices Dan Slott and his editors will make in Spider-Man: "Big Time" but in one way it's not done yet: Mary Jane Watson still goes by her maiden name. The history of mainstream superhero comics is no different from other long-term serial fiction. The creators stretch the rubber band as far as they can and then let it come back. "Brand New Day" has epitomized this.

Whether intentional or not, much of what was so shocking in "Amazing" #545, like Harry's apparent unexplained return from the grave, have been turned into mere twists and flashbacks. The series' status change gave way to a normalizing force. Things aren't exactly as they were but they make sense.

Except for one little marriage certificate.

Oh well. Maybe next year.

~ @JonGorga

San Diego 2o1o Final News Round-Up!

So it's been over a week since the end of the San Diego Comic-Con but there were a few things Josh didn't cover in his previous post and that I think should be talked about. They are laid out below:

-"Concrete", Paul Chadwick's unique man-trapped-in-the-body-of-a-monster character returns after an absence of about five years! The unfortunate professor, the gal pal, the assistant (all of whom I cannot remember the names of, but fondly remember the existence of) will return with the series that was one of Dark Horse's first critical successes. The related and almost equally cool announcement is that Chadwick's characters will return in "Dark Horse Presents", the company's original anthology comic which is itself returning to a printed page existence (after several years in webcomics form as MySpace Dark Horse Presents) sometime soon!

-"Kirby: Genesis" is the (I hope, tentative) title of an unusual project from Dynamite Entertainment bringing old Jack Kirby characters and concepts (some of them long since lost from the public eye) back in what will probably be a comic-book mini-series written by Kurt Busiek, designed by Alex Ross, and drawn by some artists yet to be announced. As you may have gathered, the details are fuzzy.

-Although I'd be lying if I said it excited me personally, John Byrne's "Next Men" will be returning with IDW Publishing in December 2o1o after disappearing from shelves, on a cliffhanger ending, for fifteen years!

-"Ultimate Doom" will complete Marvel's trilogy of minis started with "Ultimate Enemy" years ago. They seem to be making a concerted effort to not reveal the 'ultimate' enemy but... they've titled the final mini "Ultimate DOOM". If you're any kind of fan of Marvel Comics I think you know who this'll be.

-I suspect this will mean nothing to many of our readers but: Marvel has acquired CrossGen's old characters. It probably wasn't too hard since Disney bought them years ago and then bought Marvel late last year, putting them both in the same 'house' so to speak. Now Josh mentioned in his post that "it can't be every year that Marvel buys Marvelman and promptly does nothing of note with the property" but in a way we do have a very similar announcement here. Marvel now owns a cadre of little known, but in some cases well-loved, series: "Sigil", "Scion", "Ruse", "Way of the Rat", "El Cazador", and J.M. DeMatteis' "Abadazad". The shared universe in which many of them live having been cut-short in the middle of its first crossover event by bankruptcy in 2oo4. Only in the past few months have we finally seen some actions utilizing the Marvelman family of characters that Marvel announced acquiring at the San Diego Comic-Con LAST year. Hopefully we won't have to wait as long to see an effect from this year's acquisition.

-And connected with the new direction for Spider-Man Josh mentioned there will be:
A. A new series featuring Arana re-branded as a new Spider-Girl.
and
B. A Norman Osborn mini-series.
and
C. A Carnage mini-series.

~ @JonGorga

P.S. ~ And well, of course, on the adaptation movie front there was this HUGE news. Awesome.

That and there's going to be an "A Contract With God" film. Exciting, but sad for me. I wrote an adaptation script for that classic comic by Will Eisner back in college... Probably never going to get that job now!

SDCC Was...

...well, a little disappointing, to be honest.

• There was a lot of news on the movie front, most of which we already knew- and some of which we really wished was true, even if it wasn't.
• We've got some fun new stuff from Marvel, like the new Strange Tales and Fred Van Lente's Power Man and Iron Fist mini.
• We've got an end to the Brand New Day status quo, with Dan Slott taking over all writing duties on Amazing Spider Man, which will now ship twice monthly.
• We've got a Grant Morrison penned Batman team book called Batman Inc. and a suggestion that Bruce Wayne, upon his return, is going to do something other than be Batman.
• We've got an 80-page Robert E. Howard anthology series from Dark Horse, entitled Savage Sword (which, oddly enough, I'm looking forward to- if for no other reason than that it looks like a good way to jump into some of Howard's characters).
• We've got some images from the next League of Extraordinary Gentleman.
• We've got a Morrison and Geoff Johns collab.
• We've got a shit tonne (that's an official measurement, by the way) of Captain America related projects.
• And we've got Kieron Gillen, a fantastic writer, on a new, awfully titled, X-Men series called Generation Hope.
  

While a lot of this is really cool, it's also run of the mill sort of stuff. Nothing explosive happened at SDCC, no announcements that were truly mind-bending. There weren't even that many announcements, all things considered. Are there no more exciting announcements, in a world where the Internet is basically just a huge rumor mill? Or are the companies sitting on something big for NYCC, which is an actual comics event?

We'll just have to wait until October to find out.

LATE EDIT: In retrospect, this post is perhaps a little cynical. After all, it can't be every year that Marvel buys Marvelman and promptly does nothing of note with the property.

Thursday's Most Exciting Announcement...

...is Fred Van Lente's upcoming Power Man and Iron Fist mini-series, spinning out of the Shadowland: Powerman mini that begins next month.

Van Lente is a hell of a comics writer, and he's among the few people I trust to bring a modicum of the glory that was The Immortal Iron Fist back to the character. It's no secret that I hold the sixteen issues of that series that were written by Matt Fraction and Ed Brubaker and drawn mostly by David Aja in high esteem, so FVL is going to have some high standards to live up to... but I think he'll probably be up to it, provided that he doesn't go too far down the buddy comedy route. In his interview with CBR about the project he sells it as sort of a fun street book and he talks about the way Fraction thinks of the character, which are both good signs.

It helps too that Van Lente's done some of the best comics work out there in recent years, from The Incredible Hercules to Comic Book Comics- Marvel is handing the reigns of one of my favorite characters to an excellent writer and, while I do hope that Fraction and Brubaker return to Danny Rand some day, I have high hopes for what FVL can do.

The runner-up announcement is pretty cool too. While Jon and I had mixed feelings about the first Strange Tales anthology, the list of talent (which includes Kate Beaton, Rafael Grampa, Jeff Lemire, Jhonen Vazquez and the late, great, Harvey Pekar) is mind-boggling, as are the possibilities.

And the Eisner goes to...

It's getting to be award season for comic books. The Eisners will be announced this weekend at San Diego ComicCon, and voting for the Harveys has officially started, to be announced in late August. It's always exciting when it's time to see these awards, especially the Eisners, which are chosen by the fine folk on the internet. For those who don't know, the Eisner's encompass a wide variety of categories from the obvious like "Best New Series" to the more surprising like "Best Comics-Related Periodical/Journalism" Online polling has closed, but you can check out the list of nominees here. I had to smile at the fact that DC Comics was the publisher with the most nominations. Go DCU!

The Harvey Awards are a little different. While there are no restrictions on who can vote in the Eisners, the Harveys are for professionals only. When submitting your ballot, they ask for information so that they can do a check on your professionalism. Sadly this means, I cannot vote, although it is still fun to watch the process. I'm assuming the idea behind this is to cut out the "screaming fanboy coercing his friends into voting through blackmail" demographic, and create a more objective voting environment. Whether or not this actually works is hard to say, because we all know that even professionals can be secretly screaming fanboys. The list of nominees for the Harvey Awards can be found here.

Well, that's all for now folks. Enjoy perusing the nominees list, and good luck to all of the nominees! I'll most likely be posting the winners of the Eisners after they are announced on Friday.

Making the Best of It?

There's a new movement of people (proudly?) declaring themselves #notatcomiccon. You can read about it here. 55 comic shops around the country will host parties funded by Dark Horse Comics and something called ChinaShop Magazine, supposedly owned by Red Bull. The goal is to give people who can't make it out to San Diego for the big days a chance to get together in their respective communities.

This is... interesting.

On principle I'm against declaring something in negative terms. I don't believe it to be mentally healthy. Why are you declaring yourself #NOTatcomiccon? It smacks of over-the-top, woe-is-me irony. The promotional images don't help.

On the other hand, on principle I'm for spreading something good out from a single-centralized geographic location. Why should San Diego have all the fun? Furthermore, the San Diego Comic-Con, while probably still a very fun and exciting event, has become increasingly 'the San Diego Media-Con' as TV and film folk originally there to promote their comics adaptation works have, in some people's eyes, begun to take over the convention.

This simultaneous nation-wide party is described as a promotion to "celebrate the highly dedicated culture of sequential art". To me, that sounds like the way it's supposed to be.

"a fun and creative atmosphere where free drinks and over $200 worth of Dark Horse prizes will be available"

I believe that the 24th is the exact date of a previous engagement Clare and I have with a college friend. If it weren't for that, I'd be planning on being at either Midtown Comics (Times Square) or St. Mark's Comics (Brooklyn Manhattan!) here in NYC partying it up!

~ @JonGorga

UPDATE 7/21/2o1o:
I was incorrect on two counts here. One is not my fault because Dark Horse's website gave me bad info. The party hosted by St. Mark's Comics will be at their MANHATTAN location, not their Brooklyn location.

The other, is that the dates were changed for the previous engagement and so you can expect to see me at at least one of the two #notatcomiccon parties. Possibly both!