Chatter: Dan Slott 1/10/2o13

In speakng about his recently released intense turn of events for poor, beleagured Peter Parker in "the Amazing Spider-Man" writer Dan Slott said wonderful things during his interview in The Village Voice. Here's my second favorite excerpt:

"
"We're a crazy medium where people put on skintight costumes, climb up walls, fly, and shoot things out of their eyes," Slott says. "If there's any part of you that goes, 'You can't do a brain swap!' then you should go read Great Expectations." He rattles off a list of other fantastic story lines from his run on Amazing: "If you say, 'You can't give everyone in Manhattan superpowers!' or 'You can't create a doorway that takes you 24 hours into a future where Manhattan is destroyed!' remember, this is the Marvel Universe. We have mutant children raised by talking cows. We have teleporting dogs. It's fun."
"
~@DanSlott

And it's all true.

P.S. ~ Did you get a load of the issue's awesome cover? [See it up top?] Even more importantly, do you appreciate that the current Spider-Man comic-book storyline and the Spider-Man fanbase's reaction is the subject of the cover story for The Village Voice? It's not about the movies (hardly, anyway) or about the Broadway musical (not really, anyway) or about the rumors surrounding the lovelife of an actor palying Spidey, it is an interview with Slott about his current and ongoing work with the original main 616 Peter Parker character. In other words, it's about SEQUENTIAL ART. Genre fiction sequential art no less.

P.P.S. ~ My favorite excerpt of writing from this interview is more just a great joke about fandoms in general. "Game of Thrones" die-hards are apparently a little crazy.

New Dawns

These early days of the new year find me once again reading as many of the past year's comics as I can in feverish preparation for the decisions (both very easy and very hard) behind my annual Best of the Year post.

A large number of what I'm reading is from DC Comics this year as their New 52 reboot was one of the big news stories of 2o11 and a lot of the titles excited me but I burned myself out on their characters writing a long retrospective of the first 75 years of the publisher's characters that posted as the second month of the relaunch hit comics stores.

So here I am at the start of 2o12 reading the start of DC's new universe/status quo as well as many other comics I've never read or haven't read much of: "Spontaneous" from Oni Press, "T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents" (which may or may not take place in the DCnU), and "Mudman" by Paul Grist.

2o11 was a strange year.

We saw DC claim they were about to become the new hotness then actually become the new hotness.
(Yeah. I just used 'the new hotness' to describe an American comics publisher. I'm a little bit embarrassed too. You can deal with it.)

We saw the return of Craig Thompson to the full-length graphic novel format in "Habibi".

We saw Ultimate Peter Parker die and be replaced as Spider-Man by a new multi-racial character.

We saw Batman dress up in a new costume for the start of "Justice League" #1 and then promptly get undressed in a semi-sexually explicit scene at the end of "Catwoman" #1.

And that just about all happened in or around September, folks!

DC Comics' share of the monthlies market nearly doubled in September 2o11 then actually grew in October, shocking us all. Unfortunately the high was not to last. November brought them down to a slim, slim margin above Marvel's share and last month's number sees the company returned to where they were before: below Marvel's percentage.

[see article with details by Nicholas Yanes (@NicholasYanes) here]

What will this mean for 2o12? What will this mean for my annual Best of the Year post?

Only time will tell.

~ @JonGorga

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.

A Comic With a Personal Stroke

"My Reaction to the Amazing Spiderman Trailer" from PennyDreadfulComics.com

It's a bit well... over-dramatic. Intentionally dour, but still.

I've been reading Spider-Man comics since I was in the second grade and Peter Parker is essentially my model of how to be a person. So I have no right to call Maggie Vicknair out on having a personal reaction to some media including Spider-Man in it.

That said, the discussion Josh (@IamJoshKopin) and I had in our first little video dispels all reasons for us as comic journalists/creators to get upset about a comic-book adaptation movie. Doesn't mean we won't have reactions as fans anyway.

More importantly: The style on display is smooth and professional, the black-and-white tone-effects (which I'd wager are digital but do have the quality of an old-school ink-wash) are very good and the whole thing has a depth that's quite honestly way more work than most people would determine this gag is worth. The faces in the piece are remarkable. And most panels are tremendously effective: awkward surprise and confusion/disgust fueled by nostalgia. That's a tough feeling to get across. The piece has a structure, both visually and in terms of narrative, which doubles, then builds, and crescendos all in seven panels. If the tone wasn't so subtle and the desired effect so specific, the strip would be hilarious. If the concept wasn't over-the-top and the desired effect so ironic, the strip would be emotionally affecting.

THE LONG AND SHORTBOX OF IT?
I immediately found this webcomic impressive while I also find it, as I said, over-dramatic. Doesn't tickle me.

It only takes a second to read to see for yourself. The link is at the top of the review.

Maggie's style can be seen on a more regular basis in her ongoing webcomic "Penny Dreadful" at PennyDreadfulComics.com. I have actually intended to write about her work for months, ever since I had the pleasure of meeting her about a year ago. Check out her work. Quite honestly, you should check it out solely because one of her best strengths as a comicsmith is her coloring.

~ @JonGorga

The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side...

So. I wrote up a review recently of "Flashpoint" #1, written by Geoff Johns (@geoffjohns).

Note the specificity in that sentence. A REVIEW of FLASHPOINT NUMERO UNO. I didn't review the whole "Flashpoint" event (after all, it's not over yet) and I didn't review Geoff Johns' entire career (it's not ending anytime soon either) and I didn't review every comic in the fictional DC Universe. And I reviewed the issue in question fairly negatively.

But I just read "The Flash" #12, the last issue of the current series and the end of a four-part story titled "The Road to Flashpoint", and goddammit if it doesn't give the story more emotional weight for our central hero Barry Allen! The truth is the story is stronger for being in a few parts. Spread over several examples of what writer Tom DeFalco once called "a complete unit of entertainment" (MARVEL Podcast, "The Amazing Spider-Girl", 4/28/2oo7), i.e. one comic-book, not two or three.

In this separate comic-book (also written by Johns), Barry mentions that the birthday of his long-gone mother is the next day and asks his wife Iris to "just give me tomorrow", for "one more day" (I know, very weird considering what Spider-Man's been through for the past few years) to think his life through, all quite wonderfully drawn by Francis Manapul (@FrancisManapul), and well, just look...
...

In the comic I reviewed, Barry wakes up on his mother's birthday, everything is different, she's alive, he's not the Flash, some of his allies are enemies to the world at large, and Iris is in love with someone else. OUCH. Not the "tomorrow" Barry Allen expected he'd be waking up to.

Johns set us up in the end of "The Flash" #12 and knocked us down in "Flashpoint" #1. IF you read both. (Mind you, "FP" #1 also has a huge amount of very obvious set-up for more to come.) Could it all have fit into one comic, one "unit of entertainment"? Probably. But if it was, it definitely wouldn't have had the space for all the other characters' story-lines, most of which I made it clear I found uninteresting. But something dramatic with a splash of traumatic has happened to Barry Allen and this particular thread is a wonderful surprise! The weirdest part? Neither are excellent comic-books. But they are excellent together.

This is what I love about American superhero comics, really. This is why I fell in love with comics in the first place. I was given a copy of "Spider-Man" #35 in 1993 or '94, read it lying down on the couch in my parent's living room, and I realized that because it was labeled "Maximum Carnage" Part 4 of 14, something came before it and something came after it. I HAD to know what. (There's a page devoted to the issue on The Amazing Spider-Man Gallery that gives you a good feeling for the flow of continuity.)

Et voila:
Shared universe ongoing stories. It doesn't end. As Adrian Veidt says "Nothing never ends." Something came before and something comes after. Like... life.

But it's problematic. Most people's brains don't seem to work like mine does apparently. "This is only part of a story? I'm not going to buy this. It's not complete."

So what's a mainstream American superhero comics publisher to do? For that matter, what's a review of mainstream American superhero comics to do? Can you see the dilemma here? You, the consumer, should not have to buy multiple items to get a complete story. I stand by that. But I know stories can become richer, fuller, and more life-like when expanded over multiple items. Several 'units of entertainment'. I stand by that.

I guess a quick and dirty solution is to do just what I did. I wrote a review of "Flashpoint" #1 with a side note alerting all of you, my readers, to consider that ramifications affecting perception of the story might be sitting in recent issues of "The Flash" and/or upcoming issues of "Flashpoint". As part of a larger, shared-universe, semi-mythological, 80-year story something did come before it and something will come after it.

Continuity flows:

*Superman was alive, then dead, then alive. Then "Dead Again", I believe. Since? Alive again.

*Spider-Man was single, then he got married, then he was a widower, then he was married again, then he was magically never married at all.

*Batman was alive, then his spine was broken, then he got better, then he was dead, then suddenly he was just trapped in a repeating pattern through time itself. Now he is back.

*Then there's Brás de Oliva Domingos, main character of the brilliant "Daytripper" by Fabio Moon and Gabriel Bá. In just about each of the ten issues of the series he's alive and then suddenly and tragically he's dead. Slowly, a picture of a life emerges across those ten comic-books.


But each issue stands alone, a cohesive unit. Of entertainment-- or art depending on the eye of the beholder.

Writer Grant Morrison once said at New York Comic-Con, that it occurred to him one day: When you pick up any issue of Superman, what you're looking at is a piece of a life. And what if some god was doing that with his life or my life right now? Picking up and reading it, a slice at a time.

This is actually the exact structure of the late Harvey Pekar's ongoing autobiographical stories. The first series "American Splendor" combined with the mini-series that followed and various graphic novels along the way, the latest of which was published quite recently: "Huntington, West Virginia 'On the Fly' ". And it's not the last. "Harvey Pekar's Cleveland" is yet to come out. Harvey's been gone for over a year and the output of stories still isn't quite over yet. All of them together tell the story of his life. I'm far from the first to point this out. He's made us all like gods who can peer into the memory of his imagination.

I wrote in my recent review "I don't believe we should encourage this one-comic-is-needed-to-understand-another storytelling structure" but you know what? I also really do. That's what first made me fall in love with comics and it's STILL a big part of what I love about comics. Barry Allen, Spider-Man, Brás, and Harvey included. A multitude of short incomplete stories that add up to more than merely the sum of the parts.

Part x of ∞

And so the monkey has swallowed its own tale, this linear-publishing model of life becomes a circle of death and resurrection, and I am back where I started all those years ago on my parent's living room couch. It's exciting. It's about life and death and the tension inherent in moving forward.

So I'll continue to review these units by themselves, while taking into account the traditions and ongoing stories as ever-expanding structures, of which each each comic is a single brick.

Long live the serial narrative.

~ @JonGorga

Quote for the Week 7/7/11

"My problem with Marvel is many-fold, but the general attitude seemed to be that having super-powers makes your life worse. For me the bottom line wasn't "Hey, look, even Peter Parker has trouble getting a date!" it was "Oh, crap, even super-heroes can't get dates - what possible chance to I have? This is the most depressing thing I've ever read!" :)"

~ John Ordover, former editor in charge of Star Trek prose-novels at Pocket Books, including the Star Trek: The New Frontier series which proved popular enough to spawn two comic-book minis from IDW Publishing, writing on my Facebook wall this week.

I agree in theory, although I disagree in practice. I love me some pathetic Spider-Man stories! I think that was made clear in this editorial about lovable-loser characters in comics.

~ @JonGorga

Quote for the Week 5/19/11

"Also, my Daredevil won't look at you. He doesn't need to. As often as not, he'll be fighting while facing the "wrong" way, something that I think would be fairly disconcerting to an opponent. ... On one level, Matt's blindness is an act -- an interesting aspect of his personality by itself -- but on another level, he really should conduct himself differently than any other superhero. When I draw Spidey, I do my best to make sure he doesn't touch the ground; with Daredevil, I want him to always look like he's listening."

~ Paolo Rivera (@PaoloMRivera), in an exclusive interview with CBR about his upcoming Daredevil work for Marvel (@Marvel).

YES. If you're going to work with corporate characters instead of your own, damn if you can't have a lot of fun thinking about what makes them unique and then creating from that perspective.

~@JonGorga

Marvel Day-And-Dates The Ultimate "Death of Spider-Man"

What does THAT mean? Just that Marvel Comics announced plans this morning for a further flirtation with simultaneous digital and paper release of a comic-book at the same paper cost ($3.99) and this time with all the issues in a short but high-profile crossover 'event': namely the "Death of Spider-Man" from their Ultimate Comics imprint.

Those easily alarmed take NOTE: The Peter Parker in "Ultimate Comics Spider-Man" isn't the same Peter Parker in "the Amazing Spider-Man". "Twice the Spider-Man!" said the marketing people in the year 2ooo and we've had two separate ongoing universes ever since.

And in the words of those marketing people: "Marvel is proud to announce that every issue of the hotly-anticipated DEATH OF SPIDER-MAN will be available day & date on the Marvel Comics app, available via iTunes for the iPad, iPhone & iPod touch."

CBR.com's article by Kiel Phegley reprinted that press release with a few comments from the main writer of the upcoming story, Brian Michael Bendis, and the interesting comment: "the issues mark the first event comics – a driving force in comics retail for the past decade – to be offered day-and-date online, though Marvel has been experimenting with high profile releases in this format including the recent 'Invincible Iron Man' Annual and the 'Ultimate Thor' mini series."

The first issues in the "Death of Spider-Man" story are to release in comics retail stores and on the iPad, in February of 2o11.

[via ComicBookResources.com]

And what of those comics retailers? Should they be worried? The crossover 'event' has meant big bucks for them for a long time. I've written on this very site about how much better suited the crossover is to digital simply because it the eliminates the: "Damn! I won't know how this story ends without reading a DIFFERENT comic-book? What the HELL!?" Press a button, problem solved much faster. Or could this prove one of the failings of digital comics? No ACTUAL HUMAN BEING to point to a comic-book and say: "Oh, I've already flipped through that, if you want the whole story you'll have to read THIS first."

However, whether or not "Death of Spider-Man" is a crossover 'event' at all is questionable to me because one of their defining characteristics is the multiplicity of inter-locking comic-book series. Not just one or two. I think one character (or set of characters) appearing in another's book is a guest appearance, two sets of characters appearing in the other's books for one story is a crossover, but a crossover 'event' requires a wider net. Those definitions are far from all-encompassing, I know, but are worth mulling over if for no other reason than nobody else seems to! Why has Phegley specified that "Death of Spider-Man" is an "event" not a "crossover event"? What does he mean when referring to other comics as "high profile" as opposed to "events"?

Is the entire family of terms: crossover, event, and crossover 'event', just marketing hype pure and simple? Perhaps this is all best left to the comics historians of the next generation to worry about, because by just about any definitions you can't call it a crossover 'event' until it's over and done. We will all have to wait and see.

~@JonGorga

P.S. ~ Josh and I have a little plan in the works to probe the nature of digital day-and-date releases in a series of reviews in the coming year!

Mr. Spider-Man Goes To Town.

I thought about calling this post "Spider-Man Hits The Big Time, or "It's a Big Time For Webheads, or, even, "Big Time = Big Fun". None of those really rang true, and here's why:

Spider-Man has been big time since Amazing Fantasy #15 hit in 1962. Saying that this is Spidey's big time, that he's hit it big, that now's his moment- well, hasn't it been his moment for almost fifty years? Hasn't Peter Parker been slinging webs and helping offbeat kids get by since JFK was President? Hasn't he been to space? Hasn't he been in the Avengers? Hasn't he worked with the Fantastic Four and fought Galactus and been Marvel's flagship character since then?

Let's just say that I think calling it the "Big Time" era might be a little disingenuous. Still- although the branding might be misguided, the change in status quo must come as welcome to certain corners of Spidey fandom. The Brand New Day era, despite producing some great stories (including a Fred Van Lente written issue featuring the Spot that was one of my favorite comics of 2009), wasn't very well received, mostly because of the poorly conceived story which preceded it also wasn't very received. Getting rid of the brand, then, was probably a huge boon for Marvel marketing and taking solo writing reigns was certainly a boon for writer Dan Slott.

Slott, who had been one of the rotating team of "webheads" responsible for delivering the book on time thrice monthly during Brand New Day, has been given sole writing duties on the book (now bimonthly but at 40 or so pages an issue) for the forseeable future. Given all this, and because I have found Slott to be a singularly entertaining writer of comics, I figured I'd give this new status quo a shot, buy myself the first few issues, see how it stacked up.

Near as I can tell, it stacked up alright. I'm new to the Spidey game (much newer to it then Gorga, at any rate), so I wasn't particularly attached to either the pre- or post-Brand New Day status quos, but my understanding is that poor Peter Parker has really been having a tough time of late, so it's good to see one of the good guys, well, making good. Still, the first part of #648 didn't quite ring true. The character's voices didn't seem quite right- a little stilted, a little overplayed- and this was particularly true of Spidey, who Slott writes, albeit briefly, as just too sloppy and sentimental for my taste. Once we get past the seemingly obligatory team-up (which features a clever, if overwritten, climax), things get a little bit better. Peter's voice is a little stronger, his personality a little more assertive and the pieces just sort of fit together better. It feels like the start of a Spider-Man story rather than a half rate Avengers yarn. There's even a fantastic bit at the end where author and artist Humberto Ramos work together perfectly, and the result is clever use of the comics medium to display precisely what Peter is thinking. Still, Slott goes out of his way to prove Peter's a schmuck (he can't pay his rent! He's been run out of the photojournalism biz!) and then way the other way to remind he's not (Doc Ock, Aunt May and the Human Torch all use the word 'genius' to describe our dear hero).

By the time we hit the second issue, #649, though, Slott's hitting his stride a little bit more. The rise of a new goblin, Pete's first day at his new job, the team-up with Black Cat- it all works. And it all works well. Slott's Spidey may not quite be what we expect, may be a little different from the Peter Parker we've seen around these parts recently, but that's just what we need right now, at the beginning of a new era. Although the characterization is at times ham handed, the author does deftly and subtly make some interesting moves, particularly in suggesting that Peter is a reactive rather than proactive thinker, that he's a situational genius and not one that can work in a vacuum. It's a brilliant thought- let's see where he takes it.

Ramos works great for this story, too, which helps turn the pages even when Slott doesn't hit his mark. His work is both kinetic and blocky, a synthesis of two styles that I love which are rarely integrated very well. The thick black lines are complemtented by brilliantly cartoony and just-this-side-of garish colors that really bring out parts of the storytelling, parts that might go unnoticed otherwise.

So, how is the new status quo so far? Pretty good, by my reckoning, but not quite good enough. I've got faith in its creative team and it is quite a lot of fun, so I'll hang on for a few more issues to see how it goes, but unless they step it up (and, to be honest, I'm expecting they will) we may need to wait a little longer for Spidey to really hit it Big.

(Sorry.)

I carry with me at all times a near-perfect recipe for making new comics readers:

Good comics.

That is the best way to convince people this stuff is worth their time. By showing them. But a random confluence of events has brought together some particular comics in my shoulder bag. These comics together represent many of the talking points I think might help people to recognize comics as the separate, viable, wonderful art medium it is. And as I walk the streets of New York City I thought I would share with you what they are and why I think they might work as somebody's 'first comic'.


Some of these I bought just recently, some of them were given to me as birthday presents, some of them I have because I'm reading them, some of them because I am or was reviewing them, or both the former and the latter:

"Electric Ant" #1
From Icon (an imprint of Marvel Comics), David Mack's and Pascal Alixe's adaptation of Phillip K. Dick's prose novel

Opening a comic such as this one can lead to thoughts like: Oh, a smart adaptation of a prose novel? It's really not a new edition is it? Comics isn't just illustrated prose. It's a different experience of the same story. Not a translation, an adaptation. Just the idea that a book can become a comic in the same way a book can become a film encourages one to think of it as smart mass media entertainment instead of junk. And it's by David Mack (@davidmackkabuki), of "Kabuki" fame. So you know it's good.

"Captain Swing and the Electrical Pirates of Cindery Island" #2
From Avatar Press, Warren Ellis' and Raulo Caceres' steampunk crazy time

Well... This one's crazy and perhaps not great for most new readers. Shocking an old lady with bloody violence and guns that shoot tiny light bulbs for bullets probably won't endear her to my beloved sequential art. But someone who digs steampunk, someone who likes things off the beaten path. Pirate ships flying on electric oars? They should see this stuff. The imagination owned by Warren Ellis (@warrenellis) has few equals in the field of comics. The evidence of vibrant imagination in the art-form is priceless to an argument that it should be appreciated. I bought issue #1 on a whim and I'm glad I did.

"Superman: Earth One"
DC's experimental graphic novel written by J. Michael Staczynski and drawn by recent L & S interviewee Shane Davis

This one has blown not only individual brains but the entire industry straight to the ground. A depiction of Superman as a 20-year-old young man with the problems of the average modern American 20-year-old: what the fuck do I do with my life? how the fuck do I do it? why am I doing it? To see a superhero character made so simply and easily relatable would no doubt be a major eye-opener to many who see superheroes (most particularly ones like Supes) as dumb jocks in a cape. No, the main genre found in the medium isn't only punching and explosions. My review of this just went up days ago.

"Captain America: Man Out of Time" #1
A new series from Mark Waid and Jorge Molina about one of Marvel's first superheroes

Speaking of recent comics re-telling a superhero's story from their own point of view, this is another great-looking work. Captain America is, in the perception of the mainstream, probably the only more prissy superhero than Superman. But, as usual, the mainstream is missing the new trees because it is expecting to see an old forest. I was sold on this issue the moment I saw the way Waid (@markwaid) brought Cap from World War II through his frozen state to the present in two successive splash pages. Someone who doesn't know what mainstream superhero comics are actually like will be amazed to see so 'goofy' a character as Captain America presented with such imagination and gravitas.

"Amazing Spider-Man" #648
With a three-year debacle behind him (mostly) Marvel's Spider-Man moves on to the "Big Time" with Dan Slott and Humberto Ramos

Well... I haven't read this yet. But it ISN'T "Brand New Day". So it might be more new reader-friendly than Spider-Man has been for a few months to a few years, depending on your point-of-view. Dan Slott (@danslott) has a great ability with humor. Anybody with a funny bone would probably enjoy Slott's writing and thus prove that the Joss Whedon style of dramedy can be found in comics, further proving that it's capable of anything.

"Falling for Lionheart"
A glorious mash-up of the two worlds of American comics by Ilias Kyriazis, released on the same day as "Superman: Earth One" from IDW

Not having actually read this, I can only comment on what it looks like. But it looks like one of the best graphic novels of the year and maybe the best 'first readers' graphic novel I have ever seen. It tells the story of Lionheart, a super-powered man on a state/corporate-approved team of superheroes. It is also the story of a man who feels that something about this life is hollow and chooses to make autobiographical mini-comics to express his ennui. None of that is new material (superheroes beholden to centers of authority, characters who make comics about their lives), except of course the brilliant twist that these men are one-and-the-same! Yes, "Falling for Lionheart" is about a superhero who is also an underground comicsmith. A tortured artist superhero love story. The two strongest arms of American comics re-introduced in one slim volume. I'm going to LOVE it. Look for a review soon.


I hope this silly list serves a few purposes for you, dear L&S readers:
1. I hope it has laid out just a little bit more of the incredible variety available in the medium of sequential art.
2. I hope you now know that you can ask me for reading material, if you ever see me on the street!
3. I hope you have some ideas about how to get that special STUBBORN someone in your life to give comics a chance. Lord knows there's plenty of them left out there...

~@JonGorga

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

Scott Pilgrim Is The New Peter Parker

"Peter Parker is the ideal man. He's smart, he's funny, and he always at least TRIES to do the right thing. Plus, thanks to Marvel's publishing schedule, we get to see each other pretty much every week."

Alison Lynn, friend of mine and Clare's, said those words the night I met her. Of course, Peter Parker holds a few points over most other guys by simple merit of being fictional. He can do and be lots of things us regular joes can't. Like be in fourteen places at the same time in a given week. Scott Pilgrim is far less reliable by comparison. He only dropped into our lives six times somewhat randomly over the course of six years. Does that make him more special by reason of being scarce? I'm not sure.

What I do know is the two hold a great deal of similarities between them. Think about it: Male, main character. Great responsibility... fucks up a lot. Beautiful girl to fight for. Special abilities that force him into an unusual situation. In the end the only difference between these two lovable losers is secrecy and spandex.

The release of Edgar Wright's adaptation film "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" has come and gone and the world didn't exactly explode over it. Its box office gross was considered a disappointment by most and although the film was really well-crafted and is already a beloved film among many (including the writers of this blog), it probably isn't going to spawn a billion other indie graphic novel film adaptations.

However another friend of Clare's and mine has been telling me about an ongoing experiment she's conducting with the residents that, as an RA, are under her stewardship. Rachel Altvater shares with The Long and Shortbox Of It a bit about people at her college dipping into comics:

I went to see the movie with two guys from my staff who hadn't read the books, and they both really liked the movie. I encouraged them to read the books, and one of them was skeptical because they were "comics." When I referred to them as "graphic novels," he jumped at the chance to borrow "Precious Little Life."

...

The guy from my staff said that he'd never read a graphic novel before, and he was liking it so far. He said that "Precious Little Life" was "really good...it just kinda sucks you in, and it looks just like the movie so far."

...

The person who came to possess my copy of "Precious Little Life" seems to be a lost cause. I can't even get the book back from him.

Josh's latest post proves this to be even more true as a friend of his picked up a copy of "Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life" without prompting of any kind at an unrelated college event.

People love Scott Pilgrim even more than they love Spidey.

Actually, there's also a lot of Charlie Brown in the character as well as Peter Parker. And maybe even some of the late, great Harvey Pekar in there? Could Scott Pilgrim's appeal be essentially that he is a loser with a good and stout heart? And we all see a bit of ourselves in him?

If so, I have never seen such proof that humans like to read about lovable losers because the "Scott Pilgrim" series is currently the most successful graphic novel series in America's history. As Clare said to me: "Bryan Lee O'Malley doesn't need to publish anything else for the rest of his life. And neither does Oni Press." At the very least, THAT makes me giddy as a school-girl because if it's really true, it means that one of America's most inventive comicsmiths and one of America's most varied comics publishers have carte blanche to do what feels right, to take chances, and throw caution to the wind.

Truly, as far as I'm concerned, if even one person discovers a few comics they wouldn't have otherwise I'm glad the adaptation was made. And more money in the bank for creators and publishers during this tough economic time is a good thing. That could be the real legacy of the "Scott Pilgrim" film: the bankroll it brought to a creative comicsmith and a publishing house.

~ @JonGorga

P.S. ~ From bios and other public sources, I understand that Bryan Lee O'Malley (@radiomaru) and Hope Larson (@hopelarson) have been in a committed relationship for some time. So... would it be weird to point out that makes two young creative comicsmiths who both work often with Oni Press (@OniPress) with room to grow and money to burn?

Because this gives me hope for the entire medium, and the future of the American popular graphic novel form.

Talk Over Balloons: writer Fred Van Lente

One of the many talented writers to more recently make a mark in the American comics industry is the versatile Fred Van Lente. Since 2oo4 Van Lente (@fredvanlente) has collaborated with artist Ryan Dunlavey (@RyanDunlavey) to create the well-loved "Action Philosophers" series and its to-be-completed follow-up series "Comic Book Comics" for their small-scale publisher Evil Twin Comics. He has also done a great deal of work for Marvel Comics including co-writing "The Incredible Hercules" with Greg Pak (@gregpak) and writing issues of "The Amazing Spider-Man" (inarguably among the most high profile comic-books published in America today!) as well as fun stuff like "Marvel Zombies 5" and "Iron Man: Legacy" with many, many various artists.

The Long and Shortbox writers have been aware of his work for a good many years and Fred graciously agreed to answer our questions about his comics writing work- past, present, and future.

Jon Gorga: So, off the bat and into the trenches: By working on comics like "Comic Book Comics" as well as comics like "The Amazing Spider-Man" you straddle the line between the mainstream and the indie worlds of American comics. The truth is you are one of many who dance the same dance at Marvel: Fraction, Bendis, etc. Do you think we're in a new era of creators playing wherever they please, and if so why?

Fred Van Lente: Well, there's a pretty straightforward reason for it: the indie publishers are the farm teams where Marvel recruits its talent from. Fraction, Bendis and Jonathan Hickman were all Image creators prior to coming to Marvel, and I was a self-publisher and had some stuff done through Moonstone. We all began as indie creators and that's how we were first introduced to the comics world, so it's no surprise we want to remain a part of it. The independence and creative freedom of creator-owned work is an addictive drug; a lot of time it can't match Marvel paychecks, though.

JG: I can imagine returning to your roots at Evil Twin feels good when you can manage it. Speaking of your indie work, what stage are you and Ryan Dunlavey at right now with "Comic Book Comics" #5?

FVL: It's almost wholly scripted, and Ryan is pencilling hard. Life has thrown us some bumps along the way but we hope to have it for New York Comic Con in October.

JG: Then we will see you both there! I'm curious, how did a project that's a comic-book about the history of comic-books come about?

FVL: We knew ACTION PHILOSOPHERS would eventually end, and we wanted to continue doing the Humanities in comics form, for lack of a better word. It occurred to me that no one had ever done a comprehensive history comic about comics before.

I also knew way more about comics history than philosophy when we started, as I served for many years on the Curatorial Committee of the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA) in New York City, where I'm now a trustee.

JG: MoCCA is among my favorites places in NYC. Always has been. Let's move over and talk about your Marvel work like "The Incredible Hercules". Hercules and Amadeus Cho made a pretty damn strange team. The Prince of Power and the Prince of... sugary snacks? What made them work together for you?

FVL: It's a deceptively simple concept: Brains plus brawn equals great team. Also, it helped Hercules as a character to be paired with someone arguably more irresponsible than he was.

JG: Balancing humor and pathos seems to be something you're particularly adept at. Do you find that it's the reader feedback that helps you find that balance?

FVL: Sort of. It's more of a lifetime of being a wiseass, so it's the feedback from classmates and family members when I was in the eighth grade. The problem with depending on reader feedback is that they're reacting to stuff you wrote quite some time ago, usually about six months, and you've moved on since, so their comments aren't always applicable anymore.

JG: Where did the inspiration come from for those sound-effects in "The Incredible Hercules" issues you co-wrote with Greg Pak?

FVL: Assistant editor Nate Cosby, who started it in WORLD WAR HULK, and carried it over into iHerc and we ran with it. That's why in the climax to SACRED INVASION, when Herc takes out the god of the Skrulls, we made the SFX "NATECOSBOOM" as a tribute to him (and that's now his Twitter handle, 'cause he's a nerd).

JG: I'm actually following @Natecosboom myself. The advice he's giving away for free on there is invaluable. SDCC's announcement pointed to Dan Slott as the new solo writer on "The Amazing Spider-Man". Are you looking forward to reading some "Amazing Spider-Man" you didn't have to sit in a meeting about or are you feeling wistful about your time tag-team writing the series as one of the 'web-heads'?

FVL: It was a lot of fun and a very special way to work. The best part of working on the book were those writers rooms. Since I was doing AMAZING and also the anthology title, WEB OF SPIDER-MAN, I've got to say I'm a little Spider-Manned out, so Dan came to the rescue at just the right time. But I have a couple small Spidey things lined up already for the future, so the readers of AMAZING aren't quite rid of me yet -- and I wrote the lead story in our last "Web Head" issue, #647.

JG: Well I'm glad to know there will be a little more Spider-Man material from you coming to us. Now, all three of us at The Long and Shortbox Of It are big fans of "The Immortal Iron Fist" work from several years ago that really rejuvenated Danny Rand as a character. How much of that stuff is informing your writing of the character for the "Shadowland: Power Man" mini-series that has just begun and next year's "Power Man and Iron Fist"?

FVL: It's definitely a part of it, but IMMORTAL IRON FIST mined that mythology pretty thoroughly. I'm more interested in the mismatched private investigating duo that made Mary Jo Duffy and Kerry Gammil's POWER MAN AND IRON FIST so terrific. It's a spellbinding mystery with El Aguila the center, and introducing a lot of great new villains like Don Pagliacci, Noir and the Commedia dell'Morte.

JG: Before we let you go, a large number of our readers are college-age and plenty of them are aspiring comics-folk. What advice do you have for writers and artists just starting out?

FVL: We're back where we started -- start making your own comics. It's how you're going to get noticed, and thanks to the Ye Olde Interweb, you don't even need a publisher any more to get that notice.

JG: Good advice. Any upcoming releases you want our readers to keep an eye out for?

FVL: Don't forget, CHAOS WAR is the multiverse-shattering climax to me and Greg Pak's "Incredible Hercules" saga, shipping (twice!) in October, and in November I'm doing the tie-in DEAD AVENGERS, which is exactly what it sounds like.

_________________________________________________
Fred's writing will be instrumental in Marvel's upcoming crossover-event "Chaos War", pitting gods of the Marvel U against one another! And in October, "Comic Book Comics" will illustrate another chapter of the history of the medium of comics in the Twentieth Century. Check out Fred's website here!

Thanks for reading!

And Fred, a thanks to you for your time! We were lucky to have you!

There Can Only Be One...

For the most part, I'm going to let our resident Spider-Fan handle this one, but I wanted to put in my own two cents about the following quote from Spider-Editor Stephen Wacker (via Robot 6, who pulled it out of a longer interview with Wacker from last week):

"For the couple of months coming out of "One Moment in Time," we're going to be bringing a lot of threads of Peter's life that we've been developing since we started working on the book into one big story, 'Origin of the Species.' It sort of gives Pete a moment to assess all the stuff that's happened to him for the last 100 or so issues. Beyond that, we've already started talking about the fact that it might be time for a new, or at least better, Spider-Man. I feel like we've done as much as we can do in terms of Peter Parker's time as Spider-Man."

The only thing I've got to add is the following: haven't we been down this road before? And how did that turn out?

Jeph Loeb Has New Job as Marvel's Head of Television

"Executive Vice-President, Head of Marvel Television" to be exact!


Huh...

This is a subtle ramification of Disney's purchasing of Marvel last year. In this video, Loeb talks about "hour-long dramatic television series" (presumably he means live-action series) soon to be in development with "ABC and ABC Family", both Disney owned channels if you didn't know. It's exciting because although there has been a 'Marvel Animation' or a 'Marvel Studios', there has never been an over-all TELEVISION division at Marvel. That is why there have been so few Marvel properties in live-action television adaptations, and why they have generally been very cheesy when done. It is also why there has never been a push toward television advertising for Marvel's comics.

"The Amazing Spider-Man" 1977 live-action series:

is a prime example of Marvel on TV gone bad.

The 70s "Incredible Hulk" live-action series is the exception to this... although it's not exactly perfect either.

What will this mean moving forward? Well, I imagine that if nothing else it means we will have one centralized force working to get Marvel's characters back on television and hopefully in high quality narrative productions, but possibly limited to channels owned by Disney.

Regardless of the quality of the comics he has been producing of late, Jeph Loeb is a damn smart man who has had a varied career in varied media for decades: film, television, and comics. This isn't Marvel putting a comics writer with no experience in moving image media in charge of their Television division. This is a shrewd move on the part of Marvel/Disney and I'm sure we'll see some nice productions come out of it but...

I hope this leads to some avenues for direct comics advertising on channels owned by Disney. Because this blog is about comics, Disney bought Marvel and Marvel is in the business of making comics goddamnit. I know, 'Again he's harping on this?' but I really do believe that good adaptations may lead people back to the comics and bad ones may steer them away from the medium, but advertising for the comics themselves can only be good for the industry. No matter how bad an advertisement for a specific pizza brand is, it gets you thinking about pizza. This is even more important for comics in the US because we are in a country where thousands or even millions of people don't even know that comics HAVEN'T died out yet.

If this new "Marvel Television" diverts even more capital away from the sequential art division and isn't also going to incorporate some advertising for the comics or at least some planned financial kickback into the comics, I'm going to be pissed. The potential here, as always, is great. Whether Marvel remembers to keep the focus on their roots remains to be seen.

~ @JonGorga

Paolo Rivera, Gentleman Artist!

I had the unique pleasure of meeting the truly amazing artist Paolo Rivera a few weeks ago at a signing event at Jim Hanley's Universe in Manhattan! Rivera has done a great deal of excellent work for Marvel over the past few years including his very cool origin-retelling project with writer Paul Jenkins: "Mythos".

The sketch he's holding is preliminary work for the covers he did on "The Amazing Spider-Man" issues #615-616, which I reviewed a few months ago here!

Meeting people who have a 'public face' for the first time is a strange experience. You 'feel' like you know them, even though you know you don't. Mr. Rivera was generous with his time and his work: He was sketching for a number of fans while chatting with many others. There were three of us standing there flipping through the sketches he had placed on the table... and talking about them. In front of him. I realized suddenly that although we were just saying "Paolo Rivera is awesome!" we were rather rudely talking about him in the third person. In front of him.

So I apologetically said as much and he immediately said that hearing us right there talking about him was kind of cool as it was at least a sort of physically immediate feedback. Sort of like hearing his blog's post comments read out loud. Like I wrote in the title of this post: Paolo Rivera, gentleman artist.

Let that be a lesson to you: Don't be an idiot like Gorga was, engage with these people at cons and signing events. Treat them with respect but not a damn religious reverence, just like you would anyone else.

Rivera is the artist on the upcoming big (possibly huge) Spider-Man story written by Joe Quesada to run in "Amazing" #637-640 in July of this year. We Spidey fans are dreading it, but for reasons completely unrelated to his art. It's another chance for Joe Quesada to change his mind/give the fans what they want/make sense of a two-year-old groaner of a story. Whether he takes that chance (he's had several already), is yet to be seen. Quesada was interviewed about it here on ComicBookResources.com. We're not holding our breath. At least it's going to look gorgeous!

A dynamic figure artist with a sensitive color palette, Rivera really is one of the best talents making comics in the mainstream today! Do not pass up a chance to look at his stuff, read his stuff, or meet him! His bloody brilliant art can be seen on his blog The Self-Absorbing Man!

~ @JonGorga

EDIT (11/28/2o1o):
Oops. "One Moment in Time" was in "The Amazing Spider-Man" #638 #639 #640 and #641.

Big Characters in The Big Apple

When I visited New York City at about ten-years-old I needed to see as many locations related to the Marvel universe as possible. (Yes, I was- and am- a big geek. Moving on.) I made my own very, very simple Spider-Man Tour check-list of the real-world local inspirations for Marvel universe events, which I still have! (Okay I am a very, very sentimental big geek. Moving on.)

Apparently I wasn't alone. Among the great revelations of the "New York, The Super-City: Superheroes in New York" panel held about two months ago on March 9th by the Center for Independent Publishing and sponsored by GraphicNovelReporter.com was the discovery that yes, even professional comics historians think about such 'geeky' things. I was delighted to learn that noted comics historian Gene Kannenberg Jr. had the same thought as I did upon visiting the Brooklyn Bridge for the first time:

'wow... that's where Gwen Stacy died'

But this panel discussion was about more than the inner-thoughts I share with professional comics historians, it was about the wonderful inter-textual waltz between reality and fiction that superhero comics (really, all comics and all art) have been dancing since as long as they've existed. Urban centers seem to have held especial fascination to visual storytellers since the turn of the Twentieth Century. And there ain't nowhere as urban as The Big Apple.

The event was part of a series on "Labor, Landmarks, & Literature" covering "the way comics' creators used New York City as a setting an inspiration, and even a character in their works". New York City's influence on the cultural imagination of the country at large is, of course, monumental. We've all known this for years thanks to the film world's heavy use of the city as locus for story after story (as I write these words, I'm sitting in on a friend's NYC movie shoot). But the use of The Big Apple as the inspiration and setting for stories in the comics medium has gotten comparatively smaller attention and this is what Peter Gutierrez's (@Peter_Gutierrez) wonderful evening panel helped to rectify.

Will Eisner loved to quote what Jules Feiffer wrote in his book "The Great Comic Book Heroes" about Eisner's creation The Spirit: "his nose may have turned up, but we all knew he was Jewish." (Feiffer, 39). Eisner usually simplified/clarified it to: The Spirit didn't have a big nose, but everybody knew he was Jewish. By the same methods, even though his home was a littered slum-land noir playground called Central City, everybody knew it was New York. But some fictionalizations aren't so clear-cut...

Superman lives in Metropolis.
&
Batman lives in Gotham City.

Two major urban centers that reflect these two heroes' personalities/philosophies: one unflinchingly positive, the other dark and brooding.

[Comics panel images of the DC universe cities are from their respective ComicVine.com pages.]

Everybody knows and agrees upon this. But where do they REALLY live? What's the real world model? Christopher Nolan's film "The Dark Knight" presupposes that everyone will accept a re-tooled Chicago as the stand-in for Gotham, despite the fact that painstaking effort was put into the first film to create a unique fictional CGI cityscape for the Caped Crusader to slink through based on the Gotham City of the current comic-books.

It was always my understanding that "gotham" is just old-english for city or something, and thus was one of the nicknames for the biggest city in America: NYC. (Actually, a little research leads me to the discovery that it means a home 'where goats are kept' but I suspect once upon a time that was the height of civilization...)

However, Clare vehemently disagrees with this interpretation, pointing out to me that Chicago's fame as the first home of organized crime in America makes it a far better candidate for the source Bill Finger and Bob Kane used to create Gotham in the late-Thirties. I knew "Gotham" is the nickname for New York City, so I figured NYC was the only logical location for... Gotham. Metropolis, the home of Superman, is a city of steel canyons that looks like certain parts of this city and like no where else in the world. But the truth is that no part of Manhattan gleams with such a clean white sheen. So Gotham City = New York or Metropolis = New York? Or both?

For that matter what about Star City, home of Green Arrow, or Keystone City, home of the Golden Age Flash?

As you can see it's all pretty impossible to determine conclusively. Hell, the DC writers can't even decide what state all these cities reside in!

The answer according to these assembled historians, comicsmiths, artists, writers, and editors seems to be that while nothing is sure, bet on The Big Apple.

The second major point of the evening's presentation was more interesting to me as a long-time Marvel Comics fan: Spider-Man, Daredevil, and the Fantastic Four live in New York City. Plain and simple. It was no question that Stan Lee's placing of Marvel's major heroes and villains in front of the backdrop of New York was going to figure heavily in the evening's talk.

That was the great thing about having former Marvel Comics editor Danny Fingeroth (@DannyFingeroth) on the panel to talk about the ways his era utilized the setting that Stan Lee passed down to them. [He was the editor responsible for several cool (and some downright silly) photo covers for Marvel's comics in the mid-Eighties (like the one above for "Marvel Team-Up" #128) featuring photos of real New York locations with either costumed actors -cough- intern and future comics artist Joe Jusko -cough- or drawings superimposed over them.]

The different strata of New Yorker culture are represented in Marvel's comics from the homeless kids Spider-Man helps out and the junkies Daredevil 'interacts' with to the rich and famous models Patsy Walker parties with and the dignitaries the Fantastic Four meet in the Baxter Building.

The creators themselves and their characters have almost always been New Yorkers. As a result, the powers that be at Marvel felt there had to be some effort in their comics at addressing the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center in 2oo1 and this was the next topic of March's panel. This was even more interesting to me as I had given a small presentation myself about the comics world's reaction on the sixth anniversary of the attacks in my second to last year of college. "The Amazing Spider-Man "#477 was the first topic, followed by Marvel's "Heroes" charity publication and the ones from other companies that followed. The speakers focused on the famous issue of "Amazing" and moved on to talk about other comics reacting to the attacks including Art Spiegelman's "In The Shadow of No Towers".

This also brought the discussion to the work of panelist William Tucci. Tucci's "Shi: Through The Ashes", which was also for charity, tells not only a fictional story about his character Shi (who fights in a secret half-millennium-old war, sometimes on the streets of NYC in the dead of the night) but also about real fallen New York City firefighters and policemen whose accounts were related to him by their fellow servicemen.

Comics utilizing the history and real locations of New York City with both satirical and memorial intent are legion and often fascinating. As a comics maker/historian/reporter I reveled in the chance to get a refresher in the history of Comics' interaction with the mythical and real sides of New York City as well as learn about work I had never seen adding new chapters to that story.

[This drawing of Ana Ishikawa (a.k.a. Shi) in the ash cloud created by the fall of the World Trade Center towers from William Tucci's "Ashes to Ashes" was among the images displayed during the presentation.]

~ @JonGorga