Comics

When the new 52 was launched, there was a little eyebrow-raising at the extent to which DC was raiding the Vertigo creator roster. The Trinity of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman were all staffed by writers of a Vertigo pedigree with Grant Morrison, Scott Snyder and Brian Azzarello. I'll grant you Morrison does a little more superhero work (pun intended), but it was noticeable and a lot of people thought that Animal Man and Swamp Thing were really Vertigo books that just happened to play in the superhero world.

Tom Brevoort may have just confirmed that Journey Into Mystery won't be ending after Kieron Gillen leaves...

Amid a flurry of controversy over the Kickstarter for this Garo tribute, Angie was kind enough to pass over her contribution, titled "The Teacup Tree," a whimsical tale of the coming of age and the tragic loss of imaginary friends.

Here it is - an exhaustive look at all the Marvel books announced this week for Marvel NOWWWW, from Iron Man to Thor, with X-Men and Hulk inbetween. Also, the campaign for a Pixie Ongoing series picks up pace!

After Mark Waid's "Four Panels that Never Work" comic was seen just about everywhere yesterday, one might have been forgiven for thinking that given the fourth-panel poke at Geoff Johns penchant for mutilating heroes, Waid and Johns must be feuding or something. However, Waid showed up in the comments at Robot 6 to answer questions and revealed that it was merely a friendly rib:

We knew the crossovers were coming, but as things go, this one sounds fairly modest -- a mere three-issue tale spanning Supers Man, Boy and Girl as they face the menace of the shirtless, alien terror, H'el, who is so horrible he wears his cape around his waist like a skirt. Sounds pretty basic and maybe even jumponable? Going by the cover art, though, it looks like some injury-to-the-arm is headed our way.

Afternoon diversion: Well, well, talk about tying up all our themes in one handy image, while tooling round we spotted the cover to the new edition of Women, Art, and Society by Whitney Chadwick, which covers:

This acclaimed study challenges the assumption that great women artists are exceptions to the rule who “transcended” their sex to produce major works of art. While acknowledging the many women whose contributions to visual culture have often been neglected, Whitney Chadwick’s survey reexamines the works themselves and the ways in which they have been perceived as marginal, often in direct reference to gender.

This homage to Wally Woods's 22 Panels that ALWAYS work by Mark Waid and Jeremy Rock at The Gutters nails quite a few good ones. Go to the link for the other four—oh and a snark about a DC executive. CAN U GUESS WHO?

An article on USA Today celebrates Fraction/Bagley's Fantastic Four, and Fraction/Allred's FF. But it also reveals that Fraction/Dodson's Defenders series is cancelled with issue #12

Jaws dropped around the comics movies-o-sphere yesterday when Variety boldly announced that Ben Affleck might direct a Justice League movie. The story made a bit of sense—although the less said about his acting career the better, Affleck is growing in stature as a director, even if a three-ring circus like a JL movie would tax anyone but D.W. Griffith or Michael Bay.

Mere days ago we revealed ACES WEEKLY, a new digital anthology which cartoonist David Lloyd is launching. The contributors list sounded awesome, but no sample pages were released. However Kyle Baker has posted a huge preview of SMASH MANNIX VS THE MOB, his strip for the anthology, writing:

Mitch O'Connell is known as a wonderful artist in a vintage/pin-up style. He also has a huge collection of old comics. And at a perhaps unthinkable cost to himself, he's used that collection to give us one of the great treasures of our age: Sex in Comic! The top 100 strangest, suggestive and steamy vintage comic book panels of all time! Here are three excerpts but the whole thing has us gasping for air.