Publishers

When we ran yesterday's news about a new Suicide Girls comic from IDW, the PR included a rough version of the cover by Cameron Stewart. Stewart tweeted the finished version and it's a lot nicer. And for a comic based on a website featuring nude models, it is totally classy.

Actress Brea Grant, artist David Hahn and cover artist Cameron Stewart are not a creative team to be taken lightly. The Suicide Girls are an early adapter in the "tattoo'd Goth Girls are sexy" derby, and for a subscription you can look at naked but kind of artful photos of lots of them, and the individual models have more of an empowered air about them than most naked girl sites. Anyway, a comic book.

An AP story flooded the wires with a total spoiler on the death in this week's FANTASTIC FOUR #587. We blanked out the name here but click on the link if you MUST know:

TAKIO is definitely something different from Brian Bendis and Michael Oeming: a kids' story. Set in a family where two squabbling sisters learn to...

Tony Millionaire at Desert Island -- let do this!

By Jen Vaughn -- What do you do with a man with a wild mind of his own and a pair of drawing hands that just won't quit? You make him KING.

James Kochalka is the one of forerunners of autobiographical diary comics with his syndicated comic, American Elf, which is also available online and began way back in October, 1998. He is also the creator of other excellent comics like irreverent SuperF*ckers and children's books like the Johnny Boo series and most recently, Dragon Puncher. His comics are published by Portland-based comics publisher, Top Shelf.

A minor market segment, these box sets offer what most fans are clamoring for: ownership of the actual file instead of an app, affordable comics (even at $50, the per-comic cost is usually below twenty-five cents), and extras which turns these collections into electronic omnibuses. However, due to sticker shock, and the experience of reading these comics on a horizontal screen, many fans have been reluctant to purchase these collections. Which means that now, as the digital marketplace transitions to apps and browser-based readers, these older CD- and DVD-ROM collections are being sold at clearance prices. So, dear readers, in these challenging economic times, we offer you this bargain bin listing of select titles found on Amazon.com. We make no money from directing you to these forgotten gems, and, as with anything on the web, caveat lector et emptor.

After yesterday's news that DC Comics was dropping the Comics Code, leaving Archie the last surviving member of the Comics Code Authority...comes word that...

Sierra Hahn and Dave Marshall have been promoted to full editors at Dark Horse Hahn has edited many media tie-ins and original series, while...

Marvel and the retailing community sometimes have a love/hate/love relationship, but here's news that they are strongly supporting members of ComicsPRO, the retailer advocacy organization, by releasing Orson Scott Card's FORMIC WARS: BURNING EARTH #1 a day early on Tuesday, February 15th to ComicsPRO member stores. Participating stores will also sell an exclusive poster. The regular sale date is Wednesday, 2/16.

Over on the various DC blogs, Jim Lee and Dan DiDio have announced that DC is pulling out of the Comics Code in favor of a multi-layer ratings system:

This week's PW Comics Week newsletter included our owninterview with Dynamite’s Nick Barrucci, and it was a pretty frank talk, covering all the aspects of the Hobson's choices that comics publishers must make. Barrucci says it's all damned if you do damned if you don't on many matters, and newer channels have their own issues: