Culture

Famed comic book spoofer Rob Granito to has finally answered some direct questions, and didn't get paid to do so, which is awesome. . But the origin of such things as Jay Didillo, Granito's non-existent collaborator on a non-existent DC book, is strangely prosaic:

-The Norse God continued to bring the hammer down at the North American Box Office for the second weekend in a row, contradicting...

This is so not comics, but the Final Three go at it tonight and we'd been saving up some notes. We started watching American Idol a few years ago because we felt the need to pay attention to a least one thing that wasn't nerdy but instead reflected the more mundane and/or inane side of culture -- something universal, just so when we had to hang out with normal people we wouldn't be entirely defenseless. Plus former judges Simon and Kara talked about music a little and it was interesting. But that was then. This season's judges, Steven Tyler and Jennifer Lopez excel at nothing but praise, blather and administering something called the "amazing" scale:

There are many Hulks on Twitter -- feministhulk, DRUNKHULK, and HIPSTERHULK -- but it is only PREPRESS HULK, who rampages into uncontrolled rages when faced with a improper PANTONE number or lo-rez file, that is a hero in the production world.

For several years, those who feel that the San Diego Comic-Con has lost the comics part of the equation (even though it isn't true at all ) have been wondering if an alternative event -- a "Slamdance*" to CCI:SD's Sundance -- would spring up. And artist/animators Scott Morse and Ted Mathot (who both have Pixar as a day job) are making this "Slamcomic" come true with TR!CKSTER, an alternative venue for comics events that will be open to the public and located right across the tracks from the SD Convention Center.

In spite of the dramatic international intrigue Sparkplug Comic Books and its affiliates faced at the Canadian border on the way to TCAF last weekend, we managed to simultaneously invade a whole other continent at Stockholm Sweden’s 11^th Annual SPX Festival. Sparkplug was honored to be invited to the festival for the 3^rd year in a row along with many other hella distinguished international guests.

It's a busy week for cartooning events here in NYC, with so many you can't even get to them all. One we didn't want to miss took place last night, DRAWING THE LINE at the Society of Illustrators, a group chat about the cartooning craft by Joe Quesada, Walt Simonson and Jim Steranko. The panel was organized and moderated by artist Dennis Calero (X-MEN NOIR) as part of a move for the SI to get more involved in covering the graphic literature world. In the regard it was a total success, allowing three important artists talk about their work and approaches devoid of the promotional efforts that color most convention and bookstore appearances. Calero did a great job moderating as well, keeping the talk circling various aspects of the cartoonist's life, including dealing with "shortcuts", deadlines and the rewards of artwork, and showing a great knowledge of the trio's careers.

A bit of an interesting experiment going on over at the Drawing Words Writing Pictures blog, as two young cartoonists are learning how to make their way in the world -- without even drawing cartoons:

In case you were wondering, Aaron, author of SCALPED, WOLVERINE and PUNISHER MAX, sports a beard as fearsome as his talent.

YouTube user BronyVids has been sharpening his/her Final Cut skills on My Little Pony Mash-ups, and it is WATCHMEN's turn. We had no idea My Little Pony looked so good and we totally want to watch it now.

When you think of sports cartoons -- if you ever do -- you probably think of something by Bill Gallo -- he was the best known -- and probably one of the last -- practitioners of the art. The legendary NY Daily News sports cartoonist passed away yesterday in White Plains at the age of 88 after a 70 year career at the Newss.

Click for the larger version. Also notice how they ran out of time on some of the photoshopping. Via Dave G.