Culture

We're gonna try not to have minutely news updates on this year's San Diego, but it's probably gonna be daily from here on out, so here's a round-up of pertinent links and ephemera. Which reminds us....isn't it time San Diego was renamed Douche Prom?

§ Why is this totally AWESOME quote by Dan DiDio not getting the attention it deserves??? The pants are really intentional for the...

Batman Forever does something that Batman and Batman Returns were unable to do: it makes Batman a proper protagonist, with goals and desires of his own. Not merely reacting to events, Bruce/Batman is after something in Forever. His various allies and antagonists, seductions and betrayals are all thematically consistent and relevant to his struggle. This does not mean that the finished movie is without flaws. WHAT DOES THE PROTAGONIST WANT? Bruce Wayne wants to lead a "normal life." He wants to be able to fall in love, put his demons to rest and have a fully integrated personality. Life has, as life will, other plans, first in the form of Two-Face. Just as Bruce is motivated by an unending revenge for his parents’ death, Two-Face is motivated by an irrational desire for revenge upon Batman. Two-Face’s sense of justice (arbitrary and cruel) and divided-down-the-middle personality are twisted mirrors of Bruce. Bruce would love nothing better than to put away Two-Face, settle down with that nice Dr. Meridian (astonishingly, yet another blonde with a bat obsession — how lucky can one guy get?) and hang up his cape for good.

Ken Quattro uncovers the transcript of testimony in the 1939 lawsuit DC vs Victor Fox. The suit involved C suing the other publisher for a Superman knock-off which has been producer by the Eisner./Iger shop and then 22/year/old Eisner was called on to testify, an event covered in both the Andelman/Eisner biography and The Dreamer.

This week, a quick one, while he's away: Are Chris Ware and John Romita Jr. working in the same medium? Was Wonder Woman in the Avengers back in 1993? Do you still not care about the World Cup? And does the most interesting new comics release this week start with a "W," too?

TRIPWIRE Magazine, the excellent comics magazine edited by Joel Meadows, will have a new issue out in time for you-know-what. PR Below. TRIPWIRE is back...

A look at most of the past 600 issues of Wonder Woman's various runs show many changing fashions in heroism, art styles and just how much of a butt shadow you can safely show.

While we're on deadline with another story, you might enjoy, courtesy of iFanboy, The Vince Coletta Letter:

Season Three/Episode Three: It Hurts Me Too It hurts me to tell you what you already know - this recap is late.  Let’s just say...

The annual American LIbrary Association wrapped up its annual meeting yesterday and, as the above photo suggests, there was abundant graphic novel programming and presence. Our own Torsten Adair was there, and he blogged of many things, like the Dabel Brothers new imprint, Sea Lion Press:

We've mentioned book bloggers a few times lately, and contrasted their peaceful, herbivore ways with the violent, predatory jungle of comics blogging. Now here's a VERY direct comparison -- and also some interesting market research type stuff -- via the Graphic Novels Challenge. This is a blogging program in which book bloggers try to read a bunch of graphic novels in a given period -- one of a series of similar challenge for memoirs, history books or whatever. Most of the bloggers are not trained-from-birth comics experts and heir comments are illuminating. The list is also high on "litereary" and young adult comics -- not very much Marvel or DC. They also check books to read out of the library, so they are not "Wednesday" Crowd" much.

Well, it was a rough weekend. But we can take a little solace in enjoying the great Lorenzo Mattoti's soccer comic. Alè Tran Tran,...