News

Best American Comics series editors Matt Madden and Jessica Abel have just posted the Notable Comics of 2011 list, those comics that did not make the contents of this year's Alison Bechdel-edited book, but are still worthy of notice. The listing includes covers, links and more information:

What is Platinum up to now that COWBOYS & ALIENS finally came out? Well, according to this call with shareholders, lots of COWBOYS & ALIENS merchandising and licensing...meaning it has now taken the place of MEN IN BLACK in the SCott Rosenberg bio. But new stuff is coming! And in a cost-cutting measure they have hired a company to rep them -- but instead of paying cash they pay stock. Elsewhere, it's a LOT of cost-cutting -- not a bad idea given the huge losses they have been reporting.

Time is rolling out its top 10 lists and two graphic books made the 'Top 10 Fiction Books list: THE DEATH RAY by Daniel Clowes and HARK! A VAGRANT by Kate Beaton, both published by Drawn & Quarterly. (To see the individual listings you'll need to go through the annoying, hit making slideshow format.) Confirming the nerd-friendly tenor of the list, A DANCE WITH DRAGONS by George R. R. Martin topped the list, although more traditional literary tomes were at other spots. Comics-mole Lev Grossman penned the entries for the books. It was only a few years ago that Alison Bechdel's FUN HOME topped theTime list, and announced that graphic novels were just books with ideas and themes, too.

These days, it seems like three years on a title is a good run. Brian Michael Bendis is calling it a day with eight years on the Avengers titles. In an interview with Comic Book Resources, Bendis says:

The mostly triumphal (photos to come) Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival was marred for one indie comics stalwart when AdHouse publisher Chris Pitzer's car was broken into and several art items stolen. The complete list is in the link -- as Pitzer notes, it's kind of unlikely that that thief was much interested in the art, but there is a reward for its return.

Alan Moore will contribute a prose essay to the Occupy Comics project currently running on Kickstarter. He joins David Lloyd on the roster of the project which will record the Occupy Movement in comics -- their V FOR VENDETTA comic has been an inspiration for the protesters with the Guy Fawkes mask from the comics showing up around the globe.

A terse SEC filing on Friday has led to headlines all over comics: Gareb Shamus has resigned as CEO, President and Director of Wizard World, Inc., the convention-running entity of the Wizard empire. Seeing as how Shamus is the owner and founder of the company it came as a shock. But what does it really mean? Has Shamus really been ousted from his own company -- or is it just a filing to reflect some internal resource shuffling?

As of last Thursday, Gareb Shamus is no longer president/CEO of Wizard World, Inc. Being publicly traded, notice of this change had to be filed with the SEC. This includes the company's report:

Once again there are six judges this year: Brigid Alverson, Calum Johnston, Jesse Karp, Larry Marder, Ben Saunders, and Mary Sturhann. Congrats to all these fine judges -- you will get to read lots of comics!

Via PR. Congrats to Alex! He gets to wear a shiny deputy badge now.

Bon Alimagno is leaving Marvel to take a job with software company The Apollo Group. At Marvel Alimagno worked closely with Senior Vice President, Business Affairs & Talent Management David Bogart on freelancer scheduling and handling. He was formerly the editor at Harris Comics, overseeing the adventures of Vampirella.

Janna Morishima, formerly of Scholastic and Diamond, has just joined Papercutz as Marketing Director. At Diamond Morishima helped spearhead the then-nascent market for kids graphic novels, so working with the Papercutz lineup of such things as The Smurfs and Lego is a natural move for her.