Marvel’s Next Big Thing: Captain America
The final Marvel phonecall of the week was for Rick Remender and John Romita Jr’s Captain America relaunch. More than the other calls, this...
Studio Coffee Run: Arrow, The Walking Dead, Kickass 2, The Hobbit, etc.
While the 2nd episode of Season 3 of The Walking Dead dropped in the ratings from the first episode, it still topped the ratings...
Good Work, Comics!
Is there nowhere in the world of culture which can stay positive for more than five minutes!? This week we found out that not...
Apple features Madefire in iPad mini rollout
The biggest players in the comics space may soon be (or already are) Apple, Google and Amazon, and at least two of them are...
Comics: for one fantastic moment, everything was OK
Is this the magic moment? Probably. Or as a recent ICv2 headline put it:Comic Retailers Cautiously Ecstatic, following the "Return of the Pamphlet." Despite the innate caution, pessimism and low self-image endemic to the comics industry, it seems that following a year of improved sales, general awareness, mainstream recognition and booming live events, the comics industry has taken a moment to kick back the recliner and crack open a frosty one:
Alan Moore and Superfolks Part 1: The Case for the Prosecution
In 1977 Dial Press of New York published Robert Mayer’s first novel, Superfolks. It was, amongst other things, a story of a middle-aged man coming to terms with his life, an enormous collection of 1970s pop-culture references, some now lost to the mists of time, and a satire on certain aspects of the comic superhero, but would probably be largely unheard of these days if it wasn’t for the fact that it is regularly mentioned for its supposed influence on a young Alan Moore and his work, particularly on Watchmen, Marvelman, and his Superman story, Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? There’s also a suggestion that it had an influence on his proposal to DC Comics for the unpublished cross-company ‘event,’ Twilight of the Superheroes. But who’s saying these things, what are they saying, and is any of it actually true?
Halloween supplemental: horrific work areas
Colleen Doran is rightfully horrified by the above photo of a work area—that belongs to an unnamed cartoonist. As a prescription, she offers a list of declutterizing resources, which I'm sure we could all do with a look at.
Marvel’s Next Big Thing: All-New X-Men
It's time for another Marvel conference call, this time as Brian Michael Bendis and Nick Lowe talk about All-New X-Men #1. And I was...
DC Month-to-Month Sales: September 2012
One year after the big relaunch, DC wanted to give its superhero line another jolt by borrowing a gimmick from the glory days of 1994 and releasing "zero" issues of all of the "New 52" titles.
In terms of average sales, this means an increase of more than 1,000 units compared to August. Of course, these are sales to retailers, and increases based on this type of gimmick never stick around for subsequent issues, but the fact that retailers have enough faith in DC to support the initiative to this degree is good news, certainly.
What’s next for New York Comic Con
By most accounts, this past New York Comic Con was a success, giving fans access to all kinds of stars, comics and otherwise, and presenting a news fusillade on many topics. It was also crowded, congested and teeming with people. Crowding has been a serious issue at NYCC ever since the very first one, which was shut down by state troopers and left many people who had purchased tickets stuck outside. Since then the madding hordes have ebbed, but mostly flowed. Crowd control was pretty horrible in 2010, and got a little better in 2011—but my witnesses say it was back to 2010 levels this year.
Marvel’s Next Big Thing: The Indestructible Hulk
Mark Waid and Leinil Francis Yu are the team behind the relaunch for Marvel's Hulk, who will NOW! be known as 'The Indestructible Hulk'....
Dark Horse to publish the complete Sin Titulo
Cameron Stewart's excellent webcomic Sin Titulo has finished and will get a hardcover collection from Dark Horse next year. The strip, described as "a dark, neo-noir semi-autobiographical mystery thriller concerned with dreams, family, and memory" launched in 2007 as part of the TX webcomics collective, and has continued on, with a few lengthy breaks, ever since. It won the Eisner Award for Best Webcomic in 2010

























