Kibbles ‘n’ Bits 3/5/14: Mystery bullet found in former comics shop

§ I bet you thought the Michael George murder case was over. The former comics shop owner was tried twice for killing his wife in 1990, and convicted in 2011 after years of legal proceedings. But one little shard of the past may have just been revealed: a dusty bullet found behind a water heater in an unused room in the commercial space that was the murder scene back in ’90. Creepy, isn’t it? George’s defense attorney has been granted a motion to have the bullet tested for fingerprints and any other evidence, just in case it provides new light on the case..

§ Augie DeBlieck has some interesting commentary n Eric Stephenson’s ComicsPRO speech.

He went on to point out that the biggest problem with the Direct Market is its continued reliance on The Big Two, who now operate at the whim of their much larger corporate masters, putting the Direct Market in a bad position. In the world of computer programming, we refer to this as the bus factor: The bus factor is the total number of key developers who would need to be incapacitated (for example, by getting hit by a bus/truck) to send the project into such disarray that it would not be able to proceed.

§ What is Paul Levitz going to be doing as a Boom Studios board member? Vaneta Rogers went and asked him:

But I’ve been doing a lot of teaching, as you know, a fair amount of writing — the part of my brain that hasn’t been fully occupied is the part that’s used to solving business problems. So I’ve been looking, over the last couple of years, as my non-competes became looser, at what kind of opportunities there might be to use those skill sets. I’ve done a little bit of consulting work, but not directly related to comics. Once the contracts made it possible, I wanted to see if there was anything useful I could do that way in comics. I told a number of my friends, “I’m available if there’s a consulting project, or a board seat in your structure. I’m open to having conversations.” And the conversations with Ross led to doing a consulting project for them, and to the offer of the board seat.

§ You know the Federal Reserve as the mysterious organization that somehow controls our monetary supply. But they also make educational comic books! And you can read them online for free! One of them has had perhaps MILLIONS of copies distributed over the years (it is printed in batches of 250,000, just like our money.).

Of the five comics Steinberg wrote himself, three were updates of the Fed’s longest-running titles, while two, The Story of the Federal Reserve System and The Story of Monetary Policy were new additions to the Fed’s extensive comics catalog.

§ I guess there was a mini-kerfuffle the other day wherein Newsarama Editor Lucas Siegel complained anonymously about a comics company not wanting Newsie to cover their comics. Okay, whatever floats your boat. The Outhouse, as usual, has the best coverage. Is that what it has come to?

§ Speaking of Newsarama, here’s a fine piece by Jim McLauchlin that looks at the monetary aspects of he convention boom, such as charging for autographs and the money to be made from sketches:

They’ve grown so much that artists can make way more money being artists at conventions than in the pages of a Marvel or DC book. Look no further than beloved longtime comic artist George Pérez.

“I can earn more in a single weekend of convetioneering than I would in an entire month drawing comics,” Pérez says. “And I get a pretty high rate drawing comics.”

§ I don’t always do Kickstarter listings but here’s a really good one: help Robin McConnell and Brandon Graham hit the road to record a series of live Inkstuds podcasts. They’ve made goal but are adding on a trip to New York to gab it up.

§ Here is a depressing piece about how just having a bestselling book doesn’t mean you’re going to have money to live on. All of my cartoonist friends on Facebook shared this link so you do the math there.

§ Retailer Duncan McGeary (he owns Pegasus Books in Bend, Oregon, formerly owned by Mike Richardson) is now an author, with the release of Led to the Slaughter: The Donner Party Werewolves. I’m pretty much fascinated by the tale of the Donner Party, and adding werewolves makes it just a wee bit scarier than what really happened.

§ Ulises Farinas has given up writing comics reviews and delivers an exit manifesto:

The reason i read other reviews, is because critical thinking should operate from a certain standpoint. We all gotta be speaking the same language, understanding how a story works, characterization, that kinda shit. And when i go and read other reviews, it quickly becomes clear that IT JUST DOESN’T HAPPEN. There are no ten commandments. There’s no one talking about story, why Batman is doing something Batman-ish. Just because we all understand the archetype doesn’t mean you get to get away with brooding for 172 pages cause THATS JUST HOW HE IS. Do you know how many superhero comics have basically just skipped any kind of character development? How many comics have basically abandoned any kind of narrative structure and called it ‘serialization’ and ‘decompression?’

I really enjoyed Ulises’s reviews because they were the kind of stuff people say late in the bar but never put in writing, and I guess there’s a reason for that. Anyway I guess he can get back to drawing his most excellent comics now.

§ Finally, Johnny Ryan illustrates a sad trip to Corey Feldman’s house for a horrible party.