Kibbles ‘n’ Bits, 5/28/13: G. Willow Wilson at Marvel; San Diego dread

§ Apparently Author G. Willow Wilson has a Marvel project in the works. Wilson’s novel Alif the Unseen has been very well received, and her comics work—Air, Cairo and a Vixen mini series for DC—wasn’t too shabby either. She previously worked on the Mystic revival for Marvel.

§ The 2013 edition of Tom Spurgeon’s yearly massive San Diego Comic-Con tips and tricks has been posted, and as I think I do every year, if there is ONE PIECE OF ADVICE you should heed if you value your immortal soul, it is this:

Let me be firm about one thing: forget entirely getting something done “when you get there.” Whatever you’re thinking of leaving of doing until you get to the hotel room? You will not get that thing done. It’s not convenient, you’ll find 10,000 excuses to skip it, and you’ll end up feeling dumb as a rock having to carry the raw materials back home with you on the plane. Packing materials you never touched back into the bag you brought with you is the DIY Walk of Shame.

So so so true.

I read the hints and tips with some wistful feelings; for the last few years I’ve stayed at a quiet-to-dead hotel on the other side of the tracks; trips to Ralphs were frequent and coming home at night was uneventful. This year I ended up at the Hyatt, which is sort of like being told you’ve been assigned to a combination of Mardi Gras, TGI Friday’s and Ari Gold’s bachelor party. The last time I stayed at the Hyatt, I never even made it over the railroad tracks. Dread dread dread.

§ One resource not mentioned on the Comics Reporter guide is the Unofficial San Diego Comic-Con blog which really does stay up to date on parties, off sites, exclusives and all that other stuff that has nothing to do with comics.

§ Grace Bello profiles Rutu Modan for PW

But when Modan embarked on a novel about her family’s country of origin, she needed to learn about Polish history and culture. She knew so little about the land that the first thing she did was turn to Wikipedia for answers. She also spoke with Polish folks in Poland and in Israel, read books about the conflicts between Jews and Poles, and visited Poland herself. In fact, this nuanced, touching story took Modan more than two years just to develop. She describes her process (after the research is complete): “First I write the whole script. I know what’s going to happen in the story; I write the dialogue. Then afterward I make the storyboard and start drawing. And then it took me another year to draw it. So it was a very long and quite painful process. And also fun, really.”

§ The Chicago Tribune previews Printers Row, a publishing fest which increasingly spotlights graphic novels, with several versions of this “graphic novels worth reading” piece.

§ Of all the stories about comics you find perusing Google’s newspaper sweep, this kind is my favorite: the local profile of a veteran cartoonist. In this case, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune talks to the great Nick Cardy:

Nick Cardy was an artist in the fledgling comic book industry in 1943 when a draft notice sent him to Europe as a tank driver, an assignment for which he was singularly unsuited. In England recovering from pleurisy he contracted on the voyage across the Atlantic, he was assigned to the Third Armored Division. “This man says, ‘I see here that you were in the motor pool, can you drive a tank?’ I said, I can’t even drive a truck. He said okay.

§ Here is a linkbait piece called The ten most heartbreaking moments in comic book movies which seems to have forgotten that American Splendor, Crumb, Ghost World, A History of Violence, Road to Perdition, The Rocketeer and V for Vendetta were also comic book movies.