As usual, Jamie Coville has curated a slection of the best panels at Comic-Con for your listening pleasure.His pictures are in this album. Learn about the history of underground comics, Robert Williams,

 

Coville also recorded the Wonder Woman in the 1940s panel with ghost writer Joye Murchinson Kelly, but that will be posted at a later time by special request.

San Diego Comic Con 2018 (July 18 – 22) 26 Photos



Maggie
Thompson Spotlight: The Comics Buyers Guide
(40:51, 37.4mb)

On the panel was Maggie Thompson, Mark Evanier, Scott Brick and R.C.
Harvey. Maggie described the origin and the ending of The Comics Buyers
Guide. Mark Evanier spoke about why he started and stopped writing for
CBG. Maggie told a story about proposing a book of Mark Evanier columns
and the shocking reason they turned it down. R. C. Harvey talked about
his involvement with the magazine. Scott discussed writing comic history
articles for CBG. It was also revealed that Scott wrote the most popular
article the magazine had and that was about who added the ‘snap’ sound
effect to Gwen Stacy’s fall, killing her. Maggie revealed the effort to
save the CBG archives from the dumpster. Maggie and R.C Harvey told
stories about Steve Ditko. Finally, they talked about digitizing CBG and
putting them online.


20
Years of About Comics
(52:00, 47.6mb)

The panelists were Nat Gertler, Lea Hernandez, Andrew Farago, Scott
McCloud and Jim MacQuarrie. Nat spoke about why he got into publishing,
who some of the early creators he publish were and what they’ve done
with their careers. He talked about some non comics related publications
that are popular like the Green Book and a Jewish parody of James Bond.
He also spoke about Superfolks that influenced Kingdom Come. Nat
mentioned that as of late he’s been reprinting works previously
published by Eclipse, Aadvark, Dark Horse and Epic/Marvel. Scott McCloud
and Nat spoke about 24 hour comics and some of the creators who did it
and was published by Nat. Lea spoke about her own experience doing a 24
hour comic. Jim talked about the Licensable Bear, one issue having the
first Obama in it and Nat selling a bunch on ebay and giving a cut of
the ebay money to the artists.


Comics
Arts Conference #3: Attorneys vs. Historians: Who Authors the Authorship
Narrative?
(50:19, 46mb)

An introduction was done by Kathleen McClancy. On the panel was James
Thompson, Danny Barer, Alex Grand and Marc H. Greenberg. The group spoke
about 3 cases where there are conflicting stories among the co-creators
and publishing. They were Bob Kane and Bill Finger over Batman, Stan
Lee, Martin Goodman, Jack Kirby and Joe Simon over Captain America and
Stan Lee and Jack Kirby over Fantastic Four. They also pointed out how
sales of the publisher or other media adaptions had correlated with
those statements. They briefly went into how comic history books have
written about these topics. Marc spoke about Batman and Me written by
Bob Kane and Tom Andrae and Bob suing Tom and how that played into Bill
Finger getting credit for Batman.


Spotlight
on Robert Williams
(48:38, 44.5mb)

Eric Reynolds interviews Robert Williams. Among the topics discussed
were how much of his art is already finished in his head before he
starts drawing or painting, his rules for himself as an artist, the
comics he read as a kid and his other interests and how that influenced
him as an artist. Robert talked about his early jobs he was fired from,
working with Big Daddy Roth and then comics. Williams revealed he just
didn’t fit in with the fine art world and how the punk rock culture
become his peer group. They spoke about Juxtaposed, The Lowbrow art of
Robert Williams, Zap Comics, Feltch and an obscenity case against
underground comics. Other topics covered were politics, museums showing
comic art, Tijuana Bibles and reduction & reproduction of art.


Splashing
Ink of Museum Walls
(52:04, 47.6mb)

Moderating the panel was Rob Salkowitz, panelists were: Kim Munson, Ann
Nocenti, Adam Smith and Emil Ferris. Emil spoke about how art in museums
was a part of her growing up. Kim spoke about the history of comic art
in museums, Rob spoke about Robert Crumb being in a show with Rembrandt,
Picasso and other traditional echelon of fine artists and why. Ann spoke
about meeting Jack Able at Marvel and how art would be blown up and then
sold for millions of dollars. Adam spoke about his plans for the new San
Diego Comic Con Museum, how they want to be different from other museums
dedicated to comic book art. Ann and Adam spoke about ‘ghettoizing’
comic book art and avoiding doing that within the museum. Emil discussed
the Familiar Strange, the Wolfman being her favorite monster and what
was behind the pentagram on the hand. Multiple people spoke about how
taking 1 page out of a story and displaying it in a museum and how the
comic art isn’t just art, it can be a historical artifact that people
have a real attachment to.


Spotlight
on Shannon Wheeler
(54:28, 49.8mb)

Comic Con gave Shannon an inkpot award at the start of the panel.
Shannon played 2 minutes of the Too Much Coffee Man Opera. Then Shannon
did a reverse timeline of his career, where he started with the work
he’s doing now, meeting Stormy Daniels at a strip club and Sh*t My
President Says, and going back through time covering God is Disappointed
with You, Oil and Water, Gramps Won’t Wake Up, Screw Heaven, When I die
I’m going to Mars, The New Yorker and the process of relearning how to
do cartoons to get published by them, the Too Much Coffee Man Opera and
why he did it, the Too Much Coffee Man comic book and the incentive for
stores. He spoke about the “bootleg” t-shirt of TMCM, JAB #3 where they
shot a hole through the comic and Children with Glue.


Len
Wein Tribute
(48:19, 44.2mb)

Moderated by Gary Miereanu, panelists were Lynn Latham, Gillian Horvath,
Christine Valada, Melinda Snodgrass, Paul Levitz and Charlotte
Fullerton. The group talked about their first interaction with Len,
working with him, where Len’s creative spirit came from, why he was so
positive, his life long health issues, Len’s extraordinary memory, The
Fan vs. Pro Trivia matches at San Diego, Len’s wish for Wolverine’s
healing powers, Len’s odd rules for food and other things, Len’s work
being displayed on Big Bang Theory, how Batman saved Len’s life as a
kid, Len’s love of broadway musicals and singing, from the audience
Michael Davis told a story about Len helping him out of a very serious
situation with his singing. At the end a woman from the audience read
something that Len wrote about Wolverine in an interview with her for
Christine.


Graphic
Novels: From Eisner to Explosion!
(46:41, 42.7mb)

On the panel was Paul Levitz, Richard Burning, Scott McCloud and Emil
Ferris. Scott talked about the Graphic Novel terminology and where he
saw the graphic novel going after A Contract With God. Emil spoke about
how Eisner’s work inspired her. Richard discussed the gap between the
self expression of underground work and character expression of
superhero work. Paul reminded everyone that A Contract With God was a
disguised personal expression as it related to the death of his
daughter. Paul also spoke to how Eisner saw the whole page when he drew,
something that most artists didn’t do until the publishers replaced the
2x up boards with 1.5 boards. Emil talked about her crazy journey in
creating and getting My Favorite Thing is Monsters published. Richard
spoke about repackaging comics into graphic novels in the 1980s. They
also spoke about the Graphic Novel format (particularly with A Contract
With God) having the format fit the work, instead of having to fit the
work into the format.


Comics
Arts Conference #6: Two Women and Wonder Woman
(51:56, 47.5mb)

Kathleen McClancy did the introduction and then Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson
and Trina Robbins spoke about their issues with Jill Lepore’s book on
Wonder Woman. Nicky went through the Greek Mythology influence on Wonder
Woman that Jill didn’t mention, she also did this in regards to Amazon
warriors. She also spoke of H. G. Peter and how under rated he is
towards the success of Wonder Woman. She revealed how much of the family
wasn’t that happy with Lepore’s book as Marston and his accomplishments
were regularly trashed within it. Trina went through 3 golden age Wonder
Woman stories that were both funny and revealing to Wonder Woman’s
character. She also spoke about the changes to Wonder Woman over the
years. Nicky spoke about the possibility of a good book about Wonder
Woman and Marston ever coming out.


50th
Anniversary of Underground Comics
(50:51, 46.5mb)

Panelists were Joyce Farmer, Mary Fleener, Carol Tyler, Robert Williams,
Denis Kitchen, Trina Robbins and Ron Turner. The panel was moderated by
Charles Brownstein. Jackie Estrada started off by giving an Inkpot Award
to Justin Green, who couldn’t make it to the convention. Carol Tyler
accepted the award on his behalf. The group talked about how they got
into Underground Comics, why they did those comics, what the current
generation can learn from their struggles and S. Clay Wilson. In the
audience was underground cartoonists Lee Mars and Bill Stout who also spoke.


2000AD:
Simon Bisley
(51:59, 47.5mb)

Simon Bisley is interviewed by Mike Molcher. They went over a range of
topics including Simon being a self taught artist, his growing up, his
influences, getting his professional start, painting, his styles of work
and their evolution, getting work in the US, Batman / Judge Dredd, his
following among the gay community, Lobo and where he was at the time,
how he chooses projects, not doing a long run on a single character,
Hellblazer, Album covers, what characters he wants to work on, his
playing base in a band and his upcoming work.
IDW
Artists Edition Panel
(15:31, 14.2mb)

This was a very short panel where Scott Dunbier announced a new print
run of Bernie Wrightson artist edition book and a new Bernie Wrightson
Frankenstein artists edition book. Liz Wrightson joined the panel
briefly as well. During the Q&A Scott revealed that DC for some reason
doesn’t want to do any artists edition books and names some of the
artists he’d do books on if he could. This panel was delibritely made
short so that there could be a tribute panel for Steve Ditko who
recently passed away.


Steve
Ditko: Artist
(45:17, 41.4mb)

Scott Dunbier, Paul Levitz, Nick Lowe, David Schwartz and Steve Leialoha
all shared their stories of Steve Ditko. Paul spoke about working with
Steve Ditko and Wally Wood at the age of 19 on Stalker. Scott talked
about printing Ditko’s art in the artists edition books. David told his
story of communicating with Ditko via letters and eventually getting a
3-hour visit and conversation with him. Nick told some hilarious Ditko
stories courtesy of former Marvel editor Ralph Macchio. Steve Leialoha
talked about inking Ditko pencils on what is likely his last comic book
for another publisher and then meeting him. Paul and Nick revealed that
DC and Marvel were still regularly reaching out to Ditko to see if he
was willing to do some work for them, Marvel in particular wanted him to
do something with Squirrel Girl. They spoke about Shade the Changing Man
and what Ditko did best in comics.


The
Gospel According to Archie
(57:03, 52.2mb)

On the panel were Adam Sand, Rob Bradfied, Jennifer Joan, Tessica
Tseang, Pat Jankiewicz and it was moderated by Erik Amaya. Among the
topics discussed were Al Hartley’s work at Marvel and why he quit to
work for Archie. They started talking about Spire, their licensed work,
then the Archie comics. They went over some odd and now politically
incorrect parts of the comic, how Archie characters were sometimes drawn
off model, how certain characters like Reggie and Midge were almost
never used and how there was some dark scenes not typically found in
Archie Comics. The groups spoke about Hartley’s method of trying to
convert people with these comics and why she didn’t agree with it. They
also spoke about Jack Chick Comics and the Riverdale TV show.



Larry
Stroman Spotlight
(44:19, 40.5mb)

Larry got an Inkpot award to start off. He talked about his
neighbourhood growing up and having dyslexia, how the Fireside Marvel
books inspired him to become a comic artist, him quitting his job to
pursue comics full time and moving to New York, selling his art in
central park, going to a comics convention with his portfolio, Howard
Chaykin giving him work and helping him get work from publishers,
focusing on working for editor Carl Potts on the Epic line, getting his
first regular book, his hilarious story about becoming the regular
artist on X-Factor, doing Tribe at Image, his getting out of comics and
doing other type of work, going back to do comics again, his commissions
and how doing them has improved his inking, his restarting Tribe, his
influences, differences between doing creator owned work via Image vs
working for Marvel or DC, developing a style and having it slowly go
away and how he feels about having one of his comics turned into a movie.


CBLDF
– The Trials of Underground Comix
(49:01, 44.8mb)

Moderated by Charles Brownstein the panelists were Robert Williams,
Joyce Farmer and Ron Turner. Charles began by giving a brief overview of
the censorship of EC Comics and the Comics Code Authority. Robert
Williams spoke about psychedelic poster artists who were all EC Comics
fans, he also spoke about the drug culture starting in the 1950s and the
‘beat’ culture. Ron continued on with history of how the beat culture
connected to the origins of underground comics. Joyce spoke about her
personal experience of getting married, having a child, getting a
driver’s license, then divorcing her husband, Richard and Ron told a
funny story about Feltch comics going missing causing a obscenity case
to be dismissed, they also spoke about Zap Comics #4 being busted for
obscenity and how that affected the comics industry.


Thi
Bui Spotlight
(48:13, 44.1mb)

Thi started by getting 3 audience members to join the panel for a
reading a portion of her book The Best That We Could Do. She also spoke
about A Different Pond, which was a children’s book that she drew, she
revealed she is working with an Asian American Law organization to help
fight the Trump administrator deport Asian refugees and the results of
that work. She spoke about another book that is being worked on about
climate change in Vietnam where the issue is very pressing. She talked
about going to Vietnam twice and how the local population reacted to
her. She also revealed why she chooses to use comics to tell her
stories, how she deals with anxiety issues and the conflict within the
Asian American communities in terms of conservative vs progressive politics.


How
to create (and survive) a successful Graphic Novel series
(45:25,
41.5mb)

The panelists were Jennifer and Matthew Holm, Raina Telgemeier and Traci
Todd. The panel was moderated by Dr. Rose Brock. Jennifer and Matthew
spoke about how they started collaborating together and their process of
doing books. Raina spoke about her process and how much of her personal
life she puts into the book. Traci spoke about the process from the
editor’s perspective. They all revealed what they would tell their
younger selves before doing a graphic novel. Traci recommended being
brave and accepting feedback from humans (and not social media). They
all gave recommendations for other graphic novels they enjoyed. They all
spoke about what they wanted to be when they grew up, if they put real
people in the book and how they keep themselves organized.


Fan
vs. Pro Comic Trivia – Len Wein Tribute Edition
(48:39, 44.5mb)

The Fan side was David Oakes, Derek McCaw and David Crowe. The Pro’s
were Christopher Sequeira, Paul Levitz, Jamie Coville and eventually
Glenn Hauman. Tom Galloway did some moderating and served on the fan
side as did Derek McCaw. Christine Valada also did some moderating. All
of the questions were about Len Wein’s work, including X-Men, Hulk,
Swamp Thing, Batman, Teen Titans and much, much more. This is likely to
be the last Fan vs. Pro Comic Trivia match.
 

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