Tag: Top News

Yikes for today's Marvel mystery event thing we go all the way back to the 80s! Before there were Events!!! Armor Wars, by David Michelinie and Bob Layton, was one of the original golden age of Iron Man storyline and showcased Tony Stark's penchant for being a hoarder with his armor suits as being a bad thing. The current promo, by Steve Pugh, shows a bunch of different Stark Armors, including a mecha-szed one blowing a hole through the face of the Statue of Liberty. Nice one, Tony. Also shown: the Hulkbuster armor, West Coast Avengers-Iron Man and more.

While the harassment problems seems to have been put under control, by and large, there are a rather alarming number of reports of theft from the show, including this one, about a hand painted "Dunny" statue worth $2000 being stolen from a booth. The culprit was caught on tape taking the items at 7:25 after the show closed and fled on foot. I also saw tweets indicating that writer Amy Chu's laptop was stolen, and there's a report of an artist having some pages stolen as well. Thievery doesn't invite the same kind of "they were asking for it" response as other kinds of claims, but unfortunately, these incidents are a reminder that leaving valuable things lying around is not a good idea at a crowded con. It's also a sad comment on an otherwise peaceful crowd.

The British Comic Awards have announced their short list of nominees and that the great Posy Simmonds will be inducted into the hall of fame. The nominees were selected by the BCA Committee based on suggestions from the public and winners will be chosen by a panel consisting of Jonathan Entwistle, Jessica Hynes. Danny John-Jules (yes The Cat from Red Dwarf!), Jonathan Ross and Suzy Varty. Winners will be announced November 15th at Thought Bubble.

In our cartoonists getting plaudits corner this week, Roz Chast has made the five book short list for the National Books Awards for her exemplary Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? which deals with the twilight years of her hilarious, annoying and lovable parents. She is entered in the non-fiction category and it is the first adultcomic, and only the third graphic novel over all to ever make the NBA lists. The entire category:

Look at the size of this thing! There are so many puns to be made and this Humble Bundle pr makes the most of them. And while Marvel may be publishing Star Wars now, Dark Horse has a mighty backlist of Star Wars classics. Sp get in on this pay what you want download. ALSO for the first time, Dark Horse is offering DRM-free downloads.

Via Comic Book Resources, Marvel has added to it's mystery Summer event event, with a teaser by Art Adams reminiscent of the classic "Days of Future Past" storyline in the X-men. And everyone is in their classic 80s mufti too.

With this week's epochal news that the Marvel Cinematic UNiverse will be adapting the Civil War event storyline, many are wondering...why? Few of the superheroes introduced in the MCU even have secret identities—which were the crux of the kerfuffle between Iron Man and Captain America. Some just think it's a bad idea on other terms. Noelle Stevenson, of Lumberjanes and Nimona fame, is one of the sharpest commentators on Twitter, with incisive character analysis delivered in short 140-character bursts. Her thoughts on Avengers characterization are below.

With attendance of 151,000, this year's NYCC is now the biggest reported North American comics convention, surpassing the San Diego Comic Con's 130,000. According to show runner Lance Fensterman, the increase of 20,000 from last year was due to selling tickets for a full day Thursday, which was previously a half-day "pro day. I'm told neither number includes pros and exhibitors and 'industry support" however, so the exact number of numb and yet enthused people wandering the halls of either Comic-Con has not been released. Given the number of lookie-loos who hang around in San Diego, that event would still seem to be the biggest. Many people wondered how NYCC could be bigger than SDCC when the Javits Center is smaller than the San Diego Convention Center. I'm sure Torsten can give us the exact dimensions, but on most lists I've ever seen, the Javits is actually larger than SD Convetion Center. This stat is misleading however.

The NC Comicon will be held this year November 15-16 in Durham, NC. I've attended the last two years and to be blunt, it's a blast: a comics focused show in a great setting with lots of artists and enthusiastic fans. The show is expanding this year with more animation screenings—including the US premiere of a Kung Fa Panda short— as part of the second ComiQuest Film Fest. But there are also a ton of great comics artists including Fiona Staples, Sean Murphy, Bob Fingerman and John Paul Leon. John Barrowman provides nerdlebrity appeal. The show is run by retailer Alan Gill and artist Tommy Lee Edwards, and they put the effort in to make this a well rounded event.

Every once in a while I mention the "small companies banding together to survive in a hostile environment" strategy, and here's a perfect example. Aspen Comics, the long running company founded by the late Michael Turner, has acquired Big Dog Ink as an imprint. Both Aspen and Big Dog publish primarily periodicals, and that really is a tough business plan these days unless you have well known IP, and even then it is no cakewalk.

WHOA. It turns out that Civil War tease Marvel sent out was just the prelude to the real blockbuster news: Robert Downey Jr. will play a major role in Captain America 3 which will feature the Civil War storyline.

Well, as everyone was saying at New York Comic-Con, the last days of DC in New York are dwindling down to months, and expect a TON of jobs to start opening up in Burbank -- although I'm also told that some of the contract folks already in place in Burbank are not being renewed, especially in the digital realm. But there are some pretty sweet jobs opening up!