I really do hate conventions. Ok, maybe “hate” is too strong of a word. Hmmm…how about “don’t really care for”? Ya, that sounds a bit better. I don’t really care for conventions. There was a time where I used to count down the days but not so much anymore. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact the ever since Wizard bought the Chicago Comic-Con it has been shit. For almost a decade now that convention has indeed been shit and has gotten worse and worse every year. Last year was the first time in over 20 years that I didn’t go to the Chicago Comic-Con as a fan or a retailer. Wizard has killed any excitement that I once had for comic conventions. After attending the C2E2 con last weekend I can now change “has killed any excitement” to “had killed any excitement”. Why? Because C2E2 has brought back those feelings of excitement I once had for comic conventions.
I have to stress that this was a COMIC convention. Not one of those multimedia affairs that Wizard cons have turned into. Ya, there were some movie people there (from Carrie Fisher to the cast of Kick Ass) but the amount of industry professionals that were at the show was astounding. I couldn’t walk 10 feet in Artist Alley without seeing an artist whose work I have not enjoyed. Artists like Tony Harris, Michael Golden, Adam Hughes, Eric Canete, Jimmy Cheung, Amanda Conner, Jimmy Palmiotti, Terry and Rachel Dodson, Ron Garney, Jonathan Hickman, Mike Mignola, Art Baltazar, Geof Darrow, Jill Thompson, Gail Simone, Doug Mahnke, Patrick Gleason, Stephane Roux and too many more too name. Serouisly, I don’t remember the last time I saw these many great artists at a Chicago convention.
The convention hall itself was quite nice. The entire floor was covered in nice, plush carpet. There were also windows going all the was a round the top of the room letting in sunlight as well as showing off the great Chicago city skyline. This is is stark contrast to where Wizard holds it’s conventions here. The exhibit hall at Wizorld World has no natural light coming in what so ever and it feels and smells like your in somebody’s basement. One other noticeable difference the C2E2 exhibit hall had was the the aisles were nice and wide. I can not tell you how fucking nice it was not to be literally bumping into people every 2 seconds like at Wizard World.
There were not as many dealers there as previous conventions I’ve been too but I rarely buy anything at cons anymore so that didn’t bother me. I do wish there had been some more import (Japanese toys mainly) dealers there but that’s just me. As for the comic company booths I took some pictures which you can find down below. Most of you who get out to conventions will find the pics a little boring but I did want to give our readers who don’t get to cons often a sense of what they can expect to find there.
On a personal note I would like to thank all the people who came up to me to tell me they enjoy CCW TV. I truly wasn’t expecting to get recognized but it really was nice talking to you guys. The highlight of the convention for me was when I went over to the Image booth to meet Ryan Ottley and found out that he watches our little show and he had some nice things to say about it. If you guys ever get a chance to pick up Ottley’s sketchbook at a con I recommend you do so. It is quite amazing.
So, ya, overall I would have to say that C2E2 was a very, very pleasant experience and really can’t wait for to come back next year.
Hi folks, it’s me again with another shellacking of my opinions from the last couple of weeks or so and of the comics I’ve read and other things. This has ended up being way later than it should have been, I came down with the flu last week and its taken longer than I thought to recover.
RANTS
1. Last week started with the news of the death of John Hicklenton, a ground breaking artist mainly published in 2000ad and Judge Dredd: the Megazine. I guess he wouldn’t be that well known in the USA which is a real pity. He broke through into comics at the age of 19 by drawing a Neil Gaiman “future-shock” story for 2000ad which garnered him the notice of writer Pat Mills who immediately commissioned him to write 2 books for his long running character Nemesis: The Warlock. This was one of the most popular 2000ad characters which had artists of the calibre of Kev O’Neill and Bryan Talbot work on it before Hicklenton which I think shows how stunning his art was for a 19 year old to take over from those masters.
Its hard to understate how much of an impact Hicklenton’s art had, readers either loved or hated it but over the course of a couple of years many more loved than hated the organic sinister subversiveness of his creativity. Imagine if HR Giger (designer of Alien) had drawn comics then you might get a handle on where Hicklenton’s imagination lived, he could draw disturbing characters and visceral action. He passed away 2 weeks ago at the age of 42 from multiple sclerosis. There are some clips of him from the award winning 2008 documentary about him
2. Then as if the week couldn’t get any cheerier I heard of the death of Dick Giordano. He was a lot older than JH but still its disturbing to hear that death of one of the greats. Dick Giordano is most famous I suppose for the innumerable inking jobs he did, especially on Neal Adams work and for many Batman titles over the years. He was also a great pencilled with a beautiful delicate line, I recall only a few years ago he did some fantastic work on Devin Graysons Gotham Knights title.
He was also hugely significant as editor in chief and an executive for DC during a very successful time during the 80’s and early 90’s including encouraging the “British Invasion” of new artists and writers, regenerating the Teen Titans franchise, the Crisis on Infinite Earths, Watchmen, Dark Knight, the beginnings of Vertigo. The only failing you could say perhaps was letting Alan Moore get disenchanted with DC but then Alan Moore always seems to fall out with everyone eventually.
I’ve seen on Marvels June solicits that the Dracula story he did with Roy Thomas is being reissued, I’d recommend that anyone who enjoys a great story and beautiful art pick it up.
3. In comparison to the first two sections the other stuff like who’s artist on what pales into insignificance in the order of things but still we should talk about the normal stuff in our hobby as well as the heavy stuff, its all part of the tapestry of life and the world keeps moving on and its ok to talk about the stuff that’s important to us at the time…speaking of which…
4. No more Batwoman – Three words even more devastating that Wanda’s “No more Mutants”, the news that Greg Rucka has quit all DC’s projects and will be concentrating on his creator owned stuff. This is fine, I’m sure I’ll be checking out Queen and Country and whatever else he has planned but it is somewhat sickening that the single best mainstream comic of the last year is no more. The Rucka/J.H.Williams III Batwoman stories in Detective Comics were pretty damn amazing, great writing, outstanding art, fine colouring, just a complete package.
The proposed Batwoman title which was forecast for this summer could have been great but now we’ll never know as I don’t think a replacement writer would have as sympathetic take on Kate Kane, they’d probably get some hack like Winick to do it. Rucka has been very nice to DC in his announcement about it but I can’t help a nagging feeling that someone in management at DC poured some cold water on a “lesbian title”, I hope that’s not the case. (Editor’s note: It was announced today that J.H. Williams III will be co-writing and drawing the new Batwoman series beginning later this year)
5. No more Phonogram – This interview from Comics Alliance puts some things in a fairly poor perspective in my point of view. The fact that a great series like Phonogram couldn’t sell as much as C list Marvel and DC comics shows how fucked up the comics business is now. The writing was smart, the art was appealing yet it couldn’t sell much more than 4000 copies, that’s just a disgrace, some fucking piece of shit like Rulk can sell 60000 copies yet Phonogram can’t even sell enough to pay the artist electricity bill??? That just shows how fucked up the comics market is now. Maybe if the characters had all worn costumes and punched and stabbed each other to death, maybe that would have made it more appealing to the masses?
The comic had the reputation of being “elitist”, but for me it was one of the most joyous books of the last year and the comics world is all the poorer if it loses books like this. Hands up who needs more Deadpool books?
6. Youtube – For fucks sake, why in hell did they have to change it? Now the comments section is all fucked up and its lost all sense of narrative. And the info section is all over the place, none of the links or options are in as handy places as they used to be, youtube you fucked up, you bastards!
COMICS MINI-REVIEWS
Battlefields #4
I love this comic, Garth Ennis is such a good writer when he’s doing war stories, he can treat the subject seriously yet still leavens it all with the black humour of the ordinary tommies, yanks and fritzies. In it Sergeant Stiles commands a Sherman Firefly and leads his men in search of fearsome King Tiger tank. Its full of set piece action, good characterisation (even for the Germans who are far from the evil cardboard cut out characters as usually portrayed in TV and movie) and excellent art from Carlos Ezquerra. I’d love to see Jose and Elliot review this one actually.
Air Fighters #1 (Moonstone)
From the sublime to the ridiculous as it were. This was half price on dcbs and since I love war books, especially aviation books I figured it would be worth a chance….boy was I wrong. The cover by Tom Grindberg is very nice but after that it goes all kinds of wrong.
It’s a 72 page anthology based on characters from the Golden age of comics and most of the stories are hokey and just plain stupid. I prefer my war stories with a good realistic base and these are fantastical and make little sense. And as for the artwork….I’m not going to name any names because the art is so awful, its embarrassingly bad, some of it looks like a monkey doodled on the page or something. Some of them didn’t even bother to do some simple reference work, one story portrays a kette of Ju87 Stukas doing a combat air patrol complete with twin 37mm cannons when anyone who would have an interest in this book would know that’s ludicrous beyond belief and just shows how little the writer and artist cared about the whole charade.
Solomon Kane: Deaths Black Riders 2 & 3 (Dark Horse)
Ahhhhh back to something good, 2 issues of Robert E Howard’s puritan antihero and his encounter with some evil demons (are there any other kind?) in the black forest of southern Germany. It reads like a modern version of a classic Hammer Horror film or EC comic, I had to switch off the computer and read this in silence so as to give it my full concentration, so I could absorb every eerie word of Scott Allie’s script and drink in every line of Mario Guevara’s atmospheric artwork which draws you completely into the story so much as that you feel that you are in that dank forest surrounded by bloodthirsty demons with just a pistol and a trusty sword to protect you.
Power Girl 9 (DC)
This comic is such a joy to read, Gray and Palmiotti subvert the normal superhero clichés on almost every page and deliver a quality story every time. This issue sees PG up against Satanna and her “gun-toting Animal men and PG gets thwacked around with a big hammer for most of the issue until that other Amanda Conner favourite Terra turns up to save the day. It’s a real pity that Amanda Conner is quitting as this is a title she was born to draw, can’t wait to see what she works on next.
King City #5 (Image)
Another comic I fell in love with instantly, you can’t help but like Brandon Grahams Ameri-manga art style which has hints of Adam Warren but a more looser, expressive style. The story is about Joe and his Cat who steal things to order and the dramas that they get into. The humour in this title is definitely of the black cynical variety but that makes it no less funny. Its also black and white which shows the linework to its best advantage and its bigger than the normal comic book size so it fits more in, it’s a winner on both counts.
JLA #41 (DC)
Jose asked if anyone is reading JLA at the moment, I don’t remember if anyone answered and I couldn’t blame them. I started reading the book at #38 and the Blackest Night issues were horrible, just really awful writing and art, especially the Dr Light vs. Dr Light battle which got into misogynistic areas. I actually enjoyed #41 though, it felt like those old Avengers issues where Cap or Iron Man would put a new team together, of course this is JLA so it was Donna Troy putting the team together. Perhaps I took a liking to it because I loved the New Teen Titans so seeing Dick, Donna, Cyborg and Starfire on the same team again brought back good memories. Even Mark Bagley’s art seemed tighter and less rushed in this issue.
BACK ISSUE BIN
DC Action 1-6 (London Editions Magazines)
This is a title which came out in 1990 from LEM who specialized in DC reprints for the British and Irish market. I had already been reading their Batman and Superman/JLI reprints when they came out with this oversized 68 page magazine with a cardstock cover featuring the classic Wolfman/Perez New Teen Titans, the Grant Morrison Animal Man title and a third strip which changed every 2 issues. In 1-2 was the Creeper, in 3-4 was the history of Paul Kirk and the Manhunters and in 5-6 was the start of the Perez History of the DC Universe.
This book introduced me to the wider DC Universe back when Marvel Comics were by far and away my favourite company. Unfortunately it only lasted 6 issues, the book had production values that have still not been equalled by any American or British comic in my opinion but that was its downfall as at £1.75 ($3.50) an issue in 1990 it was by far the most expensive comic on the newsstands but still it has fond memories for me. If you are ever in the UK you might be able to track it down in some second hand shops or at car boot sales.
Here in Duckberg http://texcap.wordpress.com/
This is a cool little blog focusing on comics mostly but some game stuff as well and it seems to mostly feature stuff I like which is great lol. Its straightforward and informative without being confrontational and controversial like the CCW blog. Blogger Texcap has a friendly open style and a good eye for his layout which is easy on the eye.
Paleofuture http://www.paleofuture.com/
This blog takes a look at the sci-fi and comics genres predictions of the future, in its own words it’s “a look into the future that never was”. I just love all the retro-future stuff, especially from the 50’s and 60’s when the world was going to be so bright and modern complete with Domed Cities and flying cars…..I want my flying car now dammit!
TV
One of my favourite recent TV shows is Newswipe with Charlie Brooker which was broadcast on BBC2 in February/March. It is a topical news show presented by comedian Charlie Brooker who dissects news organisations and politicians with savage satire, sort of like Stephen Colbert but with less joshing and more vicious wit. There’s also a philosophical side amongst the funny asides, don’t trust the news media, there’s always an agenda, make up your own mind.
Looks like another lack luster week for me as far as comics go. It’s nice to see that Invincible finally decided to ship though. It’s almost been 3 months since the last issue and I was getting kinda worried. Here’s what else I’ll be picking up tomorrow:
Batman and Robin #11
Buffy The Vampire Slayer #34
Doom Patrol #9
Invincible Returns #1
Shield #1 (Jonathan Hickman)
Superman Secret Origin #5 (Why am I still buying this?)
Books I am on the fence about are Turf #1, Codebreakers #1, Avengers Origins #1 and Spider-Man: Fever #1.
Meh…small week but I do get my manga fix with Gantz Vol 9 shipping. I am trying to cut down on my Marvel monthlies so I think I will trade wait the new Pet Avengers book. Pretty solid quality comic week though. Here’s what I will be buying on Wednesday:
Batman and Robin #10
Criminal: Sinners #5 (Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips)
Daytripper #4
Doom Patrol #8
Gantz Vol 9
REBELS #14
The Unwritten #11
So what are you getting this week? Anything that you think I may be missing out on?
Whoa…quite a few indie books for me this week. Cool. Here’s what I’ll be buying on Wednesday:
Buffy The Vampire Slayer #33
Detective Comics #862
Chew #9
Dingo #4
Forgetless #3
Sword #22
Underground #5
Two other books that I am sorta interested in this week are Girl Comics #1 and First Wave #1. I’ll have to give them the ol’ flip through before I decide whether or not to pick them up. Seeing Dingo and Underground coming to an end on Wednesday is kinda sad. I have really been enjoying the hell out of those two comics. Hopefully we’ll end up seeing a sequel to them somewhere down the road.
Also, how apropos is it that the new volume of Bleach hits the U.S. this week?
Yikes! Slim pickings this week and if your LCS is one of the stores affected by the Marvel drought on Wednesday the pickings will unfortunately be even slimmer. Lucky for me my shop is one that will be receiving a majority of their books. Depending on how drunk I am what kind of mood I’m in I’ll try to write up a review for Siege #2 for those of you unable or unwilling to buy it. Here’s what I’m getting this week:
Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #3
Buffy The Vampire Slayer #32
Criminal: Sinners #4 (Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips)
Dingo #3
Doom Patrol #7
Now that I showed you my list it’s time to show me yours. That’s kinda how this post usually works.
The CCW*TV Companion Blog 