Punisher War Journal #4 was a fun issue, with the goings on at Stiltman’s funeral. Looking at it a second time, I notice Matt Fraction tossed in one very subtle joke.
At first glance, it looks like they’re laughing about some time the Shocker got bested by Spider-Man.
Now, then…
Look at the hand gesture on the right.
“Aw, come on. I didn’t know what that name meant when I picked it. Can we just move on, already?”
Matt Fraction’s keen.
Yeah, so I accidentally overslept this morning, which means that I need to be out the door post-haste.
In the meantime, though, I got a lovely email from Lene Taylor of I Read Comics. She found my essay on Patriot via Kalinara and found it worth reading! It touched her enough that she talked about it on her podcast, which you may find here.
Give it a listen, and then go on to listen to her back catalog. Very good stuff!
Thanks again to Lene for featuring the post.
I did a lot of purchasing at the NYCC. Oh man, did I. Curious? Here’s the list of what I came home with that was new, not counting magazines (Wizard with Claire and Nikki from Heroes on the cover, UVC Magazine) and sketches.
40 oz Collection – Jim Mahfood
Ares: God of War – Mike Oeming/Travel Foreman
Batgirl: Destruction’s Daughter
Blokhedz
The Blvd Sketchbook volume 2.0 – John Paul Leon/Trevor Goring/Tommy Lee Edwards/Sean Chen/Bernard Chang
Diesel Sweeties: Pocket Sweeties Volume One – R Stevens
Diesel Sweeties: How I Blew My Thursday Night – R Stevens
DMZ v2: Body of a Journalist – Brian Wood/Riccardo Burchielli
Firestorm: The Nuclear Man: Reborn – Stuart Moore/Jamal Igle
The Five Fists of Science – Matt Fraction/Steven Sanders
Freddie E Williams II Sketchbook
Ghost Rider – Howard Mackie/Javier Saltares/Mark Texeira
Goats – Contains One Space Battle – Jonathan Rosenberg
Goats – A Tale of Two Comics – Jonathan Rosenberg
Grant Morrison: The Early Years – Timothy Callahan
JLA/Avengers – Kurt Busiek/George Perez
Justice League: A New Beginning – Giffen/DeMatteis/Maguire
Kabuki Metamorphosis HC – David Mack
Khary Randolph Sketchbook
Modern Masters v3: Bruce Timm
Modern Masters v6: Arthur Adams
Modern Masters v8: Walter Simonson
Modern Masters v9: Mike Wieringo
Modern Masters v10: Kevin Maguire
Naoki Urasawa’s Monster v7
Nat Turner Encore Edition – Kyle Baker
One Page Filler Man – Jim Mahfood
Project Romantic – Various
Puttin’ the Backbone Back – Jim Mahfood
Runaways HC v2 – Brian K Vaughan/Adrian Alphona/Takeshi Miyazawa
Wigu: The Bravest Boy in the World – Jeffrey Rowland
Ouch, my wallet. Cons are bloody expensive.
I’ve already read Blokhedz, and a review on that is forthcoming. That Ghost Rider trade is the first seven or eight issues of the series that introduced Danny Ketch, and I bought it because I either have bad taste in comics or am a complete and utter masochist. Or maybe it’s good, I dunno. Kabuki: Metamorphosis rounds out my Kabuki collection, which is a good thing.
The Grant Morrison volume is a lit-crit look at Zenith, Animal Man, Doom Patrol, and Arkham Asylum. Yes! It also includes an interview with The God of All Comics in the back about the book and his work.
I got a little more superheroic stuff than I really wanted to. I’m not only a superhero reader. At least two fifths, and sometimes even three fifths, of my top five are non-supers. (100 Bullets, Kabuki, Stray Bullets.) (I also like bullets, I guess). Still, seven out of thirty-one ain’t bad, though the Modern Masters volumes technically aren’t comics. I also haven’t read a lot of this stuff, or haven’t read it in years at the very least. It’s probably 85-90% new content to me.
Here’s the kicker: I’m planning on reviewing all these books. Yeah, that’s right. It may be a grouped review, it may be a single review, but I want to put my thoughts out there about all of them, excepting only the Modern Masters because those are awesome by default, and the sketchbooks, because they aren’t exactly reviewable, save for the one by The Blvd.
I’ve also got the PC demo of the Marvel Trading Card game to look at, as well as a free copy of the Marvel Comic Book Creator software. Should be an interesting few weeks!
New York Comic Con has come and gone. Fuuuuun shit.
First, let me just go over last year’s show. I only showed up for Saturday. It was the first year of NYCC in the Jacob Javits Center, so they had no idea what they were doing. Me and my friend got there at about noon and already the place was pretty packed. You could barely move through the aisles and if you could, you couldn’t stop. We were packed like sardines.
Eventually, the fire marshal made a stink about the maximum occupancy on the floor. He was threatening to close the place down. Instead, they made a line into the convention floor that wouldn’t allow anyone – not even those with tickets – onto the convention floor unless someone in there exited first. For a few hours, this made things unbearable. Towards the latter hours, many of the people on line just plain left and things were a bit better.
The people behind the Comic Con insisted that they would fix the whole overpopulation problem. For one, they would limit the tickets. For two, they’d allow more room. Since I had a good time last year, I decided to go all three days. This time, I brought hermanos and Riskbreaker with me.
This is our story.
Firestorm has had a rocky run recently, but the quality has never wavered. Jason Rusch’s coming of age tale has been smart, interesting, and well-drawn. I even got Jamal Igle to sign the Firestorm trade I bought at the con that collects the One Year Later story arc… and is also the only collection out.
Yes, lads and ladies, DC’s crap trades department put out a trade of a series 20-odd issues in and are going to cancel the series with #35 in April. A few trades earlier on and Firestorm could’ve built an audience. C’mon, DC! You’ve got Time Warner backing you. If Marvel can trade every series ever, including Marvel Nemesis: The Imperfects, you can do it, too! The bookstores are the future!
No biggie, though! There’s nothing wrong with buying canceled books, especially ones that look as good as this. Stuart Moore and Jamal Igle had a great run, but Dwayne McDuffie and Ken Lashley are on tap for the final three issues. Here’s the solicit for #33.
The superstar creative team of Dwayne McDuffie (JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED, STATIC), Dan Jurgens (Superman, Captain America) and Ken Lashley (The Flash) bring Firestorm to bold new heights! Jason Rusch and Prof. Martin Stein just want to get their lives back to normal, but the New Gods have other plans! When Orion comes looking for Prof. Stein, you can bet a throwdown’s not far behind! Guest-starring the Seven Soldiers’ Mister Miracle!
C’mon, now. You’re a comics fan on the internet. I know that you liked Justice League and Justice League Unlimited. Dwayne McDuffie was behind a lot of the cool stuff on that show, so Firestorm #33 is pretty much guaranteed to deliver a good-sized bang for your three bucks.
Still not convinced? Look here for an interview and a quick preview. Jason Rusch is growing up, gaining confidence in his powers, and is still rookie enough to make Orion mad.
It drops today, it’s got New Gods, super-science, and a quality protagonist. We may not be able to save the series before it’s canceled, but we can read a good story along the way.
But, fuck it, they gonna let us in, or else we rush the door
I got too many reasons, save your “whys” and “what fors”
–Talib Kweli, “Twice Inna Lifetime”
(The blogroll is updated, by the by. Drop me a line if I missed you.)
Here’s about the most thorough coverage of the Black Panel I’ve seen so far.
I really had a good time at NYCC, but I also had something of a revelation during The Black Panel.
The comics blogosphere is a big and varied place. There are very large fanboy, feminist contingent, and gay portions to it. But, where are the black voices?
There are a few very good black boards out there. I’m fond of Dwayne McDuffie’s forum, and I was recommended Hero Talk by a guy at the con, too. I picked up UVC’s inaugural issue at NYCC, and I like The Musuem of Black Superheroes, too. Those are message boards, though. They’re incestuous by nature, though that isn’t always a bad thing.
There are even a gang of quality bloggers. I recently discovered Cheryl Lynn a few weeks ago, and think that Bahlactus is great. So is Glyphs, though its RSS feed has never, ever worked right for me. It’s just that there has to be more. Who else is there? Where is everybody?
Even more than that, though… where am I? What am I doing for this? Do I have a responsibility to stand up?
I’m leaning toward “yes.”
Read the rest of this entry �
I caught three awesome panels today– Make Me Laff with Kyle Baker, Black Panel, and BET Animation panel. I’ll have thoughts on them later fa sho, but I just wanted to put this out there. I don’t think that Newsarama or CBR have covered either of them.
The BET Animation panel was, in a word, incredible. They’re doing extremely big things, and they showed a couple shorts that blew my mind. Hopefully the trailers will hit the net soon. I got to speak with Denys Cowan, who is an extremely nice guy, after the show, and I remarked (paraphrasing here) that, like a lot of the hip-hop I grew up with, these shorts are extremely subversive and, for lack of a better word, revolutionary. I told him that I’m in the Jay-Z generation, but I grew up on Rakim and PE and KRS, and each and everyone of them was subversive.
His response? “Exactly.”
Yes. This is good.
If you folks see any coverage of either the Black Panels or BET Animation panels anywhere, or discussion, can you drop me a comment? I really want to see some other reactions. BET hasn’t had a complete Road to Damascus moment, but they’re getting there.
More later. I’m completely out of it. I’ve got to say that this con has completely revitalized my interest in blogging and writing.
Also, the Marvel and DC panels pretty much universally blow. Vertigo was good, but blah on the rest.
4l is coming to you live and direct from the New Yorker Ramada in Manhattan.
Yesterday was the first day of the con and we’re about to head out again. Loot reports will have to wait, though!
I met Geoff Klock and spent a good bit of time talking with him about Morrison, Morrison on Batman, Frank Miller on Batman, and why DKSA is a good book! It’s nice to know I’m not hte only one who digs it and ASBARtBW. He was an extremely cool guy and it was neat to pick his brain.
I also got to meet Johanna Draper Carlson, who is a blogging hero of sorts for me. She was extraordinarily gracious while I babbled at her, and the blogging panel on Friday was pretty sweet. Heidi Mac was cool, too, and I missed a chance to meet Chris Butcher.
In other news! From left to right, David Mack and David Brothers; Gavok, the love of his life, and some random lady who hopped in the picture (kidding) (not really); an Echo print I bought from Mack (as well as completing my Kabuki collection); and the bloggers panel. L-R is Heidi Mac, Chris Butcher, Ron Hogan, and Johanna Draper Carlson.
More to come! I’m off to get more stuff.
The 4l crew (myself, Gavin, and Wilde) are hitting the NY Comic-con this weekend. If you want to meet up, send your info to 4thletter@gmail.com!
I get in Thursday afternoon, with the other two arriving Thursday evening. We’ll see how this goes, hey?
Anyway, I figured that I want to get a few trades signed while I’m there. Here’s what I’m packing and who I want to sign it.
Annihilation Vol 1 HC – Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, and Keith Giffen
Seven Soldiers Vol 1-4 – Everyone
Stormbreaker: The Saga of Beta Ray Bill – Oeming
Thor Visionaries Vol 1: Walt Simonson
Wildcats 3.0 vol 1 – Dustin Nguyen
Echo: Vision Quest – David Mack
Superman/Batman: Public Enemies – Ed McGuinness and Dexter Vines
I’m also taking my DS and a few novels for the trip. The Death And Life Of Superman by Roger Stern (I wonder if I can get that signed?), Green Lantern Sleeper Book One by Christopher Priest, Black Girl Lost by Donald Goines (not comics), No Dominion by Charlie Huston (not comics), and maybe one or two others. I do not know yet!
We shall see how this goes. Blogging may be light, depending on internet access.
Is there anything that we absolutely have to hit? This is my first con, so I kind of want to see all the cool stuff I can. I think we’re meeting up with some goons, and I’m pretty sure that I’ll make the PopCultureShock party on Saturday night. I want to pack my schedule and hang out with cool cats.
Anyone else attending?
I know very little about Ghost Rider. I’ve read only a few comics involving him (such as the New Fantastic Four arc, a cool Venom crossover and some What Ifs) and even less involving Johnny Blaze. All I know about him are the basics. I can’t remember his friends’ names. I don’t know if his love interest from the movie was ever in the comics. All I know is that Ghost Rider is fucking metal.
He’s metal and he’s a comic character with a movie. I had no choice but to see it.
Now, this may surprise you, but I’ve missed out on a lot of the more famous comic movie disasters. I haven’t seen Steel, Elektra or Captain America. While Superman 4 was the first movie I knew was bad (at age 6), it’s been years since I’ve seen it and I only recall certain details. I have that live action Hulk vs. Thor movie laying around, waiting to be watched. Ghost Rider, though, I knew I needed to see ASAP. I knew that while it was going to be bad, it was still going to be worth my money. I was totally right.
