PARKER / BROTHERS: LIFE IN AND AROUND COMICS
Friday
Room: 3AB
Start: 7:00PM
End: 7:55PM

Jeff Parker, writer of fan-favorite comics like Red She-Hulk and Agents of Atlas, sits down with David Brothers to have a frank and funny conversation about what working on comics is really like, where inspiration actually comes from, and why if you want to be a pro you need to stop being a fan. Do you have preconceptions of what the comics industry is like? Come through and watch this tag team destroy them with jokes, opinions, and hard facts.

LOOKING PAST THE TARGET AUDIENCE
Sunday
Room: 2AB
Start: 1:00PM
End: 1:55PM

This year, the geek community’s strained relationship with diversity came to a head. Conflicts over exclusion, and identity politics, and what makes a “real” geek have exploded into the mainstream media. Creators, curators, community leaders, and critics on the front lines examine the fight over geek identity and barriers to diversity in geek communities and media; and propose concrete steps toward a diverse and inclusive geek culture. Join industry leaders Rachel Edidin, David Brothers, Andy Khouri, Regina Buenaobra, Sarah Kuhn, Cheryl Lynn Eaton and Kate Welch as they discuss this hot button issue.

You should come by and let me put this poison in you.

Studio Ghibli and Level-5’s Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch is a type of game I don’t play very often: a family-oriented big budget title. It’s heartwarming and kind, to the point where even its violence is positioned as being a temporary evil that will lead directly to greater good. I had one thought just after the game really got going that forever shifted the experience for me: what if this isn’t real, and it’s just Oliver’s way of coping with the death of his mother?

It sounds stupid and cynical, doesn’t it? We have a habit of attempting to ruin or taint everything that reminds us of our own lost innocence, and you can definitely look at that thought as being part of that trend. At the same time, it’s a hard idea to let go of, particularly when you start to consider a few things in the game itself with less of a blindly trusting eye.

The death of Allie, Oliver’s mother, is what really gets the game started, with her revival being the end point of Oliver’s quest. To bring her back, Oliver is going to go up against Shadar, the Dark Djinn, with the help of Drippy, his fairy friend.

Drippy enters the narrative just after the death of Allie. Drippy was a doll that Allie gave to Oliver, and represents Allie’s love for her son. As Oliver cries while holding his doll, his tears fall onto the doll, causing it to come to life. Upon waking up, Drippy explains that he is not just from another world, but was locked away by an evil entity who may hold Allie’s life in his hands.

Drippy spins a tale full of wonder, but the heart of it is one idea: Oliver can get his mother back. Oliver accepts Drippy’s reality because he’s guaranteed the power to change things if he goes along with Drippy. He can return to point when he was happy. On the one hand, this is a standard hero’s journey. On the other, it’s incredibly convenient, isn’t it?

The cracks in Drippy’s narrative become even more obvious when you consider his behavior. He’s hiding things from Oliver. Oliver knows that he’s meant to save this world from the Dark Djinn, but Drippy spends more time reiterating how capable he is than actually giving him advice. Drippy emphasizes Oliver’s potential, not his reality, whenever they meet another character.

Drippy downplays the danger, and that makes me wonder if I can trust him. His explanations of how this new world works don’t quite make sense. He shows Oliver how to transfer emotions from one person to another, but that process somehow leaves the giver feeling even more of the emotion they gave away. Later, he assures Oliver that they aren’t really killing the creatures they fight. They simply go somewhere else after being chastised and will soon return as loving creatures. Where do they go after you hit them with fireballs and swords? Um. Somewhere?

The biggest warning sign, the moment that gave me pause more than any other moment, came when Oliver returned to the real world for the first time. At this point in the game, he’s fully accepted his quest and acquired clothes that fit the magical realm. We’d laugh at him if we saw Oliver in real life, with his cape, Little Lord Fauntleroy getup, and ridiculous boots. In the game, from what I saw, everyone simply takes it in stride. It barely rates a mention, and that bothered me.

The townspeople care about Oliver and how he’s coping, but they rarely remark on his clothes and avoid speaking to him at length about his mother. I got the feeling that they don’t know how to take the situation or Oliver himself. A child loses his mother and walks into your store wearing a ridiculous outfit. How do you react to that? Apparently the answer is “you ignore it and pretend like everything is mostly okay.”

The idea that Oliver is out of his depth with his grief a dark twist born from a dark thought, but the more of Ni No Kuni I play, the more the puzzle pieces seem to fit together. If I took Ni No Kuni entirely on its own terms as a lovable game about loving and being loved, I would probably lose interest pretty quickly. But my own baggage, my interests and tastes, gives me a greater — or probably just “different” — appreciation of the story.

I feel like what you bring to a work of art is about as important as the art itself. No work of art is a monologue. It’s a conversation between you and the creator of the work. You are a large part of the reason why a fantastic work of art clicks with you so hard and why some other fantastic work of art falls flat. Sometimes your mind is perfectly shaped to take a certain story. Sometimes it isn’t. In the case of Ni No Kuni, my own baggage and interests changed the game for me.

Instead of bailing out of the game early on with a “Good, but not for me,” I’m playing a lot of Ni No Kuni in an attempt to prove this thought wrong. I don’t want Oliver to have to face up to his own impotence and grief. I don’t want his mother to be dead. I don’t want Drippy to be a guide with dark intentions. I want Oliver to win.

I want you to keep this two-page story by Matt Wayne, John Paul Leon, Noelle Giddings, and Dave Sharpe from Static Shock Special in mind this month. I want you to think of this every time someone — anyone, myself included — invokes Dwayne McDuffie’s name.

I want you to think about what they have to gain when they say the man’s name.

The big nerd news of recent months is that Disney bought Star Wars from George Lucas and that Star Trek guy is going to be directing it. For me, this is great news no matter how you look at it. For one, the franchise isn’t in Lucas’ hands anymore. Already a plus. At best, Disney might be able to use some of their magic to make a good Star Wars trilogy to break the tie created by the previous two. At worst, we’ll have something new to make fun of.

I thought about doing a Crossover Celebration article about Star Wars, but then it hit me how sparse Star Wars crossovers are. Even then, they’re all fairly brief to talk about. Ergo, I figured I’d go over every Star Wars crossover I can possibly think of. Remember, it’s official crossovers only.

The first crossover came in 1979, in-between the first two movies. During the 11th season of Sesame Street, a UFO land and out come C3PO and R2D2. The two befriend Big Bird and reveal that they are sent by an intergalactic relative of Oscar the Grouch to deliver a message for the grumpy, green guy. That message being, “GET LOST!” Over the course of the episode, as well as another episode later in the season, the two droids mostly hang out with Big Bird, including a segment where they sing a song about remembering which number is which. There’s also an amusing bit where R2D2 happily tells C3PO that he’s in love, only to be brought down when he discovers that it’s just a fire hydrant.

A year later, Star Wars would keep the Muppet friendship going with a hosting gig during the fourth season of the Muppet Show. As Scooter readies the show’s guest host, a Scottish Muppet named Angus McGonagle, the trio of Luke Skywalker, R2D2 and C3PO bust through the wall. The three are looking for the kidnapped Chewbacca, but Scooter sees this as an opportunity to get rid of Angus and replace him with some real stars. Other than R2, the heroes seem disinterested in the idea of hosting a variety show. They’re more focused on tracking down their kidnapped friend Chewbacca.

Luke appears less whiny and unsure and more of a gung ho revolutionary, screaming, “REMEMBER ALDERAN!” when he bursts into the room at one point. While he isn’t keen on singing and dancing, he does leave the room so that his cousin Mark Hammill can give it a try. Wait, cousin? I wonder if he was Owen and Veru’s kid. If so, he’s certainly gotten over their fiery death. Mark fails to impress Kermit and Fozzy, especially after he and Angus do a musical gargling duet on stage.

Things pick up when they invade the set of Pigs in Space. They commandeer the Swinetrek in hopes of finding Chewy and interact with the cast. Link Hogthrob gets along swimmingly with Luke, inquiring about where he gets his snazzy uniform. Dr. Strangepork is intrigued with R2D2 and Miss Piggy dresses up as Leia as a way of hitting on Luke. This episode was released as hype for Empire Strikes Back, so we aren’t aware of how creepy this is. The two sci-fi teams fly to a planet where they confront the mysterious Dearth Nadir!

He too wants to know about Luke’s tailor. The segment becomes a pure clusterfuck with Chewbacca coming to Luke’s aid (wasn’t he kidnapped?) and Nadir being saved by Angus McGonagle’s gargling abilities. Then Kermit arrives to transform it into a musical segment, which includes the horrors of Chewbacca dancing. Then it gets into cosmic territory as both the Muppets and the Star Wars cast get together and sing “When You Wish Upon a Star” as a Disney-like castle appears behind them.

Yes, they’re doing this decades before Disney would own both properties. Absolutely crazy.

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Okay, okay. So my writing has been a little lax lately. I’ve been a bit busy, what with jury duty, a sketch writing class at UCB, the Royal Rumble, the Superbowl and work kicking my ass. But I promise I’ll get back to actually writing about comics again real soon! Scout’s honor!

I was never a scout, but I’m pretty sure I can keep that promise.

My superfriends are, as always, Gaijin Dan, Was Taters, Jody and Space Jawa.

All-Star Western #16
Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray, Moritat and Phil Winslade

Aquaman #16
Geoff Johns and Paul Pelletier

Avengers #4
Jonathan Hickman and Adam Kubert

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I’m working on a thing, but I think I need a little help. I’m researching this on my own, but maybe you can help me out.

I’m working on a list of 1) black writers 2) who have done work on the Big Two’s superhero comics 3) and contributed more than one issue to that universe. These constraints are important, I think. Cape comics are mainstream comics, the big leagues in a way, and the writer tends to be, if not the captain of the ship, the person who decides the destination.

I’ve got a spreadsheet here. It’s read-only now, but if you know of more black writers who fit the criteria, leave a comment below and I’ll add them in. Who am I missing? Is this everyone?

I’m not sure where I’m going to go with this info, not yet. But I know that I want to go somewhere, and at the moment, I’m feeling the bullet more than the ballot. Thanks for helping, if you can. Thanks for reading if you can’t.

Hey. I’m helped out this week by Gaijin Dan, Was Taters and Space Jawa. No Jody this week. He’s too busy digesting the Cookie Puss we devoured while watching tonight’s Royal Rumble.

Wade Barrett was robbed, by the way.

Sweet week of comics. I mean, just check out this Avengers panel. Also, there’s a new series included called One-Punch Man and it strangely doesn’t seem to have anything to do with Guy Gardner.

Avengers #3
Jonathan Hickman and Jerome Opena

Before Watchmen: Minutemen #6
Darwyn Cooke

Bleach #523
Tite Kubo

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Date: August 16, 2011 (aired on August 19, 2011)
Company: WWE
Show: Smackdown
Rules: Normal
Stipulation: #1 contender for World Heavyweight Championship at Night of Champions
Roster (19): Trent Barreta, Wade Barrett, Johnny Curtis, Ted Dibiase, Justin Gabriel, the Great Khali, Mark Henry, Tyson Kidd, Ezekiel Jackson, Jinder Mahal, William Regal, Cody Rhodes, Zack Ryder, Sheamus, Sin Cara, Heath Slater, Yoshi Tatsu, Jey Uso and Jimmy Uso

As we hit the last battle royal of this one-a-day series, we end on one of my favorites. It’s from the first Smackdown after Summerslam 2011. At that Summerslam, Wade Barrett defeated Money in the Bank holder Daniel Bryan. Sheamus’ sense of honor cost him when Mark Henry slammed him through a barricade and won via count-out. Randy Orton had finally ended his feud with Christian, meaning he needed a new contender for his World Heavyweight Championship.

And so, a battle royal was put together. It was meant to be a 20-man battle royal, but Daniel Bryan chose to challenge Alberto Del Rio earlier that night and got his arm destroyed. Too destroyed to compete again that night. Also, one of the angles of the time had Jinder Mahal more or less owning Great Khali, due to his status as brother-in-law. It’s a complicated Indian thing.

You can tell that they’re trying to make Mark Henry a big deal because when he walks to the ring, resident strong face dude Ezekiel Jackson is all, “Uh… shit.”

The bell rings and Henry stands in the center of the ring. With the exception of Khali guarding Mahal in the corner, everyone pounds on the World’s Strongest Man. He decides that it merely tickles. It tickles and Mark Henry isn’t a man who enjoys laughter.

“ENOUGH!”

He immediately removes Trent Barreta and Yoshi Tatsu. The minutes that follow include your usual filler of guys working each other over with nothing happening. Stuff comes alive when Ezekiel Jackson throws his rival Cody Rhodes over the top and he holds on by skinning the cat and pulling himself back in. Then Big Zeke just sends him back out with a massive clothesline.

Khali is still guarding Mahal in the corner and is commanded to take care of Ezekiel. Ezekiel stuns Khali with a running clothesline, steps back for a second one and runs right into a Brain Chop. Khali flings Ezekiel out of there and Henry decides to step up.

You might recall that Khali/Henry was a showdown that wouldn’t be in that 2007 battle royal I covered a few days ago and while they tangled in the Monster Mash, their interactions were barely of note. Finally, they’re going to go at it and I’m ready for it to be terrible. Khali chops Henry down and prepares for the Vice Grip. Henry powers out and then decides, fuck this, I’m the World’s Strongest Man!

Whoa! That’s kind of awesome! Extra points for most everyone else in the ring hanging back to see how this fight plays out.

Sheamus runs into Henry with an axe-handle and sends him rolling to the outside. He’s still in the match, but just angry. Also, champion Randy Orton is watching the battle royal unwind as he sits near the announce table with Henry angrily roaming around.

Whenever somebody gets eliminated, Henry proceeds to grab them and throw them around like a ragdoll. Just ask the Usos.

His rage not quite satiated, he returns to the ring and helps take the number down to four finalists: Henry, Sheamus, Wade Barrett and Sin Cara. You can tell Sin Cara is the fan favorite because of all the chants they edited in in post-production. Barrett, Sheamus and Sin Cara go at Henry together, but Barrett’s greed gets to the best of him and he turns on Sheamus. The two Europeans end up brawling on the apron after each going over the top rope. Sheamus wins the brawl with a kick to the chest and Barrett falls to the floor.

Sheamus and Sin Cara have a nice little battle that ends with Sheamus preparing to Brogue Kick him out of the ring. Henry gets up from the earlier beating and washes his hands of the big Irishman.

Now we’re down to Sin Cara vs. Henry. Sin Cara does a crossbody off the top and Henry falls over after catching him. It’s hard to tell if it’s a botch or not, but my gut says yes. Sin Cara is unable to move Henry with a couple hurricanrana attempts and goes for a crossbody off the second rope. Henry catches him correctly this time and crushes him with the World’s Strongest Slam. Then he presses Sin Cara’s sin carcass over his head and dumps him out of the ring like he’s nothing.

Mark Henry is the #1 contender and ends the show staring down Orton, taking a second to get a whiff of him.

“YEAH, I SMELL YOU. THAT’S FEAR. THAT’S FEAR I SMELL!”

After a career of being a jobber to the main event, Mark Henry would be rewarded for being suddenly awesome after 15 years by going over Orton cleanly and decisively. Twice! He proceeded to have the best heel title run in forever that sadly got derailed by an injury. Part of me will always lament that we never got the correct ending to the Rocky III Balboa/Clubber angle they were setting up with Daniel Bryan and Henry. But hey, said injury also led to Bryan’s heel turn and the whole, “YES! NO!” thing, so it all evens out.

Enjoy the Royal Rumble, everybody.

Date: November 23, 2009
Company: WWE
Show: Monday Night Raw
Rules: Normal
Stipulation: #1 contender for WWE Championship at TLC
Roster (8): Ted Dibiase, Mark Henry, Kofi Kingston, Randy Orton, Montel Vontavious Porter, R-Truth, Cody Rhodes and Sheamus

2009 to 2010 was a dark time for Monday Night Raw thanks to the guest host gimmick. Every week, there’d be a different guest host, originally in the form of a GM with power over the roster. Sometimes it would be a wrestler who wasn’t active at the time like the injured Batista or long-retired Dusty Rhodes. Sometimes it would be a B or C-list celebrity. Any given week, you’d be in store for a crapshoot that usually depended on how into it the guest was. Sometimes you’d get Bob Barker spinning straw into gold with the Price is Raw. Then you’d get Dennis Miller hosting the Slammys, which was just head-shakingly bad. I recall him making a “joke” that was just him going, “Hey, global warming isn’t real, am I right?” And when people didn’t react, that led to some insisting that the wrestling audience wasn’t smart enough to get that comedic genius. Ugh.

One guest host was former Governor and current nutjob Jesse Ventura. He started up a little controversy about John Cena as WWE Champion, pointing out how sick a lot of guys backstage were of him. Ventura decided on a series of qualifying matches between those who haven’t been champion before, meaning we’d get a much needed break from the never-ending Cena/Orton series of matches. The winners would advance to what he called the Breakthrough Battle Royal.

Throughout the night we had Kofi Kingston defeat Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus defeat Finlay, the team of R-Truth, Mark Henry and MVP defeating the team of Jack Swagger, Chavo Guerrero and Chris Masters, Cody Rhodes and Ted Dibiase defeat Cryme Tyme and a match between Primo and Evan Bourne took a strange turn. Orton was so angry about not being allowed into this match that he attacked Primo and took his place, having little trouble in beating Bourne. Since Ventura loves cheating, he let it slide. Meanwhile, smarks had someone to outright root against for this match because if WWE was stupid enough to let Orton win… Jesus Christ.

A backstage segment had Ventura rant at Vince McMahon in a way that almost seems off-script due to bringing up Vince Sr., something that’s usually a big no-no. Ventura wanted to make a little trip to the past and insisted that the commentary for the Breakthrough Battle Royal be done by he and Vince. Whoa. Now that’s something.

Now for the match. Ventura comes out to nearly zero reaction and Vince not only has his old 80’s theme song “You’re My Obsession” by Human League playing, but he has this swank bowtie picked out by Ventura.

The commentary is very weird. Familiar, but different. It is a trip to hear Vince talk at length in that tone that sounds like he’s thinking to himself aloud, plus Ventura telling him, “Shut up, McMahon!” It’s just that age and development has changed them. Ventura is an asshole face and Vince is a doofy heel when the face/heel alignment should be switched. Plus Vince is just plain grumpy at times, calling this a rotten idea.

There’s some interesting faction stuff going on in the lineup. This is the night after Survivor Series, which included a team that had Kofi, Henry, R-Truth and MVP against a team with Orton, Rhodes and Dibiase. So Sheamus is the odd man out here. At first, it’s the four guys from Team Kofi ganging up on Legacy while Sheamus hangs back and does nothing. Eventually, Orton slinks out of the ring and walks around, surveying the action. Henry and R-Truth start fighting each other to make things fair.

Nothing happens for quite a while, but at least the commentary is entertaining and there’s some nice tension with Sheamus and Orton each staying to themselves. Eventually, Sheamus snaps out of it, grabs R-Truth, clotheslines him down and then flings him easily out of the ring. Shortly later, Sheamus waits for the perfect opportunity to catch MVP off-guard.

Easy pickings, bringing us down to six.

Henry goes for Sheamus and almost has him out of the ring until Rhodes and Dibiase attack. Henry ducks a double clothesline from them and sends them both out over the top with a pair of clotheslines of his own. Sheamus clobbers him from behind and throws him out, giving us Sheamus vs. Orton vs. Kofi. By this point, Orton’s finally returned to the ring.

Sheamus hangs back for the most part, but when he does get involved, Orton makes short work of him. Orton sends Kofi over the top rope, but Kofi hangs on and takes out Orton via skinning the cat.

When Kofi gets back up, Sheamus is ready for him with a running axe-handle, sending Kofi to the outside. Sheamus wins and gets his title shot against John Cena at TLC. Not only are we saved from another Cena/Orton fiasco, but we also got that sweet Orton facial reaction above.

In the following segment, Sheamus and Cena have a contract signing where Sheamus annihilates Cena and puts him through a table. Ventura announces that their PPV match will be a Tables Match. Sheamus would go on to win that match and have a rather interesting feud with Cena. While Sheamus never got to outright defeat Cena decisively, the same can be said about Cena beating Sheamus. All in all, Sheamus looked plenty strong around this time until the Nexus showed up to make him run away in fear, thereby hurting his monster persona.

Kofi and Orton continued their feud. Kofi was looking like he was ready to ascend into the main event at times, but then he fucked up a spot, Orton RKO’d him, had an in-ring tantrum and the feud practically died right after. Since then, Kofi’s been stuck in the position/gimmick of “generic good guy who gets cheers”.

I haven’t heard much from Ventura after he was on Opie and Anthony and Jim Norton verbally destroyed him to the point that Ventura stormed out of the interview. Norton rules.

Tomorrow’s the last day and we’re going to be ending it strong.

Chad Nevett is doing a Blogathon for charity, a blogathon being a 24 hour blog writing jamboree, and I’m helping out. Helped, technically, but you haven’t seen my staggering contribution to the blogathon yet. Chad’s going big for his final blogathon, which is very cool. Here’s the roster of assistants: Tim Callahan, Tucker Stone, David Brothers, Alec Berry, Brian Cronin, Graeme McMillan, Jeff Lester, Tim O’Neil, Ryan K. Lindsay, Adam Langton, Matt Brady, Ales Kot, Shawn Starr, Kaitlin Tremblay, and Augie de Blieck, Jr.

Lotta people in there I dig a whole lot, though I run hot and cold on that Brothers guy.

You can see full details here, but here goes an excerpt, too:

Now, you may think that by bringing in 15 writers to do 16 posts, that means I’ll be taking it a bit easier this time. You would be wrong. For those half-hour periods, I will be doing a series of posts over at Comics Should be Good on the best of 2012. It’s not just a bigger Blogathon in contributors, but in blogs.

That brings us to the most important thing in all of this: the Hero Initiative. It’s a charity that provides financial assistance to comic professionals that require it. It’s an organisation that I have a large amount of respect for and one that, sadly, the comics industry desperately needs.

This is a good project, and you can help out by donating to the Hero Initiative in the project’s name. You can also buy products from their site or visit their eBay store.

Either way, on 1/26 — tomorrow! — take a look at Chad’s site and Comics Should Be Good and enjoy a whole bunch of opinions on and around comics.