There is a great interview up at CBR featuring Grant Morrison, Tim Kring, Mike Mignola, and Johnathan Lethem. Go check it out.

Morrison said superheroes are representative of certain qualities and as such they need to be allegorical of other concepts in order to appeal to more adult readers. As an example, Morrison explained that when he was young he liked The Flash as drawn by Carmine Infantino simply because his bright yellow boots looked so cool due to their “awesome huge treads.” Now that Morrison is older, boot design isn’t enough to make the character appeal to him. Now Morrison likes The Flash because he feels he is representative of urban living and urban culture due to his speed. Morrison explained that lives of superheroes are huge cosmic version of the way human beings live, and that if they were not based in the lives of ordinary humans, they may not have an appeal.

I love that man so much.

COMICON.com: McNAMARA’S QUEST FOR CONTINUITY

My buddy Jason McNamara’s been interviewed by Jen Contino over at The Pulse.

THE PULSE: What influenced you the most in coming up with the world her dreams occupy? How’d you design this pharmaceutical police state?

McNAMARA: The dreams are the downside of wish fulfillment. Got a crush on some dude? Bam, now you’re pregnant. Hate everyone in your hometown? Super, now they’re all dead. Feel bad? Too bad it’s your fault.

As for the pharmaceutical stuff, I approached it by marrying the marketing of awful food to inappropriate medication. That gives you stuff like Low carb morning after pills, the abortion patch, sweet and sour anti depressants, circumcisions while you wait!

The physical design is all Tony. When he read the script he just knew what it was supposed to look like. I put a couple suggestions in the script and he, as usual, ignored them. My favorite image is a park bench that has been fenced off. That page can always make us laugh.

Go check it out. Jason Mac is great, and I’m not just saying this because he’ll kill me if I don’t.

About now I’m in the middle of writing three different articles while planning to finally update the Table of Contents. It’s annoying, because I want to have something to post, but I end up being torn between all the different projects and nothing really gets done in time. It’s like I’m a monster that has to choose between the scientist that created him or the loving child that befriended him. Too much time looking back and forth and too little time getting results.

What I’m meaning to say is that this here post is going to be really pointless. More so than usual.

As an introduction, let’s look at this quote from my interview with wrestler “Lightning” Mike Quackenbush:

“A certain type of personality and humor attracts a very specific demographic to CHIKARA, and in that way, we end up in bed with (figuratively speaking), and surrounded by, like-minded individuals. There are so many thematic similarities between pro-wrestling and comic books, that there is bound to be some level of crossover.”

This is very true. There are the obvious comparisons, like the concepts of heroes battling villains in a repeated contest of good vs. evil. Colorful costumes. Slick names, whether they be codenames or last names. Mantles are passed down. Bad guys turning to good guys. Good guys turning to bad guys. Characters with names like Sandman, Mysterio, Hercules, Nitro, Crossbones, Rorschach, the Punisher, etc.

But I got to thinking. There are a lot of similarities between comic books and professional wrestling that go unnoticed. Follow me.

In comics, one of the most entertaining guys is a talented man by the name of Morrison.

In wrestling, one of the most entertaining guys is also a talented man by the name of Morrison.

They both have connections to mind-blowing drugs, now that I think about it.

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Blogfriend Cheryl Lynn was interviewed by Sequential Tart.

ST: Who gets it right, both in comics and other media? (And why is this important?)

CLE: I look at the work of someone like Khari Evans and I truly believe that he is an artist who loves drawing women. Not just women of one particular type, but beautiful women period. All races. All ethnicities. All body types. He depicts women with a variety of features and he gets those features right. And it’s important to get those features right because a girl shouldn’t have to pick up a comic and be made to feel that she is less than another person simply because she has kinky hair, or dark skin, or no crease in her eyelids. She shouldn’t be told that characters that share her features aren’t worthy of being drawn correctly. That wears away at a person’s self-esteem. It makes for an unpleasant reading experience.

Go check it out.

hermanos is off covering that E3 thing for that magazine he does, so that leaves me to hold up the fort. It’s all right because I have quite the treat. Regular readers know that I’ve been talking about the pro wrestling federation CHIKARA to the point of annoyance in the last few months. And with good reason!

Moving to the next step of fandom, I’ve secured an interview with “Lightning” Mike Quackenbush himself. Quackenbush, nicknamed “The Master of a Thousand Holds” (though to be fair, I’m sure he’s probably sorta kinda good at eight or nine more), is a 16-year veteran of the ring and is the man who co-founded CHIKARA back in 2002. He’s a wrestler, a trainer to wrestling hopefuls, occasional commentator, writer, and possibly the next surprise identity of Ronin. He’s also one of the best performers I’ve ever had the honor of watching wrestle.

A rare image of Mike Quackenbush that doesn’t involve him shoving someone’s left knee into their right ear.

Not to mention that he’s a major comic fan. So this is, you know, still on-topic for the site.

————

I know what CHIKARA is and you certainly know what CHIKARA is, but let’s play it safe and say that whoever’s reading this doesn’t know. Can you give us a little description of what it’s about and what sets it apart from all the rest?

– CHIKARA is a group of pro-wrestlers/luchadores/ninjas/ would-be-super-heroes that get together and enact the age-old struggle of “good vs. evil” within the context of a wrestling universe that permits elements of science-fiction and fantasy beyond what is currently considered “acceptable” or “mainstream” by wrestling fans at large. I hope, when the final word on CHIKARA is written, that our effect on the wrestling performance genre will be akin to the effect Monty Python had on British comedy, or Jack Kirby had on comics.

Quack as part of Eddie Kingston’s Cibernetico team, based on the first issue of Justice League International

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Not that Carnage.

Before I get into it, though, I’ve got half of an idea in my head. Boxing, the NBA, and the NFL are mostly black (except for quarterbacks :doom:). What if you had a series of superteams, like say one in each of the 50 states, that were run like a sports team? Try outs, scandals, all stars, cocky all-stars fresh out of high school… There’s something there, but I can’t quite grab it yet. Any Given Sunday in a comic book universe.

First is Tom Foss‘s five questions:
1. You’re given the keys to the Marvel Universe, and your only order is to take one “What If” storyline from the entirety of the series and make it canon, along with whatever alterations occur to the universe as a result. Which story do you choose?

Geez. I’d probably pick Gavok’s #1, What If Iron Man Sold Out. It was an awesome story, one of the few What Ifs I owned as a kid, and had great art. It hit all my buttons– it was set just pre-apocalypse, semi-fascist, and had heroes coming back to be true heroes.

Actually, yeah, that’s it for sure. What If Spider-Man Kept the Power Cosmic was another great one, but it kind of takes my favorite superhero out of the runnings for further stories, so no dice. What If the Avengers Lost Operation Galactic Storm was great and I’d like to see that one. It was practically Annihilation III in terms of scope.

2. Who watches the Watchers?

The police. Peeping tom perverts always get theirs.

3. What five Marvel characters do you think are most likely to actually be Skrulls?

Sentry’s wife, the secret masters behind SHIELD, the secret masters behind HYDRA, and I don’t know. I haven’t really given specific Skrulls much thought. I’ll have to post my theory on why Nick Fury went underground, though.

4. Who are your top three, back-of-the-OHOTMU, favorite guilty pleasure Marvel characters?
1. Jubilee (who remains the only character I have a continuity nerd story pitch for)
2. Darkhawk
3. Terror, Inc.

Ugh, I was so impressionable as a kid.

5. Which Avengers base is/was the best?

I couldn’t pick if I tried! I only recently became an Avengers fan. So… I figure Stark/Sentry Tower? I don’t know. The mansion is just kinda blah.

Spencer Carnage is up next.
– I have to post these rules before I start.
– I have to tell you eight facts about myself.
– I have to tag eight people to participate.
– I’m supposed to leave a comment telling them they’re tagged and to read my blog.
– And the tagees need to write their own blog post, telling us eight things and posting the rules.

Ugh, eight things. Okay. Deep breath and
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Interview with Aubrey Sitterson on Marvel’s Indie Anthology.

At that time, the only name confirmed for the series was the aforementioned Dash Shaw with a Doctor Strange story. Sitterson has revealed to Newsarama additional names for the project such as Paul Pope, Johnny Ryan, James Kolchalka and Michael Kupperman. “[This project] gives us the opportunity to work with some amazing talents that we generally don’t get a chance to work with because of the types of comics that we produce,” said Quesada in “New Joe Fridays”.

They had me at Paul Pope.

I’ve been interested in Kochalka and Kupperman (Tales Designed to Thrizzle guy?) for a while now, but haven’t had a chance to scope anything but brief bits of his art in GIS or in random forum threads. This should be cool.

In fact, I want that Jacob Chabot FF story right now. Those two pages are great and that art is awesome.

I am a complete sucker for good dialogue. The Brians Three (Azzarello, Vaughan, and Bendis) are some of the best guys out at making realistic and natural-sounding dialogue. In fact, I’d say that the big three are Garth Ennis, Azz, and Bendis, in that order.

Ennis has a few themes that he comes back to over and over. “Superheroes suck!” is one. He likes to write about superheroes being awful people, war, and camaraderie. He’s got an incredible ear for dialogue. His people sound like real people. They’re distinct. I wasn’t a huge fan of the overarching story of Preacher, in part because Jesse Custer was kind of a jerk, but the dialogue was so solid that I had to keep reading. Chronicles of Wormwood is one of the most horrible, awful, and offensive comics I’ve ever read. It’s about the Antichrist, Wormwood, only he’s decided to buck his dad’s will and just live out his life without bringing on Armageddon. He’s good friends with JC, another character who has decided to try something different from what his Father wants. He ended up getting brained by a member of the LAPD for his trouble and suffers from brain damage. Wormwood is cheating on his girlfriend with a reborn Joan of Arc, too. It’s pretty despicable, but at the same time… it’s really kind of enjoyable. Ennis’s skill with dialogue turns an interview between a journalist and Wormwood into an insight into the minds and thoughts of both characters. Wormwood isn’t really a bad guy, I mean after all the Antichrist stuff. He genuinely has no interest in furthering his father’s goals and has made it a point to kill anyone who tries to make him do so. He does a bad thing when the journalist gets on his nerves and actually feels bad about it. He goes to break off his relationship with Joan (which ends up backfiring) because of this guilt. Ennis gets characters, is what I’m trying to say. Beyond all the (deformity+face) = Name and potty humor, Ennis writes real people, thanks almost wholly to his dialogue.

Azzarello is the same way. Where Ennis is a more on-the-surface kind of writer, where characters are pretty close to what they say they are, Azz’s characters exist between the lines. What they say is important, yes, but how they say it and what they don’t say is just as important. Look at that up above. Loop, the black guy. What do you get from just those three panels? He’s cocky, rocking a devil-may-care attitude, and he’s clever. Risso’s art helps here quite a bit, too. His body language says almost as much as the dialogue does. Azz’s dialogue has rhythm. People dance around each other’s words and tend to finish each other’s sentences. You have to pay attention to Azz’s dialogue, because it isn’t necessarily plain-spoken. Calling it “layered” would be a start. Words are laced with double and triple meanings. Seemingly offhand bits of dialogue end up being vital. Azz makes you think, and then think again. That’s part of why I love his work so much.

Bendis, for all the played out jokes and catchphrases, is really good at dialogue. He didn’t become one of the top writers at Marvel for nothing. Bendis’s dialogue is stuttery and fairly stacatto. But, who doesn’t talk like that? We start and stop, deliver half-finished thoughts, and talk over each other. Bendis is crazy wordy, but he’s also true to life. His people may sound similar overall, but the stutter-step talky-talk is a great device. One that has possibly been overused, but when used properly, is always excellent.

Let me round this out with one last guy. Personally, I think that Stan Lee brought a lot to comics dialogue. The pre-Marvel books that I’ve read tended toward the bombastic and overwrought. Stan the Man gave characters flaws, and at the same time, gave them voices that stick with you. He’s the man for a reason. To this day, I love the dialogue in those old Marvel books.

I picked this up out of a funny panels thread over at Batman’s Shameful Secret.

We love you, Stan. Don’t ever change.

Excelsior!

G. To read Alan Moore’s work, it’s so beautiful and architectural and everything about it is great, but for me, that fire of creativity isn’t there in it, and I’m not fooled by it. I read Promethea last night, and I thought, “This is Doom Patrol, I don’t care, there’s nothing new for there for me here, but it’s so beautifully constructed, I wish I could do this kind of thing…
S. …immaculate objects…
G. …yes. It lacks the transcendental, it lacks the soul. And even last night, I was talking to Warren, The Authority’s like Justice League, but to me, what I find in that is this voice coming out, that to me, Warren’s got this voice of this new whatever generation it is that’s coming up where there’s all this violence and black humour, and that’s why I love it, because it is a thing with fire coming out of it. I don’t get that with Moore’s stuff, I just get this brilliance.
–from an interview with Grant Morrison conducted by Spiros Xenos in 1999

My secret shame as a comics fan is that I’m not an Alan Moore fan.

I’ve spent a couple days trying to write this post, actually. It veered a little too close to being a Moore vs Morrison whinefest. I’ll try to hit you with the bullet points.

Let’s discuss.

I’ve read a few Moore books that I liked. Watchmen (I own the Absolute!), V for Vendetta, Top Ten, and LXG are all good stuff. They’re technically impressive and Moore has an incredible grasp on the craft of comics-making. He may be the best technical writer ever, and he’s been gifted to work with some stellar artists at the same time. Dave Gibbons, Kevin O’Neill, JH Williams III, Gene Ha and Zander Cannon, all of these guys are ridiculously good.

However, I just can’t get into the majority of Moore’s work. Promethea leaves me flat, Lost Girls turns me off, and the majority of his America’s Best Comics were really sort of boring.

I think my issue with it is, as Morrison kind of describes above, it’s lacking in heart. It feels empty. Top Ten is the best superhero pastiche/homage since Planetary, but it all feels very by the numbers. Here’s the Fantastic Four analogues, here’s the DC characters, and so on. There’s no sense of the “Gee whiz, this is cool!” that I get from other comics writers.

I think that this is because Moore’s work is so perfectly constructed. You can tell the care that goes into his pages. You can tell that he’s thought a lot about it. However, because of that construction, all of his work feels very calculated. It doesn’t feel fun at all. Not to say that he hasn’t done some fun comics, as a handful of issues of Tom Strong were really very fun, along with that issue of Mr. Majestic he did years ago with the Dyson Spheres, I believe. But, my overall impression of Moore’s work is that it is all very serious and important and literary, capital letters optional.

I feel like I can see the man behind the curtain in too much of his work. It’s lacking in spontaneity. It’s too perfect. It’s there to be held up and admired, like art, rather than devoured, like pop culture.

(I’m an English major, honest. I’m not a literiluddite, I swear!)

Have you guys seen the proposal for Alan Moore’s Twilight of the Superheroes? It’s a DKR-style tale of superheroes gone wrong and fascist and their grisly end. Check the internet. It’s hailed as being an incredible tale, full of vim, vigor, and clever plot twists.

I read this proposal and was completely repulsed. Billy Batson as a leather sex midget? J’onn J’onnz as a murderer? John Constantine being so stubborn that he’d doom himself to a life of loneliness out of spite? Again, technically and craft-wise, it’s wonderfully constructed. It’s just lacking that heart and charm that I like from my comics.

Reading Moore is kind of like reading the classics. It’s very, very good, but it isn’t really very fun. I love Albert Camus, Voltaire, and Faulkner. I’m okay with Hemmingway, but you’ll rarely catch me reading them just because. Alan Moore’s work is a lot like that for me.

On the other side is Grant Morrison, relentless optimist and imperfect creator. His work has a snap and just earnestness about it that I don’t get from Moore. Even when he screws up or falls short of his goal, most especially in Batman 663, you just get this sense that he’s trying to give you that same feeling of “Gee whiz!” with his work. All-Star Superman illustrates this really well. He loves the Silver Age Superman and, when combined with a talent on the level of Quitely, you can tell.

His reach can easily exceed his grasp and he sometimes falls victim to scripting anticlimaxes, but he’s really very earnest about it and that comes through in the work. JLA Classified, New X-Men, The Invisibles, Vimanarama, and half a dozen of his other books all show this. They’re cool scenes, one-liners, and dialogue that sit on top of one mad idea after another. Flying jet apes, Barbelith, secondary mutations, Flex Mentallo, and Xorn. Shoot, Fantomex. He isn’t perfect, but he’s going to take you on a wild ride.

Alan Moore is literary comics. He writes comics as if there is a comics canon out there. His comics are smart, technically impressive, and wonderfully crafted. He’s rightfully hailed as one of the greatest ever, but like a lot of literary canon, his books can be boring and not very fun to read.

Grant Morrison is glam comics. It’s focused on fun, but with a point, and isn’t really aspiring to be anything other than fun. It’s shiny without being empty, and stylish without being substanceless.

I kind of prefer Morrison’s approach. I want that cool shot, I want that one-liner, and I don’t mind when my comics fall short of their goal. I want my comics to wow me and be awesome because it’s cool. I like pulpy stories.

Am I making sense or do I need to be put out to pasture? I’m not pitching this as either/or, just as an exploration on how I’m feeling about these two creators.

It’s a tale as old as time. (Pardon the slight Beauty & The Beast reference.)

There is a child, sometimes a boy, sometimes a girl, with a hidden talent and a good heart. They may not recognize this talent at the beginning of the story, but others see this potential in them and attempt to nuture it. Outside forces discover this talent and attempt to either take it away or control it. Eventually, the child realizes his or her worth and takes control of that power.

There are a lot of reasons why this story is so old. It speaks to the idea that we’re all special, and if only we can find that special thing inside of us, we’ll be happy forever. It’s a cautionary tale from parents to children, warning them to stay on the straight and narrow. It’s a fun adventure romp about a relatable person doing great things. It’s a morality play, will you or won’t you abuse that power? There are dozens of interpretations.

This is a classic story. It’s straight out of Campbell. It’s Spider-Man, Superman, Star Wars, Snow White, and a thousand other stories. It’s a story we all know and can appreciate, and a story we’ll likely be telling for hundreds of years to come.

This is also the story of Blokhedz.

First, some info and errata. (I’m trying out these new Amazon links and info formatting. Good idea, bad idea? They seem a little large, which could make formatting a pain.)

Title: Blokhedz #1: Genesis
Creators: Brandon Schultz and Mike and Mark Davis
Homepage: Blokhedz.tv
Publisher: Street Legends Ink/Simon & Schuster/Pocket Books
ISBN: 1416540733
Book Info: Blokhedz #1: Genesis collects Blokhedz #1-4, originally published in 2004 by Street Legends Ink. It is going to be released on March 20, 2007, and will be followed up by a straight to graphic novel volume 2 in Fall 2007.
Misc. Info: Interview with Format Magazine. Publishers Weekly article on the move to Pocket Books.

Extra special thanks to Ed Schlesinger at Pocket Books for getting me one of the last comp copies at New York Comic-con last weekend!

Blokhedz is the first offering from Pocket Books’s graphic novel line to my knowledge, and it’s a good start.

The hero of the book is Blak, a young black kid in Empire City. He’s extraordinarily skilled at rapping, both from written rhymes and freestyling. The book opens on him telling the story of a tragic shootout. From the first scene onward, it’s clear that he’s torn between two things. Is he going to be a smart rapper and speak the truth, or is he going to play dumb and rap about things he was never involved in? Is he going to be true to himself or is he going to “keep it real?”

The person he was rapping about is his older brother Konzaquence, who cautions him to stay true. He doesn’t want to see his little brother fall down the same path he did and gives him his lion medallion as a kind of contract between the two of them.

The hook in the book is that the words in rhymes can alter reality. It’s a little bit Dr. Strange, a little bit Biblical, and, to me at least, a little bit Invisibles. The first time this power is shown is when Vulture, a rival rapper and gangster, has his crew attack Blak. This causes Blak to lose his medallion and pride, but gain new abilities. His words become reality.

Blokhedz #1: Genesis is an engaging read. The story is familiar, but tilted to a new angle. Blak has to dodge the allure of gangs, thug rap, and life in the city in order to survive. His older brother has been there, done that, and did the time for the crime, literally. One of his brother’s old running buddies has gone from drug-dealing to running a rap label, bringing to mind Prince Paul’s A Prince Among Thieves, wherein Mr. Large, the guy who runs all the crime in the city, also dabbles in rap management. He courts Blak and, unbeknownst to him, uses his rhymes to create Crypt, a drug that hits the streets hard.

It’s about choices. Blak is torn between good or evil, God or the Devil, and vengeance or justice, but he must choose one side or the other. Both sides are tempting, but Blokhedz presents one side as being right. Good and evil are clearly delineated in the book, even down to the bad guys looking sinister. Vulture, for example, looks more than a little like his namesake and behaves worse than that. It’s simplistic, but it works. It’s also kind of refreshing in today’s comics landscape to see this kind of black-and-white viewpoint, particularly when pulled off without being either preachy or overly adult.

This is a good read, and a pretty good book for kids, despite a little bit of salty, but censored, language. There are a few gaffes, such as a handful of main characters appearing on-screen and having speaking roles without actually being introduced. I didn’t know the name of Essence, the spoken word poet and inner city crusader, until a chapter and three scenes after she was introduced, if memory serves. The focus of the book is on Blak, of course, but it would be nice if his supporting cast didn’t feel quite so not-there. A brief introductory bit of dialogue, or even a caption presented with the same flair and style found in the rest of the book would be great and enhance the read. We get that Blak has friends, but they’re a group of friends, rather being distinct individuals.

Still, this is a great start. It’s easy to read and the art is quite attractive. It’s a blend of American and anime-inspired art and it works really well. The characters can convey emotion easily. The book looks a lot like a cartoon, but in a good way. I’ve got to give them props for the backgrounds, too. Even in Marvel or DC produced comics, the “Big Two,” the backgrounds tend to be pretty bland, nondescript, and sometimes even nonexistent. These backgrounds are busy. They’re cluttered. They’re almost completely covered in tags. They have character. You really get the feeling that Empire City is a genuine city thanks to this attention to detail.

Blokhedz #1 is a good showing, and it’s cheap, too. It’s well worth a read.