• Simone/Waid Twitterwar FACT: Mark Waid has been arrested TWICE for giving CrossGen comics to CHILDREN. "EVIL!" says local crack dealer!
• Simone/Waid Twitterwar FACT: Simone gifted by Dave Gibbons with original Watchmen covers, uses them as placemats. IT'S TRUE.
• Simone/Waid Twitterwar Update: Waid needs grocery list, Peyer and Augustyn write most of it.
• Simone/Waid Twitterwar FACT: At least WAID pays HIS ghostwriters in something other than old copies of ROSE & THORN.

I haven't seen a scuffle like this since the Joss Whedon/Warren Ellis slapfight of '06.

We, of course, will continue to monitor the fighting as long as safety allows.

We'd ask "Whose side are you on?" but the last time we did that, the guy with the shield died. On the other hand, he'll be better soon, so feel free to exercise your right of free speech in the comments section.

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As a company that has strong ties to the 80's independent comics scene, with us publishing stuff from First Comics and Eclipse, we're really happy to hear that Bill Cucinotta and Gerry Giovinco are getting back into the game with CO2 Comics, a web comics publishing site developed by the former Comico partners and publishers.

Making the jump from print to pixels is an exciting adventure for the pair who were instrumental in laying the groundwork for Comico the Comic Company, which was one of the most dynamic and influential independent comic publishers during the 1980's featuring such titles as Mage, Grendel, Elementals, Robotech, Jonny Quest, Gumby, Starblazers, and Space Ghost.

The project is quickly turning into a reunion of Comico artists. Besides works by Cucinotta and Giovinco, comics are presented featuring the talents of Chris Kalnick, Joe Williams, Andrew C. Murphy, Reggie Byers, Bernie Mireault, Bill Anderson, Rich Rankin and Neil Vokes.

We look forward to seeing what they're up to.

The one Michael Jackson comics reference I haven't seen mentioned yet is from Wasteland #16 from DC Comics, in a story entitled "Heartshadow" written by John Ostrander and drawn by Rick Magyar. It's a story where a young fan of "a dark prince named Michael" commits suicide.

Now, in the wake of Jackson's death, reports are coming in of Michael Jackson fans committing suicide:

Fans of MICHAEL JACKSON have been hit hard by the star's death - 12 devotees have allegedly killed themselves following the tragic news.

The King Of Pop passed away on Thursday (25Jun09) from a cardiac arrest and millions of his fans worldwide went into mourning.

But several of them found it too hard to cope and subsequently ended their own lives, according to the founder of an online Jackson fanclub.

Gary Taylor, president and owner of MJJcommunity.com, says, "I know there has been an increase (in deaths), I now believe the figure is 12. It is a serious situation that these people are going through but Michael Jackson would never want this. He would want them to live.

"They (fans) can't accept it, they feel in some sort of different reality. I'm stunned that he's dead. One minute he is coming here for concerts and the next he is gone. I think the funeral will be where the reality kicks in that he is gone and won't be coming back, there will be a huge depression in the fan community when that happens."

Stop Forgetting to Remember
By Peter Kuper
Crown Publishing, July 2007, $19.95

Stop Forgetting to Remember is the autobiography of “Walter Kurtz,” a fortysomething cartoonist born in Cleveland and resident in New York City, who worked on a strip about two color-coded spy-types for a satirical magazine popular with teen boys, and who otherwise has an immense amount in common with Peter Kuper. But he is not Peter Kuper – or, rather, he’s different enough from Kuper to provide any plausible deniability that might become necessary.

Kuper worked on Stop Forgetting to Remember for at least ten years, 1995-2005, and the final product is loose-limbed and discursive, a collection of autobiographical stories folded into the “present-day” obsessions and concerns of Kurtz. The present-day material is all in gray tones, with the flashbacks and similar imaginative scenes drawn in a maroon like a day-old bruise. Each chapter does make a connection between present and past, but Stop Forgetting reads like a collection of shorter biographical pieces rather than one graphic novel. (That ten-year span means the book isn’t quite the way either the 1995 Kuper or the 2005 Kuper would have made it. It ends up being loosely organized around the life of Kurtz’s daughter Elli, but it’s not about her; she’s just there, growing up, and her life gives Kurtz things to reminisce about.)

Prose novels sometimes show the signs of too much development time, but there it’s typically an overworked surface, like a miniature painting from an obsessive, with every tiny detail written and rewritten and re-rewritten until it’s completely airless and self-enclosing. By contrast, comics that have been worked on too long get disjointed; it’s much more difficult to rework a ten-year-old comics page than it is to rewrite a ten-year-old novel chapter, so the comics page gets a few tweaks or a new panel pasted on top where the prose chapter would get rewritten from beginning to end. Stop Forgetting to Remember has a mild case of this; there’s a sense that Kuper had an overarching idea for this book – or had more than one, at different times – but that idea doesn’t come through cleanly, so the book becomes a series of glimpses of a life.

Continue reading Review: Stop Forgetting to Remember by Peter Kuper ›

Nominations for the Harvey Awards are selected exclusively by creators - those who write, draw, ink, letter, color, design, edit or are otherwise involved in a creative capacity in the comics field. They are the only industry awards both nominated and selected by the full body of comic book professionals. Professionals who participate will be joining nearly 2,000 other comics professionals in honoring the outstanding comics achievements of 2008. Thank you to all that have already participated by submitting a nomination ballot.

Final ballots are due to the Harvey Awards by Friday, August 28, 2009. Full details for submission of completed ballots can be found on the final ballot. Voting is open to anyone professionally involved in a creative capacity within the comics field. Final ballots are available for download at www.harveyawards.org. Those without Internet access may request that paper ballots be sent to them via mail or fax by calling the Baltimore Comic-Con (410-526-7410) or e-mailing baltimorecomicccon@yahoo.com.

This will be the fourth year for the Harvey Awards in Baltimore, MD. Our Master of Ceremonies this year will be Scott Kurtz. Look for more details soon on how you can attend the Harvey Awards dinner.

This year’s Baltimore Comic-Con will be held October 10-11, 2009. The ceremony and banquet for the 2008 Harvey Awards will be held Saturday night, October 10.

The full ballot is listed below.

Continue reading 2009 Harvey Awards nominees announced ›

It's the hallmark of good journalism... Ask The Question.

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‘TRIBUTE: MICHAEL JACKSON, KING OF POP COMIC BOOK OFFERS LASTING REMEMBRANCE FOR FANS FROM BLUEWATER

To millions he was the King of Pop; one of the world’s most cherished entertainers and a celebrated international icon. With his untimely passing, Michael Jackson left an extraordinary and tragic legacy. Bluewater Productions is paying tribute in October to his memory and legacy with a special collectors edition biography comic.

The newest addition to the publisher’s critically acclaimed biography library will trace Jackson’s rise as a musical prodigy with the “Jackson 5” through last Thursdays sad end. The book will feature highlights from his storied career and cover his enigmatic private life.

“Michael Jackson’s music served as the soundtrack to countless lives…including mine,” said Bluewater president Darren G. Davis, “His influence on our culture has been profound.”

“TRIBUTE: Michael Jackson, King of Pop,” features a wraparound cover and foreword by “The Official Michael Jackson Fan Club’s” Giuseppe Mazzola. Mazzola was also Jackson’s personal friend. The issue is being written by Wey-Yuih Loh, (Political Power: Colin Powell” and “Political Power: Joe Biden) and illustrated by Giovanni Timpano (Vincent Price Presents). Noted cover artist Vinnie Tartamella will also provide an alternate wraparound cover.

On the bright side, there won't be a comic three years down the line where Michael returns because he was in a cave at the beginning of time. Probably.

3-day weekend total is $112M and 5-day overall is $201.2M from 4,234 theaters. Those figures include a Sunday estimate of around $34+M mirroring that day's -15% play on the first Transformers. The breakdown is $40.6M for Saturday, $36.7M Friday, $28.6M Thursday, and a record smashing $60.6M Wednesday. Included are 169 IMAX screens which contributed a giant $14.4 million to the five day total. Internationally, the robot sequel made $162M with a cume of $187M including the early debuts in Japan and the UK. So that makes for $387M worldwide, a nice haul for the 100%-owned Viacom title.

So it's #2 off all time openings, behind The Dark Knight, in spite of brutal reviews. I mean, mind-crunchingly bad. The shortest is T:ROTFL. Some of the roughest comes from Topless Robot, who I think is taking this as an affront to robots everywhere.

But the question no one seems to be asking is: How could this movie be so disjointed, with plot holes you could fly a teleporting jet plane through? Weren't there writers?

Actually, for a decent part of the movie's production-- no, there weren't any writers. They were all on strike.

The Writer's Guild of America, the union that represents all writers in Hollywood, went on strike on November 5, 2007, ending three months later on February 12, 2008. During those hundred days, writing on all movie and TV projects stopped cold, no matter where they were. Foreseeing the possibility of a strike, production companies accelerated production of films and television episodes in an effort to stockpile enough material to continue regular film releases and TV schedules during the strike period. And one of the films in that rush period was Transformers.

With Transformers, the timing issue was even more critical. Delays for the project were deadly; a summer 2009 release date was already planned and was critical for generating the most income. The visual effects were another problem. You've probably already seen articles on how many years of computing time went into making this movie, and that they literally blew up servers rendering the film. Once again, very little time to spare.

So they had to go into production with what they had, and hope that they would be able to pull it all together later. Reanimate a robot here and there for new lines, and cover the rest with explosions and fast movement, and hope that the audience would be dazzled enough not to notice the problems.

And the final cost is now apparent.

UPDATE: Edward Douglas has the pull quotes from screenwriters Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci to match what I'd been hearing off the record:

Roberto Orci: We took the job with Ehren Kruger two weeks before the strike so in that two weeks, we had to generate a 20-page outline that we handed in, and then during the strike, Michael and the amazing (producer) Ian Bryce tried to prep everything they could off of that outline. Then from the day the strike ended to the first day of shooting was three months, so we had to write the script in those three months, handing in pages at the end of every day so they could be prepped. It was crazy. We finished writing the movie two weeks ago, literally.
Alex Kurtzman: Because you're writing lines for the robots in post. Not only did we rewrite on set but we spent the last six months with Michael in post, cutting the movie and writing the lines for the robots, just making jokes or making plot points more clear. Literally, they had to just rip it out of our dead hands the other day. (chuckles)

This is not the way to make a coherent movie. Suddenly, I'm even more worried about what the G.I.Joe movie is going to be like.

The Atlantic:

I was walking through a bohemian part of town and ran across this place called a "bookstore". I thought, "Hmm, that's interesting. I've always gotten my books electronically on my kindle, but this could be an interesting idea." So I stepped inside. What I saw was an unfamiliar way of experiencing books: on hundreds of of sheets of paper, bound up on one side with glue and wrapped in a hard cardboard cover. They even smell a little musty, at least the old ones.

At first I was excited; but then I began to think, well how would I do a text search in such a book? Supposing it was a reference book, or I wanted to find a quote that was particularly memorable? Also, I can resell it if I don't want it, but I can't take notes in the book without ruining its value. Plus, where am I going to keep these books if I buy a whole bunch of them? They're really heavy! And it uses a lot of paper - especially newspapers! What if it's dark and I need a bigger font? What if I'm on the train to work and decide I want to buy the paper version of the Times that day? Can't get it!! Not only that, but they wanted to charge me MORE for these clunky, static, physical, books than the normal electronic price! Honestly, with all these limitations and disadvantages, they should be giving them away for free. I decided I'm never going to pay a single red cent for a paper book until these issues are addressed. No way.

Interesting. Let's take it from the POV of the comics buyer:

"But still, this paper edition does have a few advantages-- I mean, wow, color? I wonder how my Japanese imports would look in full color? And some of the pictures are crisper, the ones that aren't painted-- these paper versions look like someone took all the figures and traced a black line around them, to make them sharper. Neat!

"Oh, a few in paper shouldn't be bad. It's not like I'm going to buy thousands of them and keep them around."

Your thoughts?

The Last Airbender, a live action version of the Nickelodeon animated series Avatar, is scheduled to be released on July 2, 2010. Take a look:

Ron Moore's Virtuality pilot is on Fox tonight. Refresh my memory: is this sleeping in the timeslot where Terminator: The Sarah Chronicles slept, or is this where Harsh Realm was? Here's the trailer:

Your thoughts? Reviews? What did you think?

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