Things are hoppin’ in the Pulp Genre and people are wantin’ to talk about them!!! Today, author Bill Craig talks about his various series and titles and later, Bill Cunningham, Pulp 2.0 Press Publisher leads off a two part interview about his RADIO WESTERN ADVENTURES! Stay tuned in the next few days for interviews from Don Glut and Adam Garcia! And more and more in the coming days, no kiddin’, everybody wants to talk to ALL PULP!!! Don’t you???
All Pulp delivers a slam bang, action packed interview with Wayne Reinagel, Knightraven Studios, Writer and Artist of the PULP HEROES trilogy. This Herculean effort of fiction is both mind boggling, pulp worthy, and even educational, so go learn about the genius workhorse behind it!
George Lucas is a filmmaker who believes that movies are works that can be revisited and altered as the artist’s vision or his tools change. This has been a hallmark of his dating all the way back to his 1967 USC student film, [[[Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB]]]. When Lucas and colleague Francis Ford Coppola made it from film school to Hollywood, they wound up getting the money to make a feature-version of the story as Lucas’ film directing debut. A co-production between Coppola’s American Zoetrope and Warner Bros., [[[THX 1138]]]was shot and released in 1971 to dismal results.
In the wake of his subsequent success with 1977’s Star Wars, he re-edited the film back to his original 86 minute cut, adding in five minutes, for a re-release. After tinkering endlessly with the [[[Star Wars]]] trilogy, Lucas decided it was time to go back and play with THX 1138, resulting in an 88 minute director’s cut that was released on video in 2004. Adding in numerous CGI elements, the spare film is filled out, in some cases for the better and in most cases, to its detriment.
The 2004 version is now out on Blu-ray from Warner Home Video and is an interesting exercise to watch. You certainly see the detached Lucas, the one we knew wanted Star Wars to focus on the droids. He’s uncomfortable with people it seems, or at least he was, and stuffs humanity under the surface into a loveless, emotionless existence in this bleak story. We don’t know when mankind moved underground or why, but clearly, to keep the population busy, new levels of scrutiny are employed, bringing George Orwell’s Big Brother to life.
Pulp mastermind Ron Hanna stops by the All Pulp site today to talk about things past and future! A great look into one of the most respected pulp publishers around! Check it out under the Interviews section!
There are some movies that provide us with indelible characters and performances, few giving us more than one. Then there are movies that help reflect a decade of the American experience. But, there are few that do all of the above and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is one of those films.
Now, in celebration of the 35th anniversary of the Academy Award winning film, it’s available for the first time as a download on iTunes with extras including all-new interviews with Michael Douglas and Deleted Scenes (starring Jack Nicholson). The Blu-ray edition of the film also came out this week so you have a choice.
For those unfamiliar with the story, it is based on the American literary classic by Ken Kesey. One Flew
Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is the powerfully dramatic film that took the
1975 Academy Awards by storm with its compelling tale about the triumph
of the human spirit and the fight for freedom.
Our friends at Warner Digital have given us a free download to bestow on a lucky ComicMix reader. What we’re looking for is the craziest thing you’ve read in a comic book this year. Name a character, incident, cover image, whatever (or an incident from the real world relating to comics) and put it in the comments section below. Our team of judges at ComicMix will evaluate your contributions and pick a winner. Submissions have to be posted in the comments section for this item not later than 11:59 p.m. Thursday, September 16.
Electro-shock is optional. (But fun.)
There are institutions in Chicago that make the city what it is. Deep-dish pizza loaded with premium toppings. A hot dog “dragged through the garden.” The Sears Tower (sorry, it’ll never be “Willis Tower” to anyone in the city). Da Bears. And Oprah. More than the robust food, gigantic buildings, or the amazing football team, Oprah’s seat in pop culture has been cemented in recent years as an unstoppable brand. Thanks to the big O, no less than than four talk shows litter the dial. And soon, an entire cable network will launch, thanks to the big O. In addition to the television shows, Oprah and her fifth-dimensionally named Harpo productions is responsible for magazines, telefilms, a radio station, and, we’re pretty sure, an eventual space station where housewives will be whisked away by private rocket to nibble on Southern comfort food and dish on their louse husbands, in between book-club meetings.
Earlier in this year, Oprah shocked her audience of 12 billion viewers by announcing the end of her talk show. And while some shows may have a special “farewell” episode, Oprah is enjoying a “farewell season.“ Chicago comic creators Todd Allen and Scott Beaderstadt are dedicating an arc of their graphic novel series Division and Rush in response to the announcement of Oprah’s eventual retirement on daily TV. Division and Rush is a serial strip published on the Chicago Tribune Media Group’s ChicagoNow website. It follows the exploits of a pair of Chicago detectives as they scour the city and confront eerily familiar pop-culture icons and current events. Story arcs from the strips are collected and reprinted as full-fledged graphic novels. The first arc, “The Murder Professor,” was a #1 bestseller on Amazon for the Kindle.
The newly announced second arc, dubbed “The Cult of Low Self-Esteem,” follows Oprah-esque television diva Opa! as she announces her eventual move to California. Not everyone is thrilled by her decision, and the murderous romp begins to unfold. We here at ComicMix dig the strip, and think you should do yourself a favor and check it out. Just don’t tell Oprah we recommended it, lest we incur her wrath. Don’t think that’s scary? Just a tip, there, hotshot: the last time Oprah got mad, America gave up BEEF for a month. We don’t want to see what happens if we get on her death-ray radar anytime soon.
[[[Chuck]]] is the ultimate fanboy dream television show. We all wish we could be accidentally zapped with the Intersect and be a walking computer, filled with espionage details. This way, we too could be protected by the CIA and NSA in the form of the rough Colonel John Casey and the gorgeous Sarah Walker. The show’s producers know this and Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak have carefully built up the television series reeling in the fans and finding new ones along the way with a delightful mix of humor, action and pathos.
The show, though, has never been a ratings hit and NBC has been cautious with its episode orders so there has always been a campaign to ensure the series is renewed annually. Last year, a 13 episode commitment and a spring debut seemed to be the most the Peacock Network would offer up and the producers made certain each episode would further the theme. If season one was about the boy, then season two was about the boy becoming a man and season three was all about the man becoming a spy. When [[[Heroes]]] tanked early, NBC rushed Chuck onto the schedule earlier than expected and an additional six episodes were ordered, giving the producers more room to play with.
The results can be found in the excellent [[[Chuck the Complete Third Season]]], now out from Warner Home Video. All 19 episodes are included along with a handful of bonus features and they’re well recommended.
Season recap and spoilers ahead…
Of course you do, it’s new and shiny and out in stores today
— but we’re not giving it away to just anyone.
Send a note telling us who you think the lead character really is in The Lord of the Rings (and why) to @ComicMix
on Twitter (you can click the link below) by Thursday, September 16th,
and a winner will be chosen at random. (If you’re not a member of the
Twitterverse yet, you Luddite, you can also just comment below.) There is
a runner-up prize as well, with extra ‘LOTR’ goodies, including a
poster. We’ll announce the lucky buggers on
September 17th. Here are some ground rules:
Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
To enter, send who you think is the lead character in ‘Lord of the Rings’ and why to @ComicMix on Twitter or comment below (not anonymously, of course).
Your entry must be posted before Thursday, September 16th, 8 PM Eastern Time.
You may enter only once. No being tricksy now– we hates that.
One grand prize winner and one runner-up will be selected in a random
drawing. One Grand Prize Winner will receive The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy (Theatrical Editions + Digital Copy) [Blu-ray]
(valued at $99); One Runner-up Winner will receive
‘Lord of the Rings’ merchandise (valued at $49).
It has been reported that for the first time in 15 months no single comic book gathered more than
100,000 copies in orders in the direct sales market. Make that 93,459, to put a
point on it.
Conventional wisdom has it that sales have dropped because the average cover price has gone up, and who am I to question conventional wisdom? But there’s another reason. A big one.
Historically, whenever one of the major publishers (which means Marvel and DC; I’m talking superhero comics here) felt they were being challenged by one or more upstart publishers, that company would flood the market with crap, usually reprints or revivals of frequently cancelled titles. The other publisher would rapidly follow. Before the direct sales tail started wagging the dog, it was believed there was only so much space in the newsstands
and DC and Marvel could crowd the others out. That, of course, was nonsense: if the newsstands cared about comic books (how much profit is there in a 40 cent item?) nobody would have to crowd anybody out.
This philosophy extended to the direct sales market. When companies such as First, Eclipse and Malibu were making waves and racking up competitive sales, DC and Marvel started dumping product into the pipeline. How many times could you revive Kull The Conqueror? But retailers had to order at least a few copies because it was a Marvel Comic, and cumulatively all that sucked a lot of bucks out of retailers’ tills. Remember, they buy this stuff non-returnable.
But now comic book stores have dwindled down to a precious few and the big bookstore chains such as Barnes and Noble and Borders are coughing up blood, sales truly suck.
Which makes it real curious to see that Marvel is once again flooding the comics rack. Having finally lost the Kull license, the House of Idea has gone the Oreo Cookies route: they’re jerking their “going to the movies” properties as though they were crack fiends at a milk farm.
For example: the September Marvel Previews (books on sale November) lists no less than six Iron Man titles, eight Thor titles, and 13 Avengers books. There’s also two event series: Shadowland, which winds up with a mere four titles, and Chaos War, which boasts five.
I didn’t even mention the massive – and expanding – X-Men group. That’s old news.
27 issues featuring Thor, Iron Man, and/or The Avengers.
Boy, you’d think there was a Thor movie coming out that, oh I don’t know, tied in to the Iron Man movies, to be followed by the big The Avengers
movie.
So, why the flood? Is Marvel worried about competition from Boom, Dynamite, and IDW? I don’t think so. They started producing material
for this latest dump just about the time the Disney takeover was ratified. They are trying to impress the Mouse.
Disney doesn’t care about their comic book profits, and nor does Warner Bros. Marvel and DC, respectively, are there as R&D, fodder for movies, television and animation – and their concomitant merchandising revenues. All Marvel and DC have to do on the publishing front is show a decent
return on investment and their new masters will be content.
It’s hard for me to think of a way Marvel could better promote comic book bootlegging.
Atlas Comics, the 1970s upstart designed to rival Marvel Comics, is being revived in time for New York Comic-Con next month. In a Deadline Hollywood exclusive, Jason Goodman, grandson of Marvel founder Martin Goodman, revealed that the line is poised to be revived beginning with Phoenix and Grim Ghost.
Handling the creative will be Ardden Entertainment’s Brendan Deenan, working with J.M. DeMatteis as editor-in-chief. Together, the pair previously produced a well-received adaptation of Flash Gordon and Casper the Friendly Ghost. No creative assignments were announced in the story but will be unveiled at the convention where both Atlas and Ardden will have table space.
“Although my grandfather eventually sold Marvel, he insisted on keeping Atlas Comics in the family,” Jason Goodman told Deadline. “As a result of his vision, Atlas Comics is the largest individually-held library of comic book heroes and villains on the planet. We have 28 titles and hundreds of characters imagined by some of the greatest minds in the industry.”
In 1972, Goodman sold Marvel Comics and by June 1974 decided he wanted to keep his hand in and created Atlas, a name once used by the company. His son, Chip, was its publisher, a role Martin intended Chip to have at Marvel, but one denied him by the new owners. It was always speculated Martin founded Atlas to beat Marvel in revenge.
Martin Goodman hired former Warren editor Jeff Rovin and Larry Leiber, a relative and brother to Stan Lee, to run the color comics and black and white magazines respectively. Both men always felt they were given the wrong jobs.
The line aggressively launched after luring many of the biggest names working in comics to produce covers or stories. Atlas paid top rates and offered creator participation, making them a more attractive outlet than either DC Comics or Marvel.
However, no sooner did titles launch than they were ordered retooled to more closely resemble Marvels’ heroic universe. An example was Howard Chaykin’s pulp-inspired The Scorpion, but after two issues he quit when orders to update it came down. He took his unfinished work to Marvel, reworking it into Dominic Fortune.
The line lasted long enough to publish approximately 60 color comics and nine black and white magazines.
Columns / Glenn Hauman / News
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