September 8, 1966 was a pretty big night of television for fans of the fantastic. NBC ran a sneak peek of several new shows a week prior to the formal premiere of the prime time season. At 7:30, Ron Ely first swung on a vine across trees as Tarzan while an hour later, Captain James T. Kirk confronted the Salt Vampire on the first airing of Star Trek. While the latter has gone on to great international fame, the former series has always been somewhat eclipsed.
Warner Archive, bless their souls, has rectified that by releasing the complete first season of the two season series. You can find the first fifteen episodes on four discs comprising Tarzan Season One, Volume One while the remaining sixteen episodes are available in the second volume. Warner has done a nice job cleaning the prints and the show looks pretty darn good. (more…)
Whenever my old employer, DC Comics, reprints some of my ancient work, it’s gratifying, particularly if what’s reprinted is one of the “socially relevant” stories Neal Adams and I did in the early 70s, but it can be a little disheartening, too.
The problem is, the stories are for the most part still relevant, and what does that say about the state of the nation? Environmental upset? Yep, still got it. Racism? The folks down in Florida could tell you about that. Addiction? That lovely singer is no longer with us. Overpopulation? Hasn’t improved. American Indians? Some of the nation’s worst poverty is found on reservations that don’t house casinos.
As one of Bill Maher’s guests said on his show last week, it seems unbelievable that birth control could be a factor in presidential politics in the in the twenty first century. I mean…birth control?
But occasionally a glimmer of light shows through the gloom. So let us smile and extend a salute to Batwoman.
Digression: Batwoman and I go way, way back. Fact is, I killed her 40-something years ago. Why? Don’t remember, exactly. Her demise was almost certainly a plot point in the days when comics stories were largely plot-driven, and she must have seemed to be good cannon fodder: a character who, although she was in the continuity, hadn’t done much in a long time and if we needed a snuffee, and I guess we did, she was a good candidate. I do regret ending her offstage; she probably deserved a death scene at the very least.
End of digression: Batwoman is back. Wait – make that a Batwoman, who has the same name(s) as the original, but a different lifestyle. She’s a redhead and…oh yeah, a lesbian. Big deal? In our world, it kind of is since, from the beginning of mass-marketed comics, redheads were forbidden.
Just kidding: it’s gay people who could not grace our little sagas and in this we were one with most other media. In television and most movies, sex of any kind was antiseptic – all those cardboard kisses! – and gay sex was way outside the limits. And if gayness was an element in a story, as in some of Tennessee Williams’ film material, it was no more than hinted at and its practitioners were going to suffer plenty before the last reel.
In comics? Well, one of the characters John Byrne created for his series Alpha Flight was gay, but not too obviously; John’s editor knew of Northstar’s orientation, but I’m not sure anyone else in the editorial department did, not at first. (I’m informed that later creative teams pulled Northstar further out of the closet.) And a couple of years back, Marvel let us know that the ol’ rannie from the western titles, the Rawhide Kid, was gay, news that managed not to shake any foundations. But on the whole, the Kid and Northstar and a few others, including the revamped Question, in private did icky stuff that wasn’t mentioned, except, maybe, in he gutters.
Now, Batwoman. Last week she received a media award from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation and nobody’s making any secret of the recognition.
Call it one of those glimmers I mentioned earlier. And be grateful for it.
Of all the characters Dan Ackroyd played on Saturday Night Live back when the show was actually funny and clever, my favorite was a guy named Leonard Pinth-Garnell, a tuxedoed teevee critic who hosted segments called, alternatively, Bad Playhouse, Bad Cinema, Bad Ballet, and so on. Whereas the premise was obvious, the ambiance was brilliant. Pinth-Garnell was an über-snob, the kind who pontificate with their noses so high up in the air you’d think they’d drown in a light drizzle.
Needless to say, damn near everybody who ever applied letters to opinions has a bit of Leonard Pinth-Garnell in him, her, or it. Some of us try to keep him locked up in a dark corner of our brainpans, but he keeps on popping up on our shoulder like the devil that torments Donald Duck, or, more to my point, Tom Hulce in Animal House.
Then the Internet came along and freed our inner-Pinth-Garnell. Now we had a forum where we could say anything. Of course, with great power comes great dues and we have to subject ourselves to comments from the masses. As I see from elsewhere on the Wild Wild Web – certainly not here at ComicMix, where I have come to regard our commenters as family – some responses can be quite abusive.
Well, what goes around comes around.
The problem with criticism is that, categorically, it’s like shooting ducks in a barrel. It’s simply too easy to criticize someone for doing something you didn’t like. Of course, when you do you’re pissing off all those people who did like your target. Doubtlessly, you are aware of the famous aphorism known as Sturgeon’s Law: “ninety percent of everything is crap.” This led to my own definition of a cynic: “he who believes Sturgeon was being conservative.”
Here’s something that confirms your suspicion: occasionally, some critics (never me, of course) often are exploiting their target so they can get their audience all riled up and generate a lot more page-site hits, which inure to the benefit of the advertising revenue. My dear friend, author Max Allan Collins, once referred to this technique as “tossing a hand grenade into the audience and then throwing your body on top of it,” and nobody does that with a bigger smile on his face than Mr. Collins, my generation’s version of Richard L. Breen.
Such criticism is among ComicMix’s raisons d’être. Whereas I do not impose these (or hardly any other) standards upon our sundry columnists and commenters, I strive to be informative in this acre of bandwidth. I like turning people on to cool stuff they might not have come across, or, better still, they were considering but hadn’t decided upon. Like all writers I admire a well-turned phrase, particularly my own. The reason why I never got a vanity plate is because back in my First Comics days Rick Oliver and I saw a car license that read “BLIND.” I can’t beat that one.
Occasionally, we all come across an unavoidable target: one so well promoted that commentary is necessary to preserve the greater societal sanity. This is often known as “the Emperor’s New Clothes,” or “What is Frank Miller doing next?”
Yeah, a little Leonard Pinth-Garnell every once in a while sure is good for the soul.
Puttin’ The Monthly Back into Pulp with Sci-Fi, Mystery, and Good ol’ Masked Vigilante Action, PRO SE PRESENT #8 hits the streets, adventure blasting from both barrels!
Van Allen Plexico’s exclusive epic novella ‘Hand Of The Machine’, featuring HAWK, his latest creation, concludes ! Kevin Rodgers takes us into the terrifying state of mind…or reality….known as ‘Paranoia’ and New Pulp’s Best New Writer of the Year Chuck Miller shares another tale of his wild and wacky hero, The Black Centipede, starring in ‘Funeral for a Fiend!’ With mind blowing art work provided by Sean Ali and Rowell Roque, PRO SE PRESENTS #8 is almost too much Pulp to handle! Available for the Kindle on Amazon, for the Nook on Barnes and Noble, and for other formats on Smashwords!
New Pulp Author Martin Powell offered a first glimpse at the prehistoric world of Pellucidar as envisioned by artist Jamie Chase, for the upcoming graphic novel based on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ classic sci-fi adventure, At The Earth’s Core.
At The Earth’s Core is written by Martin Powell with art by Jamie Chase and is fully authorized by ERB, Inc. Coming soon from Sequential Pulp Comics and Dark Horse Comics.
Brian Bendis has bagged a book deal outside of comics – sort of, plus more behind the scenes at HARRY‘S LAW with Nate Corddry and SYFY bags monster ratings with one finale.
All Pulp congratulates Mark Maddox on being named the Rondo Artist of the Year by the Rondo Hatton Awards for his contribution to horror magazines and book covers such as Little Shoppe of Horrors, Undying Monsters, and Mad Scientist.
No stranger to pulp, Mark’s art has graced the covers and interiors of several New Pulp titles including the Captain Hazzard series, Sherlock Holmes, Our Man Flint, Kolchak The Night Stalker, Lance Star: Sky Ranger, and more.
All Pulp congratulates to Nancy Holder, writer of Moonstone’s New Pulp Domino lady comic book series on winning a Stoker Award for Best YA Book for her novel, The Screaming Season.
Pre-orders are now available for the audio dramas of HONEY WEST and DOMINO LADY at http://audiocomicscompany.com/. Visit the site for more information on these cool new audio dramas.
I’m convinced that there comes a time in every creator’s career when he or she has that one project that becomes the project. Be they a writer, artist, photographer, director or whatever, there comes a time when said creator realizes without a shadow of a doubt that they have created their baby.
Their triumph. Their masterpiece.
This is the project that they will not compromise on. There will be no quarter given creatively; there will be no major changes to the premise no matter what.
At the many Static Shock pitch meetings at major television networks we were asked if we would consider many changes to the original bible, which I wrote. Some of those changes bothered me, like Static’s mom being killed in a drive-by. How fucking stereotypical was that shit? But as bullshit as I thought that was it wasn’t a deal killer.
At one high level network meeting the question was asked “How about if we make Static…white?”
I said, “How about I bang your wife?”
True story.
OK… almost a true story. I did not actually say the part about his wife. But the network executive did suggest we make Static a white kid, which to me was just as fucked up as me asking to bang his wife. I did think about responding to him with the wife thing but he had a photo of her on his desk and lets just say…ugh.
Many changes were made to the original Static bible. Some I thought were good many I thought sucked. The show was a different story. I thought the show worked on every level regardless of my personal feelings towards the changes to the original bible. Static Shock was handled wonderfully and I have nothing but good things to say about the show.
But Static Shock was not just my baby and I had little to do with the show once it was on the air. But, I do have a baby.
Actually, I have three babies…damn I’ve got the perfect black father joke but I’m going to let it pass… like child support.
My first baby is a project called The Adjuster. I created the Adjuster over ten years ago and twice it came very close to becoming a reality. I refuse to let the Adjuster go just to get it made. Nope. The deal has to be right. The company has to be right.
My second baby is called The Underground. It’s a Dark Horse project and has been for a few years. If by chance Mike Richardson is reading this I will have the book finished this year. It’s a major undertaking and I’m as anal as I am black so it’s been a labor of love and frustration for the last couple of years. But, Mike, to be fair, you took a while approving the story…and I’m still traumatized by the Comic Con incident. You know the one…
Those are my babies and I’m blessed to have the Dark Horse deal and excited about the future of The Adjuster but there is one project which I consider my masterpiece. I won’t mention the title as it’s currently being considered at a major publisher but I will share with you its journey that is a festinating one. I’ll call it Project X.
In 1998 I had a vision of what I thought was the greatest idea I’ve ever had. The idea was so good it scared me. It scared me because those types of “great ideas” usually suck. It’s never a good idea to think that your idea is a great one.
People lie and the one person people lie to the most are themselves. You may not think it’s lying when you convince yourself that something is a good idea but if you have to convince yourself then to me that’s a lie. But this idea was such a good idea and I was convinced it was great. So, clearly I was lying to myself.
Clearly.
Or was I?
I decided to ask three of the best writers in the industry if they thought it was a good idea. I asked Keith Giffen, Lovern Kindzieski and David Quinn.
They all said it was a great idea. Not a good idea, a great idea. Keith Giffen called it one of the greatest ideas he’s ever heard.
That’s Keith Giffen who said that.
Keith Giffen.
THEKeith Giffen.
After telling those three guys, I ran it past Dwayne McDuffie. He said it was such a good idea he wanted to write it. Not bad eh?
So, with all that love from four of the best in the biz I decided to pitch the idea to DC Comics and I did. And…I sold the idea.
September 8, 1966 was a pretty big night of television for fans of the fantastic. NBC ran a sneak peek of several new shows a week prior to the formal premiere of the prime time season. At 7:30, Ron Ely first swung on a vine across trees as Tarzan while an hour later, Captain James T. Kirk confronted the Salt Vampire on the first airing of Star Trek. While the latter has gone on to great international fame, the former series has always been somewhat eclipsed.
