Author: Matthew Weinberger

#SDCC: ‘A Contract With God’ Big-Screen Bound

#SDCC: ‘A Contract With God’ Big-Screen Bound

  • News
  • July 24, 2010

If there’s a better place to announce a silver screen adaptation of pioneering 1978 graphic novel A Contract with God than the presentation of creator Will Eisner’s namesake awards, I can’t begin to imagine it. 

It’s true: Denis Kitchen, Eisner’s literary estate executor, made the unexpected announcement at the presentation of the 2010 Eisner Awards at San Diego Comic-Con. The New York Times’ Arts Beat column jumped right in with details after the announcement was made, and it looks like the adaptation of A Contract with God will have four different directors: Alex Rivera, Tze Chun, Barry Jenkins, and Sean Baker. Comics veteran Bob Schreck will be one of the producers.

A Contract with God is an incredibly important work in the history of the graphic novel. It wasn’t the first (It Rhymes With Lust can probably claim that honor), but Eisner’s heartbreaking story of a Jewish immigrant community in New York remains one of the most influential on the development of the medium.

#SDCC: The Joss Whedon Experience – UPDATED

  • News
  • July 24, 2010

I don’t think we really need to introduce Joss Whedon. But just in case, he’s the creator of shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dollhouse, and Firefly – not to mention that just yesterday he officially became director of Marvel’s The Avengers.  He took the stage at San Diego Comic-Con today for the “Joss Whedon Experience,” where thousands of his closest friends gathered to ask him questions without even a moderator between them. Thanks to Marisa Roffman over at Give Me My Remote and her live coverage of the panel, here are some highlights after the jump… and thanks to ecsmith34, we’re getting video.

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Review: Kirby Krackle – ‘E for Everyone’

Review: Kirby Krackle – ‘E for Everyone’

I first became acquainted with Kirby Krackle‘s music at New York Comic Con 2009, where no less than Joe Quesada himself told me to check out their self-titled first album. (Okay, it was a Twitter post to all his followers, but still.) It turns out the man knew what he was talking about, because I fell in love with KK’s self-described comic book rock on first listen – and before I knew it, I was a full-fledged Kracklehead. It turns out I had been wanting to hear a rock ode to Benjamin J. Grimm my whole life and didn’t even know it.

Today, Kirby Krackle’s much-anticipated sophomore effort, appropriately titled, E For Everyone, was released. I admit, I was afraid it was going to leave me in want of a retcon, but at the end of the last track I queued it right back up to listen again, and again, and again. Comprised as it is of a comic book shop owner and an accomplished indie-rock musician, KK’s biggest strength has always been its dedication to rock-solid musicianship and catchy hooks first and geeky subject matter second. I sang along to album closer Going Home at my desk twice before I realized it was a song about the band’s love for comic conventions, and that only served to enhance my enjoyment of an already great tune.

Their subject matter weaves in and out of different fandoms – E For Everyone opens with “Vault 101,” a pop-rock song about the video game Fallout 3 so catchy it should be regulated by the FDA, and it’s followed up immediately by “On and On,” a ballad that does more to demonstrate why we should care about Wolverine in three-odd minutes than his solo series has done in three-odd years. That’s the secret behind Kirby Krackle’s appeal: like geek-rock progenitor Jonathan Coulton, KK delivers songs by nerds, for nerds, that never pander and only rarely hew close to deserving the dreaded “comedy song” moniker. 

It’s not perfect, though, especially if you listened to their previous album as much as I did. No individual song is as grating on repeated listen as “Naked Wii,” but E for Everyone doesn’t hit the peak of brilliance as often, either. It makes for a more even listening experience but slightly lessens the album overall. Moreover, they repeat a few of their old tricks: “Henchman” covers the same ground as the earlier, better “Villain Song,” and “Roll Over” – a song about a ménage-å-every-female character-from-an-80’s-Saturday-morning-cartoon – takes over from “Marvelous Girls” in the “vaguely misogynist but still rockin’ party song” department.

Bottom line: If you’re reading ComicMix and you’ve listened to the first album, you probably love Kirby Krackle as much as I do, and this will scratch the itch for more you’ve had for a year. If [[[E For Everyone]]] is your first exposure to the band, then there’s plenty here to understand what all the hubbub is about. It suffers a little from more-of-the-same syndrome, but when the same rocks this hard, it’s difficult to care overmuch, and I can’t wait to see what the duo does next.

Kirby Krackle is very active on Twitter, so in their honor and in the honor of the man they’re named for, the final word in 140 characters or less: Don’t ask, just buy it!

The DCAU Justice League returns in ‘Crisis on Two Earths’: UPDATED

The DCAU Justice League returns in ‘Crisis on Two Earths’: UPDATED

  • News
  • September 16, 2009

Ain’t It Cool News is reporting that the next direct-to-DVD DC Comics movie after the upcoming Superman/Batman: Public Enemies will be a new release titled Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, tentatively coming Spring 2010.

As you can glean from the title, it takes place on two different planet Earths: one protected by the Justice League, and one ruled over by the evil Crime Syndicate. When a heroic version of Lex Luthor steps over from that parallel Earth to ask the Justice League for help, a superhero fight breaks out. That last part is merely conjecture, but we’d put good money on it.

What we do know for sure is that Dwayne McDuffie, who masterminded the original Justice League cartoon and its Unlimited followup, will be writing the script, and that it’ll feature an all-star voice cast, including Gina Torres (Firefly) as Wonder Woman’s doppelganger Super Woman and James Woods (Ghosts of Mississippi, those episodes of Family Guy) as Good Lex Luthor.

The AICN article has the press release and full details, so go check it out.

UPDATE 9/17: Andrew Laubacher writes in comments:

Based on the image in the AICN article, this is NOT the DCAU Justice
League. Hal Jordan is Green Lantern and Wonder Woman is wearing the
costume from Lauren Montgomery’s WONDER WOMAN animated movie. If you
have some evidence for your assertion, please, give it up.

Well, everybody’s officially locked down for comments while promoting the current release of Superman/Batman: Public Enemies. However, someone close to the production confirmed that this is not strict JLU continuity.

On the other hand, since this is dealing with alternate earths, things could be up for grabs– and in fifteen years or so, we’re going to need a “Crisis On Animated Earths” to reconcile this, New Frontier, Challenge of the Super Friends, Swamp Thing, WildC.A.T.S., Krypto the Superdog, and the Superman/Aquaman Hour.

NYCC and NYAF Sitting in a Tree

NYCC and NYAF Sitting in a Tree

  • News
  • September 10, 2009

We just received word that next year’s New York Anime Festival and New York Comic Con are going to co-locate, with both conventions taking place October 8-10, 2010 in the Jacob K. Javits center in Manhattan. The full press release with all the details is after the jump, but here’s a highlight:

“Our decision to co-locate NYAF
with NYCC is the final installment of a strategic plan to place and
sequence our pop culture events in a manner that best serves the needs
of our fans and exhibitors,” notes Lance Fensterman, Vice President of
the Reed Exhibitions Pop Culture Group.

“We are launching the Chicago
Comic and Entetainment Expo (C2E2) in April 2010, and we have moved
NYCC to a permanent October date, thus providing a spring and fall
balance to these two key events which will remain in place as we move
forward.  Rather than create a third date for NYAF, it was decided a
co-location would be better for anime fans, professionals, exhibitors,
and partners.  We spoke to attendees and exhibitors of both shows
before making this decision, and everyone agrees that this will provide
an opportunity for both shows to further grow and prosper.”

What do you think? Can these two conventions join hands and sing in harmony? And even more, what does this do to the plans of Wizard with their convention in New York planned for the fall?

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50 comics facts about the Class of 2013

50 comics facts about the Class of 2013

  • News
  • September 2, 2009

Every year, Beloit College puts together a list of facts regarding the mindset of the class entering college this Fall—the Class of 2013. Their list, as always, is well worth a read, but this is ComicMix, and we’re here to talk about comics, by gum.

So as we get ready to send them off to college, we wondered: what constitutes the comics status quo for them? What’s normal to these kids born in 1991 (he asks, knowing that being born in 1986 puts him in largely the same boat)? So glad you asked.

  1. The guy who did the above strip had already ended his daily strip and retired by the time these freshmen started reading newspapers.
  2. There has never been a Miracleman (or Marvelman) comic published in their lifetime.
  3. They have no idea who Don Thompson or Carol Kalish were.
  4. Gambit has always been on the X-Men.
  5. Spider-Man was always married to Mary Jane… until One More Day.
  6. There wasn’t a DC multiverse until the end of Infinite Crisis.
  7. Wally West was always the Flash, and his first sidekick was Impulse.
  8. Adam West has never been Batman—he’s best known as the mayor on Family Guy.
  9. Wolverine never wore a brown costume, and has always had a solo book.
  10. Barbara Gordon has always been in a wheelchair.
  11. Sandman has always been that pale-skinned goth guy with the hair.
  12. Batman has had three Robins: Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown, and Damian Wayne.
  13. Lex Luthor has always been a businessman.
  14. Image Comics has always existed.
  15. So has Wizard Magazine.
  16. New Mutants was a short-lived series from 2003-2004, until the recent relaunch.
  17. Hank McCoy’s always been blue and furry.
  18. Elektra has always been dead.
  19. Frank Miller is the guy who did Sin City, and he never worked with Klaus Janson.
  20. There’s never been a character named “Streaky the Supercat.”
  21. The only composite Batman-Superman was a giant robot.
  22. The original Dove has always been dead.
  23. Thanos has always been searching for the Infinity Gems, so he can impress Death.
  24. Death has always been a goth chick.
  25. Jim “Rhodey” Rhodes has always been War Machine.
  26. S.H.I.E.L.D. has always stood for Strategic Hazard Intervention, Espionage Logistics Directorate.
  27. Kyle Rayner has always been a Green Lantern.
  28. Starman has always worn goggles and a leather jacket.
  29. John Romita. Jr. has always been known as a regular penciller for Amazing Spider-Man. John Romita, Sr. never was.
  30. Ghost Rider was Danny Ketch.
  31. Jean-Luc Picard was the first captain of the Enterprise.
  32. Cerebus the Aardvark was always a classic.
  33. Grendel has always been a Dark Horse title, except for that DC crossover.
  34. Cassie Sandsmark was the first Wonder Girl.
  35. Roy Harper was only known as Arsenal up until the current volume of Justice League of America.
  36. There’s never been a First or Eclipse Comics. Comico only did some of those soft-core Elementals books.
  37. There were originally four Justice League titles on the stands.
  38. The original Teen Titans were comprised of a de-aged Atom (Ray Palmer), Risk, Argent, Captain Marvel, Jr., Omen, Prysm, Fringe, Arsenal, and Joto.
  39. Julia Carpenter was the original Spider-Woman.
  40. The two Avengers teams were the East Coast and West Coast branches. None of this New, Mighty, Dark, Pet, and Caramel Covered.
  41. There’s always been a comic called Love and Rockets.
  42. The superhero cartoons of choice were Darkwing Duck and Fox’s X-Men. For live action, it was all about the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers.
  43. Kraven the Hunter has always been dead.
  44. Northstar has always been out of the closet.
  45. Kevin Conroy has always been the animated voice of Batman.
  46. Jim Shooter was the guy behind Valiant, then Defiant, and then he wrote the Legion for a while. Wait, he was at Marvel, too?
  47. Phoenix is Rachel Summers, not Jean Grey.
  48. Karate Kid was Ralph Macchio, and Ralph Macchio was the guy editing X-Men.
  49. There have always been Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novels.
  50. Disney never had a major successful comic book franchise.

What’s yours?

(Alan Kistler and Glenn Hauman contributed to this list.)

Disneyfication Wave, Plus One Day

  • News
  • September 1, 2009

Share photos on twitter with TwitpicSo Disney is buying Marvel. By now, that’s old news– in Internet terms, anyway.

How big a deal was it? I don’t think Marvel sent out a single press package today hyping their comics. Usually, we get two or three of them a day.

The Beat has an excellent roundup of what we do and don’t know by now. But they don’t say much about other reactions. So what does the Internet think? Twitter, as might be expected, has gone crazy with the #disneymarvel and #disneybuysmarvel hashtags. Reactions can be broken down pretty easily into three categories, in order of increasing rarity:

People Trying to Be Comedians

poohbear151: So is everyone ready for the spider-man/fantastic four/x-men/high school musical crossover event? 

smmEBob:  Buzz Lightyear and the Guardians of the Galaxy

Grimloche: Finding Namor

Professionals Trying to Be Comedians With More Success

Brian Reed (Writer, Ms. Marvel): “Face it, Tigger, you hit the jackpot!”

Stephen Wacker (Editor, Amazing Spider-Man): Y’know I never thought Cinderella and Prince Charming shoulda gotten married…hmmm.

Jason Aaron (Writer, Punisher Max): Can now officially have the Punisher target the entire cast of “Hannah Montana.”

Jeff Parker (Writer, Agents of Atlas): Please, will someone draw MODUCK (NOTE: Ryan Dunlavey did, as did Chris Samnee.)

Warren Ellis (Writer, Astonishing X-Men): so I got this phone call from Joe Quesada and it was just the sound of him rubbing himself with money and now I am confused

(Broken Frontier has a strong round-up of other professional’s reactions in somewhat longer form.)

People Who Might Actually Know What’s Going On

C.B. Cebulski (Marvel talent liaison/editor/writer) Allow me to reassure you right now, guys, that Marvel’s going to continue to produce great comic books the way we always have.

Joe Quesada (Marvel Editor in Chief) If you’re
familiar with the Disney/Pixar relationship, then you’ll understand why
this is a new dawn for Marvel and the comics industry.

Marv Wolfman: Because I was both the Editor-in-Chief of Marvel as well as one of the
two founding editors of Disney Adventures Magazine, I’ve already gotten
numerous phone calls, including one from Forbes Magazine, asking what I
think about Disney buying Marvel. The easy answer is – nobody knows.
Certainly I don’t.

We’ll keep more stuff coming– we don’t think this story is going away any time soon.

Chicago Comic-Con Round-up

Chicago Comic-Con Round-up

  • News
  • August 11, 2009

The Chicago Comic-Con ( or The Convention Formerly Known As Wizard World Chicago) was this past weekend, positing that you can never have too many comic conventions in one summer.

It shouldn’t come as a shock that, this soon after San Diego Comic Con, publishers didn’t have much to announce, but here’s a quick roundup of our favorite news to come out of CCC, mostly from Marvel:

  • Jeff Parker (Agents of Atlas) will write Thunderbolts starting later this year. (Link)
  • “Assault on New Olympus” is the next major Incredible Hercules arc, and sees the Prince of Power leading a team of heroes, including members of both the Mighty and New Avengers, in an assault on Wall Street. A one-shot prologue will herald the start of the arc. (Link)
  • Spider-Man and the Secret Wars, an in-continuity retelling of the original Marvel crossover from the perspective of everyone’s favorite wall-crawler, will be a four-issue miniseries written by Paul Tobin (Marvel Adventures Spider-Man) with art by Patrick Scherberger (GeNext).
  • From the X-Men Panel: Paul Cornell will be writing a five-issue Dark X-Men miniseries with art by Leonard Kirk, involving the return of Nate Grey, perhaps better known as X-Man. Moreover, Kieron Gillen (Beta Ray Bill: Godhunter, Phonogram) will be writing a S.W.O.R.D. ongoing series about the adventures of Agent Brandt, spinning off from Joss Whedon and John Cassaday’s Astonishing X-Men run.
  • DC’s only real announcement sounds like a lot of fun: Batman/Doc Savage, written by Brian Azzarello with art by Phil Noto and a cover by J.G. Jones.
  • Last, but certainly not least, the Comix4Sight auction was a smashing success, raising over $13,000 towards writer John Ostrander’s glaucoma treatment costs. We’re still waiting for the final tally of cash donations over the weekend, plus new photos of the art that was donated on

Did we miss anything?

Happy 70th Birthday, Marvel!

Happy 70th Birthday, Marvel!

  • News
  • August 11, 2009

Marvel Comics, then Timely Comics, first opened its doors for business on August 11th, 1939, making it a septuagenarian as of today.

To celebrate, Marvel’s sponsoring parties at over 500 specialty retailers nationwide, all starting at 9pm local time tonight. As part of the festivities, they’ll have early copies of Brubaker and Epting’s The Marvels Project for sale.

If that’s not enough, seven Barnes and Noble stores across the country will also be having parties, with Marvel creators and special guests galore. My local Barnes and Noble here in New York City is promising signings and Q&A with Joe Quesada, Klaus Janson, Chris Claremont, Greg Pak, and Fred Van Lente, with special guests Iron Man and Spider-Man.

If this kind of thing floats your boat, face front, True Believer, check this link for full details!

Hugo Award Winners 2009: Gaiman wins Best Novel, ‘Girl Genius’ wins Best Graphic Story

Hugo Award Winners 2009: Gaiman wins Best Novel, ‘Girl Genius’ wins Best Graphic Story

  • News
  • August 10, 2009

Last night, the annual Hugo awards, given for excellence in the field of science fiction and fantasy and voted on by the fans, were presented at Anticipation in Montreal, Canada. I could bore you with the history of the awards, notable past winners (and losers), famous acceptance speeches, and so on and so forth. But you know all that (And if you don’t, their website is pretty informative).

What you’re waiting for are the winners, and here they are, straight from the horse’s mouth:

  • Best Novel: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)
  • Best Novella: “The Erdmann Nexus”, Nancy Kress (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)
  • Best Novelette: “Shoggoths in Bloom”, Elizabeth Bear (Asimov’s Mar 2008)
  • Best Short Story: “Exhalation”, Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
  • Best Graphic Story: Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones, Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
  • Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: WALL-E
    Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim
    Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney)
  • Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy)

More awards after the jump. A very hearty congratulations to all the winners! (more…)

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