Author: Van Jensen

Heidi MacDonald and Foreign Comics on NPR

Heidi MacDonald and Foreign Comics on NPR

NPR ran a feature on All Things Considered, the daily news program, about the solid sales of foreign graphic novels in the United States.

One interesting note was that foreign novels don’t sell, but comics do. That seems to indicate comics readers are a bit more cultured than the general public, doesn’t it?

A few big comics people are quoted in the piece, including Heidi MacDonald of The Beat.

Heidi MacDonald, who blogs about graphic novels for Publishers Weekly, says the Japanese invasion has helped pry open American markets to authors and illustrators from other parts of the world, including Marjane Satrapi.

"Marjane Satrapi … she’s definitely one who has had a huge breakthrough commercially and critically," says MacDonald.

‘Greatest American Hero’ Returns at SDCC

‘Greatest American Hero’ Returns at SDCC

There are more than a few mysterious elements coming up at Comic-Con this week, and one of the big question marks hovers over the return of Greatest American Hero, the goofy superhero TV show from the ’80s.

Sounds like a comic book series is in the works, if not more. According to a press release (check it after the jump), a whole slate of original stars will be on hand in San Diego. There’s also a mysterious teaser video posted after the jump — which seems to be scaled far too large for embedding on most websites.

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DC Comics Relaunches Website

DC Comics’ boring old Web site saw a big relaunch over the weekend, perhaps coinciding with the record-breaking debut of The Dark Knight film.

Not a ton of new features on the site, which you can view right here, but it’s a whole lot prettier than the previous incarnation.

There is a nice feature called "30 Essential," which lists 30 of what DC views as it’s can’t miss graphic novels. That’s sure to be useful for new readers, though it’s old ground for long-time readers.

You can find that feature right here.

L.A. and Vegas Vying for Comic-Con

L.A. and Vegas Vying for Comic-Con

As all interested parties get ready for this week’s Comic-Con International, a couple other municipalities are preparing to try to wrest the massive convention away from its historic home in San Diego.

Both Los Angeles and Las Vegas have their eye on Comic-Con, according to Variety. The event’s extreme growth has been a boon, but San Diego can’t handle the demand anymore, Comic-Con marketing director David Glanzer said.

That means Comic-Con may have to embrace the marketing mayhem that became a fixture of E3 before it downsized a year ago. So, even with the convention locked into San Diego for the next four years, cities such as Las Vegas and Los Angeles are actively trying to lure Comic-Con away.

"We don’t like to go in and infringe on other people’s leases when they are in the middle of doing business," says Chris Meyer, VP of convention sales for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Bureau. Nevertheless, he admits, "We will be down in Comic-Con 2008 to have some discussions."

The way he sees it, Las Vegas has some dramatic advantages, including twice the floor space and a surplus of competitively priced hotel rooms. Meyers notes, "I’ve got more rooms on my corners than they do in most of their downtown area."

‘Dark Knight’ Breaks Weekend Record

‘Dark Knight’ Breaks Weekend Record

After setting box office records for top midnight opening and top Friday sales, it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that The Dark Knight broke the weekend record set by Spider-Man 3.

Sunday’s tallies showed The Dark Knight, the sequel to Batman Begins, hauled in $155.34 million for the weekend, according to the Associated Press. That tops Spider-Man 3 and its $151.1 million take.

The new Batman also bested Spidey’s IMAX debut, $6.2 million to $4.7 million.

The opening day grosses for "The Dark Knight" far exceeded the full weekend haul of its predecessor, "Batman Begins," which took in $48.7 million in its first three days in 2005. …

"We’ve really never seen anything like this," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Media By Numbers. "The death of a fine actor taken in his prime, a legendary performance and a movie that lives up to all the hype. That all combined to create these record-breaking numbers."

I finally caught a showing Saturday morning, which still nearly sold out. That might be the most applause I’ve heard at a theater yet, with the most coming somewhat surprisingly for Jim Gordon.

From Glenn H.

Media By Numbers’ OFFICIAL DARK KNIGHT RECORDS SO FAR (in order of occurrence):

1 – Largest Number Of Opening Theatres with 4,366 (More Than The 4,362 Debut Theatres Of Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End in 2007).

2 – Biggest Midnight Preview Gross with $18.489 million in 3,040 Theatres (Beats Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith And Its $16.9 million in 2,915 Theatres in 2005).

3 – Biggest Imax Midnight Previews set a new record with $640,000 (Included in The $18.489 million Preview Number).

4 – Biggest Single-Day Gross in Box-Office History with $67.850 million (Bests The $59,841,919 set by Spider-Man 3 in 2007).

5 – Biggest Opening Weekend Gross in Box Office History with $155.340 million (Bests The $151,116 million set by Spider-Man 3 in 2007).

6 – Biggest Opening Weekend Gross For An Imax Release in Box Office History with $6,214,061 million in 94 Theatres With $66,107 Per Theatre. (Bests The $4.7 million set by Spider-Man 3 in 2007.) Imax Showing At Full Capacity $1.9 million On Saturday Alone.

7 – Biggest Opening Weekend Of 2008 with $151.340 (Beats Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull‘s $101.137 million From May 23-25, 2008)

8 – Biggest July Opening Ever (Beats Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest‘s $135,634,554 On July 7, 2006).

New Vertigo Blog

New Vertigo Blog

Vertigo junkies will be happy to know a group of the DC imprint’s creators have joined together — not unlike Voltron — on a blog.

Standard Attrition is the new blogging home for Jason Aaron, Brian Wood, G. Willow Wilson, Jock, Cliff Chiang, David Lapham and Brian Azzarello.

So far, the site has mostly just news on the group’s individual projects and media appearances. There’s also some news about what they’ll be doing at San Diego this coming week.

If you’re curious, that’s the cover to Wilson’s Air, which debuts from Vertigo next month.

(via The Beat)

The Dark Knight Project

What do you do when you desperately want to make a Batman movie, except you have little film-making experience and Warner Bros. doesn’t know you exist?

Well, you just go right ahead and make a Batman movie. At least that’s the thought of Jerry Vasilatos, a Chicago director. He decided to create The Dark Knight Project, essentially a fan movie set between the two new Batman films.

The story follows some Gotham students who try to get video footage of their city’s new vigilante. The expected trouble ensues, as Joker’s gang starts to cause problems.

You can watch the film right here. You can also read quite a bit on the background of the project at Vasilatos’ blog, which is right here.

That "other" Batman movie opened this weekend.

(via Doomkopf)

Dan Abnett’s Top 10 Movies

Just stumbled across this on the blog of writer Dan Abnett, who’s been doing a hellaciously good job on Nova and, to a slightly lesser extent, the new Guardians of the Galaxy.

Here are his top 10 favorite movies of all time, with a surprise atop the list:

1) Singin’ in the Rain
2) Casablanca
3) Some Like it Hot
4) This is Spinal Tap
5) A Matter of Life and Death
6) The Empire Strikes Back
7) A Canterbury Tale
8) One Million Years BC
9) Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
10) The Magnificent Seven

I can only wonder if that top choice had some influence on the cover of Nova #13 seen at right, wherein Richard Ryder and the Silver Surfer appear to be engaging in some intergalactic tango.

Harvey Pekar’s Next-Door Neighbor

In the remote chance that you’ve foolishly passed up the opportunity to read the free online Next-Door Neighbor comics project at Smith magazine, here’s a reminder that Harvey Pekar’s contribution is up now.

The art — a page of which is posted below — is by Rick Veitch.

Superheroes Boost Hat Sales

Back in the day, it was the cool thing to have a New Era cap of a sports team. I had one of the Chicago Bulls.

That trend has fallen off, though, and New Era is coming back by making an array of caps featuring not athletes but superheroes. The company previously had a deal with Marvel, but now they’re working with DC, as of this week.

Further evidence that comics is the "in" thing, I suppose.

Part of this latest comics push is connected to this weekend’s release of The Dark Knight, the new Batman movie. Over at New Era, they’re running a special promotion for the flick.

One can only wonder if people who jump on the superhero apparel bandwagon are also jumping into comics.