Tagged: creators

Marc Alan Fishman: The Shoot Promo on Comics

Fishman Art 131123The professional wrestler C.M. Punk truly made his mark and broke free of the shackles of mid-card obscurity by way of his infamous pipe bomb shoot promo. For those not in-the-know, a shoot in wrestling is an interview (or soliloquy some of the time) wherein said grappler breaks the fourth wall. As relived in this week’s WTF podcast, Punk was vivid in saying that this promo was done because he was at the end of his rope.

With the WWE wanting him to resign for three more years and Punk decidedly against continuing to not be the guy on the roster, Vince McMahon allowed him to air his grievances live on their Monday night broadcast. If Punk captured the zeitgeist, he’d be a made-man forever in wrestling (which, by my count, is a little over two years). If he failed, he’d be gone, buried back in VA halls wrestling for gas money, and be nothing more than a footnote in WWE’s now 50-year history.

The shoot worked. Punk resigned, and ruled the company with an iron fist until he literally could give no more. The glass ceiling was shattered on the “norm” of the product, and wrestling now is forever changed. Well, maybe not, but I’ll circle back round that idea in a bit.

Why do I bring this up? Well, for one, because it’s topical to me. I was just listening to the podcast on my way home from work tonight. Beyond that, it dawned on me that with all the coverage and snark that exists in the world of comics… there is no C.M. Punk. There is no shoot promo to cut, on any live broadcast. There’s only guys like me; indie creators and op-ed columnists chasing windmills and yelling into the wind. But this here is my stage. This here is my time. So, allow me to speak ill of the industry I wish every damned day I was a part of, but know full well I’ll never actually see.

The WWE’s CEO lives a double life as an on-screen performer. He enjoys his product not only for the money it makes but for the crafted product it actually is. Warner Bros and Disney are just faceless boardrooms ruled not by the glee in little kids’ faces, but cold hard cash. Their publishing branches exist for one reason, and one reason only: to keep the movie and TV machines churning. Don’t think for a second that your issues of Batman mean any more to the execs in Burbank than a roll of teepee. It doesn’t. That rag in your hands? The one that has the blood, sweat, and tears of a dozen hard working men and women broiled into its pulp? It’s an incubator of ideas for a movie or cartoon show. It’s a crockpot keeping the license warm. It’s a mosquito light that keeps the most vocal fans distracted. Go ahead, post your death threats if we make Afflec Batman… but hey! Look over there! It’s Zero Year!

We all desire the notion that those behind the rich mahogany desks (being packed up in Midtown Manhattan in 18 months) lie overgrown fanboys and girls that just want to knock the socks off us, the ever-enduring fans of a dying medium. But it too is just a pipedream. The suits that run your comic book publishing companies are shackled to boulders far too big to drag up the mountain. Beyond the goodwill garnered by our little niche market, and the fervent fans that exist at comic cons lie those aforementioned suits in bigger boardrooms that still demand that at the end of the day everything be profitable. Profits occur when sales increase. Sales increase when gimmicks, #1s, and creators that draw a crowd are given the top spots. When a book stops earning what meager profits it can when it’s hot, it’s tossed out with the bathwater and things start again. The era of continuity is long dead. All hail the retcon.

The closest thing we had to C.M. Punk in comics was Robert Kirkman. He took his indie prowess and love of the craft and turned out The Walking Dead. Now, Kirkman is a suit. Behind a desk. Of a multi-media empire. He won the championship belt, and didn’t even have to work for the man to do it. Now, he is the man, and no longer a voice of the voiceless. Like so many though, atop his mountain of money many years ago he gave birth to his manifesto wherein he challenged the industry to veer towards creator-owned projects. Hey Robbie! Trickle-down economics don’t work in real life or in comics. If every known talent jumped off their pedestals at Marvel and DC to come make indie books at Dark Horse, Image, and Boom! the line to replace them would still be wrapped around the vacant Midtown offices and land somewhere in the opposite ocean. Everyone is replaceable when the end goal is product. Not good product. Just product.

The fact is this: After he changed the world and held the WWE title for longer than any wrestler in the last two decades or so, Punk took a much-needed break. When he returned, he was just as our resurrected Jean Greys, Steve Rogers, or Hal Jordans… a hero to be celebrated for what he was, not who he is now. A long and listless program against his on-screen mentor, and Punk is now booked right back in the mid-card where he started. The comic book industry has no panacea to cure itself of the ills we rally against. Just as the WWE fans buy their John Cena Fruity Pebbles Lunchboxes… so too do we comic fans flock to every worthless gimmick they shove on the racks. We make our excuses, we plunk down our money, and we bitch about it on the Internet later.

The only way to make change, is to make it. There is no utopia. There’s only revolution.

SUNDAY: John Ostrander

MONDAY: Mindy Newell

 

Michael Davis: Haters Gotta Hate!

Davis Art 131119From the very second we announced Milestone in 1992 to today, there have been those who simply hate us.

Chief among our haters are a small but vocal group of black comic book creators. Back in the good old days we were just called house niggers and we were hated because DC Comics owned us.

The fact that Milestone was never, not 20 years ago and not today, owned by DC Comics is irrelevant. It’s simply ignored by those who want to say we have somehow sold out the black race by any association with any white company.

I never got that.

Most successful black entertainment companies have some association with or are flat out owned by white companies. If the product is a good one and is focused on the African-American consumer I don’t see the problem.

Now, white backed black companies that market to poor urban black consumers products such as spinning rims, $200.00 sneakers and 40oz beers, promoting these and other items as lifestyle must haves to young black kids… now that I can see black people having a issue with.

I can see calling a white owned black company a bunch of house niggers if they were producing products that underscore a thug lifestyle as desirable.

But if a white owned black company was producing worthwhile products for the black community why would anyone call them house niggers? Why would any black person call them house niggers?

Milestone isn’t owned by a white company.

We produce positive comics and television animation featuring African-Americans role models not seen enough in pop culture. They are good stories well told and considered among some of the best comics ever produced by some.

Yet some just consider us house niggers because they think (wrongly) a white company owns us.

Forget the stories we are telling. Forget the excellence in the work. We are house niggers because a white company owns us.

Except we aren’t owned by a white company, but even if were why call the work we do the labor of house niggers?

I just don’t get that.

We’re an independent black owned company that has produced work that 20 years after our debut and 16 years after we ceased monthly publishing is still held in the highest of regard.

Our television show Static Shock has been on the air somewhere non-stop since 2000. Milestone has a worldwide audience and a dedicated fan base like no other.

The biggest pop culture event in the world just honored us with a celebration and bestowed on us one of the most significant awards in comics.

But to some black comic book creators we will always be house niggers.

OK. I get that. Haters got to hate. Hate us, hate whitey, and hate anything and everything they are not or can be.

In the 20 years since Milestone came to be we have never, and I’ll say it again, never attacked any black creator or company. But for all of our two decades we were and still are the target of countless attacks and outright lies.

I just don’t get it.

We never attacked anyone we rarely responded and when we did our response was; ‘there’s room for everybody.’ That was not just Milestone’s company line we believed it then we believe it now.

Recently a black creator of some renown wrote that he believed Milestone may have been given his companies’ business plan and used that to create the plan for Milestone.

That did not happen. It couldn’t have happened. It was impossible.

Milestone was already in the stores months before the date he assumed we stole his plan.

He has since acknowledged he was wrong in that regard. His creation and talent and are both still considered brilliant not just by me but every surviving member of Milestone. Our partner who did not survive loved his work as much if not more than the rest of us.

I’m not mentioning the work or creator because that sad chapter between his camp and Milestone is closed and I don’t want to give the impression they are the reason I’m writing this.

They are not.

Some other black creators are now saying Milestone not only stole the business plan but Milestone itself was “inspired” by and only came to be because of the idea and hard work of another black publisher.

So Denys Cowan’s idea wasn’t his idea and our business plan wasn’t our plan.

So now we are house niggers, lairs and thieves.

OK. I’ll be your house nigger if that’s how you define house niggers in your world. In your world I’ll be that. Since I don’t live in said world, what the do I care?

However, in no one’s world will Milestone be anyone’s lairs or thieves.

So, haters, think what you will. Say what you will. Believe what you will.

That’s on you.

I’ve no idea why you hate us the way you do but have at it. Continue to voice your hate in your forums, your on-line chats, your next hate Milestone meeting, any and all public and private social media.

But listen to this very carefully. Whatever you say, just be prepared to prove it. I’ll say that again, whatever you say, be prepared to prove it.

Be prepared to prove we are lairs. Be prepared to prove we are thieves.

Because sure as shit you continue to slander us you will be asked to prove it. Stick with calling us house niggers that you won’t have to prove. It’s laughable to us anyhow so feel free.

Slandering me and my Milestone partners as lairs and thieves, that’s no laughing matter to me. We are neither and continuing to say we are you will be asked to prove it. That question will come in a targeted legitimate onslaught. So unforgiving will the correspondence asking for your proof be, I shudder to think about it.

Shut up, put up, or pay up.

I’m fed up.

WEDNESDAY MORNING: Mike Gold

THURSDAY MORNING: Dennis O’Neil

 

Dennis O’Neil: Should Superheroes Booze It Up?

oneil-art-131113-150x140-6046071So there they were on the small screen, Oliver Queen and his main man, knocking back vodka shots and there I was, riding the couch and being maybe a bit befuddled, remembering that an MD once told me that vodka was the alcoholic’s libation of choice because it didn’t have much telltale odor. (As you lurch into the china cabinet, mom thinks you’re having a little inner ear problem.)

Ollie Queen and John Diggle were drinking vodka.

Of course, plenty of people devoid of drinking problems know the taste of vodka and scotch and brandy and absinthe and beer and the rest of the barman’s wares, and booze has been a part of civilized culture for millennia, even part of religious ritual. But I have a question for which I don’t have an answer and its this: Should heroes drink?

Consider: heroes are, among other things, role models and they appear as such in the fiction of everyone from Ayn Rand to Aesop. We seek other humans to admire – ask Evolution why – and that search leads us to heroes, both fictional and the real life versions: Athletes and musicians and actors who perhaps acquire a bit of the mystique of the stalwarts they portray. (And so life imitates art imitating and amplifying life and does anyone have a headache yet?) Our ad men know this, which is why they write checks to celebrities willing to smile at the camera and just love the living heck out of a product that you, yourself, can buy and thus, in some tiny way, emulate the objects of your admiration. It’s an old ploy and it must work because they keep doing it. Should they do it to promote alcohol? Or, more insidiously, should boozing be promoted outside advertisements by showing the good guys doing it?

If there’s a line to be drawn, I don’t know where it is.

One of the problems with alcohol is that when you take that first sip, you don’t know if every subsequent sip will be taken only on holidays in extreme moderation, or if someday you’ll find yourself puking in a gutter.

We know, from our nation’s horribly failed experiment with prohibition, and our more recent disastrous “war on drugs” that banning the citizenry’s recreational intoxicants is not wise. And there’s the matter of that pesky First Amendment, which, in effect, forbids censorship of anything spoken or written and surely that includes the words and actions of televised performers.

But to persuade some bonny young person that the gateway to sophistication, wit, and devastating attractiveness is found inside a bottle is to tell a seductive and potentially ruinous lie. Some will content themselves with that taste of holiday wine, sure, but others will find their way to the gutter.

In the end, I guess, creators must decide for themselves where the danger begins – with booze and tobacco and drugs and, hell, even with certain combat techniques. Sometimes, storytelling can be a bitch.

THURSDAY AFTERNOON: The Tweaks!

FRIDAY MORNING: Martha Thomases!

 

The Point Radio: Getting Back To The REVOLUTION

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NBC’s REVOLUTION is evolving, and that’s something that the cast and creators want to be sure viewers are aware of. Series star, Tracy Spiridakos, and new writer Rockne S. O’Bannon (FARSCAPE, ALIEN NATION) talk about what has been happening on the show since the lights went back on and where it is headed this season. Plus motte Big Box Office for Marvel and DC racks up another good month in comic stores.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE! The Point Radio App is now in the iTunes App store – and it’s FREE! Just search under “pop culture The Point”. The Point Radio  – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or on any other  mobile device with the Tune In Radio app – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

Marc Alan Fishman: How to Meet Your Heroes*

fishman-art-131109-150x135-5922021*And not stick your foot in your mouth, come across like an idiot, or otherwise embarrass yourself.

The other day I hopped into Facebook because, you know, why not be pseudo-social, right?. I noted in my news feed that the show-runner from the Kokomo (Indiana) Comic Con was pleading to his friends, customers, and followers to help him live a dream – to secure Denny O’Neil for the 2014 Kokomo Comic Con. I figured since I shared column space with the living legend, I might be able to lend a hand. I made some introductions via e-mail, and well… the gentlemen are ironing out the details. Suffice to say, I love their con, and hope to see Denny there next year. Heck, I hope I see John, Mike, Michael, Emily, Martha, Mindy, Adriane, Glenn and everyone who reads my column there! But then again, like the aforementioned show-runner, I am a dreamer.

Several times throughout my life I’ve been able to meet men and women I greatly admired. And in every instance I wedged my foot so far down my mouth, I passed shoelaces. It’s taken many years, many opportunities, and a few lucky breaks to finally figure out the best way to meet someone I admire and come out of said meeting with my feet solidly beneath me. Consider this my three easy steps for not making the same mistakes I did.

Look where you are.

When you come across that special celebrity / comic writer / artist / C-List celebrity from a reality show you enjoyed back in 2008, do yourself a favor and look where you’re about to initiate a conversation. Are you bumping in to them in a coffee shop or are you in a receiving line at a convention? Context is key. If you’re running into them in a setting where they might be trying to live their life, be considerate. Yes, they may hold significance to you and your life would not be complete without telling them exactly how they’ve impacted your experiences as a night nurse in the Lackawanna County Jail… but let them get that cup of coffee. If they don’t look like they are in a terrible hurry, then go on, cowboy.

How did I learn this lesson? I ran into Mark Waid at the Chicago Comic Con about a decade ago. He was perusing some long boxes deep in the heart of the dealer room. Without warning, amidst hauling out a pile of Scrooge McDuck comics, I bolted up to him, and immediately started blabbing away. He smiled, gave me a curt answer to one of the 1,000 questions I stammered out, and pulled his focus back towards the dealer. I turned a brighter shade of red, and limped away. Flash Fact: Creators don’t walk the show floor looking to be interviewed. Sometimes they’re just enjoying being a fan.

Think before you speak.

I know it’s cliché. But it’s a long-standing piece of advice for a reason. A big thing we geeks tend to forget in mid-frenzy is that our heroes are in the industries we love… but that doesn’t automatically make them as fervent, opinionated, or as knowledgeable in the minutiae of their specific craft as we may be. I like to equate this to the person at the office party who bends his co-workers ears off about work. Your heroes are people. They have likes and dislikes that don’t always align perfectly with what they do for a living. While I myself love talking comics, I also love the Chicago Bears, haute cuisine, and the acoustic-stylings of the Barenaked Ladies. So too, might Wil Wheaton have more interest in the finer points of liberal politics over phaser settings.
Simply put, when you have an opportunity to have a little repartee with an esteemed person of note? Be original. Sure, you can tell them you love their work. But in the day and age of the Internet, Wikipedia, and social media, why not have a question about something outside of the norm? I’ve found that when I catch someone off guard with a question, comment, or anecdote they weren’t expecting? It breaks the ice, and moves the conversation beyond the normal small-talk that dissipates without even a lingering memory. My case in point: Pitching to Dan DiDio to buy my book because the stickers I threw in with the deal “are totally better than those ten cent rings you’re giving away for Blackest Night.” And you know what? He bought the book, and laughed.

Remember it’s not a pitch meeting, job interview, or investment opportunity.

When you come face to face with someone you admire, there just might be that catch in your throat… that little voice in your head that says “Hey, when will you ever have this chance again! Tell them about how you can save the franchise!” Obviously though, it’s not gonna happen. Trust me when I tell you this: I’ve spent the last five years finding every way possible to dance around the idea that I’m one joke, one conversation, one chance blurb away from landing that big gig I’ve always wanted. I’m now older, wiser, and weary; conventions are where deals get started, yes, but not because you want them too.
I’ve been lucky enough to have breakfast with a CEO of a company I would shave my face to be a part of. I broke literal bread with the man. I was witty. I listened attentively. I asked leading questions. I even got an industry veteran to vouch for what good work I was doing. And you know what? I’m not working with that company now, and can safely say it’s not on the horizon either. Lucky for me, the breakfast was damned tasty and the next time I saw that CEO he waved hi and asked me how Unshaven Comics was doing.

Sorry for going a bit long today, kiddos. I’m just looking out for you. Next time you run into that retired wrestler, cosplaying sexy Spongebob, or Kevin Smith at the Quick Stop? Remember: look where you are, think before you speak, and don’t waste your opportunity to make a memory in lieu of begging for a job they don’t have the power to give you on the spot. Shake their hand. Tell them why you love their work. Ask about their favorite album released in the last year, and then leave on a laugh. Those coveted creators and celebrities are just human, and as such, it’s worth it to enjoy making a human connection with them.

SUNDAY: John Ostrander

MONDAY: Mindy Newell

 

The Point Radio: REIGN Rules On The CW

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The new series REIGN is catching a lot of buzz on The CW Network, we talk to the cast and creators about the good and bad parts of a show based on such a famous, and tragic, historical figure. Plus Bye Bye Blockbuster and Netflix (with Marvel) drops a bomb on the fans.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE! The Point Radio App is now in the iTunes App store – and it’s FREE! Just search under “pop culture The Point”. The Point Radio  – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or on any other  mobile device with the Tune In Radio app – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

Michael Davis: Maybe I’m amazed…

A selection of secondhand paperback books for sale…or just fucking stupid.

My closest friends are like family to me, and family is what Whitney Farmer is in my life. I’m a pretty smart guy (if I say so myself – and I do) and I know a lot of smart people,. Whitney is one of the smartest people I know.

There are two kinds of smart: street smart and book smart. I’m both. If I had to choose between the two, I’d pick book smart.

Oh hell no I wouldn’t. Book smart can get you a job, sure but street smart can save your life.

Being able to hold my own in a conversation with a art professor from Yale on artists is a lot of fun at dinner parties but the chances of me being shot in the head because I disrespected him are small.

However, being able to hold my own in a conversation with those who grew up I the hood like I did under a different value system is preferable. Odds are that Yale professor won’t bust a cap in my ass because I argued Kenneth Noland and William T. Williams were more color field artists than they were non-objective artists.

Whitney, god bless her, thinks she’s street smart but… no.

Yes, she can handle herself in most any situation. Yes she is a fighter but rolling with the homies?

Err, nope.

Whitney assumes that everyone is as smart as she is.

No. No they aren’t.

I’ve been telling her that for years. I’ve seen her talk to a rocket scientist who couldn’t keep up. I call that a “Whitney.” A Whitney is stating something that you think is painfully obvious to everyone but it isn’t because you are above their pay grade in that particular subject, point or gray matter.

The other day I did a Whitney. I wrote an article for Bleeding Cool and assumed people were as smart or at least as satirical as me. I thought people would see a clear farce with one goal, letting one young talented artist know and by her example let all young talented artists know they are worth something and the industry needs someone like them.

Some people got it, but those who didn’t suggested I was not professional enough to write for Bleeding Cool, the piece needed to be completely rewritten and various other reasons why the article sucked.

That didn’t bother me. Really.

Hey. I’m Michael Davis. People have loved what I do or say or hated what I do or say since the moment I entered the industry. The Bleeding Cool comments telling me how non professional and down right stupid I was made me spit tequila all over my Inkpot Award and PhD from laughing so hard.

So, come on, those bullshit comments didn’t bother me at all.

What really bothered me – and I mean really – is the complete non-interest in the focus of the article: new talent.

I’m real serious, when I ask this, when it comes to comic fans caring about the soul of the industry the future of the industry which is like any other entertainment medium is talent, am I stupid?

There is no entertainment media on the planet that can survive without nurturing and supporting new talent but do those who read comics care little about anything except rather or not Ben Fucking Affleck is a good fucking Batman?

The way my piece was written it could have been seen as a rambling mess. Although, throughout the piece I kept referencing that it was thus the joke assholes – but I can see how someone who did not see the humor or appreciate the style in which it was written could object.

The last time I checked, and that was before my un-professional ass got on a plane to Japan or Hawaii (I can’t tell) to talk unprofessional business, there were a few comments from people who saw what I was doing but somehow those other comments and the lack of mention or the down right dismissal of the artist made me wonder rather or not comic fans care about future talent and that means the future of comics.

If that is the case, I can’t blame them. Not because I don’t think it’s very important to have fans care about the next generation of creators. I think it’s fucked up if most don’t, really fucked up if that’s the case.

No, I can’t blame them because when I was “just” a fan I didn’t give any thought to future creators either. I’m a lot of things but I’m not a hypocrite.

Here’s the thing. I just have this overwhelming hope that today’s comic book fan is better, smarter and more vested in the future.

I hope there are more comic fans that get the Japan / Hawaii joke than those who will have to have someone explain it to them.

Last thing, Whitney once destroyed a woman at a San Diego Comic Con panel who dared to challenge her on comics in the classroom. Much like the ending of Kill Bill 2, she hit that woman so hard and so fast with facts it killed her but allowed her to walk five steps before her heart stopped.

Just because she’s not street smart doesn’t mean she’s not gangta.

WEDNESDAY MORNING: Mike Gold

THURSDAY MORNING: Dennis O’Neil

 

John Ostrander: The New Breed

ostrander-art-131103-150x140-7201015Last weekend I was at the Detroit Fanfare (which is why I wasn’t here) and I enjoyed myself immensely. It’s a good Con, well organized, and they took good care of me. I had a chance to say hello to old friends like Bill and Nadine Messner-Loebs, Paul Storrie, Howard Purcell, Norm Breyfogle and others and make new friends like Whilce Portacio. And, of course, talk with fans and sign books and stuff which, for me, is the main reason I go. I love meeting and talking with fans and having a chance to say “thank you” for their support.

I was ferried there and back by my cohorts in Unshaven Comics – Marc Alan Fishman (my esteemed fellow ComicMix columnist), Matt Wright, and Kyle Gnepper (the cute one). Marc drove and we blathered together in a wonderful fashion.

Da Boys (as I refer to them and, being from my home town of Chicago, they’ll understand) are indie comics creators, notably of the Samurnauts (which you can learn about and buy at their website here and they make the rounds of Cons, setting up shop, and hawking their wares at their booth. They do nearly a dozen a year and FanFare was the last one for 2013.

They were in a separate but adjacent ballroom to mine so I would touch base with them throughout the show and we had eats together. At the end of the Con, I wandered over while they broke it all down and packed it up. I was really struck with how organized they were and how compact it all became. Da Boys really know their stuff. Their book is wonderful but they also have a better business sense than I did at that time or have even perhaps now.

They sell their books, sure (and go buy them at the site) but I saw buttons and posters and cards at the table and they did (and do) sketches and so on. I looked around the room, which was mostly Indie folk, and this was a trend. My friend, Paul Storrie, who was nearby, also has a very professional set-up.

I don’t know but I suspect this is a trend among the younger creators. I suspect they wouldn’t sneer at work from the Big Companies but they have their own creations that they own and that they are hard at work selling.

You should also read Marc’s column from yesterday. Yes, I’m very flattered by the kind words directed at me – although if they eat with me a few more times I suspect they’ll get over the novelty – but what I was really struck by was how they evaluate which Con to go to. They know the numbers in terms of what they sell, of the costs of going to a certain con, the bottom line of each venture. They factor in the time away from family and having to go to their day jobs. They – and I suspect the other Indie creators – know their business far better than I did when I was their age. Hell, I’m not sure I had started writing comics when I was their age.

I salute them and I intend to support them. This is the future of comics, boys and girls. This is where the really good stuff, the fresh and exciting stuff, is coming from. So I’m going to urge you, next time you go to a con, to seek out Unshaven Comics and the other Indie producers, look at what they’re doing, sample the books, get the buttons, and be a part of something that is alive and vital in the comics industry.

As another innovator in the field was known to remark, ‘Nuff Said.

MONDAY MORNING: Mindy Newell

TUESDAY MORNING: Emily S. Whitten

 

Shout! Factory to Release Wolverine vs. Sabertooth in January

Wolverine vs SabertoothAt the start of the New Year, Marvel fans are invited to witness one of the most ferocious battles in the Marvel Universe. The superstar team of writer and Executive Producer Jeph Loeb (Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) and Artist Simone Bianchi (Astonishing X-Men) team up to deliver the thrilling comic book action adventure WOLVERINE VS. SABRETOOTH. This pulse-pounding story captures the biggest rivalry of the Marvel Universe in Marvel Knights Animation’s WOLVERINE VS. SABRETOOTH DVD, debuting for the first time on home entertainment shelves nationwide on January 14, 2014 from Shout! Factory.

This highly anticipated Marvel Knights Animation adventure boasts unparalleled storytelling combined with rich visual animation and insightful bonus content. This deluxe DVD is collected in a unique comic book style packaging that bridges the comic book to DVD concept. Marvel Knights Animation’s WOLVERINE VS. SABRETOOTH DVD is priced to own at $14.97 SRP.

An exclusive behind-the-scenes bonus content feature provides an intimate and retrospective look at the development and production process of this amazing story. Marvel Knights Animation remains true to the heritage of panel-by-panel graphic storytelling, boasting groundbreaking illustrations, sensational soundscapes, and of course, the explosiveness of the mighty Marvel universe. Behind every image and every word lies the genius of Marvel’s celebrated creators.

Synopsis

Superstars Jeph Loeb (TV’s Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) and Simone Bianchi (Astonishing X-Men) team up for the biggest, best and, quite possibly, last battle between Wolverine and Sabretooth! These sworn foes have been locked in an endless grudge match that goes back longer than either can remember – or even imagine. The key to victory is eons old, and it’s certain to rock their world. Think you’ve seen Marvel’s fiercest go toe-to-toe before? Those were just warm-ups!

Bonus Features Include:

Brand new retrospective featurette includes interviews with Jeph Loeb and Simone Bianchi.

Total Feature Running Time: +/- 66 minutes

The Point Radio: Why Alex Borstein Is So Bloody Funny

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Alex Borstein makes us laugh every week as Lois Griffen on  FAMILY GUY and she explains how her passion comedy actually came from dealing with the disease hemophilia and how that cause is still close to her heart. Plus we have more with the creators and cast of THE LEAGUE, including how Paul Scheer (Andre) chooses that wardrobe and if the show can run another five years.

If you are in the New York area, check out Alex Borstein along with Sarah Silverman and more in WHAT’S SO BLOODY FUNNY?, an evening of comedy to benefit the National Hemophilia Foundation this Wednesday (10/30). Go here for details.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE! The Point Radio App is now in the iTunes App store – and it’s FREE! Just search under “pop culture The Point”. The Point Radio  – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or on any other  mobile device with the Tune In Radio app – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.