Back to the Spidey?
A while ago we told you Amazing Spider-Man was going thrice-weekly and Sensational and Friendly were being canned. Some scoffed, some reached deeper into their pockets, and ultimately (and quite recently) Marvel confirmed. Now they’ve announced their creative team.
Since just about the only single writer/artist duo alive that can handle producing 72 pages a month is Stan Lee and Steve Ditko and Steve isn’t interested in returning to his co-creation, four writers (Bob Gale, Marc Guggenheim, Dan Slott and Zeb Wells) and four pencillers (Chris Bachalo, Phil Jimenez, Salvador LaRoca, Steve McNiven) will be handling Amazing. They will work together to provide seamless on-going story arcs, sort of the way DC did 52 – but, hopefully, in a fashion that provides interesting stories.
If the name Bob Gale rings a bell, he’s the guy who co-wrote and co-produced the Back To The Future movies. The Albany Park, Chicago writer (hey, I grew up there at the same time) has some comics writing credits, including Batman, Ant-Man, and Daredevil.
I still say Marvel should bite the bullet and make Amazing Spider-Man a weekly.
I’m writing ahead so I can properly annoy people at this past weekend’s San Diego Comic Con, so here’s some massively random thoughts from a probably senile old fart.
Back when the Chicago Tribune was still running Lee Falk’s The Phantom, their feature editor told me the strip ranked first among black males. I like The Phantom, but let’s face it: the story is about 21 generations of white men who rule (they each sat on a throne) Africa and the black natives who think he is really one 400 year old man. Was there a severe self-image problem amongst those polled, or what?
Back in the height of the alternate / silver foil / prism / wacky numbering fad (as opposed to today’s alternate / pencil cover / second-printing cover fad), Mike Grell and I wanted to publish a special issue of Shaman’s Tears between issues 3 and 4. It would have been called Shaman’s Tears #π, and it would have been printed on bubble gum stock. We were overruled. Within a year or so, Marvel licensed their comics out to be printed on bubble gum.
George McManus (1884-1954), once a household name via his long-running domestic-shenanigans comic strip Bringing Up Father, stands as a practical embodiment of the comics’ industry’s cinematic possibilities. The last of his comics-into-movies adaptations, Jiggs and Maggie Out West (Monogram Pictures; 1950), came to hand recently during the excavation process for a fifth volume of novelist John Wooley’s and my Forgotten Horrors film-book series.
The other day I met a young lady at an airport. She looked around 16 or so. I noticed her looking at the comic book I was reading. When I was done I gave it to her. We started talking. She is a young artist who is struggling with her weight. She is being picked on at school and has one real friend. She wants to be a comic artist and is a big fan of Static Shock. She rarely goes outside and says that she sometimes wishes she were not born. She also has a family, which is a little odd. I told her that her family does not define her and that one day what is happening to her will help her. She wished she could start over. Before I could tell her anything else her father noticed we were talking and told her to “Get the **** over here.’ 
Perhaps the comic book world has achieved a higher level of respectability. According to WCBS radio in New York, military recruiters have discovered two new and potentially lucrative areas to ply their trade, as they have started targeting shopping mall food courts and comic book stores.
Department of “Shoulda Seen That Coming”: in the UK, a government minister issues a stern warning that a particular book, Tintin in the Congo, contains “hideous racial prejudice,” and that no right-thinking Briton should ever, ever read it henceforward. Result? 
O.K. I’ve got to admit this: I can’t remember the last time I’ve had so much fun with something I’ve pulled out of my weekly Diamond Distributing box., Betty Boop blow-up dolls notwithstanding.
