Tagged: New York Comic Con

MARTHA THOMASES: Good Times At Comic Con High

It is something of a movie cliché, especially in buddy-movies, for one of the two, in the heat of battle, to mutter, “I’m getting too old for this.”

That’s how I felt before New York Comic Con.

It’s another cliché that, just when you think you have life figured out, it changes. I had a pretty good time.

Granted, I was frustrated by the crowds, and the noise aggravated me (and yet, I live in New York City!). Also, I wasn’t there on Saturday, when I’m told the crowds were the worst. And I’ve been to so many shows by now that I know how to edit my experience.

So, despite the backpacks and the people who thought that because they were taking photographs they were entitled to take away an entire aisle from pedestrian traffic, and the plethora of booths devoted to gaming, not comics, there’s a fun time in there.

Let me count the ways:

• Even before the show, the press coverage was so much better than comics used to get. Sure, there was a lot of attention paid to people in funny costumes, but there were also stories like this in the New York Times, which focused on people who are cool and creative and artists worthy of attention, just like other New York talents.

• Not only are talented writers and artists getting some respect, but so are the fans. True, there was lots of pandering to people’s desire to get something for free, but there were also some unusual businesses setting up booths. The Museum of Natural History promoted their planetarium. Chevrolet not only had a booth, but they also had artist-painted cars around the show, including one by Neal Adams. This is so much better than the first show, where there were military recruiters.

• There are so many kids (who probably hate being called kids, but indulge this old fart) who are excited enough by comics to want to make them. For example, Joe Corallo recognized me and chased after me to give me his self-published comic, The Uncanny Undergrads. Comics remain one of most democratic of media, where anyone with an idea and guts can make something amazing and try to make a career out of it.

• Best of all is seeing old friends. I never went to comic conventions as a fan. It was never part of my social life. When I met Denny O’Neil, I started to go to convention parties, back when they were easier to crash. When I had to go to cons for work, I found out that, for me, Artists’ Alley was the most fun place. It still is. At a big show, it’s a place where you can usually avoid mobs, and actually talk to the people who make the comics we love. This year, I was blessed to run into Bob Camp, whom I hadn’t seen in more than 20 years. He’s still sweet and funny and brilliant.

So maybe, if I have to go to more comic shows, I’ll go. I’ll kvetch, but I’ll be secretly pleased about it.

Martha Thomases is proud of herself for not buying a rabbit on Saturday.

SATURDAY: Marc Alan Fishman

DENNIS O’NEIL: Comic Con Meets Greystache

It’s happening as I sit here typing, on a Thursday, about 30 miles due south of the village where I happily abide, and, barring as always the unforeseen, I’ll be in the midst of it sometime tomorrow, mingling with armies of strangers, gazing at exhibits both exotic and banal, almost certainly meeting folks I have known for decades but seldom see whelmed by noise and flashing lights and color and celebrities and hucksters and the breath of chaos…

I refer, of course, to the New York Comic Con. (You thought I meant Armageddon? Naw… but maybe next week…) This is the younger, but extremely vigorous sibling of the monstrous (in at least two meanings of the word) San Diego Comic Con, but it is no wimpy little brother. Like Athena, springing from the head of Zeus, the NYCC arrived burly and mature, though a bit disorganized, three years ago and has been growing ever since. I’ve heard that 75,000 attendees are expected at the con site over the next four days. (At the San Diego shindig I attended last year, there were 130,000 or 140,000 con goers, depending on who provided the information.) That this event, and its west coast equivalent, could not only exist, but prosper, is yet another sign of how much comic books, that lowly, despised publishing stepchild, have changed and gentrified since I shuffled into the office of Marvel Comics about 45 years ago.

There were conventions then, sure, but they were miniscule compared to the current iterations – a few hundred or later, and at most, a few thousand avid fans who were there, not to ogle celebs or buy cool t-shirts, but to share a love of a certain kind of storytelling. You may have heard me describe (at a convention?) accompanying Flo Steinberg to my first con at the McBurney YMCA in Manhattan: maybe a hundred citizens of various genders and ages wandering around the Y’s gym, a few tables bearing stacks of old comics for sale, and the afternoon’s big deal, a group of comic book professionals on the stage discussing…well, discussing something. I was among them, and that, of course, was to laugh – me, in the business a month or two, sharing an audience with men who had given joy to me on many a summer afternoon and Sunday morning, who shaped the medium in which I labored. I wonder what I said. Probably something. Ah, the arrogance of youth…

The biggest attraction, at the Y that day, was the presence of a genuine movie star: Buster Crabbe, the screen’s Tarzan, Flash Gordon, and Buck Rogers, in the flesh. If I hadn’t been a blasé college graduate and Navy veteran who’d actually been to a foreign country, yessir, or if I’d had any sense of what popular culture is, I’d have been impressed.

But hey! I’m no greystache lamenting the good old days when, dang it, things was the way they oughta be, decent and proper. Things now are different, but they’re as decent and proper as the universe allows them to be.

Somebody say amen.

Recommended Reading: Walden, by Henry David Thoreau. Hey, have you ever actually read it? Or read it since you had to do so as schoolwork?

FRIDAY: Martha Thomases

New York Comic Con’s Pulp Panel

  • News
  • October 19, 2011

New Pulp Author W. Peter Miller was part of the pulp programming at last weekend’s New York Comic Con.
Reposted from his blog, http://docsavagetales.blogspot.com/2011/10/new-york-comic-con-part-1-pulp-panel.html with permission.

New York Comic Con – Part 1 – Pulp Panel

 
 
Note – It seems I have misidentified some people in the pictures…
This past weekend I joined the masses at the New York Comic Con. Sunday afternoon was the occasion of the Pulp Fiction – Now With Even More Pulp panel that featured a huge all-star panel that included authors Adam Garcia, Mark Halegua, Jim Beard, and Will Murray, artist Tom Gianni, publishers Greg Goldstein (COO of IDW), Joe Rybrant (Dynamite Comics), and Anthony Tollin (Nostalgia Ventures). Ed Catto was the moderator.
With this many panelists and the volume of pulp material being published, the hour flew by quickly and a bunch of fans got to take home some freebies. The panel was introduced and the current and upcoming projects of the panelists discussed. Disappointingly, there was not nearly enough time for a  discussion on the state of pulp fiction today. I think that there is a lot to be discussed about New Pulp and the term didn’t even come up.
 The panel from r-l: Ed Catto, Greg Goldstein?, Will Murray, Anthony Tollin, Tom Gianni, Adam Garcia

The panel cont. r-l: Joe Rybrant, Jim Beard, Mark Halegua
Some of the upcoming projects mentioned were quite exciting. Here are some highlights, or at least what I remember…
Greg Goldstein said that IDW is doing another anthology series with the Rocketeer, featuring new creators and a few returning creators from the first series. That is great news, because those were good stories. The major publishers can’t even get one story in a comic and the Rocketeer Adventures had 3 or 4! I would also like to see a longer adventure featuring Cliff Secord and Betty.
Will Murray wrote the first new official Doc Savage novel released in almost 20 years, The Desert Demons, written from Lester Dent’s notes. That came out this summer, but the next one, Horror in Gold is coming out soon! Audio books of Will’s first 2 Doc novels are out from Radio Archives. Will is also overseeing a line of of pulp audio books with them as well, starting with The Spider.
Anthony Tollin has many things coming including a Shadow movie serial script and a behind the scenes look at the serial and interviews with crew members. The Shadow Scrapbook will be expanded and reprinted, including a 1934 radio script by Walter Gibson.
Tom Gianni has painted a cover for Moonstone’s Avenger Chronicles and is working a Graphic novel of his own called, “Mechanic Anna”, which is hoping to have out next summer. Tom’s beautiful art, can be seen here.
Adam Garcia is making a name for himself with his new Green Lama stories which span the media. His new Green Lama novel, The Crimson Circle should be out early next year, and there will be Green Lama comics and an audio drama, too. Exciting stuff!
Dynamite has a lot going on and Joe Rybrant clearly loves pulp and talked about an upcoming Flash Gordon / Phantom cross over featuring another unnamed pulp character that may be Mandrake of possibly the Green Lama… Dynamite also has another big pulp character coming that will be announced soon.
Mark Halegua has his first story out in Mystery Men & Women Vol 2 from Airship 27. It features his original character, the Red Badge.
With this many creators and this many new books to talk about there wasn’t much talk about the future of pulp, or the New Pulp movement, except for when Adam Garcia talked about bringing more to the table by leaning in a slightly more literary / post-modern vein that some pulp fans don’t seem to care for. I think that there is plenty of room for that and the mainstream publishers are publishing that under the guise of ‘steampunk’ and other names…

The fans swarm the panel for free goodies

Adam Garcia and fellow Green Lama writer W. Peter Miller
Also, New Pulp Author and pulp panelist, Adam Garcia posted two videos of the panel on YourTube for your enjoyment.
 

MIKE GOLD: Occupy The Comics Racks!

For those of you who experience my weekly hysterical polemics over at Michael Davis World (yep, that Michael Davis), it will come as no surprise that I was looking forward to Dark Horse’s new series Orchid. Sure, new comics come about as often as simians poop, but this one was written by Tom Morello.

Who, you may ask, is Tom Morello? I’ll try not to indulge in musical and political elitism here; there’s always enough of that to go around. Suffice it to say that Morello is one of those activist musicians, and his work shines brighter than most. Best known as the guitarist for Rage Against The Machine, Tom was also in the bands Lock Up and Audioslave. For much of the past decade he’s been a solo act, a.k.a. The Nightwatchman. This latter work is acoustic; the former more punk/new wave/hip-hop. Or, as we in the Whole World Is Watching racket like to say, loud. I play his stuff on Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind, I listen to his work lovingly, I watch him on Bill Maher, and evidently we are or have been members of the same union. Indeed, if he was at last week’s New York Comic Con, he and I were probably the only two people among 100,000 to be wearing IWW garb.

What I find really cool about this guy, outside of his work and his politics, is that his mom co-founded the anti-censorship organization Parents for Rock and Rap (say “anti-censorship” and I’m there) and, oh yeah, he’s the nephew of Jomo Kenyatta, the anti-colonialist anti-Communist activist who became Kenya’s first president.

Ahem. So, to get down to the nitty-gritty, is Orchid worth reading?

The simple review is, yes it is. I wish I had worked on it. There’s some rough edges in both the story and in Scott Hepburn’s art, but compared to most of what haunts the racks these days it’s Alex Raymond. Hepburn seems to have been influenced by British guys like Mik McMahon and Ian Gibson; that’s high praise. He’s done a lot of Star Wars stuff for Dark Horse and some Marvel gigs, and his storytelling is as strong as the story he’s telling. In fact, I might track down some of Hepburn’s Star Wars work – as John Ostrander can tell you, it takes a lot to get me to read Star Wars.

The story is post-apocalyptic, an overworked genre that generally lacks the strong emotional point of view needed to make it work. Not so with Orchid. The lead character is a teenage prostitute who protects her family in their struggle to survive in swampland shanties while the rich live above the morass in their fortresses, harvesting the poor (I’d say the 99%, but this number has not yet been established) as slaves, organ providers and sex toys. Morello and Hepburn make it work by sheer dint of their craft and their applied appreciation of allegory.

Morello supplements each issue with a new downloadable song. I’d give you the link, but I’d rather you check out Orchid #1, available at more-intelligently run comic shops and online.

I can’t help wonder if the current Occupier demonstrations all across the nation – now, all across the world – weren’t orchestrated by Morello as a promotion stunt. Given my own background, I’d say that was really cool. Highly doubtful, but really cool. If only that same intensity were to morph into greater exposure for Orchid.

THURSDAY: Dennis O’Neil

NYCC 2011 Cosplay, Part 1: Deadpool, Taskmaster, Darkwing Duck and the TARDIS

  • News
  • October 19, 2011

To my mind, these NYPD cosplayers were pretty good… but if they were really going for authenticity, they’d be beating on the people in the V For Vendetta masks.

Here’s even more wackiness…

The Point Radio: Katee Sackhoff & Eliza Dushku on “Batman: Year One”


This week, one of the most revered story arcs in DC history becomes a direct-to-DVD feature. BATMAN YEAR ONE hits the shelves and we talk to Katee Sackhoff, Eliza Dushku and long time WB Director Andrea Romano about translating the comic to film. Then there was New York Comic Con – what a weekend – and do we have news for you!

The Point Radio is on the air right now – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun for FREE. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE on any computer or mobile device– and please check us out on Facebook right here & toss us a “like” or follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

New Conan Creative Team Adapts Robert E. Howard’s "Queen of the Black Coast"

  • News
  • October 15, 2011
Conan Art: Becky Cloonan

At this weekend’s New York Comic Con, Dark Horse Comics announced a new Conan the Barbarian comic book series by the DEMO creative team of writer Brian Wood and artist Becky Cloonan that will be in stores beginning on February 8, 2012.

The first story arc will adapt Robert E. Howard’s “Queen of the Black Coast,” in which Conan turns his back on the civilized world and takes to the high seas alongside the pirate queen Belit.

For more information on Conan and Dark Horse Comics other pulpy offerings, visit them at http://www.darkhorse.com/.

New York Times on New York Comic Con

New York Times on New York Comic Con

West Side Highway by Jacob Javits Center

Image via Wikipedia

The New York show, which opened Thursday night at the Jacob K. Javits Center in Manhattan, bounced around the calendar for a couple of years before finding a home in October last year, when 96,000 fans made the trek to New York to attend.

Organizers expect attendance at the show, now in its sixth year, to surpass 100,000 this year. And while its rival in San Diego grapples with growing pains, New York Comic Con is finding its footing.

via In New York, Comic Fans Flock to the Smaller Convention (of 100,000) – NYTimes.com.

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MARTHA THOMASES: Comics and The Big Con

The Internet tells me that this weekend’s New York Comic-Con anticipates attendance of about 100,000. I’m not sure if that means 100,000 individuals over the three days (plus Thursday night) or 33,000 going each day, or something in-between.

In any case, it’s a lot of people.

San Diego Comic-Con gets around 125,000 people. That’s more. And it has more of an impact on the city, where 125,000 people dressed funny are noticeable. In New York, that’s pretty much one block of the Village Halloween parade, or Times Square on a Saturday.

NYCC is a relatively new show that grew very fast. I remember when we thought San Diego was a big show with 60,000 attendees. Of course, that was back in the 1990s, when San Diego was still mostly about comics.

The New York show is still mostly about comics. Yeah, there’s a bunch of TV and movie hype, but most of the programming and the celebrity guests are from comics. Since DC and Marvel are headquartered here (for the time being, at least), that’s easy and cost-efficient.

The San Diego convention center is much nicer than the Javits Center, and much closer to the amenities one expects of a major metropolitan area. It’s set up much better for mass transit, too, which is surprising, given the Big Apple’s reliance on MetroCards.  On the other hand, New York in general is set up better for tourists, with better restaurants and better hotels (with more rooms available). Be warned, though – you get what you pay for, and in New York, you really have to pay. And if you want to look like a New Yorker, you’ll walk.

When the show is in New York, I get to sleep in my own bed, with my own husband. And when the show is in New York, I have to clean up my own mess and deal with my own life.

The timing of the show is wonky. True, autumn in New York is beautiful and the Broadway season is in full swing. On the other hand, it’s the same weekend as the New York State Sheep & Wool Festival in Rhinebeck, and I hate to have to choose which geeky aspect of my personality to indulge.

This year is going to be a little bit different for me. I actually have a project to hype. Mary Wilshire and I are working on a graphic novel. I’ve been in the business long enough to know that one doesn’t actually pitch something at a show, because the editors working the booths are too frazzled by fans to focus on freelancers. Nor should they. The show is for the customers. Still, I hope to at least chat up an invitation to send in our pitch. Which means I’ll have to be nice to everyone, just like I was working a booth again.

Martha Thomases doesn’t know what she wants to buy more – original art or hand-spun yarn.

SATURDAY: Marc Alan Fishman

NYCC PULP PANEL TAKES CENTER STAGE!
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NYCC PULP PANEL TAKES CENTER STAGE!

  • News
  • October 10, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Pulp Panel at New York Comic Con
Leading voices of Pulp Fiction Gather

New York, NY (October 4, 2011) The leading voices of Pulp Fiction will gather at New York Comic Con for an examination of a unique American genre; Pulp Fiction. This Panel will explore the roots of pulp and look forward to the exciting efforts of today and tomorrow in comics, prose, e-books, audiobooks and recorded drama.

Panelists include: Nick Barrucci, Publisher of Dynamite Comics (The Shadow, The Spider), Greg Goldstein, COO of IDW (The Rocketeer), author and historian Will Murray (Doc Savage’s Wild Adventures), historian Anthony Tollin (Reprinting classics via Nostalgia Ventures), Mark Tepper (CEO Radio Spirits), Wade Hosth (Pulp Historian) Mark Halegua (Pulp1st), author Jim Beard (Fourteen Miles to Gotham City) and author Adam Garcia (Green Lama).

Bonfire Agency’s Ed Catto will moderate the panel.

“We’re expecting a robust discussion celebrating everything new and fresh about this unique genre. And we’re also planning on giving away a plethora of free prizes to panel attendees,” said Ed Catto.

The Panel is scheduled for Sunday, October 16, 2011 from 1:30 to 2:30 in Room 1A02 of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center at 655 West 34th Street in Midtown Manhattan.

The event is open to all registered attendees of the New York Comic Con, space permitting, and has been made possible by special arrangement with Ghost Light Films, Inc., Reed POP and Bonfire Agency, LLC.

# # #

About Bonfire Agency LLC
Bonfire Agency LLC is the marketing community’s first advertising and promotional agency specializing in helping brands reach and deepen connections with highly influential, but difficult to engage, pop culture consumers. This demo, labeled by some as geek or comic culture, is comprised of incredibly passionate, tribe-wired fans of everything from comic books, video games and action films to underground music, sci-fi inspired television and cutting edge adult comedy. Bonfire’s mission is to find ways to build relevant bridges between brands and a diverse audience of consumers that just might become their most effective advocates. The agency was founded in January 2011 by marketing veterans and pop culture specialists Steve Rotterdam (former Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing at TimeWarner’s DC Comics) and Ed Catto (former Senior Vice President at Ogilvy and Reed Exhibitions). For more information, visit www.BonfireAgency.com.

About ReedPop
ReedPOP is a boutique group within Reed Exhibitions that is exclusively devoted to organizing events, launching and acquiring new shows, and partnering with premium brands in the pop culture arena. ReedPOP is dedicated to producing celebrations of popular culture throughout the world that transcend ordinary events by providing unique access and dynamic personal experiences for consumers and fans. The ReedPOP portfolio includes: New York Comic Con (NYCC), Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo (C2E2), Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) East & West, Star Wars Celebration V, New York Anime Festival (NYAF), and UFC Fan Expo. The staff at ReedPOP is a fan based group of professionals producing shows for other fans, thus making them uniquely qualified to service those with whom they share a common passion. ReedPOP is focused on bringing its expertise and knowledge to world communities in North America, South America, Asia and Europe.

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