The Mix : What are people talking about today?

Nat Turner done deal

Kyle Baker is bursting with pride upon the completion of his latest work. Quoth he on his blog, "It took longer than I expected, but it’s only THE MOST IMPORTANT GRAPHIC NOVEL OF ALL TIME BY THE GREATEST CARTOONIST EVER! Yeah, I said it. What! We’ll be putting together some preview pages and interactive e-goodies with our new publisher, Image Comics, over the next weeks in order to prepare humanity to withstand my wonders!"

Not that he has an opinion or anything. Of course, in Baker’s case it’s well justified.

She’s Spartacus

She’s Spartacus

  • News
  • February 12, 2007

Former DC editorial assistant Valerie D’Orazio, who caused quite the stir late last year with her multi-post series "Goodbye to Comics," has written her second post about Supergirl wherein she expounds upon her belief that the best way to change a System for the better is from without, not within, particularly if the System perpetuates institutionalized sexism (and she does a nice job of differentiating between that and actual individual sexism).

One of the more eloquent voices working on changing institutionalized sexism from without belongs to Mely of Coffee and Ink (hat tip to Michelle Bacon for the pointer), who’s worth quoting in full (beneath the fold).

Kirby books by Evanier

Kirby books by Evanier

  • News
  • February 12, 2007

On the anniversary of the day Jack Kirby left this world, his longtime friend and colleague Mark Evanier has announced his planned two-volume biography of the King. The first volume, says Evanier, "will be a very nicely printed art book with a simpler but quite complete version of the Kirby biography. The volume will also be loaded with rare Kirby art, all of it in reproduced in full color, much of it shot from the original artwork.

That needs a bit of explanation. Many of the pieces will consist of black-and-white artwork in pencil or ink but we’ll be printing them in color so that you can see all the pencil marks, corrections, smudges and in some cases, notes in the margins. There will also be plenty of pages that print Jack’s art in pencil form and, of course, color pieces and some things you’ve seen before but not in the way we’re going to present them. This book will be called Kirby: King of Comics and it will be released in October of this year by Harry N. Abrams, Inc., which is one of the world’s most prestigious publishers of high quality art and illustrated books. It’ll be a hardcover volume, 9" by 12-1/2", all in color and with a gatefold and all sorts of nifty features that we hope will make it worthy of its subject."

Mark is also seeking "interesting and special Kirby art to include in the book… I’m most interested in pieces that are either historic or early… I’d like to locate the original art to some early pieces and especially to things that weren’t done for Marvel, or were done for DC in the forties or fifties. I’m also trying to find intricate pencil pieces and one or two really spectacular pages from the Fourth World material."  Please contact Mark if you have anything along those lines.

The Dark Tower: interview with Peter David

  • News
  • February 12, 2007

Dark Tower 1Peter David, writer of stuff, was able to take a few minutes between bowling, barfing babies, and boarding a plane to Maine to explain what’s germaine and urbane (and other words in the same vein) about the new Dark Tower series, going on sale tonight at midnight. Oddly, even though I’ve known Peter for over two decades and have been his webmaster for almost five years, this is the first time I’ve ever interviewed him…

Q. Assume I know nothing (always a fair assumption) about The Dark Tower. For those folks out there who’ve never read The Dark Tower or any other works by Stephen King, or just know his works from the movies, can you sum up what the heck’s going on here? What things do I need to know about the story that will make it accessible to me? Or will the comic be fully accessible to those who know nothing about The Dark Tower or even Stephen King?

A. You don’t really need to know anything about the series (well, aside from how to read) than anyone required when the very first Gunslinger novel was published. Basically, Dark Tower is a blend of fantasy and iconic western heroes, detailing the life’s story of Roland, the last of the Gunslingers of a long-ago city called Gilead, and the circumstances that forged him into the hero he eventually became.

Q. So this is more of a true dark fantasy than King’s usual horror?

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Len Wein – Thumbs up on 300

300Len Wein went to a preview of the movie based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel 300, and has a very positive review of it up on his blog. "The story is one of history’s great tales of heroism and sacrifice and this film definitely does it justice… One word of caution, though: this film is as graphically violent as any I’ve seen."

Graphic violence, from a Frank Miller graphic novel? How unexpected!

What went wrong with Warlord?

What went wrong with Warlord?

  • News
  • February 12, 2007

Scott Dutton is Defending Skataris, where he tries to analyze why DC’s recent revival of The Warlord didn’t work. I have my own suspicions, but you can’t have Mike Grell, he’s busy. On the other hand, if Dwayne McDuffie can do what he did in Justice League Unlimited…

UPDATE: It seems that Alex Ness is asking the same question.

A bissel schmoozing at NYCC

A bissel schmoozing at NYCC

  • News
  • February 11, 2007

Neil Kleid reports on the panel in which he’ll be participating at the New York Comic Con, "The Jewish Side of Comics." Guess what they’ll be talking about? Don’t worry, it’s not on shabbos. On the other hand, nu, would it hurt them to have bagels? Or a maidele or two like Leela Corman (to talk about Unterzachen, her graphic novel in progress about twin sisters in the turn-of-the-last-century Lower East Side)?

Conventional Wisdom

Conventional Wisdom

  • News
  • February 11, 2007

As we all gear up for the 2007 convention season, what with Len Wein’s Phoenix Cactus Comicon report and Heidi MacDonald’s heads-up regarding a rumor of limited NYCC publisher passes for pros and the news that the San Diego Comic Con International’s Artist’s Alley is already at capacity, the one post I found most buoying was Kathleen David’s about appreciating all the effort that goes into organizing a convention. Granted, Kath is more likely discussing smaller, non-professional cons, but it’s a good set of rules to remember no matter where you find yourself traveling this year.

Warren Ellis and Tom Spurgeon talk about certain instances where there’s no love lost between attendees and organizers, particularly regarding a certain upcoming event.

Comics companies gear up for Toy Fair

Comics companies gear up for Toy Fair

  • News
  • February 11, 2007

Prior to becoming the center of the comic book world with the New York Comic Con, the Javits Center plays host to the 2007 American International Toy Fair this week (from February 11-14), and companies with comic-book tie-in toys are gearing up for their presentations. Hasbro has various Marvel-related offerings, Diamond and Dark Horse have exhibiting booths, but curiously the Toy Fair website makes no mention of McFarlane’s vast array of merchandise.

Could Todd & co. be a no-show? 

The Beat has Day 1 pictures.

Mike Gold: The Editor Babbles

  • News
  • February 11, 2007

Mike GoldWelcome to ComicMix — well, phase one of ComicMix.

This is the part where I’m supposed to explain who and what we are. In order to do so, I’m going to have to do something I rarely do and generally avoid: I’m going to speak seriously.

I’d like to say "welcome to the 21st Century," but I’m seven years late and not quite that pretentious. So I’ll get down to the details. Phase one of ComicMix is a community based around news, information, opinion and blogging, covering the entire range of the comic art medium and those elements in the broader media that we all tend to enjoy. We add this because, contrary to old-time fan thinking, we do not live in a vacuum.

We post the news continuously, we post our columns daily, we post our information and background stuff incessantly, we post our all-new podcasts thrice-weekly (starting Tuesday, February 13th; as they used to say in Pogo, "Friday the 13th falls on a Tuesday this month"), and we run our blogs continuously and irrepressibly.

(more…)

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