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Pittsburgh -– Get READY!

Pittsburgh -– Get READY!

If you’re going to be at this weekend’s Pittsburgh Comicon, you’ll be seeing a lot of folks wearing ComicMix t-shirts and such. That’s because a whole lot of us are going to be there – Timothy Truman, Mike Grell, Robert Tinnell, Martha Thomases, Mike Raub (podcasting and videotaping, no less), Kai Connelly, Chris Burnham, and yours truly.

Many of us will be on a panel together on Saturday at 1:00 – ask us about the new GrimJack and Jon Sable Freelance projects, badger us about Phase 2. No doubt Mr. Raub will try to stick a microphone in your face at some point; he’s a broadcaster so he can’t help himself. Timothy, Mike, and Chris will also have tables in Artist’s Alley.

We hope to see you this weekend at the Pittsburgh Comicon. For more information, click here.

MICHAEL DAVIS: You’ve got a friend in me… a comic book story

MICHAEL DAVIS: You’ve got a friend in me… a comic book story

For most people, comics are a small part of their lives. By that I mean if your comic book collection and your girlfriend were hanging by a cliff and you could only save one your choice would be simple.

Your choice would be simple, right? If not then you should really seek some professional help.

As much as I love comics I have never thought that comics would affect my life in any significant personal way. By personal I mean that outside of my love for the medium and income from the business, comics would not play a major role in my life. I have always thought that comics were an important but small part of my life.

Boy, was I wrong. Sometimes it’s the small things that lead to the big things.

My birthday is Sunday and I have been thinking about my life and my friends lately. Everybody in the comic book industry who knows me knows that Denys Cowan is my best friend. I don’t have a lot of friends (insert your joke here) but those friends I do have are great people. I know I’m a bit hard to get to know-truth be told people meet me and they either love me or (insert your next joke here) hate me.

Of those friends I consider among my best friends: Mike Stradford, Lovern Kindzierski, Roger Klohr, Jason Clark, Ehrich Van Lowe, Lee Speller, Len Wein, Marv Wolfman, David Quinn and Denys. Of those guys Denys has been around the longest except for Lee, and we go back to Junior High. I would take a bullet for every one of those guys. That said, Denys and I grew up and went to school together – even if we did not know it.

So how do you grow up together and not know it? Here’s how. I grew up in Queens, New York: Jamaica, Queens then Rockaway, Queens then back to Jamaica, Queens. In all the years I lived in Jamaica, Denys literately lived around the corner from me and we NEVER met.

That’s nothing special until you consider that we went to the same specialized high school, The High School Of Art & Design in Manhattan and we still never met.

Consider this: Denys and I lived around the corner from each other, we rode the same bus, from the same bus stop took the same subway train from the same subway station everyday. We then had to walk the same blocks to the same school in Manhattan. We did this for years and never met. What are the odds?

How did we meet? Why did we meet?

Comics.

We literally met at Marvel Comics years after high school because a mutual friend of ours thought that two black guys working (or in my case trying to work) in comics should know each other. We both resisted that meeting but our friend Darlene was smarter than both of us and arranged it. She asked me to have dinner with her one day and told me to meet her at Marvel where she was the receptionist. When I got there she asked me to Xerox something for her. I went to the Xerox machine and standing there was Denys Cowan.

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Dragon and Dungeon magazines fold

Dragon and Dungeon magazines fold

Paizo Publishing and Wizards of the Coast today announced the conclusion of Paizo’s license to produce Dragon and Dungeon magazines effective September 2007. The final issues will be Dragon #359 and Dungeon #150, both of

which will contain special content commemorating the history of these magazines. Dragon and Dungeon have been the backbone of Paizo Publishing for five years since they spun off from Wizards of the Coast’s periodicals department in 2002, and both magazines have been an integral part of the RPG publishing world for decades.

The magazines have a long history of publishing comics content, including Phil Foglio’s What’s New and Aaron Williams’ Nodwick.

“Today the internet is where people go to get this kind of information,” said Scott Rouse, Senior Brand Manager of Dungeons & Dragons®, Wizards of the Coast. “By moving to an online model we are using a delivery system that broadens our reach to fans around the world. Paizo has been a great partner to us over the last several years. We wish them well on their future endeavors.”

Subscribers should go to Paizo to learn more about the future of their subscriptions. Multiple options will be available for customers whose subscriptions extend beyond the final issues of the magazines. 

Heroes … and losers?

Heroes … and losers?

As we pack out bags for The Mighty Pittsburgh Comicon, help us clean off the news desk with stories ranging from Elvis to Stan Lee’s fetish to yet more second printings and amazing ticket sales for Spider-Man 3! We prime you for the Big Convention, tell you where the Martain Manhunter will be popping up, review the return of Heroes and trip back to when Steely Dan managed to irk a nation of football fans.

The Midweek Big ComicMix Broadcast – #32 if you are collecting them all –  is packed full. Trust us.

Just press the button. Don’t make us give Alec Baldwin your phone number!

 

The Joker and Doctor Who

The Joker and Doctor Who

Sometimes you just don’t want to know.

This was on the Daily Mail site this morning.  Presented without comment, mostly because we’re not that awake yet.

JOHN OSTRANDER: Odd Delights

I hesitate to recommend films these days – what I like you may well loathe. That said – having burdened you with a collection of “perverse pleasures” recently, I thought I’d devote this column to films that I own that I truly do enjoy, that I think are good films, and which you may not know.

Get Crazy is a 1983 film from Allan Arkush, who also directed the cult classic Rock And Roll High School and is an executive producer of Heroes. I came across it in the company of Timothy Truman while we were at a convention. We were staying at a distributor’s house and were too tired after the day’s proceedings to move. The distributor had the (then) novelty of projection screen TV and cable and Tim and I had a few beers as Get Crazy came across the screen. It sucked us in. At the time, we couldn’t decide if it was the beers or because we were exhausted but it seemed to us to be one of the funniest movies ever made. I’ve watched it many times since and it wasn’t the beers or the exhaustion; this is a damn funny film.

IMDB posts this plot synopsis of the film: “Mega-promoter Colin Beverly plans to sabotage the New Year’s 1983 concert of small-time operator Max Wolfe. Wolfe’s assistants Neil Allen and Willie Loman find romance while trying to save the drugs, violence, and rock and roll from Beverly’s schemes.” Fair enough so far as it goes but it barely scratches the surface.

To start off with, Colin Beverly is played by white-on-white Ed Begley Jr. in a terrifically manic mode. In a stroke of brilliance, his two henchman are played by two former teen idols, Bobby Sherman and Fabian Forte. That is hip, intelligent casting and a great joke in and of itself. The movie is full of little nods like that. Lee Ving, the frontsman for the punk band Fear, plays a punk musician called Piggy who has to be chained up when not performing. (Ving was also in another fave film of Brother Tim and myself, Streets of Fire.) Howard Kaylan of The Turtles plays a Jerry Garcia-ish Captain Sky. You don’t have to get all the in-jokes and references for the movie to work but boy do they add to the movie.

Malcolm McDowell plays Reggie Wanker, who is an amalgam of Rod Stewart and Mick Jagger. One of his band mates – Toad – is played by John Densmore of The Doors. How damn hip do you want a movie to be? And he looks so much like Keith Richards in the film, he could be Keith’s long lost brother. One of the best scenes is late in the movie when Wanker has a talk with himself in the men’s room after getting very high. I can’t tell you why without spoiling the joke but, trust me, it’s LOL funny.

But the absolute best guest shot has to be Lou Reed playing a character named Auden who is heavily modeled on Bob Dylan circa 1983. The in-joke is that you have a recluse (at the time) playing a greater recluse (at the time). Even if you don’t know the reference, the part is written and performed as to have its own laughs. Plus, Reed has a great song by the end of the film, "My Little Sister."

There’s others such as Paul Bartel of Eating Raoul in a bit part as Max’s doctor, Bill Henderson as King Blues and Franklin Ajaye as his driver, and more. There’s tons of music including at last three versions of “Hoochie Koochie Man.” And as much schtick as in any Police Squad movie.

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Star Wars gets Chicken

Star Wars gets Chicken

In a few weeks… in a galaxy not so far away!

The force is with Seth Green and Matthew Senriech, the creators of the stop action animation parody show Robot Chicken.  They are celebrating the 30th Anniversary of Star Wars (30 years??) with a special Robot Chicken episode that will feature the voices of the galactic creator, Mr. George Lucas as himself and the one and only one-armed, Darth’s son, Leia’s brother, x-wing fighter pilot, Yoda-taught Jedi played by Mark Hamill. Hamill is no stranger to the Robot Chicken voice team.

Listen carefully and you will be able to pick out other celebrity voices that I won’t tell you. Here’s a clue: Late Night with Scrubs at the ER with a Hero-ic Ape dancing with the stars. Bye Bye Bye

It’s too early to set your TiVo for this one.  The episode will air on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim block at 10:00 pm on Sunday, June 17.