Archive for February, 2010
Since the official announcement was made today in this USA Today article, I can finally talk about one of my current IDW projects: an all-new, original 4-issue limited series based on the characters and settings of James Patterson’s latest YA book, Witch & Wizard.
This is the cover mock-up they ran in the article, but it’s not going to be the final cover of the first issue. The artwork is being handled by the extremely talented Victor Santos, who recently collaborated with Brian Azzarello on the Filthy Rich crime noir graphic novel from Vertigo. You can also see his work in the Mice Templar series from Image. Once I get the go-ahead from the powers-that-be, I’ll post some of his pages from our book here.
Apparently Tokyopop (of all places) has a graphic novel adaptation of the book (and now movie) Shutter Island. Today’s Columbus Dispatch has a short write-up on it.
“The climactic sequences of Lehane’s book possessed a powerful click as they fell into place, and, under French artist Christian de Metter’s watch, the dread and revelation remain intact.”
So Tokyopop is publishing non-manga books now? Hmmm.
The Other Paper features and interview with me this week, mostly about my Ghostbusters one-shot. If you’re in Columbus, you can pick up a free copy, or read it online here:
Ghostbuster takes time out for romance
Marvel has issued an apology for depicting “Tea Party Activists” as white supremacists. How ’bout discussing the reference to the act of teabagging I found in my latest friggin’ Captain America comic?
This week’s 7 Covers is courtesy of PANELista Matt Kish, who had this to say about his choice:
“Unlike Brent, who has confessed to being an ardent Robert E. Howard fan, the fantasy paperbacks that filled my youth were the tales of Michael Moorcock’s Eternal Champions. Elric. Hawkmoon. Corum. Erekose. And so on. I devoured every Moorcock book I could find, and I was thrilled when I discovered that Pacific Comics, and later First Comics and others, were turning his Eternal Champion books into comics. My first experience with these comics was the miniseries “Michael Moorcock’s Elric,” adapted by Roy Thomas and gorgeously illustrated by P. Craig Russell and Michael T. Gilbert. It was an amazing comic. Although the title jumped from publisher to publisher and changed artists several times, eventually Russell would bring the whole thing to a close in the late 90s at Dark Horse by adapting the novel “Stormbringer” on his own. Even more thrilling for a young fantasy addict like myself, the publishers saw fit to dig deeper into Moorcock’s body of work, also bringing excellent comic adaptations of the Hawkmoon books, with art from Filipino komiker Rafael Kayanan, and the Corum books, with mindblowing art by a young Mike Mignola. Every one of these books is great and well worth checking out.”
I’m one of the presenters at Pecha Kucha Columbus. My slide show will be about comic books, from early influences to my latest projects. There will be 9 other presenters, with topics ranging from labor and fashion, to detention tactics, to wine! There will also be music, food, and entry is a mere $2 donation.
The event is Thursday, Feb 11, starting at 7 pm. The location is the OSU Urban Arts Space at 50 West Town Street.
More information and directions can be found here.
What is Pecha-Kucha?
Pecha-Kucha Night, devised by Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham of Klein Dytham architecture in Tokyo, was conceived in 2003 as a place for young designers to meet, network, and show their work in public. Pecha-Kucha (which is Japanese for the sound of conversation) has tapped into a demand for a forum in which creative work can be easily and informally shown, without having to rent a gallery or chat up a magazine editor. This is a demand that seems to be global – as Pecha-Kucha Night, without any pushing, has spread virally from Tokyo to over 160 cities world-wide.
Curious? See pecha-kucha.org for more info.
What is the format?
As a presenter, you are allowed to share 20 slides total, and you get 20 seconds during each slide to talk. Slides should be timed… 20 slides at 20 seconds each gives you a total of 6 minutes 40 seconds to speak.
There goes the neighborhood; Neil Gaiman is writing an episode of my favorite SF show, Doctor Who. Do I think he’ll do a good job? Sure. I’m not as enamored of Gaiman as most folks, but I don’t dislike him, either. And bits (as in, about half) of his book Neverland struck me as being cribbed from Doctor Who.
The episode is slated for the 2011 season, so we’ve still got a little over a year to wait.
Picked up the Alive this week and got the rundown on the new Wonderland space. If I was more organized and with it, I’d try to attempt something similar with the real estate around where Clintonville Electric was situated. I have no idea how degraded the interior is but I always thought that space could be something fantastic if the funding was there. I’ve watched that area of Clintonville slowly turn into a mini-Portland over the past decade with it’s aging hipster shops popping up.
The real estate includes a building that was formerly a theater.
Anyway, Wonderland is planning on taking over the old Wonder Bread factory by CCAD. My excitement was slightly muted by the fact that the Couchfire group is involved. They’re planning on moving homebase from Junctionview into this new space. Roughly by 2014, when that space is set for demolition. I’ve had mixed feelings about Couchfire. Their heart’s in the right place but every show comes off like well organized hype. Friends and I have tanked (sales wise) at every recent function they’ve put on. Sure, you could relate it to the crap economy but I have items that are around $2 to $4. It’s great to get exposure but people seem there for more of the entertainment and food/booze. I say this as I have done other non-Couchfire related events around town and sell way more than I ever did at one of their events. It’s one thing to be great at paperwork but the end result is lacking… a lot.
Yes, they can stir up a crowd but is that crowd the kind that’ll buy a painting for under $100? Or a print for $10?? Or is it the crowd that’s there for the bands and the booze. I’m thinking it’s the latter. Case in point: The lousy C-Note show had a jacked-up cover charge (???) and on a brief walk thru, only a few pieces sold. There was some decent stuff up on the walls. What kind of a gallery has a freaking cover charge??? I thought it’d be sponsored out the butt.
Possibly this will change over time. Who knows in twenty years what will happen with their efforts. I’d like to be able to sell a painting in this town for over $500. Realistically it’s nigh-impossible with the average income in Columbus. We’re talking about middle to upper middle class and Les Wexner. I am getting sick of the one sided hype online with this crew. You can’t build up something without airing both sides of story.
I think this post is pretty much just for me and Dara. I finally got around to buying Models Inc. No. 1, the one with Project Runway’s Tim Gunn on the cover.
The issue itself didn’t grab me: it’s basically a group of Marvel’s model characters (there are a lot of them!) doing light comedy and light drama. Comics are good at heavy comedy, but you have to be incredibly good to do light comedy. Same with light drama: when it’s really, really good, it’s just OK. When it’s so-so, it really sucks.
Writer Paul Tobin also labors to introduce 6-8 characters I don’t care about, so the whole thing kind of drags.
But then there’s an 8-page backup feature starring Tim Gunn, and it’s a hoot and a half. Writer Marc Sumerak (who?) manages to squeeze in every Tim Gunn catch phrase (the guy has more catch phrases than The Rock) and still tell a story with a point of view.
Tim Gunn’s giving a tour of a superhero fashion exhibit when AIM bursts in. The big reveal after that page is an Iron Man suit, which Tim Gunn dons to defeat AIM.
Why was the Iron Man suit at an exhibit? Why was it charged? Why is Tim Gunn able to pilot it? Fuck you, that’s why.
Right after this, Iron Tim gets blasted by a ray gun. I appreciate that Sumerak gets in a few reversals of fortune in this 8-pager. But the suit manages to reboot itself just in time for Tim to give his final catch phrase:
I’m not a Clive Barker fan. I haven’t read any of his books and haven’t seen the Hellraiser series of movies. In fact, I think the only ones of his movies that I’ve seen are Nightbreed and Lord of Illusion. So why’d I pick up this one-shot comic book? Mostly out of curiosity. I like artist Gabriel Rodriguez, and wanted to check out the 3-D effects. So, with that in mind…
The book came with a variant cover by Barker himself (the white one, below)
Here’s how the story is described in the original press release when the book came out last October:
“In Seduth, Barker tells the tale of celebrated architect Harold Engle, who first glimpses the small cloud of darkness inside a glittering, priceless diamond, without any knowledge of the terrible plague contained within. Seduth follows Engle on a surreal journey through murder and madness to the very heart of existence and a terrible, impossible choice-to unravel the very fabric of the world, or to save it?”
Now, if you think that sounds a bit metaphysical, let me assure you that the above description is about as straight-forward and coherent as the story gets. The book itself is a weird jumble of bizarre landscapes, surreal ideas, and disjointed narrative threads about love, death, sex, heaven, hell…you know, what some less artistic folks might be inclined to call “pretentious”. Here’s one example of what to expect from the writing team of Clive Barker and Chris Monfette:
Now, I pretty much knew what to expect as far as the writing goes, and had a feeling it wasn’t going to be for me. In one of those rare impulse buys, I picked this comic up more for the art. Rodriguez does a fantastic job of bringing some semblance of clarity and sanity to the otherwise bizarre settings and realms. (The colors are by Jay Fotos, and 3-D effects by the legendary Ray Zone) Some of the pages, like the one below, make good use of the 3-D effects:
While on others, everything comes together perfectly to take full advantage of an otherwise distracting gimmick. This page in particular struck me as how well it worked; if you move your head from side to side, the glass shards move across the face for an added layer of effect:
There’s also a very impressive double-page spread (which I didn’t scan) in which Rodriguez draws about 70-80 distinct faces as our protagonist contemplates the universe and his place in it. Gabriel is a really talented guy, and while he’s currently exclusive to IDW (working on Joe Hill’s Locke & Key), I hope to see him do more work at other publishers in the future.
The book also features some of Barker’s notes in the back, with his ideas and sketches from (presumably) the inception of the project. In one such page he describes the book as “a completely nihilistic story” and “this is my Superman”. Here’s a look at another one of his notebook pages:
So, 24 pages of story and 8 pages of Barker notes for $6. Was it worth it? I guess that’s more for you to decide for yourself. I’m not Barker’s main audience, but I liked pouring over the art and checking out the 3-D effects, so it definitely entertained me for a while. Your mileage may vary.
John Porcellino now has a blog. So far it’s just started so check back or add it to the feed. I also came across an online comics archive that Porcellino takes part in. You’ll find some work by folks like Jordan Crane, Sammy Harkham, Ted May and… oh god they’re adding Gabrielle Bell (why? if they add Jeffrey Brown to the mix, I’m tapping out.).
Porcellino’s work has always managed to elevate itself from the navel gazers like Bell (or Brown). He can make the most mundane thing seem epic, beautiful and readable.
recommended reading: A Perfect Example. (locally at the Columbus Metropolitan Library)