Hm, will this be the killer app for webcomics? Joey Manley announces what could be a fairly significant venture:

Today, Josh Roberts (owner of ComicSpace and Onlinecomics.net) and I are excited to announce that we have signed a Letter of Intent to merge our businesses into one corporate entity. We will be working with E-Line Ventures, a New Jersey-based ‘double bottom line’ early-stage investment firm (they look at both the financial and social impact of their investments) to secure the necessary funding and support for us to effectively merge and run the combined business.

It’s been obvious to me, and to anybody else paying attention, that my websites are too ambitious, and have grown much too quickly, for one person to manage properly. As some of you know, I’ve spent the better part of two years looking for the right partners to help me step my efforts up. A lot of people and companies have come calling during that time, but nothing felt quite right, for one reason or another.

A few months ago, Josh and I were corresponding on a technical issue, and our conversation sort of veered into this territory. Turned out he was in the same position I was in — and had turned down a lot of the same offers I had turned down, for the same reasons. Josh’s skillsets are quite different from mine, but his goals and plans are very, very similar. Each of us fills a gap in the other’s area of expertise. After brainstorming for a while, we realized that we would make a great team, that each of us would be stronger with the other at his side, and we decided, way back then, to merge our businesses — but only if we could find investors, and get the funding to build out the kind of stable business infrastructure we’ve both been lacking.

E-Line has provided a blueprint for making that dream come true, without our having to sell out our core beliefs. We’ve been working with them for what seems like a year or two now (but has really only been a few months), to bring our vision for offering the most useful, empowering and engaging services for digital comic creators and readers to life. The folks at E-Line not only understood and support this vision, they have complimentary skills to help us make it happen. Those guys rock. You’ll be meeting some of them – as well as some of our own new co-employees — over time.

The websites to be part of the new venture include: ComicSpace.com, WebcomicsNation.com, OnlineComics.net, GraphicNovelReview.com, TalkAboutComics.com, ModernTales.com, Girlamatic.com, Serializer.net, and GraphicSmash.com.

Those last four (Modern Tales, Girlamatic, serializer and Graphic Smash) will continue to operate as separate brands, with their own domains, though they will gets lots of cool new features thanks to our increased development resources.

All of the others — ComicSpace, WCN, OnlineComics, GNR, and TAC, will be merged into one fully-integrated site, combining all the best features from each of the existing sites with many other new features, all designed to empower creators to reach their own goals — find larger audiences, make a living (or at least a little more money) from their webcomics, and reach out to new distribution channels, like mobile and print, etc. — while maintaining full control and ownership of their intellectual property.

That combined will be called ComicSpace.

Details on existing memberships and more in the link.

It looks like sellouts aren’t just the province of the Big Event crew, as Image announces Diamond has sold out of the first issues of Jamie McKelvie’s fantasy SUBURBAN GLAMOUR.

Jamie McKelvie’s SUBURBAN GLAMOUR #1, hot off the heels of his critically-acclaimed mini-series PHONOGRAM, has officially sold out at the distribution level.

“SUBURBAN GLAMOUR is the first work I’ve done completely solo, following LONG HOT SUMMER with Eric Stephenson and PHONOGRAM with Kieron Gillen,” said series writer/artist Jamie McKelvie. “Writing and drawing on my own was initially nerve wracking, but news like this has me very excited.� I’m especially happy there’s a solid readership who will experience the story getting much stranger and far more dangerous for Astrid and company.”

SUBURBAN GLAMOUR is a four-issue modern day fantasy mini-series featuring a teenage girl, Astrid, whose world spirals out of control once her childhood imaginary friends turn out to be real. Her previously make-believe friends reveal themselves to be harbingers for a greater evil centered upon the hometown she’s eager to leave. The mini-series has already received high praise from such sources as FELL’s Warren Ellis.

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With the Red Sox having handily dispatched the Rockies, there is nothing to keep you from watching tonight’s PBS’s American Masters focusing on Charles Schulz. All sorts of goodies in the link, including an excerpt from David Michaelis’s controversial new biography, a preview clip, and additional footage including interviews with Lynn Johnston and the little red headed girl, and more. There’s also a link to find out when the show airs in your area.

MUST watching, of course. Variety reviews the show:

It is not an entirely unflattering portrait, but one can see why the Schulz heirs would object, since Michaelis in particular (unlike the testimonials from Schulz’s widow or friends) injects a degree of pop psychology into the analysis — questioning rather unconvincingly, for example, whether the cartoonist’s fascination with the movie “Citizen Kane” amounted to a kind of pathological obsession. From that perspective, the most telling clips come from interviews with Schulz himself, whose simple demeanor reflects a man of considerable wit, who is nevertheless clearly ill at ease with the spotlight.

Schulz’z children, Monte, Amy and Jill and other associates have been making their feeelings over the Michaelis’s biography’s purported inaccuracies known over in a comment thread at Cartoon Brew. It’s definitely thought provoking reading.

I can’t pretend that I knew Charles Schulz at all, but I did interview him once over a decade ago, and the impression I got from a half hour conversation was that the guy never ever let go of anything sad that had happened to him. (The sadness in his voice when he talked about the death of his dog 50 years previously was heartbreaking.) If that was the takeaway from a short talk with a complete stranger, I would suspect that this profound melancholy was a regular part of his character, and it certainly was reflected in his work. I’m sure there were other aspects of his character (his kindness was also well known) but the melancholy was so pronounced that once I got over the shock of actually talking to Charles Schulz, I never forgot it. This view is not incompatible with the kind, caring father remembered by his kids…great artists are complex, and Schulz was both.

After all the recent chatter about sales charts, and trends and whether the “wait for the trade” mentality is to blame for the attrition in sales, I noted Brian Hibbs’ comment:

I’d suggest that this is the best evidence that retailers HAVE been, historically, ordering “right” — that there IS a 2nd (and 3rd) issue drop off, and its not merely that retailers are a Cowardly and Superstitious Lot.

Given that this pattern can be observed going back as long as there have ever BEEN sales charts — which absolutely and emphatically predates even the CONCEPT of “waiting for the trade” — this would suggest that Jesse’s analysis is incorrect.

I wondered how the pattern would look ten years ago, so dug up one of Matt High’s original analysis posts from long ago Usenet. It’s from May 1997, a date I chose arbitrarily, just because it was there. The formatting on the chart is a bit wonky because of all the pyrotechnics I had to go through to get the text reformatted for HTML. (And I’m not that big of a web whiz.) Note that Column 4 is the sales, in 1000s. Column 5 is percentages, but someone an extra zero got added to pad it to two decimal places. I did go in and change the negative numbers to red so you could easily see all the declines. This was just as comics were beginning their big slide, so the declines are perhaps a bit more dire than they would have been a few years earlier.

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Corey Lewis has posted more infor on his new Zuda series in his LJ with some nice concept art:

“REVERSE-ZOMBIE TALE”
Doesn’t mean it’s a story about a world of zombies that are plagued by a “human” virus (although that… would be… cool… FUCK!). ANYWAY, my story deals with your standard zombie virus, but, unlike most all other zombie stories, Dead in the Now is about a person who finds the FIRST “root” zombie, and decides HIMSELF to let the usher in the catastrophe of allowing the undead lay claim to the world. Of course, the steps he takes to build his zombie army, and the moral issues he deals with along the way are the MAIN NOUGAT of what make my comic so awesome.

ZOMBIES. Wouldn’t want to bet against that in the popularity poll.

Speaking of Zuda, Todd Allen analyses the first contestants and discovers most of them are from the print comics world, concluding:

One thing possibly of note as a tangent to the overwhelming presence of established creators: is this a result of the copyright and trademark issue? The established webcomics community is blasting Zuda to no end over trademark control issues. For cartoonists used to the print world, the Zuda contract is nothing unusual and more benign than a boilerplate work-for-hire agreement. Are the webcartoonists practicing a “just say no” policy, and if not, where are they?

§ Over on his blog, Howard Cruse looks back at an 80s TV appearance:

Crumb and S. Clay Wilson being unavailable, it fell to me, a one-time flower-powered longhair who by 1984 had discovered the convenience of a shorter trim, to acquaint a mainstream television audience with what we dope-smoking, acid-tripping counterculture cartoonists of yore had brought forth once we applied our comix-creating impulses to the dispensation of outrageous sexual fantasies, religious transgression, political belligerence and, in my case, cockroach-infested parables on cosmic matters—all in “easy-to-read comic book form.”

§ Have you ever wondered what the state of cartooning was in Brunei? Wonder no more!:

Cartooning is not considered a “real” job in Brunei but those willing to take the leap of passion will find it rewarding.

§ CNN profiles Milton Caniff.

§ Writer Clifford
Meth and artist by Rufus Dayglo, are running an original art contest to promote their new IDW mini-series SNAKED. Details here.

Following up on a previous post here that mentioned a retro Marvel t-shirt, reader “Donnie” found a picture of it.
Cap is definitely Byrne; at first we thought Wolvie was Cockrum, but on second thought the long ears are Byrne-era, too.

Lots of movement in DC’s upcoming movie slate over the weekend as both the FLASH film and the GREEN LANTERN movie got directors.

First up WEDDING CRASHERS helmed David Dobkin says he’s set for the Flash, replacing Shawn Levy.

Levy’s reasons for leaving The Flash were not disclosed, but his dance card is pretty full right now with Night at the Museum 2 looking to go before cameras pre-strike.

Dobkin informed MTV that Wally West will be the Flash in his movie, which “will exist in the same universe as the upcoming (Justice League of America) as a direct spin-off.” That means whomever JLA director George Miller casts as Wally West in his movie will almost certainly appear in Dobkin’s Flash.

He also teased MTV about what The Flash’s tagline might be: “You can’t outrun yourself.”

Before anyone makes the WEDDING FLASHERS joke, the comedy director going over to the superhero franchise follows Tim Story on FF and (sort of) Jon Favreau on IRON MAN.

Next up, Greg Berlanti is set for GREEN LANTERN:

Berlanti will write the script with Marc Guggenheim and Michael Green. Donald De Line will produce; Andrew Haas is exec producer.

Berlanti hopes to make the jump to big-budget fantasy fare after serving as writer and exec producer on character-driven TV series “Dirty Sexy Money,” “Brothers & Sisters,” “Everwood,” “Jack & Bobby” and “Dawson’s Creek.” He previously directed 2000 feature “The Broken Hearts Club.”

From the sound of things, Green Lantern will be Hal Jordan, whatever that means.

Pan’s Labyrinth director interested:

“They came to me once, for the third one,” he remembered of “The Prisoner of Azkaban”. “I’ve read them all, and when I read the books before the movies were done, I always pictured Charles Dickens – they were very Dickens-ian. The situation of Harry Potter reminded me a lot of Pip from ‘Great Expectations’. I saw them as deeper, more creaky, more corroded; then [the stories] were textured very differently when the first two movies came out. They were so bright and happy and full of light, that I wasn’t interested.”

After seeing the last few films, however, the director famed for a shadowy imagination and morally ambiguous characters has begun to reconsider. “They seem to be getting eerie and darker … If they come back to me, I’ll think about it.”

THAT WOULD BE COOL!

It’s looks like Devil’s Due is the latest comic book company to set up a colony in Tinsel Town:

as they’ve hired Stephen Christy to run an LA office, and liase with everyone in sight. According to the Variety piece, DD already has DRAFTED set up at New Line.

Christy will serve as manager of intellectual property development, overseeing adaptations of Devil’s Due properties as films, TV shows and videogames. He’ll also work on developing graphic novels and books for third-party production companies.

Until now, Devil’s Due prexy Josh Blaylock has been shepherding the publisher’s entertainment efforts, working with William Morris Agency, which reps the company.

The story mentions Lost Squad and Hack/Slash as also being in the works. Christy previously worked in development at Marvel and on such shows as “America’s Next Top Model,” “The Real World” and “The Shot.”

Nature is cruel.

Rounding up a bunch of photos or cartooners spotted about the globe, conquering all in their path.

Via Jeff Newelt, photos from the Paul Pope Diesel Party in Hollywood celebrating the release of PULPHOPE
and debuting new original PP screenprints on sale at Diesel’s Melrose location:

Pope, James Jean and David Silverman, director of THE SIMPSONS MOVIE.
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Mocca is throwing a Halloween Party…Happy Hauntings!

Lock your doors, seal the shutters, turn the lights low, and put away mom’s good china because MONSTERS are coming to MoCCA.

First off at 6:30 pm is the Opening Reception for our latest exhibit: “THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT.” Peruse some of the greatest graphic representations of your favorite monsters with the curators of this exciting show. Talk at length about the metaphoric potency of these malformed beasties with us. Share with us which one lived under your bed or in your closet…we’re all ears!

Then at 8:00 pm the lights will drop down low and the volume will go up as we celebrate MoCCa’s 6th Anniversary with our Annual Masquerade Party! The theme this year is, of course, MONSTERS! There’s gonna be rafflin’ and dancin’ and eatin’ and drinkin’ and screamin’ and costume contestin’… all at your favorite New York comics museum.

Cost of admission? Fifteen Bucks for all you can eat and drink all night. Lock your plans in now.

MoCCA is located at 594 Broadway, suite 401. This event is sponsored in part by Yuengling and Oak Beverages.

Al Columbia’s cover for MOME 10. [Via Flog]

Last week’s Tilting at Windmills by Brian Hibbs was a particularly meaty one as he delved once more into the periodical vs trade debate currently going on, and even questioned if TOO MUCH product was going out:

One of the tests that I think should be put into place is “When volume 1 (or 2 or 3) goes out of stock, will it be reprinted?” If not, then, most likely, the work shouldn’t be collected in the first place, other wise we’re just creating more “orphans” clogging up the system and the shelves – and we have far too many of those as it already is.

But let’s say that you’re a publisher and you’re willing to make a serious commitment to keeping a work in print and available, what then? How do you handle both the serialization and the eventual collection?

Hibbs also discusses why Vertigo’s sales are going steadily down for quite some time. I talked a little bit last week on the difficulty of launching new characters, but the figures from this month’s sales charts state the case even more starkly. (Those who point out that these figures are low — add +/- 15% and you have more accurate final sell-in, and just as dismal a picture.)

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Via Flog:

Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery is pleased to welcome to Seattle the cartoon genius that is Joe Sacco. This Friday evening and Saturday afternoon, Fantagraphics celebrates the publication of “Palestine: The Special Edition” with two extraordinary events.

On Friday, October 26 from 7:00 - 9:00 PM we host an exhibition of Joe’s stunning original artwork from “Palestine.” This also marks the world premiere of the deluxe hardcover edition of “Palestine.” It includes supplementary material including photographs, journal entries, sketches and more from his visit to the war torn region 15 years ago - an exquisite, modestly priced volume that is an essential addition to any comics-lovers library. Sacco will be present to sign advance copies.

This Saturday, October at 2:00 PM, Joe will discuss his groundbreaking approach to “comics journalism” in conflicts from the Middle East to the Balkans, as well as his pop culture and autobiographical works. If you haven’t seen Joe speak, you’re in for a treat. This artist is passionate, articulate and entertaining.

Fantagraphics Bookstore is located at 1201 S. Vale Street at the corner of Airport Way S. in Georgetown, just 10 minutes south of downtown Seattle. We’re open every day 11:30 to 8:00 PM, Sundays until 5:00. Phone: 206,658.0110. Come down and check out our new releases and complete selection of Fantagraphics favorites, including hard-to-find backlist books. See you soon.

Industry watches and fans endured an emotional rollercoaster this week as they followed Mark Millar’s valiant quest to get the chance to write the next Superman movie. While Millar’s assault on Mount Krypton was doomed to failure, according to IESB.net, another cartoon type is trying to plant his flag on a film franchise; in this case artist/director Kaare Andrews is longing to get his hands on He-Man with a bid to work on the MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE film. Writes Andrews (Spider-man: Reign):

Where I grew up we didn’t get He-Man on television. We had to rent them on VHS. It made the show special… gave each episode an importance. I watched them mostly when I was staying with my Dad. I’m not sure why. Maybe my Mom didn’t have a VCR yet. I had a lot of the toys. My favorites were Battle Armor He-Man and Battle-Ram. I had He-Man bed sheets. I had the Paninni He-Man sticker book. I bought the comicbooks. My Mom sewed me a He-Man Halloween costume. And when I was supposed to ‘grow out’ of my toys my little brother carried on the tradition. I don’t believe in trying to intellectualize childhood experiences. Obviously it had something to do with power fantasies, imagination and storytelling. But I prefer to think of that time in simple words. Because simple is powerful. And He-Man was the most powerful in the Universe.

In addition doing comics, Andrews has been making short films for a while, directing music videos and even winning a few awards, so this he isn’t coming at this from complete Outer Mongolia. To prove it he put together a video presentation which you can see in the above link.

Retailer John Riley of Grasshopper’s Comics has a piece at ICv2 called “Sharpening the Sword–Where Are The Villains?” which suggests that since we’re living in grim times, the pervasive grimness of superhero comics may be hurting sales over all. He spends a lotof time on Marvel, where he says “It seems that the current Marvel Universe is bogged down in some weird Orwellian dark age where the heroes aren’t heroes, and the villains just aren’t important.” Towards the end he also passes along an anecdote:

I had an interesting related experience a few weeks ago here at the store. I brought my seven year-old son in to work with me. He wanted a Webkinz (sold in the store next to mine) and I told him he could work at our store to earn the money to buy it. So I sat him down with bags and boards and a few hundred “reader copy” silver age comics and told him that if he bagged and boarded all of them he’d earn enough money for the toy. Well, it took him hours. But not because he was going slow. No, it took him hours because he read every single cover and had about ten questions to ask me about each book! He was totally captivated by them and I let him choose a couple to take home.

And all the time he was doing this he walked past the new comic rack at least twenty times and never gave them a look.

We could certainly believe that the kid was more interesting in the old comics just because he was holding them in his hand, not just walking by them, but there is something that feels accurate about this anecdote. A friend of mine showed up to an event the other night in a retro-style t-shirt he’d just purchased from Target — on the front were the heads of Wolverine, Captain America, the Thing and Thor — the heads were all from the 70-early 80s period — they were in fact the ones that had been used as the corner cover symbols. We had a good time trying to guess who had drawn the heads, but it also struck us that it was the retro look of the characters that made them to classic. It’s hard to imagine that a t-shirt with contemporary licensing art of these character would sell as well — or seem as cool.

Today’s issue of Variety (we think — it might have been yesterday’s) includes a special “10th Anniversary salute” to Tokyopop. Usually these “salute” sections in the trades are put together as advertising opportunities, and we have no idea how this one came into being, but the general message it sends out is “Hey Hollywood, we have movie properties!” as spelled out in this overview:

Manga film adaptations, however, remain an undiscovered country — even more mysterious to many Hollywood execs and producers than American comics and graphic novels. That makes manga something Tokyopop has to demystify for many industryites.

“Hollywood is still grasping with what is it about graphic novels or sequential art that truly would make a successful film,” Levy says. “Is it the fact that everybody’s heard of Spider-Man, or is there something inherent about the medium of sequential art and the graphic novel that allows for a film to be adapted in a more efficient or effective manner?”

There’s also a profile of the Tpop visionary himself Stuart Levy:

In the early days, Levy says, getting manga licenses from Japan was easy; it was getting manga into stores that was difficult. While some comicbook publishers had tried manga in specialty shops, Levy says that market was too much of a niche to be the company’s sole outlet. “I was always thinking about the malls,” he says.

Waldenbooks was the first to bite. The market then grew steadily, but it took the introduction of right-to-left manga for the category to really take off.

Some will find it odd that this list of Tokyopop Top Ten: The biggest titles from the imprint’s first decade, includes STAR TREK and NOT SAILOR MOON, which was the manga license that not only put Tokyopop on the map but is generally credited with having ushered in the Girl Revolution. Of course Tpop lost the license long ago, so we can understand not promoting this in a piece that showcases licenses they own like BIZENGHAST and DRAMACON.

But there’s also good news for Tokyopop’s Hollywood hopes: ICv2 reports that there’s some live action activity:

Anime News Network is reporting that at TIFFCOM in Tokyo, Tokyopop announced plans to create a live action adaptation of Yuji Shiozaki’s 12-volume seinen fighting manga, Ikki Tousen, which Tokyopop publishes in the U.S. as Battle Vixens. The sexy Ikki Tousen/Battle Vixens manga is a loose adaptation of the classic Chinese saga, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, transposed to Japan where skimpily dressed girls (and the occasional guy) from different high schools fight it out. According to ANN, Tokyopop’s live action version shifts the setting of the story from Japanese high schools to American college campuses.

VIA PR:

DC Comics, the largest English-language publisher of comics in the world, and home to Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman announced today that legendary Batman comic book artist Jerry Robinson, a key contributor during the early years of the Batman comic book series, will be a creative consultant for the company.

“It’s an honor to have Jerry complete his journey from DC’s bullpen to advising us on characters he was intimately involved with, and the international world of comics he knows so well,” said Paul Levitz, DC Comics President and Publisher.

“I am delighted to be affiliated with DC Comics, my alma mater, as Creative Consultant,” said Jerry Robinson. “I look forward to working with Paul Levitz, whom I greatly admire, and the enormously talented DC editors, artists and writers.”

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Mike Mignola and Alex Ross are the first announced guests of honor for next year’s New York Comic-Con.

New York Comic Con (NYCC) has announced its first guests for the 2008 convention which will be held in New York City at the Jacob K. Javits Center, April 18 – 20, 2008. Mike Mignola and Alex Ross will be Guests of Honor and will be joined by several Featured Guests including Neal Adams, Kyle Baker, Amanda Conner, Dean Haspiel, Robert Napton, Jimmy Palmiotti, and Paola Rivera. Many more guests and activities will be announced in the near future as con officials prepare for another major growth spurt for NYCC in 2008.

“Delivering titans of the comic world to our fans is a major part of what New York Comic Con is all about,” notes Lance Fensterman, newly appointed Show Manager for NYCC. “Having direct access to talent of this caliber is what makes our convention such a great experience and we’re looking forward to an all-star list in ‘08. These guests certainly represent an impressive first step in that direction.”

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From this week’s Permanent Damage:

Ultimately there’s no publisher in America today predicated on the idea of letting talented creators go their own way, because no publisher has a coherent plan for capitalizing on that, and that goes for both indie and mainstream. So, really, it falls to creators themselves. Which means there’s “selling out” and there’s “selling out.” To work in as many venues as possible, and to do the most impactful work there to open more opportunities to do the comics you think should be done instead of what publishers and editors should be done, to take the opportunities presented to you and do your best with them and to pry open new opportunities even when it sometimes means accommodating other expectations to get what you want, that’s an okay kind of selling out. It’s only trouble if accommodating other expectations at your own expense becomes habitual and reflexive. Wanting to write “popular material” in the absence of good ideas for that material, that’s not such a great way of selling out.

Another classic old time blogger has hung it up: Johnny Bacardi is folding up after five years. Bacardi was there at the beginning of the Blogging Explosion, and rode the wave:

Then, not long after I started, the Comics Blogosphere happened, and since I was reviewing and writing about comics as well as music, movies, sports and TV, I was kinda caught up in the groundswell and witnessed how it grew (for better or worse). I have been privileged to see the advent of a ton of great writers who have written either solo or as part of a collective, many of whom extended friendship and respect my way. Even though I kept writing about other things, eventually I decided to focus on comics at the expense of the other subjects, and that’s what I’ve featured here for quite some time now.

Bacardi cites several reasons for going to that great cache in the sky: not having much to say about comics today, a lack of link love. We can understand both–this is a tough gig, and you need to be motivated, God Knows — but we’re saddened nonetheless. Bacardi, aka David Jones, will continue to have a web presence with his LJ and a website devoted to the song stylings of Elton John.

So long, Johnny, and if you ever want to come back, we’ll be waiting for you.