The writers are still striking. Godspeed, o scribes! Nay the nectar of thine muse doth protest ill…

An oldie but goodie:

WIRED magazine blog points out the irony of WGA protest signs being so lame.

They may be able to pen some of the most riveting dramas and hilarious comedies this side of the Atlantic, but Writers Guild of America members can’t seem to be bothered to think up a witty slogan — and everyone’s a critic.

But that’s not all. They started a WGA Strike Slogan Contest. Below, arguably the best entrty:

We write, they wrong.

Hey y’all. It’s Anne Ishii, previously of Vertical, guest-blogging for the next few days alongside Mark. I hope you had wonderful Thanksgivings. i.e. Not the kind where you go to the movies alone and then get sick on popcorn and your flask of plasticky bourbon, come home, and watch ten hours of Law&Order. [Having done these things on holidays previous, I empathize and feel the immunity to ridicule.]

So…let’s start this baby right. First, this wouldn’t be a comics blog without mention of Neil Gaiman in a context other than his own writing.

Gaiman Pimps Amazon Kindle. [I couldn’t help but notice though, the footage is unusually long. Viz: “Director” cycling his fingers and nodding at Gaiman, gesturing to keep going because it’s great; yelling “cut!” only after he’s passed out.]

Second, this wouldn’t be a blog if I weren’t making fun of someone.

Canadian Choreographs Interpretive Dance Piece About Manga

Poor guy gets torn apart by this Toronto Star Dance Critic.

Via Concedearte, these folks just got married! Don’t know who they are.

(more…)

You can spend hours and hours and hours pouring through the wonders at the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive, a vast resource of information on and art by a who’s who of animation/comics/illustrations notables. In fact there’s even a Hall of Fame! Educate yourself. And support them. One reason? This archive of Gustaf Tenggren’s THE LITTLE TRAPPER and other classic Golden Books.

Or this reprint of the illustrations from a 1945 Coronet magazine. The above is by Vera Bock.

Check out the blog for more reasons to support this amazing resource.

We don’t know if the movie will be any good, but, boy, you have to give the people behind THE DARK KNIGHT points for originality and thinking outside the box.

Not sure when they went live, but a friend of ours pointed our browser to two more viral sites related to the upcoming Bat-Movie.

The Gotham Times

The Ha Ha Ha Times

“I miss my Mommy.” That’s just mean.

Posted by Mark Coale

We didn’t get to see the comic-centric episode of THE SIMPSONS last week, because we had forgotten it was going to be on and, honestly, we’ve not watched the current series in a couple years (preferring to just relive seasons 3-7 on DVD).

However, tonight’s episode will bring almost a big a nerdgasm as last week’s “Watchmen Babies” bit: the debut of Sideshow Bob’s (and Cecil’s) father. And yes, he will be played by John Mahoney, who played the cranky father on FRASIER (who we like to remember as the overprotective dad in SAY ANYTHING).

And, while we’re talking about the Groening-verse, don’t forget to pick up the new Futurama DVD, BENDER’S BIG SCORE, this week while you out doing your Christmas/Hannukah/Winter Solstice shopping.

Posted by Mark Coale

If you’re a comics lover — and we mean a REAL comics lover, the kind of person who wants to understand the joy and sorrow implicit in the butterfly wing of every line on paper — then #1 TV show of all times for cartoonists was definitely MY WORLD AND WELCOME TO IT.

The show was based on the work of James Thurber, the brilliant writer and cartoonist whose whimsical flights of fancy on the page belied his deteriorating eyesight. (He created Walter Mitty, among other things.) The program starred William Windom and here are the opening credits:

You can see another clip here. Each episode mixed some gentle sit-com situations with illuminating forays into animation based on Thurber’s work. The writing was by smart people like Melville Shavelson and Danny Arnold, and the animation by DePatie-Freleng, best known for The Pink Panther.

The show isn’t out on DVD of course — it’s pretty obscure even by TV standards. (The young Beat watched just about every episode.) However, some bootleg DVD’s are available now which have sparked tributes by Eddie Campbell:

After many years of thinking about it, I have at last found access to dubs of one of my favourite tv shows of all time (thanks Gareth). These are not official and I can’t point you in any direction. In fact the quality is somewhere close to looking at the picture through a woolly cardigan.

The title was called My World and Welcome to it. It was a half hour comedy series that ran for one season of 26 [According to IMDb 14] episodes over 1969-70, and then won an Emmy after it was cancelled. It starred William Windom as a cartoonist, John Monroe.

and Jerry Beck at Cartoon Brew:

The series was a bit laid back in some respects, and Thurber’s witty parables were possibly over the heads of much of its viewing audience. Despite winning two Emmys (Best Comedy Show and Leading Actor, William Windom) it was cancelled after one season. A DVD release of the complete series would be quite enlightening. I’d love to see it again.

By the way, Thurber’s bad eyesight stemmed from a childhood incident in which his brother shot James’ eye out with an arrow. See? It isn’t always funny.

A big huzzah to Comicraft, who just celebrated their 15th Anniversary. We talked to Richard Starkings a few years ago for our first book BREAKING THE PANELS and he may have given the most thoughtful and non-comics-related answers out of all the people interviewed.

To commemorate the occassion, Comicraft has unveiled a new font, convenientally called COMICRAFT.

Starkings has this to say in the anniversary presser released by Comicraft.

“JG and I feel very fortunate to have worked with so many top talents in the industry during the last fifteen years,” said Starkings, “and we feel really honored to have been able to contribute to so many great books. We’re very proud of our track record and we’re continuing to invest the same level of quality and commitment into our own titles and websites, and the fonts we make available at comicbookfonts.com.”

Congratulations to Richard, JG and all the other folks involved with the company.

Posted by Mark Coale

We didn’t get a chance to experience Black Friday first hand today (too much sleeping during the day).

Anyone want to share their expierences from shopping today, at the local comics store, big box retailer or online?

Thankfully, our latest Amazon order came on Wednesday, allowing us to spent much of Thanksgiving night watching Season Three of our all-time favorite TV show, Mission: Impossible.

Posted by Mark Coale

From the twisted pen of R Sikoryak, presented at Again With the Comics.

As an alternative to parades or football, may we suggest, these 39 never-reprinted Kirby Monsters comics at Philip Parodayco’s Monster Blog. Hours of browsing fun.

Most of Jack Kirby’s 188 pre-superhero stories have been reprinted; here’s the 39 that have NEVER been, in chronological order. As collectors provide me with scans from their original issues, I’ll be posting these stories on Monster Blog for your eternal enjoyment and edification!

Hope you all have a lot to be thankful for. I know I do.

More in jump.

(more…)

While we’re away Mark Coale will be manning the ship. We’re happy to announce that will be guest posting next week, as well. Treat them nice! And have a great holiday.

Wizard Entertainment CEO Gareb Shamus has left his position at the IFL, the mixed martial arts league he co-founded in 2006. Jay Larkin, a former Showtime exec, takes over Shamus’s positions.

The International Fight League, the world’s number one team-based professional mixed martial arts league, today announced a change in its senior leadership, naming Jay Larkin acting Chief Executive Officer.

Larkin, who had joined the IFL as President and Chief Operating Officer on September 21, 2007, replaces IFL co-founder Gareb Shamus, who resigned his positions as chairman and chief executive officer, effective immediately. Shamus will remain available to the IFL as a consultant.

Taking a sports and entertainment entity from an idea to an established brand in 14 months is nothing short of amazing. Gareb should be commended for his vision and leadership during that period,” Larkin said.

Not sure where this fits in with all the recent reshuffles at Wizard. Various Wizard entities, including the conventions, had spent many resources promoting the IFL.

Based on this post on Bryan Lee O’
Malley’s LJ, we’d guess it is not so easy:

I wish it was easy to get a copy of Scott Pilgrim volume 4, but it’s still kind of hard (and confusing). Here is my attempt to explain.

1. Good comic stores who ordered plenty of copies should still have copies. Examples of good comic stores: the Beguiling (Toronto), Strange Adventures (Halifax NS), Chapel Hill Comics (north carolina), Jim Hanley’s Universe, Midtown Comics and Rocketship (all NYC), Comix Experience and Comic Relief (both Bay Area California), Meltdown (Los Angeles), Gosh (London UK), Page 45 (Nottingham UK), many more that I can’t list. Obviously, not everyone lives in one of these cities. Some of these shops do mail-order and you could check the website of your closest one and find out.

2. Khepri.com probably has copies (if anyone knows, please inform me). They’re an online comic store. Here is another one: In Stock Trades dot com.

3. As far as I know, most of the Big Box Bookstores (Barnes & Noble, Borders, Chapters, Indigo, etc) do not have copies yet. If you work at one of these stores or corporations in a knowledgeable capacity, please inform me otherwise.

3a. I am told Borders ordered “several hundred” copies. Which would mean less than one book per store.

According to the post, 7000 copies are already in circulation.

Not only is Francoise Mouly launching a new line of comics/books aimed at very young readers, but the Toon Books website kicks all kinds of butt. Look at these awesome art previews — we made our own little montage but click on the link for more previews, bigger art and info.

There’s also a very informative blog which seems to have been going for months with nary a trackback. Clever!!! Anyway, you must bookmark it, because it is full of stuff like this summary of a study entitled “Pallenik, M. J. (1986). A Gunman in Town! Children Interpret a Comic Book. Studies in the Anthropology of Visual Communication, 3(1), 38-51.”

Fifth graders pick up far more information than third graders, with explanations seeming less stereotypic – allowing them to anticipate and integrate events more quickly and accurately. Eighth graders “move back and forth between their knowledge of conventional genre structure and the particular story” (46). Fifth graders are more capable of predicting future events from individual panels — each panel implies something about future events. While eighth graders can predict to the end of the story, fifth graders make more short-term predictions about action sequences.

Eighth graders see the story as conventionally ordered by the dictates of the genre. Two strategies were used by eighth graders. When uninterested, they use a “flat” style that perceives and decodes the story as it unfolds bit by bit. A contiguous reading style incorporates the understanding of the genre to expand on the given information with schematic knowledge (unlike with third graders, this isn’t to make up for missed information though).

Holy frak it’s the mother lode!

T Campbell runs an analysis of Compete, Alexa and Quantcast, triangulates the results and comes up with a list of the most popular webcomics, with a bit of Dilbert thrown in for good measure. XKCD, a darkly funny stick figure comic is #1, showing,once again, that people like to laugh.

The big winners: Alexa and Compete agree on the top three webcomics: xkcd, Cyanide and Happiness and Penny Arcade. Those of us who believed in our hearts that Penny Arcade would remain the #1-ranked webcomic for the rest of our natural lives… we may need a moment to absorb that. The rise of xkcd has been greeted, belatedly, with a rash of mainstream media articles, gatherings of the fan base and other usual signs. Cyanide and Happiness’ gains have been a bit less perceptible, but its canny use of online video and community-building has served it well. Both sites have done well by adapting to certain changes in the Web, and in its audience– but that’s another blog post.

[Link via Dirk.]

For more on XKCD, which is the brainchild of ex-NASA employee Randall Munroe,
see this profile.

NASA roboticist-turned-car- toonist Randall Munroe started the increasingly popular comic strip back in January of 2006 when he discovered sketches and doodles drawn amid the graphs and equations of his old math notes. Munroe decided to put them on his website, and before he knew it, a cult following of comic readers emerged. He started to draw more seriously, and now makes his living as a full-time cartoonist.

Newsweek writes up SHOOTING WAR, the new graphic novel from Grand Central, presents a slideshow of Milton Caniff art, and looks at the graphic novel booklet:

“Shooting War” is an example of a growing industry. Over the last five years the graphic novel market has more than tripled, with sales of book-format comics growing from $100 million in 2001 to $330 million last year, numbers that are noticed in a publishing industry that has been flat over the last several years. “The market for graphic novels has exploded. There aren’t a whole lot of categories that have shown that kind of growth in decades,” says Calvin Reid, a senior news editor at Publishers Weekly who has covered the comics and graphic novel industry since the 1980s.

Victor Gorelick has succeeded the late Richard Goldwater as Archie E-i-C, and Mike Pellerito has been upped to Managing Editor. PR below:

In the late 50’s, Victor Gorelick, a graduate from The School of Industrial Art, was hired to work in the production department at Archie comics. In a few years, Victor moved on to become the Art Director and later an editor. By the mid 80’s Victor had been promoted to Managing Editor, where he has strived to keep Archie current and relevant to each new generation of readers. We are pleased to announce, Victor Gorelick has recently been named as Archie Comics’ new Editor-in-Chief.

Among his accomplishments, Victor also serves on the board of advisors to the Joe Kubert School of Cartooning and is always looking for new talent. Victor hired Kubert School graduate Mike Pellerito to work in the production department. Mike moved on to become an Associate editor, where he worked with Victor and soon became the Editor for Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic X and Sabrina the Teenage Witch. His hard work and dedication to his job is the reason why the decision was made to promote Mike Pellerito to the position of Managing Editor.

Victor Gorelick has succeeded the late Richard Goldwater as Archie E-i-C, and Mike Pellerito has been upped to Managing Editor. PR below:

In the late 50’s, Victor Gorelick, a graduate from The School of Industrial Art, was hired to work in the production department at Archie comics. In a few years, Victor moved on to become the Art Director and later an editor. By the mid 80’s Victor had been promoted to Managing Editor, where he has strived to keep Archie current and relevant to each new generation of readers. We are pleased to announce, Victor Gorelick has recently been named as Archie Comics’ new Editor-in-Chief.

Among his accomplishments, Victor also serves on the board of advisors to the Joe Kubert School of Cartooning and is always looking for new talent. Victor hired Kubert School graduate Mike Pellerito to work in the production department. Mike moved on to become an Associate editor, where he worked with Victor and soon became the Editor for Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic X and Sabrina the Teenage Witch. His hard work and dedication to his job is the reason why the decision was made to promote Mike Pellerito to the position of Managing Editor.

Paging every screenwriter who is eyeing the comics medium: PLEASE READ THIS:

Do you really have to pick shots? Think hard on this one. Do you really have a good sense of what will make a good picture, or do you just feel like you’re supposed to do it because it’s your job? Because it’s not, necessarily. You can almost always tell an artist what really needs to happen in a scene, and she will have opinions on how that should all go down. And she’ll be taking composition into consideration, and balancing lots of visual elements. Can you do that? It’s not really necessary with a good artist, she’ll do it anyway. But if that isn’t a strength of yours, then don’t impose such notes on our artist.