According to SPX director Karon Flage, it wasn’t just your imagination: there WERE more people at SPX this year. She writes:

Paid admissions were 1772 which is a nice increase of 19% over last year.  Add to that about 150 free admissions from flyers and coupons we handed out, 500 exhibitors and 150 in staff, volunteers, retailers and press we end up with about 2600 people through the doors.

COMICS ARE STRONG.

UPDATE: MK Reed sent us a link to the Nerdlinger Award Winners. We were wary of just reporting the winners since the categories are almost the best part, such as “Jen Vaughn, winner of the Fourth Annual Montgomery Burns Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence.

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Acclaimed French cartoonist Emmanuel Guibert, had a bit of a press triumph this weekend as the subject matter of his two award-winning books from First Second — THE PHOTOGRAPHER, the story of a dangerous medical mercy mission in 1983 Afghanistan, and ALAN’S WAR, the remembrances of an American GI in WW II — resonated with the Memorial Day holiday.

He was on NPR:

Guibert says that Cope wasn’t a hero — he arrived in Europe too late to see battle — but his stories are still powerful. He first set foot on European soil in the bombed out city of Le Havre, northern France. One day, while trudging along amidst the ruined city with their heavy packs, Cope suddenly remembered that it was his birthday.

“He’s in the middle of this world in ruins and he’s 20 years old, and he forgot his own birthday,” says Guibert. “It was very moving to me to listen to his story because it made me realize something that we all know, which is that war is always made by kids.”

THE PHOTOGRAPHER was reviewed in the NY Times:

The book has the feel of a film, attesting to the skill of Guibert and Frédéric Lemercier, the graphic designer. But there is nothing romantic about Afghanistan or the Afghans, who can be at once courageous and generous as well as heartless and menacing. Lefèvre, on the way back, is abandoned by his feckless guides; his horse collapses and eventually dies; and the photographer nearly succumbs in the snowy mountain passes. “I take out one of my cameras. I choose a 20-millimeter lens, a very wide angle, and shoot from the ground,” he says — “to let people know where I died.” The next page shows his exhausted pack horse amid snowy boulders, followed by a bleak spread of the gloomy mountain pass. Lefèvre is saved by a band of brigands, who shake him down for much of his money but get him out. The physical toll of his trip left him suffering from chronic boils. He lost 14 teeth. But before he died he returned to Afghanistan seven more times in an attempt to tell the stories of those he first met in 1986, whom he could not abandon or forget.

And on Friday, he appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show:

We were so impressed by the above segment that we made a little screen cap:

Let’s take a moment to enjoy this image: a well known TV pundit (who reads graphic novels) is interviewing a world class cartoonist, with respect, about world events — not some superhero dying or getting married or getting zapped by Dr. Light — and she has the book sitting right in front of her on her TV news desk. (Dr. Juliette Fournot, who led the mission, is the other guest.)

And the result for THE PHOTOGRAPHER? We all know Amazon is a bit wonky as a sales indicator, but there has clearly been a surge:

Congrats to the First Second team for putting together this assault on Media Beach. And congrats to Guibert for producing work of such power and clarity that it is deserving of such attention.

Sometimes it’s design, sometimes it’s fate, sometimes you just have a week that makes you realize you are one lucky duck indeed. Despite sometimes yucky weather, and bad train schedules, we managed to hit a dizzying array of high spots last week.

§ Wednesday night it was the “Greatest Films You Never Saw.” Set in The Boiler — an immense former industrial chamber rimmed with a giant, well, boiler — Mark Newgarden projected films from his collection of priceless oddities, while Brian and Leon Dewan, aka DEWANATRON, and their merry men improvised on drums, bass, trombones, Dewanatron, and trash that was found lying around in the street. The films were all amazing — a few are available on YouTube — but seeing them projected as film like they should be is so much more impressive. Several of the movies were from the early days of special effects and the thrill of discovering projection, animation, and other effects to these early filmmakers was infectious. One film involved a man being chased by a giant lobster, presented as both animation and a man in a lobster costume.

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A tweet yesterday about “packing up my office” prompted some concerned private messages, and I am always touched by concern, but I am just moving office, not leaving office. However, I’ve been packing up all the stuff piled in my cubicle and it’s just insane. My packrat nature has rarely been such a burden. Plus, I’m recovering from a sprained ankle and putting extra weight on it (like say lifting a giant box of books) results in an unpleasant bulgy feeling.

Plus what to do with all these p-p-…comic books. Tons and tons of comic books that I think I will someday get around to reading, just like someday I will get around to climbing Annapurna.

I took heat from one poster yesterday for saying I called comic books periodicals instead of pamphlets, heat which was somewhat justified. In my fatigued state, I should have added the word “now.” I certainly have written about floppies and pamphlets many times, often derisively, but in their current, endangered state that seems kind of below the belt. While editing articles for PW Comics Week, I sometimes find our writers using the word “pamphlet” in a business sense — pamphlet publishers, pamphlet industry. The word “periodical” seems more dignified, perhaps.

The origin of the phrase “32 page pamphlet” as a negative term for periodical comic books is usually attributed to either myself, Kurt Busiek or Marv Wolfman. Specifically it goes back to PROcon, a gathering for comics professionals, back in the early ’90s, that was sort of an industry issue conference. Attendees listened to panels of other pros, and spirited hand raising debates often began. And everyone wore togas.

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Will ‘Watchmen’ live up to the hype? WATCHMEN has the widest opening EVER for an R-rated movie and midnight screenings are tracking way ahead of 300…if it breaks $70 million, it wil be the biggest March opening ever.

And, to cleanse your palate, here’s Rickey Purdin’s Watchmen Sketchbook including Rorschach by JASON. GODDAM, I LOVE COMICS.

Oops! One more: Steve Murray and Barry Hertz give you all you need to know about the history of the WATCHMEN movie, in graphic book form.

We were a little disappointed when the Covered blog first began. The idea — indie cartoonists recreating classic comics covers — was dynamite, but initial efforts were a bit too close to copying. But now it has gotten mad good. Look at this Richard Sala Batman if you don’t believe us. Much more in the link!

Whilst searching for an appropriate cover for the previous post, we came across this beaut on Cover Browser, a site which reveals so much about changing tastes and standards that we could probably spend the rest of our career just writing about it. However, no matter how mores and fashion evolve, a flying pooch is always a boon to mankind.

Sulk (Vol 1): Bighead and Friends

Grant Morrison, eat your heart out!

So, just how shitty are things? Really, quite shitty.

Wednesday was a black letter day for the book publishing industry, as it seemed to be Armageddon all over the place. Jay Franco rounds up most of the news:

It’s all over the blogosphere. Publishers are making major changes. One publishing news site already referring to today as Black Wednesday. That’s awfully disheartening. But reality, it might be.

Random House, Simon & Schuster, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Thomas A. Nelson — major players every one, and all publishers of graphic novels — all announced layoffs, restructuring, executive shuffles, or all three. Sam Theilman at Variety laid it all out:

In the past few days, publishers including Simon & Schuster, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Random House have all seen layoffs, painful reorganizations or both. The contraction culminated Wednesday in layoffs eliminating positions at Simon & Schuster and Thomas Nelson and in a massive consolidation at Random House that left, among others, “The Da Vinci Code” publisher Steve Rubin without a job.

Of course, book publishing is just one aspect of the decimation now taking place. ICv2 has been reporting on the layoffs at Wizards of the Coast:

The fallout from Wizards of the Coast’s consolidation of its digital initiatives (see “WotC Pulls the Plug on Gleemax”) has become apparent in a new round of layoffs that reportedly includes VP of Digital Gaming Randy Buehler, Director of Digital Games Andrew Finch, Creative Manager of Digital Design William Meyers, and Online Community Manager Jennifer Paige.

And then Hollywood, lavish, entourage-emulating Hollywood, fell yesterday:

The Hollywood Reporter was gutted and Variety closed its DC bureau.

NBC/Universal: 70 from Universal, 500 overall.

Viacom: 850 people, 7 percent of its workforce.

More to come, of course, yet somehow, Miles O’Brien , we’ll miss you most of all.

O’Brien, who has been CNN’s chief technology and environment correspondent since ending his stint as anchor of “American Morning” in April 2007, is departing as the network dismantles its science and technology unit. Six producers also will be leaving.

Enthusiastic, forward looking Miles. You were always there for us through the falling shrapnel, sonic booms and vengeful astronauts wearing diapers. “Dismantles” science and technology is not a sunny face upon the future.

Thus far — THUS FAR — comics have been weathering the storm relatively well, with the biggest cuts coming, sadly, in the newsaper biz, where editorial cartoonists are dropping like flies, as at the Des Moines Register:

Among the positions cut was the newsroom’s editorial cartoonist, Brian Duffy, who has been in that position since 1983. The Register had claimed to be the only newspaper in the United States with an editorial cartoon on the front page. The tradition extended back to at least the early 20th century, according to Register archives. Ted Rall, the president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, estimated that about 20 editorial cartoonists have been laid off or retired in the last three years.

In comics, immediate news of layoffs has been limited to Devil’s Due and Tokyopop, with some publishing contraction, as with Broccoli Books.

All in all, as we surely don’t need to tell anyone reading this, it’s hard times around the world. As more than one pundit has noted, we’re in the grip of a course-altering economic crisis that will leave little unchanged.

So how bad will it hit comics?
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NPR’s Laurel Maury has released her Best Graphic Novels Of 2008. There are five, and we won’t tell you what they are, so click on the link already! Let’s just say it’s an eclectic list and comics are great, you know?

Now that the first blush of wonder has faded, new fans are beginning to realize what comics buffs have known for decades: Comics and graphic novels have their own traditions and idiosyncrasies, and learning to understand them can be a rewarding lifetime journey.

One further note: In the comments section, someone coins the term “CAFKA” for the phrase “comics aren’t for kids anymore” and puts it on the banned list. Resolved: We hereby adapt this term and shall use it henceforth.

This could have gone in Kibbles ‘n’ Bits, but it is so excellent it deserves it’s own item. Shaenon K. Garrity’s Ten Comics That Made Me Cry is a nice reminder, in the midst of character deaths planned by corporations, writers who tell the stories they’ve waited to tell all heir lives after an editorial retreat suggests it to them, and entire comics planned with all the care of an entry in the latest spec script sales listings, that comics are all about stories that last and last and last:

Anyway, the saddest sequence of Peanuts strips is that in which Patty tells Linus about finally meeting the little red-haired girl and crying because she realizes she’ll never be able to compete with someone so pretty. There is nothing in the world sadder than those strips. Charlie Brown thinks he’s suffered in love? You’re a solipsistic ass, Charlie Brown.

The second saddest Peanuts strip is Spike’s origin story. I can’t even talk about that one.

In perhaps the most unlikely sentence ever typed, I Love Rob Liefeld is giving away a copy of ALAN’S WAR, Emmanuel Guibert’s award-winning graphic novel about World War II as related by a veteran. Hit the link for details.

This 50 facts about Obama article has spurred considerable hopes that the incoming US president might, at last, be the one to truly represent a long-oppressed minority in the White House. Eight simple words that spell hope for the world:

He collects Spider-Man and Conan the Barbarian comics.

Note the use of the present tense. While it’s a well known fact that young Barack was an avid comic book reader, and certainly no stranger to superhero imagery on the campaign trail, this one verb would have us believe that he still keeps a long box, or perhaps some trendy graphic novels, in his reading pile. Something like, CONAN: BORN ON THE BATTLEFIELD by Kurt Busiek and Greg Ruth, maybe? Or maybe he’s more of a Bendis fan?

We’ll leave the parsing of this particular truth to others. What with administrative transitions, and global recession and nukes in Iran, he’s got a lot on his plate, and to expect him to weigh in on the Clone Saga is just a bit much. Frankly we found this factoid just as interesting.

He has read every Harry Potter book

Maybe the president-elect is just, you know, kind of a nerd.

Developing?

Or talks to God or whatever. IGN-UK has a big interview with him which has tons of pull quotes on everything and anything. We’ll quote the bit everyone else has, but you have to read the other parts, too:

I’ve been listening to people talk about ’saving’ the ‘industry’ for over 20 years while comics have continued to be published and have, in fact, become better, to the point where the only conclusion I’ve come to is that comics are best ’saved’ by sealing them in Mylar bags! Everything else is just messianic inflation. Just do good books and stop trying to be the savior of a whole medium that’s been doing okay without you and will continue long after you’re gone.

Yes, I think Kirkman’s right, in that I’d like to see more of our creative community unleashing their wild imaginations onto the page and less of the obvious ‘movie pitch on paper stuff’ that’s come about recently as a result of comic creators chasing the Hollywood dollar but I don’t have a problem with writers and artists working on Marvel and DC properties if they enjoy it. I’d rather read a good Green Lantern story by someone who cares than work my way through a ‘creator-owned’ project that’s been created solely to appeal to lowest-common-denominator movie executives.

Otherwise, he’s possibly being slightly disingenuous by issuing this ‘call to arms’ at a time when, to be honest, I can’t think of any significant comic book writer for Marvel or DC who doesn’t have creator work on the go. Apart from Geoff Johns, who’s told me he much prefers writing DC superhero books, everyone else - me, Warren Ellis, Mark Millar, JMS, Garth Ennis, Matt Fraction, Brian Bendis, Kurt Busiek, etc etc - seems to be hard at work creating new properties, so I’m not entirely sure where the problem lies.

Methinks this news has been out there before, but Dan Nadel makes it official: PictureBox is doing Ogden Whitney:

PictureBox is going to publish a collection of Ogden Whitney’s romance and sci-fi comics in late 2009 or early 2010. Co-edited by Frank Santoro, Bill Boichel and little ol’ me. We are scouring the earth for any and all Whitney material. We aim to solve a few mysteries with this one and should get down to work on it as soon as Mr. Santoro stops blogging for a minute and finished Cold Heat! Ha! Just kidding. Sort of. No, but seriously, Frank is very close to finishing and we will send the book to the printer in December in order to have the books in stores everywhere in April.

They are also seeking Whitney’s son…so get out your sleuthing caps.

A new comic by Larson/O’Malley! Bear Creek Apartments. And there was great rejoicing! And server crashing, apparently.

Following his surprise hit, genre-busting ALICE IN SUNDERLAND, Bryan Talbot is getting back to basics with his work in progress GRANDVILLE, which he calls “an anthropomorphic steampunk detective-thriller. This is the protagonist, Detective-Inspector LeBrock of Scotland Yard.”

We say…whoa! Comics still wonderful in spite of it all!

Bryan also writes to tell us that his THE NAKED ARTIST, tales of comic book cartoonists doing odd things, illustrated by Hunt Emerson, is now available to read for free at Wowio.

Item lifted wholesale from the Forbidden Planet blog.