Yesterday, word broke of an impending deal between Archaia Studio Press and Devil’s Due Publishing. Statements have just been received from both parties in the deal, and the story going around is not entirely accurate: ASP is being acquired, but by Kunoichi, Inc., a company formed by DDP’s Josh Blaylock but owned by DDP CEO P.J. Bickett, not DDP. Bickett sent out the following statement:

Normally, Devil’s Due Publishing would not comment on unattributed rumors. But, due to the amount of queries we have received about this, we want to set the record straight.

While DDP and Archaia Studios Press had some initial exploratory conversations, DDP is not acquiring ASP. We are continuing to have conversations with Archaia about the possibilities of working together in some capacity, as we are with many other publishers both big and small.

ASP’s founder, Mark Smylie, has a longer statement with much more detail.

While Archaia is not ready to put out an official press release, for the moment (and for attribution), I can let you know that we’re in the process of being acquired by Kunoichi, Inc., a creative services company based in Chicago that was co-founded and co-run by Josh Blaylock until he exited the company to focus solely on Devil’s Due. While we had some initial conversations with DDP directly, it will actually be Kunoichi that is acquiring us. Further cause for confusion may stem from the fact that we are still in separate talks with DDP about working together on a few opportunities once the Kunoichi acquisition is completed, including a potential publishing partnership of which we are one of several players in the fold. There’ll be more on all of that soon, I hope.

In regards to contracts, we are indeed shifting from a more traditional publishing contract to something that can be better described as a media rights contract; this is in part a reflection both of the overall direction of the comics industry, for better or for worse — every company or individual investor that had talked to us about an acquisition expressed the same sentiment, that our IP approach would have to change to match our competitors — and Archaia’s interest in working with its creators on broader and more long term IP development. Despite the changes, we have tried to put in place as many guarantees of creator control and protection as we can; at root, we’re still all about trying to find creators who have a specific vision they want to pursue and letting them do that in a way which hopefully profits both them and the company. I’m signing ARTESIA to the company under the same contract as everyone else and am remaining on board as the managing editor, so I wanted to make sure that creators had as much final say over their properties as possible. We’re still in the process of finalizing a few individual creator contracts, but it’s looking like most of our previously published titles will be moving forward as part of Archaia’s new publishing schedule. We strongly believe that the new contract is competitive with industry standards and has a high degree of creator control that can these days only be beat by self-publishing.

Re the story going around yesterday about ASP creators being “strongarmed” to sign new contracts, we’ve heard from at least one ASP creator who clearly felt that he’s being treated fairly. More to come.

Looking to volunteer for a good cause? This may be the way:

The CBLDF is looking for volunteers available NOW!

If you live in New York City, and are over the age of 17, we need your help!

Please send your resume to volunteercbldf@gmail.com.

While the gold rush of comics to mainstream book publishers seems to have slowed a bit (there were very few announcements or rumors at SPX, aside from Raina Telgemeier’s SMILE deal with Scholastic) it isn’t all over: Jimmy Gownley’s AMELIA RULES is getting the book treatment. PR:

Ginee Seo Books, an imprint of Atheneum/Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing, today announced it has acquired the world rights to Jimmy Gownley’s popular comic and graphic novel series AMELIA RULES!. The deal was brokered through an auction by Judith Hansen of the Hansen Literary Agency. Originally published by Renaissance Press, the AMELIA RULES! graphic novels and comics have become a favorite with both critics and fans alike.

Centered around the happenings of ten-year-old spitfire Amelia Louise McBride, the AMELIA RULES! series captures the true essence of being an adolescent girl in America today, as Amelia adjusts to life in “small town America” after her parent’s divorce as she is forced to leave NYC. “Jimmy is a true creative genius, and AMELIA RULES! has that rare combination of mass appeal and literary substance that every publisher dreams about. We are thrilled for Jimmy to be joining the S&S list, as we work to expand our list with some of the top comic and graphic novel talent publishing today, and we look forward to making his name and his characters known to even wider audience beyond his already substantial following,” said Ginee Seo, VP, Editorial Director of Ginee Seo Books.

Jimmy Gownley added, “It was important for me to find the perfect home for AMELIA RULES! and I strongly believe Simon & Schuster and Ginee Seo books are a great match. I am more excited than ever about Amelia and kids graphic novels in general”

The plan is for Simon & Schuster to put out reprints of the first four already published AMELIA RULES! books over the next two years, with the first reprint AMELIA RULES!: The Whole World’s Crazy to be published in Spring 2009 and the last reprint AMELIA RULES!: When the Past is a Present scheduled to be published in Spring 2010. AMELIA RULES! #5: The Tweenage Guide to Not Being Unpopular will be the first original publication with the hardcover and paperback scheduled to come out simultaneously in Fall 2010.

IDW’s presidential nominees bios are out today, and the creators are going on a tour, starting TODAY:

Writers Jeff Mariotte & Andy Helfer will be appearing at comic shops in New York, Los Angeles, and Orange County to promote the release of Presidential Material: John McCain & Presidential Material: Barack Obama from IDW Publishing. The signings begin Wednesday, October 8th, the day the books are released, and continue until Friday, October 10th.

New York:

October 8th, 2:00 - 4:00 PM at Forbidden Planet, 840 Broadway, New York, NY 10003

October 8th, 5:00 - 7:00 PM at Jim Hanley’s Universe, 4 West 33rd St., New York, NY 10001

Los Angeles:

October 9th, 6:00 - 9:00 PM at Golden Apple Comics, 7018 Melrose Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90038

Orange County:

October 10th, 4:00 - 7:00 PM at Comics Unlimited, 16344 Beach Blvd., Westminster, CA 92683

This has nothing to do with anything, but it is always fun to post Mitch O’Connell art of Tura Satana.

§ Mike Catron writes to tell us that the Grand Comics Database has completed indexing of all 800+ issues of ACTION COMICS:

With the approval of issue #709 today, Action Comics (including Action Comics Weekly) has been completely indexed here at the GCD. That’s 871 unique issues (869 plus 0 and 1000000, not to mention one DM and one 3D alternate). I believe that’s the most continuous issues we have indexed for one (virtual) title, at least for a US title.

Action joins Batman as titles continuously published dating back to 1940 that have been completely indexed.

§ Who is “Hot Shot Hamish”?

§ Todd Allen finds empirical proof of the death of print:

I have seen the death of printed newspapers and magazines.

It all started with a full bladder. Seeking relief I headed towards the men’s room. As I approached it, I noticed the odd sight of a gentleman ahead of me approaching the same chamber with a laptop in his hands, screen up.

Entering right behind him, I saw him make a beeline for a stall. I noted that this particular men’s room had an empty magazine rack and wondered if the fellow had a wireless Internet connection on the laptop as I broke off in the other direction for the urinals

§ ONE LAST MINX LINK. Clearly the life and death of the Minx line has become the defining moment for our generation:

The world is vast, and I am the center of it. This is the point of view of many (though not all) Young Adult protagonists. Not in a particularly self-aware sense, but in a social and emotional development sense. YA protagonists are incredibly self-absorbed, reaching for the first time in their lives for true depth, for understanding, for a place in a world so much larger than themselves. This is one of the key journeys of adolescence.

The Minx titles each begin with a girl who has just suffered a change in circumstance. This external change is the mirror and catalyst of the internal change that needs to occur. Actual teenagers are a blend of sociopathically self-centered and profoundly altruistic. The protagonists in Minx — particularly in Confessions of a Blabbermouth, Kimmie66, and The Plain Janes — are jerked out of insular comfort by events that force them to recognize that they are connected to others in ways they did not intend or understand.

The gossip site TMZ spies singer Michael Jackson shopping at LA’s Golden Apple comics shop with a photo gallery. Jackson is a long-time comics reader and a long-time customer at the store. Seen above, shop co-owner Sharon Liebowitz and the mysterious masked shopper.

Apparently Jackson’s kids — who usually appear in public with masks on — were also shopping for their favorite comics. It’s nice to see them looking semi-normal, because you know they’ve got to be well adjusted.

Speaking of the Golden Apple, they’re hosting a signing tomorrow!

Nikki Finke had an interesting post the other day on Warners’ supposed discomfort with funny stuff:

Who cares if Warner Bros just signed a 3-year/first-look deal with Steve Carell? Because everyone in Hollywood knows that Jeff Robinov and Alan Horn have no sense of humor. So they’ll waste him in unoriginal mainstream crap. (Don’t expect anything similar to The 40 Year Old Virgin. Horn is such a PC dipstick that he won’t allow the studio to make low cost/big box office Judd Apatow-type laughers rated R.) And Russell Crowe confirmed this during last night’s appearance on Letterman. The actor explained that his soon-to-be-released film Body Of Lies contained “my favorite line I ever delivered in a movie. But it’s not in the film. They took it out. I think that Warner Bros executives had an attack of taste.”

The post goes on to quote the line and why it was removed, and we can see why some might think the PTB were being a little sensitive. Apply to WB’s superhero movies as desired.

Are we the only person who is on some kind of spam list for folks in Dubai selling expensive construction equipment (cranes and bulldozers)? With PICTURES? We are excited as anyone by the idea of looking at pictures of 80-ton cranes, but how on earth did we get on this list? Is this some kind of Al Qaeda front or a variation on the Nigerian scam? WTF?

PS: We’re on the road again, this time for R&R — more posting later.

Peter Rios reveals something that has been bubbling along undetected for a while: Devil’s Due is under negotiations to buy Archaia Studio Press. ASP is best known as the publisher of MOUSE GUARD.

Archaia announced a reorganization back in May when biz sider Aki Liao left, leaving publisher Mark Smylie to find new investors. Most creators being published under ASP expressed solidarity with Smylie, but the fate of the company and its projects has been up in the air for some time.

Now it appears that Devil’s Due, which recently announced a licensing deal with Les Humanoides, is also looking to acquire ASP’s properties. It’s our understanding that negotiations with various ASP creators — who all have their own creator-owned contracts — have been in negotiations with DD for a while now. However, according to Rios — or someone he’s quoting, it isn’t really made clear — this has hit some snags:

The purchase has hit a serious snag. A large number of the ASP creative roster are upset that Devil’s Due is refusing to honor their old ASP contracts. Under threat of non-publication, creators are being pressured to sign a new agreement which grants Devil’s Due each and every worldwide right, trademark and copyright, of every nature. Since most of Archaia’s talent signed to the company precisely to retain control of their books, this has been a major stumbling block. With DDP’s unwillingness to honor the spirit of the old contract and refusal to allow creators to take their books elsewhere severe friction has developed between publisher and talent.

Other ASP creators respond anonymously, including this one:

Truthfully, if there isn’t another publisher currently willing to pick the project up right now I’ll simply move on to other projects and give this one a whirl again later.While I don’t think everything is as sinister as your initial informant made it out to be - not being published isn’t a “punishment” of not signing on, nor is it a strong-arm tactic. It’s simply the result of not coming on board with a new regime and deciding to take the book elsewhere - it does suck that a company formed by an independent creator FOR independent creators has pulled a 180 on it’s stance regarding a creator’s rights to his or her property, as these new contracts would indicate.

Sadly, this is increasingly the way of the world. Devil’s Due is certainly within their rights to ask for the kind of deal they offer their own people, but the creators at ASP originally signed on to escape just that kind of control. And yet, clearly, being profitable wasn’t in the cards for ASP, or they wouldn’t be getting shopped around.

We have a few emails out there. Developing.

UPDATE: There is apparently much more to this story, but we’re waiting for official statements.

Today’s “It Kids” of snark and anti-establishmentarianism, Tucker and Nina Stone, are interviewed by Chris Mautner at Blog@Newsarama. Depending on your point of view, you will find them to be ultra-haters or honest proponents of an outsider viewpoint. Nina, who is new to comics, comments on the rollout of her exposure. Sometimes it pays off:

NS: OK. I saw that some of [the site comments] directed toward me were saying things like “this is like jumping into chapter seventy in a seventy-five chapter book and you really shouldn’t expect to understand.” And, you know, I learned from my American Splendor experience. I didn’t like the comic – and my opinion was based solely on that comic, at that time. People “commented” that I should really read his older stuff to get a better picture of what he’s really all about. So, I read a bit of his older stuff and watched the movie…and now I totally adore Harvey Pekar. And his wife. And I get it. I get what the comic was about, how it came to be, why it was successful, etc.

Sometimes it doesn’t:

So, after reading Final Crisis and all those comments, I decided to go to DCcomics.com, and spend a little time around there. Maybe there is some little primer there? Well, there actually IS some section that says “New to comics?” — so I clicked on it and it’s basically — I found it really funny because it has a FAQs page with minimal links and the questions are: “What are comics?” “Where can I buy comics?” “Where can I learn about comics and the comic fan community?” “And How does DC Comics, WildStorm, and Vertigo fit into all of this?” None of those FAQs really helped. So I clicked on Heroes and Villains and basically it tells me that to get caught up I need to read — 52, was that it?

Tucker argues from a more informed viewpoint, and once again, depending on which side you’re on, he’s either a connoisseur or an elitist:

It’s the same standard—that if it’s good, then it’s art, and if it’s not good, well it’s comics and you should shut up–over and over and it shouldn’t be because comics are in the same exact some marketplace as everything else. They’re not fighting for the comics dollar. There isn’t a comics dollar. They’re fighting for the entertainment dollar, It’s not just that manga sells more. Comics are up against TV, movies, video games, playing outside with a rope—run of the mill super-hero comics are fighting for the same free time that everything else is fighting for. It’s not enough that a comic is entertaining—it’s got to be more entertaining then it would be to watch a cat do something cute on YouTube, because that’s what it’s competing with for my time.

Stone also deals directly with the problem so many critics have: Contact between author and subject is all too possible and taints the whole barrel:

I made the mistake of responding directly to a creator who didn’t like the way I treated his shitty comic book. Back and forth, debating it like we respected each other’s opinion when in the end, I didn’t feel any different, he didn’t like me, and it wasn’t like he was going to break down and admit the thing was trash, and it wasn’t like I was going to lie and pretend I was kidding. At the end I felt dirty. I shouldn’t have done that. That’s me though, I had to learn. Now, I think I would just not get into it with them.

In a way,Tucker Stone is saying the most obvious thing possible: We should raise the bar to separate what is considered good from the vast sea of mediocrity masquerading as the majority of comics. And yet so many people spend so much time talking about that mediocrity. Dick Hyacinth picks up on the theme:

Comics readers seem to love the mediocre. I don’t think the problem with comics criticism (in a broad, broad, very inclusive sense) isn’t that it rewards terrible, bottom-of-the-barrell work; it’s that it rewards second-rate work. Any stab at respectability, no matter how modest, is too-often greeted with hosannas. I’ve seen people laud Kingdom Come because it used foreshadowing–which I’m sure we all remember is an actual, honest-to-god literary technique! I guess that’s a step up from those who think crying superheroes holding the charred remains of less-famous superheroes connotes respectability.

The way the comicnets obsess over mediocre comics, it’s as if movie blogs kept arguing the deep meaning and value of Beverly Hills Chihuahua and College all the time.

In all candor, The Beat is as guilty of this as anyone. Confronted with a sincere press release on something of, shall we say, “limited appeal,” we run it anyway, just in hopes that improvement is in the offing.

Look, did you see? We did it again. “Limited appeal.”

We meant to say “mediocre comics.”

We truly believe that this is a golden age for the graphic storytelling medium. Our recent trip to SPX proved that; it was the comics equivalent of a Christmas stocking, full of goodies and treasure. There are more and better trained cartoonists around us than at perhaps any time since the Golden Age of illustration.

Yet, every week we get stacks of comics from major publishers, and just sorting them out is a tedious chore, one to be fobbed off on interns, who, in turn, hate doing it. These comics have become so inbred, so tortured in their self-reflexive appeal to an an ever shrinking base that the brain automatically shifts away. Don’t get us wrong; there will be some new readers who will take the Nina Stone challenge and like it; in an Internet-driven world where mastery of inane factoids is currency, the draconian choice between total immersion or total rejection makes some kind of sense. So creating products for the cult makes economic sense. It’s the dearth of NON-cult products for new audiences that seems total nonsense. And despite what you may have heard, good comics(FUN HOME, WATCHMEN) win over more new readers than crappy comics do.

At the same time, having worked in the comics industry, I know that the monthly or weekly grind lowers one’s resistance to crap. The joy of just getting a book out every month soon drowns out the tastebuds, and it’s only long afterwards that, stepping back, you can see the poverty of imagination.

There are lot of barely readable or unreadable comics out there, and yet they are being argued over as if they were a novel by Dostoyevsky. And you know what? They aren’t.

And people gradually wake up to that fact. Every once in a while, a comic comes along that hastens the awakening. This week, it’s NIGHTWING #149. Greg Burgas tales up the call.

Over at Every Day Is Like Wednesday, I came across a description of Nightwing #149: “[I]t is incredibly, spectacularly awful.” Caleb goes far more into it, and I just thought, “I must buy this. I must read it.” And so I bought it. And I read it. Boy howdy, he’s right. He celebrates its awfulness, however, believing that nothing can come “anywhere near the terrible glory” that is Nightwing #149. I can’t be quite so blasé about it, however. This is a bad comic. More than that, it’s a depressing comic. In a DC Universe that has recently been all about cruelty, this stands out. If you didn’t buy it, I thought I’d break it down for you.

Everyone grows up sometime. You just can’t keep arguing over this stuff and thinking about it without a little bit of your soul dying. Thus it pleases us to see a bright, perceptive person like Laura Hudson beginning to emerge into the light:

Coming directly off of my weekend at SPX, as well as recently reading a string of excellent, engrossing non-superhero graphic novels like Skim, Swallow Me Whole, and Alan’s War, picking up a comic book like Nightwing #149 feels a lot like shutting my hand in a car door. And I’m thinking — I’m thinking I should stop doing that.

We all need to raise the bar a little. I do; you do. We all do. It’s not that potboiling pieces of mediocre pap (or worse) won’t still come out. It’s just that we need to stop pretending they matter in any way, shape, or form.

Over at Blog@, Jeff Trexler reports that ne of his posts has been introduced as evidence in the Siegel/DC copyright lawsuit. Under examination is the post discussing a collaboration between Jerry Siegel and an artist named Russell Keaton on what appears to be an early version of Superman.

The discovery of this new material set off a heated legal exchange. DC’s lawyers challenged the Kitchen documents on several fronts, prompting Toberoff to defend Joanne Siegel’s ability to verify her husband’s signature and Denis Kitchen’s trustworthiness. DC claimed that the new material was filed too late to be considered at this point in the proceedings; the Siegels argued that DC had made a series of its own “rogue filings” with “unauthenticated evidence.”

The reason why the Siegel/Keaton material has received so much attention lies in one of the hottest issues in the comics business today: work for hire. A creator cannot use termination rights to regain ownership of material created as work made for hire, since the creator did not own the material in the first place. However, the Siegel heirs were able to regain half of the copyright in the Superman material in Action Comics #1 in part because Jerry Siegel had co-authored it before entering into the September 22, 1938 employment agreement with Detective Comics.

More in the link.

Watch legendary illustrater Bob Staake create this week’s New Yorker cover in this video. Apparently his process is quite amazing, according to Drawn!

Thanks in part to YouTube, author and illustrator Bob Staake gives the world an inside look at how he goes about creating his one-of-a-kind illustrations. Believe it or not, Bob creates all of his digital work in Adobe Photoshop 3.0… with a mouse… all on one layer!

After a flurry of rumors that he was ending his OPUS comic strip, cartoonist Berkeley Breathed has confirmed it is ending on November 2.

WPWG Editorial Director/General Manager Alan Shearer praised Breathed, saying the cartoonist “pushed all sorts of topical and stylistic envelopes” and “influenced a generation of new cartoonists.” Lago said Breathed is ending his comic with a contest asking readers to guess Opus the penguin’s fate. Currently, the character is in prison courtesy of U.S. authorities. The actual solution will be available only on the Internet, not in newspapers, according to WPWG.

The Internet thing is a nice twist.

Some good news from Rick Veitch: he’s collecting BRAT PACK in a remastered edition:

When the fifth printing of my BRAT PACK tpb sold out a few months back, I promised I’d have big news about the next edition and here it is! King Hell Press will release INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH BRAT PACK, a 300+ page limited hardcover collection of all things Slumbergian, in Spring of 2009. The book will include the completely remastered original graphic novel (I’ve been able to rescan all the original art thanks to good guy art dealer Albert Moy), all the various color covers, over fifty pages of sketches, unused pages and promotional art along with the never before seen original proposal that I presented DC Comics with back in 1998. On top of that I’ll be writing a behind the scenes history of Tundra, King Hell and the whole furshlugginer comics scene circa 1991 when BRAT PACK became the #1 best selling independent comic and was nominated for an Eisner Award as best new series. And as icing on the cake, Steve Bissette has written an enlightening historical and cultural appreciation of the sidekick phenomena in comics and film titled TEEN ANGELS.

For those not familiar with it, BRAT PACK completes the troika of immortal works dissecting the superhero genre, with the other two being DARK KNIGHT and WATCHMEN. Indeed, for those brave readers looking for a follow-up to WATCHMEN, BRAT PACK could be just the thing. We were flipping through a copy the other day, and it’s just as disturbing and horrific as it ever was. Now, if only we could get a COLOR reprint.

While there are countless blog posts about SPX out there, a few of them merit more than passing mention.

§ The I love Rob Liefeld blog has a good rundown of purchases.

§ Of course we loved Brian Heater’s report, because we’re IN IT. But he also catches that special SPX vibe:

The magic of SPX has always been, at least in part, due to the fact that the show is held in a Bethesda, rather than New York or San Francisco, so most of those in attendance haven’t just happened onto the showroom floor to get in out of the heat or the cold, but have rather devoted a significant chunk of time and money into attending the show. The location also ensures that those present don’t scatter to the wind as soon as the floor closes, but rather hop in massive carpools to the next location. And, when you wake up, bleary-eyed the next morning, there’s a pretty good chance that the person riding down in the elevator with you or stumbling down the hotel halls is there for the same reason. It’s a sense of comradery by necessity almost entirely absent in big shows like San Diego, and even smaller ones like MoCCA or APE

§ Ben Towle has the fun:

I returned in time for the post-show booze-fest, which was, as usual, a lot of fun. Again, pretty much everyone I talked to had nothing but great stuff to say sales-wise about Saturday. The cheery mood led to much merriment of course. In some strange manifestation of “six degrees of separation,” I wound up sitting at a table with a bunch of comics bigwigs far, far out of my league–including novelist and professor Tom DeHaven and his wife, and Fantagraphics/Comics Journal founder Gary Groth. I mostly talked to that guy that always comes to SPX in drag… who was curiously also sitting at this same table with us.

But he also does a breakdown of his sales at Heroes Con vs SPX… with numbers and GRAPHS. This part is definitely worth looking at:

Interestingly, as far as cash-in-hand goes, I wound up with almost exactly the same amount of money walking out the door at both shows. It says a lot about how brisk SPX was, though, that it’s a two day show and Heroes is a three day show. On the other hand, the hotel at SPX costs about 160% of the hotel at Heroes. A huge factor for me personally, though, is that I’m usually a guest at Heroes, but have to pay for a table at SPX–and of course Heroes is just down the road from me, whereas I have a long drive and one extra day in a hotel for SPX.

§ Nate at Bramble Vine Comics chose this year’s Balitmore show over SPX and has exhibitor’s remorse:

Don’t get me wrong, I still had a lot of fun at BCC. I met a lot of people and sold a ton of pins and sketches. The crowds at BCC were overwhelming and everyone I spoke to about it while at the con who had exhibited there last year agreed that there were far more people attending than last year. But, us indie folk in the Artist Alley, which ringed the convention floor, all saw mediocre sales. I could see it in people’s eyes as they walked past my table, they were searching for things they knew. They wanted something familiar, something that matched the superhero logo on their t-shirts. The majority of people at the BCC were not interested in new unknowns like myself. Webcomics were not on their radar screens, they wanted a deal on a new copy of Watchmen and the latest Batman action figure.

SPX 2007 was such a different experience for me. The folks that went to SPX were hunting for new comics and cartoons. They wanted to feel like they were discovering something, they wanted fresh, weird and experimental. Webcomics were high on their agenda of things to check out. There may have been fewer attendees, but I sold a lot more books and got a lot of encouraging comments there. The crowd that goes to SPX are far more likely to open their wallets on something that they haven’t seen before

And from the Chris corner:
Chris Mautner
Chris Pitzer

Laura Park has been one of the most admired cartoonists around for a few years. Her output has been mostly confined to minis and an issue of SUPERIOR SHOWCASE. But following her Ignatz win for “Best Artist,” one had to wonder, which lucky publisher was going to glom on to her? It seems she’s joined the Fantagraphics list, as she’ll be appearing in an upcoming issue of MOME.

§ We told you Domingos Isabelinho’s blog was gonna be deep:

There are, at least, four cultural fields that can help to expand comics as an art form: Medieval (or older art) painting and book illustration; the wordless engraving cycle; Modern and Post-Modern painting; Concrete and Visual Poetry. None of these fields are linked to comics on the gentiles’ heads. For a variety of reasons they all have problems to be accepted by the comics milieu as well. Let’s briefly examine some of these objections.

§ Bill Griffith is interviewed at CBR:

“Zippy”is a vehicle for you to do pretty much anything. Some good examples are the autobiographical strips you’ve done, which are very different from the typical strip. Was it always your intention to make “Zippy” a vehicle for anything you wanted? I’ve always thought that an essential quality of Zippy’s character is his unpredictability. He can talk or think about anything and isn’t constrained by “reality” or even time. That makes for a lot of flexibility in what I can deal with in any given strip or storyline. I like to experiment with the strip structurally as well as with subject matter. For instance, I recently introduced two new characters from a kind of “parallel universe” to Zippy’s, Fletcher and Tanya. They look like pinheads, but are drawn in a minimalistic style and speak entirely with text clipped and pasted from old magazine advertising. Likewise the autobiographical series I did about my father some years ago. I just launched into it and hoped readers would come along. Sometimes I need a break from doing “just” “Zippy” and my regular cast of characters. I enjoy surprising readers—and myself. It keeps things from stagnating.

§ Also at CBR, John Mayo’s monthly sales analysis:

While this could be seen as a sign of the strength and longevity of “Watchmen,” what it really demonstrates is a major marketing success for DC. In a brilliant move, DC set up a consignment program for “Watchmen” and offered it to retailers for free provided they return any unsold copies in salable condition between December 1 and December 30, 2008. By doing this, DC is taking on the risk and making it as financially viable as possible for retailers to have as many copies of “Watchmen” as they want over the coming months. DC was under no obligation to do so, particularly for as well known a product as “Watchmen.”

§ How much do people love IRON MAN? So much so that the IRON MAN Blu-ray disc is the fastest selling Blu-ray in history. So many people bought it that downloading additional content from Paramount’s website, crashed the site big time

That alone wouldn’t have been a problem, but because this caused the loading of the movie to halt while the content was downloaded lots of people thought the disc itself was defective. Paramount has now issued a statement to explain the problem.

§ Liquid Comics is flowing — to Hollywood. The former Virgin Comics has had one of its properties — Ramayan — picked up by Mandalay:

Sony Online Entertainment optioned “Ramayan,” first published in 2006, last year to turn the game into a massively multiplayer online role-playing title.

John Collee is adapting the comicbook, based on epic Hindu poem about the adventures of legendary blue-skinned warrior Prince Rama, who fights to rescue his wife from the demon king who kidnapped her.

According to the piece, several other Virgin/Liquid projects — including VIRULENTS and THE GAMEKEEPER — are still in play in Tinseltown, and others are still hoped to go into development.

§ MEANWHILE, the only REALLY important thing going on is: Guillermo del Toro talked The Hobbit this weekend:

I find you have to discipline yourself to write in the morning, and then watch and read in the afternoons stuff that seems relevant, even in a tangential way. For example, reading or watching World War I documentaries or books that I think inform ‘The Hobbit,’ strangely enough, because I believe it is a book born out of Tolkien’s generation’s experience with World War I and the disappointment of being in that field and seeing all those values kind of collapse. I think it’s a turning point that you need to familiarize yourself with. I’m starting.

We’re busy writing up our official SPX report for tomorrow’s PWCW, but a very few quick notes:

The show was generally speaking, a big success; everyone was having fun and selling books and talking about making comics. Future Mr. Beat — an indie show near-virgin — had a telling comment, comparing it to last week’s Baltimore Comic-Con (which was also fun). He pointed out that at Baltimore, as you walked through Artist’s Alley, there would inevitably be people sitting there all by themselves with that puppy dog look of desperation, trying to sell their books. At SPX, by contrast, everyone was busy and happy, whether selling to the eager crowd or checking out each other’s work. It was just an engaging, lively place to be.

That observation was dead-on: SPX is full of so much enthusiasm, joy, and talent. It brings a tear to the eye, it does. It’s also, as always, a chance to watch the changing of the guard. This year’s Saturday/Sunday timeframe, a change from the Friday-Saturday of years past, was a selling success and all of us old-timers who liked the idea of Sunday as a Summit and picnic/softball game realized that pining for that was useless. That was 10 years ago, fer cryin’ out loud — we might as well yearn for grunge and Pets.com. And the kids of today have their own bonding SPX rituals: the Nerdlinger Awards and Saturday night’s karaoke fest, which was stinky and loud and chaotically groovy. (Above photo from Brian Heater’s Flickr stream captures the mayhem (although not the madness of the group “Yellow Submarine” singalong.)

The show also had Joost Swarte and Kramers Ergot #7 and all the things that push the needle artistically. Jog also caught the vibe:
Now it’s like a city. A small city, but still something you can’t cover in its entirety. The population has bunched up into closer, self-sufficient groups, which is as natural as a city gets. I know its contours, and its basic layout, but I couldn’t name every cheese shop or hairdresser. And there’s no need to, really - I know the places I like, and I know how to find other places, and there’s enough transportation by communication to keep the place lit. It’s even gotten so there’s cleaner borders with other (sub)cultural municipalities, like Anime City, which is where I go to buy meth away from the eyes of my family.

For pictures, check out the link above and doubtless many more to come. In closing many thanks to the road trip crew of Jah Furry, Brian Heater and Ben McCool for laughing all the way. Thanks also to Laura Hudson, Jimmy Aquino, Calvin Reid, Greg Bennett, Van Jensen, Jill Friedman, and Bill K. for help of various types.

The Comics Reporter has a list of “If I Were The Emperor of Comics: Two Dozen Things I’d Decree To Make Comics Better,” none of which we’d disagree with outright, few of which any responsible comics observer could disagree with, although some of the business suggestions would get a fight. As we head into the Cormac McCarthy model of a world economy, making cave drawings to amuse ourselves may be the only thing we have, so all this may be moot; however, we’d add another one:

#26: Make POS systems of some kind universal in comics shops.
I vividly remember walking into LA’s Meltdown Comics for the first time in many years or so and being amazed at its size and vibrancy, as owner Gaston Dominguez-Letelier ran us through the wide variety of items that sold well in his store. I asked about what he thought of using a point-of-sales system to track sales and he just smiled. “I’ve had POS for 10 years,” he said. Accurate sales information, via computerized inventory tracking, as Brian Hibbs has been telling us, is not only a way to save money but to gauge what readers like buying, not based on prior prejudices of the seller but actual sales numbers. Many retailers have told us that after installing POS systems, they made unexpected discoveries about what kinds of items had the highest turnover in the store. Hint: They were not published by Marvel and DC. Diamond’s POS has been slowly rolling out as it is tweaked, but there are already good systems available, such as MOBY, which Hibbs uses. While some people rail against the direct sales market as an outmoded superhero delivery system, as many people in the book industry would attest, having a dedicated nationwide base of thousands of specialty stores is something most publishers would kill for.

We’ll have more, maybe, after today’s deadline crunch, but in the meantime, read Tom’s piece and ponder.

More legal maneuvers in the case of Michael George, whose conviction in the killing of his wife has been sent back for a new trial: Although judge James Biernat Sr. did not remove the Macomb County Prosecutor’s office from the case, he has issued a gag order:

But Biernat instead imposed a gag order prohibiting attorneys from speaking to the media about the case, because he said he’s concerned about a tainted jury in an upcoming trial.

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“The defense has presented a colorful argument,” Biernat said. “However, the court finds that given the present status (of the case) with the Court of Appeals, it would be inappropriate.”

Apparently all the Ignatz winner lists out there have left off the Debut Prize winner, probably because the nominees weren’t part of the original press release. At any rate, the winner was Nate Powell’s SWALLOW ME WHOLE (Top Shelf.)

Congrats to all the very deserving winners.

§ ICv2 has the most information yet on Fred Pierce leaving Wizard:

Gareb Shamus, founder and Chairman of the Board of Wizard Entertainment, told ICv2 that “the parting was amicable, and we wish Fred well in his new endeavors.” Shamus indicated to ICv2 that he is open to the idea of filling the position held by Pierce, but has no plans to do so at this time.

According to the piece, Shamus is more involved and sees “great things ahead” for Wizard.

§ Rivkah has more on publihsing and payments and the realities of the world::

In no way do I believe that the principals and pay that should be applied to a major, potentially global endeavor should be applied to the grassroots press or small publisher, and I want that to be absolutely clear. For two years I helped run a publishing company putting out fiction novels from non-agented, beginning writers. We paid 10%-14% on gross sales (that’s gross, not net), put no holds against returns, held no “costs” or “administration fees” against the writer, and paid bi-annually so that writers were getting paid within six months of publication with a thorough summary of what sold where for how much. And we had a damn good grassroots free marketing campaign. Not once did we pay an advance.

§ Best Week ever presents a fumetti with Paul Pope and clothing:

§ Vulture responds to Tom Spurgeon with Ten Oddball Things Your Comics Collection Truly Needs:

1. Anything by Rob Liefeld.
The artist may be the laughingstock of the comics industry, but his hilariously awful drawings of hysterical ponytailed men with extraordinarily improbable anatomy, an abundance of shoulder pads and pouches, and machine guns the size of Buicks define an entire era of superhero comics.

§ Finally, hours and hours of fun: Google in 2001.

Quite a busy weekend for comics-related group activities: FallCon, Mid-Ohio, and the Birmingham International Comics Show all took place, in addition to SPX.

§ In the UK, this year’s BICS sounds like it was bigger than ever:

About 3,000 fans, artists, writers, publishers and comic dealers were treated to exhibitions, demonstrations, workshops and discussions involving some of the comic world’s greatest names.

Co-organiser James Hodgkins said: “It’s getting bigger every year. We’ve got a great guest list. A bigger theatre and more exhibitors than before.”

He added that the show is now established as a part of the national comic industry calendar.

Biggest draws included a theatre presentation by leading British artist Dave Gibbons whose Watchman pipped Japanese classic Akira to be voted the greatest graphic novel of all time by convention goers.

Based on various emails, Twitters, and text message received by Future Mr. Beat, it also seems that great deals of alcohol were consumed at the show. Tony Lee has more on the show as a whole, not just the drinking.

§ As for Mid-Ohio, moved to the early October time slot by new owners after a long run as the post-Thanksgiving con, it went well, Mark Evanier reports:

Everyone seems to have had a good time at this year’s Mid-Ohio Con here in Columbus, Ohio…which is where I’m blogging from as we speak. This has always been one of the friendliest comic/s-f/media conventions around and its new proprietors are continuing that tradition. I didn’t hear a bit of industry news here — it’s not that kind of convention — but I sure got to see and talk with a lot of great people…especially yesterday when I interviewed the great Joe Kubert for an hour. Joe has been drawing comics since John McCain was in knee pants and it’s warming to hear that he still enjoys doing it. I did Joe the great favor of not giving him the big hug and a kiss that Sergio sent for him.

Lurid.com has a Mid-Ohio Con photo gallery, most centered around artist P. Craig Russell, such as the above shot of him and Chris Claremont.

§ Meanwhile, FallCon was also fun, based on a few online reports we glanced at. We randomly chose Matt Schuler’s blog to quote, and he got his picture taken with Alex Niño.

Fall-con is finished, and it was another fun one to attend. I got to meet a ton of new people, and got to catch up with some that I have talked to before. One of the ‘great’ moments of the convention was the talk I had with Alex Nino, who is pictured above.

“And…here our troubles began…”

Photo by Brian Heater. Soon after this photo was taken, one man involved was battling explosive diarrhea, another was nauseous, and yet a third had a Cúchulainn-like gout of blood spurting from his nose. We have to give a call-out to Jah Furry’s cat-like survival instincts: after a bite or two of a biscuit, the techniques taught him by an ancient Navajo shaman kicked in, warning him that to finish it would mean total incapacitation for at least 18 hours, as well as chronic dropsy for the rest of his natural life. The Beat? The Beat is okay because we had stuck with an actual Waffle, which had a seemingly lower lard content than anything else on the menu. We don’t know how you people live, we really don’t.

Anyway, aside from the Waffle House disaster, our trip to SPX was fine and dandy. Many comics purchased, many old friends seen, much news exchanged, many songs sung. More in the next post!

But before we do, welcome aboard to the new Beat Intern, Aaron Humphrey, who lives on the other side of the world in Australia, but is doing our events calendar to get warmed up before he does great things for the world.