The Comics Reporter

February 9, 2012

Go, Look: Cody, Part One

posted 3:40 am PST | Permalink

Missed It: Ali Ferzat Joins Coalition Of Artists On Syrian Statement

Ethan Heitner caught this English translation of a letter that was published in Le Monde from a coalition of Syrian artists, including the cartoonist Ali Ferzat. The fact that a picture of Ferzat after his beating at the hands of pro-government thugs adorns the top of that letter in its reprinting gives an idea as to how prominently the Sakharov Prize winner is featured in the promulgation of that statement. His is one of the primary signatures. It's a powerful statement, even translated.

posted 3:35 am PST | Permalink

Go, Look: Puddle Complex

posted 3:30 am PST | Permalink

Go, Read: Kiel Phegley at CBR Talks To Marvel's Dan Buckley

Today's mainstream comics executive taking the major interview plunge is Marvel Publisher Dan Buckley, who talks to Kiel Phegley in this first of a planned two-parter over at CBR. I think it's a much better showing from Buckley than similar pieces I can recall from 2009 and 2010. I've been joking elsewhere about that site's employment of the word "exclusive" with italics as a sales point in presenting the interview, but I think it's sort of worth noting in serious fashion, too. That the leading comics news site is using the occasion of this kind of interview to draw distinctions between itself and its competitors -- that it's splitting the interview into two parts even -- underlines the fact that such interviews aren't only important for their content and the exchange of ideas but as items through which Marvel and the people that score such interviews do business.

Phegley does a nice job of beating on Marvel with the DC stick; you could make a joke that the interviewer sounds like he's dating Marvel's competitor its recent successes come up so frequently. Buckley does his best work trying to convince that Marvel cutting its line and emphasizing top titles by doing more than 12 issues a year with certain comics is a strategic move designed to best serve the nature of today's market; this not only justifies those strategies but helps explain away recent perceived Marvel slippage as a failure by the company to enact such strategies as effectively as they should. Buckley also has a nice line about Marvel's output vs. DC's output, although I wasn't aware that anyone was really suggesting Marvel was out-publishing DC on an eight to five ratio. The publisher's display of patience with Marvel's strategy of simply telling the stories it wants to tell as best as it can tell them, in trusting the content to bear Marvel through whatever relatively tough times exist, will likely buttress the spirits of some and deflate hopes a few others may have had that Marvel has a strategic or infrastructure-related ace or two up its sleeve.

Buckley is much less persuasive when it comes to articulating some of the details and implications of general Marvel strategy. I imagine there's a fine line to walk between extolling the virtues of a company's willingness to try a variety of digital strategies and looking like a company is just flinging stuff at the wall to see what sticks; Buckley does not make it any easier to see that line. If character death isn't a specific plot/sales point with grim implications and a limited shelf life but just another storytelling-driven outcome among many, what are the other storytelling points that worked the same way as Marvel killing off two of its prominent characters in 2011? Because I don't remember that media coverage or those sales bumps. At what point is focusing on major titles and giving the market what it will bear smart strategy, and at what point is it an admission that Marvel no longer has the ability it once had to shape the market in a way that serves a broader range of publishing goals, long-term plans, and character development aims? Gabriel also doesn't have a convincing answer for the price-point issue beyond the usual "hey, those comics we do that with sell, man" take, which I suggest doesn't take into account all the ways pricing your material at a higher point can have long-term effects on the marketplace and a specific company's place within it.

posted 2:40 am PST | Permalink

Go, Look: Some Primetime Whiz Comics Art

posted 2:35 am PST | Permalink

That Upcoming Heritage Comics Auction Does Look Pretty Amazing

It's hard for me to imagine that I'll be running every breathless update sent along by the PR people in charge of hyping the forthcoming comics art auction at Heritage, but a look at the event page does reveal it to be a pretty amazing collection of offerings from a broad range of comics-makers. I lack the context as to whether or not I can describe it as the greatest such auction ever -- I like to imagine there was some sort of super art auction in 1974 attended solely by Wimbledon Green types and lost to cultural memory -- but it's certainly considerable and worth a poke around if you haven't yet. Some of the art even seems affordable according to current bids, if you can picture yourself as the kind of person with lots of money to spend on original comics art. I don't think I've seen this bit of Kirby art before, and this piece is certainly a show-stopper.

posted 2:30 am PST | Permalink

Go, Look: More Jacky's Diary

posted 2:25 am PST | Permalink

The Never-Ending, Four-Color Festival: Cons, Shows, Events

By Tom Spurgeon

* it's mostly about guest lists this week.

* love this special guest list for the forthcoming convention in New Delhi.

* that is a stellar initial special guest list for the Alternative Press Expo in October. That could be all the special guests -- it could be all the guests, period -- and it would be a show worth attending. I believe APE is opposite the New York Comic-Con this year, which is interesting in that while the NYCC has enjoyed a lot of success with the number of attendees they attract, elements like British comics-makers taking the relatively short hop across the Atlantic and generally with New York-area publishing companies and pros, it's never found significant traction with alt-comics. They would likely disagree with this, and New York is going to attract some work and cartoonists of this type just by virtue of being in New York, but the two NYCC shows I've attended I could have been in and out in 10 minutes if seeing alt-comics were my only reason for attending. So I think there's room for both shows that weekend.

* Small Press Expo announced Dan Clowes and Chris Ware for their September show.

* Comic-Con International released its Annual last week, which means their special guests are solidified.

* there's not a lot out there that isn't guest lists, at least not that I'm seeing: here's a piece about the recent show in New Orleans that seems to suggest there's a natural relationship between comics being great and people wanting to dress up like comics characters, which I don't think is automatically true, but would endorse were it to become a general principle applied to all things. Also, something terrible happened to an English-style phone booth at Angouleme.

* finally, the hotel lottery for Comic-Con International goes live on March 29. Most people seemed to like how things worked out last year. I slept through it. Happiness is having a room in advance. Also: warm puppy.

posted 2:20 am PST | Permalink

If I Were In Portland, I'd Go To This

posted 2:15 am PST | Permalink

Forthcoming Comics-Related Events, This Month And Next

Go, Look: The Art Of Dan Clowes: Modern Cartoonist Preview

posted 2:05 am PST | Permalink

Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* Gabrielle Bell is selling posters at quite the bargain price.

* here's a bunch of information on what John Carter-related comics have been collected, giving me another chance to run this awesome John Carter image from Jesse Marsh.

* Johanna Draper Carlson on Princess #4. Greg McElhatton on Blabber Blabber Blabber. Todd Klein on BPRD: 1946 and BPRD: The Warning. Rob Clough on Pornhounds 2.

* not comics: I don't play role-playing games but me wanty.

* Michael Cavna talks to Stan Lee. Frederik Hautain talks to Robert Venditti. Vaneta Rogers talks to JH Williams III and Amy Reeder. Alex Dueben talks to Nate Powell.

* not comics: a very high-profile gig for Seth.

* Daryl Cagle editorializes about the "New York Times Wants Cartoons But Only If They Get Them Cheap" story.

* I don't know, Jessica, I can dream a lot of Birdseye Bristoe.

* whoa, Simon Gane.

* this discussion between Jog and Douglas Wolk is lengthy, indulgent and kind of awesome. There's even a mini-discussion of DC's recently-announced publishing initiative that's as good as anything that's been put out there about it.

* finally, a tiny bit of shelf porn. More like a Shelf Showtime Original Series, really.

posted 2:00 am PST | Permalink

Happy 58th Birthday, Jo Duffy!

posted 1:00 am PST | Permalink

Happy 53rd Birthday, David B.!

posted 1:00 am PST | Permalink

Happy 50th Birthday, Sarah Byam!

posted 1:00 am PST | Permalink