Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* let me join my voice with Milton Griepp's in a call for the best digital numbers we can get from the various publishing companies. If nothing else, it's a hedge against publicity that overstates or lies.

* Martin Wisse writes about the Henry Pym character, an original Marvel Comics superhero universe character (the 1960s universe) that at one point was saddled with a wife-beater storyline and has ever since been stuck with that portrayal as a kind of baseline. The mechanism of writers returning to the most potent characterization even if that characterization kind of sucks balls as a recurring portrayal (Wisse says positive things about the initial storyline) is an interesting one to me. I'm also kind of intrigued by the fact that no one has found anything else to do with that character that's resonated with fans since... maybe the Thomas/Roth Goliath-At-Ten-Feet era? Yow. It's weird, too, in that growing really big is one of those pure wish-fulfillment superhero powers, and has an element of poignancy for over-tall kid readers. As I get older, I kind of enjoy the characters that never quite take -- the Nighthawk character that Marvel does sometimes is another one.

* Daryl Cagle reprints a Penn State-related cartoon from Mike Keefe that apparently caused some controversy when it ran in that university's student newspaper. This is hardly the point of that post, but I always think it's a little weird when a student newspaper runs syndicated material.

* Sean Gaffney on Twin Spica Vol. 10. Erica Friedman on Dolltopia. David P. Welsh on Only Serious About You Vol. 1.

* this John Hodgman interview about comics is a lot of fun. It sort of focuses on DC Comics' New 52 initiative, but it goes a lot of different places. Hodgman is like a lot of adult readers of comics in that he likes a wide range of material and doesn't really differentiate between this kind of comic and that kind of comic. It's a very early '80s attitude, in a way, when the rise of the alt-comic was seen by many fans as this incredible opportunity to read more comics hitting a different kind of material. The notion that some comics threaten other comics just by existing -- as opposed to publishing tactics that really do cross the line -- is a silly one in a lot of ways.

* hey, it's the first holiday-buying list that's not also a top comics of the year list.

* Chris Sims talks about Rob Liefeld's advice on how to deal with criticism. I think there's probably a difference between the kind of criticism that is "I don't like the way you draw Captain America with the boobies and such" and the kind of criticism that is more like "I think you contributed to the destruction of people's businesses through your lax publishing practices," but I can't really tell how deeply Sims -- or, for that matter, Liefeld -- get into the various kinds of criticism Liefeld has received.

* the man who stole a bunch of Superman memorabilia from a mentally disabled man received six years in prison after pleading guilty to the crime.

* George Tramountanas talks to Rick Remender. Steve Sunu talks to Marc Guggenheim. Tim O'Shea talks to Jim Gibbons.

* over at Comic Riffs, Michael Cavna compares and contrasts the cartoon work about the Occupy movement done by Nate Beeler and Susie Cagle.

* the writer Graeme McMillan expresses love for Dynamite, mostly as a place where mainstream talent perhaps slightly out of favor can find work. In a more critical article, McMillan shakes his head in disbelief that with the cancellation of its title starring the character X-23, Marvel will have comics out there starring a female character. That's a weird thing. I think it says a bit about Marvel's culture, a bit about Marvel's target audience, and a bit about Marvel's inability to support titles that aren't hitting right in the middle of their sweet spot right now.

* Ward Sutton is having a really interesting career.

* finally, the writer Chris Claremont has donated his archives to Columbia University. That's nice. I know the fact that Stan Lee once devoted his archives to the University of Wyoming made my research into him a possibility, so hooray for anything that's a boon to future study.
 
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