Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* Variety has put its "Bags and Boards" blog up by the register, or whatever comics-shop metaphor applies, as the long-running (by comics blog standards) and high-profile, on-line effort has been terminated for financial reasons. Tom McLean is taking the column to its own site for the recent future, as he details in that final post. I hope that you'll all adjust your bookmarks, I wish Tom the absolute best in his effort's next phase, and I look forward to linking to his articles there.

* there's nothing to say about it more than "there it is," but I liked this story about a father and son taking a long trip to meet Don Rosa.

* a few of you have sent me this long, rambling look at the X-Men that focuses on their late-'70s/early-'80s Golden Age without being rigidly locked into continuity issues as an aesthetic measure. I'm not sure I believe every assertion made here -- I think there's probably more to say about Wolverine's ascension from supporting character to crossover superstar, for instance -- but if you can stomach the loose format and really like those comics, it might be worth your time to use the piece to muse on what is really an unlikely success story, even by comics standards.

* not comics: a summary as to where the legal battle over the forthcoming Watchmen film stands right now.

* for some strange reason I've been forgetting to roll out the birthday posts on the web site. So a belated happy birthday to Rian Hughes (1963), Guy Davis (1966), Jill Thompson (1966), Stephanie Gladden (1969), Terry Gilliam (1940), Roy Thomas (1940), David Wenzel (1950) and Ron Randall (1956).

* speaking of birthdays, my friend Rich Tommaso had a birthday the other day, but I couldn't post anything because I don't have a birth date for Rich. Happy Belated Birthday, Rich. I really do need a birth date. I mean, I'm sure both Roy Thomas and Terry Gilliam are swell guys and I'd wish each of 'em a happy birthday if Roy and I worked out in the same gym and Terry went to my church, but for CR I'm more interested in the fact that they're the same age, and how that makes me perceive each career.

* this appraisal of the late, great Saul Steinberg's gifts sure doesn't waste any words.

* I found this profile of Kenji Ando fascinating for how it deals with the total lack of an oppositional journalism vein in reporting on Japan's manga industry to the point where the arrival of someone trying to get a few questions answered who is willing to ask these questions in a pretty straight-forward way seems freakishly bizarre.

* this headline made me laugh. Also it's funny how odd serial comics publishing sometimes sounds when you try to describe it these days.

* in we are all hurtling towards the abyss news, Craig Thompson remembers working on Goodbye, Chunky Rice ten years later. Eddie Campbell softens a potentially similar blow by becoming slightly unstuck in time remembering his personal history with Dave Gibbons.

* finally, I'm not sure how on earth any interview this Fall with the great Art Spiegelman could be said to be exclusive, but this is one of the better ones in the recent run, and I appreciate any interview these days that takes the time to use the profile format as opposed to the Q&A. One thing that's fascinating about Spiegelman's conception of comics is how ingrained it is within the publishing model he chose, whereas a lot of cartoonists seems to operate not exactly in opposition but very much oblivious to how that work is eventually presented.
 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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