“Do you have that one comic? With the staples?”
So on Tuesday, someone came to the shop and asked “do you have that Superman comic with Clark Kent?”
…
I paused for a second. Probably blinked once or twice. “How in God’s name do I answer that question?” I thought. Just wave my hand in the general direction the back issue bins with all the Superman and Action comics and say “sure, pick one!”
And then I remembered seeing some reference that morning on the Twitter about Superman being in the news for…well, you can click on this if you want to see, if you don’t know already.
Anyway, being generally out of the news-cycle loop for the last couple of days was apparently a bad idea, and left me unprepared for this gentleman’s question, which, in fairness, wouldn’t have been too far off from some questions I’ve fielded over the years. But once I realized what he was talking about, I was able to assist him, let him know when the comic in question was due out, even offered to save a copy if he’d like.
And of course that got me to wondering if I’m going to see a rush on this title from the real-world news interest, but I guess I’ll find out when I go into the store today. Frankly, I’m not sure why this particular plot twist is “news” other than the self-reflexive commentary of “even Clark Kent sees the writing on the wall,” but given we just had a news cycle based around “GASP! Batman fights the Joker!” I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. However, I suppose the coverage of that sort of plot development is an improvement on the ol’ “THIS ISSUE, SOMEBODY DIES!” media stories, the returns of which have diminished quite considerably.
So we’ll see what happens with this Superman comic. But frankly, the news should be covering Maggie #1, the special Simpsons one-shot that features lots of work from Sergio Aragones, as well as Carol Lay, Mike Kazaleh, and other Folks of Note. But that’s just my opinion.
Enough of that…how ’bout this:
- Twitter pal Chris informs me of this short Swamp Thing vs. Man-Thing strip, which someone in the comments there felt compelled to correct, but it’s still pretty cool anyhow.
- …And then Reader Mike emailed me to let me know that cartoonist Jason and been Nancy ‘n’ Sluggo-ing it up on his site as of late. I mean, how does one even react to something like this with anything but sheer terror?
Sluggo CK!!
Genius.
Snake Sluggo and Magritte Nancy now haunt my every waking thought.
Love that man thing vs swampy comic!
I saw that Man-Thing/Swamp Thing picture last night and it immediately set off my Sterling Sense ™!
I once had a customer at my store ask me if we had any comics with “Batman vs. somebody.”
“Do you have that Swamp Thing comic? The one that Mike Sterling doesn’t have?”
“Do you have any comics that are four-color for a dime? … How much?!? Uhh… gotta go!”
— MrJM
“Do you have that comic with SUPERHEROES in it??”