- To follow up on my statement the other day regarding customers unfamiliar with the concept of multiple covers, I bring you this from Saturday:
“Hey, this comic has two different covers. That’s weird…I’ve never seen that before!”
And I assure you, that wasn’t sarcasm. And he’s been buying comics from us for a while.
It’s a little reassuring, actually, that there are still comic fans who don’t worry overly much about the publishers’ marketing gimmicks. Sometimes I forget, since I have to look at and deal with these things pretty much every day, that not everyone is totally plugged into every single aspect of the industry.
- I don’t buy DVDs much anymore, since setting up a Netflix mail-rental account (though of late, it seems like my local post office sits on my movies for about a week before finally getting around to delivering them to me…but that’s another story). However, after talking about Superman Returns with a customer of mine on Saturday (hi, Glenn!), I realized that, regardless of whatever storytelling problems and quirks the movie had, the sheer beauty of the film, along with some stunning set pieces (like the plane rescue) made this a film I’d like to own.
So, yeah, I bought it…the two-DVD set that came with the little metallic-silver covered booklet detailing the character’s history (including the “post-Crisis” status of the character that’s becoming less and less valid as time goes on).
As for the movie itself, I reviewed it, kinda sorta, here, here, and here if you’re curious. Though I’d like to amend my statement about Luthor looking a bit like Smallville‘s Lionel Luthor during the museum heist…I now think he looks more like Snape from Harry Potter.
- Speaking of movies: after wondering whether or not Galactus was going to be in the Fantastic Four sequel, this article appears with the director apparently confirming that Galactus will indeed make an appearance. Curiously, the director says this:
“We haven’t finished the design of him/it so be careful about what you read and believe.”
Admittedly, I don’t know a whole lot about filmmaking, but with the movie opening in June, isn’t this cutting things a tad close? Though I seem to remember that Star Trek: The Motion Picture, I believe, was still putting final touches on the film’s effects almost until the absolute last minute, so this sort of thing probably isn’t uncommon. I’m sure one of you folks out there can set me straight.
When I was talking with pal Dorian about this at the shop on Saturday, it occurred to me that maybe some kind of William Castle-esque gimmick can be employed. Reed Richards, at some point in the film, can point offscreen and shout “Look out! It’s Galactus!” And then someone in a Galactus costume can run down one of the theatre aisles, shout “I HUNGER!” or something similar, and run back out again.
This is what goes through my head at work when I wait too long to take my lunch break.
- Pal Dorian pointed me in the direction of this Newsarama article detailing a DC panel at Wondercon. The only bit of information of note, at least to me:
“Will Swamp Thing go back to the original DCU? Didio: We ask every day. We really do.”
VERTIGO EDITORS! LET OUR SWAMP THING GO!
- Clue #1 that we have too much stuff at our store: selling a few thousand dollars’ worth of graphic novels to a library on Friday, and having the shelves look like hardly a dent was made in them. Well, except for the suddenly depleted Little Lulu section.
Clue #2 – Would you like to buy a full run of Dazzler? ‘Cause we got it. Multiple full runs of Dazzler, actually.
- One thing we’re not overstocked on is Amazing Spider-Man #252, the first appearance of the black costume. We acquired what can only be accurately described as “a royal buttload” of them a couple years back, but we’ve run through about 2/3rds of them in the last few weeks as folks snap them up in anticipation of the black costume’s appearance in the third Spider-Man movie. At least, I’m assuming that’s the reason.
- Been noticing this over the last few weeks: Wildstorm’s licensed horror titles (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, etc.) are just withering on the vine at our shop. Our orders are dropping so low on them, it’s almost not worth bothering. I wonder what’s more to blame: Avatar Press devaluing the properties when they had their mitts on them, or just general disinterest in these aging franchises? (Or maybe they’re just not very good, but I haven’t read them, so I hesitate to judge.) I do get people asking to poke through the back issues for these series, but invariably it’s just to look, not buy.
- I’m sorry, did I just see the Hulk with an dinosaur head coming out of his…
GAH!Photo totally stolen from Chris Karath, who has lots more large pics of this toy and the Apocalypse “Shape Shifter.”
sir-links-a-lot
Catching up.
Geez, this flu is still lingering, but when a man’s gotta blog, a man’s gotta blog, so let me at least address a few items here before I go wrap the drapery of my couch about myself again:
- A “good luck ‘n’ fare thee well” to pal Ian, who’s putting aside the weblogging thing in favor of paying writing work. Oh, sure, be like that, why don’t you.
Best wishes, buddy. Don’t forget the little people you’ve left behind!
- One thing about being sick is that you watch a whole lot of TV that normally you wouldn’t watch…I’d mentioned that I finally inflicted the Spawn movie on myself last week. Well, I also saw the Hulk movie again, for the first time since experiencing it in the theatre, and…you know, that’s not a bad movie. I’m not saying it’s perfect, not saying it’s the pinnacle of the genre…but this movie at least had the sense to have the Hulk fighting the army in the desert, which is like every ’70s Hulk comic I remember. There are moments of simple beauty, with the Hulk leaping through said desert, finding peace in the quiet of his own solitude. I like the relationships between the characters, I like the multiple-image inset-picture etc. (you know what I’m talking about, even if I can’t describe it properly) direction that resembles comic book pages, I like those two moments in the film when the Hulk speaks. Even the much-maligned climatic battle between the Hulk and Banner’s father didn’t bother me so much this time around.
That said, I could happily watch a two hour movie of the Hulk just fighting things and tearing up cities, without all that “character development” and “dramatic structure” you kids are into. Lowest common denominator? Yeah, probably.
- Okay, I just discovered via Chris’ podcast that Kevin Church has some unsettling domestic fantasies involving yours truly.
- Pal JP has been posting up a storm lately, but I wanted to point out the “Swamp Thing folk art” he found.
- THINGS I DON’T WANT CUSTOMERS TO ASK ME TO DO WHILE I’M AT WORK AND SICK:
1. Explain the Marvelman/Miracleman publishing history/ownership issues/legal brouhaha.
- For the three of you who missed the news: Fantagraphics to release the complete Walt Kelly’s Pogo. Another classic strip, given the complete, chronological reissuing, which is great news for classic strip fans. (One step closer to the complete U.S. Acres…keep your fingers crossed!)
- Pal Dorian got this close to Dolly Parton, and this time security didn’t have to drag him away. No, I’m not jealous, why do you ask?
- Whenever a superhero movie opens, the one thing we can depend on at the shop is repeated iterations of this question: “Have you seen it yet?” No need to identify what it is, of course…there’s a new superhero movie, we’re in a comic book store, what else could it possibly be? Sometimes when I’m asked this, if I feel like being a jerk, I’ll feign ignorance. “Why, whatever do you mean, good sir? Please, speak plainly!” I’ll retort, as I polish my monocle, glaring at the person over my bushy handlebar mustache.
This time around, though, when I was asked “did you see it,” I’d totally forgotten, in the fevered delirium of my illness, that the Ghost Rider film had opened. And that this was apparently, after conferring with Employees Aaron and Jeff, one of the two times this was asked of us since the film debuted. It’s not like we weren’t busy…we had a store full of people all weekend…but there was nearly no discussion of the film instigated by the clientele, unlike every other superhero movie opening weekend ever. Obviously, somebody saw the film, since it was the top moneymaker this weekend, but I guess our customers weren’t among those crowds. Either that, or the customers for once decided not to bring it up.
I did have one fellow looking for Ghost Rider comics for his four and five-year-old niece and nephew. The niece wanted Krypto, which I tried to sell the uncle on, but nope, Ghost Riders for everybody!
- Speaking of Ghost Rider, star Nicolas Cage ain’t happy about a crack made about his new film in Entertainment Weekly.
- So we have these comments from an interview with Fantastic Four star Ioan Gruffud:
AICN: I’m just going to ask: does Galactus play a role in this film?
Ioan Gruffud: Um…his presence is felt in the movie. He doesn’t physically appear, no. Galactus does have a form, doesn’t he, in the comic books?
AICN: Actually he has a really beautifully designed costume that Jack Kirby created. It’s a fairly elaborate costume actually with all sorts of machinations. When I first heard that the Silver Surfer would be in this second film and people were being a bit evasive about whether Galactus appeared, I’d assumed that the second film would set up the coming of Galactus, and that the actual confrontation with him would occur in the third film.
Ioan Gruffud: It’s more of a finite movie than the first one. It’s not open-ended in that sense. But Galactus doesn’t actually appear, so it does leave room for that possibility.
Compare with the quote from this interview with Fox chairman Tom Rothman (which I’d mentioned before):
“IESB: Is [Galactus] going to look like anything like we’ve seen him in the comic books?
TR: Yes, I think that Galactus, look, I don’t want to give away too much, right, but I will say this, Galactus will appear and fans will not be disappointed.”
WHY MUST HOLLYWOOD TOY WITH MY EMOTIONS? Just give me my planet-eating Galactus, you bastards!
A bad movie and some Stan Lee.
I made a reference in yesterday’s post to the new Fantastic Four movie hopefully being better than Eragon, which would imply that, yes, I did indeed inflict Eragon upon myself. I wrote a brief review of it for some pals, which was as follows:
“Boy, Eragon really wasn’t very good. I don’t think it could have been more predictable if I had a copy of the script with me and I was reading along. Totally generic by-the-numbers fantasy twaddle, and ends with a total lead-in to a sequel that will probably never come, which would be sad if anyone cared.”
And for some reason, the fact that the movie’s title is the word “Dragon” with an “E” instead of a “D” really irritates me, but that may just be free-floating hostility toward this film.
So, yeah, avoid at all costs. Which, it appears, most of you have been doing anyway.
Special “Stan Lee’s Birthday” news:
- More thoughts on the new Fantastic Four movie, this time from the Daytona Beach News-Journal:
“So who’s playing Galactus? No names on at IMdB. Maybe he’ll be CGed, although how cool would it be for Stan Lee to finally have a big part in a Marvel movie?”
- Comic book tie-in to Who Wants to Be A Superhero? to be released several months too late.
- Here’s an audio clip from NPR where Stan Lee discusses realism and superheroes.
- The Motley Fool discusses Marvel’s potential financial rise or fall, depending on the fortunes of their 2007 movie releases (most of which will feature Stan, natch).
- And, hey, did anything ever come of this? “Stan Lee and Ringo Starr Team to develop new superhero franchise – Ringo Starr to become evil-battling – yet reluctant – superhero.”
“‘Ringo is beloved worldwide for his commitment to people and his singular wit. Our Ringo Superhero character will combine these qualities, along with Ringo’s secret powers which people generally didn’t know about because he has kept them secret, until now,’ said Stan Lee, who also serves as POW’s Chief Creative Officer.
“‘What a blast this’ll be! Ringo Starr is one of the most colorful, creative guys I know. Between the two of us, we’ve cooked up enough wild ideas for music, humor, action and superhero surprises in our new animated project, featuring the rollicking, ringed and bearded Ringo, to keep the fans happy and excited for years to come,’ Stan Lee added.”
Because, honestly, this would be 100% fantastic.
Hey, Cully — there’s a link for you at the end.
Site update: I finally got around to thumbnailing images from a number of the last week’s posts (except for yesterday’s…I’ll give it another day or two). Hopefully you folks on the dial-up will now be able to load my page without having to start a new hobby or finish reading Spenser’s The Faerie Queene while waiting for the images to come up.
But, really, if it’s available in your area, get yourself some of that broadband connectivity. It’s not that much more expensive, and you’ll be able to download porn surf the web a heck of a lot faster.
In other news:
- I was planning on a post examining sales drop-offs on DC’s post-Infinite Crisis spin-off series, as I sort of had the feeling the series were experiencing some serious attrition. But, as I crunched the numbers, it looks like the drops were actually within expectations, generally 20-25% from the first to second issues across the board. The biggest dip I noticed was on 52, but again, not surprising, as that series is more of a commitment and thus easier for folks to decide to drop. 52 dropped by about 20% right away, and now has settled at a consistent 60% of the sales of that first issue.
On the same topic…our Irredeemable Ant Man sales dropped by 2/3rds between the first and second issues. Ouch.
- For no real good reason: an Internet Movie Database entry for an episode of Family Feud, featuring the cast of the ’60s Batman TV show versus the cast of Lost in Space. The actual entry has few details, but a commenting user relates his memories of the episode.
- New comics weblog with a great name: Comics Make No Sense. No, they certainly don’t. Just what the heck is Dr. Fate doing, anyway?
- Now I know this has been all over the comicsweblogosphere recently, and you all have seen it, but for some reason I received several e-mails over the last day or so sending me this link. So, once again, I’m posting this link solely for my pal Cully, as I’m the only comics weblog he reads. Hey, Cully: Jack Chick/Fantastic Four mash-up!
What did I learn this past week? That the people want Doctor Doom sex jokes. Holy frijole, I blew through some bandwidth right quick. Thanks to pal Andy (and everyone who gets their links from pal Andy) for the attention.
I’ve been pondering a theory regarding new comics for quite a while now, and I think it holds true for the most part. Let me know if you can come up with any exceptions:
The quality of a new comic book series is inversely proportionate to the amount of related “preview” books, sketchbooks, script and/or rough-pencilled page books, etc., that are released prior to that series’ debut.
Speaking of comic promos, I recently received an envelope in the store mail filled with promotional trading cards for a forthcoming comic book series. The accompanying letter stated that we were receiving these promo cards because fans in our local area were writing to the company and requesting that these cards be made available to them. And that, since there was such demand in our area, we should of course order lots of the comic in question to meet said demand.
Yeah, since I was apparently born yesterday, I’ll jump right on that.
Things I did at work on Saturday, while processing some inventory — idly making up scenarios for Marvel’s What If series:
“What if Daredevil became the Punisher, joined the Avengers, and fought Galactus during the Secret Wars?”
“What if the Fantastic Four were the Fantastic Fourteen?”
“What if Peter Parker had been bitten by a radioactive tongue-eating fish parasite?”
“What if Wolverine had been Lord of the Vampires during Inferno?” (Oh, wait, I didn’t make that one up.)
Confidential to pal JP: I wasn’t making up the “avenging the dead puppy” genre of war comics, honest! (I first saw this referenced in some fanzine or another, probably Amazing Heroes.)
For those of you who were worried (and I’m sure some of you were), Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #1 sales have finally picked up at our shop. Thank goodness…I’d hate to think one of the half-dozen or so Spidey titles on the shelves in any given month was a poor seller. That might indicate that, oh, I don’t know, that there were more Spidey titles than the market could support, or something.
Your casual dismissal of the comics industry for the day:
“You may think that gamers are much like comic book geeks. They are not. Games are a multi-billion dollar business, on par with other entertainment mediums.”
Ooh, harsh. (via Metafilter)
EDIT: To clarify my comments about the AC Comics’ Nightveil DVD…I wasn’t trying to be overly negative about it, and I hope I didn’t give anyone that impression. The movie does look like cheesy, low-budget fun, which is the best kind of fun, as I’m sure you’ll all agree. Congrats to the folk at AC for being able to pull together the resources to produce and release their own film.
1. Johanna has reported that her copy of the new Little Lulu volume from Dark Horse, Lulu Takes A Trip, has a few pages out of order. And, I’m sorry to report, my copy does as well. It seems unlikely that Dark Horse will recall all copies and issue corrected volumes…you all may have to wait for the second printing.
2. Scott Saavedra brings us Captain Marvel versus Captain Marvel. “Split!”
3. Dave at Yet Another Comics Blog has a Spider-Girl digest giveaway. You only have ’til March 11th to enter, so get cracking!
4. Beaucoupkevin, I command you…to continue making me laugh!
4a. Speaking of Galactus, here’s an overview of that epic meeting of Galactus and Dazzler. And here is some computer-generated fan art.
5. Spider-Man Dog Costume. “Images deemed reliable.”
How do you keep a comics fan in suspense?
The results of the Swamp Thing: Bad Seed contest will be announced on this very webpage tomorrow, and I will send notification e-mails out to the winners then. Thanks to everyone who entered, and thanks of course to Ringwood’s Ken Lowery for donating two extra copies of the book to give away.
In the meantime…links ahoy!
Laura “Tegan” Gjovaag has a contest of her own, and she’s giving away the Colonia: Islands and Anomalies trade paperback by Jeff Nicholson. Please visit her site for details…deadline is January 20th.
Just the other day Ryan Claytor of Elephant Comics dropped by our store, and we got on famously, so I’d thought I’d point you in the direction of his mini-comics. They’re all easily purchasable by PayPal, for your shopping convenience. His 24 Hour Comic Rock and Soul, available on his site, was also featured in the 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2004 book from Nat Gertler’s About Comics.
Congratulations to Scott Saavedra for finding the best New Year’s Day-related comics panel yet.
I’m not the world’s biggest manga fan, and yet this article I’ve been pointed to by several people really kept my attention: Abhay covers the work of Naoki Urasawa, a Japanese cartoonist whose work hasn’t made many inroads into the U.S.
A couple links to pal Ian: not only does he cover what may very well be my favorite Rick Veitch story, but this comments section for another post on his site delves into the nominees for…The Greatest Comic Book Cover of All Time.
The Superman V movie rumors site has…yup, you guessed it, rumors about Supes’ costume in the forthcoming film. Darker colors, “3-D” emblem. The article includes a link to a fan-made interpretation of said costume redesign.
1. For some reason, Diamond accidentally shipped us two Galactus statues today. How you’d accidentally ship two huge things like this, I have no idea…but they’re darn cool.
2. How you know you’ve lost control of your own weblog: there are multiple discussions on the virtues of Gorilla Grodd and super-pets going on in my comments sections.
3. I’ll have a more comprehensive overview of new funnybook day tomorrow, but in the meantime…finally, the first Little Lulu volume is out!
Sir Links-a-lot.
Via pal JP – Superhero Food Commercials! The Hawkman commercial is still a favorite of mine.
Spotted in The Sock Drawer – some slightly better cast pictures from the Fantastic Four movie. They’d better tape up the Thing’s left wrist…ouch! And the more I think about it, the more I wonder how they’re going to get away with Mr. Fantastic’s stretching power without the movie being laughed off the screen. Hoo boy.
This fellow has gone through DC’s Who’s Who series issue by issue, with commentary…starts here, continues here, here, here, here, and I’ll let you seek out the other entries. He also did the first five issues of the Official Handbook to the Marvel Universe here, here, here, here, and here (he completely has the right attitude about Galactus).
A website chock full of X-Men fan art and fan fiction…Disco Dazzler is my favorite, and the “Rogue KISS Doll” page hurts my head. There’s oh so much more, but it’ll feel like I’m picking on people if I keep pointing things out. Oh, and apparently X-Day is officially celebrated on September 23rd…I’d better get out my “Happy Belated X-Day” cards.
Milo George has reached Part the Hundredth of that darn Last Road Home. Somehow this has something to do with Endemic Treponematosis.
In the world of the Associated Comics And Pop Culture Webloggers of Ventura County, CA And Outlying Environs*, Pal Ian continues his look at the work of Howard Chaykin, this time focusing on Blackhawk, pal Corey has discovered a possible connection between the Hulk’s Leader and our own Fearless Leader, pal Dorian has a brief look at what is and is not selling at our shop (and also wishes boyfriend Pete a happy birthday — happy birthday, Peter!), pal Tom is watching TV until his eyeballs fall out, and pal Sean is on semi-hiatus as his impending marriage…um, impends, I guess.
Speaking of me and my pals, it appears that Yoko Ono is currently getting more votes than our little band of misfits in that “Who’s the Identity Crisis Killer?” poll on The Comic Treadmill. Ahem.
* As always, ACAPCWOVCCAOE for short.
Blogging! It’ll always be popular!
1. Pal Ian has started his own comics weblog (it’s all the rage, you know) over at Brill Building. It’s small now, but treat it with love and soon it will blossom.
2. Everyone’s seen that redialogued Spider-Man comic strip page that Warren Ellis linked on his site, so I’m not even gonna link it, even though I think it’s really funny in an extremely rude sort of way. So there.
3. Speaking of dirty words, Ringwood is back! Go visit the poor lad and drive his traffic stats back up.
4. This is the greatest Shadow comic book ever published:
The Shadow #19 (Jan 1989) – art by Kyle Baker
…so of course it got cancelled too soon. I think it was something about the Shadow’s owners objecting to their character’s treatment…can’t see why.