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Okay, how would you describe the premise of Infinite Crisis to someone who doesn’t read comics? (I mean, aside from “nerds who worry too much about things that happened in comics 20 years ago get a series just for them.”)

Now I did enjoy Infinite Crisis, but then, I’m right there in that target audience (about the same age as its writer, Geoff Johns, and read all the same comics he did…plus, there’s the whole “worrying about things that happened in comics 20 years ago”). Plus, I’m a sad old DC fanboy and am thus a sucker for events like this. However, I’ll admit that IC may be a challenge to summarize.

Commenter Dwight gave it a shot:

“Twenty years ago, reality got hard-rebooted. Now, a few survivors of those who had to make that reboot happen in the first place have decided they’re not happy with the results, so they’re gonna do it again. Mayhem ensues.”

Per Bully’s suggestion, I’d replace “reboot” with, I don’t know, “rebuilt?” “Restructured?”

How about

“Twenty years ago, the shared DC Universe was rebuilt from the ground up. Now, a few survivors, left out of the new restructured reality despite helping it come about, have decided they’re not happy with the results, so they’re gonna do it again. Mayhem ensues.”

That still uses fan-concepts like “shared universe,” but I don’t think that’s too bad.

You folks have any ideas?

Shirts and other short bits.

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Found in an old t-shirt catalog:


You wore this shirt design, didn’t you? ADMIT IT.

I’ll give Marvel’s Civil War series this: it’s a lot easier to explain to the uninitiated than Infinite Crisis.

“What’s Civil War about?”

“There’s a superhero-related disaster that kills a lot of people, which causes the government to step in and attempt to regulate the heroes, which then divides said heroes into two camps…for regulation and against.”

“What’s Infinite Crisis about?”

“Well, when DC’s multiverse was collapsed down to a single universe as a result of Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Superman of Earth-2 and his wife, Lois Lane, the Superboy from Earth-Prime, the son of Lex Luthor from Earth-3 survived, but return to the modern DC universe to….”

“Whoa, hold on, I think my nose is bleeding.”

Pal The Ferrett, inspired by that discussion I found, poses a question of his own: which superhero has the largest…er, manhood?

Ever get the feeling that arguing about comics is like two crocodiles fighting over a rapidly evaporating stagnant pond at the height of an African summer?

Thank goodness for the Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes comic, so that I have at least one Supergirl comic on the stands that young girls would be interested in. Because it sure as heck isn’t the regular series.

And yes, that means I have young girls buying Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes at our store.

The thought occurred to me that Marvel’s Sentry character is similar in some respects to DC’s ’90s character Triumph, in that they were both past superheroes forgotten by the rest of the heroes in their respective universes, and reintroduced into modern continuity…but it looks like Wikipedia beat me to it. Darn, and here I was thinking I was all clever and insightful and stuff.

Via the godfather of comics-weblogging, Neilalien, comes Peanuts characters drawn as Marvel characters. This one is my favorite:


In a similar vein, here is the Battlestar Galactica cast as the Simpsons, which has already been posted on every weblog ever, but there’s the link anyway.

Just some random stuff I’ve listed on the eBay.

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So I have on my hard drive a folder filled with thousands of scans of items that I’ve listed on the eBay over the years…no, I have no idea why I still have them either, but you never know when you might need a scan of a Transformers comic pre-pack:

This next photo is a tad blurry, so you’re just gonna have to take my word that on this pair of X-Men holographic glasses, Wolverine is facing off against the Juggernaut…or something like that, anyway. Nothing says “cool” like a pair o’ these:

Several years ago, we had one of these figures opened up at the store…”I’ve got claws, I can use them” was a catchphrase around the shop for perhaps a little too long:

You know, as promotional freebie gifts go, a flimsy little foil sticker is kinda lame:

Rob Liefeld’s 7-inch Shaft…old joke, still funny:

And now…10-INCH GIANT MAUL:

Sigh…once again, I apologize in advance.

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Surely the person who started this thread knew it wasn’t going to end well:

“not trying to be gay or anything…. “

“….but has anyone else noticed that on the blue beetle cover #2* his ‘package’ so to speak seems to…. stand out……..”

“It’s okay, most men check out the competion at the gym. Or urinal. Or comic book cover,”

“No I think both of you guys are gay. I don’t check out other ‘men’ at the urinal or at the gym. Non of my male friends check out other ‘men’ at the urinal or the gym. As a matter of fact, the idea to check out any part of another man’s body has never occurred to me. So my guest is you are both gay. Well maybe not the first guy who might have noticed it by accident. That is to say without looking at the cartoon’s package. The second guy who defended the idea of looking at a cartoon and taking a peep at the guy next to you at the urinal. The second guy is gay.”

“don’t believe you and i think you might be gay as you seem very afraid of it.”

“No I never have. I went to catholic school we had a gym locker. I showered next to other guys in school. I never looked at another guys joint. […] The idea of looking comparing or whatever gay term you want to use for checking out a guys package has never been in my head. But, I grew up in Brooklyn N.Y. I guess other parts of the world are naturally more gay.”

“Dude- you are so gay. How much time do you spend thinking about how Not Gay you are? Couple hours a day?”

Okay, back to the topic at hand:

“I think it is a codpiece. I haven’t looked at it myself, but a lot of armor designs have codpieces to protect men’s bits and intimidate the enemy. It is sort of like an athletic supporter with a cup inside of it. It is most likely part of Blue Beetle’s armor/exoskeleton that protects his bits from being kicked or punched.”

“i looked at the cover and the costume is not thin enough bec. i cannot see the 2 balls distinctly bec. i am quite sure there should be”

“Maybe the new Blue Beetle is the new gay character? Or he could be the DC counterpart to Spider-Man who makes people gay by looking at him?”

“i think the gay community can give dc artists some advice on how to draw the bulges on a gay superhero to avoid adding any more art mistakes to the many in infinite crisis 1-7.”

“I have the utmost faith in Phil Jimenez as both artist and consultant when it comes to package design.”

THE TRUTH REVEALED:

“i just made a topic based on a friends observation because i figured someone would get a laugh out of it, but guess this has turned into the psychology of being gay class, its very odd…..but hey who am i complaining its kinda funny seeing the reactions of evryone on this board”

The final word:

“Frankly, I think you’re ALL gay.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

PLEASE DON’T FEED THE FETISHIST – found while forum-hopping…no link, it’s pretty much just this:

“I was just wondering if anyone can post a scan of supergirl using her frost/super breath if not how about her eye beam?”

* The final printed version covers the area in question.
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So Employee Nathan was putting away this comic today:


…when he pointed out the slightly peculiar wording used in this particular blurb:


…which immediately reminded me of this:


“Flash and Green Lantern face their greatest challenge in…‘The Mouthwatering Menace of Mutual Cannibalism!’ (Story: Gardner Fox / Art: Gil Kane & Sid Greene)”

I ain’t scared of no weekly comical book.

filed under Categories this week's comics

Your out-of-context quote from new comics day:

“Devo sweat? You’re soaking in it!”

Okay, so it was I who dared to say such a thing, while I was reminiscing with pal Tom about how I saw Devo during their first reunion tour in the late ’80s. I was pressed up against the dead center of the stage, with Mark Mothersbaugh flinging his Devo sweat right upon me. AND I NEVER SHOWERED AGAIN.

Anyway, back to comics:

Kid Chris speaks briefly about that comic book-themed UCLA radio show he was on yesterday morning. I only got to listen to it for about half an hour, just long enough to hear pal Ian‘s call and his vain attempts to get a word in edgewise what with all the excitable college students and uncooperative equipment. Plus, I heard Kid Chris totally slam Swamp Thing. Hey, Chris, remember that “former employee discount” you used to have….?

Oh, relax, Kid Chris fans, I’m just joshin’ him. Maybe.

52 #1 – Well, here we go, the first installment of the next year of your comics-readin’ life. I do like the idea of a weekly comic, and this issue is a strong start, with a nice interweaving of several characters and plotlines (and a cameo appearance by Mr. Mind, a fave of mine). Nice art, strong creative team, interesting concept…I think there’s a danger of some weekly-comic fatigue from the fans after a few months, though, particularly from the people who don’t want to still be thinking about the impact of Infinite Crisis nine months after the fact.

But I’m not some ordinary, weak-kneed, lily-livered comics fan. You think a weekly comic can break me? Bring it, suckas.

Quick shots:

Mad Magazine #466 – Since Stephen Colbert has been in the public eye of late, I thought I should note that the new ish of Mad contains screenshots and a transcripts of The Colbert Report‘s birthday tribute to Fold-In master Al Jaffee.

Angel Spotlight: Illyria – A sorta sad and quiet issue, um, aside from the action scenes, nicely written by Peter David.

Spike: Lost and Found – An improvement on the last one-shot, which was pretty crappy, with a story more of interest to longtime fans, regarding a second Gem of Amarrah. Don’t worry if you don’t know what that means…I do, but then I’m a professional nerd.

Last Planet Standing #1 – Employee Nathan pointed out Galactus’ use of the term “Final Solution” in this comic, which we all agree seems like kind of a bad idea.

Will Eisner’s John Law: Angel’s Ashes Devil’s Dust #1 – No comment about the contents…just wanted to say I got a real Kitchen Sink Press vibe off the way this comic looks.

Crisis on Multiple Earths Vol. 4 – More crazy JLA/JSA team-ups, including one that throws in the Legion of Super-Heroes too. They better have given artist Dick Dillin hazard pay for that story.

You know, doing these really brief comments about various comics make me want to do another discussion of every comic that comes out in a single week (here’s the last time I did it). But then I wait a while, and the feeling eventually goes away.

In other news:

E.C. Segar’s Thimble Theatre is being rereleased in hardcover. GOOD. I missed Fantagraphics’ reprinting the first time around (though I’ve been able to borrow and read ’em). Six affordable volumes, which I think are going to reprint the whole run…this is good news. Tom Spurgeon promises more info, so watch this space. Or, rather, Tom’s space.

Via pal Dorian:

BUY ME THIS:*


It’s a freakin’ Grumpy prop from Land of the Lost. If you buy me this, I’ll be your special internet friend. (But not with “benefits” — sorry, Kevin.)

* You don’t really have to buy me this. Honest. I’m not legally responsible if you spend several thousand dollars on this item to send to some guy you’ve never met, just because he told you to do so on his stupid weblog.

It’s…(sniff)…it’s okay.

Another look at Marvel Super Heroes POGs.

filed under Categories pogs

Well, a good chunk of them are just pictures of the characters, with their logos:

Then there are a handful of group shots:

Some group shots are “themed,” such as “Brusiers” (with Hulk, Venom, and the Thing), or “Fire ‘N Ice” (Human Torch and Iceman), or this one, featuring a skull motif:

This one brings up some vague memories of the Great POG Scare of the early ’90s, particularly that the “skull” POGs were considered more desirable, for some reason. Or maybe I’m confusing them with the “poison” POGs (not to be confused with these guys)…or maybe the skull POGs and the poison POGs were the same thing. I don’t remember. I don’t really want to remember.

At any rate, the themes get a little strained, like this one:

Because, you see, the Thing is rocky, and Ghost Rider…rolls, I guess, since he has a motorcycle. ROCK AND ROLL, DUDE.

And there are quite a few POGs that just have logos:

The sample pack we opened was primarily just logo POGs.

All those images above were taken from a promo poster we were sent a few days back, by the way. I’m half-tempted to put it up in the store just to see customer reactions: “No, not POGs! Not again! Nooooooooo-“(deep breath) “-ooooooooo!”

I think this attempted POG collectible revival may be about five-to-ten years too early for the typical 20-year “nostalgia gap” that most things like this seem to have. Assuming, of course, there will be nostalgic interest in these at any point in the future…most of my customers who had bought them as young’uns seem embarrassed by it now, and in my case, I’m embarrassed that I even sold them here at the shop.

Given that the superhero trading card market is fairly moribund (it primarily consists of people not buying new cards, but trying to sell their old Marvel sets to us and being surprised that they’re not worth much of anything now), I don’t think the tangentially-related superhero POG market is going to take off. Unless, of course, they sell it as a gaming item (since there is a game of sorts associated with POGs, mainly involving throwing things at other things) to the kids buying the Yu-Gi-Oh collectible card game and the like, but even the CCG market sorta looks like it’s slowing down.

POGs. Geez, of all the things I thought I’d never have to deal with again….

Free Comic Book Day 2006 – The Final Chapter.

filed under Categories free comic book day

Some final comments on this year’s Free Comic Book Day:

I’ve had a few reports show up in my comments sections from over the weekend (1, 2) which make me very glad things went as smoothly as they did our store. Commenter Jamie in particular has my sympathies, judging from his description of how his local event went, with people grabbing comics out of kids’ hands and loud, obnoxious people driving out other paying customers.

Fortunately, we also didn’t have any problem with people assuming everything was free and walking out with a pile of, say, the new Infinite Crisis. We avoided that problem by setting up a couple big tables right by the front door, spreading out all the FCBD books, and having the people manning those tables let people know as soon as they walk in the door “hey, all the free comics are right here.” And, as in past years, we divided the comics into three age groups – kids, teens, and grown-ups – and packed the comics into color-coded bags. Kids got the bag with all the kids comics, teens got the teen bag and the kid bag, and adults got all three. Thus, no panic grabbing…comics were handed out in an orderly fashion, and if people didn’t want all the comics, they could pick and choose off the tables.

I had a question from someone asking if our business improved for that day…business as in “taking in money,” not just “warm bodies milling about the store,” and the answer is, yes, sales were up for that day. I know that wasn’t the case for everybody, particularly those stores afflicted with the magpies who just want to grab the free stuff because it’s free. However, we had enough new faces come in the door that day who took a look around the shop and found items that they hadn’t been exposed to before and just had to buy. For example, we had that boxed set of DC Direct Justice League action figures that had been kicking around the shop for a while…a dad came in with his kids, saw the set, thought that was just the neatest thing he’d ever seen, and purchased it for his children. We had another fellow who used FCBD as an opportunity to finally come in and ask about work by Los Bros. Hernandez and Dan Clowes…and came back the very next day to use one of our discount coupons to buy one of Clowes’ books.

I know there is some concern as to whether or not FCBD actually does anything to generate new comic book readers to any sizeable extent, and the only real answer is “I don’t know.” Like Tim says, there is no industry-wide method of keeping track of new customer influx aside from, say, someone like me noticing a fellow like the guy who came back and bought a Dan Clowes book. And maybe, in the short run, no, the industry as a whole may not get a whole lot of new converts to the cause, but if we got a couple, certainly there must be a few more, somewhere. At the very least, FCBD does the job of increasing the general public’s awareness of comic books. I don’t think I’ve had the comment of “oh, comic books, they still make these?” in quite a while.

Even if it doesn’t bring in a lot of new people, there’s still the chance that, as I’ve noted in the past, regular customers will be exposed to comics they wouldn’t otherwise have tried. Queen & Country and Courtney Crumrin benefited from FCBD in previous years. It’s too soon to say which will be the breakout title this year…but it better be Owly. That was my favorite from this new batch.

Another question I had was just how much it would cost a retailer to participate. Well, the minimum buy-in is $5 worth of each Gold Sponsor book, for a total of $50 (which, assuming an average cost of about 25 cents, gives you 200 comics to give away). That doesn’t sound like a whole lot, which can make people wonder how some stores can claim they can’t afford to participate. I certainly thought that, until I considered something. Say you’re a store, and you bought the minimum number of books. You have 20 copies each of 10 different books that you’re going to give away on FCBD. If you have 200 people show up at your store, you’re either going to have to give everyone just one free comic (which will make most of the customers complain) or you can give 50 people four copies each, or 20 people one of each comic…or however you do it, you’re gonna run out in short order. So, realistically, you’re going to have to order way above the minimum…which may then be cost-prohibitive for smaller stores with smaller budgets. At least, I hope that’s the reasoning behind the folks who say it costs too much, and not “Fifty bucks!? Why, that’s seventy-two and a half 69-cent tacos! Forget it!”

We always order lots of extras, especially on the kid-friendly books, as we continue to use them throughout the year. I’m still giving away copies of Teen Titans Go from…was it last year? I don’t remember. Anyway, I’m still giving them to kids who come in the store, along with the Disney books, and they’re almost always well received. Plus, when our local libraries make their regular comic purchases from us, we also donate a bunch of the FCBD comics to them as well. And my girlfriend gives them away to the kids she teaches at Sunday school…we get plenty of mileage on the FCBD books all year long.

So was it a success? Well, we gave away a lot of comics, made a bunch of people happy, made some money, and hopefully got a new customer or two out of it. In the long run, that’s good for business, even if in the short run, it looks like it made only a small impact on expanding the customer base. It takes small steps, sometimes.

That was a lot to plow through, so here, have a panel of Linus JUST SAYING NO:


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