I’m still interested in any reports or articles on European comic conventions as well as news on new and collected comics from Europe.
If you can help or want to promote a convention in 2008 or 2009 please get in touch.
T
Everyone knows that I am a major fan of Invincible. And I’ve been telling everyone just how good Image Comics are for at least ten years. War Heroes sold out and now..well,I’ll let Image tell you [but the story is somewhat given away by the news title]:
PRESS RELEASE - THE ALL-NEW, ALL-AWESOME INVINCIBLE ALL SELLS OUT!
The new era of Invincible begins with a distribution level sell out!
31 July 2008 - The brand-new era of INVINCIBLE began with a nearly instantaneous sell out at the distribution level and a new printing is on the way.
“It’s tradition for the issue after a milestone like fifty to taper off, but it certainly wasn’t the case here,” said Kirkman. “In fact, the combination of INVINCIBLE’s new costume, new sidekick and the totally kick-ass cover by Jim Lee made this the best selling issue yet. Having this sell so well after we blew through issue fifty showed me the series is healthier than its ever been.”
After the status quo was completely shattered in the fiftieth issue, Kirkman and series artist Ryan Ottley rebuilt the character from the ground up, giving him an entirely new direction which acted as the perfect jumping on point for readers unfamiliar with the book while giving longtime fans what they’ve always wanted, right down to the spine-tingling cliffhanger. While a very limited amount of the original printing may still be available in your local comic book shop, Image will be releasing a second printing featuring an homage to the series’ very first issue by Ottley.
INVINCIBLE #51 second printing, a 32-page full color comic book for $2.99, will be in stores this August.
Garen, the creator of the highly-acclaimed Rainbow Orchid, has been a favourite of mine for a few years now and some of you may know that he is currently drawing for The DFC [sadly only available online].
He is also now compiling an A-Z of popular comic characters on his blog -Lazer Eraser,Iron Man and so on. You can check out his blog at:
Well worth spending an half hour looking over!
It’s a question a lot of us have been asking since the appearance of Fantastic Comics #24 in 2007 -great cover reproduced above.
Top talent was being attracted to the series of titles including [deep breath]:Erik Larsen, Mike Allred, Kyle Baker, Frank Cho, Bill Sienkiewicz, Howard Chaykin, Steve Niles, Phil Hester, Dan Brereton, Ashley Wood, Joe Casey, Ivan Brandon, Eric Canete, Gerry Duggan, Frank Espinosa, Jay Faerber, Steve Gerber, Brandon Graham, B. Clay Moore, Moritat, Tom Scioli, Jim Valentino and Tony Salmons.
phew.
A review of Fantastic Comic #24 can be found here on CBO. I had a mixed reaction to the title but it grew on me and I could not wait for the next book.
That would have been Crack Comics #63 [cover by Mike Allred below].
Confused by the numbering? Let Uncle Terry explain. Erik Larsen had the idea of creating a modern version of these Golden Age comics from where they ceased publication. So,Fantastic Comics ended with #23 -modern version #24.
There was confusion as people waited for Fantastic Comics #25!
So what IS going on? I asked Joe Keatinge,PR & Marketing Coordinator for Image Comics and his response:
“It’s happening, albeit slowly. There may have been some miscommunication. There’s not a plan to do a FANTASTIC COMICS #25 (the one we published was #24), but we ARE planning to do a second NEXT ISSUE PROJECT. ”
Awwww. We gotta wait!! But,I promise,as soon as Image Comics -home to some of the greatest independent comic book creators [see link on blogroll- tells CBO,YOU will know!
PRESS RELEASE - WAR HEROES DEPLOYS A SELL OUT!
Mark Millar and Tony Harris‘ superhero miniseries sells out upon release!
30 July 2008 (Berkeley, CA) - Within twenty four hours of release, Mark Millar and Tony Harris’ WAR HEROES has sold out at a distribution level and a second printing is on the way to meet demand!
“Much like KICK ASS, the response to WAR HEROES has taken a lot of people by surprise,” said Millar. “Stores all over are reporting sell outs and are reordering as many as possible, even as the initial supply is exhausted! Those fans from ULTIMATES are coming to WAR HEROES in droves so we’re putting even more copies out there! Retailers are advised to order up as our initial printing had a substantial overprint and that clearly wasn’t enough for the fans!”
With WAR HEROES, Millar and Harris have created a thematic sequel to their many works including CIVIL WAR, KICK ASS, EX MACHINA and especially THE ULTIMATES as a United States torn by terrorism gives its citizens the one thing they can use to fight back against a world gone mad - superpowers. The second printing will feature a new cover by Harris, spotlighting the super-powered nature of their soldiers of tomorrow.
WAR HEROES #1 second printing, a 32-page full color comic book for $2.99, will be in stores this August.
Image Comics is a comics and graphic novels publisher formed in 1992 by a collective of best-selling artists. Since that time, Image has gone on to become one of the largest comics publishers in the United States. There are currently four partners in Image Comics (Erik Larsen, Todd McFarlane, Marc Silvestri, and Jim Valentino), and Image is currently divided into four major houses (Todd McFarlane Productions, Top Cow Productions, Shadowline, and Image Central). Image comics and graphic novels cover nearly every genre, sub-genre, and style imaginable, offering science fiction, romance, horror, crime fiction, historical fiction, humor, and more by the finest artists and writers working in the medium today. Visit www.imagecomics.com.
This from John Freeman.
“Hi All
downthetubes.net Beano Birthday Tribute Live
British comics news and links site downthetubes.net is proud to publish the first art and memories we’ve received from a range of creators, including Garen Ewing, Stephen Baskerville and Kev F Sutherland, to mark The Beano’s 70th Birthday this month.
You can find our special tribute section here:
http://www.downthetubes.net/features/comics/beano/beano_at_70/index.html
If anyone wants to offer their own memories or art, you can send them to me via johnfreeman6-downthetubes@yahoo.co.uk or post to this thread on the downthetubes forum – art and comment allowed… (registration required to try to prevent spammers and scammers):
http://preview.tinyurl.com/5ah9lc
The Beano is of course © DC Thomson.
Cheers, and best wishes,
John Freeman”
Tuesday,30th July,2008. Mark that day well. As Paul Brown [alleged artist] and Darron Northall [alleged and rumoured but never proven] paid their usual weekly visit to the Black Tower [or Uncle Terry’s Studio of the Macabre and Weird]. As usual,Mr.Brown scoffed every biscuit without the scantest regard for how a poor old man pays for them. In fact,being honest,Mr.Brown did bring along a packet of Jaffa Cake biscuits to ease the strain. He ate all of them as well.
Darron Northall complained about a speck of dust on his mug of tea,dog hairs and,temporarily,blacked out as I tried to explain what was going on in the Marvel universe with specific reference to Captain America’s death,his reappearance as a Skrull,then as Bucky wearing Cap’s outfit and a renegade loony Captain America -oh,and the Invaders time warping to modern NY along with Captain America.
Discussed was Blake Bell’s excellent -SUPERB- Steve Ditko book which Mr.Brown will be reviewing,as well as the Alan Moore introduction to issue One of Brown & Northall’s hit 1980s Vigilante Vulture series. And Mt.Brown announced that he may revive the anthropomorphic vigilante. Mind you,he also said he was awaiting the script for the now almost mythical Outlaws 4022 part 2.
And Darron [”I ain’t casing the Bank”] Northall’s reaction? He promises to complete all six Outlaws scripts by January,2009 and to re-write some of his Vulture scripts.
One should bear in mind that,after heavy consumption of tea and biscuits little Paulie does get a little hyperactive -he promised to produce 69000 pages for Indian comics by September. One should also bear in mind that Mr.Northall [”the lock-in Kid”] is a fibber.
That said,look at the photo below. Would these tough honchoes lie? Go on -look!
Below,Paul Brown quivers with excitement as he announces that he is still “The Daddy” and will “re-imagine Vigilante Vulture for the post-Thatcherite 21st Century totalitarian fascist right wing Labour UK”. Nice boy.
Will these men now deny their promises? And what of the alleged deal they made with DC comics to incorporate Vigilante Vulture into the DC Universe?
Only time will tell.
ps. some of the above may be nothing more than lies a joke. Maybe.
Victor Gorelick is given the Inkpot Award
Archie Comics‘ Editor-in-Chief, Victor Gorelick, was honored with a surprise presentation of the legendary Inkpot Award during the 2008 Comic-Con International. The Inkpot Award was presented to Victor by the Comic Con’s Gary Sassaman, during Victor Gorelick’s Spotlight Panel.
Victor Gorelick has worked at Archie Comics for 50 years, and is a veteran of the comic industry. Victor joined Archie Comic as an art assistant, and has served as production coordinator, art director. After being art director for a number of years, Victor was promoted to Managing Editor and Richard Goldwater became President and Editor-in-Chief. Victor now services as Archie Comic’s Editor-in-Chief. Victor has unique knowledge of every facet of the editorial process required to create and publish successful comics. He has done everything from writing to coloring, and everything between. He has highly regarded artistic skills and an eye for meticulous detail. He also has a well honed sense of the wholesome content of Archie Comics that has been the basis for the bond of trust built with readers by Archie Comic down through the years. He has worked closely with numerous companies designing various custom comic books. For example, he has overseen collaborations between Archie Comic and Kraft General Foods, Radio Shack and even the F.B.I.! He is a moving force on the Comic Magazine Association of America’s Code Authority Guidelines Committee, a member of the Board of Advisors of the Joe Kubert School where many of today’s comic artists first learned their craft, and he has taught cartooning as an instructor at the Kingsborough Community College in New York City.
Since 1974, Comic-Con International has awarded the Inkpot Award. It is an achievement award given to professionals in comic book, comic strip, animation, science fiction, and related pop-culture fields.
Past Archie Comics Recipients of the Inkpot Award include, Al Hartley in 1980, Bill Woggon in 1981, Dan DeCarlo and George Gladir in 1991, Stan Goldberg in 1994, Irv Novick in 1995, Batton Lash in 2004, Bob Bolling, Bob Fujitani and Dexter Taylor in 2005.
We at Archie Comics would like to congratulate Victor Gorelick on receiving Comic-Con International’s 2008 Inkpot Award.
The announcement came out of the blue [well,San Diego Comic Con actually]:DC announced that it now had the Archie Comics “MLJ” heroes such as the Black Hood,Shield and so on. The characters were going to initially appear in The Brave & The Bold comic -hence the above illo featuring Batman.
I’ve had a few hundred emails since and Yahoo groups dedicated to these much loved characters have seen a virtual hurricane of activity asking “What?” “Who?” “When?” And more specifically:”Why the hell didn’t you tell us this was happening?!”
Well,for one thing,although I do heavily promote Archie on CBO as well as elsewhere,I am NOT privvy to company info. I rely on what Archie tells me.
As it stands what I know is this:at San Diego,Dan Didio announced that it had “licenced” [?] the MLJ characters from the Golden Age -Silver Age also though Joe Simon copyright excludes the use of Lancelot Strong and The Fly [in the illo above rather deceptively has the Fly in it–I’m told DC had not realised that Fly and Strong were copyrighted to Joe Simon,pointing to a lack of knowledge on comic book history].
The characters will appear in The Brave & The Bold and then spread out into the DC universe,guesting in other books and so on.
This is rather odd. If the characters are licenced then when a trade paperback of B&B or JLA or whatever featuring the characters is put together a NEW licence would be needed. Very odd. Not how DCs owners work normally.
J. Michael Straczynski,having now left Marvel after years of writing the same old story again and again and having written The Twelve which showed his “love” of these characters probably never existed in the first place,is set to sort through the 1940s MLJ characters to see which he wants to use.
Straczynski,apparently,”loved” these characters as a kid “but needs to do more research on them”. Yeah,obviously a ‘major’ fan. And echoing the usual bilge,when asked by Newsarama about his move from Marvel to DC,JMS stated:
“I think the DC universe is a bit lighter and more polished in some respects, but that’s neither better nor worse than being grittier or darker, it’s mainly a philosophical thing. Growing up, I always enjoyed Marvel, but I was a massive DC fan particularly in terms of Batman, Superman and the core DC characters. I have one of the biggest collections of Superman stuff on the Western seaboard.”
Oh. Right. “..a bit lighter and more polished” –sorry,are we talking about THE DC comics?! But didn’t JMS say how he was the “biggest Marvel” fan when he signed to them?
And didn’t he “love” those Marvel characters as a kid as well?
Sorry,but JMS was brilliant -BRILLIANT- when it came to Babylon 5 but comics,well,he has run out of ideas. Having chanced The Twelve I’ll not be chancing his take on the MLJ characters. I’ll leave that up to the hardcore “JMS can do nothing wrong” mob.
A major problem has been that DC made all the announcements and rumours have filtered through of DC and Didio stating at San Diego that they “own” the characters. Archie is silent and will not make a PR statement on the matter.
I’ve had several mails from people saying they have heard Archie may sell out completely to DC next year. This is RUBBISH. There is no commercial sense in doing that and getting rid of a much loved family business. However,the Archie silence is fuelling the rumours which could harm the company in a number of ways.
I cannot see the sense in remaining silent. A simple statement such as follows would scotch ALL rumours:
“Archie Comics has licenced its adventure characters [referred to generally as the “MLJ heroes”] to DC comics for a specified period. Archie still owns all copyright on these characters. News on how DC will use these characters will be released by DC.”
So,watch this space as we try to sort out what the rumour mill is grinding up!
BETTY & VERONICA DIGEST #186
“Party Game”: Dragged to another high-society party by Veronica, Betty resigns herself to the fact that Veronica will once again get all the attention… or will she?
SCRIPT: Mike Pellowski.
ART: Tim Kennedy.
“Picnic Panic”: The girls are looking for something to do, so Jughead suggests a picnic… as long as he can come along!
SCRIPT: Mike Pellowski.
ART: Jeff Shultz.
Shipping Date: July 30th, 2008
On Sale at Comic Specialty Shops: August 6th, 2008
On Sale on Newsstands: August 12th, 2008
Full color digest format
$2.49 US.
BETTY & VERONICA DOUBLE DIGEST #163
PART 3 OF A 5-PART, INTERACTIVE STORY WHERE THE READERS DECIDE THE OUTCOME!
“And the Winner Is… Part 3 of 5”: 2008 is an election year, and Archie Comics is no exception as we present a special election of our own: your chance to vote for Cheryl Blossom’s new boyfriend! Two issues ago, Reggie and Cheryl broke up, and Cheryl wound up on the TV show “The Lonely Hearts Club” in search of a new beau. Three hot contestants stepped up for the challenge, and you the reader will witness each of their dates with Cheryl and vote for who you think Cheryl should choose online at www.archiecomics.com! This issue, Cheryl goes on a date with Brandon . He’s a computer genius and entrepreneur, but even clumsier than Archie! That might be more than Cheryl can handle… unless your votes decide otherwise! Don’t miss out on the Archie Comics event of the summer – be sure to reserve every issue!
SCRIPT AND ART: Dan Parent.
ALSO: “Pool Players”: Tired of all the splashing kids at the public pool where she lifeguards, Betty can’t wait to “relax” around Veronica’s pool… or will she?
SCRIPT: Mike Pellowski.
ART: Tim Kennedy.
PLUS: Other new and classic tales!
SCRIPT AND ART: Various talents.
BONUS: Puzzles, games and pin-ups!
Shipping Date: July 30th, 2008
On Sale at Comic Specialty Shops: August 6th, 2008
On Sale on Newsstands: August 12th, 2008
Full color digest format
$3.69 US.
Comic Bits Online is the web version of the Comic Bits magazine Edited and run by Terry Hooper. Currently Interviews Editor at Manga Life,Terry has over thirty years experience in the comic industry as script writer,artist,freelance Editor,publisher and much more. But if you want the facts:
Curriculum vitae Name:Terry HooperDob:6th June 1957 [50 yrs]Currently living Ashton Vale,Bristol,United Kingdom ...Read More