#some (not all) of the variant comic covers just draw him as like. superheroic comic style and that's...not who poe is fjdksk

[userpoe]

in response to this :: i started reading poe comic the gathering storm today and it was SO nice and lovely. the first couple frames is him working out (v nathan bateman imo 🥺) and they drew him so well and his curls are so soft and defined!!! and he’s confiding in BB8 and it’s just heartbreakingly sweet. it got me in my poe feels so bad as i ate my lunch. poe is just everything and he deserves the world.

The Gathering Storm is one of my favorite arcs in the series! The amount of emotion in it is just so good (and, of course, has several of my favorite Poe scenes in general in it!).

I love the scene where he's boxing: it's one of the first times we see him really be vulnerable and frustrated in the series, even if it's just to Beebs (which hits me in so many feelings, they're such a little team!). The Gathering Storm is, in my opinion, a huge turning point in Poe's characterization and his motivations, shaping him up closer to the Poe we see in the Force Awakens and especially in The Last Jedi.

Phil Noto, my beloved. No one illustrates Poe quite like Phil Noto does (except for Angel Unzueta who takes over shortly after this arc) - and that's because man did his research:

Noto is working with a lot of visual X-wing reference material for space battles, but for Poe’s look, he’s studying Isaac’s filmography. “Seeing so much of him on screen, it’s easier in a way to act that part out in my head while I’m drawing: How would Oscar Isaac act in this situation as Poe Dameron?” Noto says. (from the series announcement & reveal).

So it's likely that Noto was inspired by Ex Machina for this scene!

who talks first let's talk about the flyboy!

[aion-rsa]

A Beginner’s Guide to Marvel Zombies

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This article contains spoilers for Marvel’s What If…?

Man, Marvel’s What If…? series really does draw you in with a false sense of security, doesn’t it? The first episode is an adorable romance story laced with punching Nazis. The second is a tribute to a late actor in the form of galactic utopia. Then we get the Avengers being murdered, the universe being melted, and now Captain America eating human flesh. Enjoy your nightmares, kids!

The fifth episode of What If…? is a bit of a fanservice choice. For the latter half of the 2000s, Marvel was riding the Marvel Zombies train like nothing else.

While the first use of the concept came in 2005, one could consider What If…? v.2 #24 (What If Wolverine Was Lord of the Vampires?) to be the prototype. The story involved Dracula turning the X-Men into vampires, but Wolverine’s healing factor allowed him to overwhelm Dracula’s control and fight back. He then littered New York City with vampire heroes and humanity’s last hope came in the form of the Punisher wearing Dr. Strange’s cape.

Mark Millar

The first real use of Marvel Zombies was more of a prank than anything else. Mark Millar and Greg Land were doing Ultimate Fantastic Four and all signs pointed to the idea that they were setting up a crossover. Not just any crossover, but THE crossover. Marvel had been adamant about the Ultimate Universe being separated from main continuity, but solicitations and covers made it seem like the two Reed Richards counterparts were going to meet up. Much of Ultimate Fantastic Four #21 played into this with Ultimate Reed conversing with an alternate universe Reed who very much resembled the mainstream one. Ultimate Reed created a portal to go visit him.

What he found was zombie incarnations of the Fantastic Four with Reed asking, “Ever had the feeling you’ve been had?”

Robert Kirkman

The rest of the arc was about Ultimate Reed trying to survive and escape that world with the help of that world’s Magneto. This set the stage for the first Marvel Zombies miniseries, written by The Walking Dead’s Robert Kirkman with art by Sean Phillips (Arthur Suydam did zombie parody covers of classic Marvel art, which would continue for several more miniseries). Initially, Kirkman wanted to do a story about Luke Cage being the last hero alive, playing up his unbreakable skin as a deterrent, but since the Ultimate Fantastic Four arc already depicted Zombie Luke Cage, that was off the table.

Instead, his story involved two main arcs. One was the survival of Black Panther, who – much like the animated What If…? episode – was kept alive, albeit with his limbs being gradually removed for the sake of being zombie food without infecting the body. While the cartoon had Scott Lang’s disembodied head, the comic had a decapitated Zombie Wasp as Panther’s ally. She was never cured of the disease, but she did stop being hungry after a while and came to her senses.

The other story was about Earth’s zombified heroes dealing with the coming of the Silver Surfer and Galactus. A handful of them went on to devour the invaders and absorb their cosmic powers, along with their cosmic hunger. Hank Pym, Iron Man, Luke Cage, Wolverine, Spider-Man, and the Hulk went on to wipe out nearly all life in the universe as the Zombie Galacti. The follow-up was the basis for Marvel Zombies 2.

As for what caused the zombie outbreak in the beginning, that’s where things get a little hairy. The Ultimate Fantastic Four story revealed that a Zombie Superman (recolored to be the Sentry so as not to piss off DC) got so hungry that he punched reality until breaking into an alternate universe and infecting its heroes.

Kirkman and Phillips did a one-shot prequel called Marvel Zombies: Dead Days that suggested that Magneto bartered with some force to unleash the virus on Earth, thinking that it would only target humans and not mutants. Then a later miniseries called Marvel Zombies Return created an alternate universe time-loop where the zombies from Marvel Zombies continuity ended up in another universe, where they caused an outbreak, infected that world’s Sentry, and Zombie Sentry ended up popping into the Marvel Zombies universe to cause the initial outbreak.

Did anybody follow that? I hope so. Either way, Zombie Sentry was never mentioned again. He infected the heroes and then…nothing. Just a loose plot thread. Weird. Though fitting that the Sentry stopped being a threat because people forgot about him.

Crossovers

The initial Marvel Zombies universe was revisited here and there in several ways. Black Panther’s comic (during when he was leader of the Fantastic Four) journeyed into that universe and dealt with the Zombie Galacti. Ash from Army of Darkness got his own cool crossover miniseries taking place during the initial outbreak. Zombie Wolverine showed up in an Exiles story about a team made entirely out of Wolverine variants. Zombie Deadpool (Headpool) became a major part of the short-lived Deadpool Corps. Marvel Zombies also did a crossover with Marvel Apes.

There was also a one-shot called Marvel Zombies Halloween that revealed that Kitty Pryde and her son survived, while also showing what Mephisto was up to in this reality.

Fred Van Lente

With Marvel Zombies 3, Fred Van Lente started writing and brought the series in a different direction. He introduced ARMOR, a SHIELD offshoot based on dealing with alternate realities. While it still dealt with the Marvel Zombies universe, focus was more on the mainstream Marvel universe as it tried to prevent an invasion. The protagonists for the story were Machine Man and Jocasta. In the follow-up, Marvel Zombies 4, Morbius brought the Midnight Sons back together to save the world from a possible outbreak.

Van Lente’s swansong was Marvel Zombies 5, which was about Machine Man and Howard the Duck venturing into different zombie universes for reasons. After that came Marvel Zombies Supreme, taking place in regular Marvel continuity and featuring Battlestar and Jack of Hearts fighting zombie versions of the Squadron Supreme. Then came the last gasp for the line with 2012’s Marvel Zombies Destroy, where ARMOR sends Howard the Duck and Dum Dum Dugan to fight an alternate reality filled with zombie Nazis.

The Zombie Saga Continues

They did get a shot in the arm a few years later with Secret Wars. The event featured a world made up pieces of alternate Earths, haphazardly connected together. There’s a No Man’s Land on this Earth that’s filled with zombies and homicidal robots. It’s basically a place to dump criminals for execution.

A couple more stories were released, though neither had any connection to the original Marvel Zombies or the stuff with ARMOR. Marvel Zombie was a one-shot about a band of heroes trying to survive a zombie apocalypse, who end up teaming with Simon Garth, Marvel’s Zombie. The ending is…well, it sure is something.

More recently is Marvel Zombies: Resurrection. This one is about the Brood infesting and killing Galactus. The race evolves into a hivemind of zombies, all very interested in infecting Franklin Richards. The heroes for this one include Spider-Man, a Sentinel reprogrammed to be Franklin and Valeria’s nanny, a blind Wolverine, a techno-organic Frank Castle, and a SUPER EXCITED Blade.

Also of note is Marvel Universe vs. The Punisher and its sequels (Marvel Universe vs. Wolverine and Marvel Universe vs. The Avengers). This reality also dealt with a zombie superhero apocalypse, but in a different and more coherent way. Instead of being a virus, it was a bio weapon let loose into the ecosystem. That meant that presumably everyone was going to succumb to it eventually, turning into a savage cannibal. The Punisher, who was inadvertently behind the mess and was immune, would spend his days hunting down and beheading heroes. Also, he’d have to kill Deadpool on a nearly daily basis.

That’s Marvel Zombies in a nutshell.

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The post A Beginner’s Guide to Marvel Zombies appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3tqMadj

[hellyeahheroes]

Saturday Series Spotlight: New Super-Man

Written by Gene Luen Yang (American Born Chinese, Superman Smashes the Klan) and with art by Victor Bogdanovic (Batman: Arkham Knight), Billy Tan (X-23) and others, New Super-Man follows Kong Kenan - an arrogant and troubled Chinese teenager who is offered by Ministry of Self-Reliance to participate in an experiment that grants him powers like those of Superman. Kenan joins the Ministry’s Justice League of China, which also includes their own counterparts to Batman and Wonder Woman and over the course of the story they also pick their counterparts to Flash and Aquaman. 

The series is bravely dealing with political issues, be it relegated to the portrayal of Chinese characters in comics or China’s government. For example, the book draws a contrast with a preexisting Chinese superhero team the Great Ten and questions which way of doing diverse heroes is right. Are JLC just shameful copies of American ideas or an attempt at beating them at their own game? Are Great Ten heroes proud of their heritage or just a bunch of offensive stereotypes? Of course, the book actually picks up some characters seen as stereotypical, like blind martial arts master I-Ching, and tries to flesh them out and give new depth. In one of its arcs, it even goes to challenge the story from very first book DC ever published, Detective Comics #1 and tear apart racist stereotypes in it. Meanwhile antagonists like Freedom Fighters of China or Alpaca, Chinese counterpart of the Joker, constantly force the team to question whenever they should actually be loyal to the Chinese government. In the final arc, after the series changes titles to new Super-Man and the Justice League of China, the team almost comes apart due to dilemma whenever they should save a North Korean refugee at risk of straining a relationship between a nuclearly-armed dictatorship and the only country it sometimes listens to.

Despite this description, the book is far from being all serious and gloom. In fact, it has pretty good humor that often comes from great characters - they really come off as good-natured teenagers that want to do the right thing and learn how complicated that can actually be sometimes.

Also, if you’re gonna pick it in floppies I recommend variant covers by Bernard Chang, most of them are freaking hilarious. 

- Admin

[battlersexual]

Board Game Showcase #3: Sentinels of the Multiverse

Introduction:

I mentioned in my introduction post for this series that my love of board games only really blossomed when I joined my college’s board game club. This game in particular was actually one of the major reasons why.

Sentinels of the Multiverse is a game about superheroes, but it’s not like any of the multitude of superhero-based board games on the market. Most of those just license actual Marvel or DC superheroes and put them on some other game, like Monopoly or a generic deckbuilder skeleton. Sentinels is something very different: It’s a totally original superhero game, (admittedly very much based on the Marvel-DC characters in a lot of ways) and it’s incredibly fun. Let’s talk about it!

Story:

I’m going to give you the broad strokes here, because trying to tell you the full story of Sentinels would be kind of like trying to summarize the plot of Magic: The Gathering in a single text post. Even with that, this will probably be the longest story segment I write.

In an alternate universe, instead of the Marvel and DC we’re familiar with, the comics publisher that came out on top was Sentinel Comics. Within the world of Sentinel Comics, the stories followed a similar trajectory to ours: the Golden Age where superheroes fought ordinary criminals and nazis, the Silver age with its wacky space shenanigans and superscience nonsense, the more restrained Bronze age where comics started to tackle more serious issues, a brief Dark age where everything was gritty and EXTREEEEEME, and the Modern age, where writers tried to take the best of everything that came before and just tell good stories (perhaps with mixed results, but I’m not a comic critic, so I’ll leave it at that.) The actual card game can best be described as a licensed game set in the Modern age of Sentinel Comics, which just so happens to have fallen through a time portal to our universe.

Overall, the story follows the Freedom Five, an Avengers-esque superhero team working together against all manner of villains, from the moustache-twirling to the downright terrifying. The villains in the game are all structured like crisis crossovers, with a team of supers going up against them. Each expansion to the game introduced part of the ongoing struggle as the comics progressed, culminating in the OblivAeon crisis and the end of the multiverse as we know it.

Obviously there’s more to it, but I want to move on and talk about individual characters later.

Mechanics and more under the cut.

Mechanics:

Sentinels is, technically speaking, a card game instead of a board game. That said, it still falls into the nebulous category of “Tabletop game” and most board game fans consider them board games anyway.

The game is technically 3-5 players, but can easily support 1 and 2 player games by having each player control multiple characters. Each player will pick a hero from the box, along with their deck. For example...

(Legacy is in some ways the most basic hero, so I’ll be using him as an example often.)

Each hero has a character card that gives them an HP value and a base power (In this case, Galvanize). This means the hero always has something they can do no matter which cards they get. Each hero has a unique deck of cards that focuses on their particular niche, Legacy’s being buffing the team and tanking damage.

Heroes generally work on their own, but often excel by teaming up with other heroes and complementing their own powers. Each turn, a player does three things: Play, Power, Draw, in that order. Play a card from their hand, use a power (either their innate power or one listed on an ongoing card) and draw a card. You can skip both play and power to draw two cards instead. If a hero is reduced to 0 HP, they’re not out of the fight yet: the flip side of their card has “Incapacitated abilities” that help the other team members.

(I couldn’t find a good image of Legacy’s incap side, this is from one of the other characters, Fanatic).

Sentinels is a cooperative game: the heroes work together to defeat a villain.

Each villain has their own deck, which acts as a rudimentary AI. Before the heroes get their turn, they flip over the top card of the villain deck and do whatever the card says. Villain cards are often extremely powerful, and can seriously screw over the heroes’ efforts.

In addition to heroes and villains, each game of Sentinels has an Environment. This is a third type of deck that works similarly to the villain deck, but tends to be neutral: I.E. it helps or hurts both the heroes and the villain. The environments range from the city of Megalopolis to the far-off planet Dok’Thorath to the town of Silver Gulch in the year 1883 to a far-future post-apocalyptic earth, each with unique mechanics. The turn order goes villain, heroes, environment before repeating until either the villain or all the heroes are defeated.

Flavor:

An AMAZING amount. You might have noticed that Legacy’s cards have quotes on the bottom referencing a comic he was in. Every card in the game has this, and it’s a joy to piece it all together and figure out what happened in the extensive storyline of Sentinel Comics. The game itself also presents an exciting puzzle where you try to figure out how to get past the villain’s defenses before they kill you. Each hero feels unique and interesting, and once you find your favorite, you’re all set. (Mine is Chrono-Ranger, the time-traveling cowboy).

I do have another particular favorite in terms of flavor, but I... don’t want to mention him. (Too late.) He might show up, and that’s not going to be good for anyone (Hey!) so let’s just move on.

Expansions:

The base game includes ten heroes, four villains, and four environments. This is a pretty good number, but honestly a lot of the most fun heroes arrived in the expansions. I find every new deck to be fun and interesting, so I can blanket-recommend all the expansions, but there’s a lot of them, both big boxes and mini-expansions consisting of a single deck (Like me!), so I’m not going to talk about them individually like before (WHAT?), so let’s just move on to-

No no no no NO! What kind of cop-out is that? You’re just going to tell people that expansions exist and then not explain anything? You make me SICK.

Oh no.

Oh YEAH! That’s right, I’m here to take over this showcase, so why don’t you just sit down in that corner and watch a REAL pro do his job?

Get off my post, Guise.

Not gonna happen! Take this! And this! And some a THESE!

...There we go. Hello, reader! Yep, I’m talking to you, the one reading this now. My name’s Guise, and I’m the best hero in the whole game!

Ha, I love that picture. ANYWAY, since that idiot couldn’t be bothered to cover the expansions properly, I’ll be doing that for him, just for all of you! Aren’t I the greatest? Well, let’s hop to it!

Ahhh, good old Rook City. Nice place, if you like giant mutant rats and government corruption. Which I do, because that stuff is totally X-TREEEEEEEEME!!!

Rook City was originally its own expansion, but the developers released a box that combined it with the next expansion, Infernal Relics! What nice people. Rook City includes two heroes who are almost as X-TREEEEEEEEME!!! as me, as well as two environments and four, count ‘em, FOUR dastardly villains!

Infernal Relics has plenty of spooooooky magic at play, and features another four villains, two environments, and two heroes, one of which is my good friend the Argent Adept! Here, look at this picture of us!

Ha ha, good times.

They did it again! Shattered Timelines and Wrath of the Cosmos, all in one box. How can you turn that down? If you like time travel and space adventures, these are gonna be your jam, with a total of four heroes, eight villains, and four environments, two of which are IN SPACE! Everything’s better in SPACE! Here’s a picture of me, IIIIIIINNNNNNNN SPAAAAAAAAAAAACE!

Oh, and the Shattered Timelines expansion is where that cowboy that the dumb nerd who started this post likes comes from. You know, if you cared. Which you don’t, because you’re cool! Like me! I can tell.

Vengeance added five new heroes, and introduced the TOTALLY AWESOME team villain variant, where instead of fighting one strong villain, you fight a team of weaker villains! This one can get pretty crazy. The set includes the VENGEFUL FIVE, who you can see on the box, and their decks come with all sorts of bit villains and lackeys to torment the heroes! I took a picture with my nemesis, Argentium!

Whooo, that was one tough customer! Luckily, I got him to chill out. Get it? Chill out? Because I froze him, ha ha! I’m hilarious. And awesome!

And then they did more team villains! Villains of the Multiverse has ten new villains for the team mode, four environments, and NO HEROES AT ALL! Well, lucky thing you can still use the ones from the other expansions, hey? I took a picture with a villain to commemorate this one too, but I can’t seem to find it...

Oh, there it is!

And the last major expansion is... OblivAeon! (Dun dun DUUUUUUUUN!) This one adds five heroes (formerly villains! Oooh, exciting!), five environments, and OBLIVAEON himself, with a new game mode centered around fighting him! Not to mention, you get to see ME take center stage as the big hero that saves the multiverse!

(Uh, not really, it was mostly Luminary who-)

Hey, quiet! Don’t go badmouthing me in front of my adoring fans!

Anyway, I’d love to show you my cool new form in this expansion, but that might be a liiiiitle spoiler-y, so I’ll just say I look like THIS, but WAY sexier!

Well, those are all the big expansions, but we’re not done yet! There’s a bunch of mini-expansions, little individual decks you can buy to add one hero, villain, or environment to the game. I’d cover them all, but there’s really only one you need...

That’s right, ME! Hell, you don’t even need the other big expansions when I’m so much better! Not only do you get my awesome character card, you get all the cards I’ve shown you from my deck, as well as the best card ever! No, really, that’s what it’s called!

I mean, come on! You don’t even need the base game! Just buy me, and you’ll have the best part of Sentinels of the Multiverse, all for the low low price of- hey, get off me! Ow! Stop that! HEY!

All right, that’s ENOUGH. Get OUT of my house.

...Whew, he’s finally gone. All right, let’s get on with things.

Replayability:

Sentinels is pretty darn replayable. You’re almost never going to get the same experience, even if you pick the exact same heroes, environment, and villain. If you have all the expansions, you not only get over 60 heroes and 45 villains, but you can get Variants, which replace all the hero cards (and some villains!) with new versions of the characters that have different powers. I’ve never played a game of Sentinels and felt like I’d seen it before. In addition, you can play it alone, so if you can’t have friends over regularly it’s still a good purchase.

Criticisms:

It runs into a similar problem to Cosmic Encounter where the game is SO spread out over so many expansions that the full experience ends up being an expensive and space-consuming prospect. It’s also a very fiddly game, with tons of counters and cards, so it can be a chore to play some of the more complicated characters. Both of these problems have solutions, however.

Availability:

Sentinels is still being sold, as far as I’m aware. It’s also totally available as a mod on Tabletop Sim, although this doesn’t fix the problem with fiddly counters and running out of space for cards, and in fact makes it worse. But there’s another option.

Sentinels of the Multiverse: The Video Game is an official online version of the card game. It includes every expansion as dlc, heavily marked down from its price as a physical item, and takes care of all the tedious bookkeeping for you. It also lets you earn the variant cards by doing challenges in-game, which is super fun, although you don’t HAVE to to unlock them that way. There are weekly challenge games that pit a certain team against a specific villain and environment, which often act as a cool little puzzle, (and you get to hear my amazing voice!) Shut up, Guise. I very occasionally stream games of SotM on my twitch channel, so if there’s enough interest I can show off more of the game. In general, I recommend the video game even if you already own the board game: it’s really well-done and fun to play.

Creators:

This is kind of a special segment. I normally don’t talk about the creators of these games, because they’re usually irrelevant to the final product. However, artist Adam Rebottaro and writer Christopher Badell are incredibly active in the community around their own game, and they have a podcast where they talk about the lore of the game and answer viewer questions about the characters and universe.

It’s a ton of fun, they’re really engaging and you can feel their creativity and love for comics radiating from their voices whenever they talk. They’re super funny, too.

(And if you want more of ME- ah, what am I saying, of course you do! - you can tune in to this episode right here, where I make a special guest appearance to talk about myself!)

Get OUT, Guise!

Ugh, what a pain. Anyway...

Conclusion:

I know superhero stuff is kind of over-saturated right now, but even if you’re sick of superheroes - give Sentinels a try. It’s a celebration of comics more than superheroes in particular, and despite taking a lot of cues from existing superheroes, everything about Sentinels is fresh and fun. It’s one of my favorite co-op games ever, and its story is so well-told that I genuinely feel like I need to go read the comics, which I remind you don’t exist. Sentinels of the Multiverse is brilliant and just plain FUN.

Seriously, go play it, and make sure to use all my cards!

Didn’t I tell you to get out of my house?

[allspark]

It’s time for our weekly Diamond Comics Shipping List! Check out some great titles IDW has in store for us next week like Transformers, G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero, My Little Pony, Spider-Man, Star Trek, and more! All coming your way for June 12th!

TRANSFORMERS #7

Brian Ruckley (A) Cachet Whitman (CVR A) Christian Ward (CVR B) Livio Ramondelli

When another body shows up, Chromia and Prowl feel the pressure to get answers. Bumblebee, meanwhile, applies for a new job-as a bodyguard. But first, he has to impress Elita-1.

•   New story begins here! •   A brand-new era of Transformers!

TRANSFORMERS #1 (2ND PTG)

Brian Ruckley (A) Angel Hernandez, Cachet Whitman (CVR) Gabriel Rodriguez

GI JOE A REAL AMERICAN HERO #263

Larry Hama (A/CVR A) Netho Diaz (CVR B) Dan Fraga

As Cobra continues its relentless onslaught on a global scale, G.I. Joe is there to meet them in kind. It’s tyranny versus freedom-heroes and villains will rise and fall, bullets will fly, blood will spill, and who and what remains when the smoke clears is anyone’s guess! Join Living Legend Larry Hama and superstar artist Netho Diaz for another explosive adventure into the action-packed world if G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero!

AMBER BLAKE #1 (2ND PTG)

Jade Lagardère (A/CVR) Butch Guice

AMBER BLAKE #4

Jade Lagardère (A/CVR) Butch Guice

Amber Blake has finally found the person responsible for all of the pain in her life-and there’s no way she’s letting him get away again. But nothing is as it seems, and when the people closest to her betray her, she’ll have to use all of her skills to get out alive-and to get the vengeance she’s longed for.

BERKELEY BREATHED’S BLOOM COUNTY ARTIST EDITION HC

Berkeley Breathed (A/CVR) Berkeley Breathed

The Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of one of the most cherished and fondly remembered comic strips of all time showcases his art in this deluxe oversized edition. You’ve read all the strips, now see the art! This Artist’s Edition features an incredible selection of daily and Sunday comic strips, as well as a selection of sketchbook pages and drawings, published here for the very first time, each and every one scanned from the original art. The dailies are presented at the ACTUAL size drawn, and the Sundays have been slightly reduced but are still bigger and more beautiful than they have ever been presented before! This is the ULTIMATE Bloom County collection by the inimitable Berkeley Breathead!

•   Advance solicited for November release! •   Bloom County returned as a successful webcomic in 2015, with collections published annually by IDW to critical acclaim.

DISNEY COMICS AND STORIES #5

Andrea Castellan, Marco Gervasio, Tito Faraci (A) Andrea Ferraris, Marco Gervasio, Alessio Coppola (CVR) Paolo Campinoti

Three stories never-before-seen in the U.S. await you in another fun-filled issue! In “Mickey Mouse and the Hydrophilic Monsters,” Mickey and Goofy encounter plant life like they-or you-have never seen before! Then, in “Pluto and the ‘Super’ Day,” what happens when Goofy dog-sits Mickey’s beloved pup? Why, nothing less than the unexpected! Finally, in “Shhh,” Peg-Leg Pete and his accomplice encounter more than they bargained for in a robbery gone very wrong!

GLOW #2

Tini Howard (A/CVR A) Hannah Templer

Faced with foes in the forms of the Star Primas-who have real muscles and matching windbreakers-the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling are ready to prove they aren’t unskilled losers. They’re paid television actors! And it’s time to show those Star Primas that paid television actors mean business… Based on the hit Netflix series!

GOOSEBUMPS HORRORS OF THE WITCH HOUSE #2

Denton J. Tipton, Matthew Dow Smith (A/CVR A) Chris Fenoglio

Rosie thought it was bad enough having a witch as a neighbor, but now the witch is trying to take over the whole town! As their parents fall under the witch’s dark spell, it’s up to Rosie and her friends to try and save the day. And they thought algebra was hard…

GLOW #2

Tini Howard (A/CVR A) Hannah Templer

Faced with foes in the forms of the Star Primas-who have real muscles and matching windbreakers-the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling are ready to prove they aren’t unskilled losers. They’re paid television actors! And it’s time to show those Star Primas that paid television actors mean business… Based on the hit Netflix series!

GRAVE TP

Dan Fraga (A/CVR) Dan Fraga

ADVANCE SOLICITED FOR APRIL RELEASE! For fans of coming-of-age stories similar to Stephen King’s The Body; the movie based on it, Stand By Me; IT; Stranger Things; and E.T. Drawn one panel per day over a year, follow the story of three boys who discover a shallow grave while on a weekend camping trip. But that’s just where the mystery begins. The unexpected find reveals a cigar box containing seven mysterious items: a knife, a coin, a pocket watch, a rare baseball card, a gold ring, a silver spoon, and a strange manga comic. How are these items connected? Whose body lies buried? Find out in this once in a lifetime tale of friendship, mystery, suspense, and growing up.

MARVEL ACTION SPIDER-MAN #5

Erik Burnham (A/CVR A) Christopher Jones

Now that Peter, Miles, and Gwen have joined forces, nothing can stop them! Except maybe for homework and an internship at the Daily Bugle. Not to mention being stalked by a most dangerous foe… Kraven the Hunter! All-new web-slinging action in the Mighty Marvel Manner! This exciting new story arc features the Marvel Action debut of Kraven the Hunter! Variant cover by Marvel Action: Black Panther artist Juan Samu!

MY LITTLE PONY FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC #78

Katie Cook, Andy Price (A/CVR A) Andy Price

The thrilling conclusion to the “Cosmos” story arc is here! With the most powerful ponies in Equestria under Cosmos’ control, do the remaining ponies stand a chance? And whose side will Discord take? Don’t miss the end of what might be Katie Cook and Andy Price’s finest MLP story yet!

MY LITTLE PONY TO WHERE AND BACK AGAIN GN

Justin Eisinger (A/CVR) Various

Adapting the most beloved My Little Pony animated cartoon episodes to graphic novels! My Little Pony comes to bookshelves! Revisit the inhabitants of Equestria and learn about the magic that friendship brings in this adaptation of the television series’ sixth season finale! This volume adapts the two-part “To Where and Back Again” in an original graphic novel.

ROAD OF THE DEAD HIGHWAY TO HELL TP

Jonathan Maberry (A) Drew Moss (CVR) Santiperez

Advance solicited for June release! The five-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author introduces the world to the latest chapter of the zombie epic in this over-the-top wild-ride prequel to ROAD OF THE DEAD! The dead rose and are feasting on the living and a young scientist may hold the secret to a cure. Meanwhile, zombies and biker gangs want her dead, so it’s up to a bunch of losers in muscle cars and a hijacked tank to risk everything to save her.

STAR TREK Q CONFLICT #5

Scott Tipton, David Tipton (A/CVR A&B) David Messina

The contest for the ages continues as the Captains race to capture the one exotic creature that Trelane is missing from his intergalactic menagerie-a Borg Queen! But as the Godlike beings revel in the games, the crews are hatching a plan of their own. Don’t miss the penultimate issue of the biggest Star Trek crossover of all time! The crews of The Next Generation, The Original Series, Voyager, and Deep Space Nine come together to face their biggest challenge yet! Written by Star Trek: TNG: Mirror Broken scribes Scott & David Tipton!

STAR TREK VS TRANSFORMERS TP

John Barber, Mike Johnson (A) Jack Lawrence (A/CVR) Philip Murphy

When Kirk, Spock, and the entire crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise investigate problems at a remote mine, they’re met with a explosive battle between powerful warriors who change into vehicles from the 20th century! As the battle between the Autobots and Decepticons rages, it’s up to Kirk to decide-does he violate the Prime Directive and interfere in a war that’s raged for millenia? And how will the Klingons complicate the issue? It’s cartoony fun between two of the most popular science fiction franchises in the world!

•   Advance solicited for May release! •   Four decades in the making, it’s the crossover that fans have demanded! Kirk, Spock, and Autobots! •   Decepticons and Klingons! Optimus Prime and the Prime Directive!

SWAMP MONSTERS

(CVR) Iger Shop

Something’s out there in the mad, murky depths of the fear-filled, sinister swamp… some… swamp… THING is coming for you! And it’s out for mud! The terror team that brought you Zombies, Return of the Zombies, and the petrifyingly popular hit series, Haunted Horror, takes you on an excursion of evil into the dankest, lagooniest corners of your nightmares, and dredge up over 240 pages of icky, drippy, slimy, grimy beasts from the grungy bottom of the Pre-Code comics’ bog. Swamp Monsters includes a fascinating introduction by comics legend, acclaimed artist of Swamp Thing, “Swampy” Stephen Bissette!

V-WARS GOD OF DEATH ONE-SHOT

Jonathan Maberry (A) Alex Milne (CVR A) Ryan Brown

Michael Fayne was patient zero of the plague that exploded into the Vampire Wars. A cult of militant vampires wants to resurrect him. Luther Swann leads a strike team to prevent the rise of a vampire god. New York Times bestseller Jonathan Maberry returns with an all-new V-Wars tale.

Five-time Bram Stoker award-winning author Jonathan Maberry returns to his signature comic book creation in time for the new TV series starring Ian Somerhalder!

Cover and interior art features the return of Transformers: Unicron superstar artist Alex Milne! Watch for V-Wars on Netflix starring Ian Somerhalder in 2019!

  Join the IDW Hasbro Shared Universe related conversation here in our Comics Discussion and Reviews section and here for all other franchises, superheroes, or general comic book discussions! Not a member? Join our community by creating your own free account here! Or jump right into the live chat on our Discord server or our Facebook Group!

IDW Comics Shipping List for June 12th! It’s time for our weekly Diamond Comics Shipping List! Check out some great titles IDW has in store for us next week like…

[mondofunnybooks]

MONDO FunnyBooks: Bunker Down.

Were you a recent visitor to the wonderful world of comics fandom and discussions between professionals in the business, you might have the idea that comic customers were essentially a superstitious and cowardly lot.

Current sources of outrage, retweets and outbreaks of delusional authority run riot have been ranged from the fairly embarrassing to the downright worrying. Arguments in this writers memory have been about: 'Is The Joker doing something not very nice to a human being?', 'How dare a movie studio choose to cast who they like in the film they're paying to make without consulting US first?', 'This man who draws and has been drawing people in a particular fashion has drawn this person in his particular fashion. How dare he?' We reached peak David Icke/Alex Jones levels of hilarious Othering this week when an X-Men artist referred to SJWs as 'Nazis'.

Irony and Satire have apparently given up on humanity and gone for a pint.

The usual conservative, tribal viewpoints of people who've confused an artistic medium with a constant stream of politically free distraction designed only to anatheize rather than engage and stimulate thought, then. It's more important to harass Ruby Rose for being cast as 'Batwoman' until she feels compelled to leave Twitter or be upset at the news of Michael B. Jordan playing Johnny Storm for reasons that were absoultly nothing to do with racism but rather the...uh...misportrayal of the modern American family which defintly traditionally couldn't contain a black man. Also something something tradition or something.

When we've brought this up before, we're usually countered with something like 'Oh, you should see Harry Potter/Overwatch/Hunger Games/Fortnite fandoms, they're JUST as bad.' Which we are willing to assume is true, having seen YouTube comments, but it does seem that the entertainment industry has a bad habit of emulating the worst excesses of the comics industry.

Whether it's Empire or TV Guide running variant covers, Toy producers doing convention exclusive figures and then selling them at a premium afterwards or even, HighFather Keep Us From Laughing, the application of the words 'Limited' or 'Collectiable' to a product to imply both a scarity that requires instant purchase and a possibilty of high resale value when in fact those are words that could be applied to any physical product ever.

We can almost guarantee that there are only a limited amount of copies of 'Night Rocker' by David Hasslehoff in the world and should you decide to purchase one or more copies, you have collected them, but neither fact is hard evidence that anyone will offer you more than you paid for them ten years in the future.

This is a rather..odd state of affairs to have come about. With the exception of poetry or graffiti, Before the medium was hijacked into becoming one more vehicle to sell corporate superhero products, work like George Herriman's 'Krazy Kat' explored the nature of language via abusive animals against the unrelenting tedium of the desert. Little Nemo In Slumberland by Windsor McCay was a continous attempt to map the subconscious in a strip adaptable to any format thrown at him by publishers. Sigel and Shuster commericalised the Jewish notion of a charismatic Golem who would maintain balance against an American society that had been taught to hate them. Fly By Night publishing types would use the form to glamourise the world of true crime and vaguely condemning tales of drug abuse to create an entire sub-culture by showing a willingness to adapt to the times.

These were the early days of comics and sequential story-telling and by now there ought to be work making these masterpieces look like the plinkings of Woody Gutherie against the all out assault on the cortex that is an Atari Teenage Riot. Instead the front end of the medium seems more concerned with dotting the I's and lining the t's of it's previous output (our favourite example being Marvel's 'Secret Wars Too: A comic that explained to readers why the comic it was parodying would be late. They charged money for this, as well.)

Comics were long considered the Outlaw Artform, so capable of shaping the public psyche that the content and distribution were brought up in Congress to see if it was necessarily to regulate the avalibilty of them to children. It's a longer story than will run here but the essence of the events is that while the 1954 hearings saw Congress conclude that comics were NOT a harmful product that would negatively influence children's minds, the comics industry decided that it would be best to settle public hysteria by establishing 'The Comics Code Authority', which would impose a series of standards and regulations upon comics seeking to be distributed on the newsstands.

Ironically, one of the people on the earlier incarnations of the board that would make up The CCA would be John Goldwater, one of many who takes credit for the creation of Archie Andrews'.. This writer likes to think Mr Goldwater was probably a little resentful of EC Comics's Archie parody 'STARCHIE!' (MAD Magazine Issue 12. Remains funny but now also looks like any episode of 'Riverdale'.) and was more than happy to choose the phrasing of a code that also happened to regulate the key words in EC Comic's top selling comics out of publication. All the resentful little men in comics complaining about being mocked are 'Happy Days''s Howard Cunningham wearing his Grand Poobah hat in our head.

We say 'ironically', because the current Ickeian theory is that comic sales in the direct market are so low due to Marvel and DC 'giving in' to the demands of the 'SJWs'. What with their unreasonable demands for more realistic representation in mainstream comics, we can see how 'Could you produce more comics we'd be willing to buy?' would definetly be an agenda designed to bring down the entire comics industry.

Because we are given to facts, we can't dispute a lot of the problems the new comics industry faces. Sales on New Comics to The Direct Market ARE down.

It would take the same sort of mind that blames Barack Obama for his Presidential inaction during Hurricane Katrina to think that the problems of new comics are the work of those damned SJWs, though. Not unless Heidi MacDonald has a time machine.

Unless Laurie Penny staged a hostile takeover of The Marvel Editorial Summit and said 'Right. Here's what we want: Please keep raising the prices of your comics by roughly about a dollar every few years, do more $150 crossovers that will have no significance in about 4 years or so. Please spin off as many comics as possible from one of your prime brands. Make sure your top staff behave like Obnoxious King Nerds on social media whenever possible.Instead of focusing your sales team on promoting the comic as a good read, keep pitching your comics as must buy investment issues aimed at speculators who won't be back for the next issue. As soon as your readership have begun to settle into a book, it's direction and it's creative team, that's probably the best time to relaunch your titles.

Be sure to confuse readers and retailers by pretending each relaunch is a 'Season' without ever referring to which season is currently published in advertising or trade dress. Come up with any justification whatsover to publish an anniversary issue that's triple the price of a regular comic as frequently as possible. Try to devalue the contribution and sales cache of your creative team over the amount of variant covers offered to retailers. Have your top writers actively and vocally hostile to the notion of second printings and finally publish no comics that even vaguely resemble the TV and Movie versions of your characters so new readers can come into a shop after seeing "Avengers Assemble" and be offered 7 books called "Avengers" but they'll mainly be about some men chatting at a table.'....then the reasons why new comics are failing aren't at the hands of SJWs.

They're at the hands of the publishers. The above list is the main reason for the decline in sales of new comics in specialist shops that we saw in our days behind the till. All things we were saying over a decade ago at retailer meetings with Marvel and DC. We were brushed off in order to try and wave shiny new 3D variants back then.

A few years later, when it was apparent that the law of diminishing returns was in full effect, was when finally The Big Two turned to the 'gimmick' of appealling to a wider audience. When oddly, that half-hearted effort to win over a new readership by publishing the books in the same venues as usual didn't work,with little support from their publicity and advertising departments both Marvel and DC quickly threw these efforts under the bus as proof that trying to expand your salesbase beyond a Wednesday crowd was a waste of time.

Except that''s nonsense of course. Any analysis of pre-order charts will tell you that the sales have been in heavy decline since 2007's 'Civil War' from Marvel. The constant attempts to repeat that success in that format are the problem. Marvel and DC trying the 'Social Justice' route and it's subsequent failure is a shameless attempt to rewrite history for the benefit of an agenda of tired Poobahs scared of time and their limited views of the comic medium making them irrelevant.

In fact, Marvel's recent attempt to appeal to Muslims,AND teenagers (imagine.) at once was quite late in the game with 2013's 'Ms Marvel' while the 'Feminazi Bible' Mockingbird wouldn't begin threatening Poobah Egos until around late 2016. Meanwhile, Archie Comics had smelled which way the wind was blowing several years earlier....

Archie Comics were always smarter than the ongoing superhero titles because they never set themselves up to tell an ongoing story, but rather worked like an extended cartoon strip. If you read three random issues of any Archie comics, you were probably as clued up on the cast of Riverdale as you were going to need to be to understand the dynamics of what was going on. Archie was perptually out of sync with the world around him, Betty was goal driven and meant well, Moose wasn't quite sure what day it was but loved Midge more than anything, etc. etc. All you had to do was set up a situation, add two or more of the characters and let the rest play out.

Even better, since the characters weren't obliged to be a certain age given the backstory (Peter Parker can't be worrying about teenage problems since he's been around long enough to get married, be a lecturer, etc.) the backgrounds and fashions could simply be updated to reflect the times of publication.

So no awkward retcons such as Reed Richards and Ben Grimm starting off as veterans of World War 2 and suddenly having gone through The Gulf War instead, prompting questions like 'Which comics have and haven't happened, then, because The Avengers definitely went to Saigon in the 70's but the existence of The FF precedes The Original Avengers finding Captain America in the block of ice and Cap turned out to be fighting Richard Nixon during The Secret Empire Saga so...argh!'

Archie managed to stay on the newsstands long after the self absorbed and inside baseball nature of superhero comics rendered them unsaleable in your average W.H.Smith's or Wal-Mart, since any issue of Betty & Veronica could be read by anyone with no need to check out previous issues. It was very rare that any one tale would run more than one comic and the few times it did, it was with fantastic results. We'll get to that.

In 2010, Marvel was wasting everyone's time and money on 'Siege; or 'What If Asgard wasn't in space but in Oklahoma instead?' while DC insisted on spreading the myth that people who grew up in Liverpool talk like they're from Shoreditch by adding John Constantine to the line up of 'Brightest Day'.

During the same year, Archie dragged mainstream comics kicking and screaming into the future with 'Kevin Keller', a comic featuring an openly gay male lead out in the real world and everything. This annoyed some American Mary Whitehouse wannabes called 'One Million Moms!'. They campaigned against the title being sold in children friendly areas such as Toys R Us but only really proved their basic inability to count to 1 million.

In the same year they published covers featuring Archie kissing Valerie, the black bassist from Josie & The Pussycats. If this doesn't strike you as a big deal for a comic being published in the mid-west of America, well, you might be one of those guys suggesting that there's always been adequate representation in comics.

They didn't sell as many comics in specialist shops, but while The Big Two continued to tread water, Archie kept moving forward, kept looking to crossover with big name brands, parodied the biggest comic crossovers, featured the likes of Barack Obama and Sarah Palin, paid homage to EC Comics and got Adam Hughes to draw covers. They even explored exactly what WOULD happen if Archie finally chose Betty. And Veronica. And heartbreakingly, how deep Archie's love for his fellow man ran in the conclusion to the marriage stories in 'The Death Of Archie.' Oh, and he also met the Predator.

Then they stepped everything into higher gear with our second favourite horror comic of the 21st Century with Afterlife With Archie. It was a book we'd recommend to new readers as a good alternative to the horrendously overpriced, badly drawn horror or just too boring to be scary books glutting the market with 'Torture Porn Variants'. AWA would feature at least one chilling moment per issue likely to stay with you long after you finished reading. One issue of tie-in book 'Sabrina The Teenage Witch; is worth 3 or 4 'Walking Dead' trade paperbacks in terms of actual horror instead of people talking around a trailer park.

If you had been a fan of the Archie world before and hadn't read it for a while, though, our glee would be magnified. While the horror/jump scare bits of AWA are genuinely well done and actually quite intense, the bits between undead assault are where the real horror lies as relationships between all the characters are twisted forever, new angles and revealations would stop you ever being able to see Midge, Cheryl, Reggie and more in quite the same light.

This moving with the times meant that the Archie readership were quite capable of seeing the characters they loved for so many decades in different modes of storytelling and art styles laid the groundwork for two things: The relaunch of the line in 2015 with high profile creators such as Mark Waid, Fiona Staples, Chip Zdarsky and Adam Hughes doing new and interesting takes on a universe we all knew so well (A bit like The Ultimate Universe but with a point and a plan.) and also the hit show 'Riverdale'.

It will not surprise many of you to learn that the Grand Poobahs Of Comics (TM MONDO FunnyBooks 2018) hated 'Riverdale' and frequently grumbled 'Not MY Archie.' but then, by folding their arms and threatening to hold their breath until the artform of comics goes back to being what THEY want, they've proven time and again that they're constantly wanting to find a straw man to blame for the world moving on without them. These were the same people who moaned about 'Archie Vs Punisher' for not taking Frank Castle seriously enough and thought the parody crossover 'Love Showdown' (Which promised that Archie would finally choose a permanent girlfriend) would break the Archieverse once and for all.

There are lots of ways to improve the state of comics. Indulging the whinging of grumpy old men and refusing to believe the rest of the world might be interested in comics are not on that list of ways.

And as a wise man once said 'The people want BeBop. And who I am to tell them that BeBop is wrong?'

[davidmann95]

Action Comics 1000!!!

Action Comics #1000!

(The above being the cover I ended up getting, since another anon asked me about that. Allred’s was better, but I thought this was not only more broadly iconic, but a better contrast with Action Comics #1 with the color scheme and Superman showing the opposite side of his nature as an ethereal figure reaching down to help rather than a strongman smashing a car. There were several store-specific covers I would’ve preferred, but they’re store-specific, and I wasn’t gonna wait however many years and pay however much money to meet Doc Shaner and have him do a sketch on the blank variant, so whadaya gonna do?)

Was this all it should have been? God no, of course not, conspicuously not, at least not on the writing end - no Morrison or Waid or Ellis or Ennis or Gaiman, King being the only one here arguably on that tier (someone made the not-unconvincing suggestion that DC didn’t want to get anyone who’d obviously overshadow Bendis’s debut). Artwise on the other hand this was a runaway smash, a mix of classic talent and contemporary big names, with most of the obvious available figures ‘missing’ from this already hard at work on Man of Steel.* Still, DC should’ve been trying for another Superman #400-scale testament to the ages, and instead it’s a nice normal anniversary issue.

But as nice, normal anniversary issues go? This was a damn good one. One where, oddly, I only accurately predicted how much I’d enjoy one story, with a number I thought would be mediocre or simply pretty good based on the creative teams being among the better or best, one or two I thought would be sure standout winners being mid-tier, and the story I thought would be the guaranteed stinker of the bunch winding up a highlight. In order of presentation, with some small spoilers:

For The City That Has Everything: I was not expecting much from Jurgens, but he really outdid himself, at least by his own modern standards; the crowd shot at the end was what put it over the top for me. Every Superhero getting together to thank Superman for their existence is something I’ll always stan for.

Never-Ending Battle: God what a pretty story. To be honest, I was a little disappointed about Gleason being the one to go onto Action Comics with Bendis, but that’s entirely in the past now; dude’s dynamite when let loose. Tomasi’s writing is sort of superfluous if still nice, but it’s both strange and hilarious to imagine Superman actually giving this rambling recounting of his day, bereft of visual aids and leaving out most of the actual details in favor of moral lessons and philosophizing about the deeper narrative meaning of his own life.

An Enemy Within: The one shoulder-shrug of the bunch; Wolfman just can’t quite make it come together with the Swan material he had to work with. Killer last page though.

The Car: So I’d seen a blurry shot for the first page of this in that group photo the editors posted once this issue went to the presses, and since it looked like Pa in the barn in Smallville, and with Johns’ Donner-nostalgia and Donner actually being Donner, I expected a pat Jonathan-teaches-young-Clark-a-lesson yarn here. This is, uh, definitely not that. Instead it’s a story I never knew this issue needed but it absolutely did, as not only the sequel to Superman’s most important tale, but one that retroactively places the most important parts of that ‘Superman spirit’ as it’s developed over the years back before they were fully conceived, in a way that fits this particular take on the character. Definitely my favorite thing Johns has done with Superman since at least Legion of Superheroes, and lord does Coipel need to be doing interiors for DC on the regular.

The Fifth Season: A great character piece that ends up working as a pocket sequel to Birthright, which softens the blow of Waid not being here, and Albuquerque acquits himself particularly admirably given this was originally supposed to be drawn by Tim Sale. Between this and letting his cosmic freak flag fly in Metal, I officially want Scott Snyder to take a second proper crack at Superman someday.

Of Tomorrow: I responded to this when it was released online, and as expected it’s by far the best of the bunch.

Five Minutes: The sort of ‘normal’ Superman story that simply had to be in here, and in that regard this succeeds perfectly well. And Ordway always delivers.

Actionland!: I was disappointed in this one…until it went in the direction it did. Still, I feel like it grasped at being even better yet couldn’t quite get there, and given how well Dini did with the backup in Action #975 last year I expected more. I can’t complain too much though, because good lord y’all, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez with Kevin Nowlan inks and Trish Mulvihill colors.

Faster Than A Speeding Bullet: The one that was obviously supposed to be terrible, and…wasn’t? I didn’t contest Meltzer being in this mix - there’s always an unjustifiable inclusion based on internal politics with these sorts of things, and moreover the dude helped save Jerry Siegel’s house; that counts for something, so better him than Goyer or JMS - but understandably didn’t expect much, especially after his piss-poor contribution to Detective Comics #27 a few years back. But, accompanied by in my opinion the best John Cassaday art in a good long while, he told a really gripping little story here that manages to cut the bummer of a knot that lies at the heart of one of the most archetypal types of Superman stories: you have to acknowledge sometimes that Superman can’t save everyone, but you don’t want to actually see him let anyone down. Though Superman recommending someone become a cop is…a little more charged in 2018 than Meltzer probably had in mind, which knocks it down a couple points in my estimation.

The Truth: People seemed to be hating on this one on Twitter, but personally? I thought it was fun. Very slim, which isn’t unexpected given Bendis is working against his own best tendencies for Jim Lee and Lee isn’t well-suited to him in the first place and it’s a prologue/in medias reis teaser, but it has a few really good moments (”STOP!”), Bendis seems to remember Superman’s supposed to be a tough dude as well as a kind one, and Jim Lee can still draw the heck out of some punches. The ending twist is one that could go well enough without breaking anything or work out very badly indeed, but this did its job of getting me to think I’d like to read a weekly miniseries and then two Superman comics a month by this writer for the foreseeable future.

As for the pinups, Romita Jr.’s is weird but in my opinion effective, Simonson’s is obviously good, and Jimenez is god-tier. So that’s about it; wish they’d sprung for more big-name writers, it especially stings Morrison isn’t here, and it’s inexcusable that Lois didn’t get a story, but by and large, this was a damn good piece of Superman comical bookery. Roughly speaking, Wolfman/Swan

* Other than Alex Ross, who even more than say Frank Quitely is genuinely bizarre to not see here. The latter I understand doesn’t have any special affection for superheroes - he may have done some Milk Wars covers, but those would’ve been helping out a friend of a friend - but Ross I can easily envision tearing out one of his teeth or breaking a toe without hesitation for this gig. I guess Marvel must have him under an exclusive, with an exemption for Astro City covers.

[chrismaverickdotcom]

Mavademics: Male Gaze through Visual Signifiers in Comic Art

Last week I saw an image for a cover to a Popeye comic. This version, drawn by Steve Mannion featured Popeye and Bluto with exaggerated vein popping musculatures and Olive Oyl reimagined as a sexy femme fatale in the style that, at least to me, is most close evocative of Salma Hayek‘s character from Deserpado. At the time I thought it was an upcoming series that reimagined Popeye in a modern context in the same way as recent series have done with Flintstones, Scooby Doo and Snagglepuss. I was intrigued and excited. I wanted to see what they were going to do with it. I’ve since come to learn that it was actually an older variant cover to Popeye Classics, IDW Comics‘ series of reprints fo classic Popeye adventures. I’m actually a little disappointed by this, because I was totally interested to see where it would go, but even without a new series to back it up, the image did make me think of some issues that I am working with in my dissertation that I figured it would be worth floating here in my blog to see what people’s thoughts were. In other words, it’s time for another fun round of everyone’s favorite game, “let’s comment on Mav’s dissertation research!”

Namely, I am interested in the fact that when I posted the image to Facebook, the main criticism that people jumped on immediately was the obvious sexualization of Olive Oyl. My friend Cenate pointed out that “A curvaceous Olive Oyl is just so strange. My brain can’t process it.” and a lot of this is because, as in the words of my friend Steve, “Admittedly I expect comic book bodies to be unrealistic, but man, my whole body is in pain just thinking about how deformed and twisted Olive’s skeleton must be. Either her left knee is twisted ninety degrees or she has a goat leg, likely both given the appearance of the silhouette of her right leg…” And while that’s true, my counter argument was that I find it interesting that this is what their attention is called to despite Olive Oyl never being particularly anatomically correct traditionally, and Popeye and Bluto also being extremely non-proportioned in they image. That is, I find it interesting but not surprising. In particular I see it as emblematic of the usage of male gaze in comic art. That is, here I am referring to “comic art” as an art style (or really set of styles collecting a series of like visual tropes) as opposed to the physical media (comic books), or the common genres most often associated with that media (superhero fantasy).

First, I think it’s worth defining the idea of “the male gaze.” I am not using it in the common internety way, of just saying “its bad to portray women as sex objects.” There’s an important conversation to be had there, but that’s not really where I am going with this. At least not directly. It’s an obvious connection that follows, however. When I am using the term I am doing so more in the vein that Laura Mulvey does in her original essay that introduced the term, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”. Specifically, at least here, I am concerned with the techniques by which the art style uses the media to portray female characters as sexual objects inviting a voyeuristic gaze, in contrast to make characters being depicted as subjects capable of active agency, rather than the ramifications of doing so. In her essay, Mulvey focuses on the specifics of how this is done in classic cinema pointing to the manner in which the woman, who’s primary purpose is to-be-looked-at, rather than progress the actual action of the plot, must necessarily freeze the otherwise progressing action of the film in order to invite the audience to partake in the voyeuristic pleasure of admiring her body. Since Mulvey is concerned primarily with classic cinema, she uses examples like Rear Window and Marnie. But I’m a comic book geek, so I’m going to offer Ming the Merciless’s hypnosis of Dale Arden in the cult classic Flash Gordon:

Note that when Ming takes control of Dale, everything else in the film stops so that people can just look at her. No one attempts to save her. The extra-diegetic lighting in the room inexplicably lowers so that the audience we can more easily ignore Flash Gordon and the others and focus on Dale as she runs her hands up and down her body and dances for Ming’s (and transitively our) amusement. She’s fully clothed, and in fact, is far more erotically dressed in nearly every scene that follows this in the film, and yet this scene is inherently sexual. Her movements and slow semi-orgamsic moans expressly tell the viewer that this is about sex, however her explicit lack of consent and even awareness of what’s going on key us to read that her personal sexual enjoyment, or lack thereof is entirely irrelevant. Even Flash, her love interest in the film, who is very much aware of the fact that his girlfriend is being psychically sexually violated against her will, can’t help but acknowledge that looking at her as an object (her explicit purpose in the scene) is “sensational.”

That is not to say that the sexuality on display cannot be germane to the plot, or that even doing so makes it a bad narrative. After all, in Rear Window, Mulvey’s key example, the voyeurism inherent in watching is central plot of the film. This can also be seen in the actual scene from Desperado that I compared Olive Oyl to in the first place:

Here, we’re actually given far less time to focus on Carolina(Hayek) as an erotic object. In my head, before I rewatched the scene, I remembered there being far more time to focus on her than actually occurs. She is introduced at a key moment in the action as the Mariachi (Antonio Banderas) is being pursued by his adversaries. She does not freeze the action, but instead is inserted into it because of her sexuality. She is explicitly scantily dressed to key the audience in to the fact that her sexuality is important. We don’t get much time to focus on her bare midriff, flowing windblown hair, or the fact that her tight shirt is tied to frame her boobs — approximately five seconds while other things are going on — but we are entirely aware of them. Moreover, the car crash that happens as she carelessly walks across the street keys us in to the fact that men are so distracted by her beauty that they can focus on nothing else, and her laugh at the event tells us that not only is she used to this sort of thing, but she enjoys it. Immediately after this, we have all action occurring in slow motion as the Mariachi is transfixed by looking at her, so much so that he (and we) almost ignore the the armed assailant whom we all know is coming to kill him. And yet, from this point onward, Carolina is one of the key characters of the film. But she is defined by her sexuality because the tropes of filmmaking tell us to define her that way.

So that takes us back to the Olive Oyl image. Obviously she is sexualized. But the question becomes why… and how does she command specific attention in the image beyond what the other figures do. After all, Steve commented that “my whole body is in pain just thinking about how deformed and twisted Olive’s skeleton must be. Either her left knee is twisted ninety degrees or she has a goat leg, likely both given the appearance of the silhouette of her right leg…” but Popeye’s suffers from much the same issue, his left leg is raised higher than should be possible with out a dislocated hip. His elbow has been relocated to the bottom of his oversized forearm, which should be breaking both his underdeveloped bicep and shoulder from the sheer weight of support. Given the the relative length of his right upper arm, we must assume that his left lower arm has been severed from the occlude left bicep. Similarly, Bluto, whose left arm is more massive than Olive’s entire frame, appears to be missing a right arm entirely, unless we as readers are to assume he has a congenital birth defect causing an underdeveloped arm, which would then call in to question why Popeye is attacking a disabled man. In a sense, Olive may actually be the most realistically proportioned figure in the entire image.

She is also more realistically rendered than her classic interpretation, a wiry, frail woman with joints that seem irrelevant to the points at which her body is capable of bending. While the new interpretation of Olive, with her ample bosom (again, like Hayek’s framed in a tight, low-cut, midriff exposing blouse), skirt clinging tighter to her legs to suggest her crotch, and leg pointed suggestively to expose her new 4-inch heel Fuck-Me Boots, the classic Olive isn’t actually that far behind. It’s true that Olive was never classically visually depicted as having a body that is conventionally sought after as attractive by women of the current era or her 1919 origin, she was always a sex object. She is designed to be a flapper (hence her hair and skirt), a stereotype that has as much sexual connotation at the time as it does now. It’s just that the specific style that E.C. Segar used when drawing her and the other Popeye/Thimble Theatre characters wasn’t designed to “realistic” so much as expressive. She frequently made it clear from her posture and actions that she was extremely horned up almost all of the time. In fact, a LOT of Popeye strips are pretty much about Olive basically wanting to fuck whoever pays the slightest flattery to her. It’s one of the reasons Bluto and Popeye hate each other. When she is not actively seeking amorous attention, she is the perpetual kidnapped damsel-in-distress from Bluto, who desires her sexually.

The sexual aspect of the Olive Oyl character was so prevalent in the 1930s and 40s that she became one of the most common characters featured in Tijuana Bibles (NSFW, seriously… DO NOT click to enlarge this image unless you really want to see a raunchy, rapey, bisexual, anal threesome between Olive, Popeye and Wimpy that your grandfather or great grandfather probably jacked off to at some point during the during the war… I mean, who are we kidding, we all know you’re going to click on it, but you’ve been warned). While the authors and artists of Tijuana Bibles are generally anonymous, it is widely believe that many of the underground artists creating the pieces were employed by day as the regular artists or assistant artists of these very same strips. So while they are certainly not officially sanctioned, they were very much understood as part of the comic culture of the time in the same way sexualize fan art that you might find on DeviantArt, or commission from an artist at a comicon is today. And Olive became a favorite of these because she was understood to be an innately sexual character.

So if we return to the Mannion cover we see some very specific elements at work that call attention to this sexualization despite Olive taking up comparatively little space in the composition. Obviously, the clothing choices are designed to present a sexualized image consistent with modern 21st century fashion choices. Her her hips, boobs, and legs are extended in such a way as to accentuate her femininity as much as possible. While the other characters are more dynamic, she is positioned in front of them, signaling her importance to the composition. Finally, she is the focal point of a golden spiral, the visual instantiation of the golden ratio, φ. In layman’s terms’s Popeye and Bluto are positioned relative to the rest of composition to form the beginnings of a spiral that causes the eyeline to drift towards a specific focal point, as you follow the action. In this case, specifically you are drawn closer and closer to her torso, which continues the spiral which is now framed by her boobs and crotch. Mathematically, you the image literally signifies to you “tits and pussy, right here kids.” Like Hayek in Desperado, she seems both completely aware and totally disaffected by the effect her sexuality has on Bluto and Popeye behind her. She knows they’re there, but this is regular occurrence for her (and it is) so she is happy to mind her business and rejoice in her function, to be looked at as an object to drive the action rather than a participant in and of herself.

Again, I’m not making a Frederic Wertham argument here. I’m not so much arguing that the objectification inherent in the image is “bad.” In fact, in this case, I think it’s used particularly well. But the argument is more in the fact that it is commonplace enough to have become a specific visual trope. I actually went to the comic book shop, Phantom of the Attic, yesterday to count how many female sexualized covers there were. From a pure blatant eroticization stanpoint, of the 216 covers that were on the shelf yesterday, only eight had covers that I think your common viewer people would claim were blatantly eroticized towards a male gaze, far fewer than I would have expected, honestly (and way less than would have been the case in the 1990s comic boom). However, 42 of them used golden spirals to draw the focus to an at least mildly sexualized female character or body part. While some of these make sense tonally or narratively, (as is the case with the Red Sonja/Tarzan cover pictured below), others (as in the Hit-Girl cover) seem almost incidental but for the fact that because the character is female, the focus on a sexual characteristic must be sexual.

In particular this becomes complicated by the manner in which we view an eroticized male vs an eroticized female, is is the case in two similar bondage covers that happened to be on the shelf, one for Spider-man and another for Breathless. The female cover takes on a much more erotic connotation despite being effectively identical to the male. This appears to be a function of the cultural view of feminine vs. masculine sexuality as portrayed in art. Clearly the sexual aspects of masculinity are as exaggerated, if not more so, in Popeye and Bluto than they are in Olive in the Mannion image, but it is Olive that appears to draw our attention, not only because of the focus of the spiral, but because we are more predisposed to notice the woman as sexual object than the male.

So anyway, that’s what I’m working with right now. I’m curious as to people’s base opinions and thoughts. This may possibly get worked into a future episode of the podcast… which reminds me… I want to end on a cheap plug. Check out my podcast, VoxPopcast which I do with Wayne Wise, Katya Gorecki and whoever else I happen to rope in that week. Subscribe on iTunes and Facebook and leave reviews and comment and all the things that will make me famous so I can just think about sex in funny books all the time. You know…  for you.

Laura Hudson, Cenate Pruitt, Jessica Keller, Vox Popcast liked this post

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Mavademics: Male Gaze through Visual Signifiers in Comic Art was originally published on ChrisMaverick dotcom

[whitelippedviper]

Pop Comics #2: Dark Nights: Metal #1

This article originally appeared on my patreon, which you can subscribe to for as little as one dollar a month.  As a patreon subscriber you get to see these and other articles sometimes weeks before everyone else.  Subscribe now.

So this is the second installment of my more informal writing series(my, me rambling into an open window on my desktop...series) on popular monthly comics.  Each week I pick a comic from the top 10 on Comixology's best seller list, and I read it...and then I come over here and write about it.  This week: Dark Nights: Metal #1

Dark Nights: Metal #1 was written by Scott Snyder, penciled by Greg Capullo, inked by Jonath Glapion, colored by FCO Plascencia.  It's I guess the start of the new DC event or something.  I'm not sure.  The issue starts with the JLA in some sort of arena battle scenario on some planet Mongul has taken over.  They figure that whole situation out, return home, and there's a giant mountain that has appeared in Gotham.  They go into said mountain, see some shit.  Cyborg is like "man this shit is some shit, huh?" and then the Blackhawks show up.  Which I thought they were like a WWII team or something, but apparently they are like...I don't even know...Batman.  And they're run by Kendra Sanders, the I don't know what she is in this continuity but I think she's Hawkgirl or whatever.  Or is it Hawkwoman.  I don't remember.  Probably girl, right?  Let's see...it's woman if they are their own hero.  Girl if they are a female knock off.  But then reverts back to woman if they are a lesbian knock off of a male hero....  I think that's how it works.  

Anyways.  Kendra Sanders convinces the JLA to come to her secret base to explain how Batman is the vessel of some ancient evil, which is callback to Morrison's Batman RIP ish run stuff after final crisis--which I did read!  I vaguely remember some of that.  But so they've done all this research on batman, but still just pull guns on him, and so of course he escapes.  For some reason he is able to fool the whole JLA who don't think to look for him...at his Bat Cave?  I don't know. So batman is at his bat cave like looking at nth metal on his microscope.  He finds some journal from carter hall.  And just as carter hall is like "look batman, I know you think shit might not be shit, but let me assure you, shit is way fucking the shit" Dream...from Sandman...shows up and is like "Batman, this shit is about to get real(shit)".  The end. 

  And I'm not sure if Dream is now just running around normally in DCU continuity again, or if this is meant to be something like special.  Either way, you can see in the above image, Dream has apparently sent his stylist to hell this time. Either way....holy shit.  It's a first issue of a superhero comic, and so of course it ends in a splash page shocking reveal cliffhanger at the end.  I mean this whole thing is just so by the numbers for how you do event comics it is just hollow.  Heroes do a thing seemingly unrelated to the main thing, the big thing happens, it's like multiverse spanning, splash page reveal...the end.  Even Capullo's art here looks bored with itself.  There's two panels in this comic that I can recommend.  One is a small panel of Superman:

The other panel is when Batman is riding a dinosaur, which I still didn't even bother to take a picture of.  On the whole, it makes Howard Porter look like JG Jones.  And this is supposed to be a big event comic.  If all of these event comics are just going to be continuity porn they should at least be a spectacle.  I'm just not sure what I'm supposed to take away on any level from a book like this.   Even the Variant covers were pretty mailed in.  Great artists like JRJR and Jim Lee just kinda drawing a standard superhero pinup and calling it a day.  Nothing really on the theme of metal.  You get this sexy idea of doing a heavy metal version of a superhero comic, but then it turns out it's nth metal, and that's not really metal at all.  Go get Joe Jusko to paint Wonder Woman riding a vampire bat out of a lake of blood.  Come on.  Metal.  It's like the Met Gala where all these stars who have the money to have taste show up completely off theme and completely boring giving us nothing even remotely aspriational.   If you asked me why I don't care about superhero comics, this comic is pretty much what I'd conjure up as an example of why.  I'm too old to give a shit about which of these palette swaps dies and then is resurrected or what worlds collide.  And I don't care about good versus evil in these basic cop versus robber terms.  I'm not a child.  But like I'm reading JRJR/Williamson and Nocenti's Typhoid Mary comics this week, and thoroughly enjoying them.  And it's not because I give a shit about Daredevil.  It's because there's actually shit on the page to react to.  There's great art to inspire you.  And the writing is in big bold terms, but it has a certain soap opera quality.  It's not ironic.  It just says what it means and is all about these sappy triangles of people.  It works.  It doesn't matter that it's a superhero comic.  It's just a great comic.  I think what I want from superhero comics now, doesn't have anything to do with them being superhero comics.  It has to do with the two biggest companies putting the most resources behind their comics, I expect to see a quality of work, particularly artistically that I can look at and just be in awe and be like "never in a thousand years could I draw that".  I think people don't respect the art in these things anymore because the styles artists have adopted don't scare people, don't put them in awe.  And honestly neither does the writing.  People read these things and they are just like "oh man, I could do this" which is cool, I mean I'm one of those people.  But it's not healthy in terms of the sort of reverence the top artists in the comics game should demand. No one was stepping to Neal Adams or Norm Breyfogle. But I mean, I think it's just a paycheck, and it reads like that--which makes sense, because why would grown adults who have been in the industry for decades in some cases, and who have already written like a million superhero things--past a point, you just get that formula, hit those marks, cash those checks, and try and whittle away on whatever your actual passion is in the background, like the rest of us. But then meanwhile this is the stuff that gets geeks breathless and hyperbolic...and for what.  What is all of this for?  It's just this cycle of fans pushing up artists until they are gibbering self parodies of themselves, and then dropping them off creator cliff to go die in a ditch somewhere.  And these fan groups, what do they do with their shit?  Stay in this false dream for as long as they can.  Throw a tantrum at anyone who says anything negative or threatening to that dream?  Like there's no wrong way to live, all of our lives are meaningless, so value is an illusion.  You just do what best makes sense for you to pass the time until you die.  But for me, this shit fucks up my hustle, because I'm in this life game to see shit.  I want things that at least aspire to be something I haven't seen before.  At least TRY to be beautiful.  But the demands of these fan things, are so insane, who has time for beauty?  And because that's where the money is, it just sucks people in and traps them there until there is nothing left.   You see the effects of this stuff at Image where creators are supposedly let loose to do their passion projects, but they've been so warped by working these fan projects, that there's very little truth left to them.  And all these big two tics of how to do issue #1 arc #1 and so on and so forth come up and really mar work.  It's not just the writing.  It happens to artists too.  There's like a set way these sort of things get laid out on the page, and certain stock ways you do a scene because you're like double shipping a book and don't have time to really like consider the absolute best way for you as an individual to do a book.    So even when artists get outside of that infrastructure, it is usually too late and they are reduced in potential by their habits.  I mean I can't be the only one who can open a comic from these sorts of people, and your eyes just glaze over as you see it's just the same thing.  It's appropriate that this thing ends with Dream, because this comic is sleepwalking.  Like most of the most talented people in comics. Every month you have the opportunity to say one thing to an audience of several thousand.  Which is huge for a comic.  And you are going to say...what?  You are going to show them....what?

[rahliterature]

CBC: Three Page Paper: Select one comic or Sequential Art object that you have read in full either to series completion, or to a story arch completion, and analyze the comic for content, including one to three major themes discussed in the author lectures in Module Three. (Marvel Tsum Tsum)

One of the biggest complaints adults have in regards to children’s media is that it is too commercial. Often times television shows and movies can feel like one giant advertisement for their toys, trading cards, and video games. Some shows, like Pokémon or Yu-Gi-Oh!­ were created with the main purpose to advertise their merchandise. So, when a comic book that was based around a cute fluffy toy came out, it turned many people off, making them think it is just another advertising ploy. The beauty of Marvel Tsum Tsum Takeover by Jacob Chabot and David Baldeon is that this comic is not just a long advertisement for Disney’s tsum tsums. It does a good job in making the reader want to buy a tsum tsum to cuddle. Through a short four volume issue, this fun and action-packed comic not only brings a little joy and humor into a series that has become pretty dark and bleak in recent years but also questions the definition of a hero as well.

           The name tsum tsum comes from the Japanese word “tsumu” which means to stack1.  Tsums tsums are stuffed toys that are easily stacked hence the name. They come in four different sizes and hundreds of different characters: from classic Disney characters like Mickey and friends to every episode of Star Wars, from Disney Princesses to Marvel superheroes and villains. These cuddly things have been around since 2013 in Japan and 2014 in the United States1 and new tsum tsums are released bimonthly. In August of 2016, from the inspiration of the marvel tsum tsum app as well as the cuddly toys, comic writer Jacob Chabot and penciller David Baldeon decided to create the first volume of Marvel Tsum Tsum Takeover2. Chabot was not new to the idea of taking a child’s toy and turning it into a comic series. From 2013-2015, Chabot worked on a 6 part “Hello Kitty” comic book series3, turning a cute and cuddly cat toy into a real character with emotions and feelings. While “Hello Kitty” does have some plot and character developments in video games and a few mini-series television shows that have come out over the years, there is nothing really cohesive or a well-defined canon to turn into a full-fledged comic. On the other hand, Chabot has also worked on 74 issues of “Sponge Bob Square Pants” comic books over the years3 which has an over abundance of plotlines to turn into a comic series. Both of these different comic issues show how he is used to creating stories with either a little or a lot of source material. It also shows how Chabot is used to drawing inspiration from unusual source material that most people wouldn’t consider turning into a comic book. Prior to the comic release, tsum tsums had no plot or purpose behind them. The app, Marvel tsum tsums, was more of a “Candy Crush” style game without any real cohesive plot line. Disney has never released a back story to go along with the tsum tsums; they are simply cute toys to play with and cuddle. Chabot was able to take these cute toys and give them a purpose and a story that was unique and exciting, just like he had done with other characters in the past. He managed to craft the story in a way that uses the cute and ridiculous nature of the tsum tsum and make that tell a story, rather than telling a story about a cute toy. He was able to do so because of his past experience, both with unusual comic topics but also with normal American comic plot lines as well.

Chabot has worked on previous Marvel comics, specifically X-Men and Spiderman comics, so he knew how superhero comics in a traditional American way worked and he was aware of how dark Marvel comics have become. In the same month as the first tusm tsum volume release, 33 different issues in the Civil War II arc were released as well4. Just a few months prior, the entire world was shocked and angered at the reveal of Captain America being a Hydra agent. This was a dark time for Marvel. Superheroes were punching each other, both in comics and on the big screen as Civil War had just been released in the MCU that May as well. One of the most beloved Marvel characters had just become evil and at the time there seemed no hope of redemption for him. Marvel Tsum Tsum Takeover was like a breath of fresh air. It’s simply a fun comic. There are these cute little toys becoming miniature versions of some of marvel’s favorite superheroes, running around with miniature versions of their powers, and chaos ensues. It’s fun without being too silly. There is a cohesive plot line in the story with real character development. Although there are toys that are alive, in the comics they are an alien species, giving credibility through comic logic on how these toys are alive. The comic doesn’t take itself too serious though as there are times when other characters question whether or not the tsum tsums are toys, creating a great moment of dramatic irony in the story. The story does a good job of straddling the fine line of humor and silliness, keeping the light-heartedness of the story flowing without comprising the story. There is real character development not only with the tsum tsums but also with the human characters as well, making this a real story instead of simply a long advertisement. That growth is found, not only in the three main characters, Albert “Bert” Ergle, Holly Hae, and Duncan “Dunk” Diggs, but in their families and even in the main human villain as well. The combination of plot, real character development, dramatic irony, and the silliness that comes with using tsum tsums creates this funny comic that is just fun to read. It can reach a large audience, from children to adults, because it is so light-hearted and fun. It’s a reminder that comics don’t have to be dark in order to accomplish character and plot development; fun and light-hearted comics can deliver a message just as efficiently and maybe even better than a dark and grisly comic.

Through the light-hearted story, the comic poses the question of what is a hero and what do they fight for. The initial thought would be that the tsum tsums are the heroes of the story; after all, they are the titular characters with superpowers. In a normal comics, they would be the hero of the issue. Instead, this comic seems to focus on the three children dream of being superheroes5. They draw their own comics and do stupid stunts to try and gain superpowers. The reader, along with the Avenger tsum tsums, watch as Bert and Holly are scolded by Bert’s mother for running around and playing superhero when Ultron has been attacking the city. This panel puts an emphasis on the children as the main characters with the tsum tsums on the sidelines. This panel is also is a major turning point in the comic as well. Before, the children were focused on the superpowered superheroes and trying to gain powers like them. When they found the tsum tsum, they get swept up in the excitement that came with discovering the tsum tsum’s powers and what amazing deeds they could accomplish. Bert’s mother acts as the voice of reason, reminding the children that they aren’t superheroes with superpowers. She reminds them of the very real danger that exists in their universe, with real villains who have killed before. After this wake-up call, they seem to end their superhero shenanigans. Until something goes wrong with the tsum tsums and they don their superhero costumes, this time to help their friends instead of for glory. The children go to fight in a battle they know they cannot win, not for the glory or the chance to show-off to the Avengers but to protect their friends, the tsum tsums. They become heroes in this story, not because they fearlessly ran into battle but because they ran to help their friends even though they were scared. Fighting beside the Avengers and the tsum tsums, the children are viewed as the real heroes of the comic. The comic shows that it’s not superpowers that make a hero; someone is a hero when they fight to protect their friends and family.

It doesn’t take a dark and gritty comic to communicate a message to an audience. Even a light-hearted and somewhat silly comic can send a powerful message of what it means to be a hero to an audience. Comics can use any medium to communicate this message, even fluffy cute toys called tsum tsums. Just because something is based off of a toy doesn’t mean there isn’t a message to be learned. Creating a comic from a toy can be a great way to advertise the toy, but it is also a way to reach an audience at a level that they can relate with, both as children and adults.

 Refences:

1.      Graser, Marc. “Will Japan’s ‘Tsum Tsum’ Characters Translate in the U.S. for Disney?” Variety, 1 July 2014, variety.com/2014/biz/asia/will-japans-tsum-tsum-characters-translate-in-the-u-s-for-disney-1201256414/.

2.      Kieranshiach. “Disney Tsum Tsum Invades The Marvel Universe.” ComicsAlliance, 16 May 2016, comicsalliance.com/disney-tsum-tsum-variant-covers-series/.

3.      “Jacob Chabot (Person).” Comic Vine, comicvine.gamespot.com/jacob-chabot/4040-55702/.

4.      “Calendar | Comics.” Marvel.com, marvel.com/comics/calendar/month/2016-08-01?byZone=marvel_site_zone&offset=0&tab=comic&formatType=issue&isDigital=0&byType=date&dateStart=2016-08-01&dateEnd=2016-08-31&orderBy=release_date%2Bdesc&limit=300&count=21.

5.      Reviewer, Joey Edsall Best Shots. “Best Shots Review: MARVEL TSUM TSUM #1 'Removes The Doubts Imposed By Adulthood Cynicism'.” Newsarama, www.newsarama.com/30488-best-shots-review-marvel-tsum-tsum-1.html.

These are two of the panels I referenced in this paper.

[cbilluminati]

So many great titles from IDW this week, and we have your early look at them all. Here’s the IDW Publishing Previews for 1-18-2017.

Action Man, Vol. 1

Writer: John Barber Artist: Paolo Villanelli Cover Artist: Chris Evenhuis

He’s the world’s greatest special agent… until he dies saving the planet, with all the world’s eyes on him. Now his young protégé has to step into the role—whether he’s ready or not! Collects issues #1–4 and the Revolution: Action Man one-shot.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 128 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-809-0

Bullet points:

“Strike(s) a balance between innocent, old-school spycraft and a more grounded, real-world-influenced take on the franchise.” –IGN

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Angry Birds Comics: Game Play #1

Writers: Paul Tobin & Various Artists: Paco Rodriques & Various Cover Artist: Ciro Cangiolosi

An all-new season of Angry Birds Comics is here! Featuring art and stories from some of today’s finest storytellers, this new series is guaranteed to please readers of all ages who love the Angry Birds app or great comics in general!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Fresh off the successful launch of the new app, these stories focus on the fun and magic surrounding one of the world’s most popular and well recognized game properties!

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The Art of Zach Howard, Vol. 1: Wild Blue Yonder

Writer: Zach Howard Artist: Zach Howard Cover Artist: Zach Howard

Zach Howard has been producing art for some of entertainment’s biggest companies, working on projects like Shaun of the Dead, Spiderman, X-Men, G.I. JOE, and Batman along the way being nominated for an Eisner award and multiple indie awards. In this series, fans get a behind-the-scenes look at his process of creation. Volume 1 focuses on the critically acclaimed series Wild Blue Yonder providing pages of preliminary pencils and finished inks.

TPB • B&W • $9.99 • 48 pages • 8.5” x 11” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-811-3

 Bullet points:

“Zach Howard…just crush(es) it. Wild Blue Yonder is stunning beyond belief. The dirt and grit of the world clings to the characters. This is a lived-in universe, a place where you can see the wear and tear on nearly everything.” –IGN

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The Complete Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy, Vol. 21

Writer: Chester Gould Artist: Chester Gould Cover Artist: Chester Gould

Dick Tracy leaps into the Space Age when Diet Smith’s experimental Space Coupe brings back a visitor from outer space! Meet… Moon Maid, the most outrageous character in the strip’s entire history. Prior to venturing where no detective has gone before, Tracy deals with some very earthbound—and gruesomely entertaining—adventures, including the use of napalm (!) to flush out a gang of crooks from their hideout. In these strips from August 27, 1962 through April 12, 1964 Tracy mixes it up with the criminal 52 Gang—each named for a card in the poker deck—who have found a novel way to dispose of the corpses of their enemies, Junior is smitten by a girl who literally wants him dead, Sparkle

Plenty falls into the hands of crazed modern artists and their ape accomplice, and (six months before it happened in the “real world”) a doctor has perfected heart transplant surgery—but in this case it’s on unwilling victims!

HC • B&W • $44.99 • 272 pages • 11” x 8.5” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-794-9

Bullet points:

“One of the best things to happen to the comic market in the last few years was IDW’s decision to publish The Complete Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy.” –Scoop

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Dirk Gently: The Salmon of Doubt #4

Writer: Arvind Ethan David Artist: Ilias Kyriazis Cover Artist: Ilias Kyriazis

Plagued by nightmares of a life he never had, Dirk Gently discovers that a holistic detective can have more than one past, and they’re about to catch up with him! Featuring favorite characters from the original books as well as the cast from the TV series, including Samuel Barnett and Elijah Wood!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

The star of two (almost three) beloved Douglas Adams novels!

Written by executive producer of the TV series Arvind Ethan David!

Executive produced by Max Landis (Chronicle and Superman: American Alien), the writer of the BBC America TV series!

Each issue will have a photo cover featuring the cast of the show!

Ask your retailer about variant cover by Robert Hack (Sabrina the Teenage Witch)!

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Donald Duck: Timeless Tales, Vol. 2

Writer: Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, Luciano Bottaro, Lars Jensen, Daniel Branca, Pat McGreal, Joe Torcivia, Thad Komorowski Artist: Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, Luciano Bottaro, Lars Jensen, Daniel Branca, Pat McGreal, Joe Torcivia, Thad Komorowski Cover Artist: Andrea Freccero

“Howlin’ crashwagons!” IDW’s Donald Duck comics come together in a collectors’ hardback with more of what you want: more amazing epics by Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, and other great comics maestros; more danger for desperate Donald, and more bills for Uncle Scrooge McDuck, forever hauling his nephew’s fat out of the fire! With extras for true Disney Comics aficionados, this collection provides hours of history and thrills. Collects issues #7–12.

HC • FC • $29.99 • 256 pages • 7.25” x 10” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-765-9

Bullet points:

Beautiful Hardcover Edition for Disney Collectors!

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Ghostbusters Annual 2017

Writer: Erik Burnham Artists: Dan Scoening, Rachel Stott, Corin Howell, Erik Evensen Cover Artist: San Schoening

Join us for this special double-sized annual, featuring Ghostbusters past, present… and future! Learn the origin of Slimer! Witness a crazy bust in the Midwest with the Chicago Ghostbusters! Find out what Winston Zeddemore was up to during the Scolari Brothers incident in Ghostbusters 2! And peek into the future at the next generation of Ghostbusters… and much more! Be there or be slimed!

FC • 48 pages • $7.99

Bullet points:

The secret origin of Slimer and much more!

Part of IDW’s 2017 Annual Offensive! Over-sized and action-packed key stories in a deluxe format!

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Jem and the Holograms Annual 2017

Writer: Kelly Thompson Artists: M. Victoria Robado, Maria Jose Barros, Svanna Ganucheau, Katarzyna Witerscheim, Gisele Lagace Cover Artist: W. Scott Forbes

The Starlight Girls have been writing and drawing an “exquisite corpse” style fan fiction comic that re-imagines their favorite pop stars — Jem & The Holograms — as pop-stars by day and renegade space heroes by night. Follow the adventures of Jem and The Holograms as you’ve never seen them before — superheroes fighting to save the universe from the evil Majestrix Pizzazz and her…army of Mecha-Spider-Pizzes!?!? OMG.

FC • 48 pages • $7.99

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My Little Pony: Princess Twilight Sparkle

Writers: Various Artists: Various Cover Artists: Various

The celebrated animated series comes to book shelves! Revisit the habitants of Equestria and learn about the magic that friendship brings in this adaptation of the television series. This volume adapts the two-part “Princess Twilight Sparkle!”

TPB • FC • $7.99 • 148 pages • 5” x 7” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-802-1

Bullet points:

Fan-favorite television episodes adapted for readers of all-ages!

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The October Faction: Deadly Season #4

Writer: Steve Niles Artist: Damien Worm Cover Artist: Damien Worm

With their first clue to Fred Allan’s disappearance, the rest of the Allan family turns to Geoff’s magic in an attempt to find their missing father. Meanwhile, a manhunt’s on for Fred as he tries to survive in a dead city. Will the family be able to locate him before the monstrous children of his old enemies hunt him down?

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

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Popeye Classics #54

Writer: Bud Sagendorf Artist: Bud Sagendorf Cover Artist: Bud Sagendorf

The genius of Bud Sagendorf! You’ll have plenty of ARF ARFs when you read about Popeye going up against Dynamite Dan in “Gentlemen Only!” Swee’pea, Pappy, Olive Oil and Wimpy join the one-eyed sailor in “Gone!” Plus “Mountain Monster” and “O.G. Wottasnozzle, The Only Man on Earth with the Atomic Brain.”

FC • 32 pages • $4.99

Bullet points:

Variant cover by Jorge Gutierrez!

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Powerpuff Girls #6

Writers: Haley Mancini and Jake Goldman Artist: Nicoletta Baldari Cover Artist: Nicoletta Baldari

While stopping The Fashionistas in their latest attempt to steal the coveted Diamond Pumps, The Powerpuff Girls get blasted by an experimental SASSY RAY! Have they gone from “sugar, spice and everything nice” to “sass, frass and zero class”… forever?!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Comic series written by show writers Jake Goldman and Haley Mancini–Haley is also the voice of arch-villainess PRINCESS MOREBUCKS! Each issue ripped directly from the NEW world of The Powerpuff Girls.

Each retailer incentive cover will be by a Powerpuff Girls animator!

Variant cover by Julia Vickerman!

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Revolutionaries #1

Writer: John Barber Artist: Fico Ossio Cover Artist: Tradd Moore

THE REVOLUTION MAY BE OVER–but the future is just beginning! Ripped from the pages of the hottest crossover of the year, the REVOLUTION team of John Barber and Fico Ossio continue the action! KUP is a CYBERTRONIAN literally older than the universe; ACTION MAN is the ultimate special agent trying to live up to an impossible legacy; MAYDAY is a G.I. JOE leader trying to rescue her first command; and BLACKROCK is a CYBERTRONIAN that thinks he’s a human. It takes the mind-bending clash of ROM versus MAJOR BLUDD and the OKTOBER GUARD to bring this unlikely team together… and the secret they learn threatens to unravel the entire universe.

FC • 32 pages + mini-comic • $4.99

Bullet points:

Exclusive bound-in Savage mini-comic reprinting a lost tale written and drawn by the late, great Joe Kubert himself!

Written by one part of the powerhouse creative team that brought you the mega-event, Revolution!

New tales that continue the storyline of the hit Revolution comic-book event and featuring the same amazing creative team!

Illustrated by Revolution artist, burgeoning superstar Fico Ossio!

The secrets of the Hasbro universe will be revealed. If you follow one new book this month, make it Revolutionaries!

Variant covers by Sara Pitre-Durocher, Sonny Liew, and Paul Pope!

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Rom, Vol. 1

Writers: Christos Gage & Chris Ryall Artist: David Messina Cover Artist: Zach Howard

Far away, in another galaxy, the knights of the Solstar Order, defenders of justice and truth, were ambushed by the evil magicians, the Dire Wraiths. In the end, the Solstar Order prevailed and began seeking out its scattered enemies. One of these knights has followed the trail of the Dire Wraiths all the way to Earth. This knight, the one the Dire Wraiths fear more than all others has hounded them and kept them underground for centuries and could wipe them off the face of creation. He is ROM, Lord of the Solstar Order; Rom, the Wraithslayer. Collects issues #0–4 and Rom: Revolution.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 132 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-817-5

Bullet points:

“This new series captures all the fun and charm of the classic ’80s franchise, with just enough touches of real-world drama to give weight to Rom’s never-ending battle with the Dire Wraiths.” –IGN

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Star Trek: Waypoint #3 (of 6)

Writers: Cecil Castellucci, Mairghread Scott Artists: Megan Levens, Corin Howell Cover Artist: Daniel Warren Johnson

Star Trek: Deep Space 9 and Star Trek: Voyager return to comics! In Castellucci’s, “Mother’s Walk,” major Kira confronts how she can perform a mandatory, ancient Bajoran pilgrimage when so many family members, needed for the rite, are dead. Who can she turn to? And in Scott’s “The Wildman Maneuver,” an unlikely member of the Voyager crew “saves” the ship!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Check out the variant covers featuring STAR TREK artists from the last 50 years of Trek comics!

Photo cover variant!

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Universe #6

Writers: John Lees, Nick Pitarra, Brahm Revel Artists: Nick Pitarra, Brahm Revel Cover Artist: Freddie Williams

Behold the debut of the TMNT’s weirdest foe yet: Wyrm! When Michelangelo tries to help find a missing person in the sewers, he ends up discovering something he wished stayed in the dark!

FC • 32 pages • $4.99

Bullet points:

A new back-up story from Brahm Revel (Guerillas) takes us inside the Foot Clan!

Variant cover by Logan Faeber!

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Transformers: Titans Return

Writers: John Barber, James Roberts, Mairghread Scott Artists: Livio Ramondelli, Priscilla Tramontano Cover Artist: Priscilla Tramontano

Once he ruled CYBERTRON with a brutal (and literal) iron fist… left for dead four million years ago, SENTINEL PRIME is back. But in a world where STARSCREAM rules CYBERTRON, OPTIMUS PRIME has invaded Earth, and MEGATRON is an AUTOBOT—SENTINEL doesn’t like what he sees! Collects the Titans Return one-shot, Transformers #56–57, and Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye #56–57.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 120 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-821-2

Bullet points:

“The Transformers: Titans Return is perfect to get readers of all kinds hooked.” –Major Spoilers

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Walt Disney’s Comics & Stories #736

Writers: William Van Horn, Evert Geradts, Thad Komorowski Artists: William Van Horn, Mau Heymans, Giovan Battista Carpi Cover Artists: Daan Jippes, Ulrich Schroeder

In “Quest for the Faceplant,” Donald’s out to catch a monstrous man-eating plant for Uncle Scrooge—but will pirates get there first? Then Donald turns soap opera actor in “As the Snail Trails”… and Goofy gets an online Valentine in “Crimes of Passion”!

FC • 40 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Fan favorites William Van Horn and Mau Heymans deliver wild new tales of Donald, Scrooge, and Daisy at their dizziest!

Rediscover classic Golden Age Disney art by Walt Kelly (Pogo) on our Subscription Cover this month!

Check out the Massimo Asaro winter fun variant cover!

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The X-Files #10

Writer: Joe Harris Artist: Greg Scott Cover Artist: menton3

“Contrarians,” Part 1 (of 2): Mulder chances upon evidence that suggests the now-defunct Syndicate’s involvement in the Iran-Contra affair. Guest-starring the Cigarette Smoking Man and President Reagan!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Executive produced by The X-Files creator Chris Carter!

Part of IDW’s Artist’s Edition Cover Month!

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via IDW Publishing

IDW Publishing Previews for 1-18-2017

So many great titles from IDW this week, and we have your early look at them all.

IDW Publishing Previews for 1-18-2017 So many great titles from IDW this week, and we have your early look at them all.

[aion-rsa]

Gerard Way Hopes to Extend His DC Influence Beyond Young Animal

At Emerald City Comicon 2016, DC Comics announced a new line called Young Animal, with “The Umbrella Academy” writer and My Chemical Romance singer Gerard Way as its public face and curator. Reminiscent of early Vertigo, the line is a mature readers, promising surreal and experimental takes on existing DC Comics properties such as “Doom Patrol” — and in the case of “Mother Panic,” a new character but set in the familiar setting of Gotham City.

A year later, the line now has four monthly ongoing series — “Doom Patrol,” “Mother Panic,” “Cave Carson Has as Cybernetic Eye” and “Shade, the Changing Girl” — plus a new miniseries slated to debut in May, “Bug!: The Adventures of Forager,” from the familial creative team of Lee Allred, Mike Allred, and Laura Allred. Though “Doom Patrol” — written by Way and illustrated primarily by Nick Derington — has seen shipping delays, the line has received a largely positive response, with its more unconventional take providing a contrast to the more back-to-basics superheroics of DC’s current “Rebirth” initiative.

CBR spoke with Way late last month at WonderCon in Anaheim about the first year of Young Animal, what he wants to see in the next year, the freedom he’s received from DC Comics, the latest on the “Doom Patrol” schedule and the possibility of him having a creative impact at DC outside of the imprint.

“Doom Patrol” #6 cover by Nick Derington.

CBR: Gerard, it’s been just about exactly a year since the announcement of Young Animal. What has the experience been like? It’s been a new endeavor for you, and a new one for DC. How has it lined up with whatever expectations you may have had?

Gerard Way: It’s been a lot of really rewarding work. A lot of super-hard work, but very rewarding. We knew they were all very different from mainstream comics when they came out, so they’re finding their audience. Now that the first trades are about to come out, what I expect to see is an expansion of the readership. People getting into the second arcs, reading the first in trades, things like that. But I’ve been extremely happy with everything. Collaborating with all the creators has been the best part.

It’s a new role for you in comics — you’ve written before, but this is you as the curator of a line.H How has your role evolved over the last year? How hands on have you been?

Basically, [DC Comics editors] Molly [Mahan] and Jamie [S. Rich] really do run that imprint. They make sure the books get out. They make sure the art gets in. They proofread, they do all that stuff, they help with story. But then everything still comes through me, and that’s another reason “Doom Patrol” gets a little late — because I have this whole other workload. Sometimes I’ll sit down on a Monday to write, and it’ll be Thursday before I’m scripting, because I’ll be dealing with all this other stuff.

What I’ve now found myself to be doing, aside from Young Animal, is trying to find other things to bring into DC. If it’s a special project, or if it’s somebody that does special editions of something. I have a lot of connections in other areas. My contract with DC is as a consultant, so I try to consult. I try to bring ideas to them.

So we may see stuff from you at DC outside of Young Animal?

We might, yeah.

“Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye” #7 variant cover by Robert Hack.

We’ve seen comics from you in the past that are your own creations, but now you’re working with established characters more than before. It’s a unique take, deliberately, but it’s still within franchise-type properties — what have that been like for you, as a creator?

I enjoy franchise things. I think they’re really exciting. Basically, the challenge in starting something like that is building a world, and then your job is to keep the world alive and keep adding to it. That’s really fun, as opposed to, “Here’s a comic about this,” about one-off subjects. I’m interested in building worlds and keeping them alive.

Is it a different creative muscle for you as a writer?

Yeah, it is. Especially team books. I’ve never really written a solo character — I guess I did for my Spider-Man thing [2014’s “Edge of Spider-Verse” #5]. But it’s almost always been team books. I just prefer them, I don’t know why. I like juggling a lot of characters.

A huge company like DC, who are caretakers of these characters, you don’t necessarily expect them take on something like Young Animal, which is by its mission statement, experimental. How has the relationship been with DC?

The relationship has been amazing. [DC Entertainment Co-Publisher] Jim [Lee] focuses on the bigger picture art type of things. That’s where his vision comes in. [DC Entertainment Co-Publisher] Dan [DiDio], he’s the nuts and bolts guy. The amount he wanted to take risks was really refreshing and s surprising. I’ve gotten to take a lot of risks, and they’ve been more than supportive. So it’s been great.

Let’s talk “Doom Patrol.” You clarified a bit on Instagram earlier, but there appears to be come misconception on the statue of the series — you’re taking a little bit of a break after #6?

After #6, yeah. Basically, the orders for #7, #8 and #9 got canceled, but that’s only because we’re going to resolicit very soon. We just want to catch up. We want to get ahead. We were getting frustrated with always being a little bit late. A little more late. A little more late. It escalates.

At the same time, you’re trying to make the best book you can. We just didn’t want to rush. We realized, as a team, we needed more time. So we’re just taking that time.

Is Mike Allred still drawing issue #7?

Yeah, absolutely. 100 percent. In fact, the issue I’m writing for him is literally tailor-made for him. It’s a very different issue than the first [six].

And the Allred family are also doing “Bug.” We’ve seen some pages from the series — what’s got you excited about what they’re doing there?

The enthusiasm of the Allred family for this character has been incredible. That’s been a real amazing thing to watch. It’s been the most inspiring thing about the book, it’s what sold me on the book. Obviously, I love obscure characters, but I knew very little about Bug. They convinced me there was something — it’s an amazing old Kirby character, so there’s amazing stuff there. They helped get it out of the character.

And “Flintstones” writer Mark Russell is writing “The Wonderful World of Rocks” back-up in “Cave Carson,” drawn by Benjamin Dewey. What does it mean to have Russell contribute to the line?

He’s a great writer. What we hope to accomplish with his writing at Young Animal is help us expand Cave Carson’s universe, and fill in some of the background.

It’s been one year since the announcement — what are you hoping to see from Young Animal in the next year?

I want to keep the books extremely healthy. I would rather have four really healthy monthlies than more monthlies. But what I would like to see is experimenting with miniseries this year. I think we’re going to start to see that. “Bug” is a mini, there are a couple of other in the pipeline we’re developing right now that I can’t talk about, but they’re miniseries. I’d like to see us expand with some things like that.

The post Gerard Way Hopes to Extend His DC Influence Beyond Young Animal appeared first on CBR.

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[vshen3-75-blog]

The outrage over Marvel, Magneto, and Nazis, explained by Alex Abad-Santos

In the eyes of its most fervent fans, Marvel has assassinated Magneto, arguably the most beloved villain the comic book company has ever created. And they did it with just one cover.

This past week, Marvel revealed variant covers to its upcoming crossover event “Secret Empire,”  an event in which Steve Rogers’s allegiance to the Hydra criminal   organization will be revealed. Magneto appears on one of those covers,   suggesting he’s been in clandestine cahoots with Rogers and Hydra. And   being that Hydra is an organization with comic book roots in Nazi   Germany, the cover links Magneto, a Jewish Holocaust survivor, to Nazis by way of Hydra.

Fans are upset.

Their gripe: Marvel has miscarried the character,  jettisoning decades of storytelling and fundamentally misunderstanding  Magneto’s very nature by aligning him with Hydra.

The apparent editorial move — which at this point is still speculation based on a variant cover — comes on the heels of

last year’s Marvel reveal

 that Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, believes himself to be a   Hydra agent. That decision was also met with fan resistance, and   insistence that Marvel diminished the work of Rogers’s creators.   Magneto’s similar twist makes it seems like Marvel is doubling down on   the prospect and also not listening to the feedback the company has   received.   For people who aren’t comic book readers or casual fans,  the vocal fight over the origins of fictional characters can seem  confusing, or even trivial, considering real life white supremacists  have become fixtures in the current national political conversation, and  bad fiction happens all the time. But the fight goes beyond the comic book history of  Captain America and Magneto and deeper into the significance of art’s  connection to morality. It’s an embodiment of how powerful fandom can  be, and the ever-challenging question of who owns art: the artists  creating it or the fans purchasing it. 

Why Magneto’s Hydra alliance is upsetting to fans

The key to understanding Erik Lehnsherr, a.k.a. Magneto,  is that his worldview is shaped by his childhood, a brutal experience  that took place in Nazi concentration camps. Many of the X-Men movies  have fleshed this out, but the writer who transformed Magneto was writer   Chris Claremont, who’s considered the godfather of the X-Men comics. In 1981 and throughout the decade, Claremont conceived and developed Magneto’s origin story, which begins in Auschwitz:

The brutality Magneto witnesses, combined with the death  of his family, shapes his understanding of men: They can’t be trusted,  they can’t be given power, and their default setting is inhumanity.  Though you don’t have to agree with him, his disenchantment with mankind  makes sense given his backstory.

The trauma Magneto experienced at the hands of Nazis is  why he could never fully be an X-Man. Throughout his publication  history, he’s occasionally joined the X-Men for a stint or helped them  out, but he never stays for long, because he can’t reconcile their  optimistic view of mankind with what he knows firsthand. In Claremont  and artist Brent Anderson’s God Loves, Man Kills graphic novel, you see this distinct crystallization of Magneto’s viewpoint and the clash with what the X-Men believe:

Magneto believes that mutants need to rule over men (how  strong this viewpoint comes across depends on who’s writing him) because  he knows that they’re capable of genocide. It’s core to his character,  which is why his sudden allegiance to Hydra, an organization with ties  to Nazis, came as a bitter surprise to fans. 

But this apparent revelation about Magneto and Hydra is  further complicated by the current goings-on in the Marvel comic book  universe. 

How Marvel is rewriting Hydra’s Nazi history

Magneto’s Hydra business comes on the heels Marvel’s  reveal last May that Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, believes he  is a Hydra agent. The condensed version:  A character named Kobik restores the aging Rogers’s youth and powers, but also rewrites his earliest memories. We later find out that the   Hydra leader, a Nazi known as Red Skull, influenced Kobik to corrupt   those memories.

When Marvel published that reveal, fans felt that the character and, more importantly, his creators had been wronged.

Who owns Magneto?

Officially, Marvel hasn’t specifically stated Magneto’s upcoming affiliation or storyline. The company’s release reads: 

“Things are heating up in the Marvel Universe  as the threat of the Secret Empire looms. As heroes far and wide stand  united against Hydra’s tyranny, the villains have assembled their own  forces! Today, Marvel is pleased to reveal the first five villains to be  featured – Hydra’s secret weapons in the war against the super heroes!”

But Marvel’s decision to flip Rogers, and now apparently  Magneto, has sparked ire in fans and writers who believe the company is  being tone-deaf about both the characters and the current cultural  climate. And that ire raises an important question about the  responsibility of art to its consumers.

“The idea of a Nazi Cap was objectionable in the first  place. But the fact that Marvel has continued despite the fierce and  legitimate criticism speaks to the company’s tone deafness,” Tegan O’Neil wrote for the A.V. Club  in January. “Now that Donald Trump is president and approximately half  the country lives in a state of heightened terror, the idea of Captain  America being a Nazi and infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D. will be, for many, simply dispiriting, unsettling, and too close to home to be fun. It’s   demoralizing. It’s a very sad and upsetting comic, but not how anyone   intended.”

I understand where O’Neil is coming from.

On the day following President Donald Trump’s inauguration, the debate of the day was whether it was okay to inflict bodily harm upon an actual Nazi. (Spencer actually tweeted out  in January that we shouldn’t punch Nazis.) It was a completely surreal  moment for anyone who never really thought that in 2017 we’d still be punching Nazis, much less debating the morality of doing so. And further, I’m of the Grant Morrison mindset that comic books and superheroes have a power to be as influential in shaping a person’s morality as religion.

But I’m also not sure where to draw the line in regard to  Marvel and its creators’ responsibility to give us stories that aren’t,  in O’Neil’s words, “dispiriting, unsettling, and too close to home to  be fun.”

Horrendous stuff has always happened in comic books. A few personal stingers just from the X-Men universe: Kitty Pryde was trapped in a bullet that was just orbiting aimlessly in space. Mutants known as Morlocks were massacred. Magik, Colossus’s little sister, died from a virus that was an allegory for AIDS. Religious fanatics blew up a bus full of de-powered mutants in front of a school. And as of this week, Emma Frost has been turned into genocidal widow.

Superheroes wouldn’t be super if horrendous things never  happened to them. Superhero comic books are about selling, and twists  like these sell.

But the bigger question is whether fans have a say in the  fates of the characters they love, and what does Marvel or DC (see:  Batgirl, the Joker, and The Killing Joke)  or any comics publisher owe to them? How does Marvel balance what fans  want versus what upsets them? This tricky ambiguity over the  cross-section of artistic ownership and moral responsibility is what’s  fueling the Magneto controversy — though, as with so much internet-born  and -bred controversy, it may end up being premature.

The Magneto outrage is anger over an issue that hasn’t even been published (yet)

The most important factor to take into account here is that the Secret Empire crossover,  and the Magneto issue in question, hasn’t even published yet. (The   crossover event goes to print in April.) And covers — especially   variants — don’t necessarily spell out the entire story. (Magneto could very well be a double agent or undergo some kind of Kobik mind-warping.)

Yet people are already passing judgment on something they haven’t seen, not unlike the people protesting or cheering the remake of Beauty and the Beast for re-imagining one of its characters as gay. This sort of sight-unseen outrage is unfortunately how we operate now.

Further, because comic books are released by issue  instead of volume, there an inclination to judge an entire story before  it’s completed. Comic books are not like a television show where you can  binge a season, or an artist’s album where you can listen to all the  songs, or a movie that wraps when the credits roll.

Comic books are living, continuous things. And it’s important — for both creators and fans — to respect that.

[outright-geekery]

So many great titles from IDW this week, and we have your early look at them all. Here’s the IDW Publishing Previews for 1-18-2017.

Action Man, Vol. 1

Writer: John Barber Artist: Paolo Villanelli Cover Artist: Chris Evenhuis

He’s the world’s greatest special agent… until he dies saving the planet, with all the world’s eyes on him. Now his young protégé has to step into the role—whether he’s ready or not! Collects issues #1–4 and the Revolution: Action Man one-shot.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 128 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-809-0

Bullet points:

“Strike(s) a balance between innocent, old-school spycraft and a more grounded, real-world-influenced take on the franchise.” –IGN

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Angry Birds Comics: Game Play #1

Writers: Paul Tobin & Various Artists: Paco Rodriques & Various Cover Artist: Ciro Cangiolosi

An all-new season of Angry Birds Comics is here! Featuring art and stories from some of today’s finest storytellers, this new series is guaranteed to please readers of all ages who love the Angry Birds app or great comics in general!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Fresh off the successful launch of the new app, these stories focus on the fun and magic surrounding one of the world’s most popular and well recognized game properties!

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The Art of Zach Howard, Vol. 1: Wild Blue Yonder

Writer: Zach Howard Artist: Zach Howard Cover Artist: Zach Howard

Zach Howard has been producing art for some of entertainment’s biggest companies, working on projects like Shaun of the Dead, Spiderman, X-Men, G.I. JOE, and Batman along the way being nominated for an Eisner award and multiple indie awards. In this series, fans get a behind-the-scenes look at his process of creation. Volume 1 focuses on the critically acclaimed series Wild Blue Yonder providing pages of preliminary pencils and finished inks.

TPB • B&W • $9.99 • 48 pages • 8.5” x 11” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-811-3

 Bullet points:

“Zach Howard…just crush(es) it. Wild Blue Yonder is stunning beyond belief. The dirt and grit of the world clings to the characters. This is a lived-in universe, a place where you can see the wear and tear on nearly everything.” –IGN

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The Complete Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy, Vol. 21

Writer: Chester Gould Artist: Chester Gould Cover Artist: Chester Gould

Dick Tracy leaps into the Space Age when Diet Smith’s experimental Space Coupe brings back a visitor from outer space! Meet… Moon Maid, the most outrageous character in the strip’s entire history. Prior to venturing where no detective has gone before, Tracy deals with some very earthbound—and gruesomely entertaining—adventures, including the use of napalm (!) to flush out a gang of crooks from their hideout. In these strips from August 27, 1962 through April 12, 1964 Tracy mixes it up with the criminal 52 Gang—each named for a card in the poker deck—who have found a novel way to dispose of the corpses of their enemies, Junior is smitten by a girl who literally wants him dead, Sparkle

Plenty falls into the hands of crazed modern artists and their ape accomplice, and (six months before it happened in the “real world”) a doctor has perfected heart transplant surgery—but in this case it’s on unwilling victims!

HC • B&W • $44.99 • 272 pages • 11” x 8.5” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-794-9

Bullet points:

“One of the best things to happen to the comic market in the last few years was IDW’s decision to publish The Complete Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy.” –Scoop

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Dirk Gently: The Salmon of Doubt #4

Writer: Arvind Ethan David Artist: Ilias Kyriazis Cover Artist: Ilias Kyriazis

Plagued by nightmares of a life he never had, Dirk Gently discovers that a holistic detective can have more than one past, and they’re about to catch up with him! Featuring favorite characters from the original books as well as the cast from the TV series, including Samuel Barnett and Elijah Wood!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

The star of two (almost three) beloved Douglas Adams novels!

Written by executive producer of the TV series Arvind Ethan David!

Executive produced by Max Landis (Chronicle and Superman: American Alien), the writer of the BBC America TV series!

Each issue will have a photo cover featuring the cast of the show!

Ask your retailer about variant cover by Robert Hack (Sabrina the Teenage Witch)!

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Donald Duck: Timeless Tales, Vol. 2

Writer: Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, Luciano Bottaro, Lars Jensen, Daniel Branca, Pat McGreal, Joe Torcivia, Thad Komorowski Artist: Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, Luciano Bottaro, Lars Jensen, Daniel Branca, Pat McGreal, Joe Torcivia, Thad Komorowski Cover Artist: Andrea Freccero

“Howlin’ crashwagons!” IDW’s Donald Duck comics come together in a collectors’ hardback with more of what you want: more amazing epics by Romano Scarpa, Giorgio Cavazzano, and other great comics maestros; more danger for desperate Donald, and more bills for Uncle Scrooge McDuck, forever hauling his nephew’s fat out of the fire! With extras for true Disney Comics aficionados, this collection provides hours of history and thrills. Collects issues #7–12.

HC • FC • $29.99 • 256 pages • 7.25” x 10” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-765-9

Bullet points:

Beautiful Hardcover Edition for Disney Collectors!

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Ghostbusters Annual 2017

Writer: Erik Burnham Artists: Dan Scoening, Rachel Stott, Corin Howell, Erik Evensen Cover Artist: San Schoening

Join us for this special double-sized annual, featuring Ghostbusters past, present… and future! Learn the origin of Slimer! Witness a crazy bust in the Midwest with the Chicago Ghostbusters! Find out what Winston Zeddemore was up to during the Scolari Brothers incident in Ghostbusters 2! And peek into the future at the next generation of Ghostbusters… and much more! Be there or be slimed!

FC • 48 pages • $7.99

Bullet points:

The secret origin of Slimer and much more!

Part of IDW’s 2017 Annual Offensive! Over-sized and action-packed key stories in a deluxe format!

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Jem and the Holograms Annual 2017

Writer: Kelly Thompson Artists: M. Victoria Robado, Maria Jose Barros, Svanna Ganucheau, Katarzyna Witerscheim, Gisele Lagace Cover Artist: W. Scott Forbes

The Starlight Girls have been writing and drawing an “exquisite corpse” style fan fiction comic that re-imagines their favorite pop stars — Jem & The Holograms — as pop-stars by day and renegade space heroes by night. Follow the adventures of Jem and The Holograms as you’ve never seen them before — superheroes fighting to save the universe from the evil Majestrix Pizzazz and her…army of Mecha-Spider-Pizzes!?!? OMG.

FC • 48 pages • $7.99

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My Little Pony: Princess Twilight Sparkle

Writers: Various Artists: Various Cover Artists: Various

The celebrated animated series comes to book shelves! Revisit the habitants of Equestria and learn about the magic that friendship brings in this adaptation of the television series. This volume adapts the two-part “Princess Twilight Sparkle!”

TPB • FC • $7.99 • 148 pages • 5” x 7” • ISBN: 978-1-63140-802-1

Bullet points:

Fan-favorite television episodes adapted for readers of all-ages!

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The October Faction: Deadly Season #4

Writer: Steve Niles Artist: Damien Worm Cover Artist: Damien Worm

With their first clue to Fred Allan’s disappearance, the rest of the Allan family turns to Geoff’s magic in an attempt to find their missing father. Meanwhile, a manhunt’s on for Fred as he tries to survive in a dead city. Will the family be able to locate him before the monstrous children of his old enemies hunt him down?

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

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Popeye Classics #54

Writer: Bud Sagendorf Artist: Bud Sagendorf Cover Artist: Bud Sagendorf

The genius of Bud Sagendorf! You’ll have plenty of ARF ARFs when you read about Popeye going up against Dynamite Dan in “Gentlemen Only!” Swee’pea, Pappy, Olive Oil and Wimpy join the one-eyed sailor in “Gone!” Plus “Mountain Monster” and “O.G. Wottasnozzle, The Only Man on Earth with the Atomic Brain.”

FC • 32 pages • $4.99

Bullet points:

Variant cover by Jorge Gutierrez!

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Powerpuff Girls #6

Writers: Haley Mancini and Jake Goldman Artist: Nicoletta Baldari Cover Artist: Nicoletta Baldari

While stopping The Fashionistas in their latest attempt to steal the coveted Diamond Pumps, The Powerpuff Girls get blasted by an experimental SASSY RAY! Have they gone from “sugar, spice and everything nice” to “sass, frass and zero class”… forever?!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Comic series written by show writers Jake Goldman and Haley Mancini–Haley is also the voice of arch-villainess PRINCESS MOREBUCKS! Each issue ripped directly from the NEW world of The Powerpuff Girls.

Each retailer incentive cover will be by a Powerpuff Girls animator!

Variant cover by Julia Vickerman!

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Revolutionaries #1

Writer: John Barber Artist: Fico Ossio Cover Artist: Tradd Moore

THE REVOLUTION MAY BE OVER–but the future is just beginning! Ripped from the pages of the hottest crossover of the year, the REVOLUTION team of John Barber and Fico Ossio continue the action! KUP is a CYBERTRONIAN literally older than the universe; ACTION MAN is the ultimate special agent trying to live up to an impossible legacy; MAYDAY is a G.I. JOE leader trying to rescue her first command; and BLACKROCK is a CYBERTRONIAN that thinks he’s a human. It takes the mind-bending clash of ROM versus MAJOR BLUDD and the OKTOBER GUARD to bring this unlikely team together… and the secret they learn threatens to unravel the entire universe.

FC • 32 pages + mini-comic • $4.99

Bullet points:

Exclusive bound-in Savage mini-comic reprinting a lost tale written and drawn by the late, great Joe Kubert himself!

Written by one part of the powerhouse creative team that brought you the mega-event, Revolution!

New tales that continue the storyline of the hit Revolution comic-book event and featuring the same amazing creative team!

Illustrated by Revolution artist, burgeoning superstar Fico Ossio!

The secrets of the Hasbro universe will be revealed. If you follow one new book this month, make it Revolutionaries!

Variant covers by Sara Pitre-Durocher, Sonny Liew, and Paul Pope!

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Rom, Vol. 1

Writers: Christos Gage & Chris Ryall Artist: David Messina Cover Artist: Zach Howard

Far away, in another galaxy, the knights of the Solstar Order, defenders of justice and truth, were ambushed by the evil magicians, the Dire Wraiths. In the end, the Solstar Order prevailed and began seeking out its scattered enemies. One of these knights has followed the trail of the Dire Wraiths all the way to Earth. This knight, the one the Dire Wraiths fear more than all others has hounded them and kept them underground for centuries and could wipe them off the face of creation. He is ROM, Lord of the Solstar Order; Rom, the Wraithslayer. Collects issues #0–4 and Rom: Revolution.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 132 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-817-5

Bullet points:

“This new series captures all the fun and charm of the classic ’80s franchise, with just enough touches of real-world drama to give weight to Rom’s never-ending battle with the Dire Wraiths.” –IGN

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Star Trek: Waypoint #3 (of 6)

Writers: Cecil Castellucci, Mairghread Scott Artists: Megan Levens, Corin Howell Cover Artist: Daniel Warren Johnson

Star Trek: Deep Space 9 and Star Trek: Voyager return to comics! In Castellucci’s, “Mother’s Walk,” major Kira confronts how she can perform a mandatory, ancient Bajoran pilgrimage when so many family members, needed for the rite, are dead. Who can she turn to? And in Scott’s “The Wildman Maneuver,” an unlikely member of the Voyager crew “saves” the ship!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Check out the variant covers featuring STAR TREK artists from the last 50 years of Trek comics!

Photo cover variant!

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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Universe #6

Writers: John Lees, Nick Pitarra, Brahm Revel Artists: Nick Pitarra, Brahm Revel Cover Artist: Freddie Williams

Behold the debut of the TMNT’s weirdest foe yet: Wyrm! When Michelangelo tries to help find a missing person in the sewers, he ends up discovering something he wished stayed in the dark!

FC • 32 pages • $4.99

Bullet points:

A new back-up story from Brahm Revel (Guerillas) takes us inside the Foot Clan!

Variant cover by Logan Faeber!

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Transformers: Titans Return

Writers: John Barber, James Roberts, Mairghread Scott Artists: Livio Ramondelli, Priscilla Tramontano Cover Artist: Priscilla Tramontano

Once he ruled CYBERTRON with a brutal (and literal) iron fist… left for dead four million years ago, SENTINEL PRIME is back. But in a world where STARSCREAM rules CYBERTRON, OPTIMUS PRIME has invaded Earth, and MEGATRON is an AUTOBOT—SENTINEL doesn’t like what he sees! Collects the Titans Return one-shot, Transformers #56–57, and Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye #56–57.

TPB • FC • $19.99 • 120 pages • ISBN: 978-1-63140-821-2

Bullet points:

“The Transformers: Titans Return is perfect to get readers of all kinds hooked.” –Major Spoilers

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Walt Disney’s Comics & Stories #736

Writers: William Van Horn, Evert Geradts, Thad Komorowski Artists: William Van Horn, Mau Heymans, Giovan Battista Carpi Cover Artists: Daan Jippes, Ulrich Schroeder

In “Quest for the Faceplant,” Donald’s out to catch a monstrous man-eating plant for Uncle Scrooge—but will pirates get there first? Then Donald turns soap opera actor in “As the Snail Trails”… and Goofy gets an online Valentine in “Crimes of Passion”!

FC • 40 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Fan favorites William Van Horn and Mau Heymans deliver wild new tales of Donald, Scrooge, and Daisy at their dizziest!

Rediscover classic Golden Age Disney art by Walt Kelly (Pogo) on our Subscription Cover this month!

Check out the Massimo Asaro winter fun variant cover!

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The X-Files #10

Writer: Joe Harris Artist: Greg Scott Cover Artist: menton3

“Contrarians,” Part 1 (of 2): Mulder chances upon evidence that suggests the now-defunct Syndicate’s involvement in the Iran-Contra affair. Guest-starring the Cigarette Smoking Man and President Reagan!

FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Bullet points:

Executive produced by The X-Files creator Chris Carter!

Part of IDW’s Artist’s Edition Cover Month!

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via IDW Publishing

IDW Publishing Previews for 1-18-2017 So many great titles from IDW this week, and we have your early look at them all.

[aion-rsa]

Rob Liefeld’s Youngblood Returns to Image Comics in May

Rob Liefeld’s quintessential ’90s superhero title “Youngblood” is getting a fresh start just in time for the series’ 25th anniversary. However, it seems Liefeld will be taking a backseat on the title. The first issue of the new “Youngblood” series will still feature Rob Liefeld’s work on a variant cover, but “X-Men ’92” scribe Chad Bowers and Jim Towe will helm the relaunch.

According to the official synopsis for “Youngblood” #1,

An uber popular self-protection app called HELP! is changing how we stay safe — “HELP! lets you decide who saves you.” But when a high-rated young hero on the app goes missing, his best friend’s search for answers gains the attention of some unexpected allies, and together, they’ll do whatever it takes to find him… even if it means resurrecting the world’s most hated super-team, Youngblood.

RELATED: Rob Liefeld’s Most Controversial Comics Titles

“Trust me, you’ve never read a ‘Youngblood’ story like this,” Bowers said in a statement. “I’m so incredibly proud of what Jim and I are doing on this book, and can’t wait for readers, especially those who’ve maybe never picked up a ‘Youngblood’ comic, to see what all the fuss is about!”

“I’ve been having the time of my life with ‘Youngblood.’ The combination of so much creative freedom along with having a fantastic writer like Chad has really made this an artist’s dream book to draw. We’ve crafted an incredibly fun and exciting modern day reimagining of these characters that I think both new and old fans are really going to enjoy,” added Towe.

RELATED: David Finch’s Youngblood Variant Recalls Series’ 1992 Debut

“‘Youngblood’ has had outstanding talent contribute to its amazing history,” shared Liefeld. “Alan Moore, Robert Kirkman, Keith Giffen and Mark Millar are a few who have left their mark. Chad Bowers and Jim Towe are four issues into their run and are producing stories that will be held as some of, if not the best ‘Youngblood’ tales ever told. It honors the best of the past and forges exciting new paths for these characters!”

Written by Chad Bowers and drawn by Jim Towes, “Youngblood” #1 is due to go on sale May 3. Liefeld, David Finch and Chris Daughtry will provide additional variant covers.

The post Rob Liefeld’s Youngblood Returns to Image Comics in May appeared first on CBR.com.

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[aion-rsa]

Catching Up with Chip Zdarsky, From Sex Criminals to Spider-Man

Good news, Brimpers: “Sex Criminals” is back on comic book stands today, after an absence of nearly 10 months. The beloved sci-fi sex comedy has been off Image Comics’ schedule as series creators Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky have gotten multiple issues completed, and the book’s fourth arc is slated to ship on a monthly basis.

But that’s not all Chip Zdarsky has going on in an especially busy week for the writer/artist. Since “Sex Criminals” has been away from stands, his profile as a comic book writer has grown, and today also sees the release of two new Marvel issues written by Zdarsky: “Star-Lord” #3, illustrated by Kris Anka; plus “Doctor Strange #1.MU,” a one-shot illustrated by Julián López and teaming Doctor Strange and classic Ditko/Lee monster Googam, in a tie-in to the ongoing “Monsters Unleashed” event.

And, as a tantalizing prelude to his big Wednesday, Marvel announced this past Tuesday that Zdarsky is writing “Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man,” a new ongoing Spidey series launching in June and set in New York City (as opposed to the globetrotting of “the current “Amazing Spider-Man” book), with art from veteran comics superstar Adam Kubert and a focus on Peter’s supporting cast.

CBR talked to Zdarsky about all of the above, including why “Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man” is “personal in a different way” than “Amazing,” unleashing “Sex Criminals” back into the world, the “ludicrous pairing” of Doctor Strange and Googam and the inherent conflict between Star-Lord and Daredevil.

“Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man” #1 cover by Adam Kubert.

CBR: Chip! News broke on Tuesday that you’re writing “Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man” which is obviously a pretty big deal. I’m sure we’ll talk about that book more in depth as it gets closer to release, but what are you hoping to bring to the character that maybe hasn’t been seen in recent months? (Other than, apparently, senior citizens.)

Chip Zdarsky: I don’t think I’ll be bringing anything to Spider-Man as a character that hasn’t been seen lately in “Amazing,” it’s just contextual stuff, really. Dan [Slott]’s telling a big, international story with Peter achieving his potential, but it’s still classic Spidey at the heart! In fact, I’d say it just reinforces what makes the character tick by putting him in new environments and situations.

With “Spectacular,” we’re narrowing things a bit and focusing on Spidey in New York. So it’s personal in a different way than “Amazing,” as it’s about Spidey slightly nostalgic for when his life didn’t involve board meetings and jet-setting. With great power comes great responsibility, and his power’s never been greater, but the increased responsibility can be… look, Obama went grey real quick, y’know? In a lot of ways this series is about recognizing the need to share that great responsibility. Also there are jokes.

But that’s not till June — this week, “Sex Criminals” returned for the first time in nearly a year. I don’t want to say the absence of the book is the reason the last 10 months or so went down the way it did, but the timing is conspicuous. How does it feel to have the series back on stands, and be back on a monthly schedule?

Oh god, it feels so good. I get the idea behind us taking time off to get issues in the can, but being off the stands for that long just gutted Matt and I. Nothing kills your work momentum on a book quite like no one seeing it. Because I’m a stupid control freak doing pencils, inks, colors, letters and design, it means we’re a bimonthly book in a monthly world, and there’s no good solution for that. Having issues 16-20 out back-to-back is going to be great. Especially with where the series is headed. Gasp!

“Sex Criminals” #16 starts with a fun and rather thorough recap of the series thus far. It can be a little tricky for any series to gain new readers mid-stream, so how much of a priority was it to y’all to make this issue as welcoming as possible?

Ha! Yeah, Matt really wanted to do a detailed old-school recap, so we added eight pages to the book! I don’t expect to necessarily gain a lot of new readers with issue #16, though this issue does facilitate that. What we really wanted was to give some help to the returning readers. The issue itself beyond the recaps eases people back into the world with a focus on Jon and Suzie, setting up some big things to come. Our cast is growing, but those two are the heart of it all. Also there are jokes.

“Sex Criminals” #16 cover by Chip Zdarsky

The first issue of “Sex Criminals” since April also means the first time people will have seen new interior art from you since then. As your writing career continues to grow (you’re writing Spider-Man, for goodness sakes), how tricky has it been to balance your time between writing and drawing? You see a lot of creators who do both eventually move to writing full-time — how important is it to you to keep active as an artist, even beyond “Sex Criminals” (variant covers and such), as your writer profile rises?

The goal is always to draw a page a day, and then switch over to writing in the afternoon/evening. I’m not gonna lie, it’s tricky, but I have a certain amount of physical and mental bandwidth during the day for drawing, and so it’s nice to be able to switch back and forth.

And covers are just fun! Doing those are my version of “leisure time,” really. I was out with friends the other night and everyone was talking about their hobbies, their collections, stuff like that. And I had nothing. And then I realized that my hobby is doing comic covers. Is that sad? Am I sad? You can be honest.

“Doctor Strange #1.MU” cover by Chip Zdarsky

Speaking of writing — you wrote a “Doctor Strange” one-shot as part of “Monsters Unleashed,” also out this week. How much fun was it not only writing a doctor who is strange, but also Googam, in what had to be one of that character’s most substantial appearances?

Oh my god it was a crazy amount of fun. Even though Googam and Doctor Strange is a ludicrous pairing, this is weirdly my most serious issue to date, but with one panel that still makes me laugh.

I love what Jason Aaron and Chris Bachalo have been doing on the main “Strange” book and it was great to be able to use this lesser-powered version of the character, scrambling to survive. And the art! You’ll be seeing a lot from Julián López in the near future. He’s insanely talented! I want him to draw my life.

“Star-Lord” #3 cover by Kris Anka.

“Star-Lord” #3 is also out this week! It’s a lot of fun to see Star-Lord and Daredevil interacting, as Daredevil is effectively “the” street-level hero and Star-Lord is… Star-Lord. What inspired putting the two together?

Well, first of all, if Star-Lord isn’t in space, he’s really a “street-level hero,” which is something else he struggles with in this arc as he gets used to Earth again. And he’s frustrated by some of the Earth things he’s forgotten about, like basic laws. So it just made sense to have Marvel’s resident District Attorney give him some gentle reminders of how things go here. And they fight! I know what you’re thinking: Superheroes? Fighting each other?? It seems ludicrous, but here we are!

Also, Kris Anka is a beefcake god.

“Sex Criminals” #16, “Doctor Strange #1.MU” and “Star-Lord” #3 are on sale now. “Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man” is scheduled to launch in June.

The post Catching Up with Chip Zdarsky, From Sex Criminals to Spider-Man appeared first on CBR.com.

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