It is good news and strange news that Marvel Comics now has the rights to Marvelman

It’s weird because I was thinking the other day “what ever happened to Marvel Comics' strong push to get the rights to Marvel Man (Miracle Man),” and now here we are. Honestly, from a comic book standpoint this is the biggest and most important news to come out of Comic Con. I just don’t see anything else as earthshaking being announced. (see here)

Marvel Man has a long history and it doesn’t behoove me to try to get through the whole thing here, so check the Wikipedia page out for more detail. The article is actually quite detailed. Simply put, one of the main reasons that Marvel Man is important is because it showcases work by Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman (and some great artists too). This is Moore before Swamp Thing, Watchmen, and V for Vendetta; and Gaiman before Sandman (sorta).

Marvelman was originally a British knockoff of Captain Marvel and essentially the UK’s first superhero. His adventures were good, silly fun in the tradition of the big red cheese. Marvelman had a nine-year run from 1954 to 1963.

Alan Moore reinvented the dormant character in the 1980s and all the notions of modern comics that we associate with Watchmen were actually first explored in Marvelman. The irony of ironies, is that Marvelman had to be renamed Miracleman in the US as Marvel Comics was not interested in buying this strange adult character (unlike what DC did with V for Vendetta) and was none to pleased that another comic company (Eclipse) could publish MM’s stories using their company’s name. It’s my understanding that the birth scene really freaked them out. It was a big missed opportunity by Marvel at the time, but obviously Marvel has come to realize how important MM is and that they really need more Alan Moore comics in their intellectual property inventory to make gads of cash like DC does.

Anyhoo, Gaiman picked MM after Moore was done but only got about one third of the way into his storyline before Eclipse went bankrupt and MM was abruptly cancelled. The rights were tangled up badly for almost two decades with everybody claming to own all or part of the character and it was beginning to look like Marvelman would never see the light of day again. But now we have Quesada’s announcement that MM is back and Marvel has him and what’s even better is that they have worked out the rights with the original creator, Mick Angelo too.

What this all means (hopefully) is that Alan Moore’s run on the title will be collected and published again; Neil Gaiman will finally be able to finish his MM storyline; and the original 1950s-1960s stories will be collected for the first time as well.

What is maybe not so good is that it sounds like Marvel will bring MM into regular Marvel continuity somehow. That might not work out so well but we’ll wait and see I guess. An alternate MM is kinda already a part of the Marvel Multiverse via Moore’s work on Captain Britain. That might possibly be the way to do it but I’m not holding my breath.


I could go on about how important the Marvelman is to me personally. I was a teen when MM was published by Eclipse Comics. It blew my mind. I had never read anything so adult and so deep in comic book form before and when it comes to supervillians I got two words for you, Kid Marvelman. Never has a bad guy done so much, to so many, in quite such a horrific way. It was so delicious that my folks thought I was engaged in some light kidde stuff when in reality I was exploring the dark side of the superhero soul. This is what could have and maybe what should have happened to characters like Superman and Captain Marvel but obviously will never happen.

If you are a fan of Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Atomic Age superheroes, or are interested in the development of the “modern” superhero,” Marvelman is one of the true blues that changed the comic industry forever. Once you read MM, you’ll see how it has been ripped off and imitated countless times since it was created. I’m looking at you Sentry!

Make Mine Marvelman.


PS. I’m not saying MM is perfect but I am saying it’s very important. Plus it’ll be very funny if MM does become a top tier, mainstream Marvel Comics character because a very British Superhero will now carry the Marvel identity… now that is ironic and random strange.


Oh and one last thing... if you like comics and superheroes and don't think this is an big deal then tah hell with ya! :)!


-Swinebread

Stumptown '09 Very Late and Fairly Short

I realized that I'm never going to have the time to do that extended post on the fest that I wanted, so I'll simply post what had written far back in in April and leave it at that. So here is a few words about my little excursion to this year's Stumptown Comics Fest.


Some of the many kids that came to this years comics fest.

The building was decorated with window art in honor of Jeff Smith and his creation Bone.



I had a good time at the fest this year although I had to cut it short due to personal stuff. The first thing I noticed right off the bat was the amount of kids that were present. This was due to this year’s honored guest Jeff Smith. I knew he had a following with the kids but this was something else… …and you know what? I liked it. It felt great to have youngsters around. I also felt a slight twinge, as little Swinbread Jr. is too young to attend something like this for a while. I can’t wait to discover what his comic interests will be. Anyhoo, The first thing I did was to make a b-line for Gail Simone’s Table. I handed her my first five issues of The Secret Six to sign and we exchanged pleasantries. I additionally thanked her for making such well-rounded characters. Apparently Gail has been at the Fest before but this was the first time that she was a recognized guest. She told me that likes Portland a lot. What was even better was that Gail had her own panel. Which was quite a treat.

Gail Simone was a hair dresser for 15 years when she decided that she really needed to make a change and started the You'll All Be Sorry! column. That eventually led to work with Bongo Comics, (the guys that do the Simpsons stuff). It’s funny because she said that at the time she didn’t really know how pitch a story or write a script. So she had to be kinda sly in getting info from Bongo and she also enlisted her friends in industry for help. She worked her way up to Marvel and DC from there.

Gail said she couldn’t remember the first comic book she read but she was always attracted to the medium going as far back as Carl Barks’ Donald Duck. What really clicked for her though was when she read the Justice League of America for the first time. She just loved how the JSA worked together as a team. See, her home life was “dysfunctional” and the camaraderie and solidarity between the characters was something she longed for. Wonder Woman had a big impact on her too. Gail’s wasn’t a real fan of Fairly Tales because she never saw a Knight coming to sweep her off her feet so she could live happily ever after. Wonder Woman was a princess she could relate to. WW is someone that had to make her own way in the world and was strong and beautiful doing it. (Incidentally Gail said the Wonder Woman animated movie, which she co wrote, was really fantastic) The Barbara Gordon batgirl is also important to Gail as she because she was bullied because of her red hair and she took a lot of inspiration from the character’s strength.

Many questions were asked but I just had to ask her to talk about women in refrigerators. She mentioned that it has moved beyond what she had started. All kinds of folks were looking into the issue of the treatment of female characters in various forms of fiction but it all goes back to her observations in in the mid 1990s.

Note this is where I left off in April, so that's it.

Jeff Smith was very interesting but all these months later what sticks with me the most is that he didn't originally write Bone for kids, it just turned out that children really responded to it and librarians loved it. Some of its appeal is probably due to the fact that the bone characters are patterned after the classic cartoon trio as best exemplified by Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy. Also, Jeff always saw all the comics as one whole story which is very apparent if you read the collected addition as I did.

Another fact that came out about Bone was that Art Spiegelman was really the one to push Jeff Smith to get Bone colored. Apparently he kept bugging Jeff about it. Jeff responded to him with "well Maus is in Black and White."
and Art said "Maus is about the holocaust... Bone is about life. It should be in color." Needless to say, Jeff agreed to the get his cartoon labor of love colored after that. The colored Bone is not just one trade paperback like the collected black and white version but several shorter vloumes. The last Bone volume with color was just published earlier this year.

Here is Ryan Dunlavey the artist on Action Philosophers and Comic Books Comics.

One of the folks from The Center for Cartoon Studies was at Stumptown this year. These guys need start a branch of this school here in Portland damit!

Well this sure would have been more interesting if I had posted it back when the fest happened oh well!


-Siwnebread

Stumptown Comcis Fest 2009 Is Almost Here

April 18th and 19th brings the return of Portland's own Stumptown Comics Fest.

Jeff Smith will be there and so will Gail Simone!


-Swinebread

Comic Con For Me

Of course Comic Con is going on this weekend but for obvious reasons I haven’t been paying much attention, But here’s a few stories that sparked my interest.


Rose McGowan and Robert Rodrigez talk about the new Red Sonja movie that's due out in late 2009 (here). It looks like it could be a lot of fun and I like what both McGowan and Rodrigez had to say about the Character and the project. The director, Douglas Aarniokosk, seems like a total putz though with statements like this:

"We're trying to do what Chris Nolan did with Batman, and that's [to] take an established story and an established character and reinvent it," he said. "You didn't have to see the other 'Batman' [movies] to appreciate it. You didn't have to read the comics to appreciate it."

You don't even have care about the Red Sonja at all to appreciate it... sigh

-------------------------------------------------------------------


The Greatest American Hero is set for a comic book debut this fall. The cast and crew reunited for walk down memory lane to talk about a what made the show so special and why it was canceled before its time. Plus, there’s a buzz of for possible film in 2009. See Here

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Frank Miller’s adaptation of Will Eisner’s classic comic The Spirit might be really cool or it might suck and maybe Samuel L. Jackson might make or break the film project. See here

-------------------------------------------------------------------


Watchmen, Watchmen, Watchmen… blah, blah, blah see here

Also, watch Dave Gibbons discuss his experience with the film here

Take a gander at the Nite Owl's ship here

-------------------------------------------------------------------


The Warlord is returning to comics for his 35th anniversary and this time the relaunch will be done by the character's creator Mike Grell. See here. This a big relief after the reimagining that DC did a few years ago stunk so bad. It is time to get back to the original version. Hopefully the new Warlord will be a success so some Warlord Showcase Presents will get published.


-Swinebread

Emerald City Comic Con part three

I could do some very bad things with this picture in Photoshop.



Zenescope was there representin with some of their gals. I bought the zero issue of 1001 Arabian Nights: The Adventures of Sinbad.



Here's Arthur Suydam. He's the guy that's done all those wonderful zombie covers. His line was way too long so I didn't wait around for his signature.



Another guy that had a honking huge line was Ed Brubaker. It was OK for me because I didn't have anything for this Cap-killer to sign.



I would have picked up Arcana Comics' Dead Men Tell No Tales trade but I had already ordered it through previews. They had an early release for ECCC. I forgot to get this fine fellow's name (if you know it leave a comment please) but I encouraged him to check out the Stumptown Comics Fest because Arcana Comics is a Pacific Northwest Company (based outta' Vancouver BC). I hope they show up in Portland next year!



Good Bye ECCC. I had a wonderful time and I loved the new space for the show.



We caught a rainbow on the way back to Portland. Very colorful just like the comics I enjoy so much.


-Swinebread

Emerald City Comic Con part two

A mistake on my part was not attending more panels. I paid my 20 bucks to get into ECCC and I didn’t really take advantage of it. I guess I was a little too focused on getting creators signatures. The only panel I attended was DC Nation. I really wanted to hear what Dan Didio, Executive Editor of DC Comics, sounded like. He’s supposed to be the guy that’s ruining their whole line of characters right? ☺

It was actually quite a weird experience for me if the truth were told. I’d never attended anything like this. Being in a large room where the minutia of a fictional universe is being discussed was just odd. I realized I had no idea what was going on for the most part with the DC Universe. Not a surprise as I’m not reading most of their stuff. Maybe I was also taken aback at being out geeked by most of the folks there.

As for Dan Didio, I have to say he’s a pretty charismatic guy. He’s certainly knows how smooze a crowd and he has impeccable comic timing. His timing is so good I actually think he’d make a good standup comedian or actor. So maybe I was somewhat lost during the DC Nation Panel and haven’t agreed with many of his editorial decisions but he sure made the hour spent in the room quite fun.

CBR has an excellent rundown of the event here.

If you notice this section:

Didio’s next threw out a question to the audience: “How many people picked up €DC Universe’ #0.” While 90% of the room held their hands high, Didio playfully shot back with, “Why isn’t every hand raised?”

When a fan jokingly said that he didn’t purchase the issue because it didn’t have Ambush Bug in it, Didio pointed out that Stephane Roux just completed the latest “anti-inspirational” ad which will feature the character. He said it’s an image of Ambush Bug with the word “Unvictorious” underneath it, which seemed to please the audience.

That fan was me. That’s right. I’m a huge Ambush Bug groupie, so why not get this panel discussion off and rolling with the bug. I always assumed that the DC folks, including Dan, hated the character, so why not have a little playful sniping. What was funny was that Ambush Bug got mentioned several times throughout the event. So much so, that Dan stipulated that the last question could not be about Ambush Bug. I even got up at one point and asked couple of questions just so I could mention Ambush Bug again. The first question was just something so I could sound normal but the second question was “any chance of a Jonah Hex / Ambush bug crossover?” Dan seemed to get frustrated and cried “who would want to see that?!” Kurt Busick said maybe it could be Ambush Bug’s ancestor Bush-wacked. Heh, heh.heh It would be funny though as some sort of Joke I suppose. Hey Keith Giffen You listening?


Dan went into he audience several time to coach questioners to great humorous affect. This is the gal that asked about titles for new readers because most of DC's titles are too continuity heavy and confusing.

Heidi and James Meeley

I met up with Heidi and James Meeley from Comics Fairplay at the space goat booth. We had a great conversation about many aspects of comics and blogging. Our chat was one of the most fun things I did that whole day. Now that I know they like a good microbrew, I can’t wait for an enjoyable pub conversation between us. They said they were going to try to make it to Portland for the next Free Comic Book Day. Maybe they can take a trip sooner, but either way it will be fun to have them visit the city of roses and talk comics. They also introduced me to Laura “Teagan” Gjovaag of Bloggity-Blog-Blog-Blog. She was really nice and inquired if I was an Aquaman fan since she was. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I’m more of a Sub-Mariner kinda guy. Being really angry and kicking Nazi butt is more of my thing. Oh and the pointy ears too. Gotta’ love them pointer ears.

Michael Alan Nelson

I swung by the Boom Studios booth and said hi to Michael Alan Nelson. He’s the guy that’s been writing most of the Cthulhu Comics. I told him how much a mythos horror title was needed and that Fall of Cthulhu and Cthulhu Tales fit the bill perfectly. As you can see he’s got a Mohawk now. Michael was such a straight looking guy before; the knowledge of the outer void must be affecting his mind.

Jeffery Brown

Here’s Jeffery Brown. He’s signing my copy of Big Head. Jeffrey is most known for his autobiographical comics but Big Head was a nice departure. It’s a title that’s made deceptively simplistic looking. I think it’s great because it captures the magic and imagination of childhood while at the same time expressing the angst of adulthood. Plus, it’s really funny too. I recommend it to readers whose habits cross back and forth between mainstream and indy comics.

-Swinebread

Emerald City Comic Con part one

Well, I learned my lesson last time and so I’m going to post this in parts. I think my wrists will thank me for it.

Lady Bug and I drove up to Seattle in a one-day mad rush for the Emerald City Comic Con. The show has really grown by leaps and bounds and so this year’s con was in a larger venue, the Seattle convention center.

I had brought a ton of books and comics to sign but I did tell myself that maybe some of the lines might be too long and sure enough there were a few folks I didn’t have the patience queue for but there was so much going on it didn’t matter.


Here the entrance into the main showroom… kinda looks like the Superman movie’s fortress of solitude.

Bill Willingham

I lucked out when I had Bill Willingham sign my comics. For some reason there wasn’t a big line but while I standing there, with only a few folks in front of me, a huge gaggle developed. Bill’s gaggle was merging with the line for Ed Brubaker, which was creating a big mess. I took charge and said “hey, why don’t we shift this around the other way.” Bill thanked me for adjusting things and then proceeded to sign several issues of Shadowpact for me.

I asked Bill about the connection between the Villains and Vigilantes modules (Death Dual with the Destroyers and the Island of Dr. Apocalypse) and the Elementals. Basically, while he was trying to break into comics, Bill was doing art for Fantasy Games Unlimited and worked on a couple of modules. Around that time, He had created a portfolio containing generic superheroes that he sent to Comico. They liked what the saw and Bill had a new job. When he showed up at Comico’s offices, Bill asked what he was going to be working on and their response was something like “what? You’re going to work on the proposal you submitted to us.” Bill was like “oh, yeah, of course” so he took the generic superheroes and fleshed them out into the Elementals. Needing a storyline quickly, he grabbed the outline from Death Dual with the Destroyers and the Island of Dr. Apocalypse as he owed the rights to all the characters and the rest is history. Sadly, Bill says the Elementals will never be reprinted, as the guy that owns the rights to the stories is a complete jerk. Back when Image was flush with money in the ‘90s, they tried to offer the jerk a large sum for the rights, but he always kept asking for more. The Jerk has disappeared and Bill has heard he’s homeless now. Maybe he should have taken the deal.

Brandon Jerwa

Here’s the multitalented Brandon Jerwa, along with his band mate Jessica Blackshear from SD6. He’s been writing several of the BSG titles for Dynamite Entertainment. Brandon told me that they’ve had such success with the BSG season zero comic that they might extend the series. He wasn’t sure they would do a Capria comic book based on the upcoming BSG related show, but he did say that there is going to be a BSG comic with a different group of survivors. Basically, you’ll have you’ll the same cylon models but a story that’s centered on a completely different group of humans. Kinda reminds me of a Star Trek: New Frontier approach.

Brandon signed my copy of BSG Season Zero #1, which had a great photo cover of Jamie Bamber.

Since Jamie Bamber was at ECCC, I decided why not have him sign my comic as well. His line was small at one point, so I just walked up and marveled at how short and how handsome he was. I shook his hand and he had a genuine smile on his face. It was funny because I guess Jamie hadn’t seen any BSG comics before because he was very intrigued with the issue I plopped in front of him. He opened it up and looked at pages. He then said with disbelief “is that supposed to be Colonel Tigh?” pointing to a scratchily rendered image. He flipped another page and again with disbelief said, “is that supposed to be Eddy?” Remember, he’s asking these questions in a gentle British accent. He looked right at me pleading for an explanation. I just raised my hands in an “I don’t know” shrug. With that, Jamie said, shaking his head, “I love comic books” and signed the cover with his image on it.

I realized at that moment that Dynamite Entertainment had really blown it by not getting an artist for the BSG comics that could draw realistic representations of the actors. I think Jamie was actually offended that the characters and actors he’s so familiar with didn’t look as they should. In this situation, the negative stereotype of comics was reinforced because the folks at Dynamite couldn’t be bothered I guess. The stories are quite good, but most non-comics types will look at the art and dismiss the titles completely just as Jamie did.

Moving on, I asked Jamie a few more questions. He told me he has nothing lined up after BSG. He’d slightly prefer to do films to more TV but if a TV show had the same level of camaraderie as BSG came along, he’d jump at the chance. I asked what was the best part of being on BSG for him personally and he said it was working with and learning from such a great group of people. Finally, I thanked him for coming to Seattle and (because of some theater experience in my background) I told him the one thing you are supposed to say to compliment an actor. He really seemed truly touched by my expression of gratitude and I walked away feeling like I needed to talk to some women to shake off our man moment. (Oh and I’m not going to tell what I said, this is the Internet of gosh sakes, so do your own research). .

Phil Noto & Gerry Duggan

I was really eager to meet Phil Noto as I greatly enjoyed his work on Jonah Hex and his current work on The Infinite Horizon. Phil, come to find out, is a very quiet guy actually so I ended up talking to Gerry Duggan the writer for The Infinite Horizon. We discussed the apocalypse-light world of IH a little and also adapting the odyssey into a near future tale. Gerry mentioned his post-apocalyptic x-mas story The Last Christmas and I bought it from him on the spot. Santa fighting cannibals in bombed out cities? I had to have it. Lastly, I encouraged him to check out the Stumptown Comics fest in Portland. He seemed very interested in the comic creator centered event. Hopefully he’ll make the trek to Portland someday.

Rick Remender

Rick Remender and his wife Danni had just had joked about something that’s why they look kinda snarky in the photo. Maybe it’s was something about my geekiness? Heh heh. Regardless I let him know how much I was enjoying The End League and that I saw a huge improvement from issue one to issue two. I think we’re at the beginning of a very cool series. I also decided to give Rick’s XXXombies a chance too and picked up the first issue of that. Kieron Dwyer drew it so how could I not try it out?

Matt Maxwell

I came across Matt Maxwell by chance and found the cover art to his book Strangeways: Murder Moon very compelling. Matt was happy to tell me about it, basically it’s a cowboys and werewolves horror story. I threw out the term Weird West, and Matt joked that his book is listed on wikipedia under Weird West. He also, mentioned that he’s working on a new horror western and it will include vampires but it won’t be all Goth like Vampire the Masquerade. I mentioned that that’s a good idea because I’m really tired of the artsy bloodsuckers and that I prefer the monstrous type. He joked that Vampire the Masquerade was a lifestyle and not merely a game. I laughed and agreed. Needless to say, I bought his book.

Eric Powell

Here’s Eric Powell, creator of The Goon, and next him is one the Nashville Roller Derby gals that Eric has designed promotions for… That's pretty f***ing cool. I had Eric sign an issue of the goon, and the Devil Dinosaur one-shot for me.

Esteban Maroto

The fantastico Esteban Maroto, had a bunch of amazing art, including original pages from Conan the Barbarian and Savage Sword of Conan. I really wanted one, but I was afraid to ask how much they were because I would embarrass myself if I couldn’t afford any of them. I had Esteban sign my copy of The Adventures of Red Sonja trade, which reprints a story he drew. I thanked him in Spanish.

J. Michael Straczynski

The lines were too long to meet J. Michael Straczynski, except at one point but then he had to rush off to a panel discussion, so I missed out. I wanted to tell him how much I enjoyed Babylon 5 and his current comic series the Twelve. I did learn that that he’s a very tall guy though. He’s friggin' huge.

Gail Simone

I had Gail Simone sign an issue of Villains United. I’m not reading her titles so I felt bad that I had nothing to ask her. Maybe I should have found out what Marvel character Gail would like to write if she had the chance, She-Hulk maybe?

-Swinebread

Off To Emerald City ComiCon

I'm leaving early in the morning so I'm posting my message now.

So much to see. So much to do. Plus, I gotta' drive 3 hours to get there and 3 hours back.

Regardless, I'm sure excited. ECCC here I come.


-Swinebread

Stumptown Comics Fest '08

The Stumptown Comics Fest has come and gone again and boy it sure did seem like it came faster this time… oh wait, it did! It’s only been seven months since the last one. I think they made the right decision in moving it to the spring though. It really seemed to click this year including the weather. The attendance was much higher and there was an additional space for even more panel discussions. The fest was finally on the cultural radar and I think it will stay that way.

One of the things that really struck me about Stumptown this time around is that the fest actually seems like a nice break for the comic creators. The relaxed atmosphere makes it like a big party at a friend’s house. I’ve been to other conventions and there’s always this tension from the creators, like it’s very stressful to be there. But Stumptown, as a creator focused venue, really allows the folks to let their hair down and just be. A lot of it has to do with the fact most of the people attending are really part of the comics world in some fashion rather than rabid fans. Also, there’s no media overload from the movie and TV guys. It’s all about the comics at the SCF. Although I did see two guys wearing costumes… but I think they realized that this was the wrong place for cosplay and Star Wars dress up. One of the down sides to the relaxed atmosphere was that many of the creators didn’t feel the need to spend a lot of time at their tables and so I was unable to get a bunch of my books autographed, but no biggie.

In this shot you can get and idea how busy it was at the show. See how the black tablecloth is pulled out on the left side there? That’s because some guy got his foot tangled up in it right before I took this picture. You can see the gal look over with surprise on her face because all her books almost got yanked off the table.

Oh and another great thing about the show was that there was a lot of women attending. There might even have been more women than men! A moment that really stood out for me occurred when I was returning to my saved seat just before Scott McCloud’s talk was about to start and I noticed a very attractive Asian gal (about 20 years old) with a copy of Scott’s Understanding Comics on her lap. I was so stunned I caught myself looking too long. That’s when I thought, “wow, I think we’ve finally kicked the whole only geeks and weirdoes read comics thing.”

Craig Thompson
The first thing I did was to attend a talk given by Craig Thompson. He kept it real informal and just answered questions rather than have any kind of directed lecture. He was all over the place. Some of the things he spoke about included:

He’s parents didn’t react very well to Blankets. Craig’s dad was angry about exposing things about the family that were private and his mother was upset that her son didn’t believe in Christianity anymore.

He had a great time in Morocco. It really influenced his next book Habibi, which he has been working on for the last few years. It’s almost finished. It explores Islamic themes and Arabic Calligraphy.

He felt very comfortable exploring Islam, as his Christian fundamentalist background was similar. He also isn’t worried about any kind of backlash from the Muslim world as he’s exploring the grey areas rather than the taboo areas. He’s more worried about sharks than terrorists.

Despite lots of offers from Hollywood and record companies for design work, Craig has shied away from this type of work despite his 2007 Grammy nomination.

In the early days, Top Shelf was a great company to have publishing his stuff but as Craig grew in popularity and Top Shelf grew in size, they both grew apart and that’s why Pantheon is publishing his next book. (I asked his about his relationship with Top Shelf).

Scott McCloud

Scott McCloud, comic’s de facto philosopher, was the next speaker up and he didn’t disappoint. Like Craig he was all over the place but he was very animated and was joyfully yelling and running around. He was joking the whole time. Some of the things he related:

He’s was amazed because he felt the long shot dream of multiple genres for every taste, mentioned in Reinventing Comics, occurred in the 2000s. He didn’t think it was really going to happen, but it did and he couldn’t be happier. Technology played a big part (the internet) and also Manga. “10 years ago you’d never have seen a teenage girl reading comics.”

He reminded the audience that Portland was special when it comes to comics and that creators, artists and fans don’t have any place more accepting of comic’s culture.

He’s obsessed with matching up Comic creators with musicians. He rattled them off so fast that I can’t remember all of them but Will Eisner is the Duke Ellington of comics, Jack Kirby is the Elvis of Comics and he resigned himself to being the Herby Hancock of comics.

Scott spoke about how the younger folks don’t see the difference between paper comics and on-line comics but some of the older creators see them as separate. He likes online comic strips but he doesn’t like on-line comics unless you can click on the virtual page itself rather than looking for some next button on the webpage. Scott feels that it takes one out of the reading experience.

He halfheartedly defended his argument from Understanding Comics that single panel cartoons like Family Circus and the Far Side weren’t comics (a question asked by the attractive Asian gal I mentioned before). I didn’t completely get his answer but basically it relates back to the term sequential art.

Mike Richardson
The final talk I attended was by Mike Richardson, Dark Horse comics founder, president… and huge F***ing giant (he’s a very tall man). Listening to Mike was great because he’s a manger type and so he had a very liner approach despite the fact that his discussion was off the cuff as well. His mother was in the audience and he acknowledged her as the origin for his love of comics as she always bought them for him. For me, one of the best things about Mike’s talk was that I asked a question and that kept him going for at least 20 minutes. It must have been the question he was looking for. Some things spoke about:

Some of Mike’s friends had an actual intervention with him to keep him from opening up his chain of comic shops because he was going to ruin his life. Similar things happened to him when he was starting Dark Horse Comics.

When he was young, he’d wait outside the 7-11 late at night until no customers were in the store to buy his comics.

He started Dark Horse Comics because of Secret Wars and Teenage Mutant Nina Turtles. His customers at his comic stores complained that they had to buy the awful SW series to make sense of Marvel’s connected continuity. The geek side of me said to myself that he was really taking about Secret Wars II as the 1st Secret Wars was mostly a stand-alone series (like it matters!). TMNT proved that his vision of providing B&W comics cheaply was possible.

His sympathies have always been with the creators. He wanted to start a company where the creators owed what they made. Besides if you make the creator happy then he’ll want to work with you again and again and you’ll both make money together. It’s good EQ to be able to see the future potential, which DC and Marvel don’t seem to have.

Dark Horse was having monetary success with it’s licensed books like Aliens and Predator but the creator owned stuff was not as successful but that changed when they got Frank Miller on board. They got Frank by giving him a sheet that broke down the profits and expenses of their comic business process. Frank was so impressed that he signed up with them the next day. The rest is history.

They had an un-official slogan that “nobody gets more than Frank” as the deal was very beneficial to both parties. When a group came to Mike and wanted even more money than Frank received, he said no. They went off and formed Image.

He always believed that there’s a comic for everybody, it is the distribution that’s a problem. That's why he loves the Internet as it’s vastly increased the type of material DH can publish. It’s also a great way to find new talent, like Nicholas Gurewitch.


Larry Marder
Here’s a shot of Larry Marder (right) sitting next to the CBLDF guy (I forgot his name gulp). I bought one of Larry’s Tales of Beanworld Books. I also asked him what it was like to work at Eclipse Comics as they were my favorite company from the 1980s. He got a little chocked up and said that it was wonderful as he was really close with both Cat Yronwode and Dean Mullaney. It was a sad time for Larry personally when Eclipse collapsed.

Craig Thompson
I stood in line for a while to get my copy of Blankets autographed by Craig Thompson. He had a request to draw a picture on a gal’s typewriter… hah! Only in Portland! If you get something signed by Craig, tell him a short interesting story. That seemed to be his price for an autograph.


Brian Churilla and Jeremy Shepherd
I hadn’t realized that Brian Churilla and Jeremy Shepherd, the creators of The Engineer, were local boys but it was a nice surprise. It told ‘em I really enjoyed the title as it had a Kirby, Guy Davis feel and that I had just picked it up on the off chance that it might be fun. They mentioned that Mike Mignola was another influence (which the heavy blacks confirm) and thanked me for supporting their comic.

Brandon Seifert and Lukas Ketner
Here is a couple of new guys on the comic block, Brandon Seifert and Lukas Ketner. They’ve got a great new title: Witch Doctor.

It’s a sick world — literally. The universe is an organism, and the creatures of myth and legend are its parasites. Earth’s antibodies — humankind — have been at war with supernature for all of history. But to fight a disease, you don’t need soldiers — you need doctors. Enter Dr. Vincent Morrow. Excommunicated from the medical community and headhunted into an exciting new career in the black arts, he’s here to diagnose earth’s dark underbelly. Morrow serves the world with both hands — one in magic, one in medicine — as earth’s protector. Earth’s WITCH DOCTOR. It’s a sick world — he’s here to treat it.

Great stuff. It’s like Dr. Strange, Tales From the Crypt, Mr. Monster, Lovecraft and Warren comics all in one. Witch Doctor is very imaginative, well written and has art that’s very reminiscent of Bernie Wrightson. I loved it. A fantastic 1st horror effort by the young writing and drawing duo!


Nicholas Gurewitch
As I stood in line to get my autographed copy of The Trail of Colonel Sweeto, a Perry Bible Fellowship collection, by Nicholas Gurewitch, I took a couple of snapshots. After the first one Nicholas said "Hey how about an action shot" so he mugged for the camera while the gal fan played along by exaggerating her body language. This Perry Bible Fellowship stuff is some of the funniest dam strips I’ve ever read. Read for yourself if you don’t believe me.


Tara McPherson
The lovely and wonderful Tara McPherson. If only I hadn’t run out of money as that book was a reasonable 20 bucks. I had her sign issue # 45 of Lucifer.


Scott Allie here. I really enjoyed his Devil’s Footprints title. I wish Dark House was producing a few more comics like his. His buddy, out of the frame, took a picture of me talking a picture of him. Heh heh,

This was just a small part of what was going on at Stumptown. A truly great experience this time around and the ’08 fest has been the best one yet. Comics are cool and booming in Portland and Stumptown is proof of that. It’s wonderful thing to see evolving right in front of my eyes and in my hometown. Incredible!


-Swinebread