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

There's Something About She-hulk

I've been thinking about Valerie D'Orazio's post about supporting women superhero comics and the related fallout to Josh's Tyler's anti-Female Superhero rant. In regards to Josh's post (and film in particular) all I'll really say is that Female superhero movies have generally sucked. They have been poorly written, poorly designed, and poorly produced. So I don't think laying the whole thing at the door of the Female superhero trope is really fair. When a Male superhero movie bombs we don't say the whole concept of the male superhero is dead, we just say "they" didn't get the character and made a bad movie. I submit that Hollywood in general doesn't know how to make a good female superhero film and certainly doesn't know how to attract a female crowd.

When it comes to comics I think there is somthing to the fanboys not buying into and simply not buying female superhero comics. But I'm not all fanboys... I'm just me and I can only speak to my personal habits.

As women heroes concern me, it would seem, superficially, that I'm not one that really supports the "girl characters" all that much other than drooling over the occasional stacked drawing but if I look closer a few things do pop out namely She-Hulk... and I guess, Red Sonja.

To be honest I wasn't totally into She-Hulk from the beginning. I found her interesting when I first encountered her in the Avengers but it wasn't until John Byrne got ahold of her that I became a fan of Jennifer Walters. I can't say I was a consistent fan but I always maintained a fondness for Shulkie since her FF days. As for Red Sonja I'll cop to some good old male horndogness, but I also really like the idea of a female warrior in the vain of Conan. In fact, the idea of Red Sonja has a lot of power for me because I'm still following the Dynamite Entertainment title despite the beef I've had with a lot of the plotting.

But is that really it? Is that all the stock I put in female characters? Well maybe when it comes to DC I think so. I've never been very compelled to pick up any of the gal books by the Distinguished Competition. A lot of this reflects my disinterest the DC Universe. The Marvel characters just always seemed richer, deeper and absolutely a lot cooler (not in the last several years though). Sadly marvel had less books featureing gal heroes in the 80s and so there wasn't much women stuff except for team books... and I sure did loves me some female heroes in my X-men (Storm, Shadowcat, etc). There's a few random mini-series in there too like firestar...

Outside of superheroes I've picked up Love and Rockets, and Strangers in Paradise...


...Uh, Strangers in Paradise? OK kiddies, this post has officially gone off the rails. I'm not even sure what I'm talking about here. So I'll just wrap up by saying when it comes down to it, I've thrown my lot in with She-Hulk for better or worse. She just has that certain something that other characters don't seem to have...


Green Skin?



-Swinebread

Favorite Costumes

Since it’s almost Halloween, I thought I’d list some of my favorite comic book costumes from years gone by. You'll notice no Superman, Batman, or X-men costumes (except for Dark Phoenix) because I'm just too overexposed to them. In no particular order:

Fantastic Four She-Hulk
Shulkie is interesting because she's never really had a costume per se except for her time in the mid '80s with the FF. The results were stunning don't you think?



Spiderman
Spidey's look is as iconic as DC's big three but somehow his costume still seems fresh after all these years.



Doctor Spectrum
I enjoy this Marvelized Green Lantern for his bold colors and simple masked design.


Sandman
The original pulp superhero. You gotta' love the gas mask and gas gun.


Harbinger
She's gotta' nice mix of Roman goddess and classic Sci-fi in her superhero outfit that gives her sexy regalness that brings it home for me.


Judge Dredd
Dredd has a hardcore, over the top, and supercool costume that's perfect for fighting crime in the future.


Doctor Doom
Doom is powerful and fearsome in his medieval looking armor and green cape. Plus his sidearm gives him that modern fascist look.



Supernova
He has kind of a generic costume but that's why I like it I think. It's sort of an everyman kinda look. The combo of full mask and cape really pulls the whole thing together.


Blue Beetle
I really groove on the cross Spiderman/Batman vibe that the Blue Beetle costume (at least the Ted Kord version) has.



Scarlet Witch
I love everything about how the she looks. The Scarlet Witch is the perfect gift for Valentine's day.



Gamora
She's had a lot of changes to her costume but I like the original the best. Sassy and deadly all in one.



Psycho-Pirate
His suit messes with my emotions...



The Question
Who doesn't like a guy with a fedora and trench-coat but when you add the blank face... classic!



The Shocker
I like the fact that this guy just looks like a thug.



G.I. Joe
I picked up a few issues of the G.I. Joe when I was a kid but I dropped it after I realized it was more about shooting people then having amazing superpowers, but I was still always attracted to the title for some reason. Now I know why. It was because of the costumes. Regardless of any jingoistic message of the series, G.I. Joe had and still does have a ton of wonderfully designed outfits. Basically, the X-men movie folks ripped off costume ideas from G.I. Joe when they went they looking for a more realistic look for the mutants. Here's a few of my top favorites.

Snake-eyes


Storm Shadow



Baroness



Cobra Commader with hate hood



Captain America
OK I admit the little wings don't work as well in this day and age but otherwise what we have here is the ultimate patriotic costume. Plus the Cap shield seals the deal for me. Cap is the Defender of Liberty not the attacker for Liberty and the Shield symbolically backs that up. Folks outside the US might not be able to appreciate his outfit as much which makes sense.


Valkrie
Does this really need to be explained to you?



Dark Phoenix
Sexy Cosmic Evil? ...I think so!


Moon Knight
I've never been a super big fan of Moon Knight but I keep coming back because of the excellent look that he has.



The Rocketeer
Best homage to retro-sci-fi ever. How could this wonderfully conceived outfit not be on any comic lover's list.



Vance Astro
The Guardians of the Galaxy are great and Vance has the best costume of the group with or without cap's shield. It's simple but elegant with an amazing abllity to stick to his face.



The Human Bomb
This guys is obviously dangerous and his costume says this in spades.



Doctor Fate
The archetypal superhero magic-user. I love the Helmet and color scheme .



Union Jack
I'm not an Anglophile but Union Jack sure has a kick-ass patriotic costume.



Jennifer Morgan
She sure looks like she has mystic powers right?



Nova
His suit has been messed with a lot over the years but I like the classic version the best although the latest one isn't too shabby.



Original Spider-Woman
One of the first amazing female costumes at Marvel IMHO. The 2nd Spider-Woman had a pretty good one as well.




Mr. Monster
Nothing says Halloween Like Mr. Monster!



Hobgoblin
Playful and Scary at the same time.



Kang the Conquerer
I know that most folks think his costume is dorky but there is just something about it that works for me.



Doctor Midnight
A classic cross of Pulp Adventurer and Superhero



Green Lantern
I think Hal Jordan's orginal sleek costume was a masterstroke from a design sense but I also like all the variations that DC has created for the different Green Lanterns over the years.



Dart
probably the best thing about the Atari Force comic was the character of Dart. I loved her her sci-fi mercenary look.



Jack of Hearts
He's always been one of my favs and his complicated playing card inspired costume is one of the reasons.


Wonder Woman
I'm not particularly into WW but you have to admit that her superhero costume is one of the best ever.



-Swinebread

Justice League: The New Frontier

Using the “Justice League” title with “The New Frontier” is somewhat of a misnomer as Darwyn Cooke’s original comic dealt with the transition from the Golden Age of superheroes to the Silver and the period just before the creation of the Justice League of America. But the Justice League is a recognizable brand and tying this project to that brand makes sense from a marketing standpoint.

But is it any good? Yes, it is good. I was a little worried because the online chatter had been mixed, however, I realized after watching JLTNF that most folks who were disappointed wanted something else and not Darwyn Cook’s amazing work. What they wanted was some sort of tie-in to the Justice League cartoons, this is simply crazy as the New Frontier story could never connect to those shows because it’s set in the 1950s and it's different in theme to those shows.

The story is very faithful to the original comic, but it does drop most of the mini-plots to focus in the main thrust of the story, that thrust being the rise of a new era of heroes and a threat to human existence on the planet. The story was so faithful in fact that there weren’t any surprises for those of us that have read the New Frontier comic book. So, the film’s enjoyment comes from seeing a great story animated, with excellent voice acting. It would be interesting to hear reactions from folks that haven’t read the original.

There are a few things to keep in mind. Much of JLTNF focuses on lesser-known characters in the DC Universe. The big three, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, have supporting roles. The main storyline focuses around Hal Jordan and the Martian Manhunter. The New Frontier is infused with events and the ethos of the 1950s and very early 1960s. Not knowing anything about the time period could reduce someone’s enjoyment (I’m thinking about you Dana Perino). This movie is certainly for the older crowd as suicide, murder, and horror figure into the plot of the film.

It’s a good film and despite some of it’s darker elements. The New Frontier gives a fresh take on the concept of heroism and what it really means. Many of the topics from the show resonate and that’s part of the appeal beyond the amazing artistic style. The idea that some shadowy crap is going on but at the same time there is still great hope for a new future truly resonates. That’s part of the brilliance of Justice League: the New Frontier.


Here is what I liked in no particular order (spoilers):



Darwyn Cooke’s original drawing style and designs are intact and look wonderful when animated.

I like the way Cook draws women and, by extension, how they appear in this film. They’re my kinda’ sexy.

The Martian Manhunter is great character. I never knew much about him before but both the comic and the movie have peeked my interest. He’s a great combination of sci-fi and noir.

Now we have a good reason for the new look Batman.

I like the Lovecraftian elements. It’s almost like the age of the Superhero finally overcomes its pulp origins with The New Frontier.

They kept the nod to John Henry in and I appreciated that.

I enjoyed the voice acting

The 1950s look of the story really helps convey how exciting the dawning of the silver age was.

I bought the cheap, single DVD version and was surprised by some good extra features like a Justice League doc, and commentary tracks.

Wonder Woman’s invisible plane bit is pure genius.

The “not so good” side of the 1950s is touched upon.

Events seem more connected in the film than in the comic.


Here is what I disliked in no particular order (spoilers):

Something is a little off with the Hal Jordan/Green Lantern storyline but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

Why didn’t The Martian Manhunter just impersonate one of the astronauts instead of showing up at the last minute and trying to ride the rocket from the outside?

I don’t think this film works well cross culturally.

I would have liked animated sequences rather than static images for the end speech.

Sometimes the horror aspects and Cooke’s style don’t quite work together. (Although, I think they work better here in the film than the comic)

Trailer:


WB's site for the film here


-Swinebread

DC’s Super Feminine Mystique

My post Men are From Marvel and Women Are From DC, generated some interesting comments and fun discussion, imagine that. I came to one big conclusion about the femaleness of DC and the Maleness of Marvel… it all goes back to Wonder Women… …Duh. Think about it. Having a major female superhero thrive in and more importantly, survive the golden age of comics speaks volumes. Marvel/Timely, in truth, never had interesting women characters to begin with but the break between their 1940s supers and the 1960s Marvel Age cements my point.

The fact that Wonder Woman had her own successful title for decades gives the DC universe a possible womanish vibe even if her stories didn’t always depict females in the best light. The Amazon is a headliner. This fact combined with numerous other characters like Catwoman, Power Girl, Super-Girl, and Black Canary make a for a solid foundation that echoes down the years through the DC Universe. It seems obvious when you think about it but then I’m a man bred on Marvel Comics… 80’s Marvel Comics.

D0nnaT0ry had a good point in that a person’s universe of choice comes down to their gateway comic. The appeal of Wonder Woman and other DC heroines is obvious, so this must be the reason why girls have flocked to DC Comics. They have the female supers, so they have the female readers. Now this makes sense and could end the gender question right there but… the gateway comic doesn’t ring true for me personally as a man. If it did, I’d have been a DC Comics fan for most of my life. The first comic book I ever read was an issue of Green Lantern/Green Arrow, bought by my sister no less, and while I generally liked the characters it didn’t really fire my imagination. I also read some Justice League of America too and again it didn’t do much for me and these were male character dominated titles. Consequently, I didn’t really read comics extensively until years later. One day, out of boredom, I convinced my mother to buy me three, bagged together; marvel comics… and my addiction began. I’ve often wondered what would’ve happened if I had encountered an issue of Amazing Spiderman or The Avengers instead of Green Lantern/Green Arrow and Justice League. So I tend to think there is something a little more feminine to the DC Universe…

Now a thought experiment to test if DC is more female-like than Marvel would be to pick a masculine heavy genre that women generally don’t enjoy, like War Comics. If you do a little compare and contrast, I believe women would come down on the side of Sgt Rock rather than Nick Fury. I’m not discounting the fact that Rock was better written and drawn than Fury, which would make it more appealing to most folks including me, it's just that I have a feeling that women would be better entertained by DC's WWII comic over Marvel's version. Besides, which title had Mademoiselle Marie?

Wonder Woman gets to the heart of the matter to me. Having her front and center made DC unconsciously more diffused with a female ethos. But, and here is where we get to the Feminine Mystique aspect, DC super-heroines are saddled with pre-women’s lib baggage. Wonder Woman and friends were still struggling against the sexist themes of the golden age long after the successes of the sexual revolution at least that’s how I perceive it. Maybe that’s why I wasn’t attracted to DC Comics as much. Not because their comics were more feminine but because they were more 1950s feminine. Case in point, She-Hulk. I’ve always liked Shulkie and as I’ve said before, she’s a modern woman. I like female superheroes a lot, I think I just prefer ‘em post second-wave feminism. This is not say that Marvel was doing a great job with their female characters, far from it as the Wasp’s annoying prattle in the 1960s Avengers attests, but rather that Marvel simply had a more male centered universe even though, paradoxically, it was a more modern universe.

By the 1990s a lot of the gender issues I’m proposing about DC and Marvel had changed. Through retcons, modern storytelling, and the X-men Splitting into a plethora of titles with strong female characterizations the view has been blurred. Many younger readers have more choice to jump back and forth between the big 2 without much regard to gender or gender legacy. In other words, they’ve grown up with comics that are less defined by such issues. Again, I’m not necessarily saying the big 2 are doing a good job, I’m just saying they seem to have more freedom when it comes to expressing a masculine or a progressive feminine ethos rather than sticking to what was par for the course in the past. Whether they use this freedom, responsibly or creatively is a different issue.

What are your thoughts?

I ended the “Men are From Marvel” post with a Hillary and Obama political cartoon. So with that in mind I’ll end this post with them. Maybe the struggle in the Democratic Party is a fight between the Wonder Woman Generation (Hillary) and the She-Hulk Generation (Obama). It’s looking more and more like the She-Hulk generation is gonna win.

-Swinebread

My Favorite Wonder Woman Story...?

Over at Comics Fairplay, Heidi put out the call for bloggers to rap about their favorite Wonder Woman story of all time (here)…. ah gulp… I haven’t really read much Wonder Woman outside of team books and event stuff. Oh, wait I know.

I remember one crossover where Wonder Woman visited the Marvel Universe. While there, she met She-Hulk and they decided to become a crime-fighting duo after defeating Dr. Doom through some spontaneous teamwork. Eventually, their relationship deepened and they fell madly in love with each other. Despite the trials and tribulations of being super-heroines they decided to become life partners and raise a family. After experiencing the joys of parenthood from adopting a Chinese baby boy, they realized that what they really wanted was to go through the birthing process ala artificial insemination. They procured a sample of Captain America’s semen, but they ran into some trouble in their relationship. It seems they both wanted to bring the baby to term. The two of them worked it out though when She-Hulk changed her mind. She realized that it was probably safer for Wonder Woman to have the child since She-Hulk physically transforms. The scene where Wonder Woman gives birth was really powerful. There she is on the bed pushing, with sweat pouring down her face while Shulkie is lovingly holding her hand in a strong grip. Finally, the baby comes and they both burst into tears of joy and give each other a big kiss while holding their new daughter. It was a great story. One I’ll never forget. An interesting aspect of the Women’s relationship was the fact that Jennifer Walters was not in love with Wonder Woman, like She-Hulk was. Although Jennifer considered Wonder Woman a close friend, she just couldn’t have that kind of relationship with her and that led to all kinds of interesting story dynamics, as there were essentially three people in the relationship.

Oh Wait… no! Sorry, that was a dream I had, never mind.

Hmmm let me see, I must have read something. There was some story about Chronos stealing all the clocks in the city so nobody could tell what time it was… nah that was just silly. Well, the only other two I can up with are Wonder Woman’s first appearance from All-Star comics # 8, and issue #1 of Volume 2 of the Pérez reboot from 1987.

Her origin story always struck me because in it Wonder Woman wore a mask and shot another Amazon in the arm plus I liked the classic drawing style.


When in comes to Volume 2 #1, I read that issue as a Millennium Edition reprint in 2000. It was at that point that I realized I had missed something special.


So, I guess I’m gonna pick those two stories as my favorites as that’s all I’ve read.

It’s not that I don’t like Wonder Woman; it’s just that I always threw my money to the Marvel super-heroines like She-Hulk.

-Swinebread