WALKING DEAD: I'd never heard this before

Obviously, this story had to have happened... it just had never happened to ME before.

Customer comes to the counter, waving a copy of WALKING DEAD #105. "What the heck is this?!" he exclaims.

"Uh...? What do you mean?" I ask.

"This! What IS this?" He's sort of shaking the comic about, I guess this is the one legitimate time to call it a "floppy".

"I'm not sure exactly what you mean, sir, do you mean 'in relationship to the TV show'?"

"No, no, I know the comic is different from the show; what I mean is what, exactly, is THIS?"

I blink a few time, and am entirely unsure what to say. "It's... it's a comic...?"

"I don't understand," he's getting frustrated, "is this volume 18 or something?"

"Oh!"

"I mean, I have the first seventeen issues, so what is this?"

I get it now. "Yeah! I mean no! I mean, you know that the books are just collections, don't you...?"

"What do you mean?" he demands.

"Each of those volumes you have is a collection of single monthly issues! There's six in each one. Volume 1 is issues #1-6. You're holding issue #105."

"So... this IS volume 18?"

"Well kind of, issue #103 is what comes right after volume 18, this is the middle of what will be that book"

"Wow!" he exclaims, all excited, "I had no idea!"

"Yeah, and, actually, I think it's kind of a better read as a monthly serialization because you get six cliffhangers. In a book, you just breeze through them. Like you remember in vol 16 when [spoilerific content], and you just turned the page, and you knew he was OK? Well, WE had to wait an entire month to find out what was going to happen. It drove us insane!"

"Wow, that sounds great, I totally have to start buying these!"

Obviously, OBVIOUSLY, there had to be a guy who only read TWD in GN form, and never had encountered a monthly comic before. When you say it outloud, it becomes self-evident. I'd just never met a member of the species before. And I was proud to pop his comic book cherry.

God bless us, every one!

-B

All over the map: Hibbs' 11/7

Comics, TV, and a movie, after the jump.

Comics, first? OK with me!

 

FUCK ALAN MOORE BEFORE WATCHMEN: MOLOCH #1: Much like MINUTEMEN, this would be one of the FAMBW books that I was at least curious about -- we don't really know a lot about Moloch, and he's arguably a principal... well, "catalyst", at least, if not "character". And I was hopeful because, hell, Eduardo Risso is drawing it, and that cat can fuckin' draw, y'know? Sadly, though, it has all the subtlety of any other comic that J. Michael Straczynski has written recently, that is: slim-to-none, and the result is just a cliched horrible mess -- Moloch's bad because he's ugly (no explanation for the bat ears is given), and because all women are horrible predatory whores. Yay!

Even Better is how this was hastily solicited to fill in a massive scheduling hole, where, suddenly, they seem to have lost an entire month's worth of FAMBW titles -- going from weekly to skipping five week's worth of issues is a kick in the gut on momentum on this series which was pretty strongly selling to a specific group of customers who are buying the entire project (not specific minis, like I thought in advance) -- well, damn, it makes DC suddenly look like Marvel in terms of schedule.

Either way, I know this isn't aimed at me, but we continue with "Exceptionally pretty, but emotionally bankrupt", which the closest on the Critic scale is, I think, EH.

 

DEADPOOL #1:  Brian Posehn (!), Gerry Duggan, and Tony Moore do the Marvel NOW! relaunch of  "the Merc with the mouth", and he's pretty much a character that I've never really cared one teensy bit about ever -- to the point where I don't believe (from the tags) that we've ever once reviewed a straight Deadpool comic on the site ever! -- and, hey, guess what, I thought it was reasonably entertaining! I can't say I'd personally add it to my monthly reading stack, but there was some charm and wisecracking, and an imaginatively funny series of antagonists, and it's almost certainly modestly GOOD.

What's funny for me, as a retailer guy, is just how much better this is selling right now then the next book (about 250% of that figure), as well as outselling it's previous incarnation, handily (for now at least) -- I went long on this #1, chasing that fat 70% discount, and I'm confident they'll eventually go (week 15, or 16, I'm guessing), while the next book I can already tell I'll never ever sell them all. *sigh*

 

IRON MAN #1: is that next book, and, in many significant ways for this retailer, my real litmus test for the commercial viability of MarvelNOW! as a branding exercise for Marvel.

I'm sure that in a month or two I'll write a post-mortum on the launches for TILTING AT WINDMILLS, but going into this my feeling was that Marvel comics are a significantly more popular "brand" than DC, and have a MUCH larger number of "lapsed" readers. The "New 52" launch succeeded by any dream of avarice I might have had, where even books where it was clear that they WOULD be cancelled within a year (HAWK & DOVE, anyone?) still sold 70-80% more copies than I ever thought they possibly could have, and the "big books" totally dominated fourth quarter sales charts.

Now, to me, IRON MAN is the modern quintessential Marvel comic -- two hit movies, lead role in the AVENGERS film, can't HELP but benefit from a big wide "push". DC reboots sold like 500%+ their previous issues, I didn't feel at all shaky going 300% of "current" IM sales, scored the extra discount on the first issue, at least (as I did with most, but not all, NOW! books)

So far? I've sold precisely one FEWER copy of #1 than I have of #522 in the same time period (day #6). Uh? What? The? Fuck? Again: I'm sure that will pick up eventually, but, damn, that's the exact opposite of what was supposed to happen.

The big problem is that I can't actually push the comic very hard on the strength of its contents -- I'm no real fan of Greg Land's stiff-and-lightboxed art, and Kieron Gillan's script, despite being one of the "Yeah, that makes sense!" names attached to NOW!, gives us a story whose premise is essentially that of "Armor Wars". I've read "Armor Wars". God help me, I've even read "Armor Wars II", this isn't what I want to read as the Big Relaunch.

I mean, it isn't terrible, or anything, but it's also not much better than OK, and for a $4 asking price, am I really going to suggest people buy this over, say, STUMPTOWN or even the next book, this week? Yeah, didn't think so.

This week is going to be the real test of it, I think (with 6 NOW! books), but I'm starting to feel like MarvelNOW! is going to be as big of a miss as New52 was a hit, and that's truly terrifying if that's playing out in the rest of the world the same way.

 

DIAL H #6: A beautiful, beautiful done-in-one story essentially ruminating on the stupidity and banality of some characters, and just how hard it is to "fight crime", and the real selling point for me was that the issue was drawn by David Lapham, who, of course, isn't even cover billed. Yeah, this was a truly great issue of this series -- I thought it was VERY GOOD.

 

How about some TV? Sure, can do!

 

ARROW: much to my disconcertion and surprise, I thought this was kind of non-shitty.  I was expecting more "Smallville" (ew), but instead it's kind of about as close to "Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters" (well, or more properly, the monthly book by Grell & Hannigan just AFTER that mini-series) as you're likely to find -- there's a structured mystery, and plan, and it seems like it is playing out alright, and while it's a version of Green Arrow from Earth-TV (Speedy is his sister, Deathstroke is some sort of army torturer, or something, the probably-some-day Black Canary is named "Laurel", rather than "Dinah", so on, so forth) it has an interesting continuing flashback structure -- yeah, I don't love it (I'd never have watched it if I didn't own a comic book store), but I like it very fine. Marc Guggenheim has managed to make a very solid little weekly vigilante TV show.

Two notes: first: man, the budget on this thing seems loooooow, to me -- they're constantly setting scenes in "night clubs" which are fairly clearly a soundstage, with a curtain hanging in the background with colored lights playing against it, and like two silhouettes dancing behind it -- yet they sell it pretty damn well.

Second: this Arrow (oddly called "hood" by most characters IN the show) is a STRAIGHT-UP killer. Some episodes the body counts top a score. And it's all very kind of sub-rosa -- I mean, yes, the cops are after him, but one gets the sense it's more from being a vigilante, rather than being a KILLER vigilante. You'd think that "Laurel", as written, would be appalled by Arrow's actions, but, yeah, kind of not.  It is odd.

Anyway, I think this show is watchable, and surprisingly OK.

 

THE WALKING DEAD: So far, season 3 has been going swimmingly (I'm a week behind, I think?) -- this has been going breakneck speed, and shock follows shock pretty much every week. What I'm liking the best is that all of the same pieces are in play from the comic, but things come in different order, at different times that you can't really second guess it much. I mean, clearly, we have the prison, we have the Governor, but other than that, "anything can happen". I'm finding this a real thrill this season, and some of the acting this go round is getting downright good -- especially a recent reaction to something that happened involving Rick -- that was some raw-ass human emotion there. This really has been VERY GOOD, with only memories of the first "half" of Season 2 keeping me from wholly embracing it.

 

What, and a film, too? Sure! (though this has to go faster than I thought, since I just got the call that the truck with this week's comics will be here in a few minutes!)

 

SKYFALL: The latest James bond film was, I thought, one of the better ones -- it's actually ABOUT something, and when viewed with CASINO ROYALE (skip out on QUANTUM OF SOLACE, I think), it really projects a lot of new possibilities for the character -- but the last act of the film, while emotionally connective, was almost terrifyingly "small" in scope and range for a Bond movie, where you expect it to get bigger and bigger and ludicrous.  There's a crazy villain, however, and bi-sexual flirting (!), and a surprising denouement there at the end, and it even had what I thought were the best credit sequence of the entire series (seriously, it was almost entirely nude woman free, AND relevant to the actual movie, for once). You have to go far to beat MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN in my heart (and SPY WHO LOVED ME / MOONRAKER in my memory, though, watching those again with Ben, I didn't care for either much), and this didn't beat those heights, but, yeah, I thought it was terrific and thoughtful in most ways. It's a very strong GOOD.

 

Whew! Gotta bounce! How about you? What did YOU think?

 

-B

Wait, What? Ep. 102: Age of Chance

NewPage9From the thirteenth issue of Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, assembled by Miguel Corti.

The episode--she is long! (Just a bit over two hours and forty minutes, in fact.)

The show notes--they are extensive!

So join me after the jump for both, and a bit more about Watchmen issue #13!

Oh, and hey, let us know how this episode sounds to you, eh?  I gave a listen to the sound quality of the first call before throwing it into Levelator and thought it sounded...really okay?  So I'm mixing this raw.

0:00-3:38:  So, is this episode where Graeme is Goofus and Jeff is Gallant?  (Spoiler: No.)  But Jeff is much more chipper than last week, certainly.  At least until we starting discussing... 3:38-6:18: Comics!  (More specifically, Marvel Comics.) (Ultra-specifically, the twenty variant covers for Uncanny Avengers.) 6:18-28:46: Which leads us into discussion of Avengers Vs. X-Men #12 which Graeme has read and Jeff has not so it's time for some heavy-duty recapping on the part of Mr. McMillan. 28:46-43:52: Getting back to twenty variant covers situation, we ponder whether the fact Uncanny didn't outsell Walking Dead #100 is... a good thing? A bad thing?  Just a thing? [Insert "It's Clobbering Time" joke here, as appropriate.]  This ping-pongs us back to talking about (for lack of better expressions) "natural" events vs. "forced" events with Avengers Vs. X-Men, its sales, and whether or not the event was review-proof. 43:52-55:09: Sensibly, Graeme uses the recent (stunningly great) Grantland excerpt of Sean Howe's Marvel Comics: The Untold Story to compare and contrast Marvel's current marketing and operating approach with those prior.  The more things change, the more they stay the same? Well, maybe as far as killing off major characters and trying to capture female readers go.  But if you've ever enjoyed listening to us talk about Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin, you should most definitely check out the excerpt...and probably the book?  (Also, if you haven't seen Howe's amazing Tumblr, check that out too. 55:09-59:40:  Another book up Graeme's sleeve: Batman #13, the first part of the upcoming "Death of the Family" storyline. Jeff counters with Action Comics #13 by Grant Morrison and Travel Foreman. 59:40-1:06:04:  Graeme talks a bit about The Nao of Brown by Glyn Dillon, published by Self Made Hero and distributed in the U.S. by Abrams.  For you pull-quote types:  Graeme McMillan says "It is just a blinding book" and "the most beautiful comic I've seen in the longest time." 1:06:04-1:29:19:  This gives Jeff an opening to talk about Gordon Harris' self-published graphic novel, Pedestrian, Graeme mentions Josh Cotter's Skyscrapers of the Midwest which we hunt up on Comixology.  Doing so reminds Graeme he had also read the digital only sequel to Chris Roberson's Memorial... which leads us to spend a few minutes kicking around the can that is digital pricing and real vs. perceived value using such varied examples as a Digital 2000AD subscription, Saga, Valiant's digital editions, Bandette, Comixology sales, full-price books from Marvel and DC, Shonen Jump Alpha, and more. 1:29:19-2:02:32: A quick rundown by Jeff of the other books he's read this recently: Harbinger issues #1 and #2, a detailed  discussion with Graeme about Amelia Cole and the Unknown World, Black Kiss #2.3, Fatale #8, the very strange saga that is issues #7-10 of Star Wars by Roy Thomas, Don Glut, Howard Chaykin, and Tom Palmer, Axe Cop: President of the World #3, a stunning story by Michael Fleisher and Alex Nino from Showcase Presents House of Mystery (Vol. 3) (and thanks, Dylan Cassard, for that one--you should check out his podcast and podcast-related Kickstarter).  All of which reminds Graeme (somehow) that he's also read issue #0 of The Phantom Stranger. 2:02:32-2:18:48: Also, Graeme has read Thanos: The End by Jim Starlin as well as The Return of Thanos trade paperback featuring both issues of The Thanos Quest.  We talk about that, a little bit about Englehart's first issue on Silver Surfer with Marshall Rogers, The Annihilation books, DC's Cosmic Odyssey, as well as Graeme's favorite Green Lantern. This is what happens when you meet a stranger in the Alps! 2:18:48-end: And then, finally, we talk about the stunner that is the 13th issue of Watchmen, which listener Miguel Corti assembled after a discussion Graeme and I had on-air about just such an issue being via random cut-up of the first twelve.  Here's Miguel talking about the idea and how he executed it, excerpted from our correspondence:

Anyway, my original plan to show my appreciation for the effort you put into creating a show that I enjoy listening to was to make something for you based off of a throwaway idea from one of the episodes that came out in either early 2012 or late 2011. In that episode you discussed the idea of creating a 13th issue of “Watchmen” based on randomly picking panels out of the graphic novel and rearranging them until you had this ersatz issue. I was intrigued by the idea since I had just finished re-reading “Watchmen” and re-watching the movie version because I wanted to thoroughly compare the two and see why the book works and the movie doesn’t, especially since Snyder was so slavish about adapting the source material. Well, a little synchronicity was all it took to get my creative blood flowing, and I decided I would make that heretofore nonexistent 13th issue as way of further analyzing the superb work Moore and Gibbons did with that book, and maybe as something you might be interested in seeing. [...] What follows are the steps that went into making this issue. Please skip to the end if the details hold no interest for you.

First, I had to find a copy of “Watchmen” that wouldn’t object to being gutted and mutilated so heartlessly. Not as easy as I thought. The only copy I had here in Japan was the Absolute Edition, and my softcover TPB was in the states. I just wasn’t up for taking digital photos of such an unwieldy book. So, I bought another softcover (used from amazon.co.jp) and tried taking pictures with that. Again, the quality wasn’t what I wanted. For a split second I contemplated cutting up the softcover, but fortunately the rational side of brain pointed out—quickly—that I would end up only being able to use the panels from one side of a page. So then I thought: a-ha! This is the digital age! I can just download a copy from DC and then take screenshots with the iPad and then transfer them to my computer. Well, wouldn’t you know it, but for whatever reason, none of the digital comics providers were selling “Watchmen.” No one. Not even DC. (This may have changed in the intervening time, but this was the fact of the matter when I started this project earlier this year.)

So, I turned to the pirates, and found a PDF of the entire series and downloaded it. I’m not proud, but since I had already purchased the book 3 times in my life, this was as close to a victimless crime as I was going to get. (Unless, of course, you count all the people who were leaching off my seed with bittorrent while I was downloading it. There’s a chance some of them never have and never will buy the book.) If I could have found a proper digital copy (which would have made the work a lot easier) I would have gladly bought it. Unfortunately, I had to come to terms with the moral ambiguity of the situation and move on.

Next, came breaking down the work. I remember you had discussed that the book was a 9-panel affair throughout. In theory, yes, but there are a lot of double and triple panels throughout the book. Each page is built on a 9-grid layout, however. In some places, there are a whopping 18 panels on the page, but they’re still laid out with the 9 grids. I assigned each grid a number. For example, the panel in the top right of page 5 in issue 1 with Rorschach picking up the Comedian’s happy face pin would be 1-5-3 (issue 1, page 5, panel 3).  The panel after it would be 1-5-4. I made an Excel sheet with the entire book broken down like that. I needed the numbers to all fit within the margins of the paper I was going to print out, because I was going to cut them up and literally pull panel/grid numbers out of a hat. (It ended up being a plastic bag.) Unfortunately, all the issues don’t have the same page count, prohibiting me from doing a simple copy/paste over the whole file. The first issue is 26 pages, then issues 2 through 11 are 28 each, and issue 12 is 32.

After sorting that out, I printed out the file and sat down to cut it up. But, wait! On the last panel of every page, the panel is always abbreviated to allow space for a quotation in a black box. I couldn’t have my 13th issues without one of those, so I needed to separate the 9th panel/grid for each issue’s last page from the rest of the panels. I highlighted them so I could find them after cutting up the pages, and set those 12 scraps of paper aside. (The one I ended up using in my issue is from issue 5.)

Having cut up all the pages, and placed all the scraps in a plastic bag, I thought it would be easy as pulling numbers out of hat. I was wrong. Again, it’s that damn 9-panel grid that messes with you. Sometimes some panels take up more than 1 grid space, and that would alter what I was trying to do. Usually, I would pull 9 scraps out of the bag, and then record them in the order I pulled them. Then I would copy the panel from the PDF into a Word document. I ran into trouble when, for instance, I would go to get the panel matching the number on the 3rd scrap of paper, but it would turn out to be a 2- or 3-grid panel, or more on some occasions. This meant I had to discard that scrap for now, and keep pulling new one’s until I found one that match the space allotted.

What the last two paragraphs showed me is that even though I tried to make my fake issue as random as possible, that randomness was still subordinate to the original work. You can only imagine the relief I felt at work saved when the first scrap I pulled for one of the pages happened to be from the grid of one of the full-page panels in issue 12. That was the easiest day of copy-pasting-cropping during the whole project.

For the last page, I pulled a scrap from the final panels first because, well, not all of them only occupy one grid’s worth of real estate. This was the only time I went out of order.

Finally, I needed an ersatz cover for my ersatz issue 13. As you probably already know, the cover images of the original series all lead in to the first panel of the interior art. I took my cover from the panel before 10-16-2. If I was any good with Photoshop, hell if I even owned Photoshop, I would have been able to edit out that tail from the word balloon, but so be it. OK, enough of the nuts and bolts. What did I learn? First, the issue itself. It’s just as unreadable as you would imagine an endeavor like this to be. However, there are some interesting aspects that illuminate the whole.

1.     Dave Gibbons drew way more 2-or-more-grid panels than I remembered, which shows how important the size and pacing of the layout was to the story. Every time I come across a comic with half a page’s real estate devoted to something mundane like a plane flying or a car driving, it makes me want to drop the book. I don’t know if the writer or the artist is to blame, but most of the panels in modern comics don’t require that much space, especially now with the shortened book lengths. Gibbons and Moore paced “Watchmen” perfectly, and when panels are drawn bigger than average, it’s for an important reason. The opening full-page panels of issue 12 are shocking because Gibbons held that back until the very end. And despite their size, you’re not sure of what your seeing because you’re visually overwhelmed (at least the first time through), which is the disorienting feeling, I believe, they wanted to convey. Every time I read a comic now that ends with a full-page splash of just a person sitting in a darkened room with no visible background, I want to throw it across the room. And then maybe walk over, pick it up, and tear it apart. Too many modern comics writers and illustrators are just piss-poor storytellers. Whatever your opinion of the work “Watchmen” may be, I think it’s hard to argue against the fact that it is pure comics from start to finish. It’s rare to find creators who actually embrace the medium and do what books and film cannot. I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about this because it is tangential to my field of employment (video games) where too many games are trying to be movies instead of doing what they should be doing: being and interactive medium. Games that fail to be interactive are doing a disserve to the consumers, and comics that settle for storytelling that could just have easily been done in a movie or book, or even better in those media, are doing a disservice to comics readers everywhere. 2.    As the narrations of Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan are the most prevalent  in the work, their panels in this composite issue have a weird interstitial effect of ordering the randomness of the chosen panels. It helps that in many of Dr. Manhattan’s source narrations he was already jumping around the timeline, so it doesn’t feel out of place here. Many of Dr. Manhattan’s panels tied eerily to the next panel, although the placement was random and almost always from a non-sequential section of the story. For example, on page 12, panel 3, Dr. Manhattan narrates, “They’re shaping me into something gaudy and lethal…” Then the next panel depicts Adrian in his gaudy purple suit swinging a post at his erstwhile assailant. On page 13, panel 2, Dr. Manhattan again narrates: “Laurie’s met him several times. She says his name is Dreiberg.” In the next panel Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are locked in a kiss. There are many other pieces of synchronicity, but the best are tied to Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan because of their strong narratives. In my issues 13, the story becomes Dr. Manhattan’s tale to tell, with Rorschach in a supporting role, a victim of the event surrounding him. One could argue that this isn’t too far from the original’s narrative. The fact that it continues to be so in this jumble I have assembled speaks to the focus and intent of the original. Or maybe there were just too damn many Dr. Manhattan panels to begin with. 3.    Almost all of the commentary on politics and the Cold War itself is lost in my issue. Time is the only strong theme from the original work that remains. Again, that is one of Dr. Manhattan’s themes. The lack of that political backdrop robs the story of some of its weight. I felt that when I watched the movie version too. Because although Snyder is almost slavish in adapting the source material, he does it ever so superficially. Sure it’s still set in 1985, but it doesn’t feel like the world is on the brink of a nuclear war in the movie like it did in the book. New York doesn’t really feel like the dirty, crime-drenched metropolis of the ‘70s and ‘80s. In the book, despite all the advances in technology, New York still remains a non-gentrified, citywide slum, which is exactly what the mass media wanted you to believe about New York in the ‘80s. Snyder’s New York is too aestheticized to feel like it ever needed vigilantes in the first place. This also ties into the altered ending as well. I understand that a faux alien invasion spearheaded by a giant squid would have been a tough pill to swallow for viewing audiences of Snyder’s “realistic” superhero movie; but the fact of the matter is, Snyder revealed his ignorance of current affairs when he made that film 8 years after 9/11. In the book, just like after 9/11, it’s believable that the world would stand with the United States after the tragedy that had befallen it. In the movie, however, the fake Dr. Manhattan attacks hit cities around the world, not just New York. Again, not wholly bad, because of the fact that it was Dr. Manhattan and not an outsider, a la the alien, I have a hard time believing the world would unite in global cooperation. What’s more likely is that the world would erupt in furor at the U.S. for creating Dr. Manhattan in the first place. The U.S. would be culpable in the world’s eyes. What’s worse is that in the context of the movie, there’s nothing for the people of the world to not assume that this wasn’t an attack by the U.S. aside from the fact that the U.S. was hit as well. Since the world knows Dr. Manhattan was created in an accident, how does the world know that a preemptive attack by the U.S. on the Soviets didn’t backfire on them when they tried to exploit Dr. Manhattan?

As you'll hear on the podcast, Graeme and I greatly enjoyed reading Miguel's assemblage, and we wanted to give you the opportunity to check it out and get inspired for yourself. [link is 22.8MB]  And as I mentioned to Miguel in an email to him, I found this project and his analysis to be a tremendous DIY counterpoint to Before Watchmen--it really is a way to revisit Moore and Gibbon's story while respecting the original achievement. We are incredibly pleased to have played even the most indirect part in this project.

Hmm, feel like I'm forgetting something?  Oh yes, the podcast, the podcast... As tempting as it would be to add to the artsy shenanigans and leave only these notes and the book as a type of seashell on the beach for you to find, Episode 102 is indeed out there in the world (provided you define "the world" as your RSS provider of choice) and you can listen to it here as well, should you choose:

Wait, What?, Episode 102: Age of Chance

As always, we hope you enjoy...and thanks for listening!

Trying to get back on track: Hibbs' 7/4 & 7/11

I posted the Batman Earth One review last week, so that covers my "quota", I guess. I'm going to mix up a little of this week and last for this week's post from me... ADVENTURE TIME MARCELINE SCREAM QUEENS #1: I've actually not read this, but I brought it home for Ben, as I've brought home every issue to date so far. Eight minutes of silence later, he handed it back to me, and said I should bring it back to the store. "What's wrong with it?" I asked, puzzled.  "Eh, I don't know," he said, "I don't think it had enough action is, and it wasn't very funny." So, that's what a comics-consuming eight year old boy thought. I'll go with that first word then and say EH.

  FUCK ALAN MOORE BEFORE WATCHMEN OZYMANDIAS #1 (OF 6): I kind of don't even want to discuss the "plot" (which, I shit you not, added a "Women in Refrigerators" moment to WATCHMEN as the grossest of its sins), but, oh my god what a crazily lovely comic book. Jae Lee just killed it here, invoking the sense of design that WATCHMEN had, and totally putting his own spin on it with a moving "round" design on every page. this may well be an execrable, money-grubbing project that is being told soullessly and clumsily by most of the writers, but fuck me if this isn't the most beautiful comic of the month by far. That's some Eisner-level art, yo. Too bad it is in service of such a horrible comic book. Two poles of rating for art and writing, landing it smack in the middle with an OK for overall rating.

BLOODSHOT (ONGOING) #1: Wow, that's a gory comic. Like really crazily keep it the fuck away from kids level of gory. Do people actually like that, actually? There's an alright set-up, I guess, in here, with "weapon for the government" and "everything you think is a lie" and all that, but there wasn't a thing in here that got me considering to actually come back and read issue #2, because I don't really see any signs of it going in anything other than a regular Frankenstein direction. Fairly EH.

BTVS SEASON 9 FREEFALL #11: Oh, I liked this issue. Actually, it might have made a better issue #1 than issue #1 was. I very much need Buffy to stop being such a whiny girl by now -- the character has been going backwards for most of the last year, and this plot line seems like it gives her a chance to move forward again. GOOD.

CROW #1: Uh, what? I know I've been saying this a lot lately, but IDW really has to get their shit together on the editorial level -- this comic's script is barely first draft where the title character appears on the last page, and the 21 before that is a ton of boring, endless repeating set-up -- the antagonist says or implies what they're going to do multiple times, AND we see it from another angle as well. This entire first issue should have been set-up in no more than eight pages, max, not padded out horribly like this.  I also think this new set-up completely upsets the straight-forward revenge of the original, AND misses the "sorrow is my fortress" vibe of O'Barr's gothy original. Almost as clear of a miss as I can possibly imagine, and I didn't even really LIKE the original very much (it remains a product of its time, very much) -- sadly AWFUL.

EARTH 2 #3: Honest to god, I wish ALL of the New 52 books were as solid and world-buildy as this one is. THEN we would have had something magic on display. This is really VERY GOOD stuff.

FANTASTIC FOUR ANNUAL #33: This year's annuals for this, DD and Wolverine are an interconnected story by Alan Davis, with connections to Clandestine. Clandestine has never quite worked for me, and I can't say why exactly, but I really love-ity love Davis' clean superhero art, and if I can't have him drawing silver age DC characters (or a variant thereon), then, yeah, have him draw what is very clearly his baby. I wonder though if he gets some kind of character participation or something for him to keep coming back to this when it keeps not clicking with the general audience? Anyway, this was solidly GOOD, and made for a nice stand-alone, star-drawn annual.

INFERNAL MAN-THING #1 (OF 3): In case you all were wondering, Jeff really IS sticking with his Marvel ban -- I could not get him to budge on what I thought would be the easiest tempt of all: new Steve Gerber, doing his #2 best known character, ooooh, with yummy art by Kevin Nowlan. It's a clear follow through on an old MT story, and I thought it showed a lot of strong maturity and growth in balancing the "Gerber wacky" with actually affecting human emotion -- that is to say: this is less of a lark than, say, NEVADA. I don't really like much of Gerber's tics, but I thought this was really solid stuff, well drawn and grounded. You can see why they let this take ten years (or whatever) to get drawn. Hm, maybe if I repitch it as "originated two editorial regimes ago"? GOOD.

PUNK ROCK JESUS #1 (OF 6): Wow, nice! It's a profane title (and probably a profane execution, if I was sensitive to such things, which I'm not), but I really really liked the setup of a morally screwed up entertainment corporation creating a reality show where they clone Jesus. Hijinx, as they say, then ensue. It's a little early to say whether Sean Murphy has the writing chops to stick the landing on this one, but this first issue was a pretty wonderful read. VERY GOOD from me, and my pick of the week!

SPACE PUNISHER #1 (OF 4): I didn't necessarily expect much from this (the name tells you most of what you need to know), but I did expect less toy-etic takes on the "normal" Marvel U (example: "Doctor Octopus" is a "Space Criminal" with octopus legs for a body) -- sadly AWFUL, and not the awesome I know you were hoping for.

ULTIMATE COMICS X-MEN #14 DWF: OK, the Ultimate universe has reached that point that it seems like all "alternate super hero universe" (CF: "The New Universe", the "Supreme Powers" Universe, etc.) finally end up at -- they don't know what to do with the CHARACTERS any longer, so they think "Well let's make big big changes to the WORLD". This issue opens with a map so you can keep track of all the fucked up things that have happened in Ultimate America -- DC nuked, the southwest an internment camp, and so on, and suddenly it is no longer "a world outside your window", it's something utterly unrecognizable and (this is more important, I think) unsympathetic. Even without the "We're officially out of ideas" stench that SPIDER-MEN brought to the line, copying the general throughline of (ugh!) THE PITT isn't going to lead to anywhere good for the Ultimate Universe. I have a hard time, other than from stubbornness, understanding why these books should still be published a year from now. AWFUL.

WALKING DEAD #100: That may be the single most fucked up thing that has happened in a series where all kinds of crazy fucked up things happen all of the time. Brutal, absolutely brutal -- but it sets the book out along what I hope will be a solid new direction that should shake all of the complacency away. I thought this was an EXCELLENT installment (And, ooh, MONSTER seller, too) -- may they have another 400 more issues after this! My ONE complaint? I was really hoping the 6 page (?) Michonne story that was in that issue of PLAYBOY would have been reprinted here after the letter col.

OK, that's me... what did YOU think?

-B

Wait, What? Ep. 93: Thrill Power Overboard

PhotobucketAbove: The Chocolate Waffle, which is a liege waffle covered in dark chocolate, from The Waffle Window, Portland, OR

Yup, Episode 93.  I would say more but I'm slightly overwhelmed with the amount of shite multitasking I'm currently doing (kinda dashing back and forth between two computers at opposite ends of the room at the moment, which neither makes me feel like a mad scientist or a keyboardist in Journey but just someone who is old, Internet, so terribly old).

On the other hand (and behind the jump):  show notes!

0:00-7:51: Greetings; getting schooled by Graeme on Tharg and the mascots of 2000AD and other British comics, with a half-hearted attempt by Jeff to pitch Mascot Wars [working title] 7:51-11:37:  By contrast, Jeff guiltily admits he's been reading the first volume of the Vampirella Archives 11:37-13:37:  Somehow this leads to a discussion of the fascinating copyright information found in Dynamite Books 13:37-15:51: Bless him, Jeff is not giving up so easily on his Mascot Wars idea 15:51-18:55: Jeff gripes about getting back into the routine after his Portland trip, Graeme gripes a bit about getting back into his routine after the 4th of July holiday 18:55-20:52:And so, finally, we start talking comic news--the announcement of Marvel NOW! and the launch of Monkeybrain comics. 20:52-24:35:  Graeme has a thing about the Uncanny Avengers cover and I really cannot blame him; 24:35-25:57: And since we are on the subject, Graeme has a few things to say about that Marvel NOW! image by Joe Quesada, too. 25:57-38:25: And so we talk about Monkeybrain instead, including Amelia Cole by friend of the podcast Adam Knave, Bandette by Colleen Coover and Paul Tobin, the other launch titles, and what we would like to see from the line in the future; 38:25-41:54:  Speaking of fantastic digital comics, the second issue of Double Barrel is out!  And neither of us have read it. But it is out!  And you should consider getting it.  Because it is also Top Shelf and also coming out in digital, we talk James Kochalka's American Elf. 41:54-49:57: Jeff talks about League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century: 2009. Here there be spoilers! 49:57-1:06:42:Graeme's interesting rebuttal concerns whether bad art can be forgiven if it is suitably ambitious. We have a tussle of sorts and then move on to discuss when does the creator develop that "not so fresh" feeling.  (Bonus: Graeme does a pretty great job of justifying our existence, pretty much). 1:06:42-1:15:37: Incentivizing the singles? Does it work?  Brian Wood's The Massive, Ed Brubaker's Fatale, and more discussion of the Monkeybrain publishing plan and a discussion of what works in the direct market. 1:15:37-1:29:48:  Who is stronger, Watchmen or Walking Dead?  Fight! 1:29:48-1:38:32:The possible Thief of Thieves TV show and the need to keep creating new IP for Hollywood; and when or if the Big Two will come around on that. 1:38:32-1:42:37: Uncanny Avengers.  We are a little fixated. Also, Graeme sings the ballad of Cafe Gratitude (except he doesn't sing and it's not a ballad).  And then some clever Brass Eye jokes that Graeme has to explain to Jeff.  Again. 1:42:37-1:47:36: On the other hand, Jeff did get to the comic store that week so he has that going on for him.  His quickie reviews while Graeme listens on helplessly:  Batman, Inc. #2, Fatale #6, The New Deadwardians #3 and 4; Mind MGMT #2; Prophet #26; Popeye #3 (which is awesome and must-have-ish); Tom Neely's Doppelganger; Flash #10; and Action Comics #11. 1:47:36-2:04:08: San Diego Comic Con! Graeme has two questions about it.  Crazy predictions are made and anxiety dream stories are exchanged. [brrt! brrt! David Brothers alert! brrt! brrt!]  Also, Jeff once again tries to coin the term "Nerd Vietnam" to describe SDCC. 2:04:082:09:20-: Closing comments, and a few reviews of waffles from the Waffle Window.  And then....sign off!

If you are of an iTunesian inclination, you may have already chanced upon us.  But if not, we offer you the chance to give a listen right here and now:

Wait, What?, Episode 93: Thrill Power Overboard

And as always, we hope you enjoy--and thanks for listening!

Late, but still here, Hibbs sorta is in 5/9

Staggeringly, I've still barely read any comics this week, due to a confluence of many things, but maybe fewer means more in depth? Let's see below the jump!

Part of it, for me is being hit by crossover burnout hard this week -- 3 different "Night of the Owls" tie-ins, which, basically, all have the exact same story, three from AvX (more on that later, I suspect), and two parts of "The Culling", which, surprisingly, isn't leaving the involved books cancelled. Ugh.

(I think I've mentioned before that I kind of have to get through the shittier books first each week, before I "let" myself read the presumed good ones, because otherwise I'd never read much of the superhero books, and, then, wouldn't be able to do my job as effectively.)

There's only two things I read that I feel like saying anything about this week.... but first, a late-ish movie review!

AVENGERS:  because we're in the last week's of elementary school right now in San Francisco, things are crazy hectic with performances and other end-of-the-year stuff, so I didn't get to see this until this weekend. On the upside, I got to see it with two eight-year-old boys, which was kind of awesome in and of itself.

I don't think it's any real surprise after the film has made One. Billion. Dollars!....but, jeez, what a terrific film! I walked out thinking "Oooh, I want to see that again", and I've already had one customer in the store tell me he's seen it six times so far. Yikes!

What I think I like the most about it is just how strong the script was, giving every character plausible character arcs, a place to drive the greater plot, and a moment to shine with how awesome the characters are. That's a crazy hard trick.

It also worked remarkably well as a Classic Marvel Comic Book -- it's absolutely a continuation of various threads from other movies, but if you never saw those movies, everything you might need to know is clearly spelled out in both dialogue and action -- worked better, in fact, most current Marvel comics do in that regard!

Honestly, most big budget blockbuster movies are usually ultimately shallow affairs more about spectacle, but Avengers very nicely ties all of it's set pieces to individual character's arcs.

The action is big and crazy and maybe even, post 9/11, a bit disturbing, but it's also very well shot and staged, and things are almost always clear as a bell of what is happening. It also showed just how terrifying super-humans can be as engines of utter destruction.

I really think this might just be the most perfect super-hero film ever made -- it has as much brains as brawn, and it juggled a gargantuan cast of characters with the utmost of aplomb.

There were a few things I didn't really like -- I thought Scarlett Johanson was really kind of one-note/look through the whole thing. And I don't believe her as a Russian even one bit. I also thought the new Cap mask looked pretty bad. I thought Hawkeye's arc was weakest (though it tried really hard to find a way to make "real" Hawkeye's "reformed villain" origins work in movie continuity), and took him off the board for too much of the film. I thought the death in the movie was kind of uneeded, and the "hey, we got blood all over your nostalgia!" was a bit off-note for the rest of the film. But, hell, those are all just quibbles really. None of that could possibly take away from my consensus that this was an EXCELLENT movie!

Joss Whedon should now be allowed to do whatever he wants, however he wants (though that's been true for years), for doing such a loving job in bringing to the screen such a remarkable version of Stan Lee & Jack Kirby's (among many others) creations.

 

Just two comics I want to talk about, as I noted, so here we go:

TRIO #1: Here's one of those weird riddles of comics and ownership and all of that. John Byrne is well beloved for his run on FANTASTIC FOUR, a run which certainly couldn't have been without Lee & Kirby before him. Byrne doesn't/can't work at Marvel any more, but many people seem to want nostalgia from their superhero works, and they're sad he can't draw FF any longer. Ah ah, but what if Byrne instead came up with something that was remarkably LIKE FF, but wasn't legally-actionably the same, huh? There's a brute made out of stone, and a character that both stretches and turns invisible, and they're fighting some sort of a sea ruler and... well it hits every note just right, but it's just enough different. I'd almost say it's like "What if Paul McCartney, rather than Neil Innes, formed The Rutles?"

So if you want to read Byrne doing the almost-FF (and, if you like action adventure "classic" Marvel-style comics, yeah you probably do), then this is certainly the thing for you. I thought it was pretty GOOD.

 

WALKING DEAD #97: I'm not afraid to say that I think TWD has been a smidge off its game the last few months, with the super-crazy-hyper competent ambassador from the big settlement really feeling kind of out of place, but now that we're starting to think about starting to work through a "Big Bad" again in the form of Negan, I've lost most of my hesitation. This arc is looking as strong as the book has ever been, which is great because this is the first issue that will come after the second compendium ends (and/or v16), and is a great place to jump on to the monthly reading experience. This was VERY GOOD.

 

OK, time to go get ready for the NEXT week's worth of comics...

What did YOU think?

-B

Wait, What? Ep. 75: Joshua Judges OMAC

Uploaded from the Photobucket iPhone App [Above:  Not a deliberate shout-out, I'm sure, but we'll take what we can get, of course.]

Thanks for your patience during our mild vacation! In return, we offer you Wait, What? Ep. 75, which features more than two and twenty minutes of Graeme McMillan and me "stealing the air" or "pump[ing] up the volume" or whatever it is you "kids" call it. [Thanks to Joolian for pointing out that should really read "two hours and twenty minutes," damn my eyes!]

Do we talk Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and The Walking Dead? Do we, ever! Dare we discuss Gary Friedrich, Ghost Rider and Marvel? Dare, we do! Tire I of answering rhetorical questions? Frankly, yes, but I won't let that get in the way of telling you we also chat about L.J. Smith and The Vampire Diaries; John Rozum, Scott McDaniel, and Static Shock; and James Doohan and William Shatner and Star Trek.

Also, there's Brian Bendis' ideas for the New 52; sales expectations for the Marvel and DC; Marvel's possible reboot and their strategies for Avengers Vs. X-Men; the myth of the Marvel Architects;  Joss Whedon and Buffy The Vampire Slayer; and et cetera, and what have you, and like that.

If you were the type to indulge in auditorial gambols, you may have encountered our gift in the wild autumnal splendor that is iTunes (where nearly-extinct creatures like Ping and DRM still play).  But if not, please take it as it is offered here, with utmost generosity and verbal pomposity:

Wait, What? Ep. 75: Joshua Judges OMAC?

As always, we thank you for listening and hope you enjoy!

"'Fear Itself'? More like 'Fuck Yourself'!" (wokka-wokka-wokka)

Hey, look, reviews!  

STAR TREK/LSH #1: Awwwwww.... I really really wanted to like this more than I actually did. The idea of a "Mirror/Mirror"-ed LSH 31st century is a cute one, but at the end of issue #1, the two groups aren't even together yet! I'd have preferred that the cause of things was much clearer than it was -- like an episode of the show. Ah well, I still have incredibly high hopes for the next one. EH.

 

WALKING DEAD: THE RISE OF THE GOVERNOR HC: Sadly, as a piece of prose, I thought this kind of stank -- it's told in an odd voice (my English classes are decades behind me, is "They do this, they do that".... third person, present, is it? Awful awful choice in any case), and it relies way way too much on a last-minute twist that really doesn't make a lot of sense for what we see in the comic. It spends far too much of its length in stuff I really didn't care about (maybe the last 30 pages are in Woodsbury, making this kinda more "the road to the rise of the Governor", and, again, that "twist", ugh, cheaty-mccheaterpants.

As a marketing exercise, I understand this even less, as it is a tie-in to the COMIC BOOK (The TV show can't have the Governor until at least season 3, if that), yet the cover design just screams "TV show" in aesthetic. Yet anyone watching the show would likely be baffled by this novel, since there's not a single character they know in it. At the least, you'd expect that maybe there'd be a page of "now read the comics for more" or something. But, there's not -- Ugh!

Also: I couldn't really hear Kirkman's voice anywhere here. I rather get the feeling that he just plotted it, or something.

Sorry to say, this was pretty AWFUL.

 

FEAR ITSELF #7: Um, wow. this has not exactly been a stellar comic all the way along, but I think this issue is a special kind of low. Virtually nothing made sense to me (like WHY is Thor dead? I don't get it?), and it suffers greatly from the Lord of the Rings movie problem, where there's just epilogue after epilogue after epilogue, all designed to funnel you into other comic books. It also doesn't help there also was a brand new 12-issue (!) mini (the Fearless) spinning out the same day, nor that there also seems to be a new branding trade dress ("Shattered Heroes"), or, that they seemingly forgot about a few characters along the way (please see Graeme's AMAZING missing scene from the issue), or that they have the temerity to extend the mini by three more "issues" (7.1, 7.2, and 7.3? OY!), or that we're already ramping up for the next set of events and crossovers ("point one" ships in like 3 weeks), and it's all just too much.

It's a big giant "fuck you" to all of Marvel's readers.

The biggest sin, of course, is that it is just plain dull -- but the calculatedness on top of that? Fuck Marvel here, is what I say -- this was AWFUL.

 

WOLVERINE #17: I thought the "Schism" stuff was all kind of mediocre, generally, but at least it had a point and a purpose.

I go kind of crazy sometimes, when I read comics set in San Francisco, that gets basic stuff about The City 100% completely wrong. Like look at this cover:

There's no possible place in San Francisco this should could be from (remember, SF is surrounded on three sides by water -- the only place it isn't is SOUTH, so, no, you can't "walk off into the sunset"), and even putting that aside, well, I can find 8 different "no, not in SF things" here -- seriously, gang, I'm available cheap as a San Francisco fact checker!

This story here is fairly throw away, but I have to give it one big ups -- it has my new favorite line of dialogue of 2011.

So there's like a bunch of reporters standing around a crime scene, shouting questions at the harried detectives, just like what you've seen in a hundred movies, but has never happened in real life, and one shouts out something very close to:

"Captain, Captain, can you confirm that this murder puts kung-fu related deaths up by 200%?"

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

The only rational response to a question like that would probably be "Yes, they're now at 200% of ZERO, dumbass", but this is comics, so that actually rules, and I'm going to give it a capricious-ass GOOD just for that line that made me giggle like a little school girl.

 

And, with that, I bid you anon, until next week...

 

As always, what did YOU think?

 

-B

 

Wait, What? Ep. 52.2: Jerks, Fighters, and Jus' Folks

Photobucket I admit it. I love "Our Valued Customers" even though it caters to the worst stereotypes about comic store customers. (Although I had my share of crazy people stories when I worked the counter at CE, none of them ever seemed quite as bad as what apparently walks into Mr. Tim's store on a weekly basis -- and honestly, most of the crazy people we had were "it's San Francisco and there are mentally ill people on the streets" crazy as opposed to "I must talk to you about Spider-Man so hard spittle is always flying off my lips" crazy.)

In any event, none of this is especially relevant to the conclusion to Episode 52 of our podcast, although it might be pretty easy for you to imagine Graeme or I coming off like this guy as we discuss Marvel and what might happen to the direct market in 2012;   Chris Roberson's Superman, recommendations for crazy silver-age DC stories, NuMarvel, comic book movies, Bendis and Ultimate Fallout, New Dark Avengers, Frank Darabont and Walking Dead, and much, much more, thanks to our listeners, colleagues, and fine friends who follow us on Twitter.  Itunes should have the episode all queued up for you, or alternately, you can listen to us gab about all of the above here:

Wait, What? Ep. 52.2: Jerks, Fighters and Jus\' Folks

We hope you enjoy and as always, thanks for listening!

 

Wait, What? Ep. 51.2: Nothing and All

Photobucket What's that saying? "A day late and a dollar short?" The Early Bird Gets the Podcast Entry?" I don't know...something like that.

In any event, the rousing conclusion to Wait, What? Episode 51 is here with Graeme and myself talking X-Force #12, Captain America and Bucky #620, Witch Doctor #2, Walking Dead #87, Criminal: Last of the Innocent #2, Kirby Genesis #2, Dan Slott's Spider-Man and Paul Levitz's Legion of Super-Heroes, and -- believe it or not -- more.

Itunes? Why yes, it's there (or should be) but it is also very much here, ready to be listened to and perhaps even loved:

Wait, What? Ep. 51.2: Nothing and All

As always, we hope you enjoy it and appreciate your patronage!

Wait, What? Ep. 50.2: In A Dark Woods

Photobucket Picking up midway through our journey--more or less literally--it's the conclusion to our fiftieth episode of Wait, What?! Graeme and I tackle subjects small and large, from Walking Dead to the shootings in Oslo, from Supergods to Amy Winehouse. Ambition; death; Outbreak; Haywire.

It's an unconventional wrap-up to our less-than-conventional milestone episode and in some ways is more than a little bit of a downer -- we thought it would be an excellent idea to tell you now. It's probably shown its face on iTunes or you can hold a compact mirror up to it here:

Wait, What? Ep. 50.2: In A Dark Wood

As always, we hope this is a thing that you enjoy even when one of us (not to name any names...in part because he's writing this entry) drags things into the less cheerful side of things.  We humbly thank you for listening and are here with us for the next fifty!

"Don't Fuck With the POS", and other thoughts on 6/29 by Hibbs

Retailing story first, then into some reviews...

So, I'm in the back of the store yesterday, pulling the subs, but I can hear what's going on the floor just fine.  I hear Matt greet someone, then, in a shockingly short time -- like within a minute -- something escalates to screaming. "You're trying to rip me off!" and things like that. I give Matt a few minutes to try and sort it out, but he's not able to calm the guy down.

So, I saunter out, "Hello, I'm the owner, what seems to be the trouble here?"

Older gentlemen, probably in his 50s, with a teenager with him. He's gone straight to apoplectic, which is generally a sign that someone is lying to you before they even start, but let's listen to his story.

"I was trying to explain to this guy," the guy launches in, "that I was here a week or so ago to buy MICE TEMPLAR volume 2.1 for my son, and your store sold me THIS instead!" He thrusts a copy of MICE TEMPLAR v1 in HC in my hand. "And now he won't exchange it!"

"Hm, I see," I say, "do you have your receipt with you?"

"NO! I already told him, I lost the receipt. Your store sold me the wrong book!"

"Can you tell me who sold it to you, sir?"

"It was a guy with black hair, and he was wearing a hat."

"Interesting, because me and Matt are the only two people working here in the last few weeks, and our other employees are both women." (Matt and I are both light haired, and don't wear hats, BTW)

"Well, it must have been that guy!" he said, pointing to Matt. I feel if you're going to accuse someone of chicanery, you should at least have a clue as to who you are accusing.

"Hm, OK, give me a second, and let's look at the records. We're computerized, shouldn't take a moment. Hm, hm, well, I have a record of someone buying a copy of v2.1 on 6/18 from Matt."

"Yes, that was when it was, but he sold me this one instead!"

(After the guy leaves, Matt tells me that he remembers the first encounter, and how the customer and he had had a conversation about what if the man has bought the wrong copy for his son? Keep the receipt, Matt says he said, and we can exchange, of course. This is SOP at the store, and I thoroughly believe that Matt had that conversation with the guy.)

"We haven't sold a copy of v1 in HC since... looks like 2008."

"Anyway," I go on, "it doesn't seem likely that you thought you were buying a paperback of volume 2.1, but were sold a HC of v1. Didn't you notice?"

"No! That's what I'm saying! You're cheating me!"

"Well, sir, that really isn't possible. The computer reads the barcode..."

"It must have read it wrong!"

"That's really not possible, sir..."

"Well, that's what happened!"

"Really, sir, it couldn't have. Look, let's test it now." I scan the HC he is "returning" -- it scans as v1 HC. I scan a TP of 2.1, it scans as a TP of 2.1. "So, you see sir, what you're describing really isn't possible. Now, if you can find the receipt..."

"FINE!" he yells, throwing down the HC, "You just keep this one, and I'm NEVER SHOPPING HERE EVER AGAIN!"

"Fine by me!" I tell his back. I have little patience for liars.

What's funny is that if someone came in, without a receipt, saying they'd bought the wrong book, I'd generally be cool enough to swap it out -- there's nothing wrong with customer service; but to try and trick us with a completely different book that we haven't sold a copy of in THREE years? Man, I don't think so. When someone gets THAT angry, THAT fast, it's usually a good sign they're lying.

The open question is what was going on here: did he somehow have a second copy of v1, and thought he could get an easy 2.2 in exchange for it? What's weirdest is that in looking at our record for the HC of v1, it showed up on a periodic "haven't sold in a year" report that I ran in early May. On 5/13, I wasn't able to find the copy as I trolled the racks pulling off dead stock, so I noted that in the computer with a "Biffed out previously?" note, since, really, it should have been dealt with in 2010, at the latest (though I seldom make it all the way through the biffage list before I fill up the bins, and boxes in the back room)

ANYway, what I'm thinking NOW is that either he or his son STOLE the HC some time before 5/13/11, bought that 2.1 on 6/18, then thought they'd trade the stolen book for 2.2 yesterday. Can't prove if that's right or not, but it feels correct to me.

Either way, if you're trying to take the moral high ground when you storm out, leaving the business you are storming out of the book that you claim they sold you under false pretenses? Not exactly a "punishment", really.

Really though, the point is, don't fuck with the POS -- I can track, with a pretty insane level of accuracy, everything that I've EVER sold since 2007!

 

***

 

Comics you say? Sure, here's some!

 

WALKING DEAD #86: In a weird way, WALKING DEAD has entered this strange place where since it is so consistently good month-after-month, there's really very little need to chime in and say "Hey, another great issue!" USAGI YOJIMBO is like that, too, and I often feel bad that that book doesn't get more attention, too.

Anyway, this blog used to tweak Robert Kirkman a LOT about timeliness, and it's good to every once in a while jump back in and give an "attaboy!" for staying on schedule. WD isn't *quite* clockwork-same-week-of-every month, but it HAS been no-more-than-five-weeks-between-issues for the last FIFTEEN months, which is pretty damn good, especially for an Image book.

(I HAVE to note here that IMAGE UNITED? Issue #4 is now FOURTEEN months late, as of today -- and that's after EIGHT MONTHS between issues 2 & 3)

The other thing Kirkman is doing is using the power of HIS book, to promote OTHER books, and here with #86, he hits a Grand Slam, including the entire (COLOR) 32 pages of ELEPHANTMEN #1 -- which means he had to pay color prices even for his B&W WD pages... making this issue a giant 52 pages, half in color, for the same regular $2.99.

My only "negative" note on that, would be "might be a good idea to LET RETAILERS KNOW" when you do something like that, so they might have extra stock on hand to capitalize on it." Sadly, with the way that reorders work, if I place orders for something TODAY, it won't arrive here for thirteen more days.

Anyway, "another great issue!" VERY GOOD.

 

AVENGERS: CHILDREN'S CRUSADE #6: I'm not really sure when exactly this stopped having pretty much anything to do with YOUNG AVENGERS per se, and moved to trying to undo HOUSE OF M. I dunno, I want to like this because I really like the YA characters, and I guess seeing two of them getting back with mom is fun, and I absolutely adore Jim Cheung's art on this... but I'm bored to tears reading about the Scarlet Witch's "redemption". This is one of the few cases where leaving the character in limbo might have been a better thing. Very EH.

 

THUNDER AGENTS #8: I think this book suffers pretty badly from pacing problems -- just when there's a little forward momentum in this story, the issue suddenly ends. Plus the Dan Panosian art was pretty plain.

But what really prompted me to say something was the cover blurb.

Blurbed from "weeklycomicbookreview.com" it says ""IF YOU HAVEN'T JUMPED ON YET, NOW'S THE TIME."

Yes! Jump on now! Two Issues before the book gets Cancelled! Gooood Call!

(You know, to the best of my knowledge, after ten years of reviewing comics on the internet, Savage Critic has NEVER been cover blurbed on anything? Isn't that weird?)

Anyway: a very EH comic.

 

 

That's it for me this week, I think.

 

As always, what did YOU think?

 

-B

 

Verse Chorus Verse: Jeff's Capsule Reviews from 6/8

Does it bode ill for my reviews when I can't think of a clever thing to say while convincing you to follow me behind the jump for capsule reviews?  It probably is, isn't it?  Ah, well.  I just finished watching the screen adaptation of The Black Dahlia.  I mean, I'd heard that movie would be bad, but there were wrong casting decisions, terrible direction, and some bad mistakes in adapting Ellroy's skeezy epic to the screen. As a quasi-fan of Brian DePalma, it's a painful, painful movie to watch.  And I blame it for my inability to bring you a witty intro: the movie is a like a form of slow-acting toxin to the higher brain functions. Anyway, after the jump:  lower brain function reviews of Empowered: Ten Questions for the Maidman, Invincible Iron Man #504, Witch Doctor #0, and more.

EMPOWERED: TEN QUESTIONS FOR THE MAIDMAN:  Maidman -- the cross-dressing vigilante of Adam Warren's Empowered universe -- gets his own one-shot with alternating black and white sections by Adam Warren and color sections by Emily Warren. It was a book I wanted to deeply like, but really only admired. You can read this one-shot as a deconstruction of Batman (Maidman is one of the few non-powered superheroes in the Emp universe and easily the most feared), a deconstruction of Batman analogs (in some ways, this is the funniest issue of Midnighter never published), or maybe even a spoof of the cape industry's current trend in Mary-Sueisms.  Alternately, you could also take it as a face value, with Warren using the same gimmicks to get the reader to like Maidman that Johns or Bendis or a host of others use these days -- (a) introduce character; (b) have everyone talk admiringly of character; (c) show character doing something impossibly awesome; (d) profit.  Empowered: Ten Questions... shows Warren as being as skilled a practitioner of the current bag of comics writing magic tricks as anyone currently working.  I'm glad he at least has his own little universe to toy about with, but I wish I could get more worked up about a more-or-less OK one-shot...in no small part because I worry about him getting it yanked out from under him if the sales aren't there.  Vexingly OK.

INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #504:  Really interesting to read a book where the regular writer is caught off-balance by the obligatory line-wide event when the same guy is writing that event, too.  I mean, that two page scene with Tony and Pepper is really quite good for what it is.  But the meat of the issue, where Tony goes to Paris because one of the hammers of the Worthy has landed there, is underwhelming. Fraction clearly built the issue to that last page climax but it feels like that's the only thing he's trying to  accomplish.  So when you get to that last page, it definitely has some punch to it but it also eaves you feeling super-empty and annoyed immediately after.

Also, that last page what feels like part of an ongoing tug-of-war between Fraction and Larrocca. Instead of focusing on rendering that kinda-important pile of stones Tony is on top of, Larroca focuses on the building beside it.  It doesn't feel quite like a "fuck you" from one collaborator to another, but it does suggest painfully opposing goals\.  $3.99 price-tag + ineffective storytelling + forced event crossover=AWFULness.

POWER-MAN & IRON FIST #5: Similarly, last issue of this miniseries turned out very meh in the end despite my modest expectations.  Wellinton Alves' work ended up rushed and ugly, and Van Lente's script tried to do wayyyy too much in too short a time.  Not only do both heroes have romantic relationships resolved in this issue, but a mystery is solved, fight scenes are had, and the creepy Comedia Del'Morte are...well, frankly, I have no idea what happened to them.  It's a shame because I was won over by so much less with that back-up story from Amazing Spider-Man. (On the plus side,with very little rejiggering, Van Lente and Alves could re-tool this as an arc of the post-Morrison Batman & Robin and it'd fit right in.)  I'm tempted to get all Rex Reedy on you and say this puts the EH back in "meh," but I won't...in part because it was AWFUL.

SECRET AVENGERS #13: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! No. CRAP.

WALKING DEAD #85/WITCH DOCTOR #0:  Although I like the swerve Kirkman made with this storyline a few issues back, I don't know if there's really much more going on than that.  I suspect as we come 'round issue #100, Kirkman's biggest flaw --his ability to dramatize character development is rudimentary at best, and so he has to have scenes where his characters explain their motivations to one another for us to get it --  is getting more and more apparent. While I'm at it, Charlie Adlard's biggest strength -- drawing a large cast of characters to keep them easily identifiable without resorting to any flashy tricks -- may also be hindering this book:  the dramatic scenes either run to the inert or the occasionally overheated.  Energy, ambition and craft have gotten these guys farther and higher than anyone would've suspected and I in no way mean to diminish their achievement.  But I think if this book is going to make another 85 issues, they're going to need to shake up their skillsets for a change, not their storyline. OK stuff.

As for WITCH DOCTOR #0, despite having very little interest based on the material I'd seen online, I ended up enjoying the hell out of it.  Everyone [by which I mean at least me] has always wanted to write a biologic explanation for vampires, a la Matheson's treatment in I am Legend, but writer Brandon Seifert really goes to town here. Lines like "his saliva's got the usual bloodfeeder chemistry set-- vasodilator, anticoagulant and an anesthetic--plus some interesting mystical secretions.  I think one's a anterograde amnesiac--" make my heart go pitter-pat, and Seifert has a lot of them.  I can easily see how it might feel dry to some, but to me it showed a commitment to research and world-building I think you really need to make a series about a doctor (even a mystical one) work.  As for Lukas Ketner's art, it's enjoyably quirky, especially when it chooses to go detailed and when it decides to loosen up: panels of this remind me of Wrightson, others of William Stout, and still others of Jack Davis, and I could never figure out when the next swerve was going to happen.  VERY GOOD stuff and I'm definitely on-board for the first few issues of the regular title now.

WOLVERINE #9:  Not the most recent issue I know, but so much more satisfying than issue #10, I figured you'd forgive me for writing about it instead.  I mean, to begin with:  God damn, this is some gorgeous looking work.  Daniel Acuna (who I guess is doing both the art and the colors) really sold me on this story about a mysterious assassin (Lord Deathstrike) and Wolverine both trying to hunt down Mystique on the streets of San Francisco. But I should point out that there's three full pages of wordless action that feel perfectly placed in the script and I think writer Jason Aaron should really be commended for having the confidence to let the art do its stuff.  And there's also a hilariously over-the-top assassination scene at the beginning that I loved.  I suspect this book is going to have diminishing sales in no small part because Aaron just can't keep away from writing Wolverine's adventures with a strong dash of the absurdly extreme, and a larger audience for this character really want this stuff served straight-up.  I can understand that desire (especially when you get issues like #10 where it's Logan vs. the Man with the Jai-Alai Feet) but when you get such an artist who can sell you on both the sweet & sour sauce of Aaron's mix of awesome and absurd? It's really pretty satisfying.  This was one hell of a  VERY GOOD issue.

UNCANNY X-FORCE #11:  I guess this is what you can do with okay art and good characterization--you can make me care somewhat about stuff I wouldn't ordinarily care about. I missed out on the original Age of Apocalypse stuff powering the plot here and yet, thanks to a forty-issue Exiles habit, I'm pretty familiar with what's going on.  In fact, arguably I'm too familiar as I felt like I was at least a beat or two ahead of the plot at all times.  But at least some of the time I was surprised by what the characters said or how they said it.   I still quietly pine for the awesomeness of the first five issues, but this was on the high end of OK for me.

SECRET AVENGERS #13: Seriously, though.  Do you need to know why I thought this was terrible?  Well, let's just say when your plot about a Washington invasion hinges on the fierce determination of a congressman who also happens to be a magical negro mutant, and that leads to Lincoln from the Lincoln Monument and all the dinosaurs from the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History rising up to hold the line, then I think it's safe to say things have gone wrong.  Weirdly, I could've bought it in a DC book -- for whatever reason, I expect the surreal and the schmaltzy to intermingle more freely there -- but here it seems like a big ol' misfire.  Again, to sum up:  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! No. CRAP.

And that's my week in pamphlets.  As for my TRADE PICK....

BAKUMAN, VOL. 5:  Oh man, how I love this series.  It's not an easy sell, I know, and I'll be the first to admit that first volume is more than a little forced.  And in fact, here in volume 5, there is still a surprising number of misfires:  for example, there's a chapter here about an artist who is so committed to proving his worth to his writer that he draws pages outside her window in the middle of a blizzard and it's really treacly and ineffective. And there are more than a few hilariously cynical moves by the writer and artist to pander to their publishers:  in more than a few places, the editors and publishers of Shonen Jump are treated with a degree of reverence that borders on the fanatical.

On the other hand, Bakuman has changed my understanding of how manga is created so much I've since read other titles with new eyes --I doubt I would've enjoyed my thirteen volume romp through One-Piece nearly as much without it. And even more than that, I'm totally a sucker for the way Ohba and Obata have introduced so many different young manga creators and then blurred the lines between enemies and allies so much you realize none really exist.  As a book about the comics industry properly should, Bakuman is very much about who you have to decide to trust and the possible long-term implications of those choices.  But it's also a book where competition doesn't preclude comradeship and that totally hits a sweet spot of insecurities and needs I didn't really know I had.  Really, the series is so very far from perfect it's kinda painful...and yet the last four volumes now have been some of my favorite reading of the last year.  VERY, VERY GOOD for me, but you really not might feel at all the same.

The Reason We Read Periodical Comics

There are two kinds of special thrills that periodical comics can bring. The first is tied to world-building, in which you get a piece of a story here, and another piece there, and eventually it adds up, building into something much larger than it's parts -- this is much of the thrill of the Marvel or DC universes, and one of the reasons that every other attempt to make a "universe" usually comes crashing down: it is nearly impossible to coordinate in that particular way, and it takes a multi-year dedication to build, with titles come out in a specific way. When you try to "erect" that kind of thing, the scaffolding is usually pretty apparent, and like a magic trick, you don't want to see how it is done.

(Because, of course, DC and Marvel both stumbled into their "universes" nearly by accident -- and they grew organically from there)

Even Marvel and DC have become pretty bad a really mining this special thrill. Look at the way sales figures have flattened as they've tried to geometrically expand the search for that thrill!

But this is something that really only main-veins as a periodical experience -- because that kind of manic soap opera thrill depends AT LEAST as much on sequence and spatial-relationship-in-time as it does about content. That is to say, to create a really lousy example that doesn't actually exist, anyone can team up Spider-Man and Daredevil to fight, but only comics can have Spidey start a swing-punch in SPIDER-MAN #123, and have him finish that arc in DAREDEVIL #213. When the inter-relationships-of-titles get reprinted in book form, you're generally only getting one strand of it, so you miss out on this whole kind of meta-thingy.

I could totally explain this better, I think, but THAT thrill isn't the one I actually want to really talk about today, it's the OTHER one: the cliffhanger.

I remember vividly the first cliffhanger that REALLY stuck with me -- at the end of the first issue of the O'Neill/Cowan QUESTION #1, Vic Sage gets shot in the head at point blank range, and falls into the river, apparently dead.

Whoa!

That was a very long month, I tell you.

In #2 it turned out that because of the caliber of bullet, the angle of the shot and the shockingly cold temperature of the river, the bullet just bounced off Vic's skull, and he was able to survive. O'Neill even told a story in the letter's page of a similar real-life incident that he took as inspiration.

But when you read this in the paperback collection, where one page he plunges down, and the next he is rescued most of the cliffhanger's power is completely abrogated. It's actually a pretty flat sequence.

It's a bit like, say, watching LOST on DVD box set, and just CHEWING through the episodes -- that can be satisfying in it's own way, but losing out on the week-between-airings and the time-to-think that stems from that is missing most of the cultural weight that LOST had on the Broadcast audience.

In fact, in really terrific network-style TV, you can get some awesome impacts of this kind of thing just from commercial breaks, which, again, get often minimized on DVD. The thing TV-on-DVD has going for it (as it were) are the musical cues which can help build suspense or otherwise manipulate your emotional reaction.

Comics don't have THAT particular trick (though they have a few native ones), so it is my firm belief that the cadence of periodical versus book-format is very very different.

Once one has been doing comics enough, it's very possible to make the periodical seams vanish when something gets collceted -- what we usually refer to as "decompressed storytelling", but unless you're very careful or very very good, it's pretty easy to short change the periodical.

I'd say that, consistently, really the only cartoonist who master the comic/book split right has been Dave Sim. Especially from, say, CHURCH & STATE through to MELMOTH or so, there are little jolty cliffhangers every 20 pages in CEREBUS, so that reading the monthly was generally satisfying (and often thrilling), but when you join those together in a book, almost every one of those cliffhangers is nearly invisible within the book as a whole. Things rise and fall differently in a book.

The other guys who have started to really figure out the trick are Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard in WALKING DEAD.

Which brings us to this week's issue of WALKING DEAD #86.

There's a potenitally massive massive game changer here, just one of those moments where your jaw drops and you're all "please god say you didn't!" and "I wantwantwantwant the next issue NOW!!!!", and now you've got to live what what you saw for the next entire month.

I'm not going to spoil it, but I KNOW it is going to read differently in the paperback than it does here. Why? Because similar things in previous issues have as well -- it read one way in serialization, and in a more subdued way in the collection.

And if you're one of the (many!) "I read it in trade" people, well you're missing out on one of the best thrills of WALKING DEAD -- the wait between events, and the suspense that engenders.

(Plus, the Big Thing isn't the ONLY thing that happens this issue -- there's at least one more Pretty Big Thing [and maybe 2] that gets undersold because of the Big Thing)

Anyway, this is really WHY I read comics -- for the suspense BETWEEN issues, and this was a truly EXCELLENT example of that.

What did YOU think? (though, if you comment, any spoilery ones will be deleted by me)

-B

Asshattery, and so forth: Hibbs burbles some

Like Jeff said, you being active in some way really DOES matter -- whether it is giving us a buck, or even just posting to the comments threads, it keeps us going knowing that people ARE interested.

So, since like 25% of the people posting in the shipping list thread asked, let's talk about Asshats.

I like that word, because it's really only sort of a swear -- it sounds dirtier than it really is, I think, because for me it really is more about idiocy than anything else. After all, who needs a hat for one's ass? It would quickly fall off!

(Mechanical) things are the way that they are in the DM for what are usually actually very very sound reasons. That's not to suggest or imply that the DM is perfect, or that there aren't 47 different things that go wrong in the execution, but when you look at the underlying principles behind, say, the solicitation process, they evolved into what they are because they work for the participants of the DM.

There's a reason, for example, that books generally ship monthly -- much slower than that, and the audience is much more prone to drift; much less than that, and the audience gets confused whether they've bought an issue or not.

Honestly! *one* of the (many) reasons we put in a POS system was that we get asked "did I buy this already?" quite a bit. MOST comics readers don't come in weekly. MOST don't have a pull list. MOST don't read the news sites. MOST aren't totally-organized in their collecting, making themselves lists or whatever.

So, for me, screwing with how-the-customer-buys is just an idiotic thing to do. And that makes you an Asshat.

There's no way I'm going to do this every week -- because there's weeks where no one was especially egregious, or there's nothing meaningful to say, or there's some really valid other reason. But sometimes you get some pretty obvious boners, and it's worth handing out the Award for Auspicious Asshattery.

There's even TWO this week!

AAA #1 goes to LOCAL #10. Holy, frickin' cow, this book was supposed to ship in NOVEMBER 2006. Nine months late? Are you insane? And you have the AUDACITY to not resolicit? I deeply deeply love much of what Oni puts out, but they have some of the sloppiest shipping schedules in the business. Listen: freakin' AVATAR is a more-likely-to-hit-their-shipdates publisher these days (Avatar has, to their credit, seemed to have mostly solved their shipping problems)

AAA #2 goes to an old friend of Asshattery: Robert Kirkman and WALKING DEAD #41. Dude, #40 came out LAST FUCKING WEEK. Double-you-tee-eff? Man, am I going to be swimming in "did I buy this?" questions for the next few weeks! I repeat: MOST comics customers don't come in weekly. Don't undercut your own sales. What's funny is that I believe that if WALKING DEAD shipped on an old-school schedule, like how I know that some of you could remember the days when you could set your clocks by comics -- BATMAN came out the second week of the month without fail, or whatever -- anyway, if I could tell people, "yeah, WD comes out the last week of the month, guaranteed", we'd be selling 30% more copies just like that. WD would be a top *50* comic, y'know? And the ironic thing is that I tend to suspect that with the freakish exception of MARVEL ZOMBIES, as a creator-owned book under the Image deal, Kirkman pretty much has to be making more money off of WD than any of his page-rate Marvel work.

What really makes this harder for me is that I GENUINELY like WALKING DEAD. There may be sequences I hate (like the rape stuff), but over all this is pretty much certainly Image's strongest and most consistent book. If I had written reviews last week (ah, sorry, sorry, it was order form week with a new computer system, and new hybrid method of taking orders!), I would have given #40 an "Excellent", full of wonderful and vivid characterization.

Which brings me to a special Award for Auspicious Asshattery: Diamond comics for shorting me 2/3rds of my order of WALKING DEAD #41, so I can't even fill subs, let alone have copies for the rack. Though, actually, this sorta works in my favor, because now it will look to most of my customers as though there were two weeks between issues. Hmmmmm.....

(Robert Kirkman is now allowed to make the "...and such small portions!" joke in the comment section, if he feels like it; and I will be obligated to say something self-deprecating in return)

-B

Crazy baby

I'm watching Ben today while Tzipora is off shopping -- the kid is a little dynamo, trying to get into little nooks and crannies where he shouldn't be. There's only so much baby proofing you can do, and there's always some place he shouldn't be. His latest thing is to rip apart the CD collection... which is on a shelf under the TV, abotu 4 feet off the ground. Yet the little terror manages to crawl up there with no real problem. Quickly, a few more books while I've distracted him with some shiny keys!

WALKING DEAD #9: Like I said, I need to cleanse my palate every few shitty comics. Glad I picked this one. Gripping, human story by Kirkman, and fabulous art by Adlard. The book took a quantum leap forward (and it was already really good) when Charlie came on board. That little reaction sequence on the bottom of page 10 is good, chilling comics. Excellent.

Damn, he's bored with the keys already and is hauling ass into my office trying to rip up this week's funny books.....

Let's try this one-handed with the baby in my lap.

EXCALIBUR #3: We keep selling out of this, which surprises me -- this is the worst of Claremont's excesses, with few of the charms. The supporting cast makes "Nudge" from Doom Patrol look like a fully formed character. 3 issues in, and there's still no real explanation of how (and why!) Mags is back. Poop. Awful.

Ok, Ben is squirming too much, this isn't working... back later

-B