#26 ACK! The comic strip CATHY is ending. After 34+ years, the final strip will run on Sunday, October 3. As if newspapers didn’t have it bad enough! Will she ever find a bathing suit that fits? Will she ever get married? Am I being overly sarcastic?
Stephen Mayer: Chocolate, Chocolate, Chocolate. ACK! - Liz Lemon
Gregg Schigiel: Oh, Cathy, if nothing more you will live on through Andy Samberg.
#27 The Scott Pilgrim vs. the Animation short is on Adult Swim! It's only 7 minutes long, you've got time! So, what did you think of it?
Gregg: The one I saw was about half that long…showing how Scott’s started dating Kim. I liked it. It was pretty much the comic but in color with sound and movement…but considerably better than a “motion comic”. Makes me wonder what the movie would have been like 100% animated…despite the fact that it (no spoilers) totally works live action, I think likely better than had it been animated. Edgar Wright gets an A+ for audio-visual style and execution.
Stephen: I thought that the actor's voices didn't work as well with the animation, but that's probably because the visual style of the comic straight translated into animation probably tied me closer to my original readings of material. So to that extent, I don't think I would have enjoyed a fully animated movie as much as the live-action.
#28 Years ago there was a Marvel theme restaurant in California called Marvel Mania, with foods named after characters and such. In that spirit, create and describe a sandwich based on a comic book character.
Stephen: The Spider-Ham would be too easy...
The Wasp - mini cucumber sandwiches with a side of Waldorf salad, sweet, light, and sophisticated.
Gregg: Thinking mostly visually, I’ll say the Red Robin, a Chinese barbecue cooked chicken breast (so it’s all red and such), tomato, and roasted red pepper on pumpernickel.
The Mr. Fantastic would be a long, narrow baguette, grilled on a press with several gooey, melty cheeses for maximum stretch after every bite.
And after seeing the movie I’m also thinking the Scott Pilgrim would be a slice of garlic bread between two slices of garlic bread.
#29 Marvel is taking Earth's Mightiest Heroes to the all-ages market. The creative team is there with cartoon and X-Force scribe Christopher Yost and Atomic Robo artist Scott Wegener. The hitch, perhaps for you, it's gonna be $3.99. Do you go for the automatic avoid or see what the show is bringing back to comics as you do with Brave and the Bold?
Gregg: I don’t want to start another to-do on the message boards, but the chances of me picking up that book are slim to none. I’m very much for all-ages stuff, as we’ve discussed, but it’s a fool’s errand to put a $4 price tag on what will be seen by everyone as a “kiddie book”, no matter how well produced it is.
The only thing that might change my mind is if the cartoon knocks it out of the park (because I’d love to read a “classic” Avengers comic) , and even then it’s a dicey proposition.
Stephen: I'm all about this one, having given up on the stand against $3.99 books long ago. I think Scott Wegener does a great job in the Marvel Universe (see: Human Torch Marvel 70th Anniversary Special).
#30 In the category of “nitpicking”, what are the tiny things, those not noticeable by most lay-people, that bug the heck out of you when you’re reading a comic. Could be anything…nothing it too myopic.
Stephen: Typos might seem like an obvious choice, but they can really take me out of a story. When there's a big one like last week's S.H.I.E.L.D. #3 variant cover (Isaac Newton spelled "Issac Newton") it gets a lot of press and people wonder how it gets by, but I can usually find at least one example every week. If a book has too many, I almost can't bring myself to finish it.
Which is probably incredibly hypocritical of me because I almost never copy edit Regarding Comics...
Gregg: Or the awesome typo on the cover of the recent Spider-Ham one-shot, where it said across the top, “25th Anniversay Issue”.
It always bugs me when word balloons aren’t lined up properly against panel borders (a hazard of digital lettering)…or when something minor but noticeable is miscolored (i.e. a glove isn’t colored in or something). On the one hand I think, come on, if I noticed it someone else should have…on the other hand I think, I’m probably the only person noticing it.
#31 We've talked about the timeline before, but how did you parents feel when you moved to New York to become a comic book artist?
Gregg: My parents have always been supportive, even if they to this day might not quite understand what I really do. Not that I’ve made it so easy by going from editorial (with the random penciling job) to licensing and licensed publishing to now where I’m sort of all over the map drawing, writing, etc.
Stephen: My parents didn't love the idea of me jumping into retail after they paid for my college education, but I think when they came to the Q&A for the Sitdown with the M.O.B. event in November and saw a room full of people and creators from across the country and the whole production there was a greater understanding.
#32 Buffy the Vampire Slayer got Season 8 in comics form, and there was talk of a Pushing Daisies comic…what TV show, no longer on the air, would you want to continue enjoying in comics or graphic novel form?
Stephen: I always envisioned doing a comic version of the West Wing. How exactly does one master the "Walk and Talk" in the sequential narrative? I always thought that would be amazing.
But I could never come up with an artist and I wouldn't even want to hear about it unless Sorkin was writing.
Gregg: I’ve actually looked into mine (the benefit of being “in the business” and having “connections”, I suppose – though, no luck so don’t get too excited, folks), which is for a long time I’ve thought Nickelodeon’s The Adventures of Pete & Pete would be an awesome comic or graphic novel series. But again, I’ve made my interest known, so if it ever does happen, hopefully I’ll be part of it.
#33 The reputation of AMC as a producer of fine televised entertainment and Frank Darabont's for directing the #1 movie on IMDB's Top 250 of all Time has given WALKING DEAD some real heat. Are you warming to the idea of the TV show?
Gregg: I’ve never been cold on the idea, despite not being a reader of WALKING DEAD, but curiously enough, Frank Darabont isn’t the major draw for me either. I liked The Shawshank Redemption, sure, but I wasn’t so won over by The Green Mile and I never even saw The Majestic.
My checking out the show will mostly be on the word-of-mouth of the comic from friends and colleagues. We’ll see if it captures my interest. A TV show, generally, is a pretty small investment.
Gregg: I'm hoping that the Carousel Luxury Cinemas here in town will add Walking Dead to their TV Club schedule, which already includes Mad Men and True Blood. So I'm looking forward more to the spectacle of seeing it on the big screen, the opportunity for Acme to really blow it out and the chance to get in on something on the ground floor.
#34 What comics related logo/costume/design element doesn’t yet have a t-shirt with it on there that should?
Stephen: No CHEW shirts, no shirts based on Chris Samnee's design from THOR: THE MIGHTY AVENGER, no PIX shirts.
Gregg: I’ve always been a fan of shirts and such where, to look at it, you wouldn’ t know what it was referring to if you weren’t already in the know.
In college I was very close to making some shirts based on Watchmen; one white with a Rorshach mask pattern on it and one blue with the Dr. Manhattan forehead symbol on it. After so much increased awareness of Watchmen, I’m surprised that hasn’t happened.
I also tend to enjoy shirts with symbols or images you wouldn’t know unless you knew what was up. And while I rarely if every wear shirts with logos and symbols on them, a black shirt with the Wonder Man red “W” might be something.
#35 As a fluent Spanish speaker, do you ever keep up with comic translations or original international material?
Gregg: Not really. I’ve enjoyed a number of books produced over in France or Spain or elsewhere, but always in an English translation. Though I suppose I could probably make my way through a Spanish comic (though my audio comprehension might be better than my reading). But things like ZACHARY HOLMES (Vanguard/Dark Horse), GUS AND HIS GANG (First Second) or ORDINARY VICTORIES (NBM), are some really great books/volumes produced across the Atlantic. The Zachary Holmes books are great all-ages reads.
Stephen: We have a handful of books in Spanish around the store (mainly Clone Wars Adventures, Hellboy and that one issue of Blue Beetle). It's not uncommon for folks to come in and ask for books in Spanish, but when they see what we've got they don't seem too interested.
#36 Over at Comics Alliance, in a piece about Inception, Jason Michelitch wrote: “Over the last decade, there's been a fractured but widespread push to make American comics more like film.…Younger creators looking to distance themselves from the embarrassing history of superhero comics marketed their comics as "paper movies" in an attempt to align themselves with a more acceptable-for-adults popular visual medium in the minds of potential readers”. Any initial thoughts or reactions to that?
Stephen: I think I've mentioned it in the past, but I credit the AUTHORITY for blowing open the doors on a lot of the widescreen, decompressed storytelling of the last 10 years. And I always accused BKV of being embarrassed of comics the way he wrapped Y and is about to wrap EX MACHINA and looks like he's gone to Hollywood for good. So those are initial reactions without any cohesive thought.
Gregg: While I’ve not spoken to him in a while, I have to say from my experience with him, Brian Vaughan is unquestionably a comics fan and is not embarrassed by them or embarrassed to be associated with them.
But beyond decompression and widescreen panels, I see things like showing seams in costumes so they look more “real”…how infrequently narrative devices like “Meanwhile” and “Soon” and such are used in comics to set time/place…the practical ghetto-ization of comics for younger readers (specially imprinted books racked separately)…and the more regular use of the phrase “graphic novel”…all of that points to a home-grown embarrassment on the part of comics folk and, as he puts it, “an attempt to align themselves with a more acceptable-for-adults popular visual medium”.
There’s room for both, and it seems for the most part the baby’s being thrown out with the bathwater.
#37 Batman news continues today as DC teased that Batman might get himself a White Lantern ring in BRIGHTEST DAY. Does this change how you feel about the Brightest Day event or the remainder of Return of Bruce Wayne?
Gregg: The white lantern ring and power is so poorly explained, if it has been explained, that this news literally has little to no value to me. I realize that’s possibly a harsh take, but especially since I’ve not been reading BRIGHTEST DAY, it all leaves me sort of “yeah, alright, I guess”. I read BIRDS OF PREY #4 and there’s a moment where Hawk, dying, gives a white ring to Dove and it wasn’t so much as distraction as a reminder to me that I don’t get it or have the patience to, really.
What the heck does a white lantern ring even do?!
Stephen: I guess we don't even really know, but, boy, does Sinestro want that power battery.
#38 Looking at the solicits/Diamond Previews for October product, what’s caught your eye?
Stephen: Here's looking behind the curtain a bit: I usually don't even look at Previews until the last week of the month. 1) I don't accidentally break up the Previews packet that includes the catalog, Marvel Previews, special offers, our order book and the order forms of all of our customers 2) It keeps my head clear when going through the ordering process. Between invoices, advance solicitations, press releases and full online solicitations, it can honestly be tough to keep straight what has arrived, what's been ordering already and what's to come.
Gregg: Veeerrrrry interesting. Then I won’t spoil anything for you save to say the thing I found most interesting was a book from Cartoon Books called FISH ‘N CHIPS VOL. 1, notable because it’s not Bone or Rasl related, but a book by Steve Hamaker, the colorist of the Bone volumes put out by Scholastic/Graphix.
#39 Does this make you want to get a game system: http://www.comicsalliance.com/2010/08/16/batman-the-brave-and-the-bold-the-video-game-bat-mite/
Gregg: It makes me want my friends with game systems to get that game so I can play it when I visit them. You’re gonna have to trust me; I don’t need the additional in-home distraction!
Stephen: Having recently acquired an Xbox, I was pretty sure I was never going to buy another Wii game again (lack of upgrades and compatibility, strange game controls), but this will get me to return to that well.
#40 Which is more interesting to you: the new “man without fear” or “the return of Thunderstrike”?
Stephen: I'll say the man without fear even though I'm not currently reading DAREDEVIL or SHADOWLAND. I've got six Daredevil omnibus on my shelf, yet I've never read an issue of anything featuring Thunderstrike.
Gregg: I’ve had little to no interest in Daredevil stuff for a long time. Thunderstrike, however, I have a weird fondness for, if only because I read all of those DeFalco/Frenz THOR comics and, if I may recall our topic from two weeks back, that stuff is underrated.
#41 Other than Dean Trippe's BUTTERFLY, a sidekick of a sidekick, do sidekicks still have a place in modern comics?
Gregg: Of course they do! This is another perfect example of the “aging-up” of comics so they don’t seem like kids’ stuff. Anything seen as a “classic” trope of comics can still be very valid, absolutely. You could say it’s all a matter of how said trope is handled. Handled well, respectfully, and properly (see Mary Marvel in POWER OF SHAZAM!, for example), sidekicks have as much a place in modern comics as anything else.
Heck, if Rick Veitch’s BRAT PACK didn’t put the kibosh of sidekicks, they’re not going anywhere.
Stephen: Agreed. I think some kids today even yearn for the entry point of a character their own age.
#42 Have we ever asked/answered this downright classic question: If you could any super power, which power would you choose?
Stephen: I believe that you've answered this one in one of the random question pieces.
For myself, I'd like to have Prodigy's power from NEW X-MEN where he could pick up on whatever anyone around him knows, even though the knowledge would fade when he lost proximity.
I'd rather be a super spy rather than a super hero with super powers...
Gregg: You’re nuts. Teleportation would be the best, just on its practical usage alone. Man, I wish I could teleport…
#43 Why isn't there a Venture Bros. comic?
Gregg: Probably a better question for the folks at Adult Swim or Jackson Publick, but it could be a lot of things, from the creators wanting to maintain control of the content to the powers that be not seeing comics as a money-making venture.
But consider this: the powerhouse that is SpongeBob SquarePants is only now getting his own comic book, starting in February 2011. Considering my first day at Nickelodeon learning how to draw SpongeBob was in February 2000, who knows why anything does or doesn’t happen…
#44 With respect to “Going Green”, do you find it the least bit surprising there hasn’t been any push for that in comics…be it recycled paper or alternate energy production or even “recycle your old comics” programs? It’s not even a selling point for digital comics. Are we as an industry not doing our part, or is it all hokum and bunk and in 2012 it’s all over anyway?
Stephen: I hope we've got more than 1 year and a half left in us! There was an issue of EX MACHINA that dealt with this in a big way (Ex Machina Special #4, I can say with certainty after a quick trip to the back issue boxes). Mayor Hundred briefly postulates making comic companies switch to recycled paper the way other periodicals are expected to at this point. The last page is a splash with a word balloon stating "Print is Dead." The heavy-handiness of that last page bucked me, but ever since I've thought about it.
It's surprising that even at Comic Con there aren't a) protestors of the comic industry not going green (but less violent than the terrorist in Ex Machina) or b) at least one company getting a tone of press for taking the Green stance.
Gregg: On the creative/production side, I’ll admit to preferring better quality paper to work on (recycled paper has a different texture and takes ink, especially, much differently). But I’ve also seen papers that purport to be produced in wind-powered paper mills and such, which is interesting.
As for the recycling comics, I think we’re probably all guilty of being unable to get rid of these things if we know they’ll be destroyed (even if for a “good cause”). That, or no one wants to recycle all their X-FORCE #1s only to find out one dude didn’t and as a result of all the recycling, it’s finally worth something after all.
#45 As someone that has worked in comic editorial, can you explain to people the difference between a re-boot, a ret-con, and a re-launch?
Gregg: I actually don’t know if I can. But I’ll try…or at the very least I’ll tell you what I think they are and how they differ (I reserve the right to be wrong on all counts).
The simplest, I’d say, is a re-launch, where a title is effectively cancelled and re-started with new numbering, sometimes the creative team remains, sometimes it’s changed. AGENTS OF ATLAS has had a number of re-launches. Conceptually it’s remained the same, but the numbering’s started over.
A reboot, I’d say, is a like a re-launch with a new concept/creative approach added to it. So, for example, the recent GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY I’d call a reboot, where there used to be one version and this is a new version that exists on its own, with or without connection to the earlier rendition. That said, unlike a re-launch, a reboot need not be renumbered, as evidenced by the THUNDERBOLTS reboot in the mid-2000s.
And a ret-con is the trickiest, as to my best understanding it has nothing to do with actual publications, but with content. In a nutshell it’s a story or story element that changes or affects events that have already happened/been published. John Byrne’s MAN OF STEEL or SPIDER-MAN: ONE MORE DAY, those are ret-cons. Less directly, I’d say CAPTAIN AMERICA: TRUTH is also likely a ret-con as it inserts content into a character’s continuity.
#46 Now that you’ve met him it might be tricker to answer this, but after ASTOUNDING WOLF-MAN wraps up, assuming he’s looking, what would you give Jason Howard work on? Similarly, where would you put the team of Landry & Walker (Batman: Brave & the Bold), together or separately?
Stephen: I thought Jason already had something else in the works with Kirkman? But since it's all in the name of fun, I'd love to see him do Zatanna actually. This is fresh on my mind since Stephane Roux didn't do issue #4 of the new series, but I think Jason would do a great Zatanna with even better demon designs.
Gregg: Yes, all in the name of fun, indeed, as I also understand they have a follow-up cookin’.
I think he’d be an interesting choice for Flash…his more angular style and graphic design skills would, I think, play well there.
And I told Eric Jones this at Comic-Con, but I want to see him draw Blue Devil if for no other reason I think it’d look pretty cool. Or put those two guys on the (Marvel Adventures) Spider-Man book.
#47 At this point in the weekend we now know that Scott Pilgrim vs. the World only opened in 5th place, taking in only about 12 million bucks. Thoughts?
Gregg: Unfortunately not surprised…well, maybe that it didn’t beat out Inception, which has been out for a good while. But I’m not surprised Eat Pray Love did as well as it did. There’s an audience of women that people always act surprised to find out is there, be it for Titanic, Sex and the City, The Notebook, or whatever.
I know I saw it opening night and there were good, big crowds…but this is also NY. I also know a number of people I know who would like that kind of movie who stayed away because it was opening night and to avoid crowds and a “scene”…maybe the backlash of the ironic/hipster/counterculture being the base for this kind of movie?
It’s also a reminder, the splash of cold water, that reminds up just how small the comics/graphic novel community is. Sure, it looks like a big deal at Comic-Con and it’s a nice success story within our walls, but as we talked about earlier with Diamond Preview numbers and stuff, even the biggest selling books, at 100,000 copies, say, aren’t actually selling to 100,000 readers. So something like Scott Pilgrim or The Losers or Jonah Hex…the “built in” audiences are a blip.
But I liked it. I’d only read the first two volumes, so a lot of it was new to me. Immediately after seeing it I did feel like the Scott/Ramona love story lacked a lot of depth, but in talking it over and re-registering it as more a play on video games than love, I accepted that, much like Mario saving the Princess for no other reason that it’s what he does, Scott Pilgrim loved Ramona because that was the object of the game (movie). If that makes sense.
I’m guessing, especially based on topic #1 (scroll back if you gotta), you’re less than thrilled with this box office showing, eh?
Stephen: I saw it three times (that I paid for), so I kind of feel like I did everything I can and pretty much all of my friends saw it multiple times as well. Like you said, every time theaters were more than half full. In my own little world, I don't know anyone that saw Expendables or Eat Pray Love, but I guess I was really shocked for that reason. My comics, my TV (including ESPN Sunday Night Baseball), my video games were all telling me it was gonna be huge. I read an article that tried to blame Michael Cera for the trouble, pointing out that Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, Youth in Revolt and Year One didn't make more than 25 million, but I thought he was great. This probably needs a full blog for me to get all the thoughts together...
#48 Barack Obama has made a number of comic book appearances. But which President, of them all, would you want to see in a monthly comic wherein we’d get to thrill to his adventures?
Stephen: TAFT! When I was in U.S. History, my friend Ryan I even came up with a theme song for when the comic is optioned into a TV show. "Who's the man with the sandwich in his hand? TAFT!" Like Shaft.
Gregg: That’s pretty good. I wondering if you’d go with Harrison and say it’d be a mini-series (get it folks? If not, check your history!).
In seriousity though, Teddy Roosevelt might have a good deal of potential as a comic book adventure hero/President.
#49 Why does every artist hate drawing cars?
Gregg: Because they’re a pain, man!
So, let’s say buildings are fairly boring to draw because they’re just…blocks with a lot of windows on ‘em (that’s the boring/pain part). At the very least they’re usually lined up or otherwise in some kind of simple-ish perspective.
Cars, on the other hand, are like buildings except with curves and, also, rarely are they just lined up in a row…especially in a chase or some other action-type deal, which is often the case.
That said, some folks have a real affinity for it and/or have figured out the cartooning/shorthand. But for those of us who haven’t: they’re a pain.
That, and if a car looks wrong, it looks WRONG, so there’s additional onus on getting it right.
Stephen: Big ups to Phil Jimenez and all the other guys that had to draw all those Overdrive stories from Brand New Day.
#50 This is it, 50 columns down. Can we do 50 more?
Stephen: I think absolutely so. I never tire of getting your opinions on things and I dig the way we can pick up again, even after not seeing each other for the better part of a year. I think the column has been big for me personally as far as forcing me to think critically three years removed from school and really respecting another's point of view.
Gregg: Then let’s do it! And now, if we’re ever stuck for a topic to discuss, we’ve got nearly 50 starters to revisit. In case of emergency, break glass, if you will.
Gregg Schigiel is a cartoonist, illustrator, and writer. He's worked as a penciller, writer and editor for Marvel Comics and an illustrator and cartoonist at Nickelodeon. In addition, he's in various stages of cooking up new comics-related works, unless he's too preoccupied actually cooking. Check out his website at Hatter Entertainment.com.
Stephen Mayer by typing in this chair even though it makes his back hurt and eating all the extra avocado that fell out of his sandwich.
