We wrap our coverage of Marvel March Madness and kick off the advent of the Acme A-List with our good friend Jennifer Grünwald! It only seems appropriate as Jen becomes the first industry professional to be interviewed for a third time on Acme Comics.com (and all in six months, no less)!
I also want to take this opportunity to once again, on behalf of the store, encourage everyone to sponsor Jen in this year's AIDS Walk New York!
While Jim signed double copies of New Avengers: The Reunion #1 and Chris sketched until his had fell off, it's safe to say that Jen was key ingredient that made Marvel March Madness the success that it was!Â
Not only could she sign every collection that people could think to put in front of her while beating Jim at arming wrestling and going verbally toe-to-toe with Irish about the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe hardcovers and Omnibii galore, she also applied for membership at both local watering holes and did this interview.Â
Stephen Mayer: We're here with Jen Grünwald for her umpteeth Acme Comics.com 
interview, but this one is extra special because this is her very first visit to Acme Comics, the first of what we hope will be many over the years.
Jen Grünwald: Aw, me too.
SM: Thank you so much for coming to the store.
JG: I love it, it's a great store.
SM: What do you think of Greensboro so far?
JG: It's full of very nice people. Honestly, I've had such nice conversations today. It's been really cool and there's lots of good food here. Biscuitville [thumbs up].
SM: And what do you think of the store?
JG: The store is AWESOME! I really, really like the store. It's so cool. I like the separate room for the back issues. That's really awesome. I've never seen a store with this much space for back issues. It's really cool. It's laid out so nice. It's really, really cool in here. It's very, I don't know, fun!
SM: Any extra special stories you have from today so far?
JG: Two little girls came in before, and I'm not usually a big fan of the little ones, but these were some of the cutest girls I've ever seen and 
one was dressed up as Captain America and one had Hulk hands, which I find really cool. Rather than being Wonder Woman or Phoenix, we've got a little girl dressed as Captain America. That was the coolest thing and they took a picture with me, which I thought was really cool. Oh, and someone brought us cookies! That was really awesome. Homemade chocolate chip cookies. I felt really special.
SM: What collections are you working on right now that you're really excited about? You said you're wrapping up the second Red Hulk collection and...
JG: Yeah, Red Hulk, one of the best designed books. Comicraft does an amazing job when we do get to use them for our trades. The handbook, we're still chugging along with those hardcovers. They're amazing. I feel so proud of them when they're done. Obviously I'm not the only one involved. The handbooks guys that we use are just incredible at what they do. I don't know, we collect so much stuff...I just finished the Cloak & Dagger premiere classic that was really cool. There's too many, you should have prepared me for that question! [laughs[ I love them all! They're all my babies.
SM: How about the "omniboo" that are coming out?
JG: I just finished the Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark Daredevil Omnibus, which is really cool, and I'm working on the Iron Fist Omnibus with Fraction, Brubaker, and Aja. That's gonna be nice, I'm really excited about that one. I don't know what other ones I can talk about just yet, so I'm not going to...
SM: What kind of special features can people expect to get on those if they double dip?
JG: On Daredevil, unfortunately, we used everything that we had in the trades, but a lot of the sketches that were a quarter of a page we blew up to a full page. That was really cool. We got to show off the Lee Bermejo covers and really, really nice pencil pages that we only got to show this big [makes an L7 with her fingers] in the trade are now full page. Iron Fist, I'm working on that right now, seeing what I can get. David Aja usually comes up with a lot of cool sketches to put in, so it should have some stuff from that. I'm still working on it, so I don't know yet.
SM: Outstanding. Thank you, again, Jen, for coming down. You've been the life of the party the whole time and we really appreciate it.
JG: That's my job. That's what I can offer you. I don't draw, but I can be friendly!
Jennifer Grünwald is the Collection Editor for Marvel Comics. She's been involved in the majority of all trade paperbacks, hardcovers, digests, and omniboo that company has but out in the last half decade. She can be found at Brian Bendis' Jinxworld Message Board, her blog, I Got Kitty Pryde, or the Marvel trade department blog, Collected Ramblings!
