Random Crap

Had you fooled last month didn't I? Seriously the whole thing was the brainchild of our editor. Now that I look at it, it was not that bad an article for me as it could have been. I may still throw in some Star Wars and GI Joe things from time to time, but right now it is just onto the business at hand and that is random comics news.

Set in Concrete

I have always been fascinated by the character Concrete from the mind of Paul Chadwick. The comic comes out monthly in the Dark Horse Presents (DHP) anthology comic. It was not until I started reading the new Dark Horse Presents that I got more of a feel for the character. From what I understand, the character, Concrete, has a body of solid concrete with the mind of a man in it. I don't think how that mind got into this animated mass of building material is as important as the stories that Chadwick tells with him. In the first new issue of DHP it has some characterization of Concrete, showing us that he has a three legged dog that he takes for a walk from time to time at night. Through the subsequent issues we see a world that is either terrified of this man mountain or accepts him for who he is and is cool with him. The only thing that really makes the character tragic is that being in this body of concrete may make him virtually immortal and invulnerable, but he cannot feel the touch of the woman he loves. That would be enough to drive a person to the point of insanity and make them hardened to the world. The man inside the concrete has come to terms with that by just doing the best he can. What brought on this little tangent? Well back about a month ago, Dark Horse released a short motion comic on their web site blog about Concrete. Here's a link to the post on their blog. I have not seen it as of yet, so it may be NSFW.

Younger Brothers ask Good Questions

My younger brother, who is not a big comic fan but he does have a complete run of every What If Marvel has produced except one, just posed this question to me about Marvel Comics' The Thing from Fantastic Four. Has there ever been a time where Ben Grimm has gone from orange rocky Thing back to human form? I want to say yes there has been at some point in the 1980's during the John Byrne run on the book, but I cannot say that with 100% certainty. My knowledge of 1980's Marvel comics is limited to GI Joe so I could be completely wrong. As a follow up to this question, I could have sworn that at one point The Thing had the ability to control his ability to turn orange and rocky, so it that true? I may be confusing that ability with the old 1960's or 1990's Fantastic Four cartoon that might have had that as a plot point in an episode. Anyone who can help me with either of these questions I would appreciate it.

Where the Wild Things Are

Author Maurice Sendak, the writer and illustrator of children's books such as Where the Wild Things Are and In the Night Kitchen died last month at the age of 83. He had suffered a stroke a few days before and died in a Connecticut hospital with long time friend and caretaker Lynn Caponera at his side. I first became acquainted with Mr. Sendak's work when I was about eight or nine years old when they did part of an episode of the PBS show Reading Rainbow with Where the Wild Things Are. Being just outside the age group that the book was aimed at I wrote it off as a little kids book. It was not until the movie of the book came out in 2009 and I was listening to NPR that I learned there was a much darker subtext to the book. There were a lot of people that called into the show that had such fond memories of the book, that I felt like I had missed something. Now that my sister is having a kid, and I'm going to be an uncle, I figure that I would get the child a copy of the book. I know there are a lot of books out there that little kids might appreciate more like Dr. Seuss, but I want the child to look back on the times that Where the Wild Things Are was read to him/her and remember it one way and then look at it an entirely different way through adult eyes. For more information, I direct you to this article by Samantha Critchell of the Associated Press that I pulled from one of Dallas' television news web sites.

Conventions

Frank Cho is a successful comic book creator and artist, and with the trend of comic book creators buying their own comic book stores or making comic conventions happen in the major town of choice; it should not be a shock that Cho has bought a share of the Big Wow Comic Fest in San Jose, California. The festival took place last month and will hopefully be an ongoing thing every year. Take a look at this interview with Frank Cho on Bleeding Cool's web site about the comic fest as well as his opinion on cosplayers of all sorts. This is a comic festival that I could get behind, not only is it your usual show with a dealer's room and things like that, but it also includes programming for independent comic artists wanting to improve their skills, and fledgling comic artists as well. You could go there and sit in on panels that feature well known comic artists drawing or painting in front of you and you can follow along on your own paper if you want. In a time where comic book conventions seem to be focusing more on the next big Marvel Comics movie, and less on the medium that brought that movie about, this seems to me to be a breath of fresh air. The comic convention that I went to last month, had nothing like this on their docket. Instead we got media stars talking about their latest projects and maybe one (1) sixty minute panel with comic people. This was billed as a Comic-Con, and you have one panel about comics? It should bill itself as a media convention that just happens to have a few comic book people working it as well. If I had the gumption and money, I would start my own convention like this because comic book artists are everywhere, they just don't show up on a lot of people's radars because they are not working for the big companies.

Ha-Ha!

I feel bad for some stores that had bought into the hype of the Trading Card Game (TCG), Redakai, being the next big thing. Early last month I was picking things up from the local Target Store and as I was going through the toys I saw an end cap with clearance prices on their Redakai TCG stock. Not just marked down 25% but some things were marked down by as much as 60%. I was tempted to get some, but passed on it. I'm trying to avoid purchasing more stuff that is not easily stored and can be considered collectable. I've got my comics and I am happy with that. I think the thing that hurt this game was also the thing that made it unique. You needed a bunch of extra accessories to play the game. To get those accessories, you needed to spend roughly $25. If you look at a game like the long lasting Magic the Gathering, it does not need a lot of accessories. Just a sheet of scrap paper and a pencil to keep track of your health. I'm sure someone might have made an iPhone/iPad/Android app to keep track of your health for those of you that are tech savvy.

How Did This? What the Heck?

In last month's issue of Grifter from DC Comics, Rob Lifeld introduced one of Jim Lee's WildC.A.T's characters, Zealot, into the DC Comic's universe. In usual Lifeld style he makes gross mistakes in female anatomy. Here's a two panel spread of Zealot that appeared in the book. Artists may want avert your eyes as you will erupt into a rage filled state (like I did) or spontaneously combust when you look at this art.     HER HIPS ARE WIDER THAN HER SHOULDERS! No, that never happens in real life. If that happened in real life, a woman would walk so awkwardly that she would more than likely topple over. At least her chest is not as large as it was in the 90's. Another thing is that woman's bodies do not flow like that from the waist, and make near right angles at the hips. It almost looks like he was trying to show her rear end as well. What the heck is up with her hands being balled up into fists. I have not read the issue in question, but that does not seem like something you should be doing facing someone you are supposed to be working with. I would say that she could have them down at her side nice and casual like, or in her pockets, but that outfit does not have any pockets or pouches. That's very un-Liefeld like. Here's a paragraph on other things I could find wrong with those two panels, and the fixes for them: Zealot's mouth is too small for her face. The outer ends of the lips should come to about the center of the eyes and in that picture it looks like she has duck lips. Her ears are too small for her face.. The topmost part of the ear should meet on a line with the eyebrows while the bottom point of attachment is along a line where the point of the nose is located. He got close at the bottom of the ears, but the top of the ear is where things are off. Last thing I promise. Her knees are way to small to hold up those legs. Finding things wrong with these two panels is way to easy for me. I also don't think those stairs are to building code either; they need a handrail. There is no real background other than something that might be walls with random seams. I understand that there is only a limited amount of time to crank out a comic in a month, but that is just sloppy work. Yeesh, a sophomore student who has just finished two semesters of college level drawing classes could do better.

Polar Bear WHERE?!?!

In last month's Avengers versus X-Men #4 there were a few panels with a polar bear helping protect Wolverine while he was in the Antarctic. Ummm, when did this happen? The only animals that are native to the Antarctic are various species of Penguins and the wingless fly. That's all I remember from watching 3-2-1 Contact when I was younger. There also may be some sort of seal or Walrus as well but don't quote me on that. Really? Are the writers of Avengers versus X-Men in that big of a rush to get things out that they cannot fact check one simple thing. I think the biggest question is how did this slip by editorial? I mean anyone who watches enough PBS shows knows that Polar Bears are strictly an Arctic thing. Maybe they meant Arctic and some letters got thrown into the mix through spell check. Since when does Wolverine have the ability to communicate with animals? That polar bear walked up and sheltered him from the elements like he bought it dinner first. When I read that the limited series was being written very inconsistently last month I thought I can see that kind of happening, but to have two things like this happen then the writers are definitely not talking to each other or talking to each other just enough to communicate to get the issues out, but not much else. Marvel better have its asbestos underpants on when they go to San Diego this year with all the A versus X stuff that is hurting the suspension of disbelief. Yet it is selling like gangbusters. Are the readers out there really that slow on the uptake that characters are not being written consistently between all the books?

Reorders What Now?

This link from Bleeding Cool has the list of reorders for the first full week of May. There are both the already published and soon to be published lists. The published list has only one comic from DC, Earth 2 #1 (which one local comic store underestimated the demand for while another had a surplus), as well as two issues of AVX from Marvel. The majority of the top 25 being taken up with Walking Dead trades and comics. (Must resist making comment about people buying it being zombies themselves.) The future release reorders might be a bit skewed because at the top is Hit Girl #1, but the only way to get that book was via reorder because Diamond neglected to put the comic in its order forms in the first place. Also an 8th printing of Justice League #1? Really, has demand been that great for it? My local comic book store still has first, second and third prints on the shelf. That is nearly one reprint a month since the book was published in the last week of August 2011. There's also the Before Watchmen book The Minutemen on the list. That is the only Before Watchmen title on the list so far, but the month was young when the list was collected.

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