Day Two dawns bright and early and I am peering out of the window of the Radisson Harbour View (the harbor's there, but waaaaaay in the distance) looking forward to the bright new morning! What better reason to wake up than to zip down to Comic-Con and re-start the festivities? I am sure those of you who are not morning persons or have already come to loathe SDCC are now cursing my name. I can tell because my ears are burning.
It's an incredibly busy day: Friday day tickets are sold out so we're at full capacity here, but unlike BookExpo America at the Javits Center in New York this past June, the AC is cranked up to "Hoth" and it's pleasant to work and move about. "Here they come!" shouts someone down the aisle, and while my natural impulse is to cry back "Walkin' down the street, get the funniest looks from everyone they meet!" it's actually the cry to arms for dealers and exhibitors to batten down the hatches: the con attendees are on the floor.
The next several hours are a gay, mad, blur. It's a good thing: when you're working continuously, chatting with people, selling and restocking books from the table, time flies even though it's a long day. At times both the Norton and Fantagraphics booth are so packed they resemble a cattle stockade, but I handily avoid any scary connections by simply popping up to greet new guests with a cheery "Hi hi hi! I'm Bully!" as they wander in the booth.
Miss Jenn and I are a great team and together we manage to sell a lot of titles. We run out of stock on Will Eisner's The Contract with God Trilogy hardcover (the paperbacks and other Eisner books are still available), and we're down to three copies of Dr. Seuss Goes to War and only a handful of Killed Cartoons and Big Bento Box. Less books to pack up at the end of the show, always a plus! Down in the comic book region of the show floor, it's never as busy as down east with the big media stuff: Star Wars Land, or the big Heroes booth that has cheerleaders running in and out of it every minute on the minute. I do believe I spot Miss Jane Wiedlin in a cheerleader uniform. Or is that merely wishful thinking? I'm also pretty sure I saw her on the escalator heading up while I was moving downwards; she was sipping on a strawberry smoothie and reading her con program. That certainly had to be Jane I saw testing out a replica broadsword in one of the armory booths...watch out, Jane! I do believe I also spotted Jane stopping a big guy from throttling a convention attendee in purple makeup and a yellow Sinestro uniform, which only goes to show: in the wild west of life, Jane Wiedlin is the Sheriff of these here parts. I shall keep my eyes wide open for Miss Jane as WiedlinWatch '07 continues, and with all the Wiedlin-sightings I've been thinking I'm seeing, there's no doubt in my mind that I'll get a moment alone with the Divine Miss J before the show opens. Fuzzy nose-kisses are certain to ensue, so stay tuned.
"Uh huh, Bully," I hear you all saying as you roll your eyes heavenward. "Sure, you saw Jane Wiedlin. Who else did you see today?" Well! I'm very glad you asked. Today was not only the day I met the Three Troopers (not to be confused with the Three Tenors, although startling enough these guys did have amazing singing voices):
...as well as the very special limited edition show exclusive Orange Juliustrooper, as refreshing as he is deadly:
...but I also spotted their illustrious boss, the big D.V. himself, who took time to kindly strike a pose:
Mind you, all this terrorizing of the universe is thirsty work. Luckily even Sith Lords seem to enjoy a cold frosty lemonade:
Although this little stuffed bull prefers to brave a longer line is search of more caffeinated beverage refreshment. Mmmm, frappuccinos!
An important lesson I learned today at the Con: never get into a staring contest with Batman:
My pal Kal (aka Superman) prefers things a little less confrontational, so together we cooperate and stare into the distance:
In the afternoon, Miss Jenn kindly and expertly minds the booth and winds up selling a large stack of varied books in my absence. Hmmm, maybe I should keep my ugly mug out of the place more often! I do have a delightful time attending my first-ever panel at a SDCC, the wonderfully celebratory Will Eisner tribute panel. L-R: Deborah Del Prete and Michael Uslan (producers of the upcoming Spirit movie), Denis Kitchen (Will's agent and publisher at Kitchen Sink), Ann Eisner (Will's wife, with whom I had a very lovely chat earlier in the Norton booth), and Darwyn Cooke (The Spirit comic book, at least through issue #12.)
Many fun and fond anecdotes and memories of Will were told, including several "The dirtiest look Will ever gave me" stories, some hints and teases of the upcoming Spirit movie (plus news that there will be a Spirit animated series), an update on the comic book (there's no replacement team chosen after Darwyn leaves, but Gail Simone, Michael Golden and Jeff Smith are among those who will work on the second twice-yearly "anthology" issue, out this Christmas). Denis Kitchen very kindly mentioned the word Norton is doing reissuing Will's work, and everyone had a splendid time. I must go to more panels now; this was lots of fun!
Soon after I returned to the Norton booth I was delighted to see that Newsrama star Tom Bondurant had returned to talk today, and this time he brought two of his Newsarama colleagues, Carla Hewitt and JK Parkin. We had a dandy of a time discussing comics new and old, the blogosphere, introducing kids to comics, and the various merits of Silver St. Cloud and Gwen Stacy. Carla gave me a big hug too, which made me go all moo-shy inside. Golly, Miss Carla!:
I must say that the delight of my day was meeting two of my very favorite comics creators, Colleen Coover and Paul Tobin over in the Oni Press booth. They created Banana Sunday, my "most fun comic of 2005" award-winning ultra-favorite, and I hope I was not too giggly and silly in expressing how wonderful I thought their work was. Colleen has in the past given me quite a nice namecheck and link in the past on her own LiveJournal, so to my surprise and giddiness she was as chuffed to meet me as I was her!
As John explained to them, I'm not 'lowed to read Small Favors (I think girls kiss and do up each other's hair in that...y'know, mushy stuff), but Banana Sunday is indeed one of my very favorite recent comics, and I bought the trade paperback edition to go on my bookshelf of the comics I love to read again and again:
I got both Paul and Colleen to sign it for me. Colleen was lovely and kind enough not only to inscribe it for me for but to draw a sketch. Who did she draw? Well, see for yourself whose handsome mug she penned into my book:
Thank you so very, very much, Paul and Colleen! Truly, meeting you meant a lot to me.
Then, Miss Jenn and John and I went to In-n-Out Burger! Yum!:
Oh, stop looking at me like that. You know I'm just stuffed with beans and fluff, so it's hardly cannibalism.
So now, full of fries and giddiness, I'm drifting off to sleep. And remember, tomorrow's Saturday, the busiest day of the show...so in the words of Dr. Daniel Westin, you ain't seen nothin' yet!
SIMPSONS #112: This comic is fun. At last, a Simpsons comic that is more than just sorta fun...it's actual full-out real fun! It's a comics sequel to one of my favorite episodes, "The Simpsons Spin-Off Showcase" and features three stories based on the Simpsons spin-off series from that show. My favorite in the TV show and in the comic was "Chief Wiggum, P.I." ("Look! he's slowly getting away!"), but the other two were good fun as well. And hey, a guest appearance by Susan Dey and Gary Busey! Still not convinced? Not enough to tickle your funny bone? How about the sudden reappearance of long-absent but always-loved Troy McClure, who you may remember from such comics as "Troy McClure's Comics and Stories" and "All-Star Troy-Man and Troy-Boy-The-Boy-Wonder." (Sniff. You're missed, Phil Hartman.)
BATMAN & THE MONSTER MEN #1: This comic is fun...sorta. Wow! Best Batman cover in a long time! Creepy and cool. (But that sure is a big moon, Mister Wagner.) It's kinda a big shock after that cover to have the first word in the book be a swear word! Just to remind you: I am allowed to read comic books with some swear words in. An' it doesn't say "For Mature Audiences Only!" on the cover in big red letters, does it? (Checks and sees.) Nope! No, it does not. Still, that is not the first word I expected in a Batman comic book. It's a little too inspired in tone and format by Batman: Year One (not that there's anything wrong with that) but the plot seems promising enough: early in his career, Batman's facing off against the Mob (hey! isn't that a little like Batman: The Long Halloween?) but some monsters are very likely 'right 'round the corner 'cause yay! There's Professor Hugo Strange! You gotta love Professor Huge Strange. I wonder if he is Doctor Strange's brother. Anyway, there was one thing missing from most of this Batman story: Batman! He's only on five pages of the whole story! Yes, I'm aware that this is just the first chapter and I know there will be plenty of Batman coming later. But there were even whole rows of pages in which Bruce Wayne didn't appear. And then...oh no, can it be...pages of Batman's girlfriend in her underwear??!? Well, sorta. It looks like she got tired when visiting Bruce and Bruce let her sleep over. That was nice of him! The story is all well and good but that's not what I buy a Batman comic book for. Still, fantastic art. I might peek at the second issue to see if there is more swearing and kissy-kissy stuff first, though.
RUNAWAYS #10: This comic is fun...sorta. Here's a little riddle: what do the original X-Men, the Micronauts, and the Runaways have in common? Give up? Give up yet? The answer is: when they first appeared in their very first issue #1 of each comic, they were a team of heroes, none of which had ever been seen before. So you might assume, as I did when I first read John's old copies of Micronauts, that maybe this didn't take place in the Marvel Universe, so maybe we wouldn't get any cross-overs that would make it more confusing and tied-down to Marvel events and...whoops! There's Man-Thing! And Ant-Man! And the X-Men! Oh well! Anyway, it'll take a lot to make Runaways not fun to me, but plopping them down firmly in the Marvel Universe is one sure step. I really think this was a mistake not only in terms of making the story more reliant on Marvel Universe events (for example: will Molly of Runaways lose her powers after House of M?) but it also makes it a little less accessible to new readers. A book like Runaways is ideal to target to teens and pre-teens who like manga: the storyline of kids whose parents turn out to be evil villains is something any kid would enjoy, huh? But start tying it into the Marvel Universe: Ultron is one of the kid's fathers, ex-New Warriors and Power Packers show up, and Cloak and Dagger become regular cast members...well, that's jus' plain confusing for the casual reader. Don't get me wrong: I loves me some Marvel Universe. But I don't think every book they publish has to be set smack-dab in the middle of Marvel crossover land. (That said, without the Marvel Universe you couldn't get my entry for a new feature in my weekly comics reviews: The Best Line of the Week, this time spoken by Iron Man as he comes across Wolverine on a rooftop: "A Wolverine appearance? How novel." Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!)
BANANA SUNDAY #4: This comic is fun.
Oh, I love this comic, and in any normal week, it would easily win most fun comic of the week. The monkeys are funny, the girls are cute, the mystery is cool, the mythology is surprising (John was close but no cigar on what the monkeys represented when he guessed what they were in issue #1!), and the dialogue is just plain wonderful. (As Go-Go, 
FANTASTIC FOUR #532: This comic is not fun. This is the end to the storyline I like to call "The Cosmic Rays Are Intelligent But Are They As Interesting As Galactus? No, They Are Not." Reed learns a lot about the secrets of the universe but apparently mostly just how to get home and get in bed with his wife. Maybe they were both very tired. (Wow, that seems to be happening a lot this week in comics! Maybe all these superheroes should take some more vitamins.) A lot of the subplots are wrapped up pretty quick and I'd forgotten about most of them anyway. Some of the funny and fun stuff happening with my per'sonal hero, Ben Grimm, kinda spirals down the drain on the last page, maybe just serving as a set-up to the new THING comic book. And since the story is mostly about Reed, why is Johnny on the front cover? I figure I gave Mister J. Michael Straczynski (I don't even feel like making a joke about how to pronounce his name anymore!) enough time. Now that this story is finished, I'll prob'bly drop FF from my monthly comics shopping list and maybe peek in on the next storyline when or if it's collected in trade. It jus' isn't fun enough for me. And when "The World's Greatest Comics Magazine" isn't fun enough for me, well, that's 30 dimes I can save and spend instead on...
ALL STAR SUPERMAN #1: This comic is fun. Wait, that doesn't do it justice. Let me repeat it with the aid of excessive, needless HTML:
ALL-STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN THE BOY WONDER #1: This comic is not fun. I musta misunderstood. I thought this was gonna be a comic kids could read—that it was gonna be a good introduction to Batman for new readers, a little like the Ultimate books that Marvel does. Even John did because he gave it to me without looking! Then I turned the page and I was so embarrassed! It was just like the old joke: "What's black and white and red all over?" "A little stuffed bull blushing because he saw Batman's girlfriend in her underwear!" Yikes! I don't need to see that in my Batman comic. So I turned the page real quick. And there was more pictures of Batman's girlfriend in her underwear! So I turn the page again and guess what! There were lots of picture of Batman's girlfriend changing clothes in and out of her underwear! STOP THAT, Mister Frank Miller and Mister Jim Lee! You just stop that right now! If I want to see women in their underwear I will watch MTV, do you hear me!!! 
ASTRO CITY: THE DARK AGE #1: This comic is fun. Now, here's a comic that's a good example of a little grim 'n' gritty but which is still fun! (Are you listening, Misters Miller and Lee?) I've always liked Astro City (even tho' it doesn't come out half as often as I'd like it to!) 'cos it really captures the sense of wonder and awe that normal people would feel in a city full of superheroes. (It kind of reminds me of what it must have been like to read those early Fantastic Fours when they first came out and realize, "Yes! Hey! This is fun—we get to see what the normal joe on the street thinks about a stretchy man or a big orange-rocked monster living on their block!") The Dark Age begins a new maxiseries (don't take years to finish it, Misters 
BANANA SUNDAY #1: This comic is fun. John doesn't allow me to read Colleen Coover's other comic books (I don't know why! From what I can see they are jus' filled with cute girls.) I like cute girls just fine but you know what I really like? Monkeys! And this comic is chock-full of monkeys. If it were a barrel then I could probably say it was a barrel of monkeys. (But it's not. It's a comic book.) Banana Sunday is about Kirby Steinberg, a (really cute) girl who starts at her new high school with her three amazing talking monkeys! There's Chuck, the really really smart one, Knobby, who is very emotional and falls in love a lot, and my favorite, Go-Go! (Remember how Robin—the real one, not the one in ALL-STAR BATMAN AND HIS GIRLFRIEND IN UNDERWEAR—was declared 
THE BRONTES: INFERNAL ANGRIA #1: This comic is fun. I sure do like the work of Mister Rick Geary: his artwork is clean and clear and cartoony but very dynamic and moody. Which came as a surprise to me, because when John handed me this comic and told me I should read it, I thought this comic would be a little like reading the worst of a batch of home-schooling books: a story about dead people who were real but don't seem alive. Boy was I wrong! Just like a great, great man once said: "If you're not careful, you might learn something before it's done!" John told me the Brontes are very famous sisters who wrote some very famous books that I have read as CLASSICS ILLUSTRATED comics or seen on Masterpiece Theater. But in this story about their lives, the sisters and their brother go through a magic doorway into a amazing fantasy world! (It's kind of Jane Eyre in Narnia). It's suspenseful and has a good cliffhanger. I even liked the back cover, which has a family tree and a little map of the area in the book. It reminds me a lot of the old Dell Mapback paperbacks John collects with maps of the book's setting on the back. This is the most fun I've ever had reading about authors of great English literature. (And I read the novelization of Shakespeare in Love!)
MICHAEL CHABON PRESENTS THE ESCAPIST #7 FEATURING MR. MACHINE GUN This comic is fun. This is another kinda dark comic but it's a li'l campy and outrageous...c'mon, it stars a guy with a machine gun instead of a hand! John says this reminded him a lot of the old pulp comics like Doc Savage and The Spider and it had some great artwork by Ed Barreto, who you don't see too much from these days. All I know is that it was eighty pages long (and no ads!) so it felt like a real comic book, not just a pamphlet. (And it told a whole story!) This one was all written by Mister Michael Chabon, who's a big-name fiction writer but you can just tell he loves comics, too. I know that Dark Horse Comics republishes these keen Escapist series comics in to small trade paperbacks and sells them in the graphic novel sections of bookstores, but it's too bad so many of the people who have read and loved 
will never realize these comics by Chabon exist! Dark Horse oughta package an Escapist collection to look like a thick paperback book, price it comparable to a thick paperback novel, and them shelve them in the 'fiction' section of a bookstore with the Michael Chabon books. Jus' imagine that: gettin' somebody who never read a comic book to buy one, maybe? But the comic book industry jus' doesn't think like that sometimes. Sigh!
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