BEA Day 0: Some Assembly Required

Roll down the window, put down the top
Crank up the Beach Boys baby
Don't let the music stop
We're gonna ride it till we just can't ride it no more

From the South Bay to the Valley
From the West Side to the East Side
Everybody's very happy
'Cause the sun is shining all the time
Looks like another perfect day
I love L.A.!

Welcome to Los Angeles, California, home of swimmin' pools, movie stars, and BookExpo America 2008, the trade book industry's annual big-ass trade show, party, and place to pick up roughly 500 pounds of free book galleys per attendee. Once a year they unbox Stephen King and James Patterson and wheel them out for this event, and everybody who's anybody in the book world attends with their eyes wide. None so more than a little stuffed bull, here for the fun and excitement of BEA. Also, for the giveaways.



Today is the aptly named "Day Before BEA Opens," or, as I like to call it, Day Zero, which is not the culmination of a DC Comics line-wide event but the day all the exhibitors arrive early to unbox and set up their booths. Since W. W. Norton, the publisher I help out at sometimes (I like to go into their offices and pile Norton books in shiny colorful stacks) is paying my expenses (including airline transportation via luxurious overhead compartment) and our stay in a fabulous fancy hotel, the gorgeous Kyoto Grand (where tonight's TV viewing actually included Planet of the Apes...in Japanese), I'm spending the day helping out all my pals at Norton to set up our booth. I did spend a couple hours this morning going out to see the "Homes of the Stars," as seen in the map I purchased from that guy on the street, and of course I was excited on stepping out into Los Angeles and Beverly Hills to spy Bing Crosby stepping out to pick up his morning newspaper, Katherine Hepburn mowing her front lawn, and Jack Benny and Rochester working on the Maxwell in his front driveway, but then I discovered my map to the Homes of the Stars was dated 1953. All that was on display on the tour was Brad Pitt washing his car and Angelina Jolie sunbathing, and nobody is interested in seeing either one of those things.



So I headed over to the LA Convention Center to help with set-up day at the Norton booth. It's more exciting that usual, because this year, we have a brand-new booth, replacing the prestigious but outdated old "Grey Lady" battleship booth Norton has had for the past few years. This one is bigger and airier, with lots of plush carpet, big poster display boards, lovely modern podiums, and plenty of storage space. In fact, there are so many cunningly-concealed closets, cupboards, and cabinets that the new booth is an ideal place to play hide-and-seek:



There are brand-new tables to set out, excellent for holding meetings, taking orders, or having lunch:



And crates to unpack and explore. I think this crate contains our book about bubblewrap:



Our good pals at Fantagraphics are here as well, so I kept a close watch on their boxes of books to make certain that no one takes them. Everybody wants Fantagraphics books!



As with all exhibition booths, some assembly is required:



...but friendly and enthusiastic union teamster workers are on hand to help us set everything up with a minimum of fuss and a maximum of colorful language...



...giving the whole booth the appearance of the bridge from Star Trek: The Next Generation.



Captain Picard will not be appearing at the Norton booth this weekend, more's the pity, but yours little stuffed truly'll be here all the show, so if you're at BEA, stop by W. W. Norton (booth #1320) and ask to see John, my big pal with the snazzy necktie, and he'll bring me out (if I'm hunkerin' down in one of the new cupboards) so you can shake my hoof. I'll be giving away free Dracula teeth while they last! (Garlic not included!) In the meantime, there's still lots of work to do to get the booth ready for y'all. But that's no reason for me to...



See you at the show!

Carry On My Wayward Bags

Hullo folks hullo! Wish me a safe and happy trip, 'coz I'm off on a jet plane for sunny, funny Los Angeles, home of movie stars, hardboiled detectives, Disneyland, and that restaurant where Lindsay Lohan threw up. But I'm not there to sit at a soda fountain and be discovered and put in a series of entertaining yet timeless moviola adventures. Oh, no no no no. (Well, maybe.) I'm heading out to attend the 2008 BookExpo America (BEA), the publishing industry's annual trade show, exhibition, and place to pick up shopping bags full of free book galleys. If you're gonna be at BEA this weekend, stop by the W. W. Norton booth (booth #1320), ask for my pal John (the big guy with a snazzy tie), and shake my hoof...I'll be delighted to meet you!

But today is a traveling day, so I've packed my little bags and I'm hopping into the car service towncar to head for the airport. I note that my carrier American Airlines will be charging $15 for checking a second bag. Wha—?!? Why, I'm only a little stuffed bull on a budget...I can't afford to spare fifteen bucks! That's a whole one and a half Indiana Jones movies, or five Jeff Parker comics!

Now, that Susan Storm Richards, she's pretty smart: she knows the way to get bags on board without anybody noticing:

Panel from Fantastic Four #227, written by Doug Moench, art by Bill Sienkiewicz and Bruce Patterson, coloring by George Roussos, lettering by Jim Novak

Reed spots her deception immediately because she's "walking funny," and that means they'll definitely be dipping into Willie Lumpkin's Christmas tip money to pay for those to be checked. Still, like her famous hothead brother, sometimes Sue is as dumb as a bag fulla hammers. Because, you know, it's not like she could have used a force field or anything to carry them on.

Anyway, as I always say: "Travel light, and buy snacks at the airport." See ya in Los Angeles!

C'est Clodagh Rogers! La fameuse chanteuse Anglaise!

(Context):

Everyone's a Skrull!

Everyone's a Skrull!
Skrull Skrull Skrull!



Skrull Skrull Skrull Skrull Skrull!
Everyone's a Skrull!



My father (Skrull!)
My sister (Skrull!)



My roommate and my kitten and the Red Skull! (Skrull Skrull Skrull!)



The policeman on the corner and Heidi Bruhl!



The president and even your little stuffed bull!



Everyone's a Skrull!
Skrull Skrull Skrull!



Skrull Skrull Skrull Skrull Skrull Skrull!
Everyone's a Skrull!



KT Tunstall!
(Skrull!)



George Goebel!
(Skrull!)



Will Farrell!
(Skrull! Skrull! Skrull!)



Bryant Gumbel!
(Skrull!)



Martin Mull!
(Skrull!)



Colin Powell!
(Skrull! Skrull! Skrull!)



Snoopy the beagle!
(Skrull!)



George Segal!
(Skrull!)



And Ian Anderson from Jethro Tull...
Everyone's a Skrull!

Mystery Science Monday: "One of thirty-two short films about...this guy."

"Once Upon a Honeymoon" (1956), Part One, directed by Jerry Fairbanks. This MSTed version is from Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode 701 (1995), starring Mike Nelson, Trace Beaulieu, and Kevin Murphy


Here's part two:

Ten of a Kind: Thirdiversary

The cover of The New Teen Titans #13 featured the prominent announcement: Heralding our second sensational year!
I've always kind of liked that header, even though technically it was the start of their second year and was only celebrating their first anniversary. As Titans was the biggest success in years at DC, I'll forgive 'em that. And I kinda wished they'd done one on issue #37 or so that celebrated their third anniversary and heralded the start of their fourth jam-packed action-thribbled Judas Contract-filled Starfire-squeezed fourth year. Why? Because I woulda liked to use that header today. Again, why? Because three years ago today, May 25, 2005, yours little stuffed truly sat down at the keyboard and tentatively typed my first entry in this blog, a review of Spider-Man #520 and other comics of the week, a Spidey issue that didn't hint of an armored Spider-suit, a public unmasking, a deal with the devil and a universal reset. Ah, those were the days.

As he begin our fourth sensational year here at Bully Says: Comics Oughta Be Fun!, let's look back at some of my favorite posts from the past twelve months, shall we? (Or, you can just skip below for the pictures, which is a good bit and has a really beautiful Legion cover.)

• What If...Captain America Had a Baby?
• The Tender Trap (A Comic Book Music Video)
• Wow, Galactus looked great in FF: Rise of the Surfer.
• Look out for The Backstabbers, Doc Strange! (A Comic Book Music Video)
• 76 of a Kind
• Museum of Character Archtypes, Spice Wing
• Batroc celebrates Bastille Day
• Let's Do Math! (with The Mighty Avengers!)
• Swinging on a Star (A Comic Book Music Video)
• Things You Don't See Iron Man Do Anymore
• I get more Google image search hits for this post than any other on my blog.
• The 5,000 Hats of Jack Kirby
• Girl Fight Tonight! (A Comic Book Music Video)
• A post so definite, it's linked to from Wikipedia's page on Photonovels
• Batman, Master of Timing!
• Sweet Luke Cage's Baadasssss Christmasssss
• Un Más Día
• Rat Pack, Assemble!
• Ten memorials Batman does have in the Batcave
• The glory and grandeur that is Bring It On Week 2008!
• Olive, You're a Fine Girl (A Comic Book Music Video)
• If I Were Running the GAF View-Master Company
• What If...Clark Kent worked for Barry White instead of Perry White?
• Evil Bully!
• The Ballad of Lieutenant D'Amato
• Ten other things Dr. Doom would never say.
• If I Ran Marvel Comics #1 and #2

Plus, various Tens of a Kind, Separated at Births, Saturday Morning Cartoons, A Wodehouse a Weeks, and many other features I keep forgetting to do. (Mystery Science Monday, where have you gone?)

So what's up for Year Four? New team members! New superpowers! New costumes! New headquarters! New crossovers with...oh, wait, I got confused. What's up for the year ahead? Same thing as every year, dear reader: we're going to have fun.

To kick off Bully: Year Four, here's a Ten of a Kind featuring the third anniversaries of some of my favorite comic books of all time. (Bi-monthly or irregular publications or zero issues often mean that the third anniversary is not falling smack-dab on issue #37.) Enjoy the blogiversary celebrations, Bully-boosters!





















(More Ten of a Kind here.)

Ben Grimm Totally Rocks! #17

You can bet yer bottom dollar that when the Thing relaxes on a bright sunny May weekend like this one, he doesn't just hang around the house...er, Baxter Building, all day. Nope! Mister Grimm is out and about, heading over to the AMC Empire 25, ready to grab a large-sized bucket of popcorn (he's the only person in the Marvel Universe who can eat a whole large popcorn) and settle down in his seat for the Saturday matinee showing of one of his favorite movie series.

Why, whatever could be premiering this weekend that Ben Grimm might be a fan of?


Panels from Fantastic Four #241 (April 1982), script and art by John Byrne, colors by Glynis Wein, lettering by Jim Novak

Yep, that's right: when there's a new Indiana Jones movie at the cineplex, there's no time for love, Mister Grimm! But yes, he will bring Alicia and whisper what's going on in her ear. Because he's that kinda guy: a man who loves his Harrison Ford action-adventure movies so much he's willing to wait 19 years for the next installment to come out. And that's another reason why Ben Grimm totally rocks.

Separated at Birth: Attack Plan X!

L: [Uncanny] X-Men #1 (September 1963), art by Jack Kirby and Sol Brodsky (?)
M: [Uncanny] X-Men #104 (April 1977), art by Dave Cockrum
R: Marvel Knights 4 #24 (January 2006), art by Mike Allred
(Click picture to Fred Dukes-size)

Saturday Morning Cartoon: Bathtime in Clerkenwell

"Bathtime in Clerkinwell" by The Real Tuesday Weld (2007), animated by Alex Budovsky


And the sequel...


"Last Time in Clerkinwell" by The Real Tuesday Weld (2007), animated by Alex Budovsky

Cartoons suggested by the lovely Lucy-Anne, who is away and being much missed this weekend.

Spyday Night Fights: Hey, hey, what do you say? Someone took your plans away.

In a world...where the great Bahlactus demands we fight in black-and-white, what more natural impulse is there than to pit the forces of black versus the forces of white? Now, I'm not talkin' about Muhammad Ali versus Superman (although we all know who would win that one...there's a reason they call him The Greatest!), but rather the unending battle of agent against agent set in the shady world of espionage and rivalry between the man in black and the man in white—better known as...


Created by the late great Cuban exile Antonio Prohíos for MAD magazine in 1961, at the height of the Cold War, "Spy vs. Spy" has waged a never-ending battle between...well...it's not quite good vs. evil. It's not even democracy vs. communism. It is, in fact, only and forever just spy versus spy:

"Spy vs. Spy" by Antonio Prohíos, from MAD #144, July 1971 (Click picture to spy-size)

Along with the elaborate, Rube Goldberg-esque machinations of each spy to trap, crush, or destroy each other, there's another important continuing element: nobody ever wins. Yes, although the Black Spy might triumph one month (or, see above), you only have to wait to see the tables turned on the world spy stage:

"Spy vs. Spy" by Antonio Prohíos, from MAD #164, January 1974 (Click picture to Newman-size)

Prohíos passed away in 1998, but the Spy vs. Spy saga continues in MAD in the capable hands of Peter Kuper. The Spies have moved on to other media as well. But the basic premise remains the same:



You can learn a lot from a pair o' spies. Just like David Lightman taught WOPR that in war games, "the only winning move is not to play," Spy vs. Spy taught me that in espionage, the only winning move is to hit your opponent over the head with a spring-loaded mallet cunningly concealed inside a fake bomb. With role models like these two, who says the Cold War is over?


Nobody does it better/Makes me feel sad for the rest/Nobody does it half as good as you/Bahlactus, you're the best.

These feelings won't go away/They've been knockin me sideways

Nope, you haven't fallen over on your side, true bull-lievers: during much of the 1960s, Marvel Comics featured "sideways" house ads, all the better to spotlight multiple covers from their bombastic offerings every month in a super-Cinemascope widescreen format. It's like sitting in the first row of a movie theatre! These ads are not only nostalgic, they're mini-works of art in themselves, so savor the sweet sixties swingin' sensations by turning your computer monitor 90 degrees to the left and getting ready to look at Marvel from a whole new angle!: