Friday Night Fights: Zombie Time!

Here's a little "live"-action action for ya! From Dragon*Con:

ZOMBIE SPIDER-MAN VS. ASH!
Click to embiggen

It's close to midnight and Bahlactus is there lurking in the dark.

Weird-Ass Cover Wednesday: The Little Stooges!

OK, I think The Three Stooges are funny. I even liked The Robonic Stooges. However, The Little Stooges is taking the franchise a step too far. All of the covers are truly weird so I'll just show you the first three.

#1

So, the sons of the Three Stooges are mod. They're totally hip and swingin' man. And a dog is taking their picture. A dog who is communicating with them telepathically. I can't decide what the weirdest element of this cover is.

#2


The addition of apes or monkeys automatically makes any comic-book cover cooler. Except this one.

#3


I didn't think it was possible to make the concept of "Teen Car Wash" unsexy but here we are.

In The News: Comics!

Check out this article about a guy who tried to sell stolen Superman comics. It's a tutorial in how NOT to unload stolen goods. Rule #1: Stick to your story.

The story gets extra points for using the phrase "comic magazines".

Also, here's a picture of H.R. Pufnstuf from Dragon*Con:

Knit One Clobber Two!

Someone knitted Ben Grimm! She even made the eyes blue! I sure hope The Puppet Master doesn't get his hands on it.


Thanks to Knitty-Cat

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Banana?

This isn't directly comics-related but every time I see this picture I want someone to put word balloons on it and turn it into an entire story about angry citrus fruit.


Click here for more of these cool sculptures.

Don't Call It A Comeback!

Awesome Cover Friday: Psi-Force!

Last week's Justice feature got me thinking about some of the other cool New Universe titles. Justice was my favorite but Psi-Force and DP7 tied for second. Psi-Force was about a group of teenagers who got psionic powers from the White Event. They were led by an ex-CIA agent called Psi-Hawk. No, really.

This title pushed all the appropriate Tomorrow People buttons for me at the time and I can still recall certain scenes vividly.

#1

This is an excellent first cover. You got your kids with powers, your big, glowing Indian guy, your obligatory supergroup pose. It grabbed my attention so well I kept coming back.

#2


The second issue starts off with a cool action scene. A good cover should make you ask questions. This one had me saying, "Woah! What's up with the intangible, astral-projecting dude?!?". The answer was pretty cool.


#24


I think I like this one because it's got a Legion of Super-Heroes feel to it. Also, it's got a great economy of image. Just a few elements combine to say a lot.


#9


This is my favorite of the batch. Look at the detail on the faces in the background. This was a really good "price of power" issue and the cover sells it.

Talk Like A Weird-Ass Cover Day

In honor of Talk Like A Pirate Day (Yes, I know most of you are reading this the day after) here are some covers with scurvy pirates on 'em. Avast ye!

Doctor Mid-Nite Says: Stay Tuned

Now that I've caught up on my comics reading (just in time for the new stuff tomorrow), reviews are forthcoming. Until then, enjoy this picture of an awesome Doctor Mid-Nite costume I saw at Dragon*Con:

Click to embiggen and get a closer look at the renovations to the Marriott Marquis.

Awesome Cover Friday: Justice!

Yes, it's another title from the 1980s. But you know what? The '80s saw some of the most awesome comics ever produced. For example, Justice. This was part of Marvel's New Universe line which took place in, well, a different universe. It was pretty much like the one we live in until White Event (a big, white explosion in the sky) occurred. Then there were all kinds of freaky people with powers running around.

The line had its ups and downs but I think it was a successful experiment. Justice was a guy who started out as an alien who came to Earth around the same time as the White Event. His origin got retconned when Peter David was brought on as the writer and he became a DEA agent whose memories had been altered by some guy who hated him. Either way, the character transcended his "Judge-Dredd-Ripoff" beginnings and became a very cool character.

How much of a badass was Justice? He dressed like this:

and he still kicked ass. Justice made that mullet work!

Here are the covers:

#16


Simple. Iconic. Interesting. This dude looks driven. Or his pants are on fire. Either way, I want to know why!

#24


Here's a good action cover. BAM! Nice work on this one. I like the colors and the composition. Also: There's a big glowing fist knocking the crap out of someone!

#18


This is my favorite Justice cover. It's visually different from most covers, it's bleak, and it's got a post-apocalypse thing going.

-=Special Bonus Cover!=-

Oh...shit.

When Strikes The Virus!

Hi. I'm Infectious Lass and I'm here to apologize to Vaklam for all of the illness he and his family have been experiencing lately. Seriously.

But, to be fair, they should have known what they were in for when they asked me to house-sit for them while they were on vacation. Hello. It's right there in the name. "Infectious".

So, I just thought I'd stop by and say "get well". I was gonna send a fruit basket but the last time I tried that didn't turn out so hot. Anyway, um, take care and if there's anyone you need me to hit with some amoebic dysentery or something let me know.

Weird-Ass Covers in a World They Never Made!

I put a lot of titles in Weird-Ass Cover Wednesday because they are unintentionally weird. Howard The Duck's weirdness, however, is completely intentional. Howard was mostly a chance for Steve Gerber to parody pretty much every other Marvel property in existence. Check out the cover text such as "When Bites the Beaver!". It's spot on. Howard The Duck is the comedic ancestor of The Tick.

The best thing about Howard, though, is that he's in official Marvel continuity.

The following covers need no further commentary. They speak for themselves.

#2

#3


#9


#7

Mike Baron resurrects The Badger!

Oh my god.

Oh. My. God.

The Capital Times has a story about Mike Baron and The Badger and IDW. Here's a quote:

There will be a series of trade paperback editions collecting the early Badger stories into books (with a new introduction by Baron); concurrently, a series of entirely new monthly Badger adventures will launch.

I cannot express to you how happy this makes me. Badger!

Badgerbadgerbadger, Badger!!

Kicking a nun in the face:



By the way, there may not be an update tomorrow since I am sick, out of town, and have an eight-hour drive to face tomorrow afternoon. See you Tuesday!

Shadow of Awesome Cover Friday

I got to chat breifly with Brian Stelfreeze at Dragon*Con. He's a really cool guy and a great artist. Back in the 90s he was the cover artist for Shadow of the Bat. The stories in Shadow were dark, psychological tales and Stelfreeze's covers helped drive that mood home because they looked so much different from the other Bat-titles that were out.

#10

My name is MC Escher and I'm here to say...

I can't get enough of wacky landscapes. They look whimsical and scary at the same time. Covers like this always remind me of those "Carnival of Terror" stories from the old-school horror comics.


#15


Batman impaled on a giant pitchfork? Tangled up in his cape? Cast into a hellish realm made up of his own insecurities and fears? Sold!


#18


Speaking of fear, check this out! The Scarecrow is one of my favorite Bat-villains because he's so damn effective. Batman always has to find a way around the fear dust and that way is often just bulling his way through it with sheer willpower. The multiple Scarecrows jumping around in the background are appropriately creepy.


#37


Comedy! Tragedy! Get it?

This is one of my favorite Stelfreeze pieces. It's one of the things that made Shadow of the Bat one of the bright spots of '90s comics. This painting is beautiful, dark, and evocative like the story behind it.

Weird-Ass Cover Wednesday: Now With 100% More Gazoo!

Some covers are weird because of their subject matter. Others are attached to such weird-ass titles that they can't help but be weird. Back in the 1970s Charlton published 20 whole issues of The Great Gazoo starring the little green guy who killed the Flintstones TV show. Alas, the comic doesn't have Harvey Korman's voice but the magical dude from the future still goes around screwing stuff up for Fred and Barney.

The covers below tell a story. It's the tale of the back-and-forth relationship between Gazoo and Fred:

#1

Right here in the first issue Fred uses Gazoo's spaceship as a bathtub. This really pisses the alien off.

#3


So, Gazoo, with all his awesome reality-altering power, flips Fred ass-over-teakettle thus using him as a random number generator. By the way, this would make a pretty good Friday Night Fights entry.

#10


Fred exacts his revenge by using Gazoo as a bowling ball. Considering that those pins are made of stone that's probably gonna leave a mark.

#11


But Fred and Gazoo finally make up just in time to enter the, um, giant Kangasaurus races. And all is right with the world.

Dragon*Con Report

Here are a few images (taken by others) from my trip to Dragon*Con. Click to embiggen.

This is part of the comic artists alley:



That black stand-up area near the middle is the Gaijin Studios table where Cully Hamner, Brian Stelfreeze, and Karl Story all sat. The artists alley was big. This is less than a third of the space they devoted to comics people. The layout was confusing, though, which led to me passing the same artists several times.

The second time I walked past Arthur Suydam's table he handed me a zombie cover for my next project. I said, "I'm not writing any comics".

His reply, "Well, you never know".

Just kidding.

Here's an awesome Black Manta costume:



I bet that makes a lot of noise in the dryer.

My favorite thing about Dragon*Con is that it's so big that you get some really obscure costumes. Black Manta, for example. There was even someone in a replica of the dress Carol Burnett wore in her Gone With The Wind parody. The one with the curtain rod still in.


Next up, a couple of pictures of some of the guys (and one of the women) in 300 costumes. My wife got together with several of the other female Dragon*Con attendees to write a formal letter of thanks:





That last picture is from the parade. Dragon*Con has a parade every year on the Saturday of the con. Atlanta closes off a bunch of streets and everything. It's a lot of fun and I'll post some more pictures of it in my next post.

Heloooooo! I'm Back In The Shooooow!!

I'm back from Dragon*Con and boy are my arms tired. Also, hello to all new readers who picked up a flyer for Noetic Concordance at the con. How ya doin'?

I got to meet Andy Runton who is a very cool guy with an excellent indie haircut. I now have two signed Owly graphic novels and a plush Owly which was a big hit with my son:


Melissa got a super cute Owly shirt, too!

I also got to chat with the dapper Ted Naifeh and Brian Stelfreeze.

In non-comics news, I spent most of my time hanging around the Science and EFF Tracks watching presentations by Michael Shermer and Elonka Dunin who are both engaging speakers as well as being officially Wicked Smart.

More later as I find the pictures I'm looking for.