I’m particularly geeky when it comes to comic book covers, so this Wired News piece devoted to World War II and post-war cover art made me downright giddy. It’s not a treatise on the subject — it’s a gallery of 13 images, with a few lines of commentary from Ben Samuels — but it’s nice to see, nonetheless. Plus, it includes one of my favorite Captain Marvel Jr. covers. (Thanks, Rick.)

At Heroes Con earlier this summer, Matt Brady interviewed Dan DiDio, covering a wide range of topics that eventually turned to the use humor in comics. DiDio brought up the company’s now-cancelled Young Justice title:

Again, not to harp on it, but in Young Justice – I’m sorry, but when you introduce a character called “Slobo”…[audience laughs] No – honestly – Lobo is a character that’s dark, dangerous, edgy, and over the top. That’s why Lobo is funny, not because he’s a joke. When you make a Slobo character, it’s not a good character. It’s ruining something stronger. It ruined Lobo, in my opinion. It’s selling a character down the river for a laugh, and I never want to do that. I never want to sacrifice a single character for a single laugh. At the end of the day, you do more damage than good. You may get one funny laugh, but you hurt the character in the long run, and that’s not the right thing to do.

After being asked about DiDio’s statement in the comments section of his blog, Young Justice writer Peter David responded:

First he complained about the quality of the book’s sales, stating that a book which features such iconic characters should have far higher numbers. And second he asserted that “Slobo” ruined the character of Lobo.

The aspect that Dan perpetually leaves out of his two-part evisceration of “Young Justice” is that YJ was specifically designed to appeal to a younger readership. That was the mandate from editorial. That’s what I was asked to write. YJ was intended to skew young–in its stories, in its subject matter, in its readership–with the notion that it would draw in younger readers who would eventually “graduate” to the older-skewing titles. I was told at the outset that DC neither expected nor needed the book to sell huge numbers; it was aiming at the long-term goal of bringing in new, younger readers. So his complaining about the quality of the sales is irrelevant…not to mention that YJ outsold “Impulse” and “Superboy,” both of which were also cancelled, and even he admits the book was turning a profit. So pointing to these iconic characters–characters so “iconic” that DC did away with them–and complaining that sales didn’t reflect their presence is really beside the point.

As for Slobo, I wanted to introduce a Wolverine-esque character to stir things up. Since the book featured junior versions of Superman, Batman, and the Flash, a junior version of Lobo seemed perfectly appropriate. A character who was, in his execution and handling, far more serious than Dan remotely gives him credit for (because, y’know, having Slobo go slowly blind was such a knee-slapper of a storyline). And, frankly, I think that a company that raped and murdered Sue Dibny, murdered Blue Beetle, tortured and crippled Batgirl, and had both Superman and Wonder Woman at various times cold-bloodedly murder opponents, doesn’t get to say that *I* ruined one of their characters.

(Ironically, yes, they’re arguing about THAT Lobo …)

Curious about the feeling towards Green Lantern on the Girl-Wonder.org boards, I drafted a list of questions about how female characters are treated in Green Lantern and posted them on the Females in Comics forum. For comparison, I posted the same questions on the Green Lantern forum at Comic-Bloc and on the You’ll All Be Sorry board at CBR. I received only a small sampling, 32 responses total — 10 from Comic-Bloc (the Fanterns), 10 from YABS (the Neutral community), and 12 from G-W (the Feminist community). This is by no means a conclusive survey, this is an extremely small sample. However, the answers were actually a lot worse than I had expected.

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Those of you, like Blog@Newsarama’s John Parkin, who actually wanted to see this back-and-forth between Kirkman and McFarlane, you can!

Behold the power of YouTube.com!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kb_8caBaN-g

Of course, speculation has already begun as to whether this was a genuine situation of one creator asking another creator about more work or if it was simply a PR stunt for both Kirkman and McFarlane.

The last day of the San Diego Comic-Con is usually a little more leisurely and (hopefully) a little less crowded than the rest of the convention, but it sounds like this year has seen pretty heavy crowds, so who knows if that held up. While there were fewer panels today than on previous days, today still brought a few tidbits.

At DC’s Brave New World panel, Mike Carlin made several comments about Jeff Smith’s upcoming Captain Marvel limited series, Captain Marvel and the Monster Society of Evil. I guess that answers the question of whether the book is still coming out, despite the upcoming Trials of Shazam! mini-series. Smith’s four-issue series is nearly done, with three issues of the four issues already in the can, and should be ready to ship early next year. It will be more in line with the historical portrayal of the character. The book was first announced in San Diego a few years ago, so it’s fitting that it would be brought up again.

Dan DiDio teased an All-Star Wonder Woman title earlier this week involving Adam Hughes, which Newsarama confirmed today. Hughes will write and draw the title.

At the Mondo Marvel panel, featuring a large panel of Marvel creators, projects like Warren Ellis’s newuniversal and Fantastic Four: The End were previewed. When asked about Joe Quesada naming him as a potential successor to the Marvel editor-in-chief job, Jeph Loeb said, “He drinks a lot…it’s a terrible problem.”

More Comic-Con news:

DC’s Big Three Panel: Morrison, Dini, Busiek, Johns, Dodson talk about the DC trinity

Marvel announces Pete Wisdom MAX series

Nicholas & Wes Cage to write for Virgin Comics

Palmiotti, Gray and Conner team for Terra mini-series (She isn’t dead?)

Paul Levitz interview on DC’s animation projects

Kirkman vs. McFarlane (This is something I would have liked to have seen)

Mike Carey talks about Ultimate Vision

James Kochalka on Squirrely Gray

Brad Meltzer spotlight panel

Fables contest announced

Scream Awards nominations

Action Figure Times on DC Direct, JLU and much more! (lots of pictures)

Fans get first look at Spider-Man 3 (Associated Press story)

Blogging:

Brian Cronin on The Eisners and “What was the coolest news?”

Glyphs on the Spirit movie

Warren Ellis

Jeff Parker on Toth tribute panel

Previous round-ups:

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Cinema Blend has the first image of Spider-Man 3′s Venom up at their site, following yesterday’s confirmation in San Diego that Topher Grace would, indeed, be playing Eddie Brock/Venom:

CB’s Josh Taylor writes:

After months, no years of will he won’t he speculation, we finally have some sort of actual confirmation. Topher Grace really will be playing Venom in Spider-Man 3.

Reports are pouring in from the floor of Comic Con, from sources like AICN, where footage of Topher Grace (as Eddie Brock) actually becoming Venom was shown. He’s not just playing Venom, but he becomes him in the film, in exactly the way each and every web head has hoped. It’s going to be glorious.

‘Nuff said.

Related: Superherohype.com’s Spider-Man 3 panel report

The local San Diego paper, the Union Tribune, is on site at the con this weekend posting stories that go beyond the typical “Comic-Con is more than comics” or “Hollywood invades San Diego” stories usually featured in the mainstream press. Heck, they even manage to talk about comics.

Witness their feature story on Kazuo Koike, creator of Lone Wolf & Cub:

Like his characters, the 71-year-old Koike believes in old-fashioned values. This weekend’s stop at Comic-Con is his first appearance at an American comics convention, but he is revered in the world of manga, or Japanese comic books. He owns his own manga publishing house and teaches his techniques as a professor at Osaka University of Arts.

His talents extend beyond comics. He founded a golf magazine, served as the host of a TV show and writes novels and poetry.

But Koike is best known as manga’s storyteller supreme, spinning tales of assassins and generals, monks and prostitutes, farmers and detectives. His yarns are rich in historical detail – “Lone Wolf” and “Samurai Executioner” are set in medieval Japan, while “Lady Snowblood” takes place in the mid-19th century – and in character.

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Dark Horse has posted Comic-Con photos on its website. There you’ll see pictures of Mike Mignola signing a fan’s arm, Mike Richardson talking to Edward James Olmos … and Stormtrooper Elvis, posing. Or something.

On their blog, artist Fabio Moon posts a photo of his brother, Gabriel Ba, signing at the Dark Horse booth with 2006 Eisner-winner James Jean and (I believe) Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance. Ba, Way and Jean are working on Umbrella Academy for the publisher, due next year (a glimpse of Ba’s art for the title can be found at the blog; Jean’s cover can be found here).

For the complete list of Dark Horse’s Comic-Con announcements, go here.

Related: Matt Maxwell blogs about the “Dark Horse Horror” panel

With all the upcoming movies, TV shows, cartoons and video games being hyped in San Diego this weekend, it’s kind of funny that the big news today came in the form of a comic created several decades ago by two industry legends. The original “lost” version of Fantastic Four #102, a single-issue story featuring a villain called Mega-Man, was written by Stan Lee and drawn by Jack Kirby. Parts of the issue were used in a flashback in Fantastic Four #108, but the full issue has never appeared.

“We’ll be shipping all of the material off to Stan shortly so that he can begin working on his end-it’ll be up to him to decide whether he wants to keep any of the dialogue he wrote for FF #108, or if he’d rather just script the job clean,” Marvel editor Tom Breevort told Newsarama.

On the movie side, Marvel held a panel that featured the directors of three of their upcoming movies: Iron Man’s Jon Favreau, Hulk 2′s Louis Leterrier and Ant Man’s Edgar Wright. The fact that the Hulk sequel will feature the Abomination and “a lot more Hulk as hero” will hopefully be a step in the right direction for the film.

And at the DC Universe panel, the new animated movies I mentioned earlier were announced, and Paul Dini’s Black Canary/Zatanna hardcover was made official. Go fishnets!

More news from San Diego:

Joe Quesada’s Cup ‘O Joe panel: What are Loners, Silent War and Marvel Comics Presents?

DC’s 52 panel

Tokyopop’s State of Manga panel

The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation

NBC’s Heroes panel

Oni Press Spotlight: My Name is Earl, Colbert and more

Joe Casey to write Nixon’s Pals, Charlatan Ball for Image

C.B. Cebulski writes Wonderlost, Drain for Image

Ande Park does Blood Red for Oni

Image to reprint TenNapel’s Gear

Sam Raimi unveils Venom for Spider-Man 3

Neil Gaiman talks about the Death movie, Stardust

300 movie panel

Samuel L. Jackson talks Snakes on a Plane

Bruce Timm/WB animation panel

Augie De Blieck, Jr. on Robert Kirkman

Top Cow talks about The Freshmen

Optimus Prime revealed

Lost panel

Austin-American Statesman: Comics convention shows industry’s growth

Blogging:

Bags and Boards

Beaucoup Kevin

Kody Chamberlain

Comic Reporter

Peter David

Mark Evanier

Neil Gaiman

galleycat

Jeff Parker

No, but at the Oni panel in San Diego, probably the next best thing was announced. At the bottom of Comic Book Resources story from the panel was this tidbit:

Finally, James Lucas Jones announced the biggest surprise by playing a clip of Comedy Centrals “The Colbert Report,” in which faux host Stephen Colbert promoted his epic science fiction mary sue novel, featuring lead character Tek Janson. Following the clip, Jones declared, “when I first saw that, I said ‘we have to secure the rights to do the comic book adaption of Stephen Colbert’s Tek Janson.’” Details are still being sorted out with Colbert and his writing staff, but they will be involved with the new series’ development along with a regular comics creative team.

Colbert + comics … what could be better?

Some weeks back, Graeme McMillan blogged about “leaked” information about the New Frontier direct-to-DVD animated flick. Moments ago, Paul Levitz confirmed it at the DC Universe panel in San Diego:

Working with Warner Bros. Home Video and WB Animation, the company will launch a new line of direct-to-video DC animated movies that are being designed with DC Comics fans in mind, Levitz said.

He continued, saying that DC is looking to do a series of titles that will tell the character bits and stories that were important to fans, and will be working with the comic book creators on them. The first title will be the previously-leaked animated film version of Darwyn Cooke’s The New Frontier. Cooke will work with Stan (JLU) Berkowitz on the film, with Cooke providing key art direction.

Other upcoming animated movies announced at the panel include a Superman/Doomsday movie and an adaptation of the legendary Teen Titans story “The Judas Contract.” Bruce Timm will oversee all of the movies, while Marv Wolfman and George Perez are said to be involved with the Judas Contract flick.

Levitz took a shot at Marvel’s Ultimate Avengers movies in the panel: “‘We’re looking at more than the last five minutes of history,’ Levitz said in regards to what will differentiate this from movies such as Ultimate Avengers.”

Hellboy 2 still up in the air
Superherohype.com reports that Hellboy 2 is still up in the air, per director Guillermo del Toro:

Director Guillermo del Toro told San Diego Comic-Con attendees Friday that he was hopeful that Hellboy 2 would get a green light in the future, but the current status of the project is still up in the air. He said that trying to find a home for the second movie in a franchise has proved taxing, but he is excited about the script, which has the seal of approval from “Hellboy” creator Mike Mignola.

“I hope it gets made, but that is really all I can say right now,” said del Toro.

Speaking of deals up in the air …
Bryan Singer has a similar story for the Superman sequel:

At the Warner Bros. panel at Comic-Con International on Saturday, Superman Returns director Bryan Singer said that he wants to direct another Superman film for Warner Bros.

“I haven’t concluded a deal to do it yet — which is also iffy — but my intention is to do it,” Singer said. “My intention is to do it for 2009.

“With this one, we kind of introduced the characters and the universe to some degree, which required some measure of re-introduction since it had been several years since Superman had been around,” Singer said. “The next one enables me to get all Wrath of Khan on it.”

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It sounds like actress/comic writer Rosario Dawson is having a pretty good week … not only did Clerks II open, but she’s also in San Diego promoting her comic book from Image, The Occult Crimes Taskforce, which has been covered by People magazine:

Dawson stopped by the huge Comic-Con convention in San Diego on Thursday to promote her own comic-book series, The Occult Crimes Taskforce, the Associated Press reports. And while she might not look the part of a comic-book geek, the sexy 27-year-old Clerks II star told the crowd that she’s hooked.

“This really is the most exciting thing I’ve been doing,” she said. “As an actor, you’re only a third of the production. With this, I get to be so much a part of all of it.”

Cinematical, meanwhile, has an update on all things Rosario coming out of San Diego, including her role in the Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez flick Grind House, Sin City 2 and the movie version of OCT, which Dawson said would happen at some point. She plans to play the lead.

As if you haven’t noticed by now, Man Of Action‘s live blogging from Comic-Con has become required, and very enjoyable, reading for me. Where else can you read from-the-floor guest-blogging from Grant Morrison?

Here on the blood red carpets of San Diego pretending not to be me – the heat inside this sweating hall of mutated flesh! The blinding glint of light from shiny ill-fitting costumes! The stench of dreams wrapped in plastic, pimped, sold, and flaunted before a Rabelaisian outpouring of humanity! Oh, the diribles! Thank god for the marines in the harbor and the helicopters – these guys are the only thing that stands between us and the howling mustachioed hordes of Saddam Hussein and Shirley Temple! Doesn’t anyone realise how difficult it is to go through a tough military hazing ? Never mind Al Eisner and Bill Kirby and all these comic book bods, the real heroes are bullnecked boys with grudges!

There also are guest contributions from Robert Kirkman, and Matt Fraction, who joins Joe Casey for a pint-sized installment of “Basement Tapes.” (The site’s permalinks are odd, so you’ll have to scroll down for the goods.)

With “The Future of Marvel’s Film Franchises” panel scheduled for later today at Comic-Con, The Los Angeles Times takes a well-timed look at, well, the future of Marvel’s film franchises.

Will second- and third-tier characters like Ant-Man and Iron Man wow movie audiences the way Spider-Man and The X-Men have? Well …

Marvel’s most obviously bankable characters — Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four and Wolverine — are already locked into deals for movies with other studios, as is Ghost Rider, a Nicolas Cage vehicle that hits theaters in February. A fair share of the other most-recognizable names — among them Daredevil, the Punisher and Elektra — have already seen their screen moments come and go.

On the floor of Comic-Con, comics, video games and toys are now automatically sized up for viability as a $150-million summer film — that’s the popcorn era we live in these days. Plenty of genre-industry competitors suggest that Marvel may be opening a store with shelves that have already been picked clean of high-end merchandise.

“There is a clear benefit to their approach when it comes to smaller or niche characters that have a set audience and can reach the screen in targeted films,” said Holly Rawlinson, U.S. vice president of licensing for Pokémon, the Japanese card game and animation powerhouse. “But, really, their most special stuff has already been done if you’re talking about those huge expensive films, the franchise films … the really big names, they’ve pretty much gone through that list.”

Still, The Times points out, Marvel’s Blade began life in 1973 as a supporting character, yet spawned a lucrative film trilogy and, now, a TV series.

The 2006 Eisner Awards were announced last night at Comic-Con. The winners are:

Best Short Story

“Teenage Sidekick,” by Paul Pope, in Solo #3 (DC)

Best Single Issue (or One-Shot)

Solo #5, by Darwyn Cooke (DC)

Best Serialized Story

Fables #36-38, 40-41: “Return to the Homelands,” by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham and Steve Leialoha (Vertigo/DC)

Best Continuing Series

Astonishing X-Men, by Joss Whedon and John Cassaday (Marvel)

Best Limited Series

Seven Soldiers, by Grant Morrison and various artists (DC)

Best New Series

All Star Superman, by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely (DC)

Best Writer

Alan Moore, Promethea, Top Ten: The Forty-Niners (ABC)

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Warner Bros. and Pantheon Books are teaming up with Amp’d Mobile to distribute the graphic novel version of A Scanner Darkly via mobile phones. Per the press release, “This marks the first time a graphic novel has been distributed through the mobile platform in the United States.”

Actually, the rights to call themselves “first” might have gone away when GoComics announced their line of cell phone comics, which include Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Five Fists of Science, Godland and Guilstein. Call it a tie, I guess; meanwhile, comics on cell phones in Japan are already happening.

Also from the WB release:

“Pantheon is thrilled to be a part of this breakthrough promotion. As a long-time publisher of graphic novelists we see this medium as a wonderful way to reach comics fans who are so often on the cutting edge of new technology. A Scanner Darkly showcases the amazing ways in which book publishing can bring the excitement of these new technologies back to the printed page and we’re extremely proud of the result. The fact that this can be brought to so many viewers in so many formats makes us extremely positive about the future of comics,” said Farah Miller, Director of New Media, Pantheon Books.

And from the GoComics story:

GoComics subscribers agreeing to pay $3.99 monthly now have an option through Sprint to choose from several titles they can download through a mobile reader.

Verizon Wireless, Cingular Wireless and other carriers will also begin offering the GoComics service in August, said Jeff Webber, uclick mobile content director.

So now we’ll have something else to do while sitting in traffic.

Day Two of Comic-Con saw the official announcement of the worst-kept secret in comics: Filmmaker Richard Donner is joining Geoff Johns and Adam Kubert for a stint on DC’s Action Comics, beginning with October’s Issue 844.

The run is open-ended, Johns tells Newsarama.

“Dick’s sense of plotting and pacing are uncanny,” he says. “I watched him for years talking story and asking him questions and with this he’s constantly like — what’s the emotional core? What does this mean to the characters? Also, he’s not as familiar with continuity so it’s great to hear his initial reaction to characters we talk about using and what he thinks we can do with them.”

More Comic-Con coverage:

IDW to release remastered hardcover Dick Tracy collections

Marvel announces Halo as ongoing series

Mike Carey announces Crossing Midnight for Vertigo

Dark Horse to release The Original Grendel

Vertigo panel report

CMX panel report

JLA/JSA panel report

“Spider-Man, Then & Now” panel report

Random House panel report

Morrison-Chopra panel

Wildstorm announces horror-film titles

Wildstorm panel report

IDW panel: Scarface miniseries

Dark Horse announcements: more Robert E. Howard titles

Spotlight on George Perez report

The O.C.‘s Adam Brody to co-write Wildstorm miniseries

USA Today’s Whitney Matheson, who’s blogging from Comic-Con, has posted photos of McFarlane Toys’ first series of Lost action figures, which premiered during Preview Night.

Some of Matheson’s photos are actually better than the ones now up on the McFarlane Toys website. It’s both creepy and amazing how realistic those figures are.

The blog contains a lot of quick-hit posts as Matheson stops by the Daniel Clowes panel, and checks in with creators like Roman Dirge and James Kochalka.