Following up on the merriment from earlier this week, we have a second round of holiday gift ideas from folks out in the comics community. Again, we asked them …

1. What comic-related gift or gifts would they recommend giving this year, and why?
2. What gift (comic or otherwise) is at the top of their personal wish list, and why?

We’ll have part three on Monday, featuring suggestions by the Blog@ crew. And props to Mark Engblom, who provided the cartoon up above. Go check out his blog to see more of his stuff, or visit his Cafe Press shop if you want greeting cards, an ornament or anything else with the above artwork on it.

And without further ado, let’s go shopping …

Neil Kleid

1. For young, just-reading kids, I’d recommend the Castle Waiting collected hardcover from Fantagraphics — beautiful package design, wonderfully imaginative fantasy story that’s perfect for all ages and really brings them into comics in a way thats non-violent, fun and enjoyable.

For the pop-culture fanatics, I humbly submit season two (and one, if you’re behind) of the HBO series, ENTOURAGE. I’m fascinated by the backdoor Hollywood deals, the glamour, the backstabbing and the stress involved in closing the deal – plus, there’s pretty, pretty girls. Season Two focuses on the protagonist, Vinnie Chase, scoring the lead role in Warner’s “Aquaman” film and there’s an excellent episode set at the San Diego Comic-Con. With porn stars.

2. I’m an odd case – people hate buying me things because apart from book/project deals and associated monies, there isn’t anything I really want. But this year my wife got me hooked on the idea of getting the Nintendo Wii after playing virtual tennis with my neighbor. Once I track the damn thing down I’ll be playing Marvel: Ultimate Alliance and Trauma Unit, because damn if I’m not going to learn how to perform video surgery!

But I’ll also take a Vertigo mini series. Or a gift certificate. Or something.

Xeric Award-winning creator Neil Kleid writes Ursa Minors! and wrote the graphic novel Brownsville. He’s also a great interviewer and blogger, as we here at B@N can personally attest to. Check out his website for information on all his projects.

Stuart Immonen

1. Give a membership to the CBLDF or just make a donation in the name of someone who cares. Or donate to the Hero Initiative, or make arrangements to volunteer at their next event.

If you absolutely must give a thing, both of these worthy endeavours offer opportunities to acquire original art or premiums. You’d be giving twice, really.

2. Me, I don’t need anything, thanks. Although nothing says “You’re my hero” like Big Bang Star undies from Ginch Gonch.

Comic artist Stuart Immonen draws Nextwave for Marvel, and he does it really, really well. He’s also drawn Action Comics, Ultimate Fantastic Four, Ultimate X-Men and the still-worthy-of-being-on-anyone’s-gift-list Superman:Secret Identity, among other titles. He’ll soon be drawing Ultimate Spider-Man. He also does a web comic with Kathryn Immonen, Never As Bad As You Think. Check out his website for more information.

Colleen Coover

1. Popeye vol. one: This is great for anyone who has enjoyed the other recent high-quality reprints of early strips. If you enjoyed Walt & Skeezix from Drawn & Quarterly, or Peanuts and Dennis the Menace from Fantagraphics, you’ll enjoy the E.C. Segar comic adventure. It’s a good gift for Dad or Grandpa, especially.

Marvel Adventures Digests: These are good for young readers, or for those of us who remember when super-hero comics were supposed to be fun to read. I especially recommend the Fantastic Four volumes “World’s Greatest” and “Fantastic Voyages”, and the Avengers volume “Heroes Assembled.” Not coincidentally, they are all three written by Jeff Parker, and are chuck full of good humor and adventure!

Original art: Many artists make their original pages or illustrations available for sale, which makes a great gift that is truly unique. ComicArtCollective.com is a good one-stop-shop for a variety of indy artists. Or you can write artists directly to inquire about commission work, though it’s getting to be a bit late to make it in time for the holidays. But Valentine’s day is right around the corner!

2. I want an iPod so I can listen to podcast programs without disturbing the other people in my studio.

Colleen Coover is the artist of Banana Sunday, written by Root Nibot, and the creator of the erotic romance comedy Small Favors. She is currently working on a new graphic novel with Nibot’s alter ego Paul Tobin. Find out more about her at cooverart.com.

George O’Connor

1. I would recommend as a gift for anyone, but especially as a gift to the non-comics initiate in your life, the Locas hardcover by Jaime Hernandez, collected from the initial run of Love and Rockets. Hernandez is hands down the greatest draftsman in comics, his black and whites are so clean and stylish, his storytelling so impeccable, that I am filled with envy every time I look at it. Not only that, taken together, the complete Hopey/Maggie stories, read as one ginormous chunk, comprise one of the best love stories ever told in comics.

For the kiddies, my little cousin has just discovered Marvel’s Ultimate Spider-Man trades all by his lonesome. He absolutely loves them (particularly Venom and Carnage, ick) and they make good reads for you as well. I especially recommend volume 2, Learning Curve, my favorite scene being Spider-Man’s list of fat jokes he had prepared in advance to slam on the morbidly obese Kingpin. He so funny, that wall-crawler.

Not to let this opportunity go by without some shameless self-promotion, but I would like to add my own Journey into Mohawk Country for the history buff/young reader/ New Yorker on your list. The text of the graphic novel is the actual 1634 diary kept by a Dutch explorer in what would eventually become New York. Read in Harmen Meyndertsz van den Bogaert’s own words about the trip he and his companions took into the uncharted territory (by Europeans, at least) of the Mohawk Indians, and see how what he did would eventually insure the existence of New York City. I provide the pretty pictures.

2. Way back when, I first got into comics through Walt Simonson’s awesome run on the Mighty Thor. His treatment of larger-thanlife mythological concepts was a revelation to the young me. One of my favorite storylines from that run was when Thor took over the body of the indestructible Asgardian Destroyer armor. Now Toy Biz, makers of the awesome Marvel Legends line, has made a Destroyer action figure. For me, Christmas will always be (at least partially) about toys, so that’s why the Marvel Legend’s Destroyer is on my personal wish list. That and a pony.

George O’Connor is the author of several picture books, including the New York Times bestseller Kapow!, Kersplash, and Sally and the Some-thing. The excellent Journey into Mohawk Country is his first graphic novel. Read more about him over on the First Second website.

Jason Rodriguez

1. A postcard used by a comic book legend, like this one from R. Crumb that recently went on EBay for $200:

Original art from Scott Mills. Ten bucks a commission, three for $25. I already have a Fantastic Four and a Senor Muerte.

As far as books go, I’d have to go with A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition. And, of course, you can also get someone a CBLDF gift membership.

2. I think a lot of people are getting me used postcards this year and I’m interested to see what they come up with. So, used postcards. And Absolute New Frontier.

Jason Rodriguez is satisfying his postcard fetish by putting together a book of postcards that’s due next year. Follow his progress over on his blog.

Steve Niles

1. Batman 13″ Deluxe Collectors Figure and/or Batman through the Ages Boxed Set; Ultimate Alliance for XBox 360. Oh, and that Kelley Jones-inspired Batman figure. It looks just like his art!

2. A robot suit.

Steve Niles at sometime was probably responsible for your nightmares. He co-created 30 Days of Night, soon to be a major motion pictures, and also writes Creeper for DC, Criminal Macabre for Dark Horse, and many other comics you can find out about at his website.

Adam Hughes

Top five must-have gifts.

1-Absolute Kingdom Come
2-Atomika: God is Red trade paperback
3-Justice: Volume 1 hardcover
4-Absolute Watchmen
5-Stray Toaster by Bill Sienkiewicz

Adam Hughes has drawn all sorts of wonderful covers and artwork for titles like Catwoman, Wonder Woman and the classic Maze Agency. Find out more at his website.

A. David Lewis

1. Justice League Heroes (Marvel Ultimate Alliance) — When you can’t read, play! Or, if you are opposed to superheroes, limit your button mashing to let them have their asses handed to them. (I pick DC over Marvel simply because the Marvel commercials were much more lame.)

Lost Girls — When sharing a hotel room with Mark Smylie at the Baltimore Comic-Con this year, he let me borrow his brand-new set bought that day from the convention floor. And, frankly, it’s a good thing he was there in the room with me so that I could appreciate the story rather than be tempted by, um, baser motives…

The whole Seven Soldiers of Victory run, including the uncollected individual issues and JLA: Classified #1-3 — Grant Morrison pulled off something pretty unprecedented here, but also something that’s hard to appreciate without viewing its gestalt, en masse form. And, again, if you’re shopping for someone who loathes superheroes, you can swap in a full run of Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Persepolis 2, Embroideries, and Chicken with Plums.

Absolute Watchmen — Because there’s no question that your copy is getting rather bent at the spine and the corners are getting sorta folded. That, and ’80s coloring is *so* last score.

The Lone and Level Sands — Consider it a gift for both your loved one *and* for me.

2. Four letters and three numbers: XBOX 360. My PS2 predates Sept. 11th, for Pete’s sake — It’s a new world.

If people can’t afford that, I’ll take Absolute New Frontier. It’s like an XBOX on paper!

A. David Lewis wrote the award-winning graphic novel The Lone and Level Sands. Find out more about it at his website.

Joshua Hale Fialkov

1. A. David Lewis and mpMann’s Lone and Level Sands from Archaia. Aside from being my personal favorite graphic novel of the year, it’s got all that wrath of God stuff the kids like so much around the holidays. It’s a truly amazing book that’s handsomer than hell and deserves to be read by anybody who doubts just what this medium is truly capable of.

2. I’m making my way through the original Doctor Who TV show DVD’s, and have plenty of holes to fill. If only people could understand the love a twenty something Jew from Pittsburgh can feel for a Timelord from Galiffrey. It’s actually the only super geeky thing I’m into, and I’m still hideously embarrassed by it.

Now if you’ll excuse me, my Dalek alarm clock is going off.

Joshua Hale Fialkov wrote the Harvey Award-nominated book Elk’s Run, which will soon be completed and collected by Villard Books. Check out his blog for more information.

Michael Netzer

1. A copy of Dave Cockrum and Len Wein’s Giant-Sized X-Men #1 to Marvel CEO Isaac Perlmutter, Chairman of the board of directors Morton E. Handel and each laywer in Marvel’s legal department … Because perhaps the same spirit of giving which they received from Dave and Len might also rub off on them, though it’s a little late in the game now for such a miracle.

A copy of Alan Moore’s Lost Girls to George and Laura Bush… Because they might enjoy, together, reading and looking through this marvelous statement on sensuality and the lust for war… and perhaps it might bring them to reflect on their own version of the subject.

A copy of Mark Millar’s Chosen series to every reporter in the comics media as a reminder of how prophetically relevant the comics are – in hopes of using their voice to prod and inspire creators, editors and publishers into exploring more socially relevant content in the comics, as we enter the second half of the present administration in Washington, less than two years away from the increasingly critical upcoming elections in 2008.

2. A spirit of peace and goodwill which sweeps the comics community and awakens us to the rising prominence of the medium in our culture – inspiring a sense of mission to help save a troubled world which no one else has any hopes of doing in the same way that the comics, fandom, the press and its creators can do together.

May it be a joyous holiday season for all, and a new year of personal discovery, good cheer and collective landmark achievement.

Artist Michael Netzer has drawn Superman, Batman, Legion and many other comics for Marvel and DC. Check out his website for information on his current activities.

Mark Engblom

1. Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the Comic Books, by Gerard Jones. Having read dozens of comic book histories, this one goes “behind the curtain” and examines the movers and shakers who started (and sustained) the comic book biz. It’s not always a pretty picture, but it’s fascinating reading nonetheless.

Marvel Masterworks: Fantastic Four Vol. 5 Why volume five? As great as the prior volumes are, this is the period when everything seemed to “click.” Creators Lee & Kirby went into hyperdrive with cool concepts galore, such as the marriage of Reed and Sue, the Inhumans, and the almighty Galactus. Quite simply, some of the best comics ever made. Sadly, the book is out of print and tough to find, so start prowling eBay for your copy! A good alternative to vol. 5 would be vol. 4, which is also packed with superb storytelling and readily available on Amazon.

Justice (vol. 1), by Alex Ross, Doug Braithwaite and Jim Krueger. Collecting the first four issues of a fanboy’s dream come true. Free of regular DC continuity, Ross and friends engineer the ultimate clash between DC’s classic good guys and bad guys, with dazzling (occasionally brutal) results. Highly recommended for fans as well as people with only a more casual interest in DC’s pantheon of heroes.

Comic book display frames: I’ve got three in my home studio, and I love being able to display favorites from my collection. Perfect for hard core collectors. A variety of retailers carry different sizes and styles, but you might want to start with Bill Cole Enterprises. Gift givers could make an even bigger splash by framing a long sought-after issue!

For bigger wallets, the Superman Ultimate Collector’s Edition
DVD set. Weighing in at a hefty $75 on Amazon, it includes almost everything having to do with the Christopher Reeve (and Brandon Routh) Superman movies. For more detail, you can
check out an overview of the set on my own blog.

2. See item #5 above. As a long-time Superman fan, I’m dying to get my hands on that 14-disc, extras-packed monstrosity.

Marvel Masterworks: Doctor Strange (vol. 1): I’ve always been a big fan of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko’s eerie mystical world, so this year I’d love to get a collection of the good doctor’s earliest adventures.

Absolute Watchmen. Still the “Citizen Kane” of comics, the only thing that could make it better is the kind of minutia and behind-the-scenes insights DC’s Absolute line excels at.

4. Mylar, mylar, mylar. I can never quite bring myself to buy mylar comic bags, but if a friend or family member wants to buy me some, I’ll happily accept them.

5. Randy Bowen’s Captain America statue. I’m not much of an action figure/statue guy, but this one I’ll make an exception for. Simply stunning.

You may recognize Mark Engblom’s work, as displayed above, from Comics Buyer’s Guide, where he used to contribute editorial cartoons in the 1980s and 90s. Check out his blog, Comic Coverage, for more from Mark.

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