At Wizard World Los Angeles, I got a lovely chance to participate in the “Sunday Conversation” panel hosted by the Distinguished Competition’s Dan Didio and Jimmy Palmiotti. This was the second time the EiC of DC stepped down off the panel podium and got to know a little something about the love of comics and the fans who follow them. Both creators got into the act, telling stories from their youth and personal pics and pans, everyone in the room pretty united in fandom. Palmiotti shared a story about being a kid and running nearly a life long debate about a problem that has plagued mankind for decades: “Who would win in a fight: Superman or the Hulk?” Every time his friend would chime in with a way that the Hulk would come out on top, a young Palmiotti would devise a new way the Man of Steel could thwart Banner’s puny attempts to destroy him.

I’m proud to say that I achieved my first job at a comic shop by forgoing the interview process and getting to the nitty gritty of the job. When asked who would win in a fight between Batman and Superman, the speed at which I answered Batman and the reasoning behind it got me the job and a little respect around the store.

I’m pretty sure, dear reader, that as you’re reading this, there’s some part of your brain reversing these decisions. “But the Hulk could totally beat Superman!” or even “Batman doesn’t stand a chance against Superman!”, there’s always another side to these arguments in the lives of our favorite fictional characters and these debates rage on to this very day and beyond, no matter what publishers decide or how stories are written.

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Writers Jason Aaron (Scalped, Ghost Rider), Brian Azzarello (100 Bullets, Loveless), Brian Wood (DMZ, Northlanders) and G. Willow Wilson (Cairo, Air), and artist Cliff Chiang (Greendale, Green Arrow & Black Canary) all now have online forums at one convenient location: Aaron’s Standard Attrition message board.

As the countdown to the movie’s release reaches its climax, Tom Brevoort remembers his own history with Iron Man:

The first Iron Man story I read was literally the first Iron Man story–his origin, from TALES OF SUSPENSE #39, as reprinted in the SON OF ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS collection Simon & Schuster issued in the ’70s… Truth be told, I wasn’t all that knocked out by Iron Man. His first story was all right, but the second, more modern Iron Man story they’d included (illustrated by Gene Colan, who’s one of my all-time favorite Iron Man artists) didn’t really strike my fancy. Could be because it was a middle chapter of a longer storyline, in which Iron Man didn’t do much other than writhe in agony and recharge his armor from a car cigarette lighter.

But comics were relatively cheap in those days, and as I got deeper and deeper into the Marvel line (sampling modern issues of X-MEN, AVENGERS, DAREDEVIL and so forth), I eventually picked up a copy of IRON MAN on some slow week. That issue, #111, was right in the middle of an extended sequence itself, and probably wasn’t the best place to come in. IRON MAN was a series that, unbeknownst to me, had been limping along for some time, and while Bill Mantlo (who wrote this issue) had done yeoman work on the book, it wasn’t really setting the world on fire… While I like him just fine, Iron Man’s never really been a big favorite of mine. But I sure am looking forward to seeing the film in a day or so’s time.

EW.com has the first look at Anti-Venom, who may be a brand-new character, or simply a retooled Venom. Honestly, I can’t tell for sure from EW’s description. Anti-Venom will debut in August’s The Amazing Spider-Man #568, by Dan Slott and John Romita Jr.

The website also has a promotional collage for the next big storyline,”New Ways to Die,” which features images of Mary Jane Watson, Venom, Anti-Venom and the grave of Kraven the Hunter.

Via his blog, the Monologuist.

A number of interviews went up over the past few days. Let’s see if we can do a quick rundown.

First, Van Jensen talks to Scott Dunbier about working at IDW:

WCW: How did you get connected to IDW? What was the time line for all this getting set up?

SD: I’ve known the guys who started IDW for a very long time. They came from WildStorm. Ted Adams, the president of IDW, and I play poker from time to time. Over the summer and fall we went to a couple of games together. On the drive up or over lunch, I would tell Ted about some of the ideas I had for various projects, things I wanted to do. It was just a couple of guys talking, I wasn’t pitching for a job. A couple of months later, Ted called me up and asked if I’d have lunch with him, I figured he wanted to offer me some freelance editing or something similar. But it turned out to be entirely different. We had a couple more lunches and talks, and I believe it was in late October or early November when we agreed in theory that I would go to IDW.

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The popularity of the 1966-68 Batman TV series apparently knew no bounds. In the upcoming Bat-Manga!, Chip Kidd and Saul Ferris look at the show’s reach into Japan, but now Ethan Persoff posts a bootleg 1960s Batman and Robin comic from Vietnam, in which the Dynamic Duo travels around in a submarine and fights some sort of pirates. There may or may not be an alien space ship. Oh! And Robin turns invisible.

(Via The Ephemerist)

Hope Larson has a new site up featuring her more NC-17 illustration and comics work. NSFW, obviously.

About a month ago I posted a link to Evan Shaner’s Watchmen/Peanuts mash-up, and Jeff Parker commented in the thread that he had done something similar back in college. Now Jeff has posted his version, pictured above. And in case anyone thinks there’s ill will or Jeff’s accusing Evan of ripping him off, Jeff says:

But somebody was zinging Evan as if he ripped me off, when he never saw the one I drew. Boo, Anonymous Commenter, boo! As I’m sure it was with Evan, this just seems such a natural matching that I’m surprised no one else has done it too. Here’s mine, which was obviously done pre-internet so it fits better in three columns along the bottom than in a blog browser…

– Cool blog to check out: The Mindless Ones.

– BOOM! needs interns.

– Man, I wouldn’t mind sporting one of these.

– Feiffer’s Explainers explained.

– I thought Chip Kidd was designing those Vertical Black Jack books. Apparently I was wrong.

– Doug Wolk reports on Stumptown.

Brendan McCarthy makes me long for a world where he ran a comic company:

The WORLD of SHAKY KANE! Ah, now that’s a book I would buy instantly.

And a good art book on Jamie Hewlett (not just Gorillaz, but everything - from Atomtan onwards).

How about a collection of Philip Bond’s stuff: Cheeky Wee Budgie Boy is surely ripe for a reprint.

And a Mick McMahon extravaganza… I’ll have that too!

The Art of Frank Bellamy anyone?

Maybe even a new edition of SWIMINI PURPOSE might be called for…

Some eccentric millionaire, please make this happen.

Technical issues aside — curse you, Wordpress! — it looks to be a pretty good week.

DC Comics ramps up for this summer’s big Final Crisis with DC Universe: Zero while Marvel paves the way for Alex Ross’ Avengers/Invaders miniseries with a greatest hits-style compilation of the teams’ previous meetings (while bidding farewell to another super-team title, The Order).

Elsewhere, Vertical unleashes the first volume of Tezuka’s Dororo, Dark Horse rolls out new volumes of B.P.R.D. and the Buffy omnibuses, and IDW Publishing releases the fourth installment of Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy.

To see what other titles Chris Mautner and I think are worth mentioning, just keep reading. As always, let us know your choices in the comments below.

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Matt Dembicki has launched a production blog for a new anthology he’s putting together called Trickster. The project will include about 20 trickster tales as told by Native American storytellers from around the country, drawn by comic artists. The cover, a glimpse of which is pictured above, is by Peter Kuper. The book is due this fall from Little Foot Comics.

Via

CollegeHumor.com presents the trailer for The Dark Knight alongside footage from 1989’s Batman, and asks the question … “Why so similar?”

It’s funny, but I don’t know how much of a point it makes. I’m sure somebody could do the same thing with the James Bond movies. Or, say, Superman and Superman Returns. Oh, wait. Never mind.

(via slashfilm)

Illustration Art has a short tribute up to one of my favorite Mad artists (and Rankin-Bass animator) Paul Coker, Jr. Someone needs to do a coffee-table tribute book of his work and fast.

Warner Bros. announced Monday that it will revive its WB brand online, as TheWB.com.

The “digital network,” which launches in beta next month, will air shows that once appeared on the broadcast network, such as Smallville and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and new content created specially for the site.

Warner also is launching KidsWB.com, which will feature a mix of classic Looney Tunes segments, original short-form cartoons, and games.

Original content on TheWB.com will include the thrillers Exposed and Lockdown.

The WB television network broadcast from 1995 to 2006, when it merged with UPN to form the CW. Kids’ WB ends this spring, after which the CW will outsource its Saturday-morning programming block to 4Kids.

Chris Butcher talks to Viz’s Marc Weidenbaum about the company’s plans to publish original content and reports back on what he’s learned:

Now, you have to understand, all the while I’m having this conversation with Marc… I’m feeling pretty good about all of this actually, but this nagging phrase wouldn’t stop repeating itself in the back of my mind: “THE TOKYOPOP DEAL”. I f****** hate The Tokyopop deal, flat out. It’s awful and abusive of young creators, and while I haven’t gotten up and shouted I TOLD YOU SO at anyone two years later, the number of disenfranchised and angry Tokyopop creators has more-or-less done the work for me. I’m not particularly happy about being right of course; it is, at best, a pyrrhic victory.
“Marc,” I said. “Who owns it?” I was honestly not anticipating the response.

“The creators do. It’s going to be a standard book-industry type contract, although even there we’re doing a bit of tweaking. I believe in that, and we wanted a fair deal.”

Don’t send your work in yet thought folks. They’re not ready to accept submissions.

Todd Klein has another cool original print he’s working on, this time with Neil Gaiman:

Neil delivered the text last week, and I spent most of the weekend pencilling, inking, scanning, and adding gray tones. Above are the pencils, later versions will be revealed as the on-sale time approaches, but I’m once again using the “blurring” thing so those who order can have the pleasure of reading it for the first time when they receive their copy. Neil has approved what I’ve done so far, and now I’m waiting for the paper to arrive so I can begin printing. After that I have to add some white paint to each one. This will be a first printing of 1000 copies that I hope to have ready for sale in June, but that depends on how fast I can paint them, and how soon Neil can sign them, among other things. The process is well underway, though!

Based on the pictures and reports that have come out about Portland’s Stumptown Comics Fest, it sounds like it was a hell of a lot of fun. Lots of reports from enthusiastic attendees have hit the web, including Jamie S. Rich:

And it looks like the show is only getting bigger and better. I know a lot of the folks who have gotten involved with the programming and were part of the move from fall to spring, and it looked like it was an idea that paid off. Good weather, good crowds, and lots of excellent guests. As I said before, I skipped this time just because I was feeling overexposed in my place of residence, and felt it was good to take a break while I wait for new material to come out. Still, I wasn’t going to pass up doing some browsing, shaking hands, and kissing babies.

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Warner Bros. has released a series of posters in the U.K. for Batman: The Dark Knight. See all the posters after the break.

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