You know what doesn’t sound like it would make the transition into a comic book adaptation very well, if at all?

The Muppet Show.

Just look at the name. A Muppet is the type of puppet used by Jim Henson and his crew in the many brilliant works they created over the decades, a type in which the puppeteer is heavily involved in not only making it move, but in really performing it.

And it was a type of show; originally a television show, but they transitioned to film quite easily.

So when you remove the Muppet and the show from the concept of The Muppet Show and then try to give it a go, it really doesn’t sound like it should work at all, does it?

And it might not, if the Muppet characters weren’t so thoroughly developed over the decades to the point that the can exist as characters, regardless of whether they’re just voices on a John Denver album, or animated characters in a cartoon, or, now, characters drawn into a comic book.

And if cartoonist Roger Langridge wasn’t the guy writing and drawing Boom Studio’s new four-issue miniseries, The Muppet Show.

The Muppet Show #1 is a surprisingly faithful adaptation of The Muppet Show, it is, in fact, literally a comic book version of the show. Langridge draws a whole show almost exactly as it would have been seen on TV (or now on DVD); all’s it’s missing is the theme song and sound.
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It is no secret around here that I love Ryan Kelly’s art. I also love comics with musical themes and riffs off of pop music (hence my repeated shilling for Phonogram and Comic Book Tattoo). So when I read about the Side B anthology at Kelly’s blog, I fell in love. I must have this. You must have this too.

From the website:

Music touches our lives every day. It is an influential and defining part of all generations and cultures. We have compiled an anthology full of stories about the influence that music can have on life – be it the life of the artist as and individual or on the creative process.

Over 200 pages of lost lovers, rocking out, spirit guides, ghosts, and dinosaurs – it’s like an action adventure comic for the music lover in all of us. (Edited by Rachel Dukes, published by Poseur Ink.)

And so. I must have it. I also appreciate anthologies chock-full of people I’m unfamiliar with, dotted with names I know and love. They give me an opportunity to find so many new and wonderful artists and writers whose work I can follow for years, and yet guarantee that they’ll be worth my hard-earned dollars.

The theme here, though, would probably make me want it no matter whose work was in it.

They have preview images at the site. Go check it out. Then call your local shop and pre-order.

The Fantastic four musicians who comprise a string quartet: Here’s a cute story from the Cleveland Plain Dealer about a string quartet from the Cleveland Institute of Music who visit grade schools as Supersonic Sound Man, Harmony Hero, Viola Girl and Mr. Rhythm to teach kids about music. It got me thinking—aren’t most comic book characters who have some sort of super-powered classical instrument villains? Maybe these guys can help reclaim classical music from the likes of The Fiddler, The Piper and Anton Allegro.

This week’s cartoontroversy: A Pat Oliphant cartoon responding to Israel’s recent military actions in Gaza that left at least 1,300 Palestinians dead is called ‘hideosuly anti-Semitic.’

The secret origin of Iron Man’s house: This NPR profile of architectural photographer Julius Shulman opens by pointing out that Tony Stark’s home in last year’s Iron Man movie was inspired by Shulman’s photos.

“It seems only fitting, and long overdue… that the history of comics should be chronicled in comic book form”: NPR’s Monkey See blog on the first couple issues of Fred Van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey’s comic book history of comic books, Comic Book Comics.

Well it can’t be both “sexually explicit” and have “a lot of sexual undertones,” now can it?: Here’s a not very well-written article about some lady somewhere being mad about a school library having a Spider-Man comic, which is either a “‘Sexual’ Spider-Man Comic” or a “sexually explicit” Spider-Man comic or one that has “a lot of sexual undertones.” There was no indication of what comic it was that caused the offense given in the text version of the story, and I couldn’t listen to the local newscasters talking about it without wanting to kill myself, so I’m not sure what the offensive comic was. The one they’re flipping through looks like John Romita Jr.-drawn story with Mary Jane in it, though. Given the fact that Marvel’s kept Spidey out of the Max books I doubt that it was anything other than a book with “sexual undertones,” and, given Marvel’s clear rating and labeling, I can’t imagine how something actually inappropriate would get into a school library. I’m always glad to see stories like this though, as it means kids—or at least this one kid—is actually interested in comics (or at least this one comic).

This is where I lose all faith in The Onion‘s comics reviews: Here are the latest batch of the A.V. Club’s regular reviews of recent-ish comics. This time out, everything that isn’t A Drifting Life, Humbug or My Mommy in in America… gets B’s, even Batman: Battle for the Cowl #1, which features “clear…storytelling” from Tony Daniel.

Tim O’Neil keeps Kingdom Come discussion coming: Here’s the latest post of O’Neil’s discussing Kingdom Come and its place in comics history. Like his previous posts on the subject, it’s an excellent read, and persuasively makes the case that today “Superhero comics have become superhero comics about superhero comics, which are themselves stories about superhero comics in a fallen world.” Go give it a read. Unless you happen to be a writer of superhero comics, in which case I imagine you might want to avoid reading it, as it might strike you with creative paralysis if you send any time considering how to write a good superhero comic without making it about superhero comics or replicating the deconstructed model of Alan Moore and pretty much everything since.

Well at least we’re all unhappy about it: Someone asked Justice League of America writer Dwayne McDuffie, “Do you actually enjoy writing JLA? It just seems to be constant editorial rewrites and bad art.” And he responded, “No, I don’t.” I’m actually kind of glad to hear that. I’ve always enjoyed McDuffie’s writing, but I dropped his JLoA within his first arc on the book, unable to stand another month of Ed Benes’ completely inappropriate artwork and amateur design skills and storytelling. But I have kept flipping through it each month at the shop, and it seems like every single story has either been in a lead-in or lead-out to another comic and/or devoted to cleaning up after the narrative mess of Brad Meltzer’s breif run. With artwork that hurts my eyes. (Link stolen from David Brothers of 4thletter.net)

Man, did I miss sharing this with you?
Mea culpa, but here’s a little weekend “Moment of Zen” that celebrates Bat-branding through the ages.
Cheers!

Via Entertainment Weekly . . .

Namaste!

See that book over there, to the right? That’s A Drifting Life, the memoir of Yoshihiro Tatsumi, the manga-ka responsible for the short, emotional, sometimes quite disturbing slice of life stories that Drawn and Quarterly published in the collections The Push Man and Other Stories, Abandon the Old in Tokyo and Good-bye. It was eleven years in the making, and covers fifteen years in the life of a Tatsumi stand-in character.

Because of how well those previous collections were received in the states, as well as the important role Tatsumi played in the development of manga (and thus world comics as a whole) and the overall quality of A Drifting Life, it was almost certainly the biggest release of this past new comics day.

And, at 856-pages long, it’s also the biggest release of this past new comics day. Seriously, this is a very  large comic book. While it’s only about eight-and-a-half-inches by sixe-and-a-half-inches tall and wide, the spine is two inches across. It is a thick book.

Given enough copies and some mortar, you could build a sturdy brick wall out of copies of it. You could throw it through the a glass display window during a riot to loot a store. You could lay it on the gas pedal of a car that you wanted to drive into a lake or off a cliff without being in the car.

In fact, I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen a comic book this thick. I kind of wish I had a copy of Vertical’s 2006 release of Osamu Tezuka’s Ode To Kirihito in my apartment, as that might have been in the same neighborhood, but unfortunately I don’t. Let’s see how A Drifting Life stacks up to what thick books I do have lying around though, after the jump.

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Yeah, that title sounded a little better in my head. Whatever — Marvel has announced that it will be releasing a new line of female apparel and cosmetics, based on your favorite characters from the Marvel Universe!

(That’s right. Boys who rock.)

Anyhoo, here’s some quotation from Susan Fields, VP of product merchandising:

“Hulk was a big component for us when it came to being eco-friendly, with T-shirts featuring the character and sayings like ‘go green.’ We also introduced a more stylized character graphic which looks like Japanese animation… Also, anything that we can relate to current music trends does well. For instance, we have a T-shirt where all the superheroes were assembled into a band with a saying like, ‘I heart boys that rock.’”

The line, which will be released sometime this year, also has released two images of broken heart pendants.

The Peter and Gwen one I think some couples could get into (if you get past the whole “she’s dead” thing — she was nice enough, so I suppose I’d ignore it), but the Spider-Man and Green Goblin… hm, well, I’m sure people will buy it, even if it does sort of push the very limits of subtext. A Brand New Day indeed!

I am a failure as a feminist English major, I must admit. I have never read the original Pride and Prejudice. In fact, I have never read a single Jane Austen book, though I have seen several of the movies, including the one starring Keira Knightley recently.

I enjoyed that film, but after reading this book, I think it might’ve been improved with a few zombies.

After all, we’ve seen Keira running around with varied weaponry and impractical clothing in Pirates of the Caribbean and King Arthur and Domino. We know she can kick ass–why not zombie ass?

In all seriousness, though, I don’t know if the Regency classic would’ve been quite so addictive without the zombies. I zoomed through it, swooning over Mr. Darcy and giggling at the vomit jokes, cheering for Elizabeth when she’s beheading zombies, battling ninjas, or sassing Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

In all seriousness, the zombie-battling probably made the book less annoying to my 21st-century sensibilities. After all, who wants to read a book where the heroines’ sole employment is wafting around annoying men and being annoyed by them? Zombie-killing gives them something to DO, while not removing the still-compelling love story across class lines. Grahame-Smith inserted a background of Shaolin kung fu into the Bennet sisters’ backstory and for laughs, plays up the class/racial discrimination against the Chinese training from the more posh neighbors, who prefer Japanese fighting styles. It oddly serves to make the snobbery more apparent and understandable.

Elizabeth’s rejection of Darcy comes much better with a Mr. & Mrs. Smith-style battle in the drawing room to underscore the politely pointed barbs. Who can resist scenes like this?

“His misfortunes!” repeated Darcy contemptuously; “yes, his misfortunes have been great indeed.” With this, he swept her feet from beneath her and sprang to his own. Elizabeth was too quick to allow him the advantage, for she was soon upright and swinging the poker at him with renewed vigour.”

Maybe if I’d read Austen before, I’d have had an easier time knowing exactly what Grahame-Smith added, but it’s to his credit that sometimes the seams in the story were hard to pick up–obviously, the zombies, vows to eat a rival’s heart, etc. But he’s good enough at mimicing Austen’s style to make this literary mash-up really flow.

Updating Austen to a modern setting would be nearly impossible–the nuances of class and social interaction would be lost nowadays, though class certainly isn’t gone from our problems. So why not update it instead with something completely ridiculous like zombies? I’ve said it before: everything’s better with a zombie apocalypse–even a posh British wedding.

You just know that someone’s going to chop scenes from Pride and Prejudice into scenes from 28 Days Later or Dawn of the Dead on YouTube. But what I want to see is this movie done from the beginning–with the same cast.

Also, comics. Like, now.

From Terry Moore’s blog:

“After a week of drawing commissions I’m ready to get back on Echo! Issue 11 is on my drawing board. It shipped this week and will be in stores next Wednesday. Looks great.

I’ll post some of the commissions I’ve done, but not the private ones.”

One mature image (ie, some slight possibly NSFW nudity) after the cut…

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Video: Print Vs. Web Vs. A Bear, Panel

Lee attended the first ever New England Webcomics Weekend last week in Easthampton, Mass. This is the first of several webcomics panels Lee recorded that weekend. Please excuse our amateur camera work and lack of any decent sound quality, this is indeed the first video I have ever produced. And I just noticed I missed an ‘r’ in Gary’s last name. Oh, well, I’ll catch it next time.

In the video:
Gary Tyrrell
Jon Rosenberg
Steven Cloud
Chris Hastings

NEWW Panel: Print Vs. Web Vs. A Bear from Lee Cherolis on Vimeo.

For more info on the New England Webcomics Weekend go here.

And of course Kyle and I are open to your questions/comments/suggestions – you can email us at brainstormingcomics(at)gmail.com or contact us at http://www.brainstormingcomics.com

You may have seen earlier this week when Newsarama broke the scoop about Cully Hamner (Blue Beetle, Black Lightning: Year One) having signed an exclusive contract with DC Comics.

But his collaborator, Greg Rucka, has posted on his LJ account some interesting news in a post titled “Question Everything“:

So now I can talk about the fact that Cully and I are doing the co-feature that will begin running in Detective Comics #854, the Batwoman debut issue, this June. Starting with four eight-page chapters, then expanding to ten-pages an issue, and he’s been drawing, and it look incredible, and no, I can’t share the pages with you.

But wait — you already knew that? Well, you probably hadn’t seen these attached design images:

…Now discuss. I particularly liked the note about Charlie’s hat.

This is some interesting quotage via Fangoria — Alex Proyas, who did pretty well for himself last weekend with the #1 box office earner (and Nic Cage vehicle) Knowing — has spoken out against Relativity Media’s plans to remake the Crow.

What many fans are up in arms about is the human cost of the last film — namely, star Brandon Lee’s death after being accidentally shot with a blank round. Proyas had to then perform a Herculean task of completing the film with his star dead. Many feel that remaking the actor’s final performance would be an insult to his memory.

Here’s what Proyas had to say:

“I have nothing to do with the remake of The Crow. That’s other people involved with that and I wouldn’t even dream of remaking the movie, because as far as I’m concerned that’s Brandon Lee’s movie and that’s why I finished the movie – in memory of Brandon. That’s the only reason I finished it actually.

So the whole notion of remaking it, to me, is just ridiculous and I’d have nothing to do with it, as I’ve had nothing to do with any of the sequels or the TV show or any of that stuff.”

You can read more by clicking here.

Because it’s Thursday, I’m swamped, but the rest of the blogosphere hasn’t been slacking.

Dollhouse: I’m not gonna lie, I skimmed this review because I haven’t watched this episode yet. However, some of the insights noted struck me, so I’m linking here. Also because I mean to write more about Dollhouse, which I think is steadily improving–and growing more challenging–with each episode.(h/t When Fangirls Attack)

The Blockbuster Mentality and the Invisible Audience: about how the magical male 18-35 demographic became so in Hollywood, with interesting possible extrapolations to the comics industry.

Joelle Jones, whose art I fell in love with on Token, links to a preview of her new Oni Press graphic novel with Jamie S. Rich, You Have Killed Me. Her art is worth it on its own, but the preview looks pretty fabulous.

Jezebel notes that Good Morning America has finally resolved the question: “Are There Vampires Among Us?” And in related news, Gawker assures us that Boston Latin High School is not, in fact, crawling with vampires. (Too bad, as I’m heading to Boston this weekend).

Daryl Cagle has a North Korea-related political cartoon that made him laugh. It made me laugh, too.

Finally, Splash Page posted this story about an autistic boy saved from a ledge by a man in a Spider-Man costume, which reminded me that Rachel Maddow actually had video on the other night. So here’s the video. Enjoy!

I’ve been blogging about comics for, oh, about three years now, which is the equivalent of 30 years non-Internet time. Yet there’s one type of blogging that I never really get to do, but always wanted to try—liveblogging.

You know, like the political bloggers or the people who report on who wins Oscars and Grammy’s do, where you have the TV on to the historic event/boring election results/annual awards show and have one eye on the TV screen and the other on your computer screen like a chameleon, typing away? That seems like fun.

Sadly, because the Eisners are not televised like some awards shows, and the president never gives a special address about things like comics increasing from $2.99 to $3.99, I never really have this opportunity.

But, I can fake it. Like, I can watch something that isn’t actually live, and blog about it as I watch it, and post it later. I guess that’s not actually liveblogging, but it feels like it on my end, and that’s what’s important isn’t it? Me?

So I thought I’d blog my way through Wonder Woman, the direct-to-DVD movie that DC recently released.

Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “Hey, didn’t that come out like three weeks ago? Why are you just getting to it now, and is any kind of review of it at this point even timely for a daily comics blog?” To which I say yes. Yes, you are correct it did come out a couple of weeks ago, and I am only just now getting to it because I had to wait my turn on the library cue so I wouldn’t have to pay any money for it. And yes, my colleague Sarah Jaffe already reviewed it. And no, it’s probably not that timely but, well, the daily blog beast must be fed it’s daily meal of content and hey, this qualifies as content, right?

So! After the jump, my thoughts on Wonder Woman as they occurred to me while watching it. That should be fun, right? I should note before we get started that there will be a lot of swearing, so if you are a child you probably shouldn’t…oh wait, actually, if you’re a child, you’re probably not interested in this movie, which is the second most violent thing I’ve seen this week (I also watched the Turok, Son of Stone direct-to-DVD animation and good God, was that gory!)

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If you like what’s you’ve read so far totally check out more super cute comics at:www.sosuperduper.com!

Project Rooftop, who just over two months ago began its its post-Batman R.I.P. Batman 2.0 costume design contest, has announced its winners of its Dynamic Do-Over!

Grand Prize – Anjin Anhunt:

First Place – Daniel Heard:

Second Place – Christian Nauck

Guest judges for this contest included Bat-artists J.H. Williams III and Dustin Nguyen!

Lady Death creator Brian Pulido has released the web site for his upcoming feature film debut, The Graves.

Here’s what the movie is in a nutshell, according to the creator:

Set in present day, Arizona, The Graves is about inseparable sisters, Megan and Abby.  Megan is a self-assured ass kicker. Abby is a caustic, Hot Topic Goth afraid of her own shadow. They couldn’t be less alike, but they share a life-long obsession with comics, pop culture and rock ‘n’ roll.  Simply put, they are beautiful geeks. Their visit to remote Skull City Mine turns into a mind-bending fight for survival against menaces both human — and supernatural.

“Writing and directing The Graves was exhilarating,” Pulido said in a press release sent out by Mischief Maker Studios. “We’re looking forward to unleashing it on the world.”

The cast includes horror vets including Clare Grant (Masters of Horror), Jillian Murray (The Fun Park), Bill Moseley (H2, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Devil’s Rejects, House of 1000 Corpses), Tony Todd (24, Candyman), Amanda Wyss (A Nightmare on Elm Street, Dexter), and D. Randall Blythe (Frontman, Lamb of God).

Warner Bros. has sent us an interview with Alex Tse, who wrote the screenplay for Watchmen, on the creation of Tales of the Black Freighter, the upcoming animated feature designed to go part and parcel with the main film. Here’s some of what Tse had to say:

“Black Freighter went through a lot of incarnations – we talked about doing it live action, then ‘300’ green screen-style, then we decided it would be animated – so I wrote it without a firm idea of the format,” said Tse, who had not previously written for animation. “I guess I just didn’t treat it any differently than any writing project I normally undertake. And I’m guessing this was probably like nothing I ever will work on again.”

“In the book, I think it was written as a parallel to the Watchmen story – with one major difference,” Tse said. “In Black Freighter, the sea captain thinks everything he is doing is for a good purpose. But then he realizes, no matter how well intentioned his acts have been, he has done some horrible things. In Watchmen, even though Adrian Veidt says he realizes the consequences of his actions and that he has made himself feel each death he has caused, he never seems to express that pain or sorrow. There’s no real remorse for what he’s done. So either he doesn’t fully realize it or he just doesn’t care.”

“I am not a huge fan of movies where you’re just watching someone go crazy – as a viewer, it’s hard to connect to that idea,” Tse said. “You need to be able to relate to his situation, to understand why he’s going insane. With Black Freighter, it was important to keep it grounded in the cause of his madness. He’s been through a traumatic experience, he’s alone, and now he’s doing anything he can to get back to his home and save his family. So when he does these horrible, crazy things, you know he’s doing it to try and save what is dearest to him. An audience can understand that situation.”

The co-feature came out March 24th.

This just in for our British readers, via Facebook:

David Hine, creator for FVZA, Spider-Man Noir, and X-Men, along with Seven Soldiers and Azrael’s Frazer Irving, will be hitting Orbital Comics this Saturday!

The creators will be signing from 3-6pm at 8 Gt Newport Street in London. Check it!