Between the success of Saga and this surprise news, it seems as if everything’s coming up Brian K. Vaughan:

Well-placed sources tell us that New Line Cinema may finally be getting around to making a feature-film adaptation of the graphic novel, Y: The Last Man.

Of course, when a project has been in development for almost a decade, it can sometimes be difficult to get excited about the latest twist or turn. But even still, we hear that the studio is very pleased with a draft from former Jericho writers Matthew Federman and Stephen Scaia, and has already begun the process of meeting with director candidates to hire for the project.

Hands up everyone who thought that this movie was as dead as the entire male population on Vaughan and Pia Guerra’s Vertigo series? Exactly. Nice to see that we were all wrong.

(And where is Guerra these days? Outside of her Doctor Who: The Forgotten series with Tony Lee a few years back, I can’t think of anything she’s done post-Y. Is she off working on something wonderful and I’ve been missing it?)

At this past weekend’s Baltimore Comic Con, Marvel’s Tom Brevoort gave what may have been the most interesting convention panel talk of the year – His traditional “How to Edit Comics” presentation normally presented to Marvel Comics editors:

Getting right into it, Brevoort said that the lecture is given about once a year because, “It became apparent that at Marvel we’ve come up with a philosophy about how we do what we do, and what goes into the process of being an Editor.” He added that for the higher-ups, they have a short-hand when talking about how to edit, while younger Editors may not have the same language. So Brevoort gives the lecture, usually when the Senior Editors are away at San Diego.He also noted that not only would the lecture be – mostly – common sense, but it’s also applicable to Marvel Editors, specifically.

MTV’s Alex Zalben went to the Baltimore panel, and reported very clearly what Brevoort said; it is a lot of common sense stuff, as promised, but there’s a lot to chew on in there as well, specifically the need for visual and emotional clarity in the finished product, the lack of importance of continuity (Sorry, hardcore continuity fans) and the editor’s need to take the blame for when things go wrong:

The main philosophy of Marvel is that, “Creators get the credit, Editors get the blame.” Brevoort added that isn’t opinion, it’s a fact, and that if you’re editing right, you’re not noticed by the public. “The creators are the stars, the actors, putting on the show for the audience,” continued Brevoort. “You as the Editor are support. You’re behind the stage, pulling curtains and whatnot. That is the division of labor. Trying to back-seat write the comic book only leads to crappy comic books.”Next! “Be responsible as the Editor.” Meaning, basically, do your job, and get the stories out on time, and make sure that the stories are, “in the bounds of the Marvel Universe. And, ultimately, the job of an Editor is to sell comics; and good comics sell better than bad comics.” It’s also the responsibility of the Editor to make choices, and take responsibility for those choices. Particularly in a big company like Marvel, it’s easy to pass the buck; so don’t do that.

I’d genuinely be curious to hear if there’s any similar presentation given to editors at DC, and if so, whether the advice given differs in any significant way, if only because – despite the “if you’re editing right, you’re not noticed by the public” and “editors are behind the scenes” commentary above, I feel as if Marvel’s editors (Brevoort and Steve Wacker especially) are public figures far more than their DC counterparts. Maybe DC has a “keep your head down, even when Rob Liefeld is naming and shaming you” lesson somewhere in there…

This may be an overlooked part of the news coming out of Baltimore Comic-Con, but it shouldn’t be:

Brevoort also spoke to the future of “Infinite Comics” and Marvel’s commitment to digital-only comics near the end of the panel. “The real answer is yes, absolutely. We think that forum, digital comics, whatever forum that they take, is clearly where the future lies. We’re definitely going to be doing more with it.” He added, “I wouldn’t be surprised within the next year to see us roll out some kind of regular series in that format.”

It’s surprising that it’ll have taken Marvel quite so long to have a digital-only ongoing series, if/when it happens, to be honest; with Archie, IDW and DC (at least?) offering multiple ongoing digital series at this point, it makes Marvel look as if it’s playing catch-up to only get around to seemingly entertain the notion now. Perhaps when the eventual announcement comes, it’ll be something that allows the publisher to regain the upper-hand it once had in terms of digital initiatives.

So, how great were August orders for the Direct Market? Well, pretty great – as you’d expect from a five-week shipping month – and suggesting more growth for the market as a whole, according to ICv2:

For the first eight months of 2012 comic book sales are up a remarkable 20.51% over the same period in 2011, while graphic novel sales have posted a 14.13% gain.  So far in 2012 the combined sales of comics and graphic novels have posted a blistering 18.41% boost over the same period in 2011.

Worth remembering: The digital market is also growing, parallel to this expansion. Either the same number of people are reading more comics, or more people in general are reading comics these days. Either way, that’s pretty wonderful.

Important note to any dedicated fan interesting in owning the massive 10-disc “Marvel Cinematic Universe” collection: It’s been delayed until spring 2013, per Marvel’s official Tumblr. The release will now “come in a new briefcase and include even more than the content and features that we had first advertised,” it’s stated.

The collection was originally intended to be released on Sept. 25 along with Avengers, and is slated to contain all of the previously released Marvel Studios films that comprise “Phase One”: Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger and Avengers, along with a variety of extras; all housed in a briefcase similar to the one that held the Tesseract. Which looks to be the problem: The Chicago Tribune reports that Marvel did not have permission to make a replica of the Rimowa briefcase that appears in the film, thus the “new briefcase” mentioned earlier.

For those who feel as if 2012 is Image Comics’ year – You may not be mistaken:

This year, Image, IDW and Dark Horse have aggregately sold approximately 6.5 million comics this year.  While that’s only 16.9% of the total sales this year, it’s a significant increase from this time last year.   From January through July 2011, those same three publishers sold only 4.7 million comics.  That means that sales have increased 38% from last year.

Further breaking down those numbers, it becomes clear that Image is the biggest mover of the three this year.  It’s sold nearly a million more comics than it did during the same time period in 2011 and is only 200,000 comics shy from matching its 2012 totals with five months of sales remaining.  In fact, Image’s sales growth (how many more actual comics it’s sold this year than it did last year) is greater than Marvel’s by nearly 200,000 units.

That’s from a must-read post at the Outhousers about the rise of the big indie comics over the last few months. As writer Christian Hoffer explains, “While the market has expanded by 19.31%, these three companies have nearly doubled that rate of growth.  The three companies’ aggregate sales are up 37.95% from last year, a figure far exceeding Marvel’s growth and comparable to DC’s.” There’s a lot to chew over in terms of information from the post (Not least of which is, if Image, IDW and Dark Horse are growing at twice the market rate, as is DC, and Marvel is also growing, albeit at a slower rate, how badly is the rest of the market faring in comparison? Despite the title of the post, I really don’t think this is the “Year of the Small Publisher,” but the year of the midrange publisher and the small ones should be worried), but don’t take my word for it: Go and read, and learn for yourself.

I’m not sure if I’ve said it on this here blog or not, but I am of the opinion that Al Ewing – best known, probably, in the US for his Jennifer Blood work following up on Garth Ennis’ run on that Dynamite title, but hopefully that’ll change as soon as IDW releases Zaucer of Zilk and people start to realize how great his various 2000AD work is – is one of those there “Writers To Watch” who’ll soon have the world as their metaphorical oyster. The reason I mention this now is that Colin Smith, he of the Too Busy Thinking About My Comics blog, has the first part of an interview with Ewing up, and it’s worth checking out:

“Why comics”… well, they’re my favourite medium. That combination of words and pictures, read as one thing greater than the sum of both… I understand it, in the way that someone who can play the guitar understands how the six strings work together without being able to fully put it into words. And I love it. I love being part of the history of comics, part of that tapestry that stretches from the first awesome issue of Union-Breakin’ Laffs (first appearance of The Golden Scab) to a poorly-photocopied scrap of what looks like Daisy Duck wanking off a horse that I just found in a hedge. I’m a small part of that history, but I’m part of it, and that history is in turn part of a larger history of pop culture (which is my favourite form of culture). So it’s nice to be involved in that.

Also: Track down Ewing’s collaboration with the severely-underrated Henry Flint on Zombo, those who like funny, self-aware comics full of violence and commentary. Seriously just great work.

The Hollywood Reporter’s Heat Vision blog has two new guests at MorrisonCon listed today, James Gunn and Max Landis. Gunn was recently chosen as Marvel Studio’s director for the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy film set to hit theaters in 2014, and reportedly remains in active talks as the sole runner in that race. Landis, meanwhile, wrote the superpowered film Chronicle, a parody youtube video on The Death and Return of Superman, and has a story in the Action Comics Annual in October 2012.

The two Hollywood and Comics connections will be talking at the convention about… Hollywood and Comics’ connections. The duo join Gerard Way, Robert Kirkman,  Jonathan Hickman, Jason Aaron,, Jim Lee, Frank Quitely, J.H. Williams III and Chris Burnham as already announced guests, alongside Grant Morrison, of course.

MorrisonCon hits the Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas, NV September 28-30, 2012.

The traditional idea that movies don’t help the sales of comics? Yeah, tell that to Batman:

The release of Christopher Nolan’s final Batman film, The Dark Knight Rises on July 20th had a major impact on sales of graphic novels sold in bookstores during August according to numbers released to ICv2 by Nielsen BookScan reporting service.  Led by Frank Miller’s classic Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Geoff John’s recently published Batman: Earth One, Batbooks took the top four spots on the August list and six of the top eight titles.  Altogether there were eight Batman-related books (including Insight Editions’ The Dark Knight Manual) in the Nielsen Top 20 for August.

Outside of all the Batman love, I am very happy to see that Gene Yang’s work on the Avatar: The Last Airbender books also seems to be drawing readers towards his own work: American Born Chinese is at #12 on the chart, rather wonderfully.

(Something very odd: I went back to May’s Bookscan numbers to see if Marvel’s Avengers books got a similar bump from that movie’s release, and… kind of? Not really? While an Avengers book is at the top of the charts, it’s not from Marvel – It’s DK Publishing’s The Avengers: The Ultimate Guide to the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, which isn’t actually a graphic novel – and there’s only one Marvel graphic novel on the chart: The Infinity Gauntlet, at #19. Seriously, is Marvel cursed in bookstores?)

Good news from Thanos creator Jim Starlin:

I didn’t know Thanos was going to be in the movie until a couple weeks before and so there were some mixed feelings on that. Marvel and I are now talking. I can’t say anything more than that at this point about it. As far as the books go, I stopped reading Thanos when I stopped writing it, so I have no feelings about anything anyone’s done with it because I don’t know what they are.

He’s also not the one responsible for the sudden cancellation of the Thanos: Son of Titan series:

Like I said, I’m not working with Marvel now so I don’t know the reasons they did that for. Like everyone else, I saw it on the internet. I did talk to the author of it and he told me that they were going to go through and pretty much stick with what I had put down and he was going to do some time things with his mother that I didn’t quite understand what he was talking about. It sounded like he had a good recap, which I’m not quite sure why you would need that these days because you have all the books in print… I know they got a really good job right afterwards, you know, a replacement job so they’re not unhappy about it. I know the author was very hot to do it and I was really sorry to see it fall apart like that.

The “replacement job” Starlin’s talking about is the January-launching Morbius The Living Vampire series that’ll be written and drawn by the announced Thanos team of Joe Keatinge and Rich Elson. Calling the never-to-be-seen Thanos mini a “recap” feels a little harsh, doesn’t it…?

File under “fascinating” and “about damn time”:

Barely a year after NBC opted against moving forward with David E. Kelley’s reworking of the comic book icon, and just as the character is hooking up with the Man of Steel in the comics, Vulture hears that the CW, Warner Bros. TV, and DC Comics have found a new way to revive the legend of Diana of Themyscira. The plan this time: origin story, all the way.

Yes, it’s Smallville for Wonder Woman, and apparently it’s coming from the pen of uber-WW fan (and onetime WW comic writer) Allan Heinberg. This seems like so much of a good idea that I can’t believe it’ll actually end up happening.

In writing about the lack of female Avengers in the first promo image for Jonathan Hickman’s relaunch of the book, Brett White says something interesting:

Women read comics. Anyone at all engaged in social media knows this. Women read comics and are a driving force behind fandom. I think I could call them the driving force behind fandom and put up a convincing argument. Just think about it: what fandoms have driven America crazy in the last decade? Could anyone dissuade me from saying that they were Harry Potter, Twilight and the Hunger Games? “Avatar” may have put butts in theater seats, but you don’t hear about it… ever. No one is immersed in the world of “Avatar” except James Cameron and people who enjoy wearing Na’vi Zentai suits. “The Avengers” was pretty darn huge and, if Tumblr is any indication, a whopping portion of the people driving that fandom online do not possess a Y chromosome. Women engage in fandom to levels that men do not. When women get behind something, their sheer numbers and passion force it into the mainstream. That’s why you can name the actor who plays that werewolf kid in “Twilight” and probably sing at least the chorus to one Justin Bieber song. What do tween boys like? I have no clue. Sports? Probably sports.

I’m finding it very hard to argue with this.

Geoff Johns and Seth Green talk about this weekend’s Robot Chicken DC Comics Special, and what a surprise: They reveal that Aquaman is the star of the special: (more…)

Here’s a blast from the relatively recent past: The 20th Century Danny Boy blog revisits John Byrne’s testimony in the trial over whether or not Marv Wolfman owned Blade, Nova and other characters he’d created for Marvel (Spoiler: He lost). It’s fascinating stuff, whether for the story of how Byrne tried – unsuccessfully – to break into Marvel the first time, or for his attitudes towards creator ownership and corporate characters:

Q: You have referred to yourself as “a cog in the machine at Marvel”?

A: I have indeed.

Q: And you would probably call yourself a company man?

A: Yes. I have no problem with that. I believe corporate loyalty is a good thing. You are loyal to the company that you work for.

Q: And you are loyal to Marvel, of course; isn’t that right?

A: When I am working for Marvel, I am loyal to Marvel, I suppose, yes.

Q: And you are working for Marvel right now, aren’t you?

A: I am indeed.

Found via the Forbidden Planet blog, Aled Lewis reveals how Batman appears to disappear after asking the important questions:

I now really want to see Lewis’ Batman team up with Kate Beaton’s Wonder Woman in a very special issue of The Brave and The Bold.

Won’t somebody save Smallville creators Miles Millar and Alfred Gough? Well, 12 men and women will have their chance, as a judge has refused requests for summary judgment in the ongoing lawsuit between the two and the studio (Warner Bros. TV) and network (The CW), citing “triable elements” in the case as he sends it towards a jury trial next year.

Millar and Gough files suit in March of 2010, claiming that WBTV sold the rights to Smallville to sibling network The WB (later The CW, when it merged with UPN in 2006) for below fair-market price. If true, this impacts Millar and Gough (as well as Tollin/Robbins Productions, the production house responsible for Smallville) because it means that profits for the show are artificially lower than they should be, meaning that their contracted cut of said profits is also lower. The show, which ran for ten years, was clearly successful – but the lawsuit suggests that it was actually more successful than it looked on paper, a fact hidden by various sweetheart deals within the large Warner Bros. structure.

WBTV and The CW had each asked the court for summary judgment in the case – Essentially, the Judge issuing a verdict without the need for a trial – but, in a ruling from Judge Michael Johnson issued yesterday, he refused both requests. Unmoved by multiple arguments by the defendants that they had the right to sell Smallville for whatever amount deemed appropriate, the judge ruled that the matter will be best decided by a jury, finding numerous elements in both the original allegations and defenses against said that he believed would be best explored via trial.

The trial is expected to begin at some point in 2013.

Firstly, you’ve all seen the interlinked covers for Avengers #1-3 on the main site already, right? Good. Now we can begin.

The first thing that I noticed about Dustin Weaver’s cover for the first three issues was the weirdness of the perspective of the whole thing; I get that Weaver’s trying to wrap everything around, somewhat fish-eye-lenslike, but even so; if Thor and Black Widow are at such an angle on #2 and Iron Man, Hawkeye and Spider-Woman even moreso on #3, I feel as if everyone on the #1 cover should be slightly more angled…? But then again, by making them so even-keeled, it offers the possibility for additional linked covers for #4-5, adding to the image on the left instead of the right.

The second thing I noticed was Thor’s missing leg. I mean, sure; it’s actually behind the Black Widow, but I can’t imagine what position Thor’s in in order to make that work properly. Is he doing squats? I do kind of like the idea of Thor: God of Stretches, but I’m not sure it’s going to sell so well.

It’s not all bad, of course; I’m glad to see Cannonball and, I’m guessing, Sunspot be promoted to the big leagues, and hope that some of the other New Mutants follow suit (Dani Moonstar deserves a place there, says the former New Mutants fan in me. Even if she doesn’t have powers anymore, there’s always technological ways around that issue, right?). It’s nice to see that the three female characters displayed aren’t overly sexualized, and are actually exposing less skin than either Wolverine or the Falcon, too (It would’ve been nice to have seen more than three women in the first fourteen characters revealed for the team, but, hey: Comics).

I like the new logo, bringing out the central identifier of the logo from the last, what, 15 years, now and simplifying the look considerably in the process, while also playing up the title’s connection to AvX (I wonder if we’ll see a new X book at some point, to match?). Given the amount of visual clutter on each of those covers, doing anything to simplify things is a great idea; the red strip along the bottom of the cover, which I’m guessing is the new Marvel trade dress, remains ridiculously cluttered, bringing the number of logos on each cover to a staggering five – The Marvel NOW! logo, the Marvel AR logo, the “Join The Re-Evolution” logo, the “Free Digital Copy” logo and the individual title logo, respectively – even before you get to the barcode or issue number; I really hope that as the relaunch goes on, at least two of those logos can be dropped or reduced in some way.

What I’m entirely missing from this cover, though – And this is actually true of all of the Marvel NOW! covers released to date, with the exception of FF – is any sense of “new.” Or, to be honest, even “exciting.” Some of the costume details may be slightly changed, but when I look at this image, I think “Yeah, that’s the Avengers, okay” instead of having any feeling of “What an exciting new beginning!” Am I missing something, or just expecting too much from Avengers and Marvel NOW! in general?

(Oh, and also, Marvel? Assuming that he’s coloring it, can you add Dean White’s name to the first issue, please? It’s driving my inner OCD crazy.)

Who knew that Spider-Man was at the center of the upcoming singularity?

And, given that our increasingly globalized and technology-reliant world has created conditions under which space-time itself is compressing, it’s logical to assume that, eventually, there will be multiple Spider-Man films coming out simultaneously, in which each Spider-Man makes slightly different decisions and wears slightly different costumes. Soon enough, in fact, all movies will be Spider-Man movies, and, naturally, Lars Von Trier will direct them all. Emma Stone will play Aunt May in 2042, and even the 400 Peter Parkers sent to save Uncle Ben won’t be able to (spoiler alert!).

I should be worried that I actually kind of understood that, right…?

I read through all of the DC New 52 annuals from last week – Detective Comics, Flash, Green Lantern, Justice League International and Superman – and what jumped out at me was that not one of them was a standalone story; the closest were JLI and Superman, neither of which were direct continuations of storylines from the ongoing title, but in both cases, they set up things that’ll play out in future issues (or other series). That’s not to say that they weren’t any good (The Flash Annual was so good, in fact, that I ended up going out and picking up the issues of the series I’d missed), but I found myself oddly nostalgic for the days when an annual meant an entirely standalone story that showcased the series for newcomers.

And yet – When was the last time an annual did that? Marvel’s annuals are mini-crossover events, it seems like, with three annuals forming one storyline in most cases, and the others reading like extended fill-ins instead of Big Stories That Had To Be Told. Thinking back, I remember a lot of “Summer Events” taking over annuals of my youth – The Evolutionary War! Eclipso: The Darkness Within! Atlantis Attacks! Armageddon 2001! – and it strikes me that the kind of annual I find myself wanting is something that hasn’t really been the norm for more than two decades.

So am I just being an old man? Are annuals best served by connecting them to the monthly titles or each other, especially in this kind of market, or do other people long for the days where you could pay your $4.99 (Five dollars for a comic book etc.) and have a complete done-in-one experience that felt like an event in and of itself?

Christopher Nolan’s third Batmovie is now more successful than his second:

The studio is waiting for China’s grosses to announce it officially today. But the Warner Bros’ and Legendary Pictures’ Batman trilogy finale from Christopher Nolan has hit a milestone believed out of reach just a month ago. Despite the tragic start of its run in North American theaters, The Dark Knight Rises has now grossed $431.4 million domestic and $574+ million international for a total $1.005+ billion through Sunday. That’s ahead of the trilogy’s second installment The Dark Knight, which maxed out at $1.0003 billion worldwide in 2008 (not adjusted for inflation or higher ticket prices).

Worth pointing out: TDKR has managed to do this despite not having the benefit of increased 3D ticket prices, as Warners likes to point out. Perhaps more surprising from the Deadline report, the idea that the movie has a long life ahead of it in terms of making money: “Hollywood even believes there’s more moolah ahead for TDKR which is still solidly in the Top 10 grossing films even now.”