Less than 48 hours after a historic election, comics creators and commentators ponder what a Barack Obama presidency will mean to America … and to comics:
• At MTV’s Splash Page, Laura Hudson rounds up comments from a slew of comics notables, including Incredible Hercules writer Fred Van Lente, K Chronicles cartoonist Keith Knight, Love & Rockets creator Jaime Hernandez and DMZ and Northlanders writer Brian Wood.
“Real-life politics has played a huge role in my work, from the Rudy Giuliani ‘Quality Of Life’ regime in the ’90s to the W. Bush legacy of war, torture, illegal politics, occupation and terrorism,” Wood tells Hudson. “But this morning it was impossible to get up after a long night watching election news and put myself into the necessary pessimist headspace to work on the latest DMZ script.”
• Blogger Sean Kleefeld thinks a sense of optimism may seep into the works of creators. However, “that’s about all an Obama presidency is going to lend to comics, I figure. He can’t wave his hand and suddenly have 200,000 more people head off to their LCS every week. He can’t suddenly make paper and/or printing costs diminish to pass savings on to readers. Even the suggested economic stimulus package won’t have that dramatic an impact on comic sales since people are still spending more on food and gas.”
• Blogger Valerie D’Orazio briefly looks at how the national mood during President Bush’s two terms were reflected in comic-book storylines.
• The Washington Post’s Michael Cavna calls on fellow cartoonist to hone their caricatures of President-Elect Obama.
• Dan Goldman, who’s also interviewed in that Splash Page piece, unveils the final cover art (above) for 08: A Graphic Diary of the Campaign Trail. The “sociopolitical-document-in-comics,” by Mike Crowley and Goldman, is available for pre-order. It’s due in stores in January.