Just how crazy has DC Comics gone?: Crazy enough that Steve Rude would ask if he could maybe make them some awesome comic books and they said no, apparently. That’s just nutty. I can sort of see why DC would put him off for a few months, if they really want to instill a sort of uniformity to their line starting in September (there definitely doesn’t seem to be much in the way of stylistic variety in the designs and artists involved with their new 50-book slate, for example), but I can’t imagine it being a good idea to turn Rude down altogether. No original graphic novels or miniseries or Steve Rude Draws Whatever He Wants #1 one-shot? Ironically, yesterday DC  announced that Rude’s fourth choice on a list of DC characters he’d like to work on, OMAC, would be getting his own ongoing title—with DC publisher Dan DiDio co-writing it.

Now read this: Check out the Level Up creative team of Gene Luen Yang and Thien Pham’s cute strip about where the arcade heroes of yesteryear are now.

“Here is a period piece for our postracial times — in the era of Ella Baker and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the most powerful adversaries of spectacular apartheid are a team of enlightened white dudes”: In The New York Times, writer and X-Men fan Ta-Nehisi Coates talks about taking in X-Men: First Class with his son, and what he noticed that his son didn’t. Meanwhile, in the New Zealand Listener, David Larsen notes some of the quite disturbing implications of the film that the creators seem to have either not noticed or glossed over. And at his blog, David Brothers talks about his viewing (I agree with a lot of what he said, particularly regarding the awesomeness of Fassbender and McAvoy) and he also notes some of the disturbing (and hopefully accidental!) X-Men = Nazis implications. Peter David really liked it, though.

Nobody will ever like the  new Teen Titans: Andrew Weiss is so confident in the rottenness of the new version of the Teen Titans DC announced this week, that he’s already inducting them into his “Nobody’s Favorites” hall of shame. I can’t disagree. I personally experienced aesthetic pain while looking at the cover image of Teen Titans #1. Of course, someone somewhere must like it, or DC never would have greenlighted it, would they? Do you like? Speak up in the comments, please. I’m genuinely curious, as I have a hard time comprehending anyone liking it.

Wow, Bryan Lee O’Malley used to suck: Check out his 1988 Transformers comic for evide—oh, he was only eight years old when he drew that? Damn, that’s actually pretty good then. (And he drew better Transformers at eight then I can at 34, the talented little punk…!)

“Batgirl’s Last Dance”: Will Brooker covers the hell out of The Brave and The Bold #33, the Cliff Chiang-drawn issue where Barbara Gordon, Zatanna and Wonder Woman do karaoke to a Beyonce song.

“The salient reason that more people aren’t reading about mainstream superheroes, of course, is not because they are…confused by backstory — it’s that they don’t happen to be particularly interested in mainstream superheroes”: Here’s NPR’s Glen Weldon on DC’s post-Flashpoint plans.

Awesome artist Simon Gane, drawing awesomely: Check out his Batman, Batgirl and, um, these other characters. (Ganked from Comics Reporter)

If First Class comes first, what comes second?: Johanna Draper Carlson raises an interesting dilemma regarding the latest based-on-a-Marvel-comic film, X-Men: First Class. If you want to read the comics it’s based on, um, what do you read? The heart of the movie is the Charles Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr relationionship, but where is that in the comics? I think spread out all over, along with Hellfire Club and Emma Frost stuff, none of which is all that much like it was the movie anyway. Everything branded “First Class” in the comics, the Jeff Parker-written stuff, is fantastic, but doesn’t have anything at all to do with the movie, beyond the fact that Beast is in both. I’d recommend Marvel’s X-Men: First Class comics, but only for people looking for fun, accessible X-Men comics, not people specifically looking for something like the movie. (Besides, none of the comic book versions of Magneto and Professor X were ever as dreamy as Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy).

DC’s direct market sales for April: Marc-Oliver Frisch’s analysis on DC’s sales from April at The Beat should be of special interest this time, given how radically DC is changing their publishing game in September. Frisch calls the planned 52 new launches “a workable enough load for the market,” given DC’s April output.  I’m sure that’s reassuring to some who see the move as a potential direct market apocalypse, but I still have some doubts. (It’s workable, but only if enough individual readers want to try to read a ton of new books; it looks like a very tempting jumping-off point, and, if anyone was ever considering moving from signles to trades, DC created the ideal time to do so—take four to six months off, then start collecting trades in spring of 2012). Speaking of, DC’s latest announcement of new titles, it seems like each and every one of those books would have a much better chance of flourishing if released over the course of a season or year, instead of in a single month.

Drawn and Quarterly to have an awesome fall: Actually, perhaps it’s more accurate to say comics fans are going to have an awesome fall.

Does DC have an Alan Moore created/recreated character hit list?: Gavok examines the evidence.

Congressman Anthony Weiner gives political cartoonist license to make dick jokes: Michael Cavna rounds up some of the most eye-catching, and Daryl Cagle has a Weinergate gallery.

I think the latest announcement makes it official: DC Comics has gone and went insane. (Quick, see if you can spot the typo in that Source blog post before they fix it!) As the main page reports, DC is relaunching both Batman and Detective Comics with new #1′s, and trading creative teams, with Greg Capullo taking over for Jock as Scott Snyder’s collaborator. I have more frightened and confused thoughts on the subject here.

And on the subject of DC relaunches: Bully, The Little Stuffed Bull proves once again why he should be in charge of the comics industry, naming his 52 tiles, which include the likes of Batgirl, Inc. starring Barbara Gordon, Stephanie Brown, and Cassandra Cain and Anyone Else You Want; Are You Happy Now? #1; Tom Spurgeon offers his own wish-list, five titles strong and, finally, Ty Templeton follows DC’s lead and launches his own 52 new versions of his Bun Toons.

Oracle no more?: While some fans are having fun with DC’s announcement, others are pretty concerned about what it means for some of the characters, including the most prominent person in a wheelchair in all of superhero comics (Professor X doesn’t count, because he’s always standing up, and also is also a mutant). Here are two posts expressing concern that Barbara Gordon will quit being the center of the DC heroes’ information and intelligence universe and one of their greatest leaders just so she can go back to her Bronze Age status quo, on DC Women Kicking Ass and Irrelevant Comics.

I want all of these: Check out Seth’s roller derby team logos. Then buy shirts of each. And give them to me. Please.

Anders Nilsen looks like this: Only hotter, I’m told.

“Just how many times can Hollywood insult Scotland?”: The Herald isn’t happy with a change X-Men: First Class made to one of its characters. Comics writer Alan Grant is quoted in the article.

So what’s Bryan Lee O’Malley up to?: Apparently, his fourth outline of a new project. He offers evidence via Twitter.

“We have a larger global footprint … than all of the major museums in the world combined”: That’s DeviantArt co-founder Angelo Sotira talking about the site in this USA Today feature.

Thomas Zahler’s weirdest commission?: The Love and Capes artist shares an unusual commission request for an image featuring both Power Girl and Ms. Marvel, and reveals a line he just wouldn’t cross. (By the way, if you haven’t ever seen it before, Zahler’s commissions page is a great way to waste time on the Internet).

Fearpoint and Flash Itself: Tim O’Neil on the latest chapters of the two big publisher’s two big series. (I think…it’s a creative piece, as far as comics reviews go).

I don’t know, would my blog post make a good rap song?: “Could My Screenplay Make a Good Graphic Novel?”

The dust from DC’s bombshell: If you missed it, and I’m not sure how you could have, here’s the USA Today article featuring the announcement itself. Here’s Tom Spurgeon’s more-cogent-than-most reaction to the news (that Spurgeon is one cogent fellow, isn’t he?). Here’s Heidi “The Beat” MacDonald’s round-up of creator and retailer tweets on the matter. Here’s Brian Hibbs’ reaction, offering the retailer’s point of view, and really focusing on those 52 titles. (Which is a strangely exact number, particularly if you’re having trouble thinking of, say, 10 DC characters capable of selling more than 20,000 books a month…or ten DC writers whose work you want to read monthly. It occurs to me as I write this that 52 is the same number of worlds in the current DCU multiverse, which may suggest there will be, like, five different Batman titles starring five different Batmans from five different earths or something, but also suggests a real randomness to this output explosion—those 52 worlds came about simply because there were 52 issues of 52, which was determined because it was a weekly series, and there are 52 weeks in a year. Huh.)  Here’s J.K. Parkin of Robot 6. Here’s Michael Cavna of The Washington Post. Here’s Flash-focused blog Speed Force taking a close look at Jim Lee’s Flash redesign (it’s boring old Barry Allen, based on the eye color). Here’s Tom Foss. Here’s Snell, who notes that the people who are announcing all these new titles which are going to be better than the old titles are the exact same people responsible for all those old titles that sold so poorly they needed rebooting. Here’s Jim Smith. Here’s Kiel Phegley, objecting to an omission in the new Justice League line-up, which seems particularly glaring given the new teams sartorial choices. And finally, here’s my own initial reaction from last night, which admittedly consisted mostly of disgust at the JLA’s matching dumb collars. I’m honestly having trouble even processing this announcement (or the reboot/redesign half of it, anyway), as it seems like a out-of-control line expansion applying the “Brand New Day” formula to not just a single franchise, but every single thing DC publishes. It just seems so…risky.

Hmm, did they ever consider just making all their comics really good…?: Here’s David Bitterbaum on four recent DC comics, three of which he liked and one of which he hated.

Supergirls rock and rolling: My God I love Cliff Chiang…is he drawing all 52 of those books? Because that might work…

I’d second this, so long as there are parades involved: “Geek Pride Day”

What, none of Bluewater bio-comics made the list?: Here are CNN’s “top five political comic books.” Number two on the list is probably particularly relevant right now, given the news of the later part of last week.

2011 Glyph Awards Winners: I don’t always list award winners here, because there are so many awards, but then I feel like I probably should list the Glyph Awards winners, since I was one of the judges this year, but then I think maybe I shouldn’t because it’s gauche to do so given my involvment, and then I think it’s not about me so I why am I overthinking it and anyway, here’s who won what. Congratulations to all of the winners; and to all of the losers, I hope you realize I was totally susceptible to bribes, so if you didn’t win, you have no one to blame but yourself for not offering me large sums of money. (Legal disclaimer: I’m totally kidding)

Rapturetoons: In light of recent predictions that didn’t quite go off (Guys, Jesus said “of that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone” right there in the gospel of Matthew!), Sequential rounded up some Rapture-related comics on the Internet, while Daryl Cagle did the same with political cartoons on the subject.

“We can all agree now that it was crap, right?”: Writing for Mightygodking.com, John Seavey examines the impact of Marvel’s Civil War series five years later, specifically looking at what changes the series wrought that Marvel embraced and which they ran away screaming from at first opportunity. It really does seem like a lot of the latter, and not so much of the former, huh?

And you say the sky is what color, exactly?: “‘Beetle Bailey’ set bad example”

I always enjoy reading stories like this: At Sequential Tart, Anita Olin talks about how she got into comic books. (Via The Beat)

Mike Sterling apologizes: But sometimes, when you’ve been thinking about some small aspect of a 1974 Swamp Thing comic book for years, it’s best to just put it on your blog and get it off your chest.

What comics publishers talk about when they talk about selling out: I imagine most of you have heard some version of this before, but Jason Wood does a nice job of explaining what exactly it means when a publisher announces that a comic book has sold out in this piece for iFanboy. I suppose it varies from publisher to publisher, but personally when I hear one of the bigger publisher’s announce a comic book selling out, it  usually just confuses me, since comics are ordered far in advance and are unreturnable, making direct market publishing awfully close to printing-to-order. So sometimes when I read some announcements of sell-outs, I can’t help but translate them into “We messed up pretty badly” in my head. Anyway, the info Wood presents is always worth keeping in mind when parsing publisher PR.

Nice @#$%ing cover: Fantagraphics’ Flog blog shares word that Paul Hornschemeier is providing the cover for Dan Sinker’s The F***ing Epic Twitter Quest of @MayorEmanuel, a fake twitter account attributed to the notoriously foul-mouthed Obama chief-of-staff turned Chicago mayor that rapidly evolved into a fantasy novel of sorts. From what I’ve read of it, the book should be really funny, and that’s a damn fine cover image.

If so, it’s probably Circe’s doing: “Is ‘Wonder Woman’ Cursed?”

Superhero comics won’t truly be mainstream until newspapers care enough to Google the correct spelling of  “Spider-Man”: That personal pet peeve aside, this Ottawa Citizen feature on Dale Eaglesham, premised on his upcoming Alpha Flight comic, is a nice spotlight of a deserving talent.

“Life After ‘Walking Dead’”: This Fear.net article, sub-titled “Five Horror Graphic Novels You Need to Read,” has a very broad definition of horror, and I’m not sure those five works would necessarily appeal to someone who liked Walking Dead (It’s not like it has much in common with Jill Thompson’s Scary Godmother comics, for example), but no one can ever go wrong with Jill Thompson, Rick Geary, Richard Sala, Thomas Ott and Lorenzo Mattotti.

“After all, if you’re going to ogle a drawing, it would be nice if it appeared to be human”: Good point, Matthew J. Brady.

IDW’s TMNT creative team is…: Comics Alliance put the word “exclusive” in brackets after their “IDW Announces ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ Creative Team” headline, so I’ll link to their peice. That’s news I’ve been waiting to hear announced for quite some time now, and I’ll admit that it was pretty shocking news. There are three names attached, two of them belong to people whom I had never heard of, and the third of which is literally the last person I ever would have expected to hear as being attached to this project. Well, literally the last comics person—my grandfather is probbly the last person in general I would have expected to hear is attached to this project.

Doug Moench and Russ Heath, Doug Moench and Roger Ebert: Bhob shares an old Moench/Heath strip, and the story behind it. (Via tcj.com)

Life imitates political cartoon: Michael Cavna shares a 2003 cartoon about an Arnold Schwarzenegger love child by Cam Cadrow, which now looks prescient.

Bad movie, good beer?: Bryan Munn didn’t care for the Thor film, but he drank a rather appropriate-sounding beer before taking it in. (I’m pretty positive those 3D action sequences would have made me ill if I had any beer in my stomach, although I did like the movie for the most part).

“One psychologist even changed the comic book world and influenced…the feminist movement”: Psychcentral.com profiles William Moulton Marston.

The logic of most of these reasons is completely unassailable: “Why Aquaman is the best damn superhero in comic history”

Flashpoint vs. Fear Itself: Yan Basque counts up August’s number of tie-ins for each series/event/thing. Which one wins or loses depends on whether you think a huge number of tie-ins for a big, huge series is a good thing or a bad thing.

Hey, Al Milgrom’s first name is Allen?: The veteran artist gets profiled on the occasion of the Thor movie making Marvel superheroes the main topic of pop-culture conversation for another few weeks.

I can never see Herc’s thumbs-up face too many times: This Michael Agger piece for Slate doesn’t really definitively explain the origins of the meme “Cool Story, Bro!”, or find out who attached it to a panel from Incredible Hercules (It makes me think of Chris Sims, but I guess that’s just an image that makes me think of Chris Sims in general), but it worth noting simply because that’s a lot of Incredible Hercules to see on the generally Herc-free Slate.

Could Ben Grimm have really been Blackbeard?: Sean Kleefeld examines the evidence. Maybe they shoulda cast Michael Chiklis in the new Pirates of the Caribbean instead of Ian McShane…

Gene Ha doesn’t mess around when he does con sketches: Check out his Shade. (Via Speed Force)

I’m not going to miss reading articles and blog posts about Smallville: Despite my curiosity about seeing favorite characters in live-action on a TV budget and all the young, attractive folks cast, I never got into Smallville, and am pretty sick of hearing about it’s final season/episode at this point. I do like articles like this one, however, which have pictures of the subject I’m most interested in—the designs and costumes. Like Alan’s recent column, it’s a nice reminder of how widely varied, but generally awful, the designs were (I think Zatanna, Black Canary, Aquaman, Green Arrow and Booster Gold were among the best, while Martian Manhunter and—hoo boy—Hawkman and Dr. Fate among the worst).

The most horrifying thing I’ve seen all week: Archie’s face on the Betty and Veronica cover Bully includes in this round-up of Oz-inspired comics covers, in recognition of L. Frank Baum’s just-passed birthday. He’s dressed as the Scarecrow, but it looks like someone made a scarecrow out of Archie’s face and…brr!

As a Cassandra Cain fan, I approve: Despite DC and the Bat-office seemingly having no idea what to do with the second Batgirl for the last five or six years—but trying something radically different and contradictory every couple of months anyway—it looks like Grant Morrison and Chris Burnham gave her a decent status quo, a cool codename, and a pretty neat new costume.

“Homogay…?”: This weird-ass article from Christwire.org is so over-the-top and the selections limited to out-of-context panels that the comics blogosphere has been making fun of of for years—where’s the one about the Joker’s boners, or Robin being the last person Batman touched?—that I think this is supposed to be a parody of conservative Christian alarmism, but, if so, it’s not really funny enough to waste too much time figuring out. It is the first time I’ve heard anyone use the term “homogay” before though. Is that common? (Via Tom Spurgon, whose link reads “it’s adorable when people think kids read comics”).

He’s right, I do like the fat guy, the horse and the frog!: Ty Templeton explains Thor.

The ability to build anything out of Legos instantly would be a pretty great superpower: This dude made me think of that.

Ryan Reynolds is easily started: Apparently.

If the free market chose the Justice League: I always read The Beat‘s sales analysis with interest, and for a while I would read Marc-Oliver Frisch’s DC month-to-month sales to see who the company’s seven most popular heroes were at a given time, with the arbitrary criteria of popularity simply being which characters headlining their own solo books sold the most copies in a given month. And then imagining them as a Justice League. I quit doing it after awhile, because it was almost always Superman, Supergirl and a bunch of Bat-people. This month is kind of interesting though, as there’s only three Bat-people, and the others are all traditional Justice Leaguers: Green Lantern Hal Jordan, Batman Bruce Wayne, Batman Dick Grayson, Superman, Green Arrow, Wonder Woman and Red Robin. If too many chefs spoil the soup, do too many Batmen spoil a League? On a less nerdy note is the fact that “a consistent, critically acclaimed creative team” on a Batman book that comes out like clockwork seems to be helping Detective Comics gain rather than lose sales, and several other titles seem to be increasing for no obvious reason, which Frisch suggests reflects the market reacting to the quality of the work itself instead of the usual gimicks.

They made a Scott Pilgrim videogame, so maybe a Prison Pit one’s not out of the question: Fantagraphics’ Flog blog shares a link to a piece of fan art presenting the 8-bit videogame opening screen to a videogame that doesn’t exist…but should.

I don’t know how to pronounce it, but I like it: Down The Tubes has details on a new edition of  work featuring Sláine, Pat Mills and Simon Bisley’s Celtic Conan-type, coming to the U.S. Also on Down The Tubes, there are some details about a biography of a Terry Nation, a screenwriter for the old Dr. Who series, entitled The Man Who Invented Daleks. I barely even know what a Dalek is—Dr. Who is one of several large blind-spots in my nerd-culture knowledge—but that looks like a pretty neat book.

Personally, I would have picked a series with far fewer issues: At Chasing Amazing, Mark Ginocchio chronicles his quest to collect every single issue of Amazing Spider-Man.

Wonder Woman’s costumes on real women: As Jill already  mentioned, NBC has apparently passed on the much-discussed Wonder Woman series. I’m kind of disappointed; whether it would have been great, awful or somewhere in between, I was at least very curious about it, and I can’t imagine it being any worse than all those other terrible live-action TV superhero shows of the last few years. Anyway,  Noah Berlatsky has an interesting piece over at Comixology regarding Wonder Woman’s costuming, and how what works fine for a drawing doesn’t always work well for a real woman. The TV Wondy was the launching point of the article, but H.G. Peter’s original costume design and art is the focus.

And finally, speaking of comics and television…: The LA Times asks, “Will comic book hero Stan Lee turn into a zombie for ‘Walking Dead’?” and The Courier and Mail is among the venues reporting that Dynamite, Kevin Smith and Jonathan Lau are making a Bionic Man comic book (as you no doubt already saw on the main site).

The many random superpowers of J’onn J’onnz: Silver Age Comics looks at The Martian Manhunter’s powers as they originally began to emerge. And a few days previous, a look at J’onn’s greatest enemy.

Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, in handsomer days: Sean Kleefeld found some images of Wheeler-Nicholson, the founder of what would become DC Comics, the guy who kinda sorta invented comics and one of the many colorful characters of the Golden Age, and shared them on his blog.

Is the Preist movie based on a “graphic novel”…?: This article about the film based on the manhwa series, published state-side by Tokyopop, refers to the source material is a graphic novel in the headline. It’s one of several I’ve noticed in the last few days to do so. I know the term is a malleable one, but even at its most malleable, I’m not sure it applies here. What do you guys think?

Two rather idiosyncratic reactions to Thor: Law and The Multiverse explores the legal issues raised by the film in a pair of posts,  and Kalinara notes the greater-than-usual female presence in the film.

Yeah, Death Note will do that: Curt Purcell thought he could spend just a few minutes on the addictively suspenseful manga series and walk away.

Blank Slate’s upcoming slate: Down The Tubes shares the British publisher’s plans for the near future, which include a lot of neato stuff, like that Nelson collaborative graphic novel thing with the beautiful cover. Elsewhere on the site, cameos by several Scottish comics creators who aren’t Grant Morrison are revealed in a panel from All-Star Superman.

Some state politician vs. Neil Gaiman: At The Beat, Heidi MacDonald follows the goofy objections that Minnesota House Majority Leader Matt Dean has to Gaiman receiving $45,000 speaking fee to speak at a library that hired him to speak there (It began with Dean saying he hates Gaiman and calling him “a pencil-necked little weasel” and claiming that he practically stole the money. The various volleys and reactions have been about as sad and occasionally amusing as one might expect in such a situation.

“Who Is The Mighty Thor, And Why Should Anyone Care?”: At his blog Too Busy Thinking About My Comics, Colin Smith looks at the first issue of The Mighty Thor, the Marvel comic that seems specifically positioned to appeal to new readers interested in the movie. He finds it wanting. (Those Langridge/Samnee Thor: The Mighty Avenger trades seem like they oughta do the trick though, matching the tone of the film’s Thor/Natalie Portman relationship).

Superman vs. Spider-Man….Sorta: Ty Templeton presents a Mother’s Day cartoon, one which is a good illustration of my personal belief that Krypto the Super-Dog is the scariest character in comics. Speaking of the oft-linked to Templeton, it’s his birthday today—Happy birthday, Ty Templeton!)

They were the best of bin Laden cartoons, they were the worst of bin Laden cartoons: Michael Cavna and Slate collect the best cartoons reacting to the death of Osama bin Laden (I think Slate‘s “best” usually just means “a bunch”), while Matt Bors looks at the worst.

“Is this the way to make Wonder Woman work on the big screen?”: This Interestant post compares a potential Wonder Woman to the actual Thor movie, in that both feature mythological superheroes. I found it interesting because it was my thinking that the upcoming Captain America movie was the most natural parallel to a potential Wonder Woman movie, given that it features a star-spangled superhero fighting Nazis in World War II.

Now that’s an original superpower: Manta-Man is a man who can turn into a flying manta ray.

“Kat Dennings Gets Her Comic Book Movie Wish, Sans Workouts”: Thor might have been Dennings’ first comic book superhero movie, but it’s not her first superhero movie.

Congratulations: To the Doug Wright Awards winners, Aaron and Kempo and the folks who made the Thor movie (Can you believe that the possibility of a Warriors Three spin-off movie even exists? Truly, we live in an age of wonders).

Thor vs. Green Lantern, the Hi, I’m a Marvel… edition: JustSomeRandomGuy does it again.

Your FCBD reminder: This Saturday is the very best day of the entire year (Sorry, Christmas!), but circumstances beyond my control (stupid day job) will prevent me from visiting a comic shop for Free Comic Book Day goodies. Fantagraphics’ Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse, Top Shelf’s Top Shelf Kids Club (See Chris Eliopoulas “cover” characters created by James Kochalka, Andy Runton and others!),  Drawn and Quarterly’s John Stanley’s Summer Fun, Marvel’s Captain America/Thor (By the Mighty Avenger team of Robert Langridge and Chris Samnee) and Image’s Super Dinosaur Origin Special #1 are the book’s I’m most interested in and excited abou, so let me know how they are if you pick any of ‘em up. Also, drop some cash on a trade or something while you’re there scoring freebies; I think proper Free Comic Book Day etiquette demands it. If you’re only a casual comics reader, in which case I’m surprised you’re reading this at all, you can find your nearest participating shop here.

FCBD in USA Today: America’s most copiously colored newspaper has a short feature on Free Comic Book Day in today’s edition. Yesterday, they ran a feature story on DC’s upoming Flashpoint, and, to a lesser extent, comic book publishing event/crossovers in general.

“Who would you pick, Miller or Morrison, to ‘explore’ her past?”: DC Women Kicking Ass talks about Frank Miller and Grant Morrison’s interest in a Wonder Woman comic. I’d like to see both, actually (and I’m sure DC would as well, given the fact that those are two of the most marketable names among today’s creators). I’m sure both would be a blast, although I don’t know that either would do a good job of communicating the “real” Wonder Woman that Marston and Peter created. The best Wonder Woman comics of the past decade or so have been Adam Warren’s Empowered comics,  but it would probably be redundant for him to do another comic about bondage, feminism, male-female power struggles and relationships and superheroes at this point, even if a Wonder Woman comic would give him new characters and classic designs to play with.

“Well, every so often I need to be reminded that comics are supposed to be a fun part of my life”: The Supergirl-centric Supergirl Comic Box Commentary blog lookst at Tiny Titans #39, that would be the “pink” issue, an  ideal reminder of just how much fun comics can be.

Peter David thinks Thor is better than The Incredible Hulk, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Iron Man 2 and Punisher: War Zone: On his blog, David called it “easily the best Marvel movie since ‘Iron Man’,” although I don’t think that says a whole lot. Bloggers are starting to respond to thier own viewing experiences. The Comics Journal‘s  Dan Nadel didn’t like it, while Heidi “The Beat” MacDonald and Savage Critic Brian Hibbs had more mixed feelings. I plan on seeing it in a couple hours of here, and I imagine that as long as Natalie Portman gets enough screen time, I’ll be at least mildly entertained—the ability to stare at Natalie Portman for long periods of time even made the last few Star Wars movies endurable, after all.

This sounds like a funny premise…that’s about five years too late: Writer Chad Blakely has written a graphic novel entitled Kidnapping Kevin Smith, about two comic shop employees who kidnap the director/writer/actor/comics dabbler in an attempt to force him to write a screenplay about them. Really nice Mike Allred cover image though, and a good “get,” considering Allred’s history with Smith’s intersection with comics.

“A History of Storm in Comic Covers”: Doubles as a sad commentary on the deevolution of the importance of drawing skills and design on comic book covers over the years.

“As there are any number of reviews out there that will tell you why you should avoid this book, I’ll provide a little contrast by illuminating what I liked”: Collected Editions actually finds a few things to like in  the Justice League: Rise and Fall collection, which includes The Fall of Green Arrow and the Prism-award winning Rise of Arsenal.

You know, I’ve been waiting to see these guys reappear in a new DC Comics ever since Batman Inc was first announced: “Green Arrows of the World Meet the Battling Bowman”

Reminder: Michael Dooney still draws pretty ladies very well.

The Mindless Ones‘ “Three Fools” Part 3: I linked to the first two parts of the series, so I might as well do the third as well, focusing on Grant Morrison’s version of The Joker that has appeared during his current run on the Bat-books and began, oddly enough, way back in Aztek.

New Teen Titans was apparently a great source of “Nobody’s Favorites” characters: Andrew Weiss tackles DC’s first dude named Azrael.

There seems to be some confusion regarding the definition of a “shirt”: Because if you take some time to explore Hot Chicks In Batman Shirts, you’ll find that  some of those shirts are clearly undergarments, and some of the girls aren’t even wearing shirts. It’s probably NSFW, I imagine (Via Tom Spurgeon, Your #1 Source For Photos of Attractive Women Wearing Superhero Merchandise!)

Speaking of Batman shirts…: Bully, the little stuffed bull-ogger, does some detective work that I think would make Batman proud, closely examining a Batman shirt purchased from Target. Also at Bully’s Comics Oughta Be Fun, he presents some less than masterful work from the comic book masters.

Is it gauche to linkblog back to your own blog?: Because I’m gonna do it. I have some suggestions for future issues of DC Comics Presents. How about you guys? Anything you’d like to see re-presented in DC’s $8, 100-ish page almost-trade format?

How will this affect Frank Miller’s Holy Terror graphic novel?: I don’t know. Or care that much. But I feel weird linking to any comics-related “news” this morning and not at least mentioning the thing most folks are going to be talking about/thinking about. It’s a slow news day today, other than, you know, that news.

So long, Sluggo Saturdays: At his Progressive Ruin blog, Mike Sterling talks at length about his two year-long Sluggo Saturdays feature, pointing out some of his favorites and the awesome panel that first drew his interest to Sluggo in the first place.

“One of the best by one of the best”: The Moment of Moore tumble-thingee spotlights a 1998 drawing of Alan Moore by Gilbert Hernandez. I love the fact that as great a comic writer as Moore is, he’s also a great comics character. (Via Flog)

Everybody interview Chester Brown: Here are two new mainstream media pieces on the Paying For It cartoonist, from The National Post and The Star.

Truth, Justice and the Death To America Way: Guys, I honestly cannot tell you how glad I am that Graeme has been blogging about Superman renouncing his citizenship or whatever in Action Comics #900 (here and here). When I first heard the news, I gasped “Oh no!” Not because I particularly care about imaginary character Superman’s imaginary citizenship—dude’s not even “real” within the fictive DC Universe, where Clark Kent and Kal-El are his “real” identities, and spent about a year exiled from Earth on New Krypton at the request of planet Earth—but because the last thing I wanted to do was sift through mainstream media coverage of another ginned-up comic book “controversy” like Batman hanging out with a Muslim or Captain America comic book featuring signs taken from a real world protest of a black man being president. Heidi MacDonald of The Beat has a stronger stomach than I, and is paying attention to the mainstream reaction, so check her out for more. I think Mike Sterling  sums it up pretty well in this post at his Progressive Ruin blog (you’ll have to scroll past the really important news of the day, regarding Swamp Thing action figures), noting that the subplot is “causing people who’ve never read Superman comics to threaten to never read Superman comics.” Political satire blog Wonkette has a similar take about the importance of threats to “boycott” Superman, expressed in their own particular style and vitriolic viewpoint:

So here’s mythical metrosexual King of America and lamestream media reporter Clark “Superman” Kent pledging to join the U.N. or something. Teabaggers will be very upset! Even though the only comics they read are “Mallard Filmore” and those emailed pictures of the Obama Chimp Family picking watermelons outside the White House.

Will that stop teabaggers and Palin slobs from “boycotting” something they don’t read and would never purchase. Of course not, c’mon, are you new around here?

Hard to argue with the conclusion of their post either, of which I’ve taken out a swear because we try not to use those particular swears here: “You know what’s going to be…awesome? Never looking at the Internet again.” Oh, if only it were that easy…

Steven Weissman draws Harry Potter: Check it out here.

Oh, maybe that’s why his Batman comics have been coming out late: Grant Morrison has a lot going on these days, like his prose book Supergods. DC’s Source blog has a first look at the cover.

R. Sikoryak’s Jerry Robinson’s Joker (And Jerry Robinson, too): The artist has a nice illustration of Robinson and Robinson’s most famous creation in The New Yorker, accompanying an article on Jerry Robinson. You can see it here. And, of course, in The New Yorker.

Oops, I’m not done with politics just yet after all: What’s the difference between depicting a white president with big ears as a chimpanzee and a black president with big ears as a chimpanzee? Alan Gardner of The Daily Cartoonist links to an NPR piece on potentially offensive political cartooning, in which Tell Me More host Michel Martin interviews American Political Cartoons author Stephen Hess and political cartoonist Mike Luckovich. I’m linking to Gardner’s post instead of just straight to NPR, as Gardner provides a bit of background. Do give the interview a listen, or read the transcript here. Luckovich is a hell of a cartoonist, and there’s some interesting stuff in there about political cartooning in general and a bit about his thought process, and Hess has some funny stories, like one about a 1902 conflict between a cartoonist and a governor.

More Toth imminent: Yesterday I mentioned the release of Genius, Isolated, the first part of a biography of Alex Toth by Dean Mullaney and Bruce Canwell. Well, there’s another handsome-looking volume coming on the subject of Toth set for summer release, Setting The Standard: Comics By Alex Toth 1952-1954, edited by Greg Sadowski. Fantagraphics shows off the cover here.

Please give Ross Campbell a call, IDW!: I know I discussed artist Ross Campbell’s sketches and in-depth thoughts about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on my personal blog already, but I’m not sure if I have here or not yet. Well, I’m going to do so today, because Campbell’s still posting sketches and thoughts, including a story he apparently started for Mirage starring Shadow, Casey Jones’ now-teenaged daughter. If you’ve any affecton for those characters, I’d highly reccomend you spend some time with Campbell looking at his art. And if you happen to have the license to publish new ninja turtle comics—IDW—I’d highly reccomend you hire the hell out of Ross Campbell. He’s the ideal artist for 21st century ninja turtle comics.

Rick Veitch draws Dr. Strange: Here.

“The Adventures of Alfred”: Those Fabulous Fifties shares some comics featuring everyone’s favorite comic book butler, in some extraordinary extra-buttling adventures.

Mark Millar tells the truth: The Mindless Ones on Kapow!

I like the name Sugar Ninjas: If you like the concept, and are a female artist, they’d like your submissions.

Everyone should always be doing this: Zak from Playing D&D With Porn Stars draws his way through the Fiend Folio.

When Dr. Voodoo was a white guy: Found in the The Comic Book Catacombs, a previous Dr. Voodoo who wasn’t Brother Voodoo promoted to Sorcerer Supreme.

Is Scott Adams maybe moving into performance art?: That would certainly explain the Dilbert cartoonist’s activities of late. Here’s the latest “Say, that’s a strange place for Scott Adams’ name to appear” story.

“Robin in the Rye”: Andrew Lorenei has Robin perform scenes from J.D. Salinger’s most-read novel. Nice Penguin cameo. Check out Lorenei’s archives while you’re there; lots of good stuff. (Via Comics Cavern)

“So you tell me… is the following image OK for a 12-year-old?”: At Eye on Comics, Don MacPherson notes a weird panel from a recent issue of Thunderbolts, and points out that Marvel rated the comics okay for ages 12 and over. It often seems to me that folks at DC and Marvel spent a lot of time coming up with their ratings systems, appy them to some books once, and then never, ever thnk about them again.

Lois Lanes are fun to draw: So says super cartoonists Kate Beaton at the bottom of this series of Lois vs. Superman strips. I don’t know about drawing them, but Lois Lanes are certainly fun to look at, at least when Beaton’s drawing them. I hope someone at DC is already on the phone trying ot get a hole of Beaton to offer her a sack of money to do a Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane revival special.

“We’ve been well received. We’re told there’s nothing quite like it in the city”: That’s Drawn & Quarterly publisher Chris Oliveros in this Montreal Gazette feature on the D+Q  brick-and-mortar bookstore.

“I never would have imagined that the American popularity of anime would have given birth to such an involved, complex and constructive culture”: I really enjoyed this column on Sakura-Con by Timothy Siegel of Forbes. It’s kind of charming in its outsider speaking to an audience of outsiders tone, but ir really sounds like Siegel went from knowing nothing about any of this goldanged anime stuff to being completely won over by it. I wonder if he’ll be cosplaying at the next Sakura-Con?

Please enjoy some Easter leftovers: Yet Another Comics Blog shares a Walt Kelly-drawn Easter cover, Polite Dissent continues its Peeps cosplaying super-teams tradition, Sunday Comics Debt looks at an older B.C. Easter tradition (Wait, if the comic is literally set Before Christ, then how can they acknowledge a holiday founded on the death of Christ…?), Todd Klein tells us about his easter egg coloring, Ty Templeton presents some rabbit-on-rabbit violence and shares a picture of Superman hanging out with a Joker-creepy Easter bunny, Law and the Multiverse examines a few legal issues regarding the Easter rabbit and Daryl Cagle rounds up some Easter-themed political cartoons.

So basically Thing doesn’t need to wear his XXXL raincoat and Carmen Sandiego hat get-up anymore, right?: I enjoyed this really smart piece by Colin Smith about how Ben Grimm’s transformation into The Thing and the tragic nature of his appearance as originally conceived no longer means the same thing that it once did, in the Marvel Universe or our universe. (Via Comics Reporter)

“It’s all fiction. None of this happened”: That’s Gary Groth vs. Jim Shooter’s recent blog posts on one of the more important/touchy issues in the last few decades of the American comic book industry—Marvel vs. Jack Kirby over Jack Kirby’s art. It’s a great read. Plus, I learned two new words while reading it.

Okay, Swamp Thing can return to the DC Universe: But Josh Bayer gets to do the covers. Deal?

The tradition of casting black folks in viking movies: Writing for Salon, Bob Calhoun examines the tempest in a teapot that was casting Idris Elba as a pseudo-Norse space-god in the upcoming Thor movie, and notes its hardly the first time a black guy has appeared in a viking movie.

Someday someone will mount a full production (I hope): This sounds kind of neat. Apparently a theater company that does Shakespeare is performing a reading of Anthony del Col and Conor McCreery’s Secret Wars-starring-Shakespeare’s characters comic Kill Shakespeare. That’s obviously a comic with a lot of dramatic potential, and I figure it’s only a matter of time before it gets full-on adapted. I wonder if it will make it to the stage or to the silver screen first though…?

Is there a font called “Spirit Title” yet?: Imprint magazine has a downright astonishing article on Will Eisner’s usage of three-dimensional looking, “stone type” in his Spirit features, and some of the comics covers his signature technique inspired over the years (Via The Source). Comics Alliance has a similarly-themed post, which includes a swell Gotham Adventures cover.

Oh yeah, Wizard was good for something: Bully posts Ben Grimm’s Passover adventure from Twisted Toyfare Theater.

“Surprise Penis!”: Ty Templeton carefully defines and explains Surprise Penis, and counts down the top-ten best examples from toys, cartoons and comics. Probably NSFW.

Because you worry about really weird things…?: “Why Wonder Woman’s Costume Really Worries Me”

He’s not writing Detective Comics for nothing: Scott Snyder unravels an extremely pervasive mystery plaguing superhero comics, and takes to Twitter to reveal it; iFanboy captured the results.