PW’s Calvin Reid grabs Comic-Con marketing director David Glanzer to ask him the lingering questions:

PWCW: I guess you’ve had to answer this question a lot, but what is your response to the general discussion out there that, perhaps, the show should move to another city?

DG: We would love to stay here; we love San Diego and it would make things so much simpler if we stay here. When we signed our last agreement with the city to stay through 2012, we knew we would have to forego growth for a few years. Now there is the possibility of the expansion of the Convention Center by the city. That’s something that wouldn’t just be just good for Comic-Con, but would be good for the city as a whole. They could book shows simultaneously and other things. But we haven’t seen much movement from the city on plans to expand the convention center.

Whitney Matheson at Pop Candy gave away a cool piece of swag at her meet-up during the San Diego Comic-Con … a collection of single-panel comics based on posts to the Pop Candy Twitter feed. Matt Silady, who contributed, showed me his copy during the con; his comic featured John Candy and Kermit the Frog getting very close. You can check out the entire comic over at Pop Candy.

And, via Topless Robot, Kotaku has a shot of The Joker from the game.

Yes, Comic-Con International ended two days ago, but there are still stories and announcements filtering out:

• ICv2.com has a convention overview, and an interview with David Glanzer, director of marketing of public relations. This year saw a sellout before the show even began, and “a large increase” in registrations by journalists. Comic-Con will remain in San Diego at least through 2012, when its contract with the convention center expires. However, if the facilities don’t expand by 2010, Glazner says, “we’re going to have to explore options.”

• National Public Radio’s All Things Considered reports on librarians at the convention attending tailored panels and searching for — you guessed it — manga.

• Deb Aoki covers Chip Kidd’s Bat-Manga! panel.

• The Christian Science Monitor, which couldn’t resist a “POW! ZOWIE!” headline, looks at scholars who are drawn to comics, and to the convention.

• The Los Angeles Times laments that comics are being squeezed out of Comic-Con. Here’s The Spirit actress Jaime King: “There does seem to be some random booths here which don’t have anything to do with comics. Slowly but surely the entertainment community is taking over to promote their projects here even though they have absolutely nothing to do with comics. What’s next? A panel for Deal or No Deal?”

• Wildstorm continues snatching up licenses, announcing comics based on the video games Resident Evil and Devil May Cry.

Yesterday DC announced that after Grant Morrison’s “Batman R.I.P” story ends, Denny O’Neil will write a couple of issues focused on Gotham City and the aftermath of that storyline. After that, in January 2009, DC teased that Neil Gaiman will write a Batman story called “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?” On his blog, Gaiman shares a few nuggets of info:

So I don’t have to write lots and lots of emails back to all the journalists:

1) Yes, I am writing a two part Batman story.

2) Yes, Andy Kubert will be drawing it.

3) Yes, it will be two oversized issues.

4) No, I don’t plan to say anything else about it until it’s all written and drawn.

Related: Matt Brady talks to Dan DiDio about the announcement

Activision and Marvel rolled out a new trailer for Spider-Man: Web of Shadows at Comic-Con. The game will hit shelves in October.

Coming next February, the next Scott Pilgrim volume is titled Scott Pilgrim vs. the Universe. This was announced at the Oni panel on Saturday; watch for my full report from the panel on the main site.

It was announced before the San Diego Comic-Con, and now Mattel’s collector’s website is live. Unfortunately, you can’t buy anything off of it yet; the four con-exclusive toys they had at the show are listed as “coming soon” and the “add to cart” button on the home page image generates an error.

Update: You can now order the Giganta and Lobo exclusives from San Diego.

• Shhhh! The comics industry is sleeping now.

• At Good Comics for Kids, Scott Robins reports that Scholastic has plans for more Bone after Vol. 9 is released next spring. Previously published “peripheral material” will be adapted for a young audience.

• Gia Manry covers the spotlight panels on creators Tite Kubo (Bleach) and Hiro Mashima (Fairy Tail). As an added bonus, she has video of Mashima drawing Natsu from Fairy Tail.

• ComiPress has an exhaustive roundup of manga-related convention coverage.

• Tor.com’s Pablo Defendini reports on the Watching the Watchmen panel, which featured Dave Gibbons, Chip Kidd and Mike Essel discussing the upcoming book that details the making of the groundbreaking comics series.

• Another Comic-Con, another round of folks questioning whether the convention could, or should, leave San Diego: Variety, Broadcast Newsroom, Major Spoilers.

• According to Geoff Boucher of The Los Angeles Times, sales of original art were brisk at the convention. He spoke with art dealer Joe Mannarino, who had just laid out $115,000 for the original pages from Green Lantern #84, by Neal Adams and Bernie Wrightson.

• Wired‘s Underwire blog provides a convention overview, focusing on the relationship between comics and Hollywood.

• Creators Jason Aaron, Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, G. Willow Wilson and Brian Wood blogged from San Diego. Azzarello will never have a career as a food photographer …

• USA Today blogger Whitney Matheson rattles off her “15 favorite things about Comic-Con.”

• Heroes star Milo Ventimiglia is, I don’t know, producing a comic through his DiVide Pictures, to be released by Top Cow.

You can follow our complete Comic-Con coverage here.

These photos and captions were provided by Newsarama writer Vaneta Rogers, who I met for the first time in person at the con this year. She was a lot of fun to hang out with in the line to get our press badges and at the Eisners.

Grant Morrison signs at the DC booth:

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There was quite a bit of big publishing news at this year’s comic-con, some of which got buried underneath the plethora of press releases, panels and general announcements. PW, however, caught the news of book publisher Abrams creating a new comics imprint:

[Editor Charles] Kochman will direct the new imprint, which will launch with four new titles: The Art of Harvey Kurtzman: The Mad Genius of Comics by Denis Kitchen and Paul Buhle; The Art of Jaime Hernandez: The Secrets of Life and Death by Todd Hignite, designed by Jordan Crane with an introduction by acclaimed cartoonist Alison Bechdel; Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-creator Joe Shuster by Craig Yoe; and Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow? by Brian Fies, the creator of the award-winning Web comic/book Mom’s Cancer.

Abrams publisher Steve Tager said launching a new imprint “made sense. We’ve published comics and pop culture titles in the past—we’ve sold half a million copies of the Art of Walt Disney—so Charles is building on a history that Abrams already has. But he brings a passion and experience in the category. He’s brought in more graphic novels and launching an imprint just makes sense in this marketplace.” Tager said the imprint will be able to cross-promote with Abrams’s children’s book line, special markets department and internationally—he noted that Kirby: King of Comics, Mark Evanier’s biography of comics artist Jack Kirby, is a bestseller for Abrams U.K. “We’ve been coming to Comic-con for several years now and our education in the category continues,” said Tager. “And our designers and sales reps all love Charlie’s books; he focuses on the little things and that’s what makes his books special.”

I fell behind on posting pictures from the con, so let’s see if I can catch up ….

Here’s the Brave and the Bold banner that was hanging outside the convention center:

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Shaky footage of the X-Men Origins: Wolverine trailer shown at Comic-Con has, of course, made its way to YouTube. A quick, if somewhat blurry, glance shows appearances by Deadpool, Blob, Gambit — to cheers! — and what appeared to be Emma Frost.

The movie opens on May 1.

Editor’s Note: Paul Levitz returns to Blog@Newsarama with thoughts on the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award he received during the Eisners Friday night, as well as Comic-Con and Watchmen.

by Paul Levitz

Mistake or not, I’m not giving it up.

In a field like comics, giving a publisher a humanitarian award is almost oxymoronic. Ultimately, the publisher’s job is to run the business, in an industry that is always (and rightfully) centered on its creative goals and accomplishments. Luckily, I grew up loving comics, so I never disagreed with those priorities, even when I recognized that the mix of my skills would lead me to spend more years on the business side than writing or in editorial.

Even more luckily, I learned early that it’s good business to align people’s interests…and that means the creative people need to win when the company does. Friends and mentors like Jenette Kahn, Joe Orlando, Dick Giordano and Phil Seuling taught me how to try to do that, and DC has been part of a corporation that values and rewards creativity as one of its fundamental values, so I was never doing this alone.

Receiving the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award at Comicon International this week was one of the highlights of my life, for its unpredictability (special thanks to Mark Evanier for keeping me from leaving the Eisners for a counter-scheduled DC event–the best turn he’s done me at San Diego since he almost drove us to Tijauana when he gave me a lift here for my first SDCC almost 35 years ago), for the warmth from my peers in the room, and for receiving recognition for a part of my work that has always been close to my heart. The last time I felt remotely that way was receiving an award at the 100th anniversary dinner for Stuyvesant, and getting it from my favorite high school English teacher, Frank McCourt.

* * *
The rest of Comicon is a blur, set to the soundtrack of the WATCHMEN trailer playing in the DC booth. So many friends touched, bits of good news passed on, and positive developments for DC and the whole field. With the wind at our backs from the phenomenal success of THE DARK KNIGHT (was it really less than two weeks ago that we were celebrating at the premiere?), the debut of the WATCHMEN trailer and Comicon sneak peek, and so much more, we’re at a great moment. There’s our rich history to look back on (and celebrated at moments like the 50th anniversary LEGION panel), and an even brighter future ahead.

Speaking of ahead, spent time at Comicon on an opportunity which may create more new graphic novel readers in a short period of time than anything in memory. For years, our retailers have told us that WATCHMEN was the field’s best gateway drug–give a copy to a potential new reader and there’s a good chance of conversion. The WATCHMEN trailer created a response unprecedented in bookselling, boosting sales of the graphic novel by enormous percentages. It hit #2 on Amazon.com (not #2 graphic novel, #2 overall) and has stayed on all hit lists in comic shops and book stores. We’re literally printing every copy we can, shipping over 200,000 in a matter of weeks. If we get historic rates of conversion, we’ll have significantly increased the total audience for graphic novels in America.

I’m going to go collapse on a couple of chairs in the meeting room of the DC booth now, and gather my strength for Chapman’s annual Dead Dog Party.

I’m exhausted, and I’m not even in San Diego.

Saturday’s “DCU: A Guide to Your Universe” panel at last put an end to relentless questions about the status of the Milestone Media characters: They’re being incorporated into the DC Comics universe, initially in the pages of Justice League of America and Teen Titans.

The same panel also revealed that the Archie Comics line of superheroes — The Fly, The Shield, The Black Hood and others — have been acquired by DC. The characters, licensed by DC in the early ’90s and published under the Impact imprint, will be reintroduced during J. Michael Straczynski’s run on The Brave and the Bold.

Marvel, meanwhile, announced that Mark Millar, original writer of Ultimate X-Men and The Ultimates, is returning to help reshape the Ultimate line.

“The Marvel Universe has basically been turned into the Ultimate Universe, right down to the military super-teams,” Millar told Newsarama, “so now it’s time to go back and take things to the next level. I have a very big pad filled with notes here and am blazing on this stuff. I just want to take things to the next level.”

The publisher also revealed its followup to Secret Invasion: a cosmic event called War of Kings.

Other convention-related announcements:

• ComiPress has a good rundown of the manga acquisitions and new releases announced at Comic-Con.

• Devil’s Due Publishing has entered into a parntership with Humanoids to release some of the French publisher’s titles in the United States.

• Mike Grell will helm a new Warlord series from DC, debuting next spring.

• IDW Publishing announced that Joe Hill’s Locke & Key will return in December as an ongoing series, and Steve Niles is revisiting vampires with Epilogue.

• The sequel to Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s Eisner Award-winning miniseries The Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite now has a title and a release date: The Umbrella Academy: Dallas will debut in November.

• Dark Horse is revisiting the Aliens and Predator franchises.

• Writer Andy Diggle (The Losers, Hellblazer) will take over Marvel’s Thunderbolts beginning with Issue 126.

• Top Cow is releasing Art of Wanted, an oversized art book containing images from the comics, stills from the movie, and concepts from the upcoming video game.

You can follow our complete Comic-Con coverage here.

Gary Miereanu of Warner Home Video sent this photo of Nathan Fillion posing with “Wonder Woman” yesterday on the convention floor. Fillion, best known as Capt. Malcolm Reynolds in Firefly, provides the voice of Steve Trevor in the direct-to-DVD Wonder Woman animated movie. (It’s set for release in February.)

Any reason to run a Nathan Fillion photo, I say …

Devil’s Due Publishing announced yesterday at Comic-Con that it has partnered with Humanoids to release some of the French publisher’s titles in the United States.

Humanoids entered into a similar, if short-lived, pact with DC Comics in 2004.

This new partnership calls for two to three serialized comics and graphic novels to be released each month, with at least an initial focus on works by well-known American creators.

The imprint launches in November with I Am Legion: The Dancing Faun, illustrated by John Cassaday. That’s followed in December by The Zombies Who Ate the World, by Jerry Frissen and Guy Davis.

Other titles will include Redhand, written by Kurt Busiek, Metal, illustrated by Butch Guice, and classic books such as The Metabarons and The Technopriests.

The full press release can be read after the break.

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I’m stealing another item from Random House’s Suvudu blog, which has the video of Frank Miller’s keynote address from Friday’s Eisner Awards ceremony.

Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof solved at least one mystery at Comic-Con yesterday: the whereabouts of his unfinished 2006 miniseries Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk.

The second issue of the planned six-part series was released in February 2006; the third issue initially was solicited for April 2006, but it never appeared.

That status of Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk has been a recurring question at Marvel convention panels, but at yesterday’s Ulimate Universe panel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada — with some help from Lindelof — finally had an answer.

When, like clockwork, the question was posed, Lindelof ran to the stage with the script to Issue 6 in hand.

“Hey, these pages are blank,” Quesada joked.

Lindelof apologized for the delays, and said he’d be “eating s**t” in the hall outside. (You may remember that last July he was about to turn in the script to the fifth issue.)

Lindelof even provided a title for the final issue: “The One That Took Two Years To F***king Write.”

Now how’s Leinil Fancis Yu’s schedule?

What would Mark Waid do … or, more accurately, what should Mark Waid do?

At the BOOM! Studios panel on Friday at the San Diego Comic-Con, Waid said he wanted fan input on his next project for BOOM! Should he do superheroes, or something else?

So, what do you want to see from Waid? A western? Horror? Comedy? Something with giant robots fighting dinosaurs Or even original superheroes? Let’s hear your opinion in the comments section.