And of course, there’s nothing geeky about using a homophone (words spelled differently, but sound the same - yes, your English teacher is ashamed you forgot) to “re-name” your brand…

In a move that will further embolden its critics who claim that Sci Fi is far more “Fi” than “Sci,” and sometimes not “Sci Fi” at all, the network has announced that it will be changing its official name from “Sci Fi” to SyFy – in order not to seem so geek-oriented. David Howe will make the announcement at a network upfront today in New York.

From TV Week:

“The name Sci Fi has been associated with geeks and dysfunctional, antisocial boys in their basements with video games and stuff like that, as opposed to the general public and the female audience in particular,” said TV historian Tim Brooks, who helped launch Sci Fi Channel when he worked at USA Network.

Mr. Brooks said that when people who say they don’t like science fiction enjoy a film like “Star Wars,” they don’t think it’s science fiction; they think it’s a good movie.

“We spent a lot of time in the ’90s trying to distance the network from science fiction, which is largely why it’s called Sci Fi,” Mr. Brooks said. “It’s somewhat cooler and better than the name ‘Science Fiction.’ But even the name Sci Fi is limiting.”

Mr. Howe said going to Syfy will make a difference.

Though 2008 was the network’s best year ever, the network’s management had the feeling that the name was holding it back. 300 possibilities were considered before “SyFy” was selected. The changeover to the new name is slated to take place July 7th, in conjunction with the debut of the network’s new series, Warehouse 13.

The Sixth Sense: Not the Bruce Willis movie, but some crazy technology that Warren Ellis has video of over at his blog. Is crazy, and very cool. Go check it out.

Watchmen: The Hathor Legacy reviews Watchmen, though I’d like to have seen them deconstruct Laurie’s character more. Oh well, maybe I’ll do it myself one of these days.

PIXU: Via Becky Cloonan, apparently there’s a 17-page PIXU preview at Publishers Weekly. You’re welcome.

More Previews: Jason Aaron has preview pages from this week’s Ghost Rider and Scalped. If you’ve any sense you’re already buying Scalped regardless of preview pages, but if you haven’t the sense maybe this will convince you. Also, flaming skull head guy.

Racialicious on The Big Bang Theory, Nerds of Color, and Stereotypes. An interesting look at the assumed whiteness of “nerds” and of geek culture in general, and how the different stereotypes play out on TV.

Eliza Dushku not only stars in Dollhouse (to which I am now completely addicted), she’s also a producer.

Jezebel takes on the Japanese rape simulation video game. And here I was really hoping this was a bad joke.

Finally, a good friend of mine took me up on my suggestion that he read Northlanders. He was thrilled with the results. (Like the comic, the review contains some adult language.)

I went to see Watchmen with a hateful review by Anthony Lane stuck in my mind. His review in The New Yorker came complete with dutifully snarky illustration by Istvan Banjai and it got me wanting to see what could have inspired such bile. In general, I love The New Yorker but Anthony Lane just doesn’t get it to the point of being absurd.

At first, I thought his review must be a gag but he means what he says. He thinks most graphic novels are trash and that those who read them are as obsessive as fans of Wagner. Wow, this guy sounds like the clueless blowhard in Annie Hall with the subject being graphic novels instead of Marshall McLuhan.

In an alternate reality where there’d never been a Watchmen graphic novel, I think the movie would have been taken seriously by the Anthony Lanes of the world. The same content objected to in a comic book movie would be placed in its proper context and be accepted much as it would in a film like Clockwork Orange or Pulp Fiction.

Fortunately, the reality is that there is a graphic novel. It came first and it was written by Alan Moore. The reason that he will not support the movie, despite what Lane would try to imply, is that he does not support Hollywood. Getting past preconceptions, when I look at Watchmen, I see a movie that holds its own in the world of cinema. It is a great movie whether or not it came from a graphic novel and it’s great that it indeed comes from a graphic novel.

I had the pleasure of seeing Billy Crudup on Broadway in The Pillowman where he portrayed a man whose parents drive his brother insane through a series of freakish experiments. In Watchmen, Crudup brings his gentle but determined presence to the role of Dr. Manhattan where he is the result of a freakish experiment. He is no one’s brother but it is literally in his power to save humanity. It is a wonderful role played to perfection by Crudup. Another standout performance, of course, is Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach. He provides the most powerful moment in the movie when the volume is turned up on one of the panels from the graphic novel as he must stand his ground as a new prison inmate. He has just cut a rival down to size when he delivers these lines: “None of you understand. I’m not locked up in here with you. You’re locked up in here with me.” It is one of those moments suitable to be replayed as often as Jimmy Cagney saying, “Made it, Ma! Top of the world!” in 1949’s White Heat.

Watchmen’s theme of deconstructing superheroes is probably best expressed within the pages of comics. And the best argument for the need to move beyond the traditional superhero is the actual Watchmen graphic novel. As Moore states, the comics industry as a whole did not get his message. So, it’s understandable why he’d expect even less from a movie version. To the credit of the director, Zack Snyder, the screenwriters, David Hayter and Alex Tse, and the whole creative team, the movie is essentially in tune with the graphic novel while recalibrating it for the screen. It’s the politics of Watchmen that the movie fully develops in ways natural to cinema. Lifted up from the page, the doomsday geopolitics of the graphic novel of some twenty years ago, along with the universal truth of aggression, can be appreciated from the perspective of today. We’re still playing with a balance of power even if there are new players and the rules have changed. 

For those gremlin reviewers determined to undermine the movie by overstating its violence and dismissing its relevance, that is the act of an elitist attempting to bully through his agenda.  And that is more offensive than anything in the movie.

The NYTimes has seen an increase in popularity of these little books with pictures that so many of us dedicate our money, time, and even lives to, and as such has launched the “New York Times Graphic Books Bestseller Lists.” The three lists cover Hardcover, Softcover, and Manga in separate categories, so we don’t have to see nothing but Naruto on top at all times. It’s a huge step of acceptance of our pasttime, and cheers to all the creators who are leading the way as all-new New York Times Best-selling Authors! They’re compiled by a combination of book stores, online retailers, and direct market reported sales. The debut Hardcover list features a pretty solid mix of mainstream and indy books::

1. Starman Omnibus, Vol. 2 by James Robinson and Tony Harris. (DC Comics, $49.99.) Jack Knight, the son of the 1940’s Starman, meets his disco era namesake and his father’s colleague, the golden age Sandman.

2. Eerie Archives, Vol. 1 by various. (Dark Horse, $49.95.) The gruesome magazine, following in the steps of its cousin Creepy, gets the hardcover collection treatment.

3. Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. (DC Comics, $39.99, $75.) This epic tale from 1986 signaled a new maturity in comic books.

4. Batman: R.I.P. by Grant Morrison and Tony Daniel. (DC Comics, $24.99.) Thomas Wayne, the father of the caped crusader, is cast in a sinister light.

5. Walking Dead, Vol. 4 by Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard. (Image Comics, $29.99.) The gripping story of the human survivors in a world overrun by zombies continues.

6. Beanworld, Book 1 by Larry Marder. (Dark Horse, $19.95.) The fantasy series, about a world of bean characters, gets the deluxe reprint treatment.

7. Mighty Avengers Assemble by Brian Michael Bendis and Frank Cho. (Marvel Comics, $34.99.) The first adventures of a new team of heroes gets an oversized collection.

8. Incredible Hercules: Love and War by Fred Van Lente and Clayton Henry. (Marvel Comics, $19.99.) The demigod finds himself in Atlantis – just in time for a war.

9. Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland. (DC Comics, $17.99.) This critically acclaimed story from 1988 offers a possible origin for the Joker.

10. Complete Terry and the Pirates: Volume 6 by Milton Caniff. (IDW Publishing, $49.99.) The final volume of the series collects strips from 1945 and 1946.

The debut Softcover and Manga lists are after the jump.

(more…)

Over at Slate.com, Grady Hendrix loudly trumpets the idea that Watchmen “failed” to usher in a comic-book revolution.

Maybe Grady Hendrix should actually read some comics.

The summary of the article in Slate’s sidebar is “The revolution it was supposed to inspire—comics about ordinary people—never happened.”

So I guess Hendrix hasn’t seen Scalped or Local or Phonogram or pretty much anything Vertigo puts out, has never read Demo or The Boys or any of Warren Ellis’s recent Avatar books examining the nature of superheroes and real people (No Hero yesterday? Fascinating–and twisted–stuff.)

Hendrix is clearly waiting for comics to show up and tap him and the rest of the mainstream culture on the shoulder. Which is sad, because his reading of Watchmen is actually not bad–he highlights some of the best, most integral parts of the story and really seems to get it.

He also makes a point of the graphic novel fetish that mainstream culture seems to have. I read a lot of “graphic novels” but I blanch at anyone who says “I don’t read comics, I read graphic novels.” I’m tired of the false divide. Hendrix points out that Watchmen was treated like any other superhero comic until it was sold as a collection, and then the mainstream took notice of it, but he himself only takes notice of superhero comics and ignores the stacks of other books each month that are, for my money, better (quite literally, because anyone who’s been reading my blog entries knows what I spend my hard-earned dollars on).

Much praised for its “realistic” take on superheroes, Watchmen made the point that superheroes, realistic or otherwise, were beside the point. Its costumed do-gooders are retired, impotent, or insane, and they generally do more harm than good.

Yes. And how many more books could actually make this same point? Oh, that’s right…as I noted above, The Boys, No Hero, Black Summer, and probably an endless list of other books that I haven’t had the time to read are variations on this same theme.

Hendrix also ignores the technical and narrative innovations of Watchmen, choosing to focus on the “normal people”–which was indeed an important aspect of the comic, both the normal people on the street and the “normal” parts of the main characters (which I wrote about here). But his shallow focus on the innovations in cover design and backmatter skip entirely over the innovations in narrative.

He blames Watchmen, instead, for the turn towards “dark” stories in superhero comics, because broad themes in art and literature can always be traced back to one single event rather than broader sociological happenings. Hell, he even contradicts himself in the same paragraph, noting that

The year Watchmen came out, DC had already discovered the sales boost that came with knocking off superheroes, having killed dozens of them in their best-selling Crisis on Infinite Earths miniseries.

and then just a few lines later:

Watchmen helped kick off a decadent death spiral that would see adolescent violence peddled as adult content full of rape, murder, and corpse-burning.

So which is it? Is it Watchmen’s fault, or is it something that was happening as a trend across comics? Can you blame Watchmen for Frank Miller’s noir-inspired work? Or should we note that classic noir, among infinite other things, influenced Watchmen, as well? If you want to situation Watchmen in a historical context yet simultaneously claim that it is responsible for everything that happened in comics after its publication, what do you do?

Oh, that’s right. You’re writing about comics for an audience that you assume isn’t reading comics, so you don’t have to actually back up your sweeping claims. You just tell everyone out there that comics still suck, except for Watchmen, and that while you’re at it, the Watchmen movie will probably suck too. (Trust me, you’ll get my full take on that as soon as I get to see it.)

The achievement of Watchmen is that it showed comics could do something exciting and complex that wasn’t tied up in the concerns of the superpowered set. But it’s a testament to the power superheroes have over our imaginations that the costumes ultimately overshadowed everything else and will be front-and-center this Friday.

So wait a minute–his actual point is that Watchmen, the comic that pretty much everyone agreed was the best thing ever done in sequential art, failed because the people who made the movie about it missed the point? He’s blaming the comic because the adaptation sucks? (Well, we don’t even know if he thinks the adaptation sucks, because this isn’t a review of the film.)

It’s a huge leap to say that the comic, enjoying a resurgence now that may have been sparked by the film, failed. One can hope, instead, that it will lead to those thousands of people reading a comic for the first time to go into a comic shop and ask “What else can I read?”

And that’s certainly not failure.

So I ask you, Blog@Newsarama readers, what should we tell this guy to read that would show him that the things he wants to see in comics are already there? My personal choice, for a start, would be Demo, but I know you all have suggestions…

The LA Times Book Prize nominees were announced today, and there was a bit of excitement for comics readers.

Nate Powell’s Swallow Me Whole, published by Top Shelf, is on the list for Young Adult Literature, right next to another luminary we all know and love: Neil Gaiman with The Graveyard Book.

This might seem like a double victory for us comic lovers, and it is, but Powell’s book is the first comic since Maus (Fiction, 1992) to be nominated on the list. While Gaiman is One Of Us, The Graveyard Book is prose.

“As a fan, I admit I’m kind of hoping Neil and Nate huddle in a corner somewhere in LA and hatch a plan to collaborate on a new book,” Leigh Walton of Top Shelf said, and I can’t blame him. Swallow Me Whole (read my full review here) is a haunting story of a brother and sister in the grips of mental illness, beautifully rendered in black and white, and full of images straight out of a dream.

“We sort of had the feeling Swallow Me Whole would be a sleeper hit. This tremendous honor is a great opportunity for those who haven’t looked at this amazing book to check it out. Nate’s artistic wizardry is obvious from first glance, but the richness of his storytelling is something that grows and grows the more time you spend with Swallow Me Whole. We’re incredibly proud of Nate and delighted that his book is going to reach so many people so deeply — especially young people,” Walton said.

Check out more of Powell’s work over at Top Shelf 2.0 as well—because what’s better than free webcomics?

A friend gave me a copy of Labor Days way back in those dark days before NYCC, and I finally got the spare time to actually read it.

And I loved it.

It reads like Lucky Number Slevin meets Clerks and then has a whirlwind affair with Marxist theory and every cheesy spy movie you ever saw. It winks at everything from hip music to celebrities to communists, and allows you to laugh

It has sassy writing, unique art, a wicked sense of humor, uber-geeky theorist references combined with foul-mouthed sex jokes. In other words, almost everything I love.

Labor Days is the story of Bags, a ne’er-do-well who stumbles into the middle of a mess over a videotape that every revolutionary group in the world wants a piece of, and each time it appears that he’s going to get out of trouble, he finds himself falling in deeper.

Philip Gelatt and Rick Lacy mock all the revolutionaries–from communists to radical feminists to super-jingo-American-spies–but does so with an understanding that they aren’t going to accomplish anything but at least they’re true believers. The real bad guy is the one who stomps on all their dreams, even if those dreams were outlandish and silly.

And, well, this quote speaks for itself:

“It’ll be all the chicks, beer, and revolution I can handle. And at least some of the chicks and beer you can handle.”

Buy it. Read it. Laugh. Then wait for Volume 2.

Tragic Relief by Colleen Frakes

$9 US, 5 1/2″ x 8 1/2″, 80 pages, 

ISBN: 9780981690902

http://www.tragicrelief.blogspot.com/

As a cartoonist, I can tell you that it’s always satisfying to get a drawing right the first time out. To pick up a brush, dab some ink on it, and make a gesture on paper that results in, say, a cute mermaid, is one of the simple pleasures in an artist’s life. Colleen Frakes, a recent graduate of The Center for Cartoon Studies, provides us with that feeling of spontaneity in her Xeric winning graphic novel, Tragic Relief. No doubt, she needed to go back and refine, redo, but her work wants to jump around and she’s managed to mostly control the illusion of a free-wheeling paint brush moving from page to page.

She’s also good with characters and makes us care about this poor sad sack in a fractured fable who stumbles upon one fetching beauty after another. Each is a half woman/half creature but that’s okay by him. But then each dies at the hands of his devilish mother. With simple bold strokes, Frakes builds up the tension between mother and son. The son is an innocent boyish hulk, pot-bellied with wild hair and matching beard. The mother is a little doughy clump with dark glasses that black out her eyes and such pronounced creases around her mouth that her full face looks like a skull. Can you say, along with Norman Bates, “Mother!”

Even the pages that might look rushed I accept in the spirit of capturing an expressive look. Overall, I find myself coming back to the book and enjoying little scenes on their own. This comic has no panels, or words, which gives it a sketchbook quality with each drawing doing well in carrying its own weight. All the better to go back and linger over a haunting scene like that of a fallen Woman-Lion shot in the back with an arrow. It’s a good thing that this comic has no words. They would get in the way.

The epilogue brings everything to a satisfying resolution. Maybe we expect part of the ending but the last scene, down to the very last drawing, adds another dimension to what is a very chilling little tale.

Now that Heath Ledger’s posthumous award has shown once and for all that superhero movies are as worthy as any other films of the best talent out there, it seems like an even better time to discuss casting for Bat-sequels.

MTV Splash Page has an interview with Greg Rucka saying he’d love to see Catwoman in the next Nolan Bat-movie, and I couldn’t agree more. As Rucka said, with the death of Rachel Dawes, the time is ripe to introduce a new love interest, and the traumatized Bruce Wayne we saw at the end of The Dark Knight would be ripe for an unhealthy, dark, messy relationship with a Nolanized Selina Kyle.

Nothing campy about Catwoman in Nolan’s Gotham City. She’d have to be sexy, of course, but also capable of being conflicted, complicated–as much so as Bruce/Batman himself. I love the idea floated of Rachel Weisz (also, the picture!). She did the genre in Constantine (eminently watchable if you allow yourself to forget that Keanu Reeves is supposed to be playing, well, John Constantine), and she’s pretty but not in a conventional way (not unlike Maggie Gyllenhaal, who fit so well into the Dark Knight cast).

At a party at NYCC, I got into a discussion with the lovely Molly Crabapple about what we’d like to see in another Batman film, and we both agreed that it was time to up the female presence. To make the film pass the Bechdel test, what if Nolan added Harley Quinn? The Joker’s gone–they’re obviously not going to replace Heath Ledger this soon. So what about a psychotic Harley out for revenge? Instead of the girlfriend in the background, she’s in the foreground, out for blood.

I love the Joker archetype and I would love to see a woman playing that type of character. Molly and I quickly tossed out a few rules for Harley: we want her to not be uber-pretty, and even better if she’s a bit older. We want her dangerous, like the Joker but both more seductive and more unhinged, Angelina Jolie in Girl, Interrupted ramped up to 11. But who could play the role? Angelina, sure, but she’d have the pretty-pretty thing going.

We didn’t reach any conclusions that night, but it hit me the next day:

Courtney Love.

Discuss.

F. Scott Fitzgerald would have been pleasantly surprised to find his short story, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, finally becoming a movie but could not have anticipated something like a graphic novel as well. Both the movie and the comic are fine works in their own rights. However, both must work in the tricky world of adaptation which sets up some formidable challenges since its always asking a lot to compete with your mind’s eye reading the original.

Amid all the buzz surrounding the Brad Pitt flick, I first turned to the graphic novel adapted by Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir and illustrated by Kevin Cornell. Its ambitions are more limited than the movie as, chapter per chapter, it remains faithful to the original. It reminded me of a theater group putting on a play version of a favorite classic book. Once you get past the novelty of the characters coming to life off the page, it all depends on the actors. 

Much like a theatrical adaptation, you get to enjoy from this graphic novel the novelty of the characters and action from the original inhabiting a different space. Then you have to ask yourself how good is it, would it be better if it were just a reading?  Had this graphic novel taken on the goal of pushing the comics medium, then a bolder statement would have been made. Instead you get a mellow and charming presentation which is fine but holds back too much. It all depends on the art in this case and Kevin Cornell provides a wonderful characterization of Benjamin Button starting with our first look at a Father Time figure in a baby crib.

Now, as for the movie, the sky is the limit in the hands of director David Fincher and his creative team. Not since Robert Redford in The Great Gatsby in 1974 has there been a major motion picture of such caliber based on a work by F. Scott Fitzgerald. It’s hard to resist comparing the two movies considering how much Benjamin Button is transformed into a tragic hero, dark and enigmatic, not unlike Jay Gatsby. In the original short story, Benjamin Button follows a more linear path with only a few key adventures befitting a tall tale. In the movie, everything is nuanced down to the slightly more plausible version of Benjamin Button’s fantastical birth and physical development.

It is Benjamin Button’s spiritual development that is carried out in the grand old Hollywood style, enhanced by digital wizardry, and so it all depends on that style to make this movie work. Much like Robert Redford in The Great Gatsby, Brad Pitt knows how to command the screen in quiet moments with himself. He’s a natural leading man who doesn’t take himself seriously and we can relate to him with ease. He’s perfect to play the role of a man we want to see “reinventing” himself, a concept at the core of The Great Gatsby and which continues to influence us.

Finally, I looked up the original story. I considered how old it is and yet how full of life it is too. The movie version begins the story in 1900 and has Benjamin live well into the ’80s while the original story begins in 1860 with the Civil War which would have resonated with a reader of the time. And then I thought about how much fun it is to read it and how timely the theme remains concerning an individual’s progress in relation to society’s demands for conformity. The theme of reinventing oneself is there too but not as fully developed as The Great Gatsby and hardly full of the drama of a grand old Hollywood movie.

In the original, as well as in the movie, Benjamin Button manages to live up to the standards placed by society and himself. This reminds me of another movie about an enigmatic character who lives out the American dream: Forrest Gump. Unlike The Great Gatsby and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, it won Oscars for Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Director. It too is an adaptation from a book but it somehow found a way to become a phenomena. The right movie at the right time much like Slumdog Millionaire. But this is really no slight against Benjamin Button considering that Eric Roth wrote the screenplay for both Forrest Gump and, with Robin Swicord, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I think F. Scott Fitzgerald would have been pleased.

The Vertigo panel at NYCC left me fairly salivating for new upcoming books, but even among the awesomeness promoted there (new Mike Carey series! New original Peter Milligan series!) there was one book that stood out for me as something I had to have, ASAP.

Dean Haspiel announced an original graphic novel written by the woman he described as his “second mother,” Inverna Lockpez. Lockpez, an artist, is from Cuba, and there was a lot Haspiel didn’t know about her past. So recently, when he asked her to “purge” after reading some of his works, he found out a lot of her incredible story–and brought her to Karen Berger to pitch a comic.

I’m fascinated by this for a lot of reasons. One, of course, is that I really like Dean Haspiel. As an artist, and as a person, and when he says this will be his most personal project, I really want to see what he’ll turn out. But more than that, I am fascinated with the story. Here in the U.S., what we hear about Cuba is pretty simplistic. I am thrilled with the idea of getting a story from the ground, from a person who saw good and bad, but lived through it all.

And yes, part of me is even more thrilled that it’s a woman. Because stories like this one–Lockpez was a surgeon, and in Castro’s militia–so often revolve around men. And while I don’t think fundamentally the story is that much different, I still like to see women’s stories told.

Learning history on a grand scale, the themes and political actors, is of course important, but I think that we only really feel history when we see the events through one person’s eyes. Comics and graphic novels offer a unique way to tell these stories, providing visuals as effective as the biggest Hollywood blockbuster, but on a scale that’s accessible and feels more intimate, somehow.

I don’t want to wait til 2010!

The Deformitory

by Sophia Wiedeman

48 pages, 4 3/4″ x 7″,$8

www.sophiadraws.com

Are those claws on the girl on the cover of The Deformitory? No, far worse. And what’s a deformitory? Sophia Wiedeman takes us there in her book that recently won the Xeric grant, a source for self-publishing comics founded by Peter Laird, co-creator (with Kevin Eastman) of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Among Xeric grant winners, what sets Wiedeman within the sphere of rising stars is her agility as a storyteller, her willingness to tap into our common insecurities and turn them into fiction in refreshingly new and weird ways.

The book revolves around Delores, a Kafka-like city dweller stuck in the rut of working in an office. Instead of turning into a cockroach, her hands, overworked from typing, turn into claws, each literally with a mind of its own. These claws have faces and they can talk. With cute little eyes, they could pass for muppets.

Desperately lonely, Delores finds the bright side of things and instantly becomes friends with them, giving them names, Cornelius and Buster. It’s as if Kafa’s Gregor Samsa, upon awakening to find himself a cockroach, decides to enjoy being an insect. 

Delores loves hanging out with her new friends, getting lost in conversation on the subway, buying three lattes when she used to buy only one. Wiedeman’s delicate line work helps to beautifully sustain the story and evokes vulnerability. It reminds me of the work of Gabrielle Bell who taps into the surreal quality of life in the big city.

But being a misfit is not all fun and games. If Delores thought she had problems before, her new claws have further ostracized her from her normal routine. They’ve taken control too as they guide her to The Deformitory, a secluded place where they suggest she can find peace. It looks like a tower out of a fable and functions as a condo for freaks. It also functions as a plot device that allows us to see other poor souls like Delores. 

We get an overview of some of the tenants early in the book before we know who they are and it’s fun to see them as they weave their way through the story. There’s one subplot about a rivalry among mermaids which is very engaging. It speaks to the cruelty we all can easily inflict upon others and it’s done with a nice dose of dry wit. The slug at the end of this subplot, who bears the rejection from the ugliest of mermaids, returns home to the apartment she keeps with Delores. Both of them engage in some numb housemate pleasantries just as Delores leaves for a fateful date which will prove her undoing.   

It is during this date that the claws, the seemingly innocent Cornelius and Buster, show their true colors by attacking the young man Delores is having dinner with. The power to this tale resides in what happens between Delores and her claws so much so that I could see taking the risk of just telling the story between the three of them and the few characters directly related to it. Paring down to the essentials would add to that Twilight Zone vibe in the main plot. Nevertheless, The Deformitory is a very satisfying read and demonstrates the handiwork of a sly writer.

This is my first review with Newsarama and I look forward to many more. I am a cartoonist and writer with an interest in literary and art comics and pop culture in general. If you’d like your comic considered for review, feel free to contact me.

With this year’s NYCC coming the week before Toy Fair instead of a couple of week after many of the big names in toys have decided to unveil some surprises for ‘09 early. Take a look at some of the highlights below, then go hit Action Figure Insider’s NYCC Galleries for everything shown on day one.

Hasbro rolls out its main focus for the next year with their 3.75″ Marvel Universe line: Fury Files. A mind-bogglingly deep line right out of the gate, the focus will be on the entire Marvel Unverse and not just the normal heavy hitters. There will be singles, 2-packs, 3-packs and boxed sets.  There will also be exclusives in the line.  Walmart will have some exclusives, including packs that have one ginat figure and one normal sized figure. Movie lines will also be in the 3.75″ scale.  For most movies there will be both a movie and a comic version line running side by side. And as an added bonus, Frank Cho has drawn all the package art for the first year- over 35 figures!

DC Direct also has a good showing, with a bunch of new reveals such as a new Deluxe figure from their incredibly successful World of Warcraft line, a smoking hot Adam Hughes designed Black Canary statue, a new Batman: Black & White statue, and some figures that tie-in with the upcoming “Blackest Night” event in Green Lantern.

And last but certainly not least, Mattel ups the ante with their DC showings, specifically the awesome Four Horsemen sculpted DC Universe Classics wave 8, which feaures among other favorites a Jack Kirby designed “Super Powers” Parademon! Another big hit was their new DC Minis line, which turns the Brave & the Bold designs into cute l’il buggers!

Lots more to come, Super fans, so keep checking back!

Brian Wood has announced the reversion of publishing rights to his debut work, Channel Zero, and its prequel, Jennie One.

According to the press release:

First published in 1998 by Image Comics and later in 2000 by AIT/Planet Lar, Channel Zero is writer/artist Brian Wood’s first published comic, born out of a senior thesis project for Parsons School of Design.  Critically acclaimed and hugely influential, the book went on to enjoy six editions in its collected form.  Wired Magazine called it “surprising and fresh.”  Famed comics creator Warren Ellis called it “one of the most uplifting comics of the 1990’s”.

Channel Zero might be as definitive a response to the Giuliani years in New York City as DMZ is to the Bush presidency. Written during the “peace and prosperity” of the Clinton administration, the book nevertheless looks at the darker side of a lot of the “cleanup” issues of the time period. Jennie One, the (anti?)heroine of both books, set the tone for Wood’s complicated, compelling female characters, and Jennie One the book was the beginning of Wood’s collaboration with the always fabulous Becky Cloonan.

Keep an eye out for more news on the books, as Wood is now free to find a new publisher for a possible new edition.

Not likely.

I’m a campaign junkie. I write about politics all the time, so most of my time is spent talking about policy and actions, but I really live for the campaign trail. Now that it’s over, there’s been something missing in my life.

So when I stumbled across a mention of 08: A Graphic Diary of the Campaign Trail, I was beyond thrilled.  By Dan Goldman and The New Republic’s Michael Crowley, 08 is:

Taking its cue from campaign classics like Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 and The Making of the President series, 08 brings politico journalism into the graphic novel form.

There’s nothing I love more than passionate, thoughtful political writing and comics. Blending the two? Win. Bonus points for art that actually looks like Barack Obama, unlike another recent graphic depiction…

I can’t wait to read it. Hits stores this Wednesday.  (Also, at the site linked, you can download a free excerpt.)

In reading Neil Gaiman’s journal, I stumbled upon a link to a quite excellent essay about Sandman and the 90s.

Dream, on the other hand, and not just Dream but also Orpheus and Delirium and Lyta and Remiel and Duma and Haroun al-Rashid and Robespierre and Wanda, cannot go with the flow.  To the postmodernists they reply that some things are too important simply to accept as impermanent, that our lives may be brief but that for them to be worthy they must hang on a strong nail of meaning.  Dreams’s duty, Delirium’s openness to all experience, Orpheus’s sorrow, Remiel and Duma’s God, Haroun al-Rashid’s Baghdad, Robespierre’s revolution, Wanda’s female gender, cannot be cast on the flowing waters and said a mere good-bye to.  Identity is what we refuse to give up; I can only change so much before I am no longer me.  And if I go to work at a job I hate, I cannot be me; but also if I quit the job that I hate I cannot just decamp to the country with my dog and paint pictures, I must still engage with the world on my terms.

I agree mostly with the blogger’s reading of Sandman, and of Gaiman’s characterization of Dream as someone who finds he must change or die, and would rather die.

The one thing I would point out, though, is that Dream does indeed change, and his death comes because he has changed enough that he realizes he can change no more. He dies because he HAS changed and cannot forgive himself for it, as much as because he will not change. (more…)

The term “graphic novel” has been taken over by the pretentious and usually used to refer to hipper-than-thou underground comics. But since this is the year when, through the work of Heath Ledger and Christopher Nolan, the Joker went highbrow, it’s only fitting that the best original graphic novel I read this year was Brian Azzarello and Lee Bermejo’s Joker.

It’s not a sequel to the movie or a spinoff, but it perfectly captured the anarchic, frightening joy of Ledger’s performance. As Azzarello noted at this summer’s Wizard World Chicago, to actually get into the Joker’s head would ruin the character. He must remain utterly without guiding principles and motives to be truly frightening. This Joker isn’t the embodiment of evil, he’s the embodiment of lack of control.

Bermejo’s Joker looks like Ledger, but not in a distracting photo-realistic way. His face, especially the scars, is so textured you expect to feel it when you touch the page. In the background run familiar characters from the Batman mythos, even Batman himself, a murderously sexy Harley Quinn and a twisted new Riddler that we should be begging to see in the next Nolan Bat-flick.

But the star of the book is Jonny Frost, a guy just dumb enough, just mean enough to think he can run with the Joker. Jonny Frost, dressed all in white, a small-time hood, is also just nervous enough for the reader to sympathize with him, but no matter how many steps he takes to reach the Joker’s level, he’ll never really get there.

Ultimately, the only one who understands the Joker is Batman, and vice versa.

Earlier today, Newsarama had a chance to speak with Christian Beranek about the Max Payne animated graphic novel Michelle Payne, which is on the Max Payne Blu-Ray DVD set to be released on Tuesday. We’ve now spoken with his co-writer, Raven Gregory, on his take on the project.

NEWSARAMA: How’d you get involved with this project?

RAVEN GREGORY: Well, me and CB go back a while.  We both came up together in the business (me on THE GIFT and at Zenescope Entertainment, and him at Silent Devil and then Kingdom Comics at Disney) and our personalities just clicked with each other.  So Christian called me up one night and asked me if I had ever played the game Max Payne.  I told him I was a huge fan and still had my Playstation 2 copy of the game.  He filled me in on the idea of telling a prequel to the Max Payne film and I just fell in love with it.  We brainstormed a bit together and pitched some ideas to Rick Karo at Comflix and they really dug what we presented to them.  During the movie, very little is revealed about Max’s wife so it freed us up to really flesh out the character and bring her to life.  As much as I love Max Payne’s story, Michelle’s story just blew me away.

NEWSARAMA: What’s your take on Max Payne, and how did this inform your approach to the project?

RG: What I like most about Max and his story is this could have been anybody.  As I get older you really begin to understand that no one is promised tomorrow and seeing the effects Michelle death has on Max and the path it puts him on is easy to relate to.  I’m not saying if the same thing happened to me that I’d go gun toting and blowing up corruption on every corner but the theme of depression and lack of control and trying to find that balance again, to answer the question of why bad things happen, is something that everyone feels.  The guy just wants answers.  He knows in his heart it won’t make anything better but we as humans need an answer to get the closure needed to move on.

NEWSARAMA: Can you give a little summary of the story? Where’s it fit in the Max Payne mythos?

RG: In short, it fully reveals the tragic event that made Max into the person he is at the beginning of the movie.  In the movie, you know Max lost his wife and he’s searching for answers.  Here you get to see the story of what really happened.  It’s some pretty heart-wrenching stuff but given that the ending was already established we still had a lot of free reign in fleshing out the characters in a way you never see them before in any of the previous installments.  Seeing Max before all the pain went down only makes knowing what is coming that much more tragic.

NEWSARAMA: Anything cool you’re looking forward to that you can allude to?

RG: Possibly more goodness from Comflix.  Maybe some Raven Gregory creator owned madness at that.

NEWSARAMA: This is an animated project — how has that differed from your typical comic  gigs? Any skills you have to unlearn?

RG: Not really.  We approached it as a comic.  We knew it was going to be animated but never over thought that aspect of it.  At the end of the day, you try to tell the best story you can, and if you do your job well it all works out.  Hearing the actors voices, the words sound even better than they did in my head, so it’s a lot like the comic making process in that you ask for one thing, and at times get back something that is even better than you could have ever imagine.

NEWSARAMA: Collaborating with Christian — can you describe it?

RG: I just love the guy.  Besides being one of my best friends in and out of this business he’s the kind of writer that you can go to with a story and say, “Hey, this isn’t working.  This part, it’s bland, the rest is good, but this is suck at it’s most suckness,” and he’ll take that and breathe such life and energy into and suddenly it works and it not only works… it kicks ass.

NEWSRAMA: Last, but not least — is there anything you think we should know about this project that I haven’t already asked?

RG: I just hope people enjoy it as much as we enjoyed writing it.   For a sneak peek check out the teaser trailer up on http://www.maxpaynethemovie.com/michellepayne/

Arriving in stores next Tuesday on the Max Payne Blu-Ray DVD comes a really interesting addition: the animated graphic novel. Newsarama asked our own Christian Beranek, who is one half of the writing team of Michelle Payne, about his project.

NEWSARAMA: How’d you get involved with this project?

CHRISTIAN BERANEK: I first hooked up with Comflix Studios a few years back via my good friend Larry Shuman. He introduced me to Scott Schneider who wanted to do something in what is now called the “motion comic” space. Now, we see a lot of that stuff these days, particularly with Watchmen being available on ITunes. Comflix, however, was ahead of the curve back then and I wanted to be a part of it. Scott and company quickly got to work adapting Dracula vs. King Arthur, the graphic novel I co-created with my brother Adam and Chris Moreno.

Flash forward to 2008. Scott and his partner Rick Karo told me there was some stuff they were working on with Fox. First up was Babylon AD. They needed a 5 minute long prequel piece to include on the special edition DVD. I wrote the story and suggested Dennis Calero as the artist. The end result was very satisfying.

So, when they said they needed to do a longer project for Max Payne I couldn’t say no. It sounded like too much fun.

NEWSARAMA: What’s your take on Max Payne, and how did this inform your approach to the project?

CB: Look, Max Payne is one of the most popular video game franchises of all time. The only thing I could do was pay respect to the character and enhance certain elements of the story in relation to the film. That’s all I set out to do and hopefully the goal was achieved.

You see, when millions of people play a video game like this… Well, they are Max Payne for those hours they spend shooting up bad guys. They have their own take on who Max is. You have to honor that interactive spirit and not take away from it.

NEWSARAMA: Can you give a little summary of the story? Where’s it fit in the Max Payne mythos?

CB: This a prequel. We show Michelle (Max’s wife) Payne’s back story and how it leads into the movie. It’s an actual extension of the film.

NEWSARAMA: This is an animated project — how has that differed from your typical comic gigs? Any skills you have to unlearn?

CB: Well, we (co-writer Raven Gregory and I) wrote the story as a 48 page comic that was translated into a Comflix animated short. We knew there was a set amount of minutes alloted, so we paced the story out accordingly. I think that by having worked in comics, being constrained to page counts for certain issues, prepares you to be economical in terms of storytelling.

Now, there are certain skills you have to unlearn. For instance, voice over becomes very important. You can have more dialogue in some scenes than you would normally do, less in others. There is  a learning curve, to be sure, but the mediums work well with one another.

NEWSARAMA: Collaborating with Raven — can you describe it?

CB: It’s like being in a hurricane! Seriously, Raven is one of my best friends. He is also a true lover of comics. This guy lives, breathes and eats the medium. He is also a huge Max Payne fan and when I got the gig I called him up to co-write.

He’s a great collaborator and had a ton of awesome ideas. Very easy to work with and I can’t wait to do something with him again. Just keep him away from my nachos!

NEWSARAMA: Anything cool you’re looking forward to that you can allude to?

CB: Well, my main gig is with Disney. They were very gracious to allow me to work on the Fox projects as I have an exclusive with them for comics. This falls in that realm.

Right now Ahmet Zappa and I are in the lab cooking up a lot of stuff under the Disney’s Kingdom Comics banner — expect news on that soon!

Beside comics, I have several screenplays in development with some producers and directors I like and admire. In addition, I’m working on some TV stuff, my first novel and an album. Lots going on and it’s good to be this busy.

NEWSARAMA: Last but not least… anything you think I should know about this project that I haven’t already asked?

CB: The DVD comes out next Tuesday and I hope you’ll check it out. The trailer can be viewed here: http://www.maxpaynethemovie.com/michellepayne/

Keep reading Blog@, readers, where we hope to chat with Beranek’s co-writer, Raven Gregory, for his take on the project!

As the year comes to a close, it’s become clear that in the Marvel Universe, there has been major upheaval from within the company’s heroic pantheon. With a new Captain America leading a band of Secret Avengers, what’s old is new again, with the concept of the legacy hero getting a set of legs at the House of Ideas.

But what is a legacy hero, you might ask? For those needing a refresher in comic book geekspeak, a legacy hero is typically an associate, lover, or sidekick of a fallen hero who assumes their friend’s mantle if he has retired or fallen in battle. DC Comics has made this concept into one of the company’s key pillars, beginning all the way with Barry Allen as the Flash in 1961. The idea of the legacy hero is that it gives a franchise an epic, generational feel, while allowing each generation of readers to adopt their “own” hero to match their own values and storytelling standards. But as 2008 and 2009 — as well as several earlier attempts — show us, Marvel isn’t above adopting a good idea when it sees one.

As if I needed to warn you, there be spoilers up ahead…

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