“I adore what I do and don’t think of it as just a job. It is what I breathe, it is intrinsic to my being”: That’s Hana Hajjar, “Saudia Arabia’s lone female cartoonist,” talking about her profession in this nice feature on CNN.com. You can see a slideshow of Hajjar’s work there, and much more of it on her website.

“Crazy Dudes Wanted to Fly to Denmark to Murder Old Man Over Cartoon, of All Things”: Gawker had probably the best headline of all the coverage of the plot by two Chicago men to kill the Danish Muhammad cartoonist.

“Not your average wiggly things”: Check out this National Post feature on Drawn and Quarterly’s recent collection of R.O. Blechman’s work, Talking Lines. I plan on writing a full review at some point in the near future, but in the mean time I will say it’s an excellent book, and one I hope you’ll take the time to look at soon.

“Costume possibilities are endless with a simple cape”: Need a last-minute Halloween costume? This article from The Orlando Sentinel makes a good case for starting with a cape and making a simple superhero costume from there. If it was good enough for Superman…

“That’s… different”: Savage Critic Brian Hibbs did a good job of expressing why “Dark Reign” has been less than satisfying for me, in large part because it seems like a branding exercise rather than a story, a new status quo in which nothing ever actually happens—dark or light—as the whole Marvel line simply waits around for the next Secret Invasion-sized event. He did so while expressing some admiration for Dark Reign—The List: Punisher #1, in which something pretty big and pretty dark does happen. Also on Savage Critics, Sean T. Collins defends The Dark Knight Strikes Again. Let the record show: I loved that series (I could have done without all the newscaster segments, but otherwise, I thought it was pretty damn great).

Changes in store for The Comics Journal: The venerable comics magazine’s next issue, November’s #300, will be its last on the current schedule and in the current format. In the future, the hard copy of TCJ will come in “expanded semi-annual editions, each customized to fit its content.” Meanwhile, TCJ.com is going to massively beef up its content. You can read the company’s official press release on the changes here.

How often do Ivan Reis and Johnny Ryan draw the same exact thing in the same exact week?: This week’s Blecky Yuckerella strip on Fantagraphics’ Flog! Blog has Blecky doing to her pal Wedgie just what the Silver Age Atom did to the Golden Age Atom in the pages of Blackest Night #4. Weird.

Also, does it even mean anything if the artist in question has only drawn like five different stories in that career?: Heidi MacDonald finds the phrase “best work of his career” kind of annoying when its used to hype up an upcoming project.

Fantastic: Check out Johnathan of Living Between Wednesday’s Halloween costume. Here’s a hint—It’s Designed Only for Killing…

Spider-Man: The Short Halloween

Written by Bill Hader and Seth Meyers

Art by Kevin Maguire

Published by Marvel Comics

This one passed me by when it first came out earlier this year. As a special Halloween treat, let’s look back at this delightful one-shot. How often is it that you have “Saturday Night Live” veterans writing a superhero comic? Is it possible that Bill Hader and Seth Meyers are the first? I think so but I’d be happy to learn that there’s like some Chevy Chase script about Wonder Woman out there or maybe Al Franken’s take on Wolverine.

Hader and Meyers opt to be respectful and even include a reverential recap on how Spider-Man got his powers just in case you’re from some other planet. The story finds Spider-Man in typical fashion, pursuing a baddie. But that’s perfectly fine as we ease into some offbeat and often hilarious writing. It’s easy to see that Hader and Meyers love comics and the people who read them. The title itself, “Spiderman: The Short Halloween,” is a geek in-joke referring to Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale’s “Batman: The Long Halloween.” And the story, well it’s not some obvious satire. No, it’s actually a little masterpiece involving mistaken identity and, in the bargain, a clever juxtaposition of the weird world of superheroes and us average citizens.

In some ways, you feel like you can’t cross a line with Spider-Man. Peter Parker is as average as you can get. He’s forever fighting for his well-earned cash from The Man, J. Jonah Jameson. Who can’t relate to that? And, as Spider-Man, the guy gets no respect. What’s not to love? Hader and Meyers appear to feel the same way and give you a story where Joe Average gets to take center stage and we consider his problems. And the villains, they’re average too. Actually, they’re below average. And Spider-Man is totally enmeshed in this.

You can really take this mistaken identity thing to new heights. What happens is that the real Spider-Man is quite accidentally knocked out while confronting a third-rate wannabe villain. At the same time, a drunk in a Spider-Man costume, who happens to have a great Spider-Man costume and a credible build, is being hauled around by two of his buddies after a Halloween night that has gone wrong. As the drunk Spider-Man careens down a corner and collapses by a dumpster, the real Spider-Man heroically falls out from the sky and crashes into a heap nearby. So, the buddies haul the real Spider-Man into their apartment. And the awkward villain makes off with the drunk Spider-Man to show off to the rest of his crew of lame baddies.

I love it every time New York gets to be a character in a Spider-Man story. I  prefer the offbeat and the more domestic and talky stuff and how it can play off the superhero stuff. That’s always been an important part of Spider-Man and it’s carried off here with a lot of authentic dialogue and some very natural action. For example, the drunk Spider-Man’s life is a mess with his girlfriend ready to leave him. Finally getting past his friends, she is more than ready to go through “the talk” with him as he lays on a couch. Having said what she needs to say, she feels some regret and goes to kiss his hand. And, with perfect comedic timing, that’s when Spider-Man’s webbing shoots into her face. It’s a scene done with such skill since it’s so in the moment.

What keeps the writing so in the moment too is the amazing art by Kevin Maguire. His realism mixed with cartoony flourish is a perfect match. From the start, you know that Fumes, the clumsy villain, is more like us than Doctor Octopus. He has that face. And the guys out on the town with the drunk Spider-Man, elicit sympathy. You’ve been in that same cab with these guys as they agree with their pal that’s he’s Spider-Man– or at least you feel like you have.

How often does comedy mix with comics? Well, within superhero comics, there’s some of that in the current run of Marvel’s “Strange Tales” which includes Peter Bagge’s hilarious sendup of The Hulk. Of course, superhero comics can have a sense of humor but strictly comedic, not so much. Then again, it all depends on where you look, like for instance, “The Metal Men.”

That said, comedy is certainly as viable as anything else in comics. As reported here at Newsarama, American Original’s Jeff Katz, in connection with Top Cow, will gather a lineup of star comedians to create their own comics. They will be collected into graphic novels under the series title, “Comedy Death Ray.” It will be an impressive roster including Sarah Silverman, Zach Galifianakis, Patton Oswalt, Bob Odenkirk, David Cross, Paul Scheer, B. J. Novak, Janeane Garofalo and another SNL talent, Fred Armisen. The proposed first four issue run is scheduled to come out this winter.

“Comedy Death Ray” probably won’t have that much to do with superheroes. The series editor, comedian/writer Scott Aukerman, is more of a fan of stuff like Dan Clowes’s “Eightball” and Peter Bagge’s “Hate.” But maybe he’s read “The Short Halloween.” If so, that’s a good thing since it’s a great example of comedy writers writing comics.

Hope everyone has a safe and fun Halloween.

Find out more about Global Freezing here on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays or at ComicsByEgg.com.

He’s a hard man to find. And occasionally, a harder man to talk to. He’s the Caped Crusader, the Dark Knight Detective, the owner of the Hammers of Justice . . . he . . . is . . . BATMAN. And he’s the last interview that we have in our series of iconic heroes commenting on the costumes based on their images. This time, we had to expand out a bit, as Batman’s partners and rogues gallery has inspired a fair field of costuming. We met atop a wind-swept rooftop in Gotham, pictures in hand, to find out what The Batman thinks.

NRAMA: Thanks again for meeting.

Batman: Keep it short. Crime is impatient, and justice doesn’t like to wait.

NRAMA: Wouldn’t that make them both impatient?

Batman: . . .

NRAMA: Nevermind. How about we start with your enemies?

Read the rest of this entry »

Television and video, you say?

We’ve got it in spades this week.

First of all, online animation series The Gloomers have released their first-ever Halloween special. Starring Scott Spiegel, the writer of Evil Dead II, the Halloween episode is (as the rest of the series, apparently) a razor-edged sendup of old-school Hanna Barbera animation style with a contemporary and slightly twisted sense of humor. I’d never heard of the show until the Halloween special came out, but the new episode is pretty sweet. There’s a lot of fun to be had in this episode and, eventually, I’ll probably work back through the archives now that I’ve seen the kind of absurd humor they have in store.

Second—and even cooler, in my estimation, but with the possibility to go horribly wrong—The Hollywood Reporter has a story that the Britcom Being Human, which revolves around the day-to-day lives of a werewolf, a ghost and a vampire, has been optioned by Syfy for an American treatment. Obviously, there’s a pretty checkered history with American networks trying to adapt British television, with stinkers like Kath & Kim and the abortive Spaced remake (seriously? Will Sasso?), but there’s always NBC’s The Office to consider—and the reality that even just a few mentions on mainstream American television could bring a decent-sized audience to the good, British version of a show whether the original sucks or not.

The Warner Brothers Home Video weekly e-mail newsletter just hit, too, which offers fans a shot at up to 40% off all DC Comics products at the Warner Brothers website. It’s mostly notable because of the nice little piece of accompanying art that came with it, featuring characters like Guy Gardner and the black Firestorm. I recently bought a t-shirt at Wal-Mart that had Kilowog and Mr. Terrific on it; I have to say I’m loving how DC is promoting its not-so-mainstream properties these days. Anyway, the sale might be a good place to pick up that four-movies-in-one-box Batman DVD for eleven bucks or a couple of the recent direct-to-DVD DC movies.

And last but not least, Smallville has been in the news quite a bit this week; after a producer confirmed for fans that they’re hoping to get a tenth season for the “adventures of Superman when he was a boy” show on the CW network, Hawkman Michael Shanks has a great interview on the Huffington Post today, where he discusses the upcoming Geoff Johns-scripted episodes of the show. In it, Shanks mentions that he’ll be the re-incarnated Egyptian Acrcheologist, Carter Hall. He has wings, he has a mace, and yes, he will be using both, flying and doing some damage.

Smallville producers have been hitting the Internet this week, saying that they’re lobbying the network for another season after this one’s over. It first came out of a Michael Ausiello column at EW.com (after all, what doesn’t these days?), but it’s now been confirmed a few other places. Our own Lucas Siegel put the question of whether a tenth season of the show was a good idea to ‘Rama Readers over on Twitter, to mixed responses.

A lot of people only wanted to see more Smallville if it meant Superman would finally actually appear on the show. “Not unless they allow some ‘tights & flights’,” said a reader who goes by pibdgardel on Twitter. User troyrobbins agreed: “Only if he officially becomes Superman - the whole show is a build up to Supes and we need to see the payoff.”

Meanwhile, hyacinthe718 spoke pretty definitively for the fans who aren’t interested in more seasons of the show, saying “please, please let it f*@!@ end!” RockyShields agreed, adding with a sentiment that echoed a lot of other readers that the show should have ended or changed concepts: “The show should have ended after season five. Or renamed it Metropolis.”

This is, of course, just the beginning; Lucas has promised more polls like this, and fans should follow@newsarama and @newsaramablog on Twitter for more to come.

Great Odin’s raven! Reports are coming in all over from Worst Previews to MTV concerning Academy Award winner Sir Anthony Hopkins will be portraying Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Loki’s (Tom Hiddleson) father, Odin, in Kenneth Branagh’s Thor adaptation.

This news comes just over a week after the Robert DeNiro and Jude Law casting rumor is put to rest, much like an Odinsleep.

I personally couldn’t think of a better casting. Now, there were rumors of an actor by the name of Brian Blessed originally playing Odin, but I just love this idea. He joins an already well-rounded ensemble, along with Natalie Portman as Jane Foster and Jaimie Alexander as Sif.

Filming is to start January and Paramount Pictures will release the film on May 20, 2011.

Fantagraphics recently announced that they’ve struck a deal for seven (7) new books with writer/editor Greg Sadowski, who was responsible for Supermen!: The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941 and a couple of B. Krigstein-related works for the publisher.

The books will be published one a season, so seven of ‘em is really planning ahead, and should carry them through to fall of 2012 or so (I don’t even have my next seven blog posts planned yet).

Here’s what they have planned at the moment…

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Greetings, Blog@teers — have we got some news for you!

For the past six months, a webcomic has been featured by Ain’t It Cool News and CNN, celebrated for its action, characterization, and respect for the blaxploitation films that inspired it. As its creator notes, it’s Super Fly meets The Equalizer, the step-child of Shaft and Rip Kirby, a love letter to the Black action films of the 1970s. For some, it’s street justice like you’ve never seen — and for those on the run, well, all that’s coming their way is a WORLD OF HURT.

And in keeping with our mission to deliver the best and the brightest to you, our readers, we are proud to announce that WORLD OF HURT will be making its second home at Blog@Newsarama, as the latest in our weekly webcomics series. We sat down with writer/artists Jay Potts about the comic, his blaxploitation inspirations, and what the future holds for Isaiah “Pastor” Hurt.

Newsarama: Jay, just to start out with, can you tell new readers a little bit about what World of Hurt is about?

Jay Potts: WORLD OF HURT is a weekly, black & white serial adventure webcomic that is my personal love letter to the Black action films of the 1970s and the Golden Age of newspaper adventure strips.  It is set in the early1970s in the city of Pointe Blanc, a fictional version of San Francisco and Oakland, and follows the exploits of a Black troubleshooter named Isaiah “Pastor” Hurt.

Nrama: In terms of getting to know you a little bit — what’s your background been in terms of comics? Is World of Hurt your first one, or have you been building up this?

Potts: I’ve been drawing since the age of four and have been a comic book fan for just as long.  However, it wasn’t until I entered the graduate program in Sequential Art at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, GA in 1997, that I received any formal instruction.  What I learned there about storytelling and composition, and the exposure to an incredible range of talent, was truly eye-opening.

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Joe and Azat
Written & Illustrated by Jesse Lonergan
Published by NBM

Cartoonist Jesse Lonergan traveled to Turkmenistan with the Peace Corps, and his experiences there are filtered through exaggeration, fiction and personal creative whimsy to craft Joe and Azat: the story of a young American cartoonist Joe and his unlikely friendship with an idealistic Turkman named Azat.

Joe and Azat is a fairly surprising work. Joe’s raison d’etre for being in Turkmenistan, his mission with the Peace Corps, is referenced only obliquely, and the country’s political circumstances get even less page time. Joe and Azat is the tale of two young men’s culture-clashed, and culture-crossing, friendship.

To anybody with immigrants in their life, Joe’s experiences with Azat’s family will ring immediately true. Lonergan’s ability to show Azat’s meddling mother, drunken brother and idealism about capitalism works because he doesn’t cast any judgments. Every character is delivered with warm humanity, building the palpable reality of their existence.

I appreciated how Azat, overwhelmingly defined by his naïve love of capitalism and his unreasonable expectations for marriage, provides a range of personality. He embraces his opportunity to befriend Joe, he looks for the silver lining in his stumbling business ventures, and he believes fully that he’s found the love of his life. Joe’s dissociated window into Turkmen society allows us to peer into their world with a healthy degree of skepticism, but also an eye toward learning

Lonergan’s depiction of Azat’s mother, a what-will-the-neighbors-think immigrant mother, treads effectively (as Art Spiegelman lamented his own ability to do in the latter pages of Maus) the fine line between cliché and cliché-truth.

Artistically, Lonegran’s bigfoot cartoon style suits his upbeat, affectionate writing style. Occasionally, characters are difficult to distinguish; the thickness of Azat’s brother Merdan fails to come across, leaving the reader confused as to which sibling is angrily berating Joe and which is doggedly devoted to him. Actually, it’s obvious which is which, but the confusion does lead to some momentarily jarring sequences.

Joe and Azat is a warm, humorous comic, solidly crafted, and well worth picking up if you’re at the comic shop this week and find an extra $11 in your pocket.

There’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while now, that yesterday’s issue of Blackest Night reminded me of, and intensified my curiosity about.

If you’ve been reading DC’s superhero line for long, you know that the company has been actively promoting their Blackest Night miniseries and the surrounding story event for well over a year now.

If you’ve been reading Geoff Johns’ Green Lantern work, you know that he’s been writing his way toward this story for a very long time, perhaps as long as he’s been writing Hal Jordan stories.

As the event grew closer, it became apparent that some of the high profile characters the company was killing off were being killed off precisely so that they could return as undead Black Lantern.

Certainly Martian Manhunter and Aquaman were killed for this purpose, but how far back has DC been killing their characters with the expectation that they’d come back as zombie Lanterns in Blackest Night and then, perhaps, stay back once Hal Jordan is able to harness “white light of creation”…?

But what about The Question and Ralph Dibny, killed during the course of 52? Or the Freedom Fighters, Pantha and all the Infinite Crisis casualties? Or Max Lord, Sue Dibny and Blue Beetle II?

There are two relatively minor characters, both villains, that I was kinda shocked DC actually killed off, and I’ve been wondering and worrying about ever since Blackest Night started returning the dead.

That would be Monsieur Mallah, the intelligent gorilla who wears a beret and bandoliers and speaks with a French accent, and The Brain, who is just an evil brain that lives in an evil-looking gumball machine-esque support system.

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It’s time again to interview one of the heroic icons of comicdom regarding their representation in the land of Halloween costumes. With a little help from Daily Bugle photog Peter Parker, we were able to round-up some time with our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

NRAMA: Thanks, Spidey!

Spider-Man: This isn’t just going to be a hatchet job, is it?

NRAMA: No. Why would you think that?

Spider-Man: I haven’t had the best relationship with the press. I stop a robbery, and the Bugle says, “Spider-Man: Robbery Suspect?” I rescue kids from a burning building, and it says, “Spider-Man: Arsonist?” Then there was that time I rescued the sheep from the collapsing 4H building.

NRAMA: What was the headline?

Spider-Man: I’d rather not talk about it.

NRAMA: Well, then, let’s start with the costumes . . .

Read the rest of this entry »

As Bowie might have put it, “We can be sparkly, just for one day.” According to The Hollywood Reporter, “Twilight”, the first film adaptation in the “Twilight Saga”, will get a one-day return engagement to theaters on November 19th. That’s one day prior to the debut of the second film, “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”. The first film will get play on around 2,000 screens, though the sequel will open even wider.

“Twilight” studio Summit Entertainment regards this as a wise move. “Despite the first film already being on DVD, fans across the nation have been calling out to see the film once again on the big screen, and the studio is honoring their request,” Summit was quoted as stating in the THR piece.

Clearly, this isn’t the first time that a move of this type has been made. Nevertheless, this, along with recent brief engagments for the first two “Toy Story” films and “This Is It!”, makes one wonder if so-called micro-releases or micro-engagements might be a shot in the arm for studio bottom lines.

If you had a film that you’d like to see on the big screen (again, or for the first time) just for one day, what would it be?

If you like what you’ve read so far (c’mon, how can you not?) totally check out more super cute comics at:www.sosuperduper.com!

Fans of Craig Ferguson got an intersting surprise Tuesday night, when award-winning author Salman Rushdie alluded that he would be taking his talents toward sequential art.

Here’s a highlight, from ICv2:

Ferguson asked, “Do you ever think, “Oh, I’d quite like to write a book with just pictures and stuff?”

Rushdie answered, “Yeah, and actually I got asked recently if I’d like to write a graphic novel. I was kind of keen on it. When I was a kid I was a real comic book nut. I could tell you a lot about superheroes.”

Considering big-name writers like Stephen King and Orson Scott Card have been getting a piece of the comic book pie with Marvel and DC, this isn’t a huge stretch. And with Rushdie’s most famous work — Midnight’s Children — being almost a mix of Heroes and the Umbrella Academy in terms of it’s premise, this could be a big deal indeed.

And speaking of Ferguson and super-heroes, he just did an Aquaman bit with Tim Gunn. Seriously.

Batman has always been known by his many trademark moves: the Batmobile, the fact that HIS PARENTS ARE DEEEEEEAAAAAAAAD, the grapnel, the being prepared for everything… and his trademark vanishing act at the end of a conversation. Well, except this instance that Topless Robot found, which gives Batman an epic fail in his usual ninja exit.

Oh, Bats. “I found some evidence.” Smooth move, Bruce.

Private Wars
Written by Greg Rucka
Published by Bantam

Greg Rucka’s Queen and Country wasn’t like most comic book series. Another comic serial about a British spy would likely be a superficial pastiche of James Bond clichés, but in the hands of Greg Rucka, Queen and Country was a taut, psychologically challenging, procedure-oriented game of political maneuvering and morally debatable (in the best sense) international intrigue. And the heaviest emphasis was on the personal demons endured by the series’ lead agent, Tara Chase, as she coped with the internal stress of assassinations, carefully planned missions gone awry, and the loss of several colleagues.

The series took a strange twist, in my opinion, when Rucka chose to write a novel about one of Tara’s missions (A Gentleman’s Game). The comic book incarnation went on hold, returned briefly, but felt slightly off-kilter when it did, as if too much tragedy had confronted Tara beyond its pages and she didn’t quite fit back into the format. Rucka’s most recent foray into Tara’s life, the prose novel Private Wars, however, finds Tara’s life and adventures slipping comfortably back into the world of the unadorned written word.

Private Wars concerns itself with Tara’s efforts to lift a potentially sympathetic political figure out of Uzbekistan. It might be an easy job, except there are divergent political agendas at work within the British government, and Tara’s effectively going against U.S. expectations for the region.  As might be expected from Rucka, it’s a tense read, dramatic and tragic.  There’s nothing within that rewrites its genre, but it’s all delivered by a dedicated craftsman who understands pace and character.

As he’s done in the past, Rucka stuffs Private Wars with complex personal agendas, crafty political gamesmanship, and surprising plot twists. In anything, he’s probably outdone himself this time. Tara’s reasons for being in Uzbekistan aren’t what she was told, and when things go to hell, she quickly finds her entire mission turned completely upside down.  Similarly, her boss Paul Crocker has sent her on a mission he didn’t intend for, and he finds himself attempting to turn a political minefield to his own advantage.

Probably the most interesting writing Rucka’s able to pull off is switching up allegiances effectively and convincingly. CIA rat Aaron Tower turns out to be an okay guy when you’re on his side. Incoming Uzbeki president Sevara Malikov never truly leaves behind her manipulative, self-serving ways, but she offers glimmers of humanity in the guilt she tries to hide when dealing with her family, as well as in her capitulation to U.S. demands to improve humanitarian conditions. Only ex-KGB operative Zahidov skews ever-so-slightly toward simplistic comic book villainy, and even there, Rucka imbues him with a palpable nationalism, a recognizably overzealous sense of pride, and a more sad devotion to a love that won’t be returned to him.

Still, Rucka’s best work comes from the comparison and contrast of Tara Chase against her initial rescue target, Ruslan Malikov. Single parents, both widowed by the murder of their partner, Tara and Ruslan are both torn from their children, driven by regret and rage, and their final scene together leads one to wonder: is there any real difference between them? That human angle adds depth and human connection to Private Wars’ racing plot, leaving readers not only breathless, but hopefully moved and with something much more human than your typical thriller.

“Spy vs. Spy vs. Alien vs. Predator”: Ryan Dunlavey has posted a bunch of mash-up comics he’s done, in which he adapts one sort of comic book or cartoon character into the style of a famous comic strip artist. Like The Thunderkatzenjammer Kids or Little Zemo in Slumberland. Great stuff. (Link via Mike Sterling)

“Because it was a sedentary, solitary activity it was seen as impure. But comics do things that a novel can’t do, that a film can’t do”: Phill Juptus talks comics—how he started reading them, what he likes about them, what he recommends—in this piece from The Daily Mail.

“Mr. Zemeckis has called the dark movie a ‘graphic novel version’ of the classic tale”: That’s an exceptionally random line from a New York Times article about the upcoming computer-animated, Jim Carrey-staring Christmas Carol movie, and the Zemeckis is director Robert Zemeckis. Unfortunately, the Times reporter didn’t follow up by asking him what the hell he meant by a  “graphic novel version.”

What?! No Merv Pumpkinhead?!: For reasons I don’t understand myself, I love characters with carved pumpkins for heads. There’s something about that element in a character design that I find really appealing. So I enjoyed the topic of this list—“Five Comic Book Pumpkinheads For Halloween”—despite the fact that it was written by someone else named “Caleb” (I don’t know if any of you not named Caleb were aware of this or not, but all Calebs are natural enemies with one another) and that it included a character from Malibu Comics instead of more obvious examples.

Cooking with Oishinbo: Derik A. Badman reviews Oishinbo…by cooking from it.

“I then realized that I would have to go beyond grassroots comics evangelism in order to truly effect positive change.”: Josh Elder from Reading With Pictures talks with The Graphic Novel Reporter.

“All Cartoonists Seem To Be Cursed Forever Globally”: Hey kids, what do you want to be when you grow up? If you said “a cartoonist,” think about this Pravda headline before you apply to art school, okay?

I got to draw fishes!

…

And then had to cover’em up with a word balloon.

Find out more about Global Freezing here on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays or at ComicsByEgg.com.

You have to feel a little sorry for the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Since 1985’s Crisis on Infinite Earths, when Superboy was retconned out of existence and the backstory of the Legion invalidated, the team—once one of DC’s hottest sellers—has undergone cycles of abuse and neglect from creators, editors and fans. It had a short, happy life on the Cartoon Network and has had as many false-starts and reboots (and as much chaotic and impossible-to-understand continuity) as anyone this side of Hawkman.

It’s only fair, then, that Crisis on Infinite Earths artist George Pérez should be the one to help bring those reboots under one roof, and hopefully save the franchise from disaster, along with superstar writer Geoff Johns, in last year’s Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds, out this week in hardcover from DC Comics.

Given that each of the reboots have their fans, and Geoff Johns joins with most Legion fans as loving the originals instead, the way he’s dealt with these characters—to reintroduce a modernized, tweaked version of the originals as the “central” Legion while acknowledging the new ones as canonical as well; this is a great approach that the return of the Multiverse has allowed for. Yes, your favorite comic happened. Yes, so did mine. They ALL happened. Maybe you won’t be able to read “your” Legion forever, because frankly we need one that more people will enjoy…but at least the door isn’t completely closed to them coming back at some point, or getting a one-shot or something.

I’ll admit that I was never a huge Legion of Super-Heroes fan until fairly recently, but to those who think titles like this one (and Hawkman, Aquaman and Manhunter for that matter) can’t succeed financially or critically, I say “Go away and don’t come back until you’ve done some serious thinking.” The reality of it is, there are no “bad” properties at DC or Marvel. Anything you’ve ever seen come out of a mainstream superhero universe can be made good, profitable, enjoyable, or all three given the right creative mix.

Johns and Pérez certainly fit the bill as “the right creative mix.” Even with the insufferable Superboy-Prime as the principal bad guy, and its tenuous connection to the central Final Crisis story, this comic was fantastic. Seeing Pérez finally get to draw the Legion for a long period of time was well-worth the…well, the long period of time…that we had to wait between issues, and Geoff Johns showed again why he’s one of those guys who can be trusted to come in, mix things up and make them better (at least as far as most readers are concerned).

The resulting miniseries was so good, that the predictable twists and turns it took (let’s face it—three of the last four issues ended with “surprises” and only one of them actually surprised anyone) were paced out so well that they left readers gaping at the execution. The final handful of pages featuring Superboy-Prime may feel a little out of place with the rest of the story…but that’s the unfortunately part of what happens when you’re writing for a continuity-heavy universe where you always have to be “setting up the sequel,” as it were. You can’t just have him powerless and relegated to Earth-Prime with disappointed parents. There has to be a little PS to remind readers that, yes, he’ll be in Blackest Night.

Following up this series with Adventure Comics was great (although I still really like Manapul’s interpretation of the Legion, and felt like he was a little wasted on Conner Kent alone), but I hope that there’s a plan in place to make sure that the Johns-less Legion doesn’t fall prey to reader apathy and creative stagnation. The fact that the team is losing Johns and the format of the book is changing at the same time, certainly doesn’t seem too healthy…and DiDio’s reluctance to name the fill-in team (plus his insistence that the book will basically be absorbed into the all-consuming Borg that is the current “Superman on New Krypton” story) is a little frightening as well. The “event” we were promised for the fiftieth anniversary of the Legion ended up coming a little late, and now that we’ve finally seen it I feel like it would be a real shame to watch it all fall apart as the cycle of neglect and abuse picks up steam again.