Comics History
Last Bat-Time, Last Bat-Channel
This is one of those odd, tragic stories that you see so often in the comics industry… a particular injustice that was the final contemptuous boot in the ass to a talent that the comics industry had already beat like a piñata for most of his career. Continue Reading »
Friday Aboard the Star Wolf
Not comics this week, just comics-adjacent. But I think it’s a story you’ll enjoy, and also a chance to help out with something really cool. Continue Reading »
After Forty-Five Years… the Friday I Said So Long
You know, maybe it’s some kind of comics-related Seasonal Affective Disorder or something. Continue Reading »
Saturday with a Weird Hero
I’ve spoken in this space many times about the different paperback series that I loved in the mid-seventies, and how they crossed over with comics. The pulp reprint stuff like Doc Savage and the Avenger, the hardcore “men’s adventure” series like Mack Bolan and everything he inspired, and the barbarian hordes that followed in the wake of Frank Frazetta and Conan.
But there was one paperback series I adored more than any other… Continue Reading »
Sunday Funnies
I’ve talked here pretty often about my first superhero comics, the DC Giants of the late 1960s. But I was reminded not too long ago that those weren’t my actual FIRST comic books. No, those I got… in Sunday School. Continue Reading »
One More Friday at the Tipping Point
The last couple of weeks, I’ve been talking about that moment when you go from being mildly interested in something to becoming a fan, and listing a few different times that moment happened for me. And this week we have one more set of them, and oddly enough, I came to each one through an unexpected, back-door route. Continue Reading »
Another Friday at the Tipping Point
Last week I talked a little bit about that moment of discovery, when you become a fan of something, rather than just a casually-interested member of the general audience, and gave a few specific examples. This week, we do it again with a different list. Continue Reading »
Friday at the Tipping Point
I got an interesting question the other day: “When did you go from being a reader to being a fan?” Continue Reading »
A Friday Farewell to a Classic Illustrator
This certainly has been a depressing December for comics fans. Jerry Robinson and Joe Simon, both industry giants, leaving us within days of each other. There have already been many words written about both men by comics historians far more erudite than me, and i imagine there are more to come.
It’s not getting nearly as much press as the loss of Joe Simon the same day, naturally… but the death that hit me the hardest was the loss of Eduardo Barreto.
Continue Reading »
Scary Afternoons
My boss Katie had a call from a parent who was upset about my class last week. The mother of one of my students had heard we were planning a ‘scary movie’ for my Young Authors class this Monday — Halloween day — and she really didn’t feel her eleven-year-old son was ready for something like that. Continue Reading »
Saturday in the Hyborian Age… well, almost
This is one of those things that’s so easy to get right… and yet, somehow, they keep getting it wrong.
Which is to say, yeah, we saw the new Conan movie. Continue Reading »
Friday with the Academics
Oddly enough, by “academics” I guess I mean me and my blog colleague Ms. Kelly Thompson. No, really.
It happened like this. Continue Reading »
Shapeshifting Saturday
Lately, I’ve been thinking about my personal ambivalence towards digital comics and where that comes from.
