Stephen Mayer: Sidekicks (the teenaged kind, not the Jonathan Brandis and Chuck Norris taking down asthma and Joe Piscopo, respectively, variety) are one of the oldest elements of the superhero tradition, but aside from Damian on the Boy Wonder, they're almost absent from modern mainstream comics.
Just from checking out his piece above, you can tell Cliff Chiang digs 'em.
In the broadest sense, what's the deal?
Writing from the comfort of the bed in the beautiful Marriott Baltimore at Camden Yards! It's been a fun night bumming around the Inner Harbor, but now it's time to get back to COMICS!
If you're back in Greensboro, don't forget that tomorrow is International Read Comics in Public Day. In addition to the additional 10% off your next purchase that you'll receive if you bring in a picture of yourself reading in public, Ian will have a table and chairs set up outside the store for you to enjoy the comfort of the outdoors and there will be folks at Center City Park downtown offering the services of their camera to catch you in the act of enjoying comics!
Stephen Mayer: This week Gregg and I are going to join forces for an epic review of epic epicness. And what garners such epic devotion? Scott Pilgrim vs. The World!
I promise, this will be the last I talk about it...at least until the video game comes out next week...and the DVD release.
Spent the night in the back room burning the midnight oil on a very special project and up with the roosters and back here bright and early! It's gonna be a big week, culminating in Jermaine and I heading out of town on Friday morning, all the way up to Baltimore, Charm City, in an attempt to land some of the biggest names in comics for our next year of events!
#26 ACK! The comic strip CATHY is ending. After 34+ years, the final strip will run on Sunday, October 3. As if newspapers didn’t have it bad enough! Will she ever find a bathing suit that fits? Will she ever get married? Am I being overly sarcastic?
Stephen Mayer: Chocolate, Chocolate, Chocolate. ACK! - Liz Lemon
Gregg Schigiel: It’s our 50th conversation/column. To commemorate we’re doing two things. Thing one, we’re gonna call the column “Regarding: Comics” from now on, you know, to class up the joint. Thing two, and without further ado, we’re going to tear through 50 bits of comics news and info, starting…now!
Between Temple of Doom, the Street Fighter tournament and Scott Pilgrim, last night was pretty packed! Rolling over some of the fun into the rest of the weekend, I'm running a little contest between the ol' First Look and my personal blog. Head over there to check out my trivia quests! Then e-mail your responses to stephen@acmecomics.com! The first person to hit me up with all of the correct answers gets a nice prize!
Stephen: In honor of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World hitting theaters this week, I thought I might be fun to throw down in the geekiest of fashions: "Who would win in a fight, [blank] or [blank]"!
One of us will propose a fight, any character from any company against another character from any company. Then the other will respond to the prompt, however seriously or ridiculously they chose. Then the originator of the bout will have to do a quick sketch of the fight in progress!
I set the format, so you set the tone with Round 1!
We're whipping ourselves into a Scott Pilgrim induced frenzy here at the story, getting ready for the Street Fighter tournament qualifying round tomorrow night! While you can still check out the official rules here, I want to remind everyone that it costs $5 to enter, but that gets you into a drawing for tickets to the Scott Pilgrim premiere Thursday night at the Carousel, and even though the tournament starts at 8:00, you must be registered by 7:00 PM. Beyond that, we're offering 50% OFF all video game back issues tomorrow, and the tournament will feature a DJ and some other sweet surprises! Come out and have a good time!
And before you ask, comics do not qualify for the tax free weekend. Sorry. If you need them for required reading at school, bring us some proof and we'll work something out!
Gregg Schigiel: With Comic-Con prep and the Con itself behind us, it’s time to get back in the RE: COMICS! saddle and talk about comics again. And in as much as I thought it might be fun to go category-by-category and compare our Eisner Award predictions with the actual results, I then realized I’d confused fun with super-boring.
Instead, as news from San Diego spreads and jockeys for position to get noticed amongst so much “noise”, I though it might be nice to take a different path and talk about “underrateds”…which is to say, point out and give props to those who maybe don’t get the attention we think they deserve, or, alternatively, don’t get the right kind of attention/acclaim/credit.
So maybe there’s a writer out there doing great work but isn’t a household name…or there’s an artist out there who, even though they’re a big name, should get credit for something else. I don’t know what.
Interestingly, semi-speaking of the Eisner’s, there was once a category called “Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition”…so I guess we’re sort of doing that.
To that end, let’s go categorical and see what happens.
And here we go!