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Knights of the Dinner Table #219 Now on Sale

Knights of the Dinner Table #219 Now on Sale

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Knights of the Dinner Table 219-small DC Showcase 12 Challengers of the Unknown-small

The latest issue of Knights of the Dinner Table boasts another great Kirby tribute by the fabulous Fraim brothers. The cover is an homage to DC Showcase #12, featuring the Challengers of the Unknown, drawn by the great Jack Kirby and originally published in 1957. (Kirby later claimed he reused elements from this series at Marvel Comics, when he collaborated with Stan Lee to create The Fantastic Four four years later.) Click on the images for bigger versions.

I remember buying the very first issue of KoDT, at a comic convention here in Chicago. I had no idea then that it would become one of the longest-running independent comics in history.

Knights of the Dinner Table Magazine is written and drawn by my friend Jolly R. Blackburn, with editorial assistance by his talented wife Barbara. Readers of the print version of Black Gate may remember the KoDT spin-off The Java Joint, which appeared in the back of every issue (and was eventually collected in a single volume in 2012).

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New Treasures: Hexed: The Sisters of Witchdown by Michael Alan Nelson

New Treasures: Hexed: The Sisters of Witchdown by Michael Alan Nelson

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Hexed Michael Alan Nelson-smallI’m not familiar with the the BOOM! comic Hexed, but perhaps I should be. It’s apparently a spin-off from the horror comic Fall of Cthulhu, but you don’t need to be familiar with her appearances there to enjoy her adventures in her own comic. I’m not sure how many issues were published, but enough to be collected into at least two graphic novels, the first published in March 2010, illustrated by Pretty Deadly Artist Emma Rios, and the second by newcomer Dan Mora, to be released this July.

Lucifer the thief, the star of Hexed, seems like a pretty interesting character, and The Sisters of Witchdown marks her first appearance in a prose novel. It’s being marketed as a YA title, but I’m intrigued enough to check it out.

Luci Jenifer Inacio das Neves, Lucifer for short, isn’t your typical teenaged girl. She’s a thief who survives by stealing bad things from bad people in the magical and mystical underworld hidden beneath our own. So when a policeman’s daughter, Gina, is kidnapped by a force he can’t explain, Lucifer is the only one who has a chance at getting his daughter back.

With the unsolicited help of Gina’s friends, including Gina’s boyfriend David, Lucifer’s investigation leads to the unfortunate truth of the kidnapping. Gina was taken to an otherworldly dimension by a creature of unspeakable evil: one of the Seven Sisters of Witchdown. Against all odds, Lucifer must use every magical tool hidden in her trick bag to steal her way into the Shade and bring Gina back before the Sister sacrifices her for her own dark ends. But the closer Lucifer gets to Gina, the closer she gets to David. And David to her. Lucifer must risk her life by confronting demons, witches, and the cruel demigoddess controlling her destiny — all to save the one girl who stands in the way of Lucifer finally finding love.

Michael Alan Nelson’s comic writing includes 28 Days Later, Supergirl, Valen the Outcast, Dominion, Cthulhu Tales, Dead Run, and many others.

Hexed: The Sisters of Witchdown was published by Pyr on May 5, 2015. It is 279 pages, priced at $14.99 in trade paperback and $9.99 for the digital version. The cover is by Larry Rostant.

You Gotta Know When to Fold ‘Em

You Gotta Know When to Fold ‘Em

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ODY-C 4-smallIn my review of issue #4 of Ody-C  I said that it might be my last. I read Issue #5 hoping to be proven wrong.

I wasn’t.

Artistically, Ody-C is still strong, and a lot of people out there are going to love it. I’m just not one of them. What I love about Homer and the direction Fraction and Ward are taking the work are two very different things. And that’s ok. That’s how re-creations work. But as someone who has far less time to read than things she wants to read, this is going to have to drop off the list for now to make room for something else.

And that in turn made me wonder: what is it that makes you, as a reader, stop reading? When I was younger I always finished books, even when I didn’t like them. I wanted to really dissect what I didn’t like about them. I’m also just too curious to go without finding out how a story ends.

As I’ve gotten older, though, the reasons I drop a book or series have multiplied. There are those that I simply don’t like, like Ody-C. There are those that I’ve just gotten tired of, like a TV series that shall remain unnamed but is in its tenth season and probably ought to go. Even the actors look tired of their parts, my favorite side characters are gone, and the sense of peril has completely drained away.

(OK I lied. It’s Supernatural. Bobby’s gone, Ellen and Jo are gone in a way I’m still angry about, and there are only so many times your main characters can die before it stops meaning anything. Also, I think they have run out of new monsters.)

And maybe it’s age leading to crankiness, but there are storylines and characters I’m getting tired of. I’m really, terribly bored with ‘very tough on the outside and won’t accept any help but deeply emotionally vulnerable on the inside with a load of childhood traumas’. Of all available genders. This makes reading entire genres difficult.

But again, these are my objections. What are yours? What makes you drop something: a show, a comic, a book? And what could bring you back to it?

Want to Break Into Comics?

Want to Break Into Comics?

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onibk_292  If you want to break into the big comic publishers, a bit of internet research, or visiting a local comic-con will reveal the accepted wisdom pretty quickly:

  • If you’re an artist, show your portfolio to editors at a con, or establish an online portfolio and email the editors. There’s lots of advice in different places about breaking in as an artist, and lots of places to learn (the comicsexperience.com podcast seems to me to be a great place to start).
  • If you’re a writer, pair up with an artist, make a comic, sell to the smaller comic presses to show your abilities and then approach bigger publishers, who, of course, offer a bit more money.

There isn’t really an advertised direct route in for writers either way. The submission guidelines at DC are pretty clear that they’re only looking for artists.

Marvel does let on that they’re looking for writers and artists, but mostly through the process laid out above.

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Through the Woods and Other Stories by Emily Carroll

Through the Woods and Other Stories by Emily Carroll

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Through the WoodsAnd now for some utterly uncontroversial awards news: on April 22, the nominees for the 2015 Eisner Awards were announced. You can find the complete list here, representing some very impressive work. I’ve written in the past about Astro City, Sandman: Overture, and Saga; I want to take a moment now to write a bit about one of the other nominees. Emily Carroll’s up for two Eisners, ‘Best Graphic Album — Reprint’ for her anthology Through The Woods, and ‘Best Short Story’ for her online piece “When the Darkness Presses.” They’re both excellent.

I first stumbled across Carroll’s comics shortly before the Eisner nominations were made public. I found a copy of Through The Woods at my local library, after which I read through the short stories on Carroll’s web site. I thought both the print and online works were brilliant comics. Mostly horror or dark fantasy with a strong mythic edge, they experiment with form in order to get at the heart of their narratives. Panel designs and lettering and storytelling are all unobtrusively intelligent and quietly inventive, finding new ways to bring out the emotional textures of the tales.

Carroll changes her style and approach with each story, but maintains a distinctive voice. She moves easily from web to print, working with the possibilities of page design in both mediums in a way that feels not just accomplished but effortless. Reading through her work you’re struck by the range of approaches but also by the sense of an overall unity — the unity that emerges from a major artist exploring the themes that hold meaning for her.

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Spot the Avengers: Age of Ultron Spoiler on the Cover of the 1967 Paperback The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker

Spot the Avengers: Age of Ultron Spoiler on the Cover of the 1967 Paperback The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker

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The Avengers Battle the Earth Wrecker-small The Avengers Battle the Earth Wrecker-back-small

I took my kids to see Avengers: Battle of Ultron on Friday, and we heartily enjoyed it. It’s a remarkable funny and ridiculously fast-paced two hours and 20 minutes of superpowered mayhem, and it’s obvious that writer/director Joss Whedon and his cohorts have a genuine love for the source material, as it’s packed with asides and sly references for those who remember the Marvel comic by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

Yesterday I was doing what I do every Saturday — sorting piles of old paperbacks — when I stumbled on the 1967 Bantam paperback The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker by Otto Binder. It came from a collection of 52 vintage paperbacks I bought on eBay for fifteen bucks last year (which also included The Unknown, Nine Horrors and a Dream by Joseph Payne Brennan, and Robert Bloch’s Nightmares.) Earth-Wrecker is one of only two Bantam Marvel tie-ins I’m aware of; the other is Captain America: The Great Gold Steal, by Ted White (1968).

The fascinating thing about The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker, though, is that, despite being released nearly 50 years ago, it has a mild spoiler for the Avengers: Age of Ultron right on the cover. If you want to avoid spoilers, just scroll on to the next article. Otherwise, read on.

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Watch Stan Lee Give Tips on How to Give a Great Cameo Performance, in the Stan Lee Cameo School

Watch Stan Lee Give Tips on How to Give a Great Cameo Performance, in the Stan Lee Cameo School

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I was watching movies on YouTube last night when an Audi ad popped up featuring Stan Lee. [I’d like to take a minute to point out that sentence would have been completely nonsensical 15 years ago. Ah, what a world we live in.]

It turned it to be well worth watching. Directed by Kevin Smith, “The Stan Lee Cameo School” is a hilarious two-minute short featuring featuring Lou Ferrigno, Tara Reid, Michael Rooker, Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith. I won’t ruin any more for you — check it out.

Audi has a long tradition of appealing to science fiction fans — check out their Star Trek ads. (And Volkswagen reunited William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy for an ad late last year.) All this talk of Audis does make me miss mine, however… tragically, it was destroyed in a head-on collision in 2011.

The Three Phases of Marvel’s Adam Warlock: Last Half of Part Two – The Thanos Arc

The Three Phases of Marvel’s Adam Warlock: Last Half of Part Two – The Thanos Arc

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Warlock_Vol_1_12Adam Warlock was one of those brooding, tragic, lonely heroes I gravitated to as a thirteen-year old, along with Dr. Strange and Son-of-Satan and the oddball Defenders. I’ve broken up Warlock’s chronology into the three phases. I covered the first, the pre-Jim Starlin era, in my first post. I covered the first half of Jim Starlin’s 1975-1977 run, the Magus saga, in my second post.

Today, I’ll discuss the last half of Starlin’s run in the 1970s, where Thanos plays the big heavy. As always, this post is nothing but spoilers, so read it with your eyes closed if you still haven’t read Warlock. If you’d prefer to read the comics first, they’re all available at comixology.com; today’s Adam story covers Warlock 12-15, Marvel Team-Up 55, Avengers Annual 7 and Marvel Two-in-One Annual 2.

So, although Thanos helped Adam Warlock killed his future evil self in Warlock 11, he doesn’t come back immediately. Thanos is the Titan with a plan, and so Starlin takes a couple of episodic detours.

First, Pip the Troll, the moral degenerate who is Adam’s only friend, avoids arrest by trying to spring a prostitute from her pimp. Hilarity and tongue-in-cheek ensue. I’ve never been a Pip fan, but I get how Adam’s unique and tragic fate means he gets to have one friend in life (one and a half if you count Gamorra).

Then Adam fights the Star-Thief, another original and surreal creation of Starlin’s. A man born on Earth, with a functioning brain but bereft of the five senses, the Star-Thief is completely trapped in his mind. With nothing else, he explores the inner parts of his brain, gaining tremendous power and a grudge against humanity that makes him want to extinguish the stars.

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Future Treasures: Rat Queens Volume 2 by Kurtis J. Wiebe and Roc Upchurch

Future Treasures: Rat Queens Volume 2 by Kurtis J. Wiebe and Roc Upchurch

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Rat Queens Volume II-smallRat Queens, Volume 1 was nominated for a 2015 Hugo — and all on its own, too, without having to rely on a slate or anything. (I wonder if we’ll have to put that qualifier on all future Hugo nominees.)

The Rat Queens is a darkly comedic “sass-and-sorcery” graphic novel, featuring a pack of booze-guzzling, death-dealing battle maidens-for-hire in the business of killing all god’s creatures for profit. It follow the adventures of four Dungeons and Dragons archetypes, Hannah the Rockabilly Elven Mage, Violet the Hipster Dwarven Fighter, Dee the Atheist Human Cleric and Betty the Hippy Smidgen Thief, as they hack their way through dungeons and strangers things, in this modern spin on an old school genre.

A brand-new, booze-soaked tale of the Rat Queens reveals a growing menace within the very walls of Palisade. And while Dee may have run from her past, the bloated, blood-feasting sky god N’rygoth never really lets his children stray too far. Collects issues #6-10 of the smash-hit series, plus extras.

Volume 1, Sass & Sorcery, was released on April 8, 2014, and is still available — at the low introductory price of $9.99. It’s definitely the best starting place if you’re not familiar with the series. I bought it last year, and it was quickly snatched up by all the comic-reading bipeds in my house.

Rat Queens Volume 2: The Far Reaching Tentacles of N’rygoth was written by Kurtis J. Wiebe and illustrated by Roc Upchurch and Stjepan Sejic. It will be published by Image Comics on May 19, 2015. It is 136 pages in full color, priced at $14.99. There is no digital edition.

Pretty Deadly: The Song of Death-Faced Ginny

Pretty Deadly: The Song of Death-Faced Ginny

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Pretty Deadly 1-smallI still remember the first time I read Sandman. I didn’t read comics back then: I thought of them as longer versions of the strips in the Sunday paper and didn’t give them much other thought. Then one day, I was sitting in the metal working classroom in High School, and Morley, a red-haired skinny punk rocker I still wish I had gotten to know better, handed me a comic book and said, “You should read this. It’s awesome.”

I knew from the cover, a strange collage that was both enticing and off-putting, it wouldn’t be what I expected. But I had no idea what I was in for. I didn’t like the art, and some of the references confused me, but otherwise, I was completely blown away. It was one of those life altering experiences: not only did I discover Neil Gaiman, I discovered comic books. That first volume completely changed the way I thought of storytelling and visual design, the way that myth and story could dance together, and the way the mythic and mundane could crash together.

Twenty years later, I had that experience again. Kelly Sue DeConnick and Emma Rios’ Pretty Deadly is a lush, gorgeous and lyrical graphic novel, a mythopoeic western that plays with the conventional gunslinger tropes while bringing in elements of horror and folklore. And what ties it all together is the song of Death-faced Ginny.

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