It has just been released today that The Walt Disney Company has bought The Marvel Entertainment Company (Marvel Comics)
I was shocked when I first read the news.
But I think I can see some reason for the corporate take over.
Marvel has had a lot of success recently with their movies and the company does like to bring up the fact that they have loads of characters (5,000) which I am sure looks good to Disney since it this would be more sources of revenue for Disney which has seen a bit of a down turn recently (bad economy equals less people coming to their theme parks)
And on Marvel's end it makes since they would want to be bought by one of the worlds largest entertainment companies. Disney has master licensing and has many outlets they can put Marvel characters...or the current owners of Marvel just wanted to cash out.
Also oddly enough I guess this balances out the fact that Warner Bros owns DC comics
But know I wonder how will this effect both companies.
Will Disney change the way Marvel does business or impose creative control on the types of things Marvel can do?
Will Marvel now publish comics based on Disney characters?
I could also see DC using Marvel as a brand aimed at Teens. the way Disney is seen as a brand aimed at kids and family focused media and has the brand Miramax for movies that are aimed at adults and ESPN for sports fans.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Looking back at Warlock and the Infinity Watch
a while back I reread all my cloak and dagger comics and talked about them here. I realize this is something I may do time to time because comics are getting pricey and it's much cheaper to go back and reread things I haven't read in a long time. This time I reread Warlock and the Infinity Watch and much of the comics that tied into the book.
One of the first things I thought rereading this series was that I couldn't believe that I forgot how good it was. The title started out as Jim Starlin doing a Keith Giffen era of the Justice League type book since it's a team of oddballs stuck together in a team and their personalities clash for comic effect. Though the humorous tone only lasted in for the first half of the series or so.
also now that I look at it both teams where formed due to events in company wide big event cross overs, JLI form Legend and Warlock and the Infinity Watch from the Infinity Gauntlet.
The problem with Warlock and the Infinity Watch was that the titled was tied into the Infinity whatever series, so not only did you need to read the Infinity Gauntlet to understand why the team was formed (or at least read wiki page for the mini series) for the first 2 years of the title you would have to read extra miniseries (and each event added an extra title you needed to read) to understand whats going on.
At least that was the problem when the series just game out, but rereading it with when you have all of the books it's easy to spot another problem this series faced around the time of the Infinity Crusade cross over and the Thor/Strange/Warlock & crew cross over that followed it...the quality in the art slipped.
It's understandable that with deadlines from time to time an the art of an issue wont be as good as it should be since the artist rushed to get the book out on time. But at the time the book was rotating between to artist Angel Medina and Tom Grinberg.
I think in Grinberg's case he may have been trying a new style that was similar to the styles of the founders of image comics since that look was popular at the time.
the art picked backup when Pat Oliffe became the series artist at issue 29.
during the last year or so of the title Jim Starlin left the title to do a creator owned book at Malibu comics and John Arcudi took over as writer. John Arcudi run of the book was good but my only complainant was that he didn't seem to get the character Thanos right and reduced the character into your typical villain wanting revenge.
After reading the series one thing I can say is that I wouldn't mind seeing the character Maxam used again.
BE WARNED DOWN BELOW BE SPOILERS
don't read if you want to find out the secret of Maxam by reading the comic and not some guy's blog post
ok here it is.
the character wasn't really developed much but a Black guy form the future sent to the past to stop the guy that will grow up to destroy worlds is an interesting base to start form. More so when it's revealed that the guy he must stop is currently a superhero.
though I realize that there may not be much demand for the character. For most of his run he had no memory of who he was and so the character was pretty much a blank slate (thought that worked fine for Wolverine) and I am sure many fans didn't like the character when it was revealed that he was sent to kill Adam Warlock. But I think the last part is what makes him interesting since it basically asked the question if you could go back in time and kill baby Hitler would you.
and that's where the character Maxam is at, sure as Adam Warlock he didn't do anything wrong and was in fact a good person...but Maxam lived through (or after I'm not sure) the horrors that he will cause later in life.
One of the first things I thought rereading this series was that I couldn't believe that I forgot how good it was. The title started out as Jim Starlin doing a Keith Giffen era of the Justice League type book since it's a team of oddballs stuck together in a team and their personalities clash for comic effect. Though the humorous tone only lasted in for the first half of the series or so.
also now that I look at it both teams where formed due to events in company wide big event cross overs, JLI form Legend and Warlock and the Infinity Watch from the Infinity Gauntlet.
The problem with Warlock and the Infinity Watch was that the titled was tied into the Infinity whatever series, so not only did you need to read the Infinity Gauntlet to understand why the team was formed (or at least read wiki page for the mini series) for the first 2 years of the title you would have to read extra miniseries (and each event added an extra title you needed to read) to understand whats going on.
At least that was the problem when the series just game out, but rereading it with when you have all of the books it's easy to spot another problem this series faced around the time of the Infinity Crusade cross over and the Thor/Strange/Warlock & crew cross over that followed it...the quality in the art slipped.
It's understandable that with deadlines from time to time an the art of an issue wont be as good as it should be since the artist rushed to get the book out on time. But at the time the book was rotating between to artist Angel Medina and Tom Grinberg.
I think in Grinberg's case he may have been trying a new style that was similar to the styles of the founders of image comics since that look was popular at the time.
the art picked backup when Pat Oliffe became the series artist at issue 29.
during the last year or so of the title Jim Starlin left the title to do a creator owned book at Malibu comics and John Arcudi took over as writer. John Arcudi run of the book was good but my only complainant was that he didn't seem to get the character Thanos right and reduced the character into your typical villain wanting revenge.
After reading the series one thing I can say is that I wouldn't mind seeing the character Maxam used again.
BE WARNED DOWN BELOW BE SPOILERS
don't read if you want to find out the secret of Maxam by reading the comic and not some guy's blog post
ok here it is.
the character wasn't really developed much but a Black guy form the future sent to the past to stop the guy that will grow up to destroy worlds is an interesting base to start form. More so when it's revealed that the guy he must stop is currently a superhero.
though I realize that there may not be much demand for the character. For most of his run he had no memory of who he was and so the character was pretty much a blank slate (thought that worked fine for Wolverine) and I am sure many fans didn't like the character when it was revealed that he was sent to kill Adam Warlock. But I think the last part is what makes him interesting since it basically asked the question if you could go back in time and kill baby Hitler would you.
and that's where the character Maxam is at, sure as Adam Warlock he didn't do anything wrong and was in fact a good person...but Maxam lived through (or after I'm not sure) the horrors that he will cause later in life.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Top 6 gimmick covers that should have been done during the 90's
Recently it seems like gimmick covers are making a comeback.
With marvel recently coming out with foilogram (foil + hologram) covers on the first issue of their relaunched ultimate comics and the fact that Marvel's VP of sales says "This is the 90's
done right" I started to to think about gimmick covers on comics that came out when I was a kid and decided to list the top things I was surprise that actually never where used in gimmick covers.
this is my top list in no real order
6. Metal Letters for the comic's tittle.
why? During the 90's I notice a bit of clothing (usually Hats some t-shirts) that used metal (or something that looked metallic) was used for lettering. Now I'm not talking about metallic ink, which where actually used during the 90's gimmick boom, but actual metal letters pasted onto the comic.
5. tie dye comic book covers
well since we are talking about fashion form the 90's tie dye did make a come back around that time. It also has a bounces since tie dye was big in the 60's and 70's which works great since there is a segment of fans that always won't to back to the types of stories (or just the characters) that where around then.
4. motion cover
you remember getting cards usually in cracker jack or cereal boxes that when you moved the card side to side slightly the picture on the card would change.
I was always surprised that no one thought of using this for a comic book cover.
3. video game cover
OK, I don't mean video game on the level you would get on your xbox 360 or even SNES (or even NES) I was thinking over the type of game tiger direct made or nintendo's watch games.
2. scratch and sniff covers.
Scratch and Sniff stickers where big when I was a little kid growing up in the 80's. So the technically was there in the 90's to make scratch and sniff comic covers and at a reasonable price (unlike my video game cover ideal)
1. Spinners!!!
Your comic is staying still but the wheels keep spinning. Hey it works for cars!!!
Now giving there where so many gimmick covers on the comics that came out during the 90's I wouldn't be surprised if one or more of those ideals where actually used by some small company trying to get us gimmick crazed kids to buy their comic. if you know of any comic that used any of these ideals feel free to point them out to me.
With marvel recently coming out with foilogram (foil + hologram) covers on the first issue of their relaunched ultimate comics and the fact that Marvel's VP of sales says "This is the 90's
done right" I started to to think about gimmick covers on comics that came out when I was a kid and decided to list the top things I was surprise that actually never where used in gimmick covers.
this is my top list in no real order
6. Metal Letters for the comic's tittle.
why? During the 90's I notice a bit of clothing (usually Hats some t-shirts) that used metal (or something that looked metallic) was used for lettering. Now I'm not talking about metallic ink, which where actually used during the 90's gimmick boom, but actual metal letters pasted onto the comic.
5. tie dye comic book covers
well since we are talking about fashion form the 90's tie dye did make a come back around that time. It also has a bounces since tie dye was big in the 60's and 70's which works great since there is a segment of fans that always won't to back to the types of stories (or just the characters) that where around then.
4. motion cover
you remember getting cards usually in cracker jack or cereal boxes that when you moved the card side to side slightly the picture on the card would change.
I was always surprised that no one thought of using this for a comic book cover.
3. video game cover
OK, I don't mean video game on the level you would get on your xbox 360 or even SNES (or even NES) I was thinking over the type of game tiger direct made or nintendo's watch games.
2. scratch and sniff covers.
Scratch and Sniff stickers where big when I was a little kid growing up in the 80's. So the technically was there in the 90's to make scratch and sniff comic covers and at a reasonable price (unlike my video game cover ideal)
1. Spinners!!!
Your comic is staying still but the wheels keep spinning. Hey it works for cars!!!
Now giving there where so many gimmick covers on the comics that came out during the 90's I wouldn't be surprised if one or more of those ideals where actually used by some small company trying to get us gimmick crazed kids to buy their comic. if you know of any comic that used any of these ideals feel free to point them out to me.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Director Angela Robinson to write DC's the Web
Angela Robinson, who directed Herbie: Fully loaded, shows for the L-word and directed and write D.E.B.S (both the short film and it's feature length movie) has been announced to write the new comic series The Web (featuring the character form Archie's Red Circle comics) the first issue will come out in September.
The book will also have a back up series featuring the hangman being written by John Rozum (former writer of Milestone's Xombie)
The book will also have a back up series featuring the hangman being written by John Rozum (former writer of Milestone's Xombie)
Friday, May 29, 2009
Dwayne McDuffie fired off of JLA for telling fans the truth
It seems that writer Dwayne McDuffie has recently been let go from writing Justice League of America because he gave a little to much information about some of the things that go behind the scenes in the comic book biz.
almost a month after lying in the gutter collected a number of comments Mr. McDuffie posted on DC comics own message boards over a 2 year period when he talked about things like the stories he had to change because of editors, or the character he wanted was being used in another book etc.
it's a shame that DC decided to do this. He didn't say anything negative about DC comics or the editors he worked with, his comments where basically things like I had to cut this story short because we need the book to tie into a big event cross-over or I couldn't use this or that character because he or she or it was being used by someone else and so they where off limits.
The odd thing is that these comments where posted on DC's message board and so one would think that if they had a problem with him telling to much someone would have seen his post over the last 2 years and could have told him keep it down if they didn't want this type of info out.
I think JLA editors made a stupid decision to fire a talented writer for a dumb reason.
But on his board Dwayne is taking this all well he stats he has lots of work, with a number of other projects such as the TV show Ben 10 and a new Milestone project.
his says he is only sad that he doesn't get to finish is plans which included a JLA centered big event next year and his storyline with Black Canary.
he was also sad over the fact that they finally gave him a regular artist for him to work with instead of the revolving door of artist he had one his run.
almost a month after lying in the gutter collected a number of comments Mr. McDuffie posted on DC comics own message boards over a 2 year period when he talked about things like the stories he had to change because of editors, or the character he wanted was being used in another book etc.
it's a shame that DC decided to do this. He didn't say anything negative about DC comics or the editors he worked with, his comments where basically things like I had to cut this story short because we need the book to tie into a big event cross-over or I couldn't use this or that character because he or she or it was being used by someone else and so they where off limits.
The odd thing is that these comments where posted on DC's message board and so one would think that if they had a problem with him telling to much someone would have seen his post over the last 2 years and could have told him keep it down if they didn't want this type of info out.
I think JLA editors made a stupid decision to fire a talented writer for a dumb reason.
But on his board Dwayne is taking this all well he stats he has lots of work, with a number of other projects such as the TV show Ben 10 and a new Milestone project.
his says he is only sad that he doesn't get to finish is plans which included a JLA centered big event next year and his storyline with Black Canary.
I'm distressed by where I left Black Canary, as my intention was to use the current subplot to strengthen her character and relationships with the new membership
he was also sad over the fact that they finally gave him a regular artist for him to work with instead of the revolving door of artist he had one his run.
Friday, May 22, 2009
Grant Morrison documentary
it seems that there is going to be a documentary done on comic book writer Grant Morrison coming out next year. You can see a trailer for the film below
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Looking back @ Cloak & Dagger
it's interesting when as an adult you go and look at something you liked as a kid.
I did this recently when I reread the issues I have of cloak and dagger (minus there stunt in strange tales) and man was I shock at all the stuff I didn't really pick up on as a kid.
for those who don't know Cloak & Dagger are Marvel Comic book characters that where two teenage runaways who get kidnapped and have a drug tested on them that ends up giving them superpowers.
Cloak is a guy wearing a cloak, he is basically a door way to a dark diminison where those who enter it are force to confront their greatest fears and/or the worst thing they have ever done and he can also teleport
Dagger shoots out daggers of light that basically make people feel shame and she can also heal people.
Cloak happens to be an African-American guy and Dagger a white girl.
the first thing I notice rereading these comics is that even thought the character are both around the same age (teenagers) Cloak is drawn to look much older (he looks like a guy in his 40's or 50's instead of being 16 or 17) which makes it look creepy that he is hanging out with a 16 year old even though the characters are the same age.
Next looking at there origin story, both kids are runaway who ended up in new york at same time and place, when Cloak first sees Dagger his first thought is that he should rob her because she looks rich (which she was) this only changed when someone else mugs her and he decides to rescue her.
and the racial uncomfort doesn't stop there. the title is full of saying things like dagger being pure of white light of good and cloak being said to be an evil force. basically white is good and black is bad, which doesn't come of well giving the race of the two characters.
as a kid I think I over looked all this because Dark characters are cool, and that was what Cloak came off as.
another thing as I pointed out Dagger's power is to make people feel shame (or to be correct over powered by it) in the book it is written that she is attacking people with goodness and that the bad people she attacks just can't handle it. But as I said the only thing that happens in the book is that those character feel guilt over what they did, but from the issues I read it doesn't look like anyone started to become a good person because they where hit by Dagger's daggers. So really even thought the book tries to play these characters powers as being connected to good and evil, it's really about fear and guilt.
I did this recently when I reread the issues I have of cloak and dagger (minus there stunt in strange tales) and man was I shock at all the stuff I didn't really pick up on as a kid.
for those who don't know Cloak & Dagger are Marvel Comic book characters that where two teenage runaways who get kidnapped and have a drug tested on them that ends up giving them superpowers.
Cloak is a guy wearing a cloak, he is basically a door way to a dark diminison where those who enter it are force to confront their greatest fears and/or the worst thing they have ever done and he can also teleport
Dagger shoots out daggers of light that basically make people feel shame and she can also heal people.
Cloak happens to be an African-American guy and Dagger a white girl.
the first thing I notice rereading these comics is that even thought the character are both around the same age (teenagers) Cloak is drawn to look much older (he looks like a guy in his 40's or 50's instead of being 16 or 17) which makes it look creepy that he is hanging out with a 16 year old even though the characters are the same age.
Next looking at there origin story, both kids are runaway who ended up in new york at same time and place, when Cloak first sees Dagger his first thought is that he should rob her because she looks rich (which she was) this only changed when someone else mugs her and he decides to rescue her.
and the racial uncomfort doesn't stop there. the title is full of saying things like dagger being pure of white light of good and cloak being said to be an evil force. basically white is good and black is bad, which doesn't come of well giving the race of the two characters.
as a kid I think I over looked all this because Dark characters are cool, and that was what Cloak came off as.
another thing as I pointed out Dagger's power is to make people feel shame (or to be correct over powered by it) in the book it is written that she is attacking people with goodness and that the bad people she attacks just can't handle it. But as I said the only thing that happens in the book is that those character feel guilt over what they did, but from the issues I read it doesn't look like anyone started to become a good person because they where hit by Dagger's daggers. So really even thought the book tries to play these characters powers as being connected to good and evil, it's really about fear and guilt.
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