Highway 62

For me, the con started a day early. I made an attempt to meet some friends on Preview night, figuring that it would be lightly-attended and not much of a bother. I mean, I’d never had much problem registering or waiting in lines once I’d started getting press/pro credentials. Why should this be any different?

I’ve no idea, but it was. I spent nearly an hour waiting to get my badge (which is still better than the typical wait I’d endured in the wrap-around-the-building lines of old.) Once I hit the floor, I found that I had little more than twenty minutes left before they’d start kicking people out. I made the most of it by snapping up a copy of the latest Walking Dead (a few days early, even) and Samuel Hiti’s Tiempos Finales (which looks great, but I’ve not had a chance to read it, or much of anything else I bought at the con, really.)

Right about then was when they started firing up the bulldozers and herding the masses towards the exits, so I found myself chased out for the evening.

Oddly enough, the following morning, I took my own advice and loaded up with a relatively balanced breakfast and chose to park as far away from the Convention Center as I could and still be in San Diego. Well, Old Town, actually. The trolley took just a hair longer than it would have taken to find parking and walk in, but the reduced aggravation and expense was well worth it. Pity they stop running the trolley at midnight on weeknights. Puts a crimp in the whole party-‘til-dawn stylee that the Con inspires.

Spent a lot of the first day buying a lot of comics that I could have bought at any time from any number of retailers and carrying them around all day. I never said that I was very smart, merely clever from time to time. I know that the Con floor was bigger this year, but it didn’t really seem that way to me ‘cause about a third or more of it was written off nearly instantly by being toy booths and full scale X-Wings and clutter and the like. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, mind you, but it’s not what I come to the convention for.

And yes, Lucasfilm was the biggest booth on the floor, some 10,000 square feet of stuff that I’d have eaten up were I ten again, but I’m not. I admired the spectacle from a safe distance, but didn’t really participate in it. I will say, however, that it was the hottest part of the show floor. No, really, I mean it. Literally ten degrees hotter than any other part of the Con, probably twenty percent more humid, too. Bleah.

Oh, and another thing, yes I’m a writer trying to get into the business, but I’m not (repeat, NOT) going to bore you with details of who I talked to and what I talked to them about. If there’s a direct impact on Strangeways, then I’ll let you know, but shmoozings will not be repeated here. So, if there seem to be giant gaps in the coverage, chalk it up to that or to near-total collapse of my higher brain functions.

People will talk about how they saw more square footage of manga than comics there, and that might be true, but I saw more square footage of non-comics stuff than manga and comics put together. Unfortunately, the money is in the broader pop culture and its associated products. And remember, the slogan for SDCC was “Celebrating the Popular Arts” for a long time, and that still holds true. It’s not just a comics show and hasn’t been for some time. If that were true, then it’d be half the size it is now, or less. And I figure that the more eyeballs we can run the good stuff past, the more chance we have of someone new getting sucked into the fold. Comics can continue to be an insular clubhouse, or they can engage the popular culture at large.

Enough soapboxing.

Wandered through the Image area a bit, finally picked up the first issue of Waterloo Sunset, Doug Tennapel’s Tommysaurus Rex (which looks fantastic and sold me on the first page) and some more Invincible. I passed on Flight, even though it was a beautiful book, but I was already going kinda nuts and needed to throttle back a little bit. And as an aside, Robert Kirkman is a heck of a nice guy, enthusiastically embracing his fanbase and more than happy to sign the biggest stack of comics that I’d seen anyone sign at a convention. He’s a pretty darn good writer too, but even he can’t really interest me in Marvel 2099.

I wander some more, spent a damn lot of time wandering really. And you thought I was kidding about that admonition to wear good shoes, didn’t you?

As many DC comics (and sub imprints) that I end up buying, you’d think that I’d spend a fair amount of time at their booth. Not so much so, really. They had some weird figure choices that I heartily endorsed (like the Psycho Pirate) over in the DC Direct area, but the main tables didn’t offer too much for me to browse. I like to keep ahead of the game, but don’t like to spoilerize my regular reading. Ironic, I suppose. Chatted with Andy Diggle briefly, and am looking forward to his take on Adam Strange. I’d hoped for more preview materials from the 2000AD folks, but was a little let down. Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited about the material coming out, but I wanted a good look at some of it beforehand. I heard rumor of potential DC/2000AD crossovers, but nothing specific, and really, unless the right characters get to the right creators, those will likely not be all that great. With the right teams, however, they could be a damn lot of fun.

Cold Cut sponsored their Indy Island once again, featuring folks like Chip (Prison Funnies) Zdarsky and Kagan (Infinite Kung Fu) Mcleod, as well as Carla Speed McNeil (Finder) and Jim Ottovani (Two-Fisted Science). Talked with Chip a fair bit, asked him where the heck Prison Funnies #3 was and read his laugh-out-loud funny Vampirella/Monster Squad story, which is supposed to be in the next Vampirella magazine (and last month’s Scurvy Dogs/Vampirella crossover was a nice treat as well, though I have to admit it’ll work better for fans of the ‘Dogs.) Snagged some issues of Infinite Kung Fu which was far better than I’d remembered it being. Kagan McLeod delivers kung-fu fun but wraps it around clever plots and solid storytelling. Well worth a look.

Didn’t see too much at the independents to really catch my eye. And by independents, I don’t mean he bigger houses like AiT/Planet Lar. I mean the rows of tables that have the comics you’ve never heard of and you’re not likely ever to. A lot of that stuff is incredibly personal, and unless it grabs you from the get-go, it’s just not going to do it at all.

Planet Lar, on the other hand, offered up a bunch of things to get my interest. Nearly all of their announced stuff for 2005 sounds great (but that’s what promotional material is supposed to do). Picked up a couple of things from the table, including the collected Astronauts in Trouble. I also got a very nice sketch from Fabio Moon, featuring a cigarette girl from the upcoming Smoke ‘n Guns. His work knocked me out the second I saw it, and I think he’ll turn a lot of heads once more of his work gets out there. Larry, as always, is a charming fellow to talk with in person and the table was always buzzing with activity.

The only panels I attended were those for Vertigo comics, oddly enough. Meant to get to the Mirrormask presentation, but just couldn’t make it. The first of the Vertigo panels was a kind of odd affair, taking a closer look at the new talent that Vertigo is working on building up over the next few years. Granted, none of these folks have already been in comics for many years already, so I found it a little odd that they were being treated as new kids, but I realize that I’m hardly the average comic-con attendee. Not too much new was announced there, but the format led to a fairly intriguing question and answer session (with the questions coming from Vertigo editors for the audience.) Sort of an un-announced consumer focus group, I suppose.

The main Vertigo panel, however, announced a bunch of interesting projects, such as Trigger (which leads back to more traditionally SF territory), Pride (what I’m guessing will be political allegory based around a pride of lions escaped from a Baghdad zoo during the opening of the Iraq war), Sloth (by Gilbert Hernandez), an adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, and a couple others. There was a little new news on things that had been announced last year, like Vinmanarama and We3, but not much. No word of a follow-on to Seaguy (which I really enjoyed, but will talk about later.)

Got back to wandering the floor. You know, one of the things that I really love about the Comic-Con is that anyone, anyone can be a celebrity for those four days. All you have to do is dress in a really great costume (or hell, for some folks, a really lousy one will do) and you will get no end of people wanting to snap your picture. Anyone can do this. Totally democratic. And yes, there was a lot of that going on this weekend. Surprising how many characters I don’t recognize. Guess I need to read more manga or something.

Spent a lot of time over at Splash Page Comic Art. Original art is so much fun. You get a lot more of a feel for the process that way, looking at the actual artwork instead of the (mostly) nicely-printed final result. Solid blacks reveal a sea of brush-strokes and clean lines become chaotic with touch-up. Neat stuff. It’s also amazing how some pages simply work better uncolored and unprocessed (particularly with the advent of things like motion blur filters in Photoshop and the like.)

Talked a bit with Cameron Stewart (him of the artwork from Seaguy as well as a couple of arcs on Catwoman) for a little while about the secret origins of the hundreds of superheroes that he had to create for a single panel (admittedly, a BIG panel) of Seaguy. We also spoke about drawing for Grant Morrison’s scripts and how Seaguy really isn’t all that weird. Okay, it’s weird, but all the weirdness has its place and isn’t just scattered around willy-nilly.

And someone should give him a Wonder Woman book to draw, because he does a great job with the character (as evidenced by one of his commissions.) Fans of his should check out Human Target #17, which he’s drawing.

I hear that Marvel had a booth there, but you could have missed it if you blinked at the wrong moment. I still don’t get that, but I guess if folks will keep buying the comics even without a floor presence then you’re doing something right, yes?

No comment.

Lots of things wanted to stick to my fingers at the Fantagraphics booth. Foremost among those was The Frank Book, by Jim Woodring, which I assume collects all of his Frank work. If it doesn’t, I’ll be a little peeved. I understand that they’re working on releasing his Jim as well, which will be a good thing. Nearly walked away with the new Kriegstein Comics book, but had a sudden attack of willpower and put it down.

Talked with Eddie Campbell over at the Top Shelf booth. He was in a nearly unbelievably good mood for some inexplicable reason. I took advantage of it and talked with him at length about his recent Batman: Order of the Beasts graphic novel while I looked over the pages. He joked that his take on Batman had gone so far from the grim and gritty Frank Miller-take that “my Batman sips tea.” Which indeed he does. I know that his work isn’t for everyone, and his version of Batman in 30s London is likely to make a lot of people’s heads hurt, but it made me really happy. I guess his good mood was contagious. Not a bad thing.

While walking through one of the small-press areas, one of the things that did catch my eye was the Western Tales of Terror anthology, put out by Hoarse and Buggy Productions. There’s a couple of big names on the cover (Steve Niles and Dan Taylor), though really, neither of them were the selling point. I miss horror anthologies. And I’m working on a western horror book myself, so I could hardly pass it up.

Over at the Team Red Star booth, they were showing off the new Red Star videogame. Eh, looks kinda like a videogame, which I don’t do all that much of anymore. Unfortunately, the latest collection (Red Star vol. 3) didn’t get to the show in time, so I have to wait until it gets into the stores, which should be soon now. Christian Gosset (Red Star creator and artist) is working on an Elektra story, of all things, which I’ll check out for no other reason than he’ll be penciling it.

Over at Tony Moore’s booth (well, not just his, but you get the picture), he had a lot of very pretty (and nearly immaculate) Walking Dead pages to look through. He also had a promo poster for a project that he was working on with Rick Rememder called Danger Agent. At least I think that’s the name I remember. I could very well be wrong and welcome correction (but I’ve got nearly no way to fact-check that one and Google is of no help.) I was also treated to a sneak peek at a couple of pages from Five Dead Men, which is the western that he and B. Clay Moore are working on (which looks great, but I’m a sucker for that stuff.)

And I’m normally a sucker for Mike Mignola’s work, but twenty dollars for this year’s sketchbook, even if it was the 10th Anniversary of Hellboy, was just too much. Or I’m just too poor. Maybe that’s it. Word is that he’d completed a treatment for the second Hellboy movie, but that it’s no further along.

One thing that I didn’t get a lot of at the Comic-Con was news. Guess it’s because I was avoiding the panels mostly. But really, the big news out of the show wasn’t all that big. Warren Ellis and Robert Kirkman signing “exclusively not with our Direct Competition” contracts with Marvel? No offense, but yawn. If it means that they can get paid enough to write other stuff besides mainstream superhero books, then that’s good, but it’s not huge. DC’s big news all came earlier in the year with things like CMX and 2000AD and Humanoids books coming out under their banners (but they better hope to hell that they can get those books exposed out of the direct market, because that’s where they’ll find a real audience.)

This seemed more like a regrouping and realigning year than last year, with the comparatively titanic shiftings and signings. Sure, getting Bruce Jones over at Vertigo/DC is a good thing, but it doesn’t have the cachet of Grant Morrison leaving Marvel and returning to DC and Vertigo projects. Another odd thing is that at every year there’s usually one memorable icon/project/pop culture thing that sticks out head and shoulders above the rest. That wasn’t the case this year. There was no Spider Man overwhelming everything (as you’d think would be the case with the movie opening just over a month before.) Sure, Lord of the Rings and Star Wars were big presences, as was the all-seeing Big Eye of Aggregate Manga, but nothing ruled the show this year. I’m trying to figure out if that’s a good thing or not.

Hopefully we’ll return to our regularly-scheduled program sometime soon. But don’t bet on it. See you all next week.